Rialla remained impassive though anxiety coursed through her—was that sarcasm that she heard in Terran’s voice? It was hard for her to decipher from his tone alone, but she didn’t dare look up at his face.
“Just because you slept with her is no sign that she is telling the truth,” snapped Winterseine impatiently.
“Father,” said Terran slowly, without the deference that Rialla was used to hearing from him, “just because my magic works differently than yours does not make it weak. I can tell truth from falsehood.” His voice took on undercurrents that were meant for Winterseine alone. “If you choose to forget my capabilities, that is your problem.”
“I don’t understand what you mean.” Winterseine’s voice was full of innocent affront as false as a glass ruby.
“Of course not. Just remember that without me, your chances of become King of Darran are minimal at best. Especially if the dagger should arrive in Sianim.” Cold menace laced Terran’s speech. Rialla kept her head lowered.
“I think that we understand each other,” commented Winterseine coolly, as he slipped the heavy leather collar around Rialla’s neck again and tugged her to her feet. When he touched her, Rialla felt his fear… and hatred. “Shall we head back?”
There was no horse for Rialla to ride; their packhorse was heavily laden with supplies. Instead, she walked briskly beside Winterseine’s mount. The ground was rough, and the horse could travel no faster than she. It picked the easiest path through the brush and left Rialla to fight her way through as best she could.
That evening they stopped beside a stream and ate camp fare from the packs the spare horse carried. The stew was unseasoned, but might have tasted better without the tight knot in Rialla’s stomach.
After they’d eaten, Terran filled a small earthenware bowl with water from the stream. He knelt beside the bowl and nicked his thumb with his knife, letting a few drops of blood spill into the bowl. With the bowl in his hands, he sat cross-legged with his eyes closed.
While he meditated or prayed, Rialla finished washing the dishes from dinner and repacked them. Winterseine tied Rialla’s arms tightly behind her and attached her leash to a tree. He unrolled his bedroll and closed his eyes.
Rialla was too uncomfortable to sleep, so she laid her cheek against the rough bark of the tree and watched Terran without interest. The setting sun still gave enough light that she could see him clearly.
She shifted awkwardly, trying to ease the discomfort of her arms, and wished that Tris were around to untie her. She was familiar enough with the whip to know that Winterseine’s blow had only raised a welt, but it was rubbing painfully against the tree.
A weird cry reverberated eerily through the darkness and was answered almost immediately from the other side of their camp. Rialla jerked reflexively against the ropes that held her helpless as yet a third Uriah sounded from somewhere just behind and to her left.
She stared intently at a moving shadow in the nearby bushes, gradually becoming aware of other forms that surrounded the camp. She realized she’d been smelling them for a while, but had been too tired to realize it. Tris was right; they smelled like rotting corpses.
As she watched, they crept closer, mute now. This was a much larger group than the one she and Tris had found. She could count twenty easily, and suspected that there were more lurking in the shadows.
Winterseine had come to his feet at the first cry. He stood between Rialla and the small camp fire, so she saw him only as a shadowed figure that slowly pivoted until he’d looked all the way around.
Terran set the bowl aside and rose to his full height. He seemed relaxed and unworried. “It’s all right,” he said. “They have come because they know who I am.”
When he spoke, the creatures quit moving. If Rialla hadn’t been watching them before, she wouldn’t have been able to pick out where the Uriah stood in the darkness.
“Poor things,” Terran commented in a conversational tone. “The first Uriah were made before the Wizard Wars, and the black secrets of their making should have died with the last of the Great Ones. But Geoffrey ae’Magi had to play with the twisted magic once again. His perversion of magic was what awakened the old gods.” Terran shook his head. “The purpose of having an ae’Magi, an Archmage, was to prevent such forbidden magic; obviously it hasn’t worked.”
Terran waved his hand vaguely at the Uriah. “This is the reason, Father, that Altis must conquer the West. Magic is too powerful a force for humans to wield unchecked.”
Rialla thought that Winterseine’s silhouette stiffened, but she couldn’t be certain.
The Uriah began to move again, closing in on the small camp. The horses shifted nervously and began tugging at the ropes that held them—so did Rialla.
“Poor things,” said Terran again and held both hands over his head, palms facing outward. “Listen!” His voice became that of the prophet of Altis, echoing oddly in the trees. At his first word the Uriah halted their slow advance. If her hands had been free, Rialla could have reached out and touched the one nearest to her—not that she had any desire to do so.
“Hear me, Altis, Lord of the Night. Release these thy children. Release them, Altis. They suffer for another’s sin.”
The Uriah began to make a whispering noise, over and over again. The hair on the back of Rialla’s neck prickled as she listened closely to the nearest Uriah.
It spoke, but not in Darranian. In the Common tongue, it whispered, “please,” over and over again. Rialla looked at it closely, and saw that it wore the remains of the uniform of one of the Sianim guard units. Shock rippled through her as she realized that it must have once been human.
Rialla was no magician, but even she felt the power in Terran’s voice as he shouted, “Release them, now!”
Slowly at first, then all at once, the Uriah fell to lie on the ground. Rialla kept her gaze on the Uriah nearest her. As she watched, the thing’s body twisted and changed until she was looking at the corpse of a human in a state of advanced decomposition.
It lay still where it fell, without breathing.
Winterseine looked around at the corpses and then said, “We’ll have to move camp. I don’t know about you, but I can’t sleep with this smell.”
Rialla stared at the dead body that lay beside her. Uriah were said to be virtually immune to magic, and Terran had just killed at least thirty of the thrice-cursed things.
She didn’t know how strong Tris was, but she didn’t think that any kind of magic, human or otherwise, was going to be able to defeat Winterseine’s son. If she didn’t escape before Tris returned, there would be a confrontation that she and her healer would lose.
Tris couldn’t use the sylvan path to travel the whole way; the magic was draining and less effective as the yew and oak forest gave way to willow and birch. Still, in less than two days, he reached sight of Sianim—considerably faster than a human would have.
In the center of a large valley rose a steep-sided plateau with a single narrow, walled path leading upward to the city. The path was crowded at this time of the day, and Tris was forced to dawdle slowly behind a train of donkeys.
The noise from the city was deafening after the quiet forest. Tris followed the donkeys to the center of Sianim, where the markets were, then he tried to find someone with whom he could communicate. Living in Darren most of his life, he spoke Sylvan, Darranian and only a smattering of Common: a combination of gesture and slang that merchants had developed and the Sianim mercenaries had made their own. He’d hoped to find someone who could speak Darranian. but he had to make do with his poor Common.
He gave up trying to find Laeth’s apartment, but the Lost Pig was easier. When three or four people pointed to one of the winding streets that Sianim was inflicted with, Tris started down it.