Winter Warriors (21 page)

“Good. Then I will clear a way to the East Gate. If I go down, do not stop. You understand?”

“Oh, I won’t stop,” said Conalin. “You can count on that.”

“Then let’s go.”

The Avenue of Kings was deserted now and eerily quiet. Dagorian led the way, the sound of his horse’s hoof beats like slowly beating war drums. He drew his saber and scanned the avenue. There was not a sign of life.

The dawn sun cleared the mountains.

The wagon moved on. After half a mile they saw a group of men sitting quietly by the roadside. They were blood-smeared, their clothing stained by smoke. They looked up at the wagon but made no hostile moves. Their eyes were dull, and they seemed weary beyond reckoning.

Dagorian sheathed his saber.

They reached the gate and found themselves waiting in a line of some twenty wagons and coaches, all filled with fleeing families and their possessions. The gate arch was narrow, and it was taking time to maneuver the wagons through. A group of riders arrived from outside the city but could not pass, and Dagorian heard the beginnings of an angry exchange.

Dismounting, he tethered his horse and was about to climb onto the wagon when he heard the voice of Antikas Karios ordering a wagon driver to draw his vehicle aside. Ducking down below the wagon, he waited until the group cleared the gate and thundered their mounts toward the palace.

The wait to leave the city seemed interminable. Two impatient drivers moved forward at the same time. One of the horses reared and lashed out at the opposing team. Both drivers leapt down and began a heated argument. Dagorian’s patience snapped. Vaulting to the saddle, he rode to the shouting men. Drawing his saber, he held the blade to the neck of the first. “Back off,” he said, “or I’ll gut you like a fish!” The argument died instantly. The man scrambled back to his wagon and hauled on the reins, reversing his team. Swinging in the saddle, Dagorian shouted to Conalin. “Drive through!”

And then they were out on open ground.

Conalin headed the horses up the long slope toward the mountains. Dagorian rode alongside, constantly looking back, expecting at any moment to see pursuers galloping after them. “Give them a touch of the whip!” he ordered Conalin. The boy did so, and the horses broke into a run.

In the back of the wagon Ulmenetha was thrown to one side. The child Sufia began to cry. Ulmenetha gathered her close. “There is nothing to fear,” she said soothingly. The horses were breathing heavily as they reached the crest of the
hill, dropping down on the other side. Out of sight of the city, Dagorian ordered Conalin to slow down and continue following the road south and west.

The officer rode back to the rise and dismounted. Minutes later he saw Antikas Karios and his men leave the city. For one dreadful moment he thought they were heading in pursuit, but they turned due west along the merchant road.

How long before they realized their mistake? An hour? Less?

Back in the saddle he caught up with the wagon. Axiana was conscious now and sitting silently, staring out over the mountains. Dagorian hitched his horse to the wagon and climbed aboard. “We have lost them for now,” he told Ulmenetha. “Where are the maps?”

Ulmenetha passed him the first. It was an old, dry scroll, which he carefully unrolled. The city depicted was vastly smaller than the metropolis Usa had become, but the mountain roads were clearly marked. They formed part of a trade route to the ghost city of Lem, two hundred miles south. Built around the wealth of nearby silver mines that had failed more than two hundred years earlier, Lem was now an abandoned series of ruins. Dagorian studied the map carefully. They would travel south for just over a hundred miles, then swing to the west for another seventy miles, crossing the Carpos mountains and picking up the coast road to Caphis. It was not the nearest of the ports, but the route was less well traveled and should help them avoid the dangers of bandits and rebel tribesmen. Merchants were constantly harassed by such bands around the closest port, Morec.

A secondary factor in choosing Caphis, but nonetheless important, was that Malikada was likely to expect them to head for Morec, the intended destination of the White Wolf and his men.

He showed the route to Ulmenetha. She peered at the map. “What do the symbols mean?” she asked him, tapping the scroll with her finger.

“They are a form of shorthand taken from High Ventrian. This one, which looks like the head of a ram, is a pictorial
representation of three letters, NWP. It stands for no winter passage.”

“And the figures?”

“Distance between set points, using not the mile but the Ventrian league. These will not be precise.”

“How far must we travel?” asked Pharis.

“Perhaps two hundred fifty miles, much of it over rough country. We have no spare horses, so we will have to move with care, conserving the animals as best we can. With luck we will be in Caphis within a month. It is but a short trip then across the sea to Dros Purdol—and home!”

“Whose home?” Axiana asked suddenly. Dagorian looked across at the queen. Her face was pale, her dark eyes angry. “It is not my home. My home was raided by Drenai savages from across the sea. Those same savages saw my father slain and forced me to wed their leader. Is Axiana going home? No, she is being kidnapped and taken
from
her home.”

The officer was silent for a moment. “I am sorry, Your Highness,” he said at last. “I am one of those Drenai savages. But I would willingly give my life for you. I have brought you from the city because you are in danger. Kalizkan is a monster and, for purposes which I do not fully understand, desires to kill the child you carry. He and Malikada are in league. Of that I have no doubt. Malikada delivered your father to him. Kalizkan killed him. Now Malikada’s treachery has seen Skanda similarly murdered. If it is in my power to bring you safely to Drenan, then I shall. After that you will be free. You will be feted as the queen, and if it is possible, an army will bring you back to Ventria and establish you once more upon the throne.”

Axiana shook her head. “How can you be so naive, Dagorian? You think the Drenai nobility will care about me? I am a foreigner. You think they will support my child? I think not. He will die, poisoned or strangled, and some other
Drenai
nobleman will take the throne. That is the way it will be. You say Malikada delivered up my father. I can believe that. He loathed him, thought him weak, and blamed him for the losses against Skanda. You say he betrayed Skanda. This I can
also believe, for he hated him. But he has always loved me. He is my cousin and would do nothing to harm me.”

“And the babe you carry?” asked Ulmenetha.

“I care nothing for him. He is a poisoned gift from Skanda. Let them take him. And as for you, Dagorian, return to your horse. I find your company repulsive.”

The words hurt him, but he stood, untied the reins of his mount, and stepped into the saddle. Ulmenetha gathered up the map. “You are wrong, Highness,” she said softly.

“I need to hear no words from you, traitress.”

A dry chuckle came from Conalin. He glanced back at Ulmenetha. “You save her from the beast and she calls you names. Gods, how I hate the rich.”

Axiana made no reply but stared out over the snow-capped mountains, her face set, her expression unreadable. She wanted to apologize to Ulmenetha, to say that the words had been spoken in anger. Ingratitude was not one of Axiana’s weaknesses. She knew that the priestess had risked her life to save her from the undead creature in Kalizkan’s house. More than this, she knew that Ulmenetha loved her and would never willingly see her come to harm.

But Axiana was frightened. She had been raised at court, her every whim catered to instantly, and the events of the past two days had been deeply shocking to her. In the space of forty-eight hours she had been locked in a dank room, witnessed violent death, heard of her husband’s murder, and was now in a creaking wagon, heading into the wild lands. She felt as if her mind was unraveling. Kalizkan, whom she had trusted and been fond of, was now revealed as a mass murderer, a child-killing beast. The Source alone knew what he had planned for her. She shuddered.

“Are you cold, my dove?” Ulmenetha asked her. Axiana nodded dumbly. The priestess moved to her, laying a blanket over her shoulders. Tears welled in Axiana’s eyes. The wagon lurched over a rut in the road, and Axiana half fell into Ulmenetha. The priestess caught her. Axiana rested her head against Ulmenetha’s shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.

“I know, child.”

“The baby is due soon. I am very frightened.”

“I will be here. And you are strong. Everything will be all right.”

Axiana took a deep breath, then sat upright. She could see Dagorian riding ahead, scanning the trail. They were heading toward a forest that covered the flanks of the hills like a buffalo robe. Axiana glanced back. The city of Usa could no longer be seen behind them.

The dark-haired Pharis took a red apple from a food sack and offered it to Axiana. The queen accepted it with a smile, then looked at the girl. She was terribly thin and undernourished, but her face was pretty, her eyes large and brown. Axiana had never been this close to a commoner. She studied Pharis’ thin dress. It was impossible to say what color it had once been, for it was now a drab, lifeless gray, torn at the shoulder, the hip, and the elbow and badly frayed at the wrists and the neck. It would not have been used as a cleaning rag in the palace. Reaching out, she touched the material. It was rough and dirty. Pharis drew back, and Axiana saw her expression change. The girl swung away and moved back to sit with Sufia.

At that moment the child within her moved. She gave a little cry. Then she smiled. “He kicked me,” she said.

Ulmenetha gently placed her hand over Axiana’s swollen belly. “Yes, I can feel him. He’s lusty and anxious for life.”

“Can I feel him?” asked little Sufia, scrambling back on her hands and knees.

Axiana gazed down into her bright blue eyes. “Of course,” she said. Taking the child’s small, grimy hand, she placed it over her stomach. For a moment there was no movement, then the baby kicked again. Sufia squealed with delight.

“Pharis, Pharis, come feel!” she cried.

Pharis looked up and met the queen’s gaze. Axiana smiled and held out her hand. Pharis moved to her, and the baby obediently kicked once more.

“How did it get in there?” asked Sufia. “And how will it get out?”

“Magick,” Ulmenetha said swiftly. “How old are you, Sufia?” she added, changing the subject.

The child shrugged. “I don’t know. My brother Griss said he was six. And I’m younger than Griss.”

“Where is your brother?” asked Axiana, stroking Sufia’s greasy blond hair.

“The wizard man took him away.” She was suddenly frightened. “You won’t let him take me away, will you?”

“Nobody will take you away, little one,” Conalin said fiercely. “I’ll kill any who try.”

This pleased Sufia. She looked up at Conalin. “Can I drive the wagon?” she asked.

Pharis helped her clamber over the backrest, and Conalin sat her on his lap, allowing her to hold the reins.

Axiana bit into the apple. It was sweet, wondrously sweet.

They had just reached the trees when they heard the sound of thundering hoofbeats. Axiana glanced back. Five horsemen were cresting the rise behind them.

Dagorian galloped back to the wagon, his saber gleaming in his hand.

7

V
ELLIAN HAD BEEN
a fighting man for fifteen of his twenty-nine years and had served Malikada and Antikas Karios for twelve of them. He had joined the Ventrian army for the great expedition: the invasion of Drenan and the righting of ancient wrongs. Every Ventrian child knew of Drenai infamy, their broken treaties, their territorial impudence, and their killing, centuries before, of the great emperor Gorben.

The invasion was to have put right all past wrongs.

That, at least, was how it had been sold to the fourteen-year-old Vellian when the recruiting officers arrived at his village. There was no greater honor, they said, than serving the emperor in a just cause. They made extravagant promises about wealth and glory. The wealth did not interest Vellian, but thoughts of glory swept through him like a powerful drug. He signed that day without seeking permission from his parents and rode away to smite the savages and seek his fame.