Part 41 (2/2)
Utrachet ran up. Dewar saw now that he was limping and hiding it badly. He spoke to Prospero quickly, agitatedly.
Prospero exploded with an obscenity. A whirlwind sprang up and whipped away down the beach, throwing stinging sand.
Utrachet spoke again, and Prospero shook his head and said, ”Let us begone from here. The men come first.”
Utrachet nodded and left.
”As for thee, I have no time now to give audience to thy grievances,” Prospero went on to Dewar. ”Canst leave o' thyself, or I'll remove thee, for I'll have none about the place not wholly of my party. I'd not be so abrupt, but I've much in hand.”
Sorcerer and a Qentkman 343.
Dewar's hot anger drained out of him and left an icier, more enduring fury. ”1 shall leave, sir,” he said, bowing, ”and it shall be an ill day we meet again.” He pulled his cloak around him as he turned his back deliberately and walked away, into the dunes to find something flammable, to return to the Tower of Thorns and consider whether he'd been insulted sufficiently for a challenge. He halted a half-step. He should mention to Utrachel, or perhaps to Prospero, that that overly-chaste young woman Freia had aided him-but no. Let her tell them so herself, if she so chose; why, to be a.s.sociated with Dewar now in Prospero's mind might bend the Prince's ill-will toward her. She'd done him no wrong to earn that. He had nothing more to say to Prospero.
Prospero shouted after him, ”Look-” but was interrupted by a messenger from the flags.h.i.+p lying in the warm water offsh.o.r.e, and he stared angrily at Dewar's disappearing back in the darkness as he answered the messenger's question. Running off like Freia, he thought: d.a.m.ned disrespectful children. Dared they value him so lightly, selfish young creatures?
30.OTTAVIANO TACKLED FREIA AND BROUGHT HER down, knocking the breath from her as she doubled over a dead man's breastplate.
”No you don't!” the Baron of Ascolet screamed.
The Way was dark, gone. The uproar of flame and battle had stopped. Wounded survivors were moaning and calling for help. There seemed none unwounded.
Freia gasped for air spasmodically, immobilized with Otto's weight on her. He stood, cursing, and released her for a moment; she was still breathless and lay panting.
”s.h.i.+t,” finished Otto, after a pause, summing up the evening.
344 -a -EfizaBetfi <wittey trixie=”” cried=”” out=”” questioningly,=”” looking=”” for=”” freia=”” on=”” the=”” other=”” side=”” of=”” the=”” central=”” keep.=”” she=”” bounded=”” around=”” the=”” corner,=”” dark=”” in=””></wittey>< p=””>
Freia got to her knees. Otto hauled her to her feet, putting a knife to her throat.
”Tell your animal to back off.”
Freia still gulped at the air. She whispered indistinctly, hoa.r.s.ely, then swallowed as the gryphon screeched and started toward them.
”Trix-go-home-” she forced out, past the cold steel too close to her windpipe. ”Trix-home! Now!”
The gryphon stopped, confused. ”Rrrnrapulsions?”
Her look was an eloquent answer. Nonetheless, Otto disliked the idea of using violence on her. Golias had no qualms, but Otto thought of himself as a civilized, educated man.
”You were looking for your father, hm? Prospero didn't help you, did he.”
”He will,” Freia whispered.
”Oh, I'm sure you'll be missed when he comes to counting noses,” Otto said, pleased. ”A very important thing to leave behind, a daughter. Careless. What do you think he'll do now? When he notices you're not where you ought to be?”
”He'll look for me,” she whispered. ”If you hurt me, he will kill you when he finds me.”
”I don't think so. Interesting accent you have. Odd,” he mused. She shouldn't have an accent. He, having stood the test of the Well's fire, should understand her perfectly without hearing an accent. Yet when she spoke, a lilt and trill colored the words he heard. If he concentrated, he could hear the incomprehensible language she actually used, but the unusual thing was that an accent was transmitted.
Prospero's troops had had some utterly foreign language ft. Sorcerer and a (jentkman c- 34 7 which not even Otto, integrated with the Well and its worlds, could understand. Their commander Utrachet had spoken some Lannach. Otto had not had leisure to study the troops, which had struck him as strange in other ways, and now he regretted that.
”Where did you come from?” he asked.
She would not answer.
He tapped his fingers. Dewar or Prospero would come looking for her. Then they could bargain. Simple and workable, if he took care of his own defenses. Dewar, he had decided, was manageable, and Prospero could be subdued with threats to the girl here. He would demand Prospero's surrender in return for her liberty. He'd be able to get a lot of mileage out of that in Landuc. That meant he must put her someplace difficult to reach, guarded by better men than the fools at Malperdy.
Otto's mind pulled up short. If Herne or Gaston knew he had such a prisoner, she'd not be his for long. The business with this Miranda of Valgalant was still hot and he'd made an a.s.s of himself losing Prospero from Malperdy. They'd take her out of his hands and he'd lose any credit, any esteem he might have recovered.
And then two things connected in his mind, and Otto smiled in such a way that his prisoner began to sweat anxiously in her leather clothing.
He put to himself: Was not a hold on Prospero also a hold on Landuc?
Was it not so that something valued by Prospero would be valuable to the Emperor?
What would the Emperor give for something guaranteed to bring Prospero humming after it?
If she were Prospero's, she could be a more powerful weapon than the entire Army, its Marshal, and the rest of the Empire combined. Even if she were Dewar's, she could be used to bring him to heel and ensure his cooperation, or at least his noninterference. Blood called to blood.
<script>