Tangled Webs (39 page)

A soft tap at the window roused him from slumber. Despite his exhaustion, Fyodor responded with a warrior’s reflexes. He was on his feet at once, his cudgel in hand. He hauled it high overhead as the shutter swung inward.

A pale head poked into the room, and light blue eyes grew wide as they fixed upon the ready weapon in his hands. Fyodor recognized the shaman’s daughter, and as he lowered his cudgel, he heaved a sigh of mingled relief and exasperation.

Dagmar crawled in through the low window and sank at once into a deep curtsy. “You saved my new home, Fyodor of Holgerstead, and no doubt my life as well. For this I thank you.”

“I accept your thanks,” he murmured with a wry smile, “but could they not have waited until morning?”

The woman rose swiftly to full height and met his eyes. “Not as I would wish to express them,” she said frankly. Her meaning was unmistakable. Fyodor fell back a step, and suddenly he remembered he was unclad. He reached for Wedigar’s cloak and wrapped it around him.

“The mantle of First Axe suits you well,” she said, “but it is not needed just now.” With these words she parted the folds of the cloak and laid both palms upon the young man’s chest.

Fyodor caught her wrists and put her hands gently away. “You are Wedigar’s pledged bride,” he said softly. “And you are his pledged heir. It is expected.”

Fyodor dug a hand into his hair and stared helplessly at the girl. He had not imagined anything like this might come with the role he’d accepted! And yet, it seemed to him that the Northwoman’s words held little truth. He lifted one eyebrow and fixed a skeptical gaze upon her.

The young woman sighed and then shrugged. “Very well, perhaps it is not the expected custom. But there must be an heir to Holgerstead-a hamfariggen warrior who can lead the berserkers in battle. The oracles say I can bear such a son. If you give me a child, I could leave this household and go back to my village with honor. It would be a gift,” she said softly, her pale eyes pleading. “To Holgerstead, to all of Ruathym. To me. Even to Wedigar,” she concluded with a touch of bitterness.

Fyodor knew a surge of pity for the young woman, for Wedigar was not a man for pretense, and it was clear to all that the First Axe was not happy about the need to take a second wife. And having witnessed Alfhilda’s courage and loyalty, Fyodor did not wonder that Wedigar had eyes for no other woman. Not even one as undeniably beautiful as Dagmar.

As if sensing the path Fyodor’s thoughts had taken, the young woman stepped away from him and began to tug at the laces that fastened her overtunic. She stripped off gown and blouse quickly, then raked her hands through her braids until her hair fell into long golden waves. The faint light of a crescent moon filtered in through the window, glimmering on her pale hair and white skin. She went to his bed and lay down upon it.

“A gift,” she repeated softly.

For a moment the young man was honestly tempted. But an emotion stronger than sympathy, deeper than desire, ruled Fyodor’s heart. He reached for his discarded clothing. Dagmar watched with despairing eyes as he dressed and gathered up his belongings.

“But why?” she demanded. “Why do you leave? Are you not like other men, that you do not take pleasures freely offered? Or am I displeasing to you-is that it?”

“You are most beautiful; no one who is truly a man could deny that. But I cannot betray a friend,” he responded as he walked to the door.

“But you would not! Wedigar would surely thank you!” Fyodor paused in the doorway and turned back to face the Northwoman. “I was speaking not of Wedigar, but of Liriel.”

It was nearly dawn when Fyodor caught sight of the raofs of Ruathym village. A rustle in the bushes along the path caught his attention and, before he could draw a weapon, Liriel sprang out onto the path, her dark face joyful. She ran to meet him and threw herself into his arms.

Fyodor was accustomed to such gestures from the impulsive draw. She always drew away quickly, like lighting that flares and retreats. But this time she seemed to be in no hurry to part. Her arms were flung tightly about his neck, and her breath felt warm through the linen of his shirt.

Although he was loath to end the embrace, Fyodor buried his hands in the drow’s wild, snow-colored hair and tilted her face up so he could meet her eyes. “There are things I must tell you,” he said somberly.

Liriel responded with a smile that warmed his blood and sent it singing urgently through his veins.

“There are those who think, and those who dream,” she mocked him softly, “and then there are those who talk too damn much!”

Fyodor’s answering smile was slow and incredulous. “It seems we have even more to talk about than I imagined.” “Words can wait,” she murmured, and the young man found himself in complete agreement.

Impulsively he swept the darkelven girl into his arms and carried her off into the forest. To his surprise Liriel did not object. Indeed, she guided his path with whispered directions and sped his step with pramises that would have seemed improbable had he not witnessed some of the other wonders of which she was capable. And in the moments when she did not speak, her lips and teeth found keenly sensitive places on his neck and throat and ears that he had not known he possessed. Sometimes gently, sometimes not, she teased him to near madness. Fyodor did not know how far they traveled-a few steps would have seemed as endlessly long to him as a league-but at last Liriel wriggled free of his grasp.

They came to each other at the foot of an ancient oak. For once Fyodor did not think of the vast differences between them or of the unresolved emotions that had haunted him since their last, illfated encounter. He cared only that this time there was no fear in Liriel’s golden eyes. Their union was like nothing he had ever known or imagined-a fierce and joyful thing that in its own way rivaled the abandon of his berserker rage. But this he chose, and with all of his heart.

Much later, Fyodor stroked Liriel’s damp curls and watched her as she slept. He himself had no desire to sleep. Never had he felt so alive. For the first time, he allowed himself to admit that he loved this little elfwoman, and he even dared to hope she might return his love.

There was also something about this place that quickened Fyodor’s fey senses. He knew nothing of wizardly spells and did not pretend to understand the magic that Rashemen’s Witches wielded with such fearful authority, but he could feel the natural magic that lingered in certain glades and springs. Never, not even in the Witches’ spelltower that overlooked the enchanted Lake Ashane, had he felt such power in a place. His eyes lifted to the soaring branches of the oak tree overhead, and suddenly he understood why Liriel had chosen to bring him to this place. “Little raven,” he said softly. The sleeping drow’s eyes flashed open, and she regarded him alertly. “This is Y ggsdrasil’s Child, is it not?”

She sat up and regarded him with a brilliant smile. “You can feel it, then. That is a good sign.”

Fyodor reached out and took her hands. “This I must know: what happened, to make such a change in you?”

The drow did not need to ask what he meant. “I tried to cast the rune and could not. Until then I’d thought of myself as the keeper of your quest and mine. That lesson was hard enough to learn,” she added wryly.

Fyodor nodded, recalling how difficult it had been for the drow to expand her dream to iuclude his. “And now?”

“I realized we must be as one if either quest is to succeed. The rune is not mine only. There are things I need of you,” she admitted.

“Whatever you need, the same is yours,” he promised softly. “And now that you know this, you are ready to cast the rune?”

Liriel did not miss the note of concern in Fyodor’s voice. Something had happened to add urgency to their quest. “Tell me,” she demanded.

And so he did, leaving out nothing. The drow listened thoughtfully, her dismay mounting as he described the new turn his curse had taken. She had fought Wedigar in the form of a giant hawk; she did not want to know what sort of destruction a shapeshifting Fyodor could leave behind.

“I will cast the rune,” she said with more conviction than she felt. She cast a glance up at the sky; already the sunset colors stained the west. “But I will need time to prepare. If the lore books speak true, a trance will come upon me, and I will carve the rune upon the tree unknowing. Will you stand guard?”

“As long as you need,” he agreed.

The drow nodded and began the concentration needed for the casting. She sought the power of the ancient oak, the symbolic embodiment of all life, and sank into it. As she went deeper, the days and nights of her rune quest came back to her in vivid detail, each event and sorrow and joy giving shape to the rune she must use. But try as she might, she could not envision the rune in its entirety.

After a time—perhaps a short time, perhaps not-the drow abandoned this attempt. She did not try to shape the rune, but focused instead on the powers she wished to reclaim, and the need to exorcise the errant magic that kept Fyodor from being the warrior he was meant to be. She chanted her goals silently, and the chant grew in intensity as something dark and compelling slipped into her silent voice. The magic of Rashemen, the magic of the drow. Fearful things both, they combined in a way that Liriel did not understand, sweeping her away into a trance that went beyond mere meditation, beyond spellcasting. No longer ordering her own movements, Liriel watched as if from a high place—as if from all places-as her physical being took the Windwalker amulet from its chain and placed the tiny chisel against the tree. Her hands moved swiftly, surely, but she did not know what marks she made. All she knew for certain was that the faint blue light emanating from her amulet’s sheath-the captured magic of the Underdark-faded steadily as she worked. Her conscious thoughts ebbed slowly away, too; this she expected, for in her mind she and her darkelven magic were inseparable parts of one whole. At last the blue light flickered and died. The empty amulet dropped from Liriel’s nerveless hands, and the drow followed it into the darkness.

When Liriel awoke, the fat crescent moon was high in the sky, bathing the forest with its silver light. She stirred, winced, and pressed her fingers to her throbbing temples. Within her head raged the violent cacophony of spellsickness. Long moments passed before the confused girl realized that some of the noise—perhaps most ofit-came from without.

The drow lowered her hands from her head and gazed with horror at the scene before her. In the grip of a horrendous battle frenzy, Fyodor fought against opponents that he alone could see. The Rashemi had not gone unscathed, though: his clothes and skin had been torn repeatedly by branches and brambles as he raged through the woods, lunging and slashing again and again.

How long this had gone on Liriel could not know, but her keen eyes caught the bubble of pink-tinged froth that collected in the corner ofhis faint, unnerving smile. She knew only that she had failed and that Fyodor would die if she could not find a way to stop him.

Instinctively she flung out a hand. To her surprise and relief, drow magic flowed from her fingertips and sent thick streams of spider silk hurtling into the young man’s wild path. The sticky strands exploded outward, forming a giant web that stretched from the trunk of Yggsdrasil’s Child to a sister oak some twenty feet away.

The amok warrior tore through the web without missing a step.

Now that she knew her Underdark magic was still with her, Liriel reached for a more potent tool. Up came her tiny crossbow. She fired a dart into Fyodor’s thigh. He ignored it and parried some nonexistent sword thrust. Again she fired, and again, until her quiver at last was empty. The young warrior bristled with darts and resemhled nothing so much as a tall and angry hedgehog.

Yet Fyodor did not fall. He continued to fight shadowsor more likely, Liriel realized with sudden bright certainty, he continued to do battle with all the ghosts who haunted his dreams. And the phantom warriors would kill him, as surely as he had killed them.

Shaking with frustration and fear, the drow leaped into Fyodor’s wild path and shrieked at him to stop. To her astonishment, he did just that. The frenzy fell from him like a cloak, and the heavy black sword dropped to the ground as his magically enhanced form shrank abruptly down to its natural size. Fyodor swayed and fell at last into an exhausted-and poisoned-slumber.

Liriel fell to her knees beside him and began to tear out the darts. He’d already taken enough drow sleeping poison to kill a bugbear; she only hoped the berserker rage had absorbed much of it. To her relief, he continued to breathe—shallow, but steady.

She watched over her friend throughout the remainder of the night and long into the next day, dosing him repeatedly with antidote until her precious flask was empty. The forest was heavy with twilight shadows when Fyodor finally awoke. Nearly giddy with joy and relief, Liriel spilled out the story of what had happened-to her, and to him, and how he had stopped only after she’d given up rational hope. “But I’ve no idea what any of it means,” she concluded. “I do,” Fyodor said softly. “Such things have been done before, but not in my lifetime or yours.”

Liriel waited for him to continue, but his eyes were distant, fixed upon the old tales and legends that were so much a part of him.

“In ancient times,” he began, “there were warriors who gave pledged service as berserker knights, becoming personal champion to a powerful wychlaran. When this magic was granted, it was taken as a sign that the Witch was destined for a great task. You did not fail, little raven,” he said earnestly. “The control of my battle frenzies has indeed been gained-but it is in your hands.”

Liriel gazed at him in utter horror. “But I don’t want it! I never wanted that!”

“You sought power,” he reminded her. “Now that it is yours, you may not always be able to choose how and when to wield it. I think,” he concluded thoughtfully, “that this is ever the way of power.”

The drow brushed aside these philosophical musings. “But where is my choice in all of this?”