She could feel the restorative effect of the blessed springwater working on her tired body almost immediately. After a minute, Eydryth was able to climb to her feet unaided, then walk steadily across the stone flags to where Joisan and Sylvya crouched beside the stricken Keplian.
As she neared them, the songsmith was horrified to see that the gaping wound on Monso’s foreleg had opened. The leg was covered with both fresh and dried blood. The stallion must have run for leagues after the wound had opened, and she had not seen it in the darkness. “Monso…” she whispered, sinking down beside him and stroking his neck. He lay unmoving, barely breathing. Eydryth felt tears well up again, and resolutely fought them back. Weeping would not help Monso, but Neave’s springwater might!
“Joisan… Sylvya…” She clasped hands briefly with each of these women who had helped to raise her. There would be time later, after everything possible had been done for Monso, for embraces and loving greetings. “I have something that may help. We have to drench him with this,” she said, holding up the flask. “He is too weak to swallow, so I will have to pour the water down his gullet while you hold his head up.”
“Water?” Joisan asked. Eydryth saw that the Wise Woman had her bag of simples and her healcraft supplies arranged beside her. The wound was already cleansed. A curved needle and a length of pronghorn sinew were laid out on the clean cloth beside her foster-mother. “What kind of water? How can mere water aid him?”
“Not just any water,” the minstrel explained. “This is water from Neave’s spring. It has great restorative effects.” She held out her own hands, palm up. “I just drank some, and see how it has aided me. Otherwise, I would not be on my feet any more than Monso is.”
Joisan gave her a measuring glance, then nodded quickly. “Firdun! Hyana!” she called. “Come, help me hold this creature’s head up so Eydryth can drench him!”
It took three of them to raise Monso’s head so that his neck lay at the proper angle for him to swallow. Then Eydryth used both hands to pry open the unconscious stallion’s jaws. Pulling his tongue out to one side of his mouth, she drew the stopper from the flask, then, cautiously, poured the water down the pale pink tunnel with its enormous teeth.
She poured… rubbed the Keplian’s throat until he swallowed, reflexively, then poured another measure down.
This time Monso swallowed on his own. Eydryth replaced the stopper, saving the remaining water for a later dose. Gently, her helpers eased the big head back down onto the pavement.
Monso’s eyelids lifted, then closed again. The stallion groaned, but did not awaken. His breathing grew stronger, more distinct, however, and Joisan, who kept one hand on his chest, behind his foreleg, looked up excitedly. “His heartbeat is strengthening!”
Sylvya laid her head against his shoulder, then glanced up at her friend, her enormous round eyes beneath her downy head-covering full of warning. “It is indeed! You had best do your stitchery while the beast remains unconscious, Joisan!”
Nodding agreement, the Wise Woman bent to her task, again cleansing the wound, then aligning the gaping edges, pulling them closed with careful, precise stitches, knotting and securing each one separately.
“Eydryth, I am anxious to know the whole of your story,” Joisan said as she worked, not looking up from her task.
The songsmith sighed. “So much has happened that I scarcely know where to start! Oh, Joisan… we must save Monso, if that is possible. He is Alon’s horse… and Alon may even now be in terrible danger! We must help him!”
Joisan gave her a quick, sideways glance. “Who is Alon?”
Eydryth could not help it; she felt her cheeks grow hot. Firdun and Hyana, who were crouching nearby, exchanged speculative glances. “Alon…” the girl muttered, still blushing. “He is… Monso—this Keplian’s—owner and master,” she began. “He is my… friend…”
The Wise Woman smiled slightly, and gave her fosterling a fond look. “Friend,” she repeated blandly.
Eydryth grew very busy checking to see that the water flask was indeed stoppered tightly. “He is an Adept who helped me on my quest to find a way to heal Jervon.” She patted the box in Alon’s jerkin pocket. “I have the cure with me. Praise Gunnora it will—”
She broke off at the click of hooves upon the steps. They all turned to see Kerovan descending. The Lord of Kar Garudwyn was of the heritage of the Old Ones, and was plainly not of full humankind. His eyes were amber, with slitted, uncanny pupils, and he stood upon cloven hooves rather than feet. Otherwise he was human, with black hair and features typical of the Old Race.
Eydryth’s mouth fell open, then she leapt up. “Kerovan, you must not leave your protections! Yachne may be trying to bespell you even now!”
“I could no longer remain inside,” her foster-father said testily, even as he enveloped her in a tight embrace. His strength and warmth felt wonderful after the perils of the night. Eydryth felt tears threaten again as she leaned against him for a moment; then he held her away, looking full into her face. “Eydryth… Daughter… scold me if you must, but, by the Nine Words of Min, tell me what chances tonight!”
Joisan carefully knotted the last stitch, then looked up at her lord, her brows drawing together in a frown. “Kerovan,” she said sternly. “Eydryth says that you are in danger. You must not—”
He shook his head impatiently. “You cannot expect me to sit in there and remain idle while there is a threat to my home and family, Joisan!” Kerovan turned to his foster-daughter, one hand going to the hilt of his sword. “Who is this Yachne you spoke of? How does she threaten us?” he demanded, all his years of soldiering coming to the fore.
The songsmith silently struggled to order the events of the past days into some kind of coherent account. As she hesitated, Joisan threw a blanket over the still-recumbent Keplian, then turned back to her lord. Suddenly the Wise Woman stiffened, then pointed at her husband’s feet with a cry of dismay. “Kerovan! Look!” she exclaimed.
Eydryth stepped back and stared, wide-eyed. On the stone around Kerovan’s hooves a dark mist—one that she well remembered from Yachne’s cave—was slowly forming!
“Kerovan!” she gasped, pointing. “That is Yachne’s spell! She means to draw you to her, then drain you of all Power! You must break the ensorcellment!”
Joisan bolted forward, hands going out to her lord, but he motioned her back, staring down at the dark purple mist now swirling around his legs. “No, my lady,” he ordered, in a voice that brooked no argument. “Do not seek to touch me, lest you be taken also.”
Eydryth felt as though she were trapped in a nightmare with no waking. She twisted her hands in impotent anguish. “Oh, Kerovan… can you stop it? Don’t let it take you!”
He raised one hand into the air, slowly, formally, in a beckoning gesture that was not aimed at anyone present. “Yes,” he said a moment later, calmly. “I can stop it.” The lord’s strange, inhuman eyes seemed to glow with an inner light as he began chanting in the Old Tongue.
The stunned onlookers watched as a glowing shape began forming around the heir to the gryphon-lord, encompassing him as he stood. Eydryth glimpsed a fierce head that reminded her of Steel Talon’s, then a huge, raised paw. Tawny hindquarters like unto a lion’s merged into an eagle’s foreparts.
The unhuman shadow’s eyes glowed golden-amber… and its eyes were Kerovan’s eyes. But the rest of that uncanny, dimly glimpsed shape was that of Landisl’s messenger, guardian and protector, the gryphon, Telpher. All her life Eydryth had heard the tales of how Landisl, the gryphon-lord, and Telpher, his servant, had protected both Joisan and Kerovan during their adventures… but never had she seen Landisl’s heir summon the guardian spirit until now.
Slowly, almost contemptuously. Telpher’s shadowy form raised a massive paw, then dragged it through the thickening mist, breaking the spell-circle.