Dark Magic (33 page)

He voiced his thoughts to Bracht and Katya as they ate grilled fish, and they agreed that they should quit the road where it curved around the bight into Eryn to travel cross-country to the Gann Peaks.

“But Gannshold we cannot avoid,” Katya warned. “Even though Rhythamun be gone, still we must learn what we may there.”

“I doubt a half-blood trader in horses and the Domm of Secca hold common company,” Bracht reassured, “and mayhap your brother is already departed. Even be he there, well not be invited to sup at the same table.”

“But if he sees me in the streets . . .” Calandryll argued.

“He’ll see a freesword Kern all swathed in cloak against the cold”—Bracht grinned—“not his runaway brother. Rest easy, Calan.”

“Nadama would know me,” Calandryll muttered in reply, “I think.”

“You made so great an impression, eh?” Bracht chuckled wickedly. “Even wed to your brother, she holds your handsome face locked forever in her memory?”

Calandryll grinned back, a trifle shamefaced: his own memories of Nadama were dulled and dimmed by time—would she truly remember him so well? Likely, he decided, Bracht was right and he could pass by them all as invisible as he had departing Secca. He shrugged, setting aside his doubts, and emptied his mug.

Soon after they found their rooms, the tavern not so popular that they need share, but each given their own chamber. Calandryll’s stood at the building’s corner, affording him two windows overlooking Wessyl.
One faced across the steepled rooftops of the upper city, the other down toward the mouth of the bight, and for a while he leaned his elbows on the stone of the sill, peering out. The night was dark, the filled moon obscured by cloud, the wind gusting lonely through streets that held no people. Lanterns flickered there and he could make out the twin lines indicating the avenue running down to the harbor. The sea was an oily wash, booming distantly on moles and breakwaters, the ships moored there indistinct, blending into the darkness. He thought of the bellicose vessels he had seen and wondered if in them he discerned some design of his brother’s beyond the mere defense of Lysse’s sea-lanes. The rumors heard along the road to Wessyl had spoken of Tobias calling for war with Kandahar and those nefs, with their high castles for archers and arbalests, were not such craft as would ride guardian to merchantmen. That duty was for the sleek, fast-moving warboats: the nefs were designed to carry soldiery, to attack landward and deposit their troops to storm shore defenses.

Did Tobias truly intend war, then? Was the reason for his progress to persuade his fellow Domms to that cause? He had spoken for that in Secca, when Varent den Tarl had first come, and Bylath had spoken him down. But now Bylath was dead and Tobias ruled—perhaps the clouds of war did gather. Calandryll shuddered, thinking that if that was so it must surely be sign that Tharn even now wielded some influence, that even dreaming the Mad God reached out to sully the world.

And opposed against his chaotic purpose there were but three.

It was a disconcerting thought, no matter that he had the assurance of a goddess he held the means of Rhythamun’s defeat within him. He could not see it, and on so gloomy a night it was hard to find the surety that had filled him as Dera spoke her enigmatic promise. Easier, as he stared out, rain splashing against his face, to slip back into the mood of doubt,
the grim despondency, that had gripped him before. In the eye of his mind he conjured once more that dreamlike conversation and, to his pleasant surprise, the looming doubt dissolved; in its place he felt an abstruse confidence, as if the goddess, with words and touch, had imbued him with a conviction beyond his understanding. He could not define it, nor put a shape to it, but still it was there: he knew. And that, of itself, was a gift. Reassured, he drew the shutters closed and turned to his bed.

Sleep came easily, sound and empty of dreams, disturbed finally by the insistent tapping that intruded on his slumber. He opened his eyes to darkness, yawning, a hand reaching instinctively for the straightsword set on the counterpane beside him. Left hand about the scabbard, right on the sword’s hilt, he padded shivering to the door. The chamber was cold and the bare stones of the floor struck chill against his feet. It seemed the innkeepers of Wessyl were as sparing of heat as they were of conversation. Sleepily, he demanded who woke him and from the corridor outside came Bracht’s voice: he slipped the latch.

“An early start, we said,” the grinning Kern declared, striding past Calandryll to throw back the shutters. “Put up your sword and put on your clothes.”

His good humor was answered with a grunt, through teeth clenched against the cold. His fortitude, Calandryll decided, had its drawbacks, but he tossed the sheathed sword to the bed and went to the wash-stand, not particularly surprised to find a thin coating of ice riming the ewer. He gasped as he bathed his face and chest, hurriedly drying himself and tugging on his clothing.

Through the window he saw milky fog enveloping the city, all hung with glittering ice crystals, dulling what little sound there was at so early an hour. The harbor was lost in the brume; indeed, it was impossible to see farther than the nearest buildings. It reminded him of Vishat’yi and he wondered briefly how
Menelian fared as he laced his tunic and belted his sword to his waist.

“So, breakfast, tents, and we depart,” Bracht said cheerfully. “Come—Katya will join us at table.”

Calandryll hung his cloak about his shoulders, grateful for its warmth, and picked up his saddlebags, following Kern out and down a flight of stone stairs to the common room.

That was little warmer than the upper level, a sleepy-eyed drudge with soot-smeared cheeks and sacklike gown feeding fresh logs to the fire, the innkeeper yawning hugely as he emerged from the kitchen, seemingly surprised to find any guests about so early. Scratching his head he grumpily advised them that his kitchen folk were barely awake and the best he could offer was porridge and yesterday’s bread, his ovens not yet fired.

“Then that must do,” Bracht said, his good cheer unaffected by the man’s poor humor. “And information—where might we purchase tents?”

“Sailmakers Gate.”

The innkeeper sniffed and turned to leave, halted by Bracht’s raised hand. “And where is that found? Mayhap you’ve not noticed we’re strangers here.”

The man favored the Kern with a sour look and began to mumble something about freeswords, thinking better of it as Bracht casually fingered the hilt of his dirk, still smiling with his mouth. Instead he gave them directions, scowling as he was dismissed with a careless wave.

“Unfriendly folk,” Bracht murmured.

“Aye.”

Calandryll was not yet disposed to conversation, but when Katya joined them moments later she and Bracht made up for his silence. She greeted them with a smile, enthusiastically spooning the porridge delivered to their table, talking cheerfully of their departure, and before long Calandryll shook off his sleepiness, his comrades’ vitality awakening his own spirits. It was, indeed, heartening to think that soon
they would put this grey and gloomy city behind them.

Their bellies filled, they settled their account with Rhythamun’s coin and fetched their horses from the stable. The fog still hung thick upon the upper city, but as they descended the long avenue leading to the waterfront a breeze got up, blowing in off the Narrow Sea to tatter the mist and send it skirling in heavy tendrils about the streets. They found the Sailmakers Gate and negotiated the purchase of three small tents, fashioned of stout canvas, with sturdy groundsheets, that they lashed behind their saddles. Then, with no further reason to remain in Wessyl, they rode back up the avenue and found the same gate through which they had entered. None looked back as they trotted northward through the fog.

T
HE
moorland remained enshrouded throughout the day, slowing their progress so that they elected to pass the night in the caravanserai they encountered a little while before sunset. They found a better welcome there, the landlord willing enough to talk, and from him they discovered that a man answering to their description of Daven Tryas had passed by some time before, also that Tobias and his retinue were now not long ahead. They quit the hostelry at dawn, the fog dissipated during the night and the day coming clear and cold, the sky a pale blue save where the sun bathed the welkin with gold. They made better time, passing the night in the tents and the next day drawing close to Eryn.

The road curved to the northwest here, following the coastline around the innermost recess of the great bight to enter the shipyard city. From there it ran due north to Gannshold and Calandryll, drawing on his memories of books and maps long studied in Secca, calculated they should find it again several leagues inland. Of the country they must cross he knew little, beyond that it climbed over stony moors to the Gann
Peaks, a lonely and largely unpeopled terrain, the domain of isolated wildfowlers and huntsmen, where hospitality would be hard found.

“Likely swift as the road,” Bracht declared as they turned off the raised flagstones onto a sweep of coarse grass dotted with stunted heather. “And an unlikely place to encounter your brother.”

Calandryll agreed, heeling the chestnut gelding to match pace with the Kern’s stallion as Bracht gave the big horse his head.

They thundered over the grass, hooves leaving a trail of divots, the moorland spreading wide before them, a harlequin pattern of green brightened by the blue of heather and the gold of broom, silver where little streams bisected the moss and grass. Curlews sang their bubbling song and snipe chippered; lapwings and redshanks scattered at their passage, and overhead buzzards and peregrines circled hopefully. It felt good to gallop through so free a landscape and Calandryll gave himself over to the exhilaration of the ride.

When all three animals had had their fill of running they slowed to a steady canter, halting when the watery sun reached its zenith to rest awhile and eat before proceeding on until twilight. They camped then, in the fold of a low hill that broke the cooling assault of the wind, a stream tinkling by its foot, their fire cheerful as night fell, the horses hobbled and cropping contentedly on the sturdy grass. Bracht produced snares from his saddlebags and set them out on the far side of the hill, promising they should eat hare or rabbit on the morrow, and Calandryll thought that he could live happily in such a way forever, the comforts he had taken for granted in his father’s palace seeming now like some dream. He chuckled as he stretched out in his tent, listening to the wind, wondering where Tobias slept this night and what his brother might think of him now.

Probably that he was a greater threat than ever, he decided, for he felt now that he could defeat Tobias in
honest fight, thinking then of what Bracht had said, that likely someday there must come an accounting. Perhaps, he mused as sleep weighted his eyes, but on some other day, when matters of far greater importance were settled. Save that he represented a dangerous hindrance to their quest, Tobias seemed of little moment now, a problem to be confronted at need, not dwelt upon. His ambition seemed petty in light of the threat facing all the world, and even the knowledge that he had commissioned the assassination of their father failed to stir in Calandryll any very fierce response. He wondered if he should feel some deeper emotion about that slaying, but could not: it was as though Bylath, on that far-off day when he had struck his younger son and so clearly demonstrated his contempt, had severed all ties between them, electing his own fate. Perhaps someday he would confront Tobias with that crime and demand he answer, but for now matters of far greater weight occupied him and he set such thoughts aside. He became with each passing day, it occurred to him as he folded his cloak warmer about his chin, more like the pragmatic Kern who had befriended him a year ago. It felt far longer—as if he had known Bracht all his life—and on that thought he slept.

Morning saw the Kern’s promise fulfilled and they breakfasted on two plump hares before continuing on across the empty landscape toward Gannshold. Neither fog nor rain conspired to hinder them and they made good time over the moors, the ground rising steadily as they drew ever closer to the mountains ahead, the gorse and heather interspersed now with stands of scrubby, windswept juniper and cotton-wood. They encountered no one save a distant figure that watched them from a ridge, wary, as though suspicious of interlopers, and in two more days they came to the road again.

It was late in the morning, the sun close to its midmost point, shining out of a sky the color of a duck’s egg and streaked with long mare’s-tails of cirrus
blown out by the high north wind. They cantered at a steady pace, thinking that soon they should halt to eat and rest the animals, Gannshold now only a few days distant. Bracht was a little way ahead, topping a low rise, when he slowed the stallion to a walk, lifting a hand in warning. Calandryll and Katya reined in, coming alongside the Kern, who indicated with a nod the sight that had prompted his caution.

The road dipped before them, running straight across a shallow valley, a stream at its center spanned by a small bridge. The approach to the bridge was lined on either side with a procession of colorful wagons and carriages, their teams set out on picket lines to graze, as on the grass beside the water servants bustled about a pavilion of black and green stripes under the laughing eyes of women in luxurious traveling gowns and men in light armor.

From the carts and the poles set about the pavilion fluttered pennants in the same colors, black and green: those of Secca.

Calandryll gasped, scanning the crowd, recognizing the insignia that decorated the silver breastplates and halfhelms of the soldiers, the livery of the servitors. In a low voice, as if afraid he might be overheard, he said, “Tobias.”

Bracht nodded. “Nor any way to go save forward.”

“Can we not ride around?”

Calandryll looked inland, thinking that they could quit the road here and cross the stream farther up the valley; knowing even as he said it that so obvious a detour must surely arouse suspicion.