"You'll eventually have to explain to Cormac how you found them, won't you? Besides, what are you going to do with them? Drag them back to the keep? Kill them?"
Guerrand snorted. "If Quinn and the cavaliers with him couldn't fend them off, I hardly think I'd stand a chance against them. No," he said, "I intend only to retrieve physical evidence of their responsibility for Quinn's death. I'll find some way to tell Cormac when the time comes.
"Now you know everything," he announced, readjusting himself in the saddle. "Surely you can see why you need to go back. I cast the invisibility spell to slip away unnoticed, thinking it would last until I got to where I was going. I've already lost precious time, and I've a lot of ground to cover before the sun rises or the men in the mirror move on."
Kirah hugged his waist more tightly. "Then we'd better get moving, hadn't we?"
Guerrand pushed her hands down. "Kirah, don't be absurd! I'm not about to gallop across the countryside to spy on some ruffians with a chit of a girl wearing only her night shift. Even you must see how dangerous this is."
"Which is why you need me along," Kirah said brightly. "Besides, what difference does it make what I'm wearing if we're invisible? I could be stark naked for all anyone would know! I won't need weapons since you don't intend to fight them, though that makes me wonder why you're all decked out with your best weapons. Still, you obviously need my eyes. I notice details better than you. I won't take no for an answer. You know I won't."
"This is blackmail."
"For your own good. Now, kick this horse into a gallop and don't waste any more of our time."
"Don't push your luck by getting imperious, Kirah," Guerrand said stiffly. "I don't think you realize how furious I am with you."
"You know you can't stay mad at me, Rand. We always forgive each other."
Kirah was right about that. They had only each other. "Against my better judgment, I'll let you come along. Just remember, keep quiet and, for once, do what I say, when I say it."
Kirah could scarcely contain her pleasure at the victory. "Just think. This may be our last adventure before you're an old married man."
"I don't like adventure," Guerrand snapped.
They rode east, following the coast. Though the moonlight was bright when it broke through the clouds, neither horse, man, nor girl cast a shadow. Clouds of dirt kicked up by invisible hooves revealed their course across the moor.
Before long Guerrand sighted his destination in the distance, could feel the ground beneath them rising, marking the end of flat DiThon land and the beginning of sloping Berwick land. In the blue light of the nearly full moon two ancient, carved pillars dominated the night sky. Stonecliff. They seemed to hang upon the cliff face, like joint figureheads on a ship.
The young mage had been here only twice in his memory, many years ago, before the property had been sold to Anton Berwick. It would belong to the DiThons again in just four days. Three now, he corrected himself with another glance at Solinari.
Guerrand knew from rumor that most people were uneasy when near the two stone pillars perched in the clearing at the top of the bluff. Everyone believed it was a magical place. Perhaps because of that, Guerrand found the spot intriguing. The plinths were massive and tall, carved with images of grinning and sneering faces and symbols whose meaning no one seemed to know. Superstitious folk thought the symbols were missives to evil gods, and Cormac in particular reviled the carved columns as an affront to all decent deities. But Guerrand sensed their potency was untainted by human emotion or ambition; Stonecliff's power was of Krynn itself, natural and uncorrupted.
Sensing Guerrand's thoughts, Kirah said softly, "You know Cormac is going to tear down the pillars once he gets his hands on the land again."
"How do you know that?" he snapped.
"How do I know anything? By listening in tunnels," she said simply "It's the truth, Rand. I heard him tell Rietta. It makes sense, given his hatred of magic. Besides, I'll bet he's doing it to make room for the fortress."
"What fortress?"
"The one he's going to build as a tollbooth to tax the ships that travel to Hillfort on the river just beyond Stonecliff, the new boundary between Berwick and DiThon land."
"But most of those are Berwick's ships! Cormac would be taxing the very person who gave him the land!"
"And your father-in-law," Kirah added smugly. "Despicable, isn't it?"
Guerrand shook his head slowly. "I can scarcely believe it, even of Cormac."
"Ask him!"
The young man clapped his hands to his ears. "I will, but I can't think about that now, Kirah. Right now I have to think about Quinn's killers."
"Do you know where these men are?" she asked. "I couldn't see anything in the mirror."
Guerrand knew exactly where they were. He'd been studying the mirror constantly for the half day he'd had it. He now pondered the irony of the men's location. "Up there." Though Kirah couldn't see him point, his meaning was obvious.
"They're hiding out at Stonecliff?" she gasped.
For an answer, Guerrand pulled out the mirror and held it over his shoulder for Kirah to examine. Though the outline of the mirror was invisible, the image it projected hovered in midair before her face. Kirah could see one of the men leaning against a carved pillar three times his height. All three men were seated between the twin columns, a small fire burning at their feet.
Kirah looked away from the mirror, toward the pillars on the hill that ended at a cliff above the sea. She saw firelight flickering between the carved columns. Guerrand was right.
"They sure match the description given by the men who brought Quinn's body back," she whispered. "Awfully gutsy of them to camp so near our home."
"They may have no idea who they murdered," said Guerrand, "or that anyone who cares lives nearby."
"With a magic mirror," giggled Kirah.
"Sshhh!" Guerrand hissed. "For the gods' sake, Kirah, this is no joke. These men killed a fit, heavily armed cavalier and wounded two others. They won't hesitate to do the same to a slip of a girl and a barely competent warrior. They can't see us, but they'll be able to hear us soon, so say nothing, do nothing from here on out."
"Yes, Guerrand," she muttered meekly, properly chastised.
Guerrand, fearing the horse's labored breathing would draw the bandits' attention, reined the creature in on the far side of a cypress tree, some twenty rods from the stone pillars. The horse would become visible as soon as Guerrand moved away from it, but the young mage hoped the branches of the cypress would hide the roan. Now, if he could only similarly stash Kirah. Guerrand slid down quietly and looped the reins around a low branch.
"Kirah," he whispered softly, "I need you to stay here and keep the horse still. You'll both become visible, but you'll be in deep shadow under the cypress."
"You're not going to leave me behind that easily," she said. Guerrand winced. "How am I going to keep a horse quiet-clap a hand over its mouth? It's going to make noise, whether I'm with it or not. You need my eyes up there," she insisted, pointing toward the fire. But then she decided to soften her approach. "I promise I'll be quiet and careful."
Knowing this was neither the time nor the place to argue, Guerrand whispered firmly, "See that you do."
He could hear her slide off the horse, felt her hand groping for his. "You won't be sorry."
"I already am." He searched with one hand for the shield he'd lashed to the horse's saddle, then thought better of it. He was already wearing his sword, and the metal shield would be cumbersome to carry. He didn't intend to engage the men in battle anyway.