The Sword and the Flame (27 page)

Theido stared at the king, mystified by the outburst. He could make nothing of it; it was the incoherent raving of a madman.

Quentin threw his hands over his face. His shoulders started to heave, but at first there was no sound. Then Theido heard the sobs come forth.

“Darkness,” he cried, “all is darkness!”

“Ooo!” Ronsard moaned. He tried to open his eyes. Only one would open; the other was swollen shut where he had been kicked. He ached in a dozen different places, and his ribs sent stabs of pain through him with every breath.

“There, now . . . take it easy. Do not be too quick to get up, sir,” said the voice in his ear.

Ronsard turned his good eye toward the sound and saw the face of Milcher the innkeeper bending over him. “The wife has gone to bring a cold cloth for your head. Don't you worry, now. Just sit back.”

Ronsard looked around the room. Benches were overturned and tables stood on edge, but no one remained of the mob that had been there before. “Where are they? Where have they gone?”

“I do not know, nor do I want to know.” Milcher reached for a jar and held it up to Ronsard's lips. “Drink some of this; 'twill clear the cobwebs from your head.”

Ronsard took the jar and sipped the cool ale and felt the tingle on his tongue. The drink revived him a bit; his head cleared. “Who was he?”

“Sir?” Milcher blinked back at him.

“You know who I mean—Longbeard. Who is he? Where did he come from?” Ronsard made to get up, but the effort sent pain booming through his head. “Ooo!”

“Careful there, sir.” Milcher held him under the arms and helped him to his feet.

Milcher's round wife returned, sat the knight down in a chair, and pressed the cool cloth against his bruised head. Ronsard sipped some more ale. “Look at this mess!” She clucked her tongue in disgust.

“What happened 'ere?” a new voice asked. Ronsard looked up to see the tinker enter the inn and come toward him.

“There was a riot,” explained Milcher. “They worked themselves into a fit—a roaring fit! I never have seen a thing like it.”

Emm frowned. “And just the moment my back is turned, too.” She said it as if her husband was somehow to blame for all that had happened in her absence. “This gentlemen”—she indicated Ronsard—“tried to talk some sense into them, and look what happened. He got his head broken for his trouble.”

Pym only nodded sadly. Tip held her head to one side and whined sympathetically.

“Well,” replied Ronsard, “it will not be the first time I have had my head broken in the service of the king. Probably not the last time either, the truth be known.”

“How's that, sir?” asked Milcher suspiciously.

Ronsard remembered his disguise, shrugged, and said, “I am a king's man. My name is Ronsard.”

“Lord high marshal!” gasped Milcher. “I remember you.”

“No longer—but I am on an errand for the king. I meant no harm in my deception. I only came to hear the talk here in town and thought that tongues would wag more freely if there was not a nobleman about.” He fixed Milcher with a stern look. “Now, then, what of this Longbeard? I would hear all you know.”

“There is nothing you have not already heard, good sir. He came here much as any stranger might. Drank little, talked to some, and left, saying he might be back. He had business that would keep him in Askelon awhile, he said—as I have already told you.”

“Then what was that they said?” He jerked his head to indicate the now nonexistent crowd. ”All that about ‘Have you seen him? Did he change his mind?' That referred to the king, I'll warrant.”

“I do not know, sir. I only know what I have told you. An innkeeper cannot be responsible for all the talk that goes on within his walls. I keep a good house.”

“I am certain you do,” replied Ronsard. Milcher was getting worked up, and he saw no reason to keep at him; the strain of the night's events was telling on them all. “I will inquire after this Longbeard elsewhere. But you must let me know if you hear anything more.”

“He will,” said Emm darkly, and helped Ronsard to his feet. “Never fear, he will. I will see to it.”

“I am sorry—,” Ronsard began.

“No damage done, at least none that cannot be fixed right enough. Get you home to bed and give your head a rest,” said Milcher, leading him to the door.

The knight stepped out into the cool night air. The street was empty and very quiet—an unnatural quiet, it seemed to Ronsard. He knew that some violence had been loosed on the world; he could feel it deep within him, as surely as he felt his bruises. He started off down the street and then remembered he had left his horse at Milcher's barn behind the inn.

32

B
ria was awake long before the sun rose above the green mountains around Dekra. She dressed and went quietly out onto the balcony to stand in the liquid dawn, now showing pale gold in the east.

A new day,
she thought.
What a wonder. Somewhere my child will wake to this
day. Most High, be with him. Comfort him, and give him strength to endure. And give
my husband strength as well. Thank you. Yes, thank you.

Bria felt with unutterable certainty that her prayer was heard and answered even as she spoke. Here in Dekra, she mused, it was easy to believe that prayers were always answered. Nothing evil ever touched Dekra; it alone remained ever safe from the world's troubles.

They had stayed long with the elders, praying together. There would be more supplications throughout the day and every day thereafter—as long as they were needed. For that she was grateful, and for the uplifting love she felt from the gentle Curatak.

But it seemed strange to be here in this city, Quentin's city, without Quentin. Always before they had come together. She smiled as she remembered the way he had dashed here and there, showing her the things he was doing, pointing out all he saw and planned that first time he had brought her to Dekra. They were young and in love and soon to be married. Quentin was newly crowned, and his vision for the realm burned in him with such fierceness he could not stand still for a moment.

They had come often in the early days, and then when the first child was born, they stopped. One child and then another, and then one more . . . it had been a long time since they thought about a trip to the ancient ruined city, even though now it could easily be managed since the children were old enough.

But Quentin had his temple now. He was so intent upon building it—throwing all of himself into it—that he almost forgot about Dekra. He might have forsaken it completely except for Yeseph's death. What a sad time that had been. If not for Durwin, Bria wondered what Quentin would have done. The funeral of the Curatak elder had been a simple affair, and not all sad, not in the way one usually thinks of funerals. As with Durwin's burial, there had been a pervading sense of relief, even joy. Here was a servant of the Most High, finally released to stand in the courts of the One, to walk with his Creator and glory in his presence. What could be sad about that?

For Quentin, however, it was a time of confusion—mostly because Yeseph's death was so unexpected. They found him at his table in the great library he loved so well, head down upon a manuscript as if merely taking a little rest from his work. The day before he had spoken with every one of his closest friends, as if he knew that he would die soon and wanted to say good-bye to each one.

But Quentin was not there. Yeseph died without seeing Quentin again, and it was this, perhaps, that caused Quentin the greatest grief. “I should have been with him,” Quentin repeated again and again. And as often as Bria had pointed out that he had kingly duties and matters of state to attend to in Askelon, and that there was no way he could have known, Quentin often grew sullen and replied that he had never wanted Askelon.

Bria had breathed a great sigh of relief when Quentin resumed work on the new temple, for almost overnight the old fire was back. But, too, he never mentioned Dekra again, at least not in the same way as before.

“Is it really a different place?” The voice behind her started Bria out of her reverie. Esme came up to sit beside her on the parapet.

“I did not hear you! I was daydreaming,” replied Bria absently. She sighed and smiled at her friend.

“Nothing sad, I hope.”

“Sad? Why sad?”

Esme shrugged. “The look on your face seemed sad to me, but surely no one in this place is ever sad.” She turned her deep brown eyes upon the queen. Bria saw the kindled glow in their shaded depths.

“Yes, it is a different place,” said Bria. “They say it is one of the last places of power on the earth, but that, I think, has less to do with it than people believe.”

“Oh?” Esme put her chin in her hand and gazed dreamily out over the glimmering mountainside, the dew beginning to glint in the first rays of morning light. “What, then, is it that accounts for what I feel here? For there is some glamour here that weaves its magic with the soul.”

“That is easy,” said Bria. “It can be told in one word.”

“Then say the word, for I would hear it.”

“Love.”

“Love?”

“Yes, there is a love here that is rarely found on earth. Perhaps in families, certainly between a husband and wife on occasion, but almost never in the world at large. Love governs everything here. Everything. Love and the continually practiced presence of the Most High.”

Esme glanced at her friend questioningly.

“Yeseph explained it once to me. He said that the Most High is indeed ever-present with his creation, with us. But we often lose sight of him—we fall away from him unless we practice his presence. By that he meant we must keep him with us in our thoughts and deeds, lest we forget.

“For it is not the One who forgets us, but we forget him. It is how we are made, a defect perhaps, but one that makes belief necessary. And belief is the Most High's greatest gift. So even there he has rescued us.”

“Rescued us from ourselves. I see.” Esme watched the daylight rise to the sky and the night shadows withdraw from the tree-thick lowlands like a fine, transparent veil pulled away. “Is it love that transforms even the common things—the sunrise yonder, for one—into such works of beauty? Is it love that makes me feel as if all my life until now was a life lived in a shadow?”

“Oh, yes! Love, and knowledge of the Most High.”

“But I know very little of the Most High. How can it be that I feel as I do?”

“In your heart of hearts you know him. Durwin used to say that all men were born with the knowledge of the Most High in their hearts. The trick is to spend more time remembering, and less time forgetting what we already know.”

“From now on,” said Esme resolutely, “I will spend all my time remembering.”

Quentin rode to the ruins of his temple as soon as it was light enough to see. The sky was dark; low gray clouds formed a hard shell over the earth, keeping out the sun's light. A misty drizzle fell from the clouds and dampened all it touched.

Though Quentin already knew what he would find when he reached the site, he was still stunned when he viewed the finality of the destruction.

Not one stone was left standing upon another. The walls had been pushed inward on top of one another—whole sections of quarried rock, all toppled, crumbled, and broken by the force of stone crushing stone. The wooden scaffolding and wall supports were splintered kindling. Here and there a jagged beam poked out of the debris, snapped like a twig trodden underfoot. The gray-white rubble lay in a great heaped mound like a huge grave, the grave of the Most High. Or a grave for a king.

Quentin waded into the ruins, stepping over fallen rock, climbing onto the mound. Scattered in amongst the wreckage he saw tools—a stonecutter's axe, a mason's trowel, a level; the tools were undamaged. Surely there was a lesson in that, but what it could be escaped him.

When he reached the center of the mound, he stood and surveyed the damage. It was complete, save for a single column as tall as a man that had marked an outside corner of the temple. Quentin picked his way to this lone surviving remnant of his dream, looked at it sadly, placed his hands on it, and felt the cool, smooth surface.