The Fall of Neskaya (57 page)

How dare they? How dare they?
Fury pounded through her brain.

White-hot pain lanced through her temples. She staggered under its impact. Her breath came hot and ragged between clenched teeth. An invisible weight, crushing and inexorable, pressed in on her, brought her to her knees. Fingers digging into her scalp, she rocked back and forth. “Avarra—Dark Lady—help me!”

As if in response, memory flooded her. She had felt this searing pain in her skull once before, when Deslucido’s sorcerer led the attack on Acosta Castle. All that morning, the sensation of urgency had built and built. It ended at last in the compulsion spell to keep the gates locked. Until she realized what was happening, she had been as ensorceled as any of them.

Laran
attack!

Now as she clambered to her feet, she remembered the hours of restlessness through the afternoon, the vague aching which escalated into this headache. Wine had dulled it, but only for a time. Or perhaps that sense of well-being was part of the attack, designed to lull them all into complacency.

Another jolt sent her stumbling, tripping over the hem of her gown, clutching the tent pole to steady herself. She grabbed fistfuls of skirt and yanked them up, out of the way. Anger rushed through her—at Rafael, at Edric, at everyone in this loathsome camp. Her fingers twisted the fabric into knots. Adrenaline sizzled through her veins.

Taniquel bit down hard on her lower lip, using the pain to keep her thoughts clear. From inside the tent came a cry of inarticulate rage. There, within the pool of lantern light, Rafael and his paxman, Gerolamo, wrestled. They strained against each other, grappling, fists pounding. One of them bellowed curses—she could not be sure which, the voice was so distorted.

She dashed toward them, resisting the urge to snatch up an eating knife from the table and plunge it into the back of the nearer man.

“Stop it!” she screamed, but their roaring drowned her words. They were beyond hearing, beyond all reason.

The struggling men pivoted, scrambling for leverage and clawing at each other. As the light fell across them, she saw Gerolamo clench one huge hand around Rafael’s throat. The tendons of his fingers stood out with effort. Rafael’s face contorted. No sounds issued from his opened mouth. He staggered, arms flailing, eyes bulging.

Taniquel still held her skirts high off the ground. With all the power she could muster, she aimed a kick at Gerolamo’s back at kidney level.

“Yaaah!” Gerolamo howled. His back arched spasmodically. As his body tipped backward, his knees buckled slightly.

In a flash, Taniquel saw his hand loosen on Rafael’s neck. She pivoted and stamped down on the back of one bent knee just as Padrik had taught her, using her weight to drive downward. The knee gave way. Gerolamo’s body slammed into her, and she lost her balance, going down in a flurry of skirts.

Something struck the side of her head. Gerolamo’s fist, she thought. Her vision whirled sickeningly. She tried to sit up. His heavy body pinned her legs. For a moment, she thought he had shifted his attack to her. Then he rolled free and lunged once more at Rafael.

Taniquel scrambled to her feet, tangled in yards of silk but managing to stay upright. A hem ripped.

Rafael crouched in a fighter’s stance, sword held at ready. The lantern light burnished the steel to molten gold.

“Have done, traitor!” he rumbled.

“No!” Taniquel cried. “Uncle, no! It’s not Gero! This is Deslucido’s doing, this anger!”

He turned his face to her, his features congested with dark, wild light. “And as for you, little minx—”

Gerolamo rushed at him, unheeding the blade aimed at his heart. Taniquel threw herself at Gerolamo. She knocked him sideways. They both went down again. Gerolamo rolled on the carpet, clutching one shoulder, bellowing.

Taniquel rolled free. She must have shoved him safely out of the way. No mortally wounded man could make so much noise.

Gerolamo hauled himself to his feet, still holding his arm. Dark blood flowed over his fingers and down Rafael’s bright blade. Its pungent smell filled the tent.

“By all the gods, what have I done?” Rafael’s voice shook. His eyes blinked, like a man emerging from a nightmare. The sword dipped.

Gerolamo toppled to his knees in front of Rafael. “
Vai dom,
kill me now, I beg you. I do not deserve to live—to have laid hands on you—I tried to—”

“Oh, stop it, both of you!” Taniquel snapped. “We don’t have time for this! We’ve got to pull ourselves together. It was some kind of
laran
attack, don’t you see, that made us turn on each other. Who knows what Deslucido will try next?”

As if in reply, another invisible wave of the mental energy swept through the tent. This time, Taniquel felt it as a physical blow. She wavered on her feet. The men’s faces hardened, eyes gone cold. Before she could summon words, could remind them again that whatever they were feeling wasn’t real but only a sending from Deslucido’s sorcerers, Rafael shook his head and raised one hand. The starstone hidden in the folds of his shirt glimmered. He seemed to grow taller, straighter. She remembered that like all Hasturs, he had been tested for
laran
as a youth, and had trained, at least minimally, at a Tower.

Gerolamo fastened his eyes upon his lord as a drowning man toward the shore. His face paled and colored, but he held firm.

“Gero, get that arm bound up. Then find me. I will have need of you shortly,” Rafael said.

The glittery panic in Gerolamo’s eyes vanished. He did not flinch when Rafael turned and plunged into the night.

Gerolamo glanced down at the blood-smeared hand over his wound. “By the time I’ve knotted a kerchief over this, he’ll have half the camp organized.”

“Sit down. This will take only a moment.” Taniquel took the eating knife and slashed a long strip from her ripped hem. A few strokes cut away the worst of the bloodied shirt. Luckily, the cut was not deep and had bled freely at first. The blood was already beginning to clot. She poured the rest of the wine over it.

“Yow! Woman, that stings!”

“If you were a
cristoforo
, it would be just penance for your sins.” Taniquel wrapped the hem strip twice around his arm and knotted the ends, making it tight enough to compress the wound edges together and yet loose enough not to cut off circulation. “Off with you!” When he turned to say something, whether thanks or yet another apology, she shoved him bodily out of the tent.

T
aniquel stood alone in the tent. While she’d had something to do, some focus for her thoughts, she had been able to resist the relentless pressure. Now thoughts crowded in on her, pounded through her mind.

“NO!” A voice cried out, distorted but still recognizably a woman’s. She lowered her hands from her ears, with no memory of having covered them. It was her own voice.

“Merciful Evanda, mother of life, protect me!”

The cry, torn from her soul, brought a measure of respite. But in the end, she knew, as long as she had no better defense than her own weak prayers, the voices would win. She must fight the spell with action, just as she had at the gates of Acosta. Only this time, she must not be too late.

She strode to the opening of the tent and grasped the door flap. Outside, she heard the sounds of men struggling, steel clashing, screams and war cries. The darkness seethed with blood lust.

Her fingers dug into the canvas and for a heartbeat she could not move. Every instinct urged her to stay hidden, a rabbit-horn in a pack of wolves gone mad. What could she hope to accomplish out there? She had no weapon and poor skills to use any she might find. Would an attacker recognize her and hold his hand? There were men out there who had no loyalty to her, only to Rafael. They might well see her as the enemy, the way this spell warped men’s minds.

I am afraid,
the thought came to her, to be answered,
When has that made a difference? You were afraid when Deslucido cut down Padrik. You were afraid on the trail, in the frozen river. You were afraid to face Deslucido at the
Comyn
Council. Yet you did all these things and more. Do you claim to be a Queen? Then go out there and act like one!

Taniquel took a deep breath and stepped into the night. A stench like burning copper hung in the air. For an instant, she thought Deslucido’s men had already fallen upon the camp, catching them unawares. Tents had fallen into misshapen heaps between those which still stood like decrepit sentinels. Here and there, bodies lay in clumps of shadow, as if dead. She feared some of them were. Between them, in the aisles and around the campfires, men fought with anything they could lay hands on, whether rock or steel and their own bare fists. In mindless frenzy, they swung and stabbed, or grappled each other. She hurried past knots of soldiers where two or more cornered a single man, then turned on one another.

Where Rafael had passed, however, order prevailed, frenzy held in abeyance for the moment. Men were already setting the camp to rights, pulling apart those who were still fighting. A few sat groaning, heads in their hands. Aides ran along the aisles, shouting orders.

In a few moments, she reached the tent she shared with Graciela, but it was empty, undisturbed. She made her way to Edric’s tent, a short way distant. It too looked untouched. Inside, however, she found Edric and the others. They stood in a huddle, hands joined. Graciela, recognizable as the only woman, swayed on her feet like a willow in a storm.

Taniquel closed her eyes, trying to envision what she could not physically see. They’d linked somehow, forming a single unit with their minds. Wave after wave of madness battered the camp, but now she sensed a shield arising from the joined minds of the workers. It was thin, more veil than armor, but they were able to keep out the worst of it.

She stood irresolute for a time, wondering what she could do to help.
Domna
Caitlin had told her long ago that she had not enough
laran
to be worth training, but she no longer believed that. Had she not resisted Deslucido’s spells, first at Acosta Castle gates and now this night? Surely that must be of some value. But she did not know how to join with the others. She feared that if she spoke or touched one of them, disturbed their concentration, then the protective circle might shatter, leaving the entire camp vulnerable. Not even Rafael’s leadership could draw the men back together.

And no one knew when Deslucido’s armies would strike in earnest . . . They had to be ready.

Sounds came from outside the tent, toward the back—shouts, scuffling. Light flared, penetrating the canvas walls. In a moment of brightness, Taniquel saw the faces of the other workers, set with concentration. Blood trickled from a gash in one man’s forehead.

More lights from outside, more shouting. The voices sounded closer, almost on top of them. Still the
laran
workers stood, eyes closed, focused inwardly. Taniquel moved toward the door. As unthinking as the men under the spell were, they might smash into this tent as they had others. She must stop them. Maybe if she taunted them, lured them away . . .

A circle of fire points appeared on the tent fabric, low down. The dry cloth ignited instantly. Fire exploded up the wall, leaving gaping holes. Clumps of orange coals came hurling inside. Whatever they touched—carpet, furnishings—burst into flames. The tent wall blackened and fell away. The robe of one of the men burst into eye-searing white-yellow flames. He screamed and so did Graciela.

Taniquel grabbed the screaming man by both shoulders. It was Edric, his eyes wide and unfocused. He struggled in her grasp. Years of childhood scuffles with Padrik came back to her. She hooked one foot around the back of his knee, kicked back hard, and twisted his shoulders to break his balance. He went down heavily.

She snatched the carpet, praying she was near an edge, but could not get a hold. Her fingers touched something soft and loose—a blanket from one of the sleeping pallets. She pulled it over him, wrapping it as best she could. Her eyes streamed tears, half-blinding her.

The whole tent was on fire now. Within moments, it filled with smoke, dense and acrid. She could see only a few feet.

“Come on!” One of the other men, the one with the gash on his forehead, grabbed Taniquel’s arm and hauled her to her feet.

Together they dragged Edric through the tent door and let him fall on the bare earth beyond. Graciela knelt beside him, her starstone in her hand. It glowed with an eldritch blue light.

Two men in uniform appeared with buckets of water, which they threw over the collapsing tent. Their lips were drawn back over their teeth hard and tight, caught in a terrible rictus of effort. Taniquel shuddered, sensing how that awful pressure was even now shredding their self-control.

“We can’t face this!” she cried. “We must get the circle back!”

“Are you crazy?” In the last flickers of the tent fire, Graciela’s face contorted. “Edric’s burned too badly to focus. And we cannot do it without him. We barely held them as it was!”

Taniquel’s temper broke. She grabbed the younger woman’s arm and with a strength that surprised her, lifted her to her feet and shoved her in the direction of the two
laranzu’in.

“To Zandru’s icy hell with your
cannots!
You
will
do it! You will do it now!”

“
Vai domna—
” one of the men began. His shoulders sagged. “You do not understand. It is no use. The Ambervale army is but an hour away.”