Just past midnight the next night, the troop climbed a rocky hillside and rode down into a steep ravine. There on a high plateau overlooking the ravine, they saw the stark outline of several squat towers and the high stone walls of a fortress. On one side of the castle the cliffs fell sheer to the ravine floor; on the other a pale road wound its way up the steep face to the enhance.
“Good gods,” Rafnir breathed. “How do we get up into that?”
“By the front door,” Sayyed growled.
He conferred with Helmar for several long minutes and, when they were agreed, the Clannad riders dismounted. Silently and nearly invisibly, the warriors began to work their way up the road toward the fortress. Demira pushed aside her fear of flying at night and flew a reconnaissance over the fortress.
It is lightly guarded, she reported when she returned. And they are not paying close attention.
Sayyed and Rafnir watched the descending moon and gave Helmar and her warriors another half hour; then Sayyed trotted Afer openly up the road toward the fortress gates. Rafnir mounted Demira, and she launched herself into the darkness.
Demira was right, the guards were very lax that night. Sayyed rode nearly to the top of the plateau close to the gate before a voice called out to challenge him.
Sayyed replied in Turic, “I have messages for the Supreme Counselor, Zukhara.”
“Not tonight,” grumbled a voice on the wall.
Sayyed shot a look over his shoulder to the dark, rock-tumbled edge of the road. A tiny flash, the reflection of moonlight on a dagger blade, signaled Helmar was ready.
“Sorry, but I really must see him now,” Sayyed snapped, and he raised his good arm and fired a powerful blast of magic at the wooden gate. To his astonishment, the magic struck the wood and evaporated. The entrance was protected with magic wards!
This arcane defense was so unexpected, Sayyed stared in surprise. Shouts echoed on the walls, and feet pounded along the battlements. The sorcerer had wanted to surprise the garrison, and all he had succeeded in doing was rouse them all. He tried again with a more powerful bolt. That one shook the gate and boomed against the stone, but the wards were new and well made, and they held.
Sayyed took a deep breath. He was weaker than he imagined, and the thought crossed his mind that maybe he wasn’t strong enough after all to break this gate. As if Afer had read his thoughts, the big stallion neighed, and someone slipped up beside the Hunnuli.
“Try again,” Helmar cried to the clansman.
He pulled in all the magic he dared use, formed it into an explosive spell, and released it from the palm of his hand. Before he could even draw breath, a second bolt followed his across the night-dark space and exploded just behind his on the portals of the gate. The wards vanished in a clap of thunder, and the wooden gate cracked to ruins.
The Clannad warriors charged forward, their swords raised, their voices lifted in battle cry. Behind the walls, Demira came to land on the stone pavings, and Rafnir, in all the confusion, sprang into the hall to look for the women.
Sayyed looked down at Helmar, too startled to think of anything to say.
She smiled at him. “If you had been full-blooded, you might have learned that ‘clannad’ is an ancient clan word for ‘family.’”
“Your ancestors were clanspeople?” he asked, feeling rather dense.
“A long time ago.”
“But you have no splinter.”
“There are no more,” Helmar replied with a shrug. She touched his right wrist where his splinter glowed beneath his sleeve and ran to join her warriors in the fighting at the gate.
The garrison, undermanned and ill-prepared for a battle with sorcerers and sword-wielding warriors who came out of nowhere, quickly surrendered. As Sayyed and Helmar ended the assault and rounded up prisoners, Rafnir ran out of the hall, looking thunderous. “They’re gone!” he shouted furiously.
Sayyed turned on the commander of the fortress. “Where is Zukhara? Where are the women he had with him?”
The Turic drew himself up in pride for his master. “The Gryphon flies, and Lord Zukhara rides to claim his throne.”
“He did what?” asked Helmar puzzled. Sayyed had not gone into detail about the current unrest in the Turic realm. He assumed the Clannad knew.
“Lord Zukhara left this morning with the sorceresses,” the soldier explained as if to a simpleton. “Soon he will call his armies and march on Cangora.”
“A day!” Rafnir cried, totally frustrated. “We keep missing them by a day!” He paced back and forth in the hall of the mountain fortress, slamming his hand on a shield every time he passed it. The shield was a large one, hung on the wall for decoration, and it made a satisfying crash every time he hit it. “Why can’t we leave now?” the young man demanded. “The Hunnuli could catch up with their horses.
He got no immediate answer. His father, Helmar, Rapinor, Hydan, and several other warriors sat around a long table in front of a roaring fire. A map of the Turic realm, unearthed in a storage chest by the garrison commander, lay unrolled on the table amid a scattered collection of flagons, pitchers, and plates. The rest of the troop rested, tended their horses, or raided the castle storerooms for food and drink. The fortress garrison kicked its collective heels in the dungeons.
Midnight had passed hours ago, and dawn would soon lighten the road, but Sayyed made no effort to move from his chair. There were too many forces in motion now to leap precipitously into action. He wanted time to think. He had already explained in detail to Helmar and her men what had happened at Council Rock and later in the caravan. They had been unpleasantly surprised. Still, in spite of their concern, Sayyed fully expected the mysterious Helmar to take her riders and return home now that their duty was done.
He was, therefore, startled when she spoke into an interval between Rafnir’s rhythmic banging. “If you plan to go after Zukhara, you will need help.”
A ripple of surprise passed through her men. Rafnir halted in midpace.
Instead of looking pleased, Sayyed’s brows lowered in suspicion. “Why? It will mean leaving the mountains, traveling in daylight. Why do you offer that now?”
Helmar slowly rose. Her helmet had been laid aside, and her hair blazed red-gold in the firelight. She swept her hand over the map, then looked at her warriors one by one. When she spoke, her words were only to them. “For generations we have lived in Sanctuary thinking the world had abandoned us. Now the world has come pounding at our door, and we learn it has changed while we hid in our mountain fastness. Knowing what we know now, do we want to continue to hide and let the world go by without us? Or do we ride forth and embrace the possibilities of the future?”
Her question fell to every man, and there was silence while each one considered his answer.
Rapinor spoke first, the loyal, staunch warrior who would follow his chief to the grave. “I go with you.”
“Have you considered the consequences, Lady Helmar?” asked another man.
“For the past three days, Dejion. I have also considered the consequences if we stay home and turn our backs. As Minora keeps telling me, we have grown stagnant. Our bloodlines are dying from lack of new stock. If we go back, we could lose everything our ancestors tried to save.”
“Then I will ride with you, and the gorthlings take the hindmost,” the warrior laughed.
“I still haven’t seen this Lady Gabria,” Hydan grumbled. “But you make a good argument.”
The others, too, agreed to ride with the clansmen, and Helmar nodded her satisfaction. “Then go. Talk to the warriors. Tell them why and say any who wish to go home may do so.”