Dark Horse

19

Lord Savaric did not hesitate after the sorcerer fell. With a wild shout he called to his warriors and raced through the gates toward Medb’s army, which stood in stunned silence in the fields. The Khulinin were fast on their chief’s heels. Lord Koshyn, Lord Ryne, and the clansmen raised their voices into battle cries that shook the towers, and the four clans sprang after the enemy.

Clan Amnok broke immediately. They had wanted no part of Medb’s treachery, but had been swept along by Lord Ferron, their cowed chieftain, and trapped by the sorcerer’s tyranny.

Now, without Medb’s arcane goad to force them on, they turned and ran. The Geldring, too, were reluctant to fight; despite Branth’s ravings, they fled with their wer-tain to the camp. The Ferganan simply threw down their weapons and refused to fight. Only the mercenaries, well paid and eager for battle, the exiles, and the Wylfling drew their swords and faced the charging clans.

The four clans roared joyfully. The sorcerer was dead, the enemy forces were cut in half, and Athlone had been saved. Now they were running to something they understood. As they charged across the fields, they beat their shields with their weapons and shouted their challenge across the plains. Their running feet raised clouds of dust, and, through the thick air, the sunlight glistened on their helms and their swords. With one will, both sides met in a deafening crash.

The tumult rattled through the fortress. Seth, from atop the wall, watched the battle for several minutes before walking down to the ground. His icy, remote eyes revealed no feelings as he felt Athlone’s wrist and laid the unconscious man in a more comfortable position. Then he turned to Gabria. She was lying in a heap, her face pale and her golden hair dirty with sweat and dust. The Hunnuli stood over her.

“Tell her we still guard the most treasured books of the old sorcerers. She may have need of them one day.”

The Hunnuli did not answer, as he expected, but she flicked her head in understanding. Gabria stirred as the noise of the battle finally drew her awake. Seth put a skin of water to her lips; she drank thirstily and struggled to her feet. He watched her impassively.

The girl looked around at Medb’s body, at the furious fighting that raged in the fields, and at Athlone lying nearby. For just a second, her gaze softened as she looked at the wer-tain. At last she met Seth’s eyes.

He nodded to acknowledge her. “It was said in tales long ignored that sorcery would one day be found in the hands of a woman.”

Gabria didn’t answer. She was tired beyond exhaustion, but she could not rest. The strange image of the Woman of the Marsh remained in her mind, compelling her to come. She hauled herself up onto Nara’s back and put on her cloak.

Seth kept his stare pinned on her. “You are leaving?”

“I have to,” she said curtly.

At Gabria’s command, Nara wheeled and cantered south down the old road. The girl did not watch the fighting as they passed or look back at the fortress. The noise of the battle receded, and before long they were alone.

“Please take me back to the marshes, Nara,” Gabria said, her voice indistinct and empty.

Nara’s thoughts were worried. What have you left to say to this woman?

“Don’t be concerned. I need to see her.”

Nara asked Gabria nothing else, but a foreboding chilled her.

Her rider was so remote. The girl’s unresponsiveness could not be explained simply by weariness or distress. There was something different, an unnatural sense of urgency that precluded everything else. The mare settled into a gallop. There was little she could do but comply until they reached the marshes and she could learn the real purpose behind their journey.

Like a wild tide, the four clans swept through the remaining forces of the sorcerer’s army, until the ground was littered with dead and the earth was stained with blood. The Wylfling and their mercenaries fought bravely, but by the close of day they were defeated. Most of the exiles were cut down, except for a few who escaped to the hills. The Geldring, Ferganan, and Amnok clans had already surrendered, preferring the punishment of the council to annihilation by the enraged, triumphant Khulinin, and they stood aside while Savaric tore down Medb’s banner.

The fighting was still going on in the valley when Athlone regained consciousness. For a moment, he thought he had drunk too much, because his stomach was queasy and his thoughts were a jumble of bad dreams and unfamiliar pain. Then he opened his eyes and saw that he was lying beside several other wounded men by the gates of the fortress. Piers was tending a warrior close by. The memories flooded back with all their griefs and furies.

The wer-tain’s moan brought Piers to his side. The healer helped him sit up, then forced a cup into his hands. Athlone stared numbly down the hill at the body of Boreas while he drank the liquid. Whatever Piers had given him burned in his stomach with revitalizing warmth, and, after a few minutes, he was able to stand. When he saw Medb’s body, his jaw clenched.

“Why did she have to do that?” he groaned.

Piers said quietly, “Gabria had no choice, Wer-tain. She had to use the weapons at hand.”

“The weapons at hand,” Athlone repeated ironically. He could remember using the same words to Gabria. “Where is she?” he asked after a while.

Piers’s face clouded with worry. “She and Nara went south. I think she is returning to the Woman of the Marsh.”

“Returning!” Athlone cried. He threw the cup to the ground and ran for the nearest horse.

Piers yelled angrily, “Athlone! You’ll never catch a Hunnuli on that.”

The wer-tain ignored him, grabbed the bridle of an escaped mount and swung up in the saddle. He savagely reined the animal around and kicked it into a gallop.

A day later, Athlone’s horse fell and did not rise again. No Harachan could catch a Hunnuli or even keep pace with one, yet Athlone, his heart sick with fear and confusion, had urged the horse on until it had dropped. Now he was on foot and farther from Gabria than ever. In the hours he had ridden like a -madman, he had given no thought to anything but keeping to Nara’s trail and finding Gabria. But that day, as he trudged southeast in the hot sun, he had too much time to think and his emotions twisted inside him.

Athlone could hardly believe Gabria had killed the sorcerer with magic. He guessed she had learned sorcery from the marsh woman, but why had the girl decided to use magic as her weapon against Medb? Gabria had never shown any sign of using sorcery . . . or had she? As Athlone jogged along, he began to remember things that had seemed odd to him: her fight with Cor and the man’s Strange illness; Cor’s later death at her hand; and even the fight Gabria had had with him at the pool, when she had felled him with a mere shoulder wound.

Athlone vaguely recalled how he had called her a sorceress, but how could he have known? She was nothing like what he expected a magic-wielder to be, nothing like Medb. Gabria rode a Hunnuli and she had saved the clans. She had saved him.

Where was the evil in that?

Athlone groaned and ran faster. He had to find her before she was lost in the marshes. Suddenly, to his relief, he heard a Hunnuli neigh a strident greeting. Nara galloped down a long hill to meet the wer-tain. She was drenched with sweat and caked to the knees with dried mud. And alone.

Come. Gabria has met the Woman of the Marsh. She sent me away.

Athlone was nearly overwhelmed by the force of the mare’s distress. Gabria would never have ordered Nara away if she were planning to return. He vaulted to the horse’s back without hesitation and held on as Nara- burst into a dead run back the way she had come.

It was early morning when the Hunnuli reached the western fringes of the marshes. Nara worked her way down the river as far as she could go before she was forced to stop and let Athlone slide off.

“How will I find her out there?” he demanded, glaring at the marshes around him. Weary, hungry, and feverish, he was starting to feel ill.

Nara neighed. The marsh woman came to meet Gabria in a boat. They went downstream past that bend. Gabria is nearby. I can sense her.

Athlone threw up his hands and plunged into the mud. Before moving off, he stopped and, without turning around, asked, “Nara, if Gabria is a sorceress, why do you stay with her?”

Nara snorted. The Hunnuli were bred to be the guardians of the magic-wielders. It is only evil we cannot tolerate.

Athlone nodded and trudged on. The full meaning of the Hunnuli’s words did not come to the chief’s son until much later.

At the same time Nara was racing away to find help, the Woman of the Marsh was leading Gabria ashore on a small, overgrown island, not far from where the girl had left the Hunnuli. The woman had thought about waiting for the girl in the tree, but when she had learned Gabria was coming, her anticipation grew too strong. The sorceress had brought her things in her boat and met the girl at the edges of the marsh.

The old woman clicked her tongue as she laid Gabria on a mat under a makeshift shelter and unpinned the red cloak.

The girl was in dreadful shape, but she had come and she was still alive—that was all that mattered. It would take a little more time to build up the girl’s strength and tend to her most dangerous hurts, or neither one of them would survive the transference. Still, the sorceress gloated, after waiting two hundred years, another day will make little difference.

By nightfall, Gabria was sleeping heavily. She had been fed and drugged with poppy. While she slept, the sorceress pored over her musty manuscript to memorize the best possible incantation. The transference would have to be perfect and would require a great deal of strength and skill, but the results would be worth the effort.

The old woman cackled with glee. She would be young again! She could look in a mirror and see a beautiful, smooth-faced woman instead of an ugly shell. Best of all, she could return to the world. That fool, Medb, had accomplished that at least: he had broken the clans’ centuries-old complacency and had opened the door to sorcery once more.

It was a shame the girl had to die, for she would make an excellent ally. She had incredible will and a natural talent. Nevertheless, the price had to be paid and the transfer of youth left little life in the donor. The woman laughed to herself and set aside her manuscript. She would not have to wait much longer.

Morning was streaming into the shelter when Gabria awoke. She roused slowly, heavily dragging herself through a drug induced fog to awareness. When she finally opened her eyes, she wondered vaguely where she was, then she wished she could go back to the peace of sleep. Her body hurt abominably, and even more painful was the empty, aching loss in her heart. What had begun at Corin Treld had at last reached its completion, leaving her life in ashes. Medb was dead, Athlone was beyond her reach, Boreas dead, and Nara gone. And now, because of her duel with the sorcerer, she was condemned to death or exiled to a life of emptiness. There was nowhere she belonged but the grass-covered barrow at Corin Treld. Her clan was at peace now; perhaps they would welcome her.

When the sorceress came in, Gabria stared at her apathetically. “Oh, it’s you.”

The woman put on a smirk of false sympathy. “Come, my child. It is time to pay your debt.”

“What debt?” Gabria mumbled. She tried to rise, but the crone pushed her down.

“Thanks to me, you have destroyed a powerful and dangerous sorcerer. But now there is no life left for you. You do not sacrifice anything by relinquishing your youth to me. It is a fair deal for us both.” The sorceress held up a small, lighted oil lamp.

Gabria glanced at the lamp, wondering what the old hag was talking about. Before she realized what was happening, her gaze was captured by the light of the flame and the sorceress mesmerized her into a mild stupor.

The old woman sat beside Gabria on the mat. She set the oil lamp between them, took the girl’s hand, and started the spell. The magic began to build around Gabria. and the Woman of the Marsh grew absorbed in her task.

Suddenly, without warning, a commotion on the edge of the little island disturbed the woman’s chant. She looked up worriedly just as a large and angry warrior burst into the shelter. He was flushed with fever and his body trembled with rage.

The woman screeched, “Stay away! Your magic can’t hurt me!” and jumped to her feet. She pulled Gabria’s stone ward out of her pocket and thrust it in the man’s face.

Athlone knocked the ward out of her hands. He took one look at Gabria and pounced on the sorceress. “What have you done?” he bellowed, shaking her like a rag.

“She must pay,” the old woman screamed. She clawed at his fists, but it was like scratching steel.

Athlone dropped the old woman and leaned over her. “Pay what?”

The woman hesitated, reaching into her sleeve.

“Pay what!” he demanded again.

She snatched a slim dagger. “The price for my help,” she cried. “Her youth is mine now!” She stabbed upward toward Athlone’s stomach, a faint blue aura cloaking the blade.

The wer-tain saw the knife coming too late and tried to twist away. The knife struck his belt, slithered sideways, and sliced into his left ribs. The crone’s feeble Trymian Force was doused. Athlone roared in pained fury, and the woman screeched in real terror. She tried another stab, but Athlone hit her with his fist and knocked her to the ground. He heard a sickening crunch as the woman’s head struck a large rock. She jerked once and lay still.

Athlone stood for several breaths, staring at the hag’s body on the ground as if he could not believe she were dead. Then he wiped the sweat off his forehead, and a grim smile spread over his face.

Gabria cried out. Athlone whirled around and stared at the girl in horror. The marsh woman’s half-finished spell had ruptured and the forces of magic she had gathered and not used abruptly coalesced into livid red clouds that swirled around Gabria in a gathering tornado. The oil lamp spilled and flames spread around the Corin, setting her cloak on fire. Gabria screamed again over the rising shriek of the unspent power.

Athlone was filled with terror at losing her. Without thinking, he leaped at Gabria through the wild forces and ripped her cloak off. The magical aura engulfed him.

Even as the uncontrollable power raged around him, the wer-tain was stunned by the natural, familiar feel of the magic.

In a brilliant flash, he realized that magic and sorcery were not a perversion or an evil threat, simply a natural power inherent in his world—a power that could be tapped only by those born with a talent. At that moment, he knew without a doubt that he, too, had that talent.

The revelation shook him to the core. He understood a part of what Gabria must have felt when she had learned of her power. It was a bitter lesson to realize he had been wrong about something so vital.

As quickly as his acceptance took shape, Athlone noticed Gabria was doing nothing to escape the maelstrom. His skin was tingling and his ears ached in the rising shriek of energy amplified to an explosive crescendo.

“Gabria!” he yelled, pulling her close to him.

The girl hung against the warrior. Her eyes were closed and her body was limp.

Athlone held her tighter. Oh, gods, he wondered, has she given up? “What do you truly want?” he shouted at her.

Gabria was still for so long that Athlone thought he had lost her, then she stirred. Her answer was nearly lost in the roar of the whirlwind, but he heard it.

“I want to be myself.”

She wrapped her arms around Athlone and forced her will into the center of the whirling magical vortex. Then, to her everlasting joy, she felt Athlone’s mind tentatively reach out to her and offer his strength. Together, they slowed the wild whirl of broken sorcery and spread the destructive force apart until it dissipated into a mist on the morning breeze. The angry red light faded and the fire died down.

Gabria gritted her teeth against a wrenching nausea as the remnants of the spell vanished and the day snapped back to familiarity. It was over. Then she saw the burning remains of her scarlet cloak and the pent-up tears of five months flooded her eyes. She leaned against Athlone and sobbed.

For five days, Gabria and Athlone camped in a hollow by the river, spending their days along the banks and their nights in the warmth of each other’s arms. It was a time of healing for them both and, under Nara’s watchful eye, they slept a great deal and talked very little. Neither of them wanted to broach the subject of sorcery or the future until the time was right. For now they were content to be together for as long as they were allowed.

On the afternoon of the sixth day, Nara neighed a greeting to a horseman who appeared on a far hill. Athlone and Gabria exchanged lingering looks and reluctantly walked to their camp to wait for the intruder.

The young clansman, wearing a Khulinin cloak, reined his sweating horse to a halt and slid to the ground. His gaze slid past Gabria, but he saluted Athlone in undisguised relief and pleasure. “My lord, we have been looking for you for days.”

Athlone turned cold at the title. His nostrils flared and he took a step forward. “Why do you call me that, Rethe,” he demanded.

Rethe bowed his head. “That’s why we had to find you. Lord Savaric is dead.”

“How?” Athlone demanded.

“He was stabbed from behind . . . just after the fight for the camp. We think Lord Branth is responsible.”

“Where is Branth now?”

The warrior looked up unhappily. “We don’t know. The book of that accursed sorcerer is missing, too. Lord Koshyn and the Geldring’s wer-tain believe Branth took it after he murdered Lord Savaric.”

Athlone felt his grief well up. “Thank you for the message. Please leave us.”

Rethe nodded but he did not move. “My lord, Lord Koshyn has called for an immediate reconvening of the council. He asks that you bring Gabria to the council.”

“Why?” Gabria asked.

The messenger glanced past her nervously.

“Answer her,” Athlone said sharply.

Startled by Athlone’s tone, Rethe involuntarily looked at her. Gabria smiled briefly, and he relaxed a little. He and the other Khulinin could not fathom the realities of Gabria’s true sex or her ability as a sorceress. She had spent five months in close companionship with them and no one even suspected.

The clan owed its life to her and everyone knew it. Unfortunately, the debt would not erase her crimes. Rethe had no idea how the clans would react if Gabria returned with Athlone, but he doubted few people would be pleased.

“I don’t know,” Rethe answered. “I was only told to pass on the message.”

Athlone and Gabria looked at one another for a long time, their eyes locked in understanding. Finally, Gabria nodded.

“We will come,” Athlone said.

Rethe accepted the dismissal, saluted, and rode away. Athlone watched him go as Gabria slowly began to obliterate their camp and gather their meager belongings.

Athlone stood for a long while, his face blank and his back sagging. He walked out of camp and disappeared into the hills. Gabria sighed. She knew the grief he was suffering and she, too, grieved for Savaric. Nara lay down, tucking her long legs underneath her and Gabria cuddled into the haven of the mare’s warm sides.

Gabria was asleep when Athlone returned at dusk. He gently ran his finger along her jaw. His heart jumped when her eyes opened, filled with love and welcome.

The wer-tain’s voice was harsh with grief, but his hands were warm and steady as he wrapped his golden cloak around her shoulders. “I have no horse worthy to give you as a betrothal gift, so I hope you will accept this instead.”

Gabria sat for a long time, gently rubbing the gold fabric between her fingers and thinking about her family and her clan. Finally, she replied, “The Corin are dead. It is time to let them rest.” She looked up at him and smiled radiantly. “I accept your gift.”

Athlone was delighted. The smile she gave him was worth the uncertainty and difficulties of the days ahead. The warrior had no idea if the council would allow him to marry the girl, but now that he was chieftain of the Khulinin, the other lords would have to tread carefully.

“You don’t mind being with a known heretic?” Gabria asked. It was the first time either of them had spoken of the subject, and, though she remembered the Khulinin’s shocked recognition of his own talent, she was not certain how he was dealing with it.

Athlone smiled faintly. “Boreas did not mind.”

Nara snorted and nudged the new chief.

“Did you know,” Gabria asked as Athlone settled down beside her, “that Nara is carrying Boreas’s foal?”

Athlone’s smile grew as wide as the sky.