One of the powers Vulkan had that Macurdy didn't was an infallible sense of position and orientation. Thus they left without waiting for sunrise, and half an hour later reached Road B. Clouds were moving in, concealing the sun, and shortly afterward it began to snow. When it stopped, six hours later, the old snow had been covered by five inches of fresh white. It was the first substantial snowfall since the big storm in Eleven-Month. Meanwhile the air had warmed notably. At midday, it seemed to Macurdy, it wasn't a whole lot below freezing.
He preferred the weather they'd been having, bitter though it had been. With the new snow, Kurqosz could order out his entire cavalry to hunt and track raiders. Though knowing the Ozians, Kormehri, and Kullvordi, they'd no doubt take advantage of it to lead pursuers into ambushes.
Cloaked or not, Vulkan too left tracks. They were not, however, the only cloven tracks. There were both deer and elk around, and to inexperienced observers, Vulkan's prints could pass for elk. Even as Macurdy thought it, Vulkan left the road, to parallel it forty to sixty yards back in the woods. In the woods, of course, the old snow had not been packed by traffic, and travel was somewhat slower. But cloven tracks that went straight down the road for miles might inspire curiosity.
It was late afternoon when they reached the big clearing. They examined the buildings from the forest edge. The row of cabins suggested the homes of tenant farmers or bonded help.
Now, of course, they housed soldiers. But by no means all the soldiers, for nearby were rows of crude huts under construction, and a short distance from them, rows of squad tents with the new snow swept off. But Macurdy gave the manor house his major attention. The number of people going in and out suggested considerable command activity.
Macurdy and Vulkan settled into a position sixty or seventy yards from the road, careful not to betray themselves by needless movement, or tracks to the road.
Near sundown he saw about twenty mounted men ride up to the house and sit waiting. Even four hundred yards away they struck him as rakutur, from their bearing. Then a voitu emerged from the house and began to lope down the road. The horsemen fell in on both sides and behind him. He ran fast enough, they spurred their horses to a canter to keep up, continuing almost all the way across the clearing. Then he loped his way back and forth on the pattern of farm lanes that from spring to fall gave access to different fields.
Macurdy guessed the time spent running was something under half an hour. And fast! Clearly the sonofabitch could outrun Gunder Hegg without shifting out of second.
When it was dark, Macurdy contemplated going to the house. He had no idea what he might accomplish, but he'd accomplish nothing sitting where he was. Still he didn't move, till across the clearing he saw northern lights begin to form an emerald curtain across the sky. He remembered a night in Bavaria then, and felt a sudden pang of urgency.
Quietly he told Vulkan he was going to the house by himself, under cover of his own concealment cloak. And kill Kurqosz if he could. He'd hardly used his cloak since World War II, but he had no doubt he still could. He'd developed considerable confidence in it. A voitik master or adept might see through it, but he also wore a genuine rakutik greatcoat and cap. Hopefully they'd take him for one of their own.
Assuming the spell itself didn't give him away.
He had greater confidence in Vulkan's cloak, of course. He thought of it as bestowing actual invisibility, rather than simply making the wearer unnoticeable. But even it might not work against masters and adepts. And if someone saw through it, a giant boar with a rakutu on his back would draw serious attention.
He half-hoped Vulkan would suggest an alternative, or argue with him. Instead, the red eyes regarded him calmly, a pair of smoldering ruby coals. ‹I will monitor you,› Vulkan told him, ‹and if a situation develops, I will take the best action available to me.›
Macurdy took a roundabout route to the road, then strode down it into the clearing. He carried Skortov's saber, and the knife Arbel had given him, that had saved his life at least twice. They did not reassure him. As he approached the house, he saw that the entrance guards were also rakutur. How, he asked himself, do I pass them? Even if they don't see me sooner, when I open the door, it'll take their attention. Then they'll see through the spell.
As he approached, they showed no awareness of him. Their gaze was past him, fixed on something else, and pausing he looked back. A column of horsemen was trotting briskly into the clearing. At their front, enclosed by them on three sides, was a group of running voitar.
Macurdy stepped toward the house, then stood at attention a few yards from an entry guard. The approaching voitar would be his acid test.
The column reached the yard in perhaps twenty seconds, the mounted escort peeling off to the sides. The voitar slowed to a walk, and strode purposefully toward the entrance. Macurdy stood only a couple of yards out of the way. If they noticed him, they showed no sign of it, and when they'd passed, he fell in behind them. Their auras marked them as powerfully talented, but just now they were focused on something else. He had no idea what.
They pushed through the door, Macurdy with them. Inside was a vestibule with pegs on both sides, festooned with uniform coats. It opened into what once had been a parlor. Now it was an office reception area, with administrative personnel both voitik and hithik. And a pair of rakutur: security guards. No one challenged the voitar who'd come in, nor Macurdy, who at any rate would have seemed an attendant. Someone called "Attention!" in Hithmearcisc, and everyone stood ramrod straight, facing the newly arrived voitar.
Across the room was a wide staircase. His voitar were headed toward it. Another had just descended, and stood at attention. The leader of the group slowed and spoke. "Good evening, Captain Rissko! It's good to see you." The Hithmearcisc was simple and formulaic, well within the scope of Macurdy's limited knowledge.
"Good evening, Prince Chithqosz!" the voitu answered. "It is good to see you, Your Highness." Then the voitar passed him, taking the steps three at a time. At the top they turned right.
Prince! But not the crown prince. This one he'd never seen before.
Macurdy was the last one up, and paused. The upper hallway had a short section to the right, and a much longer one to the left. At the end of the right-hand section was a door guarded by a rakutu, who was reaching for the door handle, as if to let the prince through. Meanwhile Macurdy felt seriously exposed to the voitar below. To stay where he was seemed unwise, and to turn right seriously dangerous, so he turned left.
Through the opened door behind him he heard a big voice. One he knew well: the crown prince's. "Hello, brother! I'm glad to have you here! You traveled quickly! I'm sure you…" Then the door closed.
Ahead of Macurdy were doors along both sides of the hall. If he could find a room unoccupied, and hide till late at night… But if the rakutu guarding Kurqosz's office was paying attention, he'd notice a door opening, even if it opened inward. Of course, he might assume it was someone inside who'd opened it. On the other hand, if someone was inside… Macurdy heard footsteps on the stairs, and stepping quickly to the nearest door, opened it. Inward.
The room was not empty. A woman was there, garbed in a long shift. She turned, her face the color of bread dough. For a moment she peered uncertainly, then her eyes widened. For a long second Macurdy stood rooted to the floor, stunned. Then he raised a finger to his lips. "Ssh!"
Varia's knees had almost given way. She took an unsteady step backward and sat down on a chair behind her, staring at him. Carefully Macurdy closed the door. "Where can I hide?" he asked quietly.
For several seconds she simply stared, looking as if she couldn't breathe. Her eyes were darkly circled, as if from long weeping. Her mouth moved soundlessly, then she gestured. "Under the bed," she murmured, "or in the closet."
He frowned. "What's that?" He gestured at floor-length drapes hanging on one wall.
"There's a balcony, but the doors are locked." She hardly more than whispered it.
He went to the drapes and spread them a few inches. They concealed a pair of many-windowed doors. There was a simple latch, opened and closed by a doorknob, and a bolt operated through a keyhole. He wished he had the set of OSS lock picks he'd carried in Bavaria. But maybe… He could see the bolt through the crack between the doors. Deadbolt? Spring-loaded?
"What have you got that's metal and might fit between the doors?" he asked.
She took a clip from her hair, seemingly silver set with emeralds. "It's called dwarf silver," she said. "The same thing as platinum on Farside, I think. It's hard."
I'll take your word for it, he thought. All those books she'd read while married to Will… He wondered if she ever forgot any of it.
He carried a clasp knife. Now he forced its smaller blade between the doors, just above the bolt. Then he inserted the forked clasp of the hair clip, pressed it hard against the bolt, and pried. There was almost no room to work, but he gained a smidgen, and held it with the knife blade. Then got a new purchase with the clasp and pried again. And again. Something felt hot against his chest, but he ignored it. His nerves were stretched. He had no doubt whose room this was; Kurqosz could walk in at any moment.
Once he lost it all, and started grimly over, but finally the bolt was clear. The two minutes it had taken seemed like five. "Push," he said. Varia pushed, and the doors opened. He sheathed his knife, then pressed the dead-bolt the rest of the way back with his thumb. It stayed. He drew the doors closed again, and closed the drapes over them.
Blowing through pursed lips, he handed Varia her hair clip. "That's our escape route," he said, then paused, gazing at his ex-wife. On Farside still his wife. It took a moment to bring his thoughts back to the here and now. "I'll hide in the closet," he told her. "You stand outside it and tell me things I need to know. Close it if you need to."
She nodded.
The clothes hanging inside were too long to fit anyone but a voitu. Macurdy concealed himself well enough not to be seen at a glance. He'd get hot in there, dressed as he was, but it wouldn't do to take anything off. If he had to run for it…
"Have you got anything to wear besides that?" he asked Varia.
She looked down at herself, and shook her head. "Nothing for outside. They took my things. They're probably in the storage room down the hall."
He nodded. "We'll take some of Kurqosz's, and shorten them so they're wearable." He paused. "How did you get here?"
She told him of her kidnapping, and that Cyncaidh was dead. She didn't tell him how; she couldn't say it yet, certainly not without breaking down.
Cyncaidh dead! The thought stopped him for a moment. If we get out of this alive… Or maybe not. Maybe that's all over for her.
She continued talking, sounding stronger now. "Kurqosz has something important planned, for tonight or tomorrow night. He expects northern lights. Apparently they're important to his plans." She paused. "Can you feel it?"
"It?"
"There's a feeling in the Web of the World. Something ominous."
He had felt it, and blamed it on nerves. Which might be all it was, but now he didn't think so. "There are northern lights," he said. "Right now. So that means tonight."
"Probably, but not necessarily. On the Northern Sea, they often come several nights in a row."
"When do you expect him back? In here I mean?"
"It could be a minute from now, or hours. I've only been here a few days. But if tonight is the night he carries out his sorcery…"
Macurdy nodded grimly. If he simply waited in this closet, he'd probably be too late. "I guess you know why I'm here."
"To kill him," she said.
"Do you have any idea how I…" He paused, frowning. "Just a minute. Something's hot. In my shirt pocket."
He knew what it was. For months he'd transferred it whenever he'd changed clothes. His hand brought out the crystal Blue Wing had given him on the highway to Ferny Cove.
More strongly than ever, far more, it glowed in his palm.
They heard the latch; someone was opening the hallway door. Varia closed the closet and stepped away; Macurdy stuffed the crystal back in his pocket and drew his knife.
He heard her ask, "What do you want?"
Macurdy cpuldn't hear the answer. After a half minute of tension, he heard the door close, and Varia returned. "It was Kurqosz's halfblood son," she murmured. "He does things for his father, who calls him Tsulgax; says it means 'most loyal.' In the old voitik language, from before they adopted Hithmearcisc."
Son? That's it! Macurdy thought. That's the connection.
"Tsulgax doesn't like me," she added. "His aura reflects a single talent, but I couldn't identify it. Now I think I have. He foresees danger to his father, through me."
"Good lord," Macurdy said. "He's hated me from the first time we saw each other. In Bavaria, during the war. I wondered why."
He paused, his mind staring briefly at nothing. "I need to talk to Vulkan about this," he said. "I don't see any way in hell I can for sure kill Kurqosz soon enough. Set fire to the building-they'd probably get out. Walk down the hall, stick a knife in the rakutik door guard, then go for Kurqosz-it might work, but it probably wouldn't, and I'd get no second chance."
He paused. "Just a minute. I'll see if Vulkan can hear me."
"No!" She almost hissed the word, her sudden intensity startling him. "Kurqosz has his circle with him. If they're linked, and you shout psychically to Vulkan, they may pick it up."
Macurdy frowned. If Kurqosz and his circle were cooking up some spell, he wondered if anything would distract them. Their attention should be heavily attached to whatever it was. But on the other hand, Vulkan had said he'd monitor him. If he was, and could reach him with his mind, he already would have. Unless it felt too dangerous. "Well then," Macurdy said, "I guess I need to use your balcony and go to him." He looked worriedly at her. "I hate to leave you, now that I've found you."
All she said was, "How will you get down?"
"Sweetheart," he said, "I was trained to jump from high places. And when I get back, you'll have to jump."
She thought back to her escape from the Cloister, twenty years earlier, when she'd dropped from the palisade. "Then go," she said. "I can do it."
He stepped out of the closet. The crystal had become so hot, he transferred it to a pocket in his greatcoat. Varia watched, her expression sober. Stepping to her, he drew her to him. "I love you," he told her. "I want you to know that."
"Come back if you can," she answered. "You lost Melody and Mary, and I've lost Raien. I believe now that we were meant to be together." She pushed away from him. "Go now."
He nodded without speaking, then turned and went out onto the balcony, closing the doors behind him.
The balcony had a simple vault roof, and this was the north side of the house. But he could have seen the aurora from any side; it was playing over the whole sky now. He could even hear it hissing, and wondered if the crystal made it audible to him.
The balcony railings were set into stone posts. Abruptly a powerful urge seized him. Reaching into his pocket, he took the crystal out. His movements quick but sure, he set it on a post, drew his saber, then smashed the pommel down onto the crystal with all his might.
It felt as if he'd hit a box of blasting caps, but without the sound! The saber rebounded, twisting in his hands, almost tearing from his grip. From somewhere he heard screams, whether with his ears or only in his mind, he didn't know or wonder. He dropped to his knees, and for a brief moment stared blankly, confusedly, out at the sky. The screams had stopped. He heard muffled shouts inside the building.
He knew what had happened, or thought he did. Still shaking, he got to his feet. A look around found a few small shards of the crystal on the post and deck. He brushed them together and threw them out into the snow. Then reentering the room, he went straight to the closet. From there he told Varia what had happened, then hunkered in a back corner with saber in hand. Without a word she closed the door.
A scant minute later, Kurqosz entered the room, walked to the closet and opened the door. Varia told him he looked ill, and asked about the screaming.
He took out a thigh-length fur parka and fur-lined boots. "It is no concern of yours," he snapped, and stepped away from the closet.
There'd been too little time for Macurdy to stand and attack through the intervening clothes. And he didn't know if Tsulgax was in the room. That he didn't hear him meant nothing. Tsulgax spoke so seldom that at first, back in Bavaria, he'd assumed he was mute.
The hall door closed. A minute later Varia reopened the closet door. "They're gone," she murmured. "I was scared to death you might try to kill him. Tsulgax wasn't five feet away, with his saber in his hand."
Macurdy pushed his way out of the closet. His mind had moved to another possibility. "There's obviously a loft overhead," he said. "How can I get up there?"
"There's a storage room down the hall-a sort of a catchall. Kurqosz's orderly took me there to find things I might want. It has a trapdoor in the ceiling."
"Good. The crystal I showed you was obviously a crystal of power. From a dead voitu. I smashed it on one of your balcony posts. That's what caused the screaming down the hall."
Varia frowned, puzzled.
"Kurqosz and his circle will have another one," he went on. "Probably bigger; the one he had in Bavaria was big as an egg. I'm going to steal it, and the first chance I get, I'll smash it too. Without it they can't cook up any major sorceries, and judging from the screams, it'll lay them out."
"I don't understand," she said.
"His younger brother Chithqosz is here, with his crystal circle. I followed them; it's how I got in. And the crystal I had… The dead voitu must have been one of them. And each of them would have part of his essence in it."
Her expression told him he'd thoroughly confused her. "I'll explain later," he said. "I need to move fast, before they get back. Which is the storeroom?"
Mentally she counted doors, then told him.
"Is there a candle I can take? Preferably one with a holder."
She took one from a shelf.
"Look, I'll be back in a little while. Be ready to leave." He took her arms with his hands. "We're going to get out of here, and everything's going to be fine. But now I need you to open the door and step into the hall. Get the guard's attention so I can get out. And keep it long enough for me to get to the storeroom. I'll use a concealment spell."
She nodded soberly. Macurdy drew his belt knife, just in case. "Let's do it then," he said.
She went to the door, opened it wide, and stepped half out, clearing it for Macurdy. There was no guard at her door, but the guard down the hall fixed her with his eyes.
She sensed Curtis move out behind her, and called just loudly enough that the guard could hear. "Did His Majesty say how long he'd be gone?"
The rakutu scowled, saying nothing. She stood as if waiting for an answer, giving Macurdy time to get into the storeroom. Then she went back inside.
After closing the door quietly behind him, Macurdy lit the candle with his finger. The storeroom was long and narrow, with deep shelves on each side. He was surprised it wasn't fuller.
The trapdoor was large, and near the front of the room. A crude ladder leaned against the back wall. Snooping by candle light, the nearest thing he found to a rope was a long narrow drape, like those covering the balcony door. He put the candle on a top shelf, near the trapdoor. It occurred to him that what he had to do would be a lot easier without his coat and hauberk, so he took them off. Then he got the ladder, leaned it against the trapdoor opening, climbed a few rungs and pushed open the trapdoor. Next he put drape, coat and hauberk into the loft.
That done, he put the ladder back; leaving it under the trapdoor would invite trouble. The shelves were strongly built. Using them as a ladder, he reached sideways, got the fingers of one hand over the edge of the opening, and swung free. Then using both hands, he pulled himself up. It never occurred to him how few men, especially large men, could have done what he just had. Before he closed the trapdoor behind him, he reached out and got the candle.
The loft was a single room as long as the building, with a rough plank floor and no ceiling. Locating a joist by the nail heads in the planks, he followed it to the end, leaving tracks in the dust. A little beneath the ridge-beam was a small unglazed window with a louvered shutter, installed to ventilate the loft in summer. A ladder built onto the end wall gave access to it. Setting the candle aside, he climbed the ladder, opened the shutter, and looked out. This was the east end of the house; the other buildings were to the west. There seemed little likelihood he'd be seen, unless from the road.
He looked downward, and examined the outer wall. There was a vault-shaped roof a dozen feet beneath him, like that of the master bedroom's balcony.
The problems, as he saw them, were to get safely down onto the balcony roof, and from the roof get onto the balcony itself. And from there into Kurqosz's office. There were other uncertainties: Was there a guard in the office who might kill him or raise an alarm? Might the rakutu outside the door hear him? Was the crystal even there? But those weren't problems. There was nothing he could do about them. Or about leaving the drape hanging down the outside of the house, like a flag shouting "something is seriously wrong here!"
Climbing back down the ladder, he got the drape. His hauberk he left where it was; it promised to be too cumbersome for things he had to do. He thought about abandoning his coat for the same reason, but kept it for appearances and its large pockets.
After tying the drape to the topmost step, he went back down the ladder and snuffed out the candle. The stub he put in a pants pocket, the candle holder in a coat pocket. Then he climbed the ladder again. Only then did he wonder if he could make it out the window. It proved by far the most difficult part of the project. First he dropped his coat onto the balcony roof. A couple of awkward, squirming, even desperate minutes later he was outside, clutching the drape, and lowering himself down the wall. His feet touched the balcony roof with a foot of drape to spare.
After putting his coat back on, he knelt and looked over the end. It scarcely overhung the balcony rail at all; a foot at most. He bellied over feet first. His feet found the rail and took his weight. Letting go the roof edge with one hand, he carefully reached upward and inward, finding and grasping a roof brace. Then he let go with the other hand, and hopped down onto the balcony-another remarkable feat taken for granted. The easy part was the balcony door. He turned the handle and it opened. Inside he lit the candle and looked around the room. Bookshelves were built against the wall on both sides of the balcony door, their books gone. Now they held miscellaneous containers, loose goods, and weighted stacks of paper. Each side wall had a door. He examined the room no further, trying one of the side doors instead.
It opened into a smaller room. A slender metal tripod stood in the middle, topped with a black metal bowl, like the one he'd seen at Schloss Tannenberg. But that one had held a crystal. This one was empty. Next to it was a small stand, chest-high on Macurdy, holding a small casket of black lacquer. Macurdy unhooked its black-iron latch and lifted the lid.
There on a black velvet cushion lay the crystal, black as obsidian, reflecting the candle in his hand. It seemed alive, and he stepped involuntarily back. Like the one he'd destroyed, it was perfectly round, but much larger, the size of a goose egg.
Hesitantly Macurdy reached, then took it from the stand. The sensation jarred him. It was as if an alarm had sounded, silent but shrill. He shoved the stone deep into a coat pocket, beneath the mitten it already held, then darted from the room. There were shouts in the hall. Jerking the balcony door open, he stepped out, even as the hall door was being unlocked behind him. Vaulting over the railing, he landed without falling.
‹I am with you. Hurry.›
Vulkan, there, invisible! They dashed around the corner to the north side. Varia was on the balcony. She saw Macurdy through his spell, but as she started over the railing, someone came through the curtains and pulled her back.
A third figure stepped to the railing. Kurqosz! His glance took in Vulkan's massive bulk, but it was Macurdy he stared at. For a long two seconds their gazes locked, then Kurqosz turned away, bellowing orders in Hithmearcisc.
‹On my back!› Vulkan's thought hissed in Macurdy's mind. He vaulted aboard him, and they fled eastward toward the forest, the boar sprinting faster than he'd ever carried Macurdy before.
Overhead, the aurora shimmered and pulsed unnoticed.
Their flight was not mindless however. Vulkan's course angled to the road, where the new snow had been heavily tracked by Chithqosz and his escort. Within the forest edge, Vulkan stopped, and they looked back. Two figures were trotting to a point beneath Varia's balcony, where they stood as if studying the ground. Looking at tracks, Macurdy told himself.
Vulkan started down the road again at a brisk trot. Macurdy put a hand in his coat pocket. The crystal was noticeably warm. It hadn't been when he took it.
"Where are we going?" he asked.
‹Hopefully where you can destroy the crystal. You will have to tell me.›
"What about Varia?"
‹Your suicide will not benefit her.›
Macurdy's fingertips felt the crystal's glassy surface. Put it on a rock, he told himself, and hit it with another. But he hadn't seen a stone pile or boulder since the day before. Though he didn't know it, the locale was part of a postglacial lacustrine plain. The only stones were those brought in for construction.
"How much did you see or hear while I was inside there?" he asked.
‹Much of it.›
"I suppose taking the crystal caused the alarm."
‹Correct.›
And the crystal contained some of Kurqosz's essence-his and all his circle's, woven together by who knew what spells. With Chithqosz and his circle tied in. Macurdy was glad now for the hours spent in the Cloister library.
"When Kurqosz left earlier, where did he go? Or didn't he?"
‹He left the house with his circle. They went to the center of the clearing, where a pyre had been piled, and lit it. Perhaps you saw it.› Macurdy shook his head. ‹Then they sensed something amiss at the manor, and abandoned whatever they'd started to do.›
Macurdy put a hand in his jacket pocket. The crystal was distinctly warmer. "They're gaining on us," he said.
‹Seemingly.› Vulkan speeded his trot a bit.
Before long they saw a solitary horse ahead, coming toward them with a hithik rider. A courier, apparently. "Stop," Macurdy murmured. "I'm going to steal a horse."
Vulkan stepped off the road and stopped. Macurdy slid from his back, willed his own cloak off, and stood waiting, a powerful figure dressed as a rakutu, with a hand raised in command. The horseman stopped, and Macurdy walked up to him. "Get down," he said roughly in Hithmearcisc. Hoping the order was too brief for his accent to be conspicuous.
With a worried expression, the soldier dismounted, letting the reins hang so the horse would stand. Macurdy stepped up to him and peered intently into his face. Then, as if to see the courier's features more clearly, he removed the man's thick winter cap-and slammed him hard between the eyes with the heel of his hand. The hithu dropped like a stone.
Macurdy turned to Vulkan. "I'm going to load him over your back. Can you keep him on board?"
‹Hardly. I can carry him with my tusks, but neither fast nor far. And if he regains consciousness, I'll be unable to kill him. Killing an ensouled being is an act not available to me.›
Macurdy didn't hesitate. His thumb found the man's carotid, and he compressed it with force enough to crack walnuts. After half a minute he released it, and loaded the slack figure across the horse's withers. Then he swung into the saddle, and after recalling his cloak, he and Vulkan continued eastward side by side. A check found the crystal warmer than before. Kurqosz, Macurdy decided, could run even faster than he'd thought.
Not far ahead they came to a lesser road that crossed Road B. On its surface, not a single track marred the morning's snow. Macurdy stopped. "I suppose," he said, "they can sense the crystal, and that's what they're following."
‹I do not doubt it.›
"You turn south. They'll see your tracks, and probably follow them. I'll keep going east a little way, then circle north through the woods and head back to the farm. Where there are nice rock walls."
Vulkan answered by turning south and trotting briskly away through the virgin snow. For Vulkan's information, Macurdy continued his monolog mentally as he continued down the heavily tracked Road B. When they realize they're on a false trail, it should take them awhile to sort things out, and I should be able to keep ahead of them. When I get to the headquarters clearing, I'll head for the woodpile and grab a splitting maul or single bit. Lay the crystal against a stone wall, and smack the sonofabitch.
Then I'll get Varia out of there.
He didn't wonder how. A hundred or so yards farther east, he took advantage of a windthrown hemlock whose top reached the edge of the road. There he turned his horse northward into the woods, walking it along the very edge of the fallen treetop. If Kurqosz got that far, he was unlikely to see the tracks.
When he'd passed the hemlock's uprooted base, he continued northward a ways, then turned back toward the clearing. He reached the virgin snow of the lesser road where a sleigh trail entered it from the west.
He took it.
With the help of motion sickness pills, Kurqosz had learned to ride horses. Learned well enough to stay in the saddle at a gallop. Riding wasn't pleasant for him, nor were the pills, but it allowed him greater middle-distance speed than he had on foot.
Tsulgax rode ahead a hundred yards, and another rakutu behind. They were all the escort Kurqosz had on this mad ride. The loss of his crystal had shaken him deeply, and he would not wait for a platoon to be called out and mounted.
It was Tsulgax who saw the tracks of cloven hooves turn south on the lesser road. He stopped, and when Kurqosz got there, pointed them out. All three turned south then, following them.
Kurqosz was queasy from the ride, and his senses somewhat dulled from the pills. If they didn't catch up soon, he thought, he'd get down and run awhile. They'd gone nearly half a mile before he realized something was wrong, and called a halt. Tsulgax rode back to him, his expression concerned.
"Are you all right?" he asked.
"We should not have turned. He must have thrown the crystal away, or hidden it. Near the crossroad. We are getting farther away from it."
He turned his horse then, and started back north, riding hard. The crystal! he told himself. Follow the crystal! The thief, the tracks, are secondary.
Macurdy had ridden half a mile up the sleigh trail, when he came to a three-sided woodsmen's shelter. In front of it lay a snow-capped heap of firewood blocks, with a splitting maul standing upright beside it. He stopped, and getting from his horse, stepped into the shelter. Inside was a split-log bench. A heavy steel splitting wedge lay on it, and he picked it up. It could almost have been made in Indiana; it had the familiar deep grooves on its slanting faces.
He knew at once what to do. Stepping outside, he lay the wedge on the battered maple chopping block, then reached into his pocket. The crystal was almost too hot to handle! Alarmed, he laid it hurriedly on a groove of the wedge, then reaching, took the maul and hefted it. Eyeing the crystal, he swung hard, overhead and down.
The heavy steel head slammed the crystal-and a shocking pain stabbed through Macurdy's skull! At the same instant he heard a terrible cry perhaps a hundred yards away. Dropping the maul, he staggered to the horse and pulled himself into the saddle. Then he kicked the animal into a canter, and lying low on its back, fled westward through the trees, toward the clearing.
Kurqosz lay shuddering and puking in the snow, with Tsulgax and the other rakutu kneeling beside him. The blow that had struck the crystal had hammered Kurqosz much harder than it had Macurdy, whose bonding with it had been brief and superficial. After a couple of minutes, the crown prince raised an arm for help, and Tsulgax hoisted him to his feet.
"He tried to destroy it," Kurqosz croaked, "but it's still here somewhere. Unbroken. Help me."
With Tsulgax supporting him, he hobbled on, the other rakutu bringing the horses. A minute later they saw Macurdy's tracks, and in another the shelter and woodpile. They went to it, Kurqosz scanning around with his mind for the crystal. It took awhile to find it. Instead of smashing it, the force of the hammer stroke had sent it flying twenty yards, where it lay buried in snow.
When he had it in his mittened hand, Kurqosz raised it to his forehead, closed his eyes and concentrated. In his mind he saw a rakutu-no, a human or half-ylf dressed as a rakutu. Saw the face from the crystal's point of view. A face he remembered from the hive mind scene, of raiders murdering the headquarters staff at Colroi. And from somewhere earlier. He watched the attempt to destroy the crystal, saw the hammer raised and swung. And that was all. As if the sentience in the crystal had blacked out.
He realized now what had happened to Chithqosz and his circle-those who'd survived the flood. This same creature had somehow gotten Chithqosz's old crystal, and destroyed it. Crystals of power formed to resonate with the circle leader, and his younger brother wasn't hard like himself.
Turning, he gripped Tsulgax's shoulder. "I have seen his face," he told him. "And I will remember. I will hear him scream curses at the parents who gave him life. He will beg me to kill him."
The second rakutu held out Kurqosz's reins, but the crown prince declined. "I will run," he said.
Haltingly he started in Macurdy's tracks, while the rakutur mounted and followed. As he ran, he strengthened, his head clearing. He would, he told himself, have his revenge, but not tonight. First he would win the war, and he needed all his attention, all his strength, to control the forces he would use. His circle too would need to be clear-headed and strong.
So. Tomorrow night then. Tomorrow night he would win the war. The aurora would still be there for him; he sensed it with certainty. Slowing, he looked up. Through the leafless crowns of hardwood forest, he saw it flickering and pulsing. Victory and devastation would be the ultimate vengeance. He'd devastated the east with fire and steel. The energy storm he'd create tomorrow night would roll westward with far greater devastation. Where he willed, as far as he willed. Tomorrow night vast tongues of flame would lick the enemy army from the face of the earth, leaving not even bones!
Kurqosz did not follow his enemy's tracks. He pressed forward toward the farm. That was where the creature was going, he had no doubt. Going to collect the ylvin lord's widow. A half minute more and he'd have taken her earlier; she'd have been over the balcony railing and gone.
At the manor, Kurqosz posted guards inside every entrance, every ground-floor window. After working a spell, and showing them through the crystal what to watch for: a giant boar, and the face from the raid on Colroi. Kurqosz was familiar with cloaking spells. Being warned, and knowing what to watch for, was half the task of seeing through them.
When Tsulgax was shown the face, he said a single word, a name: "Montag!"
Kurqosz knew at once that Tsulgax was right. Kurt Montag, the German half-wit! But clearly no half-wit after all.
And Montag had been inside this house, inside his bedroom. Worse, inside his sanctum! Kurqosz hadn't been aware of the drape hanging from the loft vent till he'd returned with the crystal. Things became clear then; Montag had bypassed the door guard by using the loft. Ingenious! Daring! What kind of man could even contemplate the act, let alone carry it off?
Before he put him to the torments, he decided, he'd sit down with him, question him. There were things to be learned from him, and at any rate the man would be interesting.
The realizations, along with his run in the forest, had fired Kurqosz with a land of manic exhilaration, though without canceling his wits. Back in the manor, he order the woman called Varia locked up with the other ylvin women. She was dangerous. He would still beget sons on her-this evening had added to his respect-but he would not have her as a lover.
Having had two long runs in the snow, Kurqosz expected that when he went to bed, he'd fall quickly asleep. He was mistaken. There were things on his mind, demanding attention. Back in Bavaria, Tsulgax had said that Montag was dangerous, and should be killed. Tsulgax, with no access to the hive mind, and no apparent psychic talent. Only his hard, highly trained body and unbendable loyalty. But his concern over Montag had seemed ridiculous. Perhaps, Kurqosz thought, he has a talent that I do not: sensing future dangers. He warned me about the ylvin she-wolf as well.
Tsulgax. What kind of father had he been to him? By hindsight, better than he'd realized, it seemed to him. He'd been kind, and not overly demanding.
He looked back then at Kurt Montag in Bavaria. Had there been signs he should have seen? That should have warned him? None came to him. He focused on the man as first he'd seen him: earnest, stupid, and lame. He'd even felt a certain fondness for the creature. Montag, whose psychic talents were strong only by comparison with the other Germans at the Schloss.
Unexpectedly, his concentration on Montag's face clicked in another picture from the hive mind, one Kurqosz hadn't seen before: Montag wearing a peculiar uniform-baggy, and with many pockets. In Hithmearc, speaking to a guard corporal at the gate shelter! Montag, intelligent and self-assured, standing straight, and for a human, tall. This was the man in the raid at Colroi! No wonder he hadn't recognized him at first.
The corporal's trace in the hive mind ended with his shaking hands with Montag, and at the same moment a shocking pain in the abdomen. And unconsciousness. Kurqosz scanned ahead. On that same day, the gate lodge had burned to the ground, killing all but one of the guards and hostel staff. Days later the gate itself had collapsed, seemingly destroyed, stranding Greszak and his staff on Farside. Too much had happened, in too short a time, and the corporal's trace had not been investigated. The assumption had been, the man had died in the fire with the others.
Montag! The human was more than intriguing. He was sinister! And how had he come to Vismearc? Perhaps Tsulgax was mistaken. Perhaps this man simply resembled Montag. But no, for that had surely been Montag in the uniform of many pockets. For it not to be him would require nearly impossible coincidences-a Montag in Bavaria, a lookalike in Hithmearc, and another here. No, all three were one man. Kurt Montag.
The crown prince swung his long legs out of bed, wrapped himself in his robe, and had the officer of the guard called. And Tsulgax. When they reached his room, he gave them only one order: "Montag must be taken alive! At whatever cost! Alive and sound! I have questions to ask him, and he must be able to answer. If anyone kills or sorely wounds him, except on my order, that person will replace him in the torments."
Macurdy was captured in the hour before dawn, but when Kurqosz learned of it, he decided his prisoner could wait. He'd awakened with his attention on the coming night, and the sorcery he would work. It must have priority, even above Montag.
It was Tsulgax who reported the capture, and asked to be allowed to kill the German. His master's refusal so upset the rakutu, Kurqosz feared his son's protectiveness might overcome his obedience. So within the hour, Kurqosz sent Tsulgax off to Camp Merrawin, carrying a written order. He was to take command of the rakutur there-a "promotion" that did not fool Tsulgax. Nor did Kurqosz suppose it would. But it enforced his restriction without the odor of punishment.
He'd always been a loving parent.
As soon as he'd sent Tsulgax off, Kurqosz rousted his circle from their beds and ordered them out to run. "It will clear your heads!" he told them. Then he shook Chithqosz awake, and ordered him to roust out his circle, sick and feeble from the destruction of their old stone. Kurqosz himself led them all on a long walk, west out of the clearing, accompanied by two companies of rakutur.
The sorcerers finished with an easy, two-mile lope, by which time even Chithqosz's circle was beginning to look functional. I'll let them eat now, Kurqosz told himself, then lead them in drills to renew their focus.
A few days earlier, he'd sent his third crystal circle to the forward lines at Deep River, to create an umbrella against the storm he planned. It was Chithqosz's circle which would help "tap the aurora." (Actually tap the solar wind responsible for it.) Now he went over his plan with them.
It was midafternoon before he had the prisoner brought to him-hands manacled behind his back, for Kurqosz recalled Montag's talent at casting small fireballs. His only other restraint was a rakutu standing behind him, ready to act.
But Montag had little to say, so Kurqosz had him taken to the lesser of the two rooms flanking his office, where he was blindfolded, gagged, and bound to a chair. A heavy chair, bolted to the floor; he would answer questions later. The crown prince preferred to separate questioning and torture, but either way, he would have his information.
In his small prison, Macurdy was in the watchful care of a rakutu. At supper time the rakutu removed his prisoner's gag, and fed him-a cup of lentil soup, a small corn pancake, and water. Then he gagged him again. Macurdy was in blackness, for night had fallen, and the room's single candle and the snowlight through the window were too weak to filter through his blindfold.
He felt an impulse to meditate, something he'd seldom done since Varia had been stolen from him more than twenty years earlier. Being bound and gagged was not conducive to meditation, but he rationalized the impulse, telling himself it was something he could work at, to pass the time. It went surprisingly well. After a bit he reached a slow alpha stage, which was as far as he usually got. Thoughts, images, fragments of memories drifted through without taking root or lodging. Gradually even they ceased, and his sense of time shut off almost entirely, though awareness remained.
After an indeterminate period, a drum began to beat. In the next room. A small drum tapped with the fingertips in an intricate sound pattern; he could feel it more than hear it. Kurqosz, he realized. It was unlike Arbel's drumming, which produced a reverie for healing. This… this sought to lure… not him, but something.
And now he sensed the crystal; it caught and held his consciousness. The quality of blackness changed. It was no longer an absence of light, but blackness as a presence. He sensed the mind and will of Kurqosz, the synergistic minds and wills of his circle. And he himself was with them, though not of them. An observer unobserved, for they were intent on their procedure.
The state was transitory. Abruptly he was outside the room, in a night without stars, moon, or aurora. There was no land, no trees… but gradually there was light-a dirty magmic red that thickened, became a vast, pulsing, plasmic energy.
Energy with a primitive but powerful sense of its own existence, neither obedient nor resistive, but aware, responsive. Responsive to the minds that acting as one, ruled by one, enticed, molded, manipulated. The energy plasma changed, its embryonic awareness unfolding and growing. He felt Kurqosz's intention flowing into it, infusing it with something like intelligence… and purpose!
From deep within/outside Macurdy, his essence spoke. Powerful! Must not happen, must not continue to completion! Disrupt it! Disperse it! An energy swelled within him-a higher vibration, almost beyond bearing, more intense than the most powerful orgasm. His follicles clenched, erecting his hair; he writhed and thrashed on his chair. And with the energy came intention surpassing anything he'd imagined, pure intention straining for release. Now! he thought. Now! It burst from the pit of his stomach-and the universe exploded. Minds screamed, their agony searing him. His own screamed with them-but in blind exultation, not agony.
38 Reverberations
Macurdy awoke with a groan. It was still night, but now he was on the ground. A fire was burning, tended by a woman. She turned and looked at him.
"You're awake!" Varia said. "How do you feel?"
He was covered with a blanket. With an effort he sat up, leaning on an arm. It seemed as much as he could manage. His head ached badly, and he was nauseous. "Not good," he answered. Then lurched to one side, vomiting thinly onto the dirt, a slime of gastric juices that burned his throat.
After a long minute he sat up and looked around. He was in a crude, three-sided woodsmen's shelter, like the one where he'd tried to destroy the crystal. His manacles were still on his wrists, but the chain connecting them had been cut.
"It's gotten warm," he said.
"Warm enough that the new snow is melting on the brush," Varia answered, then pointed upward. "Look at the sky."
Laboriously he got to his feet and stepped outside. With the branches bare, and the woods thinned by cutting, he had a fair view upward. The aurora was hidden by heavy, roiling clouds that pulsed with reddish light. It shocked him half alert, and he spoke in a near whisper.
"Where's Vulkan?"
‹Here.›
Macurdy turned. Vulkan lay a few yards away. "What happened?"
‹You will remember, when it's time. Suffice it to say, you aborted the crown prince's sorcery, and ended the voitik threat.›
Macurdy frowned vaguely. Aborted? Ended the threat? "How did we get here?"
‹I will leave that for Varia to relate. It was she who handled most of it.›
"I was in the women's room," she said. "One large room. We had no idea what was going on, only that things had gotten strange. We could smell it. And it felt… as if something was wrong with the Web of the World, as if it was choked with something bad. Sorcerous." She looked at the sky. "It still does, but not so strongly.
"Then something hit like an earthquake. It didn't shake the building-nothing fell off the table or shelves-but we all felt it. I'd been standing, and it knocked me off my feet. After a minute there were shouts. Cries is the word. We didn't know what to think. We just sat there stunned, waiting for whatever would happen next. Pretty soon we heard people calling back and forth outside, in Hithmearcisc. I snuffed the lamp and opened the window drapes a little. Soldiers, including rakutur, were leading horses out of the stables, and riding away. Not in ranks, just leaving. As if fleeing.
"One of the other women tried the door then, but it was locked. I told her to stop rattling it. With discipline gone, as it seemed to be, I didn't want anyone reminded of us.
"The windows were latched too, so after things had quieted outside and I couldn't see anyone, I used a short bench as a battering ram, and knocked one of them open. Then I climbed out and dropped from the window sill. And found Vulkan waiting. He lowered his cloak for a moment when I got up. You can't imagine how glad I was to see him."
Vulkan interrupted. ‹I recommend you continue your account while we travel. The clouds portend a storm of worse than snow.›
Gathering himself, Macurdy followed them. Three horses were tethered to saplings behind the shelter. Two wore riding saddles, the other a loaded pack saddle. All wore nosebags, and were munching corn. He and Varia mounted, and the three of them left at an easy pace. Macurdy's headache made him reluctant to trot his horse.
They were on Road B before Varia continued the narrative she'd begun. "After I dropped out the window," she said, "Vulkan and I went in the front entrance together. Reception was full of corpses-voitar and a rakutu. No humans. Their faces were distorted; they looked terrible. Then I went upstairs, Vulkan with me. He told me where you were." She half grinned at Macurdy, riding beside her. "He broke down the door to Kurqosz's office. Kurqosz and his circle were in a side room, dead. They looked even worse than the voitar in reception. Their faces were more than distorted; they were dark and swollen, as if their blood vessels had ruptured. Their bodies looked boneless.
"Then Vulkan broke down the door to another side room, and there you were, with a dead rakutu. I almost died myself, before I saw your aura and realized you were alive."
Her expression changed. "You were the only one, you and the ylvin women. Everyone else had either died or left. The other women helped me get you over a horse. Then they headed west, toward ylvin lines."
Macurdy nodded slowly. "The dead rakutu must have shared in the hive mind. Did you find Tsulgax?" "No. Apparently he left with the others." Macurdy grunted. He couldn't imagine Tsulgax abandoning Kurqosz's body.
A few hours earlier, not many miles south of the clearing, an entire cohort of Kullvordi rode through forest.
General Jeremid had been unwilling to assume that the voitik command center was unassailable. Even if the place really did have sorcerous defenses, it seemed to him it might be susceptible to surprise attack-a swift strike followed by an equally swift disappearance. So he'd left with his cohort, riding cross-country through the forest, planning to scout the place. Unless he found reason not to, he'd hit it. Raise all the hell he could, then run. Or if things went right… Who knew?
Again the sky was weird and beautiful with northern lights, a rare sight for Rude Landers. Two nights in a row now, he thought, and wondered what it meant.
Then something changed. The night took on a deeply ominous air. Evil, dangerous. Jeremid ordered a halt, and sent his bird to scout the place again. While he waited, he took his mittens off and shoved them in his pockets, then raised his earflaps. When the bird returned, it reported that everything in the clearing-everything but the sky- looked the same, but felt very very bad. In the vicinity, the northern lights had disappeared, hidden by thick serpents of cloud, writhing and twining in the sky. Like nothing he'd seen before, even in his species' hive mind.
"Sorcery is in use," the bird finished. "Big sorcery." Its voice was subdued. Ordinarily the great raven was self-assured, even haughty. Now it sat huddled and ruffled on a packhorse, utterly demoralized.
Jeremid ordered his men to make camp. Then, leaving Colonel Tarlok in charge, he called a young officer to him, a young hillsman known as a daredevil. Like Jeremid when he'd been young. "Bring the best squad in your platoon," Jeremid told him. "You and I are going to examine the place ourselves."
They'd hardly left before something else happened. Nothing they could see or hear, but something happened. Jeremid felt it, and the others did too; he saw it in their eyes. But they rode on.
At the clearing's edge they stopped. There was no undergrowth there-cattle had grazed the bordering woods for decades-but night and the trees hid the patrol. The sky had stopped writhing. Now it brooded, flickered, pulsed, its clouds slowly roiling. They seemed too dense, too heavy to stay aloft. In the distance, soldiers emerged from the house, then from the stable, mounted their horses and left hurriedly. Neither in ranks nor singly, but in clusters, riding east on Road B.
Then nothing more. Jeremid had the patrol dismount, and they continued to wait. They saw no one else. After a while the lieutenant suggested he be allowed to ride in and see what he could find. Jeremid shook his head without looking at him. His gaze was intent, his senses acutely attuned to the scene in front of them. "We wait," he said. "Something's going to happen."
The air remained heavy with energy, and a towering, breath-suppressing sense of threat. But for a long hour, perhaps two, nothing happened, except that the sense of threat thickened. They watched mesmerized, almost unable to move.
Suddenly lightnings erupted from the clouds, monstrous blinding lightnings whose overlapping crashes drove the Kullvordi to their knees. The discharges continued for perhaps a minute, then subsided into spasmodic cracklings, and ceased. The air smelled strongly of ozone.
When Jeremid's vision recovered and he could think again, the opening held no building at all. Not one. There weren't even rubble piles. Whatever was left, if anything was, was scattered.
Slowly he got to his feet. Their horses had fled. "Lieutenant," he said quietly, "it's time to walk." Then they started back westward to the cohort. It seemed to Jeremid the war was over, though how it had happened, he had no idea. Except that sorcery had been behind it. Well before they'd walked the three miles back to the cohort, the sky had cleared. High in the ionosphere, the aurora still danced its stately dance.
As Macurdy, Vulkan and Varia traveled east on B, they heard great thunders to the west, brief but intense. Then the sense of threat dissipated, and in a surprisingly short time the sky was reclaimed by the aurora. Macurdy's headache died, and his mental processes regained their sharpness.
Before dawn they encountered scouts of an east ylvin guerrilla force. Their sergeant directed them to his captain. Over the weeks, the captain's command had accumulated heavy losses, and its two companies were down to eighty men. Two hours earlier they'd come upon an invader supply train, abandoned. Only its voitik commander remained with it, dead but apparently unwounded, his face a grotesque and blotchy grimace.
The ylf had no idea what might have happened. He only knew that he, his men and their horses, had been overdue for a rest. After selecting sixteen sleighs of food and fodder, he'd set fire to the rest, and was taking his loot to an old woods road he knew of. Macurdy and his companions were welcome to share.
Meanwhile his great raven notified Blue Wing where Macurdy could be found.
The woods road took them to an old forest burn, where there was lots of dense young growth for cover, and deadwood for fuel. There the ylver began erecting more effective shelters than they had previously. Sentries were posted, and a mounted patrol sent out. It was time, their captain said, to catch up on some serious eating and sleeping, but not to go slack on security.
The guerrillas were as impressed with Varia as with Vulkan. She was not only beautiful. She wore the rich fur robe and other expensive travel clothes that Quaie had provided. She'd gotten them from the storeroom before she left the manor house.
The captain gave his guests the best lodging available-an old hay shed, in a grove of young white pine just outside the burn. It had enough roof left, that inside, most of the dirt floor was bare of snow. It held no hay, but the captain had captured hay delivered for bedding.
By that time it was daylight. Over a hot bed of coals, Macurdy and Varia toasted hithik bread, spread it with captured hithik lard, and ate it with fresh, half-roasted hithik horse meat. Vulkan and Blue Wing preferred their meat raw. When they'd finished, Macurdy put chunks of pine stump on the fire, and watched flames begin to lick over them. He felt spent, used up, and almost fell asleep, but got to his feet instead. He still had things to do before he let go.
He went to the captain and was about to borrow his bird, when Blue Wing arrived. Through the great raven network, Macurdy made known to the entire army that Kurqosz was dead of his own sorcery, along with some, perhaps many, of his voitar. The hithar, and apparently most of the rakutur, were still alive. Then he gave orders that went far beyond his authority, knowing they'd be accepted. Units were to probe the enemy positions on Deep River and in the Merrawin Valley, and let the ylvin high command know what they found.
As soon as he'd finished, Jeremid informed him that Kurqosz's command base had been demolished by great lightnings. The report made Macurdy's skin crawl. It occurred to him that the violent, sorcery-powered death of Kurqdsz and his crystal circle might have exploded with deadly force through the entire voitik hive mind, perhaps even in Hithmearc.
He returned to the hay barn, where he, Varia and Vulkan lay down on captured hay, covered with captured blankets. Macurdy gazed at the fire, then looked away. They weren't as mesmerizing by daylight as at night, but he wasn't ready to sleep quite yet.
"Vulkan," he said, "you told me I'd aborted Kurqosz's sorcery. So I suppose that in a way I killed all those voitar. How in hell did I do that? I don't remember doing anything."
‹Ah, but I do remember. I was with you, in a manner of speaking, monitoring your mind. I did not, and do not understand what was going on at all times, and eventually, sensing the approaching climax, I withdrew to avoid sensory overload. But I know enough.
‹And you will remember when you're ready. Which I suspect will be while reviewing this life, after you've died.
‹What you did was somewhat equivalent to lightning striking an electrical transformer. While the most powerful circle of sorcerers in the world was plugged into it.›
Electrical transformer? Macurdy was always struck by Vulkan's occasional allusions to things in modern Farside, but this took the cake.
Vulkan went on. ‹Kurqosz and his crystal circle had gathered and were undertaking to manipulate forces of enormous power. And his control was still somewhat precarious. Your intervention disrupted the process, and the result was instantaneous.
‹That at least is how it seems to me. As I said, when the time comes, you will know quite exactly.›
He paused. ‹And that is all I have to say-or will have to say-on the matter.›
Macurdy went to sleep contemplating it all, and never woke up till late at night. Stepping outside to relieve himself, he found the aurora dying in the eastern sky.
By midday, more news had spread via the raven network: everywhere contact had been made, all the voitar were dead. Without exception. The hithar were utterly demoralized. The only clashes had been with small groups of rakutur, disorganized, but still deadly. And reckless now.
39 Wrapping Up the War
In Yuulith, all but two of the voitar had died on that night of miscarried sorcery, and within fifteen days, all hithik forces had surrendered without fighting. The last was the most distant, the garrison at Balralligh. It surrendered to two short companies of east ylvin guerrillas, augmented by a remnant of Cyncaidh's ylver, included Ceonigh, his lordship's elder son. Having lost their bird, and unable to locate their cohort, they had joined the easterners.
Initially the rakutur had been more devastated by the loss of their masters than the hithar had. But on the night of the cataclysm, three companies on anti-raider patrol had retained discipline and organization. Over the next two days they'd found and attached most of the rakutur who'd fled Kurqosz's headquarters.
Then they'd gone looking for trouble, more to die fighting than to win. And die they had, partly because of unit coordination by the great raven network. Over the next six days, the rakutur hunted raiders while the raiders dodged them, till enough raider forces had gathered. Then the short east ylvin force Macurdy had met, volunteered as bait, and the combined forces trapped the rakutur in the same large clearing where their crown prince had died.
The Ozians and Kormehri felt they hadn't gotten their proper share of fighting. So Macurdy assigned them to attack from the nearer forest margin. When they'd engaged and held the rakutur, the Tigers and Kullvordi charged from the farther margin, taking the enemy in the rear. Two green companies of west ylvin cavalry were posted to kill any who tried to escape. None did. However, the west ylver did bag some who got separated from the melee.
Despite near-zero temperatures, Macurdy's Tigers fought with hauberks uncovered, to avoid being confused with the enemy. The fighting was as desperate as any he'd experienced. He was glad he'd recovered his dwarf-made armor and weapons.
Small detachments of rakutur, totaling perhaps forty, had been assigned as guards for senior voitik officers on the Deep River Line. After the cataclysm, they crossed the ice and attacked ylvin positions. Their goal too was to die fighting, and they did.
Similar small bands from Camp Merrawin were hunted down and killed by east ylvin guerrillas. A small rakutik detachment had been sent to Colroi after Macurdy's successful raid, and they stayed put. Then the small combined force of east ylvin guerrillas and Cyncaidh's orphans reached there on their way to Balralligh. Badly outnumbered, those rakutur too attacked and died.
Emperor Morguil insisted the Congress of Decision be held at Colroi, his capital. Duinarog's Lord Gaerimor deferred to Morguil's wishes. Serving as Gavriel's legate, Gaerimor had full authority to act in his name.
Most of the Rude Lands forces started home. However, from almost every kingdom that took part in the fighting, Macurdy took two short companies to Colroi. Short because of casualties. He also took both cohorts of his Tigers. All together, they would help Morguil and Naerrasil remember who had bled the enemy so badly.
They and the dwarves, for Aldrik Egilsson Strongarm also took two short companies, riding on sleighs that carried the army's hay supply.
Macurdy suspected that Camp Merrawin could house more troops than Colroi could. But he went along with Morguil's wishes, so long as the raiders were housed under roofs. They had, he said, spent too many nights freezing under canvas or the stars. Strongarm had also insisted on roofs for his people. "We didn't come here to be treated as poor cousins," he told Morguil. "And we killed far more of the boogers than yer army did."
Strongarm's strong right arm was without a hand since the Battle of the Merrawin Plain, while Morguil, who had no military skills, hadn't fought. So concealing his displeasure as best he could, Morguil deferred to the dwarf. Telling himself if he didn't, the dwarves would not attend the congress, and they'd hold it against him forever.
Lord Naerrasil deeply resented Strongarm's implied criticism, and with some justification. His east ylvin army had fought desperately at Balralligh and Colroi, and under terrible circumstances. He'd lost more men than all his allies together, though mostly by execution after they'd surrendered. But because of his defeats, and his contempt for the Lion's raider strategy, his reputation had suffered. Anything he said would be discredited.
The disarmed hithar, under their own officers, were marched east to Colroi, herded by the remains of the Imperial East Ylvin Army, and units of the west ylver. Rations were short, and it was the prisoners who marched hungry. But there was little muttering in the hithik ranks; the Voitusotar had long since taught them subservience. Eventually, to the compliant, they'd allowed privileges, but any hint of unrest had been punished with quick and ruthless cruelty.
At Colroi, Macurdy and Varia were given a room with an actual stove. Each had anticipated a period of adjustment, of getting used to each other. But the process proved painless. And Varia wore her hair in twin ponytails, as she had in Indiana.
The Congress of Decision was a lot smaller than Macurdy had expected. It consisted of Morguil and his advisors; Lord Gaerimor acting for Gavriel, with the general of the west ylvin forces as his aide; Macurdy acting for the Rude Lands and the Sisterhood, with Vulkan and Lady Cyncaidh as his advisors; and Aldrik Egilsson Strongarm acting for Finn Greatsword. Two hithar, High Admiral Vellinghuus and General Horst, were brought from Balralligh to answer questions.
As far as Macurdy was concerned, the principal issue was what to do with some sixty thousand hithik prisoners of war.
On the first morning, the status of allied and hithik military forces was reviewed. And Vulkan described the nature of Kurqosz's final sorcery, an awesome assembling, molding and energizing of powerful elementals. Without saying how, he stated flatly that it had been Macurdy who'd caused its cataclysmic collapse, and by that one act had won the war.
Subsequent discussions would be colored by the fact that two voitar in Balralligh had briefly survived the shocking event at the crown prince's headquarters. Both had died within two days, without emerging from their comas. But as far as was known, all the voitar at the crown prince's headquarters, Deep River, Camp Merrawin, and even Colroi had died instantly.
Macurdy and the ylver had assumed that the voitik hive mind was unaffected by distance. The two brief survivals seemed to contradict that. Admiral Vellinghuus volunteered that during the voyage, the voitar on his flagship had lost touch with their kinsmen in Hithmearc well before they'd completed the crossing. So clearly the attachment weakened with distance.
Even if only two at Balralligh had survived, for less than two days, and comatose, how many might have survived in Hithmearc, more than five thousand miles away? All of them? Most of them? Balralligh was less than four hundred miles from the event.
To begin with, it seemed irrelevant to the question of what should be done with the hithik prisoners. Morguil demanded reparations and vengeance for the terrible massacres, atrocities and destruction committed in his empire. Lord Gaerimor got Morguil's agreement to consider reparations and vengeance separately, starting with reparations.
Not only the Eastern Empire wanted reparations. Every Rude Lands kingdom that had sent troops wanted restitution for the expense, and something on the side.
But where would it come from? Certainly not from distant Hithmearc. The only voitik "wealth" at hand were (1) military equipment and supplies; (2) the ships of the voitik armada; and (3) the hithik prisoners of war. The value of military goods was of two sorts: their military value, and their value by conversion to civilian use. The main value of the ships was as merchantmen, but there were far more of them than all of Yuulith had use for.
The prisoners were of value primarily for labor.
Initially Morguil insisted that the disposition of hithik prisoners was the privilege of the Eastern Empire. They should, he said, be slaves. Perhaps half or a third could be set to work rebuilding his empire. The surplus would be auctioned to whoever cared to bid, to help finance that rebuilding. Selected ships would be taken over by the Eastern Empire as warships, The rest would be offered for sale. Voitik military equipment-that which couldn't be readily converted to civilian use-would be sold by the Eastern Empire as weapons, or melted down for other uses.
Strongarm objected instantly to the latter. It would swamp the market for metals-the heart of dwarven economy. Macurdy pointed out that so much weaponry could stimulate wars, an argument that brought strong agreement from Lord Gaerimor and, privately, from some of Morguil's staff. Macurdy then cited the Farside example of the American military in the Pacific Theater, where at the end of World War II, large amounts of ordnance had been dumped in the South China Sea, as being surplus to foreseeable needs, and expensive to transport and store.
Gaerimor argued against slavery. Use prisoners of war freely as forced labor, he said, but don't sell them. Both empires had enslaved conquered humans in the early days, and had still not fully recovered from the evil effects. "Let us not revive the practice," he finished. "If we do, it will be over my firm objections. And I promise you without reservation that Gavriel will agree with me on the matter."
Lord Naerrasil had kept out of the discussion till then. Now he spoke, caustically. "And what do you propose we do with the surplus? Execute them? Is that what you'd prefer? We can't afford to feed them." His voice dripped sarcasm. "Or perhaps the rest of you will send annual shipments of grain and cattle to feed them with."
Macurdy replied at once. His voice was matter of fact, but his blunt words were as undiplomatic at Naerrasil's, and more insulting. "Lord Naerrasil, I don't like your sarcasm on this subject any more than I liked it about my military proposals. You were wrong then, and you're wrong now. If His Majesty asked my advice, I'd suggest he fire you on charges of stupidity."
Macurdy's words shocked the eastern ylver attending, and Lord Gaerimor and his aide looked dismayed. Macurdy realized he'd overstepped. This was not, after all, some barracks or bar. He wondered if he'd endangered an agreement. But he continued. "Send the surplus prisoners back to Hithmearc. Then send the rest back when you're done with them. It's already obvious you can't get decent value for the ships."
No one replied to his suggestion, and Lord Gaerimor moved the meeting be adjourned till Three-Day. Morguil seconded the motion, and Gaerimor spent the next day with the eastern emperor trying to heal the damage. It had been Naerrasil's sarcasm, he pointed out, that had triggered Macurdy's insult. And earlier, at Duinarog, he'd insulted Macurdy very personally, on top of which, his criticisms had been proven utterly wrong.
"Frankly, Your Majesty," Gaerimor finished, "his lordship has long had a reputation for a quick and abusive tongue. And while he is your brother-in-law, you may nonetheless wish to speak to him about it. We do, after all, have agreements to work out. And Field Marshal Macurdy provided and led the actions that won the war. He bled, embarrassed and worried the voitar into undertaking a sorcery they could not adequately control. And then destroyed them with it. Without the Lion, it would be Crown Prince Kurqosz, and not ourselves, dictating the peace."
He paused, giving time for his argument to sink in. Then added, "And almost surely, so powerful a psychic shock was felt even in Hithmearc. Felt sorely enough that I expect the Voitusotar will leave us alone in the future."
Morguil was not as optimistic as Gaerimor claimed to be, but he let the matter he. Instead he defended Naerrasil's criticism. "Marshal Macurdy," he pointed out, "is not only a commoner, he's a half-blood at best. That makes his insult far more offensive than it would otherwise be, and Naerrasil's considerably less."
Gaerimor regarded the argument for a long moment before replying. "That's true, as far as it goes," he said diplomatically. "But consider. In talent, Macurdy excels any ylf I know of in recent centuries. In that, one might say, he is more ylvin than we ylver. As for his common birth-legend has our aristocracies originating from commoners of great accomplishment. And Field Marshal Macurdy's accomplishments, both recent and past, abundantly qualify him as noble. If, unfortunately, somewhat rough-spoken." His lordship chanced a chuckle, to lighten the tone of the discussion. "As for a title, he has already been dubbed the 'Lion of Farside'; Gavriel routinely refers to him that way, as I do, and regards him very highly. I have no doubt he will confer a formal title on him, with a fief of some sort."
He closed his case with an oblique pitch to Morguil's well-known religious leanings. "It seems to me," he finished, "that the Lion is greatly favored by the All Soul. How else would he have been given such power, and so formidable a companion as the great boar."
Morguil chewed his lip thoughtfully.
Gaerimor left with hopes he'd see no more of Lord Naerrasil at the sessions, but Naerrasil continued to attend. It appeared, however, that Morguil had reprimanded him effectively. At any rate his lordship said little in open session, and when he did speak, he was stiffly courteous.
Over the next two weeks the congress worked diligently, and Macurdy saw the advantage in its small membership: there were fewer personalities and attitudes getting in the way. Especially, he told himself wryly, when I keep my own damn mouth under control.
In fact, both he and Morguil let Gaerimor run the sessions. Physically, Gaerimor looked like an affable but rather bland young ylf. But from his aura and knowledge, Macurdy guessed him at sixty years or more. Chairing the congress took a lot out of him. He became haggard, and Macurdy wondered if it was the onset of decline. His first task was to bring Morguil to the understanding that these annoying "others" around him had rescued his empire. And did not now owe him quick and easy recovery as well. Destruction was a reality of war, and recovery would require time, sacrifice, and continued privation, as well as much hard work.
After Morguil, Strongarm was Gaerimor's greatest headache. The dwarf knew what he wanted, was certain he knew what Finn Greatsword wanted, and was disinclined to compromise.
Eventually however, Gaerimor came up with a document that both Strongarm and Morguil accepted.
The keystone was disposition of the prisoners. For that, Gaerimor had adopted and adapted Macurdy's suggestions. The Eastern Empire would draw up a large rebuilding program, rough and quick. It would then estimate what labor was needed, and create the labor crews from prisoners, keeping in mind that they had to be fed and clothed to be effective. The surplus prisoners would be sent back to Hithmearc, on as few ships as could reasonably haul them. The ships would then return, if they were allowed to, to haul other prisoners when they'd completed their rebuilding tasks.
Certain other ships would augment the east ylvin merchant fleet. The rest would be dismantled, and the materials used for whatever domestic purposes were deemed appropriate by the Eastern Empire.
If the prisoner ships did not return, only then would prisoners become property of the empire. And they could not be sold, bartered, or otherwise exchanged. Except that they could buy their freedom if and when able, or receive it from the government.
The King in Silver Mountain would receive certain mining rights he'd long coveted, from the west ylver. Who in turn would receive favorable trading terms on several classes of goods from the Sisterhood, plus sixty percent of the backup cordage and canvas from the voitik armada, eighty barrels of tar, and one hundred of pitch.
That was just the beginning. Gaerimor had found something for everyone, in a maze of cross-arrangements that Macurdy didn't try to keep track of. Though Morguil's accountants seemed to, as did Strongarm. To Macurdy it was a monstrous version of some three-cornered personnel deals he'd heard about in baseball, on the radio back on Farside. Including versions of "players to be named later."
It seemed so complex, with some of the terms so ill-defined, or difficult to control, Macurdy couldn't imagine them being met. But it was an agreement, and as finally signed-organized into sections and subsections, with diagrams!-it looked useable. If the main features were more or less followed, it should work. He hoped.
Macurdy was responsible for the interests of the Rude Lands and the Sisterhood, and felt totally inadequate to the job. Fortunately, Gaerimor covered for him. The Rude Lands and Sisterhood received mainly trade agreements, but to Macurdy they seemed remarkably good trade agreements-well designed to fit their needs and potentials. And both empires honored the contracts Macurdy had made with Oz.
It was Morguil personally who'd brought up the one worrisome aspect of sending hithar home. It was a matter of the known versus the unknown. In Hithmearc, no one knew what had become of the armada and army, and if no one returned, they'd wonder why. After a while, they might assume that the hazards of the sea, Vismearc and war had claimed them. But returning the prisoners would expose the truth. And if the voitar in Hithmearc had survived the crash of Kurqosz's sorcery, they might decide to invade again.
It was Strongarm whose viewpoint prevailed. "Considering what happened this time," he said, "they'd be daft to try." The conferees were not entirely reassured, but they accepted it.
The matter of vengeance barely came up again. When it did, Macurdy had the odd experience of finding himself and Naerrasil on the same side. Morguil let the subject drop. Dealing with reparations had been trouble enough.
The Rude Lands soldiers were to be paid by their own rulers, of course. But the raiders who'd ridden the long cold extra days to serve at the congress were rewarded with two hithik horses each, and the right to take whatever they wished from hithik officers, short of the clothes they wore. When the prisoners realized what was happening, officers passed their valuables to enlisted men. But the raiders quickly caught on and pillaged them all, officers and soldiers. And did quite well.
Macurdy, for reasons of his own, arranged a favor with the east ylvin Lord Felstroin, who had especially appreciated Macurdy's scathing of Naerrasil, and said privately that if he ever wanted a favor done… Macurdy jumped on the offer like a weasel on a baby duck. Felstroin, who was in charge of prisoner assignments, was to watch for a bright young hithu of good character who showed decent skill with Yuultal, and send him to Aaerodh Manor.
That's where Macurdy would be, for he and Varia remarried in a private ceremony presided over by the Archbishop of Colroi. Lord Gaerimor and Sergeant Ceonigh Cyncaidh stood as witnesses. This time it was Macurdy who'd proposed. They were already married, of course, had been since February 1930. But Farside was in a different universe. They would live together at Aaerodh. Ceonigh Cyncaidh, his lordship's eldest son, was little more than halfway to thirty-five, his majority. Till then, her ladyship was the executor of the dukedom, the ducal regent so to speak.
And neither son was interested in agriculture. Macurdy, on the other hand, was a farmer born and raised, who wanted no more of war or the military. He would manage the ducal lands.
There was no formal banquet celebrating the peace agreement. There was no place to hold one, nor the makings for anything suitably festive. So late on the day of its signing, Macurdy went to Gaerimor's quarters to express his respect. He and Lady Cyncaidh, he said, planned to leave the next day.
"Well then," Gaerimor replied, "let the two of us celebrate." His lordship rummaged in a large wicker hamper of rumpled clothing, and came up with a wine bottle. "From Morguil, no less," he said grinning, "in appreciation of my efforts."
Efforts, Macurdy thought. Judging by Gaerimor's face, a strenuous effort. But however tired, the ylf seemed in excellent spirits. He pulled out a shirttail and wiped a couple of wine glasses with it before filling them. "The quality is excellent," he commented. "I just tried it."
Macurdy sipped and nodded. "I wonder," he said, thinking of the agreement, "how carefully people will stick to the terms. With no enforcement arranged for."
Gaerimor laughed. "The needful thing," he said, "was to get a broad written agreement. Government and commerce are neither one entirely honest. But they involve continuous decisions, which can require a lot of pondering, weighing, and balancing. Our agreement provides the several governments with a fixed and reasonably clear reference of action. Wherever pertinent they'll tend to follow it, as the course of least effort. Fudging of course. And there is always the matter of relations between states, and concern over reputation and retaliation."
Macurdy nodded. "Another thing," he said. "I can't for the life of me see how you came up with all those agreement terms."
Gaerimor chuckled. "First you must know people. And next you need to read auras, which Lady Cyncaidh tells me you do very well. Something my own observations tend to confirm."
Again he chuckled. "And next I needed broad information and understanding about the various governments and their commerce. Many years in government posts provided me with a good foundation.
"And Strongarm, who has long served as deputy to the King in Silver Mountain, has remarkable recall. Quite reliable, too. I learned that by asking him questions whose answers I knew, or at least knew somewhat about."
Macurdy nodded. Gaerimor had twice invited him and Varia to supper in his quarters, and questioned him about various Rude Lands matters. Macurdy had concluded that Gaerimor knew more about the Rude Lands kingdoms than he did, though perhaps he'd filled a few holes for the ylf.
"And Morguil," Gaerimor went on, "when he evacuated the government from Colroi, took literally wagon-loads of government records with him. Perhaps hoping against hope that someday the voitar would be driven out, and he'd have need of all those data. You'd be surprised how much of it there is. And when we had High Admiral Vellinghuus and General Horst brought here, I made sure they brought the armada's and army's records from Balralligh, to go with those from Deep River and Camp Merrawin. A treasure trove." He beamed at Macurdy.
Macurdy frowned. "And then what?"
"I read them, of course."
"Read them?"
"Not every word, obviously. Morguil's cache was categorized, of course. With most of it I did little more than look at major headings. If a heading looked hopeful, I explored the subheadings, and skimmed the contents of the more promising. Slowing here and there as appropriate. Fortunately his clerks were excellent penmen.
"The voitik records were much less complex but quite voluminous. I went through them with the help of aides provided by the admiral and general. It helps, of course, that their alphabet and numerals are recognizably like our own-a common origin, you know. And many of their words are similar, though the grammar is rather different. Most of the records are quantitative, and little grammar was involved."
His lordship had paused several times to sip his wine. It seemed to rejuvenate him. "That is one reason," he added, "that things went so much better after the first week. I'd developed a considerable sense of who had what, who might want what, and what was possible, you see."
Macurdy stared. "When did you have time to do all that?"
"Why at night, of course."
"Then-when did you sleep?"
"Every morning between four and six-thirty. Then I was pulled to my feet by my aide and orderly, stripped, helped or hustled outside, and rolled in the snow." He laughed aloud. "I believe they enjoyed treating an aristocrat and council member like that, once they got used to it." Pausing he added: "But tonight… Tonight, when you leave, I shall lie down and sleep till I waken. And woe to anyone who hastens the hour."
Macurdy considered a question, and decided to ask it. He didn't know much about ylvin sensitivities, but he couldn't imagine Gaerimor being offended by it. "Its amazing how you pulled it off," he said. "You didn't learn to operate like that overnight. How old are you?"
Gaerimor saw through Macurdy's verbal camouflage, and smiled amiably. "Eighty-seven years," he said, "most of them interesting, some of them challenging. I recommend old age highly. I should reach decline sometime over the next five years or so, and expect to enjoy that too. Not the decrease in capacity, or the eventual discomfort and pain. But the viewpoint… Ah, that will be interesting!"
He glanced at his clock. "And now, my honored guest, it is time for my overdue sleep."
Initially, in Duinarog, Macurdy had thought of Gaerimor as too weak to be War Minister, though Cyncaidh seemed to think highly of him. But here he'd quickly come to respect and admire the old ylf. And this night, when he left Gaerimor's quarters, it was with awe. He hoped he'd age half as well. A third.
Macurdy did some final things before leaving Colroi. He gave a copy of the Congress Agreement to Colonel Horgent, who was about to leave with his Tigers for the Cloister. Horgent would deliver it to Amnevi. Then, via the great raven network, Macurdy summarized it for her in advance. And informed her he was herewith resigning as dynast, naming her as his successor. She'd have it in writing when Horgent arrived at the Cloister.
And the next morning, when the Tiger cohorts mustered to leave Colroi, he announced to them what he'd told Amnevi the day before. He had no doubt they'd support her.