Part 25 (2/2)

And he saw more coming all the while, materializing in an instant, armed and ready and looking for something to kill, forcing him to reach out, to turn their loyalties to himself, to turn them against their fellows, keep the battles raging, the defoliants falling, the bombs bursting.

He could never turn them all. At the most, expending all his strength, driving himself into a red-eyed and fevered exhaustion, he could turn half of them. He could achieve parity, he could prolong the deadly attrition.

His mind was only half on the report that Lytham was giving, for he was searching the land, feeling out its soil and its rivers, looking for something that might live, that might promise some kind of hope for the future. The coastal plains were still untouched, and Corrin appeared to have been spared; but he did not doubt that, given time, the battles would spread, would overtop the Camrann, would pa.s.s the Great Dike. And then all would be gone.

I do not want this. I never wanted this.

”My lord?”

Helwych opened his eyes. ”What do you want, Captain?”

”I ... ah ... was making my report.''

”Indeed you were ...” Helwych was about to close his eyes again, but he detected a trace of dissemblance in Lytham's manner. ”Was there something else, captain?”

Lytham squared his shoulders. A boy, Helwych thought, a boy in the armor of a man. Perhaps they were all little boys, then. Little boys dressing up as men, playing at power and rape and domination until the real adults returned and- ”Kingsbury itself was unhurt by the bombardment,” said Lytham. ”Most of the sh.e.l.ls fell short and struck the Gray face positions at the base of the hill.”

”Most?”

The report was a formality only, something to keep Lytham busy. Helwych already knew the extent of the damage, where the sh.e.l.ls had fallen, how many Gray-faces had been dismembered in the detonation of high explosive and spray of shrapnel. But the sense of dissemblance still clung about Lytham, and Helwych began to probe beneath the surface of his words, examining his fleeting thoughts. Mutiny was always a possibility. Betrayal was a constant threat. Relys had been only the first. Dryyim had come then, and then Kallye.

Those strangers in the town. And, before that, Relys's strange disappearance from the men's barracks. And Timbrin had never been found either . . .

Lytham swallowed nervously. Helwych watched him intently. ”Those that did not fall short,” said the captain, ”detonated in the air. There were a few sc.r.a.pes and cuts among the refugees, no more.”

”The refugees,” Helwych said, ”who continue to drop like summer flies in the first frost.” He leaned forward, gripping the captain in his glance. ”Tell me, Lytham. What do you think of that?”

”I . . .” There was fear in Lytham's eyes. ”I think it is ... unfortunate.”

”Unfortunate, indeed. Do you have any criticisms of my actions in this matter?''

”I ...”.

”Be careful, Lytham.”

”I ...”.

And then Helwych saw it: Gelyya. She was crouched in the shadows at the base of the hill, silhouetted by the floodlights of the Grayface defenses.

Interesting.

”What about Kallye?”

Lytham blinked. ”She was killed by a hound.”

”Indeed. What of her apprentice? Where is Gelyya?”

”I . . .”.

”She escaped, did she not, Lytham? She escaped with your help?” Useless, all of them. He would have been better off with Grayfaces from the beginning, and he was now sorry that he had not sent these little scrubbed boys to share the fate of Cvinthil and Dar-ham and their warriors.

”There was an attack that night, lord. She . . . might well have made her way into the countryside in the confusion.”

”All by herself, too, I imagine. And perhaps someone took the trouble to show her the location of a gate.” Helwych sat back. Dryyim. And now Lytham. ”I want you to go and find her.”

”Find her?”

Helwych grounded his staff, and the flagstone cracked beneath it. ”Find her. Take ten of your men ...” Men! He almost laughed. ”... and go after her.''

Lytham was plainly frightened. ”But, lord, the land is-”

”Infested with Grayfaces and hounds, yes,” said Helwych. ”It is almost certain death to enter it. Quite correct, captain. You should have thought of that when you helped the girl escape. Now go: you leave within the hour.”

”But-”

”Go!”

Weeping with fright, Lytham stumbled away and out the door. Helwych slumped back down in his chair. Had he allowed himself, he also might have wept, for as surely as Lytham faced death out in the open countryside, Helwych was beginning to believe that he himself would never leave Hall Kingsbury alive.

A boy. A little boy dressed up in the robes of a sorcerer ...

With the dawn, Alouzon led the columns along the west road. The last time she had been this way, spring had lain several weeks in the future, and the land had been tricked out in pastels and gray. But while she had been in Broceliande and Los Angeles, summer had come, and as though to spite the Worm and the Specter and the blight across the Cordillera, Vaylle had rip- ened. Barley was bearded. Wheat stood tall and kingly. Oats fluttered and laughed. Wildflowers had unrolled in a variegated carpet, and pastures glowed so green that they hurt the eye with pleasure.

Alouzon rode out from the road. About her was a fantasyland of innocence and fertility set with fairytale cities and villages as a crown might be set with jewels. Struck with the beauty, she stared openly, unabashed.

Dindrane had followed her. ” 'Tis good work you do, my lady.”

”Me?”

Boyish and girlish both, the priestess spoke as though uttering common fact: ”You made it, did you not?”

”Yeah ...” Alouzon agreed, and she suddenly wondered how she could be so reluctant to claim such a place as her own.

Maybe it was the power. She had said it herself: I don't want power. Power kills. Or maybe it was the sense of hubris that clung to such a claim. But power did not inevitably have to kill. Power could make. Power could heal a wound, or soothe a spirit, or keep an entire planet up and running. And even the question of hubris was rendered meaningless in the end, for what she faced in the Grail was not in any way based upon pride or vainglory, but-again the simple fact-upon the absolute humility of pa.s.sionate and gentle sacrifice.

Dindrane was watching her as though witnessing a mystery as deep as that which, once, she had celebrated with Baares, conjoining cup and knife in a symbol of quintessential union. ”From love can come only creation,” she said.

Alouzon was still reeling. ”Thanks, Dindrane. I'll remember that. I think that'll be one of those things that keeps me going until...” She groped for words, shrugged.

Dindrane bowed slightly in acknowledgement.

They reached Lake Innael in the late afternoon. The kings' instructions had been that the a.s.sembled troops should be ready to move at a moment's notice, and they were indeed prepared. Wagons were loaded, horses fed, saddles and bridles at hand. Supplies and weapons were at the peak of condition.

Alouzon, aware of the transience of the doors and unwilling to delay even a minute, ordered an immediate departure. By the time darkness was settling firmly over the plains about the lake and the first glimmerings of the door were flicking into existence, over five hundred warriors had formed into orderly columns and were waiting for the word to move out.

Of all those a.s.sembled on the sh.o.r.e save Kyria and Alouzon, the harpers and healers of Vaylle-steeped as they were in magic and the spiritual realms-were perhaps the best equipped to deal with the sights and images that lay between the Worlds. Dindrane had taken the precaution of scattering her people throughout the ranks of the warriors so that they could soothe any fears that might arise; and at her word, the harpers struck up a gentle strain that lifted even Alouzon's spirits.

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