“He has already cost me plenty,” Clovanos agreed. He couldn’t forget the loss of his towers during the siege of lightning. “If only we could come up with some alternate plan.”
The din in the chamber was considerable. Xixis leaned closer to his ally. “What do you mean?” he asked.
“I can’t speak in certainties,” Clovanos replied, his words barely audible, “but suppose the fortress is finished before the Speaker decides the prince has been re-habilitated? Kith-Kanan has sworn to retire once Pax Tharkas is done; if Prince Ulvian is still under a cloud, another candidate must be found.”
Xixis’s mouse-colored hair was limp with perspiration, and his flowing robe clung to his clammy skin. Blotting his face with one sleeve, his eyes darted around. No one was listening to them.
“Who, then?” he hissed. “Not that dragon of a daughter!”
Clovanos sneered. “Even the open-minded people of Qualinesti would balk at having a half-human female as Speaker of the Sun! No, listen. You are familiar with the name Lord Kemian Ambrodel?” Xixis nodded. Lord Ambrodel was a prominent figure. “He is pure Silvanesti in heritage and a notable warrior.”
“But he is not of House Silvanos!” Xixis cried, and Clovanos shushed him.
“That’s the beauty of my plan, my friend. If we begin a campaign to have Lord Ambrodel named as the Speaker’s heir, then His Majesty will feel compelled to recall Prince Ulvian from Pax Tharkas.”
Xixis regarded his companion blankly.
“Don’t you see?” Clovanos went on. “Publicly the Speaker may denounce his son as a failure, a weak and cruel rogue who deals in slaves. However, Kith-Kanan won’t deny his own family. He cannot, any more than he could have had Ulvian executed. No, the Speaker, for all his harsh words, wants only his own son, the direct descendant of the great Silvanos, to ascend the throne of Qualinesti. If we agitate for another heir, it will force the Speaker’s hand. He must recall the prince!”
Xixis didn’t seem convinced. “I have known the Speaker for two hundred years,” he said. “I fought with him in the great war. Kith-Kanan will do what he thinks is right, not what’s best for his family.”
Clovanos rose to go, smoothing his pale hair back from his face. Xixis stood also. Linking his arm in the arm of Xixis, Clovanos murmured sagely, “We’ll see, my friend. We’ll see.”
“This air is like dragon’s breath!” complained Rufus, sagging on the seat of the cart. Beside him rode Verhanna on her coal-black horse, and behind the kender creaked the other cart containing the freed slaves. Two days had passed, and the sun had burned continuously for a day and a half now.
“Have some water,” Verhanna suggested, licking her dry lips. She passed her waterskin to the kender. He put the spout to his lips and drank deeply. “How far do you think we’ve ridden?” she asked. Without the moons or stars to go by, or even the passage of the sun across the sky, they’d lost track of what hour or day it was.
Rufus pondered her question. His scouting skills had grown fuzzy in the constant daylight and mounting heat. “A horse can walk forty miles a day,” he said slowly. His freckled face screwed itself into a fearsome frown. “But how long is a day when the sun doesn’t shift and the stars don’t shine?” He shook his small head, lashing his damp topknot from side to side. “I don’t know! Is there anything more to drink?” The waterskin was drained.
Verhanna sighed and admitted there was no more water. She’d shed her armor and cloak and was down to wearing a thin white shirt and divided kilt. Her elven heritage was ever more apparent in her long limbs and pale skin. The subtle influence of her human blood showed in her figure, more muscular than any elven woman.
“Any problems back there?” she called over her shoulder. The boy, Kivinellis, and the elf woman, Deramani, sprawled atop a mound of loose baggage in the second cart, waved listlessly from their perch. Selenara, driving the cart, was too weary even to acknowledge Verhanna’s call. Diviros himself was propped up in the first cart, driven by Rufus, and his hands and feet were still tied, a gag in his mouth.
No trace of the Kagonesti slavers had turned up during their drive west. Verhanna had resigned herself to the fact that they had lost the slavers. Nevertheless, she felt a strong sense of responsibility for the former slaves in her care. Rufus, however, insisted he might still recover their trail. Ahead lay the Astradine River, and the Kagonesti would have to cross it. There was no bridge, the kender recalled, just privately owned ferries. Someone would have seen the Kagonesti. Someone would remember them.
They rode on, their heads nodding as they drifted in and out of heat-fogged sleep. The forest around them was unnaturally quiet. Even the birds and beasts were oppressed by the heat.
As he bobbed along, the kender dreamed he was back in the snow-capped peaks of the Magnet Mountains, where the captain had first found him. In his mind, he climbed the highest slopes and threw himself down into the drifted snow. How good it felt! How sweet the wind was, how fresh the clear, cold air! The gods themselves knew no kinder home than the peaks of the Magnets.
No one had any business screaming in such a peaceful place.
A drop of sweat slid down Rufus’s nose. He batted it away. Ah, to shiver as the chill air brought gooseflesh to his bare arms! The brilliance of the valley below…Screaming?
He forced his eyes open as the sound came again. Verhanna was also drowsing, and it took several tugs on her arm before Rufus could get her to open her eyes.
“What—what is it?” she asked languidly.
“Trouble,” was his matter-of-fact reply. As if on cue, the scream rang out a third time. Verhanna sat up and pulled in her reins.
“By Astra!” she exclaimed, “I thought I’d dreamed that!”
Kivinellis ran up beside Verhanna’s horse. Damp with sweat, his blond hair gleamed in the brilliant sunlight. “It sounds like a lady in distress!” he announced.
“So it does. Can you tell which direction, Wart?” Verhanna nervously drew her sword.
Rufus stood on the cart seat and slowly craned his head in a circle, trying to catch the source of the sound. His pointed, elflike ears were infallible. “Ha!” he crowed at last and bounced on his toes.
Verhanna listened hard. Sure enough, she heard a faint crashing sound, the sort of noise a person might make if he were running pell-mell through the woods. She thrust her dagger and shield at Kivinellis.
“Defend the carts!” she cried. The shrill scream split the air once more. “Grab your horse, Wart. We’re off!” Rufus was off the cart and on his chestnut mount before the words had scarcely left his captain’s mouth. They turned their horses south, off the narrow track they’d been following, and plunged into the forest proper. Saplings and tree limbs raked at their faces. Verhanna had her sword, but the kender was poorly armed for a fight. Aside from a sheath knife, his only weapon was a kender sling. It was a light, handy missile thrower, which he’d used to good effect in the fight at the slavers’ camp, but it would be hard to use in the close-growing trees.
Indistinct shouts came from ahead, off to their left. Verhanna halted her horse and waited. Someone was running.
A black-haired human woman, clutching a baby to her breast, came stumbling through the undergrowth. Tears streaked her face. Now and again, she looked back over her shoulder and screeched in terror. Verhanna dug in her spurs and rode hard toward her. The woman saw the warrior maid on horseback, sword drawn, and screamed again—this time for pure joy. She threw herself at the horse’s feet.
“Noble lady, save us!” she whimpered. The baby in her arms was bawling loudly, nearly drowning out her words.
Rufus rode up beside his mistress. “Who’s after you?” he asked the frightened woman.
“Terrible creatures—monsters. They want to eat my child!”