Sorcery Rising (28 page)

Saro leaned his hand against Night Harbinger’s glossy neck and felt the pulse beat there, hard and strong, eager for the race, excited by the presence of the other horses against whom he would race. He would outrun them all, for none were as fleet as he; he was lord of the wind and all the mares wanted him. The boy on his back had no more weight than a flea: nothing could stop him. He expelled the air through his nostrils with a great snort and tossed his head with impatience.

Saro found himself smiling. If only he had the stallion’s confidence . . .

But it seemed all he had to do was to let Night’s Harbinger have his head, for here they were now, the rope holding them all back – Leonic Bakran on Filial Duty; Ordono Qaran on a great white beast with its mane all plaited with red; Calastrina’s eldest son on a neat piebald gelding with a rolling eye and a twitchy gait; and a dozen or more others, northerners and hillmen, even a desert-rider on a horse that was gold from ears to tail. Saro thought of Guaya. He thought of a home without his bullying brother in it. He had to win. He had to. He reached down and touched the bay’s neck and tried not to let his own feelings of panic intrude themselves into the stallion’s mind.

Lord Tycho Issian smoothed the front of the robe he had donned for the Gathering. It was his finest, though he planned to attend the event for only a short while. Just the time it took, in fact, to obtain the dowry from the Vingos and go find the nomad map-seller and make his trade. He had the priest standing by: he would marry the woman before he bedded her, sanctify their union in the eyes of the Goddess. What could be more proper?

He snapped his fingers and one of the slaveboys appeared promptly, dressed neatly in the velvet suit Tycho had bought the lad for the occasion, his unruly black ringlets sleeked down with scented oil. Which one was he? Felo or Tarn? He really couldn’t remember. His thoughts were befuddled: all he could think of was the woman. ‘What’s your name, boy?’ he said sharply to the child.

The boy stared up at him in surprise. He’d worked in the lord’s household for over four years, ever since the lord had acquired him and the others at the blocks in Gibeon. For the last two he’d been the master’s personal attendant, along with Felo, his cousin, a member of the same hill tribe. It was the first time the lord had ever forgotten his name. ‘Tarn, lord,’ he said hurriedly.

‘Tarn: you will walk directly behind me at the Gathering, and when we collect the coffer from the Vingo family, you will carry it for me, without stooping or stumbling, no matter how heavy it may be, and follow wherever I take you, as quickly as you can. Is that clear?’

‘Yes, lord.’

Tycho nodded. They would have to get the money away to the nomad quarter as swiftly and smoothly as possible if he was to secure his bride; for only that morning a Council official had come to his pavilion asking for an audience. Tycho knew what that was about: other lords at the Fair had been complaining about the recall of debts, and he had no intention of paying over the money he owed them at this time. He had sent a boy to turn the man away – with all the correct observances, of course – and only after a glass of rose-araque and an almond wafer; and then had slipped silently out of the back exit of the pavilion.

He let his mind stray to thoughts of the Rosa Eldi. It was a peculiar name, even for a nomad woman, he mused, for the thousandth time since that fateful kiss; though she had not the dark looks of most of that rabble. Rose of Elda, Rose of the World, he translated from the Old Tongue. It suited her well enough, he had to concede, with her fragile colouring and graceful neck. Ah, Rosa Eldi. I shall soon fold back those petals and bury myself in your scent. Soon you will be mine . . .

‘It was a stupid thing to do. Mad. Irresponsible. What your father would have said, I cannot imagine. And now look at you: how will we explain this to the lords who come to do you honour this evening?’

Stormway had been ranting on in like vein for the last two hours or more, and that was after the Earl of Shepsey had had his say and stalked out.

King Ravn Asharson sighed, took the bandage away from his face, examined the latest outpouring, refolded it to expose a slightly less bloody section, and pressed it hard against his cheek again. The damned wound just would not stop bleeding, and the blow had also caused the skin around his eye to blacken and swell. He would indeed look a sight at the Gathering tonight; but for that he cared not a whit. It had been sheer bad luck that the boy’s dagger had shattered so: he’d made damned sure otherwise the Istrian would not damage him, for all his fancy footwork and that furious charge.

‘And whatever will your prospective bride say to see you thus, all bruised and bloody? You’re lucky you did not lose that eye.’

‘For Sur’s sake, man, stop your nagging. You sound like my mother when I fell down the castle stairs chasing Breta at the age of seven.’

‘Sire, you’ll forgive me, but even a seven-year-old would have had more sense than to do what you did this afternoon.’ Stormway sat down with a thump, as if all the energy had suddenly run out of him. He looked old, Ravn thought, a tedious old man.

‘It was only a bit of fun. I’m going out of my mind with the boredom of this place. I can’t wander the Fair, for fear of being assassinated by some shadowy villain, just because one of your so-called spies has picked up a rumour; I can’t take part in the Games for fear someone will run me through or break my neck; I can’t tup any women for fear of the scandal—’

‘You’re our only king,’ Stormway said more gently. ‘You have no heir, yet. If we were to lose you, there would be civil war in the north. You know this, sire: you must understand our concern.’

‘And if I marry Keril Sandson’s girl?’ Ravn regarded his chief adviser challengingly. He knew it was the last thing Stormway wanted. Or perhaps the next-to-last thing . . .

The Earl of Stormway rubbed his remaining hand across his face in a weary gesture. ‘In the end it will be your choice, sire; but you must know that that is exactly what Sandson has been planning for these last few months. Why do you think he’s been seen at court so frequently? It’s not for love of you, sire, whatever you may think. I have seen him whispering in corners to the Earl of Fall’s Head, and to that snake Erol Bardson, too. And we all know Bardson’s spent the last few months adding to his private army—’

‘Ah, my beloved cousin. Also trying to push his girl at me. It’s a shame, she’s quite a pretty little heifer, that one. Which is more than I can say for all the rest. Well, if it’s any consolation, Bran, I don’t think I shall pick any of the beauties they are trying to force upon me.’ He watched the old man’s face relax. ‘But do not think that means I shall choose your Breta, either.’ He pictured her now: a sturdily-built young woman, which he did not mind in itself – a bit of flesh to hold onto in the midst of the deed was no bad thing; nor the softness of a woman’s inner thighs to pillow you as you dozed – but, Sur, her face! Even as a child, when he had chased and teased her all around the palace at Halbo, she had been as ugly as an elk. Give her a beard, and it would be like tupping her father . . .

‘You know our advice,’ Stormway said stiffly. ‘Take one of the Eyran girls – Ella Stensen or Filia Jansen, or the Earl of Ness’s daughter; or even Jenna Finnsen, for all her father’s only a shipmaker, he’s still a damned fine shipmaker, and I believe the girl herself is not unattractive. Take one of them, no matter what the south offer. We cannot trust the Empire lords, as those of us who remember the last war will remind you.’

Ravn rolled his eyes. Why were his advisers all such old men? All they could think of was the old wars, the old ways. ‘Have you no adventure in your spirit, Bran? Do you not sometimes hanker for change, for surprise in your life? Could you not fancy finding out what one of those southern girls have under their robes?’

‘I had enough of “surprises”, as you term them, Ravn, twenty-two years ago,’ Stormway said sourly, waving the stump of his hand in the King’s face. ‘And I’ll wager the southern women have exactly under their robes what the northern ones do.’

‘You cannot tell me, Bran, that you never found out for yourself when raiding the southern ports? That you didn’t indulge in a little defilement and depredation, a bit of rape and pillage?’ Ravn eased himself back against the pillar and watched the Stormway’s face cloud over with some enjoyment. If it served to deflect the old boor from his ranting, and embarrass him into the bargain, it was time well spent. And the truth was, he
did
rather fancy finding out what the southern women were hiding, whatever his lords might advise. The idea of a foreign girl in his bed, one who smelled and looked different to the big blondes and redheads he was so used to, one who might have unusual practices in her armoury, and who wouldn’t prattle on at him in endless Eyran platitudes, was an attractive proposition – and damn the consequences. If it meant stirring up the pot and letting old enmities and new conspiracies float to the surface, then so be it.

It was not that he did not understand the theories and counter-theories his lords rehearsed so endlessly before him: how the different factions would side with one another; how an alliance here would bring strife there; how the choice of a bride from the Western Isles would inflame the Earl of Ness; how taking Ness’s daughter would prompt hostility from Erol and his schemers; how taking any of the southerners’ women would turn his traditional supporters against him and leave him open to dissent and uprising in his own country, and possibly to some unseen machination in the Empire. It was that he truly didn’t care. Life had been dull for a long time in the northern court. He’d bedded every woman he liked the look of, and a few he didn’t, he’d fought duels and started blood-feuds that had all but bankrupted the coffers to bring conciliation between the clans, and the only prospect that held out any spark of interest to him was the chance to take passage to the Far West. Which his lords would not allow him to do until he had safely got himself an heir to secure the damned kingdom.

So a wife – any wife – was now his first priority. Perhaps he’d take the Swan of Jetra, after all; so long as she didn’t look like a walrus underneath those all-enveloping robes.

The Rose of Elda lay on her bunk in the map-seller’s wagon, with the black cat stretched out beside her and a dark green shawl artfully deposited over the damp patch where she had poured the greater part of the sleeping draught that Virelai had given her before he left. A huge rumble rose from the cat, where her hand travelled its silky fur. When Virelai was not around, she noticed that the cat was happier, more relaxed. Now, it lay on its back with a line of drool falling like a spidersilk from its mouth, with all four paws splayed under the touch of her fingers. Did she, she wondered, regarding the sliteyed creature askance, have the same effect on beasts as she did on men? Was the cat also captivated by her? Her hand stopped its rhythmic course as she pondered on this, not knowing quite how she felt about such a proposition. It could be troubling to see men reduced to slack-mouthed wonder, to see their pupils flood with desire; to watch the stirring in their breeches, and know that they responded only to her aura, to the sight and the sense of her, not to the woman she was.

And who was she? The Rosa Eldi’s beautiful brows knit themselves in frustration. Her recollections were so vague, so recent. She sometimes wondered whether the Master had deliberately induced a kind of memory-loss in her, with all his potions and charms, to keep her from straying. To prevent her from feeling any sense of loss, or displacement, or wishing to return to her own folk, wherever they might be.

She thought these things without forming words into sentences; another gap in her education in Sanctuary, with Rahe as her only tutor. Only now was she beginning to pick up any knowledge of the languages of Elda, as Virelai did his best to teach her. But even as she learned, she had the sense there was a deep chasm between the words and what they stood for in the world of men; for the world of men she understood not at all. What she did understand was desire and its currency. The Master had been very thorough in his tutelage of all aspects of
that
subject.

When Virelai returned to the caravan some minutes later, he found the Rosa Eldi rather more alert than he’d expected, given the particularly strong dose he had administered to her earlier that day to prevent any trouble arising between then and when he completed his bargain with the powerful southern lord. He was tired of travelling with the foul-smelling yeka and this broken-down wagon, with its creaking wheels and damaged rear axle, currently held together only by a binding spell he’d finally managed to coax out of the cat, though his fingers had swelled from its bite for two days, and he’d had to seek the ministrations of the old charm-seller’s daughter to cure the poison. Still, that episode had had its consolations . . .

He kicked the rotting wood of the doorframe as he came in. The worthless thing probably wouldn’t even hold together for the trip back over the Skarn Mountains. The prospect of travelling south with Lord Issian had been giving him some intensely pleasurable fantasies, based on the ancient books the Master had kept in his library, with their brightly-inked, hand-drawn pictures and delicate sketches. Virelai could feel a palace beckoning, a palace of warm golden sandstone set in the lush, rolling valleys of Istria, a palace fragrant with the scent of lemon trees and olive groves; a palace strewn with silk draperies and soft cushions and dusky maidens.

When he’d first encountered those passages in the Master’s books that told how the Istrians swathed their women and kept them locked away, he’d thought them mad. If he’d had a palace full of women, he’d thought then, he’d have them running naked through every room. Now, in the thrall of the Rosa Eldi, he could better understand why they might try to limit the power of the creatures.

He sighed.

‘What is it, my dove?’ crooned the Rosa Eldi in that strangely toneless voice.

The cat gave him the evil eye and sat up. He noticed that it kept itself close to the woman’s side, as though proclaiming her its territory.