Part 3 (1/2)

'What do you mean?'

'I mean, Dakeyras ... where did you meet him?' He could see that the question surprised her, and watched her expression change from open and friendly to guarded and wary.

'He's my father,' she said softly.

'No,' he told her. 'Your family were killed in a raid during the Vagrian Wars. And Dakeyras, riding with a man named Dardalion, found you and your sister ... and a brother, I believe, in the care of a young woman.'

'How do you know this?'

'Because of Kreeg,' he said, refilling his cup.

'I don't understand.'

The voice of Dakeyras cut in from the doorway. 'He means he knows who Kreeg was sent to kill.' The tall man untied the thong of his black leather cloak and draped it over the chair. Taking up the third silver cup he tossed back the contents.

'Fifteen thousand in gold,' said Ralis. 'Five for the Guild, ten for the man who brings your crossbow to the Citadel. There are said to be more than fifty men scouring the country for news of you. Morak the Ventrian is among them, as are Belash, Courail and Senta.'

'I've heard of Morak and Courail,' said Dakeyras.

'Belash is Nadir and a knife-fighter. Senta is a swordsman paid to fight duels. He's very good - old n.o.ble family.'

'I expect there is also a large reward for information regarding my whereabouts,' said Dakeyras soft ly.

'I wouldn't doubt it,' said Ralis, 'but then it would be a brave man who betrayed Waylander the Slayer.'

'Are you a brave man?' The words were spoken gently, but the undercurrent was tense and the old man found his stomach knotting.

'More guts than sense,' admitted Ralis, holding the man's dark gaze.

Waylander smiled. 'That's as it should be,' he said, and the moment pa.s.sed.

'What will we do?' asked Miriel.

'Prepare for a long winter,' said Waylander.

Ralis was a light sleeper, and he heard the creaking of leather hinges as the main door opened.

The old man yawned and swung his legs from the bed. Although it was almost dawn thin shafts of moonlight were still seeping through the cracks in the shutters of the window. He rose and stretched. The air was cool and fresh with the threat of approaching winter. Ralis s.h.i.+vered and pulled on his warm woollen leggings and tunic.

Opening his bedroom door he stepped into the main room and saw that someone had fanned the embers of last night's fire, laying fresh kindling on the hungry flames. Waylander was a courteous host, for there would not normally have been a fire this early on an autumn day. Moving to the shuttered window he lifted the latch and pushed at the wooden frame. Outside the moon was fading in a greying sky, the stars retreating, the pale pink of the dawn showing above the eastern peaks.

Movement caught his eye and Ralis squinted, trying to focus. On the mountainside, at least a quarter of a mile distant, he thought he saw a man running. Ralis yawned and returned to the fire, easing himself down into the deep leather chair. The kindling was burning well and he added two seasoned logs from a stack beside the hearth.

So, he thought, the mystery is solved at last. What was surprising was that he felt in such low spirits now. For years he had known Dakeyras and his family, the beautiful wife, the twin girls.

And always he had sensed there was more to the mountain man. And the mystery had occupied his mind, perhaps even helping to keep him active at an age when most - if not all - of his youthful contemporaries were dead.

A fugitive, a n.o.bleman having turned his back on wealth and privilege, a refugee from Gothir tyranny... all these he had considered as backgrounds for Dakeyras. And more. But the speculation was now over. Dakeyras was the legendary Waylander - the man who killed King Orien's son, Niallad. But he was also the hero who had found the hidden Armour of Bronze, returning it to the Drenai people, freeing them from the murderous excesses of the invading Vagrians.

The old man sighed. What fresh mysteries could he find now to exercise his mind, and blot out the pa.s.sing of time and the inevitable approach of death?

He heard Miriel rise from her bed in the far room. She wandered in, tall and slim and naked.

'Good morning,' she said brightly. 'Did you sleep well?'

'Well enough, girl. You should put some clothes on.' His voice was gruff, the words said in a sharper tone than he had intended. It wasn't that her nakedness aroused him; it was the opposite, he realised. Her youth and her beauty only made him feel the weight of his years, looming behind him like a mountain. She returned to her room and he leaned back in his chair. When had arousal died?

He thought back. It was in Melega that he had first noticed it, some fifteen years before. He had hired a wh.o.r.e, a buxom wench, but had been unable to perform despite all her expert ministrations.

At last she had shrugged. 'Dead birds cannot rise from the nest,' she told him cruelly.

Miriel returned, dressed now in grey leggings and a s.h.i.+rt of creamy white wool. 'Is that more to your liking, sir tinker?'

He forced a smile. 'Everything about you, my dear, is to my liking. But naked you remind me of all that there once was. Can you understand that?'

'Yes,' she said, but he knew she was humouring him. What did the young ever understand?

Pulling a tall chair to the fireside she reversed it and sat astride it opposite him, her elbows resting on the high back. 'You mentioned some of the men who are hunting my father,' she said. 'Can you tell me of them?'

'They are all dangerous men - and there will be those among them I do not know. But I know Morak the Ventrian. He's deadly, truly deadly. I believe he is insane.'

'What weapons does he favour?' she asked.

'Sabre and knife, but he is a very skilled bowman. And he has great speed - like a striking snake.

He'll kill anyone -man, woman, child, babe in arms. He has a gift for death.'

'What does he look like?'

'Medium height, slim. He tends to wear green, and he has a ring of heavy gold, set with a green stone. It matches his eyes, cold and hard.'

'I will watch out for him.'

'If you see him - kill him,' snapped Ralis. 'But you won't see him.'

'You don't think he'll come here?'

'That's not what I said. You would both be best advised to leave here. Even Waylander cannot defeat all who are coming against him.'

'Don't underestimate him, tinker,' she warned.

'I don't,' he replied. 'But I am an old man, and I know how time makes dotards of us all. Once I was young, fast and strong. But slowly, like water eating at stone, time removes our speed and our strength. Waylander is not a young man. Those hunting him are in their prime.'

She nodded and looked away. 'So you advise us to run?'

'Another place, under another name. Yes.'