Well. Well, well! They may not like it—they may think I’m some kind of fool, or worse—but they’ve got to admit that what Lyran and I have can be pretty useful to the Guild. “How soon do you want us to leave?”
“Are you completely recovered from—”
“Dealing with Kelven? Physically, yes. Mentally, emotionally—to be honest, only time will tell. Betrayal; gods, that’s not an easy thing to deal with.”
“Admitted—and we’re setting you up to deal with another traitor.” Dabrel had the grace to look guilty.
“At least this one isn’t one of my former favorite pupils,” she replied, grimacing crookedly, “I don’t even think I know him.”
“You don’t,” Herjes said, “I trained him. He also is not anywhere near Kelven’s potential, and he isn’t dabbling in blood-magic. Speaking of which—have you recovered arcanely as well as physically?”
“I’m at full power. I can go any time.”
“In the morning, then?”
“In the morning.” She inclined her head slightly; felt the faintest whisper of magic brush her by.
Show-offs, she thought, as she heard the doors behind her open. Two can play that game.
“We will be on our way at dawn, Councilors,” she said, carefully setting up the rolibera spell in her mind, and wrapping it carefully about both herself and Lyran. There weren’t too many mages even at Masterclass level that could translate two people at once. She braced herself, formed the energy into a tightly coiled spring with her mind, then spoke one word as she inclined her head again— There was a flash of light behind her eyes, and a fluttery feeling in her stomach as if she had suddenly dropped the height of a man.
And she and Lyran stood side-by-side within the circle carved into the floor of her private workroom.
She turned to see the mask of indifference drop from him, and his thin, narrow face come alive with mingled humor and chiding.
“Must you always be challenging them, beloved?”
She set her mouth stubbornly. He shook his head. “Alas,” he chuckled, “I fear if you stopped, I would no longer know you. Challenge and avoidance—” He held out his arms, and she flowed into them. “Truly, beloved,” he murmured into her ear, as she pressed her cheek into the silk of his tunic shoulder, “we Balance each other.”
* * *
They would not be riding Jesalis and Tosspot, those beasts of foul temper and fiercely protective instincts. This was a mission which would depend as much on the impression they would give as their capabilities, and Tosspot and Jesalis would be unlikely to impress anyone. Instead, when they descended the tower stairs in the pale, pearly light of dawn, Martis found the grooms in the stone-paved courtyard holding the reins of two showy palfreys, a grey and a bay. Tethered behind the bay on a lead rope was a glossy mule loaded with packs. The harness of the grey was dyed a rich purple, and that of the bay was scarlet. Lyran approached the horses with care, for the eyes of the bay rolled with alarm at the sight of the stranger. He ran his hands over their legs once he could get near them, and walked slowly back to Martis’ side with his arms folded, shaking his head a little.
“Hmm?” she asked.
“Worthless,” he replied. “I hope we will not be needing to entrust our lives to them. No strength, no stamina—and worst of all, no sense.”
“They’re just for show,” Martis frowned, feeling a little dubious herself. “We aren’t supposed to have to do any hard riding, or long, except for the gallop to take us through the Gates. A day’s ride to the first Gate, half a day to the second. In and out of both Gates, then a ride of less than half a day to the city.”
“If all goes well. And what if all does not go well?”
“I—” Martis fell silent. “Well, that’s why you’re along.”
Lyran looked back over his shoulder at the horses, and grimaced. “This one will do the best one can, Mage-lady,” he said formally. “Will the Mage-lady mount?”
Martis had been doing more with Lyran’s aid than her colleagues suspected. A few moons ago she would not have been able to mount unaided—now she swung into her saddle with at least some of the grace of her lover. The exercises he had been insisting she practice had improved her strength, her wind, her flexibility—she was nearly as physically fit as she’d been twenty-odd years ago, when she’d first come to the Academe.
Lyran mounted at nearly the same moment, and his bay tried to shy sideways. It jerked the reins out of the groom’s hands, and danced backwards, then reared. Lyran’s mouth compressed, but that was the only sign that he was disturbed that Martis could see. The scarlet silk of his breeches rippled as he clamped his legs around the bay gelding’s barrel, and the reins seemed to tighten of themselves as he forced the gelding back down to the ground, and fought him to a standstill. As the horse stood, sweating, sides heaving, Lyran looked up at her.
“This one will do what this one can, Mage-lady,” he repeated soberly.
The grey palfrey Martis rode was of a more placid disposition, for which she was profoundly grateful. She signed to the groom to release his hold and turned its head to face the open wooden gate set into the stone walls of the court. At Lyran’s nod she nudged it with her heels and sent it ambling out beneath the portcullis.
They rode in single file through the city, Lyran trailing the mule at a respectful distance from “his employer.” Four times the bay started and shied at inconsequential commonplaces; each time Lyran had to fight the beast back onto all four hooves and into sweating good behavior. The last time seemed to convince it that there was no unseating its rider, for it did not make another attempt. Once outside the city walls, they reversed their positions, with Lyran and the mule going first. Ordinarily Martis would now be spending her time in half-trance, gathering power from the living things around her. But her mount was not her faithful Tosspot, who could be relied upon to keep a falling-down drunk in the saddle—and Lyran’s beast was all too likely to shy or dance again, and perhaps send her gelding off as well. So instead of gathering always-useful energy, she fumed and fretted, and was too annoyed even to watch the passing landscape.
They reached the Gate at sunset. The ring of standing stones in the center of the meadow stood out black against the flaming glow of the declining sun. The wide, weed-grown fields around them were otherwise empty; not even sheep cared to graze this near a Gate. The evening wind carried a foretaste of autumnal chill as it sighed through the grasses around them. Martis squinted against the bloody light and considered their options.
Lyran had finally decided to exhaust his misbehaving mount by trotting it in circles around her as they traveled down the road until it was too tired to fuss. Now it was docile, but plainly only because it was weary. It still rolled its eyes whenever a leaf stirred. The sorceress urged her gelding up beside his.
“Can you get one last run out of him?” Martis asked anxiously.
“Probably,” Lyran replied. “Why?”
“I’d like to take this Gate now, if we can, while that misbegotten horse of yours is too tired to bolt.”
He looked at her in that silent, blank-faced way he had when he was thinking. “What if he did bolt?”
“The gods only know where you’d end up,” she told him frankly. “If he got out of my influence—I can’t predict what point beyond the Gate you’d come out at, or even what direction it would be in.”