The Dragon Revenant - Katharine Kerr [166]
“I was wondering that myself, to tell you the truth. Have you been drugged?”
“No, not at all.”
Yet when she started to stand, she felt so dizzy and sick that she had a brief moment of wondering if Nevyn had given her some sort of sleeping draught. Since she couldn’t remember drinking one, she could only assume that her clumsy and desperate dweomer-working of the day before had left her dangerously exhausted. The soldier—she still wasn’t sure if he were captor or rescuer—gallantly caught her elbow and steadied her.
“Your grandfather’s over there, talking with the officers. He must be an important man, huh?”
“Very important.” She ran hasty fingers through her hair to smooth it down. “Where’s Rhodry?”
“The black-haired barbarian? With the officers. Are you going to be able to ride?”
“Of course. Where are we going?”
“As far as I can tell, we’re escorting you down to Indila and the archon’s law courts. Except for your grandfather and you, everyone’s under arrest.”
With so many riders, horses, and foot soldiers along, the march down to Indila took three days. Since the officers had decided that Jill and Nevyn were victims, while everyone else was a criminal, she had no chance to speak to Rhodry or Salamander during the journey, not so much as a simple “Good morning.” Even from a distance, though, she could see that Rhodry was wrapped in one of his black moods, and she didn’t envy Salamander the job of cheering him out of it. Finally, some two hours before sunset on the third day, they reached Indila and found a surprising welcome. Although Jill was afraid that Rhodry and his men would be marched off to prison, instead the archon himself was waiting at the gates with a token escort of city guards, and with him was Elaeno, wearing all the fine clothes and gold jewelry that were his due as the owner and master of a merchant ship.
“I contacted him when we were first arrested, you see,” Nevyn murmured in Deverrian. “He has influence in the islands, after all, and I decided that he might as well use it.”
That influence combined with Nevyn’s various official letters worked a dweomer of their own. Instead of the archon’s prison they were escorted to a splendid inn down near the harbor—quite conveniently near Elaeno’s ship, in fact—and told that the expense would be borne by the state, because they were possible criminals under investigation, and the prison was very small—a line of reasoning that ignored the inconvenient fact that the supposed criminals were being quartered with their supposed victims. There was nothing feigned, however, about the city guards who stood in fours at every door and pairs at every window, nor were the innkeeper’s bitter complaints an idle masquerade. That very evening, as well, the archon’s personal scribe appeared to summon Nevyn and Elaeno for a conference with various officials. Jill walked downstairs with them to the walled courtyard around the inn.
“Will you be hiring an advocate, too?” Jill said.
“We will,” Nevyn said. “But only for show. Don’t look so alarmed, child. Things are going our way, whether it looks like it or not.”
“If you say so. It’s just hard to believe we’re truly safe, and everything’s all over.”
“Oh, I didn’t say that! We’ve got to get home, for one thing, and for another, I’ve got to see if there’s anything I can do about Rhodry’s memory.”
Jill had been so sure that Nevyn could cure Rhodry as a matter of course that she felt as stunned as if he’d slapped her. He cast an anxious glance over his shoulder at the secretary, impatient in the doorway.
“We’ll talk later—I’ve got to go right now. But Jill, I did try to warn you.”
“You did, truly. I’m sorry.”
After the guards escorted them out to the street, she went back to the common room of the inn, where oil lamps flickered, flashing points of light off the tiled floor and painted walls. At a table in one corner Rhodry and Salamander were playing dice while Gwin and the men from the warband stood round and watched, wine cups in hand. In time,