City of Sorcerers (18 page)

Sayyed felt himself growing weaker. He could barely stand, yet at the same time his vision of Tam was growing clearer and brighter. Summoning the last of his strength, he took a step and reached his right hand toward her.

"My husband," she murmured, welcoming him.

He took another step and another, until he was only two paces away.

Sayyed!

This time a different voice was calling him. It sounded familiar somehow---light and feminine and oddly imperious. He had no idea where it was coming from and had no desire to find it. Tam was with him again, so close all he had to do was reach out and touch her. He lifted his fingers to grasp her hand when sudden pain ripped down his arm.

Astounded, he stared at his bare forearm. Five long scratches marked his skin, and blood welled from the wound.

He jerked his head up, ready to ask Tam what had hurt him, but she was gone. In her place stood a man dressed in long red robes. His dark eyes glared at Sayyed with such hatred that the warrior stumbled backward. Before he could recover, the man was gone. Sayyed was alone again in the fog. A dread, chill loneliness struck him, and he cried, "Tam!" with all the tears in his heart.

Sayyed!
the strange voice called again.

The warrior paid no attention. Tam was gone again; he had to find her. He staggered into the mist.

Still the voice kept after him persistently, until at last he grudgingly answered,

"What? What do you want?"

Pain suddenly shot through his arm again, and he looked down and saw five more scratches crossing the first. "Stop it!" he shouted into the mist.

Then wake up,
the voice cried back.
They need your help.

Sayyed shook his head to clear it. Whose was this voice? Who needed help? He saw the mist darken to black, and he found himself at the bottom of a deep tunnel.

Somewhere up ahead the voice urged him to come, its insistence like a lifeline in the dark emptiness. It took all of his will to respond. He forced himself to move up through the thick, clinging blackness.

Hurry, Sayyed. Please, wake up,
another, more masculine voice pleaded in his head. That voice, he knew, was Afer's. There was real desperation in the stallion's thoughts, and the plea gave Sayyed the strength he needed to reach consciousness. His eyes dragged open to look into a pair of blurry golden moons.

Something behind the moons growled and grumbled, and the female voice in his head fairly shouted,
We almost lost you!

Outside Sayyed's shelter, a faint flash of lightning flared, lighting the interior of the small tent. Sayyed's vision cleared enough so he could see Tam's cat crouched by his scratched arm, her fur on end, her ears flat on her skull. "You," he mumbled.

Yes, now get up!
she yowled.

Her sense of urgency was beginning to transfer to his fuzzy' thoughts. Something was happening; he was needed. He heaved himself to his hands and knees. A wave of dizziness and nausea nearly knocked him flat again, and he had to take several deep breaths before he could move another muscle.

At the same time, sounds began to penetrate his groggy mind. He could hear his companions shouting at one another and the Hunnuli neighing in rage. Then Sayyed heard something else over the uproar: the cruel laughter of the wraith.

Sayyed threw himself headlong through the tent's flap and somehow scrambled to his feet. The scene before him was in utter chaos. The dark, wet clearing seemed to be filled with wild animals fighting five clanspeople and the Hunnuli.

Sayyed gaped in confusion, then gathered his wooly thoughts and very carefully formed a sphere of light over the combatants' heads. The light was red so as not to interfere with the humans' night vision, and it threw the fighting below into a strange, blood-colored relief. Sayyed saw Afer close by, trading blows with a wild stallion; Kelene and Niela were back-to-back, fighting off five wolves with a dagger, a tree limb, and the help of their Hunnuli. Rafnir was trying desperately to reach the women, but several large stags were keeping him pinned against a tree. Savaron and Morad were struggling to get out of their tent while a bear mauled the fabric in an effort to reach them.

Sayyed barely had time to register on the chaos around him when something growled behind him. He whirled and came face-to-face with a crouching, feral dog.

The dog was a massive male of the breed often used by the clans to hunt cave lions. It snarled again, then leaped for Sayyed's chest.

Tired as he was, the warrior reacted instantly. He drew his sword in a wide backhanded arc that sliced the blade into the springing dog's neck. The dog's head flopped sideways. The force of the blow knocked the animal to the ground, but to Sayyed's dismay it gathered itself and sprang at him again, its head still hanging at a crazy angle. Sayyed slashed at the dog's neck again. This time the head came off completely, and the head and body flopped at his feet. He stared down in amazement at the head, still snarling and trying to snap at his boots.

He took a closer look at the animal. There was something peculiar about it that he hadn't seen in the rush of its attack. The dog's hide was rough and full of holes. As Sayyed bent nearer, the thick stench of decay filled his nostrils. The dog was already dead.

Horrified, he looked around at the other wild animals. They did not appear to be whole either. Some had hideous wounds or injuries, as if they had been attacked, some were skin and bones, and none of the animals moved with the usual grace and alertness of living creatures. Every one of them was dead.

Sayyed didn't pause to reflect further on that gruesome reality, but raised his hand and sent a fistful of magic exploding into the bear attacking Savaron and Morad.

Although Sayyed was weak and the bolt was not as powerful as usual, it was enough to blast the dead bear to fragments. At the same moment, Niela managed to put up a protective shield of magic around herself and Kelene. The wolves drew back snarling, only to be pounded to bloody bones under the hooves of the enraged Hunnuli.

Sayyed turned next to help his son, but as he drew back his hand he saw something else that turned his blood to ice. Young Tomian lay on his back in the grass at the edge of the camp. Crouched over his body was a huge cave lion, the largest Sayyed had ever seen. Its mane was matted and filthy. Its pelt was rotting off its carcass. The lion's eyes were only ant-riddled sockets, and one of its ears was missing.

But its teeth and claws were terribly intact and its jaws dripped with fresh blood.

The lion raised its decaying head and stared straight at Sayyed. The warrior stumbled toward Tomian. Just as he raised his fist to fire another bolt of magic, the reddish form of the wraith materialized beside the big cat. With a wave of its hand, the form stopped the wild beasts in their places. The wraith turned slowly toward Sayyed, its visage uncovered for the first time.

The warrior stopped so fast he nearly fell. There before him was the man from his dream. He recognized every detail from the man's robes, his hawk-nose, and long dark hair to the almost maniacal look of hatred in his face.

"You will not escape again, magic-wielder," the apparition hissed. "I know where you are going and what you seek. You will not succeed. I plan to finish what I began two hundred years ago." With that he vanished into the night.

At his leaving, the driving force behind the dead animals disappeared. Their corpses sank into the grass, no more than lifeless, harmless carrion.

Shocked and disbelieving, the five young people slowly gathered around Sayyed.

Kelene and Niela were unhurt, but Savaron had a laceration in his shoulder from the bear's claws, and Rafnir's arm had been torn by a stag's antler. Morad was white-faced as he knelt beside his brother. No one had to ask if Tomian was dead, for his throat had been torn to bloody shreds. Nearby, in the shadows of the bushes, lay Tomian's Hunnuli, its black coat ripped by claws and fangs, its neck bent at an unnatural angle.

Rafnir was the first to speak. "We fell asleep. I don't know how, but we fell asleep." His words were hoarse with disbelief. Morad looked up at him, tears streaming down his face, and Rafnir forced himself to go on. "The first thing I knew, that lion was attacking Tomian's Hunnuli. Tomian tried to save him, but the cat was too fast. Then all those animals came. Gods above, what were they?" he implored.

"The Oathbreakers said the wraith was trying to kill us. It seems to have found a way to do it," Kelene said, her arms wrapped tightly around her stomach.

Savaron kicked angrily at the dead lion. "But how did it move these beasts? And why did it take Tomian?"

The others fell quiet and stared around at the wreck of their camp and at the carcasses of the animals strewn about like the trophies of a grotesque hunt.

"The wraith will be back," Niela whispered. Her hands twisted the hem of her tunic into a knot.

"Without a doubt," replied Sayyed. He rubbed a hand over his face. He was so tired he could hardly focus and so weak he could barely hold his sword. But the despair that had eaten at him for days was gone. Deep in the pit of his soul, a small seed of determination germinated. Tam was dead. He accepted that now in every part of his heart. The dreams could not deceive him again. He had seen the. face of his enemy, and although he did not know exactly what it was yet, he vowed silently to his god that he would do everything in his power to see it destroyed.

"We're going to leave, now," he said abruptly.

All eyes snapped to him at- the sharpness of his voice.

"But what about Tomian?" Morad demanded angrily.

"And Savaron's shoulder must be tended before infection sets in," Kelene insisted.

Sayyed held up a hand and took a deep breath of the damp night air to still his trembling legs. "I know," he reassured them. "Tomian died with honor, and we will bury him with his Hunnuli. Kelene, you will see to your brother and Rafnir. Then we must leave. We will move at night and rest in the daylight. The wraith hasn't tried to attack us during the day. Perhaps it's weaker then."

Savaron sat down heavily on a log. "Is it weaker in the day? Or do we just not see it through the sunlight?"

"I guess we'll find out," Sayyed muttered. Letting his head fall back, he stared up at the red ball of light still hanging over the clearing. The thunderstorm had moved to the south with its wind and rain. Except for the thunder that rumbled on the horizon, the copse of pine was quiet. He felt Rafnir's hands on his shoulders pushing him down to sit on the fallen tree trunk by Savaron.

"Stay there," Rafnir ordered. "Niela, Morad, and I will tend to Tomian."

The warrior decided not to argue. Given time his strength would return. In the meanwhile the younger ones were capable of handling the tasks waiting to be done.

Afer came to stand behind him, and he leaned back against the Hunnuli's strong legs.

The black's head loomed protectively over him. He was about to close his eyes when Tam's cat came stepping through the wet grass and hopped onto his lap.

Sayyed felt her soft fur under his fingertips. "Thank you," he whispered. "I was not ready to die."

Of course not,
she meowed, settling down on his knee.
Tam told me to watch out
for you.

He chuckled softly and let his eyelids slide closed.

While Sayyed rested, the other travelers set to work. Niela and Morad took the sad task of preparing Tomian for the grave. They moved aside the dead lion, cleaned Tomian's body as best they could, and wrapped him in his cloak. Morad chose a wide spot between four pines, and, together, he and Niela used their magic to move enough dirt to open a deep pit. As they worked, Niela's voice joined the rustle of leaves and the faraway thunder to sing an ancient song of death. Her words trembled on the darkness with the power of grief and filled the copse with a sadness as old as the clans.

On her seat on the tree trunk, Kelene paused from stitching Savaron's wounded shoulder. She listened to the ancient words and felt the song shiver in her blood. She would miss Tomian, and she grieved for Morad, but it so easily could have been Savaron who fell, or Sayyed . . . or Rafnir. The thought sat like a hard lump in her throat, and her fingers tightened convulsively on Savaron's shoulder.

"Are you all right?" her brother asked softly.

She snapped out of her reverie, accidentally jerking her needle in the middle of a stitch. The unexpected pain made Savaron nearly leap off his seat. With a yelp, he swiveled his head and glared at her.

"So sit still! I can't sew a squirming snake!" she growled at him.

Gritting his teeth, he straightened so she could continue to stitch the two ragged claw marks on his back.

"Curse it all,” Kelene said irritably. "I can't sew in this red glow. Rafnir, give me some real light."

Rafnir held a rag to his torn arm and said evenly, "Do it yourself." Both Savaron and Kelene looked at him in such astonishment, he added, "You're a magic-wielder.

You know the spell. You do it."

The young woman frowned. He was challenging her, she knew that, and there was no way to get out of it with her self-respect intact without actually trying the spell. Her chin lifted, she closed her eyes, concentrated on the unseen power' of magic around her, and repeated the spell her mother had tried to teach her so many times.

She felt the magic stream into her like a comforting heat. Through her closed eyelids she saw a dim gleam of light. When she opened her eyes, it was there: a whitish sphere the size of her fist bobbing near her head. The light was small, and it flickered, but the results were hers!

Rafnir winked at her, and Savaron nodded in approval.

"Your shoulder has a nasty tear," Kelene observed as if nothing had happened.

She went back to work, missing the grin that passed between Rafnir and Savaron.

"Bear claws are filthy even when they're on living bears. I've cleaned the wound, but I will make a poultice for you when we have time." She pushed the small bone needle through his skin again and gently drew the horsehair through to tie a knot. Savaron's Hunnuli had donated the hair from his tail, and Kelene had the needle and a pot of wound salve in her medicine bag. She was glad now she had brought it.