“I say, Mazael, I thought we had another day of travel. Is that the castle already?” said Gerald, squinting at the massive structure brooding at the top of the hill. A thick mist had risen up that morning, swirling around their horses' hooves like fingers of cloud. The fortress loomed out of the murk like a grim stone fist.
Mazael gave a curt shake of his head. “No.”
Here the land rose up into one of the Grim Marches' few craggy regions, worn spurs of gray granite jutting from the earth like jagged teeth. The rocks sported no lichen or moss, but instead tough weeds and small, rugged trees. Small brooks trickled through the hills, flowing their way to an eventual rendezvous with the Northwater.
Last night, Mazael had stopped at a dozen farmhouses to ask for lodgings. Two had turned them away, and the rest had refused to even open the door. At the last house, he had heard an old woman screaming out a prayer for Amatheon to protect her from the Old Demon. Disgusted, Mazael and his companions had bedded down beneath a tree. Unable to sleep, Mazael had kept watch most of the night, leaving him tired and irritable.
Gerald, who had seen Mazael in darker moods, was undaunted. “That fortress is a strong place. If it does not belong to your family, then who dwells there? Look at the way the ground slopes towards the walls! Fifty men could hold that place against an army. I cannot believe that it lies simply abandoned.”
Mazael yawned. “It doesn’t. That’s a Cirstarcian abbey.”
Gerald frowned. “The Cirstarcians? But...they’re the most powerful monastic order in the kingdom. Your pardon, Mazael, my lady...but Castle Cravenlock is something of a backwater.”
Mazael laughed. “So are most of these lands.”
“Why would the Cirstarcine Order establish an abbey so far away from the great cities?” said Gerald.
Rachel shrugged. “Who knows, Sir Gerald? The Cirstarcians are meddlers by nature. I cannot count the number of times Mitor has flown into a rage after meeting with an emissary from that abbey.” She gazed up at the walls with unblinking green eyes.
“The gods only know. And so do the Cirstarcians, I suspect,” said Mazael. “The Cirstarcians have been there as long as anyone can remember.”
Timothy smiled. “The Cirstarcians have always been a friend to wizards,” he said. “With the exception of the Arminiars, every other monastic or militant order in the Church condemns wizardry.”
Mazael grinned at him. “Conjuring the dead and lying with succubi and all that?”
Timothy grimaced. “If I had a copper coin for every peasant who believes that twaddle—I—well—I’d have more gold than Lord Richard himself.”
“You’d need quite a few peasants for that,” said Mazael. They rode between two crags of weathered granite.