David Farland - Wizardborn

“Your Highness!” Myrrima said, affecting a shocked tone that she really did not feel.

Iome grinned wickedly, dark eyes flashing. “I’d go with you if I could. But Gaborn would know. He might even use his Earth Powers to hunt for me, and in wasting his precious time, I might place others in jeopardy. I can’t risk that. So it seems that I must do as I’m told.”

“At least you’ll be safe,” Myrrima said.

“There is no place in the world safer than at the Earth King’s side,” Iome countered. “That’s where I want to be.”

Iome tossed her apple to the ground, and took Myrrima’s hands. “I’ll miss you. Though you’ve saved my life twice now, I think of you as far more than a protector. I want you for my friend. Each day, I’ll beg the Earth to guide you, until you hurry back.”

“I’ll think of you, too,” Myrrima said. She found it hard to speak, could add little more. Words didn’t suffice. “I wish you well in the birthing of your son.”

Iome grinned, placed her left hand low on Myrrima’s stomach, just above her womb. “May you have a child of your own,” Iome intoned.

It was an old tradition in Heredon for a pregnant woman to offer a blessing upon her barren friends this way. It was merely a gesture of goodwill. Yet Myrrima felt a muscle spasm beneath Iome’s hand, and stepped back quickly. For half a second she imagined that Iome’s touch really could fill her empty womb.

Iome laughed. “It will happen soon enough, now that your husband...I’m sorry if I’ve offended, or upset you,” Iome quickly added. “I know that you and your husband have your troubles. I—only want the best for you.”

“No, it’s all right,” Myrrima said. “Thank you.” She couldn’t hide her uneasiness. Myrrima dared not tell Iome that Borenson had never slept with her, and that she had lied about his miraculous restoration.

“Let me give you another gift,” Iome said, as if hoping to atone for an unintended offense. “You need a necklace—to make up for the one you gave away.” She reached around her own throat, where a necklace lay hidden beneath her tunic. “I’ve been wearing this, for luck. You’ll need it more than I.” She brought out the opal necklace that Binnesman had used to fight the Darkling Glory.

“Your Highness,” Myrrima said, “I could never—I have no present to give you in return.”

“You gave me my life, and the life of my son.”

Iome put the necklace around Myrrima’s neck, hugged her, and they walked hand in hand back upstream to find Borenson brushing the mounts.

Borenson said goodbye to the queen and leapt up into his saddle in a single fluid move, as Runelords do. Myrrima swung onto his warhorse, her back straight, her movements quick and efficient.

Myrrima wondered why Borenson didn’t ask for his warhorse back, for it had more endowments than the little piebald mare he rode. Perhaps he no longer wanted it. His horse was a kingly mount, and Borenson was no longer the king’s guard. The piebald mare he rode was more appropriate for a minor lord. The two rode south along the river, turned at a bend and waved back through the trees.

Iome stood among the silver-barked birches at the edge of the wood, waving in return.

Myrrima had a strange view of her then. It seemed right for Iome to be there in the woods, as natural as berries on a holly tree. There with the golden limbs hanging above her head, wearing her traveling robes of green, with a son growing in her womb and horses at her back, Iome looked a proper wife for an Earth King.

Iome waved farewell to Myrrima and Borenson. She felt miserable. Gaborn wanted her to be safe, protected. He wanted what was best for her.

But right now, she felt very much alone.

Her friends were riding to Inkarra. Gaborn planned to go to the Underworld. And she...would go where she was told while the world collapsed around her. She yearned to do more.

Iome had Sergeant Grimeson call the guard together and they headed east with the guards and wagons.

The golden plains soon dissipated, replaced by lands so rich that they remained green even at the last of summer, and great oaks pocked the fields. Cottages began to dot the landscape, and stone fences lined the highway.

People were soon everywhere, and as Iome’s horse raced by, more often than not the farmers with their pigs or sheep or wagons would hardly have time to recognize her, much less doff a hat or bend the knee.

So their party was continually followed by cries of “Was that the queen?” and “Look, quick, there goes the queen!”

By late afternoon, Carris was but an evil memory. The aroma of living wheat fields supplanted the smell of dead grass; lordly pear orchards where starlings soared in riotous clouds were exchanged for the gray soot; the lowing of cattle as they grazed in the fields replaced the cries of children.

Iome felt invigorated.

Grimeson named the villages and cities for her as they passed, and sometimes would point out an ancient battlefield or spot of ground where history had unfolded. She soon realized that this unsightly little man had a fine head on his shoulders, and was cordial enough. But she wondered why Gaborn had chosen him to be her escort.

As evening gave way to night, Iome kept wishing to stop for a real meal at one of the inns that they passed. Time after time, she would smell the delicious aromas of ham cooking in a bed of leeks, or chicken savories, or warm bread fresh from the oven.

But the need was on her, and so she rode like a gale through the night, until, as Runelords do, she slept in the saddle, passing through a dream with a cool wind in her face, her hair flying.

Under starlight they rode, until one of the guards said, “Milady?”

Iome blinked her eyes as she woke.

They came to a stop on a rise, and the dark ocean spread before them in every direction. Iome had never seen an ocean, had never smelled the bitter tang of salt so strongly mingled with life and decay. She had not conceived how endless its horizons would be.

Ahead lay several small islands, all spanned by elegant bridges made of white stone that were almost indiscernible from wisps of cloud in the moonlight.

She saw stretched out above them the soaring towers at the Courts of Tide, like silver spears taking aim at the horned moon.

As afternoon dimmed into night, Averan watched Gaborn and various lords gathered in the council. They all sat on rocks and stumps that they had pulled into a circle near the creek. The reavers had been up on Mangan’s Rock for nearly three hours, roosting there like crows. The sun slanted toward the horizon, and a cool breeze wafted out of the mountains, carrying with it the scent of pine.

The Rune of Desolation that the reavers formed was only just beginning to take shape. Many scarlet sorceresses had been slain in the march, along with the glue mums, so that this construct was growing slowly. But the sickly design was evident, and foul-smelling smokes rolled off the hill as if bubbling from a cauldron.

Still, Averan had to wonder. From Battle Weaver’s memories, she knew that Battle Weaver had been sent here precisely because she had mastered the Rune of Desolation. Other reavers might duplicate portions of the rune, but each sorceress knew only a small piece of the whole.

Gaborn’s men still held the plains in a vast circle. The reavers’ smoke burned a man’s sinuses and made his eyes water. It was bad enough so that the Frowth giants moved their camp well upwind of the rock. Yet there was still no sign of the blasting that had destroyed crops for miles around Carris.