Krull Page 3

  Something broke his train of thought. He stopped and stared out into the night: black as a lawyer's thoughts. But surely he'd heard something moving about.

  There it was again. Rain, he decided. A late summer squall moving toward the castle. He would get drenched. His more fortunate colleagues would tease him about his bad luck later that night back in the barracks.

  He strained to hear better: a mighty strong storm. He turned and called out. Several other sentries came running from their stations to join him in staring out into the darkness. They listened intently.

  "That's not rain, I think," said one. "Surely those are hoofbeats?"

  "Nay," another argued, " 'tis only rain, or the wind blowing out from the forest."

  They bent toward the rising rush, trying to reach out into the blackness, wanting to be certain before committing themselves. There was a royal wedding in progress and no man wanted to raise the alarm falsely.

  Lyssa stepped toward the font and studied the fire burning steadily beneath the water. She did not close her eyes, nor did she look the least bit sleepy. Her movements and words were crisp, businesslike. But she could not hide the slight trembling that afflicted her. She was shaking from the effort required to prepare. Nothing must go wrong. She'd waited too long for this moment.

  "I take fire from water. I give it only to the man whom I choose as my husband."

  Fingers spread, she reached out and down, one tiny hand hovering an inch above the water. For a long moment nothing happened. The torch continued its miraculous burn. Eirig held his breath.

  There was the faintest hiss, loud in the respectful silence, as she reached into the water and removed her hand. She turned it palm-up and opened her fingers, showing flames dancing hotly on pale skin. The air of expectancy in the hall was almost palpable.

  She turned to extend her fiery palm to Colwyn. Her voice dropped to a whisper and her face glowed as her entire being seemed suffused with the heat from the fire that flickered in her hand.

  "Colwyn. Now is the time. Before my father and my people, before all of Krull. Before the words that fill the old books. I ask thee most sweetly. Take the fire from my hand."

  "Rain, you think?" The sentry was tired. "It sure sounds like rain coming. You're all of you crazy if you think otherwise. I'm getting back to my post before the watch commander finds me out of position." He hesitated, listened hard as he stared into the darkness. The thunder was growing steadily louder, and there was an unnatural steadiness to it.

  Then, as his stunned companions looked on, the skeptic toppled slowly backward off the wall. Something bright and deadly had struck him in the chest.

  The others scattered, frantically trying to sound the alarm. Their shouts were unnecessary and unheard, as the sound of the explosion that blew apart the main gate aroused everyone in the castle courtyard. Fragments of wood and stone flew in all directions while thin shards of light and bursts of energy felled one soldier after another.

  The noise reached to the hall and broke the hopeful mood that had enveloped the ceremony. Colwyn wavered slightly and Lyssa's eyes broke from his.

  "Slayers! Inside the gate!" the words rang out. Wedding ceremony forgotten, soldiers turned and rushed for the courtyard.

  "Arm yourselves!" Turold roared to the gathering.

  "But the ceremony!" Lyssa pleaded.

  "No time for that now." Colwyn turned away from her, impatient to join the fight.

  The moment had cracked. Time later to mend it. Lyssa's hand became a fist. When she opened her hand again, the flame that had burned there so intensely had vanished. She hurried after Colwyn, cursing the formal gown that hampered her movements.

  "We'll fight them together," she shouted.

  "No, not here."

  "But the ceremony—"

  "Can be completed later. For the moment my concern is for your safety, not our future."

  "Colwyn, think a moment. Our safety lies in our future."

  "Soon," he told her soothingly. "The mood is important." He turned, caught the attention of a captain of the King's Guard. "Get her to a place of safety."

  "My place is with my men, fighting," the captain replied.

  "Your place is where I order you to be." The captain hesitated a moment. But he'd heard the two kings join their kingdoms. He nodded tersely. "Get her away from this. We'll clear them out and there'll be plenty left for you."

  "My place is with you," Lyssa insisted. "I'll not be shipped about at anyone's whim, not even yours."

  Colwyn tried to divide his attention between his betrothed and the increasingly violent sounds beyond the hall.

  "Do you love me?"

  "I am to be your wife. The alliance—"

  "Darkness and the Long Night take the alliance!" he snarled. "Do you love me?"

  "The declaration of unity, I . . . yes. Yes, I love you, Colwyn."

  He nodded once, then smiled gently. "Then do this for me. Go with the captain. Lead him if you cannot follow, but go."

  She shook her head resignedly. "No time for wisdom, too much time for panic. I will do as you ask, but it is unfair of you to use so strong a lever."

  "I don't care if you think it unfair of me. I care only that you are safe." He looked over at the captain. "Is there a safe way out of this castle?"

  "An underground tunnel." Colwyn whirled, to find that it was Eirig, standing close by, who had spoken. "Little used recently. It would be the best way." Eirig spoke to the captain: "Lord Colwyn's orders are to be followed as though they were my own. Conduct the princess to Timrick City. We will send word when the castle has been secured. Take a suitable escort."

  "Yes, sire." The captain turned away and began pulling soldiers from the ranks trying to push their way outside.

  Eirig embraced his daughter. "We've had our disagreements, you and I. I cannot count the occasions when you made me angry enough to burst. Yet I think you have chosen your man well."

  Colwyn tried to hide from the compliment. Compliments made him nervous.

  "Take care, daughter."

  "I will, Father."

  "Enough," Colwyn yelled. The sounds of fighting were coming closer. "Get her out of here!"

  Eirig nodded sharply to the captain, who saluted smartly and extended a hand to the princess. Lyssa accepted it, looking back over her shoulder as she departed.

  "Come back to me, Colwyh!"

  "It's not possible to conceive of anything else," he assured her. A hand came down on his shoulder. He found himself staring into the face of his father-in-law.

  "Now then, my boy, there's killing to be done. The Slayers are many more than I thought. Never fear for your lady. She will get out safely." He cleared his throat self-consciously. "I won't try to hide the fact that I expressed more than one reservation about this match. There were many who agreed with me and argued about it. They sought to discredit you in my eyes. I see now that they were wrong. As always, Lyssa's judgment is proven sound. Come and fight alongside me."

  "I'll be honored," said Colwyn. Together they moved toward the courtyard and the battle raging outside.

  One of the guards cursed as he banged his head against a low beam. It was hard to see very far ahead, and the men were nervous.

  "Captain," one man complained, "is there much more of this?"

  "It leads beneath the walls and emerges far out in the hills. Hold your patience that long." He looked to his charge. "Is my lady all right?"

  "I'm fine, Captain," Lyssa assured him, "but I don't like this place. I share your men's unease. Maybe it would be better to retrace our path and find a less confining egress. I know of a back window above the great hall. We could throw down a rope and escape by that route. Surely the Slayers will not be watching so precipitous an exit."

  "Risky. Though I think the idea has merit, the king himself instructed me to go this way, and I have to follow his orders."

  "I understand, Captain." Her eyes searched the corridor ahead, as if she could see farther than her escort. "Still, I
am uncomfortable here."

  "Rest assured we will soon be out in the—"

  The Slayers who dropped from above cut the captain off in mid-sentence. Others dropped from rafters and beams behind, cutting off any retreat. In the narrow tunnel the sudden blasts of energy from the Slayers' strange spears mixed with the screams of dying men to overpower the senses. Those Slayers who fell perished with a single piercing, inhuman wail.

  Lyssa picked up a knife and pressed her back against the corridor wall. Her retreat was cut off, as was the way out.

  As she watched, one of the Slayers disengaged himself from the battle and moved toward her. She sliced at him with the knife, feinting as best she could before stabbing upward. She wasn't quite quick enough.

  The knife barely pricked the Slayer as he twisted to the side. A powerful hand reached out to grasp her wrist. She tried to break free, trying not to stare into the empty holes in the creature's head where a face should be.

  Several more of the massive figures moved to help the first. The knife was wrenched from her fingers. She felt herself rising in bloodless arms as she probed for her captor's eyes.

  He did not have any.

  Odd how they died, Colwyn thought as he swung the heavy sword in wide, sweeping arcs. It didn't matter how you slew them; a throat-thrust, a stab to the chest, a blow to the skull; all perished with the same unearthly scream before collapsing and disintegrating, save for the strange length of flesh that emerged to vanish by itself into the ground. Even when they dodged and stabbed, they seemed more dead than alive. They used no shouts, offered up no cries of mutual support as men did. Yet they fought together, communicating in some voiceless, cryptic fashion only another Slayer could comprehend.

  And always there were more of them to cut down, as if the pattern from which they'd been stamped could repeat itself endlessly. The soldiers fought hard and well, but there are limits to what bravery and courage can accomplish. When a soldier fell, there was none to replace him. When a Slayer dropped, it seemed two more appeared to take his place.

  Why now, he wondered? Why tonight this unprecedented assault on the White Castle? It seemed the fates intended the crudest of jokes, to turn what should have been his happiest of days into one of darkness.

  Or was there more to this attack than met the eye? What was the purpose behind it, if not simply more destruction? Certainly it seemed that the Slayers fought with an unaccustomed tenacity.

  A glimpse of pale skin and dress near the ruined gate caught his attention. For the first time since the battle had been joined, his fury gave way to fear.

  "Lyssa!"

  She heard him call out and looked up toward his voice. Her hands were free to reach helplessly out to him. She rode the shoulder of a huge Slayer. There was no hint of blood, and her struggles told him that she had not been harmed. That was encouraging, and yet it was not. He did not care to think of what the Slayers wanted with a live captive. As she shouted his name, he forced himself to concentrate on killing.

  He threw himself forward and began cutting a path toward her. The first Slayer to oppose him lost his head in a single stroke. Others hurried to intercept him. The whole direction of battle shifted subtly, as if the objective now were not the taking of the White Castle but the separation of the two lovers.

  Though half-blinded by sweat, he did not pause to clear his eyes. He kept moving forward, the sword heavy in his hands. Off to one side he suddenly saw his father hard pressed to hold off several Slayers. At the same time he saw Lyssa being lifted into the air. A Slayer on horseback took her up behind him and urged his mount toward the open gate. Colwyn shouted to her again, but this time could not tell if she heard his words of encouragement.

  As he tried to divide his attention between Lyssa and his father, a burst of fire from one of the strange weapons struck him in the shoulder. He staggered, fell backward on the steps. His last conscious thoughts were of father and betrothed, his last sight that of the night sky indifferent above him.

  There was peace, but it brought him no comfort.

  The old man hid behind the tree as the ranks of mounted Slayers galloped past. Never before had the Slayers attacked a major fortress. And the White Castle at that! Truly, Ynyr thought, the Beast spends his minions freely tonight.

  Strange things were adrift on the ether this night. There had been signs for weeks now. They had brought him down from his mountaintop aerie.

  Amidst the hysteria of battle, his calm advice would have been useless. Now he could only pick his way sadly toward the ruined gate of the castle, the white flash of the princess's dress a warning flag weaving through his thoughts.

  They would have to go after her, of course. The marriage ceremony had not been completed. There hadn't been enough time before the Slayers had made their abduction. It wasn't going to be easy.

  No sentry challenged him from atop the battlements as he approached. Inside the courtyard was the stillness of death. Only the torches still lived, shining their pallid glow on the bodies of the fallen.

  Ynyr began to search, patient and resigned. If Colwyn had perished together with the others, then he might as well return to his little cabin in the mountains, for there would be no reason for pursuing this night's work.

  When he finally did locate the form he'd been searching for, he was surprised and pleased to find warm air still issuing from between parted lips. Alive, then. That was something. There was still a chance.

  Fumbling within his pouch, he removed several containers of ointment. Mixing them carefully, he applied the resultant ooze to the wound on the prince's left side, then applied bandaging. As he worked his ministrations, he was thinking how next to proceed. Enlightenment eluded him. Much would depend on the will of this young man lying unconscious before him.

  Colwyn finally mumbled, sat up as if shot. "Lyssa!"

  "She is alive, my fortunate young friend. Alive and, insofar as I could tell, unhurt. Which is more than can be said for you."

  "Where?" Colwyn tried to see past the mounded corpses.

  "Lie still. Beyond your immediate reach, I am afraid, though if we proceed carefully and plan well, perhaps not beyond your final one."

  "Where?" He winced and his hand went to the back of his head.

  "As I said. Out of touch, for now."

  "The Slayers do not fight like men."

  "And why should they, since they are not men? Expect no humanity from a Slayer. And consider yourself fortunate. When I finally found you lying amidst this slaughter I thought you dead."

  "Lyssa is among them. There is no fortune in that. They have stolen my life."

  "Then we must set to work to get it back."

  "Yes, if we—" He hesitated, squinting up at his healer. "Who are you?"

  "I am called Ynyr."

  "I've heard of you."

  "Even in far Turold?"

  "The wise men of my court have spoken your name."

  "And what do they say of me?"

  "Many strange things."

  The old man merely smiled. "You may sit up if you feel you can manage it."

  With the old man's support Colwyn did so, swaying slightly for a moment, then holding his position without help.

  "You took quite a blow," Ynyr told him. "But the wound looked worse than it was. You have lost some blood but not as much as you might. Had you been struck an inch more to the left . . ."

  Colwyn felt the place where the Slayer's spear had struck. "So much healing so quickly."

  Ynyr glanced away. "I have some small skill. But you must ride carefully for a while lest the wound reopen."

  "You've come down from your home in the Granite Mountains. What for? Why choose now to abandon your hermitage?"

  "I am needed now."

  "For what?"

  Ynyr swept a hand toward the carnage that already was beginning to fester around them. "Events have been put in motion that I had hoped to avoid dealing with for some time yet. It seems that an old man is not permitted to set his own schedule
s. So I am compelled to risk all to put things right again."

  Colwyn's gaze took in the courtyard and the intermingled corpses. The sight of so much death in one place did much to restore his wits.

  "There are no others alive?"

  Ynyr shook his head. "I have seen none, though others may have had better luck. It is difficult to believe that all who fought have perished."

  Colwyn's mind locked on a single, blustering image. "Father . . ." He pulled free of Ynyr's restraining hands and stood. "Father!"

  Bodies were roughly shoved aside as he began searching the human debris. Ynyr followed closely, impatient but understanding. There was still much boy in this man, upon whom so much depended.

  In death there is little to distinguish king from commoner. It took some time before the pale bewhiskered face of Turold yielded to his son's search. The King of Turold still held his sword tightly in his clenched right hand.

  A flash of light on metal caught Colwyn's sorrowing eye. He reached down and recovered the source of the glint. It was the royal Turoldian medallion his father always wore, displaying the arms of the kingdom and the ever-present image of the ancient glaive, symbol of old power. He stared at it, glad to have something to gaze upon other than the face of his father.

  A soft but insistent voice sounded behind him: "There is no time now for grief. Sorrow is a luxury reserved for those of small import. Those with destinies to fulfill must have a care how they ration their time."

  "Don't speak to me in profundities, old man!" Colwyn's tone was bitter, the pain at the back of his head replaced by a much stronger one deep inside. "You haven't lost a father and a bride on the same day!"

  "Nor have I ever become a king on that day."

  Colwyn tried to laugh, could not. The hurt was too deep for irony. Instead, he gestured toward the courtyard and its ranked bodies and adopted a mocking voice: "How fortunate for you. I would gladly trade all I have. A kingdom? I have no kingdom."

  "Your kingdom may be greater than you know."