Days of Blood and Fire - Katharine Kerr [151]
“Close to two days ride, straight north.” The gwerbret had swiveled round to stare at her in something like fear. “Jill, what—”
“The situation’s grave, Your Grace. Our enemies could be upon us at any moment. They could fall upon us like dweomer, because dweomer is exactly what they’ve been using.”
“What? Are they invisible? It’s going to be a task straight from the Third Hell, fighting invisible enemies.”
“Nah nah nah—naught so bad as that! You’ll see them plain enough when they ride off the end of their dweomer road and appear under your walls. Your Grace, there’s not a moment to lose. Alert the countryside, send for your lords, I beg you—do whatever needs to be done!”
Jill turned and ran for the door of the great hall. Although she feared a direct outpouring of the army near the town itself, the letter had implied that Lord Tren would be joining the force before it struck. Thus there was a chance that Alshandra’s minions had brought their army out of Evandar’s country at Tren’s dun and were planning on riding an ordinary road down to Cengarn. If so, she’d be able to scout them out in the falcon shape and bring back some solid information. She ducked into the side broch, climbed the staircase as fast as she could, then rushed into her chamber and barred the door. Panting for breath, and stripping off her clothes as she moved, she walked over to the window. Already, down in the ward, men of the warband were hurrying toward the stables—messengers, no doubt, to rouse the countryside.
As soon as she’d quieted her racing heart, Jill transformed herself into the falcon. As she leapt from the window and flew, she heard a strange noise jangling and booming over Cengarn. Since her senses were bound to the perceptions of the etheric plane, it took her a moment to recognize the sound of temple bells, ringing out an alarum for the town and for all the farmers round about. Down below, the streets and houses, seen from the etheric in full morning light, looked grotesquely dead, all black and gray as if they were carved from shadow made palpable. Among them she saw the auras of the townsfolk swarming about, rushing here and there, some to man the gates, some toward the dun itself. Others milled and bobbed about the streets or clumped in the open spaces, moving aimlessly like particles of flour move, sprinkled on a bowl of water.
Before she headed north she swung out wide, taking a turn south and east over the settled farmlands, where she saw, among the reddish auras of field and forest, the same orderly panic. Already a few farmers were driving herds of cows, judging from the size of the yellow horizontal auras, toward the city. Behind them trudged women, leading children and pushing handcarts. Warned for weeks now, the people were ready to move. In that she could take what comfort she could, and truly, there was little else she could have done to improve their lot. Even if she’d thought of the mothers of all roads that ran through Evandar’s country and had remembered earlier that Alshandra had the same access to them as Evandar himself, the town never could have sheltered the surrounding farmers, with all their families and livestock, for these last weeks of waiting. Things would soon be bad enough inside the walls as it was.
North of Cengarn lay very little but wild hills. As she flew steadily over the dirt track that did for a road north, Jill saw only a pair of shepherds and their dogs, driving a small flock toward the town. Beyond that lay wilderness, forest and stream, boulders and hill, unrolling under the unnatural speed of the falcon’s huge wings. Even though the wind blew in her favor, Jill wondered if she could fly the entire thirty miles or so to Tren’s dun and still return safely in a single day. Fortunately her long weeks of scouting had built up her physical strength to some extent, but she was still, underneath, an old woman trusting in the unnatural vitality of the dweomer rather than to sound muscle and bone.
The sun was just past its zenith