The talons let out a howl and gave chase, but the horse ran with the taste of freedom blowing in its face and had no intentions of being caught by its wicked masters. Del watched with satisfaction as the miserable creatures returned, pushing and arguing tenfold, each blaming another and threatening some horrible punishment.
Then something else caught Del’s eye—Brielle on a distant hill across the road. She danced about, beautiful and terrible all at once, gathering power with every move and reaching for the sky. Del followed the line of her arms upward and saw the thunderclouds. He looked back to the witch, beckoning to the rising storm, menacing and distinct in her white gown against the darkening sky.
The talons hushed when the sun disappeared, their arguing drowned away by the angry rumble of witching magic. Del nearly pitied them, they were so terrified, for they knew their fate was at hand. In a pathetic attempt to escape, they jostled about and tried to break free from each other and away from the wagon.
They had no chance. Even as they started, a bolt of lightning sizzled down from the clouds. Del covered his head and lay as flat and still as he could. Blast after blast exploded and crackled, and the thunder rolled on and on, shaking the very earth beneath him.
When all was quiet, Del looked with horror upon the splintered remains of the wagon and the charred, smoking bodies of the intruders.
Then a small twister whistled in just above the trees, not too far from Del. Unafraid, he understood now that this fury was perfectly aimed. The whirlwind swept down upon the road and sucked up every trace of the infection that had invaded Avalon, carrying it far, far away from the fair wood and back to the desolated land of Brogg.
Panting for breath and fighting against a wave of nausea, Del looked back at the witch. She stood calm now, untroubled, as if she could not see the blood that was on her hands. And as the clouds began to break away, their mission complete, a ray of sunlight descended upon her, lining her form in silvery approval.
The emerald in her forehead sparkled.
“My God,” Del whispered. In his own abhorrence of violence, he painted the same face on Brielle now that he had seen on Mitchell that day on the beach. But Mitchell’s rifle seemed a toy compared to the incredible power the witch had conjured. In Avalon, Del had viewed the creations of Brielle’s magic, and he had loved her even more for them. He had never imagined that she could turn that same wonderful ability into such a force of destruction.
Though her brightened form was blurred to him through the tears that had welled in his eyes, Del could see that Brielle stood at peace, grimly satisfied. Weakened by confusion and despair, he stumbled down to the road toward Mountaingate.
Soon he broke into a dead run.
Chapter 18
Caer Tuatha
“IT IS FINISHED,” Reinheiser declared triumphantly. He held up a small splinter of wood notched into an angular design on one end.
“Wonderful.” Mitchell scowled, pacing back and forth, his eyes darting anxiously about like some cornered animal. The long wait had played badly on Mitchell, eating at him. During the day, the pair had found no chance at all of getting out of the valley, for Ryell, or one of his cronies, seemed always about, watching their every move. And at night the pair remained locked in their rooms. Mitchell’s mood seemed particularly surly this night, Reinheiser noted, and he knew why: earlier that same day, the captain had seen DelGiudice escorted from the mountains to freedom. “Well, what is it?”
“A key to our door, of course,” Reinheiser answered, smiling widely.
At first the answer didn’t seem to register with the distracted man, but then his face blanched and he spun toward Reinheiser. “Where the hell did you get that?”
Reinheiser laughed casually. “Did you really think that a locked door could defeat me? Come now, Captain, you must show me more respect.”
“But how?”
“I formed a mental image of the guard’s key and merely copied it,” he answered, matter-of-factly—though in truth, even Reinheiser wondered how that picture of the key had come so clear in his mind.
“It won’t do us any good anyway,” Mitchell grumbled, clutching stubbornly to his negative attitude. “There are guards outside the door. We’d never make it out of the house, let alone the valley.”
“Do not worry, Captain. There are plans to take care of them, I believe.”
“Will you quit talking in riddles?”
“Not yet,” Reinheiser said with a laugh. “Consider it just a call in the night.” His voice trailed away mysteriously. “Patience, my friend, patience. We cannot leave yet. There are arrangements to be made and you have much to learn.”
“What are you talking about?” Mitchell demanded.
“About the arrangements, I am not, as yet, sure,” Reinheiser explained. “But I can tell you with certainty that you must do as I say when we are before the court of Ungden if you wish to attain the lofty goals you desire.”
Mitchell scowled, but Reinheiser could be even more stubborn than the big man. The physicist had learned a great deal about Ungden from his talks with Ardaz, and he knew that one wrong word from the captain when they stood before that merciless ruler would cost them both their lives.
So Reinheiser held firm, took the upper hand, and forced the concessions. In the end, Mitchell had no choice but to agree to Reinheiser’s demands. Above the fact that Reinheiser had the key and that only he could read his map to get through the secret passes out of Illuma, the physicist made it quite clear that he had some plan brewing to take care of the guards.
On Reinheiser’s insistence, they got right to work, spending the rest of that night and most of the next morning rehearsing scenarios and questions they might encounter at the court in Pallendara. Reinheiser went over the same questions repeatedly, stubbornly, forcing Mitchell not only to provide the correct answers, but also to show the proper, subservient demeanor.
And whenever the captain slipped, even a bit, the physicist got in his face, poking him and scowling at him.
Mitchell didn’t like it, not one bit.
And as they progressed, the wait became even more trying for Mitchell. Now that he had found some direction and purpose to this adventure, he desperately wanted to get on with his grand plans.
When their rehearsals at last reached a point satisfactory to the physicist, Reinheiser asked not to be disturbed and spent entire days in calm meditation, making the passing hours seem even longer. Mitchell reasoned that the physicist was finalizing their plans for escape and knew he should leave him alone, but his patience was worn away and he constantly peppered Reinheiser with the redundant “When?”
On a dark and windy night two long days later, the captain finally got his answer.
A few stars peeked through breaks in the black clouds that rushed overhead. Arien’s ancient house creaked and moaned against the swirling gusts, and the single candle in the room flickered from the drafts. Reinheiser sat motionless, trying to block out the snores of his sleeping companion and attain the relaxed state of his meditative trance: a difficult task, even for Reinheiser’s disciplined mind, for the man was agitated, as close to the edge of his control as he had ever been.
Then a soundless call beckoned to him. In both fear and excitement, he rose and crossed the room to the captain, his shadow dancing in the unsteady light like some monster in the blurred background of a nightmare. “Come, Captain,” he whispered, “tonight we are called to leave.”
Groggy and not quite comprehending, Mitchell climbed to his feet and began pulling on his clothes while Reinheiser gathered together a torch and two small packs he had stashed under his bed. A trace of mist seeped in from under the door and hung about the floor. Indeed, a ground fog shrouded the entire valley, a very strange mist that had floated in suddenly, a few minutes before.
“Hurry, Captain,” Reinheiser encouraged. He slid his key in the lock—it fit perfectly, as he knew it would—and opened the door a crack to view the hallway. Satisfied, he swung the door
wide and pushed the still lethargic captain out into the hall.
Mitchell perked up immediately, shattered from his sleepiness by the staring face of an elven guard. He raised his arms to defend against an unexpected assault, but the guard made no motion toward him. In fact, the elf made no movement at all, not to blink or even to breathe! A few feet away, another guard stood rigid in the same comatose state.
“What?” the astounded captain gawked, turning, as always, to Reinheiser for answers.
Understanding that the favorable situation wouldn’t hold for long, Reinheiser cut Mitchell’s questions off before they could really begin. “Do not ask about things that are beyond your comprehension,” he replied with a pretense of authority, as if he was an intricate part of these strange events. But in truth, the physicist’s understanding of all of this was no greater than Mitchell’s—only Reinheiser had known of the stasis before he opened the door.
Mitchell nodded and pushed Reinheiser ahead. “I’ll just take this one’s sword,” he said, grinning.
“No!” Reinheiser scolded, and once again he wondered if the benefits of keeping Mitchell around outweighed the aggravations of the captain’s endless stupidity. He accepted with a resigned sigh that, as always, he would have to lead the captain by the hand to get them through. “Take nothing, disturb nothing. If we are fortunate, they won’t know that we are gone until the morning. Now, quickly, let us be on our way. We have only a few minutes to get out of the valley.”
They hurried down the hallways and out of Arien’s house, passing several elves as they darted across the misty city, a couple out for a midnight walk and three dancing in a small clearing. But these, too, were held in time, frozen in mid-step and mid-pirouette.
Soon the two men were deep inside the maze of tunnels, straining their eyes in the torchlight to read Reinheiser’s map and counting their steps and the side passages. The eerie mist flew from the valley then, as silently and swiftly as it had come, and the unwitting elves resumed their guarding and walking and dancing as if nothing had happened.
The physicist’s calculations proved accurate, and the two had little trouble finding their way through the tunnel. When the lower exit came into view, Reinheiser put out the torch so as not to attract any unwanted attention in the open night, leaving himself and Mitchell stumbling blindly down the side of the mountain. They finally made it to the silver archway, their adrenaline pumping with the exhilaration of success, and raced across the field of Mountaingate as quickly as they could. Turning into the southwestern pass, they felt a rush of freedom as the rolling plain spread wide before them.
Mitchell punched his fist into the air. “We did it!” he growled with delight. “Think of it, Martin, the next time we see that wretched city, it will be at the head of an army.”
Reinheiser ignored Mitchell’s babbling. “That must be the Calvan scouting party,” he said, pointing to the south where the light of a distant campfire broke the even blackness of the horizon. “I believe we can get there under the cover of the night.”
The distance proved a bit farther than Reinheiser had figured, and the sky in the east had taken on the lighter shade of predawn when the two at last came upon a grassy mound, the encampment set on its flattened top. The fire in the center of the camp had died down to glowing embers, and around it lay the blanketed forms of sleeping men, their horses tethered and standing quietly a short distance away on the south side of the hillock.
“These are soldiers?” Mitchell snickered. “They don’t even know how to set a guard.” But even as he spoke, he and Reinheiser felt the sharp tips of spears against their backs, and the supposedly sleeping men within the camp sprang to their feet, short swords drawn and ready. They stood tall and straight in coats of silvery mail and black cloaks, their small black bucklers bearing silver inlays of sharks.
“Right again,” Reinheiser whispered sarcastically.
“Silence!” one of the Calvans commanded. “Thieves speak only when they are told to speak.”
“We’re not thieves,” Mitchell said.
“Silence!” the Calvan ordered, and the man behind Mitchell poked him with his spear.
“We’re not even armed,” Mitchell protested in a low growl, which drew him a second jab. With the efficiency of trained professionals, two of the swordsmen sheathed their weapons and ran up beside the intruders.
“I am Bracken,” the Calvan leader continued, a weathered man with salt and pepper hair and a steeled, angular face. “Commander of the First Scouts of Pallendara. As the representative of Overlord Ungden in the northern plains, it is within my power to try and execute you where you stand.”
“For what crime?” Mitchell cried, his tone telling Reinheiser that the man was on the verge of an explosion—an outburst that would likely get them both killed.
Bracken, to his credit, remained calm. “To approach an official military patrol without proper request and permission is a primary crime against the Edicts of Ungden,” he recited.
In his stubborn pride, Mitchell was again about to protest when Reinheiser silenced him with a determined nudge. The physicist had recognized a ring that Bracken wore, a black pearl set in gold, and knew better than to argue with this man. Ardaz had warned him of this same symbol during their many discussions. A man who wore such a ring belonged to the Warders of the White Walls, an order of knights that had come into being long before the days of Ungden the Usurper. The sole inspiration behind this band’s existence was to act as efficient and unemotional instruments for the will of whomever sat on Pallendara’s throne, and their dedication to their creed was absolute. They were few in number now, and older, for few had joined the order in the thirty years of Ungden, but, according to Ardaz, who had seemed quite certain on this point, the fanaticism of those that remained had not ebbed, even under the reign of the tyrannical new Overlord. Wearing that ring proved that Bracken was a dangerous man who had to be handled delicately, and Reinheiser knew that meant keeping Mitchell’s mouth shut.
The guards were soon satisfied that the two intruders carried no weapons. However, the man searching Reinheiser did find the parchment and quickly presented it to his commander. Bracken inspected it carefully, recognizing it as some sort of map, though the physicist’s symbols and notations remained unintelligible to him.
“What is this?” he demanded.
Reinheiser scratched his chin. It was time for him to gamble a little, and he knew he would have to word it just right. He looked around at the other Calvans. Young and naive, ambitious pawns to a perverted king, they would be of no use to him. Only Bracken with his insight founded on years of experience could comprehend the weight of his forthcoming statement. Reinheiser eyed the Calvan leader purposefully. “I beg you forgive our ignorance of your foreign laws,” he began.
Bracken cocked an eyebrow; a good sign, Reinheiser noted.
“We came to you only to present you with that map,” he explained. “A gift for Ungden, rightful Overlord of the city of men, from the survivors of yesteryear.”
The Calvan leader didn’t flinch. Eyes boring into the physicist, he slid the parchment into an inside pocket of his cloak and nodded knowingly. Reinheiser smiled in the arrogant assumption that his ploy had saved them, but in truth, this patrol had been sent north not to find Illuma, but in search of the ancient ones. Ungden, or someone in his court, was already aware that the days of the foretold prophecies were at hand.
Assured that these were indeed the men Ungden had sent him to find, Bracken now pondered the implications of delivering them to Pallendara. A crisis approached, and these men would help Ungden through it. Bracken’s devotion to his oath was on trial, and not for the first time since Ungden had stolen Ben-galen’s throne. But the Warder’s oath was his strength, and the order his purpose for living. This decision, like all of his choices, had been made forty years before, when he had sworn in to the Warders of the White Walls.
“Prepare the five swiftest steeds,” he commanded. “We shall escort thes
e intruders to Pallendara, where Overlord Ungden may decide their fate.”
Soon they were off, galloping swiftly across the endless sea of green fields. They did not treat Mitchell and Reinheiser badly, did not bind them as they rode, for the Calvans were not evil men, but Bracken left no doubt of the pair’s status as prisoners, and whenever the party stopped for a rest, their hands were tightly bound.
Normally the ride to Pallendara from Mountaingate would take a full nine days. Too long for Bracken, who, sensing the urgency of this journey, drove his charges and the prisoners to their limits. They rode their mounts hard long after the sun had set each night and rode off again before the next dawn. They passed many farmers out in the fields for the springtime planting, never even slowing down to answer the questioning glances, and they made their evening camps as far from any dwellings as possible.
Impatient to come before Ungden, Mitchell and Reinheiser accepted the exhausting treatment stoically, though their bodies were hardly used to such physical punishment. They were indeed relieved when, on the afternoon of the fifth day, the salty smell of sea water saturated the air.
As they topped a final rise, the last expanse of the Calvan plains opened before them. Far in the distance, beyond the southern shore of Aielle, the blue spray of the Atlantic blurred the line of the horizon. Just below the men, at the end of a long, narrow bay, several groupings of houses lay spread out around an immense white fortress: Pallendara, which the elves called Caer Tuatha, the City of Men. Bracken halted the party for a moment at this fine vantage point, for even at this distance the magnificence of the great city stirred him.
Five tall towers dominated the structure, two beside the massive gatehouse in the front, two at the corners of the back, facing the bay, and one in the center of the city. She had been built as a tribute to the artistry of man, a bastion of security dedicated to preserving at all costs the inspired works, and even more, the spirit of creativity and appreciation, which distinguished mankind as a race worthy of the blessings of the Colonnae. A conglomeration of beauty and comfort, the epitome of the best that man had to offer, Pallendara had stood as such for over a thousand years. But three decades of an unlawful king’s paranoia had exacted a heavy toll. In the bright days before Ungden, the heavy iron gates were thrown wide day and night, an open invitation to all who would come to partake in the celebration that was this city. Only once in the history of Pallendara, at the time of the coming of Thalasi and his mutant army, had the gates been barred. Now, under the Usurper’s wary eye, they remained closed to all, and grim-faced soldiers stalked the parapets.