The Red Wyvern: Book One of the Dragon Mage (14 page)

“He wasn’t trying to trick me,” Lilli said. “He was as surprised as I was.”

“Ah.” Brour considered this for a long moment. “Still, you’d best not scry again tonight. He’ll be looking for you. It’s too dangerous.”

“What?” Merodda snapped. “But the omens—”

“Will have to wait,” Brour said. “It’s too dangerous, my lady. Truly it is. I’ll gladly explain.”

“Do so.” Merodda turned to Lilli. “Leave us.”

When Lilli hesitated, Merodda raised a ringed hand. Lilli left and hurried down the corridor to her chamber. Once safely inside, she went to the window—the floor was soaked with rain, but outside the storm had ended. Overhead a pale moon seemed to race through the sky as torn clouds scudded past.

“He looked kind,” Lilli whispered. “Truly kind. If he’s the sort of man Cerrmor has on his side—”

She shook her head to drive the traitorous thoughts away.

Yet that night she dreamt about Cerrmor, or some dream image of it, at any rate, since she’d never been there, and of Nevyn, who seemed to be trying to find her in the middle of a vast maze of stone walls and hedgerows both. When she woke to a flood of sunlight across her bed, the dream stayed with her. She dressed and was just thinking of looking for Brour when he knocked at her door.

“It’s me,” he called out. “Are you there, Lilli?”

“I am.” She unbarred the door. “Come in. I’ve had the oddest dream.”

“I thought you might.”

Brour hurried in, then shut the door behind him. His round child’s face was pale and stubbled, as if he’d waked all night.

“What’s so wrong?” Lilli said.

“A number of small things that all add up to trouble. Nevyn spotting you, and then your dear mother’s lack of sense. She refuses to stop this dangerous scrying.”

“Dangerous because of Nevyn?”

“Just so. If he makes a link with you, he’ll be able to spy through your eyes.”

“Well, it’s not like I know very much about the king’s plans.”

“You’d be surprised what you know without knowing you know it.” Brour smiled briefly. “What troubles my heart is a selfish fear, though. I don’t want Nevyn tracking me down.”

“Oh. Why not?”

Brour’s eyes blinked rapidly; then he shrugged.

“I was a cursed poor student,” he said. “And I left before I truly should have.”

Lilli hesitated, hearing pain in his voice. Something more than that had gone wrong, she suspected—something too shameful for Brour to admit.

“It was all a long time ago.” Brour paced over to the window, paced back again. “But I’ve made up my mind. Once we work the ritual and find the bolthole, I’m leaving Dun Deverry.”

“Oh, don’t go!”

“I’m sorry, but I can’t stay here. Your mother and uncle have grown suspicious of me for some reason, and they’ll kill me when the time seems ripe. You remember the omen of my head in a chest? Well, I’m sure it was quite true. I was hoping to win your uncle round by finding the bolthole, but now I think I’ll just leave by it. Safer all round. Then once I’m gone, you can tell Burcan about it, and you’ll get the gain and favor.”

“My thanks. But I wish you weren’t going.”

“You could come with me.”

Lilli gasped and laid her hand at her throat.

“Just think about it,” Brour said. “My offer is strictly honorable. I’ll treat you like my daughter. Come with me and be my apprentice. And save your skin, too, when this miserable dun falls to the enemy.”

Lilli felt the blood pound in her throat.

“I’ve got to get back to your lady mother.” Brour looked as if he might spit at the mention of her name. “But think on it, Lilli. I beg you.”

After he left, Lilli wandered over to the window. For a long time she stared out at the many-towered view without truly seeing it. She had a decision to make, and for the first time in her life, she couldn’t go running to Bevva with it.

Over the past few days, Merodda had become more and more aware of Lady Bevyan’s growing influence over the young queen. Abrwnna included Bevyan in every royal progress through the town and every hawking party, visit to the temples, or special evening meal in the royal hall. At times, when Merodda went up to the women’s quarters, she would find Bevyan there alone, listening to one of the queen’s rambling conversations.

“I was glad at first,” Merodda remarked to Brour. “Abrwnna can be a tiresome little thing.”

“Indeed, my lady? But you’re not pleased now?”

“Well, I don’t want to see myself displaced in the queen’s favor.”

“Ah. That would be a great loss, truly.”

Merodda considered him for a long moment. His head bent over his work, he was writing out a proclamation of Lilli’s betrothal for the heralds. She would regret his death when Burcan killed him, but Burcan’s favor was the center of her life, the one thing she desperately needed, far beyond even the favor of the queen. If he wanted Brour gone, then gone he’d be. Brour stuck his reed pen into a hole in the side of his ink pot, then picked up a handful of sand from a tray beside him and sprinkled it over wet words.

“What do you think of Bevyan?” Merodda said.

“I rather like her, my lady, from what little I know of her, but I don’t know much at all.”

“Well, true spoken.” She hesitated, wondering what she wanted him to say. “It’s of no matter. Tonight I’ll be in the queen’s quarters, attending upon her highness. If anyone else wishes to see me, they’ll have to wait.”

“Very good, my lady.”

Brour picked up the sheet of parchment and tipped the sand back into its tray, then laid it down and got back to work.

That evening Merodda tried to reach the queen’s side early, but it seemed that the entire court was conspiring against her. As she made her way from the great hall, one person after another stopped her—servants asking for orders, lords hoping to wangle some favor from the regent, ladies wanting to chat, a page with a message from Burcan. By the time she reached the women’s hall Bevyan was there ahead of her, sitting at Abrwnna’s side on a footstool while the queen lounged in a cushioned chair. Her maidservants were laying a little fire in the hearth and lighting candles, while two serving women sang a song of love, trading off verses, and a third played a clumsy harp, all to keep the queen amused.

In vain, that—Abrwnna was scowling. When Merodda came in, she turned her head to acknowledge her, then waved a hand at the music-makers.

“Oh don’t!” Abrwnna snapped. “I hate that song.”

The music stopped. The singers glanced at each other, then arranged smiles. The would-be harpist looked close to tears.

“This is all unbelievably tedious.” Abrwnna lay back with her head resting on the chair and stared at the ceiling. “I think I’m going to die of boredom.”

“Well, Your Highness,” Bevyan said. “We could play a game of carnoic or wooden wisdom.”

“I’m sick of games.”

“Your Highness?” the lass with the harp said. “If your husband the king joined us, we could have a proper bard come in to entertain.”

“I don’t want my beastly husband here. He sucks his thumb when he listens.”

All the women glanced sideways at each other. Merodda found an empty chair and sat down. Their tasks done, the maidservants scurried away.

“I want to go for a walk in the night air,” Abrwnna announced.

“Very well, Your Highness,” Bevyan said. “We’ll all have a nice stroll in the gardens.”

“I don’t want anyone to come with me.”

“Your Highness!” Merodda broke in. “That would be most unwise.”

“I don’t care if it’s unwise or not! I want to be alone.”

The serving women all began talking at once, but Bevyan rose, faced Abrwnna, and caught the lass’s glance with hers.

“My poor dear child,” Bevyan said. “I know how unbelievably dreadful this all is. My heart aches for you. I can hear in your voice just how tired and lonely and frightened you are.”

“Well, I am, and all of those things!” Abrwnna seemed on the edge of tears. “When we were riding today, I just wanted to turn my horse and gallop away, just ride off somewhere and be lost. Anything would be better than another summer of this beastly war.”

Merodda felt a sudden chill—so! Bevyan had been riding with the queen, while she’d been left behind.

“Well, we can all understand that.” Bevyan sat again, but she turned the footstool so the queen could see her face. “But you feel it much more keenly than any of us.”

“I’m just so tired,” Abrwnna whispered. “It’s just not fair.”

“It’s not, truly,” Bevyan said. “We did ride such a long way today. Shall I comb out your hair for you? And then perhaps you can sleep. The morning will bring the sun and better things.”

“I’d like that.” Abrwnna turned to one of the women. “Fetch my combs for me.”

While Bevyan combed the queen’s hair, she kept up a flow of chatter in her soft, dark voice that soothed the queen the way stroking will soothe a frightened cat. She allowed Bevva to lead her to her bedchamber, too, and tuck her in. When Merodda left the women’s hall that night, she wondered if everyone she met could smell her fear—it seemed to trail behind her like smoke. To be supplanted this way! How could she possibly allow it?

Out in the deserted broch Lilli and Brour were ready at last to work the ritual of evocation. At each of the four directions stood a candle lantern which Brour lit from a fifth. In one curve of the wall lay a couple of cloth sacks—supplies, he said. On the floor he’d drawn a big circle with flour.

“It’s a bit wobbly, isn’t it?” Brour said, frowning at the mark. “Well, the circle that really matters is the one I’ll visualize, anyway.”

Lilli sat down cross-legged in the center of the circle, facing their approximate east. Brour had brought a big pottery bowl for her scrying; they didn’t dare risk Merodda noticing that the silver basin had gone missing. He filled it with ink from a leather bottle and set it down in front of her.

“Very well,” he said. “Are you ready?”

“I am.” Lilli took a deep breath to steady her nerves. “Let’s begin.”

Brour stood directly in front of her, again facing east, and raised his arms high above his head. For a moment he gathered breath; then he began to chant in an odd vibrating growl of a voice. The words themselves meant nothing to her; they were Greggyn, she supposed, or some other ancient tongue. From his telling, however, she knew that he was invoking the Light that dwelt beyond the gods and drawing it down into himself to give power for the working.

He lowered his arms till they were straight out from his shoulders and chanted again, waited, then let his arms drop. To Lilli it seemed that the room had suddenly become larger—and crowded. Although she could hear nothing but Brour’s hard breathing, she felt that the room buzzed with life and noise, like the great hall on some state occasion. Brour held out one hand as if he were holding a sword and began to chant again. As he growled out the sacred words, he slowly turned, east to south to west to north and east again, drawing a circle of blue light out on the astral plane—or so he’d told her. Again, she could see nothing of this, but all at once she realized that the stone walls of the broch shimmered in a faint silvery light, as if some reflection of the magic had come through to her sight.

“I invoke thee!” Brour began to intone in Deverrian. “I call unto thee! O Great King of the Element of Earth, I invoke thee into my presence! Show thyself and be known, in the names of the great sigils of the elements and the Lords of Light!”

Brour turned toward the north, and Lilli twisted round so that she could see. The candle lantern set there threw a mottled pillar of light up the stone wall, at first no different than any of the others in the room.

“I invoke thee! Lord of Earth and the North, home of the greatest darkness, come to me and show thyself!”

The mottles of golden light on the wall suddenly swelled and ran together to form a blazing pillar. Lilli gasped; as the light brightened, it changed color to glowing silver. Within the pillar of light a figure was forming, man-shaped though strangely slender. It stayed cloudy, shifting with the dancing of the light, yet it seemed far more substantial than a shadow. A faint greenish-grey light rippled across its body, if one could call it a body, while a russet glow formed behind its head. Its feet stood upon a sphere of polished black. Lilli heard words form in her mind and knew that this Other had sent them.

“What do you want of me, Child of Earth?”

“A question answered and one only, O Great Lord.” Brour spoke aloud. “I know full well how honored I am that thou hast answered my call.”

In the pillar the figure inclined its head. Lilli somehow felt that it was amused at Brour’s presumption.

“What wish you to know, Child of Earth?”

“Deep within thy realm of earth and stone that lies under this dun and its outbuildings, there is a tunnel leading from the dun to somewhere beyond its walls and the walls of the city that surrounds it. We wish to know where it lies.”

The figure inclined its head toward Lilli.

“Look! Child of Aethyr, look into your basin!”

Lilli followed orders. On the black surface of the ink pictures began forming: a gate in a wall, a narrow path between walls of stone, a broken tower standing in a cobbled ward. Behind that tower she saw wooden doors set into the earth.

“A root cellar?” She couldn’t contain herself. “It’s in a root cellar? You’re certain?”

Brour yelped in fear. She felt the King of Earth’s laughter wash over her and looked up at the greenish-grey figure in his pillar of silver light. He did seem to be laughing, truly.

“We are certain, little one. You will find what you seek under those doors. Now fare thee well. Sorcerer! Release me!”

“I shall, Great King of Earth,” Brour said. “And my thanks for thy aid in this matter.”

Brour flung his arms into the air and began to chant. With each alien word the silver light dimmed until at last nothing remained but the normal yellow light of a candle flame dancing in a pierced lantern. With one hand raised to hold the astral sword, Brour turned toward the east. Chanting, he erased the circle of blue fire, then walked to the west and rubbed out part of the flour-marked circle with one foot.

“May all spirits bound by this ceremony go free!” Brour called out. “It is over!”