Kingmaker's Sword (Rune Blades of Celi) (38 page)

I watched her as she sat by the fire, still unsure whether I had dreamed about her other night, or if it had really happened. We spoke very little, each of us immersed in our own thoughts.

I awoke in the night with the note of the sword singing loudly in my head. I sat up and groped around until I found the scabbard and picked it up. Even shrouded by the stiff leather, the blade gleamed brightly.

“I can see you and I are going to have to have this out,” I said grimly. Kerri slept curled down into her cloak on the other side of the fire. I got up carefully so I wouldn’t waken her, and took the sword deeper into the trees.

I took it out of the scabbard and held it up before me. The blade vibrated rapidly and glowed incandescent white, its strident harmonics screeching all around me, painful to the ears as the rasp of a file on metal. I gritted my teeth and shook the sword.

“Listen, you misbegotten lump of tin,” I snarled. “If you can’t understand duty when you see it, you’re no use to me.” I stabbed the point of the blade down into the ground and pried my fingers off the hilt, one by one. It didn’t want to let me go. It was like peeling the skin off my palms to wrest my hands from the hilt.

The sword quivered and howled, the light emanating from it surging back and forth between angry red and incandescent white. Hellas-birthing. All I needed was a sword that threw a towering temper tantrum when it didn’t get its own way. I stood before it until it finally settled to a churning orange brilliance.

“I have a duty to perform,” I told it calmly. “If you can’t understand that, you can bloody well stand there until you rust. I can do without your magic, my friend. But you can’t do without me right now.”

The sword seethed and fizzed, its light bright enough to sear my eyes. The pitch of the harmonic rose furiously. I folded my arms across my chest and watched it, trying not to think about how ridiculous this really was. No man should have to argue with his sword.

“Rust,” I repeated. “Right there.”

Finally the sword subsided. I sensed acquiescence in the tone of the harp and bell tone. I let it stand there for a moment before I put my hand to the plain leather-bound hilt.

“Once I’ve seen him home,” I said. “When I’ve seen him home, we’ll follow.”

The hilt settled into my hand, comfortable and familiar, fitting into my palm as if it had been crafted for it. I sheathed it and made my way back to the glowing embers of the fire.

Kerri sat up as I wrapped myself in my plaid again. Her tousled hair fell forward over her forehead and she raised a hand to brush it back. “Quite a performance,” she murmured. I thought she might be smiling.

I just looked at her for a moment in exasperation. “I
hate
magic,” I said with heartfelt fervency, and placed the sword on the ground by my head. “I really hate it.”

***

Late afternoon the next day gave us a glimpse of towering, snow-capped peaks as we rode side by side in silence on the narrow track. The day had been hot, the smell of dust hanging thickly in the air, but as the sun sank toward the mountains, a welcome cool descended. It was the first real summer day of the season. Midsummer could not be far off now. It startled me to realize I had completely lost track of time. Always before, seasons were counted by places. Midsummer usually found us descending the eastern slopes of the Laringorn Alps.

It came crashing down on me again that Cullin was dead. There were to be no more companionable evenings by a campfire with a merchant-train nearby. No more joyous brawling in taverns. No more testing each other’s skill with the sword. No more laughing together. That was gone with Cullin. Gone forever.

Kerri turned in her saddle to look at me, her eyes wide and sad. “I keep forgetting he’s gone,” she said, something akin to surprise and wonder in her voice. “It’s silly, but I keep expecting to see him come riding back down the road any instant.”

It was so close to my own musings, it startled me, and for one wild moment, I wondered if this bond between us allowed us to share each other’s thoughts. I met her eyes, then looked away toward the mountains. “I know,” I said. “So do I.”

We lapsed back into silence. After a while, I said, “I had a very strange dream two nights before we left Jeriad’s tower.”

For a long time, there was no sound but the slow clopping of the horses’ hooves against the hard-packed surface of the track. Finally, she said, “A dream?”

“About you,
sheyala
.” I glanced at her. She appeared absorbed in the small task of picking a burr from the mare’s glossy black mane. The heightened colour in her face might have been from the blaze of the sun all day. But it might not.

Again, there was a long pause before she replied. The burr was well tangled in the mare’s mane and required some time to remove properly. She looked up at me at last. “A pleasant dream?”

“Aye. Verra pleasant.”

“Oh?”

I smiled. “Not one I’m likely to dream again, I expect.”

“You wouldn’t want to?”

Rhuidh shied as a pheasant broke cover and flapped madly into the air nearly beneath his feet. When I had him settled down again, I looked at Kerri. She had recovered her composure and met my eyes coolly.

“It’s not that I wouldn’t want to, ye ken,” I said. “I wouldn’t refuse it if it was offered. But I learned a long time ago it’s not something one can expect or demand just because it came one’s way once. Dreams are peculiar that way.”

“I see.” She put her heels to the mare and cantered ahead. I lost sight of her as the mare rounded a bend in the track.

But Kerri was waiting as I came around the bend leading the stallion, still at a sedate walk. She glared at me. “That was certainly a lot of bush-beating, Kian dav Leydon,” she said severely. “Let me just say this, then the subject is closed. It wasn’t a dream, and I seldom make the same mistake twice.” She paused, marshalling her thoughts. “And one more thing. Stop calling me
sheyala
. I’m not a barbarian.” She paused again, then sighed. “No more than you are.”

***

As we approached the mountains, the road wound west of north, skirting the southern ranges of the Tyran Crags. The high passes, still choked deep in snow, would not be open until more than a fortnight past Midsummer. The track we followed intercepted the road north from Honandun that wound through the low, wide valley of the River Lauchruch, making an easily travelled road.

The days were hot now, almost uncomfortably so. But the gradually thickening forest as we left behind the Isgardian plain provided welcome shade, and the nights were still cool.

We rode through the gold dappled shade provided by oak and silverleaf maple. Here and there among the hardwood trees, tall, straight pines and firs made patches of darker green. To our right, rocky outcroppings thrust up through the loamy soil, reflecting the heat of the sun back down onto the track. Ahead, a thin, white thread of water cascaded off one of the small bluffs in its hurry to join the stream paralleling the track, a veil of spume making rainbows around the rock.

Just as we reached the ford, my stomach suddenly knotted in a spasm of nausea and the hair on the nape of my neck and my arms rose as I shuddered. I recognized the now familiar stench. Only the black general exuded that particular reek. I reined Rhuidh to a quick stop, holding up my left hand to Kerri. She drew the mare up beside Rhuidh and looked around quickly.

“What is it?” she asked, barely loud enough to be heard above the song of the waterfall.

“Magic,” I said. “Blood magic. Very close.”

“Maeduni?” She reached up to make sure of the sword on her back.

I nodded. “Aye, Maeduni. I think it’s the General. It has his signature.”

“Hellas-birthing,” she muttered. “An ambush ahead then.”

“Aye. Just around the bend on the other side of that small crag.”

She glanced around, standing in the stirrups. To our right, the cliff rose sheerly. To the left, the stream tumbled and churned across its rocky bed, making impossible footing for horses, doubtful and dangerous for people. There was nowhere to go but forward, or back the way we came.

“He picked his spot well,” Kerri said bitterly. “How many of them are there?”

I shook my head. “I can’t tell. I can just smell the magic. I recognize the stink of that accursed general.”

She relaxed back into her saddle, wrists crossed on the pommel, and looked at me. “What now?”

I hesitated. I couldn’t help thinking that Cullin would know exactly what to do. He always did. There might be half an army of Maeduni around that bend, or as few as half a dozen. This far into Isgard, the latter possibility seemed more likely. Either way, Kerri and I were outnumbered, even if the presence of the General were discounted. I wondered exactly how seriously Cullin and I had weakened him.

I scrubbed my hand across my cheek and jaw. “We have two choices,” I said. “We can go back….”

“Or?”

I grinned suddenly, knowing what Cullin would do. “Or we can go charging around that bend at full gallop and hope to startle them right out of their boots.”

She stared at me. “That’s the craziest idea I’ve ever heard,” she said. Then she grinned. “It’s so crazy, it might just work. They certainly won’t expect us to do anything that insane.”

I gestured toward the waterfall. “They wanted the falls to mask any noise they might make so it wouldn’t warn us,” I said. “We can play the same game. They probably won’t hear us coming until we’re nearly on top of them.”

Kerri dismounted to check the girth of her saddle. It was a good idea, so I slid off Rhuidh to check his girth. The last thing we needed was a loose strap dumping us onto the ground in the middle of a troop of hostile Maeduni.

Kerri settled herself back into the saddle and drew her sword. “Ready?” she asked.

“In a moment.” I slipped the halter off the stallion and stuffed it into my saddle pack. The stallion would follow us. I needed both hands free and Rhuidh didn’t need another horse tethered to him to hamper his movements. I made doubly sure the heart bundle was securely fastened behind my saddle, then mounted. “Ready,” I said.

The horses picked their way carefully across the stream. It was only a few paces wide, and barely deep enough to cover their hocks, but the stones were round and smooth, and none too firmly rooted in the stream bed.

On the other side, Kerri gave me a tight, fierce grin and flexed the wrist of her sword hand before raising the blade to the ready position. I drew my own sword and nodded to her.

Rhuidh leapt forward eagerly as I put my heels to his flanks and leaned forward across the pommel of the saddle. The black mare, fleet as a hawk, sure-footed as a dancer, was half a length ahead as we rounded the bend, Kerri bent low across her neck. Rhuidh, neck stretched into the gallop, tail streaming, flew close behind.

The cliff curved away from the track and the trees closed in on the right. A mounted Maeduni soldier, little more than a black shadow detaching itself from the shade of the trees, sprang onto the track long seconds too late to intercept the mare, but in plenty of time to meet the sweep of my sword as Rhuidh thundered past. The startled horse, suddenly riderless, shied violently and blundered into another horse, dumping the second rider onto the road.

Ahead, a third Maeduni, overconfident when he saw that Kerri was a woman, urged his horse into the middle of the track, a grin of anticipation stretching his lips back over his teeth. The mare, neat-footed and deft, swerved to the Maeduni’s left, opposite his sword hand. Opposite Kerri’s sword hand, too. Leaning sideways in her saddle, Kerri flipped the hilt of her sword into her left hand and swept it out in a vicious backhanded arc. The blade sliced through the Maeduni’s throat, half severing his head.

Another rider leapt out of the trees, sword raised, riding straight at me. There was no time to swing my sword. I lowered it and used it like a lance. The point went into the Maeduni’s belly. I nearly lost my seat and my grip on the hilt as he went down. I was off balance as I jerked the blade free, but Rhuidh never missed a step, dancing sideways to place himself firmly beneath me. He kept his pace smooth and steady as I pulled myself back into the saddle.

Then we were through the ambush and running free down the track. Kerri turned to take a quick glance over her shoulder, her hair flying wildly around her face. She held up four fingers, and I nodded. Only four of them in pursuit behind us. But one of them was the General. I smelled the characteristic reek of his own unique magic, strong and nauseating.

I bent lower, murmured encouragement to Rhuidh. His ears twitched and his stride lengthened.

The stench of magic suddenly thickened and intensified. I snatched a look over my shoulder and saw the General gather his magic. Nausea churned sharply in my belly and I wondered if I might be quick enough this time, and lucky enough, to catch it on the blade of the sword and reflect it back at him.

But the magic wasn’t aimed at me. The dull red bolt sailed over my head, well above me. Perhaps the General wasn’t strong enough to use it against a man. But he was certainly strong enough to use it against rock and earth. Only a few lengths ahead of Kerri, a great fissure opened across the track, at least two man-lengths wide, perhaps three.

Kerri had no time to prepare the mare properly. I saw her bend farther forward and touch the mare’s neck. The mare’s nostrils flared, displaying the red interior, and she gathered herself, muscles in her hindquarters bunching and flexing. She launched herself across the void, Kerri clinging to her back. For a moment, horse and rider appeared to hang suspended in midair, the horse stretched gracefully, the rider hugging tight to the extended neck. One forefoot, then the other, landed on firm ground on the far side of the chasm, hind feet following easily and Kerri was safely across.