Lord of the Changing Winds (28 page)

Beguchren has lost his binding
, said Kairaithin. He folded his black-barred wings and sat down on the sand with a satisfied air.

“I know,” answered Kes. She looked away, up the mountain, gray and cold, to where the snow lay on heights. “He will know it, too.”

Oh, yes.
The griffin’s tail lashed across the sand, one quick motion.

“Soldiers,” the Casmantian said suddenly, jerking a hand toward the boundary between the normal mountain chill and the desert.

There were: To his chagrin, Bertaud had not seen them until the Casmantian had pointed them out. They were far away, but coming fast. Quite a few men.
That
was not good. And neither he nor—he looked quickly—Jos had anything more than a knife.

Beguchren Teshrichten is among them
, said Kairaithin.

“Then why are we still here?” Bertaud asked urgently. The Casmantians had put their horses into a gallop; he saw arrowheads glitter in the pale morning light. The first arrows arched high and began to fall.

There will be an accounting between us
, said the griffin.
But you are correct, man. It cannot be yet
. The world tilted dizzyingly around them—then tilted back. Bertaud flung a hand out for balance, staggering. He had expected Kairaithin to move them far back into the desert, but when his sight cleared he found that they were still at its very edge. And the Casmantian soldiers were moving even faster now, if that was possible.

Beguchren prevents me
, said Kairaithin.

An arrow whipped past Bertaud’s face and buried itself for a third of its length in the sand at his feet. He took an involuntary step backward and cursed, shaken. Nearby, the Casmantian, Jos, drew his knife as though he seriously meant to face down several dozen Casmantian horsemen with nothing but that. Other arrows fell around them, though none so close as the first. Then arrows started bursting into flame as they flew, burning to ash and blowing away on the hot wind.

Well done
, Kairaithin said to Kes.

“Five minutes and they’ll be on us,” said Bertaud to the griffin mage, drawing his own knife. “Or less.”

“Less,” said Jos, tersely.

Kairaithin half spread his immense wings. Flames rose, pale in the brilliant sunlight, at the edge of the desert. The racing horses, almost too close to the fire to stop, shied away to either side so violently that two of their riders fell. One fell into the flames and sprang up instantly, running blindly toward them, his clothing on fire, screaming in a horrible high-pitched voice. Kes covered her eyes, crying out herself, and the man crumpled almost at their feet, no longer burning.

Jos, without a word, took the man’s sword. There was no sign now that the man had ever been burned, though his uniform was charred. Kes knelt on the sand near Kairaithin, eyes wide with terror, looking tiny and young and entirely helpless.

Kairaithin said,
Beguchren is trying to smother my fire.
The griffin had ringed them with fire, a towering but thin circle of wavering flames. As Bertaud watched, the circle narrowed perceptibly. The heat pouring off it was incredible. If they hid behind its protection for very long, he doubted either he or Jos would survive the experience.

“Who is stronger? You or Beguchren?” Bertaud asked Kairaithin.

In this desert, I. But if I set myself against the cold mage and break his hold, I will not have sufficient attention to spare to prevent the men from coming against you. And I will be too busy with Beguchren to defend either you or myself from them.

“Then you’ll have to let them past and hope we can keep them off you long enough. It would be nice if you didn’t take too long with Beguchren.” Bertaud stepped forward to put himself shoulder to shoulder with Kes’s Casmantian friend, in front of Kes and Kairaithin. He added, “I’ll need a sword.”

“Yes,” said Jos.

The circle of fire died. Bertaud could tell which of the men outside that circle was Beguchren, not only because the cold mage, small and white haired and finely dressed, looked nothing like a soldier, but also because he stopped in midstep and put his hands over his face, looking like a man under a terrible strain.

Besides, he wasn’t carrying a sword. Well, so slight a man wasn’t likely to do well in a sword fight, but he wasn’t carrying even a bow. No doubt being weaponless was less of a handicap for the cold mage than for Bertaud.

The first three Casmantian soldiers came in at them in a rush: Swords, not arrows, which was good; so Kes had done that much for them by burning the earlier arrows.

Bertaud threw his knife at the first man, and a handful of sand at the second—Jos lunged forward and killed the first man as he ducked away from the flung knife, and engaged the other two while Bertaud got the first one’s sword; Bertaud flung himself down, rolling under a stroke from a fourth soldier and barely making it back to his feet in time to block a slashing blow from a fifth.

The fifth soldier was a heavily built bald man with tremendous reach and plenty of weight to put behind his attacks. He also proved to be, unfortunately, extremely fast on his feet and uncommonly good with a sword. Bertaud backed up rapidly, half running, trying to prevent the rest of the Casmantian soldiers from coming at his back while he worked to keep his opponent from eviscerating him, and also tried to draw the soldiers away from Kairaithin. He was peripherally aware of Jos at the center of a knot of Casmantian soldiers, he had lost track of Kes entirely, and what
was
Kairaithin
doing
? The griffin mage seemed to be taking an unconscionable time about getting them all out of this.

The attempt to draw off the Casmantian soldier had certainly worked… a little too well. The bald soldier was backed up by two others, both uncomfortably skilled. The bald man aimed a slashing blow at Bertaud’s face, then brought his sword around in a smooth arc, terribly fast, in a reversed cut at his chest while his companions circled in either direction around Bertaud. Bertaud blocked both attacks, the second one just by a hair, and attacked straight ahead to get out from between the other two soldiers. The bald Casmantian met his attack without giving back more than a step or two; the force of their swords clashing together reverberated through Bertaud’s whole body.

He feinted at his opponent’s lightly armored legs, tried a real thrust at his belly, and was forced to leap sideways to avoid the aggressive attack of one of the others, a much younger man with silver-chased armor—he dropped to one knee under a wickedly fast attack of the young one, swept his sword in a circle to force all his attackers back, lunged to get to his feet, and the bald Casmantian made a quick sideways rush, and this time Bertaud did not manage either to block or avoid the blow.

It was like a kick from a horse against his side: There was no sense at first of being cut. That would, Bertaud knew, come. He felt no pain, yet. That would come, too. He tried to get back to his feet and found no opposition—a measure of how badly he was hurt, that his opponents backed away and did not try to re-engage. Another, that he could not after all manage to get up. He found, to his surprise, that he no longer seemed to be holding his sword. He touched his side and felt moisture; he could not bring himself to look down, and looked up instead.

He saw Kairaithin, surprisingly close, rearing up, his red-chased black wings immense against the brilliant sky. He was aware of Kes, huddled by the griffin’s leonine feet, looking tinier than ever. He thought Jos was still fighting—good for him—although he was aware of a faint and foolish embarrassment that he’d gone down before the other man. As though that mattered. He wondered whether Kairaithin was still too much engaged with Beguchren to protect himself from the soldiers. Bertaud had not managed to do much to reduce that danger. Nor would Jos, probably. Bertaud could not see the cold mage anywhere. Was that a good sign? It was obvious that neither Bertaud nor, soon, Jos was going to be able to protect the griffin or Kes much longer.

He thought he saw Kairaithin come down to all fours, wings spreading out to cover the whole sky, darkness blotting out sun and light and heat alike… and then the light returned, pouring across him with an intensity that was almost pain. He was blind with light, filled with light and heat, he felt his very bones had turned to light and burned through his body. Gasping, he lunged upward and found himself caught and held. For an instant, remembering battle, he tried to fight. A voice, soft and delicate, spoke words he did not at once understand, and the constraint disappeared. So he got an elbow under himself and pried himself up at least far enough to look around.

Kes, sitting back on her heels beside him, sighed, relaxed, stretched, and got to her feet.

Bertaud blinked, and blinked again, trying to clear his eyes of light enough that he could see. The measureless desert stretched out in all directions. Red cliffs and spires twisted upward all around them, reaching narrow jagged fingers to the hard sky. Heat poured down upon them so forcefully that it might have possessed weight and body.

If Bertaud was disoriented, Kes was not. She now stood poised, looking at once timid and confident, close by Kairaithin’s side. Her fine soft hair fell around her face, sun glowing through it; it might have been spun of pale light. A warm light seemed to glow through her skin, as though it contained fire rather than flesh. Possibly she would have been an earth mage save for Kairaithin’s intervention, but she looked now as though she had always been meant to be a mage of fire. She looked, in fact, as Kairaithin did when he wore the form of a man: like nothing that had ever been human.

Jos sat on the sand near Bertaud, in the shadow of a twisted red rock, not looking at any of them, but outward at the desert. Bertaud followed his gaze.

All around them, among the spires of rock, lounging on the hot sand or on rugged ledges, were griffins. Golden and bronze, warm rich brown and copper red; pale as the edges of a candle flame or darkly red as the last coals of a smoldering fire, they sprawled in the sun like cats and stared into the brilliant light with eyes that were not blinded. Only a few appeared to acknowledge the arrival of Kairaithin or Kes or human men in their midst.

Kes looked at Bertaud, glanced at Jos, shook her head, and raked her fingers absently through her hair. They moved again, the world tilting around them. Bertaud realized with a shock that it was the girl and not the griffin mage who had moved them this time. That she had done it as a griffin mage would: With a thought, with a shifting of the stillness of the desert. They stood suddenly in the stark black shadow of a broken cliff. The contrast of the shadow with the relentless pounding sun out in the open was dizzying.

Bertaud gasped, catching his balance with an outflung hand against the stone wall. He did not try to get up, but leaned his head back against the cliff wall and shut his eyes.

The Casmantian soldier, who had gotten to his feet, sat back down as well, with slow, careful movements.

Kairaithin lay down, stretching out like a cat. He appeared amused, although Bertaud could not have said why he had such an impression. Bertaud asked him, “Beguchren?”

Retreated
, answered the griffin, with obvious satisfaction.
This day was mine
. And, after a moment, with a little tip of his fierce eagle’s head,
Ours
.

Bertaud nodded back to him and said to Kes, “That’s twice you’ve saved my life, I think. Thank you.”

Kes gave him a quick shy smile, but she seemed more edgy and nervous now than she had during the fight. She paced hurriedly from one edge of the shadow to the other, unable to settle. She said, “I used fire. It was much easier this time.”

Of course
, Kairaithin told her.
You do very well
, kereskiita.
You are quick to learn and powerful in your gifts.

Kes turned to the griffin. “The Casmantian king said I was—was—I don’t know the word—
festech-
something.”

“Festechanenteir,”
said Jos, not looking up.

“Yes—
festechanenteir.
That means a fire-mage who is also human. Isn’t that what it means?”

Yes
, agreed the griffin.

Near Bertaud, Jos glanced up at Kes and then looked away again. Her friend, she had said, with no explanation of how she had made a friend of any Casmantian soldier. The man did not seem inclined to explain.

“My heart is turning to fire, my bones to red stone. Why didn’t you
tell
me?” Kes asked Kairaithin. Her voice rose; she might have been happy to get away from Beguchren and back to the desert, but now that she felt herself safe, and despite her apparent shy timidity, she was clearly angry. “I knew you were teaching me to love fire. But I didn’t know you were teaching me to forget earth! Why didn’t you
tell
me what you were doing to me?”

Jos turned his head away and shut his eyes. Bertaud, though most of his attention was on the girl and on Kairaithin, studied the Casmantian curiously.

Should I have? Should I have said, “You should be an earth mage, you would wake into your power at a touch, but if you reach for fire now, you will become fire? Your heart will become fire, your breath will become desert wind?”

“Yes!” Kes cried. “Shouldn’t you? Why should you not?”

Think
, said Kairaithin, patient and pitiless as the sun.
I might have told you, “Take what I give you, do as I teach you, and you will lose what you are and become something other.” You would have fled me and fought me and wasted your strength struggling against the fire, until I would have been forced to compel you by threat to obey me. I would have killed your sister’s horses, one by one. And then I would have killed your sister’s servants. And then I would have killed your sister. Would you have withstood all that I would have done?