The Wind-Witch (38 page)

“This isn’t buying a new ram to improve the flock!”

Druyan snapped. “This is
lives
, not length of fleece staple and how many crimps to the measure!”

Not all costs are the same. Some prices only a here can pay.
His neck arched like a black rainbow against the dark land. She could see his left eye rolled back to her, full of sparkling lights. Druyan’s mind’s eye was given a brief sharp glimpse of flame and smoke, the intolerable brightness of a chimera’s mane.

“But I’m no hero,” she whispered, as Esdragon’s cool wind replaced the burning vision.

No hero ever thinks so
, Valadan said inscrutably, and galloped onward, never missing a snide.

Six Riders awaited her, dismounted to let their winded beasts recover, gently walking those most recently arrived and still needing cooling to prevent founder. Only six, and the sky overhead was thin gray now, as clouds had drifted in over the sun almost the moment it cleared the horizon. Druyan shuddered, seeing the stage set for the deadly play.

Six Riders. There would be others, and perhaps those would yet arrive in time—no way to tell about that. The vision had scarcely been precise. It had offered no glimpse of the sun’s angle to guide them, since the sun could not be seen.

Two of the waiting men were not among those she and Valadan had alerted, which was a comfort to Druyan—Kellis had gotten at least that far, his message had been accepted by at least one team.

She remembered hanging the message pouch about his silver-furred neck. It seemed a month ago already. He had not allowed her to watch his transformation, but had gone discreetly behind some trees and then come trotting back to her in his wolf-shape, his yellow eyes troubled, as if he feared even she would refuse him, mistrust him. She had secured the message and he had bolted away at once, not waiting for her to speak to him. But what more could she have said?

She wished she had thought to tell him to go back to Darlith when his round was finished. He’d surely be in reach of the fami, however weary he was. And if he tried to come back to her at Keverne he would burst his heart, and still likely be too late. . .

One of the Riders called her name joyfully. Druyan lifted a hand to acknowledge the greeting and rode to join her little company.

No use to try to take up a defensive position. They were too few to find it useful, and attempting it might only bring them to the duke’s troublesome attention. Two more pairs reached them, the four horses sweat-soaked but sound. They lurked at the fringes of the fair, on high ground that offered them a slight vantage and the marginal concealment of a stand of scrubby trees. Druyan considered what they might do in such and such a case, if the raiders did thus and so. She discussed tactics with the captains—what they had found to work during other raids, in other places. Mostly they spoke because simply waiting for the disaster to overtake them was intolerable. They all knew there was no plan, however cunning, likely to grant them victory. They were straws thrown into a flooding tide—helpless, and knowing it. Some of them might never ride again.

Two more Riders pounded up, men who had been bedded down just the near side of Porlark when a wolf ’s howls had roused them from sleep. And the day was advancing, though the veiled sun did not mark it.

Druyan reckoned the progress of the tide, which was strong enough to counteract the sluggish flow of Keverne’s river, at least along these lower reaches. She should have thought of that before, as a way of knowing what to expect! The raiders demonstrably preferred to row up rivers, so as not to show sails, which might be seen from far off. They might also prefer to have the tide’s help, to make their rowing easier, she thought. And with the moon nearing full, those tides were high and puissant. They would not reach quite so far upriver as the horse fair, but one aware of the tide could judge when the raiders would find it possible to begin their voyage. Druyan strained her eyes against the gleam of the water, alternated that with glances at the horizon, watching for the dust hard-ridden horses would raise.

And all the while, small groups of horses were shepherded from holding pens to the great circle of welltrampled grass where the selling took place. The beasts left mostly singly, were led to picket lines that the buyers had set up, and kept there by drovers who had much to contend with, as old herd bonds were severed and nervous animals adjusted—or did not—to their new companions.

Bidding waxed spirited when the duke’s great roan stallion, the king of his stables, took his turn in the ring. It barely faltered when the stud took exception to the excitement and began to display his temper in dangerous ways, hauling his attendant grooms wherever he wished, ungovemable. Eventually he managed to plunge into the crowd, though folk nearest had moved back to safety several times. There was chaos, and Siarl the constable waded in himself to take personal charge of the stallion, but the bidding never quite ceased. Duke Brioc looked well pleased. He was gaining a good deal of gold in return for his horses—gold that would soon be transmuted into longkeeled ships. A little of it would go to the coffers of one of the more tractable and practical Eral chieftains—his pay for keeping off his fellow pirates—but that was a temporary inconvenience. Once the ships were ready. . .

In fact, there were a score more ships in Esdragon, that moment, than her duke guessed. And most of those were beaching on the gentle river shores at that very instant.

Those traders encamped nearest the river were the first to realize that something was amiss. All at once their wagons were being rummaged through, their strongboxes located and smashed open, the coins within scooped up, thrown into carrysacks. Merchants who objected met short, sharp swords in the hands of men quite willing to use them—men brazen enough to attempt such business in the broad light of day. Picket lines were slashed, and loosed horses spread confusion with every stride, unwitting allies of the thieves.

Turmoil spread inshore, and the only folk not affected by it were those who’d caused it—and had expected to have to deal with it.

“There’s a good fifteen ships beached in the shelter of that bluff yonder,” reported one winded post rider, who had raced his mount round the fringe of the fair to scout out their enemy.

“And never less than a dozen men to a ship,” Druyan reckoned grirnly. “Probably they’ve crammed more aboard for this. For now we act together. There aren’t enough of us here to split off and try anything fancy. Keep close, ride stimnp to stirrup.” Below, she could see her uncle’s bodyguard drawing up about their master, making no move toward the disturbance on the perimeter of the fair. “We’ll ride straight through,” she decided. “Aim for the river, and we’ll try to push them back ahead of us.
Now!
”

The horses—even the weary ones—leapt forward eagerly. “
Valadan!
” someone shouted, like a war cry. Other voices answered him, and two horses neighed. The charge was under way.

The slope wasn’t extreme, but it blessed them with momentum, and the horses, excited to run together, left weariness behind them like the dust they raised. The thunder of Valadan’s galloping hooves was multiplied a dozenfold, as if Kellis had been working his Mirror of Three again. Druyan had never ridden so fast in a close-packed bunch before—sometimes pastured horses had run along with Valadan, but never for so long. All about her, manes tossed like seafoam, heads stretched out as teeth fiercely clenched bits. Nostiils were red as firecoals, wide as wine cups, and a roaring sound filled Druyan’s ears, as Valadan led the charge. The ragged wave of sea blue and black-sheep’s gray crested into the horse fair.

The fringes might have broken their charge upon picket lines still up, or deflected it around breakwaters of wagons, but the center did not much impede them. Loose horses dodged out of their path—others loosed themselves from terrified handlers and fled, only to attach themselves to the post riders like the tail of a comet, adding weight to the headlong rush as they followed it.

“
Valadan!
” The name was screamed, high and shrill.

“
Druyan! Druyan!
” Because there was not a man there did not feel she was the Riders’ luck, their lodestone.

The shouts were all just at Druyan’s heels—Valadan was forgetting to school his pace to something the others could hope to match. And they were not pausing to slash at the raiders they began to encounter—Druyan carried no sword, could not have held it if she had. Valadan was her weapon, her shield, as well, his white teeth and sharp hooves putting sea bandits to flight more surely than any blade ever forged. No raider stood before him.

The stallion veered from the river’s edge, on the heels of a yelling man with a sack slung over his right shoulder. The yells changed to screams as he went over the bank and into deep water. Druyan whirled Valadan about, his forehooves treading empty air, his quarters bunching powerfully beneath her.

Four Riders drew even with them. Three others pelted up, to re-form the line.

“Back across!” Druyan shouted, her voice breaking into a croak. “Try to push them on toward the right.” Keverne lay in the opposite direction, and she knew there were already folk tiying to make for the safety of the stronghold—they would do no kindness to send the raiders into them.

Now to charge was a struggle, uphill and without a running start. To stay in any sort of a line was nearly impossible. The Riders mired upon knots of struggling men—stray guardsmen and horse traders fighting back against those who’d sought to rob them. Afoot, they’d never have won to the hill to regroup—even ahorse some of the Riders couldn’t get there, but were forced aside, sent wide and slowed.

They were the only mounted force on the field, but there weren’t enough of them to matter. Druyan reined in, trying to decide whether another sweep through could possibly do further good—the horse fair was absolute chaos, and determining a course of action could be done only whilst one was on the edges of it. Once embroiled in the struggle, only the next instant could be judged—only the next instant would matter. She looked, and her head swam with the enormity of it. But everyone was looking to
her
for their direction, it was
her
name they cried. . .

Valadan snorted, stamped, and tugged at the reins.
Too few of us to keep the line
, he said. Three horses had not rejoined them after the last charge—they were together in a little knot downriver, their riders quite busy and plainly too far away to return. Choose to or not, their little force was split.

Esdragon’s duke had never beheld an Eral raid at close hand, or even seen the aftermath with his own eyes. He had been willing to permit the coasts of his domain to be pillaged the rest of this season in order to better protect them the next—never had he imagined he would need his army to stand off such an unheard of, daylight, and not the least secret attack. His Guard alone should have been sufficient to keep order at the fair. So they had been, but were no longer. Two dozen men, even hand-picked, could not defend the traders and see him safe back to his fortress, as well; Brioc forbade them to try. He looked about for his son—Dimas was nowhere in sight, having made for the riverbank to report on the raiders’ ships, and steal one if he could. He should have forbidden that, the duke thought—surely those ships were not left unguarded. . .

“Lady, I’ll not ride into that
alone
, but if your Riders are game, I’ll add my horse to yours,” the trader said, speaking over the neck of a high-spirited gray he had purchased the previous day and managed to saddle ere the picket lines went to perdition and loosed the rest of his stock.

“
Follow me, then!
” Druyan shouted, and wheeled Valadan to face the worst of the fighting. She felt his forehand lighten, and all at once he reared as if he would touch the stars that hid out the day behind the gray clouds—reared and screamed both a challenge to the foe and a rallying cry to every ridden horse upon the moor. Druyan did her best to look as if the action was her own idea.

The riderless answered Valadan, as well, and the ground trembled with the thunder of thousands of hooves. If the earlier charge had been pounding surf, now it was an earthshake. And over the edge of the rolling gray-green horizon came half a dozen more blue and gray riders, with a silver shape darting just ahead of their horses’ hooves.

“
Valadan!
”

“
The Warhorse!
”

“
Druyan! Druyan!
”

“
Valadan!
”

The raiders had been hard-pressed enough to keep out of the way of the early charges. Afoot, even a single horse running at them was a terror hardly to be withstood. Now, faced with scores of onrushing beasts, some few Eral stood fast, but most broke for their ships—if, in the confusion, they still had any notion where the river lay, whether they were up- or downstream of their beached craft.

“
Valadan!
Follow the Warhorse!”

A wolf howled.

Brioc looked over the shoulders of his guards, as wave upon wave of gleaming horseflesh swept past. Incredulous, he saw his post riders among them, wielding their swords at any sea raider fool enough to be trying to stand in their path.

“What a sight!” exclaimed Siarl, Constable of Esdragon. He recognized some of the horses hurtling by. “And this you’d trade for a paltry few barnacle-covered tubs?” He spat into the trampled grass.

The duke was speechless.

The horse at Valadan’s near shoulder was a blood bay, with a white spot between its eyes. The Rider’s hair matched the stallion’s coat, though by then ’twas too dark to notice such details.

“They managed to launch all their ships, though they left a lot of their crewmen behind,” Yvain reported.

Some had in fact been drowned trying to swim after departing boats. Others were cut down ere they reached water too deep to ride a horse through at speed. A few were taken alive. Most had not been.

Robart cantered up to them. “Brioc’s safe back at Keverne. No one has seen Dimas, but there was hard fighting by the boats, and last anyone heard, he was headed that way.”