"Good morning." He said after the fact, when the rain shower had stopped and sun dappled the mossy area about the brook. She snuggled comfortably against him, the both of them damp and overheated and she in a lazy state of euphoria and wonderment that she had not done this long before. She felt as if something that had been missing had been found again. Some deep, deep part of herself completed.
"It's long past that." She giggled. "Whiled away and here we are like slugabeds."
"Hardly a proper bed. But it sufficed. How do you feel?"
"I feel lovely." She sighed.
"I meant your leg."
"Oh. I'd forgotten it."
"Ah. That I'll take as a complement."
She looked up at him, wide eyed, innocent. "Why didn't you ever suggest this before?"
He blinked at her then half laughed. "I seem to recall a hundred -- no a thousand times I might have mentioned it, but you were too prudish to engage."
"So you found others." She said, and the mood darkened. She frowned, more a mind to recall all the others now that her head was clearer. He hesitated in answering, composing the proper answer.
"I will admit to a certain -- promiscuity. But of a whole, they meant nothing. Not like you."
"And Arshes?"
Another pause. In this situation, after this intimacy, she had him at a certain disadvantage. She pressed it, feeling justified in it.
"And Arshes." He acknowledged. "It is not the same."
"How so?"
"I don't know. Yes -- I do. I raised her as a daughter and it turned into something more. I cherish her. I want to see her happy. But, in my mind, I can't help but always remember her as that urchin I took under my fold."
"And me?" she whispered, terrified of the intensity of feeling in his tone when he spoke of Arshes Nei.
"You -- sometimes I can't explain you. Sometimes its so clear it hurts."
"I hurt you?"
"No. I do it to myself. Maybe its that part of me that is Rushie. Your Rushie. He -- me- we -- adored you. Worshipped you. You are the most pure, honest thing I've ever known. Rushie is the other part of my soul, the moral part perhaps, but without you it would have no hold over me."
She chewed at her thumb, not knowing whether she cared for that responsibility. Not knowing whether that was the answer she had sought. She thought it was an honest one, for the words had not fallen glibly from his tongue but been well thought out. Perhaps the missing place within her that had been filled, was the corner of her soul reserved for love. Maybe his words hinted at the same thing.
"Father said that you would hurt me. I always told him it wasn't so. But that was before -- before this. I think maybe you could."
"I would not."
She sighed, thinking that perhaps she knew him better than he knew himself. What had been simple jealousy before, would rip her heart asunder now. She thought she might have done herself a grave misjustice.
Yoko. I would not cause you pain." He pulled her closer, pressing her head against his shoulder.
She made a little sound and relaxed against him, having fouled the pleasant morning with her pessimistic musings. He had told her truths she had not been completely prepared to hear. He had not instigated this. He had not tried to sway her with pretty words. She wished she had never brought up his past dalliances.
"Will you return to Thraxtown today?" She toyed with the end of his braid. It was frayed and coming loose, long strands of hair hanging about his face.
He sighed. "I've a notion not to. There are better ways to pass time. But, I've been invited for lunch and a game of Pirates and Kings in the lumber baron's own house."
She sat up, feeling a dull ache in her thigh. "You were? Why didn't you say? How did you manage that?"
"I was. And you distracted me. I forgot to mention it. He was impressed by my skill at the game. Besides he owes me more gold than he had on his person last night. I could put it off." He rubbed his knuckles along her hip. "I'm loathe to leave you alone in such condition."
"I'll be fine." She shivered at the touch.
"Can you place wards about this area? Do you have the skill?"
"No."
He frowned, drawing his brows in frustration at his own inability to do so. She found her tunic, discarded and damp a few feet away. She pulled it on, the feel of cold, wet cloth making chill bumps rise. With more care she pulled her bloody trousers up over her bandaged ankle and thigh. He watched her, reclined on his cloak, making little movement to dress himself. She glanced shyly at him from under her lashes, admiring the languid, beautiful length of him. He had never possessed an ounce of modesty, which to a church raised girl, could be disconcerting. She looked away, rubbing her ankle.
"It's almost mid-day. If you've a lunch appointment, then you'd best be on your way."
"Are you trying to get rid of me?"
"No." Yes. His presence jumbled her thoughts and she needed to think. "I just want this over. This curse. I don't see how they can be stopped."
Worry over that came tumbling back and she bit her lip. He rose with an exhalation of breath and knelt behind her, kneading her shoulders. Oh, that felt good. That made her want to lean back and delay him. But it was only his presence working on her mind, not reason.
"Nothing is impossible." A whisper in her ear. For him maybe. When he had full control of his magic. The rest of the world had to work with unattainable goals.
Schneider was in a pleasantly good mood. The cap had been left behind. Yoko hadn't even noticed in her distraction. It had been a very good morning. It had been a wonderful morning. He could not quite recall a better one. He didn't mind the mud on the streets of Thraxtown at all. Well -- not much, at any rate. He smiled at the invitations of the camp whores and was even so extravagantly generous as to toss a copper at a legless beggar sitting in the muck at the side of the street. She had gotten over her gloom, which had to admit she had some slight cause for, and rebraided his hair with higher spirits, even going so far as to wrap her arms about his neck afterwards and murmur an affection in his ear. At which point he almost had been delayed until he rolled atop her injured leg and caused her to cry out, cutting the dalliance short.
His mind was preoccupied more with thoughts of his return to her than it was on the chore the lady of the forest had set him to, or placating Thrax in hopes of gaining knowledge of some weakness that might be used to drive the man away from here. He was almost giddy, which was an unusual state for him. Giddy with power perhaps, during certain exceptional summoning when the energy had cursed with undue force through his body, but never quite brought to the same state by the act of sex. One had to allow that after four centuries of engaging rather vigorously in the act that after a while it lost some degree of its wonder.
He stood in the street outside Thrax's house, his mind wondering, until a wagon trundled by and spattered mud on his ragged hemmed cloak. He glared indignantly after it. Someone had gone to the trouble to plant a few shrubs and flower beds along the walk and the facade of the house, a hypocrisy if ever there were one, considering how much effort Thrax was putting into the destruction of the forest.
Thrax's plump little mistress answered his knock and ushered him with a twittering little laugh and under the lash looks that were anything but shy. She left him in a room off the main hall. There was a fire burning in the hearth and the trappings of genteel civilization on the walls and in the glass fronted shelves. A garishly brocaded tapestry of a hunt with hounds chasing after a stylized deer and nobles ahorse cheerily willing its doom. There was a small book case with gold bound volumes, which surprised Schneider considerably, Thrax not giving him the impression of being a man much inclined to scholarly pursuit and books being rare. He browsed the titles and found a genealogy of southern aristocracy. A book of courtly phrase and bearing. A series of geological studies, written by a scholar some hundred years past that Schneider had actually been acquainted with. Various technical books and histories and a fair bit of fluff. Most of the spines looked as if the books had never been opened. Save for the courtly manners one and the royal lineage text. One supposed they were here for appearance. As were the majority of the things Thrax had collected. All medals of a sort to proclaim him as a man of taste and worldly airs to the rustic folk that revolved in his domain. None of them would know the difference.
"Afternoon, Darshe." Thrax appeared in the door way, in a silk house tunic and a second plump mistress at his side. The man had a taste for well rounded women. "Here for me to win my gold back, I see."
Schneider shrugged. "At your invitation. At your risk."
Thrax laughed, more willing to accept Schneider's arrogance out of the witness of a tavern full of loggers. "We shall see. Have you lunched or shall I bring out the board?"
"Lunch, please."
The women brought it in. Arranged it on a small table by the fire and left the men to consume it on their own.
"I'm surprised," Schneider said, willing of offer complements to gain the man's confidence. "To see such an impressive array of adornments in so a rustic place as this."
"Yes. One does what one can to bring civilization to the back woods. Would that I could make my home in a finer climate, but for a man to garner honest wealth he needs keep his hands in the business."
"Ah. Understandable. You've a sizable operation. All yours?"
"And my father's before me. We came from the east, but the increase in the beastmen across the mountains made it treacherous to work. I lost as many men as I sent out and there were few willing to hire on when the chances of murder at the hands of the half men was so great. Far riper pickings here and a quicker route to the lumberyards on the coast with the river so close at hand."
"How far do you intend to go? With the cutting of the wood? Its rumored to hide within its depths things of a -- magical nature. I've seen tracks myself of an unusual nature."
"Oh, those old wives tales. I pay them no heed. There's nothing in these woods but the occasional giant, or creature left over from the war. Nothing that won't flee the saws and the axes. We've years of cutting ahead of us."
"Who ceeded you the land?"
"No one. Its claimed by no one, unless you count the elves that used to inhabit it. But they killed themselves off long ago, fighting amongst each other. Judas will barter for taxes once we've gotten closer to her territories, but that's a long way down the road. Why the interest? You're not one of those soft hearted forest lovers are you? God help me if I've invited one of those into my home."
Schneider smiled. "No. Not one of those, I assure you."
They finished the meal, and after the remains were cleared, Thrax brought out the game board. The pieces he used here, in his home were finely carved jade. Very expensive. Very rare. Fit for a true lord. Thrax, of course, took the side of the King. Schneider had a tendency to prefer the Pirate himself.
"Lovely set." Schneider remarked fingering the Pirate's lady. Thrax beamed.
"I bought them from a jeweler in Meta-Rikan who had been commissioned by a lord for them. The lord had a drop in finances so I bought them. I've heard that the old king used to play a great deal."
Schneider shrugged. "Probably did. Wasn't very good at the real thing."
Thrax blinked, suddenly interested. "I'll have a place in court one day. Titles are for sale, I hear. So many great houses were depleted of heirs during the wars that a good many lands are vacant of their lords."
"You'll fit right in."
"I feel it." Thrax agreed, missing the sarcasm. "Its my destiny. With the Southern alliance growing stronger each day, to hold lands there will bring great power and profit. I heard the regent speak, perhaps a year past, after his coronation and he foretold of a great future for those willing to invest in the south."
"The regent Larz? Optimism is his forte."
"You sound as if you have visited the court at Meta-Rikan."
"Oh, I've drifted through now and again."
Thrax leaned forward, eyes gleaming, practically salivating for news of the court he so badly wished he were a part of. "Have you ever spoken to the king?"
Schneider thought about that before answering. "We might have exchanged a few thoughts. It all gets so muddled around the royals. You know how it is."
"Of course." Thrax agreed, not wanting to seem the country bumpkin. "I even attended the same services as his majesty and listened to the Prophet himself. Have you ever --"
"No! Your gambit I believe."
Thrax looked at the board, recalling the game. After some consideration he moved a piece. "Have you ever met the Princess---?"
Thrax had certainly studied his royal lineage's. He must have slept with the book under his pillow. He knew the names of the lords of the south better than Schneider did and he'd fought with most of them at one time or another. It was almost dusk and though he had wanted to get away sooner, Thrax had held onto him like a dog with a favored bone. He had even offered a bed for the night and one of his mistresses to warm it. Declining that was a delicate matter with the lumber baron and his plump mistress looking on in expectation. Schneider could be tactful when he tried. He was getting better at it daily.
The thought of getting back to Yoko had gnawed at him for the last several hours of his stay and his mind had drifted so badly that Thrax had actually won a game. He was so distracted that he stepped in front of a lumbering cart and a solicitous logger had to grab his shoulder and haul him back, saving him from being trampled under hooves and wheels. He shook his head in amazement, thinking how ridiculously besotted he was behaving. One would think he'd never had a woman before. He'd seen love charms confuse a man less.
He passed the witch's tent he'd talked with the day before and heard her hawking flea repellents. He strode past her tent -- and stopped, thinking. Thrax was so single minded in his obsession to gain enough wealth to buy a title that there was little or nothing that would sway him from his race to fill the western lumber yards. Nothing but another obsession. Something he wanted even more desperately than a place in Larz' court. Something that in the heat of the moment, a man would forgo power and wealth and even dignity to get.
"Hello." He ducked under the flap of the hedge witch's tent. A lantern burned on the counter. There was citrus odor that kept the mosquito's away burning with the oil. She squinted up at him, in the process of filling a pouch with herbs.
"Oh, back are you? Is it more information you're looking for this eve?"
"Actually, I was wondering if you do love charms."
She canted her head, studying him. "And what need do you have for such, looking as you do? Besides any woman in town will take a tumble for a copper and mug of ale."
"Not for me. For a friend, who's in love with a person that won't take notice. A stubborn person. Do you do personalized charms? Not the generic ones, but the really good ones?"
"I could." She said carefully. "For a price. It's not considered good business to alter a person's thinking, which is what we're talking about when you get right down to it. They're burning witches nowadays for that kind of thing."
"Ah, but you and I both know that the most powerful love charm constructed will only last for a few weeks -- if that. The heart being the fickle thing it is."
"I might know such a thing." She said warily.
He put a four gold coins on the counter and her eyes bulged. It was probably more than she saw in a month or more. He had won it from Thrax this afternoon.
"I'll need something from your friend who desires a lover. A nail, a lock of hair. Somethingof them."
"I know. Don't use cheap herbs. I want this powerful and as long lasting as you can make it. I'll come back tomorrow with what you need."
"I like a man who keeps his word. You told me you'd send profit my way." She beamed up at him, yellow toothed and haggish, but possessing a certain sparkle to her eyes that gave her character. He smiled back. "I like a witch who can live up to her claims. Tomorrow."
"Yoko." He swept down on her, embracing her so enthusiastically that she peered up at him warily through the shadows.
"I have an idea. How is your leg?"
"It's better. I did a healing. What idea?"
"If we can't make Thrax leave the forest, them we make him embrace it. I am so clever sometimes I impress even myself."
She stared at him blankly. "You're making no sense. Have you been drinking?"
He gave her an offended glare, then waved his arms about the glade. "Look, right now he wants wealth to impress all the noble asses in court -- so we make him want to impress the forest more. We make him want to impress the Lady of the Forest. If he falls in love with Glyncara, then he'll be desperate to please her. And that means he'll stop cutting trees."
"You have been drinking."
"I have not and I wish you'd stop saying it. Look, I brought you dinner." He tossed her a package he'd picked up from a vender by the gates. Sausage and grilled vegetables. "I need to make a very quick trip deep enough into the wood to get her attention."
"But -- " she stared at him, very obviously stymied by his impromptu genius.
"Just stay here. Take my cloak." He put it around her shoulders and her own cloak, then kissed her half open lips impulsively.
"I wish you made half as much sense to me as you did to yourself." She grumbled, when he'd pulled away.
"But you adore me anyway." He grinned at her and didn't wait for a nay or yeah on that statement before he was trotting through the shadows.
Quick, he figured, was an hour or two's journey into the forest past where they had first picked up the trail. It was probably as close as she would or could appear to the edge of the wood. He alternated between a brisk walk and a trot, being careful of his footing in the dark, having no wish to end up in a predicament similar to Yoko's. That would be hellishly embarrassing. When he was tired of walking and impatience had started to gnaw at him, he yelled her name.
"Glyncara! Show yourself." Every five or ten minutes as he walked he would call out. The animals would quiet themselves for a while, then return to their nighttime serenade.
"If you value this wood, appear forest spirit." He put as much command in it as he would if he were summoning a fire elemental to do his bidding.
Something brushed against his neck. He started, turning and nothing was there.
"Glyncara." He warned. "I'm too tired of tromping through your damned forest for games. If you hear, then come out."
The misty coolness touched him again, a caress along the lower back that seemed to bypass his layers of shirts and brush his skin.
What do you want? The voice drifted around him, a fog seeped from the ground.
"I need something from you."
The men are still in my Forest. You have not completed your task..
"Nor will I, if you don't appear before me in solid form. I'm not in the mood for the cryptic whisperings of voices through the trees."
The mist circled up, growing denser and denser until the form of Glyncara stood before him, clothed as before only in her trailing locks.
Testy. Testy. Age will give you patience, child.
He sniffed. "I've years to spare."
You are an infant yet, compared to the forest. And there are things that make IT seem newborn. You know nothing of the TRUE earth, only of that which grants you the power you yield. It has always been the way of wizards.
"Whatever. Listen, I need a lock of your hair."
She stared at him with as much a blank expression as Yoko had.
"And how close can you appear to the edge of the wood?"
I can appear to where the trees stop if I so wish, but my power is weak there. What mischief do you plan?
"I plan to get you a suitor, lady."
Kall-Su sat and listened to the tales exchanged between his men and the trappers who also took shelter under the roof of the trading outpost. They had brought the head in this very evening, a combined party of his knights and the trappers who had been at the post when they had come in. It sat out in the yard now, an icy, horrid thing, staring with malice at the world out of glazed black eyes.
He did not enter into the conversation and no one, not even his men attempted to engage him. They knew him too well, and the trappers were wary of him among them at all, being common men and though eager to trade tails of the magic used in battle to defeat the monster, not easy with the man who had wrought it. It was no new occurrence, the wary glances and the flickering of superstition and fear in the trapper's eyes. Kall expected it, usually shunned gatherings such as this if possible, but was neatly trapped now, with men of his in need of time to recuperate from their wounds.
He gave them the fire in the small common room and sat as far as he could manage in a corner, with his armor beside him on the floor, but his cloak wrapped about him, preventing him from being totally unarmored before strange and mistrustful eyes. He would have gone up to the loft above the post where there were billets for sleeping, if he hadn't feared the dreams. He had no wish to wake with a cry upon his lips with witnesses about.
Kiro came over and sat on the floor beside Kall-Su, his arm bound in a sling at his side, his face somber and perhaps a little guilty. They sat for a while in silence, Kiro a good enough companion to his lord, for he shared the distaste for useless words.
"I was wrong to attack." He finally said. "We should have held back and let you deal with the thing and none of us would be licking wounds this night."
"You seemed to enjoy it."
"Until it hit me. Yes. After that bitter travel to find it, we were spoiling for a fight. It was unwise."
Kall thought so too, but he didn't say it. Kiro admitting it was hard enough on the man. "No real harm done, other than Sento's horse. Forget it."
"I know you dislike lodging here."
"Forget it, Kiro. It's no great discomfort."
His captain sighed, rubbing at an aching shoulder. "They've mulled hard cider by the fire, would you like some?"
"Yes." Kall said, because Kiro seemed intent on seeing him comfortable.
He sipped at the cider, which wasn't half bad and strong to boot and listened to the humm of conversation. His mind wondered, thinking about the frustrating spell lore in the book he was studying, of the winter festival to come and the onslaught of people down from the mountains that would be entering Sta-Veron. Merchants from the south and the west would come, eager to buy the furs and the mined gems the north had to offer. With them would come the inevitable priests, trying to gather converts. The fanatics who would wave their holy symbols and preach about salvation and damnation. They never changed, only now only the boldest would dare to denounce him to his face. It didn't matter, that they held their tongues, the looks, the holier than thou, venomous looks still shook him to the core, because he could never quite repress the memory of his grandfather and all his righteous cronies doing the same thing. So long in the grave that terrible old man, and he still haunted Kall. He would haunt him forever.
He shut his eyes and forced the tremulous memory away to that dark corner of his mind where he kept all the bad and horrible things hidden. Made himself relax and reconsider the logistics of the winter festival. There were a hundred preparations still to be made.
He let his guard down and something slipped past. Some sibilant, powerful presence that eased into his conscious thought and clung there stubbornly, even when startled to awareness of its presence he attempted to snap his defenses down and force it out. It struggled to be heard, a faint, familiar flavor. Not harmful, but insistent. He expanded his awareness enough to regard it and someone else's mental voice filled his head.
Gods damn you, Kall-Su, you're harder to crack than an iron husk nut. Open up. This last was demanded with a complete air of exasperation and impatience. He recognized the tone and the mental signature.
Arshes. What do you want?
I wanted not to be up all night trying to get your attention, stupid man.
He did not respond to that, used enough too her shortness with him to be terribly offended. Having grown up together, there had always been a certain sibling like rivalry between them for Schneider's affections. Not that he had not played them both, reveling in being the center of their young universes.
You've got to come south with your army, Kall. You've got to hurry.
Prey tell, why? Are we invading again?
Silence from her. He felt her tenseness -- her consideration -- her elation, and he became wary of a sudden for the reasons behind it.
Darshe is back, Kall. He's alive. Gara found out. Larz and the Prophet are after him. He bound somehow. Gara didn't get all that. Just that he's been stripped of his magic and that the Prophet did it. We think he's somewhere north of Judas. That is where Larz is sending his forces at any rate. They mean him harm. We need your help.
It all blurted into his head in a jumbled mass. It took him a moment to sort it all.
Are you certain, Arshes?
Do I make mistakes of this magnitude?
No. She didn't. She was entirely competent, when she was thinking straight. Which he wasn't sure was the case now, in light of the clamor he felt in her mind. Then the other name she had mentioned hit him.
The Prophet? That man's face had been a regular in his nightmares for sometime now. No rhyme or reason there, just a silent, malicious condemnation that he couldn't shake. He recalled the fleeting images from the first dream he'd had of the man. The one in Meta-Rikan. The man had hurt things that he loved.
He took a breath and another. Her impatience became palatable.
Schneider's alive. How very predictable of him. North of Judas. How far north?
We don't know. We're trying to gather loyal forces and chase Larz' army down.
How much of an army?
Gara only saw a legion or so leaving. There could be more. How long will it take you to gather forces and get from Sta-Veron across the mountains?
I'm on the southern side of the mountains now.
A pause on her part. A contemplation. You're closer than we are then.
I have only a handful of men with me. It will takes weeks to gather and move an army this time of year.
Then send word and have them follow. You're a force unto yourself, Ice Lord and he may not have much time before Larz is upon him.