The Dreamtrails (97 page)

Green eyes opened, and he gazed up at me for a long time, his expression grave and wondering.

“I love you,” he said.

Someone was shaking me. I had the queer, unnerving sensation of falling up, and then I was conscious of being in my own body. I opened my eyes and found I was seated exactly as I had been inside Rushton’s deepest mind, but the Rushton lying in my arms now was clothed, unconscious, and badly hurt.

I looked up to find Brydda squatting beside me.

“Elspeth?” His eyes searched mine, and I saw relief in his expression.

“How did you …?” I began, and found I had not the strength to finish.

“The ship boat capsized, and we could not find the way into the cove. I was near to drowning when I seemed to hear
a voice in my mind, saying you had need of me. It led me to the inlet, and the others followed me. We finally figured out how the rest of you had got up to the surface. I sent Gwynedd’s armsman after him and came here with the Sadorian man who had mastered the ship boat. There were signs of fire or some sort of explosion, and Gilbert was unconscious, but Hakim had awakened in time to see Rushton enter the trapdoor, muttering and snarling your name. Rushton must have got off the
Umborine
as soon as it dropped anchor and headed here, though I do not know how he got past the Hedra. I bade Selik take care of Gilbert and Hakim, and I came down after you.”

“Ariel planned it all,” I said hoarsely. “He would have made sure Rushton knew exactly how to get here. He must have left orders to the Hedra guarding the path up from Fryddcove not to hinder him.”

“You think Ariel knew he would come here?”

“I think he foresaw our coming here and intended for Rushton to die trying to kill me.”

“He must have a black hate for Rushton,” Brydda said grimly. “The voice—”

I cut off his words to ask about Andorra, Jak, and Hakim.

“Andorra was knocked out on the metal walkway. I roused her, and she was with me when we found you two here. I left her to watch you while I went and helped Selik move Hakim and Gilbert to a little chamber facing the courtyard where a fire had been lit. I fetched blankets and so forth, and then I left Selik again to come back down here.”

“What about Jak?”

“Andorra and I could not find him, but Jakoby searched and found him wandering in darkness, lost in the labyrinth of this place.”

“Jakoby!”

“You have been here for a long time, Elspeth, and much has happened as you slept. If sleeping it was,” he said. “Dardelan guessed that Rushton would come here, so the moment she could, Jakoby came ashore, borrowed a horse, and rode here.”

“The … the battle is over?”

“It was in the process of being won when Jakoby rode from Covertown, but leave that for now. We need to get Rushton out of here. He is cold and shocked and battered, but aside from a dislocated arm and a gash on the brow that needs stitching, I do not think he has taken any mortal wound.”

I heard footsteps and turned my head to see Jakoby. Behind her came Jak.

“I am so sorry, Elspeth,” the teknoguilder said, looking down at Rushton with horrified pity. “I should have come back sooner, but I found a whole lot of storage rooms filled with what I think are weapons. I was looking for the plague seeds when my lantern went out. I tried to grope my way back to the entrance and got lost. I had truly begun to despair when I heard Jakoby shouting out my name. Never have I heard a sweeter sound in all my life.”

Jakoby acknowledged his declaration with a faint smile, and then she squatted down and looked into my eyes. “All is well?” The gravity in her voice struck me, but I had no strength for questions. I nodded, and then she and Brydda gently lifted Rushton onto a stretcher, explaining that they had rigged up a basket to raise him to the hatch but had not wanted to touch him or me until I woke.

“Can you walk?” Jakoby asked.

“I can manage, but take Rushton up,” I croaked. “I need to show Jak something.”

Jakoby and Brydda carried Rushton out as Jak helped me to my feet. I cried out at the stiffness of my legs and back. Jak knelt and began to massage my legs vigorously. “No wonder you are stiff. You were sitting there for an entire day and night,” he said. “I wanted to lay you down at least, but Brydda said he had a strong feeling you ought to be left to wake naturally.”

I managed to smile, despite the pains shooting up my legs and back, wondering if Brydda would ever acknowledge that his feelings and hunches were Talent. Perhaps it does not matter how he defines them, so long as they serve him. It took some time, but finally I was able to stand straight. I bade the teknoguilder help me walk and directed him where to go. Soon we were in the tiny chamber off the torture room. I pointed to the little black and yellow symbol, and he drew a swift breath.

“I see no seeds and yet …,” I began.

“This is it, Elspeth,” Jak said, kneeling and holding up his lantern as I had done to cast light through the window. “These will be sicknesses. This is how the Beforetimers stored them. Ines showed me pictures of cupboards like this. Ah!” he cried, and I knew he must have touched the glass. He touched it again and bent to examine the round knob surrounded by numbers. “This is how the coldness is controlled. See how the numbers go from red to blue? The Beforetimers used blue to symbolize cold and red to symbolize heat.”

“Do you want me to unlock the cabinet?” I asked.

He smiled and shook his head. “That would be dangerous, and there is no need, for it is the cold that keeps the seeds alive. They are not truly seeds, of course, but the word serves well enough. Making them hot is enough to kill them.” He turned the knob in the direction of the red numbers. Then he
stood up. “Strange that something so deadly is also so delicate.”

“Are you sure they will die?” I asked.

“There would not be such careful control of the cold if it was not important. Now let’s get out of here.”

I was startled to hear a teknoguilder so willing to leave a Beforetime place full of ancient knowledge, but perhaps being lost in the darkness and finding bottles of plague had soured his appetite for knowledge, at least for the moment.

T
HE GRAY CLOUDS
that clogged the sky and shadowed our dawn departure from Norseland had dispersed by midmorning, and a fresh steady wind blew, so the
Umborine
seemed to fly over the waves.

I kept to my cabin for the day, watching over Rushton and talking quietly to Jak and Jakoby and to Brydda and Dardelan, all of whom called in briefly to check on him. Aside from being bruised and cut, with a broken wrist and several gashes in his scalp deep enough to need stitches, Rushton showed little sign of the ordeal he had endured, save for the depth of his sleep. He had not awakened during the journey across Norseland to Fryddcove, nor did he wake aboard the
Umborine
until deep in the night.

I was sitting vigil, curled in a chair reading, when a soft movement from Maruman drew my attention. I looked over to find the old cat peering intently into Rushton’s face. Laying aside the book, I moved swiftly to the bed, thinking that he was suffering another of the nightmares that had racked him on and off through the day and night, for he was grimacing and his face shone with sweat. I was about to touch his hand to rouse him when Maruman leaned down and touched his nose gently to Rushton’s. I caught my breath as Rushton’s eyes opened. For a long moment, green eyes gazed into blazing yellow, and then Maruman curled back to sleep.

Rushton turned his head and saw me, and I was relieved that his eyes were clear, his expression calm. “How do you feel?” I said.

He smiled. “Emptied out. Weary. A little confused,” he said. “We are aboard the
Umborine
?”

I nodded. “We are bound for Sador with a fair wind filing our sails and triumph behind us,” I said, reaching out to touch his cheek.

“What happened with the … Hedra?”

I saw that he would not rest until he knew something, so I told him that Gwynedd’s arrival in Cloistertown had galvanized the Norselanders. The news he shared about the Faction’s fall on Herder Isle had spread like wildfire and roused the Norselanders just as he had predicted. His impromptu army had swelled as people joined him from every farm and small village, despite the storm that raged. By the time they reached the Hedra encampment, situated atop a plateau some five leagues before Covetown, there was such a horde that the only reason they had not been spotted was the foul weather and the fact that columns of Hedra were marching from the camp in response to Jakoby’s demands signaled from the
Umborine
.

Gwynedd later learned that, as he had anticipated, the Hedra had marched straight to Covetown and stationed themselves all along the cliffs, from the top of the path up from the beach to the gates of Norseland’s sole remaining cloister. The Hedra left behind in the encampment had been completely unprepared when a ruse caused them to open the gates and hundreds and hundreds of Norselanders had poured in. There had been no time for them to open the armory and use its weapons, but as it transpired, there had been none of the worst sorts of weapons I had seen on Herder Isle.
The Hedra who had remained in the camp, though numerous, were mostly boys and unseasoned young men.

Meanwhile, unbeknownst to Gwynedd, the Per of Cloistertown had led a small group of young women and boys directly to Covetown to rouse the Per there. By the time Gwynedd and his armsmen and a small force of Norselanders arrived on the stony rises outside Covetown, hundreds more Norselanders were waiting for them, fresh and eager to fight to open the way to the beach. It was clear to Gwynedd then that it was not a small secret sortie he was involved in, but a coup. Thus, he had not waited for us to arrive as planned but had led an attack on the Hedra, from the rear, after signaling to tell Dardelan what he intended to do and asking him to send three large ship boats ashore. The Hedra were caught between the two forces and outnumbered, yet by the sound of it, they had fought with savage skill.

During the hours of fighting that followed, Jakoby had slipped ashore to seek Rushton. By then, of course, she and Dardelan had learned that Ariel was not on Norseland; nevertheless, they felt certain Rushton would make his way to Ariel’s residence.

“Do you remember leaving the
Umborine
?” I asked Rushton.

“I remember diving overboard,” he murmured. “I remember as soon as I saw the cove and the path going up, feeling the compulsion to … to find you. I swam to shore and went straight up the track that runs alongside the road to the top of the cliffs. The Hedra there took one look at me and let me through. They … recognized me, you see. ‘Ariel’s wolf’ they used to call me. I knew where to go, because I had crossed the island on foot many times before. Ariel had me do it over and over, harried by his dogs. ‘Let us hunt the wolf,’ he would say and laugh.… I think that was real.”

“It doesn’t matter,” I said, not wanting him to dwell on frayed places in his mind. “However it happened, Ariel made sure you would know the way to the residence and that you would go there and put on the demon band before coming to find me.”

Rushton shook his head. “That he saw so much …”

“I know,” I said. “But he does not see everything, else he would have seen this.” I leaned over to gently kiss his bruised lips. They curved into a crooked smile, but I noted the dark shadows beneath his eyes and sat back to finish my tale. “While you were coming to me, Gwynedd was meeting with the Per of Covetown in the stony rises, and probably about the time you reached Ariel’s residence, he was leading an army of Norselanders against the Hedra on the cliffs. By the time we arrived back at Covetown, the fighting was over.”

“It is strange to think of a war being fought so close at hand, yet for me it is no more than a tale,” Rushton said.

“We do not need to be the center of all wars and all strife,” I said gently. “I am very content for the Battle for Norseland to be a tale about other people told over a campfire. And now it is very late. Sleep.”

Rushton drew a long breath and sighed before asking, “What were you reading?”

“A book of Sadorian poetry. Jakoby gave it to me when she came to see how you were.”

“Read to me. I would like to hear your voice in my dreams,” Rushton said, and closed his eyes.

I took up the book I had laid aside and opened it, blinking to clear a mist of tears from my eyes.

Rushton slept for the remainder of the night and most of the next morning, and I did not leave his side, but when a
Norseland herbalist, who was aboard as part of the Norse delegation, appeared with a gift of some special nourishing soup she had concocted, I went to wash my face and eat a meal in the saloon.

The first person I saw when I entered was Gwynedd, surrounded by the delegation appointed by the Norseland Pers to serve their king. Neither Dardelan nor Brydda were there, so I sat at an empty table by the door and helped myself to some buttered mushrooms from a heaped platter and sliced some of the heavy Norse bread and ate. I marveled again at how readily the Norselanders had accepted Gwynedd’s claim to have king’s blood flowing through his veins.