Nothing untoward happened after fifteen minutes so he poured some of it into the bowl and drank it. He waited for another period and noticed some diminution of his fever and no other ill effects, so he drank the rest. He propped himself up on his pillows. He felt the potion begin to take effect and allowed himself to drop into sleep.
The stealthy opening of the door brought him instantly back to wakefulness. He opened his eyes narrowly and focused on the doorway. He did not move. In his weakened state he would need any edge he could get against the intruder and surprise was always the greatest of advantages. He saw a shadowy outline move closer across the room. Stealthily he grasped the poker. When the intruder reached the side of his bed, Kormak reached out and grabbed for the throat.
“You are awake then,” said a woman’s voice, surprisingly husky.
“Who are you?” Kormak said.
“You are as suspicious as they said.”
“Probably more so,” Kormak agreed. “You still have not answered my question, and I can assure you that your life depends on giving me a good answer.”
“I am not a robber,” said the woman. “I just wanted to take a look at the mysterious guest the storm deposited on our doorstep.”
“Your name, lady. My patience is not limitless.”
She laughed as if amused. “I am the Lady Kathea. I am the employer of the wizard who looked after you, or rather I am the wife of the man who employs him.”
“And you decided to visit my room in the middle of the night to make sure of their handiwork?”
“I confess I was curious,” she said. “I have never seen a Guardian before. I have read about them in the old tales, of course, but I have always thought they were legends. An order of knights sworn to oppose the Shadow, to protect humanity from the Old Ones. It seems more like a legend than something one would encounter in the light of day.”
“My order is quite real, lady, and not nearly so heroic as the tales would have you believe.”
“I am not surprised,” she said. “Life is full of disappointments. Would you mind if I lit a candle? I am not quite so adept at seeing in the dark as you.”
“Go ahead, but make no sudden movements.”
She stepped away and went over to the fire. With a wooden spill she lit a candle and came back over to where Kormak sat. It was beeswax, not tallow, a sign that the lady or her husband were rich. Of course, he had not needed the candle to tell him that. The fact that they had a wizard in their retinue was evidence enough. She sat down in the same chair as the wizard Tarsus had. The candle underlit her face and he was not surprised to see that she was beautiful. Something about her voice, her movements and her confidence had already told him that she would be.
“You are quite lovely,” he said, studying her golden hair, high cheekbones and large eyes.
“And you are very gallant for a monk.”
“I am not a monk, lady. I am a soldier.”
“And you fight a war against the Shadow.”
“That is an overly dramatic way of putting it.”
“I find it curious that you should appear out of nowhere at this time in this place. Why are you here? Who are you looking for?”
“I was looking for shelter from the storm.”
Her head tilted to one side and he could tell she was studying him very carefully. “I cannot tell whether you are lying or not,” she said at last.
“Why would I lie about such a thing?”
“Because you belong to an order that hunts men and wizards and other things and you are here now, of all times. It seems an odd coincidence.”
“In what way?”
“I cannot believe you would be here, in the middle of this forsaken wilderness, for no reason.”
“I was sent to recover something that was stolen, lady.” He was not exactly sure why he was telling her this but he was tired and it was on his mind and he felt the need to talk. Perhaps it was the medicine and the illness.
“And perhaps to kill the one who ordered it so?” There was an edge to that question, an under-current of nervousness and anticipation. What had he stumbled into here, Kormak wondered.
“I have said too much already.”
“No you have not. I bear you no ill will.”
“I am very pleased to hear it.” She leaned forward and without really knowing why, he reached up to move a strand of her hair that had fallen into her eyes. He was all too aware of the soft curves of her body. Kormak wondered why he was flirting with this woman. If she was, as she said, the wife of the local lord it was a very dangerous thing to do. Of course, that might have been part of its attraction. And there was the situation. It was night. They were in his room. He was affected by the medicine he had taken earlier.
“You are not what I expected at all,” she said. Her voice was soft and thoughtful.
“What did you expect?”
“A fanatic and a killer.”
“A killer I am, lady. One who wonders why you felt the need to visit him alone in the dark.”
She seemed about to say something then shook her head. “I do not think I am any wiser than when I came in but I shall deny you your rest no longer, Guardian.”
She rose from the chair and went to the door, taking her candle with her. When she left the room, more light than its went with her. Kormak lay awake in the darkness for a long time, listening to the wind howl, watching the fire die. Tired as he was, sleep would not come. At some point he thought he heard a scream but it might have been the wind or it might just have been the edge of a dream intruding into the world.
The wind still howled outside when Kormak woke. He rose from the bed and tottered to the window, throwing aside the curtains. Outside it was day but the snow storm made it hard to make out any details. He saw flakes falling hard and fast into a courtyard and beyond that he thought he saw a high stone wall. It was obvious he was in a fortified manor of some sort and quite a large one. His head felt fuzzy and vague and he still felt weak. Someone had come in through the night and put more wood on the fire. It alarmed him that he had not woken. Normally he slept lightly and the faintest noise would wake him. He was in worse shape than he thought.
He moved back towards the bed as he heard footsteps in the corridor. He was sitting upright as Tarsus entered. The wizard looked even older in the daylight. His face was deeply lined, etched with marks of pain. Crow’s feet made trenches around his eyes. His hair was a dirty grey. The whites of his eyes were yellowish. Kormak noticed that his nails were long in the manner of the eastern aristocracy, a scholarly caste who liked to show they did not need to perform manual labour, or even wield a blade.
“You have made a better recovery than I expected,” Tarsus said. “You must be a very strong man.”
Kormak looked at him. “You have come to check up on me?”
“I have. It would do my reputation no good for me to save you from the effects of cold, only to die of something else.”
“Your reputation is important to you?”
“You don’t like wizards, do you, Guardian? I suppose that is understandable.”
“I have seen too much evil worked by wizards.”
“We have no monopoly on wickedness, sir.”
“That is nothing less than the truth.”
The wizard raised one bushy grey eyebrow. “I am surprised to hear you admit it.”
“Only a fool denies what his eyes can see,” Kormak said.
“Sometimes what we see is an illusion.”
“We were doing so well there, wizard. We had found a point of agreement and you have to go and spoil it by your allusions.”
Tarsus smiled. “It was illusions I mentioned but we shall forget that. Let me see your hands.”