Winds of Fury Page 19

  “Is this bad enough to cause measurable crop damage?” she shouted back to Cavil. He squinted up at the sky for a moment, as if taking its measure, then shook his head. “It won’t ruin the grazing, and the hay isn’t ripening yet,” he replied. “Most people around here are raising beef cattle, milch cows, and sheep, not crops. If this were farther south—” He shook his head. “We’ve been lucky; storms have been violent, but they haven’t caused any major crop damage yet.”

  Yet. The word hung in the air, as ominous as the lowering clouds.

  :Then we do nothing,: Firesong said firmly. :There is no point in meddling and making a bad situation worse! We can endure some rough weather; the worst we will suffer is a wetting and a chill. When I have an opportunity to meet with those who have records of normal weather patterns, then I will help reestablish those patterns.: He sighed. :I fear I was only too prophetic when I said there was a great deal of work ahead of me.:

  Elspeth shrugged and grimaced slightly, but she could certainly see his point. There was only one benefit the foul weather was bestowing. Cavil could not insist on leaving the gryphons or the Tayledras behind on the excuse that they couldn’t keep up with the Companions. He’d said something of the sort just before they left the Ashkevron manor, but his own Companion had told him tartly that no one was going to go racing to Haven in a downpour. In weather like this, even the Companions could not make very good time.

  Darkwind and Nyara rode on horses borrowed from Lord Ashkevron, at that worthy’s insistence. Those horses were what the Lord had referred to as “mudders;” sturdy beasts that could keep up a good pace all day through the worst weather. They were fairly ugly beasts; jug-headed, big-boned, as muscular as oxen, with rough, hairy hides that never could be curried into a shine. But those heavy bones and dense muscles pulled them right through the mire, and their dun-brown coats didn’t show mud as badly as Firesong’s white dyheli or the Companions—all of which were smeared and splattered up to their bellies.

  Well, we hardly make a good show, but that’s not such a bad thing, she reflected, shoving a strand of wet hair back under the hood of her cloak. No one even thinks twice about making a State Visit out of us when they see us. . . .

  In fact, the three times they had stopped overnight so far, their hosts had been so concerned by their appearance that they had simply hurried them into warm beds, and had meals sent up to their rooms. They had been able to avoid State nonsense altogether.

  Elspeth had just discovered something about herself, something she had learned after a mere twelve candlemarks in Cavil, Shion, and Lisha’s presence. Her tolerance for courtly politics had deteriorated to the point of nonexistence after her stay with k’Sheyna. She just didn’t want to hear about it. No gossip, no suppositions, none of it.

  At some point during her musing, Skif and Nyara had dropped back as well, leaving her in the lead. Well, that hardly mattered. No one was going to get lost on a perfectly straight road.

  Gwena sighed, her sides heaving under Elspeth’s legs. :I will be mortally glad to get to a warm, dry stable,: she said. :The Vales spoiled me.:

  The image she sent back included one of both Companions soaking away the cold in one of the hot springs. Elspeth chuckled, a little surprised; she hadn’t realized that Gwena and Cymry had made use of the Vale’s pools, too.

  It made sense, of course, since some things in a Vale had to suit not only humans, but the Hawkbrothers’ nonhuman allies. Surely dyheli used the hot springs, so why not the Companions?

  :They’ve spoiled me, too, dear,: she replied, feeling her own twinge of longing for those wonderful hot pools. The best she could expect would be a hot bath; not the same thing at all. We have got to see about creating something like the springs at Haven. Think about coming in for a soak after a freezing rain—:

  :Like this one? Oh, don’t remind me!: Gwena moaned. :I can’t even warm up by all the shoving through the mud!:

  Elspeth patted her shoulder sympathetically. :It’s almost dark,: she said, with encouragement. :It’s not that far till we stop. I’ll make sure you get something warm to eat, a nice hot mash or something like it, and a fire-warmed blanket.:

  Gwena cast a blue eye back at her, an imploring gaze made all the more pathetic by a soaked forelock straggling over the eye. : Please. And don’t forget just because a dozen nobles pounce on you once you’re in the door.:

  Any reply she might have made was interrupted by Shion riding up alongside. “Excuse me, Lady,” the Herald said, with a sharp and curious glance at Darkwind. “This man you are with? What exactly is his status?”

  Shion and Cavil, both born of noble families, had done their level best to get her to talk—or rather, gossip. They were terribly persistent about things Elspeth considered private matters, asking very prying questions whenever Darkwind was out of earshot. Maybe being with the Tayledras had changed her, but she just didn’t see where questions like this one were any of Shion’s business.

  Elspeth narrowed her eyes a bit at that, but kept her tone civil. And she chose to deliberately misunderstand the question. “I suppose that technically he is my equal,” she replied evenly. “He is the son of the leader of Clan k’Sheyna, and an ally in his own right—”

  She had a suspicion that this was not what Shion meant, and that suspicion was confirmed when the Herald frowned. “Actually, what I meant was—what is he to you? Why is he here, rather than in his own land?”

  Elspeth decided to skate right around the question, and continue to give the answers to the questions Shion did have a right to ask. “He is here because he is one of my teachers in magic, and because he has offered to teach however many of our Heralds who have the Mage-Gift as he can. And yes, he can tell who has it. He tells me that I am likely not the only Herald to have it.” She nodded as Shion bit off an exclamation. “Exactly. Evidently it was never precisely lost, but it was never used for lack of Heralds who could identify it and teach those who had it.” She blinked in surprise as she realized something. “For that matter, I can identify people with it, but I’m not qualified to teach.”

  :Yet,: Gwena added.

  :Hush, you’ll undermine my credibility,: she replied.

  Shion blinked, and licked her lips. “Do—do I have it?” she asked, as if she hoped to hear she did, and feared it at the same time.

  Elspeth Looked for a moment at all three of the Heralds, using that new ability, and shook her head. “Not unless it’s latent,” she replied honestly. “None of you do, actually. I should tell you it’s one of the rarer Gifts anyway. About as common as ForeSight, although that wasn’t always the case. People who had it tended to drift out of Valdemar, after Vanyel’s time. Most of the time it was identified and trained as if it was FarSight.”

  She paused for a moment, thinking quickly. “Don’t assume I’m something special just because I’m Mage-Gifted. There’ve been plenty of Heralds who were—and are!—it’s just that the Gift wasn’t identified as such. Really, the main reason that I’m the first new Herald-Mage is either a matter of accident or divine providence. If a threat like Ancar had come up before, one of the other Heralds with the Gift would have gone outKingdom to get the training. If it hadn’t come up now, I would still be sitting in Haven, getting beaten on by Kero and Alberich!”

  Shion nodded, looking a little disappointed. Elspeth only chuckled. “Look, I wouldn’t worry too much about it if I were you. Any Gift is useful. Any powerful Gift is extremely useful. It’s also extremely dangerous to the bearer and those around. Mage-Gift isn’t an answer to everything, and sometimes it’s less so than mind-magic. What’s more, mages don’t always think to counter mind-magic. When they do think of it, they don’t always succeed.”

  “That is because they cannot always counter mind-magic,” Darkwind said, riding up to join the conversation, as Skif moved obligingly out of the way for him. Elspeth smiled thankfully at him; now maybe Shion would stop prying for a little. Although . . . perhaps she was being too harsh. She was the Heir, and
what had happened to her in the Tayledras lands did have some importance for the Kingdom. And it was entirely possible that she was overreacting.

  Thank Havens he understands our tongue enough to come rescue me!

  Darkwind smiled charmingly at Shion. “There are ways to block some kinds of mind-magic, but they also block all other kinds of magic. A mage-shield powerful enough to block Mindspeaking blocks nearly everything else. So if you wish to keep your enemy from Mindspeaking, you also prevent yourself from working magic upon him.”

  Shion shook her head. “It’s too complicated for me,” she replied, and dropped back to ride beside Cavil, leaving Elspeth and Darkwind in the lead.

  “Your grasp of my language is improving,” she teased. He shrugged. Vree’s head peeked out from beneath a fold of the hood for a moment. The bondbird looked at the rain in acute distaste, made a ratcheting sound, and vanished back into Darkwind’s voluminous hood. Movement inside the hood showed Vree settling back to wait, probably grumbling to himself.

  “My grasp of your language is improving because I am taking most of it from your mind, bright feather,” he replied, giving her a glance that warmed her in spite of the freezing rain. “I thought perhaps I ought to save you from that too-curious colleague of yours.”

  “You noticed that, too, did you?” She grimaced. “All three of them are like that. I suppose it’s your exotic nature. It makes them terribly curious.”

  “I don’t know. . . .” He stared off ahead for a moment, then switched to Tayledras. “We have been three days on the road now, and it has not stopped, this questioning. Perhaps it is that we Hawkbrothers are more private, but they seem to see nothing amiss with wishing to know everything about me. Not only do they wish to know in detail what I plan to do when we reach Haven, they wish to know things that have no bearing on our mission. How I feel about everything, what my personal opinions are on such and such a thing, and most particularly, all the details of what you and I have done together. They seem to think they have a right to this information. It is—rather embarrassing.”

  She shook her head, puzzled and annoyed. “You may be mistaken,” she told him, but with a bit of doubt creeping into her voice. If he had gotten the impression that Shion was being a little too personal—

  But I am the Heir. Maybe she’s under orders from Mother to find out as much as she can about the people with me, and what we might have been—ah—involved in.

  “Our cultures are very different, after all,” she continued. “What sounds like a question about our personal lives may only be a question about what I was learning with you.”

  The look he gave her told her that he didn’t think that he was mistaken, but he let the matter drop. It wasn’t the first time he had complained of the other Heralds’ insatiable questioning, but it was the first time he had mentioned their interest in something that could only be fodder for gossip and could serve no other purpose.

  “You will probably get the usual greeting when we arrive,” he said instead, changing the subject. His eyes twinkled when she grimaced and winced.

  “If one more person comes up to me and says ‘but I thought you were dead!’ I’m going to strangle him,” she muttered. “I can’t believe people could be so stupid! And what difference would it make if I had been? The twins are perfectly capable, either one of them, of being made Heir. I am not indispensable! I’m only another Herald, if it comes right down to that.”

  “But the rumors made it seem as if you were indispensable, ke’chara,” he pointed out. “The rumors must have implied that your government was in a panic and trying to cover that panic. That makes me think that the rumors must have been more than idle nonsense; they must have been spread persistently and maliciously.”

  “Persistent and malicious—” Now that had a familiar, nasty ring to it. “Well, that’s Ancar all over,” Elspeth replied. “I can’t think of anyone who deserves that description more. No doubt where it came from. I don’t know what in seven hells he hoped to accomplish, though.”

  “Enough unrest would suit him, I suspect.” Darkwind put a hand inside his hood to scratch Vree’s breast-feathers. He had warned Elspeth that he was unused to riding, but he seemed to be doing just fine to her. Of course, it helped that their pace was being held to a fast walk. You had to really work to get thrown at that speed. “He wishes, I think, to make as much disturbance and confusion as possible. The Clans have a game like that, from one created by the Shin’a’in. Artful distraction.”

  She shook her head, and water dribbled into her face. “I just can’t believe that disruption would be enough for Ancar.”

  Darkwind continued to scratch Vree—which looked rather odd, since he seemed to be feeling around inside his hood for something—and his eyes darkened with thought. “What of this, then,” he said, after a moment. “You say that your younger siblings would make good Heirs. But their father is not your father, am I correct?” At her nod, he continued. “What if the rumors of your death were only a beginning—that once it was believed that you were dead, Ancar then planned to add rumors that your stepfather had contrived your death, in order to have his own children take the throne?”

  She stared at him, mouth dropping open. “That—that’s crazy!” she stammered, finally. “No one who knew my stepfather would ever believe that!”

  “No one who knew him, you say,” Darkwind persisted. “But this land of yours is a very large one, larger than I had ever guessed. So how many of these people out here truly know him? How can they? How many have even seen him more than once or twice, and at a distance?”

  It made diabolical sense. Especially given that Elspeth’s own father—Prince Daren’s brother—had tried to murder her mother and take the throne for himself. People would be only too ready to believe in the murderous intentions of another of the Rethwellan royals.

  For that matter, they had been perfectly willing to believe that she might plot against her mother, as if betrayal were somehow inheritable.

  Ancar was even clever enough to spread two conflicting sets of rumors. One set, that Prince Daren had connived at Elspeth’s death, and another, that Elspeth was alive and trying to usurp her mother’s throne.

  “I hate it,” she said slowly, “And you are probably right. Especially since my first destination was Rethwellan, his land. People would have been only too ready to believe he’d set something up with his brother to get rid of me.”

  Darkwind nodded. “And what effect would that have upon the rulers of your land?”

  “It—at the very best, it would be a distraction and cause a lot of problems at a time when we don’t need either.” She clenched her jaw. “At the worst, it would undermine confidence in the Queen and everything she stands for. That snake—he is as clever as he is rotten, I swear! He and Falconsbane are two of a kind!”

  “Then we must hope he never achieves the kind of power that Falconsbane had,” Darkwind said firmly. “We must work to be rid of him before he does. All the more reason for your friends to be here. We have seen this kind of creature before, and I hope we can second-guess Ancar because of our experience with Falconsbane.”

  Clouds were too thick for a real sunset, but the light was beginning to fade. Something large and dark, a building of some kind, was looming up in the distance at the side of the road; the rain was falling too thickly for Elspeth to make out what it was, but out here, it was unlikely to be anything other than their next stop, the manor of Lady Kalthea Lyonnes.

  Shion looked up and cried, “Look!” in a tone that confirmed Elspeth’s guess. They all urged their tired mounts into a little faster pace, and within half a candlemark they were pounding at the gates.

  Fortunately, after the trouble at the Ashkevron manor, someone always went on ahead to inform their hosts exactly what was coming. This time Lisha had ridden ahead to warn the Lady and her household about the gryphons; there was a certain amount of trepidation on the part of the servants who came out to meet them, but at least no one fled screaming
in fear.

  Things were sorted out with commendable haste. The gryphons were conducted off to the chapel—chapels seemed to be the only rooms suitable to their size—the Companions and dyheli taken to the stables and a promised hot mash and rubdown. And finally the two-legged members of the party were brought in, still dripping a little, to be presented to their hostess.

  “Elspeth!” the Lady cried, clasping Elspeth’s hand and kissing it fervently. “Thank the gods! We heard you were dead!”

  Darkwind choked, smothering a laugh, and Elspeth only sighed.

  But later that night, after all the fuss was over and everyone had been settled into their rooms, Elspeth sagged into a chair beside the fire and stared into the flames. Perhaps this business of staying with the high-born was a mistake. . . .

  On the other hand, no inn would ever accept the gryphons. And at least in this way, word was being spread quickly that she was alive and she had returned with some real help against Ancar.

  But another little conversation with Shion and with a cousin of Shion’s who lived here had just proved to her that Darkwind was right. Shion and the others weren’t at all concerned with the welfare of Valdemar—or at least that wasn’t their motivation in cross-examining her. They were just plain nosy. They wanted gossip-fodder, and what was more, if she didn’t give it to them, they were perfectly capable of making things up out of whole cloth!

  Shion’s cousin had brought Elspeth her supper, using that as an excuse to ask any number of increasingly impertinent questions. Finally she had concluded, shamelessly, with the question of whether it was true that Hawkbrothers only mated in groups, saying as an excuse that she had read about it in “an old story.” And it was pretty obvious that the cousin also wanted to know if Elspeth had been a member of one of those groups.