The Palace (Bell Mountain Series #6) (20 page)

Kidnapping was not unknown in Obann. It was a hanging offense. But most people preferred to pay a ransom.

“One hundred gold,” Roshay said—“it’s out of the question.”

“You can try to hunt us down,” said Nelligg, “but that won’t help your daughter any. Just pay up, and you’ll get her back.”

“How many of you are there?” Roshay already knew from Ellayne’s note that there were eight, but he wanted to prod this man, if he could, into making a slip and revealing something more.

Nelligg shrugged. “I’m not going to tell you anything, so why ask? I’m just the messenger—see? I’ve given you the message, and I’ll take back your answer.”

Roshay knew he was powerless, and hated it. But he’d burned off most of his rage hours ago and was thinking clearly now.

“Twenty-five gold pieces,” he said, “and Ellayne and the other girl returned to me unharmed by mid-afternoon tomorrow—and you have my oath that I’ll take no further action. Anything else, and I’ll have a thousand men hunting you up and down the river and from here to Lintum Forest. You won’t escape, and I won’t stop until I’ve hanged you all. But for twenty-five gold, you’ll all go free. I’ll wager that’s more money than you’ve ever seen in all your worthless lives.”

“That’s your answer, then?”

“I don’t bargain with criminals,” the baron said. “You have my answer. Bring the girls by no later than tomorrow, under a white flag of truce, and you’ll get your money. That’s all.”

The guards scowled when Roshay ordered them to release the man. The baron kept a face of stone, but inwardly he rejoiced over his daughter’s resourcefulness. “Only eight of them,” he thought, “and all on foot! They’ll never get away from all my horsemen, and they can only hide for so long before I find them. And unless they’re complete fools, they know it.” This made him sure the snatchers would accept his terms and that he’d have Ellayne back in time for the next day’s supper. But even that, he supposed, would be a long time to wait.

“I wish you’d have let us follow him, my lord,” Sergeant Kadmel said, after Nelligg had been sent on his way.

“Never mind that now,” Roshay said. “Round up all the boats and canoes you can find, and don’t let anyone cross the river—twenty miles upstream, twenty miles down.”

“I wish we had that little whatsit on hand,” Kadmel said, “the one that tracked Jack for us. They’d never get away!”

“Dogs will have to do for now,” the baron said, and prayed it wouldn’t come to that.

And Ellayne, with no way to know what her father would do, had to make her own plan.

CHAPTER 21

How Ellayne Played Music for the Outlaws

Goryk Gillow traveled lightly—a pair of wagons converted into coaches by carpenters who’d not had the time to do it artistically, and an escort of ten Wallekki horsemen recommended by Iolo as desperate characters not likely to be recruited by tribesmen in the king’s service. The wagons flew white flags of truce. The Wallekki were there to deal with any bandits who wouldn’t honor a truce.

“We want to get to Obann well before the coronation,” Goryk said. “There’s much work to be done.”

So he left his army with Iolo in command, to hold Silvertown against the slim chance of its people rising up against their conquerors, and set out for Obann with as small a party as he could without seeming to be a person of no importance. He and Mardar Zo rode in the first coach, with their ancient weapon stowed in a locked box covered by a quilt. It would not see light unless they needed it in self-defense, just in case King Ryons’ army came out of Lintum Forest after them. In addition to the wagoner, who would tend the horses, they rode with two bodyguards, tough Dahai warriors in Obannese mail-shirts.

Jack and Martis occupied the second coach, Martis knowing that the Dahai and the Wallekki would be ready in case the passengers tried to escape.

Martis, alias Jayce, was supposed to be teaching Jack all about Obann. In the evenings Goryk questioned him about the traditions and procedures of the Temple, so that he would be able to put up a show of being fit to be First Prester. “Not that I need anything more than my master’s decree,” Goryk said, “but I do wish to play the part convincingly. I want to make it easy for them to accept me as First Prester—the easier, the better. I must show myself a worthy successor to Lord Reesh.”

“Which you are,” thought Martis, “but not for the reasons you imagine.” But he said, “Of that I have no doubt, my lord.”

No one, not even Martis, knew that Wytt was riding with them, having found a comfortable place on the underside of the wagon. He lived on the insects stirred up by the horses’ hooves and wagon wheels, coming out at night to steal drinking water.

Because of what was carried in the first wagon, Wytt deemed it too dangerous even to let Jack know he was there.

Sometimes, in the mounds that were all that was left of Obann’s ancient cities, poisonous snakes would congregate in a warm, snug hole and den together for the winter, sleeping their cold-blooded sleep that would keep them till the spring. When the winter passed and the days grew ever warmer, the mass of snakes would stir and taste the air with their forked tongues, and slowly realize they were hungry, oh, so hungry. And at such a time, no Omah would go anywhere near that place, because they knew that at any moment the snakes would all come out and hunt. If you were an Omah, you could smell the change in the snakes as their blood warmed and quickened in their veins. And you would be afraid.

So it was with Wytt. Something in that wagon was like a den of snakes stirring, but it was more dangerous than any nest of hungry vipers. Wytt only stayed with the wagons because Jack and Martis were there, and he would not desert them.

He missed Ellayne, and all he wanted to do was to bring Jack home to her.

While Jack and Martis journeyed to Obann and Nelligg took the ransom note to Ninneburky, Ellayne tried to drum up the courage to execute a risky plan—a half-baked plan, Jack would have called it—to foil the kidnappers.

The gang had nothing to do all day but wait for Nelligg to come back with a message from the baron. They were safe in their present hiding place, Ysbott reassured them. “No one can see us from the river, on account of the tall reeds,” he said, “and we have a thick growth of trees and underbrush on all the other sides, with no one living in the neighborhood.” For good measure, he kept a man on guard where a narrow path led to the campsite. No roads passed nearby; no shepherds nor herdsmen came this way. “We’ll be safe here for a while,” he said.

With so many men to guard them, he didn’t bother to tie the girls’ hands or stuff their mouths with gags. “No need for unpleasantness, so long as you behave yourselves,” he said.

Ellayne knew Ysbott’s men for a cowardly and superstitious lot, but she didn’t know Ysbott. His men were afraid of him, she sensed. They probably had good reason. Helki could have told her that Ysbott was feared among the outlaw chiefs of Lintum Forest “because he can smile at you like a brother, and at the same moment, stick a knife between your ribs. He’s done it often enough.” But she had neither Helki nor anyone else to give her good advice.

Ysbott couldn’t read, but that didn’t mean he was a fool. Asking for a ransom of a hundred gold spears meant he was ignorant about money and hadn’t had much experience with it, and he was greedy, too. But was he so rock-solid ignorant that even superstition was above him? He had to have some wits about him, or he wouldn’t be a bandit chief.

“What if your father won’t pay?” Enith said, jarring her out of her thoughts.

“He’ll know what to do. He always knows.”

“But if he doesn’t pay—”

“Shh! I don’t feel like talking now,” Ellayne answered.

“Might as well talk,” said one of the men. “Nothing else to do.” But Enith didn’t speak again.

The men’s boredom worked in her favor, Ellayne thought. Ysbott sat against a tree and fell asleep. Slowly, slowly, pretending to be scratching an itch, Ellayne reached for the leather-knife in her boot. If she could just cut the bonds around her ankles without anyone noticing, she’d be ready for the most dangerous step of her plan.

It took all afternoon, a second here, a moment there, whenever the men weren’t looking. Enith saw her, though; her eyes went wide when she realized what Ellayne was doing. Ellayne glared at her and Enith looked away. She had more sense than Ellayne had expected.

The trick was to cut the rope almost through, but not quite. It had to look like it was still intact, but be cut enough so that it would snap as soon as Ellayne kicked her legs hard. It wasn’t easy to do.

Enith stole another peek at her.

“It’ll be all right,” Ellayne said. She had to say something; it’d look suspicious if they didn’t talk at all. “My father is the smartest man in Obann—that’s why he was made a baron. A whole Heathen army once attacked our town, but my father didn’t let them in. It was a horrible battle, but we won.”

“Aunt Lanora told me about it. She said it was an army of monsters, half-bull and half-man.”

“What’s this about monsters?” someone asked.

Ellayne saw an opportunity. “You know!” she said. “The world is full of monsters, nowadays. You must’ve seen some of them yourself. Those giant birds—you’ve seen them, haven’t you?”

“I have,” said another man. He shuddered.

“Well, where do you think they came from?” Ellayne said. “They were never around before. But a holy man told me about it. God is going to punish the people for their sins, so He’s bringing back monsters that were here in ancient times. And other things, too. Evil things from long ago. They’re coming back.”

“Don’t!” said Enith.

“But it’s true,” Ellayne said. “There are things in the forest now that shouldn’t be and things in the river, too. Haven’t you ever heard about the ancient times when Obann had an empire? But those people were wicked. They practiced sorcery and witchcraft. They learned how to speak with demons and devils. So God wiped them all out in a single day, the Day of Fire. It’s in the books.”

Ysbott slept on, but his men were all now listening to Ellayne.

“We don’t know anything about books,” said one, “but everybody knows there were witches in the forest, long ago.”

“And some of them are waking up again,” Ellayne said. “They didn’t all die, you know. There’s a certain kind of witch that never dies—not even in the Day of Fire. And you know that demons can’t die. It’s all in the books.”

“Ellayne, can we please talk about something else!” Enith said. But an outlaw asked, “If them was really monsters that tried to get into Ninneburky, then how did your father beat them?”

“He knew how.” Ellayne paused. “It wasn’t the season for it, but that night, after the monsters almost broke down the gate and our men were all out of arrows, there was a storm, with snow and ice and freezing rain. A terrible storm! The monsters were camped out in the open, and a lot of them just froze to death. The rest just couldn’t stand it, and they ran away. In the morning they were all gone.”

It was quite a story, and most of it was true. But the rest was pure Abombalbap, with a pinch of Ellayne’s own imagination. Jack thought the Abombalbap stories were nonsense, but Ellayne knew them practically by heart, and knew how to tell them, too. By the looks on those ignorant men’s faces, she guessed they’d believed every word of it.

At that moment Ysbott yawned and stretched, and slowly stood. He paused to look up at the sky.