Prophet of Moonshae - Douglas Niles [73]
The crossbow caught her eye and she hefted it. The weapon was large but light, and the action worked with a smoothness and ease she had never before experienced. A good shot with bow and crossbow, Alicia recognized this as a device of precise craftsmanship. Nevertheless, she set it back down, sensing that it was not her destiny to bear it.
She found a golden torque, a ring to place around the neck, and thought it elegant and bright, possessing an inner strength that seemed to flow into her hands when she lifted it-but that, too, she returned to the pile. A warrior she was, and thus she would find herself a weapon. The torque seemed more appropriate as the badge of a high druid.
Then she saw the silver coils lying beneath the wheels of the chariot. Each was a series of rings made by looping a single piece of metal through several spirals, designed to fit over the forearm. They were identical, each winding through three rings the size of bracelets.
Only as the princess picked them up and studied them did she notice that each bracer was delicately crafted into the coiled shape of a long, wingless serpent. She slid her right hand through the circles of one and found that it rested comfortably on her forearm. The other did the same on her left.
"Bracers fit for a queen," announced Tavish approvingly. Alicia looked at her companions and saw Keane's raised eyebrows.
"I know," she said, understanding his look. "I thought I would gain a weapon here. But somehow these feel right!"
"I don't question that," replied her teacher. She detected an unusual amount of tenderness in his voice. "After all, I dug through a pile of riches to find a brass ring!"
As Alicia looked downward, she thought she saw-or did she imagine it?-lines of silvery light flowing along the serpentine bodies. The bracers seemed delicate, almost frail. Certainly they wouldn't serve as combat protection. It looked as though the bite of hard steel would cut right through argent metal into the flesh beyond.
Why, then, did she put them on with so little hesitation? Alicia couldn't know, but neither did she feel any qualm or question about her decision. As she looked upward to the bier where rested the mortal shell of her great ancestor, she felt somehow that Cymrych Hugh approved as well.
* * * * *
"They left clear tracks through the heath. They rode without time for concealment." Knaff the Elder smiled grimly as he made his report to the prince. The warriors of the north had broken into ten companies, each of about twenty men, and scattered across miles of this rough country. For hours they had searched and explored, but now finally they had discovered a solid and visible trail.
Brandon gestured to one of his own band. The warrior, older and slightly smaller than the average northman, was a barrel-chested fellow who bore a long, curved horn, an artifact carved from the tusk of a great snow elephant.
"Sound the assembly, Traw. Below that peak to the north." Brandon indicated the round dome of a summit that loomed above the surrounding mountains.
Traw placed the end of his great horn on the ground, then put the mouthpiece to his lips. His chest swelled, and a long, low tone resonated through the valleys and across the peaks. It reached the ears of all of Brandon's scattered companies, and with its slow, plaintive notes told them to mark off three leagues to the north of their initial starting place. All ten groups started toward the rendezvous.
More significantly, no one else heard even the slightest hint of the cry, for this was an enchanted horn. It dated from the time when great sheets of ice covered the Realms, and northmen fought for their existence against the continuous onslaught of winter and against the frost-bearded monsters who claimed the icy lands for their own.
The huge tusked beast had fallen to the spears of a half-starved band, and the meat had seen the tribe through the coldest months of the year. In the spring, the men of the cold wastes had