When they reached the tree, Sparhawk peered up through the shadowy limbs and saw the mysterious musician. It was a little girl of six or so. Her long hair was black and glossy, and her large eyes were as deep as night. A headband of plaited grass encircled her brow, holding her hair back. She was sitting on a limb breathing sound into a simple, many-chambered set of pipes such as a goatherd might play Although it was quite cold, she wore only a short, belted linen smock that left her arms and legs bare. Her grass-stained, unshod feet were crossed, and she perched on the limb with a sedate sureness.
‘What’s she doing here?’ Sparhawk asked, puzzled. ‘There aren’t any houses or villages around.’
‘I think she’s been waiting for us,’ Sephrenia replied.
That doesn’t make any sense.’ He looked up at the child. ‘What’s your name, little girl?’ he asked.
‘Let me question her, Sparhawk,’ Sephrenia said. ‘She’s a Styric child, and they tend to be shy.’ She pushed back her hood and spoke to the little girl in a dialect Sparhawk did not understand.
The child lowered her rude pipe and smiled. Her lips were like a small, pink bow.
Sephrenia asked her another question in a strange, gentle tone.
The little girl shook her head.
‘Does she live in some house back in the forest?’ Sparhawk asked.
‘She has no home nearby,’ Sephrenia said.
‘Doesn’t she talk?’
‘She chooses not to.’
Sparhawk looked around. ‘Well, we can’t leave her here.’ He reached up his arms to the child. ‘Come down, little girl,’ he said.
She smiled at him and slipped off the limb into his hands. Her weight was very slight, and her hair smelled of grass and trees. She confidently put her arms about his neck and then wrinkled her nose at the smell of his armour.
He set her down on her feet, and she immediately went to Sephrenia, took the small woman’s hands in hers, and kissed them. Something peculiarly Styric seemed to pass between the woman and the little girl, something that Sparhawk could not understand. Sephrenia lifted the child into her arms and held her close. ‘What will we do with her, Sparhawk?’ she asked in a strangely intent tone For some reason it seemed very important to her.
‘We’ll have to take her with us, I guess—at least until we find some people to leave her with. Let’s go back to camp and see if we can find something for her to wear.’
‘And some breakfast, I think.’
‘Would you like that, Flute?’ Sparhawk asked the child.
The little girl smiled and nodded.
‘Why did you call her that?’ Sephrenia asked him.
‘We have to call her something—at least until we find out her real name—if she has one. Let’s go back to the fire where it’s warm.’ He turned and led the way back across the meadow towards the camp.
They crossed the border into Arcium near the city of Dieros, once again avoiding contact with the local inhabitants. They paralleled the road leading eastward, staying well back from that heavily travelled highway The countryside of the kingdom of Arcium was noticeably different from that of Elenia. Unlike its northern neighbour, Arcium seemed to be a kingdom of walls. They stretched along the roads or cut across open pastureland, often for no apparent reason. The walls were thick and high, and Sparhawk was frequently obliged to lead his knights on long detours to go around them. Wryly he remembered the words of a twenty-fourth-century Patriarch of the Church who, after travelling from Chyrellos to Larium, had referred to Arcium as ‘God’s rock garden.’
The following day they entered a large forest of winter-bare birch trees. As they rode deeper into the chill wood, Sparhawk began to smell smoke and he soon saw a dark pall lying low among the stark white tree-trunks. He halted the column and rode on ahead to investigate.
He had gone perhaps a mile when he came to a cluster of rudely built Styric houses. They were all on fire, and bodies littered the open area around the houses. Sparhawk began to swear He wheeled the young black horse round and galloped back to where he had left his troops.
‘What is it?’ Sephrenia asked him, looking at his bleak expression. ‘Where’s the smoke coming from?’
‘There was a Styric village up ahead,’ he replied darkly ‘We both know what the smoke means.’
‘Ah.’ She sighed.
‘You’d better keep the little girl back here until I can get a burial detail up there.’
‘No, Sparhawk. This sort of thing is a part of her heritage, too. All Styrics know that it happens. Besides, I might be able to help the survivors—if there are any.’
‘Have it your own way,’ he said shortly. A huge rage had descended upon him, and he curtly motioned the column forward.
There was some evidence that the hapless Styrics had made an attempt to defend themselves, but that they had been swarmed over by people carrying only the crudest of weapons. Sparhawk put his men to work—some of them digging graves and others extinguishing the fires.
Sephrenia came across the littered field, her face deathly pale. ‘There are only a few women among the dead,’ she reported. ‘I’d guess that the rest fled back into the woods.’
‘See if you can persuade them to come back,’ he said. He looked over at Sir Parasim, who was weeping openly as he spaded dirt out of a grave. The young knight was obviously not emotionally suited for this kind of work. ‘Parasim,’ Sparhawk ordered, ‘go with Sephrenia.’
‘Yes, my Lord,’ Parasim sobbed, dropping his spade.
The dead were finally all committed to the earth, and Sparhawk briefly murmured an Elene prayer over the graves. It was probably not appropriate for Styrics, but he didn’t really know what else to do.
After about an hour, Sephrenia and Parasim returned. ‘Any luck?’ Sparhawk asked her.
‘We found them,’ she replied, ‘but they won’t come out of the woods.’
‘I can’t really blame them very much,’ he said. ‘We’ll see if we can fix up at least a few of these houses for them to keep them out of the weather.’
‘Don’t waste your time, Sparhawk. They won’t come back to this place. That’s a part of the Styric religion.’
‘Did they give you some idea of which way the Elenes who did this went?’
‘What are you planning, Sparhawk?’
‘Chastisement. That’s a part of the Elene religion.’
‘No. I won’t tell you which way they went, if that’s what you’ve got in mind.’
‘I’m not going to let this pass, Sephrenia. You can tell me or not, whichever you choose. I can find their trail by myself if I need to.’
She looked at him helplessly. Then her eyes became shrewd. ‘A bargain, Sparhawk?’ she suggested.
‘I’ll listen.’
‘I’ll tell you where to find them if you promise not to kill anybody.’
‘All right,’ he agreed grudgingly, his face still black with anger. ‘Which way did they go?’
‘I’m not done yet,’ she said. ‘You’ll stay here with me. I know you, and you sometimes go to extremes. Send someone else to do it.’
He glared at her, then turned. ‘Lakus!’ he bellowed.
‘No,’ she said, ‘not Lakus. He’s as bad as you are.’
‘Who, then?’
‘Parasim, I think.’
‘Parasim?’
‘He’s a gentler person. If we tell him not to kill anybody, he won’t make any mistakes.’
‘All right, then,’ he said from between clenched teeth. ‘Parasim,’ he said to the young knight standing sorrowfully nearby, ‘take a dozen men and run down the animals who did this. Don’t kill anybody, but make them all very, very sorry that they ever came up with the idea.’
‘Yes, my Lord,’ Parasim said, his eyes suddenly glinting like steel. Sephrenia gave him directions, and he started back to where the other knights were gathered. On his way, he stopped and uprooted a thorn bush. He seized it in one gauntleted fist and swung it very hard at an unoffending birch
tree, ripping off a fair-sized chunk of white bark.
‘Oh, dear,’ Sephrenia murmured.
‘He’ll do just fine.’ Sparhawk laughed mirthlessly. ‘I have great hopes for that young man and great faith in his sense of the appropriate.’
Some distance away, Flute was standing over the scattered graves. She was playing her pipes softly, and her melody seemed to convey aeons of sorrow.
The weather continued cold and unpleasant, though no significant amounts of snow fell. After a week of steady travel, they reached a ruined castle some six or eight leagues west of the city of Darra. Kalten and the main body of the Pandion Knights awaited them there.
‘I thought you’d got lost,’ the blond man said as he reined up in front of Sparhawk. He looked curiously at Flute, who sat in front of Sparhawk’s saddle, her bare feet both on one side of the black horse’s neck and with Sparhawk’s cloak wrapped around her ‘Isn’t it a little late for you to be starting a family?’
‘We found her along the way,’ Sparhawk replied. He took the little girl and handed her across to Sephrenia.
‘Why didn’t you put some shoes on her?’
‘We did. She keeps losing them. There’s a nunnery on the other side of Darra. We’ll drop her off there.’ Sparhawk looked at the ruin crouched on the hill above them. ‘Is there any kind of shelter in there?’
‘Some It breaks the wind, at least.’
‘Let’s get inside, then. Did Kurik bring Faran and my armour?’
Kalten nodded.
‘Good. This horse is a little unruly, and Vanion’s old armour has rubbed me raw in more places than I care to count.’
They rode up into the ruin and found Kurik and the young novice, Berit, waiting for them. ‘What took you so long?’ Kurik asked bluntly.
‘It’s a long way, Kurik,’ Sparhawk replied a bit defensively, ‘and the wagons can only move so fast.’
‘You should have left them behind.’
‘They were carrying the food and extra equipment.’
Kurik grunted. ‘Let’s get in out of the weather. I’ve got a fire going in what’s left of that watchtower over there.’ He looked rather peculiarly at Sephrenia, who carried Flute in her arms. ‘Lady,’ he greeted her respectfully.
‘Dear Kurik,’ she said warmly ‘How are Aslade and the boys?’
‘Well, Sephrenia,’ he replied. ‘Very well indeed.’
‘I’m so glad to hear it.’
‘Kalten said you’d be coming along,’ he said to her. ‘I have water boiling for your tea.’ He looked at Flute, who had her face nestled against Sephrenia’s. ‘Have you been keeping secrets from us?’
She laughed, a rippling cascade of a laugh. ‘That’s what Styrics do best, Kurik.’
‘Let’s get you all inside where it’s warm.’ He turned and led the way across the rubble-strewn courtyard of the ruin, leaving Berit to care for the horses.
‘Was it a good idea to bring him along?’ Sparhawk asked, jerking his thumb back over his shoulder in the direction of the novice. ‘He’s a little young for an all-out battle.’
‘He’ll be all right, Sparhawk,’ Kurik said. ‘I took him to the practice field at Demos a few times and gave him some instruction. He handles himself well and he learns fast.’
‘All right, Kurik,’ Sparhawk said, ‘but when the fighting starts, stay close to him. I don’t want him getting hurt.’
‘I never let you get hurt, did I?’
Sparhawk grinned at his friend. ‘No. As I recall, you didn’t.’
They stayed the night in the ruin and rode out early the following morning. Their combined forces numbered just over five hundred men, and they rode south under a still-threatening sky Just beyond Darra stood a nunnery with yellow sandstone walls and a red tile roof. Sparhawk and Sephrenia turned aside from the road and crossed a winter-browned meadow towards the building.
‘And what is the child’s name?’ the black-robed Mother Superior asked when they were admitted into her presence in a severely simple room with only a small brazier to warm it.
‘She doesn’t talk, mother,’ Sparhawk replied. ‘She plays those pipes all the time, so we call her Flute.’
‘That is an unseemly name, my son.’
‘The child doesn’t mind, Mother Superior,’ Sephrenia told her.
‘Did you make some effort to find her parents?’
‘There was no one in the vicinity when we found her,’ Sparhawk explained.
The Mother Superior looked gravely at Sephrenia. ‘The child is Styric, she pointed out. ‘Would it not perhaps be better to put her with a family of her own race and her own faith?’
‘We have pressing business,’ Sephrenia said, ‘and Styrics can be very difficult to find when they choose to be.’
‘You know, of course, that if she stays with us, we will raise her in the Elene faith?’
Sephrenia smiled. ‘You will try, Mother Superior. I think you will find that she’s not amenable to conversion, however Coming, Sparhawk?’
They rejoined the column and rode south under clearing skies, moving first at a rolling trot and then at a thunderous gallop. They crossed a knoll, and Sparhawk reined Faran in sharply, staring in astonishment at Flute, who sat cross-legged on a large white rock playing her pipes. ‘How did you—‘ he began, then broke off. ‘Sephrenia,’ he called, but the white-robed woman had already dismounted. She approached the child, speaking gently to her in that strange Styric dialect.
Flute lowered her pipes and gave Sparhawk an impish little grin. Sephrenia laughed and took the child in her arms.
‘How did she get ahead of us?’ Kalten asked, his face baffled.
‘Who knows?’ Sparhawk replied. ‘I guess I’d better take her back.’
‘No, Sparhawk,’ Sephrenia said firmly. ‘She wants to go with us.’
‘That’s too bad,’ he said bluntly ‘I’m not going to take a little girl into battle.’
‘Don’t concern yourself with her, Sparhawk. I’ll care for her.’ She smiled at the child nestled in her arms. ‘I’ll care for her as if she were my own.’ She laid her cheek against Flute’s glossy black hair. ‘In a way, she is.’
He gave up. ‘Have it your own way,’ he said. Just as he began to wheel Faran around, he felt a sudden chill accompanied by the sense of an implacable hatred. ‘Sephrenia!’ he said sharply.
‘I felt it, too!’ she cried, drawing the little girl closer to her. ‘It’s directed at the child!’
Flute struggled briefly, and Sephrenia, looking surprised, set her down. The little girl’s face was set, looking more annoyed than angered or frightened. She set her pipes to her lips and began to play The melody this time was not that light air in a minor key which she had played before. It was sterner and peculiarly ominous.
Then from some distance away they heard a sudden howl of pain and surprise. The howl immediately began to fade, as if whoever or whatever had made it were fleeing at an unimaginable rate.
‘What was that?’ Kalten exclaimed.
‘An unfriendly spirit,’ Sephrenia replied calmly.
‘What drove it away?’
‘The child’s song. It seems that she has learned to protect herself.’
‘Do you understand any of what’s going on here?’ Kalten asked Sparhawk.
‘No more than you do. Let’s keep moving. We’ve still got a couple of days of hard riding ahead of us.’
The castle of Count Radun, the uncle of King Dregos, was perched atop a high, rocky promontory. Like so many of the castles in this southern kingdom, it was surrounded by massive walls. The weather had cleared off, and the noonday sun was very bright as Sparhawk, Kalten, and Sephrenia, who still carried Flute in front of her saddle, rode across a broad meadow of yellow grass towards the fortress.
They were admitted without question; in the courtyard they were met by the count, a blocky man with heavy shoulders and silver-shot hair. He wore a dark green doublet trimmed in black and surmounted by a heavily starched white ruff of a
collar. It was a style which had gone out of fashion in Elenia decades ago. ‘My house is honoured to welcome the knights of the Church,’ he declared formally after they had introduced themselves.
Sparhawk swung down off Faran’s back. ‘Your hospitality is legendary, my Lord,’ he said, ‘but our visit is not entirely social. Is there someplace private where we can talk? We have a matter of some urgency to discuss with you.’
‘Of course,’ the count replied. ‘If you will all be so good as to come with me.’ They followed him through the broad doors of his castle and along a candlelit corridor strewn with rushes. At the end of the corridor, the count produced a brass key and unlocked a door. ‘My private study,’ he said modestly. ‘I’m rather proud of my collection of books. I have almost two dozen.’
‘Formidable,’ Sephrenia murmured.
‘Perhaps you might care to read some of them, madame?’
‘The lady doesn’t read,’ Sparhawk told him. ‘She’s a Styric and an initiate in the secrets. She feels that reading might somehow interfere with her abilities.’
‘A witch?’ the count said, looking at the small woman. ‘Truly?’
‘We prefer to use other terms, my Lord,’ she replied mildly.
‘Please, sit down,’ the count said, pointing at a large table standing in a chill patch of wintry sunlight coming through a heavily barred window. ‘I’m curious to hear about this urgent matter.’
Sparhawk removed his helmet and gauntlets and laid them on the table. ‘Are you familiar with the name of Annias, Primate of Cimmura, my Lord?’
The count’s face hardened. ‘I’ve heard of him,’ he said shortly.
‘You know his reputation then?’
‘I do.’
‘Good. Quite by accident, Sir Kalten and I unearthed a plot hatched by the primate. Fortunately, he isn’t aware of the fact that we know about it. Is it your common practice so freely to admit Church Knights?’
‘Of course. I revere the Church and honour her Knights.’
‘Within a few days—a week at most—a sizeable group of men in black armour and bearing the standards of Pandion Knights will ride up to your gates. I strongly advise you not to admit them.’