Kinson pursed his lips thoughtfully. “She seemed to lose strength momentarily, but it didn’t last long. But her eyes. On the bluff, when you disappeared in the storm while talking with the shade of Galaphile, she said she could see you when the rest of us could not. Her eyes were white.”
“Her magic seems quite complex, doesn’t it?”
“Empathic, you said. But not in any small way.”
“No. There is nothing small about Mareth’s magic. It is very powerful. Probably she was born with it and has worked to develop her skills over the years. Certainly with the Stors.” He paused. “I wonder if Athabasca realizes she possesses this skill. I wonder if any of them realize it.”
“She isn’t one to give much away about herself. She doesn’t want anyone to get too close.” Kinson thought for a moment. “But she does seem to admire you. She told me how important it was to her that she come with you on this journey.”
Bremen nodded. “Yes, well, there are secrets yet to be revealed about Mareth, I think. You and I, we shall have to find a way to draw them out into the open.”
Good luck to you on doing that, Kinson wanted to say, but kept the thought to himself. He remembered Mareth’s reticence to accept even the small comfort of his cloak when he had offered it. It would take an unusual set of circumstances for her to give away anything about herself, he suspected.
But, then, nothing usual lay ahead for any of them, did it?
He sat with Bremen on the banks of the Mermidon, not speaking, not moving, looking out across the water, projecting images from the dark recesses of his mind of what he feared might come to pass.
They rose at sunrise and walked through the day in the shadow of the Dragon’s Teeth, following the Mermidon west. The weather turned warmer still, the temperature soaring, the air thickening with moisture and heat. Travel cloaks were discarded and water consumed in increasing quantities. They rested more frequently in the afternoon hours, and it was still light when they reached the Kennon. There Tay Trefenwyd left them to continue on across the grasslands to the forests of Arborlon.
“When you find the Black Elfstone, Tay, do not think to use it,” Bremen cautioned on parting. “Not for any reason. Not even if you are threatened. Its magic is powerful enough to accomplish anything, but it is dangerous as well. All magic exacts a price for its use. You know that as well as I. The price for use of the Black Elfstone is too high.”
“It might destroy me,” Tay finished, anticipating.
“We are mortal beings, you and I,” Bremen observed quietly. “We must tread lightly where the use of magic is concerned. Your task is to recover the Elfstone and to bring it to me. We do not seek to use it. We seek only to prevent the Warlock Lord from using it. Remember that.”
“I will remember, Bremen.”
“Warn Courtann Ballindarroch of the danger we face. Convince him that he must send his army to aid Raybur and the Dwarves. Don’t fail me.”
“It will all be done.” The Druid Elf clasped his hand, released it, and was off with a jaunty wave. “Another memorable reunion, wasn’t it? Watch out for him, Kinson. Take care, Mareth. Good luck to you all.”
He whistled happily, smiling back at them one final time. Then his long stride lengthened, and he disappeared into the trees and rocks and was gone.
Bremen huddled then with Kinson and Mareth to decide whether they should continue on through the pass or wait until morning. It appeared another storm was approaching, but if they waited it out they might lose another two days. Kinson could tell that the old man was anxious to continue, to reach Paranor and discover the truth of what had happened. They were rested and fit, so he urged that they go on. Mareth was quick to give her support. Bremen smiled his appreciation and beckoned them forward.
They hiked into the pass as the sun dropped steadily toward the horizon and slipped from view. The skies remained clear and the air warm, so travel was comfortable and they made good time. By midnight, they were through the top of the pass and starting down into the valley beyond. The wind had picked up, howling out of the southwest in a steady rush, spinning dirt and gravel off the trail in small funnels, clouding the air with debris. They walked with their heads lowered until they were below the rim of the mountains and the wind had tailed off. Ahead, the black silhouette of the Druid’s Keep was clearly visible against the starlit sky, rising out of the trees, towers and parapets stark and jagged. No lights burned in its windows or from its battlements. No movement or sound disturbed its silence.
They reached the valley floor and were swallowed by the forest. Moon and stars lit their way through the deep shadows, guiding them on toward the Keep. Massive old growth hemmed them about, rising over them like the pillars of a temple. Glades softened by thick grasses and small streams came and went. The night continued still and sleepy about them, empty of sound and movement save for the wind, which had picked up again, blowing past their faces in small, hard gusts, rustling their cloaks and the branches of the trees like shaken bedding. Bremen led them swiftly, steadily on, the pace belying his age and challenging theirs. Kinson and Mareth exchanged glances. The Druid had tapped into a hidden reservoir of strength. He had turned as hard and unyielding as iron.
It was not yet dawn when they reached Paranor. They slowed as the fortress came into view, materializing through breaks in the trees, lifting toward the starlit heavens, a massive black husk. Still, no light shone. Still, there was no sound or movement from within. Bremen stopped the Borderman and the Healer where they were hidden by the forest shadows. Silent, stone-faced, he scanned the walls and parapets of the Keep. Then, staying within the concealment of the woods, he took them left about the castle perimeter. The wind whipped across the battlements and around the spiraling towers in a mournful howl. Within the trees where they crept, it was a giant’s breath that warned of its owner’s approach. Kinson was sweating freely, his nerves on edge, his breathing harsh in his lungs.
They arrived at the main gates and stopped once more. The gates stood open, the portcullis raised, the entry left black and gaping and vaguely reminiscent of a mouth frozen in a death scream.
There were bodies by the shattered doors, twisted and lifeless.
Bremen hunched forward in concentration, staring at the Keep, but not really seeing it, looking somewhere beyond. His gray hair whipped about his head, as wispy as corn silk. His mouth moved. Kinson reached beneath his cloak and pulled forth his short sword. Mareth’s eyes were wide and dark, and her small body rigid, poised to bolt.
Then Bremen took them forward. They crossed the open space separating the forest from the Keep, walking slowly, steadily, not bothering to hurry or conceal their approach. Kinson’s eyes flicked left and right apprehensively, but Bremen did not seem concerned. They reached the gates and the dead men, and stooped to identify them. Druid Guards, most of them looking as if they had been torn apart by animals. Blood stained the ground beneath them, soaked from their bodies. Their weapons were drawn; many were shattered. They looked to have fought hard.
Bremen moved into the shadow of the wall, past the sagging gates and raised portcullis, and there he found Caerid Lock. The Captain of the Druid Guard was slumped against the watchtower door, blood dried and crusted on his face, his body pierced and slashed in a dozen places. He was still alive. His eyes flickered open, and his mouth moved. Hurriedly, Bremen bent to listen. Kinson could hear nothing, the wind obscuring the words.
The old man looked up. “Mareth,” he called softly.
She came at once, bending over Caerid Lock. She did not need to be told what was required. Her hands ran quickly over the wounded man’s body, searching for ways to help. But she was too late. Not even an empath could save Caerid now.
Bremen pulled Kinson down so that the two were huddled close, their faces almost touching. About them, the wind continued to howl softly as it twisted and turned about the walls. “Caerid said Paranor was betrayed from within, at night, while most slept. Three Druids were responsible. Everyone was ki
lled but them. The Warlock Lord left them to deal with us. They are inside, somewhere. Caerid dragged himself here, but could go no further.”
“You are not going in there?” Kinson asked hurriedly.
“I must. I must secure the Eilt Druin.” The old man’s seamed face was set and his eyes were hard and angry. “You and Mareth will wait for me here.”
Kinson shook his head stubbornly. Dust and grit blew into his eyes as the wind whipped through the dark opening. “This is foolish, Bremen! You will need our help!”
“If something happens to me, I will need you to get word to the others!” Bremen refused to yield. “Do as I say, Kinson!”
Then he was on his feet and moving away, a ragged bundle of stick limbs and blowing robes, hastening from the gates and across the courtyard to the inner wall. In seconds, he had passed through a doorway and was lost from view.
Kinson stared after him in frustration. “Shades!” he muttered, furious at his own indecision.
He glanced over at Mareth. The young woman was closing Caerid Lock’s eyes. The Captain of the Druid Guard was dead. It was a miracle, Kinson thought, that he had lasted this long. Any of his wounds would have finished a normal man on the spot. That he had lived until now was a testament to his toughness and determination.
Mareth was on her feet, looking down at him. “Come on,” she said. “We’re going after him.”
Kinson stood up quickly. “But he said . . .”
“I know what he said. But if anything happens to Bremen, what difference do you think it will make whether we get word to the others or not?”
His lips compressed in a tight line. “What difference, indeed?”
Together they hurried across the empty, windswept courtyard toward the Keep.
Within Paranor, Bremen moved swiftly down the empty halls, as silent as a cloud crossing the sky. He explored as he went, attuned to the tastes and smells and sounds of the Keep. He reached out with his senses and instincts to uncover the danger of which Caerid Lock had warned, wary of its presence and intent. But he could not find it. Either it was very well concealed or it had departed.
Be cautious, he urged himself. Be alert.
Everyone within the Keep was dead—of that much he was certain. All of the Druids, all of their guards, all who had lived and worked and studied here for so many years, all those he had left behind just four days ago. The shock of it was like a blow to the stomach; it took the wind and the strength from him and left him numb with disbelief. All dead. He had known it could happen, had believed it possible, had even seen the vision of it. But the reality was much worse. Bodies lay strewn everywhere, twisted in death. Some had died by the sword. Some had been torn apart. Some, he sensed, had been taken to the lower depths of the Keep and killed there. But none had survived. No heartbeat reached his ears. No voice called. No living thing stirred. Paranor was a charnel house. It was a tomb.
He worked his way through the echoing corridors to the Assembly and there found Athabasca, his face frozen with the moment of his death, his corpse a sad and ruined thing. Bremen stooped to look for the Eilt Druin and did not find it. He straightened and paused. He felt only sadness for the High Druid, only regret. Seeing him thus, seeing all of them dead and the castle of the Druids empty, made him wish he had tried harder in his efforts to persuade them of the danger. Guilt washed through him. He could not help himself. He was in some way to blame for this. His was the knowledge and the power, and he had failed to use either in a convincing way. This was the result. He drew Athabasca’s robes across his face and walked away.
He climbed then to the library, keeping his back to the wall as he moved through the castle’s dead shell, listening for the betraying sounds of danger, cautious and alert. It was here, the danger of which Caerid Lock and the vision both had warned. The traitor Druids, in some form, waiting. So be it. But the Warlock Lord was gone, and his creatures with him. The cauldron of magic that had been stirred with their coming—Bremen’s trip wire set in place within the Druid Well—had bubbled and boiled just enough to cause them to fear and to persuade them not to linger. Listening, he could hear it now, a faint hiss, the magic sunk back within the pit, the magic that gave life to the Keep, that gave power to most of the Druid spells. Vast and mercurial, it gave back only a portion of what it promised, and that so small it paled in the face of Brona’s monstrous power. Still, it had served its purpose this once, driving the rebel Druid from the Keep.
Bremen sighed. There was no pleasure to be taken from so small a victory. Brona had his revenge, and that was what mattered. He had destroyed those who had opposed him, who would have challenged him, and he had savaged their safehold. Now there was no one to stop him save one old man and a handful of followers.
Perhaps. Perhaps.
He reached the library and found Kahle Rese. He cried silently on seeing him, unable to help himself. He covered his old friend as well, unable to look upon him more than once, and went through the hidden doorway to the room in which the Druid Histories were concealed. The room was empty of everything but the worktable and chairs, and the dust that Bremen had given Kahle as a last resort lay scattered on the floor, dull now and lifeless, evidence that it had been put to the use for which it was intended. Bremen tried momentarily to see Kahle in those last few moments of his life. He could not manage it. It was enough to know that the Druid Histories were safe. That would have to serve as his old friend’s epitaph.
He heard something then, a sound that came from somewhere far below, a sound so soft that he detected it with his instincts rather than his ears. He hastened from the room, sensing that whatever time had been allotted him in Paranor was running out. He must find the Eilt Druin now. Locating the medallion was all that was left. Athabasca had not been wearing it. It might have been taken from his body, but Bremen did not think so. The attack had come at night, Caerid Lock had said, and no one had been ready. Athabasca would have been roused from his bed. He would not have taken time to put on the medallion. It was probably in his chambers.
Bremen climbed the stairs to the High Druid’s office, a soundless, voiceless ghost among the dead. He felt as if he had no weight, no substance, no presence. He was inconsequential, a madman playing with fire and having no cure for the burns it was sure to inflict. He felt tired, lost to his fears for the world. It was such a hopeless task he had set himself—creating a magic, forging a talisman to contain it, finding a champion to wield it. What chance did he have to accomplish all this? What hope?
He found the door to Athabasca’s rooms open and entered cautiously. He scanned the shelves and desktop without result. He opened doors to cabinets and files and found nothing. Fearful now that he had come too late even for the medallion, he hastened into the High Druid’s bedchamber.
There, sprawled on a night table, forgotten in the rush that had carried Athabasca from his sleep to his death, was the Eilt Druin.
Bremen picked it up and examined it, making sure it was real. The burnished metal glimmered back at him. He ran his fingers over the raised surface of hand and burning torch. Then he tucked it quickly into his robes and hurried from the room.
He went down the corridors and stairs once more, still listening and watching, still wary. He had gotten this far without encountering anything. Perhaps he could slip past whatever had been set at watch. Cloud silent, he eased through the gloom and the dead, past shadows pooling in narrow corners and bodies flung through doorways and across stone floors. He caught sight suddenly of a faint brightening in the sky east, visible through tall, latticed glass windows. Night was fading, the dawn at hand. Bremen breathed deeply of the musty, stale air, and longed for the smell and taste of the green forest beyond.
He reached the main stairway and started down. He was midway between floors when he caught sight of movement on the broad landing below. He slowed, stopped, and waited. The movement detached itself from the shadows, a new kind of shadow, a different form. The thing that showed itself was human, but only vaguely. A
rms, legs, torso, and head, all were covered in thick black hair, bristling and stiff, all crooked and bent like bramble wood, elongated and misshapen. There were claws and teeth that glimmered like the jagged ends of old bones, and eyes that flickered with bits of crimson and green. The thing whispered to him, called out to him, begged and wheedled with a wretchedness that was palpable.
Breeemen, Breeemen, Breeemen.
The old man glanced quickly to the upper landing, also visible within the wide, open stairwell, and another of the creatures appeared, a mirror image of the first, creeping from the gloom.
Breeemen, Breeemen, Breeemen.
Both came onto the stairs, one ascending, one descending. They had trapped him between them. There were no doors leading off, there was no way to go but up or down, past one or the other. They had waited him out, he realized. They had let him go about his business, let him collect what he chose, then closed in on him. The Warlock Lord had planned it thus, wanting to know what was important enough to bring him back, what treasure, what bit of magic could be precious enough to salvage. Find out, the Warlock Lord had ordered, then steal it from his lifeless body and bring it to me.
Bremen looked from one to the other. Druids once, these creatures, now altered into unspeakable things. Ravers, berserkers, beings stripped of their humanity and made over so that they might serve one last purpose. It was difficult to feel sorrow for them. They had been human enough when they had betrayed the Keep and its occupants. They had been free enough to choose then.