Prophet of Moonshae

10

The hounds disappeared as the four companions reached the very crest of the pass, where the two watchtower peaks bracketed a narrow niche. Walls of dark, humid granite loomed on either side, with the route narrowing to no more than ten feet wide at its tightest.

Soon, however, the cliffs parted to reveal a vista of Gnarhelm. Heather-shouldered ridges dropped away before them and off to both sides as the crest of the Fairheight Mountains fell quickly to a realm of rugged foothills. Gray clouds weighted the horizon, and mist filled many of the lower valleys. Their surroundings had a dismal, lonely look, as if they stood upon a massive island of rock that floated through a sea of gloomy ether.

"I never realized that so much of the highlands lie in Callidyrr," remarked Alicia as they rested themselves and their horses before beginning the steep descent.

"Indeed. As well as all the iron and most of the coal. And now the gold as well," Keane explained.

"Do you think that would send them to war?" asked the princess.

"I should think not. The northmen look toward the sea for their sustenance and their treasures."

"And here are our shaggy friends," announced Tavish, calling their attention to the surrounding slopes. They saw a dark shape slide along a rock before quickly disappearing. Another flashed for just a moment, silhouetted against the sky at the top of a ridge.

"I'm glad to see them again," Alicia said. "They don't seem threatening, and who knows? Maybe they're looking out for us."

As if in response to her suggestion, a sharp bark echoed across the rolling heather. It was shortly followed by another, and then a chorus. Hounds sprang from all directions and ran before them, their powerful bodies low along the ground as their legs drove them with easy grace. The full song of their baying resounded across the highland.

"What's that?" Sir Hanrald squinted. The others noticed his sword, held now in his hand. He used it to point. "There. It's a man."

"Several of them-northmen, I should say, by those shaggy cloaks," ventured Tavish. They all saw three men break from the cover of a dense copse, sprinting over a low hill and dropping out of sight. The dogs, still barking, did not follow. Instead, the large pack milled about before the woods, as if they had lost the scent of a stag.

"A trap-it's a trap!" Alicia realized. "Look, warriors could take cover along all those little hills, and we'd ride right into the middle of them." She gestured to the dozen or so knoblike crests that jutted from the rolling countryside surrounding the dirt track.

Suddenly the dogs cried anew, a deep and menacing sound that proved they had located a scent. In a great, flowing mass of dark fur, they surged up one of the small hills, flushing nearly a dozen bowmen from the top, harrying the men down the steep slopes and away from the four Ffolk.

"You were right," admitted Hanrald dryly. "But it seems the danger has been averted." The young noble looked at Alicia with keen curiosity. "I wonder what it is that first brings a Moonwell to life and now brings the hounds of Blackstone to provide us with an escort."

The princess felt uncomfortable under his gaze. Didn't he know that she was as mystified as he? "Should we return to Blackstone?" she wondered aloud.

"I think we've seen what we came here to learn. The northmen are definitely hostile. Why else would they have arranged to take us from concealment?" Keane asked.

"I'm not so sure," Tavish countered. "They might have been there simply to observe us. We could have passed by unharmed and never known they were there if not for the hounds."

The others expressed their skepticism. "That's a spot chosen with an eye toward attack," Hanrald pointed out.

"I think we'd be taking too much of a risk, to ride on alone," Keane said. "We should return to Blackstone and send news of this to Callidyrr."

"I'll ride on ahead and see what I can find out," offered the knight, with a straightening of his shoulders.

"No!" Alicia would not see Hanrald sacrificed for his own bravado. "Keane's right."

The mage's look of relief was plain as she continued. "We should turn about here and thank our stars … or thank the goddess, perhaps, that we were not taken in by the trap. When we return to these heights, it should be with a large company of warriors." And myself in their lead, she thought but did not say.

They reined about and kneed their mounts back across the rolling country toward the looming pillars of the pass. No sound gave them warning of chaos as suddenly the ground buckled beside them. The horses reared with piercing whinnies of terror as a great crack split along the earth to gape darkly in the heather. A resounding bellow exploded from the hole, and Alicia felt dire terror in the very pit of her stomach.

"Wait!" cried Keane, trying to control his bucking steed.

A huge shape moved within the hole and then suddenly whooshed upward, soaring in a circle in the sky. A great tail trailed behind the serpentine form, while leathery wings pulled the massive creature higher and higher. Scales the color of fresh blood lined the entire form, which was huge enough to cast a dark shadow on the ground below it, even underneath the charcoal gray of the overcast sky.

Compelled by instinct far more persuasive than the commands of their riders, the four horses bolted away from the trail, streaking across the rolling meadows in dire panic. The humans hung on for dear life as the steeds leaped a shallow ravine and bounded down a steep mountainside.

The red dragon bellowed again, this time belching forth a huge fireball with the sound. The sphere of flame crackled against the overcast sky, though it was so high up that it did not harm them. Indeed, Alicia couldn't even feel the heat of the blast against her face.

Then she saw an awesome spectacle. The beast dove, its wingspan expanding until it seemed to block out the sky, cloaking the entire slope beneath its vast shadow.

"Stop!" she heard Keane cry again, and then he gibbered something that made her think he had lost his mind: "There's nothing to-there-it's-"

The rest of his words vanished behind the blast of another fearsome roar as the great dragon swooped over their heads and started gaining altitude, swinging around for another pass at the helpless humans and their panicked, bolting steeds.

The horses reached the foot of the slope, splashing through a wide, gravel-bedded stream, and then they careened along the valley floor at breakneck speed. Alicia hung on for her life-a fall at this pace onto the rocky ground could very easily prove fatal-and tried to listen to Keane.

For a few moments, the mage was occupied in terrified screams. The princess sensed, however, through her own awe-inspired terror of the dragon, that it was the panicked racing of the horses that frightened Keane, not the dragon.

Alicia herself felt little fear of the ride. She had ridden with great skill since her third birthday. Though she knew that Keane wasn't her equal on horseback, she was nevertheless astonished at the focus of his panic.

"For the sake of the gods," she cried, "hold on! We've got to get to safety!"

"That's it!" Keane shrieked, his lips stretched taut across his teeth. "There's nothing to be afraid-by the Abyss!" The rest of his announcement vanished in a wail of hysteria as his horse leaped a wide chasm that gaped, perhaps a dozen feet deep, before them.

The dragon swooped past them again, this time so close that they should have felt the thunderous breath of its passage, but there was nothing, not even a slight disturbance of air. Before them now the great serpent spun through a shallow curve, and at last their exhausted horses returned to some semblance of control.

Reining in hard, Alicia studied the great shape in the sky, and as she did, it seemed to shimmer against the gray backdrop of clouds. The dragon whirled and dove at them again, and suddenly it was no bigger than a large crow.

It descended, a serpentine shape of bright colors and gauzy, butterfly-like wings, toward them. The body was first a bright orange in color, but then quickly shaded to blue. The tiny mouth gaped, but instead of a monstrous roar, it uttered a rather ludicrous squeak.

"Stop!" cried the princess, anger suddenly replacing her terror. "Stop right there!"

"What?" The small dragon halted instantly, hovering before them by maintaining the steady beat of its fairylike wings. "Aren't you afraid anymore?" Adding to the incongruity of the scene, the serpentine mouth curved downward in an exaggerated pout.

"What are you doing?" spluttered the magic-user. "You could have gotten us all killed!"

"Oh, bother!" snapped the dragon, its tone petulant. "I can't have any fun anymore!"

"Fun is one thing!" Now Tavish joined in the rebuke. "But, Newt, that was downright dangerous! And where did you come from, anyway? What are you doing here?"

"Poosh-haw!" sniffed the dragon, turning to regard Alicia with bright, sparkling eyes. He continued to hover steadily in the air while the four humans dismounted. "You all looked like you could use the run! Besides, it gets so boring up here all by myself!"

"Newt?" asked Alicia, recognizing the name though she had never met its owner. "Newt, the faerie dragon?"

"I suppose you thought it was 'Newt the firbolg,' or 'Newt the water snake'?" His voice was still a whine, but he looked at the young woman with keen interest. "And you're the daughter of my friend Tristan, I know."

"Yes, I am. My father has told me much about you-how your courage and ingenuity helped in the Darkwalker War, and how he was fortunate to have a companion as bold as yourself!" She also remembered, but did not remark about, tales of Newt's practical jokes, which several times had come close to getting Tristan or his companions killed.

"He did? I mean, of course he did!" The little dragon's chest puffed outward. "Why, if it hadn't been for me, that lad would have gotten his beard trimmed more than once. Say, did he tell you about the time he was stuck in the mud and-"

"I say," Keane interrupted brusquely, "we should have a nice chance to reminisce, but we have drifted quite far from our trail. If we are to travel back through the pass before dark, we had best be moving."

"Back? Through the pass? Tonight?" Newt digested each bit of news as if it were a tough piece of meat. "But you can't!"

The dragon suddenly vanished, popping out of sight with uncanny suddenness.

"Where'd he go?" Keane demanded quickly. "I don't trust that little-"

In that instant, Newt reappeared, hovering in the same place he had been, and then blinked away again. He repeated the process several times as the humans stared.

"He always does that when he's agitated," Tavish explained. "Faerie dragons spend much of the time invisible, and I think he forgets which is which."

"I do not!" huffed the dragon, exerting the effort to remain visible. His hover, however, became less steady. Indeed, he bounced up and down like a puppet on a string.

"Tell us," Alicia said, keeping her tone friendly. In truth, she found herself liking the little dragon, despite the shocking nature of his introduction to them. "Why did you surprise us like that? How did you know who I am? And what do you mean, we 'can't' go back through the pass?"

"That's just it. I've been waiting here for you, for a long time. I've got something to show you, but now you're going away before I even have a chance! It's-it's not fair!"

" Waiting for us? For how long? How did you know we were coming? My parents told me that you lived in Myrloch Vale, on Gwynneth!"

"That was years ago," said Newt, a trifle pompously. "When the king moved to Alaron, to the palace in Callidyrr, why naturally I moved to this island as well." He looked at the humans as if he was amazed at their stupidity. "But I suppose news travels slowly when you're not of the Faerie Folk."

"Tell us, then-why did you frighten us? One of the horses could have fallen, and the poor beast-not to mention the rider-could have been badly hurt!" Alicia kept her tone friendly but put a note of rebuke into her voice.

"I–I'm sorry," the dragon surprised them by saying. His head drooped, and the color of his scales faded from bright blue to a deep purple, but then quickly brightened again as he smiled. "But I got you to come all this way, didn't I? And I fooled you! It was a good illusion, wasn't it? Were you really, really scared?"

"I saw through it right away," Keane pointed out. Alicia remembered the magic-user trying to halt their headlong flight. At the time, she had thought him mad. "Still," the man admitted, "you fooled my horse, and I guess that was enough."

Newt sniffed, cocksure again. "Well, anyway, it serves you right. You're late. I've been waiting here for six winters."

"Six years?" Alicia stared at him, shocked. "But what if we'd never come this way?"

"Oh, you would. I knew that. I just don't know why you had to take so long about it! Say, do you have anything to eat? It's been a lot of goat meat and mountain berries for me! How about some cheese? Tristan always fed me cheese, you know. He would bring me the best- Say, you wouldn't have any Corwellian sharp, I don't suppose?"

"Wait a minute," said the bard as the companions looked at each other in astonishment, still reacting to the dragon's initial statement. "You say you knew we were coming. You mean all of us? Or one of us?"

"Why, her, of course. You really are a silly bunch if you didn't know that! I've been waiting here for the princess of Kendrick, daughter of my friends, Tristan and Robyn!"

"Very well," Tavish noted, trying to keep the dragon on track. "Now, why were you waiting for her?"

The dragon blinked, as if astounded by her stupidity. "To show her, of course!"

"Show me what?" demanded Alicia, growing exasperated.

"You'll just have to come with me to find out!" sniffed the dragon, petulant again.

Alicia looked at her three companions, then back to the dragon, who vanished just as she opened her mouth. "I know you're there, Newt, and I want you to listen to me!"

"Hah to you! I'm over here!" The voice chirped from behind her, but she didn't give the faerie dragon the satisfaction of turning to face him.

"We've learned something very important. Our neighbors, the northmen, are going to war against the Ffolk-against the kingdom of your friends, my parents. We must take word of this invasion back to Callidyrr so that the militia can be mustered and we can be ready for the attack when it comes."

"Oh, that." Newt clearly was not impressed, though he did reappear to float before Alicia again, his gossamer wings buzzing. "But I have to show you something important!"

"Then tell me what it is!" snapped the princess, growing increasingly irritated.

"If that's the way you're going to act, I'll just go by myself!" Abruptly the dragon became invisible one more time.

"Ahem!" said Tavish, speaking loudly enough that the dragon could hear if he was still in the area. "If Newt has been waiting here for six years, he undoubtedly has something of great importance to show us … to show you, my princess. Perhaps, however, one of the rest of us could carry news of the invasion back to Blackstone and hence to Callidyrr."

"I'll go," Hanrald said immediately. "I'm the fastest rider, and the two of you can remain here to protect the lady Alicia."

The princess scowled at the notion that she needed protection, but then she realized that the duke's son had meant no offense. Indeed, his suggestion made sense, although she realized that she didn't wish to part with any of her companions.

"Very well," she agreed, thinking for a moment. "However, we still haven't gained concrete proof that the northmen intend to attack Callidyrr, and it seems surprising that if this was their plan, they would send a small force rather than their entire mass of warriors.

"Have your father's men stand at the Fairheight Pass and bar the road to the northmen if they should get that far. But don't attack them unless they give you absolute proof that their intentions are warlike."

"Yes, lady," replied Hanrald with a bow.

She felt a sudden rush of affection toward this young nobleman. For the first time, she thought about him as the heir to the mighty duchy of Blackstone, before she remembered, with a bitter sense of regret, that the crude brute, Gwyeth, was his older brother and hence first in line for his father's title. If not for that, in their later years, and with the pleasure of the gods, she would be monarch over all the Ffolk, and Hanrald might become her most powerful subject lord on the island of Alaron.

"May the … goddess watch over you," she said.

Smiling grimly, Hanrald whirled his horse through a circle and spurred the steed back toward the path. Riding over the rolling highland in an easy canter, he swiftly shrank into the distance.

"Newt?" asked Tavish as they watched the man ride. "Are you still here?"

"Of course!" Grinning broadly, the faerie dragon reappeared. "Now I can show you?"

"If you don't, there'll be trouble," the bard said ominously. "Where is this 'thing' we have to see?"

"Come on!" Newt darted away. Unfortunately he popped out of sight in his excitement, and they couldn't see where he went.

"Wait! Come back! Newt!" A chorus of cries brought the dragon back into sight, and he finally preceded them across the undulating terrain at a more sedate, and visible, pace.

For several hours, they followed the rolling surface of the highlands at a brisk canter. The rugged crest of the Fairheight Mountains loomed to their right as they traveled northward, so they knew that they remained on the Gnarhelm side of the border that bisected Alaron.

Though the ground dipped wildly to the sides, rising and twisting through a chaotic network of valleys and ridges, Newt led them along a path that kept to the high, yet easily traversed, regions of heather.

Eventually their path-it could not be called a trail, since there was no evidence that anyone had followed this route in the memory of man-took them up a soft domed rise in the land. At the top, they found a smaller hillock in the very center of the grassy, rounded summit.

The dragon finally paused, hovering before a square black hole that indicated a passage into the oddly symmetrical hillock. "A burial mound," Tavish said softly. "And a great one, at that."

Alicia, too, recognized the earth-covered tomb for what it was. The grassy dome rose perhaps thirty feet into the air and formed a perfect oval shape. The low door was framed by a heavy timber over the opening, though the weight of years had bent the beam gradually downward.

"But a barrows mound of the Ffolk? Here, in this kingdom of the north?" she asked, puzzled and awed. "And one so huge as I have never seen before!"

"This was not always the territory of the northmen," Keane reminded her in his best tutorial tone.

"It has been for hundreds of years," she retorted. "Since the troubles shortly after the reign of Cymrych Hugh, when the northern raiders in their longships stole half of our lands! And," she added, driving home her points with a certain sense of pleasure, "this cannot be the burial tomb of a northman, for their greatest heroes are always buried at sea."

"Then we know that this is very old, don't we?" her teacher replied, pleased with himself.

"Well, aren't you going inside? It doesn't seem very smart to come all this way and then stand around bickering outside the door." Newt buzzed about the low doorway, lecturing. "Of course, I don't know why I should have expected anything else! You haven't exactly demonstrated your brilliance or anything. I mean, really!"

"Let's go," said the bard, swinging down from her saddle. Alicia saw that her broken harp was slung on her back and that she held Robyn's staff in her left hand, leaving her right free to grasp her dagger or short sword.

The princess herself felt the faint stirrings of misgivings, coupled with awe, as she thought of the place they were about to enter. Through the long centuries of their people, the Ffolk had buried their greatest rulers and most honored and wise citizens in such barrows. Yet never had she seen one so large. The remoteness of the location was also highly unusual.

Nevertheless, it was with the caution of a warrior that she approached the dark entrance. Her slim longs word in her right hand, she took in her left the sturdy, albeit small, shield that her father had given her. Crouching, she peered underneath the sagging timber, seeing a rubble-lined passage that swiftly vanished into utter darkness.

"I get to go first!" Newt cried, diving around her and hovering in the passage. "Follow me!"

Alicia came next, followed by Keane and then Tavish. Each of them had to stoop to pass beneath the doorframe, though within the tunnel, the two women could stand upright.

"Ouch!" cursed Keane, as he tried to do the same and crunched his scalp against another low support beam.

As soon as they started to move forward, Alicia tripped over an unseen piece of rubble, nearly falling. The footing proved treacherous, with alternating large rocks, slick pavestones, and patches of thick mud.

"Illuminatus, dero!" Keane uttered the barking command of magic. Immediately a warm glow filled the tunnel, and the obstacles stood clearly outlined in the gleam of the mage's light spell.

Newt huffed impatiently but continued to weave back and forth, leading them down the apparently interminable tunnel. None of them made any sound save for the noise of carefully placed footsteps that crunched softly in the dust or gravel.

Abruptly the space around them yawned dark and vast. The light spell seemed to dim. In reality, it was diffused through a much larger chamber. Overhead, massive tree trunks served as beams to support a lofty ceiling. Though mold and rot could be seen on the wood, the beams were all intact and appeared to be sturdy, albeit very ancient.

Columns of great trunks stood along either side of the room. The Ffolk couldn't see into the shadowy niches between the huge posts. The far end of the long, rectangular chamber lay lost in shadow, out of range of the spell.

"Well, here we are!" boasted Newt proudly.

Still silent, the trio of humans advanced slowly while the dragon buzzed in excited circles around them. They approached the shadowy end of the hall, and as the light advanced with them, they began to discern more of its nature.

They saw a great war chariot, gilded around its frame, with huge silver wheels. The skeletons of two gigantic horses stood at its front, still in the traces. The faithful creatures had been buried with their owner, no doubt.

As they moved closer, the light glinted off the facets of many emeralds, diamonds, rubies, and other gems gathered in heaps around the base of the chariot. Somehow, even in this dank chamber, they remained clean and clear, as brilliant as if they had just come from a jeweler's polishing.

The body of the king himself lay upon a high bier of solid gold just beyond the chariot. They came around the vehicle to see the form, still wrapped in the honored silks of his burial robes. A great axe, a longbow, a spear, and the empty scabbard of a sword rested across his chest, seeing him well armed on his journey into the world of death.

"The empty scabbard. ." said Alicia, awestruck, studying the sigils embroidered in golden thread on the ornate sheath. She couldn't read them, but the thing itself seemed of great portent-more for what it didn't contain than what it did. "A king, but his sword is lost. …"

"Indeed, a great king-the greatest of them all," agreed Tavish, her voice as hushed as Alicia's.

"Are you certain?" asked Keane of the bard.

But it was the princess who replied. "Yes-this barrow mound, the place where we now stand, is the tomb of Cymrych Hugh himself!"

Brandon watched in astonishment as the pack of huge, shaggy hounds raced at his men, disrupting the carefully laid ambush. The northmen would fight bravely against any foe they could understand, but there was something unworldly about this bizarre, sudden onrush. Unnerved, several bands of warriors broke from their cover and fled, while others chopped and hacked at the surrounding maelstrom of fangs and stiff-backed hackles.

Snarling and lunging, the dogs ran with their bellies low, their bodies elongated in liquid strides. Thick fur bristled along broad backs, and powerful jaws snapped around the men of Gnarhelm, a more frightening attack in its unnaturalness than any charge of human infantry.

But though they attacked with savage growls and barks, the hounds did not press closely. Several felt the bite of an axe blade or the sting of an arrow, but the dogs seemed content to circle out of reach of the humans' weapons, and their quickness and nimble maneuvering made them difficult targets for Brandon's archers.

Finally, after several minutes, the dogs broke away and vanished into the dips of the rolling highland, disappearing as mysteriously as they had arrived.

"Tempus curse you!" cried the prince of the northmen as those of his men who had fled came shamefacedly back to the band. In truth, he couldn't be terribly angry. This hadn't been the kind of battle for which his men had trained and readied themselves.

"This is an ill-omened march," growled Knaff the Elder, who had stood beside his prince throughout the strange encounter. "Arrows from an unseen foe … hounds that emerge from the mist to harry but not attack … a dragon that bursts from the ground. And now, see? Our quarry has evaded us."

"Aye," agreed Brandon, with a surly look toward the trail. He had watched with bitter anger the flight of the four Ffolk, first when the ambush had been revealed and then when the great serpent had chased them into the distance. The northmen column, on foot, stood little chance of catching the fleet riders. "Well, with any luck, they're dragon food by now."

He turned back to his old teacher. "Were any of our men hurt?" he asked.

"None." The veteran shook his head. "Mayhaps that's the strangest bit of all. These devil dogs swarm all around and make the noise of a pack on the blood trail, but then they leave us alone."

"What orders now?" inquired Knaff, fingering his huge double-bladed axe. Brandon knew the man still longed to avenge the death of his son.

"We'll scatter into small bands and scour the highlands before we go through the pass. It may be that we can meet some of those Ffolk-if any of them escaped the dragon, that is."

"I'm thinking that stranger things have happened," Knaff agreed sourly. "It wouldn't surprise me to find all four of them curled up as guests in the beast's lair!"

Brandon laughed. He realized it was for the first time since the ambush. But the humor died bitterly in his throat. Their mission was far from complete and even farther from success. Everything that had occurred merely added to the mysteries surrounding them.

Sometime soon, he knew, they would have to find some answers.

The High Queen of the Moonshaes looked like a pale shadow of herself. She lay in the great bed, buried beneath a mountain of quilts. Her long black hair sprawled across the downy pillows, tangled and thin and damp with perspiration. Above her hovered two clerics of Chauntea. They had worked their healing magic to no avail and now resorted to prayer.

But even these beseechments for divine intervention brought no succor to the Lady Robyn. Indeed, she scarcely had the strength to open her eyes for more than a few moments at a time, and she had not spoken for more than a day.

Abruptly the door burst open and the Princess Deirdre stalked into the room.

"Go, you charlatans! Leave my mother to herself for a few moments!" she snapped, her voice low but the anger in her tone still apparent. The two clerics scuttled from the door, their hands passing through rote gestures as if to ward away any insult to their deity.

"Mother.. can you hear me?" Deirdre sat on the bed and took her mother's hand, noting its cold, clammy feel.

Robyn's green eyes flickered open. For a moment, they held fast to her daughter's face and then widened in… what? Deirdre wondered. Was it concern? Fear?

Then the lids drooped, half-closing, and the princess didn't know if her mother remained conscious or not.

Once, two nights earlier, Robyn had shown an abrupt and dramatic recovery. She sat up and spoke with the cleric who had been tending her, and the High Queen had seemed in good spirits. But by the following morning, she had again lapsed into this profound lethargy.

Abruptly the daughter arose and left the room, closing the door softly behind her. She found the clerics and bade them keep watch outside of Robyn's door. Then Deirdre strode purposefully to the library that had become her nearly constant abode.

She felt a torrent of emotion at war within her. Guilt and anxiety were there, brought about by her mother's condition. But beyond these, dwarfing them in its all-consuming power, Deirdre felt the power of raw, unleashed ambition. All the years of striving in her sister's shadow, of dwelling in a castle where she was subject to the king and queen's wishes, welled up in an explosion of envy. And now no one could command her otherwise.

Once inside the library, she raised the wicks of several lamps, giving her bright light for her reading.

But Deirdre bypassed the musty tome-Azouns: the Kings of Cormyr-in which she had been immersed. Instead, she reached for a dark scroll tube, one that Malawar had indicated to her that she should approach with caution and respect. Indeed, her mysterious visitor had instructed her not to read it for some time, warning that although it contained the keys to great power, it also offered its user deadly risks.

Nevertheless, the time she desired such power was now. Callidyrr Castle sprawled around her, and within its walls, there was none to challenge her, to interfere with her pursuits. Could that power aid her mother? Perhaps. The fact that it could aid Deirdre herself was to the princess a more compelling motivation.

And the power she desired, Deirdre knew, lay in the hands of the gods. The scroll in her hands gave her the means to reach those gods.

Reverently she removed the tight leather cap from the end of the scroll's ivory container. Withdrawing many sheets of fine vellum, she spread the tissues on the table, between the flames of her bright lanterns.

She began to read. At first the words seemed to dance on the pages before her, swimming just beyond her grasp, always tantalizing her with the promise of knowledge and, more importantly, power.

But then she began to assert her mind, to seize each word, each phrase, and wrest from it the dark truth lying therein. One by one the sigils yielded to her tenacity, and slowly the web of might began to grow around her.

Page after page she read and set aside as she reached for the next. Each seemed to leave her more vital, more alive than she had ever been before. She did not know the source of this power, for the symbols lay as a screen between the reader and the god. They passed knowledge and subtly influenced her mind, while their maker remained secret.

In the background of this tapestry of words, unsensed by Deirdre but very much present-and very much pleased-lurked the dark and looming might of Talos, the Destroyer.

Musings of the Harpist

Newt! I wish I could describe the emotions that his appearance brings to me. He is a courageous little fellow and as bright and cheerful as ever. He knows deep secrets of the isles-witness the Tomb of Cymrych Hugh as one example-and he seems to be genuinely fond of the princess.

Why, then, am I so worried?