The Last Knight (25 page)

The guards threw Michael up on Tipple, who was, as I knew from my earlier wanderings, the smallest horse in the stable. They tied Tipple’s lead rope to Chanticleer’s saddle, then they tied Michael’s feet to the stirrups.

The lady’s favorite riding horse was a sprightly bay mare. I stepped forward to help her to the saddle, but the gate guard intervened.

“I’ll take care of it, sir.” As he hefted her onto the mare’s back, out of reach of my sword, I heard him ask, “Lady, do you want some of us to go with you? Is everything all right?”

“Yes, of course,” said Lady Ceciel, but she sounded confused.

The guard looked confused, too.

“What she means, fellow, is that the mysteries of the craft are not for the eyes of the uninitiated, and she requires no escort but her humble instructor.” I sheathed my sword and sneered at him. My heart thumped sickly. “Isn’t that right, m’lady?”

“Oh, yes.”

The guard stood back. He was still suspicious, but there wasn’t much he could do about it…I hoped.

I swung into Chanticleer’s saddle and he pranced restively, wondering, no doubt, why his master was riding Tipple.

“Let’s be gone, shall we, Lady Ceciel?”

She smiled.

“Open the gate, fellow.” I turned away, chatting with Lady Ceciel as if I was certain of his obedience.

Those creaking hinges were the sweetest sound I ever heard. We clattered out of the keep and onto the road, accompanied by a stream of nervous babble from me, with Lady Ceciel smiling and nodding.

The road wandered down the hill in front of us, open as the sky. No one shouted for us to stop, and if they did we could run for it. We were free. It had worked. I didn’t believe it.

“I don’t believe it,” I muttered.

“Yes, of course,” said Lady Ceciel.

Michael choked on a laugh.

We were free.

I
rode down the hill from the keep with my hands bound behind me, my feet bound to the stirrups, Tipple’s lead rope bound to Chant’s saddle—expecting an arrow in the back at any moment!—and my heart sang with freedom.

Fisk was still lecturing on imaginary herbalism—nervous reflex, I suppose, for we were out of earshot of the guards. How did he make his face look so thin? With that pale hair, and those mincing mannerisms, I wouldn’t have recognized him if I’d met him on the street! Not to mention that awful accent.

He was undoubtedly a brilliant con man. And though he might deny it, he had proved a better squire. I remembered the hurt in his eyes when he saw that I’d lost faith in him. I’d spent a lot of time worrying about gaining Fisk’s trust, but I’d given no thought to offering him mine—and until I did, was I worthy of his trust? The truth was that, in my doubt and fear, I had failed him. Mayhap this was something we both had to earn. But could trust grow under obligation, or in captivity?

Shortly after we reached the bottom of the hill Fisk turned the horses into the trees, bidding Lady Ceciel to follow, which—“Yes, of course”—she did. Amazing stuff, that aquilas. But much as I disliked her, I found my stomach turning at the mindlessly pliant expression on her face. Or mayhap my nausea was the last of my reaction to her potion—gods curse her!

In the darkness, the magica plants and trees glowed as if lit from within. I could see them hundreds of feet away. To be able to sense magic with touch was not uncommon—the one truly magical Gift granted to men—but no one I’d ever heard of could
see
it. The knowledge that her potion had changed me, even if, as I prayed, ’twas only temporary, dampened my elation. ’Twas hard to forgive, but I couldn’t forget her fury at my suggestion that she’d harmed the simple ones. She hadn’t been half as insulted when I accused her of killing her husband…and now I thought I knew why.

As soon as we were out of sight of the keep, Fisk cut me loose. My first act of freedom was to throw my arms around Chant’s neck and apologize for not having greeted him properly. As I did so, I realized that Fisk must have known our horses were in the stable, and he hadn’t told me. Ah well, mayhap he forgot it in the press of events. Mayhap not. I was in no position to upbraid anyone for lack of trust.

Fisk swiftly transferred Lady Ceciel from the mare to Tipple, binding her hands to the saddle pommel. He held up the crumpled strip of cloth he’d pulled from my mouth and glanced at me in question, but I shook my head—why gag her? We’d be long gone before the drug wore off.

Fisk mounted her mare and we rode into the forest. The moons gave enough light for us to pick our way through the trees at a nearly normal pace. This was too slow for Fisk, who kept looking over his shoulder, but I had no real fear of pursuit until the boy who brought my breakfast found Hackle in my place. By that time we’d have so great a start, they’d never catch us.

At first I was content to take in the beauty of the night, the crisp rustle of leaves beneath the horse’s hooves, and the wheeling wonder of moons and stars. But as Fisk slowly relaxed, I persuaded him to give me an account of his activities over the last few weeks.

’Twas shaming to learn how faithfully he had striven for me.

In an attempt to repay that loyalty, I told him something of what had happened to me, but ’twas difficult to discuss and emerged as more of a patchy summation than a true account. Fisk did not press for details, and I was grateful. As I listened to his account, and gave my own, questions arose to plague me. Some were things I had asked myself from the start, and some were new, but all were linked, like the chain that had bound my ankle during those weary, frightened days. As I considered them, the anchor post that held the chain became clear. The question of what to do about it had me riding in silence for a long time.

At sunrise I found a clearing and drew Chant to a stop. Fisk pulled the mare up beside me.

“Get her off Tipple, Fisk. We need to talk.”

He did as I asked. The tree trunks cast long shadows in the slanting light, and birds chirped. Now that we’d stopped riding I was cold, but the sun would warm us soon enough.

Lady Ceciel looked cold as she stood there, eyeing me with a hostility that made it clear the drug had worn off. Strands of dark hair had pulled loose from the knot at the back of her head, and her skirt was rumpled and stained from the flood of potions over the herbarium floor.

That was something else I owed Fisk. The destruction of that accursed place had cleansed my heart in a way that even the woman’s death could not have done. Mayhap it hurt her worse, too. She stood defiantly, head lifted, and spoke first.

“You can take me to trial, but they won’t convict. I am baron now, in my own right, and I can’t be tried without the presence of my liege. In a few weeks I’ll be home again, restoring my herbarium. This gains you nothing. You might as well—” She stopped, color flooding her cheeks.

I smiled grimly. “Might as well let you go? That argument didn’t weigh with you, when you held
me
prisoner.”

Her eyes flashed. “You were unredeemed! I had a legal right to do what I did. I—”

“Legal, yes, but right?”

It silenced her only a moment. “I paid for the right to rule that keep—to do my research in peace. I won’t give it up. Take me to trial and do your worst! I’ll still win.”

“Yes,” I said softly. “And no. I’ve decided to let you go, Lady Ceciel.”

“What!”

I think Fisk’s shriek was the louder of the two. ’Twas he who went on, “Are you out of your mind? She’s killed dozens of simple ones, her own husband, tried to turn you into some sort of malformed, magic thing…and you’re letting her
go
?”

“Yes. You’re wrong, Fisk—not about me, but the rest of it. We should have seen it earlier—the clues were all there.”

“Like dozens of graves full of mutilated bodies! Like—”

“Fisk, how long do simple ones live?”

He frowned. “Not long. The ones who have magic, never past adolescence. But—”

“How old were the simple ones you saw among the servants?”

“Adolescents,” he admitted. “Or older children. But—”

“So they probably died of natural causes, just as she told me. You said yourself, if she had anything to hide she’d have tried to conceal their graves. And I have a hard time believing that Mistress Agnes, who must have known what her sister was doing, would continue to send her victims. Or that her servants, or even Hackle, would permit her to kill them. Such villains are possible, I fear, but not dozens in one place. ’Tis simply not credible. ’Tis also incredible that Lord Gerald would give her the barony if she’d done such a thing.”

“But she did dose them! Against their will!”

“Sometimes,” I agreed. “But she also took them in, and saved them from starvation and abuse. Their lives may have been better and longer in her keeping than they’d have been in the world. She did dose them, but I don’t believe she killed them, Fisk, any more than she’d have killed us. She could have, since we’re both indebted. All she had to do was send her guards into Cory Port to slay us, instead of cudgel-crewers. But she didn’t. I believe her.”

Lady Ceciel smiled nastily.

Fisk scowled. “I’d be more inclined to believe it if she hadn’t killed her husband.”

“But she didn’t. That was the final clue. That’s what makes it all fit!”

“Then who did poison him? With
magica
. In
repeated
doses.”

“He killed himself.”

“That’s an awfully expensive method to commit suicide…Mike.” Fisk’s voice was so sarcastic I had to smile. “Not to mention drawn out, painful, and chancy. People who kill themselves slit their wrists, or jump off bridges, or—”

“He wasn’t trying to kill himself, he was trying to cure his infertility. Isn’t that right, Lady Ceciel?”

She stood in silence for a moment, staring not at me, but into the past. “That was our marriage bargain.”

“Sir Herbert told you he was infertile,” I continued, when she said nothing more. “So he didn’t care that you weren’t Gifted. But if his infertility became known, he’d have been scorned and pitied. Lord Gerald might have appointed an heir to share in governing the barony. So you agreed to say that you were infertile; in exchange, you gained wealth, rank—”

“I gained the freedom to pursue my research,” she broke in. “To find a way to Gift the Giftless! To give magic to normal men. You won’t stop me, Sir Michael. I kept my part of the bargain. All those years, his brother telling him to put me aside, the neighbors snickering…No one else ever guessed. How did you? I never told you anything about Herbert and me.”

“But you did. When I asked you why you didn’t take the potions, you said it contained an ingredient that no woman who might bear children should take. That puzzled me, but it wasn’t until I saw the potion bottle in the herbarium, with another’s writing on the label, that I understood. I know the effects of some of those ingredients. You kept it to analyze?”

A whisper of sadness passed over her face. “I was curious,” she admitted. “It shouldn’t have killed him. And Herbert…Well, I owed him something.”

“Yes. You kept your bargain with Sir Herbert, despite the risk of being sentenced for his murder. Would you have kept your silence to the end, Lady Ceciel?”

“Gods no! I’m not that foolish. If it had come to a trial, I’d have told the judicars the whole story. It can be proved, you know. Herbert went to every herbalist for leagues around, trying to find a cure. The faker that poisoned him fled, but the rest would testify. Lord Gerald checked it out very carefully before granting me the barony—in spite of the ‘tax’ I paid for passage of the title.” Her voice grated on the last words, but she went on almost cheerfully. “No, I liked Herbert, and we respected each other. Enough that I sent his body home for burial without explaining how he died. I’d hoped to let him keep his secret to the end. But I wouldn’t have died for him. He wouldn’t expect me to. And as it happened, I didn’t have to confess…I was rescued.”

Her lips twitched at the memory.

Fisk swore, but I began to see the humor of it.

“You’re really going to let me go?” she asked.

“Yes and no,” I replied. “I know you believe what you’re doing is beneficial, but you’ve no right to test your theories on others without their consent. And you’ve no right to use the simple ones as your victims whether they consent or not. Man must look after man, for we have no gods to watch over us.”

“But I saved them! They—”

“You saved them only to use them for your own ends. I’m going to report what you’ve done to Lord Dorian, who will pass it on to the High Liege—and he won’t permit this to continue. He’ll speak to Lord Gerald, to your neighbors, mayhap place watchers in your household. You may retain the barony, but you will never again be allowed to experiment on human beings.”

She whitened at the truth of it. “You can’t do this! He’ll make it impossible for me!” Her gaze darted about, seeking inspiration, and settled on Fisk. “There must be something you want? I have wealth, Sir Michael, I can…”

The expression on my face answered her before she finished.

“How much?” asked Fisk, in a tone of considerable interest.

“He’s joking,” I told her firmly, wishing I was certain.

She gazed at me defiantly. “There must be something. Something you want as desperately as I want this. If you tell me what it is, perhaps…”

“There is something I want,” I said. “But I’ve already figured out how to get it.” And the joy of it warmed my heart. “If you start walking now, you should hit the coast road by midafternoon.”

“But—”

“We’ll be going in another direction. I’ve no desire to be pursued, so you’ll forgive me if I don’t reveal which one.”

I also had no desire to be ambushed. I made a mental note to approach Lord Dorian with caution, for she wasn’t above setting a trap, and this time her men might have orders to kill.

“But what about Ginger? You can’t just steal my horse!”

“You stole ours,” said Fisk, “when you had us cudgel-crewed.”

With a horse, she might get back in time to send men after us. On the other hand, she might truly care for the beast. “Once I’ve spoken to Lord Dorian, we’ll send her to Mistress Agnes.”

“But I have to have a horse! What if I encounter bandits?”

“Or a wild boar,” said Fisk. “Or cudgel-crewers. They’d be lucky to get out of your hands alive.”

She looked at his grim face. She looked at me. I don’t know what she saw, but her chin lifted stubbornly.

“Very well. But I’ll succeed someday—despite all you’ve done! I’m right, Sir Michael. You, of all people, know it.”

Her eyes were full of fanatical fire. She would try again, unless I stopped her. And suddenly I knew that I
could
stop her, that I was the only one who could. Mayhap that was what gave me the strength to say easily, “What do you mean ‘You, of all people’?”

“You know what I mean.” She gazed at me hungrily. “I saw you looking at the potions in my herbarium and the way your eyes fix on certain plants and trees. Any man with a sensing Gift can
feel
magic, but you can see it! I’ve—”

“My lady,” I said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You’re lying.” But the quiver in her voice revealed the first crack in her confidence.

Fisk snorted. “In two weeks you should have gotten to know him better than that.
He
never lies.”

She had come to know me, and that knowledge was reflected in her face.

“All right. Meet my eyes, Sir Michael, and tell me that you’ve noticed no effect from my potions.”

I met her eyes. “I’ve noticed no effect from your potions. Well, except for nausea. I’m sorry, Lady Ceciel. Mayhap you had some effect on the simple ones because they already had magic, but it hasn’t changed me.”

Watching the dream crumble in her eyes, I found I did pity her. ’Twas passion to prove herself that led her into evil, not cruelty. And ’tis no light thing, to face the death of dreams. I, of all people, knew that, for I’d been trying to do it ever since Father had passed his sentence. Now my dream was within my grasp. Oh yes, I understood Ceciel.