Emily Rodda - The Third Door

‘Time for all that later,’ shouted Farr, as Manx and Sigrid, both looking very startled, hurried to his side. ‘Have you sent the signal down the line to start the pump?’

‘Not yet,’ Manx replied crisply. ‘I thought it best to wait until the hose pipe was fully in position. Two reliable men are waiting to send the flare up at our signal.’

‘And that is no thanks to your wife, Chieftain Farr!’ Sigrid burst out, clearly unable to contain herself. ‘This morning she was discovered trying to persuade the soldiers we had chosen for the task to disobey their orders when the time came.’

‘Nearly managed to do it, too!’ wheezed Barron, labouring up behind her. ‘Would have, if Sigrid hadn’t caught her at it, by all accounts!’

‘Two louts had helped her get to the men, it seems,’ Sigrid went on. ‘One, a great, hulking brute, was armed with a rusty reaping hook he must have taken from one of the carts. Fortunately he had been injured, as had his sly-looking accomplice, but even so it took six people to subdue them. They are both in the guardhouse awaiting questioning.’

Rye’s throat closed. Sonia groaned in dismay.

‘Where is Janna?’ snapped Farr, who had paled beneath the ash that still coated his face.

‘She and her half-Fellan favourite are locked in a hut,’ Manx said coldly. ‘Jett is guarding them. He was not fit for anything else.’

‘It couldn’t be helped, dear fellow!’ Barron put in anxiously, as Farr’s jaw tightened. ‘We couldn’t leave your good lady free to go around convincing the rest of the troops to defy their orders, could we? She’s very persuasive when she chooses, as you well know. Her honeyed tongue could charm the bees from the hive!’

Rye’s heart gave a great thud. Suddenly his face was hot, and his blood seemed to be fizzing in his veins.

Sonia swung round, her eyes wide. She had felt his jolt of excitement. She knew the idea that had come to him.

Of course!

She plunged her hand into her pocket and pulled out the bag of powers. Feverishly she unwound the string and gave the open bag to Rye.

Rye fumbled through the clutter of charms at the bottom of the bag and seized the honey sweet.

‘We’ll discuss this later,’ Farr was saying in a low, even voice that showed how rigidly he was controlling his feelings. ‘The important thing now is to salt as much of the forest as we can, as quickly as we can. We must only hope that the spray will be as powerful, and reach as far, as we have been told.’

‘It will,’ Manx said curtly. ‘We have been assured of it.’

‘So we have!’ Barron chortled. ‘Everything’s going like clockwork, Farr! We have those Fellan wretches on the run, for all their so-called powers. Ah, how I love to support the winning side! As I always say, there’s a lot more money in it. Ha, ha—ahem!’

He turned his laughter into a cough as Sigrid shot him a disdainful look.

Rye unwrapped the little golden square and thrust it into his mouth. The taste of honey was sweet on his tongue.

‘Wish me luck,’ he muttered. Trying not to think too hard about what he was doing, he threw back the hood and strode out of hiding.

Barron goggled, Sigrid hissed and Manx grew very still.

Rye took a breath, but before he could speak bellows of shock and rage erupted from the crowd supporting the hose pipe. He swayed back as a burning wave of hatred broke over him.

Then Sonia was beside him, and he could feel her strength joining his, pushing the hatred back.

The relief was intense, but Rye shook his head in frustration. He had wanted Sonia to stay in safety. He was willing to risk his own life, but not hers.

Sonia’s voice whisked through his mind like a cold breeze.

My life is my own to risk, Rye of Weld! The magic will be stronger if I am with you. Besides, I have something for you. The moment I touched it I knew it for what it was. You may need it.

Rye felt her push something into his hand, recognised it, wondered for a heartbeat why she had given it to him, then saw images of Farr sitting motionless on the pipeline, Farr standing rigidly behind the tree, and understood.

The ninth power.

Again he became aware of the taste of honey, sweet and mellow, on his tongue. He pushed the melting square into his cheek and, clasping his hands together to hide what he was holding, faced the shouting people.

‘Please let me speak,’ he said. ‘I have something of great importance to tell you.’

And instantly, dead silence fell. Rye paused, his skin prickling. He had not raised his voice, yet somehow the people had heard him. They had heard him, they had quieted for him, and now they were waiting for him to go on.

He began, and his first words were not at all as he had planned.

‘I want,’ he found himself saying, ‘to tell you a very old story—the story of three brothers.’

So he told the tale of Annolt, Malverlain and Eldannen—Olt, Verlain and Dann—the sorcerer sons of a Dorne chieftain and his Fellan bride. He spoke of Verlain’s banishment, Olt’s growing madness, and Dann’s escape with his followers. And Farr and his people listened without a sound. Their eyes were fixed on him. They hung on his every word.

‘Once Dann had gone, and there was no one to correct the lie,’ Rye said, ‘Olt told his people that his sorcery was all that protected Dorne from the revenge of his brother Malverlain, who in exile had become the Lord of Shadows.’

He paused, and his listeners whispered fearfully, their hushed voices soft as the rustling of the trees. They all knew of the Lord of Shadows, and the name struck terror in their hearts. Plainly, however, they had not known that the ancient, evil power in the west had been born and bred in Dorne. That fact, like so many others, had been suppressed by Olt and long forgotten by a people more interested in the present and the future than in the past.

Rye saw that the councillors Manx, Sigrid and Barron were glancing at one another, expressionless. He saw that the soldiers with the flamers and the men who had been leading the carts had all crept down the burned hill to join the crowd. He saw that Farr was staring at him intently. He felt rage and malice directed at him, but still could not locate their source.

He raised his voice a little.

‘When at last Olt died and the Lord of Shadows did not invade, the people realised they had been tricked. They thought the whole tale had been a lie, and forgot it. But it had been a lie only in part. As Olt well knew, there was a charmed circle around Dorne, protecting it from evil invasion. But the charm was held in place by the Fellan—as it is to this day.’

Again the people murmured, but this time they were frowning. They wanted to believe Rye—wanted with all their hearts to give in to the spell of his voice. Yet talk of charms and magic unsettled them, and they had grown used to thinking of the Fellan as their enemies.

‘You … offer no proof of what you say,’ Farr said, plainly groping for words.

‘You will have your proof,’ Rye replied quietly. He hoped fervently that he was right. There was not much time left. The taste of honey was still sweet in his mouth, but he could feel that the little golden square was melting away.

‘The Lord of Shadows has never forgotten the oath he swore as he was banished from Dorne’s shores. He vowed revenge. He vowed one day to return, to punish the people who had rejected him and to plunder Dorne’s riches. But standing between him and his goal was a magic greater than his own—the protecting magic of the Fellan. So he made a plan to trick you into destroying that magic for him, and put spies among you to carry the plan out.’

He took a breath. This, he knew, was the moment when his gamble would either succeed or fail. The last possible moment …