But was he sane? Suppose a madman waited in the Wizard's castle? A madman, whose power to reach and enslave other people's minds might still be intact?
Then Blade might be riding to his death. He fingered the hilt of his dagger. His original decision still stood. Death would be better than letting the Wizard get control of his mind. It would be a grim and foolish irony to have to kill himself now, after living through the battle of Morina. It would be still worse to become the Wizard's mental slave, living in a shadow world created by his master. In time the Rentorans might storm the castle, slay the Wizard, and free the body of Richard Blade. He doubted they would also be able to free his mind. Far better a quick, clean death here and now.
It was normally two weeks' travel from Morina to the Wizard's castle. Blade made the journey in ten days, in spite of the disorder spreading across Rentoro. The «armies» sent out by the cities and towns were hardly more than mobs, and Blade usually found it easy to give them a wide berth.
The few times he got close to one of them, he had a mild surprise. Three times he saw men in unmistakable Wolf armor, just as unmistakably giving orders and being obeyed. Why not? Blade thought. The Wolves were about the only people in Rentoro with real military training. Vengeance was all very well in its place, but someone was certain to realize that the Wolves were too valuable to kill. Then the Wolves in turn must have realized they had a skill to sell, or at least trade for their lives. Blade wondered if in time the surviving Wolves would emerge as a regular class of professional mercenaries, like the condottieri of Renaissance Italy. The Wizard would appreciate that final irony, if he managed to be around to see it!
As Blade approached the Wizard's territory, the marching armies faded away and even the refugees and bandits became fewer. Most of the people around here seemed to be already dead or else scattered to whatever safety they could find elsewhere in Rentoro. The few Blade talked to spoke of a terrible curse fallen on the Wizard's castle-fire, thunder, plague, Wolves and servants alike going mad. Blade did not believe all the stories, but it certainly seemed that something ugly had been going on at the castle. He began to wonder if the Wizard was still alive.
On the ninth day he was only a few miles north of Peloff, and he decided to risk pressing on in the daylight. That brought him another surprise, much greater than seeing Wolves leading Rentoro's armies and much more pleasant.
He was trotting through an orchard when suddenly a shout ahead made him pull up. Then five helmeted heads rose from behind a stone wall on the far side of the orchard. A woman's head rose beside them, and at the sight of her Blade stopped his wild grab for his sword.
«Lorya! What are you doing here?»
Lorya laughed and whispered quickly in the ear of one of the men. He motioned to his followers to lay down their weapons, and all five men crowded around Blade's heuda. Lorya stood to one side, and Blade saw that she was now tanned and toughened like leather, her hair cut even shorter than before. She wore a loose tunic and baggy trousers, and no on would have taken her for a woman, except for one thing. Her swordbelt was let out to its last notch to accommodate an unmistakable swelling of her waist.
Then Blade became aware that one of the five men was taking off his helmet and bowing his head. «Lord Blade,» he said. «Your Chosen Woman Lorya has been of our band these past months. It was not her belief that she would see you again. Is it your wish that she return to you?»
Blade shook his head. He wasn't sure what was going on here, but he knew Lorya was not coming with him this time. «No. I have business with the Wizard himself.» Instead of staring, the men nodded as if they understood perfectly what Blade meant. He went on. «I cannot take a woman with child into such danger. No, Lorya has found worthy protection here among you. Let this continue.»
«We are honored, Lord Blade,» said the leader. «Will you honor us further by spending the night at our camp?» Blade looked at Lorya for some clue as to what he should answer and saw her nod. She seemed to be trying not to burst out laughing. He would come to the camp, all right-and the first thing he'd do there was get Lorya's story from her. He'd never quite accepted the idea of her being dead-but he'd certainly never expected to find her alive, well, and giving orders to armed men.
That night, over beer and fresh-killed venison, she told him her tale. When the fifteen days of Peloff were over, she waited five more. Then she rode west to a farm. The people there took her in, and believed her tale of being under the protection of a great wizard, the Lord Blade, who had come from a distant land to meet the Wizard of Rentoro.
This tale did more than gain her good treatment at the farm. It prepared the farmer and his neighbors for the events that followed. When the rumors ran across the land that the Wolves were on the march and Morina was rising against the Wizard, they knew what was happening. The Lord Blade and the Wizard had fallen out, and their great duel would bring the Wizard's rule in Rentoro to an end.
By now Lorya had taken the farmer's second son as her lover, and she persuaded him to organize the young men of all the nearby farms as a band of warriors. It did not matter who won, she said-they would have to protect themselves, and neither side could punish them for that. It took some time for a century of fear of the Wizard to vanish, but in the end the job was done.
So now Lorya's lover commanded forty men, half of them mounted, and they patrolled the country for many miles in all directions. They kept the Wolves and the bandits out, and collected some taxes of their own. Lorya herself had learned to use a sword until she was a useful member of the band. Of course, in another month or so she would have to start saving her strength for the baby-
She saw the question in Blade's eyes and nodded. «It is yours."'
«Does your lover know?»
«Yes. I made him swear a mighty oath to treat the Lord Blade's seed as he would treat the Lord Blade himself.»
«And if he breaks that oath?»
«He is not the only protector in Rentoro. If I find a man who is traveling to Dodini, I may go with him anyway. I do not know what is happening in Dodini, but I do not think anyone there will now punish me for defying the Wizard!»
«That seems likely enough,» said Blade. «Lorya, you've done rather well by yourself. I wish you luck-«
«No, Blade,» she said with a smile. «Wish that I go on making my own luck. That is what you told me to do when you sent me to Peloff. That is what I have been doing.»
Blade couldn't argue. He only hoped she could go on making this kind of luck as long as she needed to-long enough to get home to Dodini, long enough for Rentoro to settle down. She deserved to live, and Rentoro needed more cool heads like hers.
Chapter 24
The next morning Blade kissed Lorya farewell, thanked her lover for his hospitality, and rode off to the south. With him as he rode was the knowledge that before dark tonight he might be confronting the Wizard.
In Peloff he saw again what might have happened to Lorya if she hadn't done so well making her own luck. There was no Peloff now, only ashes, charred timbers, and blackened stone, Bodies lay in the streets, most so badly charred that neither decay nor scavengers had touched them. Blade skirted the edge of the town and kept on to the south.