Outside the protective stone of the manor, the air seemed colder than it had for several days. Even in the gray light before the sun came up, the day had an almost prescient clarity, a dimension of visual precision which made Terisa shiver. She hugged the half cloak the Termigan had given her around her shoulders and tried not to think about how tired she was.
The boards of the porch creaked under her feet.
From the porch of Vale House, the hills which enfolded the Kolted River appeared to bulk larger than they had the previous evening. They were dark in the dim forecasting of dawn, deep with potential; the whole world lay beyond them, completely hidden. They reminded her that Vale House would be easy to ambush.
On the other hand, an ambush didn’t seem very likely at the moment. Even self-respecting villains and traitors were still in bed at this hour. And the Fayle’s two men were already there, along with a groom they had brought from Romish to care for the horses and a servant to look after the needs of the ladies Queen Madin and Torrent. As for the horses—
There must have been sixteen or seventeen of them, filling the hollow between the manor and the river. Terisa’s and Geraden’s mounts. Horses for the four men and the two ladies. A pack animal to carry supplies. And a second mount for everyone, so that the horses could be rested while the Queen kept moving.
They shuffled their hooves, shook their manes; two or three of them snorted disconsolately. Their tack jangled softly, muffled by leather. The groom moved among them, settling the saddles of the ones that would be ridden first, cinching up their girths. Queen Madin’s servant was busy checking the contents of his packs again.
Because she was cold and had to do something, Terisa asked Geraden, “Do you think we should try to stop her?”
He shrugged; the dimness hid his expression. “I’ll try. But don’t get your hopes up.”
The sky spanning the hills grew to the color of mother-of-pearl, but without that nacreous flatness: it was at once deep and impenetrable. If anything, the approach of dawn made the hills darker; they clenched themselves around the river and Vale House, brooding. Nevertheless a stretch of water near the bend of the hills caught the air’s reflection and gleamed silver.
Terisa wished that she could stop shivering.
After a moment, Queen Madin came out onto the porch with Torrent beside her. The light was improving: Terisa saw that both ladies were wrapped in warm cloaks; riding boots protected their feet and calves; they had scarves bound around their heads to keep their hair out of their faces.
“Are we ready?” the Queen asked anyone who could answer her. “Can we go?”
“In a moment, my lady Queen,” replied the groom. He was busy inspecting the hooves of the horses.
Geraden cleared his throat. “My lady Queen, are you sure this is wise? I have qualms about it.”
“Geraden” – Queen Madin wasn’t looking at him; her gaze was fixed on the sharp outline of the hills – “you underestimate me if. you think that any ‘qualms’ of yours will stand between me and my husband.”
He let a little sharpness into his voice. “Maybe you underestimate me, my lady Queen. You don’t know what my qualms are.”
“Do I not?” She still didn’t look at him. “You are concerned that I may fall hostage to the forces besieging Orison.”
“Yes,” he admitted. His tone told Terisa that he felt rather foolish.
“That is an important concern. I have no intention of allowing any Alend or Cadwal to use me against the King.” She paused, then said, “It will be your duty to help me insure that the difficulty does not arise.”
“Yes, my lady Queen,” Geraden murmured glumly.
Terisa put her hand on his arm and gave him a small squeeze of consolation.
“Now, my lady Queen,” the groom announced over the champing and rustling of the horses. “You can mount whenever you wish.”
Torrent gave a stifled gasp. “A moment,” she said quickly. “I have forgotten something.” Before anyone could react, she hurried back into the manor.
Softly, so that no one except Terisa and Geraden heard her, the Queen breathed, “Probably one of her dolls. She does not like to sleep without her dolls.” Her tone was affectionate, but it suggested that she didn’t know how she had managed to produce a daughter like Torrent.
It was astonishing how distinct everything was to Terisa. Every one of the hills across the river had a particular shape, an individual character. Each of the mounts was facing in a different direction, stubbornly determined to see life from its own angle. Geraden held his head up as if he had caught some of the Queen’s mood. Queen Madin herself was a knot of controlled impatience. The groom and the servant waited. The Fayle’s men had begun to move toward the porch in order to help the ladies mount.
And a touch of cold as thin as a feather and as sharp as steel slid straight through the center of her abdomen.
“Geraden!” she shouted, almost wailed because her desperation was so sudden. “There’s a translation coming!”
As if she and Geraden had the same mind, the same will, they grabbed Queen Madin by her arms, one on each side, and practically flung her off the porch, down the steps, out among the abruptly milling horses.
Terisa had time to hear one of the men curse as if a horse had kicked him. She registered the Queen’s quick gasp of surprise, her swift self-command. She felt rather than saw the tethered mounts twist their heavy bodies around her, blunder against each other, stumble, start to panic.
Then she turned in time to see a fall of rock appear out of the empty sky and crash down on the roof of Vale House.
A fall of rock as massive as an avalanche. A few heavy, bounding stones hit, followed instantly by rushing thunder, the side of a mountain coming down.
The slates and beams of the roof couldn’t hold, couldn’t begin to think of holding. Almost without transition, the whole attic story of the manor buckled and collapsed, plunging down into the level where the bedrooms were.
“Torrent!” cried Queen Madin. Without thinking, she twisted against Terisa and Geraden’s grasp, tried to run back into the house. “Torrent!”
Terisa helped Geraden drag the Queen backward.
A frightened horse hit them with its hindquarters and knocked them all off balance.
The rockfall went on with a sound as if the hills themselves had begun to rumble and break. The bedroom level of the manor held until too many tons of rubble piled into it; then, one room at a time, it crumbled toward the ground floor.
Bouncing like balls, huge rocks came off the pile into the hollow. A horse screamed horribly; others squealed, wheeling in wild circles. They were tethered, had no way to escape. Behind Terisa, the groom was trampled to death. She didn’t know how any of the stones missed her. The rockfall and the horses made so much noise that she couldn’t hear any of the stones splash into the river; couldn’t hear any cries, commands, any warnings.
Slowly, almost one stone at a time, the avalanche thinned. The rush of rock turned to scree and gravel, loose dirt.
Terisa stared in shock as the thunder subsided and huge clouds of dust swelled into the dawn.
The fact that she wasn’t moving nearly got her killed.
There were men on horseback in the middle of the chaos, at least half a dozen of them. They lashed their beasts among the tethered mounts.
One of them clubbed Geraden to the ground; he never knew they were coming. Another knocked Terisa into a swirl of panic-stricken hooves.
And yet somehow, before she covered her head and curled into a ball to protect herself from being stamped on and broken, she had time to see three men leap from their mounts and snatch up the Queen.
She had time to see that they were armed and armored just like the men of Prince Kragen’s army.