The Keep of Fire (65 page)

Grace stared. She opened her mouth, knowing she had to say something, anything.

A flash of crimson caught her eye, and she turned to see a small form dash toward her. She opened her arms barely in time to catch the girl’s thin body.

“Tira! What are you doing here?”

The girl looked up at her with tranquil eyes.

“What is this … this
thing?”
The regent had stood, and his face was ashen as he pointed a finger at Tira. The other guests stared at the girl, mouths open. “Get it out of here at once!”

Servants rushed forward. Grace stood, clutching Tira away from them. Of course—children weren’t allowed at the table with the lord. And Tira’s face was frightening to most people in this world.

“Forgive us, my lord,” Grace said. “I do not know how she came here. We will take our leave at once, if you will.”

She glanced at Aryn and Beltan. The two were already on their feet.

The regent sat, his visage composed again. “No, you must forgive me, my lady. I was merely startled, that is all. I saw a number of such children on my recent journey. Please, go if you wish.”

“Thank you, my lord.”

Holding Tira, Grace hurried from the great hall, Beltan and Aryn on her heels.

“What was that all about?” Beltan said when the doors closed behind them.

Aryn clutched her left arm around herself. “I don’t know, but I’m glad to be gone from there. Darrek has the queerest face. It’s so lovely to gaze upon, but the
more you look at it, the more you realize it’s utterly empty.”

Only as Aryn said this did Grace realize the baroness was right. She tightened her hold on Tira. “Let’s get back to the rooms.”

They had nearly reached their chambers when they turned a corner and ran into Travis.

He staggered back, grabbing his spectacles to keep them from flying off his face. “Tira! There you are!”

Grace set the girl on the floor. “Travis, how did she get away from you?”

“I don’t know. One minute she was right there, and the next she—” His eyes went wide. “But you have to come. Quickly.”

Beltan stepped forward. “What is it?”

“It’s Melia.” Travis drew in a breath. “She’s awake.”

Moments later they burst through the door of their chamber.

“How?” Grace said between gasps for breath.

“I don’t know,” Travis said. “Not really, anyway. I found some old
alasai
leaves in one of the saddlebags, and I thought she might like the smell of them—you know, that it might remind her of her home. So I crushed some into a bowl of hot water and set it by her.”

Grace nodded—it was logical. Smell was the most evocative of the senses. Sometimes a smell strongly associated with old and fond memories could induce consciousness in one who had been unresponsive.

“Melia!” Beltan called, pushing through the door into the side chamber.

“I can hear you quite well, Beltan,” a crisp voice said. “You needn’t bellow like a mad bull.”

All of them skidded to a halt in front of Melia’s bed. The small woman sat up against the pillows, her skin pallid but her eyes clear and bright.

The knight knelt beside the bed and took her hand. “Melia, are you all right?”

Her gaze softened. “Yes, Beltan. I am now. I had finished my healing, but it was so difficult to wake up. The scent of the green scepter helped enormously.” She glanced at Travis. “Thank you for that, dear.”

He only nodded.

Tira escaped Grace’s grasp and climbed onto the bed beside Melia. She leaned her head against the lady’s shoulder.

“Tira,” Grace said, “you should leave Melia alone.”

“No, she’s fine,” Melia said, stroking the girl’s fiery hair. “But there are matters we must discuss. Important matters. Tell me, how long have I been ill?”

“It has been over a week,” Aryn said.

Melia stiffened. “Over a week?” A sigh escaped her. “But you are still here—that means there is yet hope.”

Beltan frowned. “What are you talking about, Melia? What made you ill?”

“Do you remember seeing a bust of a man in the room near the great hall?”

Grace slapped a hand to her forehead. “Of course—that’s where I saw it before. It’s a likeness of the new regent. We just returned from having supper with him.”

Melia sat up straight. “You had dinner with him?” Her eyes narrowed to glowing slits. “But he was ever skillful at the art of dissembling.”

Beltan glowered at her. “I don’t understand. Who are you talking about?”

A black, fluffy form jumped onto the bed. Melia stroked the kitten’s soft fur. “It was the bust of the regent that caused my sickness. I was foolish to touch
it, but how could I have known what lay embedded within it? A grain of Krondisar. And the magic of the Imsari has ever disagreed with me. If only I could have told you then.”

Grace felt like she was drowning. “Told us what?”

“That the regent is Dakarreth.” Melia’s eyes glinted. “You just had supper with a Necromancer, dear.”

“Spider!” Travis peered into the shadows and fog that filled the lane and called out again as loud as he dared. “Spider, where are you?”

Travis shivered inside his mistcloak. He was certain if anyone could help them now, it was the Spider. And they
did
need help. But how was he supposed to find someone who had perfected the art of not being found?

He searched the gloom. This was the place where he had encountered the Spider before, wasn’t it? However, the more he looked, the less he was sure. Everything was transmuted in the fog; stone melted away, soft as mist, molding itself into unfamiliar shapes.

Travis sighed. It was time to return to the others—if he could find his way back, that was. They would just have to come up with a plan on their own. According to Melia, they had only hours, perhaps less, before Dakarreth sensed her awakened presence in the castle and was on to them. Holding his mistcloak around him, Travis turned to head back the way he had come—

—and smacked face first into a wall hidden by the fog.

“Now that,” a sibilant voice spoke behind him, “had to hurt.”

Travis snatched his hand from his head and spun around. A slender man wearing a gray cloak stepped from the fog, and Travis forgot his throbbing skull.

“Spider!”

Silver eyes gleamed in the faint moonlight that seeped through the mist above. “What is this, Travis Wilder? Why are you not in your room where you should be? You place yourself at great risk in trying to find me. ‘Spider’ is hardly a popular word to call out in Spardis these days.”

Travis stepped toward the other. “I’m glad I found you.”

A soft, mirthful laugh. “You did not find me, Travis Wilder. I found you. And by the look of it, it’s a good thing I did. Or do you enjoy trying to walk through solid stone?”

There was no time for this—it didn’t matter who had found whom. “You’ve got to come with me.”

“And why is that, Travis Wilder?”

Now it was Travis’s turn to laugh. “We need your help saving the world.”

The Spider raised a single, golden eyebrow.

Minutes later—far fewer than Travis would have thought possible—they stepped into Melia’s chamber. The others looked up, surprise on their faces. Beltan’s hand slipped to the hilt of his sword.

The Spider grinned at Travis. “Your friends don’t exactly seem happy to see me.”

Despite his thumping heart, Travis returned the grin. “They just haven’t gotten to know you yet like I have.”

Melia sat on the edge of the bed, dressed in her usual blue kirtle now, and gave her blue-black hair a final twist, binding it neatly into a single coil. “Is this your little friend who you thought might help us, dear?”

Travis nodded. “Everyone, this is …” But he couldn’t just call the man
Spider
.

The slender man bowed before Melia. “My name is Aldeth, Great Lady. I am at your service.”

Melia’s eyes glowed as she let the Spider kiss her hand. “You’re awfully polite for a spy and assassin.”

“Excellence in all things, my lady. That’s my philosophy.”

“You’re right, Travis,” Melia said. “He does grow on you rather quickly.”

“So now what do we do?” Grace said. She sat on a chair, Tira on her lap, and the black kitten on the girl’s.

Aldeth stroked his pointed blond beard. “May I suggest you begin by listening to the message I have for you?”

A shadow touched Melia’s brow. “A message? From whom?”

“Falken Blackhand.”

The Spider had their undivided attention.

“I met Falken earlier this evening just outside the walls of the castle. He and his two companions were unable to enter Spardis because of the regent’s order.”

“Wait a minute,” Beltan said, glowering at the spy. “If the castle gates are sealed, how did you get out to talk to Falken?”

“And then back in to speak to us?” Aryn added.

“There are other ways in and out of Spardis besides the gates.”

“The message, Aldeth,” Melia said. “Please.”

Aldeth turned toward her. “Falken and the others have just returned from a long journey. Into the Barrens, I believe, although why they would venture there I have no idea.” He cocked his head. “But I suppose you do. At any rate, Falken’s message was this:
The Keep of Fire is empty. The Stone has moved west. Spardis is not safe.”

Melia pressed her hands against the fabric of her dress. “Falken’s message comes a bit late. I’m afraid we already know these things. It is here, in Spardis.”

Aldeth frowned. “What is here?”

Travis opened his mouth, but before he could answer, a portion of the room’s wall swung out with a
whoosh
of dusty air, revealing a dim opening beyond. Two figures draped all in black stepped from shadow into light.

Shock paralyzed Travis, but Beltan moved with a speed that seemed impossible. The knight drew his sword and leaped in front of the opening, his blade before him.

“If you want to come closer,” Beltan said between clenched teeth, “you’ll have to pull yourself along this sword to do it.”

The figure hesitated, then lifted small hands to push back a veil of black lace.

Beltan’s sword dropped. Travis stared, shock renewed, at the young woman—no, the girl, really—who stood before them.

Aldeth rushed forward, then dropped to one knee and bowed his head before the young woman in black. “My queen! You have placed yourself in grave peril by coming here!”

She directed large brown eyes toward Beltan. “So it would seem.”

Beltan’s fair cheeks brightened. “Please forgive me, Your Majesty.”

“Nay, good knight. You should be commended for your swiftness of action. Although I find them remarkably convenient, that is the disadvantage of secret doors—it’s quite impossible to step through one without startling those on the other side.”

The queen spoke in the high, clear voice of a child, but there was a keen edge to her words that hinted at an adult intellect. Then again, Travis had a feeling
Inara had had to grow up fast in this castle in order to keep her head.

He remembered himself as the others bowed before the queen and followed suit. Inara nodded, indicating that they could rise. The second figure stepped out of the doorway: a serving maiden barely older than the queen, her round face frightened.

“My queen,” Aldeth said, “what are you doing here?”

“I might ask the same of you.”

The Spider took a step back. “I can explain.”

The queen smiled—a pretty expression that was not altogether comforting. “And you shall, my Aldeth.”

Melia glided closer to the young queen. “We heard it spoken you were in seclusion, Your Majesty.”

“Many things are spoken about me, Lady Melia. Few of them are to be believed. I yet mourn my husband, that is so. But I am secluded only as a prisoner is secluded in a dungeon.”

Grace gestured to the secret door. “Not quite, Your Majesty.”

Inara smiled again. “A queen—even one who is not allowed to rule in her son’s name—is not without resources. But I am not the only one in peril here. That is why I have come.”

“What is it, Your Majesty?” Melia said.

“A messenger arrived for Regent Darrek shortly after supper. I was not able to see who it was, for he was clad all in a robe—and a filthy one at that. Nor did I hear what they spoke of. But afterward the regent was angry, and he gave orders to his guards—orders to search the castle, to find a woman with golden eyes and black hair, and to bring her to him.”

Beltan gripped his sword. “How long, Your Majesty?”

Inara shook her head. “I cannot say. The castle is large, and they did not begin with this wing. But there
are many guards, and they are moving swiftly. You have a quarter hour. A half hour at most.”

Melia’s eyes glinted. “And why are you warning me, Your Majesty? What if the regent seeks me because I am perilous?”

“I imagine you are perilous indeed, Lady Melia. I have heard some stories of you. But I know that Regent Darrek is more dangerous yet, to me and to my son.” A shudder coursed through Inara, and suddenly she seemed more girl than queen. “I don’t know why, not entirely, but he’s horrible. That man has no soul.”

Travis almost laughed. “You know more than you think, Your Majesty.”

Both Inara and Aldeth looked up with questioning eyes.

“Now it is time for us to tell you something,” Melia said.

By the time the lady finished speaking a few minutes later, both Aldeth and Queen Inara sat on the bed, and the serving maid crouched in a corner, hands clutched to her ears. Aldeth’s silvery eyes were wide, but Inara stood, her tiny hands clenched into fists.

“I knew there was something queer about Darrek—or Dakarreth, as you call him. He has a power over others, a way of making them do as he wishes with a look. A lord with no heritage who came to Spardis should have ended up in the moat with a knife in his back after a day or two. Instead, in a matter of weeks, he gained the regency.” She looked at Melia. “Thank you, Great Lady. At least I know I am not mad now. Or a complete fool.”

Despite her young age, Travis knew this was the woman who should rule Perridon until Perseth was old enough to be king. And maybe for longer. He glanced at Grace. She nodded—she had reached the same conclusion.