The head, Milady's fiery head, had vanished. His lips pursed. "Cashel, you saved me," Liane said. "You and Rasile. Your expression, though… is there something wrong?" Cashel smiled. She was due an answer, though, so he said, "Allarde wouldn't have been a friend of mine, I guess, no matter what else was going on. But being yoked to Milady for, well, forever… seems pretty hard." "He's probably regretting not having considered that before," Rasile said, her tongue laughing. "Before he mated with her and then betrayed her, that is.
But we have work to do, companions." She walked across the room and waited by the table till Cashel and Liane joined her. Gesturing to the bit of silver, she said, "This is your task, warrior." Cashel fished the half coin Milady had given him out of his sash, leaned his staff into the crook of his arm, and picked up the rest of it. The edges mated with a dusting of blue wizardlight; the coin was whole again.
"This way, I think," Rasile said, walking toward the door in the wall to the left. It was heavy and cross-braced, but the bar had been withdrawn from the staples it rode in. "A moment," Cashel said, folding the coin back into his sash. He hefted his quarterstaff, then stepped in front of the women and pulled the door open. He strode out into a sun-dappled forest. *** Sharina retreated a step but bumped her heel into something.
She leaped high, bunching her legs beneath her to keep from sprawling backward as the scorpion advanced on her. "On command!" Prester shouted. The nave of the temple had excellent acoustics. "Aim at the eyes!" Sharina landed on the squirming body of the priest Burne had hamstrung. He squealed shrilly. She hopped to the side now that she was upright again. "Loose!" Six javelins flickered into the monster's headplate. Two clinked together in the air but penetrated anyway.
Cracks spread in pale webs across the black chitin. The slender steel points obliterated the two large eyes set close together in the center of the plate, though when the scorpion shook itself Sharina saw that there were three more eyes along each side of the head. The wooden shafts rattled together. "Keep your guard up, boys!" shouted Pont as he rushed in. The scorpion's pincers were each the length of Sharina's outstretched arm. One reached out and closed on the top of the veteran's shield, crunching it into separate layers of wood. Pont stabbed up, into the joint. The other pincer grabbed for his head, but a soldier blocked it with his shield and Prester's sword cut through that joint as well. The scorpion's tail curled, ripping with it the upper part of the screen that had closed the sanctum. The creature snapped the bronze backward and forward as it tried to shake it off.
The perforated plating flexed like thunder in the vaulted temple.
Sharina poised. Ascor bellowed a warning, but she ducked between the first two of the four legs on the creature's right side, chopping right and left. The Pewle knife cut through both joints from the inside. Yellow ichor that smelled of vinegar spurted from the wounds.
The scorpion's massive body sagged, battering Sharina to the stone floor. Ascor and Prester each grabbed an ankle and jerked her back on her belly. The tail flicked down, free of the screen, and stabbed the hooked six-inch sting into the shield which Pont had interposed. Pont slid his arms from the straps and backed away, his sword lifted on guard. With his left hand he drew his sheathed dagger. The scorpion shambled forward. Soldiers hacked at the legs on the left side, but the outside joints were protected by stiff hairs and plates flaring above and below the flexible part of the case. Sharina rolled away and scrambled to her feet. The white-haired priest was trying to get up also, but each time his foot flopped under and he fell down again. The scorpion stepped on his torso and pinned him screaming, then stepped on him again. Blood sprayed from the priest's mouth and he finally fell silent. Pont and Prester moved in together. The scorpion slashed at them with its right pincer, though the lower blade couldn't close any more. Pont lunged to meet it with the edge of his sword. The blow slammed him down, but he'd bought his comrade enough time to cut twice. Prester didn't have the advantage of being underneath, but his arm was strong and his sword was much heavier than the Pewle knife.
The creature's two hind legs collapsed, dropping it helpless to the ground. Dawn, flooding in through the opening in the eastern pediment, painted the nave the dusty red of blown roses. Soldiers enthusiastically cut at the legs on the left side, gashing chitin and spraying ichor in all directions without doing real harm. The scorpion was working itself around. Its remaining legs clacked sharply to get purchase on the polished stone. Sharina gasped to breathe, bending over slightly. Fatigue and the stink of the monster's fluids made her stomach churn. "Out of the way, farmers!" Ascor shouted. He had a javelin, perhaps the one Pont had dropped on the temple porch; he held it behind the balance. The heels of both his hands were forward as though it were a harpoon. One of the regulars turned and gaped at the Blood Eagle. Prester grabbed the man's swordbelt and hauled him clear with careless ease. Ascor took a long stride and lunged, thrusting the spear with all his strength into the scorpion's mouth. It sank to the wooden shaft. Ascor backed away. The scorpion's body arched together.
The stinger was still stuck in Prester's shield, a curved section of plywood that delivered a crushing blow to the creature's head plate.
The great body shuddered, but its movements were as mindless as ripples dancing on a pond in a sudden squall. Sharina straightened as she got her breath. She stood in a pool of dawn light. Men were shouting, and her arms were covered with ichor that thickened as it dried. Her skin itched. She heard, shefelt, a buzzing sound; the light about her changed. Dawn had become the cold ruby insistence of wizardlight. "The time is accomplished, Sharina," boomed Black's voice. "Now you must come to me!" The last thing she was aware of as she dropped out of the waking world was Burne, leaping from the floor to her right shoulder. *** "Thank you," Garric said to the boatman as the vessel grounded in the cypress grove. Rather than hand Tenoctris over the high gunwale, he took her satchel. "It's a rare pleasure to meet a scholar," the boatman said with a wan smile. "But I made a conscious choice. It wasn't a bad one, all things considered." The smile faded somewhat. The boat dissolved in mist and shadow as soon as Garric's boot touched the forest loam, but he thought he heard the boatman add,
"And I've had a very long time to consider." It was midmorning by the angle of the sun through the leaves. Tenoctris appeared beside him-out of thin air, it seemed. She wore a cheerful expression, but the lines of strain at the corners of her eyes hadn't been there when the two of them entered the grove the night before. If it was only one night.
"Your highness?" called Lord Waldron from just beyond the circle of trees. His presence here, a mile from the camp, was as unexpected as a troupe of dancing girls and it suggested much worse possibilities.
Waldron swung himself into the saddle. "Marstens, bring the mounts for his highness and Lady Tenoctris! Your highness, I'mvery glad you're back." He rode to Garric's side; it was only five or six double-paces, but Waldron couldn't imagine walking if there was a horse available.
He continued, "The enemy's approaching, about three days south of our present camp, and this isn't the best terrain to meet them on. We couldn't, of course, displace until you'd returned." "You say 'the enemy's approaching,'" Garric said. He felt buffeted by the change from discussing ancient historians on a boat sailing through the cosmos to planning a battle with an unknown enemy, but he supposed that was what it meant to be king. "The main body, you mean?" The king in his mind laughed merrily. "That's what it means to be a soldier, lad," Carus said. "Though I could've done without arguments on Poleinis and Timarion." "Yes, and the Emperor of Palomir himself is with them," Waldron said as his aide trotted up with two horses-a powerful bay gelding and a cream palfrey wearing a sidesaddle. "At any rate, there's a green banner with a white wedge that the scouts haven't seen before, and the pole seems to have a crown on it."
Tenoctris lifted herself easily onto the palfrey and wheeled it around so that she faced the men again. "Yes," she said, "that's the imperial standard. It's Mount Sebala rising above Palomir City. I can easily do a divination to make sure the emperor's really present, of course."
"No, no!" said Waldron with more than a touch of impatience. "We have to get back immediately and give the order to march. I've made the preparations, but of course the order-" He looked at Garric, now mounted beside him, and dipped his head in brief deference. "-will come from you, your highness." He gestured to the trumpeter beside him. His quick, silvery, "Advance" was echoed by the deeper notes of the cornicenes of the individual troops. The cavalry squadron started forward. Garric prodded his gelding into motion to keep up with the army commander. "Milord?" he said, not quite as irritated as King Carus but not pleased with the situation either. "Before I give any orders, what do you propose to do?" "Haft has a range of mountains down the spine, your highness," Waldron said. "Not so high as Blaise, but there's only one pass for fifty miles in either direction from the east coast to Carcosa." He must've noticed Garric glancing over his shoulder, because he added with the same impatience, "Your guards will follow at their own pace. I've given Lord Asterpos his orders." "I know Haft has hills," said Garric, controlling his exasperation in part because the boiling fury of the ghost in his mind was so obviously excessive. "And I've crossed from Barca's Hamlet to Carcosa, so I know the pass as well. Are you proposing to retreat to Carcosa?"
"Your highness, I forgot you were from Haft," said Waldron in startled contrition. Though it wouldn't be obvious to anyone who didn't know him, the army commander had just bestowed a great compliment: he had been thinking of Garric as a noble from Northern Ornifal like himself, not as a hick peasant from a backwater island. "And no, not retreat to Carcosa, but if we hold the pass the rats will have to come at us on a narrow front where they can't use their numbers." He cleared his throat and went on, "The Palomir army is larger than we'd expected.
Lord Zettin estimates there are at least forty thousand rats. I find Zettin a bumptious upstart, but his scouts seem to have a good grasp of their duties." "From previous reports it looked like the rats would come from the south rather than due east," Garric said. King Carus was sifting the data with a quick precision that his descendent would never be able to equal, but they'd come to the same conclusions regardless. "Is that still the case?" "Yes, your highness," said Waldron, visibly pleased that the camp was in sight. "They seem to have planned to overrun Cordin, but they turned north when they realized we were marching on them." Horns were calling from the camp.
The ghost of Carus scowled and said, "And I bloody well hope the artillery in the gate towers either isn't cocked or doesn't have bolts in the troughs, because they're pointing them at us." "Right," said Garric. "So we don't have to worry about Palomir maneuvering around us-they want a battle. We'll march half a day south into the dry grasslands between what used to be the coast of Haft and the reefs paralleling it. We'll give them their battle there, but I don't think it'll be the battle they want." "Your highness!" Waldron said. "I don't want you to think that I'm afraid-" Though the army commander had personality defects, nobody who knew him would suspect him of cowardice. "-but the safety of the kingdom depends on this battle.
There'll be time for the people in your home village to evacuate. And even if there wasn't, there'll be no hope for them anyway if the rats surround and destroy the royal army." The ghost in Garric's mind had a dangerous expression, but Garric gave Waldron a lopsided smile.
"Milord," he said mildly, "if I ordered you to expend all your efforts in protecting Barca's Hamlet, what would you do?" Waldron frowned like a thundercloud; then his face slowly cleared. "You wouldn't do that, your highness," he said slowly. "I… I hadn't thought or I wouldn't have suggested that your plans were based on where you grew up. Your pardon." After a further moment he added, "Though of course if you did, I'd obey my orders. I hope I know my duty as a soldier, your highness." "Much as I thought, Waldron," Garric said with a warmer grin. "My actual train of thought is this: the rats are more agile than we are. In broken terrain they'll always have the advantage. In the hills in particular, they'll be able to get around and above us, even our light troops." "But our troops are stronger man for man," Waldron agreed with increasing animation, "and we've got discipline that I certainly didn't see in the rats when we engaged them earlier." He frowned. "But theywill surround us, your highness."
Garric nodded. "Yes," he said. "We'll win the battle or die, no question about that. But milord, that wasn't really in question to begin with, was it?" Lord Waldron's expression remained fixed for a moment. Then he barked a laugh and said, "No, I don't suppose there was, your highness. This isn't like fighting the Earl of Sandrakkan, is it? Yes, we'll give the rats a battle-but as you say, it'll beour battle, not the one they want." "Put the men in heavy marching order then, milord," Garric said, echoing the words of the ghost in his mind. "I want a week's rations and water, though I don't think we'll have that much time. We'll have to pack it or push it in handcarts, because we won't be taking any horses and mules." Waldron sighed, then brightened as they rode together through the east gate of the camp.
"Well," he said, "I don't mind marching for a day if there's a chance to kill rats at the other end." King Carus laughed. "I'd have gotten along with Waldron, lad," he said. "At least until I lost my temper and took his head off. He's got the right ideathis time, by the Shepherd." Garric didn't have his ancestor's enthusiasm for battle, but sometimes there was no other choice. He grinned wryly at Tenoctris, then said to Waldron, "I don't know that I'd make that a general rule, but in the present circumstances, milord, I completely agree." *** Ilna smiled coldly as she wove and knotted the long strands.
The sisal from a captive's basket was stiff and had a harsh texture, but that made it even better for what she had to do. Not that she really needed more than her own skill. "You've come to worship me, Ilna os-Kenset," said the King, "though perhaps you didn't know it at the time. You have no choice, you see. Your former gods are gone since the Change, but I've been preparing for this moment for longer than you can count. The gods are dead, and the King of Man is God!" Usun spun his armed staff like a baton and laughed. "If living in a cave for thousands of years makes you a god, then Mistress Ilna and I just spilled another god into a canyon. Do you have any canyons here, ape boy, or do we need to find another way to dispose of you?" Ingens was talking to Hervir; they seemed to be paying no attention to the giant ape or their present circumstances. The secretary's posture suggested a degree of deference, but they were still old acquaintances meeting in unexpected circumstances. "Nothing can harm me here!" said the ape with booming certainty. "You call this a cave, little doll? My congregation has been polishing away the living rock for millennia, creating this sanctuary in which to worship me. I rule men now, but from their prayers in this sacred vault I will rule the cosmos!" The apes who'd brought Ingens to the cavern were waiting to either side of the doorway, as dull-eyed and motionless as a pair of marble statues.
Ilna was glad not to have to deal with them. They were each about the size of a man, but they'd be far stronger. She wasn't sure what effect the pattern she was weaving would have on them. "Please don't judge us harshly, mistress," said Perrine with a look of misery. "We had no choice." "The King of Man rules this valley," her brother said. He wouldn't meet Ilna's eyes. "There no will but the King's." Together the twins whined, "We had no choice!" There's always a choice, Ilna thought, but folk like these wouldn't understand that sometimes it's better to die. Her fingers wove and knotted. She'd done worse things than Perrin and Perrine had, but she'd never pretended that she'd been forced to them. Out of hurt and anger she'd surrendered herself to Evil, and for a time thereafter she'd been one of Evil's most subtle and effective tools. She gave the twins a look of hard appraisal. They weren't evengood tools… though they'd apparently been good enough to trap Ingens and Hervir and- Ilna let her eyes drift across the huge cavern. Polished out of nothing! Unless the King was lying, and she didn't see any reason he should be. -tens of tens of tens of men and women. Human beings were no better than sheep! But neither sheep nor humans would be left as prey for wolves while Ilna and her brother were in the world. "You can put that rag away, mistress," the King said contemptuously. "Nothing harmful to me can exist in this vault.
Pray to me and it will go easier for you." "I don't pray," Ilna said as she wove. "And 'easy' isn't something I've had much experience with, so you needn't expect that that offer would get me to change my mind even if I believed you. Which of course I don't." "Mistress," said the prince. "The King really can't be attacked here." "Anywhere in the valley," his sister agreed sadly, "but especially here in his chamber of worship." Sheep! thought Ilna. To the great ape she said,
"You're afraid that I'm going to make you tear your eyes out, is that it, monkey? No, that isn't what I have in mind." "Are you too stupid to understand?" said the King said. "You can do nothing to me! No fabric of yours can touch me. I cannot be attacked!" The lungs in that huge chest gave the words the volume of an ox bawling, but the hollow chamber drank it nonetheless. The captive humans fell to their knees in terror, the prince and princess along with the others. Perhaps that was an effect of the drugged wine too. Ilna met the beast's gaze squarely. The beetling brows and massive jaws would've given it an angry expression anyway, but she didn't doubt that it was really angry. Stiff silvery bristles stood up along its spine. She hadn't actuallydone anything, but the mere fact that she wasn't bowing and scraping was enough to infuriate it. There were human beings like that, of course. She had a short way with them too. "I'll giving you a final chance," Ilna said. She wondered if she'd make the offer if she thought there was the least chance the beast would take it. Perhaps, perhaps she would… but the creaturewasn't going to accept.
"Release all these humans. Take no more. And I'll let you live here and rule the little monkeys for as long as you please." "I will pluck your limbs off," said the King. There was a touch of rumbling wonder in his voice; he was no longer shouting. "I will pluck them off, and as your torso writhes on the floor you will pray to me for the mercy of death-which I will not grant!" "When people learn my skill with patterns…," Ilna said in a conversational voice. She had a sufficient fabric already, but since the time was available she continued to embellish the present design. "They often ask me if I could foretell the future." She gave the King a hard smile. Her mind was considering what would happen next, and after that, and the next thing following… but that was out of her control. What shecould control was what would happen to the beast before her, the one who'd enslaved humans for… well, the ape was probably correct in saying it was more years than she could count. That would end. "And I can, of course, or at any rate I could," Ilna said. "I don't do that because I've genuinely been trying not to injure people ever since Garric freed me from Hell, not to mince words. I'm going to make an exception for you though, ape king." "You cannot harm me here!" the King said, stepping forward. His legs were dwarfishly short, but the arm that reached toward her was twice the length of a man's. The fingers ended in claws like plowshares. "Is it an attack to show you the truth?"
Ilna said, spreading the pattern she'd knotted. The King stumped another step forward. Ilna realized with a sudden shock that his eyes were closed. Usun jabbed the pointed staff into the ape's instep. He bellowed and opened his shrouded eyes in surprise, then went stiff. It was like he'd been struck by lightning. Ilna backed. She folded the pattern between her hands so that none of the human slaves would see it. It would have a different effect on them than it did on the King, but she presumed it would be a differentbad effect. The details of the future depended on the person, but the basic facts would be the same: everyone died. Everything died. All existence ended in death. "It cannot be," the King said in a wondering voice. "This is a dream, a sending from an enemy." Ilna sniffed. "It's quite true, whatever you've seen," she said. "That's the future, your future." She hadn't been sure how the ape would respond, but she hadn't expected denial.
Partly because avoiding the truth wasn't something she would do herself, but largely out of pride: Ilna assumed that a pattern she wove would penetrate to the soul of whoever saw it, beyond the ability of his conscious mind to deny. Her mouth quirked into a wry smile.
Perhaps she'd been wrong and would very shortly pay for that pride with her life. Mistakes should be punished, so she wouldn't complain.
"It's a dream," the King said. "Adream!" He lowered his arms to his sides, but his muscles were knotting and his fists clenched into hairy mallets. Spittle bubbled at the corners of his jaw. It appeared that the pattern had worked after all. The prisoners kneeling in adoration began slowly to get to their feet and move back. They'd drifted forward since Ilna entered, but the behavior of their king and god was visibly repelling them. The King screamed like a rabbit in a leg snare, but louder. Even in this vast chamber, the impact of the sound made Ilna want to clasp her hands to her ears. She continued to hold the folded sisal pattern. The great ape shook his head as though he'd been hit on the forehead with a mallet. His ruby crown winked in the foul green light; he raised his hands to it. "Your majesty?" said Prince Perrin. "Your majesty, what should we do?" The King flexed his arms, pulling the gold wires of the crown apart. He flung the pieces blindly to either side, the silken strap fluttering behind one half.
When they hit the wall, rubies popped from their settings and clicked across the stone floor. Princess Perrine fell to her knees and began to cry. Ilna sneered at her in disgust. The ape grasped his robes and ripped them off with a jerk. Ilna raised an eyebrow. She knew it took strength to tear metal, even a soft metal like gold, but sheunderstood how tough silk brocade was. This beast could have pulled her apart by main strength if he'd grasped her by thigh and shoulder. The King's scream turned to a series of explosive grunts. He fell onto all fours, then lunged forward as suddenly as a racehorse when the bar lifts.
Ingens shouted and jumped aside. The ape's shoulder caught him a glancing blow nonetheless. He sprawled into Hervir, who'd been running for the wall even though he hadn't been in the way of the beast's charge to begin with. The men spun spread-eagled in opposite directions on the polished floor. Perrin and Perrine screamed. The King's thunderous grunts smothered that human sound. The prisoners flattened against the wall; some of them faced the stone, others covered their eyes with their hands. The King's lowered head smashed into the pillar left when the chamber was pounded out of the living rock. Bone cracked like a maul pounding a cliff face, only louder. The ape bounced back and onto the floor in a sitting position. Blood smeared the black stone, and the beast's face was a mass of blood.
Prisoners bawled in horror and amazement. The King rose slowly onto his hind legs. Ilna fingered her lasso. It wouldn't be of the least use against the huge ape, but if he came at her she'd try to drop it over his tree-trunk neck regardless. The other choice was her utility knife. She wasn't sure its blade was long enough to reach the beast's vitals. If she had to choose between two useless weapons, she'd pick the cord. The King had stopped grunting, though his breath blasted like that of an angry ox. Instead of turning to Ilna, he lurched forward and gripped the pillar between his spread arms. With his hands to anchor him, he slammed his head against the stone, slumped, then whipped his head into the pillar again. This time there was a splintering overtone to the hollowWhock! The beast collapsed slowly, its long arms still about the pillar. Its legs, no longer gripping the floor, splayed to left and right until the massive chest lay flat on the stone. Blood and brains leaked from the broken skull. There was a moment of silence. Then the prisoners began to keen in amazement.
Interlude Nivers, high priest of Franca, chanted, "Erebani akuia pseus!" and stabbed with the dagger of gray-green volcanic glass. The man face up on the altar shrieked in the grip of four ratmen. Nivers dragged the blade from neck to belly along the victim's breastbone, where the ribs were still cartilage; the victim's screams gurgled to silence. The ratmen carried his body, still sloshing blood, to the edge of the terrace and flung it as far out as they could into the fire filling the plaza below. The priest slumped, waiting for the next sacrifice. He'd had to use the strength of both tired arms to finish the cut. He'd need a fresh knife soon, another fresh knife. The ratmen kept bringing them, but only Nivers could carry out the rites since Salmson had accompanied Emperor Baray and the army. Gangs of ratmen carried timbers-whole trees, often enough-to the tops of the buildings on the other three sides, then hurled them down into the great fire in the plaza. Though the wood was green, the fire's immense heat exploded it into instant ravening life. The corpses of the victims flung from the fourth side burst, then shriveled in black, oily smoke. Even the bones burned. Ratmen were bringing another victim up the steps on the back side of the pyramid. The blaze sent its red glow through the crystal of all the surrounding structures. When Nivers looked down, it was as if he were standing above a lake of fire instead of being on the topmost terrace of the Temple of Franca. It didn't matter to Nivers where he looked or what he saw; the waking world existed for him only as a problem to be solved. The ash and stench of the holocaust swirled, and the heat of the fire hammered him even though he was shaded from its direct radiance. This was a crisis which threatened the return of the Gods. Nothing mattered save that. Four ratmen carried the next sacrifice, one on each limb; they'd given up trying to get the victims to climb the steps by themselves. The smell of burning flesh made their coming fate obvious; indeed, many of them fainted before they reached the top. "Your holiness, it's me, Marisca!" this one screamed. She still wore the short jacket and diaphanous pantaloons she'd been given when she became a member of the high priest's harem. "You remember me! You can't do this!" Nivers did remember her when he cast his mind back, though he couldn't have put a name to her. Names didn't matter, and she didn't matter. "Ilove you!" the girl said. Her eyes were open but empty, cold blue chips of terror. The ratmen threw her onto the altar which the fires below jeweled garnet and topaz. "Erebani akuia pseus!" Nivers chanted. He chopped down, then ripped the knife toward himself. A spurt of blood blinded him. He tore off a leg of Marisca's pantaloons to wipe his face, then blinked until tears had cleared his eyes enough that he could see again. The rest of his harem had gone before. There were almost no humans in Palomir save Nivers himself. On those few potential sacrifices depended the return of the Gods. One more sacrifice being carried to the top of the temple. The steps were steep, but the ratmen seemed indefatigable. Their individual strength wouldn't be enough, though, not now that the Gate of Ivory had been closed. Only the Gods Themselves could tip the balance. The ratmen reached the terrace; Nivers straightened and took a firm grip on the glass knife. It would do for one more sacrifice, and that a slip of a girl. "You senile old pervert!" the victim said. He blinked. The girl was Anone; he remembered her from the days he'd been only Nivers the high priest, not the avatar of Franca. Anone had been his favorite, the youngest and freshest of his harem. But now… The ratmen spread-eagled her on the altar. It was crystal like the rest of the temple, but days of blood baked by sunlight and fire had coated most of it with a crusty black. Her body gleamed in nude white contrast.
"I'd rather die than have you touch me again!" the girl cried. "I'd rather die! I'd rather-" Nivers stabbed. Anone belched blood, blinding him again. The hot, black smoke of the pyre wrapped and raised Nivers, filling him with the immanence of godhead. Smoke and the thunderheads lowering above Palomir merged into a mighty figure in the sky. His beard streamed with storm clouds, His fingers crackled with the lightning. He turned and strode purposefully to the west. No eyes but those of ratmen were present to watch Him go.
Chapter 16 Cashel took two steps out from the castle door, far enough that the women could follow him, and then stopped to take stock. Three or maybe four double-paces away, a man sat on the stoop of a log cabin; he had one foot up on the railing. There wasn't anything unusual about the cabin or him either one, save that they were a bit outsized: the man was easily two hand's-breadths taller than Cashel, and the cabin was built to its owner. There was a door in the middle of the front wall and a window to either side of it. The roof was board underneath from the ends sticking out at the eaves, but it'd been sodded over; buttercups now grew in the grass. Pines with chestnuts and a smattering of other hardwoods spread toward the distant mountains behind the cabin, and the usual little trees-sweet gums, dogwoods, and the like-filled in the spaces. Behind Cashel and the women was a lake; he could see across, but it stretched out of sight to right and left. A dugout canoe was drawn up on the mud shoreline; the pair of milk cows standing knee-deep in the shallow water looked back at him. The castle and the door Cashel had come out of were nowhere to be seen. A loon called from the invisible distance.
You might think it was a lost soul if you'd never heard the real thing. Cashel laid the quarterstaff into the crook of his left arm instead of holding it ready for use. He smiled and called, "Hello the house!" "Hello yourself," the big man said, lifting himself from the puncheon bench he'd been sitting on. He was taller than he was broad, but his shoulders were pretty impressive. "I don't get many visitors here." He paused for a moment, clearly considering his next words.
"Come and set," he said at last. "You and your friends." Cashel walked up slow and easy, keeping the smile. The man wore a leather tunic with no weapons in sight. As big as he was, the bench itself would make a club if he thought he needed anything. Cashel hadn't any wish to make the fellow think that. "My name's Cashel or-Kenset," he said, stopping at the edge of the stoop. He nodded to the women. "This is Lady Liane, and that's Rasile. She's a Corl." The cows had gone back to drinking.
They were in milk so there must be a bull around somewhere; maybe it was corralled in a clearing deeper into the forest. "Rasile," the big man said, letting the syllables roll on his tongue. He wasn't a giant, but even Garric would have to look up to meet his eyes. "I haven't met a Corl before." Returning to Cashel-a man talking to a man, not presuming to talk directly to the other fellow's women-he said, "Can I offer you anything? I've got milk cooling in the springhouse, and water of course." "Sir," said Cashel, fishing in his sash. "We were told to give you this. We've been sent here to release a man named Gorand. He's a hero and he's needed back in Dariada." He held the coin out in the palm of his right hand. The silver had joined perfectly, like it had never been broken. The big man took the coin between thumb and forefinger; he held it up to view one side, then the other. He spun it in the air, caught it, and said, "I don't have much to do with money now." He quirked a smile at all his visitors, not just Cashel.
"Well, I never did," he said. "I was a warrior, not a merchant." He spun the coin again, then squeezed it in his left hand. His face hardened in appraisal. "I'm Gorand," he said, "and now you've released me. Why?" "Master Cashel?" Liane said quietly. "Would you like me to join the discussion?" "Yes, ma'am," Cashel said, feeling enormous relief. "Master Gorand, I'm a shepherd. Liane, ah, Lady Liane's able to tell you about all this better than I ever could." He stepped aside gratefully. Gorand looked him up and down, then grinned. "It seems to me that you might be just be able to tell me something, boy. Might."
Cashel spread his stance a little without thinking about it. He kept the staff as it was, though, looking about as innocent as a solid, iron-shod length of hickory could. "Sir," he said and paused to clear his throat. His voice had gotten thick; the words sort of growled out.
"Sir, I've got business to take care of right now. Afterwards if you want to look me up, sure. If that's what you want." Gorand laughed.
"No, that's not what I want, boy," he said. "At least not with a quarterstaff. Did you ever use a sword?" "No sir," Cashel said. He hated swords, always had. Given the choice he'd pick a round iron bar before he would a sword. "But if that's what you want, we can try swords." Rasile gave a ripping snarl. "Males posturing!" she said.
"Are we not all the same clan today? Stop this!" "Sorry ma'am," Gorand muttered at pretty much the same moment as Cashel was saying, "Sorry, Rasile," with his face turned toward the hard-tramped ground at his side. "Yes," said Liane firmly. "Lord Gorand, the city of Dariada is being menaced by an army of pirates." "And?" said Gorand. "For in my day, Dariada had walls that no mob of masterless men could threaten."
"There are still walls," Liane said, giving Gorand a little nod to show she appreciated his mind. "But the pirates have a Worm. They would say they control a Worm, I suspect, but you know better than anyone else that no one controls a Worm." Gorand laughed long and savagely, waking a smile from Cashel's lips. Cashel had met big men and strong men in the past, but this fellow was aman, right enough.
"Icontrolled one!" he said. "The Shepherd knows I did, lady!" "Yes," said Liane. "And the Tree Oracle of Dariada said that we must release you to save the city this time also." "Ah, the Tree Oracle," Gorand said, chuckling without the fierce passion of a moment ago. He gestured to the bench and added, "Won't you sit, milady?" "Thank you, no," Liane said primly. "Milord, will you return with us to Dariada now?" "The citizens of Dariada sent me here after I settled the Worm the first time," Gorand said, letting his eyes rove over the forest on the other side of the lake. "They were supposed to leave me with this-" He tossed the silver coin and caught it by the edges as it spun, a neat trick. "-so that I could return when I pleased. But they didn't." He met Cashel's eyes. "They gave it to you instead," he said.