The Spirit Stone - Katharine Kerr [214]
The summer breeze rippled the long grass and turned it into the waves of a green sea. When Salamander used this focus to reach out to Dallandra, he could feel her presence immediately, but she never responded to his contact. He received quick impressions of her state of mind, a competent urgency. She was hurrying back and forth, giving orders, shoving away disgust and fear both.
‘The battle’s started,’ he said aloud.
Salamander shifted his focus and opened his Sight. When he thought of Dallandra he could see her sluicing down a wagon gate with water in preparation for the patients sure to come. When he turned his mind to Calonderiel and the army, he saw archers, sending arrows in long arcs of death to fall among Gel da’ Thae spearmen, whose ranks were on the point of breaking. The men milled around, their shields held high to fend off in vain arrows that plunged from the sky to split wood and leather. The arrow-rain paused as the dragons swooped down. Cavalry horses reared in panic, bucked out of control, throwing their Horsekin riders into the spearmen’s ranks, plunging after them and kicking anyone and anything as they desperately tried to escape the huge meat-eaters swooping from the sky. Another volley of arrows fell. Horses and men both began to die.
Behind the archers, swordsmen formed up for the final charge. Salamander broke the vision. At any moment, he felt, he was going to vomit. He splashed his face with cold stream water until he could banish the images from his mind. He stood up, shaking water from his wet hair. Compared to what he’d just seen, the black crystal no longer seemed in the least important.
‘The wretched thing has an evil wyrd anyway,’ he said aloud. ‘You’re welcome to it, whoever you are, but I’ve no doubt it’ll bring you naught but bad luck, bad cess, and general misfortune.’
He turned towards the forest verge to follow up his remarks with a few good imprecations. Before he could speak, he saw two Horsekin, a man and a boy, lead their horses down from the wooded plateau out into the open grassland. The boy carried a long straight stick with a dirty grey shirt attached to it for a surrender flag. Apparently they saw Salamander, because they headed straight for him. The man had cropped off most of his hair, leaving a short fur. Down the centre ran a long braided stripe like a horse’s mane. Since his horse followed him without benefit of reins or lead rope, he cupped his hands around his mouth and called to Salamander.
‘Be you Evan the minstrel?’
Salamander glanced back at the encampment. He stood close enough to yell for help if these Horsekin proved treacherous.
‘I am,’ he called back. ‘What’s all this?’
‘Surrender. It be needful for us to parley and surrender.’
‘Well, come ahead, then. I’ll listen to what you have to say.’
As the pair walked up to join him, Salamander realized that they couldn’t possibly be Horsekin soldiers. For one thing, the only weapon that either carried was the man’s hunting knife. For another, their clothes were filthy and torn, their horses ordinary riding animals, their horse-gear patched together. Farm folk, he assumed, fleeing the war, but the man seemed not the least frightened of him. The boy watched him wide-eyed and wary, but again, he showed no particular fear.
‘My name be Pir,’ the man said. ‘This be Vek.’
‘Very well,’ Salamander said. ‘How did you know my name?’
‘Sidro told me.’ Pir smiled, ever so slightly. ‘She did scry you out, too, and tell me where you’d be found. There be more of my people back in the forest. We be fifteen in all. We all fled Taenalapan when the Alshandra folk did whip up the citizens against us. We did fear a slow death at the hands of their priestesses because