Dragon Prince 01 - Dragon Prince (55 page)

“What are you doing here so soon?”

“Be happy I’m here at all,” he snapped back. Goddess, but the woman was beautiful, he thought. His gaze ran over the perfect body barely concealed by a yellow silk bedrobe. Her hair was in tangles and her feet were bare, and it was obvious that she had been aroused from a nap by his arrival with her prize. As her face suddenly lit with an inner fire, he knew she had spotted Rohan.

“He’s not hurt, is he?” she asked, anxious as any mother, though there was nothing tender in her sharp dark eyes.

“Not much. A nick in his shoulder and a sore head. He’s all yours, princess. Do what you want with him.”

“I intend to,” she said, and gestured to her hovering women. They maneuvered the prince to the ground and two men came forward with a litter. As Rohan was carried into the keep, Ianthe caught sight of the boy. “What’s that?”

“His squire, I should think. Farid died in the skirmish. I didn’t think you’d mind about that, but I do draw the line at killing children.”

“So you do have limits. How interesting. Untie the gag. I want to hear what he has to say.”

Stiff from a long night and longer day spent slung across a saddle, the boy’s blood quickly warmed with the chance to vent his fury. He spat on the ground as the cloth was removed from his mouth, then spat once more, this time at Ianthe.

She backed off a pace, scowling. “Don’t try that again, brat! What’s your name?”

He set his jaw stubbornly and glared at her.

“Speak while you’ve still the tongue to do so!”

Green eyes widened, but he said nothing.

“Those aren’t just Rohan’s colors you’re wearing,” Ianthe mused. “The blue and silver are his, but the black and green—” Tapping a finger against one flawless cheek, she began to laugh. “Oh, I should have known it by the eyes! You’re related to the Sunrunner witch, a kinsman from River Run!” Turning to Beliaev, she said, “How wise of you not to kill him. He’ll be my messenger back to Sioned. Do you know what you’ll be telling her, boy?” she directed at the squire with a viciously sweet smile. “That an army of Sunrunners won’t get her precious prince back for her, not even with Andrade at its head and down on her knees before my father the High Prince. Rohan is all mine now, little one, as he should have been from the start. I’ll let you keep your tongue after all, so you can tell Sioned exactly what you’ll see while you’re here.”

“She’ll kill you!” the boy burst out.

“A
faradhi,
kill? Never! She hasn’t the courage. None of them do. But I’m a different sort, as your prince will find out soon enough. Beliaev, see that the brat is cleaned and fed. I want him in good condition for his journey back to Stronghold.”

“What are you going to do to my lord?” the boy cried out.

“Things you won’t be interested in until you’re older,” she laughed. “But I may let you watch so you can be educated—and so you can tell that green-eyed bitch exactly what sort of care I gave her beloved.”

She swept away up the stairs, calling for her women to minister to the prince’s wounds. Beliaev, understanding at last what she really wanted from Rohan, remembered the dragon tapestries and was very glad they had not been stitched with himself in mind.

K
leve had spent fourteen of his forty-four years traversing the northern princedoms, accompanied only by two sturdy mountain ponies. The solitary life of an itinerant
faradhi
suited him; he avoided any place larger than a village with the same zeal that he avoided crossing water. But each spring he spent a little time in Tiglath, enjoying the company of a certain innkeeper’s widow and congratulating himself on a life spent away from walls and cities.

Kleve presented himself as usual at Lord Eltanin’s small palace of sun-yellow stone—a sad court since the death of lovely young Lady Antalya. Kleve expected that his lordship would as usual require him to contact Princess Sioned with reports too sensitive to be entrusted to parchment and which
faradhi
oaths kept secret. But Eltanin, whose face was scored by lines that made him look nearly Kleve’s age, had only two messages for the princess: the Merida threatened, and Prince Rohan was many days overdue.

Thus it was that Kleve saw only one sunrise in Tiglath before setting off into the Desert again. The princess had told him on the sunlight to head for Skybowl with the twin purposes of finding out where her husband was and to give warning about the Merida. Her colors had been strictly controlled as befitted a ranking
faradhi
and a princess, but beneath them Kleve had felt a black terror that had given urgent depth to her orders.

Eltanin had provided a horse half again as large as Kleve’s own faithful pony, and the gelding’s strong, smooth gait proclaimed him one of Lord Chaynal’s blooded stock. Kleve had never bestrode an animal as fine and fast as this one, and made silent apology to his abandoned old friend for his disloyal enjoyment of the gelding’s speed.

But swiftness alone could not have saved him from the threat that appeared on the first afternoon of his journey. Four riders came toward him out of the sun. Kleve tightened his fingers on the reins to feel the comforting pressure of his rings. Only five, but enough to defend himself with Fire and a judicious bit of conjuring if necessary. In his years as a roving Sunrunner he had encountered his share of bandits and thieves who had scant respect for his calling. He had always obeyed the injunction against killing, but he had never scrupled to leave his attackers much the worse for their foolishness.

He reined in the gelding and began his preparations as the four riders bore down on him. When they were near enough to see him clearly, he held up his right hand, fingers spread and angled to catch the light on his rings.

“Thank the Goddess!” a young voice shouted. “Sunrunner, we’re in need!”

Kleve stayed where he was as they rode up—a youth, a girl of about the same age, a man older than Kleve, and a boy with green eyes blazing in a bruised, angry face. He noted swords, knives, and telltale colors at a glance as well as the quality of clothing beneath the dirt. A young knight, a man-at-arms retired to more peaceful pursuits, a squire, and a girl whose position was not immediately clear. The
faradhi
nodded to himself, relieved. The only threat they posed was to the health of their horses, which bore all the signs of having been ridden too hard and too fast.

“How may I help?” Kleve asked politely.

“Where do I begin?” the girl asked bitterly, raking her hair from her face.

“Names might help,” he suggested. “Mine is Kleve, and I think I’m the person you rode out from Skybowl to find.”

“Exactly,” the young man said. “We have news for Princess Sioned that can’t be entrusted to couriers—and she’s far from Stronghold in any case.” Then he paused, blue eyes narrowing. “How did you know we’re from Skybowl?”

Kleve smiled, accepting the belated tribute to powers of observation and deduction drilled into him at Goddess Keep, and declined to answer the question. After all, Lady Andrade never did. He cast a look at the sun, which barely topped the western hills. “Tell me quickly what message you wish to send, before the light fails and it becomes impossible for me to reach her before moonrise.”

“They’ve taken him!” the boy burst out. “Princess Ianthe has stolen my lord to Feruche!”

The young knight hushed him with a glance and began the tale. Their names were Walvis, Tilal, Feylin, and Lhoys, the latter two of Skybowl, the former from the prince’s own suite at Stronghold. Only Lhoys contributed nothing to the telling, and sat glowering on his horse as the other three traded the story quickly back and forth. Kleve readied himself as he listened, boiling all down to essentials even as he began the lightweave that he would ride to Faolain Lowland where the princess was. Along the ribbons of fading sun he flew, his second such journey today. He was grateful for her instantaneous response and her strong, steadying touch on the light.

ROHAN!
Her anguished cry nearly shattered the sunlight itself and Kleve marveled that the other four could not hear it. She then disciplined herself to calm, but the colors of fury seething in her made Kleve wince.

Goddess blessing, Sunrunner. Send Walvis to Tiglath with news of the Merida. In my name he will summon the north for battle there. Accompany him, and send to me at noontimes when the sun is strongest. I will gather up the southern armies and
—
and by the Goddess, I will raze Feruche to the dead sands!

And then the sun left the high ridges in darkness, and Kleve gathered himself back into himself. He took several deep breaths to calm his racing heart, for it had been a near thing. Another few moments and the dusk would have claimed him, shadow-lost.

When he could speak, he detailed the princess’ orders. As might be expected of so young a knight, Walvis was torn between the intense desire to battle his prince’s enemies and the equally deep need to rescue him from Princess Ianthe.

“Lord Eltanin can lead the north,” he said at last. “My duty lies with my lord.”

Feylin glared at him and snapped, “We argued this all the way from Skybowl! It was
not your fault
that the prince was taken! How could you have known? How could anyone? Your duty is to obey the princess and lead the north to victory against the Merida!”

Kleve bit back an untimely smile as the pair faced off. Both of them just under twenty winters, by his estimate, full of prickly pride and youthful impatience. He caught Lhoys’ eye and saw the same amusement there before the older man’s expression smoothed and he spoke.

“Go,” he told Walvis. “She orders it. Tilal will return to Skybowl with us. He’ll be needed to tell her about Feruche.”

Walvis cast a stern glance at the squire, who had jerked upright in outraged protest. “Be silent,” he commanded. “You’ll go back with them. But I should be there, too.”

“Goddess above in glory!” Feylin exclaimed. “Why are men so stupid? Princess Sioned ordered you to go. So go!” She turned to the boy. “There are pens and parchment in my workroom. Lhoys can show you. Draw as much as you can remember of the castle and the cliffs around it, and write down all that goes on inside, how many troops you saw, everything. Goddess keep you, and give my respect to the princess.” She looked a challenge at Walvis. “Are you coming, or are you going to waste more time debating pretty points of duty when the Merida are poised for attack?”

She spared him the necessity of an answer by kicking her horse into a gallop—in the direction of Tiglath. Only then did the others realize she meant to accompany Walvis and Kleve to the city. The young knight swore; Tilal and Kleve simply stared. But Lhoys slapped his thigh and let out a roar of laughter.

“Northern women! Speak the name Merida and they go for the nearest sword! Best catch up with her, lad, or she’ll take command of the troops herself!”

Personal command of troops was precisely what Sioned was thinking about taking unto herself when she recovered from Kleve’s message. Lord Baisal, whose petition for a new stone keep had included a sunset walk over its proposed site, had gibbered with astonishment when Sioned broke off what she was saying and acquired the distant expression of Sunrunner conversing on the light. He had witnessed her performance six years ago in the Great Hall of Stronghold, of course, when she had used the moonlight to grasp at Roelstra’s renegade Sunrunner, but to stand within touching distance of a
faradhi
at work who was also one’s liege lady was something else again.

His spluttering silenced with her first words to him. Baisal, most placid and easy going of men, drew back from the grim-faced fury who ordered him to call up his levies for her inspection on the morrow and to send riders to nearby manors and keeps for the same purpose. The impossibility of these things robbed him of speech for a few moments. By the time he was coherent again, she was striding long-legged back to the holding’s walls, and he ran hard to catch up with her.

“But—my lady—provisions, horses, arms!” he puffed. “They cannot be readied in a single day!”

“You’ll be repaid for any provisions beyond those you usually supply in times of war. I am not a thief. Horses graze your fields. Catch them tonight and have them saddled and ready tomorrow morning! As for arms—what kind of
athri
are you not to have them to hand at all times?”

“A peaceful one!” he exclaimed, quivering with insult. “My lady, why are you speaking of war? What’s happened?”

“Roelstra.” The name hissed from her lips. “Roelstra and his daughter Ianthe. Lord Baisal, I formally require your duty as my liege man to recover your prince from the High Prince’s daughter at Feruche Castle. Is that specific enough for you?”

Baisal stopped dead at that. She went on without him. Sioned knew that if she paused to explain fully or even long enough to feel her own emotions, she would begin screaming. Rohan, held prisoner by Ianthe—who had no doubt released Tilal to provide details Sioned’s own imagination could readily supply. The commotion in the central courtyard provided welcome distraction, and she concentrated on finding Ostvel in the midst of it.

Instead, she found her brother.

“Sioned!” he cried on seeing her. Tossing his reins to a groom, he hurried to seize her in an embrace scented with sweat and horse and leather. Stunned, she looked over his shoulder and finally registered the meaning of the crowded courtyard.