Son of the Hero

15 – Coriander

Lesh woke noisily when I fell on him, and that woke the others. I was so wiped out that I couldn't move, not even an arm. Limp, exhausted, turned inside out, I could scarcely mumble answers to the questions that Lesh and Annick fired off. On top of all that, my back was hurting again-worse than ever. Falling across Lesh hadn't helped.

Annick guessed what had happened. "He's been caught by the elflord. We've got to get him away from here as fast as we can."

That sounded good to me, but the three of them had to do all of the work. It's a good thing we had unloaded only the essentials. I was baggage, useless, as if I didn't have a bone or muscle left-Dorothy's Scarecrow with his stuffing ripped out. The others even had to hoist me into the saddle and tie me in place. When we rode out, Harkane was at my side to make sure I didn't fall. He held the reins of my horse.

Annick led the way with her night vision. Harkane and I were close behind her, and Lesh rode rear guard. For the first hour-maybe longer; time was a nebulous abstraction for me just then-I was scarcely conscious, maybe not even "scarcely" part of the time. There wasn't much difference between being unconscious and being whatever it was the rest of the time. Perhaps there was less pain while I was completely out of it. But memories of my duel with the elflord haunted me constantly, night-mares that weren't stilled by waking, and it wasn't until later that I started to make any sense of it at all.

The duel with Xayber was real. I could have died during it even though I never physically left our camp and the elflord never physically entered. That was why my wound didn't hurt during my duel. My body wasn't physically involved. It must have remained just standing in place while the fight went on. I could have died wore at my mind through the night. There was no question whose magic was more powerful. In my short time as Hero of Varay I had come to rely on my new ability to sense danger, but the elflord had almost completely negated that puny talent as an offhand prelude to his attack. His magic had barely begun when mine ended. The elf sword was a bonus, pure luck. It as the only thing that let me survive the duel. The sword had its own magic, and drawing the weird battle tune from me was only a small part of it.

"You did right good, lord," Harkane whispered-sometime during that blurry night ride. "You survived the elflord. That means you beat him. Your father never faced a duel like that inside the elflord's domain, where he's most powerful."

I didn't feel like a winner. At that point, I wasn't even sure that I felt like a survivor.

I puzzled over the suicide sequence at length, once I started spending more time conscious than not. The only explanation that came close to making sense was that the elflord didn't think he could kill me by magic alone, and since he wasn't physically present, all he could hope for was to make me kill myself. I was guessing on insufficient evidence, though. I didn't know why he might have thought that his magic alone wouldn't suffice-because he thought I was an elf or because he knew I was Hero of Varay, or whatever. There was a chance that he wasn't certain just who I was. But if he caught me again, his ignorance probably wouldn't matter. He'd come close enough the first time.

Gradually, I started to get my wits back. Instead of feeling totally sapped and snapped, I just felt exhausted. The pain in my back and side settled into place again, throbbing as steadily as my heart. We stopped to rest the horses. I think it was the second time, but it was the first that I was really aware of. I almost managed to dismount by myself. When we got ready to ride again twenty minutes later, I didn't have to be tied to my saddle. But Lesh and Harkane did have to help me mount.

"What happened?" Annick asked after we started riding south again. She rode at my side long enough to hear my semicoherent tale. I needed quite a while to tell it. I ate a little beef jerky and drank a lot of water along the way. That helped.

"I was right, it was the elflord," Annick said when I finished.

"We have to be out of Fairy before he comes for me again. There's no way I could survive that a second time."

"I think we'll be south of the swamp by dawn," Annick said. "Do you want to turn east and try to stay hidden in the forest again?"

"Trees won't hide me from him." I may have shuddered at that. We rode on for a few minutes before I continued talking. I had to do some thinking, and rational thought came hard.

"Let's just make the best speed we can, straight south-unless he sends troops after us. And we're not going straight to Arrowroot. That's too dangerous." Particularly with me useless for combat. "We'll try Coriander instead. We can get in and out of your uncle's castle quickly from there." Or from Basil, if it came down to that, I thought. I told Annick about the feeling of danger I had had when we first left Arrowroot, before she joined us. I didn't want to head into that without knowing what was behind it.

"I guess I should react to that," Annick said. "My mother and my uncle are there." She paused, then added, "But I don't feel any of the things I should. Does that shock you?"

I didn't say anything.

"There'll be fighting at Arrowroot, right?" she asked.

"Probably. The elflord has obviously found some magic that works inside Varay, at least as far as Arrowroot." That was another complication. If Arrowroot was under active attack, I wouldn't be able to take soldiers from there to fight the Etevar, and the entire foray into Xayber might be wasted.

"Coriander faces Xayber too," Annick said. "The danger might be there as well."

"Maybe, but maybe we won't be expected to head there."

We rested for a couple of hours just after dawn, near the edge of the forest. I managed to sleep most of that time. When I woke, I felt stronger even though my back and side still hurt. Annick rebandaged my wound and said that it had been bleeding again.

"Probably from when I fell on Lesh after the duel with the elflord," I said, and she nodded.

When I had new tape on, I managed to get up and walk around a bit. I wasn't up to anything strenuous yet, but I thought I would be able to take care of routine. Annick had caught several plump fish while I slept. I've never liked sushi, but I ate my share of the raw fish. There was no time for a fire, and I wasn't ready to chance even one of Lesh's "guaranteed smokeless" fires yet.

We rode almost continuously for another two days and the night in between, resting only when we had to. By sunset the following day, people and horses were all dragging. I'd like to say I was feeling a lot better by then, but the best I can honestly manage is that I didn't feel any worse. The back of a horse isn't all that conducive to recuperation. With the burst of hard riding, though, maybe the pursuit (if there was any pursuit) would be too far behind to matter. That was the hope, why I was willing to keep going even though I was hurting. Anyway, we saw riders only once, and we were able to get under cover before they spotted us, thanks to An nick's eyesight and my returning awareness of danger. I didn't feel any probes from the elflord.

Luckily.

Eventually, we had to make a longer stop, spend the night in one place. We followed a small stream deep into the forest, wading two miles upstream. We were in place well before sunset. Harkane and Annick caught fish and a few tidbits that looked like crayfish. I let Lesh start another of his smokeless fires-but said that we had to douse it before it got completely dark, even though our campsite was so isolated. Harkane went off into the woods and came back with his helmet full of berries that looked like raspberries and tasted like peaches.

"The way we've been going, another day and a half might get us to Varay," Annick said while we were eating. "Or a day and a night."

"I don't want the horses dropping under us in the stretch," I said.

"You think we'll have trouble close to the end?" Annick asked-almost meekly, and that surprised me enough to give her a long stare.

"I'd almost bet on it," I said. "If the elflord's armies are really on the attack, we may have to go through them at either Coriander or Arrowroot." Usually, my guesses don't work out, but I might have been a card-carrying prophet with that one.

We had a quiet night and a peaceful ride the next day. The quiet night especially helped me. Then, after sleeping for half of the following night, we got an early start for our last day on the isthmus. Of course, we were also nearing the area that the chamberlain's map labeled "Here there be dragons," but I didn't take that very seriously. It's not that I felt cocky after administering the coup de grâce to one dragon-I knew that didn't qualify me as a proper dragon slayer-it's just that dragons didn't seem to tie themselves to any one spot. They didn't have to. They were arguably the "meanest SOBs in the valley," so they could go wherever they damn well pleased.

I knew we were getting close to Varay because I could feel the danger in front of us increase slowly, mile by mile, as we headed south. It was like a chronic ache rather than a sudden pain, and I had experienced enough of both kinds of pain lately to know the difference. That last night that we camped in Fairy-the half-night-I slept like the dead, not fully recovered from my duel with the elflord or from my physical wounds. I intended to take my turn as sentry to show the others that I was really recovering, but my companions vetoed it. Not that I argued very hard. A good Basilier meal would help. I found myself thinking about food a lot. I was looking forward to a chance to pig out again-too much of too many kinds of food too fast, washed down with about a barrel of beer. I think food was on everyone's mind.

"I ran a trotline all night," Annick said when she woke me near dawn. It had been well past midnight before we camped. "We have loads of fish." Nearly three dozen. Lesh already had them over a fire. We had been on thin rations the last few days, and even three dozen plump little fish wouldn't completely fill the empty spots.

The others stared at me while we ate. I couldn't read minds, but I could guess what they had to be thinking. They had to wonder whether I would be up to any kind of fight when we reached Coriander. I was wondering the same thing myself.

"I don't know," I said, and none of them asked what I meant. Lesh raised his eyebrows. Maybe he thought I was reading minds.

"We'd better get moving," I said without enthusiasm when the last of the fish were gone. The lethargy was more than a remnant of my duel and my wound. It was also an expression of my danger sense. It seemed that there was no place in this crazy world as safe as right where I was sitting, that any movement in any direction was toward peril.

"Are you all right?" Annick asked.

"Still tired, still aching," I said. I forced myself to my feet. "I'm not looking forward to more fighting either."

"Sometimes it's the only way," Annick said.

"Sometimes, but I'm still not thrilled with the prospect." End of conversation. Annick took it as a put-down and spun away from me.

The feeling of danger quickly got strong enough to scratch. The way ahead of us was blocked, a line clear across the isthmus from the way I felt. It was so strong that the pain in my back and side seemed to fade in comparison. We stopped for a few minutes fairly early that morning while I tried to judge how far ahead the danger was, but I didn't have the experience for that kind of fine-tuning. Drop a threat on my head and I could react, but this was too subtle.

"There's a whole damn army out there," I muttered, thinking out loud.

"Can we get around them?" Lesh asked.

I hesitated, then shook my head. "We can't afford the time to try. Besides, we'd probably have to steal a boat and sail around them, and I don't know anything about boats."

"Neither do I," Lesh said. Harkane shook his head.

"I do," Annick said, "but we'd have to cross to the other side of the isthmus and go back who knows how far to find one. So, unless you can fly us over this army, we have to go the way we are."

"Be ready to hightail it at the drop of a hat," I said when we started riding again. Maybe it was the wrong signal at the wrong time, but I chose that moment to pull the Cubs hat from my pocket and clap it on my head.

We saw two hunting parties, not much later. At least one of the groups spotted us, but they didn't give chase.

"An army takes a lot of feeding in the field," Lesh said after we angled out of sight of that group. "If their orders are to get food, that's all they're going to worry about." When they didn't break off to chase us, I had to agree that Lesh seemed to have it right.

By noon we were close to the Eastern Sea, almost in it at times, but just because the road angled that way, not because we sought the ocean.

"That's Dorthin, off across the water," Harkane said. "We're almost to the border." We were nearly to the base of the isthmus. The land stretching east wasn't just a headland, it was the mainland, the northern coast of Dorthin. Xayber extended no farther south than a line from this corner of the isthmus across to Arrowroot. Dorthin came right to this same corner-not more than a couple of miles from where we were sitting.

"Where's this Fairy army then?" Lesh asked.

"Already inside Varay, probably ringed right around Coriander and Arrowroot by now," I said. "Maybe with patrols deeper into the kingdom."

"We can't be five miles from Coriander right here." Harkane said. "I've been on that beach right there in the curve at the base of Xayber."

"Things could start getting hairy any second now, folks," I said. It was time to lay out my grand plan for getting past the elflord's army and into Coriander. Snag was, I didn't have anything like a real plan.

"A lot depends on how tight the siege of Coriander is, if there is a siege," I said, thinking out loud as much as "informing" my companions. "We need to get through Xayber's army and up to the gate, and hope to convince the gatekeepers to let us in before the elflord's people reach us." I thought about the static we had gotten trying to get past the gatekeepers on the town wall at Arrowroot, and we were trying to get out then.

"I have your pennant," Harkane said. I didn't know that I had a pennant. "It was your father's." He dug the strip of cloth from a saddlebag and held it up for me to see the familiar crest from home, the pennant I had seen flying over Castle Basil after Dad's funeral. "I'll wear it on my lance, as I did for your father."

"Okay, that's one problem solved." I hoped. "But keep it furled as long as you can. I don't want to tell Xayber's people who we are too soon. Until we're challenged, we'll just ride toward the castle as if we've got every right to be there. Coming out of Fairy, maybe nobody will question us if we look like we belong. Maybe we can get close enough to make our mad dash for the gate once we are challenged. The last thing we want is to get bogged down in fighting now. Once we stop moving, we're dead." That warning wasn't just for Annick. It was for all of us. Annick nodded like the others. I couldn't tell how she took it.

Castle Coriander sat atop a low man-made mound in the center of a mile-wide clearing-also man-made. The village was at the southwest edge of the clearing and even smaller and more primitive-looking than Nushur. This was just a couple of dozen rough cottages. The castle had one refinement I hadn't seen before. The outer wall was lined with long barbed spikes, a nasty complication for anyone trying to scale it. The castle had no moat, not even a dry ditch, so it needed something.

The besieging army was there all right, at the edge of the clearing and in the village. The circle was complete. The Fairy army could move to intercept anyone coming out of the castle… or trying to get in.

We rode in a tight group, keeping Annick in the middle. Her hair was braided and under the hood of a forest-green cape. We didn't want to advertise that we had a girl with us. That might look fishy in a combat zone. And I had removed my Cubs cap and replaced it with the steel pot that Harkane had brought along for me. I also had the mail shirt on again, despite the way it hurt me. We followed the road leading toward the castle gate, past hundreds of soldiers-men and those troll-like creatures-but only a few people who looked as though they had elvish blood. No one showed much interest in us at first. If the soldiers noticed anything, it was the elf sword hanging over my shoulder. I was acutely conscious of the sword myself. I had to fight the urge to draw it. I started whistling the sword's melody under my breath, and that was no conscious choice. I couldn't help it. As we neared the front lines, at the edge of the clearing, the number of Fairy soldiers increased. Finally, a mail-clad soldier blocked our path and held up his hand for us to stop.

"Go," I whispered. It would have been too much to hope for to think that we could get all the way through without a challenge. We put our heels to our horses. I drew Dragon's Death, and the soldier jumped out of its path. More soldiers came at us from the sides of the road, but not quickly enough to get in front of us. And then, after we were out in the clearing, archers started aiming for us.

"Unfurl that pennant," I shouted as an arrow skidded along my arm, ripping the fatigue shirt and sparking on the mail beneath it. The arrows kept coming. Somehow, we avoided any serious wounds, though we all received minor cuts in that first flurry. I had a nick taken out of my right leg. Two horses were also hit, but not badly enough to stop them.

Harkane waved my pennant. Lesh bellowed my identity as loud as he could, over and over, starting long before anyone inside the castle could possibly understand what he was shouting. Halfway there, I looked over my shoulder. Several dozen soldiers were chasing us, about half of them on horseback. They couldn't head us off, but we wouldn't have time to dicker for the gate to be opened. If it wasn't open when we reached it, we would have to fight-if our pursuers risked coming that close to the castle wall.

Fifty yards. I saw people above the gate, but no movement that suggested that they were ready to open up. Harkane kept waving the pennant. Lesh kept yelling. Then there was finally some movement on the parapets. I heard a creaking start. Then I looked over my shoulder again…

… and something happened.

I don't know exactly what the cause was, but my horse stumbled and I went headlong over him, rolling and tumbling when I hit the dirt. I went down hard, ending up on my back, and that sent such a shock of pain through me that I nearly passed out. My horse jumped over me and kept going toward the castle. I rolled over and found that I still had the elf sword in my hand. Getting up proved to be nearly impossible. I only managed to get as far as my knees by the time Lesh and Harkane got back to me. Annick had her bow out and she was doing her best to slow down the pursuit. I pulled myself up to my feet, using Lesh's leg and stirrup to help support my weight. Together, Lesh and Harkane managed to get me up on the horse behind Harkane. I was too shaken to do anything but hold on. Somewhere during this time, Annick stopped shooting arrows and chased down my horse. It carried one of the sacks of sea-silver.

We got to the gate with about a half second to spare. Archers on the battlements turned our pursuers back. More armed men waited for us inside the gate. There were plenty of hands to help me down from behind Harkane-and to support me afterward. I would have fallen without help. Harkane was too shaken by the accident to make his usual announcement of who I was, and Lesh was too busy trying to see to me, so I ended up introducing myself.

"I'm Gil Tyner, Hero of Varay." I left off all the jazz about being prince and heir that Harkane would have added. "I need to see the castellan at once."

"I recognize your companions, and I see your father in you," one of the soldiers said. I had lost my steel pot when I fell. "I'm Baron Dieth, Castellan of Coriander." Nothing about his dress distinguished him from the men around him.

"Let's go inside," he said. "You all look to be in need of a meal." That drew a weak smile from me and a noisy smacking of the lips from Lesh.

"We need to talk, Baron," I said. I could hardly recognize my own voice. "But first I've got to check our cargo." As I feared, both of the sacks holding sea-silver had been pierced during the fusillade. At least Annick had managed to catch my horse after it threw me. We still had both bags of seaweed. "We need to keep this stuff wet-new pouches filled with water. And I'd like to save as much of the seawater that's left in here as possible."

Baron Dieth gave orders, and two of his men carried the leather bags of silver seaweed into the keep, doing what they could to slow down the leakage. We followed. Lesh and Harkane half-carried me. I was too wobbly to navigate on my own.

"I was your father's first squire when he became Hero," Dieth said. "I still grieve at his death."