[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
."It's all right, Kaston.I'm fine—just a little surprised, that's all.""Can I get you something, Your Majesty? Shall I send for the healer?""No!" Robyn snapped, her own agitation hardening her voice.A cleric of the New Gods was the last person Robyn wanted to see right now! "I said that I'm fine!""Of course, my queen," Kaston replied, humbled.Nevertheless, she heard no sound of footsteps walking away and presumed the loyal guard had taken up station right outside her door.The feeling gave her a small sense of security as she wandered around Deirdre's room.Something jutted from beneath the rug, and she knelt to retrieve it.It was a small medallion, platinum circling a golden image of Helm's All-Seeing Eye.She dropped the icon on the floor as if it had burned her.Looking around more carefully then, she noticed other objects—figurines of wax and clay, and tiny images of gems set on plates or discs.She recognized the rounded lute of Oghma, the tiny skull that was the symbol of Myriad, lord of the beasts.She saw the bowls of liquid, only reluctantly admitting that the stuff was blood.Dimly she recalled the shout of alarm—"Murder!"—but her mind refused the implication.A shiver passed along her spine, and slowly, carefully the High Queen backed through the warped doorway, collapsing into a chair when she reached the apartment anteroom.Where had the princess gone? That question, Robyn decided, was secondary to the central issue.At the core of Deirdre's disappearance, the queen now knew beyond doubt, lay her daughter's dangerous devotion to the gods of the other Realms, the deities who so wanted to overwhelm and suffocate the sublime will of the Earthmother.For a long time, she sat still in the chair, her mind working feverishly while her body rested, storing physical strength and energy for the task she now inevitably faced.Her husband seized by madness, gone alone to war.By the goddess, she loved him! She felt a deep, mindless terror that he would face some unknown harm, some deadly fate, and she would not be there to help him.Deirdre, too, occupied much of her mind.Why had she killed? What had stolen her away? But all of her cogitation, all of her musing, couldn't give her the guidance she needed.They couldn't tell her where she would find her daughter.Yet gradually, through the curtain of her despair, she began to sense that she was being tested by these onslaughts against her family.Mysteries assailed her, a thousand unknown questions that she could try to answer, but came instead upon still more enigmatic problems.Finally, in her heart, she began to suspect the truth.She might find comfort, but she would never gain the necessary wisdom, if she stayed here in the castle, in her home.To answer these questions, the druid queen knew, she would have to seek her explanations upon a higher plane, at a different place.By now she knew this with certainty.Her body tingled with energy, and her spirit soared to the calling of the goddess who was mother to the Ffolk.Only the Earthmother could show her the course to follow, could provide her with the means to counter this threat.And so once again the white hawk winged toward Myrloch Vale.* * * * *"One human chased you off your post?" Baatlrap snarled in astonished disbelief.He growled and blustered at the half-dozen trolls standing before him, cuffing each several times as he belittled their parentage and their courage.Nevertheless, the monstrous humanoid was considerably distressed by their arrival and their story.As a lot, the warriors cowered before him, a craven remnant of a dozen savage brutes Baatlrap had left to guard the approaches to Codscove.Three of them had deep sword wounds, wounds that showed no sign of regenerating!"And a pack of dogs—hounds from the Abyss itself!" one of the trolls jabbered in the trollish tongue."He rode a hell horse, too—a steed that bore me to the earth and rended my back with hooves of steel!" another bore witness."Wait here!" shouted the giant troll as the rest of his column of trolls and firbolgs meandered out of sight in its march along the northern shore of Gwynneth.The ragged army, still strong and belligerent despite the defection of Thurgol and his stalwart firbolgs, came to a halt, the trolls and the few dozen giant-kin who had ignored Thurgol's leadership flopping in the shade of trees and trying to understand the reports of the panicked rear guards."Did this human ride before an army?" demanded Baatlrap."Almost assuredly!" pledged one of the survivors."It must have been close behind," mused another."Else why would he stand and fight us when our numbers should have put him to flight?""Your numbers should have slain him!" Baatlrap bellowed, smacking the speaker on the side of his head."And you should have buried him beneath the bodies of his horse and his hounds! How is it that you can fail me thus?"No answer came from the defeated trolls, though the creatures grew increasingly sullen in the face of Baatlrap's abuse.The hulking brute looked back and forth, along the assembled rank of his monstrous company.It was a potent band, he knew—two score giant-kin and five times that many trolls.Of course, he would have liked to create still more trolls, but that scheme had been prevented when Garisa and the Silverhaft Axe had sailed to the north.Vaguely Baatlrap felt a desire to go after the weapon.Perhaps one day he would.As for now, he had a hard time imagining a human army that could stand against his present force, nor had he yet seen any evidence that the humans had mustered any men-at-arms even to challenge him.Yet if there were such a force, it could just as easily be behind him as before him.And this human warrior, the one whose sword sliced the wounds that would not heal, could well be a harbinger of such an army.Indeed, the more Baatlrap thought about it, the more he became convinced: There could be no other explanation.Certainly any lone human knight, well mounted, who found himself attacked by a dozen trolls would try to ride away from the fight, wouldn't he? Common sense would allow no other interpretation! Since this warrior had elected not to flee the battle, it could only mean that he was followed by many more of his own kind.The prospect did not alarm the great troll.Instead, the thought of such a battle gave him a sense of pleasant anticipation, together with a self-congratulatory nod for his shrewd analysis of the enemy's situation.This way, Baatlrap's army would be ready to face the pursuing humans in a fair fight, at a place of the troll lord's choosing."Stop the march!" he shouted to the humanoid monsters of his command."We meet the humans here!"* * * * *Finellen tried to conceal her worry from the rest of her troops and from her human and elven companions.She wasn't entirely successful in either case
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]