Knights of the Rose

Chapter 18

Well to the north of Belkuthas, a pegasus skimmed over the pine tops, circled, and landed in a small clearing. An elf dismounted and started undoing a bundle slung to one side.

“Ugh,” came from within the bundle. Then other sounds, indicating distress, dismay, and a reluctance to move.

Belot undid the last binding. The bundle fell to earth with a thud. Eloquent dwarven curses replaced the other sounds.

Nuor of the Black Chisel rolled out of the carrying bag and stretched his limbs. Then he stood up. He looked down at the ground and up at the sky, then shuddered.

“Never thought I’d feel ground under my feet again. Are we at the Lintelmakers’ caves yet?”

“Hardly. We have two more flights, each as long as this one.”

Nuor groaned. “That can’t be.”

“It is.” Belot laughed. “Of course, I admit that we have not flown directly north. I swung to the south, and this time I found elves. A good many, and on the march-I think.”

“You mean, they may just be going for a picnic in the forest?”

“It could well be.”

Nuor groaned again. Belot relented. “They had all the marks of an elven host prepared for war. I did not go low enough to be able to ask whom they intended to fight.”

“It won’t be dwarves, will it?”

Belot shook his head. “No dwarf laid a hand on Lord Lauthin or any other elf. Our quarrel is with the Istarians, unless they are very quick to withdraw from Belkuthas.”

“Men with the kingpriest breathing down their necks will not give up a victory over lesser races before Hiddukel’s priests give honest measure!” groused the dwarf.

“Then we must fly again, as soon as Amrisha has drunk.” Belot turned away, then halted. “Oh, and don’t call her ‘that confounded feathered pony’ again. She is sensitive.”

He walked away, leaving Nuor alternately cursing and laughing, the latter mostly at himself.

Pirvan studied the map hung on the wall of the keep chamber. This chamber, one level below his and Haimya’s quarters, had become his post of command, where they held councils of war. The councils had become so numerous and so large, and the messengers going to and from Pirvan so continuous, that he had not wished to intrude on Krythis and Tulia.

Particularly not Krythis. Since Sir Lewin’s death, something had broken within the lord of Belkuthas. It seemed to load on him as great a weight as if he had slain the Knight of the Rose by treachery or in cold blood.

Pirvan hoped Krythis would not forever treat the horrible mischance as a crime. No man’s body or spirit could bear the weight of such guilt for long. Krythis needed both in good order. Belkuthas needed him with both in good order-and Pirvan not least among those in Belkuthas.

He realized he had been exceedingly fortunate, not to be as alone as commanders commonly are. Krythis had done much to make this so. When he stood straight and unburdened again, he could do more.

Tulia and Rynthala had said that words did nothing to lighten Krythis’ burden. Pirvan assumed they spoke truth. What next? Time was lacking. Sirbones? He might have scruples. Also, guilt was often a sickness that did not respond to healing spirits.

Tarothin? He might have more scruples than Sirbones, and even less strength. What strength he had would be needed for the day of the assault. Fireball spells, for example, drew much from a Red Robe-more than from a Black Robe-and of course for a White Robe …

Pirvan turned back to the map. A knock made him realize he had turned his back on the door, which was well guarded, but still-

“Enter!”

It was Sir Esthazas. “Message for you, Sir Pirvan,” he said briskly. “It came in with the salt shipment through the tunnels.”

“How much salt?”

“Five barrels.”

“Good.”

That should be enough to salt down the meat of the milk cows and goats that, in days, would have to be slaughtered. Fodder for them had run out. The other livestock of the refugees had long since been slaughtered and either roasted or salted, which had exhausted Belkuthas’s supply of salt.

Sir Esthazas coughed, reminding Pirvan he had not yet asked about the message. I will make a good steward for somebody, when this is done, he thought.

“Speak.”

“Ah-some of the able-bodied refugees-they’ve been training in arms since they left. They sent a message. Can they come back and help in the final fight?”

“No!”

Sir Esthazas flinched.

Pirvan shook his head and continued more quietly. “The better-trained in arms they are, the more their families need them. If they come back and we fall, they are lost and their families defenseless. If they remain in the forest and we fall, they can at least try to lead their families to safety. We will have dwarves and elves aplenty before much longer, so that safety will not be far off.”

“As you wish, Sir Pirvan.”

Sir Esthazas’s turning away was slow, and Pirvan saw the young knight’s broad shoulders slumping. He sighed. Esthazas was barely two years older than his son Gerik. He probably had the same reluctance to admit that something was troubling him, even to one who might help him.

“Sir Esthazas. I will not force help or advice on you, but feel free to ask any question you wish answered. If I can answer, I will.”

The young knight turned back toward Pirvan and almost managed to look him in the eye. “What will our place be, when the fight begins?”

“Have your men not been taking their turns of duty, even on the wall?”

“Yes. But always with an equal or greater number of other fighters watching them. The Gryphons, particularly. Their distrust is-it reeks, to be plain about it.”

In their place, mine would too, Pirvan thought, but did not say.

“It would take time to persuade Krythis and Threehands that you and your men should fight together-more time than we have.” It would take even longer to persuade his own men-at-arms. They felt the shame of Sir Lewin’s dishonor even more keenly than the knights. “But on the day of battle, whatever has been said before, your men will fight as one band, and you will lead them.”

I can’t use the argument about not doubting the honor of a fellow knight again, thought Pirvan, considering what nearly happened to Rynthala because of it. I’ll have to think of something else.

Pirvan did not expect to have time for that, either. At least Krythis’s being apathetic meant fewer allies to persuade that Sir Esthazas should fight at the head of his Solamnics. But Threehands was as tenacious as ever, and Tulia and Rynthala were not only as stubborn as their husband and father, they were much less polite.

But Sir Esthazas would fight. The trail of dishonor Sir Lewin had left behind would end on the day of battle.

Zephros felt rather as he had when, as a small boy, he was summoned to his father on the complaint of his tutor.

Carolius Migmar’s round, ruddy cheeks did not reduce the grimness of his expression as he sat behind the camp table in his tent. “I trust you have an explanation for being late, in addition to your other offenses?”

For Zephros, the truth allowed him to speak without stammering. That had also been the case when he was a boy. “We became lost, trying to avoid trails watched by Belkuthas’s rangers.”

“There are more folk than those of Belkuthas prowling these forests, Zephros. Many of them may be laid at your door. Had your contemptible little host not foraged-to be polite-on the country as it did, fewer folk might be desperate or furious.

“As it is, we have had to kill or execute a fair number of folk who, if they are not Silvanesti subjects, are probably Istarians, or even humans under dwarven protection. I am not grateful for this.

“However, I am grateful that you have done as much against Belkuthas as you have. Without you and your men, much less would have been done. The place might be impregnable.

“My gratitude extends to keeping you at the head of those you have led the past two months. I will also recommend a formal pardon-although I think it would be as well to resign after you are pardoned.”

“I do not think the host of Istar and I will miss each other, my lord.”

“Speaking for the host, I agree. But there are two conditions. One is that you lead your men at the walls on the day of our assault.”

“Consider that done.”

“The second condition is that you have no further dealings with Wilthur the Brown. I am informed-how, I shall not say-that if you do, the Knights of Solamnia will demand your head. I will probably give it to them.

“I do not ask that you seek and arrest him. You could probably do neither successfully. I only ask that if you learn of his whereabouts, you tell those fit to take him and stand aside while they do so.”

Zephros felt modest displeasure in discovering how much Carolius Migmar had learned. He felt great pleasure at leaving the tent a free man, and at the head of soldiers.

There would be a price for that pleasure-the head of a column advancing on the wall of Belkuthas would be a deadly place, no matter how many siege engines battered the citadel for however long. Yet if he fell, all who saw him fall would know of his end, and perhaps in time those who knew of his life would be shouted down.

At least he would not have those cursed kender on his trail any longer!

Pard Lintelmaker sat on a stone bench at the end of a long, low chamber. Several other dwarves shared benches on either side of him.

Before him, Belot, Gran Axesharp, and Nuor of the Black Chisel squatted on moss-stuffed deer-hide cushions. They could practically reach out and touch Pard Lintelmaker’s beard, for the “audience chamber” was mostly taken up with a museum of dwarven work.

Belot had thought dwarves were robust but clumsy, shrewd but lacking elegance of taste or execution. He had ceased to think that the moment he saw the chamber.

Every sort of rock and mineral was there, carved into lace, polished until it shone like mirrors, smoothed until it was as silk to the touch. There was gold, silver, copper, and jade jewelry and ornaments, some of it set with jewels. Some of the jewels were intricately faceted, while others were raw chunks of blazing color.

There was enough to keep anyone who was interested in beauty wandering the aisles of the chamber until snow piled high at the mouth of the Lintelmaker tunnels. However, if Belot was not out of here before the leaves began to turn, let alone before the trees were bare under a weight of snow, irreparable harm would come to all the folk of this land.

Therefore, while elven calm usually made humans look as fidgety as kender, Belot struggled mightily to keep his body quiet and his face expressionless. Before this day was over-whatever day it was in this underground world without sun-they would learn the fate of Belkuthas.

Pard Lintelmaker coughed.

“It seems pretty plain that folk we fostered and therefore have a duty to are in serious trouble. Do you say that they’re innocent in the matter of Lord Lauthin’s death?”

“I have described what I saw and what I have been told by those I trust,” Belot said. “If you do not trust them-”

“Easy, lad, Nuor said. Belot wanted to bristle at being called “lad,” and suspected Nuor was paying him back for the pride-bruising flight on Amrisha. But Nuor also might be able to persuade Pard Lintelmaker that Belot could be trusted.

What Nuor said was virtually the same as what Belot had said, in slightly different words. In the end, silence came, then seemed to swell until it filled the chamber like steam filling an elven winter-bath.

“It’s as well that Lauthin’s blood is on nobody’s hands,” Pard said. “Frankly, Belot, your folk aren’t always the best of neighbors, and they might take on a trifle over our helping Lauthin’s killers. But if we’re not doing that, we’ll come.”

Belot was so relieved, he missed the dwarven lord’s next few words.

“-underground. Walking in the sun’s no faster, and we won’t do it unless there’s friendly fighters in the woods the last few days before Belkuthas. Are they?”

When Belot had translated those mutterings, he had to shake his head. “Scouts and some refugee guards, but our folk are still marching up from the south. If you were coming that way-”

“If we were taking a tooth out by way of the bellybutton,” Pard Lintelmaker growled. “No, the tunnels it will be, and Gran Axesharp will have the chief’s hammer if I can’t find anyone who’s a bigger fool.”

“You find that bigger fool, Pard, and I’ll use the hammer on him before we march,” Axesharp said.

Belot did not feel this was entirely a jest.

The dwarves did not seem particularly concerned about the renegade wizard Wilthur the Brown.

“Just because we aren’t much for the high towers or parading around in fancy robes so long we’d trip over them, doesn’t mean dwarves don’t know anything about magic. We know enough to get done what we think needs doing, and how much that is, is our affair.”

Also, Tarothin probably knew enough about dwarven magic as he knew about the other kinds. If he had not exhausted the last of his strength before the dwarves came. If, if, if-

The dwarven chief was speaking again. “We’ll need to give warning. I’ll reply to Krythis’s message, and Nuor, you can ride back with Belot to deliver it.”

The look on Nuor’s face amply repaid Belot for being called “lad.”

Nemyotes came up to Gildas Aurhinius, on foot, leading his horse, and looking so much like a soldier that for a moment the general did not recognize his secretary.

“Well?”

“The Pass of Riomis has completely collapsed. Shrines, springs, everything. It would take five thousand men or more magic than we command to clear it swiftly enough.”

Aurhinius cursed. “There goes our last chance of reaching Belkuthas before Migmar settles in around it.” He looked at the mountains ahead, dark ripples along the desert horizon.

“Maybe our tale about setting up outposts will turn out to be the truth after all.”

He half hoped Nemyotes would come up with another way of turning futility into hope. But the secretary was tending to his horse, like any good mounted fighter ought to do.

“The scouts have reported finding a centaur, ridden to death,” Haimya said.

Pirvan turned his head on the pillow to look at her. The rest of his body was too heavy to move. At least looking at her was pleasant enough. It was a hot night, and neither of them wore night robes.

“Ridden to death, or driven to run wildly?”

“They say they found marks of a rider on the centaur’s flanks. That elven healer with the scouts-”

“Elansa?”

“Yes, and by the way, I think she and Tharash are bed-mates.”

“Get to the point, woman!”

“Really?” Haimya drew out her pillow dagger and held it up.

“You were saying?”

Pirvan had given up jesting since Lewin’s death. Haimya, on the other hand, seemed to be making more jokes than ever. It helped lift others’ spirits, but it did not deceive her husband. She was whistling as she led the march past the graveyard.

“Elansa found traces of spells on the centaur. And the last prisoner the scouts took said that they-our friends outside-were looking for an escaped wizard.”

“Wilthur?”

“No doubt.”

“I doubt this means we’ve seen the last of him.” Pirvan rolled onto his back, his hands behind his head. “I could ask Tarothin, but Sirbones says he could barely counter one of Wilthur’s major spells, let alone find the man if he is trying to hide.”

“One day Tarothin will tell Sirbones to stop playing nursemaid. Then where will you be?”

Pirvan sighed. “Where I want to be is where I need not fear losing any more friends-or even people I am bound to.”

Haimya rolled on top of him. “Even more than you want to be here?”

“Well, this place has much to commend it-yes, indeed, very much.…”

Which was as far as Pirvan could go before words became, if not impossible, at least unnecessary.

Tharash awoke to the squeal of a night-flying insect in his ear. He swatted it into silence, and for a moment lay still, forgetting why he was here.

Then he felt Elansa’s sweet-scented warmth beside him under the furs, and remembered. Briefly he wanted to forget again and go back to sleep.

Instead, he crawled out from under the furs and dressed himself, careful all the while not to wake Elansa. She had moved by the time he was done, lying on her side with one bare arm reaching toward where he had lain.

She might awaken swiftly, if she sensed that he was gone. That would never do. Tharash snatched up bow and other gear, and went outside to put it on.

By the time he was done, his eyes had adjusted to the darkness, likewise his ears. There were more insects like the one he had swatted, whining about-something new in these forests, at least in this season. Probably too many unburied bodies.

He looked around. The only people awake were the sentries, and they would probably think he was going out in the trees to answer a call of nature.

Close by his feet, the two kender slept, each under a separate blanket (cut from one of Sir Darin’s cloaks, which made three or four kender-sized blankets). Horimpsot Elderdrake had an arm thrown protectively over Imsaffor Whistletrot.

I wish you a safe return home, thought Tharash formally. And for you, young one, your Hallie Pinesweet’s goodwill, if no more.

Then he went through his final wishes for all the folk he was leaving behind, ending with Krythis, Tulia, and Rynthala.

I wish that all of you learn why I did what I did, and that I did not die a traitor. But I could not live on, knowing Lauthin died unforgiven.

Besides, I may not die.

It occurred to him that he also might die, his honor sullied, without succeeding in his purpose. But that was a thought to take away the courage of a minotaur. He would not dwell on it, lest his feet refuse to take him out of the camp.

Tharash turned and walked into the night.

Rynthala was sitting in the same spot along the wall where Belot had bid her farewell. Tonight, though, it was Sir Darin’s splendid head that rose from the stairs. There was enough moonlight to show it plainly, and not for the first time Rynthala wished he had not followed the custom of the Knights of Solamnia in growing a mustache. It was a fine mustache, but she thought he would look better without it.

“May I join you, Rynthala?”

“Certainly.”

He sat at a polite distance, which to her seemed rather far away, and remained silent so long that it began to oppress her.

“What do you think of this tale about Tharash?” was all she could think of to break the silence. “If it is a tale. It might be true.”

Small comfort you are to one whose oldest friend has run mad or turned traitor, she thought.

“It might be true that Tharash has vanished. On the other hand, reports that he has gone over to the enemy-those I cannot believe.”

“I can believe it. We have too much reason to believe that anyone can turn traitor. I do not want to believe it. But what I or you want makes but little difference to telling truth from falsehood.”

His words might lack comfort, but his voice was so soothing that Rynthala almost felt ready to sleep-if she could sleep in Darin’s arms, with that voice calming her as she drifted into slumber …

Abruptly, she realized she had fallen asleep, and was in Darin’s arms. He was holding her with a gentleness that belied his immense strength-but did not hide the steel under the gentleness.

“Please do not beg my pardon, Rynthala,” Darin said. “You might have fallen off the wall otherwise. Perhaps whatever preys on your mind-perhaps we could talk about it in your bedchamber.”

Rynthala swayed to her feet. She hoped he would realize the swaying was fatigue, not enticement.

“Will you carry me there?”

Darin did her the courtesy of staring before he smiled. He did not laugh at all. “I would be honored. Save that if I tried to carry you down these stairs, I might well fall. Then Belkuthas would be short two more captains, and your father and Sir Pirvan would be more at odds than they were over Sir Lewin.”

“The gods forbid! But-will you carry me on level ground?”

“If you wish.”

“I wish.”

Darin actually did carry her across the courtyard. Somebody-a dwarf, from the voice-shouted something at them. Rynthala suspected it was bawdy and did not care at all. The sensation of actually being carried as if she was as light as a child or a kender was new and not at all disagreeable.

The knight opened the door of her chamber with his foot and laid her on the bed as if he had been returning a kitten to its mother. Then he straightened.

“You have sacrificed enough dignity for one night. I will not undress you and tuck you in bed. But if you wish, I can brush out your hair.”

Rynthala looked in the mirror. Even in the guttering lamplight, her hair looked like an empty bird’s nest after a long winter. “I did not know you knew the ways of women so well,” she said, which nearly tangled her tongue.

“I am not so much a stranger to women as some might think,” Darin said. “Not even to women who endured what you suffer. I am neither a paladin nor unduly forward.”

“You are a wonder,” Rynthala said, but she tried to kiss him as she said that, missed, and fell forward on the bed, so that the words were muffled and (she hoped) lost in the bedclothes.

She was falling asleep by the time he finished her hair. Her last waking memory was of his immense hands gently smoothing it, and his long sword-callused fingers touching her temples and cheeks.