The Spirit Stone - Katharine Kerr [193]
‘Beloved,’ she whispered. ‘My life and hope.’
Salamander summoned his body of light, a silvery flame-shaped glow. He transferred over fast, too fast, but her etheric body had already separated from the flesh, and he had no time to spend on caution. Together he and Rocca floated in the blue light, high above the swirling storm over the battlefield. Before them the image of Alshandra towered, huge but smiling, and stretched out her hands to her worshipper.
‘Go with her.’ Salamander sent his thoughts to Rocca. ‘Let us go with her to the river of life.’
With no dweomer training Rocca lacked the skill to send him coherent thought messages, but he could feel her joy, a pure thing like morning sunlight, as they rose together through the whirling indigo vortex that led inward to the astral. Ahead of them stretched the meadow of white flowers, pale under violet light, nodding in some intangible breeze. On the other side of the stretch of flowers Salamander could just make out the white river whose water has never flowed on land or into sea. He gave Alshandra’s image a mental push that sent it floating towards the boundary of life and death. Smiling still, Rocca followed without his urging.
Pain struck Salamander like a razor cut. A tug on the silver cord wrenched him away from her. With a sound like the roar of a waterfall he plunged back into his body with a yelp of sheer agony as his etheric double slammed into bone and blood, muscle and skin. In his arms Rocca still breathed, but faintly, and for only a few heartbeats more. Her head flopped back, and her lungs emptied in a last rattling sob. He grabbed her shoulders and lifted her half off the ground.
‘Rocca!’ He howled out her name. ‘Rocca!’
She had gone beyond answering him in any world. Gently he laid her down, then closed her unseeing eyes. When he looked up, the air seemed strangely thick and shimmering. Not madness, he realized, but tears. He bent his head and wept so hard that he was barely aware of the man running towards him, sword raised.
‘Salamander!’ Gerran shouted. ‘Gerthddyn! You fool! Get out of here! The whole cursed field’s on fire.’
Salamander grabbed the sack of relics, tried to stand, and nearly fell. Gerran seized him by one arm and hauled him to his feet. All around them fire crackled in the grass as it leapt from broken beams and walls. Greasy black smoke rose high in the sky. At least she’ll have a pyre, Salamander thought. There’s naught else I can do for her.
‘Come on, move!’ Gerran was yelling. ‘Do you have horseshit where your brains ought to be? Run!’
With Gerran hauling him along, Salamander managed to do just that. Together they stumbled through the spreading fire to the safety of the Red Wolf warband, waiting with horses on the edge of the battlefield.
‘It’s over,’ Calonderiel said. ‘Prince Voran and his men are chasing down the hairy bastards that managed to escape. The rest of our men are keeping the fire back from the camp.’
‘Good,’ Dallandra said.
‘Is that all you can say?’
‘Cal, I just finished taking an archer’s leg off at the knee. He still might die anyway. I’m in no mood to sing your praises or whatever it is you want.’
Dallandra was sitting on the ground between two tents, taking a desperately needed rest. Calonderiel hunkered down in front of her. He reeked of sweat and smoke, and a mixture of the two smeared his face and neck. All down his right arm blood oozed through his mail.
‘You’re wounded,’ Dallandra said.
‘Not truly,’ he said. ‘I can still use the arm, so it can’t be that bad. You look exhausted.’
‘I am.’ She watched as two Deverry men, supporting a wounded third between them, staggered past. ‘That one’s not that badly off. The chirurgeons