But after two hours, worn out from constant spells, I stopped. One couldn’t live like this, on the jagged edge of suspicion. We had come out above the first, steepest area, and Ascelin told us we were making good progress toward the pass. A desolate meadow stretched relatively level for a half mile in front of us. With the road temporarily wide enough again to ride abreast, I pulled my mare even with Whirlwind.
I was tired of thinking about the Black Pearl and the Lady Claudia. “Have you ever been in the eastern kingdoms before?” I asked Dominic. “I never have; the school’s sphere of influence really stops at these mountains.”
“I’ve meant to come here for years, but somehow I never have either,” said Dominic. “Ever since you wizards stopped all the wars in the western kingdoms, young aristocrats have had to cross the mountains if we want to see any fighting. You know, of course, that’s how my father was killed. I grew up with my mother warning me about the horrible dangers of looking for honor that way, and by the time I was old enough to make my own decisions, I started feeling too responsible as royal heir of Yurt to follow his footsteps.”
“Well, I certainly hope we don’t run into any wars,” I said. “We’re on pilgrimage.”
“And that’s part of the reason I’m glad we’re coming this way,” continued Dominic. “You heard King Warin talking about how everyone always admired my father. Well, I’ve been hearing some variation of that story all my life. Maybe it was partly fear that I wouldn’t measure up to him that kept me at home, but now that I’m traveling east at last I don’t feel jealous of him so much as I want to learn more about him. My father is buried in a pilgrimage church east of the mountains. Neither Mother nor I ever visited his grave.”
We definitely should have sent Dominic on a quest years ago.
“I don’t think, even if we run into a war, they’ll bother some harmless pilgrims,” he said. “But I must admit it gives our trip a little excitement, a little spice even, which I’m afraid Yurt misses most of the time.”
“I’m interested in meeting the wizards east of the mountains,” I said. “I assume they practice essentially the same magic as in the western kingdoms, rather than what the mages of the real East use. The book I brought along on eastern magic doesn’t include anything west of Xantium. But the magic of the eastern kingdoms may be closer to the old magic of earth and herbs than to modern school magic.”
At this point the road narrowed again, and again evergreens and rocky cliffs hung above us. I dropped in behind Dominic, keeping my mare’s nose well back from Whirlwind’s heels.
I was thinking about the eastern kingdoms, wondering why the wizards’ school had never tried to influence them, when I heard a sudden grunt before me. I looked up in disbelief as Whirlwind reared, screaming. There were not one but two men on his back.
Someone had Dominic around the throat and was trying to wrestle him off and keep his own seat. This must be what he meant by excitement and spice.
Hugo and Ascelin turned sharply around and raced back to Dominic’s aid, their swords out. I madly tried to shape a spell that would bind only one of the wildly thrashing men before me-if Dominic fell off, his own stallion would trample him.
“Hang on, Dominic!” bellowed Ascelin. “I’ve got the scum now!” He had the bandit by one leg and was tugging. Hugo had seized Whirlwind’s reins and tried to hold him down.
The men before me had sorted themselves out enough that, in two more seconds, I would have had a binding spell working, when I heard another grunt and thump.
“Stop!” came a ringing voice. We all stopped and looked, even the bandit trying to choke Dominic. A second man was behind Joachim on the chaplain’s horse, an arm across his chest and a knife at his throat. “Drop your swords, or the priest dies.”
Ascelin and Hugo turned very slowly and dropped their swords. The bandit behind Dominic jerked the prince’s sword from the sheath and sent it clattering to the ground.
“All of you!” yelled the bandit at King Haimeric. “And you, Wizard, don’t even think of starting one of your spells.”
“I am unarmed,” said the king. “I am on pilgrimage.”
I doubted this would make much impact. I sat my horse as though paralyzed while a third bandit appeared out of the trees and yanked the king’s and my cloaks back to look for weapons. I tried to give Joachim a look of encouragement, but his eyes were cast down and his lips moving. His horse kept shifting, and he was having trouble controlling it without moving his head even slightly.
I didn’t dare try any spells. Bound or paralyzed, the bandit behind Joachim might cut his throat as he fell from the horse, and a flash of light or a clap of thunder would make him jerk the blade. I didn’t dare try turning him into a frog for the same reason.
I should have known at once that the lord of the red sandstone castle was not a real bandit. These men were ragged, weather-worn, and filthy, and one of them was missing an eye.
“Get down, all of you!” said the first bandit. Dominic was now sitting slack before him, and the bandit had managed to gather up the reins. “We’re taking your horses. Move!”
There didn’t seem to be any alternative. We all dismounted, Dominic managing to slide down on his own though rubbing his neck.
“Where’s your money?” yelled the bandit leader.
“There in my saddle-bag,” said King Haimeric. The bandit jerked the bag open and pulled out a small jingling pouch with satisfaction. The king didn’t mention that that was only a fraction of the money we had, as all of us had other pouches tucked into our belts.
The third bandit, who had collected everyone’s swords, now gathered up all the reins and tied the horses together single-file. He mounted my mare. “Don’t try to follow us!”
The leader kicked Whirlwind into motion. All the horses surged forward, Joachim still mounted and still held hostage.
With a great clatter of hooves, they disappeared up the road ahead of us and around an outcropping of rock. I flew after them, not daring to let them get away while they still had Joachim.
As I rounded the outcropping, I saw a dark figure lying stretched across the road. Paying no attention to our horses disappearing again around the next rock, I dropped to the ground beside the chaplain.
“Joachim! Say something! Are you all right? Did they hurt you?”
The chaplain, to my intense relief, started to sit up. “I’ve had all the breath knocked out of me. The bandit said something about me not being the one they wanted after all and tossed me off.”
“Thank God you’re alive,” I started to say, then stopped short. Joachim hesitated when almost sitting, then slumped again to the ground. A crimson stain spread rapidly across the collar of his vestments.
IV
The others ran up behind me. Ascelin dropped to his knees, pulled the knife from his boot, and sliced the cloth away from Joachim’s neck. A jagged cut was oozing blood.
“It’s a vein, not an artery,” he said over his shoulder. “But he’s losing blood fast.” He held the edges of the wound together and tried to apply pressure.
“A good thing it’s not an artery,” commented Hugo. “You can’t very well put a tourniquet around someone’s neck.”
I found the remark distinctly unamusing, and so did Ascelin. “Start a fire,” he told Hugo, “and go find some water. You’ll have to boil it. Well, I don’t care! Use your armor if you have to.”
Joachim lay perfectly still, his eyes closed and face white. Blood kept oozing from his neck as fast as Ascelin wiped it away. In a few minutes, though it seemed like hours, Hugo returned from having found a spring among the rocks, carrying water in his breastplate. He lit a fire with the flint and steel at his belt and, without a word but with a loud sigh, balanced the breastplate over it, to have all the shiny finish scorched and darkened.