The Keep of Fire (58 page)

It’s the Witches, Travis. One of their tasks is to watch for the one called Runebreaker
.

To watch for me, isn’t that what you mean, Grace?

Picking up another flask, he headed for the line of trees, deciding to give the brook another try.

“Do you need some help, Travis?”

He looked back at the blond knight and smiled. “Thanks, Beltan. I think I can manage.”

Travis continued on toward the brook. At least Beltan had not turned away from him. Or Grace, or Durge.

But maybe they should, Travis
.

His smile faded, and a tightness constricted his chest. Maybe Aryn and Lirith were the smart ones,
the ones who knew to avoid a monster when they saw one.

When he reached the brook, he set the flask on a boulder, then hopped to the other bank. It had been a long day of bouncing in the saddle, and he had yet to relieve himself since they had stopped. He slipped through the line of trees, and tendrils of fog wove themselves behind him.

Travis skidded down a slope—the loose rocks slick with moisture—then jerked to a halt at the bottom. Several stones rolled past him and went spinning into the mist. It was long seconds before he heard them strike far below him.

“I guess Beltan wasn’t kidding about cliffs in the fog.”

He reminded himself to warn the others of the precipice in case they ventured this way, then struggled with his hose and tunic. Add pants with zipper flies to the list of things he missed. Once finished, he cinched up the too-large clothes, then turned to start back up the slippery incline.

He had gone only a few steps when the lumpy outline of a tree stump loomed in the fog before him. Except Travis didn’t remember seeing any trees as he descended the slope. With a shrug, he started around the obstacle. Then a stray breath of wind stirred the mist, and Travis lurched to a halt.

“Hello, Master Wilder,” the stump said in a bright, bubbling voice. “It’s so very good to see you again.”

It took several thuds of Travis’s heart before he recognized the man—and not stump—who stood before him. “Master Eriaun!”

The short man took a step toward Travis. “How kind of you to remember me.”

Travis swallowed a metallic lump in his throat. There was something wrong about this. Master Eriaun had vanished from the tower after the failed
attempt to execute Travis. Why had he suddenly appeared here and now?

“What is it, Master Wilder? Are you not pleased to see an old friend?”

Travis had no idea what to say. It was Master Eriaun, yes, but he no longer seemed the plump, kindly runespeaker Travis remembered. Instead he was leaner, his cheeks sunken, as if some wasting disease had consumed his flesh. His gray robe was smeared with dirt, its hem ragged from trailing the ground, and his eyes were glittering pits in his face.

Eriaun moved forward once more, and this time Travis took an involuntary step back, toward the edge of the precipice hidden in the mist behind him. Eriaun frowned.

“Really, Master Wilder. I should think you would show me more gratitude. Do you not remember who it was that spoke runes over you when you were ill?” He grinned: a sickly expression. “Well, do not worry. I shall remind you, then.” He reached out with soiled hands.

Travis froze. He saw again the hands reaching out of the darkness of his delirium, and heard the voice hissing a single word. Yes, Eriaun had spoken runes over him. But not runes of healing.
Krond.…

“It was you! You gave me the fever in the Gray Tower.”

Eriaun bared his teeth. “Yes! I spoke the rune of fire over you, again and again.”

Travis fought for understanding. “But why?”

“Why else?” The runespeaker’s voice became a hiss. “I could not let you help the Runespeakers find a way to harm the
krondrim
. That is why my master sought me out at the Gray Tower, why he made me kneel before him and vow to serve. To watch for you. And to kill you when you came.”

Travis’s jaw worked, but he could make no sound.

“Only you would not burn. Instead you resisted
the rune of fire like none I have ever seen. But I have been following you, yes, and I have found you.” Eriaun’s hands turned into fists, and he thrust them over his head. “And now you will burn!”

Travis heard the sizzling first. Then, one by one, they appeared from the mist: three slender, sooty forms outlined in crimson light. Despite the wave of heat that rolled over him, Travis broke out in a chill sweat. He stumbled another step back down the slope. Stones clattered as they rolled away from his boots—then became silent as they tumbled into space. With slow, weaving motions, the Burnt Ones approached.

Eriaun’s grin broadened. “My master has grown interested in you, Master Wilder. He is curious about your talent with the Great Stones, and he thinks you might be made to help him. But I know he is wrong in this. I know that you are dangerous.” He stretched out a hand. “And that you must—”

“Travis?”

A tall figure, dim in the mist, appeared at the top of the slope, and a clear tenor called out again.

“Travis, are you down there?”

Eriaun changed the motion of his hand into a sharp jerk, and the
krondrim
turned and shambled up the slope. Fear filled Travis’s lungs like the mist.

“Beltan! Get out of here!”

His cry came too late. The Burnt Ones clambered toward the knight, leaving molten footprints behind them. Eyes wide, Beltan jerked his sword from its sheath just as the first of the
krondrim
drew close. Metal clanged off obsidian flesh. The Burnt One fell, rolled halfway down the slope—then staggered back to its feet and started up again.

The other two
krondrim
had reached the knight, but there wasn’t enough time for him to recover from his first swing. Instead he twisted awkwardly, took his sword in two hands, and with a roar used the flat
of the blade to batter both of the fiery creatures back. They fell, sliding down the incline, leaving trails of hot, glowing rock. Then, like the first, they lurched to their feet and started back toward the knight.

Travis’s heart ceased to beat. Beltan was hunched over his sword now, the tip of it planted in the ground. Pain wracked his face, and he clutched his side with a hand.

Eriaun let out a wheedling laugh. “Your friend is valiant, Master Wilder, but nobility is simply not good enough. The Burnt Ones will make ashes of him, and I shall do the same to you.” Eriaun’s fingers splayed apart.
“Krond.”

Instantly the air around Travis became an oven. He had only a second, perhaps less, to respond. He lifted a hand and spat out a word in reply.
“Reth!”

He felt the magic of Eriaun’s rune turn and rush away from him. Then, as if striking a wall, the magic stopped—and began to move again toward Travis. Sweat poured down his face, and his body went rigid. It was slower this time, but he could not stop it: The heat rose within him.

Eriaun’s lips peeled back from his teeth. “You see, Master Wilder? My master has made me strong. The runes I speak are not so easily broken now.”

Travis clenched his jaw as he fought to stave off Eriaun’s magic, but his hold was slipping. The air crackled around him, and the hairs on his arms shriveled and curled.

“Get back!”

Motion was impossible, but at the shout Travis managed to shift his eyes. On the slope above, Beltan swung his sword with one hand while gripping his side with the other. This time the
krondrim
dodged the clumsy blow. Beltan staggered. Then the Burnt Ones reached for him with dark hands.

Fury roared through Travis. No, he would not watch a friend burn, not again. He opened his mouth,
and this time when he spoke it was not just with his voice, but with Jack Graystone’s, and with a hundred other voices all speaking through him in a single, thundering chorus.

“RETH!”

Power hotter than any fire coursed through Travis. The wall of Eriaun’s magic shattered like spun glass, and the runespeaker’s eyes flew wide.

“But my master …”

The words were lost as Eriaun burst into flame. With a shriek the runespeaker threw himself at Travis, scrabbling with burning hands. Travis stepped aside. Eriaun stumbled forward, over the edge of the precipice. Like a blazing comet, he plunged into the twilight below. Then both fire and scream were extinguished.

Travis turned and ran up the slope toward Beltan, then halted in mid-stride. The Burnt Ones pulled their hands back from the knight. As one, they curled their bodies into balls and flung themselves down the incline. They bounced over the precipice, following their master into the depths below.

“Travis …”

He looked up to see Beltan stagger toward him. But the knight shouldn’t be moving, not now. Travis ran to him. He started to reach out to help his friend—

—then pulled his hand back. Even in the gloom Travis could see the ripples of heat distortion rising from his own body. The heat of Eriaun’s rune, and that of the rune of breaking Travis had spoken, still radiated from him.

“Travis, are you all right?”

Was he? He didn’t know, but he nodded all the same. “I’m fine, Beltan.”

Despite the gloom, Beltan’s green eyes shone, and while pain registered on his broad visage, there was something else: an intensity Travis couldn’t quite name.

“I came when you didn’t return after a time. But if I had known what was happening I would have come sooner. By Vathris, I … I should have …”

Beltan shook his head, and Travis tried to speak, but the heat in him fused muscle to bone.

“I’ll never leave you again, Travis. By my blood, I swear it.” The pain vanished from Beltan’s face, replaced by calm. “I never thought I could tell you this, that you were as far above me as the sun, but now I know that Melia was right, that I have to say it. Because ever since that day I first saw you in the ruins of Kelcior, I …”

The roar of fire filled Travis’s skull, drowning out Beltan’s words. What was the knight saying? Travis couldn’t hear. Then Beltan reached for him, and horror filled Travis’s chest. If the knight touched him now, before he had had a chance to cool, Travis knew Beltan would burn.

“Get away from me!”

Travis didn’t mean the words to be a shout, but it was all that could get past the roaring inside him.

Beltan froze. His face went white, and the light vanished from his eyes, but he did not pull back.

Travis was shaking now. “I said get away from me!”

Now Beltan snatched his hand back, and his eyes became dull and flat. The din of the fire was beginning to recede. Travis could just make out Beltan’s softly spoken words.

“I see now. It was wrong of me to burden you like this, Goodman Travis. I am so sorry. You must forget I ever said these things.”

That he ever said what things? Travis didn’t understand, but something had happened—something terrible. Beltan’s cheerful face was now as lifeless as stone. He opened his mouth, but Beltan had already turned away, and before Travis could speak another voice called out from above.

“Travis! Beltan! By the gods, what’s happened?”

A figure stepped from a bank of mist. Falken. More shadows appeared behind him. The others were there as well.

Beltan staggered, gripping his side. “Ask Travis.”

Grace and Lirith rushed to the blond knight, and he slumped against them.

Travis shook his head, wishing he understood. But he was cooling—the sweat no longer rose like steam from his skin. He could talk to Beltan later. Licking parched lips, he started up the slope to tell the others about Eriaun.

Grace only half heard Travis’s story as she examined him, making certain he had not been injured in the struggle with Eriaun and the
krondrim
. His tunic was singed in places, and he had lost much of the hair on his arms, but as she ran her fingers over him experience and instinct told her that he was all right. She gave Travis a nod of reassurance, then moved to the tall, fair-haired knight who sat on the bank of the tree-lined brook.

“Beltan?”

He had been hunched over, but now he looked up at her and grinned. “Grace.”

As bright as his smile was, she could see right through it.
He’s in agony. That’s why he’s sitting here, away from the others. He can’t stand, and he doesn’t want them to see
.

She knelt beside him. “Here, let me.”

At first he resisted, holding his arm in close to protect his left side, then she gave him a stern look, and he let her pull his arm away. With practiced motions she reached under his tunic and probed with
cool fingers. Beltan sucked in a hissing breath, his body rigid. She kept examining. The wound hadn’t reopened, but she would have given her little finger for a portable X-ray so she could see if there had been tearing internally.

But there is a way you can see, Grace
.

Before she lost her nerve, she reached out with the Touch. As she had at Falanor green and the bridge over the Dimduorn, she avoided her own thread, instead grasping the shining golden strand she knew to be Beltan’s. Quickly she probed the weakness in his abdomen. Yes, there had been a small amount of internal bleeding, but the flow had already ceased. He was out of danger. She started to release his thread—

—and saw the shadow just on the edge of vision. Fear clenched her heart. Had she grasped her own thread by mistake? But no, the shadow was smaller and fainter than the one she knew to be her own, and it was not to her thread that it was attached. It was attached to Beltan’s. She peered closer. Something moved in the heart of the shadow: two bloody hands slipping from the hilt of a dagger.

“Grace?”

The thread slipped through her fingers. She blinked, mundane vision returning.

Beltan raised an eyebrow. “What is it, Grace?”

She pulled down his tunic. “Your muscles are still weak where they were torn by the
feydrim
. That means you could easily injure them again. I think you’ll be all right this time, but that might not be the case if you do this again. I know it’s not easy in your line of work, but I need you to be careful.”

“I’m sorry, Grace.”

“Apology accepted.” She brushed his white-blond hair back from his high forehead. “You’ve got to take care of yourself, Beltan of Calavan. I need you here. We all do.”