The Sorcerer's Widow

CHAPTER EIGHT

Dorna dropped to the ground; an instant later, so did Kel.

He had been standing with his back to the Northern device, so he had had no warning, and had not ducked until he saw the flash, but then he had flung himself down vigorously enough that a blade of grass had gone up his nose, and he could smell the dirt beneath. He snorted out the grass and pushed himself up enough to free his hands, then quickly patted first his head and then his shoulders to see if he felt blood anywhere. He seemed unhurt.

“Are you all right?” he called, staying low.

Dorna’s response included suggestions that made Kel blush even more than her undressed state had; he was fairly sure at least one was physically impossible. When she had calmed down a little, she shouted, “Apparently it wasn’t the green dress.”

“I guess not,” Kel replied miserably. “Are you hurt?”

“No. My hair’s shorter on one side, though.”

Kel lifted his head further and peered through the grass, but he could not see the others-the contour of the land hid them both. With a glance over his shoulder in the direction of the Northern talisman, he got slowly to his feet, ready to drop again at the first hint of another red flash.

No flash came. He stood, and stared out over the meadow.

The talisman was still there, and the horn-thing was pointed at him-or at Dorna, or Ezak; they were close enough together it could have been any of them.

He turned around to see Dorna struggling to pull her dress back on while staying below the thing’s line of sight. As her head emerged from the collar he could see that the red flash had indeed cut away a hank of hair on the left side.

It had cut the top off Ezak’s right ear. Why would it be different? Why would it strike to one side at all, instead of right down the middle? It shouldn’t just be poor aim; this wasn’t a person, it was magic.

Maybe it wasn’t aiming for her head at all. Maybe, Kel thought, it hadn’t been aiming at Ezak at all. Ezak had been behind Dorna. And it obviously hadn’t been aiming at him-he was standing right here in plain sight, and it wasn’t throwing anything at him.

It hadn’t been aiming for the green dress, either, but Kel thought back to what he had seen a moment before. Dorna had been standing there in her shift, with her sorcerous weapon in her right hand, and the canvas bag slung on her left shoulder…

The magical blade had struck her on her left, as she dropped. Her head must have already been halfway to the ground when her long hair was chopped off.

“It was aiming at the bag,” Kel said, pointing.

“What?” Dorna looked up from tying her belt.

“It hit the hair on the left as you went down,” Kel said. “It was aiming for the bag.”

She looked down at the bag where it lay on the trampled grass to her left, then at a hank of black hair that lay beside the bag. “Blood and death,” she said. “You’re right.”

“Why would it do that?” Ezak asked. He was still sitting just where he had been all along; he had not stood up when Dorna did.

“Sorcery,” Dorna said. “It must sense the sorcery in the bag.”

“But it is sorcery!” Ezak said.

“It must be able to tell that some of what I have here is Ethsharitic,” Dorna said.

“Is your weapon Ethsharitic?” Kel asked, pointing.

Dorna picked up the black thing and looked at it. “I don’t know,” she said. “I never thought it mattered.”

“It didn’t try to hit that.”

Dorna glanced at Kel, then looked at the weapon again.

“The bag was a bigger target,” Ezak said.

“That’s true,” Dorna said, still studying the weapon. Then she looked around. The sun was moving down the western sky; they had spent most of the day pursuing the fil drepessis or dodging the Northern device’s attacks. She tucked the weapon in her belt, then swung around and began moving behind the ridge, sometimes on hands and knees, sometimes on her feet but bent almost double.

When she was about fifty feet away from the canvas bag she took a deep breath, then straightened up and looked out across the ridge and the meadow. Kel turned, too.

The Northern talisman was not moving. The horn, or tube, or whatever it was was still pointed toward the ridge in front of the trampled area where Ezak sat and the canvas bag lay.

“It’s not throwing anything at me,” Dorna said.

Kel nodded, though he realized that Dorna was not looking at him and probably did not see the gesture. He turned to watch her.

She raised the weapon, her gaze fixed intently on the Northern device. She waved it back and forth; the talisman did not react. “Whatever it doesn’t like must be in the bag,” she said.

No one answered. Kel glanced at Ezak; he was crouching behind the ridge, watching Dorna.

The sorcerer’s widow took a cautious step forward, then another.

No reaction.

She began walking slowly forward.

She had gone perhaps fifty feet, Kel watching every step, when he was distracted by a hissing. He turned to see Ezak beckoning to him.

He gave Dorna one more quick glance, then hurried up over the rise to where Ezak sat. “What is it?” he asked.

“Here’s our chance,” Ezak said. “We can take the bag and run!”

Kel blinked at him.

“She won’t even notice!” Ezak said. “She’s too busy with that thing over there.” He waved in the direction of the Northern talisman.

Kel shook his head.

“Why not? She’s probably going to get herself killed! Even if she doesn’t, we can get a good head start-we don’t need to go back for the wagon, there’s probably enough here to make us rich. We can just pick a direction, and she’ll never be able to find us without her magic.”

“No,” Kel said.

“Why not? What’s wrong with you? Here’s our chance!”

“No,” Kel repeated, shaking his head again for emphasis.

“What is it? You think she’ll find us somehow?”

In fact, now that Ezak mentioned it, Kel did think it was likely that she would come after them, and she had far more sorcery back in the wagon than was here in her shoulder-bag, so she would probably be able to find them. Even if she couldn’t do it with her inherited talismans, she could always hire a wizard or a theurgist to locate the stolen goods. And she had said that if he stole from her, she would track Ezak down and kill him.

That was not why Kel had said no, though. That had not even occurred to him until Ezak brought it up. His objection was far more simple, and far more basic.

Taking that bag of magic now would be wrong.

Kel did not think all theft was wrong; he could not have survived on the streets of Smallgate if he had taken so absolute a position. He was perfectly willing to steal from those who could afford it, or those who deserved it. He had never objected to robbing other thieves, or cutting the purse off a rich man’s belt. He was perfectly willing to steal a few coins from the bar at the Bent Sword because everyone knew that Dulbek, the proprietor, watered the beer and shortchanged anyone drunk enough that Dulbek thought they might not notice a missing bit or two. Grabbing money from a dice game was just fine, since the players had put it at risk in the first place.

But Dorna was out there trying to protect people by removing that Northern sorcery. She was risking her life. She had done nothing to Kel or Ezak to deserve betrayal. Yes, she had tricked them into helping her move her belongings, but they had been trying to rob her; that sort of turnabout was only fair.

She could have sent one of them out to blast that thing. She knew Kel could get close to it. But she hadn’t; she was going out there herself. If that talisman belatedly noticed the weapon in her hand when she got close, she wouldn’t have time to dodge the next magical blade.

“If it kills her,” he said, “then we can take it.”

“What? Why can’t we take it now?”

“It isn’t fair.”

“Life isn’t fair, Kel! You know that better than anyone!”

“Well, we should try to be better than that.”

“Fine!” Ezak threw up his hands. “Fine! We’ll wait until it kills her. She probably would track us down, anyway.” He folded his hands across his chest and sat glowering at the canvas bag.

Kel watched him for a moment, then turned and walked back up the rise to see how Dorna was doing.

She was moving cautiously across the meadow, the weapon in her hand, eyes fixed on the Northern talisman. She was about halfway. She looked very small out there in the broad open space, and it occurred to Kel that she would probably need help carrying the fil drepessis back after she got it away from the device it had fixed. She had said she didn’t really know how to use it properly, so she probably couldn’t just tell it to walk back to the inn. If she had some magical transport in mind, that would presumably be in with her other sorcery; she would still need to get the talisman back to where she had left the bag.

“I’m going to help her,” Kel said. Then he started trotting across the meadow.

“Have fun,” Ezak called after him.

Kel did not bother to answer.

Dorna was about sixty feet from the Northern device, and Kel was perhaps two-thirds of the way across the meadow, when that loud voice spoke again, saying exactly the same thing it had said when he was about twenty yards away. Dorna stopped dead.

“Do you know what it said?” Kel called.

Dorna turned, startled, and Kel realized she hadn’t noticed him following her until now. “No,” she answered. “I don’t. It sounds vaguely familiar, though. I think it might be asking for a password.”

“Do you know a password?”

“No,” Dorna said, as she raised the weapon and pointed it at the talisman.

The vaguely tube-shaped structure on the top of the device pivoted toward her, and Kel shouted, “Look out!”

Dorna dropped her weapon and raised her empty hands. Kel guessed that she did not think she could drop out of its target area quickly enough at this distance.

“Apparently it defends itself,” Dorna said, standing very still.

Kel agreed. The device must have seen the weapon before, and recognized that it was a weapon, but it was only when Dorna pointed it at the talisman that it reacted. He did not say anything, but hurried through the tall grass toward her. A moment later he stood beside her, then stooped down to retrieve the fallen weapon. Holding it loosely, not pointing it anywhere, he looked from Dorna to the talisman.

It stood perhaps three or four feet tall, a dark gray cylinder with that shiny hornlike thing on top. It had no other visible features, and Kel could not detect any sound or odor from it. He could see beside it, half-hidden by the tall grass, the fil drepessis.

The Northern device spoke again, the same phrase as before. The horn stayed pointed at Dorna.

Kel sidled away from her, to see whether the thing would follow him, now that he had the weapon. It did not; apparently it had decided that Dorna was more likely to be an enemy, despite her immediate surrender.

“Do you think it understands Ethsharitic?” Kel asked.

“Probably not,” Dorna said. “It may not understand anything except the password.”

Kel nodded, then turned to the talisman. “Hai!” he called. “Can you tell us where we are? We’re lost.”

It did not respond.

He took a step toward it, and the tube immediately swung toward him as it said something incomprehensible. He stepped back.

“If it can’t understand us,” he said, “then we can make a plan and it won’t know what we’re saying.”

“Maybe,” Dorna said. She did not sound entirely convinced, but she lowered her hands.

“Are we close enough for your weapon to kill it?” Kel watched the Northern device closely; it did not react, so far as he could see.

“It’s not alive.”

“You know what I mean.”

“If we could get a clear shot at it, yes, I think so. But it’s faster than a human being; if you point the weapon at it, it’ll kill you before you can shoot.”

“I was thinking maybe I could distract it while you shoot it.”

“Well, right now you have the weapon, I don’t!”

“I’m going to pass it to you behind my back. Then I’m going to move around, and get it to point that top piece at me. Then you can shoot it before it can swing back.”

“Maybe,” Dorna said again, sounding even less convinced.

“Maybe if you get down in the grass, and shoot it from there?”

“Maybe,” Dorna said again. “I don’t know how far it can lower its aim.”

“It didn’t kill us when we were on the ground over there,” Kel said, pointing back toward the rise where he had left Ezak.

Dorna did not answer that. Instead she turned to look at Kel. “Since when are you clever enough to be making these plans?”

Kel blinked, and turned to stare at her. “I’m not clever,” he said.

“You seem pretty clever to me, right now,” she replied.

He shook his head. “No, I’m just making stuff up. You need to tell me which parts aren’t stupid.”

“So far as I can tell, none of it is stupid,” she said. “It may not work, but it’s not stupid.”

Kel found that confusing-if it wouldn’t work, how could it not be stupid? He said nothing.

“I thought Ezak was supposed to be the smart one,” Dorna added.

“He is,” Kel said. “He’s older than me. He’s always been smarter. He’s always kept me safe and told me what to do.”

“Why isn’t he here now?”

That question baffled Kel. “He…he doesn’t want to be,” he said at last. “He’s wounded.”

“He’s scared, if you ask me.”

“Ezak isn’t afraid of anything!” Kel protested.

“Yes, he is,” Dorna said.

Kel decided he didn’t want to talk about Ezak any more. He walked casually along what he judged to be the edge of the area where the Northern device would threaten them, looping back toward Dorna. He tried to think like Ezak, to say what Ezak would say if this were one of his schemes they were carrying out.

The horn-piece did not move; it remained pointed at the spot where he had approached too closely. Apparently it considered them both harmless for the moment.

“Look at the talisman,” Kel said, as he approached Dorna, “and have your hands ready.”

Dorna did as he said, and as he walked behind her he shoved the weapon into her waiting hand.

The Northern device did not move. Kel walked past Dorna, circling further around the talisman. He eyed it as he moved, wondering whether it might be able to throw magic out both ends of the horn at once. They weren’t the same shape, but both did appear to have openings.

“Tell me when you’re ready,” he called to Dorna. He glanced over.

She had knelt down, keeping the weapon out of sight behind her back. Now, as he watched, she lowered herself down on all fours, then flat on her belly, the weapon hidden in the folds of her skirt-her green skirt, which the talisman had not mistaken for an Ethsharitic uniform after all. Kel was embarrassed at the memory of his foolish notion. He wondered why Ezak hadn’t told him it was a stupid idea. Maybe Ezak had just wanted to see Dorna with her dress off.

She rolled over on her side for a moment, adjusting the weapon’s position-or at least, that’s what Kel thought she was doing. He couldn’t actually see much through the tall grass.

“Ready,” she called.

Kel nodded, and took a deep breath, and stepped toward the Northern talisman. “Hai!” he called. “I think I’ll just come kick you, you know that? Here I come!” He started to run.

That strange deep voice spoke its warning, and the gleaming horn-piece pivoted toward him. He flung himself at the ground, wrapping his arms over his head-flung himself forward, closer to the Northern talisman, so that it would not turn its attention back to Dorna. He expected at any instant to see that deadly red flash.

Instead he saw a blue flash, and then the whole World seemed to vanish in a blinding white light. An overwhelming, painfully loud roar of thunder left his ears ringing, and the earth seemed to shake beneath him as he landed upon it. He wondered whether this was what dying was like as everything went dark and silent.

But he could still feel the crisp grass beneath his outthrust arms and hands, and he could smell something burning, and he realized his eyes were closed. He opened them, and lifted his head.

The top half of the Northern device was gone, and the stump of the gray cylinder was a smoking ruin, where the torn metal edges were glowing red-hot.

He still couldn’t hear anything, though-but his ears were still ringing, and he realized that the explosion had deafened him temporarily. He sat up and looked around.

Dorna was sitting in the grass forty feet away, on the other side of the destroyed Northern talisman; her hair had been blown back from her face, which was streaked with smoke. She was staring in comic astonishment at the sorcerous weapon in her hand.

“Are you all right?” he called, but he could barely hear his own words.

Dorna looked up at him, then back at the weapon. Then she started shaking; her mouth came open, and her eyes closed, and at first Kel thought she was hurt, or at least frightened.

Then he realized she was laughing.