Come Back to Me (39 page)

"Yes, yes, of course, lord. I know your men are skilled and you will not rob me. Only pray you remember I am but a—"

"Poor man. I know, I know. For a poor man, you never seem to lack for a cargo, but never mind, the price will be fair. Now get on with your work. I have other matters to tend to, assuming I can find my way to them."

He had come on foot, unwilling to risk any horse in such treacherous fog, and was returning to the stronghold the same way when the first whiff of smoke stopped him. He stood, just where the road began to rise toward his strong stone walls, and wondered at the sudden awareness. There was always smoke for fires burned day and night in every cottage. But the fresh sea breezes blew the scent away so that, really, it was not usual to smell fire.

Yet he did now. He most definitely did.

It was because the air was so still, held down by the fog.

There had been other foggy days, many of them, but he had never smelled anything like this.

No, that wasn't right. He had but never at Landsende. Once in Byzantium when an old quarter of the city had caught fire and burned. Again in Italia when lightning struck a stand of ancient trees. This was not the smoke of hearths. It was too big, too threatening to be anything so tame.

He began to run, heedless of the fog, following the ever-thickening scent around the stronghold walls and into a nearby field. There he saw the flames. They were rising out of a barn waiting to receive the harvest bounty. Already, they shot into the air, their heat scorching.

Dragon turned to call for help but his men were already coming to him. They too had smelled the fire, as had the men and women rushing up from the town, stumbling in their haste, many carrying buckets.

They formed a chain all the way from the high field down to the strand and the water there. Hundreds of people, children included, hefting hundreds of buckets in a desperate line to fight what quickly became an all-consuming fire.

The weather had been dry. The barn burned fiercely. The heat of the flames seared the faces of those closest to it, Dragon among them. He knew almost immediately that the barn could not be saved. All efforts were directed toward stopping the spread of the fire. There was enough dry stubble in the field to give it fuel, and even in the absence of wind, the danger lingered that it might veer toward the town or rain sparks down on the stronghold.

"Get shovels!" he ordered and set his men to digging a trench around the barn, a break for the raging flames. The tactic worked but it was several hours before the fire finally burned itself out.

Dragon did not wait. While yet the remains of the barn smoked, he walked all around them, looking for any hint of how the fire could have started. The barn had been empty, therefore no torches or lamps would have been lit within it, nor was there reason for anyone to be inside, particularly on so foggy a day when just finding the field would be difficult. There had been no storm, no lightning, nothing natural that could have started the conflagration.

Yet start it had and he meant to find out how. Quickly enough, he discovered the cause. A thick stream of pitch, the same kind used to seal the hulls of ships and readily available in Landsende, soaked the ground beginning a few yards from the barn and leading right up to it. Up to and in, he would wager. Pitch on a vessel submerged in water was perfectly safe but on land there was little that burned so well.

The fire had been started deliberately.

The fabric, the salt, Grani, the spices…

His head went up. He walked slowly, seeming still to examine the barn but in fact looking at the men and women who had come to fight the fire. Along with the folk of Landsende were the crews of every vessel in port. They, too, had rushed to help. Not a single person was missing save for the very young, the very old, and—

"Where is my wife?" he asked Magda, coming upon her as she helped gather up the buckets.

Soot-stained like all the rest, her eyes red from the fire, she looked around uncertainly. "I… don't know, my lord. I have not seen her." Even as she spoke, he saw the dawning realization in her eyes. The absence of the Lady of Landsende at such a time was strange indeed.

He raised a hand to summon Magnus, who appeared, as always, directly at his side. "I want her found." Grim-faced, Dragon turned back to survey the smoldering ruins.

COLD DAMPNESS PRESSING AGAINST HER FACE woke Rycca. She hovered a moment on the edge of darkness before memory returned with a jolt. She was on the ground. It was the wet earth she had felt against her cheek. The fog billowed all around her. She had no idea where she was or how long she had been unconscious.

Or who had seized her.

Gingerly, she sat up and took stock of herself. Save for a few aches and pains, she appeared to be unharmed.

Serpents
. The thought sprang unbidden in her mind and with it came the image of twin snakes devouring each other. She had seen that just before the darkness took her. But where and why?

There would be time enough to ponder that later, if she was fortunate. At the moment, nothing was more pressing than to be sure she was truly alone. Cautiously, she strained her eyes against the fog and listened intently. Not a flicker of movement or murmur of sound suggested anyone was near.

Relieved, she took a deep breath and willed herself to be calm. Though it was summer, the day was cool. Her clothes were wet and clung to her. She shivered, wrapping her arms around herself and trying to guess what time it might be but it was impossible to determine the angle of the sun. However many hours had passed since she was taken from the stable, day would be fading and with it would come even greater chill. She had to make her way back to Landsende and quickly.

But in the fog she had no idea in which direction to move and risked worsening her situation with every step she took. Yet to do nothing was unbearable. Still mindful of the danger if her kidnapper was nearby, she called out hesitantly, "Hello… is anyone here?"

Her words vanished into silence so thick it rivaled the fog. She might have been utterly alone in a world from which all sight and sound had vanished.

The thought chilled her even further. How many times during the years at Wolscroft had she longed to be alone? She had dreamed of living all by herself in an aerie somewhere, like a wild falcon or hawk never to be tamed by man. Except for Thurlow, there was not a person she would have missed and many a one to whom she would gleefully have said farewell forever. But that had changed now, utterly changed. She longed for Dragon, the sound of his voice, the touch of his hand, the warmth of his smile. For a moment she closed her eyes and saw him behind them. The vision gave her strength and she decided she had to move, slowly and carefully to be sure, but she could not simply stay where she was.

She had taken only a half-dozen steps when she noticed that her hands felt oddly stiff. Puzzled, she stopped and held them up. Through the swirling tendrils of cloud, black streaks stood out against her pale skin. She brought her hands closer and inhaled. The acrid smell of pitch filled her breath.

Pitch? That was odd. How could she possibly have gotten pitch on her hands? There was none in the stable, or at least she had no memory of any.

Again, she listened. Far off in the distance, muted by the fog, she thought she heard the sound of waves breaking against the shore. It might be a trick of the wind, so scarcely perceptible was it, but she had nothing else to guide her. Step by cautious step, still wondering how she had gotten pitch on her hands, Rycca began trying to find her way home.

TIME SEEMED TO MOVE VERY SLOWLY IN the mist and Rycca with it. She stopped every few feet and listened, trying to make sure that she had not imagined the sound of the sea and was still headed toward it. Her clothes felt ever more uncomfortable. She was damp through to the skin and beyond, chilled to the very bone. Shivering, she moved a little faster, only to stumble over a rock and fall hard.

Groaning, she got to her feet again and proceeded more carefully. However cold she was, it would be little help to injure herself. As she went, she thought again of the serpents and tried to imagine who could possibly have taken her from the stable. Who would be so mad as to risk the rage of the jarl of Landsende? But having risked it, why simply leave her unharmed in the fog?

Perhaps the miscreant had lost his nerve and fled rather than face his just punishment. The more she thought about it, the more she was convinced that must be what had happened. She even felt a sense of relief, for surely the same person must have been responsible for all the other things that had happened. With him gone, she could hope that life at Landsende would return to normal.

She stopped for a moment, listening again. The sound of the sea seemed louder but she couldn't be sure. However, she also thought she heard something else, a slow, rhythmic pounding of some sort. Weary, aching, worried, yet did she feel a little spurt of hope. Still, she forced herself to continue slowly.

The world had the quality of a dream, Rycca decided. With all the everyday landmarks stripped away, there was nothing between her and her thoughts. She wondered suddenly what life would be like if it were always so and decided she preferred not to know. Too much inward gazing was likely not good for the soul. She missed the world, all the vibrant color and movement. Even winter was not so barren as this fog that made her want to do nothing so much as lie down on the ground, curl up into herself, and forget about all else.

Not that she would, even for a moment. She kept going, listening for the sea, hearing again the pounding. It was familiar somehow. She had heard it before and knew what it meant, yet a little while longer passed before she realized what she strained to catch.

Hoofbeats! A horse moving not at a gallop but at a steady trot all the same. Who would let a horse do that in such blinding mist? Who would take such a chance?

"Rycca!"

Dragon's voice rang out clear and strong, seeking her.

"Here!" Never had she been so glad to hear anyone in her life. "Here! I am here!"

He came out of the cloud, first only a hint of darkness against the white, taking form quickly until she saw him, tall and strong astride Sleipnir, who pawed the ground in pleasure at having found her. Oddly, his master looked less pleased.