Katharine Kerr - The Spirit Stone

‘Most extremely unlikely, indeed. I seem to have got obsessed with this wretched illness, probably because of your friends in Braemel. I had a moment of fearing that they’d bring plague with them to the war.’

‘Well, it’s not likely and doubly so now.’ Dallandra’s worried mood returned in force. ‘Something very odd seems to be happening in Braemel.’

‘Haven’t you heard from Grallezar?’

‘No. I’ve tried to reach her several times now, but I can’t. I can feel her mind, but she seems utterly distracted. I hope things are going well there.’

‘Maybe the Gel da’ Thae simply don’t want to fight against their own kind. They have no love for Deverry men, certainly. What do they call them? Red Reivers?’

‘That’s right, Lijik Ganda in the Horsekin tongue.’

‘Wait – Rocca used a different word for red.’

‘The Gel da’ Thae have a great many words for all the different colours. Gral means red like rust. Ganda means red like fresh meat.’

‘Oh. That says a great deal about the name they chose for Deverry men.’

‘True. Now, Braemel allied itself with us and with the Roundears up in Cerr Cawnen out of fear of the Horsekin, those wild tribes of the north. This spring Grallezar hinted at some sort of trouble in her city, something to do with a coterie of Alshandra worshippers, but she never said what it was. I assumed it was none of my affair. The Gel da’ Thae can be as clannish as we are.’

‘Then we’ll know exactly what she chooses to tell us, and naught a thing more.’

‘That unfortunately is very true. I could definitely feel her fear, though, when we talked mind to mind.’

In his daily scrying sessions, Salamander had seen changes taking place at Zakh Gral. New troops had arrived, hordes of slaves were building new barracks, and always work on the stone walls went forward. He told Dallandra about these developments in detail. For some while more they talked back and forth, letting their minds reach across the hundreds of miles between them. Salamander could feel himself tiring. Far sooner than usual, he had to fight to maintain his concentration. Dallandra became aware of his difficulty the moment he felt it himself.

‘Ebañy, you’re exhausted,’ she said. ‘I know that we need to keep an eye on Zakh Gral, but be very careful that you don’t spend too much time scrying. You had to turn yourself into your bird form to escape the fortress. That was a huge strain. Then I got myself into trouble with that astral gate, and you had to come rescue me – another huge strain. I’m worried about you. Your old madness could reassert itself if you keep getting exhausted.’

‘Worry not, oh princess of powers perilous! I’m quite aware of that. From now on, I’ll scry only twice a day, morning and evening. I promise.’

They broke the link. When Salamander got up from his perch in the window, he felt so dizzy that he lay down on top of his blankets fully dressed. I’ll get up in a moment or two , he told himself. But when he woke, it was morning.

Technically, Neb and Branna were merely betrothed, not married, but with war looming, there was no time for formal ceremonies and no extra food for feasts. Since Branna’s father and uncle had approved their marrying, everyone who knew them assumed quite simply that they were. Upon their return to the dun, Neb had moved the few things he owned into Branna’s chamber from his own, and that was an end to it.

With Branna so busy with her cousin and the children, Neb saw little of her during the day. After breakfast he often lingered at table with Salamander, Gerran, and Mirryn, listening to their talk of the coming war. On this particular morning, after Branna and Galla had gone up to their hall, and Tieryn Cadryc had gone out to consult with the grooms, Maelaber, the Westfolk herald, came over to sit with them, though his escort stayed seated with the warband. Maelaber told them in some detail about the preparations the Westfolk were making for the fighting ahead. Gerran listened with the oddly bored expression on his face that meant he was absorbing every scrap of information. Mirryn merely glowered down at the table, so intensely that at last Maelaber fell silent.

‘And what’s so wrong with you, Mirro?’ Gerran said. ‘Did the porridge turn your stomach sour or suchlike?’

‘You know cursed well what’s wrong,’ Mirryn said.

‘Well, you can’t argue with Cadryc’s orders,’ Gerran said. ‘He’s the tieryn as well as your father.’

Mirryn answered with a string of epithets so foul that Neb, Salamander, and Maelaber all rose at the same moment and left the table. Neb could hear Gerran and Mirryn squabbling as they walked away.

‘Waiting for war’s always hard,’ Salamander muttered.

‘True spoken,’ Maelaber said. ‘When I left the Westfolk camp, everyone there had thorns up their arses, too.’

Maelaber returned to his escort and the warband, but Neb and Salamander went outside to the dun wall. They climbed up to the catwalks, where they could catch the fresh summer breeze and lean onto the dun wall. Between the crenellations they could see the green meadows and streams of the tieryn’s rhan. The sun fell warm on their backs, and Neb yawned.

‘Tired already, are you?’ Salamander said.

‘Being married cuts into a man’s sleep.’

‘Oh get along with you! Braggart!’

Neb grinned and decided to change the subject. ‘Have you heard from Dallandra?’

‘I have,’ Salamander said. ‘She shares our wondering about that pestilence, but she doesn’t think it came from one of the Horsekin cities. No more does she think that those priests who took you to her uncle’s have anything to do with it.’

‘Well and good, then.’ Neb turned around to lounge back against a crenel. ‘Oh by the gods!’

‘What’s wrong?’

‘Look up!’ With a sweep of his arm, Neb pointed at the sky. ‘He’s back.’

Far above them, a bird with the black silhouette of a raven circled against the pale blue, far too large for any ordinary bird.

‘So he is,’ Salamander said. ‘Our mazrak, home again from wherever his peculiar tunnel led him.’

‘He waited to arrive till Arzosah left us, I see. Huh, the coward!’

‘I wouldn’t call him that. Would you argue with a dragon thirty times your size? Ah, I see by your expression that you wouldn’t.’

Neb slid his hands into his brigga pockets and found the weapons he carried, a leather sling and a round pebble. He brought them out as casually and slowly as he could. ‘I wonder if I can get a stone into the air before he notices.’

The raven floated in a lazy circle over the dun, then allowed himself to drift in closer. Neb could see him tilting his head from side to side as if he was examining everything below him. All at once he swung around and flapped off fast, heading north from the dun, a rapidly disappearing black speck against the clear sky.

‘He must have seen your sling,’ Salamander said.

‘He’s got good eyes then, blast him!’ Neb slapped the leather loop of the sling against a crenel in frustration. ‘You know, Salamander, it’s a cursed strange thing, but I keep feeling like I know that bird – or the person inside it, I mean. It’s as if I can see through his feathers or suchlike. Well, that sounds daft, now that I say it aloud.’

‘Not daft but dweomer,’ Salamander said. ‘Most likely, anyway. You may be mistaken, of course, but somehow I doubt it. I’d say he’s someone you knew in a past life.’

‘Truly? I certainly don’t have any fond feelings for him.’

‘Oh, when you recognize a person like this, it doesn’t necessarily mean they were a friend. An old enemy will call out to you, like, just as loudly.’