The Path of Flames (Chronicles of the Black Gate Book 1) (33 page)

Trying not to let despair swamp him, he placed his hands on a mangonel and gazed out over the silvered lake. “You’ve always wanted adventure,” he whispered to himself. “Well, Audsley, my boy, you’ve finally got all that you could have asked for, and more. If only your friends back at Nous could see you now!”

A winged shape flew up out of the gloom at him, and Audsley almost let out a shriek before realizing it was his firecat. Aedelbert landed on the battlement, stalked quickly toward him and sat, presenting his back to the Magister to indicate his displeasure.

“Oh, I am sorry,” said Audsley, reaching out to run his palms gently over Aedelbert’s delicately feathered wings. He found the firecat’s favorite spot, just below where his left wing connected with his shoulder, and gave it a good scritch. Aedelbert fought to remain aloof, then gave a sulky
mrkao
and turned to run up Audsley’s shoulder and wrap around his neck.

“I know,” Audsley said. “But we’re together, which is something, and I promise to take care of you if you’ll take care of me. Is it a deal?”

He stopped. In the very far distance, high above, something flitted across the face of the moon. He gripped the battlements, steadying himself as he strained to make out the shape. A bat? Not at that distance. No, it was something fell and vast. Audsley felt terror rise up within him. What had that been? Where, by the Ascendant’s love for humanity, had the Raven’s Gate taken them?

CHAPTER TWENTY

Kethe shouldered her pack roughly and fought the urge to shiver. The wind off the lake seemed to pierce her hauberk and leathers with no difficulty. Still, she’d rather die before showing any sign of weakness before Ser Tiron.

Ser
. That title was a mockery. She watched him as he stood beside her mother, calm and sure of himself as if he belonged out here and not rotting in a hole. She’d spent the whole evening seething, waiting for a chance to corner her mother and demand an explanation, but then their world had imploded. Roddick. Kyferin Castle. Lord Laur. It was hard to believe. Her mind leaped from one thought to another, intense emotions washing through her without rhyme or reason: grief, panic, hatred, anger, fear. Exhaustion undercut it all; she’d expected a night of deep sleep after today’s combat. Instead they’d been cast into perdition—with Tiron, her very own personal demon.

Flames appeared high up on the Hold’s walls, and Ser Wyland called down that all seemed clear. The group stirred, grabbing packs and gear, and Kethe stalked forward. A strange sensation stopped her and she turned to eye the lake. The dark waters were still. Nothing disturbed their surface but the passage of the wind, but a different kind of shiver ran down her spine. For a moment she’d felt watched, and her skin had crawled with the sensation. Clenching her jaw and swallowing, she resisted the urge to draw her sword. There was no way she was going to appear like a foolish girl. Instead, she turned and hurried through the gate into the central courtyard. There, her mother was giving commands with quiet assurance. They would all camp together in the ruined great hall, where she had set the grooms to building a fire and tasked the undercook Jekil to heating some wine for the group.

Kethe stood to one side. As angry as she was, she had to admire her mother’s calm. Outside their group had been on the verge of falling apart, and now people were moving with purpose, gathering fallen wood for the fire, clearing away the plants and weeds that had grown up through the cracks in the stone, laying out blankets, piling up their belongings.

Ser Wyland descended from above and smacked his hands together loudly as if anticipating a delicious meal. Striding forward, he beamed at everyone and stopped before the small fire. “Come on, boys, let’s build this one nice and high. I think we could all use a little light tonight. And how else are we going to roast that whole boar that Magister Audsley brought us?”

Audsley, plump and diffident, gaped at Ser Wyland, and laughter broke out amongst the servants. Kethe couldn’t help but smile as well, but then she thought of Roddick and her smile disappeared. She dumped her pack against the wall and hugged herself. What were they going to do? Molder here until Roddick turned eighteen?

Sparks flared up as several large planks were dumped across the fire, and the crackle and spit of the flames cheered her despite her resentment. Fire in the dark. Was there anything more primal?

The Hold’s great hall was barely larger than the Lord’s Hall; while one corner was now lit by a warm glow, the rest was shifting shadows, with thin beams of moonlight sliding down through chinks in the wall and gaps in the ceiling above. The cold was brutal, and she was terribly aware of the dark waters only a dozen paces from the Hold’s wall outside.

Her mother was moving amongst those who had chosen to follow her, touching a shoulder here, sparing a kind word there. Kethe would be last, she knew, so she moved over to where Audsley was sitting on a roll of blankets and staring into the fire, absent-mindedly scratching behind the ears of his firecat, lips pursed. He glanced up at her in surprise, and then smiled and patted the roll next to him.

Pushing the hilt of her sword down so that its tip rose as she sat, she stared into the fire and watched as the flames licked up the desiccated boards hungrily. “Magister Audsley. Thank you for coming.”

Audsley gave an awkward shrug. “Well, but of course. Where goes Lady Kyferin, there go I. Or something along those lines. And who else would see to it that you continued your lessons?” He smiled at her, then looked back at the flames.

“Mythgræfen Hold.” She said the name softly, almost to herself. “To think we’re actually here. There was a time when I was little that I very much wanted to escape through the Raven’s Gate.” She pursed her lips. “I was unhappy, I suppose. Father yelled at me. It’s the one time I was truly scared of him.” She paused, considering. “Well, one of the few times. I never made it through, obviously. But I came close, once.”

She thought of that night, Brocuff hauling her kicking and screaming down to her father, and the month-long confinement to her room that had followed, along with the selling of her pony and the giving away of her pet hound.

“I’m glad you failed,” said Audsley quietly. “To think.”

Kethe nodded. “But coming through tonight, I realized that I know about the same that I did as a child. Children’s tales. It’s always just been here. But why? Why does the Raven’s Gate lead to this island, and why did we build a castle here?”

Such basic questions. How had she settled for nursery tales and unquestioning acceptance for so long?

“Well, those are wonderful questions,” said Audsley, interlacing his fingers over his stomach and leaning forward with a frown. His spectacles caught the firelight, and for a moment they flashed an opaque white. “Lunar Gates are rare and wondrous things. Their origin dates back centuries and centuries, to the Age of Wonders. Nobody knows why they were built, really. Why does one connect a cave to a stonecloud, and so forth? A fascinating if frustrating field of study.”

Audsley subsided into thought. Kethe was used to his diversions, however, and waited patiently. Aedelbert scooted forward to the edge of the fire and inhaled a tongue of flame, hissing it in and then edging back, a puff of smoke emerging from its muzzle as it purred contentedly.

“Now, you assume your ancestors built the Raven’s Gate to connect them to Mythgræfen Hold. A natural assumption, but is it a correct one? The records go back centuries, and I’ve read most of them, though the language grows stranger the further back you go. There was a time when the curtain wall was just logs with sharpened tips, and—well, never mind.” He gave her an apologetic smile. “Kyferin Keep is old. Terribly old. It predates the Unification, and as far as I can tell, your family has always held it. But Mythgræfen Hold is even older. I believe your family originated here, and eventually made its way to Kyferin Castle. Why? I don’t know. As for the original purpose of the Hold, well…” He shivered and hunched his shoulders. “It must have something to do with the destruction that was visited upon it each time your family tried to defend its walls. Whatever that purpose was, it’s not been observed in centuries.”

Kethe stared into the crackling heart of the fire and fought the urge to shiver as well. “And nobody knows? What attacks the castle and kills everyone?”

Audsley frowned and shook his head slowly. “There was a purging of your castle’s accounts ninety-nine years ago, during the reign of the Seventh Ascendant. Lamentable, though fortunately not complete. Your great-great-grandfather apparently was driven mad with grief after losing the Hold. It is said that his son wore the mantle of the Virtue Akinetos and led the forces that protected the Hold. That for three nights he fought against a mysterious force that assailed the castle’s walls, and despite his strength and ability to cleave the tops off mountains, he fell. His father cursed the Hold and ordered the records cleansed of all knowledge as to its history and purpose. He intended that nobody return, and nobody ever did.”

This time Kethe did shiver and hugged herself tightly. “Great. Now we’re trapped here for a month, at least. And none of us can cleave the top off a hill, much less a mountain. Just wonderful.”

Audsley gave her a lopsided smile. “With a little luck, whatever doom has been visited upon Mythgræfen Hold won’t notice we’re here. We’ll stay quiet, figure out a way to get back, and slip away before anybody comes knocking. Or tearing down portcullises. Right?”

“Right,” said Kethe, but without conviction. “Though I doubt Lord Laur has any interest in letting us return. And you know he’ll have the Raven’s Gate blockaded in case we try to force a return.”

Audsley nodded morosely. “Yes, I think you’re right.” Suddenly he sat up again. “You know, I heard the strangest thing before we left. Actually, I should tell your mother. I’ve been meaning to. But, you understand, with all this change…” He stood. “Lady Kyferin?”

Her mother was talking quietly with Brocuff and Ser Wyland, but she looked over, an eyebrow raised. “Yes?”

“A word.” Audsley gave an apologetic smile. “It might be important.”

Lady Kyferin nodded. “In fact, we should all talk. Why don’t you join me over here. Ser Wyland, Ser Asho? Brocuff, please ask Ser Tiron to join us.”

“Mother.” Kethe strode to her side and took her arm, her voice a hiss. “Ser Tiron? What are you thinking?”

Iskra looked pained and reluctant. “Oh, Kethe. I owe you an apology. I haven’t found time to talk to you as I’ve wanted to since he revealed himself.”

“You’ve had time to talk to everybody from the grooms to the undercook.”

“Kethe.” Her mother exhaled. “Do you understand how much danger we’re in? How much we owe these people for following us out here?”

Kethe hated feeling like a sulking child, but she spoke anyway. “I can’t believe I have to explain myself. I’m your daughter. He tried to kill me. Why by the Black Gate didn’t you tell me?”

Iskra’s eyes narrowed at the curse. “I vowed I wouldn’t tell a soul till he was ready.”

“You vowed? To him? But why?” Kethe felt tears sting her eyes. This was so unfair. Why was her mother discounting his obvious monstrosity and evil? Why was she talking so rationally about this, as if he were the equal of Ser Wyland?

“We need him,” said her mother. “Now, more than ever. I will use every tool at my disposal to regain what we have lost. Do you mark me, Kethe?
Every
tool, including Ser Tiron. You have to understand. We need him.”

Kethe released her arm as if she’d been stung. “Need him?
Him?
To do what? Butcher us in our sleep?”

Her mother gazed at her with such compassion and pity and regret that Kethe had to look away. “I will talk to you about this. There are parts of this story that you do not know, that your father and I hid from you. I do not deny your anger, but I must look to our survival. Please, Kethe. Trust me. Wait, and I will tell you as soon as I can why I have done this.”

Kethe scowled and looked away. She had nothing to offer to her mother, nothing but her simmering fury.

A few minutes later they were seated in a small circle to one side, a new, albeit smaller fire burning merrily between them. Kethe steadfastly ignored Ser Tiron and kept her gaze on her mother, who was the only one to remain standing. Lady Kyferin waited till they had all settled and then took a half-step forward, which drew everyone’s attention as effectively as if she’d clapped her hands.