Light of Eidon (Legends of the Guardian-King, Book 1) (14 page)

The notion of being a puppet suddenly acquired new and more sinister
meaning.

“Plagues?” He raised a trembling hand to his forehead, feeling sick again.
“I have to get out of here.”

But the door had no inside latch. With a hand braced against its polished
wood, he stood there, fear twisting in his middle, a hairsbreadth from exploding into panic. Think! He told himself. Control yourself and think!

He turned back, gaze fixing on a pewter flagon and cup standing on the low table beside his pallet. From the talk he’d overheard, they meant to wear
him down. They’d want him docile, he suspected, as unresisting as they could
get him. He snatched up the flagon, ignoring the sudden awareness of his
burning thirst, and sniffed the contents.

Sure enough, the acrid scent of hockspur stung his nostrils. But not hockspur alone. There was something else with it, a faint sour scent … ah …
redhart. To keep him thirsty, so he’d drink more hockspur should he happen
to awaken. There was probably even a little badger tail in the mix to dull his
wits.

Good. His attendants would not expect him to be awake and alert, and
they’d be counting on the hockspur to quiet any notions of escape. Evidently
Saeral knew nothing of his resistance to the herb. He just might be able to
surprise whoever came to check on him.

Now. How was he going to do it?

He fingered the belt at his waist thoughtfully, then abandoned the idea
and took up the flagon instead. The liquid splatted on the slick floor as he
poured a bit of it out. Then he lay facedown on the stone slab, one leg braced
against the floor, head turned toward the door, hair pushed back out of his
way. He draped one arm on the floor, fingers wrapped loosely around the
flagon’s neck.

Then he waited. His thirst mounted, and the temptation to drink rose
with it, but he resisted doggedly, reciting the three codices of Guardian Ordinance to distract himself.

Finally footsteps sounded outside his door, and the bar thumped as it was
removed. The door creaked. Light played over his slitted eyelids and a linen
rustle approached.

An unfamiliar voice said, “You’re right. He’s still asleep.”

Plagues! Eldrin thought. There’re two.

“Looks like he’s come to, though,” the first continued. `And had a sip of
water. Spilled most of it, too-why do they always have to spill it?”

“He’ll be out till midnight, at least,” the other voice said, closer nowfrom within the doorway?

Till midnight. It must be evening, then, or close to it. And midnight was
no doubt the time of his next appointment with Saeral.

The cloth rustled again, close by. He smelled stale incense and sweat,
heard the sough of the man’s breathing. The flagon moved in his hand. Instantly he drove himself upward, smashing the vessel into the surprised
Haverallan’s face as he shouldered the man aside and sprang to grab the door.
The other Haverallan stared openmouthed as Eldrin charged full into him,
bulling him across the hallway into the wall.

Then Eldrin fled, careening down the narrow corridor at full speed, realizing at once the major flaw in his plan-he had no idea where he was going.

Pursued by angry shouts and slapping footfalls, he skidded left at the first
intersection he came to, dashed down another empty corridor. Light hung in
pools amid the darkness, reflecting along glassy, slag-faced walls. His own
footfalls mingled with those of his pursuers, but he did not look back, concentrating on running as fast as he could. He passed several curtained doorways and was about to duck into the next one he came to when a thunderous
command reverberated off the rock.

“STOP! NOW?”

The amulet flared at his neck. Pain wrenched his forearm, and his legs
stopped moving so suddenly, momentum tumbled him head over heels. He
skidded helplessly across the slick floor, fetching up against the slag wall.

Another command echoed down the corridor. “COME HERE.” An awful
understanding writhed through him as his body picked itself up and turned
back toward his pursuers. Seeing he was obeying them, they stopped, waiting
while his treacherous legs bore him back to them. Both smiled smugly as he
stopped in front of them.

“Now,” one said, “back to your-“

He got no further as a robed figure burst from the doorway behind him.
A flurry of movement, a pair of thuds, and both men lay on the floor, unconscious. The light under Eldrin’s chin blinked out and the pressure against his
windpipe released at the same time as the compulsion over his body. He
swayed and would have fallen had his rescuer not seized his arm.

“In here,” he whispered, shoving Eldrin through the curtained opening
from which he had just sprung. Weak-kneed and gasping, Eldrin stumbled
into what turned out to be a short hallway lit only by the illumination filtering around a second curtain at its far end. His companion released him and
he sagged against the wall, seeking to regain both breath and equilibrium.

The other man, dressed all in black, secured a black fabric tube filled with
sand to his belt, then threw back his cowl.

“Meridon?” Eldrin gaped. “What are you doing here?”

The Terstan captain offered a half bow. “His Majesty suspected your decision to seek seclusion might not have been entirely your own.”

“But aren’t you supposed to be in prison?”

Meridon shrugged. “Technically I still am.” He gestured at the necklet on
Eldrin’s throat. “May I relieve you of that, my lord?”

“I’m afraid it has no clasp, sir, though I-“

But Meridon had already seized it and begun to yank on it, the woven
wire biting into the back of Eldrin’s neck.

“You’re not going to be-“

He felt a tingling sizzle as a blinding light flashed in the darkness, and the
necklet sprung loose from his neck.

“How did you do that?” Eldrin cried as Meridon flung the thing away and
drew a small pouch from his black tunic.

“I’m truly amazed you’ve resisted them this long,” Meridon said, shaking
the pouch’s contents into one hand. “I thought Saeral would have you safely
saddled and bridled.”

“I was an idiot,” Eldrin said bitterly.

“You never really had a chance, my lord. Here, put this on.” He held out
a gold chain from which depended a pale gray stone.

Eldrin frowned suspiciously. “What is it?”

“It’ll shield you against the power of their command.”

“I thought with the necklet gone-“

“They put the feyna on you, didn’t they?” Boldly Meridon picked up
Eldrin’s still throbbing left arm, rubbed a rough thumb over the ovoid scar,
and nodded. He dropped it and turned his attention to Eldrin’s right armwhich seemed to cause him some surprise. “Only once?” he murmured to
himself, rubbing the unblemished skin as if he’d expected more. “But
why… ?” When he looked up, his face was blank with surprise. “You resisted
it.,,

“Not really. It just made me sick. I think I almost died.”

“Indeed.” The Terstan arched a brow, and his eyes darted to the chain and
its charm, still looped across his palm.

Eldrin eyed it doubtfully. “I’d really rather not.”

At this point, it’s the only way you’re getting out of here. They’ll have
felt the removal of their collar, and without this you have no chance. Not
with spore in your flesh.”

Shouts of alarm and hurried footfalls echoing in the corridor from which
they had just come forced a decision. Without letting himself dwell on the
possible consequences, Eldrin snatched the chain and looped it over his head.

He followed the Terstan to the curtain at the short hall’s end, where they
dashed up a short stair, turned right into yet another corridor, then another,
and another. Eldrin was fearing they were lost in the seemingly endless warren of passages when they slipped up to yet another curtained doorway and
peered into a dimly lit circular chamber. Roughly the diameter of the Sanctum’s lowest level, it held concentric rings of knee-high obsidian benches
encircling a central brazier of glowing coals. Four aisles cut through the
benches in the traditional four-corners cross, a curtained doorway at each
end.

A cluster of robed figures stood near the curtained doorway on the right,
at the end of the crosswise aisle. Lit only by the brazier of coals, the room lay
swathed in deep shadow.

“Here,” Meridon hissed, pressing a wad of fabric into Eldrin’s hands. “Put
it on.”

It was the Terstan’s robe. As Eldrin complied, Meridon untied the black
sandclub from his belt.

“We’ll go left,” he said, “and hope they don’t see us in the dark. If you
feel any compulsions to turn around or do anything except run for the opening on the left, fight it for all you’re worth.” Meridon peered past the curtain
again. “You go first. I’ll cover you. No matter what happens, just keep moving. Things may get a bit … exciting.”

“I’m afraid they’ve already gone well past exciting, Captain.”

Eldrin slipped through the drapery, the Terstan on his heels, and they hurried along the curving wall toward the next curtained opening. No shouts
rang out, no arcane compulsions took control of his limbs; the men across the
room never knew they were there.

Not until he was two strides from their objective and a robed figure
stepped through the curtain and into his path, too close not to see him. Eldrin
and the newcomer stopped simultaneously, the latter immediately sensing
something was wrong. He drew breath to cry out, even as Meridon came
around Eldrin’s shoulder, swinging the sandclub in a wide arc that connected
solidly with the man’s head, dropping him like an empty sack.

A questing voice sounded from the men now behind them, someone’s attention drawn by the grunt and the sounds of collapse. Meridon’s fingers
dug into Eldrin’s shoulder, shoving him forward as a deep voice boomed off
the walls, commanding them to stop. Eldrin staggered, legs twitching, moving
as if through cold honey. Beside him, Meridon straightened and let fly the
sandclub. The dark tube pinwheeled across the chamber to slam into the
head of one of the Haverallans, dropping him as it had dropped the first man.

The compulsion lifted and Eldrin was free to run. He followed Meridon
along more mazelike corridors and stairways until finally they burst through
a wooden door into the night. Racing around the outside of the Sanctum,
they were barely halfway across the main courtyard when the Sanctum doors
banged open and what sounded like an army of men thundered out in pursuit
of them. Shouts rang across the stone as, alerted by the commotion, the gatekeeper emerged from his booth ahead.

But Meridon was already heading for the garden, Eldrin lagging behind
him only a little. They careened along the gravel paths, the Haverallans closing behind them. Suddenly Meridon slowed and stepped off the walkway,
pressing through a dark, prickly hedge. As Eldrin came through after him, he
stopped beside the wall and cupped his hands for Eldrin’s foot. His strength
already flagging and his breath tearing at his throat, Eldrin tried to comply.

It was messy, but he managed to haul himself to the top. He was belly
down, awkwardly swiveling his legs over the wall, when Meridon scrambled
up and over, there to catch him as he fumbled his way down. Then they were
free, dashing along the empty street, Meridon in the lead. He skidded into
the first alley he came to, Eldrin on his heels, and soon they lost their pursuers
in the narrow, twisting passages of Upper Southdock.

By then the air was tearing at Eldrin’s throat with every breath, bringing
the coppery taste of blood to his tongue. His feet had become lead weights,
his legs weak as gelatin, until at last they refused to go another step. He staggered to a stop and collapsed against a rough brick wall. It wasn’t long before
Meridon came back to sink down beside him. Eldrin sat on the cobbles, heedless of the squalor, back pressed against the wall as he gasped back his breath.

“We can’t stay here long,” Meridon said presently. In the dark he was only
a vague shape peering around the stack of crates beside them. Eldrin heard
him sigh. “I’m afraid we can’t stay in Kiriath, either, my lord.”

It took a moment for his words to register. “What do you mean, Captain?”

“The king sent me to deliver you from Saeral, yes, but also to take you away. You are too great a threat to him. To the entire realm.”

“But I am free of Saeral. And I don’t intend to-“

“Right now only distance will free you from Saeral. And with the Nunn
lords wanting you on the throne, your presence would fuel succession plots
and foster rebellion-at a time when Kiriath can least afford it.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Perhaps. But it is the king’s rule. If you refuse to come willingly, I’m to
take you by force.”

He could do it, too. Eldrin leaned his head against the wall at his back
and closed his eyes, trying to calm the terror, the fury-the hurt-that held
him, trying to force his mind to think. He could not surprise this man the
way he had surprised the Haverallans in the Keep. Even if he could, he had
Meridon’s chilling accuracy with the knife to contend with. Still, in the darkness the Terstan’s aim would not be as good. And an opportunity might yet
arise….

But what good would it do? Where could he go? If Raynen decreed he
must leave, and Saeral sought to possess him, he could not hope to elude
both for long.

“I’m to be exiled, then?” He opened his eyes and stared at uneven walls
tottering over them, separated by a thin line of star-sprinkled sky.

“I’m sorry, Your Highness.”

They sat in silence for a time. Then Eldrin burst out with a bitter laugh.
And so I’m to be turned out. Alone and penniless. Or is Raynen still offering
the money and the merchantman?”

“The money, yes. But not the ship. However, you will not go alone. I have
sworn to defend you with my life.”

Eldrin’s thoughts stilled, anger overlaid by astonishment. He looked
toward the Terstan, a man-form in the dark. Then he laughed again. “You
have an odd sense of duty, Captain. You threaten to assault me unless I cooperate with your kidnapping scheme, and in the next breath you swear fealty
to me.”