The RuneLords (46 page)

And of all reavers, the mages were most fearsome, for they had amassed powers from hundreds of their dead.

This one lunged sideways, and Gaborn heard the rasping of air exhaled from the vents on its back as his horse charged. He detected a whispering sound in that exhalation, the chanting of a spell.

Gaborn shouted, putting all the force of his Voice into his call. He'd heard of warriors with such powerful voices that they could stun men with a shout.

Gaborn had no such gift. But he knew that reavers sensed movement--whether it be sound or vibrations of something digging beneath their feet--and he hoped his shout would confuse the monster, blind it as he charged.

The reaver pointed its stalagmite at him, hissed vehemently, and a coldness pierced Gaborn, an invisible beam that stung like the deepest winter. The air all around that beam turned to frost, and Gaborn raised his small shield.

Legend said that the greatest of flameweavers' spells could draw the heat from a man, just as flameweavers could draw heat from a fire or from the sun--suck the warmth from a man's lungs and heart, leave him frozen on a sunny day.

Yet the spell was so complex, required such concentration, that Gaborn had never heard of a flameweaver who'd mastered it.

He felt that spell's touch now, and threw himself sideways in his saddle, dropped in a running dismount as his horse raced ahead. The chill struck him to the bone, left him gasping as he rushed behind his charger, let its body shield his attack.

"No! Go back!" Binnesman cried from somewhere behind the ring of fallen statues.

Gaborn inhaled deeply as he advanced on the monster. The reaver carried no scent. Reavers never do, for they mimic the scent of the soil around them.

Yet the reaver mage rasped now, in terrible fury. The air hissed from the anterior of its long body.

Gaborn's horse staggered beneath the beam of cold, and Gaborn leapt over the falling beast, rushed the reaver at stomach level, swinging his warhammer with all his might.

The reaver mage tried to step back, tried to impale him with its staff. Gaborn dodged the blow and swung at its shoulder, buried the warhammer deep into the reaver's leathery gray hide. He quickly pulled the spike free and swung a second time, hoping to plunge deeper into the wound, when suddenly the reaver smashed the agate rod down at him.

Gaborn's hammer hit its great paw, pierced a talon, and the iron T of his hammer smashed into the reaver's blazing rod. The agate staff shattered along its entire length, and flame leapt in the reaver's paw, a hot flash that erupted with explosive force, cracking the wooden haft of the warhammer.

Iome rode in behind Gaborn now, shouting at the monster, and King Sylvarresta's horse danced to its left. The tumult and the horses circling round distracted the beast, so that it swung its great maw one way, then the other.

What happened next, Gaborn did not see, for at that second, the reaver chose to flee--running over the top of him so that its huge abdomen knocked him backward.

Gaborn hit the ground, the wind knocked from him as the reaver scrambled away. Gaborn wondered if he'd die from the blow. As a boy in tilting practice, he'd once fallen from his saddle, and a fully armored warhorse had trampled him. The reaver far outweighed the warhorse.

Gaborn heard ribs crack. Lights flashed before his eyes, and he had the sense of falling, of swirling like a leaf into some deep and infinite chasm.

When he regained consciousness, his teeth were chattering. He smelled some sweet leaves beneath his nose, and Binnesman had reached down beneath Gaborn's ring mail, was rubbing him with healing soils and whispering, "The earth heal you; the earth heal you."

When the soil touched him, Gaborn's flesh seemed to warm. He still felt terribly cold, frozen to the bone, but the soil worked like a warming compress, easing each wound.

"Will he live?" Iome asked.

Binnesman nodded. "Here, the healing earth is very powerful. See--he opens his eyes."

Gaborn's eyes fluttered. He stared, uncomprehending. His eyes could not focus. He tried to look at Binnesman, but it required so much effort.

The old wizard stood over Gaborn, leaning on a wooden staff. He looked horrible. Grime and blood smeared his face. His clothing smelled charred, yet when his right hand brushed Gaborn, it felt deathly cold.

The reaver had tried to kill Binnesman, too.

There was a look about the wizard. He trembled, as if in pain and shock. Horror showed in every line of his face.

The single standing statue was throbbing with light. Great icy blasts had chipped away corners of it, cracked it. Gaborn lay for a moment. He felt a bitter chill in the air. The sorceries of the reaver mage.

Distant war dogs bayed. Binnesman whispered, "Gaborn?"

The statue seemed to waver, and the aged half-human face carved into it glanced down at him. Gaborn thought his eyes were failing. But at that moment, the light within the statue died, turning black, like a candle snuffed out.

A great splitting sound tore the air.

"No! Not yet!" Binnesman cried, looking up toward the standing stone.

As if in defiance of his plea, the great stone rent in two and tumbled, the head of it landing almost at Gaborn's feet. The ground groaned, as if the earth might shake apart.

Gaborn's thoughts came sluggishly. He gazed at the huge statue, but ten feet from him, listened to war dogs baying.

The Seven Stones have fallen, he realized. The stones that hold up the earth. "What? Happening?" Gaborn gasped.

Binnesman looked into Gaborn's eye, and said softly, "It may be the end of the world."

Binnesman leaned over Gaborn, peering at his wounds. "Light," he grumbled. A wan green light began emanating from his staff--not firelight, but the glow of hundreds of fireflies that had gathered on its knob. Some flew up, circled Binnesman's face.

Gaborn could see the old man clearly now. His nose was blooded, and mud plastered his cheek. He did not look severely wounded, but he was clearly distraught.

Binnesman smiled grimly at Gaborn and Iome, bent his ear, listening to the baying dogs in the woods. "Come, my friends. Get inside the circle, where we'll be safer."

Iome seemed to need no prodding. She grabbed the reins of hers and her father's horse, pulled both mounts round the fallen statues.

Gaborn rolled to his knees, felt his sore ribs. It pained him to breathe. Binnesman offered Gaborn his shoulder, and Gaborn hobbled into the circle of stones.

His horse had already gone in, stood nibbling at the short grass, favoring its right front leg. Gaborn was grateful that it had survived the reaver's spell.

Yet he felt reticent to enter that circle. He sensed earth power. It was old--a terrible place, he felt sure, to those who did not belong.

"Come, Earthborn," Binnesman said.

Iome walked rigidly, watching her feet, apparently unnerved by the power that emanated from below. Gaborn could feel it, palpable as the touch of sunlight on his skin, rising from beneath him, energizing every fiber of his being. Gaborn knelt to remove his boots, to feel the sensation more fully. The earth in this circle had a strong mineral smell. Though enormous oaks grew all round, taller than any he'd ever seen, none stood near the center of the circle--only a few low bushes with white berries. The earth smelled too potent, too vigorous for anything else to thrive. Gaborn pulled off his boots, sat on the grass.

Binnesman stood gazing about, like a warrior surveying his battleground. "Do not be afraid," he whispered. "This is a place of great power for Earth Wardens." Yet he did not sound fully confident. He'd been battling the reaver here, and had been losing.

Binnesman reached into the pocket of his robe, drew out some spade-shaped dogbane leaves, crushed and threw them.

Up the ancient road, the baying of war dogs came fervently, high yips echoing through the limbs of ancient oaks. The sound sent chills down Gaborn's spine.

He sat, head spinning, and said, "I heard trees calling me here."

Binnesman nodded. "I asked them to. And I placed protective spells on you, to keep Raj Ahten from following. Though at such a distance, they did little good."

"Why do the trees name me wrong?" Gaborn asked. "Why do they call me Erden Geboren?"

"The trees here are old and forgetful," Binnesman said. "But they remember their king still, for this wood held allegiance to Erden Geboren. You are much like him. Besides, your father was supposed to have named you Erden Geboren."

"What do you mean, 'supposed to have named' me?"

Binnesman said, "The Lords of Time once said that when the seventh stone falls, Erden Geboren would come again to the stones with his Earth Warden and a retinue of faithful princes and kings, there to be crowned, there to plan for the end of their age, in hope that mankind might survive."

"You would have anointed me king?" Gaborn asked.

"If the world had not gone wrong," Binnesman said.

"And Raj Ahten?"

"Would have been one of your most ardent supporters, in a more perfect world. The obalin drew him here tonight, just as they drew you and King Sylvarresta." Binnesman nodded toward the fallen creature that looked like a statue.

The obalin, these creatures had been called, though Gaborn had never heard the term.

"Gaborn, we are in terrible jeopardy. Nothing is as it should be--the kings of all Rofehavan and Indhopal should be here tonight. Men who should have been great heroes in the war to come have either been slain or now lie as Dedicates in Raj Ahten's keeps. All the Powers shall rage in this war, but the protectors of the earth are few and weak."

"I don't understand," Gaborn said.

"I will try to make it clearer, when Raj Ahten arrives," Binnesman said.

Of a sudden, the shadowy forms of the mastiffs burst from beneath the trees, their baying more fervent.

Men and a few horses rushed out behind the dogs. Only three men rode still. The other mounts had succumbed during the chase. Twelve soldiers raced beside the horses. The fact that these twelve men had run so long, in armor, across such unforgiving terrain, made Gaborn nervous. Such warriors would be terribly powerful.

The garish dogs with their red masks and fierce collars raced up to within a hundred feet of the fallen stones, then snarled and leapt as if they'd confronted a wall. The mastiffs looked like shadows thrown by a flickering fire. They would not come near Binnesman's dogbane. Some began racing around the fallen stones.

"Quiet!" Binnesman said to the dogs. The fierce mastiffs cringed and tucked the stumps of their tails between their legs, daring not even to whimper.

Jureem followed his master to the circle of fallen stones. His stallion sweated, drenched, as if it had swum a river. The horse's lungs worked like bellows. It would not have survived another ten miles of this chase.

Jureem felt half-astonished to see Prince Orden's horses still alive, limping among the fallen statues.

A strange scent filled the air--smoke and ice and dust.

Raj Ahten stared hard at Gaborn, his glance askew, as if looking for something in particular.

Something odd was going on, Jureem realized. All of the Seven Standing Stones lay fallen, like half-formed men--misshapen, as if in their death throes. The scents of smoke and ice said that a battle had been fought here. Binnesman was wounded, dirt and blood on his face.

Overhead, a soft wind blew. The enormous oaks creaked in the slow wind, waving at the stars. Pale light glowed within the circle of fallen stones.

The Earth Warden stood scrutinizing Raj Ahten's men from beneath bushy brows, starlight glowing on his wispy beard. Confident. Dirty and bloodied. Still, the wizard seemed too confident. Jureem wished that his master's flameweavers were here. It had been a mistake to enter these woods without them.

Raj Ahten finally slipped from the back of his weary mount, stood holding the animal's reins. He smiled. "Prince Orden," Raj Ahten called in his most seductive voice while his men finished circling their quarry. "Your running comes to an end. You need not fear me. You need not run any longer. Come, my friend."

Jureem felt the overawing draw of that voice. Surely the Prince would come to the Great Light now.

But the Prince stood fast.

"Princess, you, at least, would not refuse me?" the Great One asked.

Jureem felt gratified to see Iome sway on her feet, compelled to draw closer.

"No one will come with you," Binnesman said, stepping in front of her.

"You cannot draw near, Raj Ahten--any more than can your dogs, or your warriors." Binnesman menacingly crushed leaves in his hand.

Dogbane. Even when it was not in the hands of an Earth Warden, dogbane was as potent at driving away dogs as Solomon's Seal was at frightening off cobras. Raj Ahten's men began backing from the statues. The dogbane would not kill them. Yet their dogs' noses feared the scent.

"Why have you come here?" Raj Ahten demanded of Binnesman. "This is none of your affair. Leave now, and no one will harm you."

"More importantly," Binnesman said, "why have you come here? You are a king of men. Did you hear the trees calling?"

"I heard nothing," Raj Ahten said.

But Binnesman shook his head. "There are runes of concealment all about this place. Powerful runes. No man could have found it alone. Some greater Power drew you." He nodded knowingly, and his tone broached no argument.

"Perhaps...I did hear a whisper, Earth Warden," Raj Ahten said. "But it was very faint, like the voices of the dead."

"That is good. You are strong in the earth powers, and only they can preserve us. The end of an age is upon us. If our people are to survive, we must hold council. Earth called you, Rah Ahten, just as it calls to kings you have enslaved. Can you hear it now?" Binnesman stood at ease, gazing deep into Raj Ahten's eyes.

"I feel it," Raj Ahten said. "This place is strong in the Power that you serve."

Binnesman leaned on his staff. The light of fireflies shone on his face, which had an odd tint, a metallic sheen. Perhaps Binnesman had once been human, but his devotion to Earth had leached him of some of that humanity. Jureem realized that the wizard was perhaps as alien to mankind as any Frowth or ferrin.