The Steerswoman's Road (31 page)

“No, wait,” Rowan told him. “It’s no good. Try to calm down ...
start with something simple.”

Beyond hearing her, he cried his desperate monologue.

“Try to tell us your name,” she suggested, and touched his
shoulder, attempting, irrationally, to comfort him.

He tried to writhe away from her hand, twisting at the
ropes. His left arm slipped slickly in its bonds, raw flesh and bone tangling
against rope. He uttered a gurgling cry and fainted.

Bel let out a gust of air. “Well.”

Rowan sat back on her heels and was silent for a long time.
Finally, she nodded.

“What happens now?” Willam asked. He was as pale as the
soldier.

Bel made to answer, but Rowan stopped her with a gesture.
She spoke to Willam. “Get me some cloth. The spare linen shirt from my pack
should do.” He hurried to do it.

Bel came closer, suspicious. “What are you going to do?”

Rowan found Bel’s knife. “To start, I’m going to bandage
this arm.” She cut the ropes that held it, carefully disentangling them from
the muscle and tendon.

“You’re not going to let him go?”

“That is exactly what I am going to do.” She took the shirt
that Willam handed her and began tearing strips.

The Outskirter rounded on her. “Are you insane? Don’t you
know what will happen?”

“I think I have a good idea.” She gestured Will to bring a waterskin.

“But he didn’t betray his wizard, and now he knows it. There’s
no reason for him not to return to whoever sent him and say that we hadn’t been
stopped.”

“Very probably that’s what he’ll do.” Seeing that the
soldier was regaining his senses, Rowan instructed Will, “Give him some water.
No, don’t untie him. I’m sorry, friend. I’m helping you, but it will still
hurt.”

“They’ll know where we are!” Bel leaned close to Rowan’s
face. “They’ll know where we were, they’ll know where we’re going, and they’ll
find us in an instant!”

“They’ll have the information to do so.” Rowan took the skin
from Willam and poured water over the hand and arm. The man shrieked and
fainted again.

“Rowan.” The Outskirter spoke seriously. “You’ve always
seemed a sensible person, if inexperienced—”

“Thank you.” She did not have needle and thread to stitch
back muscle and skin, but she noticed that Bel’s work had been very clean and
efficient. The hand would be useless, but the man’s life was in no immediate
danger.

“But this is pure madness. It’s nothing less than suicide.”
The soldier groggily came to again and startled at seeing Bel’s face so close.
She stepped back, annoyed. “Rowan,” she repeated, and waited until the
steerswoman looked up. “I don’t care to die.”

“Good. Neither do I.” Rowan turned back and continued the
work, noticing that she was learning more about the anatomy of the human arm
than she had previously known.

Bel said nothing more.

Rowan finished the bandaging, untied the man, helped him to
his feet, gave him a bit of food and water to take, and led him to the head of
the trail. He stood, swaying and trembling, looking about in disbelief. Rowan
gestured with her chin. “Go on.”

Behind her, Bel made a wordless sound of rage, and the
soldier stumbled, turned, and left down the trail at a staggering run.

Bel set loose a flurry of curses. She stormed back to her
pack, flung off the ropes, and dragged it aside as Will watched in amazement. “It’s
impossible, it’s insane, and I’m having no part of it.” Her movements were
jerky with agitation. She pointed hack up the rising path. “I am going
that
way.
I’ll probably get lost, and I don’t care, because I’d have a better chance of
survival. I’m
not
following you to suicide.”

Rowan stepped over to one of the bodies of the slaughtered
soldiers and examined its trappings. Without looking up she asked Will, “What
do you think?”

He glanced from one to the other, confused. “I—I don’t know.
I’m glad we didn’t kill that man; it’s not his fault he’s under a spell, but ...
Lady, I think we
should
have. It would have been safer ...”

“I didn’t think you could be so stupid!”

Ignoring Bel, Rowan pulled the helmet from the corpse’s head
and studied it, thinking.

“I can still catch him,” the Outskirter said through her
teeth. “No.”

“Rowan—”

“Here.” She tossed the helmet to Bel, who reflexively caught
it. “Does it fit?”

“Fit?”

Rowan turned to the boy. “Will, are you any good at
tracking? I know how to do it, but it’s mostly theory with me. I expect you’ve
tracked game before ...”

“Yes.”

Bel turned the helmet over in her hands, watching Rowan with
suspicion.

The steerswoman stood. “I’m sick of running, and I don’t
care to dodge any more attacks. I want to find out who’s responsible.” Her
mouth twisted. “And since our poor friend couldn’t tell where he came from, he
will kindly lead us there.”

Bel stood, stunned. Then slowly, she began to laugh. She
tossed the helmet into the air, caught it, and pulled it down on her head. It
fit.

“How do we get in?” Bel wondered.

“The same way every guard gets in.”

The cliffs were a riot of raw stone and wild levels. It
disturbed Rowan; her maps showed the lake as smaller, the cliffs smoother and
slightly farther north. This area had been
made
this way, made recently,
and by magic.

One arm of stone reached out into the lake; its far edge
probably marked the limit of the original cliffs. Now, rock rose sheer from the
waters to cradle the pale gray walls of the fortress. The perimeter seemed to
be constructed of massive single blocks, one for each of the six faces. Rowan
could think of no source for such stone, no way to quarry it, and no way to
transport it. In the dawn light it seemed more like ceramic than rock.

Without a doubt, the fortress belonged to Shammer and Dhree.

Rowan and her companions had tracked the wounded soldier for
two days, until a heavy storm had battered the forest. When it had cleared,
they found that all traces of his trail had been eradicated. By continuing in
his last known direction, they came across indications of the original squad’s
outward-bound passage, but no sign that the survivor had returned that way. The
three agreed that the man had likely died in his attempt to return home, victim
of hunger, weather, and his weak condition; but the trail left by the horses
and people of the outgoing squad was still readable. By following it backward,
the travelers eventually found a northbound road that finally led them to the
lakeshore.

“Will, we need you to stay here.” His face darkened, but Rowan
forestalled his protest. “I’m not trying to exclude you. You’re our last line.
If we don’t come out in three days, you have to head back to the Archives. It’s
important that the Prime know what’s happened. Will you do it?”

He nodded reluctantly. “I guess it makes sense. But you had
better tell me all about any magic you saw, when you come out. I’ll wait here
and keep the horses ready.”

“Good lad. Do you still have the map?”

“Yes.” He pulled it from his shirt. “What’s the route to the
Archives?”

She did not look at the map, but kept her eyes on the
fortress. “Follow the cliffs along the west shore of the lake until it turns
north ...” Rattling the parchment, Willam puzzled over the chart as Rowan continued,
reciting the complicated directions precisely, with offhand ease and only half
her attention. “.. and when you reach the Wulf you should be able to get
passage to the Archives. There’s a landing; most of the rivermen know where to
find it.” She turned to him. “Is that clear?”

He looked a bit bemused. “Yes.”

She took in his expression, then laughed. “Anise the
merchant wasn’t very good with maps, was she?”

“No.” He made a wry face. “I used to wonder if she wasn’t a
bit thick.”

“I was afraid that if I showed any skill at all, I’d show
all of it. I was truly bad at pretending.”

“And here we go,” Bel said, “into the middle of it,
pretending all the way.”

The two women were dressed in attire removed from the
corpses of the soldiers they had slain. The outfits were not truly uniform,
save for the leather helmets, cuirasses, and the red surplices. The
individuality of the remaining equipment allowed Rowan to risk retaining her
gum-soled steerswoman’s boots. To the casual glance they were not remarkable,
but they provided better traction than leather soles, and they were silent.

“I’ve had practice since then,” Rowan said.

They had been watching the fortress since the previous day,
observing the visible movements of guards on the perimeters, and the entry and
exit of supplies and personnel.

From the front entrance, a railed causeway led along the
rocky arm to the road at the base of the cliffs. The end of the causeway was
closed off by a barred iron gate set in a stone arch. Each party entering was
in the company of a soldier. At the gate, the group would pause; the soldier
would step up to the right side of the arch and do something unseen from Rowan’s
angle, and the iron bars would swing slowly open to admit the party. The bars
moved with no visible human intervention.

Rowan took a moment to review what she knew about the recent
war: the cursory tale Artos had given her, and the incidental information
gained from Hugo as he outlined the present status and attitudes of the known
wizards. With her knowledge of the lands involved, and logic to fill in the
blanks, it would have to suffice. She gestured to Bel and began to clamber down
the tumbled rocks to the road below.

The arch of the gate was mortared stone, the iron bars as
thick as Rowan’s wrist and completely clear of rust. It was new, as new as the
changed landscape.

Rowan walked to the right of the arch as if familiar with
procedure. Temporarily shielded from the sight of the guards at the other end
of the causeway, she took a moment to examine the stones.

At eye level, one block had been replaced by a small square
brass door. A turn of the little handle opened it easily. Inside, the back surface
was faced with ceramic, with a recessed circle in the center, decorated with a
complex pattern of copper lines.

Rowan sighed, relieved. “Simple enough.” Bel ignored her, occupied
with keeping the reactions of the guards at the keep’s entrance under
observation, while simultaneously trying to project an air of nonchalance.

The women had carefully searched the possessions of the soldiers
they had slain. Each had carried a small wood-and-copper disk, like a talisman
or amulet, embellished with unreadable runes. The steers-woman removed hers
from a pocket built into her confiscated sword belt and fit it into the
recessed circle.

There was a quiet sustained tone, a single deep musical
note, heard but faintly. Of its own accord, the heavy crossbolt slid aside
slowly, and the gate swung inward. Bel froze and stood watching it as a cat
might have watched a dog, her lips peeled back from her teeth.

Rowan came to her side, looking down the causeway. “Expect
magic, Bel.”

A cool updraft from the lake below countered the heat
beating down from above. The women walked along the smooth-surfaced road
through an atmosphere that seemed to have no temperature, no real presence.

Four guards manned the entrance to the fortress proper.
Three stood in proper soldierly stance, watched by the fourth, who stood at his
ease, viewing everything with an overseer’s disgruntled disdain.

The guards could not be expected to know every single
soldier in the wizards’ employ; the purpose of the spell at the magic gate certainly
was to prevent entry by unauthorized persons. Rowan gave the men a casual
acknowledging nod as she and Bel passed by and turned to the left. “Easy
enough,” Bel said under her breath.

“You there! You two!” They froze.

The senior guardsman stamped after them in outrage. “Look,
you, if you’ve both got the amulets, you’re
both
supposed to use them.
You know that—it throws off the tally.”

Rowan thought quickly. “She doesn’t have one.” If the
amulets were used to get into the fortress, then only people originating from
the fortress would have them. “She isn’t from these parts. We pressed her in
Logan Falls.”

“What? Who’s ‘we’?”

“My squadron. We’re returning from the war.”

“You two, alone?”

“We were with Penn’s squadron.”

“Showing up now?” He stood with fists on hips. “Took your
damn time, didn’t you?”

“I was sick.”

He grunted disgust, then looked alarmed. “No, Penn’s squadron,
that’s the one got in the way of that basilisk, wasn’t it?”

“That’s right.”

He took a half step back. “It’s all right,” Rowan assured
him. “It just turned out to be dysentery. Then we got snowed in and had to wait
until spring to travel. And then, well ...”

Bel spoke up. “We got lost.”

He barked a laugh. “Infantry—don’t know its ass from its earhole.
But look, you been mostly mustered out since then, didn’t you hear?”

“Not a word.” She tried to catch the style of his speech, to
mimic it. “No way to.”

“Mph. Should’ve headed home instead.”

“Home where? Mine’s pretty well flattened.”

“We decided we liked the life,” Bel put in.

“Liked it?” He found the idea immensely amusing.

Rowan remembered a comment Artos’s regulars often made. “Could
be worse. We could be working for a living.”

He recognized a standard soldier’s sally. “Well ...” His
manner shifted to grudging familiarity. “We’ve gone and lost a few of the
standing, lately. Wouldn’t be surprised if you found a place. You look likely,
anyhow,” he said to Bel. “Go talk to Druin; he’s took over for Clara.” Rowan
nodded as if the statement made sense to her. “Go on.” He made a vague gesture
to the left and plodded back to his station, muttering to himself.