So you’ve been rooting through the goods, have you, Lord? he thought. Picking and choosing like some old dame at a market.
But there was a quality of both practicality and dramatic presentation in Rannick’s choice that for some reason unsettled Nilsson. It betokened both confidence and intent where previously Nilsson had judged there to be mainly bewilderment and spleen.
‘Nothing important, Lord,’ he said jovially. ‘I apolo-gize if we disturbed your rest.’
Rannick saw Gryss and the others.
‘Ah,’ he said, smiling. ‘Coming to protest at the treatment of Jeorg and the Yarrances, I presume, eh, Gryss?’
‘We’ve come to take Farnor away,’ Gryss said, quickly, before anyone else could intervene.
Rannick nodded understandingly and moved for-ward. There was a strangeness about him, his clothes and his hair moving as though he were walking through a wind that was blowing in some other place.
As he approached the group, a deep silence fell in the courtyard.
He stopped a little way in front of Gryss. Yakob and Harlen stared at him in open disbelief. Both made to speak at the same time, but Rannick gave them no opportunity.
‘What’s the matter?’ he asked mockingly. ‘Can’t believe your eyes? Allow me to explain.’ He bowed his head.
A small whirlwind of dust formed at his feet. Rap-idly it gathered a vicious, whining power and then, like a hunting bird, it flew directly into the faces of the two men. Both of them staggered back, closing their eyes and lifting their arms to protect themselves from the stinging impact.
Rannick laughed humourlessly. ‘A little dust in the eyes will help you to see things much more clearly, I think,’ he said. ‘Give you a picture of the way things are now. Am I not right?’
Gryss raised his hand to prevent Harlen and Yakob from replying. ‘We just want to leave, now…’ He hesitated, then with an effort he managed to say, ‘… Lord Rannick. We have to tell the rest of the village…’
‘Tell them what, Gryss?’ Rannick interrupted.
Gryss gesticulated vaguely around the courtyard. ‘About the… new garrison that’s to be posted here. About the need…’
Rannick shook his head. ‘That was Captain Nilsson’s jest, Gryss,’ he said, smiling again. ‘All that nonsense about the army. He and his men are no more King’s men than I am. They are fighting men, to be sure, but they are what you might call… independent. They fight for themselves rather than for some distant king.’
His manner became suddenly friendly and explana-tory. ‘They have a fascinating history.’ He looked significantly at Nilsson, whose face became expres-sionless. ‘If you knew it, you would never close your eyes in sleep again. Certainly not venture out at the sound of hooves in the street in the early morning. But now they have decided to pledge their swords to me. It is an arrangement for our mutual benefit.’ He drew closer to Gryss and his voice became a hissing whisper. ‘Just tell the villagers about me, Gryss,’ he said. ‘Tell them that I am their leader now, and that I require their absolute obedience in all things. Tell them that the penalty for disobedience will depend on my fancy at the time, but is unlikely to be pleasant. And tell them that I have instructed the Captain here to kill out of hand anyone who tries to leave the valley.’
Despite himself, Gryss asked, ‘Why did you kill Garren and Katrin?’
Nilsson’s eyes narrowed nervously, but there was no outburst from Rannick. Instead his face became thoughtful.
‘Garren was insolent,’ he said, quite casually, after a moment. He jerked his head towards Nilsson. ‘And it was my able new ally who killed Katrin.’ He held out an acknowledging hand to Nilsson. ‘Or, rather, she killed herself as I remember.’ He gave Gryss a look of injured explanation. ‘But she was trying to kill me, so he could do no other. Had he not done so then I would have had to when I had finished with Garren.’
Gryss shot an anxious glance at Farnor as Rannick gave this brief and callous account, but the young man, leaning on Harlen, seemed to be barely conscious.
Then Gryss felt Rannick’s hand close about his arm. It gave a confidential squeeze. He started violently. ‘But there was another reason, I see now. A much deeper reason.’ Rannick’s voice was almost wheedling in its self-justification. ‘Why should I waste my time brushing an insect like Garren Yarrance from my path?’ He looked at Gryss as if he truly expected an answer. Gryss found that he was holding his breath, so awful was Rannick’s presence. His arm was released.
‘But strange powers are moving here.’ Rannick peered at Gryss intently, as if his gaze would give his words greater meaning. ‘Powers that are focused on me. Powers that have perhaps been focused on me all my life. Powers that bring my destiny to fruition.’ Again the hand closed intimately about Gryss’s arm. ‘Why else should I have been born with the gift?’ A buffeting wind suddenly filled the courtyard, blowing up clouds of dust again and making both men and horses look about them uneasily. And, as suddenly as it had begun, it stopped. Gryss trembled as memories of the wind that had almost trapped him and Farnor, returned.
‘Why else should I be drawn to…?’ He fell silent and his eyes drifted northwards filled with a strange, smiling secretiveness.
Then he straightened up and continued with the air of an academic carefully following a line of reasoning to a satisfactory conclusion. ‘And why else should Nilsson and his lost band of men turn into this of all valleys but to serve my ends?’
Gryss remained silent.
Rannick looked down at his hands. ‘And why should Garren have provoked me so needlessly?’ His eyes fixed Gryss’s again. ‘Why should he have elected to provoke me and thus die by my hand?’ He curled his fingers so that they looked like talons, then he stretched them out fully and Gryss could feel the tension radiating from his whole body.
‘So many questions, Gryss. So many questions.’ Rannick bent forward and his voice became intense. ‘But only one answer. All this was so that as I made Garren learn what it meant to oppose me, so Katrin would make her sacrilegious assault on me and so, thus, I too would come to a great learning. I would see beyond the totality of my learning thus far. See that it was merely a key to a greater knowledge, a greater strength, a greater power.’ His voice fell to a whisper. ‘I would be transfigured.’
Sickened and frightened, Gryss could not move away from Rannick even though his arm was no longer held.
‘Watch,’ Rannick commanded softly.
Gryss felt the air about him come alive with a tin-gling, unpleasant energy, as though a thunderstorm were about to break. He braced himself for yet another assault by the wind that seemed to guard this place, but instead he found himself trying to focus on a vague, luminous shape that had appeared in front of Rannick. Involuntarily, he made to step back, but Rannick caught his arm and restrained him.
‘Watch,’ Rannick said again.
Gryss could do no other, so hypnotic was the eerie, dancing light growing in intensity before him. Then there came the fearful screeching that had filled the Yarrance farmyard, and the vague, shifting light became bright, flickering flames. They wove and twisted around one another, merging and separating like sensuous dancers, until they formed a tall column that rose high above the castle walls. The men in the courtyard retreated, as did Harlen and Yakob. Only Nilsson held his ground.
Gryss could feel a heat beating on his face that was worse than any he had ever known. It seemed to him that even the village blacksmith’s forge would be as a cool stream after this.
He looked at his captor. Rannick’s eyes were glisten-ing in the light, the two tiny columns of flames reflected there seemed to be burning in the heart of the man.
‘This is the merest token,’ Rannick said. ‘Such knowledge I now have. So much more shall I gain. Now I am truly on the golden road to my destiny.’