Wandering Lark (19 page)

The image of her encouraged him to smile. Fenelon took a deep breath and pushed his concentration out more. He found a ley line and latched his awareness to it. The line soared into the Ranges and then just stopped high in the air...or so it seemed. When Fenelon tried to push against it and go on, he found what felt like a barrier of solid air.

What was it his father once said? That there were parts of the Ranges no mageborn could scry into. He had always assumed there were huge voids in them, but having seen the mountains and the Shadow Vale, now he was not so sure. For certain, there was ancient magic at work in those places.

Magic that Ronan had apparently known how to tap.

Fenelon withdrew his mage senses to himself and gathered his knees to his chest as he sat thinking. What was it he knew about Ronan? What were the stories Ronan had told of his own past? A bard of high rank, forced to leave his homeland. Why? Fenelon was sure he had heard the reason, but now that he thought about it, there were so many things about Ronan no one knew.

Except Marda.

And she was dead...sundered too, all because she had tried to tell Fenelon something and could not.

He made Alaric the key.

Key to what? To the Dragon’s Tongue, most certainly, and yet now that was buried deep under tons of rock and no threat to anyone.

We hope.

Alaric himself admitted that Ronan had made him a bridge.  And that he now carried the essence of the bard as well as the memories Ronan had locked away in Alaric’s head.

And for what purpose? To hide a piece of rock that contained enough essence of the Na’Sgailean to give her life again?

Or was there some other purpose in Ronan’s mind. Why not just give Alaric the knowledge and leave it at that? Why become a parasite in the young man’s body as well, sharing flesh and essence and thoughts and...

Fenelon cocked an eyebrow and stretched his limbs.

By nature, a mageborn spirit could only reside in a willing host.

And Marda had said that Ronan made certain Alaric
was
a willing host. And in Fenelon’s mind, there could only be one reason for making certain Alaric would comply.

Ronan wants to live again.

It could be done. It was an ancient spell Fenelon had only heard about. One he would give nearly anything to possess.

Ronan knew it, he would willingly bet. Ronan knew a lot of ancient magic. Spells of that sort were only known to exist before the Great Cataclysm.

Ronan was not that old. He had said he was born just after the Unification...so he was not old enough to know spells that had been used before the Great Cataclysm.

Or was he?

A most perplexing puzzle in Fenelon’s opinion. He wished he knew a way to find those answers. But without Ronan or Alaric in present company, that would be a little difficult.

So I guess we will have to go after them and ask Ronan in person...or spirit...or whatever form he claims.

The thought still rolled around in Fenelon’s head as the others began to stir. Gareth rolled over on his back and rubbed his eyes. His shift stirred Hobbler’s trundle. The Dvergar jerked his face up out of his pillow and looked startled.

Fenelon merely rose and prepared himself for the day. He had a feeling, between his father and Hobbler, it was going to be a long one.

They took Alaric into a foyer
that was so grand that it stole his breath away with wonder. Marble inlaid with what looked like lapis lazuli and gold, friezes depicting families, and stained-glass windows greeted him. But then, they threw a blindfold over his eyes and began to march him through a series of twists and turns. He fought the age-old panic that small spaces usually induced and tried to concentrate on how many steps he was taking and how many turns. Anything to distract him from the sense of impending doom.

At last they stopped, and he was pushed into a chair. His heart thundered as brief memories of being Tane Doran’s prisoner stirred. They tied his wrists to the arms of the chair with ropes instead of metal shackles.

“Do not think of such things,”
Ronan whispered in his head.

It’s hard not to,
Alaric thought back.

He heard the fading of footsteps as most of his captors left the chamber. But he sensed that two of them remained in the room with him.

Ronan went silent. One of the captors pulled the blindfold off. Alaric blinked and saw that the pair who stood to either side of him was the man and woman who had entered the inn last night in his wake. She stepped close, leaned over and smiled at him.

“Such a pretty one, Corran” she said and glanced at her partner.

Corran made a rude noise. “Forget it, Serapha,” he said. “If you wanted to play with him first, you should have said so before we told the others.”

She rolled her eyes.

“Well, bard,” she said as she straightened up. “Would you like to make it easy on yourself? Speak now, confess, and we can avoid a lot of messy torture.”

“Torture?” Alaric said. “For what? What have I done?”

“Playing innocent is never wise, heretic,” Corran said.

“Heretic? You have me mistaken for someone else,” Alaric said. “I’m a bard. Lark is my name, and I play and sing songs and travel, and nothing more.”

“Why, of course, and I am the King’s Mistress,” Serapha said.

“You are?” Alaric said.

“No, but she wishes,” Corran muttered with a sardonic smile.

Serapha glowered at him. “No,
you
wish,” she said and turned her attention back to Alaric. “Look, bard. Last night, we saw you speaking to Talena.”

“The mercenary woman?” Alaric said.

“Yes, and Talena never shows the slightest interest in anyone unless they are a heretic,” Corran said. “All the Temple Bounty Hunters in this area know that Talena wants to be one of us, and that she has been collecting heretics to prove to the Temple that she is worthy of a place among us. So if Talena watching you, then you must be one of the heretics.”

“And that’s your proof?” Alaric asked. Then realized those words were from Ronan. “A woman speaks to me because she finds me attractive and wants to see if she can get into my bed, and you assume I am a heretic.”

Whatever game Ronan was playing seemed to be confusing the pair. They traded looks. Then Serapha turned back to Alaric and started to speak...

When the door opened to her back. She and Corran both stepped away from Alaric, turned and bowed.

The man who entered the chamber was chubby and round-faced and had a pleasant smile. He wore richly adorned robes of saffron silk, finely embroidered. Behind him came two acolytes in their simple tan outfits. One of them carried a chair.

The man looked straight at Alaric and crossed the room. He gestured, and the small chair was placed so it was facing Alaric. The man sat down and motioned for everyone to step away.

“Hello, my son,” he said.

Alaric started to deny the relation, but he stopped himself.

“Permit me to introduce myself. I am High Lord Patriarch Gwillian, and I will be your confessor.”

“But I have done nothing,” Alaric said softly. “I was only staying at the inn...I played music there...nothing more.”

“Talena was watching him, High Lord Patriarch,” Serapha quickly said.

“Talena? Oh, yes.” He nodded knowingly. “Are you a friend of Talena’s, my son?”

“I only met her last night,” Alaric said. “She bought me a drink.”

“I see. You do understand why you have been brought here, do you not?”

“Not really,” Alaric said, trying to keep his voice calm. “They keep calling me a heretic, but I’m not. I swear to you.”

The Patriarch nodded again. “I see. Many heretics swear this to me, but few of them are telling the truth. So I hope you will not mind if I question you further before I make a judgment. And I would suggest you be honest, because if I do not like your answers, I will have to resort to more frightful means of gaining the truth. Do you understand?”

Alaric took a deep breath and nodded. Inside him, Ronan whispered,
“Just stay calm and let me handle this.”

For the moment, Alaric was more than willing to comply.

Desura received the summons
just a few hours after Talena had come to tell her about the bard. She had sent Talena out, telling her to wait in the square, but now she wished that Talena were here. Her cousin’s presence was a comfort in some odd way—when she wasn’t putting off the essence of anger that seemed to continually smolder under her aura. Especially when the one who summoned her turned out to be the dreaded Lord Patriarch Rothanan.  The sight of him dredged up old anxieties and made her tremble. The way he looked at her, she felt like she was still the frightened child he had first tortured then trained to be “his Watcher.” Even now, she hated seeing him come into the chamber.

He was a tall man, dark haired and pinch-faced, yet handsome in a cruel way. The curve of his mouth, even when he smiled, always had a downward cast. Even now, as he stood at the entrance of the chamber, his cold presence reached out and seized her. His eyes—the color of granite—bore a calculating stare. She thought of him as hard, grey and unreadable.

“We have a task for you, my Watcher,” Lord Patriarch Rothanan said. “A heretic has been brought in. No doubt, your cousin Talena has told you this. Too bad she was not swifter to bring him in. He could have been the prize to bring her our trust.”

Desura said nothing. Rothanan clapped his hands and the litter was brought in. Rothanan hated Talena, but he had not been able to stop her bid for a position because the High Lord Gwillian thought highly of Talena’s skills.

If only he knew how her cousin really felt.

Sometime Desura suspected Talena did not actually forgive the Temple. But she seemed interested in become a Bounty Hunter, for all that had happened to her family because of the Temple.

For that reason alone, Desura did not entirely trust her cousin. There was a side to the mirror she had not told Talena about. Desura could find Talena wherever she was so long as the mirror was on her person.

She sensed it now, moving out of the building by way of the kitchens.

The attendants assisted Desura onto the litter so she could be carried out of her home in the Deep. The prisoners were generally taken to the level above hers for questioning. As a Watcher, she was unable to walk that far without fainting. So she welcomed being lifted by the guards and carried from her chambers.

What she did not welcome was Rothanan’s dark presence. He could spoil all her plans if she was not careful.

She could not wait to see this bard. Talena had described him as handsome and pale of coloring. And said that he had a sweet voice. Were Desura able, she would have told the guards to hurry. But she was not allowed to speak to them, nor they to her unless there was danger.

So she held her tongue and hoped it would not take them too long to ascend the levels.

They kept asking the same
questions over and over. Alaric thought he would go mad, but Ronan kept whispering soothing words of encouragement from within. Without, it was Ronan who steadfastly answered them.

“And your name is?” the High Lord Patriarch began again.

“Lark the Wanderer,” Alaric heard himself say for the sixth time.

“And you are from?”

“The village of Tynandale in the West of Garrowye.”

“And your reason for being so far from home?”

“I am a free bard and travel where I will. I seek to learn new songs and share those I know to earn a living.”

The High Patriarch sat back and nodded as he had after each session of questioning. His expression never changed from the kindly smile, which Alaric was finding more and more annoying as time passed. If he knew the Gate Spell, he would have long ago wrenched himself out of this place and damn the consequences. But Ronan was determined that Alaric would keep his head and reveal nothing.