A Meeting at Corvallis (79 page)

The blue eyes flickered to her without the least particle of attention being diverted from Tiphaine. “This is a very bad woman, Princess,” he said. “They both are. You'll understand when you're older.”

The girl's temper overflowed and she stamped her foot, immediately regretting the gesture, face flushing brick red and burying her hands in her hair. “I'm
nine,
not
four,
you oaf—nearly ten! I'm old enough to remember your face and I'll see you broken on the wheel someday unless you
let her go
!”

Joris laughed, but there was the slightest edge of uncertainty in it. Rudi knew what he must do. He shouted as he ran in, and the bow was in his hands like a spear. Like a spear he thrust it up at the knight's face, aiming for his right eye. The response was automatic, when the shield was pinned immobile by the woman he held behind it; he cut backhanded at the threat to his face. The sword flicked out, the heavy blade moving with the blurring speed of a strong man's trained wrist and shoulder. It cracked through the tough yew and flashed within a fraction of an inch of Rudi's nose, even as the boy threw himself flat with a yell. That saved him, but it put him flat on his back as the longsword drew back to pin him to the ground like a butterfly on a board. What was left of the bow cracked uselessly against the shin-guard as he flailed it at the walking armored tower.

Skrinngg.

Tiphaine's sword came down across Rudi's body, like a slanting rafter. It bent under the impact of Joris' heavier blade, but the fine steel sprang back and the man's weapon buried itself in the dirt. Joris wrenched at it with desperate strength, and in the same instant used his shield in a slamming blow against her. That wasn't as effective as it might have been, with a suddenly screeching and madly clinging Delia on his arm, but Joris Stein was very strong. And with Tiphaine d'Ath at less than arm's reach he was striking for his life, as a man might lash out when he discovered an adder coiled under his pillow.

She had leapt headlong to cover Rudi's body, with no choice but to sacrifice balance. Now the double blow of shield and sword knocked her own blade from her hand, and sent her rolling half a dozen paces with Delia falling on her with a squawk.

Rudi lay on the ground, clutching as if it were his mother as well as the Mother. Black wings seemed to flap about him, gauzy as veils, more solid and vaster than worlds. A deep thudding came from the soil as the blade was wrenched free and rose to kill, like a great heart throbbing…

Crack!

The hooves would have killed an unarmored man. They hurt Joris Stein badly, even in the diamond instant of concentration, when every dream of fortune and rank seemed to be glittering just beyond the point of his sword. He dropped as the great black mare reared again, her forefeet milling like a deadly circle of steel war-hammers, bugling out her challenge. Curled beneath his shield he felt the frame crack and the tough plywood shatter as the pile-driver feet stamped downward with half a ton of bone and muscle behind them, the loops coming free of the inner surface as it broke.

“Epona!”

Rudi shouted it, a trumpet-call of rage and joy. The horse dropped to all fours and trotted over to him, and he threw his arms around her neck, lost in the grassy scent as she nuzzled him against her side.

Tiphaine leapt even as the horse attacked, landed rolling and came erect with her sword back in her hand; she whipped it through a quick figure eight as Joris rose. Rudi took two steps back, leapt himself, grasped the big horse's mane and pulled himself over her withers. And shouted for sheer exhilaration as he felt her move beneath him: “
Free! Free!”

Joris Stein had his own sword; he shook his ruined shield free and drew his dagger with his left hand, wincing a little as he forced the wrenched muscles to work. He dropped into stance.

“You know,” Tiphaine said in that cool voice as she walked forward, “I never liked you, Joris. And you've just come onto my land, slaughtered my vassals, threatened to cut my girlfriend's throat and tried to kill a little kid I was ordered to guard.”

She smiled a slow, stark smile. “But hey, you know what they say—all's well that ends well.”

“I'll see you rot in Hell!”

“Undoubtedly. But we won't meet there today, I think. Usually it's just business, but I'm going to
enjoy
this. Let's get it on.”

“Go, Epona, go!” Rudi called. “Find them!”

Astrid Larsson trotted up the hill. The wreckage of the fight was on either side; men dead, men wounded and moaning or trying to patch their injuries. A trained eye could see how it had gone—the charge, the volley of crossbow bolts and then the savage running scrimmage up the winding pathway, the defenders falling one by one. For the last fifty yards it had been
one
defender, and her eyes went a little wide as she read the evidence of scuffed soil, bodies, sprays of blood on the trunks of the thinly scattered Douglas firs, a sword left where a desperate dying stroke had driven it into a trunk as deep as the blood-channel down the middle of the blade. The heavy iron scent of slaughter was as familiar as the sap and musty scuffed earth and duff of the forest floor. Eilir pointed with the tip of her bow, moving from one sign to another, and John Hordle's lips shaped a low whistle.

Then Astrid's head snapped up at the rapid thudding of hooves. It was very steep here for a horse, even one as agile as her Asfaloth or her soul-sister's Celebroch; that was why they'd dismounted a ways back. Alleyne gave a shout of exultation as Epona halted and pawed the earth with one hoof, but the face of the titian-haired boy on her back was strained and set.

“Follow me,” he said. “Quickly!”

“Wait—” Astrid said, but the big horse turned in place, graceful as a cat, and plunged away back uphill.

The four looked at each other. The rest of the Dúnedain were beating the woods all around…and there was no choice at all. They bent their heads and ran up the forty-degree slope, banishing exhaustion by an act of will. The trees thinned still more, turning to an open meadow that tilted from steep hillside to sloping plateau, blue distance opening around them as they passed from the shadows of the trees into knee-high grass starred with flowers and dotted with prickly Oregon grape. There were more dead men, more wounded, and two figures that still fought—one in armor, the other in white linen and black leather, with pale hair swirling around her shoulders. As the Dúnedain approached the armored man reeled back, his sword turning circles in the air as it flew away from a wrist half severed by a drawing cut.

The blond woman's sword moved with a speed that only those themselves experts could follow. The man screamed and screamed again.

“That's for finking out Lady Sandra,” Tiphaine d'Ath said in a panting snarl as she struck in a blurring flurry, every blow lethal but none instantly so. “
That's
for risking the princess.
That's
for trying to kill Rudi.
That's
for hurting my girl, you son of a bitch!”

The man tottered and fell to his knees, moaning and clutching at his wrist.

“And
this
is for the character in that stupid fucking book!”

He tried to scream once more, but the sword transfixing his throat through leather and mail had cut the voice box, and his eyes alone spoke as the blood swelled through his mouth and clenched teeth in a growing tide. When the blade withdrew with a twist he fell and beat his mail gauntlets on the ground for an instant, then slumped limp. Grass and blue lupine waved in to hide most of the metal-clad shape.

Tiphaine d'Ath,
Astrid thought, and felt herself smile as she raised her bow.
Rudi back with us and you here to kill. This is a
good
day!

The Association warrior stood and let her breathing slow, eyes flicking from face to grim-held face, seeing implacable Fate in each. Then she spread her arms, sword and dagger held loosely, the spring breeze flicking wet elflocks of her pale hair around her face.

“It's a good day to die,” she said, preparing for a final leap.

“No!”

A girl Astrid didn't recognize sprang in front of Tiphaine, trying to cover her body with her own; she was full-grown but younger than Astrid herself by a few years, wide blue eyes desperate, long black hair falling past her shoulders.

“No, don't hurt her!” The girl's hands moved in signs. “I'm with the Coven, you've got to listen to me—don't hurt her!”

The drawn bows remained unwavering; at this range any of them could shoot past without injuring anyone but their target. Astrid's eyes flicked to Eilir, and she nodded—the claim was true, then. That didn't mean they shouldn't dispose of so dangerous an enemy, of course.

“She saved Rudi's life!” the young woman went on.

“She did,” Rudi said, calming Epona with a hand down her neck. “Twice.”

Mathilda nodded vigorously, laying down a crossbow far too big for her. “She did! Joris was going to kill him! Tiphaine jumped and got her sword between them and Joris missed, but then he nearly killed her too.”

That's different,
Astrid thought as Tiphaine urged the black-haired girl aside.

“Go see to the princess, sweetie,” the noble said to her. “These people and I have unfinished business.”

Astrid closed her eyes for an instant.
Threefold,
she thought with a sigh of regret, and lowered her bow. The others did as well, Hordle with a low almost-grumble of protest and a roll of his eyes.

“Tiphaine d'Ath,” the Lady of the Dúnedain said. “I owe you nothing for your friend Katrina's death; that was honest war. But we do stand greatly in your debt for saving Rudi. Take a life for a life then, and count us quits. I am not eager to deal out death in judgment.”

Their eyes met for a long instant, ice gray to silver-blue. Then the Protectorate noble shrugged; she drew her sword blade through a cloth and sheathed it.

“You can't have the princess back,” she said carefully. “Not while I'm alive to guard her.”

“We don't want her. Lady Juniper's orders are to leave her in her mother's care. You're not in a position to make conditions, though, are you?”

The other's lips quirked a little. “Oh, I was going to challenge you to single combat. Now,
that
would have been interesting.”

“Yes…” Astrid said, with a momentary pang.
Like Éowyn and the Lord of the Nazgûl before the walls of Gondor.
“Except that I wouldn't have accepted. Duty would forbid.”

“With its shrill, unpleasant voice.” Tiphaine bowed her head slightly and sighed. “It's time to let Kat's ghost go, I suppose. Take the brat, then. He's a good kid, but sort of spooky…and that horse is worse. And a favor for a favor; you'd better hurry. I got one of my men out before the fight started, and there'll be a rescue party heading this way fast.”

The Dúnedain nodded, and silently turned to go. Rudi took his hat off and waved it at Mathilda. “See you, Matti!” he called, and then whooped as the great horse pirouetted and followed.

As the hooves faded in the distance Tiphaine took a deep breath, suddenly conscious of how distant shrieks of pain cut through birdsong and the sough of wind through forest and meadow. Some of them would be her men, and the others should be given mercy.

“We'd better get to work,” she said, turning towards the head of the trail. “We might be able to save some of the wounded; Joris and his merry band didn't have time to finish them.”

Mathilda nodded, standing silent and forlorn, staring after the path Rudi and his rescuers had taken. Delia cried silently into her hands.

“Hey, sweetie, come on,” Tiphaine said, touching her on the shoulder, urging her forward. A hug wasn't really practical, considering what coated her hands and face and much of her body. “Work to do.”

Delia looked up. “I told them all about the castle, and where Rudi was—”

“Yeah, but they weren't the ones who tried to kill us and him, were they?”

“I betrayed you!”

“Funny, I could have sworn you just now jumped between me and four drawn bows,” Tiphaine said gently. “And you stayed, when you could have gone with them. Just don't deliver any intelligence reports on me in future, OK?”

“I'm…I'm a witch.”

“I won't tell Father Peter if you don't.”

A curled trumpet sounded through the hills from the north, a harsh urgent scream:
We're coming! We're coming!

“Good,” Tiphaine murmured. “They'll have medical supplies and a doctor with them.”

And soon Joris' head will be off to Castle Todenangst pickled in a tub, with a report nailed to it which ought to cover my ass fairly thoroughly at court unless the Lord Protector wants to break with Sandra, which I doubt. And Rudi's going back home, probably Mathilda too, and the war will start again after harvest, but there's the summer to live through first. And for the first time in a while, I'm actually looking forward to that.