Darkspell - Katharine Kerr [113]
“No more until you show me the stone. Then more.”
The spirits dematerialized. Although Camdel was trembling, close to his climax, Sarcyn took his hand away.
“Later,” he whispered in his pet’s ear. “Later we’ll work the ritual again. You’ll end up liking that—in spite of yourself.”
Camdel looked at him, his face torn between lust and loathing. Alastyr ignored them and knelt down by the mirror again.
“Show me the stone!”
In the light-struck mirror clouds formed, swirled, and turned slowly to darkness. Smiling, he leaned closer as the darkness resolved itself into solid shapes: hills under the night sky, a horse standing at tether near a tree. Pacing back and forth under the tree was a lad with a sword in hand. Not a lad—it was Jill, the warrior-lass who’d interfered with his plans the year before.
“The stone,” he whispered. “Where is the stone?”
The vision swooped down and focused on her saddlebags.
“Now, show me exactly where she is.”
The vision flickered, then began to expand, to swoop out—and suddenly vanished in a blaze of white light. Half-blinded, Alastyr nearly fell forward onto the mirror as the Wildfolk materialized in the room. From the way they writhed on the floor in front of him, he could guess that they’d been banished by force. A person with great dweomer-power was watching over the lass, then, and he could guess who that someone must be.
“The Master of the Aethyr,” he whispered.
Nodding, the gnomes agreed with him, then disappeared. Alastyr sat back on his heels and considered Sarcyn, who stood watching with his usual stone face.
“The Master of the Aethyr,” the apprentice said. “Are we running back to Bardek?”
Old Gan gurgled and moaned.
“We’re not,” Alastyr snarled. “I’ve worked too long for this.”
Years had he worked—finding informants, laying his snares, then expending such a flood of power upon ensorcelling Camdel and maintaining the ensorcellment that he needed every drop of magnetic force that he could suck from his cowering victim. He refused to run again, not until he had the stone in his hands. Besides, he’d seen Jill in the flesh last summer, when she and her famous father had been sitting in an Eldidd tavern. At the time he’d thought that sight of her was merely a piece of luck, but now he was sure that the Lords of Husks and Rinds had guided him. Since he’d seen her, he could scry her out normally, and Nevyn would have no way of detecting him. He got up, stretching his painful joints.
“I’ve seen who’s carrying it,” he said. “And we should be able to kill her easily.”
Jill woke in the morning, feeling stiff and sore, to find the sun risen well over the horizon. She got up fast, stretching and cursing at her sluggishness. At least Sunrise had finished his morning graze. She gave him a nose bag of oats, then ate her bread and cheese standing up. Although it was a beautiful sunny day, she felt as cold as if she were about to take a fever. She packed up her few possessions in a hurry, and Sunrise had barely nibbled the last oat before they were on their way.
That morning her road took her away from the river. As she jogged along, the dark line of mountains that separated Yr Auddglyn from the province of Cwm Pecl loomed closer and closer, like clouds on the horizon. Toward noon she was trotting through a small valley when she saw dust on the road ahead. As the dust resolved itself into six armed men, she loosened her sword in her scabbard, but when they met, the riders hailed her with a friendly wave.
“Hold a moment, lad,” the leader said. “Are you riding a message from Lord Marclew by any chance?”
“I’m not, but I’m going to Lord Ynryc’s dun, sure enough. That silver dagger he’s holding for ransom is my man.”
The riders leaned forward in their saddles and stared at her.
“And isn’t that an evil Wyrd to fall upon such a pretty lass, to have a silver dagger for a husband!” the leader said, but with a pleasant