Guardian Last (Lords of Syon Saga Book 2) (27 page)

Trocu smiled at his retainer sympathetically.  To the guard,
he nodded.  “The battle?  Please.”

“Oh, yes, sorry.  So all this is happening, and at the center
of the maelstrom, this other one, wearing his doublet and sword and sitting
atop his horse, was not only still there but by some miracle untouched!  He
lifted his hands so slowly, as if he were making dumb show to lift something
heavy.  Then everything stopped, and all the mages disappeared––one by one,
vanishing, just pop, pop, pop––sounded like a pine knot burning hot.  At the
time, I thought he made them disappear, but now, I think they were scared by
something, sir, like they somehow knew what was coming and were taking
themselves clear.  Next thing we know, this one is lifting up his hands, and
the clothes and velvet cape and all are burning white hot, right off his back,
all but his orange knapsack, which didn’t strike me as strange until now…and
the ground is rumbling and rolling, and there’s a terrible noise of wrenching
and ripping.  We all of us fall to the ground and cover our heads, sure we’re
going to die.  When the noise finally stopped, when I got up to look, the sea
was gone, the mages were gone, and here was all this new land.”

The captain nodded.  “That’s how I saw it, as well, as I
came out the tavern door.  And off he rode, just like that.”

“Aye.”  The guard turned to the duke.  “Limigar or not, he
saved us.”  He considered for a moment, battling with himself.  Then he dug in
his pouch with a guilty look at Gikka.  “This bit of slag?  I found it just
there, where he was before he rode away.  This is all that’s left of his sword
belt.”

Gikka took the strangely shaped hunk of iron and silver. 
The silver was from the buckles, and what steel was left…  “Not much here.  I’m
thinking it were no more than a wisp of a blade with a fancy hilt made all of
air, something showy but nothing to it, such as would break as soon as it
touched flesh.  Probably even engraved with some foolishness.  A blade only a
child could love.”  She smiled fondly, and looked up at the others.  “Or Dith.”

“Aye.”  The sheriff stroked his chin.  “Dith, if it is he,
would not knowingly have resorted to such an extreme measure and put the entire
coast of Syon without good reason.”

“And no doubt Byrandia, as well…”  Trocu looked out across
the landbridge.  Indeed, if such a wave had destroyed the coast of Syon, they
could assume it had done similar damage on the opposite coast.  The
implications were overwhelming.  After four thousand years of silence, such
willful devastation would be seen as an act of war, and certainly a pretext for
any action Byrandia’s king might take.  Without the landbridge, of course, such
action would have amounted to no more than a lot of shaking of fists across the
sea, but now that the landbridge was in place, the threat of war was very real.

“Aye, Byrandia, as well.”  Daerwin shook his head.  “I grant
you, his actions at Kadak’s stronghold were likewise rash and not without
severe consequences, especially for himself, but without them, Brada could not
have survived, and we could not have won the war.  I cannot help but believe
that if he did this, he had good reason, as well.”

Trocu nodded.  “Fear me not,” he said softly so only Daerwin
would hear him. “Assuming it is Dith, I owe him too much, both personally and
as head of state––a state which would no longer exist but for his rashness at
the war’s end––to judge his actions without knowing more.  Whether it is he or
no, we should try to intercept him as quickly as possible, regardless of other
considerations, as I believe that given the power he has just wielded before
their very eyes, these other mages are unlikely to let him reach Byrandia alive,
assuming they can manage to stop him.” 

“Gikka, what say you?” asked the sheriff.  “It sounds to me
to be Dith, regardless of the horse, regardless of his peculiar state of dress
and undress.”

“Aye, my Lord,” she sighed.  “It could be no other, though what
business it is as takes him to Byrandia, I’ve not the first guess.  Nor what
possessed him to raise the landbridge, of all things.”  She swallowed hard. 
“Sure I’d know why he didn’t raise up the sea and wash away all them as vexed
him instead and leave the rest lie.  Until we find him, we’ve naught but
questions.  So the sooner we ride, the lighter my heart for it.”

“In any event,” the duke said, “I think our next course of
action is obvious, and I thank the providence of the gods, or of Dith, if such
be the case, for the landbridge.  Since we have no idea how long it will remain
in place or whether it might be his intention to lower it into the sea again
upon reaching Byrandia, gods forefend, we should make haste to intercept him as
quickly as we can.”

“Indeed so,” agreed the sheriff.  “Nestor, take Jath and
gather provisions, especially for the horses as I do not anticipate much fodder
on the landbridge for them.  Also bolts of cloth, leather, whatever you deem
useful.  We may need to fashion clothing for ourselves.  Remember that we have
the spare horses, so we can carry quite a bit.  Be generous, be thorough, and
be quick.”

“But what of my ship?”  The ship’s captain stood helplessly
looking out over the landbridge.  “What of my Jenna Calera?”

“She is quite safe.”  Jath looked at him dully.  “You simply
look the wrong way to find her,” he murmured.

“What?”  The captain turned and looked at him in confusion. 
“Wrong way?  How so?”

The Damerien stableboy smiled.  He picked up something from
the sand.  It was part of a bird’s feather.

“Where do you normally look to find ships?” the boy asked.  Absently,
he ran his fingers across the feather, looked along the sharp edge of the strip
toward the northern side of the landbridge and grinned.  “Sure not on land.”

The captain stood staring at him for a moment, uncertain.  Then
he stalked away to the north toward the Pyran lighthouse, an unwilling spark of
hope lighting his eyes.

But while Jath spoke, he had stripped the feather as for the
tailpiece of an arrow, and now he blew across it.  For a moment as their gazes
touched, the boy’s eyes seemed uncharacteristically intense.  Then, eyes dull
as a simpleton once more, he tossed the broken feather aside.

Damerien  frowned for a moment and looked out across the
landbridge.  “Nestor.”

“Aye, my Lord?”

“Do not neglect the bowyer and the fletcher in your
provisioning.”

Nestor paused a moment, considering.  Then he nodded,
looking around at the knights.  “How many bows, my Lord?”

“One apiece, and what parts he can spare us for repairs. 
That should allow for breakage afield.  Plenty of arrows, of course.  I hope we
will need them only for hunting, but without knowing what awaits, best to have
options.”

The old Bremondine nodded and gathered Jath to see to their
business.

Meanwhile, Daerwin turned to Gikka.

“I charge you, bid my daughter and the others join us here,
all but Chul.”

She drew back.  “As you will, but… ”

Daerwin laughed.  “Oh, I’d not have you leave him behind,
but he cannot come through Pyran,” he said with a meaningful glance at the
Hadrian guard, “for obvious reasons.  I leave it to you to bring him safely to
us once we’re out of Pyran, whether it means blindfolding him or skirting the
city or both.  Do what you must.”

“Aye, my Lord.”  She turned to go.

“Bremondine!” the Hadrian guard called to her.  “Can I have
that back?  Please?  It’s the only thing I have as proof I was here when this
happened.”

She snorted.  “Your battle trophy.”

He looked miserable.  “I did not take it from the dead.”

“No, that you did not.”  She examined the bit of slag for a
moment.  “Very well.  But best you keep your story of this true, aye?  Comes to
my ears as you’re making big boasts at how you come by this, I’ll be visiting
your story upon you tenfold, Hadrian.  And no mistake.”

“Yes ma’am.”

She tossed it to him and went to gather Zinion for the ride.

While Daerwin discussed logistics with the others, Trocu
lowered his hood and stared out over the landbridge, a sight he had not seen in
a very long time.  It was not quite as he remembered it, of course.  The years
had changed the contours here and there while it slept beneath the sea.  The
hills were dulled, the valleys were filled with silt or salt water lakes, and
all the trees were gone, to say nothing of the farms, the shops, the homes. 

Across the miles, he could see the strange new contours of
great coral reefs that extended sometimes hundreds of feet into the sky, like
enormous castles or ghosts of the great Dhanani cities he’d seen so long ago. 

Deep in his soul, he remembered that last harrowing ride
across the valley, the horrible wheezing of the horses, the prickling surge of
tainted Wittister energy coming closer, trying to catch him and take his life
force.  He remembered feeling the ground shudder and tremble beneath him, the
sudden plunge deep beneath the sea, and the terrible gamble he took to save
himself––himself and an infant mage.

Kharkara Plains
Fifth day of the Night Elk’s Moon

Chief Bakti Ka-Durga Ba-Vinda felt a strange hush flow
through the camp even from within his tent, and he paused in his meditations. 
This was not fear.  He knew from decades of having led them, having heard their
impassioned cries in the night, having watched them bear their children and
fight and die.  No, this was not definitely not fear.  It smelled of awe,
surprise, even excitement.  He had not felt this kind of anticipation from them
since the war’s end, when their healer, Aidan Ka-Zoga, had come back to them a
war hero.

He sighed and lifted himself to his feet with apologies to
Anado of the Hunt.  He supposed he would have to finish his meditations later. 
The nervous silence filling the camp was not going away, so neither was its
cause, and he could not know that cause unless he looked for himself. 
Solemnly, Bakti took up the Verge of Anado, at once his mark of office and his
weapon, and stepped from his tent into the cold evening air.

His people seemed to have stopped right as the mood struck
them, baskets and goods dropped beside them.  They were not standing clustered,
not gathered for common defense.  They only watched from where they stood,
craning their necks with their children upon their shoulders.  In the dusky
light, their eyes followed a ragged band coming toward them from the Bremondine
forest, all afoot, all stumbling from cold and lack of food. 

He did not recognize those who approached, not at this
distance, though the step of some few of them bespoke military training.  As
they came closer, he could tell that their skin tone was fair.  Invaders.  Whether
Bremondine bards or Syonese traders, he could not tell from here.  “Aidan,” he
said quietly.  “Go to them.  Carefully.  And Aidan…”

The shaman looked up at Bakti and saw the painful mixture of
hope and fear in his eyes.  “My chief?”

“If…” he said, choking back the hope and fear in his
voice––hope that the boy had survived the plague, but fear that he would be
foolish enough to try to return to the tribes, “if somehow the son of Dree is
with them…”

Aidan nodded.  “No fear, my chief,” the healer said cheerfully. 
“You will not see him.”

Bakti watched Aidan hike up his doeskin alb and run out at
full speed to meet them, vaguely disapproving of the clumsy lumbering steps of
one not used to physical exertion.  True, Aidan was not a warrior of the tribe,
but he was still Dhanani.  The chief raised a brow and looked around at his
people.  It was not just Aidan.  Perhaps, he allowed to himself, it was time to
move the tribe.  They were growing complacent in this Invader peace, and they
were becoming slow and fat.  He himself was becoming slow and fat.  It was
disgraceful.  Challenge would do them good.

Slow minutes later, he watched the tribe’s shaman hug these
people close to his body with that strange Invader intimacy, talking to them
earnestly and beckoning them toward the camp.  Aidan recognized them, then. 
This came as a relief.  But as they approached the camp, Bakti could see the
deep concern in Aidan’s face.  Something was wrong.

The chief recognized three warriors among them, not by face,
as they were still too far to see that clearly, but by their bearing.  They
were knights, in spite of their mismatched clothing and lack of armor.  They
were clearly well trained and carried swords at their sides, swords without
scabbards that were simply thrust through their belts, as if in haste.  With
them came a few glowworm priests, probably B’radikites, along with a handful of
ragged household servants, it seemed, and a lady.  As the woman entered the
glow of the tribe’s fires, her hair glowed a silvery red, and for a moment, he
drew up short, thinking the woman must be Lady Renda.  But no, this lady was
older and more careworn than even a few years of peace could have made such a
warrior.  Old enough to be perhaps the hero’s mother…

Three weak knights, a handful of household servants, a few
priests and…Brannagh!  The plague!  His heart seized in his chest and he
lowered the Verge of Anado toward them.  “
Trineh bwakra
!”

They stopped, bewildered.  He had called to them in Dhanani,
but his meaning was unmistakable.  They dared not approach.

“What…carries you?” the Chief called in broken Syonese, his
eyes wide.  “Are we…fetch death…from you?”  His frustration at trying to find
the strange words shown in his face, as did his fear.

The Invaders looked at Aidan, who explained that the chief
had heard about the plague at Brannagh.  After a few hasty words back and
forth, Aidan cleared his throat.  “No fear,” he called back in Dhanani, to be
sure the chief and the people of the tribe would understand.  “The plague is
defeated.”

The Dhanani behind him cheered, but Bakti silenced them. 
“Who are they,” he called, “and why do they come to us?”