Those in the rear realized it. They tried to turn and flee, only to discover that the same energy which had pushed aside their fellows caught them like a tide of glue. They couldn't run; which meant all they could do was face her and die.
Kaeritha cut them down and stepped across their bodies. She continued her steady progress through the temple's corridors, retracing her path towards the Chapel of the Crone, and sweat beaded her brow. Another group of guards came charging down an intersecting passageway from her left, and once more her battering ram broom reached out. Most of the newcomers gawked in disbelief and confusion as they were shunted firmly aside . . . and those who were not gawked in terror as Kaeritha stalked into their midst like death incarnate, brushing aside their efforts to defend themselves and visiting Tomanâk's judgment upon them in the flash of glowing blades and the spatter of traitors' blood.
She resumed her progress towards the chapel, and felt a fatigue which was far more than merely physical gathering within her. Forming and shaping raw power the way she was was only marginally less demanding than channeling Tomanâk's presence to heal wounds or sickness. It required immense concentration, and the drain upon her own energy was enormous. She couldn't keep it up long, and every innocent she pushed out of her way only increased her growing exhaustion. But she couldn't stop, either. Not unless she wanted to slaughter-or to be slaughtered by-those same innocents.
Her advance slowed as her fatigue grew. Every ounce of willpower was focused on the next section of hall or waiting archway between her and her destination. She was vaguely aware of other bells-deeper, louder bells, even more urgent than the ones which had summoned the guards to the false Voice's defense-but she dared not spare the attention to wonder why they were sounding or what they signified. She could only continue, fighting her way through the seemingly endless members of Quaysar's Guard who had been corrupted.
And then, suddenly, she entered the Chapel of the Crone, and there were no more enemies. Even the innocent guards she had been pushing out of her way had disappeared, and the clangor of alarm bells had been cut short as though by a knife. There was only stillness, and the abrupt, shocking cessation of combat.
She stopped, suddenly aware that she was soaked with sweat and gasping for breath. She lowered her blades slowly, bloody to the elbows, wondering what had happened, where her enemies had gone. The sounds of her own boots seemed deafening as she made her way slowly, cautiously, down the chapel's center aisle. And then, without warning, the chapel's huge doors swung wide just as she reached them.
The bright morning sunlight beyond was almost blinding after the interior dimness through which she had clawed and fought her way, and she blinked. Then her vision cleared, and her eyes widened as she saw a sight she was quite certain no one had ever seen before.
She watched the immense wind rider dismount from the roan courser. Despite his own height, his courser was so enormous that it had to kneel like a Wakuo camel so that he could reach the ground. He wore the same green surcoat she wore, and the huge sword in his right hand blazed with the same blue light as he turned and the courser heaved back to its feet behind him. She stared at him, her battle-numbed mind trying to come to grips with his sudden, totally unanticipated appearance, and his left hand swept off his helmet. Foxlike ears shifted gently, cocking themselves in her direction, and a deep voice rumbled like welcome thunder.
"So, Kerry, is this after being only for those with formal invitations, or can just anyone be dropping in?"
She shook her head, unable to make herself quite believe what she was seeing, and stepped out through the chapel doors two of the Quaysar war maids had swung wide. The temple courtyard seemed impossibly crowded by the score or so of coursers and wind riders behind Bahzell. Most of the wind riders were still mounted, interposing with their coursers between the remainder of the Quaysar Guards and the chapel. Two of them weren't. Baron Tellian of Balthar and his wind-brother Hathan had dismounted behind Bahzell, and Kaeritha shook her head in disbelief as she realized that over half of the still mounted "wind riders" were hradani.
"Bahzell," she said in a voice which even she recognized was far too calm and remote from the carnage behind her, "what are you doing here? And what are you-or any hradani-doing with a courser, for Tomanâk's sake?"
"Well," he replied, brown eyes gleaming with wicked amusement, "it's all after being the letter's fault."
"Letter?" She shook her head again. "That's ridiculous. My letter won't even arrive at Balthar for another day or two!"
"And who," he asked amiably, "said a thing at all, at all, about your letter?" It was his turn to shake his head, ears tilted impudently. "It wasn't from you, being as how it's clear as the nose on Brandark's face that you've not got the sense to be asking for help before you need it. No, this one was after coming from Leeana."
"Leeana?" Kaeritha parroted.
"Aye," Bahzell said a bit more somberly. "She'd suspicions enough all on her own before ever you came back to Kalatha from Thalar. She'd written a bit about them to her Mother, but it was only after you and she spoke that she was sending the lot of her worries to the Baroness. I was away-I'd a bit of business in Warm Springs as needed looking after-but I'd had a hint as you might be after needing a little help. So when I returned to Hill Guard, the Baroness showed me Leeana's letters."
He shrugged.
"As soon as ever I read them, it was pikestaff clear as how I'd best be on my way to Quaysar. I'm hoping you won't be taking this wrongly, Kerry, but charging in here all alone, without so much as me or Brandark to watch your back, was a damned-fool hradani sort of thing to be doing."
"It was my job," she said, looking around for something to wipe her blades on. Tellian silently extended what looked like it had once been part of a temple guard's surcoat. She decided not to ask what had happened to its owner. Instead, she simply nodded her thanks and used it to clean her swords while she continued to gaze up at Bahzell.
"And I never once said as how it wasn't," he replied. "But I'm thinking you'd be carving bits and pieces off of my hide if I'd gone off to deal with such as this without asking if you'd care to be coming along. Now wouldn't you just?"
"That's different," she began, and broke off, recognizing the weakness of her own tone as Bahzell and Tellian both began to laugh.
"And just how is it different, Kerry?" another, even deeper voice inquired, and Kaeritha turned to face the speaker.
Tomanâk Himself stood in the courtyard, and all around her people were going to their knees as His presence washed over them. Wind riders slid from their saddles to join them, and even the coursers bent their proud heads. Only Kaeritha, Bahzell, and Walsharno remained standing, facing their God, and He smiled upon them.
"I'm still waiting to hear how it's different," He reminded her in gently teasing tones, and she drew a deep breath as His power withdrew from her. It left quickly, yet gently, flowing back through her like a caress or the shoulder slap of a war captain for a warrior who'd done all that was expected of her and more. There was a moment of regret, a sense of loss, as that glorious tide flowed back to the one from Whom it had come, yet her contact with Him was not severed. It remained, glowing between them, and as He reclaimed the power He had lent her, she found herself refreshed, filled with energy and life, as if she'd just arisen in the dawn of a new day and not come from a deadly battle for her very life and soul.
"Well, maybe it's not," she said after a moment or two and with a fulminating sideways glower for Bahzell. "But it still wasn't Leeana's place to be telling you I needed help!"