A Crown Disowned

  Harous recovered quickly. He drew his sword and put the Sorceress behind him.

  "You will have to take me, Gaurin!" he shouted in turn. "I won't come tamely, at your call!" Then, at the sight of the others, "Three to one, eh? Those are a coward's odds."

  "You are my captive," Gaurin said, grating out the words. "There will be no unfair fight here."

  "Give over, and there will be no fight at all. I will take custody of the woman," Rohan said. Both he and Hynnel flanked Gaurin now, with drawn weapons.

  "Gaurin, is it? I have marked you as a special enemy." Flavielle gave a sneering laugh. She took a step to stand firmly beside Harous. "How highly you rate yourselves, you poor fools, to think three of you can stand against those who are your betters in every way!"

  A three-forked lightning-bolt of power flashed from her hand to send Rohan stumbling back. He lost his footing and fell, his body slamming heavily onto one of the snow-covered hillocks. A cry of pain almost drowned the sick sound of a bone in his arm snapping. A second fork of the power-bolt branched toward

  Hynnel, halting the action just begun, while the third arced around Gaurin. With a metallic crack, his sword shattered, the shards glittering as they dropped to sink at once into the snow. He hurled the hilt at his enemy and reached for the dagger in the top of his boot.

  The Sorceress threw back her head and uttered another taunting laugh. "So much for our enemies. Now, do with them as you will, my Harous!"

  Sword at the ready, Harous took a step forward.

  The Bog-men under Tusser's command decided, after their first flush of victory, that they did not want to rejoin the fighting forces they had left to do battle with the Ice Dragon. Tusser found an open spot of ground where, according to their custom, they could sit and discuss the matter. As headman, he alone was privileged to stand.

  "We not need Outlanders anymore," Lorko said sullenly. "Stay here, go back to huts, get warm."

  "Too warm for Tusser, maybe," Sumase said with a wide grin.

  He waggled his eyebrows knowingly and several other Bog-men sniggered. Lorko's story of how Vanka had vigorously objected to giving up the sacks of powder, and her threats of what she would do to Tusser the next time she saw him, had gained wide circulation among the surviving members of the Army of the Bog.

  "Tusser not happy to go back either, but give word," the Bog General repeated stubbornly.

  "Maybe we go by big city of Rendel," Kipu said. "I hear Outlander talk in camp, they say headman over all of us live there. Maybe we go see him. Maybe him and

  Tusser fight."

  That drew a more open laugh and even Tusser had to smile at the thought of a hand-to-hand battle for the position of headman over the entire land. His perspective had broadened considerably as a result of their foray out of the

  Bog, even if that of most of his companions hadn't. He recognized that there was much, much more to their world than the Bog, or even the occasional Outlander who blundered into it, risking being flung to the Gulpers in their deep, dark pools.

  "Tusser not fight with child, and headman King still child without many hairs on his chin," he said. "But I fight anybody here who decide they not want go back to battle camp with me." He hefted a shell-tipped spear and assumed a belligerent stance.

  Lorko looked up but, at the prospect of facing his headman in combat, thought better of it and turned away.

  "Well?" Tusser challenged. "Nobody fight me?"

  Silence, and, following Lorko's example, nobody except Hili, the smallest of them, was bold enough to meet his gaze.

  "I fight you," he said, grinning, "if we throw rocks. I beat you then!"

  The tension that had gripped the circle of Bog-men dissolved abruptly as the men erupted into shouts of laughter.

  "That good one!" Lorko said, wiping tears of mirth from his eyes. "Nobody beat you throwing rocks. Or bags of powder that burn."

  "Yes!" yelled Sumase. "How the great high and mighty Outsiders know how Bog-men kill Dragon all by their selves, if we don't go back and tell them? Answer me that!"

  Within moments the same men who had been on the point of mutiny were nodding in agreement and nudging each other over the prospect of lording it over the

  Outsiders who had treated them like hut-guests who had overstayed their welcome.

  Sumase got to his feet, hefting his shell-tipped spear. "You and me," he said to

  Tusser, "we go tell. Rest can stay behind and burn backsides in hut fires if they want. We laugh at them for cowards."

  "Lorko no coward," the warrior grunted. He, too, lumbered to his feet. "And no friend of Lorko coward, either." He glared around the circle, and one by one the

  Bog-men followed his example and stood up.

  When the last one was standing, Lorko nodded at Tusser. "We go now," he said.

  Ashen found her path a little easier once the snowfall lessened. She still had no idea of where she was going, but surmised that it was in the direction of the battle fought by the wounded men she had lately been tending.

  Why would anybody choose to return to that site, she wondered. Then she remembered the tale of the two Ice Dragons, and how one had been buried in an avalanche and the other had flown off in the direction of the Bog.

  Perhaps Harous, in his treachery, hoped to fly away as well, to his new allies.

  She frowned, in spite of everything still unwilling to assign such depths of wickedness to the man who had brought her out of the Bog and set her feet on the path that Zazar had foretold her. And, she reminded herself, killed Kazi in a wanton act of cruelty. A complicated man, Lord Harous, never more so than as at this moment. Surely he must think himself well justified in his action, however mysterious.

  Ashen toiled on. Ahead lay a small rise from the top of which she could see better what lay ahead. The sound of voices raised in dispute floated toward her on the still, cold air, and she redoubled her efforts.

  She achieved the crest of the rise just in time to see the terrifying scene unfolding below her. Gaurin, Hynnel, and Rohan stood to her right, swords drawn, and opposing them, Harous—and the woman Ashen had briefly seen revealed as the

  Sorceress! Lightning crackled from the woman's hands.

  "No—" she cried, and knew that her protest was in vain.

  She stepped into a strange kind of time, where everything seemed to move slowly.

  The Power from the Sorceress's hand split into three arcs. Rohan went down, clutching at his arm, and Hynnel stood frozen in midstep, unable to move. The shards of Gaurin's sword glittered in the air as they fell. The Sorceress laughed, and Harous, his weapon intact, took a step toward Gaurin, who did not flinch as he reached for his dagger.

  At that moment, Ashen realized what he had truly meant when he had pledged his life's blood for her protection. Incongruously, in this leisurely, delayed time, she remembered his exact words, spoken to the shade of his father in the catacombs of the ruined Bog city of Galinth, words meant to be conveyed to the ghost of her first husband, Obern. "It is thanks to Obern that you may now go in peace, and in honor/' Gaurin had said. "When you see him, tell him that his lady is well, for I have her in my care. Assure him that nothing will happen to her while I live."

  And here he was, unhesitatingly ready to offer himself even unto death if it would delay for a moment the approach of danger to her, or to any of those he led.

  A fierce wave of the same spirit engulfed her. "Never! This shall not be!" Ashen cried aloud, her words unnaturally drawn out. "He will not die, if I can prevent it!"

  With a fury she had never known herself capable of, she drew herself to her full height. Arms upraised, she found a ball of pure Power gathering in her hands.

  Scarcely knowing what she did, she hurled it down at the tableau before her with every ounce of strength in her.

  Below, several things were happening, all almost at the same time.

  "Here," Rohan shouted, his words slow and hollow sounding. "My Rinbell sword will fight for you!" He managed to g
rasp the hilt of the weapon with his good hand and toss it to Gaurin, who caught it neatly.

  Another lightninglike blast gathered in the Sorceress's hand but before she could launch it properly, the scintillating ball of Power Ashen had hurled went thundering into the little clearing.

  The Sorceress staggered back. Her bolt of Power, mis-aimed, smashed into Harous from behind. He took a staggering step forward, only to spit himself on the sword Gaurin had just brought to bear. Hynnel, released from his paralysis, rushed toward Flavielle with weapon upraised. She had barely time enough to grab a slender rod from her belt before he was upon her. A cloud of mist gushed from one end of the rod, taking Hynnel squarely in the face. With a superhuman effort, he managed to take another step and cut her down where she stood before he dropped.

  Time abruptly snapped into its accustomed pace again. Ashen, released, fairly flew down the slope toward the scene of carnage. "Gaurin!" she screamed. "Oh,

  Gaurin!

  He didn't turn, though she knew he had heard her. Instead, he was easing Harous to the ground. She reached them in time to hear Harous tell Gaurin not to try to pull out the sword.

  "It would do no good, only cause me more pain. Let me die as I deserve, with the blade of justice piercing my body." He shuddered. A trickle of blood escaped his lips. "Flavielle—"

  Gaurin glanced toward where the woman's body lay. "She is dead," he told Harous.

  "And with her the spell she laid upon me. Did I really turn traitor?" His gasping voice held a plaintive note.

  Ashen knelt beside him. "It was not your doing," she said, seeing no need to torment a dying man with the tale of his many misdeeds.

  "Aye, but it was, and more—" His eyes seemed to clear, to come into focus. "Is that you, Ashen? I'm not just dream-ing?"

  "I am here."

  "How does my Lady Marcala in Rendelsham?"

  "Ill, but well enough when I left her."

  He smiled grimly. "Not for long, I'll warrant." The effort of speaking was almost too much for him. He coughed. "I'll see her soon." He grasped at Ashen's hand, and looked from her to Gaurin. "Tell them I'm sorry," he said. "Tell them—"

  "We will," Gaurin replied.

  But the dying man could not hear him. With the lightest of sighs, the spirit of

  Count Harous of Cragden, Lord High Marshal of Rendel and Commander of the Four

  Armies, slipped from his body and was gone on a faint breath of wind.

  Then both Ashen and Gaurin turned to the others. It was obvious to Ashen that

  Hynnel was wounded even worse than Rohan. Both men lay in the snow where they had fallen, moaning in pain. "See to Rohan," she said as she turned her attention to Hynnel.

  "It was the burning mist," Hynnel managed to croak. "I tried not to breathe it in, but it entered my lungs anyway. It burns, it burns—"

  "Don't try to talk," Ashen said. She looked at Gaurin. "How does Rohan?"

  "He is lucky he came out of this with nothing worse than a broken bone," Gaurin said, sparing a glance at her from where he was carefully examining Rohan's injury. "Don't move your arm before I splint it, unless you want to lose the limb. The break seems clean, with no splinters coming through the skin, and that is good. Can you walk?"

  "Yes, and I can talk, too," Rohan answered, somewhat irritably. He tried without success to stifle a groan. His face was very pale. "Why do you ask?"

  "Well, Hynnel can't move, and I will not leave him alone, nor will I leave Ashen unguarded. Therefore, you are going to have to be the one to get back to the camp and bring back warriors and a litter for Hynnel. Can you manage it?"

  Rohan looked up as the gravity of the situation sank in. "Of course," he replied stoutly. "It's my arm that was broken, not my legs."

  "I wish I had one of those silly silk roses you used to conjure out of nothing, so that I could make you a temporary sling," Ashen said.

  "That was all my tiny gift of Power was ever good for," Rohan said. "That, and lighting candles without touching them. I doubt that I could do even that, now.

  All that's left is that tingling on the back of my neck when danger is nearby."

  He blinked in sudden comprehension. "The war-kat in the tent!" he exclaimed. "No wonder my neck was killing me. They always go in pairs, but that one was alone.

  Now it is clear! That must have been Flavielle, disguised. And to think Lord

  Royance actually petted her!"

  With the stoic practicality of a seasoned warrior, Gaurin removed the cloak from

  Flavielle's body and began tearing it into strips. "Ashen, please see if you can find some small, straight pieces of wood so I might bind Rohan's arm in a temporary splint."

  "Of course." Ashen knew what was required; she had splinted broken limbs before.

  She got up immediately and hurried to the little copse of woods where Gaurin and his companions had hidden. When she returned, she discovered that her husband had dragged the bodies of Harous and Fla-vielle off to the other side of the valley entrance and placed them in the shelter of yet another upthrust of the rocks that made footing so treacherous in this area. Hynnel was sitting up after a fashion and Gaurin was just finishing raking fresh snow over the bloodstains.

  "Will these do?" she asked.

  "Admirably, my Ashen."

  "A tree had fallen, and there's quite a lot of dry wood at that spot."

  "Good," he said. "That means we can take shelter there and perhaps even have a small fire to keep us warm while we wait for Rohan to return."

  "I don't need a fire," Hynnel said. "I'm burning."

  Indeed, Ashen thought, he did look more than a little feverish.

  "Nevertheless, a fire we shall have, if we need it," Gaurin said. With swift efficiency he was already busy fashioning a makeshift split and sling for

  Rohan's arm out of the strips of cloth he had torn from Flavielle's cloak.

  "Rohan, if you think you are ready, please be on your way."

  "I'll be back before you fairly know I've gone."

  "Don't forget to tell them that we may be expecting the arrival of an Ice

  Dragon, so they should come quickly, and prepared."

  "I will." The young warrior saluted awkwardly with his left hand and immediately took off at a ragged jog along the path so many feet had made in the snow, his balance uncertain but his resolve firm.

  "Now, my Ashen," Gaurin said, turning to her. "While we wait you can explain to me whence came that great ball of Power that did so much damage, and at such a timely moment."

  Fourteen

  In a short time Gaurin had found shelter for them in the stand of trees and had built a small fire of dry wood that gave off very little smoke. Hynnel lay nearby on a bed of dry needles and fresh boughs, his cloak wrapped around him only because of Ashen's insistence. He had sunk into something like a coma. From time to time she left the circle of warmth and checked on him anxiously when his moans grew audible. "I truly do not comprehend where that burst of Power came from," Ashen said when she returned from one of these visits. "All I know is that Harous was on the verge of killing you, and everything in me said no. I raised my arms, there was something between them, and then I was—well, I suppose you could call it 'pushing' and you know the rest."

  "I think the Rinbell sword really did fight for me," Gaurin said in his turn. "I had not consciously raised it, and yet it was ready when Harous stumbled against it." He unsheathed the weapon and examined it curiously. "Very fine work," he said.

  "I think I was responsible for both Harous's and Flavielle's deaths," Ashen said in a small voice. "If I hadn't thrown that ball of Power—"

  "If you hadn't done it, Rohan, Hynnel and I would be dead now and you as well when the fugitives discovered your presence, as they were bound to do. If anyone is responsible for their deaths, it is they themselves."

  Ashen could not dispute these blunt facts. Nevertheless, she was sorely troubled by the events in which she had played such a pivotal part.

  "Come an
d rest, my Ashen," Gaurin said. He leaned against the trunk of the tree under which they sheltered and opened his cloak for her.

  Gratefully, she crept into the warm, safe haven of his arms and nestled against him, mindful not to hamper him in case danger approached and he needed to be free to defend them all. With another glance at Hynnel, who seemed to be resting as quietly as possible under the circumstances, she drifted off into a light sleep.

  She awoke to the unmistakable sounds of a pitched battle. Gaurin was not at her side but the spot he had occupied was still warm. She turned to Hynnel who was valiantly trying to struggle to his feet.