Ivory Lyre (21 page)

The old woman opened the door at once as if
she had been waiting for someone, then drew back with a gasp. Then
she looked hard at his face, saw who he was, and pulled him inside.
Her blue eyes were as bright as he remembered from that morning on
the training field when they had seemed to spark with her
admiration of the horses.

“I am . . . Prince Tebmund.”

“I can see that, even without your fine
clothes. How did you come here? What is happening down there? The
battles . . .”

“The rebels are fighting. You are Kiri’ s
grandmother?”

She nodded. “You may call me Gram, as she
does. Where is she?”

“I don’t know. She was in the stadium.”

“You were there . . . ?”

“I was part of the games.”

“The gossip was right, then. And now
. . .” She glanced out the little window. “Now
. . .”

“Now the rebellion has begun,” he finished
for her.

“Then likely Kiri is fighting in the
streets,” she said stoically, but he could see the fear in her
eyes. Then she fixed a look on him. “And why do you come here?”

“Do you know of the Ivory Lyre?”

Her eyes grew wary.

He studied her, tried to see beyond that
sudden hood of secrecy. “Only the Ivory Lyre of Bayzun can help us
now. Only it can help the rebel forces. Do you side with the rebel
forces? Or with the dark? Do you side against your own
granddaughter?”

She studied him with care. A heavy silence
touched the room, and her eyes burned a challenge. “Kiri spoke of a
lyre. What do you want with it?”

“I can bring its power.”

“Only a bard can do that.”

He stared at her.

“How am I to believe you?” she said
softly.

“If I were of the dark, and I knew about the
lyre, I would force its location from the king and destroy it.
Likely the dark does not know—yet.”

She sighed. “Kiri overheard you make a spell
to charm the information from Accacia.” She shook her head. “The
Ivory Lyre of Bayzun. The power of the ancient dragon.”

“So, your Kiri gathers information.”

“Perhaps. But she did not hear where the
lyre is. Accacia didn’t tell you that. Why do you come
here
looking for it? What makes you think I would know?”

“I don’t think you know. But I think you
will help me. I saw the way you watched my horses. I need clothes,
Gram. A weapon better than this stone. I need any help you can
give—if you are for the rebels.”

She went to a cupboard and rummaged among
clothes, then drew forth a full skirt of brown hearthspun and a
gray linen smock. “You will have to go barefoot; my shoes won’t
fit, nor will Kiri’s. You will not be able to fasten the skirt, but
you can tie the belt. The smock will be tight in the
shoulders.”

He dressed quickly and found the skirt hit
him at mid-calf. The loose smock covered him well enough, and he
tied over his head the scarf she offered. She adjusted it so it
covered more of his face. “We will go the back way.”

“We?”

“I will lead you. Unless you are more
familiar with the palace than I. You will be less suspect as one of
a pair of old women than going alone. You must walk like a woman,
and keep your face down.”

“The upper treasure room first, the one near
the parapet.”

She nodded. “That stone weapon of yours
could break a lock, I suppose.” She took from a cupboard a finely
made sword, in a scabbard. He buckled the scabbard on, then tied
over it the apron she handed him, grinning at her.

“You are very resourceful.”

She didn’t answer but led him out and along
the path to the south. She carried only a lantern, unlit. “Do try
to bend over, Prince Tebmund. And take smaller steps. No old woman
has that kind of stride.”

Below them in the streets the fighting had
moved to the north and eastward toward the harbor. When he turned
to look back, toward the sea in the north, he could see no movement
in the sky there; nor could he see any ships. Just down the hill,
half a dozen bodies sprawled. A band of riderless horses galloped
up the road toward the palace, reins and stirrups flying.

Gram entered through a small gate in the
palace wall. They passed the servants’ quarters, then climbed a
narrow stair in darkness, holding hands. They went along an upper
passage, Gram careful and certain. “Here,” she said, “this is the
door.” He reached out, could feel the oak and the crossed metal
strapping. Behind them, they heard footsteps, then saw a light down
the hall. They moved away, pressing into a niche beside a cupboard.
A soldier passed them swinging his lantern, jingling keys.

It was the treasure room door the soldier
opened. His light shone in on barrels and crates and a scattering
of gold goblets and bowls. Teb hit him on the head with the stone.
He dropped at their feet. Teb pocketed his keys and dragged him
inside, then stood surveying the chamber.

There was no sense of bright power here, as
there had once been outside the door. The barrels and crates would
take all night to open and the effort turn out useless. Teb locked
the door and they went on, winding through black passages by Gram’s
sense of the palace until at last she had to stop and strike flint
to light her lantern. A quarter hour later, they descended a narrow
stair, going steeply down. The air felt damp and smelled of mold.
They went along a cleft in the mountain where no pretense had been
made to smooth the walls.

When they came to a metal-clad door, Teb
tried the five keys but none would turn. Gram removed a clasp from
her hair and, as he held the lantern, she poked it into the lock,
twisting delicately. He had to laugh. A dragon would have melted
the lock with one breath, but now he had only Gram, trying to pick
it with a trinket of tin.

The setting sun stained the sky with blood,
mirroring the blood in Dacia’s streets, and still the royal armies
wheeled after rebels that struck from behind, then vanished to
strike again. The king’s frustrated troops took as prisoners the
confused townsfolk they found cowering in corners and abandoned
shops, unwilling to fight for either side. These were herded into
makeshift cells, and the doors and windows were nailed shut.

In some quarters the rebel army tried to
force the uncertain townsfolk to stand ground against the king, but
found only a useless, cowering lot on their hands. On a corner near
the quays, Garit’s forty raiders fled from a green-clad battalion
and vanished, then silently attacked from behind. They confiscated
the dead soldiers’ uniforms and pulled them on, and took the
uninjured horses and the weapons. So a new king’s band rode through
Dacia, joining other king’s soldiers, then turning on them with the
king’s own swords. It was the only attack they could master now,
for in many quarters of the city the dark forces were winning.

But the dark leaders got no new
reinforcements from the sea as they had expected. No boat stirred
the waters, and still the sky was patrolled by the three
dragons.

Atop the stone watchtower, Kiri and Camery
killed five horsemen, and saw them relieved of their yellow tunics
and their weapons and wandering mounts. The false army grew slowly
against the larger forces of the dark. But the dark lusted for
battle and took strength from seeing men die.

In the back of the barrelwright’s storeroom
behind stacks of oak timbers and lathes, children kept the stew pot
boiling, dished up meals and tended wounds. There were too many
wounded and not enough blankets or bandages. In the chandler’s,
weapons were passed out the back door. In the sleeping loft of a
tavern, four young girls picked off the king’s soldiers with heavy
slingshots and sharp stones. Along the coast the great cats massed,
charging into side streets to cripple and stampede the king’s
horses and kill the fallen riders with quick, bone-crushing
skill.

Teb and Gram could hear the lock’s insides
move, but they couldn’t get it open with her hair clasp. At last he
took the stone to it, pounding until it gave way with a loud snap,
scattering its parts across the stone floor. He pulled the door
open; Gram held the lamp high.

The cave had a tall ceiling and was so deep
the light melted away before it reached the back. The floor could
not be seen for the piles of silver and gold that reflected the
guttering light. There were shields and caskets, pitchers and
plateware and urns and saddlery, gold bedposts and chamber pots and
tall, gold-crusted chairs with laddered backs. Casks and chests
stood open, with jewels spilling to the floor.

But Teb surveyed the treasure room with
disappointment. There was no sense of the lyre here, no hint of the
magic he had felt in the palace above. Then Gram caught her breath
sharply and he spun, sword drawn.

Accacia stood in the doorway flanked by four
green-clad soldiers, their blades catching the light. Teb flung the
lamp at them and spilled fire over one, struck another with a blow
that sent him rolling among the treasure, moaning. He faced the
other two crouching, and caught a glimpse of Gram snatching up
something bright from the treasure heap. He countered the two
blades, trying not to be backed into the tangle of treasure and
tripped, fighting close and hard with short jabs. Soon one soldier
was down, but the other had drawn a knife and ducked under Teb’s
blows—then he went down suddenly, his head lolling against his
shoulder. Gram stood over him, the hilt of a gold ax tight in her
two thin hands. Accacia snatched up his fallen blade and swung. Teb
tripped her, forced the blade from her, and forced her down with
his knee. She glowered up at him as he pulled off the heavy cord
that bound her hair.

“Tie her hands, Gram.”

Gram tied her hands roughly, the two
scowling at each other. There was no love between these two.
Accacia’s eyes were hard, her mouth set in a scowl.

Teb looked her over coldly. “Why did you
come here? Why did you follow us?”

She stared at him, mute and furious.

“You came because you knew I would search
for the lyre,” he said more gently. “But why didn’t you just tell
the king, let him deal with me?”

Her look remained defiant, but he saw a
flash of some deeper anger, too.

“You are angry with the king,” he said
softly, testing her. “The king has kindled such fury in you—” He
saw her look grow uncertain and felt a rising strength in himself.
“You came here to spite the king,” he said, and saw his guess was
the truth. “You followed me, Accacia, hoping . . . to
discover me with the lyre.” Yes, he saw the truth in her eyes.

‘To find you with it,” she said, “take you
captive and present you to the king.
Show
the king
. . . show him “

“He was cruel to you.”

“He was furious. He thought I told the queen
that you were captive in the stadium. I
told
him it was
Roderica, but then Roderica, the little traitor—” She paused,
scowling.

“Go on, tell me all of it.” There seemed no
need to charm her now; her anger made her speak, spilling
hatred.

“I
told
him it was Roderica. I know
her—everything for the queen. Sardira grabbed Roderica’s arm to
keep her from running out of the stadium when . . . when
the dragons—” She swallowed, pale with fear at that memory.
“Roderica denied telling the queen you were captive. But who else
could have?” Her eyes blazed with hatred. “But Roderica told
Sardira something else. She told him you made me speak about the
Ivory Lyre. She said she heard it all. I don’t remember,” Accacia
said, staring at him with fury.

“Who told the queen I was captive?”

“I don’t know! If not Roderica, who would?
It would take a terrible power on the queen’s part to make the
king’s servants obey her. To make them carry her to the stadium.
His orders were that she never leave the palace.” She swallowed
again and her eyes showed pain. “It would take a terrifying power
to do . . . what she did.”

Teb smiled. It was interesting to see
something really touch her, frighten and confuse that smug little
ego.

“It was the queen who saved you,” she said
in a small, lost voice. But her look at him was of hatred.

“The queen didn’t know about the lyre?” he
asked, knowing she could not have, not until the spell was
broken.

“She didn’t know. That was partly why he
kept her locked up . . . away from the places that hid
the lyre, away from the tablet that told about it.”

“And where is the tablet?”

“In his chambers, behind a panel in the
wall.” Her eyes blazed. “What difference does it make now if I
tell? What difference? He has already called me a traitor and told
me to leave the palace.”

“So you came to find me with the lyre, to
take me captive and deliver me to him, to soothe his fury.”

“Yes. But it doesn’t matter. If I don’t take
you to him, he will find you. He will kill you anyway.”

“Where is the lyre now? Where has he hidden
it?”

“I don’t know.”

He forced the spell again. “Where is the
lyre? You know you will have to tell me.”

She glared back at him, then slowly her face
grew docile, her eyes dulled. “The lyre is in the queen’s chambers,
where her dead body lies.”

“Why would he take it there?”

“A joke, his cruel joke . . . that
he take it to her, now that she could no longer use it. He kept it
secret for so many years, but now . . . now he has given
it to her.”

He took her hands, twisting her tied wrists
so she had to follow him. “You are coming with us to search for it.
If you cause a problem I will kill you.”

He pushed her toward the passage. As she
passed Gram, her look at the old woman was cruel and puzzling. They
went quickly up the passage, then up a narrow stair rising steeply
into the heart of the mountain, then a low-roofed passage—not the
one he had used to visit the queen. They joined that passage, but
there was no sense of the lyre near the queen’s door. Teb
approached cautiously with drawn sword, forcing Accacia ahead.