Stalking Darkness

8

The roar of festival gongs woke Alec at dawn. Blinking, he gazed up in groggy confusion at the bed hangings, a pomegranate pattern worked with scarlet.

He'd gone to sleep beneath layers of colored silk lit by candle glow. Ylinestra had been looking down at him, her eyes vague with pleasure.

A delicious ache ran through him at the memory, but with it came a twinge of anxiety that he couldn't immediately explain.

Stretching himself fully awake, he sat up to find Seregil dozing in an armchair beside the bed. He was still wearing last night's breeches and shirt. Slouched to one side, arms crossed tightly across his chest, he looked profoundly uncomfortable.

Alec shook him gently by the elbow and he jerked awake, rubbing painfully at his neck.

"How'd I get here?" Alec asked.

"She sent you back, I guess." The beginnings of a dangerous grin played at the corners of his mouth.

"Ylinestra, eh? And after all Valerius' warnings. Enjoy yourself?"

"Oh-yes. I mean, I did, I guess—"

"You guess?"

Alec fell back against the pillows with a groan. "It's just that, well—I think she used some magic. At first, anyway."

"So that's what it takes." Chuckling, Seregil leaned forward and touched a finger to Alec's cheek.

"And the kind that leaves marks, too. You all right?"

Alec brushed his hand away, feeling more awkward than ever. "Yes, of course I'm all right. It was great. Just sort of—strange." He hesitated. "Do you dream? Afterward, I mean?"

"I usually talk. Why, did you?"

"Yes. I remember thinking that I was falling asleep but not wanting to. And then I saw the spinning dagger."

Seregil raised a questioning eyebrow. "The what?"

"The spinning dagger that Nysander used when I swore the Watcher's oath. It was right in front of my face, just like before, and I was afraid to say anything for fear it would cut me. I could hear Nysander's voice, too, but like it was coming from far away. I couldn't understand what he was saying. There was something else, too." He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to seize the elusive fragment. "Something about an arrow."

Seregil shook his head. "You're whisked away and made love to by the most exotic woman in Rhiminee and it gives you nightmares? You're a strange creature, Alec, a very strange creature." He grinned. "I just hope you're not too worn out. This is the biggest celebration of the year. And we'd better get ready. The Cavishes are probably already at breakfast downstairs."

Alec lay in bed a moment longer after he left, trying to sort out his feelings about the previous night's unexpected climax. He knew better than to imagine that Ylinestra considered him anything more than a virginal conquest; he doubted she'd give him a second glance the next time they met.

At least he hoped not. Pleasurable as the physical act—or rather, acts—had been, the whole affair had left him feeling low and begrimed.

Seregil's well-intentioned ribbing had only underscored his own confusion.

The sorceress' scent rose from his skin as Alec threw back the covers and got up. Wrapping himself in a robe, he called for the chambermaid, asking her to prepare a bath and see to it that his bedding was changed.

The bath helped considerably and he headed downstairs in somewhat better spirits. His one remaining qualm was that Seregil had already blabbed his exploits to Micum or Kari. But no one gave signs of being any the wiser when he joined the cheerful group around the dining table, although Seregil did raise a questioning eyebrow at his damp hair.

Illia was too excited by the prospect of a day in the city to let anyone linger over their morning tea. As soon as the meal was finished the whole party set off for the Temple Precinct.

Kari and the girls rode in a comfortable open carriage, with the men riding attendance on horseback.

In contrast to the austerity of Mourning Night, Sakor's Day was celebrated with wild abandon.

Horns blared, ale flowed, bonfires blazed at all hours.

Looking around as they rode, it appeared to Alec that there was a performance of some kind-animal trainers, jugglers, troops of actors performing out of skene wagons, fire dancers, and the like—on virtually every street corner. Food sellers, gamblers, whores, and pickpockets mingled with the revelers, plying their trades.

"It's all so loud and exciting!" exclaimed Elsbet, riding along beside him.

"You'll get used to it," Alec replied.

The girl grinned. "Oh, I look forward to that."

The main event of the day was the annual investing of new troops at midday. Sakor was the patron god of soldiers and the recognition of new troops was at once a martial and religious occasion.

In the Temple Precinct, the tiers of seating had been cleared away to make room for the ranks of new soldiers formed up in front of the Sakor Temple.

The day was a cloudless, bitter one and even Alec was glad of the heavy, fur-lined cloak he wore over his velvet surcoat. Seregil chatted idly with other nobles, introducing Alec to this one or that as the fancy took him.

"I've never seen so many new recruits, have you?" Kari asked Seregil, shading her eyes with one hand as they stood together on the steps of the Temple of Illior.

He shook his head. "No, never."

"Where's Beka?" Illia demanded, bouncing excitedly on her father's shoulder.

"Over with those in green there." Micum pointed out the Queen's Horse, raising his voice to make himself heard.

Glancing at Kari, Alec thought she looked rather sad and thoughtful. As if sensing his gaze, she looked over at him and held a hand out for his.

By the time the last ranks had marched in, the close-packed regimental groupings looked like colored tiles in a huge mosaic. The Queen's Horse was a block of green and white directly in front of the Temple of Sakor.

"Look, there's the Queen," said Micum.

"They'll start now."

Looking solemn and proud despite her long vigil, Idrilain took her place between the pillars of the Sakor Temple. She wore flowing robes of state and an emerald diadem and carried the Sword of Gerilain upright on her shoulder like a scepter. The golden Aegis gleamed behind her as she stood motionless before the troops, the faint vapor of her breath visible on the cold air. The tableau was intentional; there was no doubt to whom the oath was to be given. The priests might be allowed their mysteries in the darkness, but here, in the light of day, stood the embodiment of Skalan power.

Placing the sword point downward in front of her,

Idrilain grasped the hilt in both hands and began the ritual.

"Come you here to swear the Oath?" she cried, her voice carrying clear and harsh as if across a field of battle.

"Aye!" came the response from a thousand throats, thundering in the stone confines of the precinct.

From the corner of his eye, Alec saw Micum and Seregil drop their hands to their sword hilts, as did many around them. Without a word, he did the same.

"To whom do you swear?"

"To the throne of Skala and the Queen who rules!" returned the initiate soldiers.

"By what do you swear?"

"By the Four, by the Flame, by our honor, and our arms!"

"Swear then to uphold the honor of your land and Queen!"

"Aye!"

"Swear then to give no quarter to the adversary."

"Aye!"

"Swear then to spare the supplicant."

"Aye!"

"Foreswear all that brings dishonor upon your comrades."

"Aye!"

Idrilain paused, letting a moment pass in stillness. Then, in a voice that would have done credit to any sergeant, she barked out, "Display arms!"

With a ringing of steel, the various regiments brandished their weapons: swords and sabers glinted in the sunlight; small forests of lances sprang to attention; archers beat arrow shafts against longbows, producing a strange clacking sound; artillery soldiers held catapult stones aloft. Standards unfurled on cue to snap brightly over the throng.

"Then so are you all sworn together!" cried Idrilain, raising her sword overhead. "By the Four and the Flame, by land and Queen, by honor and arms. Warriors of Skala, sound your cries!"

A deafening roar filled the square as each regiment shouted its own battle cry, vying with the others to make their voices heard.

"The Queen's honor!"

"Sakor's Fire!"

"Honor and steel!"

"The Flame on the Seal"

"True aim and well sped!"

"The White Hawk!"

Drummers and pipers stepped from behind the temple pillars, setting up a martial tattoo. Great horns as long as the men that sounded them blared and bellowed on the rooftops as the ranks turned and began to march out of the square.

"It all makes you want to join in with it, doesn't it?" Alec grinned, pulse quickening with the beat of the drums.

Laughing, Seregil threw an arm around Alec's shoulders and drew him away, shouting over the din, "That's the whole idea."

The clamor at dawn went unheard by Nysander.

Seated cross-legged on the floor of the casting room, a long dead candle guttered out before him, he floated in the dim oblivion of meditation.

Images came and went, yet nothing substantial came into his grasp.

After seeing Magyana to her tower door the previous night, he'd made his usual tour of the vaults beneath the Oreska, then found himself leaving first the House, then the sheltered gardens, to stalk alone through the windy streets.

Hands clasped behind his back, he walked aimlessly, as if trying to escape the anger that had been building slowly inside him from the moment he'd found Ylinestra hovering over Alec in her chamber.

Much of this anger was directed at himself. Ylinestra had meant no more to him than a voluptuous diversion possessed of a mind of uncommon ability. Yet he had allowed his carnal desires to blind him to the true depths of her cupidity. Her sudden dalliance with Thero had reawakened his lulled sense of prudence. What he'd witnessed this night strengthened his suspicions.

He let out an exasperated growl. The Black Time was coming, he knew, coming in the course of his own Guardianship. Was he prepared?

Hardly.

He had an assistant he could not completely trust and yet hardly dared release. A sorceress twenty decades his junior had him passion-blind.

And Seregil!

Nysander clenched his hands, digging the nails into his palms. Seregil, whom he loved as a son and a friend, had very nearly condemned himself to death through his own obstinate inquisitiveness. Alec would prove no different in time—that much was already clear.

For the first time in years, he found himself wondering what his own master would have to say about all this. Arkoniel's craggy face came to him as readily as if he'd seen him only the day before.

He'd been old when Nysander had first met him and never seemed to change. How fervently the young Nysander—that desperate, quick-tempered urchin of the streets, plucked starving from the squalor of the lower city-had tried to emulate the old man's patience and wisdom.

But from Arkoniel he'd also inherited the burden of the Guardianship, that dark thread of knowledge that must be kept at once intact and concealed. A thread that the events of the past few months, beginning with Seregil's finding the cursed disk and culminating tonight with the omens at the ceremony, showed to be nearing its end.

Finding no answers in the night, he'd returned to his tower and prepared for a formal meditation. Dawn found him motionless and seemingly serene. He'd been dimly aware of Thero's arrival and respectful withdrawal.

As the last light of Sakor's Day faded above the tower dome, Nysander opened his eyes, no wiser than when he'd begun. Denied inspiration, he was left with facts. Seregil had stumbled across the disk, ostensibly by accident, then found his way to the Oracle of Illior, who'd recited a fragment of a prophecy no one but Nysander himself had any business knowing about. Last night the same words—"Eater of Death" — had been spoken by the priest of Sakor following the strange omen of carrion birds.

Rising, he worked the stiffness from his joints and set off for the Temple Precinct again.

A cold sliver of moon was just sliding up from behind the white dome of the Temple of Illior when he arrived. Taking this as a favorable sign, he entered the temple and donned the ritual mask.

He'd sought the counsel of the Oracle only a few times before, and then more often in the spirit of curiosity. His devotion to Illior took a different form than that of the priests.

But now he hurried onward with a growing sense of anticipation. Snapping a light of his own into existence, he made his way down the twisting, treacherous stairway to the subterranean chamber of the Oracle. At the bottom he extinguished the light and strode on through the utter blackness of the corridor, more convinced with every step that the poor, mad creature at its end had answers to offer.

A lumpish, disheveled young man squatting on a pallet bed looked up as he entered. This was not the same Oracle Nysander recalled, of course, yet all the rest was as before: the profound silence, the dim, cold light, the attendants seated motionless on either side of the idiot vessel of the Immortal, featureless silver masks gleaming from the depths of their cowls.

"Greetings to you, Guardian!" he cried, vague eyes locking with Nysander's.

"You know me?"

"Who you are is nothing," the Oracle replied, rocking slowly from side to side. "What you are is everything. Everything. Prepare, O Guardian. The ordeal is close at hand. Have you preserved what was entrusted?"

"I have." Nysander suddenly felt weary beyond words.

How many times had he walked through the dusty labyrinth beneath the Oreska House, feigning absent curiosity? How many years had it taken to cultivate his reputation as an eccentric, albeit powerful, dabbler? How much had he sacrificed to uphold the trust of generations?

"Stand ready, O Guardian, and be vigilant," the Oracle continued. "Your time approaches out of darkness and hidden places. The minions of the Adversary ride forth in secret glory. Your portion shall be bitter as gall."

The silence closed over them again like the surface of a pool. Into that silence Nysander slowly recited words that, to his knowledge, had not been said aloud in nearly five centuries. It was a fragment of the "Dream of Hyradin," the one faint ray of hope he and all his predecessors had clung to down the long years of their vigil.

"And so came the Beautiful One, the Eater of Death, to strip the bones of the world.

First clothed in Man's flesh, it came crowned with a helm of darkness and none could stand against this

One but Four.

"First shall be the Guardian, a vessel of light in the darkness.

Then the Shaft and the Vanguard, who shall fail and yet not fail if the

Guide, the Unseen

One, goes forth. And at last shall be again the

Guardian, whose portion is bitter, as bitter as gall."

The Oracle said nothing to this, but gazed up at him with eyes that held no alternative.

After a moment, Nysander bowed slightly and went back the way he'd come, in darkness and alone.