Fortress in the Eye of Time (83 page)

There was a murky river. He knew where that river ran—he was in sudden danger. He had risen into the gray space—and gone badly astray, trapped, by an enemy old and clever, and
still
able to have his way.

He met the attack. He set himself to the fore of Ninévrisë, approaching the enemy on his own, but not taking the enemy's vision—

When he thought that, immediately he found a vantage he knew, outside, on the parapet of Ynefel, in the sunset. He knew his loft, the high point of a vast hall across the courtyard, highest point in the keep
.

He could see his own window, with the horn panes glowing with light in the twilight, as if he were there himself, reading by candlelight—but with the shutters inside open. That was wrong, and dangerous
.

It was his window, and it was his home, and he knew the study below, in which he kept his books, many, many of them—not Mauryl's books, but his own books. He was puzzled, and thought, That was never true
.

The height of Ynefel rang with a Word, then, which he could hear, but not hear, in the curious barriers of this dream; and at that Word, all of this glorious building trembled and fell quiet
.

He stood on the very parapet, where he had gone—or would go—naked in the rain
.

He watched all the buildings from there—the illusion of a
living city widespread about Ynefel's skirts, streets busy as the streets of Henas'amef
.

But it had not been Ynefel on that day. It had had another Name. So had he. And he had come there with Mauryl's help to cast all that citadel down
.

He was angry, he knew not why or at what. That anger grew in him, and as it reached the point that he must loose it or die, he let it loose
.

In that loosing, a wind swept the halls, swept up the men in their elegant clothing, and the women in their bright gowns, and the children, alike, with their toys, and whirled them all about the towers, tumbling one over the other, out of the bright world and into that gray space where they hurtled, lost and afraid
.

Some, more determined and more powerful, found their way back to their former home, and peered out of its walls, frozen in the stone
.

Some became Shadows, angry ones, or fearful ones, or simply lost ones, wailing on the winds that carried them through that gray light, until darker Shadows hunted them down, one by one, and ate their dreams and their hopes and their substance
.

But all such shadows as came to him for refuge he breathed in and breathed them out again with his will, and by them he mastered the anger that threatened his reason. By them he learned…better things
.

A young man in gray had stood by him, but that man was gone. He possessed securely the walls, the woods, the river, in all the vacancy he had made
.

He had done this. All the City was gone. He remained. The Tower of Ynefel remained
.

The faces watched from the walls, and the lives flowed through him with a heat like too much wine. He was trembling now. He wanted to know—who had done such a thing, and could it possibly be himself who had begun it?

But of his own countenance and his own reasons he could discern nothing
.

He had lived—or would live—in that small room with the horn-paned window. He had come at Mauryl's asking, and he knew at once his enemy was the man who had stood beside him, the young man in gray, against whom he had fought with all the resources at his disposal—even binding the lives of the people of Ynefel to his effort
.

He wanted to know who he was. He wanted to see the face of the one who would have drunk up all the world only to cast out the man in gray
.

He had asked Mauryl—or would ask one day—whether Mauryl could see his own face. He thought it clever of himself to wonder that in this dream, a trick by which he could make the dream reveal itself—and him
.

But in this dream he had no mirror, nor were there any such, until, still in this dream, suddenly standing within his own room—or what would be his room—he found on the bedside table a small silver mirror. Threads of shadow formed about it, resisting, strands clung to it as he picked it up, and shriveled when he would not be deterred
.

He had been clever. He had gained in this dream the mirror Mauryl had given him; but once he had found it, he was back in the courtyard by the kitchen door and the rain-barrel. Daylight was behind him and even with the mirror he could see no more than he had seen in the rain-barrel that day, only his own outline, an outline with a shadowed face
.

So the dream had tricked him, and would not at any trick he could play unfold more than he had seen
.

He was sitting on Petelly's back again. He had his hands locked before his lips. He was aware of the men watching him. He had come all that distance through the past, alone of those living, and alone of the dead—but he knew nothing. Nothing.

He had found reason to fear—and out of his fear, and in revulsion at Hasufin's cruelty, he thought now, had flowed his terrible anger.

And when his anger broke loose—at least in the dream—he had used lives for the stones and anger for the mortar of his fortress.

It might be illusion. Mauryl had said not to fear dreams, that there was not always truth in them. He thought that Mauryl had had a part in what had happened.

The old man had said—Hasufin would use even his dreams.

The old man had proposed to hold Althalen, and everywhere around him, now that he had broken with Ynefel, was the evidence of the old man's power.
Surely
Hasufin could not make something seem so fair—more—
feel
so fair, and so safe, and so familiar.

But the faces of Ynefel lately in his memory were a truth he could not deny.

They moved on certain nights—or seemed to, when the wind blew, the balconies creaked, and candleflame wavered in the drafts.

Ynefel, which held always a warm, homelike feeling for him—was a terrible place, where he—he!—had done something unthinkable and destructive.

“M'lord,” Uwen said, moving his horse close. “M'lord?”

He could not move. He could not look aside from that structure of glowing lines, feeling always less than he needed to be, less wise, less kind, less—able to create something like this, so fair and so bright in the gray world.

His handiwork—was other than this.

Men feared him. All men did well to fear him.

Uwen took the reins somehow, and turned Petelly about, and once they were faced the other way he realized that Ninévrisë was close beside him on one hand, and the guardsmen had gathered about them, hands on weapons and yet with no enemy against which they could defend him.

He put his hands on Petelly's neck, and patted his neck. “I can manage, Uwen,” he said as steadily as he could.

“M'lord,” Ninévrisë said—frightened, too, he thought. He had taken her into danger. “I saw nothing—nothing amiss here.”

“Then the harm, if there is harm, is in me.”

“No such thing, m'lord,” Uwen said firmly, and, leaning
from his saddle, managed to pass the reins over Petelly's head again, which required his help to straighten out. Petelly lifted his head, making the maneuver more difficult; but he secured the reins, settled Petelly's anxious starts in one direction and the other, and as their small party began to ride home, went quietly, reasonably back the way they had come, among the hills, shadowing with night, and finally across the road, down the busy center lane of the camp, where wagons and men continued to come in.

He said, to the men, when they crossed the road, “What I saw—what I saw boded no harm to you.” He knew that he had acted in such a way that might spread fear through the army. “I beg you not mention it. I shall tell His Majesty when I know the answer.”

 

The leg ached, ached so that a cup of wine was Cefwyn's chief wish, far more than a supper, no matter the servants' efforts. It was past dark, there was no sign of Tristen and Ninévrisë, and he had debated with himself whether to offend Ninévrisë by sending men out—or whether to sit and worry.

But the mere sight of Cevulirn and Umanon was reassuring, and persuaded him he had so many men in the vicinity that no enemy scouts would be too daring, and that the Elwynim rebel that tried Tristen's mettle would find that small band no easy mark at all. Sit still, he told himself. Let them learn what they can learn in their own way. Sending someone into wizardous doings was not wise.

Sending two most valuable persons to seek out wizardry worried him intensely.

But he had trusted Tristen too little so far. He could
not
rule by hampering his best counselors, whatever the frightening nature of their investigations.

Outside the royal pavilion, the White Horse of the Ivanim and the Wheel of Imor Lenúalim were snapping in a stiff wind alongside the Dragon and beside them, the Tower and Star, the Regent's Tower and the Amefin Eagle. The wagons
belonging to the Guelen regulars were disgorging their supplies. The Duke of Ivanor and the Duke of Imor had pitched their tents alongside his, with Tristen's on the other side, next Gwywyn's tent, which was the command post for the Dragon and the Prince's Guard. They made no individual fires tonight, in the tents of the common men, so as to give any spies that did venture onto surrounding hilltops no convenient way to count their number. But fires were starting outside, and cooks were hard at work with the big kettles, boiling up soup and unpacking hard bread they had brought from town. The common men would not fare at all badly tonight, mutton stew and enough ale to wash it down, very good ale, he had ordered that personally. But it would not be enough to become drunk.

There was a grimmer and very businesslike feel to this camp, from which they would set out on their final march either to fight or to establish a camp in the face of the enemy, from which they would launch a more deliberate war.

There was more and quicker order, for one thing, so Idrys had reported from his latest tour about. Untaught peasants, accepted into Amefel's line, followed lords' and officers' orders and soldiers' examples tonight in the not unreasonable confidence that their lives very soon would hang upon what they learned. So from a slovenly behavior at the outset, things were done remarkably well this evening among the Amefin, and two of the Amefin village units, of Hawwy vale, were at drill even in the dark and by lantern-light, an excess of zeal, Idrys said, and he agreed: they dared not have the men exhausted.

Meanwhile, Kerdin Qwyll's-son said, the Guelen regulars moved among the Amefin, impeccable and meticulous in their procedures, instructing those who would listen. A few officers had gone about near the fires and had eager and worshipful entourages of wise Amefin lads who wanted to live long lives.

Among them, too, in the attraction of the bonfires, were Cevulirn's riders, drilled from boyhood to ride the land and teach the young village lads what time they were outside the
service of Cevulirn's court. They had set the small Amefin section of the horse-camp in good order very quickly, and joined the tale-telling around the fires. So did Imor's men, mostly townsmen, well-ordered and well-drilled; merchants' and tradesmen's sons, they drilled on every ninth day, and of those merchants' sons every one that afforded his horse and attendants was proud and careful in his equipment—a haughty lot, more so than Cevulirn's riders, who, if the ale did start flowing, might grow less reserved than their gray, pale lord.

But they had not heard from Pelumer and they had not received Olmern's messenger.

He had made his third venture to the door, and to the fire at which his own cook was preparing the lords' fare, when horses came down the main aisle of the camp, and he saw Ninévrisë and Tristen and their escort coming in safe and sound.

Then he could let go his anxiousness, particularly when firelight lit the arriving party's faces, and Ninévrisë leapt down and ran to him saying that things were very well at Althalen.

“It was beautiful,” she said, accepting his hands. “It was
beautiful
. I wish you had seen—”

“I doubt that I could,” he said, conscious of Guelenfolk about and wondering what she might have said or seen out there that might find its way to orthodox ears; but he had not meant to make it a complaint.

“The lord Regent protects us here,” Tristen said. “I was right. He
has
won Althalen. He's held. Men loyal to the Regent died there, and so did his enemies—but most of all is Emwy village. They've sided with the lord Regent. I think they have, all along.”

“They fed us when we were camped there,” Ninévrisë said. “They kept us secret from Caswyddian's men. They were good people, in Emwy village.”

“Then the gods give them rest,” Cefwyn said, though he thought perhaps the wish was ill considered. They were
uneasy dead, by what Tristen claimed, and would always be.

But Tristen was looking downcast as he turned Petelly off to the groom. He stood gazing off into the distance at the moment, and comprehension seemed to flicker in those pale eyes, cold and clear in the firelight, as if he had heard from some distant voice.

“What is it?” Cefwyn steeled himself to ask—as he should have asked in council before. He had determined to mend his faults. And to tell Ninévrisë what he did know.

“Trouble,” Tristen said, “trouble. My lord, I very dangerously misstepped tonight. He carried me to Ynefel. I was very foolish. I almost lost everything.”

“What did he gain?” He did not need to ask who it was Tristen meant; and he had no room for charity. “Tristen?”

“Little, I hope. Perhaps knowledge of me. I—do not think lord Pelumer will join us. My enemy is moving. He is well ahead of us.”