“I’ll bring the makings for a fire and set up a privy blind so that the lady can have a modicum of privacy.”
“Yes, good, Sir Earlin,” one of them agreed. “And I’ll fill my plate with those choice cutlets and some cheese and ease over after full dark.”
“And here.” The man with the torch handed the brand to Sir Earlin and fumbled at his hip. He loosed a half-full skin and passed it to Vanx. “Sir Cyle, give the lad your skin.”
“Yes, sir.” Sir Cyle did so.
“He might try to kill me in the night while I’m chained,” Vanx said after sipping from the skin. Seeing the utter confusion in the man’s eyes, he clarified. “The duke was in the forest hunting us. He wants me dead.”
“I might want you dead too, if you was pokin’ my wife,” Sir Earlin chuckled. “But not to worry. Our orders are to make sure the three of you get to Duke Elmont’s dungeon unharmed.”
Sir Cyle nodded in the darkness. “And that’s how it will happen, so at least try to enjoy our piss-poor hospitality. If it were up to us, you would be sleeping in the prince’s pavilion tonight.”
True to their words, one or more of the knights was at hand all through the evening. A privy pit was dug and a canvas screen was erected around it so that they might relieve themselves in semi-privacy. Hot food — choice cuts, not scraps — was brought on a platter of bread and cheese, and a pitcher of clean water was passed around as well.
When asked if they needed anything else, Matty requested a bucket of wash water. It came along with a bundle of clean clothes, all thin under-armor wear, most likely from the packs of the fallen men. They took turns washing while Sir Cyle answered Darbon’s myriad questions about Dyntalla. The tired knight didn’t seem to mind, and somehow managed, with broad gestures and general descriptions, to evade Darbon’s actual questions.
Soon another knight came to relieve Sir Cyle. This man either hadn’t been at the battle, or had an extra set of fully polished armor lying about. Vanx assumed the former, for this young man wasn’t battle-jaded or road weary.
It was late; the full moon was silvery pale, and stars speckled the cobalt sky. Vanx had just drifted off to sleep when a boot at his side shook him awake. It was the dark-eyed, dark-clad man who rode with Duke Martin. Feeling a chill in his blood, Vanx sat up and glanced about. There was no one around them but Matty and Darbon, and the two of them were in a tangled knot of slumber. None of the knights were anywhere to be seen and Vanx’s heart began to hammer into a panicked tattoo, for the sinister-looking man’s expression was a blood-chilling grin of triumph.
“What do you want?” Vanx asked.
“Shhhh!” The man hissed through his delight. “If I wanted to kill you, I’d not have shaken you awake, fool.”
The reality of that statement made such stark sense to Vanx that it calmed him. He struggled to gather his wits, though, because his every instinct was telling him that this man was dangerous and evil.
“What is this Blood Stone I’ve overheard the soldiers whispering about?”
“I wouldn’t tell you even if I knew,” Vanx replied. “What are you? Where is our guard?”
“My name is Coll, and I suggested that Sir Pallance take a break and fill his skin from the keg in the cooks’ tents. He has a long day ahead of him, leading troops back to the edge of the Wildwood to fetch the bodies of the dead.”
“And he just went?”
Coll chuckled. “I can be very persuasive, as you’re about to find out.” Coll waved his hand around and mouthed the words to a spell that should have made Vanx want to answer his questions eagerly. Zythian blood was far more resistant to magic than human blood. Vanx had enough of it in him that it simply deflected the spell’s power and dispersed it into the night. Clearly Coll couldn’t understand how Vanx had defied his dark magic. He grew angry when Vanx was still able to refuse his will. Determined to learn about the powerful artifact, Coll tried a different tact. He strode over to where Darbon and Matty were sleeping in each other’s arms and cast another spell. This one was quite a bit more powerful than the last.
Just as a deep crimson cloud of gas began flowing out of his palm and crept down over the unsuspecting couple, Sir Earlin stepped out of the darkness, drawing steel.
Had he been listening all along? Vanx wondered as his hope rose and fell in the same heaving of breath. Coll’s red mist, looking like a roiling cloud of steamed blood, quickly formed around Sir Earlin’s face. The knight’s sword slid back into place. His determined expression went slack, and the big, armored man took a knee right beside the sleeping forms of Vanx’s friends.
“You see, Vanx, even though you can somehow thwart my spell, you will still tell me what I want to know.”
“Why should I?” Vanx asked with halfhearted defiance. He could have guessed Coll’s next words.
“Because if you don’t, these three will die.” Coll’s eyes locked onto Vanx’s, and Vanx felt that same icy chill he had earlier in the day.
“As we speak they are breathing in more and more of the poisonous gas. The more they breathe, the more damage is done to them, so you’d better start talking before their minds are permanently damaged due to your dalliance.”
“What do you want to know?” Vanx asked. He would say what he had to say to save his friends, but no more. Not a word more.
“You can start by telling me what talisman you carry that keeps my spells from affecting you.”
“I’m only half-human. My blood makes me immune to fledgling cantrips such as you work.”
Coll’s brows narrowed at the insult. “I might just kill your friends for that.” Coll gave Vanx one last glaring look. “Now tell me about the Blood Stone.”
While Vanx told him vaguely of the stone and how it attracted the ogres, he searched the recesses of his mind for the words and gestures required to cast a spell that he knew would summon a gust of wind. It was a sailors’ incantation, a silly poetic phrase containing a magical binding, a bargain of sorts. One day off the end of your life in trade for a steady wind. It’s a small price to pay if you’re going to die at sea without it. Vanx learned the limerick during the first days of his vision quest, when he sailed from the isle of Zyth to Parydon proper. He had worked the binding twice, just to pass the time at sea, but that had been many, many mugs of ale in the past. Still, it came to him like the words of a song.
“Who has the Blood Stone now then?” Coll asked, his face a study in smugness and burning curiosity.
“Ahhh.” Vanx sighed and put his fingers into a curl at his mouth, as if he were holding a horn. He blew into them then started reciting. “Fill the sails and sail us on, for we have been adrift too long. Wheek mar un bartered treth, a day of life for one sweet breath.”
Before Coll realized what was happening a sudden blast slammed into him. He went staggering back, windmilling his arms to no effect. The poisonous cloud of gas, as well as a few of the encampment’s tents, went with him. Within the span of three heartbeats the whole camp was alive with fright.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
I’m off to make a fool of a fool,
and a fool of a kingdom too.
I might lose my head to the kingsman’s ax,
but I’ll try to fool him too.
The wall around Dyntalla was as impressive as it was imposing. It was built for the sole purpose of keeping the wilderness at bay with absolutely no attention paid to aesthetics. Vanx estimated it to be thirty feet tall. It was made of dull, grey granite and had a crenelated top. Its plainness was broken by the two square towers that flanked the heavy, iron-banded double gate. Each tower rose about fifteen feet above the top of the wall. Vanx could make out an archer and the triangular kingdom banner posted atop each one. On the left was Duke Elmont’s family crest, a rampant lion silhouetted in a field of green. The other displayed the spread-winged Parydon Falcon in gold on a field of bright purple. The men looking out at the approaching procession were armed with heavy crossbows. Vanx knew this was so that they could easily shaft someone below them at the gate. Not until Prince Russett’s banner men raised his pennant, which showed the Parydon Falcon swooping with outstretched claws in purple on a field of gold, did the distant rattle of the gate chains come to Vanx’s ears.