“General, you can’t abandon your warriors in the middle of the night because of a dream!”
She jerked her arm free and glared at him, but she knew he was right. Equally right was her conviction that Gilthas was grievously wounded, perhaps even dying while they stood here debating. A difficult quandary, but the Lioness was not known for being indecisive.
“Rouse the camp,” she said. “Wake everyone!”
Favaronas hurried away, calling out to sleeping warriors, shaking their shoulders. Kerian did likewise. In minutes the entire band was awake, if not completely alert.
Glanthon, hair askew, rubbed his eyes and asked, “Has something happened?”
“Yes, I must return to Khurinost at once!”
“I’ll have the riders mount up—”
“There’s no time.” Struggling for calm, she said, “I go alone, on Eagle Eye. The rest of you will proceed to Khurinost without me.”
She explained her dream to them as she had to Favaronas. Her warriors knew her to be pragmatic, not given to flights of fancy. If the Lioness believed she’d been granted a premonition about the Speaker, they didn’t question her conviction. They were, however, plainly disconcerted by the content of her dream and that she was leaving them.
She gripped Glanthon’s shoulder. “I have no choice. You’ll be fine. Avoid the High Plateau. Take the easier route down the caravan trail from Kortal.” On the return journey, they had less to fear from spies. Still, she cautioned, “Tell no one where you’ve been.”
To Favaronas, she said, “If I could, I would take you with me, but Eagle Eye won’t tolerate anyone else on his back.”
He assured her he was not offended at being left behind.
It was vital that he get his manuscripts, notes, and the odd stone cylinders home intact. He certainly couldn’t have carried them all while hurtling across the sky on griffonback.
Kerian was not one to waste time. She filled two water-skins in the creek, took up a haversack with a bit of food, and said good-bye to all. The dazed warriors drew themselves up and saluted their leader.
Before jogging up the trail to Eagle Eye, she repeated her injunction to Glanthon that he and the rest were to get themselves home safely. If they were confronted by nomads, they were to try to slip away without fighting.
“And when you get back, I’ll buy nectar for everyone!” she called, and then she was gone.
Favaronas and Glanthon stood side by side, watching long after she was swallowed by the darkness. The warrior was muttering to himself, speculating about the possibility of a nomad trick or weird dreams generated by the forces at work in the valley.
“This feels wrong,” he said.
Favaronas was thinking the same thing, but they heard the cry of the airborne griffon and knew it was too late for misgivings.
Word raced through the streets of Khuri-Khan that the laddad king had been wounded, some said killed. The elves had withdrawn their soldiers, but for how long? Blood was sure to flow. Opinion was divided as to who should bear the blame. Many Khurs believed the Sons of the Crimson Vulture had tried to assassinate the Speaker. Others thought Sahim-Khan was involved.
Sahim had his own theory. The city gates, cleared by his soldiers, were kept open by entire companies of royal guards. The Khuri yl Nor was sealed tight as a tomb. Alarm flags were hoisted all over the city, recalling all soldiers to duty. General Hakkam brought the arrow, still stained with the Speaker’s blood, to the palace, and every bowyer and fletcher in the city was summoned. If the arrow’s maker could be found, its owner soon would be known.
In the Nor-Khan, behind the thickest walls in Khur, Sahim-Khan raged. How had this come about? Who was trying to foment war with the laddad? His favorite suspects were the Torghanists, whom he castigated as insolent, ignorant savages.
His captains kept close around him. His current wife sat in her place behind the Sapphire Throne. Huddled around her were the Khan’s seven youngest children, frightened but silent. Off to one side, Prince Shobbat leaned one hip on a sideboard, idly eating grapes from a silver bowl.
Zunda, who in moments of stress could speak as succinctly as any man, said, “An emissary must go to the laddad. With assurances of the Mighty Khan’s goodwill.”
“I’ll show them goodwill! I’ll decorate the city battlements with the corpse of every man who bears a red tattoo!”
“Mighty Khan, the situation may not call for such measures.”
“You go to the laddad, Zunda! Take Sa’ida and all priestesses of Elir-Sana. If the Speaker can be saved, Holy Sa’ida can do it.”
The old vizier bowed and obeyed. Any other action just now likely would cost him his head.
Once the vizier had departed, Sahim summoned one of his captains, a lean and wolfish fellow named Vatan.
“Collect a hundred men and go to the Temple of Torghan,” Sahim said. “Arrest everyone—priests, acolytes, servants, all of them. If you find Minok, slay the wretch where he stands.”
He turned away, then paused, a better idea coming to him. “No, Vatan. Bring Minok to me. Alive. His people might behave better if I hold their leader. I’ll question him personally, and we’ll learn who else is part of this conspiracy.”
Vatan departed. For the first time since summoning this emergency assembly, Sahim sat, dropping heavily onto the throne. His sun-yellow robes billowed around him. He spied Hengriff on the periphery of the crowd and waved the knight forward.
Hengriff’s natural impassivity had been perfected by his time in Khur. When Sahim asked his opinion of the orders just given, Hengriff did not say, I think you a crude and brutal fool, but replied blandly, “The Mighty Khan thinks swiftly and acts even faster.”
Sahim smiled. “I had good teachers. What does your Order do with rebels?”
“Hang the unrepentant and subvert the rest is our custom.”
“The better policy would be to hang them all!”
Hengriff took Sahim’s bloodthirsty admonition with outward good grace. The time had come for him to put into action a bold plan. He lifted the leather dispatch case in his hand and announced he had a confidential message from his Order.
In a better mood for having set Zunda and Vatan to their respective tasks, Sahim dismissed his frightened family, his captains, and his fawning courtiers. Only a handful of his personal guard remained. Prince Shobbat was among the. last to leave, tossing aside an empty grape stem before going out the double doors.
“So, what does the Lord of the Night have to say?”
After weeks of hearing nothing from the Order, Hengriff had decided on a dangerous deception. He had forged a set of instructions, ostensibly from Rennold to himself. If he guessed right, all would be well. If he chose a faulty course, his head would certainly be forfeit. His masters might forgive failure, but not one committed in their own names.
He opened the leather flap and pulled out a sheaf of papers. He made a show of glancing over the papers before clearing his throat and booming,” ‘To his Mightiness, Sahim, Khan. of All the Khurs, greetings—’”
A loud noise halted Hengriff’s recitation. Shobbat suddenly reentered the hall at the head of twenty guards.
“What’s the meaning of this?” Sahim demanded. “Are the laddad—”
“I have news, Mighty Khan. I have learned the identity of the traitor in our city, the author of all our troubles, the one who conspired to slay the king of the laddad.”
Pleased, Sahim said, “Excellent, my son! Excellent! Who is it?”
Shobbat advanced until he was standing abreast of the Dark Knight. The soldiers halted two steps behind the prince. “The traitor, sire, is Lord Hengriff.”