“Best use the latrine and get within,” Francisco announced. A wind came down from the pass, quickly gaining in strength.
Edric took one last look at the stars, now brighter than before. His cheeks and nose were already going numb with cold. It was going to be a miserable night.
One of Francisco’s men had tethered the horses in such a way that their bodies would keep off the worst of the wind, and the others were arranging themselves with the two women in the center, to make the best use of the combined heat of their bodies. Kyria lay curled around her sister.
Edric lowered himself to his place, careful to not jostle his neighbors. It wasn’t easy, for by this time, the fire had gone out and no starlight penetrated the overhanging ledge. Beside him, he heard the sound of blankets being gently moved and a murmured, “Hush, Alayna’s already asleep.”
“I’ll try not to snore,” he whispered back.
The others settled into their places. Although his body craved sleep, Edric silently went through the drills to maintain his laran shields while he slept, one of the fundamental skills in a community of telepaths who lived and worked so closely together. He changed his mind about the night being miserable. None of them would be truly warm, but neither would they risk freezing. His joints would ache the next morning, but that would pass quickly, between the work of breaking camp, saddling the horses, and setting forth. No, the threat to his rest was the young woman, so close to him that he imagined he could feel her warmth. She faced away from him, wrapping her sister in that same warmth. Even so, he felt her softness on his own body as she relaxed into sleep. Against all sense and prudence, he allowed himself to drift on the sensation.
Images formed in his mind. He seemed to be floating on his back in a sun-warmed stream, watching the patterns of dappled sunlight through the branches overhead.
More snow had fallen during the night, as was to be expected at this altitude. Francisco roused them all as the first hint of crimson light stained the line of peaks to the east. They would need every hour of travel time to make it over the pass. Breakfast was eaten cold, except for a pot of heavily sweetened jaco.
Edric set about doing his share of the morning chores, which included bringing a cup of jaco to each of the young women. Alayna was still within the cavity, but Kyria was standing beside her horse.
“How fares your sister?”
“We must get her to a warm place as soon as possible.” She looked pensive. “She should never have come on such an arduous journey. She chose it for my sake, so that we would not be parted so soon. Well, and the adventure. I’ve done a terribly selfish thing in bringing her into such risk. She’s always been more delicate than me. I’ve been told I should be more like her, a gently reared damisela, but now I am glad to be strong and accustomed to the outdoors, for how else would I be able to take care of her?”
She took a swallow of jaco and made a face. “This is too sweet. I cannot drink it.”
“You must. You will need the energy, for today’s travel will be long and hard. Make sure your sister drinks hers as well.”
Her chin lifted and for a moment, he thought she might refuse. Then her expression softened. “You are right, and I would be a fool to disregard the advice of one who speaks only out of concern for our welfare.”
They set off, setting an easy pace for the long climb. As the trail rose, the snow thinned, as if it had found no purchase on the wind-smoothed rock. The wind, which had not been so fierce in the shelter of the overhang, came rushing down the pass, so cold that it burned exposed skin. The party wrapped their faces in scarves and pulled their cloaks around them. The horses plodded on, heads down, tails clamped to their rumps.
The trail did not run in a straight line, but curved back on itself and around rocky shoulders. They paused now and again, mostly to give the horses a rest after a steep climb. Past midday, Francisco called for the men, Edric included, to dismount to ease the strain on the horses. Although the captain pointedly excluded the women, Kyria got off and insisted she was strong enough to lead her horse.
“That way,” she explained to Francisco, as if it were the most reasonable thing in the world, “if Alayna’s horse needs a rest, she can ride mine.” With those words, she took the reins and headed uphill, taking her place behind Timas.
Edric led Star beside her when the trail was wide enough for two animals to walk abreast. “That was a kind thought, but unnecessary. Neither you nor your sister are stout enough to pose a burden.”
“That is hardly the point.”
“What is the point, then?”
“I have not been waited on and pampered all my life, and I do not intend to begin now.”
My promised husband—Edric, caught off his guard, heard her thought in his mind—will doubtless try to turn me into a beribboned ornament, but he will not succeed.
They climbed and climbed, moving more slowly as they gained in altitude. From time to time, Edric glanced upward, although the crest of the pass seemed no closer than before. The wind, cold and shockingly dry, carried away his sweat and turned his throat raw. His lungs burned. He lost all sense of time, focusing on taking one step and then another, and tried not to think of what Kyria must be feeling. He felt certain that Francisco would call a halt and insist that she ride, but whenever he glanced back, there she was, her skin rosy with the cold and exertion, holding on to her horse’s stirrup.
Shadows lengthened as the afternoon wore on, and the sky seemed darker than before. The narrow trail forced them to go single file. The horse and man just in front of Edric came to a halt so suddenly, he almost collided with the horse’s rump. From behind, he heard Kyria call out, “Captain Francisco, what is it?”
“Made it—the summit.” It was difficult to hear above the wind, blustery and fierce, but the sense was clear. “—rest—a little ways below—out of the wind—”
They mounted up and moved at a more rapid pace over the high point of the pass. Not only were they going downhill, they were now out of the worst of the wind. The trail ran straight for only a little way before it twisted again, winding through narrow passages that forced them to go single-file. The weary horses slipped and slid over loose stones. From time to time, Francisco, who rode at the head of the party, let out a sharp whistle and gestured for them to slow down. Once or twice, he halted them and sent back orders, passed from one to the other, to drink as much water as they could. Edric understood the wisdom in this, and his estimation of the captain increased even more. They would most likely find running water or even snow down below, but it would not do any of them good if they became ill from dehydration and altitude.
Dusk was nearing and shadows deepened as the party passed below the tree line, descending from wind-scoured cliffsides to clumps of forest. The thin, dry wind of the heights gave way to air laden with the smells of greenery. Edric inhaled more freely than he had for the last few days. The headache he had been ignoring disappeared, and his stomach rumbled with renewed appetite. The others seemed to be feeling better as well, even Alayna. They were through the worst part of the journey, through the highest of the passes, and they had made it without serious injury.
The trail flattened, turning as it passed between huge rocky shoulders that made it impossible to see either the front or the rear of their caravan. Star stumbled on loose stones and caught herself. Edric patted her neck, crusted with dried sweat.
“Just a little farther,” he murmured.
From the head of the column came the call, “Hoy, there!”
“Ai—yi—yi!”
Edric jerked alert at the sound of shouting. For a moment, he felt disoriented, because the cries seemed to be coming from more than one direction, or else they echoed weirdly against the rocky slopes to either side. No, they were coming from in front of him—
A woman screamed—behind him.
Ambush!
The next instant, fren
zied skirmishing surrounded him. Men on foot came swarming from the front and rear, rushing toward the mounted party. One jumped down from above, landing on the guard in front of Edric and pulling him to the ground. Shouting rose above the whine and clash of steel, and the whinnying of terrified horses.
A voice rose above the clamor, a woman’s—Kyria, her voice muffled as if a hand were clamped over her mouth—
“Protect the women!” Francisco’s voice slashed through the uproar.
“To me! To me!”—Dom Ruyven?
Edric slid his sword from its scabbard. A man, eyes white-rimmed in a face darkened by weather and grime, rushed at him. Battle-trained, Star responded to the shift in his weight, positioning Edric for the blow. He had not fought, not physically, since his arrival at Tramontana Tower, but as a boy and then a youth he had been trained as the heir to a great kingdom, and now his muscles and nerves remembered. He drove down, using his height and the power of the horse beneath him. The edge of his sword barely slowed in its course as it sliced through flesh. He heard a scream, a man’s this time, and then another, further away. A sudden weight, a falling away, and the blade came free. Star was already pivoting on her hindquarters to face the next attacker. He caught sight of Alayna, golden hair gleaming in the failing light, as she struggled to control her panic-stricken horse. The bay whirled around, wringing its tail and threatening to buck, but by Evanda’s blessing had not yet unseated her.
Francisco was shouting, a rhythmic cry that was echoed by his men. Edric could not understand the words, but it sounded like a war cry.
An unfamiliar man in mountain-style skins, riding a horse that was little more than a pony, emerged from the mass of men and horses. Star settled her weight on her hindquarters, poised to rear on command. Edric braced himself in the saddle just as the other man wheeled his mount in the opposite direction.
“Retreat! Retreat!” Yelling, the man brandished a blade, short and curved on one side. The fighting ceased immediately as the attackers, those still able to fight, disappeared as rapidly as they’d come.
“Look out!” one of Francisco’s men cried, just as a handful of rocks, some barely the size of gravel but others as long as a horse’s head, slid and bounced down from the highest slope.
There was no place to run in the narrow gap. A handful of pebbles rained down on Edric. Star flinched, but her courage did not fail. A yelp or two marked where larger rocks had struck flesh. Then it was over, the dust of the fall already settling to earth.
Men uncovered their heads and rose from where they crouched. One of the horses was down, thrashing and giving out weird, chilling screams. Francisco, already on foot, rushed to the beast and slit its throat. A man groaned, and another bent over, breathing so hoarsely that Edric suspected he’d taken a blow to his solar plexus. Over these sounds came Alayna’s frantic cries.
“My sister—she’s gone! They’ve taken her!”
7
One of the men helped Alayna from her horse and held her while she subsided into near-hysterical weeping. Francisco strode up and down, shouting a string of commands, some to search the area, others to evaluate the condition of the party, including their animals. Kyria’s gray mare and the pack horse carrying the two women’s personal belongings were missing.
“We must go after her!” Edric cried, wheeling Star about. “There’s no time to lose!”
“Go rushing off when you don’t even know which way they went?” Francisco grabbed the reins and wrestled the roan mare to a standstill. “Think, man! Did you see who took the lady? Was it one, or many? Did they go back up the trail or down?”
For a moment, Edric could make no sense of the captain’s questions. His heart was beating too hard, and a sickness shot through his veins. Battle-fever . . . and fear. He brushed his fingers across the front of his jacket, over the place where his starstone lay, shrouded in insulating spidersilk. Even without his touching it directly, the stone acted as a talisman, reminding him that he was a trained laranzu, in command of his body and his mind. “You are right,” he said, although the words felt bitter on his tongue. “What can I do?”
“You have skill as a healer, yes? Then see to those who are in need, man and beast.”
“Captain! Over here!” called Geraldo. “We’ve got one of them—he’s still alive!”
“Excellent,” Francisco replied in a tone that sent a chill through Edric. “Let us see what we can learn of this ambush and where the scoundrels have taken Damisela Kyria.”
Edric swung down from the saddle and started toward where two men crouched over the writhing body of one of the bandits. He could barely make out their forms in the failing light.
“Not you.” Francisco grabbed Edric’s arm and held him fast. Edric, who like all Tower telepaths avoided all but the most careful physical contact, was shocked into immobility.
“But he—if he knows where—” Edric did not have the Alton Gift of forced telepathic rapport, but in that moment, he wished he did. The next heartbeat, he was horrified at the thought of ripping apart the mind of another person, no matter how dire the circumstances. Such a thing was not unheard of when Towers served their liege lords in warfare. Instead of using their laran for healing, or the manufacture of fire-fighting chemicals, or the transmission of messages across distances through matrix relays, laran workers created clingfire that burned through flesh and bone, or bonewater dust that left the land itself poisoned for generations, and spells that drove men mad.
Francisco’s iron grip did not slacken. “My men need you. Would you have them needlessly bleed out their lives or sicken with wound-fever?”
Stung, Edric hung his head.
“If this man knows anything, I will find it out,” Francisco continued in a more sympathetic tone. “The damisela was under my protection, and I will do everything in my power to get her back. I will need every man capable of riding and fighting.” Releasing Edric, Francisco strode away to the captured ambusher.
Edric began assessing the wounded. The work steadied him, for he did not examine the men with his physical senses only. As he had been taught at Tramontana, he used his laran to probe more deeply into their bodies, searching for internal bleeding and fractures. It would have been easy if he had been able to take out his starstone and use it to amplify his natural gift, but he did the best he could.
From the other side of the improvised camp came a man’s shriek, then incoherent babbling. Edric paused in his examination, wanting desperately to know what was going on. If he could read the brigand’s unguarded thoughts, plumb his emotions—but then the gibbering broke off. Another man spoke, his voice low but commanding: Francisco. And then there was no more. Edric, his laran open for monitoring, felt the rogue’s life force waver and then go out.
“I’m well enough,” said the man under Edric’s hands, “but please see to my friend.”
“I’m sorry, my thoughts wandered for a moment. You’re sure this doesn’t hurt? All right, I’ll go check on your friend now.”
To Edric’s relief, no one was seriously injured, nothing beyond a couple of sword cuts and bruises from the rock fall. The ambushers hadn’t aimed at killing. Yet there were only three of the guards fit to ride hard or fight, plus the captain, who looked determined enough for any ten men. And Edric himself.
Dom Ruyven took Alayna into his care, speaking to her in a soothing manner and wrapping her in his own fur-lined cloak.
Edric approached Francisco. “Did he”—meaning the dead outlaw—“tell you anything?”
“Just some unimaginative cursing.” Francisco sounded as if he wished he’d kept the prisoner alive just to wring out a morsel of revenge.
By the time Edric had finished dressing the men’s injuries, full dark had fallen. The uninjured guards took torches and searched the trail in both directions. Edric, his nerves as taut as the strings of a rryl lap harp, checked the remaining horses. They seemed unh
urt, beyond the excitement and smell of blood coming after an exhausting day. None of them, not even his own Star, was capable of a hard, fast chase, and they could not afford to lose even a single horse to lameness.
“I’m so worried,” came Alayna’s sweet voice through the darkness.
“As are we all, poppet, and the good captain is doing all he can,” Dom Ruyven answered. They were sitting on a folded blanket, close to one of the torches. “At least, you are safe. We must take heart from that.”
“You’ve got to do something! You can’t just leave her—” Alayna broke off, gulping down sobs.
Edric crouched down beside the girl. “Are you well, vai damisela? You have taken no hurt?”
“She has no need of your tending,” Dom Ruyven said, drawing his cloak more tightly around both of them.
“I—I am all right,” Alayna said in a trembling voice. Her eyes were red and tears clung to her lashes. “I am well cared for, as you see. I thank you for your kind concern.”
Edric was just straightening up when Francisco and his men returned. “What’s the news?”
“We might as well make camp here,” Francisco said. “The bandits followed the downward trail, but not for long.”
“You’re giving up?”
“There is no point breaking our necks in the dark when we’re injured and exhausted. There’s only one place they could have come from—Sain Erach.”
“Sain Erach?” Edric repeated. “I’ve heard of Sain Scarp, as foul a nest of villains as any. But not Sain Erach.”
“From the tales, Scarp is far worse. They’re said to kill for the joy of it, but these folk are more practical or greedier, which amounts to the same thing. If I’m right, they won’t harm the damisela if she can bring them a fat ransom. They’ll find out who she is and send word to her people.” Although Francisco sounded confident, Edric sensed his weariness and frustration at his own failure to protect his charge.