“In here, if you please, my lord.”
They had reached the dungeon. Vra-Ligorn unlocked a cubicle carved from solid rock that was hardly two ells wide and three ells long, and motioned for him to enter. As a wearer of the iron gammadion of shame, stripped of every talent and privilege of the Mystical Order, Kilian was no longer honored with the title of “Brother” or “Vra.” But no one could deny his noble Blackhorse blood, and so his gaolers had called him “my lord” during his period of detention—albeit with an ironic inflection.
The cell door clanged shut behind him. It was iron, with a rotary hopper through which food and other items might be passed and an observation slot covered with metal mesh. Dim light from the corridor illuminated a narrow cot and a heap of blankets, a large covered water-jar, and a tiny table that held a pottery basin with a block of soap and two rough towels. A wooden stool stood beside the table.
“Father Abbas has graciously consented to leave a lighted lantern outside your cell,” Ligorn said, “so you and your fellow-inmates need not suffer the added privation of utter darkness. Your meals will also be as usual—not bread and water—and you have warm bedding.”
Fellow-inmates?
“How long must I remain here?” Kilian asked.
“Until it pleases Father Abbas to release you. If you are well behaved, you will be given books to read and candles later. There is a latrine beneath the stone lid in the cell’s far corner, and a box of green leaves for your comfort. If you urgently require anything else, inform the Brothers who will bring your breakfast.”
The Hebdomader and the others went away then, and Kilian called out softly through the door slot, “Who else is here?”
“Niavar.”
“Raldo.”
“Cleaton.”
So the three close associates who had been convicted of treason along with him were also imprisoned. But clever young Vra-Garon Curtling, who had joined Kilian’s cause hoping to escape his vow of celibacy, was evidently still free. More importantly, so was Prior Waringlow…
“My poor comrades,” he said. “I fear that King Conrig has roused Father Abbas’s suspicions of us. Our mutual friend may find it more difficult to aid our escape, but I’m confident that he’ll still find a way to carry out the plan.”
“Master, something must have gone seriously awry down in Gala,” said Niavar. He had been Kilian’s principal deputy and Keeper of Arcana. Diminutive stature and an eyeball that wandered grotesquely around in its socket had made him an object of ridicule when they were both novices; but the handsome, imposing Kilian had unaccountably befriended clever little Niavar and thus earned his undying loyalty. “I warned you not to trust Vra-Vitubio. The man was eager, but too slow-thinking to be reliable. It’s possible that his clumsiness has undone us all.”
“We’re finished!” Raldo’s voice was shrill with terror. He had been the Palace Novicemaster, a stout, deceptively jolly-faced man notorious for savagely punishing the slightest infraction of the Rule. “Conrig has discovered everything and we’re dead men!”
“Nonsense,” said Kilian.
But Raldo persisted. “Master, you’ll only have your head chopped off because you’re noble. But we commoners will be hanged, cut down alive, drawn, and quartered. Oh, I can’t bear the thought of it. My poor entrails hacked out and held up dripping before my eyes… my limbs severed while I’m still conscious!”
“Be silent, you silly bag of guts,” growled Cleaton. He was a burly man with a swarthy, pinched countenance who didn’t suffer fools gladly, the former Hebdomader of the Palace Brethren. “You only make things worse with your futile imaginings. We can’t be sure that we’ve been condemned. Vra-Ligorn didn’t say so. In fact, he sounded almost apologetic when he locked us up. Why would he be so solicitous of our comfort if we’re going to die? He’s hardly known as a font of kindliness. No—mark my words, there’s something odd going on. Ligorn’s caught in the middle, and he wants to save his arse by obeying old Noachil at the same time that he preserves Lord Kilian and us from the worst hardships of this putrid hellhole.”
Until the downfall of their master, the trio had enjoyed high positions at Gala Palace, where courtiers, servants, and the younger Brothers forced to endure their petty tyranny had dubbed them Squinty, Butterball, and Vinegar-Face. They had not endured their captivity well. Being stripped of magical power and authority had turned Niavar sullen and Cleaton quarrelsome, while Raldo had grown morose and added another six stone to his already considerable weight. There were times when Kilian regretted having included the three of them in his escape plans. But they were his oldest friends in the Order, who had served him faithfully for nearly thirty years.
And two of them, at least, might still play useful roles in the adventure to come.
“I urge you not to lose heart, Raldo,” he said. “Cleaton is quite right. We have no solid reason to believe that we’re compromised. If the king had certain knowledge of our conspiracy, he would have taken much more drastic action against us.”
“But why else would he suddenly command that we be shut up in a dungeon?” the fat man asked querulously. “The smell of this awful place! I nearly swooned away when we first arrived.”
Someone gave a snort of derision.
Kilian responded with patience. “Whatever King Conrig’s reason, it likely has nothing at all to do with our plan of escape. Now listen to me, comrades:
At this very moment, our friend Vra-Garon is on his way back to the abbey from Elkhaven, on the great lake. While there on an errand for the abbas, he collected horses and lay clothing for us at Ironside Manor, the home of Lady Sovanna, who is a close friend to my sister, the Queen Mother. What Garon doesn’t know is that the lady also holds in safekeeping for me a large sum of money, which will finance our flight to Didion.“
“You told us that Queen Cataldis had balked at sending the gold,” Niavar said. “What made her change her mind?”
“I sent a secret letter to Duke Feribor, my nephew, who foolishly expects me to help him become High King. He has his own special methods of persuasion.”
“I hear he used them to excess on his late wife,” Cleaton said with heavy sarcasm.
Kilian said, “The money will be sufficient to pay for everything we need on our journey, with plenty left over to bribe Somarus of Didion, who has agreed to put us under his protection.”
“The rebel prince?” Niavar was hesitant. “Master, he and his followers are little more than a ragtag gang of brigands!”
“So Conrig and Honigalus would have everyone believe. But things are not always what they seem. Somarus has a wide base of support among the barons of that kingdom’s remote hinterlands, who give only lip-service to the Sovereignty and consider King Honigalus a craven traitor for having submitted to vassalage. If Honigalus and his heirs were eliminated, Somarus would inherit Didion’s throne. And a person who was in a position to… assist the new king in a significant manner would share his power.”
“Do you speak of yourself, Lord Kilian?” Cleaton asked. “And is the elimination of Didion’s Royal Family mere wishful thinking, or something more?”
Kilian did not reply to the questions. “After we escape from the abbey, we’ll ride directly to Elkhaven. It will be arranged so that no one notices that we’re missing for many hours. Vra-Garon has hired a cattle-transport boat and crew to carry us and our horses north to Roaring Gorge, at the head of the great lake. About thirteen leagues up the gorge is a cave that almost no one knows about. There we’ll take shelter, and wait for certain companions who’ll travel with us over the Sinistral Range. We will follow tracks known only to shepherds—and to Vra-Garon, who spent his boyhood in the border high-lands. Eventually we’ll come to the Lady Lakes region of the Elderwold, where we’ll join Prince Somarus and his men.”
Raldo said, “Master, I always presumed that Great Pass was the only safe way to cross the Sinistrals.”
“It’s the first place Conrig’s troops would look for us.”
>
“Riding through high mountains on backcountry tracks sounds very difficult and dangerous,” Raldo protested. His high-pitched voice trembled with anxiety. “And the Elderwold is said to be full of fierce creatures and Green Men! Who will cook our food and care for the horses? Where are we to spend the nights? I don’t think I could bear sleeping on the ground.”
“Bazekoy’s Burning Brisket!” growled Niavar. “Stay here in the dungeon, then, Butterball, and enjoy the food and warm bed. After a few weeks, you won’t even notice the stench.”
“Master, it won’t just be soldiers hunting us.” Dour Cleaton was deadly serious. “You said we’d have magic to shield us from windsearchers. But how—”
“And so we will. The person who will release us from this prison has promised to unlock our iron gammadions as well.”
Niavar and Cleaton uttered oaths. Raldo quavered, “My talents? I’ll have my talents back?”
“Only those we were born with,” Kilian said, “not the additional powers we gained when we were ordained. The combined magic of the four of us should be sufficient to defend us from ordinary pursuers and all but the most powerful wind adepts. And I have conceived a new cover spell of peculiar efficacy, which I shall erect over us as soon as my talent recovers from the years of disuse.”
“Who in God’s name is this collaborator within the abbey?” Niavar asked. “And why is he willing to break his vows to Saint Zeth and commit treason against the Sovereignty in order to help us?”
“He helps me,” Kilian said, “because he expects a reward. That’s all you need to know.”
“Part of the Gala treasure?” Raldo suggested archly. None of them knew the nature of the Trove of Darasilo, but they all were aware that Kilian had sent agents to the capital months earlier to steal something of consummate value.
“Be silent, fool!” Niavar said. “Have you forgotten that the master ordered us never to speak of that?”
Ignoring Raldo’s mumbled apology, Kilian continued. “I must try to sleep now, in case there is another dream-message from Beynor of Moss. If you find yourselves unable to close your eyes, I suggest that you spend the time praying for bad weather. While clear skies persist, we cannot escape. We need clouds and rain to conceal our getaway from ordinary human eyesight, since we have no true darkness at this time of year.”
“It’s Blossom Moon,” Cleaton pointed out. “The weather may remain clement for weeks.”
“I think not,” Kilian said. “I was allowed to work in the herb garden yesterday, and I noted a ring around the sun. That often presages a change. There could be a storm on the way.” He paused, then added softly, “A very great storm indeed.”
He went to the cot, arranged the ample bedding, and lay atop it fully clothed. But his brain was a beehive of swirling thoughts that he could not repress, no matter how hard he tried, and he remained wakeful until the tolling of a far distant bell marked the hour of rising in the abbey above.
To his surprise, Beynor knew about the attack on Gala Palace as soon as it happened.
Kilian had told him that the assault and theft were scheduled for the quiet hours around seven or eight in the morning on Solstice Day, but he never anticipated any personal perception of the event. Cocooned in a sleeping sack, he lay in apathetic misery beneath the small boat’s canvas dodger, a kind of half awning which only gave scant protection from the flying spray, enduring the slam-bang progress of the craft over the rough Boreal Sea. The team of monsters towing him insisted on swimming at top speed, and he would have been flung overboard by the constant severe jouncing if he hadn’t taken special care to wedge himself between a padded thwart and the oilskin supply bags crammed in the bow.
Beynor was ordinarily an intrepid sailor; but on this appalling voyage, withdrawing into the windworld was the only way he’d been able to avoid mortal seasickness. It was quiet and tranquil on the black bosom of the wind, except for the inconsequential mental yammering of the Salka, which was easy enough to ignore if he didn’t try to translate it. He’d almost managed to drift into uneasy slumber when a mental shriek pierced his cranium like a red-hot needle.
He gasped, sat up, and made a muzzy attempt to track the chaotic tangle of voice threads. It emanated out of the south. He knew after a few minutes what it must signify.
The silent clamor was perceptible to him, but evidently not to the dull-witted Salka, who swam on unconcerned. Wild with curiosity, Beynor tried to scry Gala Palace. But the distance was too extreme, nor was he able to make any sense of the wind-shout itself. Nevertheless, he had no doubt that it was a reaction to the attack by Kilian’s agents.
Had they successfully made off with Darasilo’s Trove? There was no way for him to find out without bespeaking them, and no way to do that without knowing their individual signatures and the password that Kilian had refused to entrust to him.
Curse the bloody secretive alchymist! Beynor decided to reinvade his dreams and demand the information yet again. Both of them needed to know what was happening.
He concentrated in the usual way, calling Kilian’s name over and over, but there was no answer. The bastard was probably awake.
Beynor attempted to envision Zeth Abbey with his windsight and was rewarded with a ghostly mental picture of the fortresslike structure. Built of pure white limestone, it was perched high among the crags of the southern Sinistral Mountains. There were certainly loud strands of windspeech being exchanged between its inhabitants and persons in Gala Palace. Beynor could not understand the messages, but it seemed likely that the Brothers in Gala were bespeaking tidings of the disaster to their fellows at the abbey.
Someone was bound to tell Kilian what had happened. But he, Beynor, would be kept in suspense for hours, until the next time the alchymist went to sleep! He ground his teeth in frustration.
Just then, a disquieting thought sprang into his mind, and with great care he sent another probe winging in a new direction, towards the kingdom of Moss, Fenguard Castle, and the chambers of his sister Ullanoth. Was it possible that she’d also perceived the wind-scream from Gala? Might she be observing the scene with her Subtle Loophole?
The refurbished old stronghold was much closer than Zeth Abbey and clearly visible to his scrying, but Ulla’s private rooms were not. Even though she no longer owned a Fortress sigil, a heavy spell of couverture shielded her quarters from his mind’s eye. The good news was that no betraying trace of the Great Stone’s sorcery shone out through the concealing opacity. Ulla was not using Loophole to oversee Gala Palace or anything else. It was quite likely that she had failed to hear the outcry.
He maintained his watch on Fenguard for another hour or so without detecting any unusual arcane activity. The wind-senses of the Glaumerie Guild members were not as keen as his own, and they remained oblivious. None of them seemed interested in observing Gala, and none of Conrig’s windvoices attempted to communicate with the Conjure-Queen. Thus far, the thieves fleeing with the trove would seem to be safe from Loophole’s invincible oversight. And if Kilian was right about Conrig’s distrust of Ulla, they’d stay that way.
At this minute, the precious books and the sigils were probably being spirited out of the ruins of the palace’s cloister wing by the agents. Before long, the trove would be on its way north. By day’s end, the well-disguised thieves might be almost halfway to the designated rendezvous in the north country, taking advantage of the initial confusion as Kilian had planned. Beynor himself would be within easy windsearching range of the fleeing agents before another day went by—not that such a search was practical. Without knowledge of their signatures, or at least their names and physical appearance, he had little chance of scrying them out.
Names and physical appearance…
A half-formed idea crept into his mind, and he drew in his breath sharply, hardly able to acknowledge that such a thing might be possible. It seemed almost too fortuitous, too perfect.
If Conrig’s officials were efficient in organizing pursuit of the agents, they migh
t unwittingly give Beynor his chance to secure the trove for himself before the thieves could hand it over to Kilian. The alchymist had rightly feared that Beynor might try to waylay his men and seize the sigils and books; but the revised plan that now suggested itself to the deposed young king was far more ingenious than a simple ambush.
All I need do, Beynor thought, is find them with my mind’s eye. There was no need to confront the men physically or even have a wind-conversation with them. If they simply listened to a certain irresistible temptation insinuated anonymously into their dreams, and succumbed to it, the trove would be his!
And the temptation would be irresistible.
The site of the allurement would have to be chosen with care. It must be a lonely spot, where no one was likely to stumble upon the abandoned books and sigils before he retrieved them.
Kilian was no problem. Even if his windpowers were somehow restored, he’d be unable to scry out the unscriable. No adept could oversee magical moonstones. They were secure from the windsight of every sorcerer save Ullanoth and her Subtle Loophole, and she had no reason to go looking for them because she didn’t know they existed.
Such a simple plan… He wondered why it hadn’t occurred to him before. He’d wait a few hours, until Conrig’s officials recovered from the initial shock of the conflagration and organized the pursuit of the fire-raisers. Images of the suspects with their names would surely be transmitted by palace alchymists to every reliable wind adept and wizard in the southern part of the Sovereignty. The magickers would be commanded to draw up reward notices carrying the pictures and post them in all the principal towns of Cathra and Didion.
What Beynor had to do was scry one of those notices—trickier than it might seem—or find some person willing to do the job for him. Unfortunately, he had few loyal friends left, and most of them lived in Moss, too far away to be of use.