Bastion of Darkness

Chapter 4
An Evil He Couldn’t Know

THE YOUNG WITCH stared long and hard at the reflecting pool, which she had created just as her mother had taught her, but the image would not come to her. She knew that there were talons in the area-the birds had whispered as much-but for some reason she couldn’t understand, Rhiannon’s magical eye was blind to them.

Behind her, Bryan paced anxiously, fingering the hilt of his sword. A hungry lion, he seemed, impatient for the kill, and with prey close by.

That image of Bryan’s distress spurred Rhiannon on, urging her to try more forcefully. She sent her heart and soul into that pool of dark water, pricked her finger and gave to it a piece of herself, a bit of her own life blood, though as soon as she let the drop of red liquid fall to the pool, she realized to her horror that she would never get it back. Somehow, throwing herself into the magic had taken that bit away from her forevermore.

She knew that beyond doubt, and suddenly the young witch found her breathing hard to come by. For all that she had learned in Avalon, the use of magic was not supposed to be like this. Her mother had practiced witchery for centuries, and had only grown, and surely had not diminished, by the summoning of universal powers. And yet, after only a few short months of truly coming into her power, Rhiannon felt weakened, felt as if the magic constantly took from her, as if it would eventually absorb her completely. She thought of her father, then, the mortal human, and no wizard. Perhaps her magic wasn’t pure, she feared, for, unlike the four older wizards of Ynis Aielle, Rhiannon had not been taken away by the Colonnae to learn and experience the mysteries of the universe, that she might comprehend the universal powers she found at her fingertips.

The young witch could not know, of course, that all the magic was tainted now, that her mother and Ardaz, Istaahl, and Thalasi, too, suffered a personal loss with each expenditure of magical energy. True to her suspicions, though, the cost was more profound for Rhiannon than for the others. So young and inexperienced, Rhiannon did not recognize the barriers that she had to cross with each spellcasting, and did not fully understand the cost until it had been exacted upon her increasingly frail frame.

Desperate thoughts drifted away as the image in the divining pool at last came distinct. “Five o’ them,” the young witch said to Bryan, working hard to keep her voice sounding calm and steady. “Putting their camp on the rocky spur just south o’ Bendwillow Pass. We’ll find them easy enough, for they’re setting a big fire to ward off the chill.”

Bryan instinctively looked to the northeast, the direction Rhiannon had indicated, as if expecting to see a campfire spring up against the darkening background. The spur Rhiannon had spoken of was well sheltered, though, and the young man knew logically that he would see nothing from this perspective, especially not now, with the sky still light from the last rays of the cold day.

“Tonight,” he said quietly.

Rhiannon tossed her black hair back from her face so that she could better view Bryan, for she knew that tone of his, the voice that Bryan held for occasions of planned mayhem.

“Tomorrow,” Rhiannon replied against the young half-elf’s cold resolve.

Bryan looked at her skeptically.

“I’m needing me rest,” the young witch explained.

Bryan nodded, and tried hard to look away from Rhiannon, not wanting his stare to seem accusatory. “Tomorrow,” he agreed, so obviously unhappy, but so obviously conciliatory to this woman. “When you are ready.”

Bryan eyed Rhiannon often that evening, studying her whenever he thought her eyes focused on something else.

Rhiannon knew. She felt his stares keenly, a gaze complete with silent sighs, the looks of an impatient lover. She knew them and understood well, because her own looks at young Bryan were not so different, she had to admit-to herself at least.

They were not lovers, not yet, and neither had made any overt gesture of passion at all. Rhiannon, the older of the pair, wondered about that, wondered if Bryan felt the same stirring as she, and wondered if she should take the lead in their romance.

But she could not, she realized, closing her eyes and seeking the solace of sleep. She could not even afford to think about it. Not out here, and not now.

Bryan watched her through it all, stealing glimpses and holding them fast within his heart and soul. He wanted to go over and kiss her, and hold her, wanted it more than anything in the world.

And yet, Bryan, so mature for his sixteen years, so sympathetic and empathetic, and so pragmatic, Bryan who had been forced to grow up by tragedy and catastrophe, could accept the obvious hold in their relationship. He understood that there was something holding Rhiannon back, something deep and powerful. But he knew that she cared for him, more deeply with each passing day, a budding love that he had to trust she would soon enough admit.

His looks this night were different than the simple gazes of a lovesick youth, though-they were of concern and very real fear. Bryan had seen the cost of the divining enchantment, had seen Rhiannon’s shoulders slump when she had dropped a bit of blood into the pool. He knew that the magic was taking from her, was killing her, and yet he knew, too, that Rhiannon, so selfless, so giving to all the goodliness of the world, would not stop, would press on until her shoulders slumped to the ground, until her last breath drifted from her body.

That image shook Bryan of Corning more than anything in all the world, more than the thoughts of his father, who had died bravely defending his city, more than any thoughts of his own possible death.

He waited until Rhiannon was asleep, and that was not so long, and then he set out alone into the cold, cold night. It was time for him to take some of the tremendous pressure off the fair young witch.

Rhiannon, thinking that her dear companion was watching over her, and so weary from her divining, drifted to sleep.

Bryan felt the brutal bite of the north wind gnawing at his flesh even through the thick cloak he had confiscated from an abandoned farmhouse. Winter was not so punishing on the southern plains of Calva, but this high in the Baerendils, it came on early and held fast for a long time. Thus, the young man was not surprised when he did at last spot the light of a blazing fire on the jut of stone that Rhiannon had indicated.

He took a circuitous route, moving behind and above the talon campsite, to a second, higher plateau in the stone, overlooking the talon camp from a height of about fifteen feet. He carefully worked his way out to the very edge; the wind had cleared all snow from the stone, but traces of dangerous ice remained. A slip might send him plummeting over the edge, bouncing down a thousand-foot mountain slide, or even if he did not go over, his fumbling would surely alert the talons that they were not alone and leave him in a desperate position.

All that in mind, and with all due caution, he managed to get to the lip of the stone. Peering over, he was hardly surprised to find that the scene was exactly as Rhiannon had predicted, with five of the ugly talon wretches gathered about a central fire that was piled high with logs. At least a couple of the brutes were asleep, clucking and snoring, and only one was standing, pacing slowly in tight circles about the fire.

Bryan huddled against the wind, trying to keep his eyes from tearing. Logical battle tactics told him to wait until the camp had settled down even more, until all of the talons had fallen asleep, or at least until all but the sentry had taken up the chorus of snoring. But practicality told the young man that he could not wait for long. Already, his fingers tingled with hints of numbness, and such a chill had come into his body that he feared it might slow his blade. Worst of all, crouching here, so close to his enemies, he could not even move about to generate some body heat.

Bryan pictured Rhiannon’s expression, one of shock and outrage, one of contempt for his foolishness, if she came in search of him in the morning and found him frozen to death against the stone, killed before he had ever even lifted his sword against the oblivious talons.

That sparked him to motion-a single, fluid movement that turned him about and brought his legs over the lip of the rocky jut, then had him sliding, sliding, to the end of his balance and dropping fast to the stone, drawing his sword as he descended, and landing lightly right beside the sentry.

The talon gasped, then gasped again as Bryan’s sword plunged through its chest.

The young warrior spun about, slashing as he went, gashing hard and deep across the sloped forehead of the second as it tried to rise. He leaped to the side, stabbing hard and repeatedly on the third, until movement from the stubborn second forced his attention once more.

The talon, blood pouring over its face, was up in a crouch, bringing its spiked club to a ready, defensive position.

Bryan thrust high, thrust low, then launched his sword into a series of graceful, tantalizing sweeps, left to right, right to left, and back again, and again. Once or twice, the club got in the way to parry, but only a slight deflection that hardly disrupted the graceful dance of Bryan of Corning. He came ahead suddenly, breaking his momentum and altering the angle in midswing, stabbing wickedly, but the talon, no novice to battle, turned and blocked with the club. On came Bryan, and away backed the talon, matching him stride for stride.

“Yous will find no holes, human,” the wretch taunted, as an evil yellow smile, one of pointed, broken teeth, widened on its face. “Garink’s friends wake.”

Bryan leaped forward, then stopped, then came on again, sword jabbing hard. That talon, Garink, was too far from Bryan for the thrust to score a hit, but Bryan understood that well, and understood, too-though the talon apparently did not-that the backing creature had retreated just a bit too far. The talon countered the first thrust by skipping back, smile widening, even offering a taunting laugh.

“Garink’s friends wake,” it said again, laughing louder and then skipping back again, Bryan’s second thrust falling harmlessly short.

Or not. For the talon’s continuing laugh shifted suddenly to a scream of the sheerest horror as the creature slipped off the edge of the outcropping and plummeted and tumbled away into the darkness.

Bryan rushed back to the fire to meet the fourth of the group as it groggily staggered to its feet.

“Duh?” it asked when it wiped the sleep from its eyes and noted that this was no talon but a human standing before it.

Bryan grabbed the creature by its scraggly hair, yanked its head back, lifting the chin, presenting a target that his sword tip was fast to find. He retracted the blade quickly, its work complete, then quick-stepped across the flat stone, dying talon in tow, and with a powerful twist of his slender frame-a movement strengthened by the recollection of Rhiannon’s slumping shoulders-heaved it from the ledge.

That left only one, and Bryan shook his head as he regarded it, sleeping soundly, undisturbed though its four companions were all dead about it. He killed it with a single stroke, then rolled it, and the remaining two, from the ledge. Then he sat down at the fire to chase the nighttime chill from his bones. As he rocked quietly, basking in the heat, letting it sink into cold skin and chilled bones, the thought occurred to him that he shouldn’t have so quickly disposed of the bodies, that he should have taken something, their ears perhaps, to prove to Rhiannon that the task had been completed.

“Rhiannon,” the young man whispered into the dancing flames, picturing her asleep where he had left her, so soft and so beautiful.

He fell asleep with that not-unpleasant image in his mind.

“Bryan.”

The word came from far away, from the depths of his dream, he believed. The whisper of his lover-not a call to him, but rather, just the reciting of his name, the acknowledgment of him as the other half of a love that completed them both.

“Bryan,” Rhiannon said again, more insistently, giving the grinning half-elf a nudge.

Bryan opened a sleepy eye. His blurry vision gradually sharpened, focusing at first on the image of the blackened logs, patches of orange, smoldering glow evident here and there. His smile slowly faded as he came to realize where he was, the talon camp, and that the morning had found him there, and that Rhiannon, standing before him, had found him there, and that they had not spent the night in each other’s arms. That was just a dream, just a dream.

Just a dream.

“Bryan?”

“I am here,” he replied groggily, rolling to the side a bit to shift his weight, and stretching his sore back.

“Are ye hurt then?” the witch asked.

He spent a moment considering that possibility, replayed the events of the previous night-the actual events and not his fantasies-and shook his head. “No. Not hurt. I haven’t a scratch.”

Her reaction caught him off guard, for she moved beside him, crouched low, and punched him hard in the gut. “Ye fool,” she scolded, and her anger was not feigned. “How dare ye take me vision from me and put it to yer own stupid use?”

“I did… What do you mean?” Bryan stammered, balling up defensively as Rhiannon punched at him again.

“Who’s telling ye to go off alone then?” the fiery young witch went on. “Who said to ye that this was yer own fight? Yer own fight alone?”

“You were worried about me,” Bryan responded, that boyish smile flashing bright, its undeniable charm stealing some of Rhiannon’s ire.

“Of course I…” the witch began, but she stopped, caught by surprise as to where this conversation might be leading.

“Ha!” Bryan laughed into the morning light, clapping his hands together and leaping nimbly to his feet. “And so you care, daughter of Brielle,” he accused poking a finger at her. “You care, and there will be no denying it!”

“Ye’re me friend,” the witch replied seriously, calmly. “I’d not deny that.”

Bryan’s eyes focused on her intently. “Just a friend?” he asked with a snicker.

Rhiannon’s cold look stole the mirth from the young man, and told him without a doubt that he had pushed her too far too quickly.

“Ye’re me friend,” she said again. “And we been fighting together, a powerful team, and for ye to go off without a word o’ explaining, for ye to take such a chance without even giving me the option o’ telling ye ye’re right or ye’re wrong…” Her voice trailed off and she looked away, chewing her bottom lip, her blue eyes growing suddenly misty.

“I did not mean it like that,” Bryan began, rushing over and dropping to a crouch beside her. He draped an arm across her shoulders. “This fight was not for you,” he tried to explain.

“That choice is me own to make,” the witch said firmly, avoiding his gaze.

“No,” Bryan disagreed, and the bluntness of his tone did draw her gaze, a look of both curiosity and budding anger. “You have no choice. You would have joined me in this fight, however weak, however weary you might have been. You would have joined me because you see that as your duty. You would have aided me with your magic, despite the obvious price, because you feel you have to, though this fight was not so difficult a task for my sword alone.”

The young witch started to look away again, but Bryan caught her chin in hand and turned with her, forcing her to look at him.

“You would have sought to protect me, as I would protect you, but that exertion, that call to magic, would have wounded you more than these pitiful talons could ever wound me.” He let go and brushed his fingers gently across her cheek, and Rhiannon made no further move to turn away.

“Do you not understand, my Rhiannon,” he said quietly past the lump welling in his throat. “By preventing you from protecting me, I protected you.”

She stared at him hard.

“Would you not have done the same?” he asked gently.

“This is not about me, Bryan of Corning,” the witch said suddenly, fiercely. “And not about yerself. We fight because all the world needs us to fight. Suren it’s a bigger thing than me or yerself, or anything ye think we two might have between us.” She pulled away then and rose, stepping quickly out of arms’ reach.

“Then think of all the world,” Bryan snapped after her, and he too straightened. “Then think of how little good a bone-weary Rhiannon can do for the world compared to what rested Rhiannon did only a few short months ago. How many did you heal then, at the great battle? And how many talons did you slay with your magics? And all of that before you battled the Black Warlock! Before you, Rhiannon of Avalon, flattened the Black Warlock to the ground and sent him slithering back to his dark hole!”

“It was not me alone,” the witch answered softly, her anger subdued by the painful memories of that horrible battle. She looked away, out over the lip of the plateau, out to the wide world spreading before her.

“But how much could you do now?” Bryan pressed. “If a hundred wickedly wounded soldiers lay waiting for you, how many now would survive?”

Rhiannon looked back to him and said nothing; she had run out of answers.

“So rest, my Rhiannon,” Bryan implored her. “Rest and recover your strength, and be ready for that inevitable time when I truly need you, when all the world truly needs you. Do what divining tricks you might to point my sword in the right direction, but then let me take care of the rogue bands. In the end, they are little enough trouble.”

“The day’s to snow,” Rhiannon said quietly, and started away, but not before she offered a conciliatory nod to the young warrior. “It’d not do for us to get caught up so high.”

They made their way down the mountain, to a low and sheltered vale, and encountered no more talons that day, nor trouble of any kind. True to Rhiannon’s prediction, a snow did begin to fall, but it was gentle down in the valley, not wind-whipped and stinging, as up on the higher plateaus. Often Bryan tried to broach again the subject of the talons, of his and Rhiannon’s respective roles in their alliance. By Bryan’s estimation, Rhiannon had done more good than any could have imagined, and she should rest now, let her powers be in case they would be needed again in more desperate times. “Whenever your animal friends speak of enemies in the region, pass the word to me,” Bryan said with all confidence, “then take your rest and await my return.”

Rhiannon was too weary to argue with the eager warrior. She understood that Bryan’s words were as much boast-and a boast aimed at her, and how that set her back on her heels!-as reason. The young warrior wanted to puff himself up-as Rhiannon’s mother used to describe it-in Rhiannon’s eyes. Given the honesty of their relationship, where they saw each other so clearly and truly, she could hardly understand any need he might have to boast.

Still, given the efficient manner in which Bryan had disposed of the last talon band, and the fact that he had long survived without her help, without anyone’s help, striking at talon encampment after talon encampment, freeing refugees and ushering them to safety across the river, Rhiannon had to admit that there was more than a little basis for his bravado. So the young witch-who had been sheltered in her mother’s forest for so much of her life, but was at last beginning to sort out the wide ways of the wide world-took Bryan’s boasting, his need to protect her and to impress her, as a compliment, and lay down by their fire that night thinking that she might find her first truly restful sleep in a long while.

Since before this power had awakened within her.

It was Bryan, supposedly keeping watch, but surely exhausted from the long hike and his escapades of the night before, who first began to snore. Rhiannon lay awake, smiling outwardly at the sound, but her inner turmoil roiled. She had not been properly schooled in the ways and the sources of magic, but she, too, like the other wizards of Aielle, knew that something was terribly amiss. At first she had thought the sudden magical weakness to be her own, but now she was coming to understand that it was the source of power that had been weakened, that those energies to which she might reach out were no longer pure and strong.

That notion brought other disturbing questions to mind. Her home, beloved Avalon, was a creation of magic, and was sustained by magic. If the source had been weakened, had the colors of Avalon, so pure and so rich, begun to fade? “Me mum,” the young witch whispered affectionately into the wind, and indeed, at that moment, Rhiannon would have given anything to be wrapped in Brielle’s warm embrace. She glanced over at Bryan, her would-be hero, leaning against a rock wall, his eyes closed, his snores as loud as ever, and she thought that she should take him there, to Avalon, to meet Brielle. This young man, barely more than a boy, had known only grief and war for so long, for months on end. Perhaps she might show him the quieter and more beautiful side of life, for if Avalon could not heal the emotional scars of war, then no place in all the world ever could.

She would take him there, she decided, and remind him of the goodness of life, to remind him of the beautiful things, to remind him of his own inner beauty.

Rhiannon paused in her musing and just stared at Bryan, and did not doubt that inner beauty for an instant.

She let those thoughts go at that, thoughts she had not held for any man save Andovar. Not yet, she silently told herself, and she lay back down, remembering her fine ranger, his easy yet emotional way with stories, his fine silhouette as he sat tall upon his horse, the graceful way the muscles of his legs held his seat as the animal galloped across the fields, leaping fallen trees with ease.

A darkness engulfed her, fell over her mental vision through the curtain of night; at first she thought it to be the emotions of the loss, the death of Andovar replayed in her imagination. But then Rhiannon recognized it as something tangible, not remembered or imagined, as some true darkness, and not so far away. The witch was up quickly, pacing about the encampment, wondering if she should try divining with a reflecting pool, or if she might simply concentrate and sense the presence more clearly. She reflected on it long and hard, and came to believe that whatever it was-and she feared it might be Morgan Thalasi-it was moving east to west, some distance north of her present position, out of the Baerendils and across the Calvan plain.

Indeed it was a darkness, a perversion, a hideous insult to Nature. That recognition angered the young witch, for indeed she was more like her mother than she could ever know, and her instincts to protect the natural world had her gathering together her things before she even realized the action. If she had sensed the darkness, then it would likewise recognize her, she suspected. Better that she go out and meet it on the open fields; better to be the huntress than the hunted.

But what of her companion? she wondered, glancing over at the sleeping young warrior. Should she wake Bryan and tell him her designs? Should she allow him to accompany her, as surely he would demand?

“No,” the witch whispered. Not this time. This was not a battle of swords, if a battle it would be at all. This was a matter for magic, and in that, Bryan of Corning could play no role. This perversion was an evil that the young half-elf simply could not know. Still, Rhiannon hated to leave him behind, and so she resolved to go out with all speed, better scrutinize the source of darkness, and then return to Bryan’s side, hopefully before the end of the next day.

She left Bryan with a gentle kiss on the cheek and floated out easily across the broken ground of the mountain trail, her black gossamer gown, the dress of her heritage, trailing behind her, shrouding her form in mystery.