Thyrn’s plea was greeted by a difficult silence. The effect on Endryk was almost palpable and Nordath and the Wardens watched him uncomfortably, torn between the raw pain in Thyrn’s voice and the brutality of what he was asking.
Eventually, Endryk reined his horse to a halt. For a moment he looked as if he were about to turn around and ride away.
‘I don’t know what to tell you,’ he said. ‘I can teach you how to survive out here, how to fight, perhaps how to be like you think I am, if that’s what you want. But that won’t make you either a survivor or a fighter. That comes from somewhere else in the end. I can’t take you back to what I went through, even if I wanted to – which I don’t.’
‘I need your help,’ Thyrn said simply.
‘I don’t think I’ve any more to offer than I already have,’ Endryk replied.
Reluctantly, Hyrald intervened. ‘You’re the only person who has.’
Endryk straightened up and looked along the valley. The others followed his gaze. As they did so, a solitary shaft of sunlight made its way through the clouds to fall on the lake. It gave it a brilliance and vividness that made all else around them seem unreal.
‘If you’re asking yourself why you came with us, I think this might be one of your answers,’ Adren said, quietly bringing her horse alongside him.
The clouds moved to extinguish the shaft of light, turning the sun back into a pallid disc and restoring the valley.
Endryk looked at her enigmatically, then gave a prosaic sniff and clicked his horse forward. He made a final faint attempt to avoid the burden that Thyrn was asking him to carry.
‘I was surrounded by trusted friends…’
‘So am I.’
‘I had skills born out of years of training…’
‘So have I – where I must fight.’
Endryk yielded. He gave Thyrn a look which Hyrald recognized. It was that of a Commander about to lie to an eager novice who has just volunteered for a dangerous task – a task he might well succeed in if unclouded by the greater wisdom of his superior. The look was full of confidence and trust, immediately behind which lay agonizing doubts and prayers to whatever forces its giver believed shaped the lives of men. As for the lies, they were necessary if those very doubts were not going to infect their recipient and bring about the doom they feared.
‘I can’t make you into a weapons master overnight. The essence of almost everything you need to know in that regard, I’ve already shown you. What you know, you know better than you think and it will work for you when you need it.’ He began to speak with more assurance. ‘I’ve told you before, not to be afraid of being afraid. It’s your greatest protection – the inner knowledge of your deepest self and that of generations long gone. When I think back to fighting in the line, much of it is vague, with only occasional, terrible images left now. But though the details have… slipped away, I do remember that everything was vivid and simple.’ He became pensive. ‘There was only the moment and its single solitary task – infinitely clear and focused, each fraction of time the totality of everything I’d ever been. Yet too, there was a deep awareness of everything else that was happening around me.’
Endryk gave a fatalistic shrug. ‘I did what I did because I was there… and because I could. True, we’d sought the battle, but we hadn’t sought the war, and now there was no choice. No acceptable choice. To yield would mean not only my death, but would bring others down with me. An endless wave of crumbling destruction would ripple out from me, spreading through my immediate companions and thence across the battlefield and far beyond – right down into the heart of my homeland and everything I loved and valued.’
He shook his head reflectively and drew the others into his conversation. ‘And if that had happened, you’d all be far wiser about the lands to the north of here than you are now, believe me. Far wiser. And your present problems would be as nothing.’ He turned back to Thyrn. ‘It was as though, like you, something had awakened in me. All of us have resources we can’t begin to imagine – you touched on part of that last night. Be grateful for it. Be glad it’s there. And know that it’ll come to your aid when you need it.’
He was silent for a while, his eyes fixed on the distant peak. ‘If this enemy you’re set on facing is a Caddoran thing, I can’t begin to tell you how to deal with it. Besides, you don’t need my help. But I do know that winning and losing will be for the most part in your mind. It will hinge on how much you value yourself.’ He leaned over and gripped Thyrn’s arm powerfully. ‘And youmust value yourself! Value yourself as we value you. I consider myself better for having met you. Maybe, like me and my former comrades you’ll have to fight just because of where you find yourself. I can’t imagine you’ll have sought a conflict or done anything to warrant an attack against you, but if such a thing happens, remember that, above all, you have the right to be, and no mercy is due to anyone who’d deny you that.No mercy. Not until they offer you no further threat. Do you understand what I’m telling you?’
‘I think so,’ Thyrn said. He kept his eyes on Endryk’s face, searching. ‘But what if circumstances are such that I do start the conflict?’
Endryk released him and met his gaze clearly. ‘If that is necessary, then it’s necessary. And nothing I’ve just said is changed. But don’t burden yourself with such a prospect. I know enough about you to believe you’ll do no foolish thing, still less an evil one. I’ve no doubts about that whatsoever. Whatever you do it will only be to prevent a greater harm, Thyrn. You can trust your judgement.’ He turned away. ‘That’s all the help I can give you.’
Vellain was nibbling at her thumbnail. Not actually biting it, just clattering her teeth off the edge of it. It was something she had not done since she was a child but she caught herself doing it several times as the coach and its escort clattered south from Degelvak. Finding herself victim of this childhood habit added a frisson of vicious anger to the deep concern which was racking her and she smacked her clenched fist against the coach’s lavish upholstery.
Vashnar had been ablaze with frantic, driving energy when he awoke.
‘I’ve been blind, Vellain,’ he told her afterwards. ‘Blind. All these years. Confining my ambitions. Restricting myself. Hedging myself in.’
It had taken her some time to quieten him down sufficiently to get him to divulge the source of this revelation. It had come as a shock.
‘Was it a dream?’ she had suggested hesitantly, despite anticipating his well-known response.
‘I don’t dream. Never have.’
He had faced her. ‘Trust me. As you always have. What happened was just as real as my encounters with Thyrn. More so, perhaps.’
‘I do, I do,’ she forced herself to say enthusiastically. ‘But it’s such a strange tale. A hooded figure – a grey hall – voices – different worlds.’
‘I felt the power, Vellain! Just as I felt it in Nesdiryn when I met Hagen. Only much more so. It was tangible this time; it struck me – held me.’ He brought his ring close to his face. ‘Hagen gave me this, do you remember? He looked at me – through me – I’ve never met anyone like him. He said I was one of them. Now I understand what he meant. And what a true gift this thing is.’
Before she could question him, he was pacing the bedroom.
His moving bulk and its attendant, storming shadows ploughed through the soft lamplight, filling the room, like a manifestation of the very power he was talking about.
‘Destiny, Vellain. That’s what it is. It’s not something I’d have given a moment’s credence to before, but I can see it now. Why me? I’ve asked. Why should Thyrn reach into me, to disturb all our carefully laid plans with his grotesque talent? But just as people are drawn to a crowd, just as money is drawn to money as Darransen’s always saying, just as rivers are drawn to the sea, so the same law works at many different levels. The reason’s unknowable, but the reality’s beyond debate; it just needs to be seen and seized. I couldn’t have avoided this if I’d wished to. Destiny has moved these things to me inexorably – Hagen, the ring, Thyrn, Hyrald and the others, Aghrid’s failure – all conjoined to bring me to this wakening. This revelation of the power that lies within the borders of Arvenstaat and is there for my taking so that these selfsame borders can be swept aside.’
Her own mood swinging between fearful doubt and breath-catching exhilaration at her husband’s passion, Vellain had not been able to speak. Vashnar stopped pacing.
‘It’s there. Faint and distant, but as clear as someone talking to me.’ He sat on the bed beside her, his great arm encircling her. ‘No, I’m not going mad. I’m just seeing a pattern in events that I can’t explain to you. But it’s inside me.’ He placed his hand on his chest. ‘I must follow the call that they’ve left me. I must find this place. It’s in the mountains.’ He stood up and began pacing again. ‘Thyrn will be drawn there, too. They told me this, but I can feel it anyway. Just as part of him has been lingering within me, so I can feel it being drawn by the same lure. And when he arrives, I’ll be waiting, and…’ He drew his finger across his throat.
Then he had charged into a flurry of planning and organizing. It had taken Vellain’s every effort to prevent him from rousing their host immediately and announcing his new intentions then and there, in the middle of the night.
She had prevailed, in the end pinioning him with a fervent embrace. ‘You might be bursting with energy, but everyone else in this place – including most of the Tervaidin – is either exhausted or drunk or both. They’ll certainly not be fit for anything. If all this has been such a time coming, it’ll be there in the morning, won’t it? And there’ll be more if you’ve rested for a while – you know that. You know your best plans come to you silently when you’re asleep.’ She tightened the embrace and lowered her voice. ‘Besides, if you’re dashing off into the mountains and dispatching me to attend to affairs at home, it’ll be some time before we’re… together again, won’t it?’
Neither of them had slept well, though, and their parting had been clumsy and awkward, something that, like the nail biting, added anger to her doubts. For doubts she had had in the colder light of morning and the mundane routines of waking and breakfasting. After they had eaten, Vashnar had curtly dismissed all the servants and, with only marginal politeness, three other guests. ‘The moment has come,’ he told his startled host. ‘Prepare your men. They must be ready to act as soon as you receive my final command, which will be within a few days.’
The man’s knees had seemed to be troubling him as he stood up, pushing his chair back noisily, but Vashnar’s firm hand on his shoulder had steadied him. ‘You know what to do. I have complete faith in you.’
The man had saluted and almost shouted, ‘To the New Order.’
Vellain did not share all Vashnar’s faith in these provincial followers and this performance only served to heighten her concern. It was her doubts about them that had marred their parting. They had stopped at a crossroads some way outside Degelvak.
‘You’re absolutely certain of all this?’ she had whispered to him as he was about to step out of the coach.
‘Yes, of course,’ Vashnar replied, tapping his foot anxiously. ‘I can see now that everything we’ve done has just been a preparation for greater things. This is the moment. We mustn’t delay. If we miss it, it may be gone for ever.’
She had not been able to keep her doubts from her face. ‘But some of your supporters,’ she gesticulated vaguely back towards Degelvak, ‘leave a lot to be desired.’
Vashnar’s foot-tapping moved to his hand, resting on the handle of the coach door. ‘I have their measure – all of them. They’re trusted and capable. Don’t speak like this in front of anyone else.’
‘You know I…’
But he was through the door before she could finish her protest, and their parting consisted of a cursory nod on Vashnar’s part followed by a sharp order to the coachman to move on quickly. Vellain had to steady herself as the coach jolted forward, but she kept her eyes on her husband as he strode away, signalling to Aghrid for his horse. He did not look back. This small neglect cut through her and a tangle of anger rose up inside her briefly. In its wake came a dark, visceral fear. She quelled both to some degree with excuses involving his preoccupation with urgent needs – having to plan quickly – move quickly. But the fear in particular would not wholly leave her. There was also an odd, even incongruous, sense of disappointment. Such a parting should have been more heroic.
She looked at the sealed orders which Vashnar had prepared and which he had told her to deliver on her journey back to Arvenshelm. He was so confident that he could deal with Thyrn, acquire this strange power that had been offered him, and be back in Arvenshelm in time to take the reins that he had told her to gather for him. But though still powered by the force of her husband’s sudden resolution, the haste with which events were moving kept her doubts swirling. She chose not to dwell too much on the hooded figure he claimed to have encountered. In that she would have to trust him absolutely. But if he was late, what then? All could well be lost without his presence to sway any waverers. Yet if she delayed and he arrived ready to sweep to power, that could be even worse.
It took her a long time and more blows to the unoffending upholstery before she calmed sufficiently to think clearly about what was happening and what she must do.
It was a time of risk, that was all. And the coming of such a time had been seen as inevitable from the beginning, even though its precise nature could not be foreseen. And too, Vashnar was more used to risks than she was. His judgement in matters of immediate action could be trusted, she knew. As for discovering that he was a man of destiny, she had always known that.
She immersed herself in the details of the tasks he had asked her to perform, resolved now. She had all his authority. There would be no faltering on her part and she would ensure that there would be none by any of his supporters.
As Vellain’s coach and escort galloped south, like the skittering pebbles that would unleash an avalanche, Vashnar was leading his Tervaidin west towards the mountains, his every sense attuned to the call that was luring him on.