DragonCrown Saga - The Grand Crusade Part 31

Erlestoke lifted his chin. "If there is a blood price to be paid, I shall pay it, dear or not. The fact is you have me at a disadvantage. How is it that the price of your father's death is presented to me?"

Those in the baron's company looked at each other, but the baron kept his eyes on Erlestoke. "Don't even attempt to feign innocence, Erlestoke. You and your Bloodmasks have done much work here, much horrible work. The countryside is up in arms against you. It is not enough that you have rebelled against your father. You now lead invaders into a nation that does not want you, and you slay loyal sons of Oriosa because they will not support your usurpation of the throne."

"I see." Erlestoke crossed his arms over his chest. "I won't feign innocence, but I will plead ignorance.

Tell me who the Bloodmasks are and inform me of the circ.u.mstances of your father's death."

The baron pointed back toward the command company. "There, one of the Bloodmasks rides openly with you."

Erlestoke looked back, then frowned. "Rumbellow? He's a Murosan, one of the Addermages."

"A murderer by any other name is yet so foul. They have been slinking around here in the Midlands, making sheep miscarry, souring milk, raising root weevils in the fields, stealing children, and poisoning wells. You boldly admit they are mages, but this we knew, and adder fits them well since they wait and strike from hiding, vicious and virulent."

"And one of them slew your father?"

The baron hesitated for a moment, then nodded emphatically. "My father had heard of the Hawkriders and their treason. He exhorted his people to remain neutral and to see to themselves. He said he would not support you in the illegitimate usurpation of your father. For that, you had him slain. For that I will see that neither you nor your army takes another step into the Midlands."

Behind him the lordlings he had chosen for his entourage nodded in agreement.

Erlestoke frowned mightily. "How did your father die?"

Another rider, an older man who, by the marks on his mask, had served the elder baron for many years, spoke. "My lord baron was found dead in his bed, alone and cold, with no sign of violence. He was slain with sorcery, of this there is no doubt at all. Had honorable a.s.sa.s.sins come upon him, they would have died with him, perhaps instead of him. Your Bloodmasks stole into his castle and murdered him at your command."

The prince pressed a finger to his lips as he thought. He sorted fact from speculation in an attempt to understand fully the situation he faced. The baron had been an old man and, even if hale, dying suddenly in his sleep could not be discounted. Sambell supposed that because his father had counseled against joining Erlestoke, the prince had murdered his father. Because the baron had been advocating neutrality, killing him would have been a self-indulgent luxury on Erlestoke's part-and a stupid one since it would certainly create exactly the sort of hostile response he now faced.

The existence of the Bloodmasks intrigued him, however. Having magicker agents causing trouble throughout the Midlands could be a strategy conceived by either the Aurolani or his father. Mayhem committed by the Bloodmasks might be enough to turn Hallard Malviston from neutral to actively hostile.

If the man were reluctant to shift in that direction, killing him and pointing at Erlestoke as the instigator likewise benefited the enemy. King Scrainwood would have known enough of Sambell and his animosity to a.s.sume the new baron would jump to the conclusion that the prince had blood on his hands, and that would aid the enemy a great deal.

Erlestoke's hand returned to the saddle horn. "My lord, where were you when your father died?"

Sambell stiffened. "My father had bid me to come south and see what it was you were doing."

"Did you have a chance to send him a report? What did you say we were doing?"

The baron waved those questions away. "It's immaterial, though it would have been to your benefit. You were ridding the countryside of Aurolani."

"Doing what you wanted to do, but your father stopped you from doing?"

Sambell shifted his shoulders stiffly. "What pa.s.sed between my father and me does not bear on his murder."

"No, it doesn't, but something else does." Erlestoke pointed to the casket. "Your father sent you south to watch what I was doing, but he never told you to order me to stop, did he?"

"No."

"So he did not believe the Bloodmasks were my agents, did he?"

"No, and he died by their hand because of his naive belief, murderer."

Borell levered his lance in the baron's direction. "Keep a civil tongue in your mouth."

Erlestoke shook his head. "Borell, no."

"But, Highness, he has thrice said you murdered his father." The young man's eyes hardened. "Once is tolerable for his grief, a second for his rank, but a third?"

"Count it another for his grief, Borell. Return to my side." The prince waited for the youth to comply, then he looked at Sambell again. "Your father wisely preached neutrality, but he did not mind my moving into his land to destroy the enemy. That is my goal, and you know it because Meredo does not burn behind me. My father remains on the throne. All rumors of usurpation are nonsense. Your father might not have supported me, but he did notopposeme, and that is all I ask. Murdering him would simply have provoked the anger you feel now and sp.a.w.ned the opposition I see before me. If you count me wise enough to dispatch Bloodmasks and murder your father, you cannot at the same time believe me stupid enough to have lost sight of that fact."

Malviston snorted. "Perhaps you are even more clever. You use your Bloodmasks to incite people, you murder my father to focus their ire at you, then you use your trickery to seduce me to your side. With me come my people. With my people comes the middle of the nation, and with it comes the Dales and Norweshire. As goes the north, so goes the south-and your father will flee for Saporicia."

Erlestoke canted his head to the right. "Fascinating plan, and one with merit, save for one thing. All I have done is make war on the Aurolani. You know as well as I do that my attacks are only provoking the Aurolani. The troops I have slain are the vanguard of a larger group. There will be a war here. If you let me pa.s.s, it will take place in the Dales. If not, you risk its taking place in the Midlands."

"Don't threaten me."

"I don't. You're already threatened, and you know it. You saw what I was doing as vital, and you reported that to your father, didn't you?" The baron nodded. "If he had only listened."

"Perhaps he did."

"What do you mean?"

"It is plain, I think. It is possible your father died naturally, finally able to let go because he knew his realm would at last be safe from the Aurolani. No more sacrificing his pride, your pride, to keep my father happy and the Aurolani benign. And, if murdered, perhaps it was because someone intercepted a message he sent to you, or one from you to him. In either case, the message led the enemy to believe your father would no longer be neutral. His murder, with the blame fixed on me, would reverse the situation to the enemy's benefit."

Sambell Malviston stroked a gloved hand over his jaw. "If I did not consider your words, I would be a fool."

"If you did not consider them long and hard, I would be surprised." Erlestoke looked back at his command company and the troops arrayed beyond them. "It is late in the day. We shall make camp here, with your permission, while you think."

The baron nodded. "You'll forgive me if I do not offer you hospitality."

"Of course. But I would beg of you one indulgence."

"That being?"

"I promised you a blood price for your father. I shall keep that vow." The prince smiled slowly. "While you think, I shall harvest Bloodmasks."

Predator, the leader of the Grey Mist, had followed Oracle into the small cave and heard her p.r.o.nouncement about Resolute. Her words had made Kerrigan's stomach turn inside out, but appeared to have a different effect on the sapphire-eyed Vorquelf. He sheathed the longsword he'd been carrying, then smeared a blood spatter across his left cheek with his sleeve. His blue eyes narrowed as he looked from Kerrigan to Trawyn, and then at the old elf hanging in the web of roots.

"What's wrong with him?"

The Loquelf answered. "Dreamwing. You can tell by the tinge of his skin. He's highly unpredictable and dangerous."

Predator pointed at the belt pouches. "Those are the Crown fragments?"

Trawyn nodded. "Yes. The Lakaslin fragment, and the Vorquellyn fragment."

The Vorquelf squatted. "Okay, what we're going to do is this. We kill the elf..."

"No!" Kerrigan shifted himself between the elf and Predator. "You're not going to kill him."

"Be quiet, boy." Predator looked at Trawyn. "You said he is unpredictable and dangerous. I say we kill him and end that threat. We take the fragments and head back south. Keeping them away from Chytrine is our number one priority."

Trawyn nodded. "I agree, but we don't kill the Vorquelf."

Oracle nodded. "This Vorquelf is the key to thecoruescion Vorquellyn. We need him to rescue the Norrington."

The princess waved that consideration away. "He may well be, but that is a secondary problem right now."

Oracle closed her eyes. "If we do not get the Norrington soon, he will be lost to us forever. He is where he needs to be to fulfill the prophecy. We must get to him or everything is for naught."

Predator laughed sharply. "Trying to get to the Norrington is a fool's errand."

Kerrigan's mouth hung open for a moment. "But you came all the way from Yslin to help Resolute."

"And he's not here now, is he?" Predator snorted. "Doesn't matter. Even Resolute would agree with the shift in priorities."

Kerrigan frowned. "No, he wouldn't. He didn't want to come after the fragments. He just wanted to go to Vorquellyn."

Predator snarled. "I told you to be quiet, boy. Your elders are talking."

The venom in his voice lashed at Kerrigan and he shrank back. His heels b.u.mped the root web. He started to flail his arms, fearing he would fall, but he regained his balance. He blushed, supposing the elves would berate him further, but they just ignored him.

They so thoroughly dismissed him that they began speaking in Elvish. That was a grave insult. They were treating him as if he didn't even exist. As far as they were concerned, his opinions and feelings, his thoughts and insights, were valueless.

Kerrigan shivered and hugged his arms around himself. With Resolute gone, he felt alone. Yes, Bok and Rym were there, but the dragon remained in his box, and Bok squatted in the shadows, saying nothing.

Even Oracle had fallen silent as Predator and Trawyn danced their way through a power-sharing agreement that would allow them to lead the group back south.

Kerrigan hung his head.I'm sorry, Resolute, I have failed you. A chill puckered his flesh. Orla, Will, and now Resolute-and with him Crow and Oracle, and even Alexia. He had failed them all. The living were off fighting, hoping that this expedition would manage to destroy Chytrine so they could destroy her troops. That's what he knew the group should be doing, but without Resolute there, everything was falling apart.

A thought shook him. Resolute had lefthimin charge. Kerrigan didn't know what to do, but Resolute would have. The youth frowned.What would Resolute do?

That thought erased the frown and replaced it with a smile, albeit a small one. He could see Resolute's eyes blazing, and his hand closing on the back of Predator's neck. He'd set Predator back, and he'd stare the princess down, and things would be going the way they were supposed to. Resolute was a force of nature, and that's what was needed to deal with the current situation.

Kerrigan's hands balled into fists as Predator said, "Then it is agreed. We will take the fragments and..."

"No! NO!" Kerrigan matched their Elvish easily. "Nothing is agreed until I agree to it. Resolute entrusted me with this expedition. We are going to Vorquellyn. We are going to rescue Will, then we're going to kill Chytrine."

Predator's head turned slowly and the sapphire stare met his as he fingered a dagger. "Shut your mouth or I'll open a second one for you."

What would Resolute do? Kerrigan snorted, then gestured casually. The spell hit Predator hard in the chest, knocking him back into a knot of Grey Misters. They all went down in a tangle of limbs and curses.

Kerrigan shifted his gaze to Trawyn. "With all due respect, Princess, I will do the same to you. By his reckoning and yours, I might be a child, but that's not what Resolute thought. You're not going south.

We're going north to Vorquellyn."

Trawyn eyed him carefully. "You'll not stop us if we want to leave."

"No?" Kerrigan reached back and fingered the root web. "I broke the wards; I can establish them again. No one leaves."

A thrown dagger hit him in the right shoulder and bounced off the drag-onbone armor. Kerrigan looked at where Predator crouched. "That didn't work. Do you know how foolish that was, or do I have to punish you?"

"I'm not following you to Vorquellyn."

"Actually, yes, you are." Kerrigan raised his right hand, then convulsed it into a fist, and the Grey Misters flinched. "You're going to follow me and help me because we're going to get your homeland back. You left Yslin because you decided it was time you did something useful. You made a grand sacrifice for a grand goal, and now you're going to stop because you found a lesser goal and the sacrifice was beginning to be inconvenient? You've got sore feet so you go home? No wonderrealelves think of you as children."

He opened his hand again and lowered it. "Sure, fighting Chytrine is not fun, but did you think war would be? You need to think of your elders who were driven off Vorquellyn, or died there. What happened to them wasn't fun.

"If they were here they'd be just like this guy behind me, having to medicate themselves because the pain of your land is driving them mad. You want her to do that to everyone else? You want tolether do that to everyone else?

"Besides, how far can you run? It won't be far enough. Are some of us going to die? Yes, without a doubt, just like Resolute. Just like Will. Just like Orla and Lombo. Just like the thousands ma.s.sacred in Sebcia and Muroso. Maybe you don't have any pride. Maybe you don't have any courage. Maybe you don't have any hope. Maybe you need to find a little bit of each, because if you walk away from here, you're not really walking, you're crawling. You'll be on your belly and ready to lick Chytrine's boots.

And all you'll get for that is a kick in the teeth."

Kerrigan whirled on Trawyn. "As for you, maybe you're just tired. Maybe you want to be dosed with dreamwing to ease your mind. You know as well as I do that if you don't want Loquellyn to be the same as Vorquellyn, Chytrine has got to die. We're taking this elf north to Vorquellyn, getting Will, and saving Loquellyn in the process."

The Loquelf raised her chin. "I have told you he will be dangerous. You've never seen anyone withdrawing from the effects of dreamwing. I have. He could kill us all with a nightmare. If it takes us a week to get to Vorquellyn, he might be sufficiently free to open thecoruesci, but we'll never make it all the way there with him. If we keep him dosed, he can't be of use. How do you propose to solve that problem?"

"Oh, I don't have to solve it."

"No?" She shook her head slowly. "I'm content to stay here, because traveling with him is to die. I do think you need to solvethatproblem, Kerrigan."

"I don't have to solve it because it's already been solved." Kerrigan smiled and began to weave a spell.

"Chytrine solved it. You want him isolated until he's rational, so he shall be."

The spell Kerrigan used on the Vorquelf was the same one Chytrine had used on him, with a couple of modifications. The magickal coc.o.o.n surrounding the elf absorbed any magick he cast, but didn't cut him entirely off from the source of magick. Kerrigan also wove a key into it that involved logic problems. He hoped that unless the dreamwing-eater was rational and lucid, they would be beyond his ability to solve.

The Vorquelves, feral and unmannerly though they were, respected Kerrigan's power. He actually thought they respected the dragonbone armor more, but he was willing to accept anything as long as they followed orders. Trawyn appeared to be surprised by his solution to the dreamwing-withdrawal problem, but remained true to her word and agreed to accompany him.

They cut the elf down and bundled him up in the roots and some blankets. Grey Misters created a stretcher for him and took turns carrying him. Kerrigan didn't think the elf weighed that much, but to hear them grumble, he could have been carved of granite. The Grey Misters did not like Kerrigan's constant commands to be quiet, but they complied because even they could see signs of gib-berers in the area.

But mostly they complied with his orders because whenever he had a problem, he asked himself what Resolute would do, and then he did it to the best of his ability. He tried not to hurt anyone too much, but some of the Grey Misters were not open to reason. He took to boosting them skyward and having them fall back down through foliage in what became known as "tree-dancing." Only one Vorquelf needed a second dance, and while Kerrigan's obvious display of power cowed most of them, he could also feel resentment rising.

Qwc's loss made Kerrigan's job even harder. The Spritha had been able to lighten everyone's spirits no matter how difficult things had been. The trek north actually was much easier than the previous trek, as the mountains sloped down toward the sea and the lush rain forests provided a lot of shade, water, and even edible flowers or some early seeds and berries. None of this quelled the Grey Misters' grumbling, and things came to a head at the sh.o.r.e of the Crescent Sea.

Kerrigan had high hopes when they came down to a cove where an Aurolani ship sheltered. A quick spell put everyone on board asleep. The Grey Misters swarmed over the single-masted vessel, dispatching the crew and pitching their bodies overboard. Kerrigan, Oracle, Bok, Rym, Trawyn, and the sleeper had remained onsh.o.r.e during the ship's takeover. With the a.s.sault successfully completed, they came on board. Some of the Vorquelves brought the gangway aboard while others quickly surrounded them on the rowers' deck and Predator looked down on them from the wheeldeck.

"There has been a change of plans. We are sailing south." Kerrigan shook his head. "You know that won't happen. I won't let that happen."

"What are you going to do, Kerrigan? Are you going to hole this boat? No, of course not." Predator began to strut. "I have tolerated what you have done because heading north was in keeping with my plans. Had we turned south, we would have been in more danger. But now we have a ship and will be able to sail back to Yslin with the fragments. You can't stop us because you can't sail this ship all by yourself."

Kerrigan gaped at him. "You can't stop now, Predator." He pointed north toward Vorquellyn. "We are so close."

"We aretooclose." The Vorquelf shook his head. "When you brought the Lakaslin fragment to Loquellyn they wouldn't let you take it to Fortress Draconis because they knew there was a chance that Chytrine would take it from you there. Now you want us to taketwofragments to an island she's owned for more than a century? The foolishness of that choice is obvious. The Loquelves wouldn't let you do it, and neither will I."

Kerrigan shook his head. "The only place this ship is sailing is to Vorquellyn. Count on that."

"Idle threat, Kerrigan." Predator folded his arms across his chest. "The only way to stop us from taking it is to kill us, and you won't do that. You're not a killer."

"He's not, butIam."