The High Lord (39 page)

He didn’t reply. She moved to the entrance of the cave. The drop into the ravine made her head spin. He put a hand on her shoulder, and she felt the vibration of magic under her feet.

“Let me do that,” she offered.

He ignored her. Magic lifted them both from the cave floor. She watched his face as they moved upward, noting the tension in his face. Tomorrow night she would insist on taking the first watch, she decided. Clearly she would not be able to rely on him to wake her up so he could sleep.

As he set them down at the top of the cliff, his hand left her shoulder. She followed as he began searching the ground. Guessing he was looking for signs of the Ichani’s passing, she hung back a little. After moving uphill for a few hundred paces, he stopped, walked back past her, and started in the opposite direction.

Turning to follow, she looked up and drew in a short breath in amazement. The wasteland spread before her. Despite the muting of the dusk light, the colors of the land were still vivid.

Dark, rust-colored soil lapped at the base of the mountains, but where rivers had eroded the land away, bands of black and pale yellow could be seen. If she looked closely, she could see a speckling of tussocky grass on the surface and, here and there, scraggly groves of trees grown twisted by the wind.

It was a bleak landscape, yet there was a wild beauty to it. The colors were so intense and strange. Even the sky was a different blue.

“It is as I feared. He continued southward instead of descending toward the wastes.”

She blinked in surprise as she saw that Akkarin was walking toward her again. He passed her and continued up the slope again. She sighed and hurried after.

A demanding climb followed. Akkarin seemed reluctant to levitate, preferring to climb up the stepped shelves of rock. He did not stop to rest, and by the time the last rays of the sun had left the mountains above, she was sore and weary again.

She soon craved the relief of standing still. Or just to be able to keep up with his long strides. Perhaps, if she got him talking, he would slow down for a little while.

“Where are we going?”

Akkarin hesitated, but didn’t stop or turn.

“Away from the Pass.”

“And then?”

“Somewhere safe.”

“Do you have a place in mind?”

“Somewhere far from Sachaka and the Allied countries.”

Sonea halted and stared at his back. Away from Sachaka and Kyralia? He did not intend to stay close so he could help the Guild when the Ichani invaded? Surely he wasn’t going to
abandon
Kyralia.

It made sense, though. What else could they do? They weren’t strong enough to fight the Ichani. Neither was the Guild. And the Guild wasn’t going to accept their help anyway. What was the point of staying?

Yet she could not believe he would give up so easily.
She
could not give up so easily. She would fight, even if it meant she would probably lose.

But what if that meant leaving Akkarin… ?

Akkarin glanced back at her. “Actually, I intend to find Kariko’s group and do a little spying myself,” he said.

“When I find them I will send images of what I see to the Guild.”

Sonea blinked, then shook her head. He had been testing her, then. The realization brought both relief and anger. Then she considered what he was saying, and felt her blood turn cold.

“The Ichani will hear you. They’ll know you’re watching,” she said. “They’ll—”

He stopped and turned to regard her.

“Why did you come, Sonea?”

Sonea stared at him. His eyes glittered dangerously. She felt a stab of hurt, then a growing anger.

“You need me more than the Guild does,” she told him.

His eyes narrowed. “Need you? I don’t need a half-trained, disobedient novice to protect.”

Disobedient. So that is what he is so angry about.
She straightened. “If that ill-considered plan you just told me is what you’re truly intending to follow, then obviously you
do
need me,” she retorted.

His gaze flickered, but his expression did not soften.

“Ill-considered or not, why should I include you in my plans when you’re so disinclined to follow them?”

She held his gaze. “I’m only disinclined to follow plans that will get you killed.”

He blinked, then stared at her intently. She made herself hold his gaze. He abruptly turned away and resumed climbing.

“Your presence has complicated things. I cannot do what I intended. I will have to reconsider what I…
we
will do now.”

Sonea hurried after. “You didn’t really intend to spy on the Ichani and communicate what you saw to the Guild, did you?”

“Yes and no.”

“If they hear you, they will be able to work out where you are hiding.”

“Of course,” he replied.

And if they caught him, they would not enslave him. They would kill him. Suddenly Sonea understood what he had intended to show the Guild. A chill rushed through her.

“Well, I guess showing them
that
will definitely convince the Guild the Ichani exist.”

He paused and straightened. “I did not mean to imply that I intended to sacrifice myself,” he said stiffly. “The Ichani will not hear if I communicate through Lorlen.”

Lorlen’s ring. She felt her face warm. “I see,” she replied.

I’m a fool,
she thought.
Well, I just managed to sound like one anyway. Perhaps it would be better if I kept my mouth shut.

But as they continued to climb, she considered his plan. There was no reason why they couldn’t still try it. She looked at his back and considered whether she should broach the subject again, but decided to wait. When they stopped next, she would ask if it could still work.

Just as the growing darkness was beginning to make it difficult to see their way, they reached the base of a sheer cliff. Akkarin stopped and turned to regard the land below. He lowered himself to the ground and rested his back against the cliff. Sitting beside him, she caught the faint smell of his sweat. Suddenly she was very aware of his presence, and of the silence between them. Now was the time to ask about spying on the Ichani, yet she could not make herself speak.

What is wrong with me?
she asked herself.

Love
, a voice in her head whispered.

No. Don’t be ridiculous,
she answered.
I’m
not
in love. And he clearly isn’t. I’m a half-trained, disobedient novice. The sooner I put these silly notions out of my mind, the better.

“We have company.”

Akkarin lifted a hand and pointed. Following the direction of his finger, Sonea found herself searching the land she had travelled the night before.

A dark shape detached itself from the shadow of a boulder far below. It was hard to estimate how far away it was. She had never needed to guess such distances in the city.

The distant movements were strange, and definitely not human.

“It’s an animal,” she said.

“Yes,” Akkarin replied. “A yeel. They are a smaller, domestic breed of limek. The Ichani train them to track and hunt. See, its owner follows.”

A figure stepped into the moonlight, pursuing the limek.

“Another Ichani?”

“Probably.”

She realized her heart was pounding, but not from any foolish notions of love. One Ichani in front, one behind.

“Will he be able to track us?”

“If her yeel finds our scent.”

Her? Sonea watched the figure. There was something about the walk that did seem feminine, she decided. She looked at Akkarin. He was frowning.

“What now?”

He looked up at the cliff. “I don’t like wasting power levitating, but we will be safer higher up. We must find a crack or fold in the cliff to hide within as we go up.”

“And then?”

“We find water and food.”

“Up there?” she asked skeptically.

“It may seem desolate, but a little life can be found if you know where to look. It will grow easier the farther south we go”

“So we’re going south?”

“Yes. South.”

He rose and extended a hand. She took it and let him pull her to her feet. As he turned away, his fingers slid from hers, leaving her skin tingling where he had touched her. Sonea looked down at her hand and sighed.

Getting these silly notions out of her head was not going to be easy.

Dannyl sighed with relief as the door to his room closed. He sat down in one of his guestroom chairs and reduced his globe light to a faint glow.

At last he was alone. Now that he was, however, he found he didn’t feel any better. He moved around the room restlessly, examining the furniture and the framed maps and plans he’d collected and hung on his walls years ago.

I miss Tayend,
he thought. I
miss sharing a bottle of wine, and talking for hours. I miss sitting in our room working on our research. I miss… everything.

He longed to tell Tayend about Akkarin’s story. The scholar would work his way through every detail of it, teasing out hidden inconsistencies or meanings. He would see possibilities that others had never considered.

But Dannyl was glad that the scholar wasn’t here. If Akkarin’s story proved to be true, Dannyl would rather Tayend was as far away from the Guild as possible.

He considered everything he had been told about black magic in preparation for his position as Ambassador, and what he had learned from the Dem’s book. By using it, a magician could draw magical strength from others. A person gifted with magical talent had more power to take than one without it—but that did not mean that a magician was the better target. A magician, once defeated, would have little magic left to take. It was the person gifted with magical talent who
hadn’t
been trained to use it who would be the most attractive victim.

Which was exactly what Tayend was.

Dannyl sighed. He felt as if he were being pulled in two directions. Though he longed to return to Elyne to make sure Tayend was safe, he did not want to abandon Kyralia and the Guild either.

He thought of Rothen and smiled grimly. I
might have joined this group of spies once. Now I hesitate, because I know how I would feel if Tayend left on such a dangerous mission. I wouldn’t do that to him unless there was no other choice.

Sitting down at his desk, Dannyl drew out a sheet of paper, ink and a pen. He paused to consider what he could risk putting onto paper.

To Tayend of Tremmelin:

As you have no doubt heard, the Guild is in a state of upheaval. I arrived to learn that the High Lord had been arrested for using black magic. You will appreciate how unfortunate the timing was in relation to our work, but while it created some problems, none have proven too troublesome so far.

He went on to relate Akkarin’s story, then explained that he could not return to Elyne until he knew the Guild was safe.

I will be surprised, and not a little annoyed, if I am not free to return within the next few months. While it is good to speak to Rothen again, I don’t feel like I belong here now. Instead, I feel like a visitor waiting for the chance to return home. When this matter is settled, I will ask Lorlen if I may continue in the role of Guild Ambassador to Elyne permanently.

Yours in friendship, Ambassador Dannyl.

Sitting back in his chair, Dannyl considered the letter carefully. It was more formal than he would have liked, but he was not about to put on paper anything more personal. If there were people like Farand in the Allied Lands, employed to listen to magicians’ mental conversations, there must also be people employed to intercept and read mail.

He rose and stretched. It might be months before he could leave Kyralia. If Akkarin’s claims proved to be true, the Guild would want to keep as many magicians in Kyralia as possible. He could be stuck here for a long time.

If Akkarin was telling the truth,
he thought with a shiver, I
might never return to Elyne again.

While outside the summer heat was slowly rising to its peak, the rooms inside the University were still pleasantly cool. Rothen relaxed in one of the large comfortable chairs in the Administrator’s office and regarded his companions. Lord Solend, the historian, seemed a strange choice for a spy, but who would suspect the sleepy-looking old man of gathering intelligence for the Guild? The other spy, Lord Yikmo, was the Warrior Skills teacher who had trained Sonea.

Solend was an Elyne, and Yikmo a Vin, making Rothen the only Kyralian magician chosen for the task. Rothen expected this would make it harder for him to get information out of the Sachakans—if they did dislike Kyralians as much as Akkarin claimed.

Lorlen drummed his fingers on the arm of his chair. They were waiting to meet a professional spy, sent by the King, who would instruct them in the art of disguise and intelligence-gathering before they left for Sachaka in a few days. At a knock on the door, all turned to see who entered. A messenger strode into the room, bowed, and informed Lorlen that Raven of House Tellen would be late and offered his apologies.

Lorlen nodded. “Thank you. You may go.”

The messenger bowed again, then hesitated and glanced around the room.

“Does this room often suffer from unexplained drafts, my lord?”

Lorlen looked at the man sharply. He opened his mouth to reply, paused, then smiled and leaned back in his chair.

“Raven.”

The man bowed again.

“Where did you get the uniform?”

“I collect them.”

So this is what a professional spy looks like,
Rothen mused. He had expected someone sly and clever-looking. Instead, Raven’s appearance was surprisingly ordinary.

“A useful habit, in your profession,” Lorlen commented.

“Very.” The man shivered. “Would you like me to find the source of this draft?”

Lorlen nodded. The spy crossed the room and began examining the walls. He stopped, pulled out a nose cloth, and wiped the frame of a painting, then smiled and slipped his hand behind it.

A section of the wall slid open.