TORISEN and his war-guard emerged from the wood into the lower meadow opposite the head of the Mendelin Steps in time to see Ardeth set his scheme in motion. The vanguard of the Horde was backed down the steps with some of it still spilling into the field. It looked a very compact, dangerous mass, black under the stormclouds that still hung over it despite the faint, predawn light gathering in the east. The Host faced it over a no man's land of about a hundred feet, as silent and keyed up as its enemy. One war cry on either side would probably have been enough to set them at each other's throats again.
Then the Host parted, and Ardeth rode into the space between the armies. He stopped about fifty feet from the Horde and sat quite still. Behind him, his men came forward with the changers' bodies and laid them on the trampled grass. Actually, there were five bodies and six heads, the spare having been brought too, still fitfully grimacing. Then the Kencyr withdrew, Ardeth last, backing Brithany all the way to Storm's side. The entire Host fell back a short distance, waiting, hardly knowing for what.
"It occurs to me," said Torisen softly to Ardeth, "that it might not be exactly tactful to show the Wasters what's happened to their revered founders. Just what are you up to, Adric, besides maybe getting us all killed?"
"Think, my boy, think. If as you guessed, the Horde is only attacking us because its founders have told it to, and if they realize now that their so-called forefathers are no such thing . . ."
"They might just turn around and go home. If they can still recognize their 'founders' in that lot; if they know what changers are; if they object sufficiently to having been tricked . . ."
"And if you spin me one more 'if,' my boy, I'll . . . look!"
A Waster had crept forward to the pile of bodies. Several more followed him. For a moment, they formed a dark knot around the changers, then from their midst came sudden yells of rage and grief. A Waster broke away and ran toward the Host, still screaming. The spears of the first Kencyr line came down. The man charged into them, trying to twist past the points, but they caught him, and he fell. The Host went forward a pace, war cries rising in their throats, and so did the Horde. Torisen spurred in front of the Kencyr line.
"Still!" he snapped at it.
Simultaneously, someone by the changers also barked a command, and the Wastelanders checked themselves, startled. An elder rose, holding the spare, severed head by the hair. He was wearing a death mask that might have come off of the changer's still-twitching face. He addressed the Horde's vanguard in Ka'sa.
Where the hell were Harn and Ashe, Torisen wondered, trying to quiet Storm. Was he about to get caught without even a sword between two colliding armies or . . .
But what happened next needed no interpreter. The Waster elder suddenly raised the changer's head and spat full in its face. Then the entire vanguard simply turned, muttering, and withdrew. The elder dropped the head, gave it a contemptuous kick, and followed his people. They all went out of the field, down the steps, onto the plain. The stormclouds followed them.
A collective sigh rose from the Host.
"Is that all?" demanded Essien incredulously.
"It seems so anticlimactic," protested Essiar.
Torisen turned in the saddle to regard the Edirr twins. They were wearing identical armor, riding twin stallions, and had both managed to get wounded on the left forearm. If he hadn't expected it of them, he would have thought he was seeing double.
"Haven't you two had enough excitement for one night?"
"Oh, never," they said simultaneously.
Lord Brandan had ridden up. "Just the same, be glad things ended now. The main body of the Horde is almost here."
"Will it turn?"
"It's already started to, following the vanguard. I would say, Highlord, that you've just won a rather major battle. Congratulations."
It hardly seemed to Torisen that he had been involved in the main conflict at all, but it wouldn't do to say so. Others would point that out soon enough. Speaking of which . . .
"What's become of Caineron? I would have expected him to be in the thick of things."
"So he was," said Brandan dryly. "Rather more so than he intended, I think. For some reason, he was crossing the top of the middle field when his own riders came over the Lower Hurdles on top of him. I don't suppose he's stopped cursing since, although I couldn't swear to it because he seems to have dropped out of sight again."
"The longer, the better."
Brandan gave Torisen a sharp look. "You had better do the same for a while," he said bluntly. "On the whole, you look as if you've been fighting the entire battle single-handed." With that he rode away to look after his own people.
"Sensible Brandan," murmured Ardeth, looking after him. "He's right, you know. You do look like something hardly worth warming over. For Trinity's sake, my boy, go get some rest."
"My lord." It was one of Ardeth's Kendar, riding up. "The Wasters left those . . . those creatures just lying there. What should we do with them?"
"That, I expect, was the final insult," said Ardeth. "The changers weren't even considered fit to eat. Tori?"
"Build a pyre and burn them."
The Kendar was shocked. "But, Highlord, three of them are still alive, and then there's that head."
"Kill them and it with my blessings—if you can."
He rode up through the meadows, through the dead and dying lying thick on the ground in the growing dawn light. His own people were here somewhere. For the first time, he hadn't fought beside them, and now every instinct told him to seek them out; but he couldn't, not just yet. First, he must keep his appointment with Danior. Here at last was his encampment, his own tent, and Burr waiting for him.
"Where's Donkerri?" he asked as they entered the inner chamber.
Burr told him.
Torisen sat down on the cot. After a long moment, he said, "Does it ever strike you, Burr, that we have a very strange code of honor?"
"My lord?"
"Never mind. Just help me out of this gear."
Burr gingerly removed the Kenthiar. Its gem still held the ghost of a glow, which lit the inside of its iron box with faint, opalescent hues until Burr slammed the lid on it. He unlaced what was left of Torisen's armor, both the rhi-sar leather and the chain mail byrnie. Under them, Torisen was wearing a padded shirt, which had prevented the mail rings from cutting into him, but he still had darkening bands of bruises where the changer's arms and the axe blade had caught him. It hurt to take a deep breath. Blackie's proverbial luck hadn't prevented him from getting at least a few cracked ribs this time, although Harn would undoubtedly point out that again he had gotten off very lightly indeed. But where was Harn? He had just turned to ask Burr when a guard announced Danior.
Torisen slipped into the soft black shirt that Burr handed him, taking his time, bracing himself.
"Send in Lord Danior," he told the guard. "Burr, go tell our people to make a special search for Donkerri's body."
Burr stood his ground. "Lord, I already have."
"Then go help them, and take the war-guard with you. I want this tent cleared, Burr. Now."
Burr left reluctantly as Holly entered, bringing his bound prisoner with him. He had stripped off the latter's distinctive upper armor and put a different helmet on his head, visor down, over a gag. Noting these precautions, Torisen gave Holly a sharp look.
"As far as you know, this is one of the captured changers, right?"
"Yes, but Tori . . ."
"No 'buts.' Stick to what you know for certain and make no guesses. They aren't safe. Understand? Now I expect you'd like to get back to sorting out your people."
"And leave you alone with this . . . this. . . ." He gave up on the word. "Tori, is that safe?"
Torisen sighed. "On the average day, I usually do at least three stupid things before breakfast, but this isn't one of them— I hope. Now scoot."
Holly started to leave, then suddenly turned back. "I almost forgot," he said. "Here." Almost reverently, he drew Kin-Slayer and handed it to Torisen. Even in the dim tent, the patterns on the blade shone coldly. "No one will ever question who you are again, Gray Lord's son."
"I suppose not," said Torisen a bit dubiously, remembering how his father's sword had served him in the hollow at the heart of the woods.
Holly left.
"Turn around," Torisen said brusquely to the prisoner.
He cut the cord that bound the other's wrists. The captive shook his hands to restore the circulation, then took off the helmet and spat out the gag. His was a young face that would have been quite handsome if not for a badly swollen nose. Touching it gingerly, he said in a petulant, nasal whine:
"I think you've broken it."
"That wouldn't surprise me. Why did you do it, Pereden?"
"How did you know it was me and not another one of those damned changers?"
"Several things suggested it. First, you called me 'Blackie' in the woods. Not many people outside of the Southern Host know that that's my nickname. Second, I recognized both your armor and your fighting style. Third, we were the only two to come out of that killing circle in anything resembling our right minds. But I wasn't really sure until just now, when you told me. Why, Peri?"
"Oh God. What else had you left me to do?"
"I?"
"Yes, you, damnit!" he said explosively. "Taking my rightful place as commander of the Southern Host, turning my father against me. You reported every little mistake I made to him, didn't you? You deliberately gave me impossible tasks so you could tell my father how incompetent I was!"
"Peri, I never asked anything of you that I wouldn't have of any officer under my command, and I've never told Ardeth more about anything than I've had to, especially about you. Now I wish I'd told him more."
"You lied to him!" It came out almost in a shriek. "You stole his love! Now you're his son, not me."
"Peri, that's not true . . ."
"True!" He began to pace. "You want the truth? You never gave me a scrap of authority you didn't have to. You never trusted me, so neither did your officers. And when they became mine, when I finally got command, did they give me their loyalty? No! They still reported to you, still told me at every turn how the great Torisen would do this or that. Damn."
He snuffled and drew the back of his hand across his face. His nose had started to bleed. Torisen silently gave him a handkerchief.
"Then word came that the Horde was marching north," he went on. "My randons said that the wise thing would be to harry and delay it. That was what you would have done. But I knew I could turn it, I knew, and I would have, too, if those precious officers of yours—yes, and the troops too—hadn't failed me."
"I see," said Torisen. Suddenly, he felt almost dizzy, both with fatigue and with knowledge that he had no desire to possess, but there was no stopping now. "What happened next?"
"I was captured. The changers told me what a fool I'd been not to demand my rights from the first. They showed me how I could still take my rightful place. My place?" He gave a wild laugh. "No, yours! The Knorths forfeited their power over thirty years ago when your father slunk off into exile like a whipped cur."
"So they promised to make you Highlord." Torisen sighed. "Peri, you are and always have been a fool."
"Maybe, maybe not. But I'll still have my revenge. How d'you think my father will react when he hears what I've done, and why?"
"It will kill him. And I promised to protect his interests."
This time Pereden's laugh was distinctly nasty. "Try," he said. "Just try."
He dropped the stained handkerchief on the floor and turned, sneering, to leave. Torisen came up behind him in three swift strides. His left hand slid around Pereden's neck to brace itself against the other's right shoulder. His right hand caught Pereden's chin.
"I keep my promises, Peri," he said in the young man's ear. Then, with a quick twist, he broke Pereden's neck.
The young man tumbled down into an untidy heap. Torisen stood staring down at him, breathing hard. Suddenly, there didn't seem to be enough air in the tent. The canvas walls moved . . . no, he was falling. Something dark moved in the chamber's entrance and strong hands caught him. He blinked. The cot was beneath him now, and Harn was bending over him, his broad face like a full moon incongruously stubbled with beard.
"All right, Blackie, all right. Don't fret. He wasn't worth it."
"You heard?"
"Enough. He deserved worse. Now what?"
Torisen pushed him back and sat up. His mind felt clear again, rather like the ringing vault of a cloudless sky. "Put him on the pyre with the other changers—and, Harn, make sure he's unrecognizable first."
"With pleasure. There'll be no dirges for this one." His expression changed.
"Now what?"
Harn hemmed and hawed, but finally told him about Singer Ashe.
"Sweet Trinity," Torisen said heavily. "If we won this battle, why do things keep getting worse? This is my fault, too. I should have made sure she had those haunt-bites tended to. What did you do with her?"
"Nothing. She's down in the lower meadow now among the wounded, helping to sort the dying from those likely to recover."
"A haunt, being useful?"
"I don't understand it, either. She has the oddest attitude toward the whole thing—not glad it happened, mind you, but interested in what will happen next. A strange woman, that, and rapidly getting stranger. I don't know what to say to her. Ah!" He shook himself. "Where's a helmet?" He picked up the one Pereden had worn and clamped it on the young man's head to hide his features. Then he slung the corpse over his shoulder. "You get some rest, Blackie."
"But what about my people?"
"A lot of good you'll do them, falling down in a heap every ten minutes. Be as stubborn as usual, Blackie, but for God's sake don't be stupid on top of it. Get some rest."
He left.
Torisen sighed and stretched out again on his cot. Harn was right. A few hours of dwar sleep wouldn't entirely restore him, but it would certainly help. Trinity, but he ached. Senethar techniques controlled the worst of it, but not his restlessness. After about five minutes, he swore out loud and got up.
"Stupid, stupid," he muttered as he found and put on the oldest clothes he could, including a dull red jacket of Burr's. Then he went out.
THE SUN WAS JUST coming up when a very tall man strode through the woods, following a golden ounce. The cat led him straight to the hollow and bounded in. The mist was thinning. Two changers, one of them headless, lay on beds of crushed ferns, writhing slowly. Their flesh was as puffy as drowned men's and mottled with bruises, which even now kept appearing in new patterns. A third changer lay motionless nearby. The ounce skirted them all warily and darted toward the far wall, only to bounce back, all his fur on end, as a large gray wolf rose snarling from the ferns.
The big man hesitated. Then he advanced slowly and went down on one knee.
"You're the Wolver, I think," he said, pitching his voice almost to a whisper because of the echoes. "I heard you were about somewhere. Forgotten yourself a bit, have you? There, there, gently. . . ." He reached slowly toward the still form the wolf guarded, but stopped as the beast held his ground, white fangs bared.
"Well, this is a bit of an impasse, isn't it? I'm Marcarn, Marc to my friends, and that's one of them there. Friend. Do you understand?"
The wolf snarled.
"Oh dear. We came to Hurlen together, the lass, this kitten, and I. I was captured by Lord Caineron. Ah, that's a name you remember. Enemy, eh? Anyway, the battle began, and then suddenly everyone in camp charged out of it, my guards included. I found the kitten, and we went looking for our friend there in the thick of things, where she usually is. No luck. It wasn't until the battle was over that it occurred to me to look for her here. That was rather slow of me, because this is obviously just the sort of place she would end up. Now, if you'll just let me have a look . . ."
He spoke in a low, soothing voice, counterpointed by Jorin, who practically stood on his shoulders, singing defiance. When he reached out again, the Wolver went back a step, then suddenly lunged. His jaws closed on Marc's wrist. Kendar and wolf stared at each other.
"There, there," said Marc gently. "You don't really mean it, do you?"
The Wolver, if anything, looked embarrassed. He let go. His fangs had barely dented the other's skin.
"Now let's see." Marc parted the fronds. "Hmm. Still breathing, no obvious wounds . . . what's this?" He picked up something white by Jame's hand. It was the Ivory Knife. The Wolver growled at it. "I agree, but then the lass always did favor odd toys. It wouldn't do to leave this one here." He slipped it into her boot sheath, "Now, let's get out of here." He picked Jame up and carried her out of the hollow with Jorin bounding ahead and the Wolver trotting at his heels. By the time he crossed the threshold, a shaggy young man followed him, looking sheepish.
"Sorry about that," he said as Marc put Jame down. "I got a bit lost in there."
"So I suspected. Ah."
Jame had started to revive the moment she was out of the hollow. Now she sat up abruptly with a sharp cry.
"Where are they? Where . . . oh, Marc! Ancestors be praised. What a foul dream I was having, or at least I think it was a dream. W-was there anyone else in there besides the changers?"
"No, lass. Who else should there be?"
"Those . . . those men. They came when the scream ended, almost as if they were answering it. I couldn't see them very well. They seemed to be wearing leather collars hung with glowing stones and nothing else. They were very squat. I-I could see their mouths move as if they were chanting, but I couldn't hear anything. Then they started to do . . . things to the changers. Terrible things. You were there," she said, turning suddenly to the Wolver. "You saw."
"I saw, but I hadn't the wits to make sense of it then, and now it's all slipping away."
Jame shivered. "I wish I could forget as easily. At first all eight darklings were there as well as Tori and that man in blue. There was a . . . a sort of dome of light around Tori and the other, centered on that gem Tori was wearing. The shadow people wouldn't come anywhere near it. Come to think of it, it looked like the stones they were wearing, only polished and bound to that silver collar with Builders' runes. Then, somehow, Tori, the other, and all but three of the changers were gone. The shadow people went on torturing the two changers who were still alive. I think they would have killed them outright if they had been strong enough. That would have been kinder. But they weren't kind. They made me watch, and wait. Maybe they were saving me for last, or maybe it was the worst they could do to me because you were there, wolf, guarding."
The Wolver was staring back into the hollow, ears flat, half cowering. "I couldn't have held them off long, not if they were the people of rock and stone who built this place. There are more kinds of ghosts on Rathillien than one. Now can we please get out of here? This place makes my teeth ache."
Just then, a branch snapped close by in the woods. The Wolver spun about with a squawk, but instead of the squat men whom he most feared, Kendar warriors silently emerged from the trees all around to ring them in. Just the same, his relief was short-lived.
"Ah, here you are," said Caineron to Jame, stepping forward with a bland smile. "You've led me quite a chase, my dear, but now I really think you will accept my hospitality at last."
THE LIGHT OF A SUN just barely up showed the middle and lower meadows strewn with battle debris, much of it human. Because most of the houses had kept their people fairly well together despite the confusion, each now had its own area to search for its fallen. The dead had to be gathered for the pyre, the wounded sorted according to who was likely to live and who to die. Highborn did much of the culling since, oddly enough, many of them had a better instinct for such work than all but the best-trained Kendar. Then, too, it brought more honor to the mortally stricken to be dispatched by the White Knife of a Highborn. Those with lesser injuries were either treated on the spot or sent back to the surgeons' tent in camp.
There were, of course, a great many Wasters still on the field. Most were dead. Searchers dealt summarily with the survivors when they found them.
There were also scavengers. Torisen came on a clutch of them stripping a dead Kendar, and a moment later was nearly trampled by the Coman's war-guard charging down on them. The scavengers bolted. One of them ran between the horses straight into Torisen's arms and struggled in his grasp, scratching and biting. It was only a child, one of Hurlen's tower waifs. So were the others.
"Names of God," said Korey, staring at his captives. "And what am I supposed to do with this lot?"
"Take them back to the city," said Torisen, carrying his prisoner in among the riders and dumping it with the other cowering children. "You'd better leave a ten-command guarding the bridge and another at the ferry or we'll be overrun."
"And who in Perimal's name . . . oh, Highlord!"
"The same, getting underfoot and frightening the horses as usual. See to Hurlen, won't you—and Korey, I understand that your people were among the last to retreat when the battle line broke. Good work."
Korey glowered and blushed at the same time. "Thank you, Highlord. I'll tend to Hurlen." He wheeled and rode off with his guard.
I really have been wearing black too long if no one can recognize me in anything else, Torisen thought ruefully, and went on.
Torisen found his own people not much farther on, the last to give way when the line broke. Now the lines of the dead seemed incredibly long. All those stiffening hands and still faces, most painfully familiar. Nearly three hundred dead, Harn's second-in-command reported, and perhaps a hundred more still missing. Even if all of the latter turned up, Torisen would still lead back to Gothregor a force more than decimated.
"Still, at sixty to one odds, it might have been worse," said the second-in-command dryly.
Torisen sighed. "I suppose so." He did what he could there, and then went on down into the lower meadow to look for the missing Kendar.
The dead and wounded of all nine houses lay here where the vanguard's initial charge had rolled over them. Searchers moved among them, identifying, classifying. Torisen recognized Ashe. At a distance, she looked unchanged, but as he approached, she turned to look at him, and he stopped short, aghast at her pale face and lifeless eyes.
"Do I . . . frighten you, lord?" Her voice was a husky, halting whisper.
"Yes. I didn't know haunts could speak."
"Most of us . . . probably have nothing . . . to say. And yet your father . . . spoke to you in the White Hills."
Torisen looked quickly around, but no one was within earshot. "How do you know that?"
"I find . . . that the dead know . . . what concerns the dead. It's the concerns . . . of the living that we forget . . . bit by bit."
He came closer, drawn despite himself by curiosity. "What is it like, being dead?"
"I . . . hardly know yet. It's like . . . a new language, heard for the first time. It will take awhile to learn . . . the words, and then they may have no cognates . . . in the speech . . . of the living. At least, for the first time in forty years . . . my leg doesn't hurt."
"Ashe, I'm very sorry that this happened. Maybe Kindrie can help. Ardeth tells me that he's a powerful healer."
"He would have to be . . . to resurrect the dead. No, Highlord. And don't . . . be sorry. Look."
He had noted the gashes in her jacket without paying much attention to them because there was no blood. Now he realized that they really did correspond to wounds, some very deep. Of course: The dead don't bleed.
"I got these . . . defending Harn's back. He never remembers to . . . when one of his fits comes on . . . which is why I followed him. Any one of them . . . might have killed me—if I hadn't already been dead. I have time . . . before me now . . . that I would have lost forever."
"But not an eternity," Torisen said sharply. "I grew up in the Haunted Lands, Ashe. I saw how haunts change. You belong to the shadows now. Sooner or later, they will consume you."
"Ah . . . but before then . . . what songs I will sing!"
Torisen shivered. "I wonder if the living will be able to bear them. But I'm not fool enough to interfere with a singer. What else can I do for you, Ashe? I owe you for Harn's life."
"Then give me . . . the child. Her brother . . . is with the Host now. She should go to him . . . and then . . . to the pyre. This half-life isn't for one so young . . . so defenseless."
"I know. I've been selfish. But I-I seemed to need her."
"You did. You don't now. Did you know," she said, with apparent irrelevancy, "that during the battle you were seen repeatedly . . . both riding a white horse . . . and on foot with a sword?"
"So I've heard. I don't know what to make of it."
"Neither do I . . . but it has something to do . . . with why you no longer need the child. Let her go."
Torisen still hesitated and wondered why. What was he really giving up with such reluctance—the bones and shadow of a Kendar child whom he had never known or, in some confused way, the ghost of his own sister, of the child she had been when he had stood by and watched their mad father drive her out into the Haunted Lands? He had let her go then and had felt guilty ever since. He didn't want to lose her again. But, damnit, this wasn't Jame. This was some stranger child with her own path, and he had selfishly kept her from it too long already.
"Yes, yes, of course," he said, impatient with his own weakness. "Let her go."
"Good." Death-glazed eyes regarded him with deceptive blankness. "Highlord, this is going . . . to sound strange coming from me . . . but you look awful."
He gave a sudden snort of laughter. "So everyone keeps telling me. Let's just say I'm tougher than I look. It's a family trait. And don't tell me I should rest. I think I'll see what I can do down here to help. After all," he concluded more bleakly, looking around, "this was my party."
THE SUN WAS UP well above the east bank bluffs now. It would be a hot day. Already heat waves rippled above the lookout's stony point on the escarpment. Torisen brushed insects away from an injured Kendar's face. She was unconscious—a good thing, given the severity of her wounds—but as far as he could tell she was also on the edge of dwar sleep and so likely to recover.
"Another one for the surgeons' tent," he said to the stretcher-bearers who accompanied him. They carried her away.
Torisen rose stiffly. Despite Harn's prediction, he hadn't keeled over yet; but he was beginning to feel distinctly lightheaded. In a way, he welcomed that. It took the edge off his perceptions, made the suffering around him easier to bear. The pain, especially of his own mortally stricken Kendar, seemed to draw him. Perhaps it was their collective suffering that had pulled him all the way here from his own camp, as if part of him lay dying on this hot field. Torisen shook his head impatiently. Leave fantasies like that to the Shanir, he thought. He didn't ask himself how he knew that all the dying Kendar personally bound to him had now been found.
Somewhere not far off, someone was whimpering in pain. That didn't sound like a Kencyr. Sure enough, in a fold of the meadow Torisen found a Karkinoran soldier curled up on the ground, arms wrapped around his lower abdomen. Half of his bowels had already spilled out on the grass. Someone in Karkinoran field buff bent over him. Torisen saw with surprise that it was Odalian. The Prince looked up as Torisen approached and shook his head. He drew a knife. The soldier saw and began to scream. He fought them both with a strength born of terror until Torisen pinned his hands, and Odalian delivered a heart thrust.
"Messy," said Torisen as they walked away.
"What did you expect?" said the other with a sort of suppressed violence. "They don't have dwar sleep, or Senethar techniques to control pain, or even a practical attitude toward death. They're like children, waking up in a slaughterhouse."
Torisen shot him a surprised look. And you're so much older? At that moment, it seemed true. "You hardly sound as if you think of yourself as one of them," he said. "For that matter, just now you're behaving more like a Kencyr Highborn."
This time, Odalian looked surprised. "How so?"
"Well, here you are—in common clothes, without your retinue, helping to cull the wounded . . ."
"Just like you."
"Yes, I suppose so." He looked around, shivering. "So many dead. It wasn't this bad when I led the Southern Host, before anyone was bound to me personally. This was my first major battle as Highlord. And you?"
"My first—as prince." The other's face indeed bore no lines of experience, but his silver-gray eyes looked old and sick. "I didn't know they would suffer so much; but that happens in war, doesn't it?" Abruptly, the naive young man in Odalian was back —voice, face, eyes. "Actually, I came down here looking for you. Have you thought any more about subject ally status for Karkinor?"
"I've hardly had a chance," said Torisen, thrown off-balance by the other's sudden change both of subject and manner. For a moment, he could have sworn that he was walking beside quite a different person. More fantasies, he told himself, and dismissed them. "You're still serious about that, Highness?"
"More than ever."
"It isn't something I can just bestow on my own, you know," he said, hedging. "In theory, yes, as Highlord, but the rest of the Council would be furious, with good reason. I'll have to consult their wishes."
"Yes, I can see that," the other replied with quiet persistence. "You said before, though, that it might impress them if I showed I was willing to undergo the full rites. What if I were to blood-bind myself to you now, as an act of good faith?"
The idea at first startled Torisen and then made him very uneasy. He had mimicked blood-binding many times before, as with Harn at Tentir, but never gone so far as actually to make the cuts. The blood itself didn't bother him or the scars. What, then? Because Odalian wanted him to play the Shanir in such explicit terms? Yes. He could feel all his mental defenses rise at the very thought. But should he let that prevent a just decision? No, of course not. But . . . but . . . but . . .
"Damnation," he said, disgusted with himself. "Your people fought beside us and many of them died. We owe Karkinor something for that. Whether the Council will go so far as to grant ally status of any sort I don't know, but at least I can give you the chance to put your request in the strongest possible terms. If they say 'no,' I'll release you and no harm done. That, at least, is something no true blood-binder could do."
"You'll go through with the rites?" The Prince's voice was eager. It must have been imagination that for an instant his eyes looked so bleak. "Here? Now?"
"In the middle of a field with stretcher-bearers tripping over us? No. I suggest the lookout's point on the escarpment. At least there with the sentinel withdrawn we'll have some privacy."
"That," said the Prince, "will be perfect."
JAME CIRCLED THE ROOM one more time, looking for some way out. Actually, "room" was probably the wrong word for it. It was an inner compartment of Lord Caineron's tent, which was the largest, most intricate of its kind that Jame had ever seen. She had been brought here in the midst of Caineron's war-guard nearly two hours ago. Marc, Jorin, and the Wolver were presumably prisoners, too. She didn't think Caineron would hurt any of them, but precious time was passing, and Tori was still unwarned.
The walls were made of strong canvas dyed yellow and orange. She might have cut her way out, if Caineron hadn't taken the Knife. She tried again to pick a seam, but her claws were too sore now even to extend. Attack the guard? Fine, if she could get at him. The room was laced shut on the outside, an arrangement that made her wonder if it had been used as a prison before, probably without that delicate table in the corner with glasses and a carafe of wine on it or these pillows scattered about its canvas floor. Jame kicked one in sheer frustration. Damn, damn, damn . . .
Someone was unlacing the door flap. A moment later, a guard held it open as Caineron entered smiling, resplendent in a white coat embroidered with sunflowers and marigolds across the shoulders. In the golden light of the room, he seemed to glow. The guard laced up the flap again after him.
"My apologies for having left you on your own for so long, my dear. Have you been comfortable?"
"Why are you keeping me a prisoner?"
He made a slight face, as if silently deploring her lack of manners. "A prisoner? Oh no. An honored guest. But I see you haven't touched the refreshments my guard left you. Let me pour you some wine." He crossed to the table.
"Where is my brother?"
"Somewhere in the lower meadow, I believe, ostensibly helping to cull the wounded. The Prince is there, too. Soon their paths will no doubt cross. How delightful for both of them."
He was playing with her. He knew she knew about the changer, because Graykin had told him, but he didn't know that she knew that he knew. Damn these games anyway. There wasn't time.
"Torisen presumably has friends among the Highborn, if not on the Council," she said. "What will they say when they find out you've allowed him to be trapped by a changer impersonating the Prince?"
He turned and looked at her. "Ah. And who will tell them? You?"
Jame stiffened at his tone. "No one has ever questioned my word or honor."
"Honor doesn't come into it," he said coolly. "Not with the unbalanced. My dear, just look at yourself. No Highborn in her right mind would dress like that or disport herself as you have. Lyra has told me about some of your little escapades at Karkinaroth, and I've seen others for myself here at the Cataracts. You're patently unhinged, my dear. There's not a chance that anyone will take you seriously. Then too, you forget that eventually your brother or more likely something very similar to him will come back from the lower meadow. Who will the Council believe then, you or him? But do have some wine, my dear. It would be much better if you didn't repulse my hospitality."
He held the glass out to her. Under the circumstances, it would be an insult to refuse; but Jame remembered all too clearly that last time someone had offered her wine. That in turn gave her an idea. She accepted the glass.
Caineron beamed at her. "That's better. Now we can be more comfortable. You know, my dear, it would interest me very much to know where you've been keeping yourself these past fifteen or so years, and how you came by such an odd weapon as this."
He was wearing the Ivory Knife sheathed at his ample waist. How like the man simply to appropriate it, just as he had Jorin—twice now, presumably.
"It has a very sharp edge," said Jame, hoping he would try it and find out for himself.
"I daresay. But you haven't answered my question."
Jame had turned her back. Keep him talking. "First tell me what you mean to do with me."
She heard him sigh behind her. "I really must teach you the meaning of obedience, my dear. In fact, it will be a pleasure . . . perhaps for you, too. At least, I think you'll be pleased with the plans I have for you. It isn't every girl who is honored with an alliance with the first blood of such a powerful house as mine." He went on, happily describing the advantages of such a match, most of which sounded extremely trivial to Jame. At a time like this, he was trying to bribe her with toys, confident that they would delight her. She made noncommittal noises, her back still turned. Deftly, she unsealed the inner pocket that held the crystals from the Builder's house. If the river water had gotten at them . . . but no. She had taken them thinking that someday she might find someone to test them on. Well, no time like the present. She dropped a pinch into her wine. The crystals dissolved immediately, leaving no visible trace. As for a smell . . .
"What are you doing, my dear?"
She turned, the glass still raised to her nose. "There's something in my wine. A potion? Was this what you meant by hospitality, my lord?"
"Nonsense," said Caineron sharply. "Give me that." He took the glass, sniffed, drank. "There, you see? Next time, perhaps you'll trust . . . hic! . . . me."
For a moment, he looked uncertain, but it wasn't in his nature to doubt himself long on any point. He went on talking about the glories of his house, sipping absentmindedly from the glass, which he had forgotten to return, and hiccupping whenever he least expected it. Torisen's presumption figured in his discourse too; but now he seemed contemptuously amused by it rather than angered.
"Imagine that . . . hic! . . . man, thinking he can disguise himself simply by putting on a red coat, sneaking . . . hic! . . . off without his war-guard to the lower meadow. Why? All so he and the Prince can confirm a pact without the Council's . . . hic! . . . approval. Ardeth is going to spit blood when he finds out. He still thinks Torisen only jumps when he pulls the strings. Well, we'll see after this who jumps, and why. Hic!"
He poured himself more wine. His feet, Jame suddenly noticed, were no longer quite touching the canvas floor. Caineron also noticed. He tentatively felt downward with one elegant boot, then cleared his throat and put down the glass.
"This is a rather potent vintage," he said carefully. "Luckily, I have a very strong head for wine . . . hic!"
He went up another inch and began to look rather alarmed, but much more so when Jame darted in and whipped the Ivory Knife from his sheath. She jumped back. He began to shout.
"Guard, guard! Assassin! Sorcery! Hic!"
The guard could be heard frantically unlacing the door. Jame slashed at the rear canvas wall. The tough fabric ripped, half cut, half rotted by the Knife's cold edge. She wriggled out through the slit into a canvas corridor. Which way now? More guards were coming. She cut through the opposite wall, and emerged in a silk-draped bower. Lyra sprang up, shrieking.
"Just passing through," Jame said hastily, and did so by the next wall.
Another corridor, another wall—Trinity, how big was this tent?—another room, and a guard spinning around to face her. He went down with a grunt under Marc's fist.
"I thought you'd be along sooner or later," said the big Kendar tranquilly while Jorin rubbed against her knee and the Wolver yelped questions from the next compartment. She slit the wall to let him out.
"Look, I'm in a bit of a hurry. Can you two cause some confusion to cover my escape?"
"I'd say you've been doing pretty well on your own," said Marc, listening to the shrieks, bellows, and shouts that followed in Jame's wake. "But certainly. Our pleasure."
"And hang onto Jorin again."
She heard the ounce's protesting wail as she slashed into and dove through the far wall. Poor Jorin, always getting left. Two more canvas barriers, each brighter than the one before, and at last the open air of a sunny, hot morning.
People had begun to gather around the tent, listening with amazement to the uproar within. One of them, a Kendar girl, led a tall gray war horse. Jame seized the reins.
"But this is Commander Sheth's horse!" protested the girl, hanging on.
"And I need it. Understand?"
The other met her eyes and let go, gulping. "U-understood, Highborn."
Jame scrambled up onto the stallion's bare back. Trinity, but the ground looked a long way down from up here. She had played tag-you're-dead on the roofs of three-story buildings and felt more secure. Behind, part of the tent collapsed to the sound of outraged shouts from within. Marc and the Wolver were evidently enjoying themselves. If they could just manage to breach the roof, maybe Caineron would float away, sunflowers, marigolds, and all.
Jame clamped heels to her mount and nearly shot off over his tail as he bolted. If she survived the day, she thought, clinging desperately, she simply had to learn how to ride. They thundered down through the camp, over the Lower Hurdles (fortunately, at a low point), and across the middle field. Searchers leaped out of the way and shouted angrily after them. The ground seemed paved with bodies, but this time she had a mount who knew where to put his hooves. They burst through the bottleneck between the woods and river into the lower meadow.
"Where is Torisen?" Jame shouted to a pair of stretcher-bearers, reining in as much as she dared. The stallion curveted, as if to test her none-too-secure seat. "He's wearing a red coat."
"Red? That was the Highlord? Then he's gone to the lookout's point, Highborn. The Prince was with him."
Jame galloped on. She was below the battlefield now with no more bodies underfoot. The upper cataract roared below her in its gorge. Ahead some five hundred feet the world seemed to end at the edge of the escarpment with nothing beyond but sky. On the point stood two figures. One wore Karkinoran field buff; the other, a dark red coat. The man in buff knelt. The other gave him his hands.
"Tori, no! Don't . . . !"
The horse shied. Jame lost her grip and tumbled off. Earth and sky blurred together as she rolled over and over in the thick grass. Her cap flew off. Long, black hair whipped in her eyes. Then she had stumbled to her feet and was running. Ahead, the buff-coated figure seemed to be on the ground, and her brother was bending over him. What had happened? She was still a good hundred yards away, her shadow leaping on before her. Her shadow? But the sun rose in the east, not the north. Something very bright was coming up fast behind her. Even as she turned to look, it shot overhead, blazing. Sweet Trinity, the Dream-Weaver. What in Perimal's name was going on?
Torisen asked himself the same thing. The proper words had been spoken, the cuts made, and the Prince had gone down on one knee to drink the blood welling up in the Highlord's cupped hands that would symbolically bind Odalian to their conditional oath.
"There. That's done," Torisen had said, relieved; and the Prince had looked up at him with an odd expression.
"Yes. It's done."
Then a tremor had gone through the Karkinoran as if the very flesh rippled on his bones. His look had turned inward in astonishment and growing dismay. Another tremor had shaken him.
"Odalian? Your Highness? What's wrong?"
But the Prince didn't answer. He was huddled on the ground now, hands over his face. His fingers seemed impossibly long and thin, stretching up over his eyes into his hair like the bars of a helmet, but the thing that he fought was inside.
A blinding light passed overhead. Torisen stared after it, bewildered. It arced out over the plain, shining like a comet as it crossed the blackness of the retreating stormclouds. The afterimage of a woman's form burned in his mind's eye. Something about her made him catch his breath. Who was that?
The Prince gave a ragged laugh. When Torisen looked sharply back, a girl was crouching opposite him, panting as if after a hard run, her dark hair tumbling down about her to the ground. Surely he knew her too, but it couldn't be . . .
"Binder," gasped the Prince through his hands. "Joke's . . . on me."
Jame stared at him. Then her eyes snapped up to her brother. Binder? Blood-binder? Tori, a Shanir?
He was staring back at her with growing incredulity. "Who in Perimal's name are . . . oh no. Don't tell me."
"I'm afraid so. Hello, brother." Growing light made her look sharply southward. "Sweet Trinity. Here she comes again."
"Here who comes? Who is that woman?"
The light was almost on top of them now. Jame sprang up without answering, shielding her eyes against the brilliance. The Prince caught at her, but it wasn't the Prince anymore. This creature's face rippled like a reflection on stagnant pond water. "Don't!" it croaked. "Don't get in her way, either of you! One touch, and she'll reap your souls. She can't help herself!"
The light slowed, hovered just beyond the escarpment's edge. Its brightness hurt the eye. Torisen saw nothing staring directly into it, but when he turned away, eyes watering, the woman's image danced before him. Her shadow stood between her and the false prince. It held a white knife.
"Leave him alone, damnit!"
Jame's voice sounded shrill even to her. What on earth was she doing, coming between two creatures of legend? The Master had sent the Mistress to bring back his faithful servant, apparently not realizing what a subtle, double game the changer had played. What was that to her . . . except that if it were not for Tirandys, she would never have learned the meaning of honor.
"Let him die in peace!"
She had spoken Master Runes more than once. For the first time, she heard threads of their power weave through her voice, but not enough of them. Never mind. She had the Ivory Knife. She could defend herself and the other two if . . . if . . .
The Dream-Weaver's beautiful face was still tranquil, almost masklike, and, this time, startlingly familiar. Jame glanced from it to the pommel of the Knife and back again in amazement. Yes, of the three faces carved there—maiden, lady, hag— the Mistress's was the second. But no ivory could catch the silver sheen of those eyes or the impossible black of their pupils, like the void between the stars.
As in the Ebonbane, Jame felt that darkness tug at her. She was falling into it, down, down. . . . But at the same time she felt the stones of the escarpment under her feet and sunlight hot on her left cheek. What she saw, though, was darkness, and an arch of rock spanning the unmade chaos that gaped at the very core of the Dream-Weaver's being. Winds howled into it. Jame could almost feel them. She had heard of the soul-metaphors used by healers and knew that this was the other's soulscape; but if the bridge was a metaphor, the gaping emptiness beneath it wasn't. Through the abuse of her Shanir powers, the first Jamethiel had opened this breach into the void beyond the Chain of Creation, just as the Arrin-ken had said. Now the souls of those whom she touched fell shrieking into it, as Jame's would too if her namesake touched her.
But where was the Dream-Weaver? She had been scarcely ten feet away, just beyond the cliff's edge. Jame stepped hesitantly out onto the arch. She felt the grass between the stones of the escarpment brush against her legs and knew that she was walking toward the brink.
Light glimmered ahead. A figure danced on the arch over the void, tracing with single-minded concentration the kantirs of the Senetha, which helped her to keep her precarious balance. In outward aspect, she had been a beautiful lady clad in dazzling white. Here at the center of her being, though, the garments of her soul had faded to the color of bone, with a glow that barely touched the surrounding darkness. Her long hair was also white, and her pale features bore a likeness more to the third than the second face on the Ivory Knife's pommel. Some shreds of beauty remained, however, saved from ruin by an underlying innocence that not even this personal hell had thus far managed to destroy. Jame took another hesitant step toward her.
"Mother?"
The woman turned. They were very close to each other now. Without thinking, Jame almost touched the other's pale cheek and saw that in a mirror gesture the Dream-Weaver was almost touching hers.
"Daughter?"
Jame stared at her. "I-I hardly remember you," she stammered. "It's been so very, very long. Why did you leave us?"
"Because I could no longer touch you."
There was so much more to say, so many questions and answers needed to span the years of separation that lay between them; but time had run out. The Dream-Weaver tottered, her eyes widening in sudden horror. She had stopped dancing. The rock beneath them had begun to crumble. Jame also staggered. She hardly knew if she felt the escarpment underfoot now or the metaphoric bridge; but whatever it was, it wouldn't be there long. If the other touched her now, she would surely fall; but the Dream-Weaver just might regain her balance. She saw the other's panic-stricken indecision. The Mistress had reaped souls before as if in a dream. To take one now, knowing what she did, would be the end of innocence, the true fall from honor, but it might also mean survival.
A sudden smile lit the Dream-Weaver's worn features. Her hand passed Jame's face in a phantom caress, and the span of rock on which she stood gave way. Jame gave a sharp cry and lunged forward to catch her, but missed. Sprawling on the edge of the broken arch, she saw the other's soul plummet away, white hair streaming, into the void. Pieces of stone fell after her. The bridge was disintegrating. Jame clung to it, too afraid to move, even though she knew instinctively that the brink of the escarpment was also giving way beneath her. Behind her, someone was shouting her name over the winds' howl:
"Jamie, give me your hand! Do you hear me? Answer!"
"I hear you, Senethari," she whispered. One of her hands released its grip on the crumbling rock and groped blindly behind her as if of its own accord, impelled by a childish trust she had thought long since dead.
Another hand closed on hers. Even as the arch gave way under her, she was wrenched back out of darkness into blinding light and fell face down on the hot stones of the escarpment.
The roar of wind seemed to fill the world. Jame felt the rushing air try to suck her off the ground, but something held her down. She could hear the trees of Eldest Island bend, groaning, and a great whoosh as tear-of-silver leaves rose in a glistening sheet from the gorge. What was happening? Even with eyes squeezed shut, she was half stunned by the light, as if the sun had come to rest just beyond the escarpment and everything was falling into the darkness at its heart. While the Dream-Weaver's soul had kept its uncertain balance, only other souls had plunged through the portal of her body into that void. Now her soul had followed the others, and all matter seemed to be rushing after it. By sacrificing herself, Jamethiel had saved both her daughter and her long-compromised honor, but had she also doomed all of Rathillien? For a moment, that seemed all too likely, but then the winds faltered and began to die.
Jame dragged herself free and turned to look. For a moment, her eyes were still dazzled; but then they cleared in time to see a point of radiance as bright as a distant star dwindle and vanish just beyond the cliff edge. The portal that had been Jamethiel Dream-Weaver had collapsed in on itself and closed forever. If the destruction of the body freed the soul, then the Mistress was free at last—if such rules applied beyond the Chain of Creation. Jame found herself praying to the god she despised that they did.
She glanced toward the ground then and saw the changer Tirandys sprawling before her, his fingers dug into the very rock like pale roots. She had crawled out from under his left arm. Torisen still lay under his right. Hastily, she pulled her brother free.
"Are you all right?" she demanded as he sat up, looking distinctly groggy.
"Well . . . enough. Too many things caught up with me at once—including you."
"Sorry. I didn't mean to be quite so dramatic about it. . . . Trinity!"
Tirandys was moving. She had thought he was dead, had hoped it, at least, for his sake, forgetting how hard changers die. He rose on an elbow. His face moved as if secret things crawled at will beneath the skin. Then he made a choking noise and convulsed horribly. They heard bones break. Jame threw off her brother's restraining hand and dropped to her knees at the changer's side. The muscles of his back and shoulders writhed like snakes under her hands.
"Tell me what to do!" she cried in an agony of helplessness.
The seizure subsided, and for a moment he lay still, panting. Then he rolled over. The Ivory Knife was in his hand.
"You've already done it," he said in a hoarse, nearly unrecognizable voice. An expression almost like a smile crossed his tortured face. "We trained you well, Jamie. Some good does endure, it seems."
Then, before the next convulsion could grip him, he turned the Knife's point to his chest and fell forward on it.
He was already dead when Jame turned him over. Even as they watched, his face changed one last time, settling into lines as fine-cut and tranquil as any on a Knorth death banner. Jame closed his silver eyes. Good-bye, Tirandys, Senethari.
Her own eyes were stinging.
"But I never cry," she said almost defiantly to her brother, and then amazed them both by bursting into tears.