Masques (7 page)

She addressed his back. “That place—it . . . twists everything. There is so much magic in the castle, it makes the air heavy, and when I breathed it . . . He loves it, you know—playing games and making people into his puppets. Power.”

She shuddered slightly, and continued, “I watched him drink the blood of a child he’d just killed, and I found myself thinking how beautifully the light of the candles reflected off his hair. It’s . . . not pleasant not to know whether your feelings are your own.” She brought her legs up until she could wrap her arms around them.

She’d begun in an attempt to explain herself to Wolf—to show him that it wasn’t him she’d distrusted but her own perceptions. Once she’d started talking, she couldn’t stop. “I have never been so frightened in my entire life,” she whispered. “I always thought that I was strong-willed, but even with my mother’s blood to help me resist the spells, I couldn’t completely block the feeling that I wanted to please him.” Her voice died.

For a long time there were only the sounds of the forest—the wind in the trees, a creek nearby, and a cricket singing.

She sighed. “I might have been able to block it entirely toward the last—when I knew what the spells were and how he worked them; but I couldn’t, because I had to act as if the spell were having its effect on me. Sometimes I think . . . that maybe I didn’t want to block the spell because it made me feel so much better . . .” She knew that she would have bruises in the morning from gripping herself so hard. She took a shuddering breath and put her forehead down on her knees. “I can’t get him out of my mind. I think some of it is still his magic, but I see his face every time I close my eyes.”

Slowly, Wolf stood up and left his place. He sat down and leaned against her. She loosed her grip on her legs and ran a hand in the thick pelt.

A cold nose worked its way under her arm, and his warm, wet tongue licked at her chin until she squealed and pulled away with a quavering laugh, wiping at her face with her sleeves.

The wolf smiled, as wolves do, and rolled over against her on his back. She rubbed his stomach (something that he
didn’t
allow in public) and one back leg snapped rapidly back and forth as she caught just the right spot.

After he felt he had cheered her up, he said in his usual cool voice that sounded wrong coming out of a wolf getting his stomach rubbed, “Don’t worry about it, Lady. Living in that place for any length of time will twist your thoughts and feelings until what you feel and what he wants you to feel are tangled together in a knot that would baffle a sailor.” His voice was gentler, sounding like velvet on gravel. “Time will help.”

“I know,” replied Aralorn, then continued in a lighter tone, “but I’m not looking forward to the next decade or so.”

Wolf rolled over with improbable quickness and nipped her lightly on the hand in response to her quip, tacitly agreeing with her unspoken decision that the discussion was too serious.

Aralorn tilted her head to the side, a slow grin twisting her lips. “So you want to fight, do you?” She tackled him and began a wrestling match that left them both flat on the ground and panting.

“Will you be able to sleep now?” he asked, rather hoarsely, even for him. “I’ll wake you up when it’s time to go.”

She nodded and rolled over until she was on the bedding, unwilling to use enough energy to get up and walk. She mumbled a good night that lost most of its consonants. He touched his nose to her cheek and woofed softly before curling up against her.

In the end, it was the stallion that woke them both. The high-pitched whistle split the night.

Aralorn leapt to her feet and had the bed rolled up almost before she opened her eyes. Bridling and saddling took somewhat longer as the obstinate beast wouldn’t stand still. As she worked, she kept an eye on the wolf as he stared into the night. At his signal, she left what was not already attached to the saddle and mounted the stallion, who was already trotting. Although not built for running, Sheen managed a very credible speed as he followed the wolf’s lead. The Uriah were close enough behind them that they could hear the howls the beasts made when they found their camp.

Aralorn had fought the Uriah before, and she knew that they were faster than any horse—certainly faster than Sheen. The creatures were too close behind and gaining quickly. She drew her sword and slowed the stallion in preparation for facing them.

Noticing that Sheen was slowing, the wolf darted back and nipped at the stallion’s heels, nimbly dodging the war-trained horse’s well-placed kick.

“No,” Wolf snarled at her. “You don’t stand a chance against the number that we have behind us. If you keep going, I can lure them away.” With that, he began to veer off, but Aralorn guided Sheen to block his path.

She shook her head and shouted over the sounds of the Uriah, “It’s me that they want. They won’t follow you, and even if they did, it would mean that you would have to face them alone. Together, we might stand a chance.”

“You know better than that, Lady.” His tones rang with impatience. “Against two or three maybe, but there are many more than that. You needn’t worry about me, I can keep ahead of them on my own.” Here the wolf paused a moment, as if he were choosing his words carefully. “They will follow me if given a choice between the two of us.”

“What do you mean by that?” Then, before he could answer, she said, “Cursed obscure Wolf. Never mind. We don’t have time to argue.” It was getting difficult to talk and keep Sheen from bolting as the howls grew nearer.

He flashed his fangs at her in a mock smile as only a wolf can do. “Lady, this isn’t the first time I’ve dealt with them. Nor will it be the last.”

She didn’t want to leave him. If she hadn’t known he was no ordinary wolf, she wouldn’t have even considered leaving. But, against so many Uriah, she would have been more of a hindrance than a help. She heard the wails of the Uriah increase exponentially as they sighted their prey.

“Right,” she said abruptly. “I’ll see you in Sianim. But, plague it, Wolf, take care not to let them ruin your fur coat.” With that, she turned Sheen in their original direction and urged him on. The wolf stayed in the path of the Uriah and watched with yellow eyes as they came closer. When the tone of their calls changed and became even more frantic, he broke into a swift run, leading them away from the path taken by his companions. Aralorn, looking back, saw that Wolf had been correct: All of the grotesque, humanoid forms followed the wolf’s trail, ignoring her entirely.

She wondered, this time without last night’s panic, exactly who Wolf really was. It wasn’t a new puzzle, by any means. She had a list somewhere of possible identities for Wolf. Some of them were vague, others were names of specific people—today she added another name to it: Cain, the ae’Magi’s son. Cain was younger than she’d placed Wolf’s age, and she’d never caught a whiff of human magic off Wolf. She’d be surprised if Cain wasn’t buried with the other people the ae’Magi had been killing, whose magic he had been stealing to use for himself. But wasn’t it interesting the way the ae’Magi’s creatures took off after the wolf?

Aralorn traveled during the dark and slept, or at least tried to rest, during the day—not because it was safer that way but because she couldn’t stand to wake from her nightmares alone in the dark. Sometimes she traveled for miles without seeing anything. Being alone didn’t bother her; she’d done a lot of traveling on her own.

She had nothing of value except her warhorse and her sword—and both were as much a deterrent as a prize. On the evening of the third day, she left the forested mountains behind for the gentler hills and valleys of the lowlands. Traveling was faster, and it was only another day until she caught sight of Sianim.

The fortressed city stood on the top of an artificial plateau in the middle of a large valley. Nothing but grass was allowed to grow within a half mile of the hill, and even that was kept short. The plateau itself was steep-sided, and the road that led to the only gate into the city was narrow and walled, so that only three people could ride side by side through it. Although it was good for defense, the narrow path made it a nightmare to get large groups of soldiers in and out of Sianim.

The origins of the city were buried in the dust of ages past: Even the oldest known manuscripts mentioned it as a thriving city. Originally it had been a center of trade, but the small armies hired by the merchants to accompany their wagon trains drew mercenaries from all over. People looking for groups of mercenaries to hire began to go to Sianim. Gradually, the mercenaries themselves became the center of Sianim’s economy. A school for teaching the arts of war was founded, and eventually Sianim became a city of professional warriors.

Mercenaries of Sianim were some of the finest fighters in the world. With the only other military school at Jetaine, which had the minor drawback of allowing no males entrance within its walls, Sianim had little competition. In addition to training its own mercenary troops, Sianim also trained fighters for various kingdoms and principalities for a healthy fee. The elite guard for most of the rulers were Sianim-trained.

Because politics and war go hand in hand, Sianim also had a spy network that would have amazed an outsider. It was run by a slender, short academian. It was to his small office tucked away in the rabbit warren that was the back of the government building in the center of town that Aralorn went after stabling Sheen.

Someone needed to know as soon as possible the danger that Geoffrey ae’Magi presented.

Stairs and narrow hallways connected little rooms occupied by bureaucrats necessary to the successful and profitable running of the mercenary city: taxes and licenses and all. And buried away down a stairway behind a worn door that nonetheless opened and closed tightly and soundlessly was a large, airy room with a window (she’d never managed to figure out which window it was from the outside) that housed the man whose fingers dipped into the well of rumors and politics that drove the world.

She slipped through the worn door without knocking—if the Spymaster had wanted privacy, the door would have been locked. She closed the door, sat on a ratty-looking chair, and waited patiently for Ren, known semiaffectionately as the Mouse, to acknowledge her.

He was perched on top of his battered-but-sturdy desk, leaning back against a bookshelf and reading aloud from a collection of poems by Thyre. He was only a little older than Aralorn, but he appeared as though someone had put him out to dry and forgotten to take him back in again.

His hair had faded and thinned until it no longer concealed the scalp beneath. His hands were ink-stained and soft, free of calluses, though she knew he was an excellent swordsman and for a time, before he came to Sianim, had made a living as a duelist in several of the Alliance cities. Only his sharp eyes distracted from the impression of vagueness, and at that moment they were hidden from her as he kept his attention on the lines he read.

Thyre wasn’t one of her favorites; he reached too hard for his rhyme. Usually, she would have fished out a book from Ren’s impressive library and read until he decided to question her; but today she just sat quietly, listening, finally stretching out on the padded bench and closing her eyes. Since Thyre was notoriously long-winded, she had plenty of time to rest.

When Ren finished, she was snoozing peacefully, and the soft sound the book made as Ren stuffed it into one of the many bookcases made her jump to her feet. He offered her a glass he filled from the bottle on his desk.

Aralorn accepted it but sipped cautiously. Bottles on Ren’s desk could contain anything from water to Wyth, more affectionately known as Dragonslayer. This time it was
fehlta
juice, only a mildly alcoholic drink, but she set it down on the end of his desk. She had the rueful feeling that it would be a long time before she would take anything that could cloud her thoughts. She sat back down on the bench and waited . . . and waited.