Katharine Kerr - Darkspell

Sarcyn stared down at the floor until he heard the door slamming shut; then, very slowly, he turned his head and looked at his adversary. It seemed that he should say something, some cry of defiance, perhaps, or make the simple remark that he was ready and willing to die, but he was weary again, and no words came. For what seemed like a long time Nevyn simply looked at him.

“I arranged your rescue,” Nevyn said at last. “Did they tell you?”

“They did. Rescue or another trap?”

“You young dolt! What do you think I’m going to do, torture you or suchlike?”

“I’m sure you’ve no need for anything so crude.”

“Ye gods, isn’t there anything between your two ears? I was the one who spoke through the fire, telling you to call upon the Light. You did, and here I am.”

He smiled. Sarcyn wondered at it for a long time, that he would smile.

“Tell me,” Nevyn went on. “Are you willing to make restitution?”

“All I want is to die.”

“Oh, you’ll get that wish, I’m afraid.” Nevyn turned sad. “But then you’ll be given the chance to get free of the Darkness forever.”

“What? Where? In the wretched Otherlands?”

“Oh, come now, lad! Do you truly believe that when a man dies, there’s an end to him? What sloppy training you’ve been given!”

Sarcyn stared bewildered, yet he suddenly began to remember hints and clues—traveling in the etheric in a consciousness free of flesh, Alastyr’s boasts about living forever in the Land of Husks and Rinds—his hatred roared inside him as he realized just what Alastyr had cheated him of.

“The great secret! Not in the Otherlands, but in my next life!”

“Just that. It’ll be a challenge, lad. It’ll be a struggle.

Nothing so great as what I’m offering you is given for free. Will you forswear the Darkness and turn to the Light?”

Sarcyn hesitated for one bare heartbeat.

“I will, O Master of the Aethyr. I will.”

And then he wept, curling up like a child upon the floor and sobbing, beyond all words and thought alike.

Although Nevyn had insisted that he was capable of riding off and bringing back a dangerous prisoner on his own, neither Jill nor Rhodry had been willing to let him. Now, however, they understood why the dweomerman had refused to let any of Blaen’s men accompany them. In silent awe they sat on a long stone bench near the wall of the enormous cavern and watched the dwarven market-fair. At least a hundred yards in diameter and easily twice that high, the cavern was lit by shafts of sunlight streaming in from far above. Directly across from them, water trickled down the rock and collected in artificial basins. Every now and then a dwarf would fill a bucket at a pool and take it away again for some domestic purpose. Out in the center of the cavern, some hundred or so of the mountain people haggled and traded. Most of the stuff for sale was food spread out on rough clothes: mushrooms, bats, root crops furtively tended up on the surface, game hunted equally slyly.

“It’s a hard life these people have,” Jill remarked.

“Huh. They deserve it.”

“Oh, here, my love. Try to take it with good grace.”

Rhodry merely scowled. When they’d ridden up to the dwarfhold door, one of the guards had held a small dagger up in front of them. It had blazed with light as soon as it had come near Rhodry and inspired a vast flood of cursing and shouting. Only Nevyn’s intervention kept the dwarves from making Rhodry wait outside. Although every now and then someone would stroll over and say a few pleasant words to her, Rhodry they ignored, as if he were a wolf or some other dangerous pet she kept.

Wearing a rough brown dress that came to her ankles, a tiny woman, no more than three feet high, came over. In a sling at her hip she carried a baby. Since Jill had no idea of how long these people lived or how fast they grew, she couldn’t tell the child’s age, but it sat up straight and looked around as alertly as a human child of about a year old.

“Ah,” the woman said. “You must be the lass who came with the Master of the Aethyr.”

“I am, at that. Is your babe a lad or a lass?”

“A lass.”

“She’s a precious lambkin, truly.”

At the praise the baby dimpled and cooed. Although she had a low forehead under a mop of curly black hair and her nose was thick and broad, she was so tiny, yet so vital, that Jill longed to hold her.

“Can I ask you somewhat?” Jill went on. “Why do so many of your folk speak Deverrian?”

“Oh, we trade with the farmers in the foothills. They’re a peaceable lot, and they keep our secrets in return for a bit of our silver. There’s naught like precious metals for making friends—or bitter enemies.”

With the last she gave Rhodry a pointed look.

“Please,” Jill said, “what’s so wrong with my man?”

“He made the talisman of warding glow, didn’t he?”

“He did, truly, but what does that mean?”

“Well, you know.” The woman considered for a moment. “Actually, I don’t know. No one much does, I wager. But we have a rhyme, an old rhyme.” Here she rattled off something fast in her own language. “It means, when the Warding Blade glows, an enemy is nigh.”

“Ah. I see. I guess.”

The woman nodded, then wandered on, clucking to her baby.

“I wish to every god that Nevyn would get himself back here,” Rhodry snarled.

His wish was granted in a few minutes when the dweomer-master emerged from a tunnel on the far side of the cavern. With him came the dwarf named Larn; behind them strode two warriors with axes and Sarcyn, who walked all bent and stiff like a very old man. Jill and Rhodry rose and hurried over to meet them. Slack-mouthed, Sarcyn looked at her, and in his eyes she saw a weariness so profound that she stepped back. He smiled, a bare twitch of his mouth.

“I’ll cause you no trouble.”

Sarcyn was as good as his word. He never spoke again, either, during the long ride back to Dun Hiraedd.

Floating above the fire, the image of Salamander’s face grinned. Nevyn heartily wished that just once in his benighted life the gerthddyn would take something seriously.

“So,” Salamander thought to him. “Camdel’s evidence means that I was right about the opium.”

“Just so. I want you to go to a certain Lord Gwaldyn straight away. He’s associated with the king’s provost, and he knows me well. Have Gwaldyn take this Anghariad under arrest as soon as he can, and tell him to guard her carefully. I’ll wager there will be a lot of the noble-born at court who are going to want her poisoned to stop her tongue from wagging.”

“I’ll go to him first thing on the morrow. How long should I stay in Dun Deverry?”

“Until I arrive. Liddyn the apothecary—you’ve met him, I think—is on his way here from Dun Cantrae. I’ll be giving Camdel into his care, then setting out to return the Great Stone to the king. Do you mind waiting there?”

“Not in the least. In fact, your asking me to stay is somewhat of a boon, because my beloved and esteemed father wants me to come home.”

“Well, now, if he needs you, I can send someone else to the capital.”

“Don’t trouble yourself, O Master of the Aethyr.” Salamander turned melancholy in a most dramatic way. “I can guess exactly what this is about: he wants to berate me for my wandering ways. I said I’d return in the fall. That’ll be soon enough to hear yet another carefully composed and precisely pointed lecture on my faults, all delivered in full bardic voice.”