Maze of Moonlight (40 page)

He sat down hard on the stone floor, staring stupidly at the two soldiers who were approaching with lifted swords. But the life-sized statue, jarred loose from its pedestal, was toppling forward, and not only did it catch and block the swords, it also knocked one man senseless and fell across Christopher in such a way that it sheltered him from the other.

Christopher's wits returned in a moment, and he found himself looking into the face of the statue. It was of plain, unadorned wood, but the baron did not need paint or ornament to tell him that Her hair was dark, Her eyes gray, Her robes of blue and silver. . . .

He stared. He knew. “
Elthia.
”

A fleeting glimpse of Divinity. He tore his eyes form Her as his second opponent kicked the statue away and slashed. The vision fled, and Christopher struggled to block, but the man abruptly lurched backward as a shrieking caricature of a human being swung down from the ceiling beams and smacked into his face, biting and clawing.

He recovered in a moment, grabbed the valiant monkey in a mailed fist. Throwing it to the ground so hard that it split open like a ripe grape, he trampled it into a smear of blood and viscera; but its bestial sacrifice had given Christopher a chance to rise, set his feet, and deliver a blow that revenged it instantly.

A few feet away, Mirya's sword went through the ribs of one opponent, then another, then a third. She moved effortlessly, killed with surgical precision. Berard's men died, their blood pooling on the stone floor, joining with that of their comrades and the women and children they had slaughtered.

One left. He was rushing in from the main door where he had been standing guard, and he had almost reached the crossing of the church when it apparently dawned on him that he was alone. After staring for a moment at Mirya and Christopher, he turned to run, but his escape was blocked at the transept doors by a half dozen village women who had seen too much killing in the last few minutes to be bothered with the fact that they were facing a man with a sword. Between him and the west door, though, stood only Vanessa and Charity. The old weaver was unarmed. Vanessa had but a candlestick.

He lunged for them, sword flashing, looking for something to kill. Vanessa stepped in front of Charity, raised her weapon. Christopher shouted for them to get out of the way, but the girl stood her ground; and as the big man rushed at her, she prepared to strike.

But when the sword fell, Charity threw herself on Vanessa, shoved her out of the way, and took the heavy blow herself. Blood was suddenly everywhere, bursting from the gash in her head, flooding from her mouth. She fell, twitching, eyes glassy, dead before she hit the floor; but she had slowed the soldier's run sufficiently for Mirya to catch up with him and plant her sword in the middle of his back.

He staggered on a few more paces, then tumble to the floor in a clatter of metal and leather. Mirya herself, her dispassion and tranquillity gone, dropped to her knees beside the body of the old woman, put her bloody hands to her face.

“
Ai, Elthiai!
” she sobbed. “Once . . . I could only save you once, and now . . . oh, Charity . . .” The Elf looked up, and her streaming eyes found Christopher. “Many years ago, she told me that she had . . . things to do. I . . . did not foresee that this would be among them.” Her eyes closed in pain. “I did not foresee anything.”

Vanessa was cradling Charity's gashed and lifeless head in her lap. Her homespun was heavy with blood and smears of brains. Her head was thrown back, her face contorted, and Christopher knew that, behind her clenched eyes, Vanessa saw nothing—no patterns, no futures, no peace—nothing save the ending of the haven that she had found for a time, a little time, in Saint Brigid.

Other men and women of the village were arriving at a run, their wooden shoes and leather shoes clattering down the length of the too-silent nave. Some recognized their sisters and children among the living, some found them among the dead. Abel saw what was left of his mother lying in Vanessa's lap.

He knelt and, shaking, touched the blood-smeared face. Vanessa regarded him mutely, her voice silenced by sorrow, and he put his free arm about her shoulders. Blond and dark, fair and swarthy, they put their heads against one another, and wept.

Christopher, drained, bit back curses and shrieks and let the living grieve for the dead without accompanying antics and capers. Paul delMari had left his doddering humor behind in Shrinerock; and in the blood-soaked church of a village with which he was linked by fate, history, and elven intervention, Christopher delAurvre left his madness.

But Mirya bent, kissed Charity's bloody face, held Vanessa and Abel for several minutes. And then, to Christopher's surprise, she rose and approached him.

“Did you say once, my lord, that other barons had joined you in your efforts?” she asked. Tragedy screamed from her eyes, and though her voice was controlled, even, there was a weight of terrifying purpose behind it.

“Yes.” Christopher's voice was hoarse. “They're gathering at Shrinerock. I hope.”

“It is in Saint Brigid that they are needed, messire.”

Surrounded as he was by the blood and bodies of the innocent, his ears filled with the cries of grieving men and women, Christopher wanted to strike her for her complacent truism. “You don't think I know that? I'd fetch them in a heartbeat if I could get out of this town.”

Mirya shook her head. “I . . . will take you to Shrinerock.”

“But . . . the sentries . . . the soldiers . . . Berard's got the fields crawling with them.”

Jaws trembling, the Elf met his eyes. “I saved the Free Towns from your grandfather's plots, and I made sure that he could not further them. Berard's meshes are but loosely woven in comparison, and my debt to you is as yet unredeemed.”

Christopher stared, stunned, unable at first to grasp what she was telling him.

“I will take you through the free company camp tonight,” said Mirya slowly. “And then we will journey to Shrinerock.”

With the coming of night, the streets of Saint Brigid were silent and empty. Chains spanned the intersections, guards kept watch at the crossings. On the wall, anxious men strained their eyes and ears into the darkness that lay between the town and the deeper darkness of the forest, searching for movement or sound. Within the houses, women cared for the dead, sewing shrouds, waking the bodies of husbands, sisters, sons, daughters, friends, singing softly over the still forms the long, slow melodies of plainchant.

Charity's house was empty and still. Christopher could hardly believe that a single, aging woman had been able to fill a home with so much life and light, but it was true. With just Vanessa and himself within its walls, it was as a husk, an empty shell.

Vanessa was angry, crying, and he held her while they sat by the fire. “They killed her, Christopher. They just killed her! They killed them a'. There wan't any reason for it. They just wanted to kill!”

Her faces was pressed to his chest, and that was good, for he did not want her to see how utterly helpless he felt. In a few minutes, Mirya would come for him, and she would lead him through the rings of eager-eyed robbers that surrounded the town, but there was no smack of empowerment to that particular turning of his personal and ephemeral maze, for it was by an elven hand that he would escape Berard's snares.

The same hand that had struck down his grandfather.

“I ha' to do sa'thing, Christopher.” Vanessa spoke with clenched teeth and clenched fists. “I can't let them do tha' and get awa' wi' it.”

“Shh,” said Christopher. “There's nothing we can do here. We'll just have to hope I can reach the alliance.”

“I've got to do sa'thing. I wi' do sa'thing. I can . . .” She lifted her head and stared at the fire. “It's just patterns . . . in't it? Just . . . patterns . . .”

There was a light in her eyes that terrified him. He pulled her head against his chest once more. “Shh . . .”

A tap at the door, and Mirya and Natil entered. The harper bowed formally to Christopher. “I ask leave, my lord, to stay in Saint Brigid. There are folk here who require my skills.”

Christopher stood up. He might as well have held a hungry lion on a two-foot tether as command an Elf. “Natil, enough of this charade. I never really had you in my service.” He glanced at Vanessa. She trusted these beings implicitly, would have done anything for them. And he himself had told Natil that he trusted her with his life. Did a delAurvre say things like that so lightly? Was the sperm getting that weak?

“You'll always have a place of honor in Aurverelle, Natil,” he said. “You'll always be welcome. But I can't give you orders. And I won't. Stay if you need to. Mirya will . . .” He hesitated, stumbling over the past.

But Mirya bowed deeply. “I will take you to meet the forces of the alliance, Baron Christopher. But we must go now.” She turned to Natil, embraced her. “Farewell, my sister.
Alanae a Elthia yai oilisi.
”

Their heads were pressed together, and there was urgency in their faces. Natil's lips moved almost soundlessly: “
Manea.
”

So like humans. Were they really that different? His eyes aching, Christopher stooped and kissed Vanessa. The light was still in her eyes, and it reminded him unnervingly of the radiance that he saw in Mirya and Natil. “Adieu, sweet,” he said. “I'll be back. And then . . .”

She shook her head, laid her finger upon his lips. “Dan,” she said urgently. “Dan make plans, Christopher. Patterns can change i' a heartbeat, an' you might na wan' me after.”

Her words were grievous, but his signet was still on her hand, and her pendant—elven or not—was about his neck. He held her greedily, possessively, just like the delAurvres always held their women. “I'll always want you, Vanessa. No matter what. I'm not going to let you go again.”

But it was he who had to go now, and a few minutes later, Christopher and Mirya slipped over the edge of the village wall and lowered themselves to the ground in the deepest shadow they could find.

Mirya's impenetrable calm had returned. Christopher sensed that she was examining the encampment of the free companies as though it were an opponent in a hand-to-hand fight. Christopher heard shouts and laughter, but he could see nothing save faint variations in the darkness of the forest and the light from the torches and lamps that illuminated the free company camp. He was reduced to holding Mirya's hand—clasping the same flesh that had wreaked profound change on his grandfather—when they left the shelter of the wall and made for the ditch.

The ground turned soft beneath Christopher's boots, and he slipped in something fetid and slimy that he was glad he could not see. They descended, but though the Elf, as usual, moved noiselessly, Christopher found that the mud sucked at his boots with a sound that his tension magnified into shouts and thunderclaps.

Mirya put her lips to his ear. “Be easy,” she whispered. “The sentries are not close enough to us here. The difficulties will begin in earnest after we have passed the palisade.”

Christopher wondered whether she knew that, in reality, his difficulties had begun in earnest the moment she had revealed herself to be the Elf who had struck his grandfather.

Peach trees. He kept thinking of peach trees.

But he crossed the ditch with her, climbed the bank, and approached the palisade. It was badly broken, and they had no difficulty passing through. But as Mirya had said, they were now closer to Berard's sentries, and the entire area was ringed with guards and the horses and tents and equipment that inevitably accompanied the movement of nearly four thousand men.

“Hold,” Mirya whispered suddenly. “Hold still.”

Christopher froze. His hand started for the grip of his sword, but he stopped instantly when he realized that Mirya's order had doubtless included even such comparatively trivial actions.

“A moment, my lord,” said the Elf, and she slipped away.

Christopher stood motionless, stranded, blind, forcing himself to believe in the Elves and in their good will as he had once forced himself to believe that, yes, a man could walk from Nicopolis to Aurverelle.

And so he had walked. Truly, a man could journey a thousand miles on foot; and, to be sure, the Elves could bring healing and assistance. But where did that leave Roger? Had he been sick? That depended on one's point of view. Had he been healed? A matter of opinion. What the devil
was
healing, anyway? What was help?

A stirring, a sense of sagging, then silence. In a moment, Mirya was back at his side. He felt her take his hand again . . . immortal flesh, magical flesh . . .

. . . help and healing . . . like Vanessa . . .

. . . like his grandfather?

“Let us go,” she whispered. “If we are silent, we can gain the trees and cut through the forest, thereby saving time.”

Christopher glanced at her. “Mirya, the forest is on fire.”

“Haste is imperative, messire,” she said. “Berard will renew the siege tomorrow. I will deal with the fire.”

Christopher was baffled. “How?”

He sensed a smile. Then: “Elves are known for being ingenious.”

Together, they slipped towards the fields, dropped on their bellies, crawled under cover of what crops had not been entirely burnt flat by the drought or ground down by the passage of Berard's troops. Minute by slow minute, they inched their way forward as the stars wheeled and the moon threatened to rise.

A horse cantered across the fields, its rider holding a torch high. Mirya hissed a warning, and they both flattened themselves among the furrows. The Elf took a long, slow breath, tensed. Christopher sensed that she was doing . . . something. The rider passed. Mirya sighed.

“I did not foresee that,” she said.

“You're not foreseeing much these days,” said Christopher, but he felt the Elf flinch.

“Our time is over,” she said softly.

He might as well have struck her. “I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that.”

He caught a flash of her eyes. “There are many things we do that we later regret,” she said.