Crown of Three (10 page)

“Needed . . . find you,” the frost witch croaked. Her voice rustled like paper, barely audible over the distant howl of wind deep in the canyon.

“I'm here,” said Tarlan. Suddenly he remembered what he'd gone for in the first place. He rummaged in his cloak. Only two of the precious black leaves that had cost them so dearly remained. When had he lost the rest? It didn't matter.

Hands shaking, he held up the leaves.

“What do I do? Crush them? Boil them? Make a paste? Tell me!”

Mirith's hand was steady as it closed over his. It had no more strength than a snowflake.

“Black leaf . . . soothes pain . . . nothing more . . .”

“But . . .”

“Hush. I sensed it.”

“What? Sensed what?”

“You . . . Seethan . . . elk . . .” With a soft grunt, she tried to sit up. “Tarlan, you are . . . in danger. The elk-hunters will . . . will not rest. You are their prey now. You must . . . must leave Yalasti.”

“Not without you!” Tarlan's tears froze on his cheeks, hard little beads of grief.

“I am dying.”

“No!”

“Take . . . this.” Mirith drew a gold chain from under her cloak. Hanging from the chain was a shard of green gemstone. It spun, glittering, and Tarlan was momentarily entranced.

“What's this?” he said.

“Show it to Melchior. . . . He will know what to do. . . .”

“Melchior? Who's he?” The name sounded familiar, but Tarlan was captivated by the jewel. Yet he was reluctant to take it, or even touch it. To do so would be to accept that Mirith was going to die.

“Melchior is an old friend. . . .”

The jewel turned, catching the icy light. The name turned too, inside Tarlan's racing thoughts.

“A wizard,” he said slowly. “Melchior was a wizard. You told me stories.”

Mirith nodded, her breath rasping as she tried to speak. “Yes,” she managed to gasp at last.

“There are no wizards. You told me they grew too old and time left them behind.”

“All but one. All but . . . Melchior.”

Tarlan looked away. His heart was too full for his head to work properly. “Who is he, Mirith? What do you mean me to do?”

Mirith said nothing. When Tarlan looked back, she was staring at the sky with eyes that had already glazed over white with ice. The frost witch's body slowly stiffened in Tarlan's arms, losing the heat of the fever that had finally claimed her life. Her skin turned the dazzling blue of winter frost, growing transparent and seeming to shine with an inner light. From somewhere far away, Tarlan seemed to hear a long, sad sigh.

Gently he lowered her into the snow. She lay there, sheer and glittering, as if sculpted from the ice she'd loved her whole life.

The green jewel hung from her icy fingers, sparkling and enticing.

Tarlan sat for a long time in the snow, heedless of the cold leaching into his body. His thoughts wandered. He wanted to cry more tears, but it seemed his body had forgotten how. He just felt numb.

After a while, Theeta's feathers fell over him as the huge thorrod snuggled against his back. The warmth of her massive body, and her soft, sad cawing, revived him a little.

“What should I do, Theeta?” he said. “If Mirith wants me to go, then I must. But where? If all the men of the outside world are like those elk-hunters, I'd rather stay here with you.”

He stroked Theeta's feathers. If only he could fly, like the thorrods. Fly away from everything.

“Hunters!” said Nasheen, her hoarse voice breaking into his reverie. “Coming!”

Peering past Theeta's beak, Tarlan saw a line of flares on the horizon. Were they coming this way? It was hard to tell.

“Are you sure it's them?” he said. Nasheen didn't reply; nor did Tarlan really need to ask. The thorrods' eyes were a thousand times keener than his. If she said the hunters were on their way, then it was true.

“Mirith was right.” He eyed the dangling jewel. “She was always right, about everything.”

Tugging the gold chain gently from Mirith's frozen hand, he tucked it safely inside his cloak. At once, countless tiny cracks appeared in the frost witch's body, racing from head to toe in an eye blink. With a soft, powdery
crack
, it shattered to blue dust. The wind picked up the dust and blew it up from the canyon and out over the mountain.

“Good-bye, Mirith,” murmured Tarlan.

“Come,” said Theeta, nudging him.

“No.” Tarlan turned to the enormous bird. His friend. “I go. You stay.”

Theeta regarded him with her deep, black eyes. “Why?” she said at last.

Tarlan was startled. He'd never known a thorrod to ask a question before. Their minds were simple and solid, filled only with facts.

“Because . . .” He faltered; he hadn't expected this to be so hard. “Because you've already lost Seethan. And . . . if I'm to leave Yalasti, I'll have to cross the Icy Wastes. It's too dangerous. I can't ask you to come with me.”

Theeta stepped back and planted her talons wide in the snow. She puffed out her chest and spread her wings. Breath steamed from her beak. She was a statue of living gold, warm and vital in the barren winter landscape.

“Not ask,” she said. “I come.”

At last the tears came. Tears for Mirith, tears for Seethan. Also tears for the thorrod before him, his loyal friend.

Oh, Theeta, I hope I never have to grieve for you.

“We come,” said Nasheen, dropping lightly from the sky to land at Theeta's side. Then Kitheen was there too, characteristically silent, but nodding his agreement all the same. The three thorrods towered over him, an impenetrable wall of feathers.

“I suppose it's no use arguing,” said Tarlan. His right arm throbbed, and his heart ached. But he also felt joy, that he had such friends at his side.

Using his good arm, he pulled himself onto Theeta's back. She waited while he settled himself into the ruff of feathers behind her neck, then opened her wings and lifted into the sky. Nasheen and Kitheen followed, and together the three thorrods carried Tarlan away from the mountain, toward the Icy Wastes.

E
lodie awoke to a harsh rattling sound coming from under the wheels of the coach. The bench she was lying on vibrated beneath her, nearly tossing her onto the floor. She threw out her hands for balance and tried not to be sick.

How long had she been traveling? Sunlight cast a dusty beam through the coach's narrow window; she couldn't believe she'd slept through the night, so this had to be the same day. Peering out, she saw the sun was low in the west. It would soon be night.

The coach was speeding over a bed of wooden planks. Below—far below—was a vast swathe of blue she took at first to be the ocean (not that she'd ever seen the sea). Then she saw distant banks; no ocean then, but a river.

To the south, the land she'd left behind was green and gentle, a familiar terrain of field and meadow and rolling dales. Ritherlee, her home. Ahead and to the north was the biggest expanse of forest she'd ever seen. Trees jostled like teeth in a crowded jaw, biting into the sunset sky.

Isur!

The coach crossed from the wooden planks onto a solid stone deck. And still the bridge went on. Elodie had heard the Isurian River was wide, but this was beyond all reckoning. At this rate, it would be dark before they reached the other side.

I wish this bridge would go on forever
, she thought, staring down at the water. A white boat was moving against the current, far below. It looked impossibly small.

Staying on the bridge would mean she'd never reach Isur, so she couldn't be carried from there into Idilliam, to experience whatever dreadful fate King Brutan had in store for her. But it would also mean she'd never see Ritherlee again.

Just the thought of home filled her with grief. If only she could exchange this cold, hard coach for the pillow-filled warmth of her tower chamber. What she wouldn't give to be sat at Lord Vicerin's table right now, dining on the finest meats and laughing along as the conversation flowed through the room.

Yet with Elodie's sadness came hope.

They won't let me go so easily. They'll search and search until they find me. I know they will!

A chiding voice came and went on the breeze:

If they think you're worth it.

Elodie shivered. With a stab of regret, she recalled Sylva's determined expression as her young chaperone had tried to chase the coach. Why had Elodie been so mean to her? She wished she could return to the start of the day and do everything differently.

The coach sped on, and Elodie dozed again. When she next awoke, it had stopped. All was still. She heard distant conversation, the crackle of fires, the faint ringing of metal against metal. She sat up in panic. Where was she?

Through the tiny window Elodie saw that the coach had stopped in a clearing filled with tents. Thick forest rose to meet a purple sky. Fires blazed; men and women bustled to and fro, carrying food and weapons, chopping wood; a small group practiced with swords, the sound of their mock combat like a steel song in the gathering dusk.

The door opened. Elodie shrank back into the corner of the bench, instinctively clutching the green jewel at her throat. A face appeared: the young man who'd captured her.

“Stay away from me,” she snapped.

The man executed a small bow. He was older than Elodie; about twenty, she thought. A long scar extended in a fine pink strip from his hairline down the left side of his jaw. “I am Fessan,” he said. “You are welcome here, Princess Elodie.”

What? How does he know?

Confused and astonished, Elodie got up and stood in the doorway of the coach. At the sight of her, everyone stopped what they were doing. Eyes grew wide. Mouths opened. Several people bowed, like Fessan; some even dropped to their knees. Elodie stared. These people had kidnapped her, so why were they behaving like this? It didn't make sense.

“Let me help you down.” Fessan took her arm, but Elodie shook him away.

“Keep your filthy hands off me.”

Hitching up the skirts of her dress, which had been badly torn in the scuffle in the market, she descended the steps with as much haughtiness as she could muster.

“Now,” she said coolly, “how do you know who I am? What do you want with me?”

“There is much I need to tell you, Princess,” said Fessan. “Come!”

He began to walk away from the coach to a large tent near the edge of the forest. Its green canvas—the same color as Fessan's tunic—made it hard to see against the trees. Elodie hesitated, wondering if she could bolt into the forest, but the watching people made her dismiss the idea. Instead, she followed Fessan into the tent.

Inside, it was sparsely furnished, with rough wooden seats made from crates. In one corner stood a barrel filled with large rolled-up sheets of parchment. An oil lamp hung from a metal post driven into the ground. Elodie wrinkled her nose at the fumes it was giving off.

“Please, sit down.” Fessan gestured toward a pile of furs. He carried himself with the same easy confidence Elodie was used to seeing in Lord Vicerin's soldiers. A military man, sent by King Brutan to bring her to Idilliam? Yet Elodie sensed that underneath he was nervous. Well, if he wasn't working for Brutan, she could guess what he and his rabble in their awful tents and tattered clothes were after. She should have realized from the start.

“I prefer to stand,” she said, eyeing the furs with disgust. “Just hurry up and tell me how much you want.”

“How much . . . What do you mean?”

“How much ransom. You obviously need the money, living out here like this in these . . . tents. Well, I won't pretend my adopted father isn't rich, but I should warn you: If you push him too far you'll regret it.”

“We do not want Lord Vicerin's money.”

Elodie didn't believe him. “Oh, then I suppose you've brought me all the way out here just to kill me?”

Fessan's cheek twitched, causing the long scar to writhe. “
Kill
you? Whatever . . . why would you think that?”

Elodie made a show of looking around the tent. “I'm surprised King Brutan didn't come to finish the job himself. I suppose he didn't want to get his hands dirty.”

Fessan frowned. “I'm not going to kill you, Princess. Quite the opposite. I am . . . we have not been sent by the king. We are Trident.”

“Trident?” Elodie was confused. The only tridents she knew were the three-pronged harpoons carried by Lord Vicerin's guard during special ceremonies in the castle.

“We are an independent troop. Practically an army now.” Fessan's chest swelled a little. “The king does not know we exist. We are based here in the Weeping Woods, which means we can . . .”

So you're mercenaries.
Elodie's confidence ebbed a little. Such people were likely to be unpredictable. But at least it meant they understood the value of gold coin.