Song of the Fairy Queen (54 page)

He laid his head down on the table and wept.

Morgan could only sit there, Jacob’s words echoing in his soul.

Had they? Had they broken him?

The look of shattered faith in Kyri’s lovely sea-green eyes haunted him. Eyes that could make him ache… That lack had been mirrored in Gawain’s eyes, so like Gwen’s.

Once Morgan had vowed to serve the law, the people, his Kingdom and his King. That King had been his friend. Oryan. He’d sworn to protect that King’s son. Gawain, who even now was with Kyri and Gordon, alone and pursued. Something inside him twisted…

Like some sick child’s toy, Jacob’s head popped back up abruptly.

His eyes glittered brightly, too brightly.

“I had a visitor earlier,” he said. “Funny, he was asking about you, Morgan.”

“Me?” Morgan went still and cold. They shouldn’t even know he was here.

For a moment Jacob was crestfallen.

Jacob sighed, sadly. “I told him you were dead.”

“I’m not dead, Jake,” Morgan said, but he could see by Jacob’s eyes that he didn’t know that any more.

The packet of Bliss was empty. Jacob was riding it into hell.

Morgan closed his eyes.

One more for the tally against Haerold. Jacob had been a good man once.

“Uh huh,” Jacob said. “So he said he’s looking for some people and where might you take them? One of them is your lady friend with the wings. So pretty. That’s bad news for her. Do you know what they do to Fairy folk? They’ll clip those pretty little wings, put her in a cage and then they’ll drain her dry. Take every bit of magic she’s got. Seen them do that to a wizard they caught. That was ugly. The thing about Fairy, though, is that Haerold thinks they don’t die from it, so they can do it again and again. Just eat her up. Yum yum, like candy.”

Just the thought, the way Jacob said it made Morgan shudder.

Memories stirred, faintly, remembering clipped wings on a gentle Healer. Galan?

Kyri
.

No wonder she’d been frightened. Yet she’d still come, at least partly because she trusted him, believed in him. How did he know her and why did she trust him so much? It must have been from when he was High Marshal, but why couldn’t he remember her?

A sudden sense of her voice teasingly calling him “My Lord High Marshal” came to him and the memory of laughter.

That didn’t matter now. He had to get back to them. Haerold’s people were looking for them and now thanks to Jacob they might know where to look.

“What did you tell him, Jacob?”

“The Knight’s Arms,” Jacob said.

Here and then gone.

Jacob looked around.

The ghost was gone. Except he hadn’t been a ghost. He’d been real. It would have been kinder if Morgan had killed him but the Morgan he’d known wasn’t that kind of man.

There was a coin on the table, though.

Taking Morgan’s advice, Kyri, Gordon and Gawain took seats down in the tavern in a corner where she could observe those who came and went. She’d gotten them rooms for the night as well and that had bought them a meal here, too. It was by far not the best of inns and she was reasonably certain a rabbit might have passed somewhere in the vicinity of the stew. How close though, she wasn’t certain.

A cup of the red wine seemed safe enough, although it was almost sour enough to be vinegar and had certainly been watered more than a little.

The room was better lit than many, with lanterns flickering. The walls had been whitewashed once, although they’d settled closer to a dingy pale yellowish-gray. Smoke hovered near the ceiling from the poorly vented fireplace.

If there was anybody to recognize here, of the three of them she would be the one to do it so she sat facing out into the room.

As it was, though, it wasn’t she who spotted them first, but he who spotted her.

In amazement his eyes were on her as he crossed the room. His plain familiar face was more than welcome. She smiled.

“Lady Kyri?” Caleb said in a whisper, incredulously, horror overlaying his shocked pleasure at seeing her. “I almost didn’t recognize you…your hair….your pretty golden hair…”

It was dark and short.

She lifted a hand to it. “It’ll change back, Caleb.”

“Welladay,” he said, astonished. “Lady Kyri.”

He didn’t know what had happened between her and the Captain, but suddenly one day it was as if the Captain didn’t know her and then she was gone. Now she was back. And this was a dangerous place for her, Fairy or no, as she should remember. If they spotted her, if they caught her... His stomach churned at the thought.

Kyri caught the warning in Caleb’s soft brown eyes, going alert.

“We’ve got to get you out of here,” Caleb said, urgently, his voice low. “You shouldn’t be here. You shouldn’t be anywhere near here.”

She gestured at Gordon and Gawain. “I can’t leave them, Caleb. And I need to find out where to go next. We need help.”

Caleb sighed. “All right. Go on up to your rooms. Blow out the candle and go out the window. I’ll meet you in the alley. Hurry, but don’t look it.”

With all apparent calmness Kyri nodded and smiled, getting to her feet.

“It was good to see you again,” she said clearly, for the benefit of those around them.

Gawain and Gordon followed after her, neither walking fast.

Gordon whispered, “You know him?”

Opening the door, Kyri nodded. “Morgan’s old lieutenant.”

The candle was blown out even as she heard loud voices downstairs. “How do you know he isn’t the man Morgan was after?”

“Not Caleb,” she said with certainty. “Gordon, brace the door.”

“Out you go, Gawain,” she said, unlatching the window and taking a quick look out. She saw no one, but the shadows were thick. There were, though, clearly people in the tavern below. “Gawain, don’t get yourself killed. Keep behind Gordon.”

For only a second Gawain hesitated, then he swung his long legs out and dropped. Gordon followed a second later once Gawain had stepped clear.

Kyri heard the footsteps pounding on the stair. She slipped out, dropping lightly to the alley with the others.

“Come on, hurry,” Caleb said, from the mouth of the alley.

“I’m afraid it’s a little too late for that,” said a voice from the darkness. “We thought you might try this.”

Kyri had her sword out and her hand on her belt-knife when a torch burst into flame, lighting up the alley.

There were a whole troop, regular soldiers, and they had Gawain and Gordon at sword point, Gordon looking furious. He didn’t dare make a move without putting Gawain in danger.

“Surrender peacefully,” the leader said, “and no one gets hurt. Much.”

Kyri couldn’t allow that.

A glance at Gordon warned him she would make a move and then her belt knife flashed into the throat of the one who held his blade at Gawain’s throat.

Gordon brought his own sword out, shoving the boy aside with a shoulder, the surprise of the attack taking his guard off-guard as he slashed down at the man’s wrist. The guard jumped back, catching the blow on the finger guard.

The others launched themselves at Kyri, Caleb running down the alley to help.

She put her back to the wall, a quick flick of her sword causing the leader of the group to jump back warily, as the second tried to come in at her side. She danced away, parrying his blade, catching the leader’s thrust, slapping that aside, too, quickly. Caleb caught the third as that one tried to come and outflank her.

There were, however, the reinforcements inside the tavern. Kyri could see the knowledge of it in the leader’s eyes. A quick flip of her blade toward the second kept him off her, as the leader opened his mouth to call for help.

“You need to worry about saving your breath for me,” she said grimly and hammered him back with relentless slashes of her sword.

The man’s eyes narrowed dangerously, anger flaring.

Who was this chit to give him a warning like that? He wouldn’t be beaten by a slip of a girl. He struck back, hard, his eyes widening as this small woman took it, easily, tilting her head curiously.

He was good, better than Kyri expected. His second wasn’t, he was clumsy. She flicked her blade at him again, making him retreat.

The leader drove forward again, his sword lashing, thrusting.

It was only a matter of time, Kyri knew, before those inside missed their Captain. They had no time for this.

She parried, feinted, trapped his sword, but he freed himself, quick thrusts of her blade kept the others at bay.

These weren’t common soldiers and this was taking too long, they needed to get out of here before the others came.

Morgan heard the commotion in the alley as he went by and saw the torch burning on the ground where someone had flung it.

As always, Kyri fought as gracefully as a dancer, her sword held seemingly lightly, facing two against one. She was as good with a sword as she was with a bow. She spun to evade one, darted in to strike at another, catching a flurry of strokes from the first as she avoided the second.

Even so, she and the others were hard pressed.

Morgan was halfway down the alley before he thought, drawing his sword to go to her assistance.

Gordon fought as competently as any old soldier, young Gawain guarding his flank.

What was a surprise was to see Caleb there, faithful Caleb.

Morgan almost wanted to laugh. Coincidence, or was it fate that Caleb was here now?

The leader saw Morgan coming even as Kyri sensed Morgan’s presence. She glanced over her shoulder in astonishment…

And then she smiled, radiantly.

That sight alone healed something deep in his soul. She still had faith in him.

“Why don’t you pick on someone your own size?” Morgan said, setting himself.

Not that size mattered, not where Kyri was concerned.

Kyri flicked away the blade of the second as the leader spun to face Morgan.

The man attacked, blade moving fast.

Morgan was a little rusty but not that rusty. Not as rusty as he would have been those first few days after escaping the prison. He parried the attack easily. The man had some skill, but not enough. Morgan slipped the other’s blade before his own was sheathed briefly in the other man’s chest.

Then Morgan saw Kyri glance up at the window above them worriedly. He heard the dull thud of someone trying to break the door down.

She slashed, taking her opponent’s throat.

“Anyone hurt?” Morgan asked. “Gawain?”

There was something different about this Morgan, Kyri sensed it.

It was as if some of the ice that had held him had thawed at least a little, restoring some fraction of the old Morgan she’d known so well and still loved so deeply.