Blackveil (63 page)
Once the wounds were treated and the cairn finished, Grant stabbed Porter’s sword into the earth near where his right hand would be and mumbled a few halting words asking the gods to receive the good private into the heavens. When he finished, the Sacoridians made the sign of the crescent moon while the Eletians looked on as curious bystanders.
While Grant took time to sort through Porter’s belongings, discarding most things but keeping tools essential to the mission, Karigan gazed away from the grave and down the road. She had hardly known Porter, but did not doubt he was a good, brave man. Otherwise he would not have been chosen for the expedition. His fate could have just as easily been hers or Yates’—any of theirs. It still could be.
She picked dainty iridescent feathers from her clothes.
Hummingbirds,
she thought with a shake of her head. She’d expected confrontations with one of the other horrid creatures that dwelled in the forest, but hummingbirds? She would never regard them in the same light again, even on her own side of the wall.
Hummingbirds,
she thought with a shake of her head. She’d expected confrontations with one of the other horrid creatures that dwelled in the forest, but hummingbirds? She would never regard them in the same light again, even on her own side of the wall.
When wings flashed in the branches above, she thought that despite Graelalea’s reassurance, the birds had come back for another attack.
OWL
T
he wings that brushed the air, however, were large and white, nothing at all like a tiny hummingbird. When the winter owl settled on a limb and tucked its wings to its sides, it looked like a clump of snow until it swiveled its head to gaze at its surroundings. Karigan realized she was squinting at the owl. The white of its plumage was so stark in the gloom of the forest that it hurt her eyes.
he wings that brushed the air, however, were large and white, nothing at all like a tiny hummingbird. When the winter owl settled on a limb and tucked its wings to its sides, it looked like a clump of snow until it swiveled its head to gaze at its surroundings. Karigan realized she was squinting at the owl. The white of its plumage was so stark in the gloom of the forest that it hurt her eyes.
The others came beside her to look at it as well.
“Where are your arrows?” Grant demanded of the Eletians. “We should kill it.”
“No.” Graelalea replied. “It is not a forest denizen, and of no danger to us.”
“How do you know? Those other birds looked harmless enough until ...” His sharp gesture took in Porter’s cairn and the hummingbird corpses littering the road.
“I know this owl is not of this forest, and that is enough.”
“She’s right,” Lynx murmured. His eyes were closed in concentration. “It’s from the other side of the wall. Besides, it would not retain its snowy plumage in this forest.”
“I saw one yesterday,” Karigan said, “when I went out for a ride. What would it be doing here? Is it lost?”
“Lost? I do not think so,” Graelalea replied. “It is not here by accident. Such owls are revered in Eletia.” She stroked one of the white feathers braided into her hair. A light shone in her eyes. “We call the winter owl
enmorial,
memory.”
enmorial,
memory.”
The owl preened, looking entirely at home in the dark woods. It paid them little heed, as if they were beneath its notice.
“Why memory?” Karigan asked.
“Memory is what it keeps.”
Karigan sighed. It was a typical Eletian response.
The owl spread its wings and launched from its limb, circling around their heads and winding down in a glide until it alighted on Graelalea’s outstretched wrist, its talons doing her no harm because of her armor. She and the owl gazed at one another for a long moment, before it lifted once more into the air. They watched it vanish above the trees and into the mist, a lone white feather twirling down back to Earth as the only proof it had been real.
Graelalea caught the feather before it could touch the ground and smiled. “Memory,” she said, and she tucked the feather into one of her braids.
They left behind Porter’s grave and trudged on along the road, the damp air thickening into a pervasive drizzle that
drip-drip-dripped
through the trees of the forest and onto their hoods. The gloom and the loss of Porter dragged down Karigan’s spirits. She could not help wondering who would be next. Who would be the next one for whom the rest built a cairn.
drip-drip-dripped
through the trees of the forest and onto their hoods. The gloom and the loss of Porter dragged down Karigan’s spirits. She could not help wondering who would be next. Who would be the next one for whom the rest built a cairn.
Only the occasional lumeni broke the spell of darkness, welcome beacons along their path. Few lumeni still held globes in their stone hands, but those that retained even a shard cast at least a little light, and that light seemed to brighten as the Eletians passed near them.
As they approached another of the lumeni, liquid light splashed across the mossy cobbles before them, and Ard sourly muttered, “Magic.”
Karigan thought the light beautiful and was glad something like the lumeni could endure in the forest for so many centuries, and she tried to imagine a different time, a different forest, when Eletians ruled this land, traveling this road freely and without fear.
“Magic?” Telagioth asked. “They collected light of sun and moon and stars. The lumeni would have been brilliant in the time before the Cataclysm.”
“He means the Long War,” Karigan said in response to Ard’s perplexed expression.
“Oh,” Ard replied. “Well, magic is magic, and you can see what good has come of it.” He swept his arm to take in the whole of the forest.
“An outside influence,” Telagioth said. “This land existed in light and harmony for many millennia before the coming of Arcosians. If you could see Eletia, you would understand.”
“Eletia is nothing compared to what Argenthyne once was.” This from Spiney, who came forward to join their conversation. He spoke as if he knew, as if he’d once tread Argenthyne’s ways during the lighter times before Mornhavon.
“I suppose I’d like to at least see your Eletia, then,” Ard said.
“You would not find your way in,” Spiney replied. “No mortal has been permitted beneath Eletia’s canopy for centuries, though some have tried.” He gazed at Karigan, a glint in his eye. “The last mortal to travel within Eletia was a Green Rider. It is still spoken of in the Alluvium.” With that pronouncement, he dropped back to walk in the rear with Hana.
Before Karigan could ask Telagioth
who,
he also left them and strode to the front to walk with Graelalea. Much Green Rider history had been forgotten over the years and so she liked it when she could find out more about the messengers who had come before her. Perhaps she could ask Telagioth more later.
who,
he also left them and strode to the front to walk with Graelalea. Much Green Rider history had been forgotten over the years and so she liked it when she could find out more about the messengers who had come before her. Perhaps she could ask Telagioth more later.
They continued on until the gloom grew into impenetrable dark. Graelalea chose to camp on the road beside a headless lumeni, its light aiding them as they pitched tents and built a fire. The tent of the Eletians was a dark, mottled gray, and it blended so well with the environs that Karigan thought she’d fall over it if she didn’t know exactly where it was. It also seemed too small a tent for six people.
“How they all going to fit in that?” Ard asked.
“Don’t know how they do it,” Yates replied, “but when they camped outside Sacor City last summer, their tents held a lot more than you’d think possible. That’s what I heard anyway.”
Graelalea told the company not to stray far, probably an unnecessary warning with the forbidding forest all around them. Everyone stuck close to the light of the campfire and lumeni as they ate their rations and prepared for the night.
Karigan was assigned first watch with the Eletian Solan. When everyone else turned in, Solan stood unmoving on the very fringe of light, gazing into the night in the direction from which they’d come. Karigan sat with her back to the dwindling campfire, her staff across her lap, and gazed in the opposite direction, down the road they had yet to travel.
Now that the company had come to such stillness, the sounds of the forest grew louder, the clacking of bare tree limbs and the patter of water spilled from branches, the wild screeches of creatures near and far. During her time as a Rider she had spent many a night alone in the wilderness, but the sounds of those nights had been more subdued, held less of an edge to them. Those nights had not been so black.
Being on watch was almost laughable, because she could not see anything beyond their light. Would something come upon them before she could warn the others? Another cloud of hummingbirds, or something even worse? She squeezed her fingers around the smooth wood of her staff. All of her old worries and problems now seemed far off. She did not dwell on Alton and Estral, and not even on King Zachary.
When she was younger and read
The Adventures of Gilan Wylloland,
she’d dreamed of a hero like Gilan coming to her rescue, sweeping her away on his magnificent war horse.
The Adventures of Gilan Wylloland,
she’d dreamed of a hero like Gilan coming to her rescue, sweeping her away on his magnificent war horse.
Stupid,
she thought with a bitter edge.
Little girl dreams.
she thought with a bitter edge.
Little girl dreams.
How many times had she fought her own way out of trouble? No one was going to rescue her. Certainly not King Zachary, and not just because she was currently out of reach. Even when she was within his reach, she was, so to speak, out of reach.
She had only herself to rely on and as pretty as the little girl dreams were, it was time to dispose of them. Perhaps it was the forest that inspired such bleak thoughts that dampened hope. She did not care. After Porter’s random and bizarre death, those old dreams lacked the weight they once held. Maybe if she left the forest alive she’d care again, but for the time being, survival was the priority. No hero to sweep her away from danger. Just herself.
She sighed. For all the darkness of her thoughts, it left her feeling somehow at peace to acknowledge what was true and what was not.
Footsteps announced the arrival of Lieutenant Grant wrapped in his cloak, his face shadowed by his hood.
“You can go to sleep, Rider. I’ll take the rest of your watch.”
“Sir?”
“It’s all right. I can’t sleep. The damned dripping—it’s driving me mad. Go along now, you’re excused.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Karigan stood and retreated to the tent she shared with Yates.
Dripping?
she wondered as she ducked through the tent flaps. Yes, there were the ever-present drops on canvas, but it didn’t bother her. Now Yates’ snoring? That was something else.
she wondered as she ducked through the tent flaps. Yes, there were the ever-present drops on canvas, but it didn’t bother her. Now Yates’ snoring? That was something else.
Not to mention the occasional bloodcurdling scream of some creature meeting its end deep in the forest.
MOONDIAL
T
hey survived the night. Those on watch reported creatures scuffling and snuffling through the woods, but nothing had come too close. Dawn arrived as another soggy, gray day and camp was swiftly packed up.
hey survived the night. Those on watch reported creatures scuffling and snuffling through the woods, but nothing had come too close. Dawn arrived as another soggy, gray day and camp was swiftly packed up.
Karigan didn’t think any of the Sacoridians had slept well, except maybe Yates, who snored his way through the night. Between his snoring and the rocks rammed into her back, Karigan certainly hadn’t. As for the others, pouches sagged beneath Lynx’s eyes, and she wondered if the voices of the forest had infiltrated his dreams. Ard looked surly and threw his gear around as if he’d like to break something. A haggard Grant kept scratching his arm and muttering to himself about the dripping.
Once everyone was ready, they set off down the road, their mood subdued, no one engaging in chatter. Nothing threatened them as they walked along, though Karigan felt as if their every movement was observed by malevolent eyes.
They paused only for a meal at midday, and when they finished, Graelalea announced, “Here we shall depart the road.”
“What?” Grant demanded. “What do you mean we depart the road?”
“You don’t expect us to bushwhack through this forest, do you?” Ard added.
The idea of leaving the road dismayed Karigan, too, but she withheld her protest, waiting to hear Graelalea’s explanation.
“There were once paths, not just roads, that Eletians used to travel this land. If you knew our roads, you would realize they are not ... efficient. Think of your main thoroughfare in Sacor City. Is it the most direct route to the castle?”
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