The Black Robe (The Sword and the Spell) (14 page)

On the back of the dray were the two large barrels which usually propped up the bar. It had taken half the morning to repair the broken one and then another candle length to get the queen settled inside, bound and gagged and with the lid firmly locked back in place. The other barrel contained Lias, an assortment of supplies and Barrin’s clothes and weapons. Barrin would have preferred to take Tuckin or Redruth with him as they were better in a tight spot, but Tuckin was too big to fit comfortably inside the barrels and Redruth’s hair would give him away in an instant.

So far the plan hadn’t gone well at all, and not just because they had a guard sitting on the wagon seat. They had planned to go straight to their destination, but with guards posted on every corner and camped in every square and courtyard, they thought it might look too suspicious if they turned up at the palace with just the two empty barrels of ale. So they had changed the plan at the last moment and were now heading for the warehouse where the master brewers kept their supplies. Barrin hoped that the air in the barrels on the back of the wagon would last until they arrived there, otherwise he was going to be the first Swordmaster ever to commit regicide.

When he at last guided the horse to the rear of the stone building, Barrin almost sighed with relief, amazed that the warehouse was still there with its doors in one piece. The rest of the city had been in chaos with shops looted and houses ransacked for anything of value. Fires burned in the eastern district, sending a pall of black smoke over the city, and bodies lay in the streets where families had been dragged from their homes and slaughtered by the rampaging army. The destruction was still going on as groups of soldiers went from house to house, taking anything they could sell, and by the desperate screams of women, taking other things as well. A deep cordon of soldiers guarded the warehouses so someone, somewhere, had decided that their contents should not be part of the common soldier’s loot.

The innkeeper handed the guard at the door his papers and, after a short delay, the doors opened and Barrin led the horse inside. Surprisingly, the only people inside were the usual warehouse workers and the overseer, all of whom were known to the innkeeper. He climbed off his seat and went to haggle for his stock. The guard, who had ridden at his side, sheathed his sword and slid unsteadily from his seat and wandered into the darker part of the warehouse to relieve himself. Barrin was sorely tempted to follow him and use the small cosh he kept hidden beneath his shirt on him, but he had more urgent business.

Barrin went to the back of the dray, hopped onto the wagon bed and carefully eased the lid of the first barrel open. Lias looked up and raised his thumb and Barrin smiled back and reaffixed the lid. He repeated the process with the second barrel, but instead of getting an encouraging sign he received a scowl and a half strangled curse. He waved back, replaced the lid and was back in place by the horse’s head before the soldier rolled back and retook his seat.

When his father returned he had a face as black as thunder clouds, and glared at the soldier as he took another swig from his skin of grain spirit. He walked behind Barrin and gave the dray horse a hefty pat, leaning towards his son as he did so. “Bloody thieves have charged me triple for stuff I’m going to have to give away. I’ve got a good mind to put shitweed in their beer and watch them gripe for a seven day. I would do it too if I thought that they would use the latrines and not the streets.”

He patted the horse once more, climbed up onto the wagon seat and handed the guard another skin of grain spirit. Moments later the warehouse workers began loading an assortment of barrels onto the wagon. Shortly after that Barrin led the horse out of the warehouse into the heart of the city and along the wide cobbled road that led to the palace.

The grand houses and mansions which lined the Royal Way had fared better than other parts of the city and, apart from the guards outside their doors, very little had changed. The nobility who lived in the small palaces had not fared so well, and bodies hung from every door post and fence. Most were men and some were grandparents, but there were no young women or children amongst them. Barrin recognised some of the corpses from his duties in the palace and kept his eyes fixed on the road in front of him thanking the Goddess that Daun couldn’t see what had happened to her people.

They were stopped at the palace gate by tired looking soldiers who cheered up a bit when the innkeeper told them he had brought liquid supplies for them and handed round a few skins of cheap grain spirit for when they were off duty. By the time they had passed through the palace gates into the spacious courtyard, the soldiers were too busy cheering themselves up to notice that the wagon had turned right along the inside of the palace wall. The magicians’ tower stood in a secluded corner, well away from the palace and out of sight of any other building. Barrin left his father to drive the slow moving wagon whilst he ran on ahead, hoping and praying that Plantagenet and Animus hadn’t been taken, and that if they were at home they would open their door to a dirty, ragged stranger.

The main door to the magician’s tower was easy to find, he had walked passed it hundreds of times, and had even peeped inside the tower once or twice during those carefree days when he and Jonderill would walk back that way from sword practice. He had never been introduced to the two elderly magicians, but he hoped that Jonderill would have at least mentioned his name to them. Jonderill had certainly talked a lot about them, mainly about spells which had gone wrong leaving him with a mess to clear up.

As he raised his hand to knock on the door he hesitated; what if the door was warded or, even worse, it turned him into a pond hopper? He thought about going back to the inn and finding another way of getting the Queen out of Alewinder, but they had gone too far to give up now just because he was scared. So he took a deep breath and knocked loudly on the door.

Nothing happened to him so he let his breath out in a long, relieved hiss. Unfortunately nothing had happened to the door either, so he knocked again, louder this time and urgently called Plantagenet’s name. Still nothing happened and by now his father had arrived with the horse and wagon and the comatose soldier who lay sprawled across the driving seat. The wagon was large, very noticeable and shouldn’t have been there so it wasn’t going to be long before someone spotted it. Barrin turned back to the door and banged on it with both fists.

“Plantagenet! Animus! Open up! It’s Barrin, Jonderill’s friend. I have the Princess Daun with me and she needs your help.”

He stepped back and suddenly had the strangest feeling as if cold water had been poured over his head. With a small click the door opened a little way and Animus’s chubby face peered around the edge about half way up with Plantagenet’s long, lean face a hand span above. He would have laughed if the situation hadn’t been so serious.

“Thank the Goddess that you’re here. I have the Queen with me and she needs somewhere to hide.”

The two magicians opened the door wider and peered up and down the roadway with a questioning look as if they expected her to walk imperiously down the street with the royal entourage behind her. Barrin held up his hand to stall them and then ran to the back of the wagon where his father had already helped Lias out of his barrel. Together they tipped up the other barrel and with some effort carried the struggling queen passed the two bemused magicians and into the tower. Once inside they placed her, still bound and gagged, into one of the large, soft armchairs. Lias followed them in carrying Barrin’s clothes and weapons, and whilst the two magicians stared down at the Queen, Lias and Barrin exchanged places. They shook hands before Lias left to help the innkeeper place his new stock in the two empty barrels and return the dray with the drunken soldier to the inn.

Plantagenet and Animus were still staring at the Queen when Barrin turned back to them. “Don’t you think we should untie her?” suggested Plantagenet. “She is the Queen after all.”

Barrin looked doubtful but nodded in agreement. He leaned over and carefully removed the gag from the queen’s mouth.

“You treasonous reptile!”  she shrieked. “I’ll have you skinned alive for this, and as for you two old, bumbling idiots, if you don’t let me out of here, I’ll have you both drowned in the moat!”

Barrin leaned over again and with difficulty replaced the gag so that Daun could only make strangled, hissing noises and bang her feet loudly against the chair. “You can see my problem. I’m doing my best to save her life and get her away from Vorgret and take her to some place safe, but every time I remove her gag she starts shrieking. I dare not untie her or she will have the guards down on us and I cannot talk any reason into her, so I thought you two might be able to help.”

Plantagenet and Animus both took an involuntary step back as if Barrin had just produced a venomous sand crawler and was asking them to hold it. “Oh no,” began Plantagenet. “The Queen has never been reasonable with us either. I regret that her threat to have us drowned is not an idle one.

“No,” put in Animus bouncing forward a step. “She took offence to us helping Jonderill to kidnap her and she has never really forgiven us. Sometimes I wish she was still the sweet innocent girl she was before Jonderill woke her with a kiss.”

That was Barrin’s cue. “Could you do that again? I mean turn her back into the girl from the cottage? If you could change her into a normal person who wouldn’t be recognised I might be able to get her away from here without us both being captured.”

Plantagenet and Animus looked at each other doubtfully. “I don’t know, it was a long time ago and Daun was drunk at the time. We really did it by accident, so I am not certain if we could repeat it.”

“And if we get it wrong,” squeaked Animus, “we could make things worse.”

There was a sudden loud knocking on the door accompanied by shouts from outside demanding that the door be opened and all three of them turned to stare at the door. “I don’t think things can get worse,” said Barrin in desperation. “Won’t you please try, otherwise the Queen is dead and probably us along with her?”

“You’re right, my boy, we have to do something.” Plantagenet pulled his wand from its place at his side, walked to the far end of the room and tapped it lightly against the wooden door. Immediately there were yelps of pain and surprise from the other side of the door and the banging stopped. “There that should hold them for a while and give us time to sort this out.”

He strode over to a large book, bound in leather with small gems embedded in its cover, which lay on a side table, and hurriedly sorted through the pages until he found the diary entry he was looking for. Animus stood at his side, his wand clutched in his round hand and pointed excitedly at the entry. For what to Barrin seemed an age, they studied the entry and muttered to each other with their heads close together. Eventually Plantagenet snapped the book shut and they both turned and took a step forward pointing their wands at the struggling queen.

Daun you are now but will be no more

but gentle Rosera as you were before.

 No longer demanding but happy and kind

with this spell your nature, we do bind.

Barrin waited expecting sparks to come from the end of their wands or something but nothing happened. The two magicians continued to concentrate on the Queen, staring at her without blinking, their wands shaking slightly as they pointed them at the struggling woman in the chair. Slowly, very slowly the Queen stopped fighting against her bonds and relaxed. As she did so her gag and the bindings disappeared, she closed her eyes and a gentle smile creased her lips. Barrin could have sworn that her outline became fuzzy and a mist gathered around her, but when he blinked, it disappeared, and instead of the Queen sitting in the chair, a pretty young woman in woodland dress was stretching and yawning as if she had just woken from a deep sleep.

She gave the two magicians an affectionate smile and turned questioningly to Barrin. “Where’s Jonderill?”

Plantagenet and Animus beamed at each other, delighted at their success. “Jonderill’s not here, my dear, but this is Master Barrin who is Jonderill’s friend and who is going to take care of you.”

Rosera gave Barrin a warm smile and Barrin gave her a small, formal bow.

“Oh dear,” interrupted Plantagenet suddenly. “We have trouble.” He and Animus stared at the door as if they expected it to melt in front of their eyes. “The wards have gone, someone has removed them and it can only be that black magician.” He turned back to Barrin in alarm. “We cannot stand against a black robe, his power is much greater than ours, and if he finds Rosera here he will sense the spell and guess what we have done, then all our lives will be forfeit.”

There was a loud banging on the door and a strident voice demanded to be let in.

“Where can we hide?”

“Nowhere, my boy, he will be able to sense Rosera wherever you hide her in our tower.”

“What about the room with the silver horse?” asked Rosera.

“Do you remember how to get into it?” asked Plantagenet in amazement.

“Oh yes, it was at the top of the stairs and it had so many beautiful things in it, I would love to see them again.”

The knocking came from the door once more and Animus looked anxiously at Plantagenet. “The room is still there, although we’ve never been able to get into it, but we haven’t been able to make it go away either. Do you think the black will find it?”

“I don’t know but there is only one way to find out. Animus, take them up to the room and see if it will let Rosera and Barrin in. If not, you will have to try and hide them in our work room. Go quickly and I will try to delay our unwelcome visitors.”

Animus gave his friend a terrified look and hurried from the room with Barrin and Rosera following quickly behind. Plantagenet returned his wand to his belt, smoothed down his striped robe and walked to the door. Taking a deep, calming breath he opened the door and peered imperiously down his long nose at the black magician who stood on his doorstep.