Spellweaver (5 page)

She began to wonder if she’d strayed into a waking nightmare. She was only hours into a journey across an endless plain with no gold, no food, and no means of protecting herself. She was being followed by something whose menace she could feel from where she stood—or stumbled, rather. And then, as if that wasn’t enough, she had been reunited with a man whose loss she had been fully prepared to mourn greatly only to find that he had become easily the most arrogant, unfeeling, unpleasant lout—

“Hurry,” he snapped.

She did, because he gave her no choice. She immediately discarded the thought of running away from him. If she did, the shadow behind her might follow her, and then she would be dead. If Ruith noticed anything, he was either too tight-lipped to say as much, or he didn’t care. She wasn’t sure which it was, nor was she sure she cared to know.

She just knew she didn’t want any more of the things that made up his life.

She trotted alongside him, numb from what he’d said to her and too unsettled to even attempt to muster up enough energy to tell him to take himself and his rude words and go to hell, and formulated a plan with what few wits remained her. She would go with him until they’d reached some sort of civilization. And then when it was safe, she was going to walk away from mages and spells and elven princes who looked like mercenaries and behaved with no manners at all.

She had the feeling her life might depend on it.

Three

Ruith walked up the slick cobblestone streets of Beinn òrain toward the schools of wizardry, trying to ignore the memories that assailed him. The last time he’d walked his current path, he’d been with his mother and a pair of his brothers as they’d prepared to breach those formidable walls for a visit to a particular master. The castle had been draped in heavy mist on that morning, just as it was now. He almost couldn’t decide if he were dreaming or awake.

He supposed some of that came from weariness. He had either walked or run with Sarah for the entirety of the last four days—in the pouring rain, no less—stopping only to drink when necessary and eat from the rather meager bag of food he’d snatched from the camp of the dead Malairtian traders. He hadn’t dared linger to look for more supplies at that particular camp.

He had, however, taken the time at that camp to wrap Mosach and Táir up in each other’s spells a bit more securely, which he’d considered nothing more than just recompense for the lives of those slain traders. He hadn’t cared to stay and exchange pleasantries with them. He’d simply looked for hoofprints leading away from camp and decided, with a fervent hope that he hadn’t chosen amiss, to follow the single set of tracks. Finding Sarah alive and well had been a vast relief.

Or it would have been, if he hadn’t realized as he’d caught up with her that he’d brought along more with him than not enough food to see them across the plains.

He’d immediately decided to adopt the attitude that he’d used to save Sarah’s life in Ceangail. He’d forced himself to keep up the ruse of treating Sarah as his servant—or worse—simply because he hadn’t wanted to give whomever had been following them any reason to think that she meant anything to him. He had regretted every harsh word that had come out of his mouth, knowing full well that each one wounded her.

Or at least he’d flattered himself that such might be the case, but given how quickly she’d descended into silence and ceased looking at him, perhaps he had overestimated his appeal.

He peered past his dripping hood to judge the distance between himself and the keep, sitting like an enormous bird of prey at the head of the street. Perhaps it was madness to think that he could even get past the gate guards. Even if he managed that, there was no guarantee he would gain the particular set of chambers he hoped for—or that the master who lived in those chambers would allow him entrance.

Unfortunately, at the moment he had no other choice. The idea of taking Sarah to Shettlestoune had been unthinkable, simply because there was no safety there. He would happily have taken her either to Lake Cladach or Tòrr Dòrainn, but he couldn’t bring himself to sully either place with his father’s bastards—assuming, perhaps poorly, that they were what hunted him.

That he wasn’t sure galled him, but he had no one to blame but himself for not being able to identify his enemy. He had grown accustomed over the years to looking out for foes of a merely mortal nature. Keeping a weather eye out for mages hadn’t been a skill he’d cultivated, though now he wondered why not.

He suppressed the urge to look over his shoulder to see if they were still being followed. He hadn’t seen anyone since they’d reached the city, but again, he couldn’t be sure. The only thing in his favor was that Beinn òrain was a busy port town and getting lost in a crowd was easily done. And now they were less than two hundred paces from the gates. Safety was within his grasp.

And once he’d reached the particular chamber he was aiming for inside those intimidating walls, he would set Sarah down in a chair before the fire, then fall to his knees and apologize profusely for his boorish behavior. He wasn’t entirely certain that he would manage to blurt out an apology before she either buried a knife in his gut or simply turned and walked away from him. He could safely say he wouldn’t have been surprised by either. It had been all he could do on the plains to make sure she stayed beside him—

Which she wasn’t, at the moment.

He spun around, dragged his damp sleeve across his eyes to clear them, but saw nothing of her. He hadn’t felt anyone with magic around him, but then again, he was hardly one to judge such a thing. He cursed fluently, then strode back the way he’d come. He ignored the pubs and inns. She had no more gold than he did, which was none, and whilst she might have been willing to work for a meal, he suspected she would have first sought nothing more than a place to hide. He passed two alleyways before he hit upon the right one. Sarah was there.

So were a handful of lads who had apparently found her worth a second look.

He strode forward, took the two lads closest to him, and cracked their heads together. They slumped to the cobblestones with remarkable grace, all things considered. Sarah struck the third in the nose, sending him stumbling backward. Ruith reached for the fourth only to have him cry out suddenly and bolt past him.

Never a good sign, that sort of thing.

Ruith felt the shadow sweep over him before he saw it, but shadow it was and not one made by the heavy clouds hanging overhead. He reached for Sarah’s hand and pulled her into a stumbling run over the slippery stone toward the alley’s entrance, hoping to blend in with the shrieking thug who was clutching his nose and stumbling about. Sarah fought him briefly, then fell abruptly silent.

Ruith pulled Sarah under his cloak and backed her against the wall with more force than he meant to.

“Careful, damn you—” she gasped.

“Feign interest,” he begged.

She glared at him before she wrapped her good arm around his neck and pulled his head down where she could whisper furiously in his ear. “If I thought I could stick you between the ribs and not swing for it, I would, you unfeeling, unpleasant ...
impolite
...” She spluttered a bit, seemingly unable to lay her hand upon an insult vile enough to suit her. “I would call you a mannerless whoreson,” she said finally and with a distinct chill to her voice, “but that would be an insult to your honorable dam, who I’m quite sure would be terribly ashamed of how you’ve behaved over the past several days.”

He agreed, silently. He would have attempted a brief apology, but he didn’t suppose Sarah was in the mood to hear it, and he didn’t dare take his attention off what he feared was coming their way. Sarah’s arm trembled so violently, he feared she would either truly do him a goodly bit of damage or collapse from weariness. He slipped his arm behind her back to hold her up, which displeased her every bit as much as he’d expected it might.

“If you think I’m going one step farther with you,
Your Highness
,” she said in a voice that trembled as badly as the rest of her, “you are sorely mis—”

“Sshh,” he whispered frantically, pulling her closer. He hazarded a glance to his left. A dragon had swept but a foot over the heads of the local civilians, sending most of them sprawling onto the cobblestones. The dragon laughed before it disappeared and a man stood in its place.

Ruith turned back to Sarah and bent his head forward to hide hers. He heard footsteps coming toward the alley, then heard them pause. He held his breath, because there was nothing else to be done. The evil that flowed ahead of the man standing there was like a strong wind before the brunt of a storm. Ruith didn’t consider himself particularly self-effacing, but he would readily admit he wasn’t up to besting even the forefront of that storm.

Damn it anyway.

After several eternal moments, boots scuffed, then walked on, their heels clicking against the stone.

Ruith would have dropped to his knees if he’d had the strength to. Instead, he held himself upright by means of his hand against the wall. He kept Sarah close likely longer than he should have, but he supposed it might be the last time he would manage it so there was no sense in not having the memory to keep him warm in his old age.

“Who was that?” she managed.

“I have no idea,” he said, though he supposed he could hazard a guess. Students at the schools of wizardry were under strict instructions not to torment the townspeople. The punishment for it was ejection from the school and damage to the reputation that anyone with a care for it wouldn’t possibly want. Of the masters, Ruith could bring to mind only one who would terrify people simply because he could.

Droch of Saothair, the master of Olc.

Sarah shuddered again, once, then shoved him away from her. He looked down, then winced. Her pale green eyes were bloodshot, her hair uncombed and hanging in straggling curls over her shoulders, and her face grey with weariness. A pity that didn’t detract at all from her beauty.

He wondered absently if he had lost his mind that he could be thinking about the fairness of her face when they were walking into a clutch of mages—one of whom, at least, would quite happily have seen him dead.

She glared at him. “I’m finished with this, Your—”

“Don’t,” he said, with more sharpness than he’d intended. He opened his mouth to apologize, but she shoved him out of the way and started toward the street before he could.

He caught up with her and stepped in front of her, blocking her way. “If you could just have another half hour’s worth of patience,” he began, “we could be inside—”

“Nay,” she said, taking a step backward, then another. “I don’t want to go any farther with you.” She gestured toward the street with a hand that trembled badly. “I don’t want any more of
that
.”

He had never once doubted over the course of their acquaintance that Sarah of Doìre would manage whatever was necessary because she was just that kind of woman. A courageous, resilient, terribly responsible woman who would do what needed to be done simply because she found herself the only one who could do it. But for the first time since he’d known her, he thought she might have reached her limit.

He didn’t attempt to move toward her, didn’t attempt to reach out and brush any stray locks of damp hair back from her face. He merely clasped his hands behind his back and looked at her gravely.

“Would you continue on,” he began slowly, “if I could promise you a safe place to sleep for a few days?”

She considered. “Will you be there?”

He maintained a neutral expression, though it cost him more than he’d thought it might. “Aye, and I can well understand why you wouldn’t want any more of my company.”

“I imagine you can,” she said stiffly, “for which you should at least have the good grace to blush.”

“I vow I will,” he promised, “when we’re safe.”

She pursed her lips. It was obvious she didn’t trust him, which he’d known would be the case. He wasn’t above hoping, however, that at some point in the future she might be willing to bring to mind a few of the more pleasant moments of their journey.

Before he’d been fool enough to take her first to his father’s well, then to the keep at Ceangail where no woman should ever have had to set foot.

“Very well,” she said with a dark look, “I accept, because I have no choice. And also because I’m not through repaying you for what you’ve put me through over the past few fortnights
and
all the terrible things you’ve said to me.”

He caught up to her quickly, before she walked out into the crowd that was still apparently recovering from almost being singed by a renegade dragon. He knew she didn’t want to remain with him, but the truth was even though she wasn’t safe next to him, she was even less safe away from him. He had also realized over that rather lengthy and anxious journey spent chasing her that he didn’t particularly care for his life without her—something he hadn’t expected that particular winter evening when he’d gathered his gear and locked the door of his mountain house behind him.