The Warlock's Last Ride (36 page)

The men heeded and, little by little, began to remember their anger. The crowd began to chum into a restless and wrathful mob. Someone began shouting for blood; others took up the cry. Soon thousands
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of voices echoed the call: "Down with the King! Down with the Queen!"

The gates of the city opened, and the mob surged toward them, howling—but a score of armored knights rode out, each followed by a hundred armed and armored soldiers. The crowd began to slow, and their shouts gained an uncertain tone.

Then someone bellowed, "Yonder!" and everyone looked up to see another score of knights riding down into the valley from the west with two thousand soldiers behind them. Another panicked cry turned the crowd to the east to see yet another army advancing. The crowd's tone took on a note of fear. One voice shrilled above the others: "They're a long way away! We can still run for… ADEEE!"

With a gasp of horror, peasants pushed backward, leaving an open space around the fallen man, blood flowing from the dent in his skull. Before they could recover from violence within their own ranks, a voice cried, "Thus be it ever to traitors!" and others took up the call, "Face the knights and chop down their horses!" Still another called, "We'll be forever shamed if we go home empty-handed!"

"The King!" a dozen voices cried, and the whole mob turned to see three men riding out from the gate, flanked by palace guards. A golden crown glittered around the helmet of the middle one.

"I AM LOATH to strike down my own people, Father," Alain said.

"I am even more loath to let them strike down you," Geoffrey said from Tuan's other side.

THE WARLOCK'S LAST RIDE 263 "Is it kill or be killed, my son?" Tuan asked. "Do you see no other way?"

"Let me talk to them, at least," Alain urged.

Tuan thought a moment, then nodded slowly. "They are your people now and will be your subjects soon. Test their loyalty."

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Alain nodded and kicked his horse into a trot. Geoffrey stared, then sped after him—but Alain heard the hoofbeats and turned back with a radiant smile. "I thank you, my friend," he said, "but this I must do alone."

Geoffrey reined in, exasperated. "Do you speak as my liege lord?"

"As your future liege," Alain qualified.

"Then I shall do as you bid," Geoffrey had to force out the words, then cried, "If they harm a single hair on your head, I'll see every one of them hang!"

Alain beamed at him in answer, then turned to ride alone toward the crowd.

They murmured in awe as he rode up to them—and in among them. They parted, scarcely able to believe they were so close to their Prince—or that he dared come into their midst when they held weapons. Then a voice shrieked, "Haul him down!"

Three men turned on the rabble-rouser and clouted him cold.

"I am your Prince!" Alain called out. "Why have you come? Tell me your grievances, that I may address them!"

"Don't trust him!" a voice shrilled. "He's a lord! They only want to use …"

A meaty thud cut him short.

"We will hear you!" a dozen voices shouted.

"Nay, it is I who shall hear you!" Alain called in reply. "Speak! Do your lords' soldiers beat you?

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Do your lords starve you or force you to work so long on their lands that you cannot tend your own? Tell me!"

The crowd milled about for a few moments, muttering to one another; then a man called out, "Why must we live in mud huts while your kind live in castles?"

"There will always be rich and poor, alas," Alain answered. "Were I to forsake my castle and give you all I own, it would be gone in a fortnight, and some other man would fight his way to owning that castle and making you work for him."

"Not if we killed all the lords!" another man shouted.

"Some of your own would gather more and more bullies about them," Alain answered, "and seek to make you all their slaves. Their grandchildren might begin to think they have some obligation to you, but how many of you would have died in misery by then?"

"How many of us shall die in misery now?" demanded another.

"Well asked," Alain replied, turning toward the voice. 'Tell me who lives in misery, and I shall give him food and clothing of my own. If you know any old folk who dwell in poverty and are like to die in misery, give me their names and places, and I will send helpers to them."

The crowd muttered in surprize. Then someone shouted, "We should not have to come to the King for that! There should be assurance!"

"Your lords should provide," Alain returned, "but if they do not, you can seek redress from me."

The crowd erupted in amazed conversation.

"I pledge it!" Alain cried. "I shall swear it if you wish!" Then, in a lower voice, "At least with me and mine, you already know us, and know what to expect."

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CORDELIA STOOD WITH Gregory and Allouette on the battlements, fingers clutching the stone, ready and braced for an enemy telepath to lash out at the royal family—and on edge, waiting to twist weapons out of hands by telekinesis if anyone tried to strike at Alain. "How can he have had the stupidity to ride among them, one man in the midst of so many enemies!" Cordelia cried.

"It is wisdom, and a calculated risk," Gregory told her. "More to the point, though, with your husband, it is compassion for the poor and a sense of what is right."

"Must he be so devoted?" Cordelia instantly answered her own question. "Yes, he must. I would not love him so if he were not."

Allouette touched her hand. "Sister, he is even more devoted to you."

Cordelia stood in silence a moment, then gave her a smug smile. "Yes. He is, is he not?"

"Who comes?" With a frown, Gregory pointed toward a small party who came riding out from the eastern slope.

The women turned to look. Cordelia frowned. "A lord and his retainers, from the look of them, with an escort of royal men-at-arms from the eastern wing. Sir Nabon must think them important indeed to send them to Their Majesties in the mist of a battle! But why is that one man bound?"

"I think, in these circumstances, a touch of mind-reading would not be inethical." Gregory frowned a moment, then stared. '"Tis your Uncle Anselm and your never-seen cousin!"

ANSELM RODE ON one side of Sir Orgon, Geordie on the other—but the young man's gaze was fixed on the crowd. "What passes here? A parley?"

"A parley between your arrogant cousin and a mob of thousands!" Anselm said. "Does he think to fight them all single-handed?" But he put on a respectful, though scowling, face as they rode up to the
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King and Queen. "Majesties."

"Well met, brother." Tuan couldn't help staring. "What brings you to me on the brink of battle?"

'To your wife, not to you!" Anselm snapped. "We bring you a traitor who urged me to rebellion again. These last few days his exhortations have grown quite urgent, and I could not think why—but now I see." He turned on Sir Orgon. "You knew about this, didn't you? A peasant uprising, and you knew when it would happen, which is why you said there was little time left!"

"If that is so, leave him to me," Catharine said in an executioner's voice.

Sir Orgon looked at her and shuddered.

"Does your son not have manners enough to greet his aunt, let alone his Queen?" Catharine demanded.

Anselm bristled—but before he could answer, Geordie cried, "I see them! Dickon and Ned, two of mine own peasants!" And with no more ado, he was galloping down toward the meadow.

Down, and in among the peasants, who parted in sheer astonishment, then closed around the rider with dark and angry shouts—but Geordie swung down from his horse and ran to his men. "Dickon! Ned!

What do you here? Do you mean to lose your lives?"

"Good day, squire." Dickon had the grace to look shame-faced. "When the guardsmen took you away, we were angered indeed by the duke's high-handedness. We heard men were marching to tear down this arrogant Queen and her supercilious sons, and we came seeking revenge for you."

"Well, you no longer have need! The Lord Warlock pled my case, and that 'supercilious son' sent me back to care for you all as well as I may!" He spun to Alain. "Your Highness! No matter who else must be punished, I beg you spare these! They sought only justice for their squire, nothing more!"

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"You are loyal to this lordling?" one of the other peasants asked, incredulous.

Dickon's face darkened; he took a firmer grip on his staff as he stepped up beside Geordie. "We will defend this man to our deaths."

"Aye!" Ned stepped up on Geordie's other side. "Our squire and his lady have done all they can to see that we and our families are well fed and well housed! If we lack anything, 'tis only because he has no more money! Indeed, the duke's men arrested him for seeking food enough to take us through the winter, though he had to shoot the Queen's own deer to do it!"

"This is the best reason I ever heard for poaching," Alain said.

"But how is this?" asked another peasant. "You do not mean to say the lords can be our friends!"

"I am no lord," Geordie said hotly, "for my father is attainted! I am only a squire!"

"But he is a lord by rights!" Ned proclaimed. "A lord, and our friend!"

"As I will be, too." Alain gazed at his cousin for a second, then smiled. "We are of one blood, after all, though we have never seen one another. Well met, Cousin Geordie."

Geordie gazed back at him, then decided to smile, too. "And you, Cousin Alain."

"How very touching," another peasant sneered, "reunion at long last—but they are lords nonetheless, and our enemies by nature!"

All about Alain, confused talk sizzled—until a voice shrieked, "We have come for blood! We cannot leave with nothing to show for our pains!"

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"You shall have my blood if you wish it," Alain said gravely. "Choose your champion, and I shall fight him with his own weapons!"

HIGH ATOP THE north tower, Alea hovered beside Magnus, worried about the tension evident in every line of his body. "You mustn't, Magnus! Mustn't interfere! There's no cause yet!"

"My prince and childhood friend is surrounded by thousands of enemies," Magnus grated, "and you tell me there's no cause?"

"Of course there isn't! You know he has the situation under control, no matter what it may look like!

You've done something like it yourself! How many times have you gone among hundreds of enemies?"

"Yes, but not to defy them!"

"Neither does he! Interfere now, and they'll lose the faith in him that he's building! I know it's the most difficult thing in the world to do nothing, but that's what you must do!"

"Unless they jump him," Magnus muttered, and almost wished they would.

THE MOB ROARED around the two cousins, who stared, each marvelling that the other could be his kinsman. The ocean of sound washed about them until one voice pierced it: "Don't trust him! It's a trick!"

"Is there none who dares fight me?" Alain called. "Surely there must be, or you would not have come! Find at least one!"

But the crowd churned about him, their noise incredulous—then died suddenly, and a channel opened as men pressed back. At the end of that channel stood a man like a wall, six and a half feet tall with shoulders like a bull's, arms thick as an ordinary man's leg. "I dare!" he bellowed, and shook a seven-foot staff. "This is my weapon! Do you dare to fight me, princeling? Do you dare shed your armor and fight me with nothing but a staff?"

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Twenty-Five

AT THE CITY GATE, CATHARINE TURNED IN A FURY. "Are you mad, Tuan? Our boy shall be slain!"

"I doubt it" Tuan returned, but his own face was taut with strain. "There is far less chance of death by staff than by swords—and our lad is well-trained."

"But if he were …"

"Then Diarmid would never forgive his slayer," Tuan said, "and the peasants would have far more to fear when you die, from a King who seeks to avenge his brother's death."

"They have not the wisdom to remember that!"

"They shall have no need to." Tuan took off his gauntlets and took her hand. "We must risk his hurt in this, as we had to risk it when he rode off to help his friends. How can he ever be King if he cannot rely upon himself?"

"But those were mere bandits and woodsrunners!"

"Is this opponent any more?" Tuan stroked her hand. "Courage, my sweet. The boy is well-trained and has faced worse enemies than this—and amazingly, he has reduced this conflict from a battle between armies to a bout with a quarterstaff."

Catharine stared at her son, stalking toward the huge peasant, and said, with a touch of awe, "So he has."

Then, tense with worry, she sat holding her husband's hand fiercely as she watched her son step forth to an apparent slaughter.

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THE SENTRY WASN'T the only one by the southern river—a SPITE telepath stood within the forest border nearby. She heard the cacophony of the monsters invading and ran out of the trees—then froze, staring, horrified by the sight of the invading nightmares. She closed her eyes, shaking her head to free her from paralysis, and sent a thought north to Runnymede, to her fellow SPITE espers.