War of Wizards (29 page)

“Kallia,” Whelan began, and emotion choked his voice. The grim, determined warrior king was gone, replaced by a worried husband. “She must be all right. If Toth had gone for her . . . Kallia must have fought him off. Right?”

Markal didn’t know. A new worry had been weighing on his mind since Toth escaped them in the Dark Citadel. Toth hadn’t seemed defeated, he’d seemed triumphant. He’d boasted about his wights conquering Balsalom. Markal could only think he meant Kallia and the child within her.

Two captains rode up with another report, and Markal was spared the need to explain his worries as the king was forced to attend to his men. Markal joined Narud, Sofiana, and the knights from the Dark Citadel assault in following Whelan through the open gates and onto the field of battle. They found Hoffan’s mounted force, and Whelan ordered the mountain lord to organize the chaotic battlefield.

They couldn’t celebrate, not yet. The wounded lay groaning across the plain, there were prisoners to attend to, and Whelan wanted foot soldiers kept out of the city. He’d already given orders that Veyre was not to be sacked, but such instructions were easily forgotten and ignored in the flush of victory.

It was almost dawn, and a gray light suffused the horizon far over the sea. Markal glanced skyward, looking for a last glimpse of danger. The cloud kingdoms had begun to drift away. They’d never intervened, never acted to change the course of the battle, curse them.

No sign of a dragon, thank the Brothers. Griffins circled the battlefield several hundred yards to the north. Something or someone on the ground held their attention.

Markal turned his horse and rode to investigate.

#

Markal found the dragon. It had fallen in the middle of what had been a farm. The ground had been churned in the fight, the house and its outbuildings burned to the ground. Little was left but a stone well, its top crushed by the monster’s fall, and a smoldering chimney from the farmhouse.

Spears and arrows without number pierced the dragon’s hide. A sword stuck out of one of its nostrils, and a broken lance jutted from its eye. One of its wings had been nearly severed, and relentless attacks had opened its ribs and hacked into its belly, where fire still smoldered, leaking a sulfurous stench. The beast was terrible to behold even in death, but Markal couldn’t help but feel sorrow as he studied it. What rage drove it to such destruction? Did it feel fear when enemies finally swarmed it in numbers too great to resist?

Yet the monster had extracted a terrible vengeance even in defeat. Dead men and animals lay burned and gashed: knights, footmen, archers, horses, and griffins, their bodies torn apart.

Two griffins pawed the ground nearby, tossing their heads and screaming as men tried to approach. One was a white griffin, the other, Daria’s tamed golden griffin, a big, intimidating beast that was diminished only in relation to the enormous dragon a few feet away. A woman with a long, dark braid stood with the griffins. She held a sword and stood over a body, snarling at anyone attempting to approach.

Markal took in the golden griffin, the woman—she was Daria’s mother, Palina—and the body, and his heart sank. It could only be the young flockheart. She had defeated the dragon, but at the cost of her own life.

How will I tell Darik?
 

One of the Eriscoban soldiers spotted Markal. “It’s the griffin queen. We tried to help, but they won’t let us near.”

Hope rose in Markal’s breast. Was Daria alive? His horse tossed her head and refused to go any closer, so he dismounted and approached on foot.

“Stay back!” Palina snapped.

“It’s me, Markal.”

“Oh, yes. Come, then. She is . . . I don’t know if anything can be done.” Anguish tore at Palina’s voice.

The griffins shrieked at Markal, but he spoke a few soothing words, and they calmed. They keened softly as he approached the young woman at their feet.

Daria groaned. She had her hands to her face. She didn’t seem to be bleeding, and she was kicking her feet as if in terrible pain, so she couldn’t have broken her back in a fall. Maybe it was nothing more than cracked ribs, thank the Brothers.

Markal dropped to his knees. “Where are you hurt?”

“Markal? Is that you?”

Daria lowered her hands. Markal drew in his breath. Her beautiful face was burned, the skin black and peeling. Her eyes were weeping, ruined. She stank of dragon blood—it must have splashed her eyes and face. Palina looked down at her daughter. There was grief and fear in her expression.

“Yes, it’s me,” Markal said gently. “You did it, you defeated the dragon.”

“Is the battle over?”

“Yes. The dark wizard has been defeated.”

“Do you think Darik—”

“Shh. Not now. Let me help you.”

Daria groaned again. “I’m scared, Markal.”

“Shh.”

Markal had withered his hands in the final struggle with the dark wizard, and they were still so badly injured that he’d needed help getting back into the saddle when they finished at the Dark Citadel. He couldn’t heal Daria, but he did have the ability to ease her pain.

He whispered a few words. She sighed, and she stopped kicking her feet.

“Is that better?” he asked.

“Better.” Daria drew a deep breath. “It still hurts, but I can bear it now. You can go. I hear the cries of the wounded. They are suffering terribly.”

“There are others to help, and I am drained of magic. Let me find Narud.”

“Markal?” She turned toward him, and Markal had to look away from her ruined face. “Do you think Narud might help me?” Daria lifted trembling fingers toward her eyes, but they stopped just short. She wasn’t talking about the pain or scarring.

“I don’t know,” he admitted.

#

“Her injuries are still fresh,” Narud murmured. “That is something.”

It was now late afternoon, nearly ten hours after Markal had found Daria wounded on the battlefield. Neither the young woman’s mother nor the griffins would allow her to be moved, so she remained where she was, under an open sky, lifted onto a blanket, but otherwise undisturbed. Her wounds looked horrible, seeping, and the burns kept them from being bandaged.

The two wizards stood a hundred feet away from her, looking toward the little encampment. Griffins still circled protectively overhead, and Palina had demanded that any flatlanders be kept far away from her daughter and the fallen dragon. Only the wizards were allowed to approach.

Markal looked down at his hands. They’d begun to heal, especially the left. “I can do something about her face. Begin it healing, encourage the skin to grow whole and pink again. There’s no need for her to be scarred. It’s the eyes that worry me. Those, I cannot fix.”

“Yes, the eyes.” Narud frowned and shook his head. “Anyone else, I might be able to do it. Not to restore the vision entirely, but a little bit. Like an old woman, her eyes clouded by age—it would be better than absolute blindness. But not the eyesight of a griffin rider. That is beyond me.”

“Beyond me, too.” Markal chewed worriedly on his lip. “If you can’t do it, nobody can. I suppose there’s no other choice. Do the best you are able. Let her tell light from dark, at least.”

Daria would be unable to fly, but maybe she could stay with Darik and follow him as he trained in wizardry—or trained with Whelan and the Knights Temperate, should he follow the path of the sword, instead. Yet the thought of Daria, so fierce and independent, a child of the mountains and the wild, holding Darik’s elbow as she groped her way through life filled him with a deep sorrow.

“There is one other possibility,” Narud said. “Something that would restore her sight. It would come with a cost, of course.”

“All such things do. Do you mean . . . ?”

“Yes. Let us explain to the girl, let her decide.”

They approached the griffin encampment. The riders knew them both, and some of the griffins seemed almost friendly when they met Narud. When the wizards reached Daria and her mother, Markal explained what they were offering.

Daria stared blankly through her ruined eyes. Her mother sat next to her, holding her daughter’s hand.

“The eyesight of a griffin?” Daria said. “That’s what I’d have?”

“Not exactly, but close,” Markal said. “To be precise, an eagle.”

“But you said there was a cost. What is the cost of that? Talon can spot a rabbit from a mile in the air. I’ve always wanted to see like that.”

“And when the rabbit is right in front of his face?”

“Close in, he can’t tell a rabbit from a sheepskin,” she admitted. “Not by sight. He relies on smell at short distances.”

“But you would not have Talon’s sense of smell, only his vision.”

“Oh, I see.”

“Reading would be a challenge, as would doing anything close with your hands.” Markal held his arms apart. “About four feet, that’s the distance. Inside of that, all would be a blur.”

“We could give you a crow’s vision,” Narud said. “A crow sees about as well as a man, both close and far. But the only way I can manage that is to turn you completely into a bird. I could do that, if you’d like. Would you like to be a crow instead?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Palina said.

Narud shrugged. “It’s not so bad.”

“Until you can’t change back, sure.”

“I’ll take the griffin sight,” Daria said. “Compared to the other thing you said—my eyes cloudy, barely able to tell night from day—there doesn’t seem to be much of a choice. It will probably make me a better rider, in fact. I’ll take that.”

“There is one other cost,” Markal said hesitantly. “To have the eyesight of an eagle means you’d need the
eyes
of an eagle.”

“I don’t understand.”

“An eagle’s eyes,” Narud said. “Quite literally.”

“But she wouldn’t have a beak or anything, right?” Palina asked.

“No,” Narud said, smiling. “Only the eyes. Dark in the center, with gold rings, but no whites. People will find her gaze hard to bear. They’ll be startled and look away.”

“Maybe flatlanders,” Palina said. “None of our own people.”

“And Darik?” Markal asked gently, the question directed to the daughter, not the mother. He chose his words carefully. “Will he find it alarming?”

“What does that matter?” Palina said.

“Mother, please.” Daria turned in the direction of Markal’s voice. “Darik will accept me. He would have accepted me if I had returned scarred and deformed. He will surely do so if my eyes look strange and I need him to read to me. He loves me, Markal.”

“Yes, of course he does.” Markal felt guilty for doubting. It had been many, many years since he’d allowed himself to fall in love, but human attraction was a strange thing. Who knew what could alter it?

“And I love him, too. I want to see him, soon. So can we do your magic now?” Daria said. “I don’t want to wait another minute.”

Markal nodded at Narud. Better do the hard part first. The other wizard squatted next to the young woman and rested his strongest hand on her face. She winced at the touch, but did not cry out or pull away.

Narud chanted the words of the spell. Moments later, Daria opened her eyes and blinked.

Palina leaned over her daughter, frowning. “Well?”

“It doesn’t hurt anymore, but I can’t see.”

“That part will take time,” Markal said. “Perhaps days.”

He looked into Daria’s bright, staring eyes. Her
eagle
eyes. It was unsettling. Even Palina frowned and looked away after a moment, her expression troubled.

“We can’t stay here days,” Palina said. “All these flatlanders, the thick air down here—it’s intolerable. If she needs help flying, so be it.”

“Talon won’t take another rider, Mother.”

“Then we’ll lead him.”

“He won’t be led, either,” Daria said.

“Talon will carry Narud,” Markal said. “Perhaps if the two of you rode together . . . ”

Narud approached the griffins. He stroked the feathers along Talon’s throat and whispered in his ear. The griffin snorted and tossed his head, but didn’t pull away.

Now Narud turned. “I have business in Veyre. The dark wizard’s magic hangs about the city. His runes and wards must be broken before the people can be freed. You go with the girl, Markal.”

Markal eyed the large golden griffin doubtfully. “Yes, if he’ll take me. Daria can take the reins, I’ll sit behind and help guide her.”

“I suppose that would be all right,” Palina said grudgingly. “You can accompany us as far as the mountains.”

“I’m not going to the mountains, Mother.” Daria pushed herself into a sitting position. She gingerly touched her face, the angry red flesh where Markal still needed to cast more spells so that it would heal properly. “I’m going to Balsalom to find Darik.”

Chapter Twenty-nine

The next few days after the battle were a time of relief for Kallia. She was blissfully free of the pain that had torn at her during the last few weeks. Instead, she faced the normal twinges any woman would endure: the aching back, the feeling that her innards had been rudely pushed about. Perhaps it was worse because it had grown with unnatural speed, and her belly was swollen as if she were carrying twins, but her only real worry was that it would never come, that she would carry the dead thing within her until it killed her. Meanwhile, she began the first steps to rebuild her battered, hungry city.

On the third night after the battle, Kallia had retired to her bed and was listening to the cricket chirping in its cage at the window, when something twinged low in her abdomen. She shifted her body and waited. A few minutes later, another twinge, this one stronger.

By the time she called in Rima and Samira, the girl’s mother and the palace midwife, Kallia was sure that the baby would soon be coming. Rima and Samira gathered basins of hot water and clean cotton cloths and made a comfortable birthing bed with sheets and pillows.

The two spoke soothing words, and when Samira prodded Kallia with her fingers, she proclaimed that the birth seemed to be progressing without complication. But mother and daughter exchanged glances, and when they’d mixed poppy into Kallia’s tea to ease the pain, Rima’s hand trembled when she poured it.