The Gathering Storm

“It will be hard to sail to this place from the sea. It’s shallow. The tree sorcerers will raise a mist to confound you.”



“Our ships can sail in shallow water. The sorcerers’ magic will not disturb us. But we don’t know the path that will lead us from the sea to these islands.”



To his surprise, she shrugged. “Even I don’t know what rivers lead to the wash and how they tangle in the fens. There are some who live on the seacoast who know, but it is these clans who guided the queen to the holy island. They will not help you. They are in league with the Albans.”



“Without help, our ships will get lost in the marshlands, won’t they?”



She cupped her hands over her mouth and gave a “courlee” call. A second cry answered from a distance, out among the reedbeds and mires. “That’s my other child, called Ki. My sister’s daughter—now mine. You can’t see her, and so can’t the white-hairs. To hunt in the fens you need a guide.”



“I need guides for my army, and I need a caretaker for the holy island.”



Her smile flashed like lightning, quickly seen and quickly gone, but her expression remained solemn. “Give me back the holy claim that my clan was charged with in the long ago days, and I will help you. But if you promise me, and cheat me, then you will fare no better than the queen. I have dreams, stranger. There is power in dreams.”



He nodded, acknowledging her blunt wisdom, and the naked threat in her words. “I know the worth of my allies.” He drew a finger around the contours of the wooden Circle hanging at his chest as he gazed out over the fens. From deep within this labyrinth the Alban queen might strike at will against his garrisons. From this shelter within the fenlands she might hold on for months or for years, a worm in his side. Alba would not be his until she was dead, her heirs executed, and her tree sorcerers shorn of their power.



Manda licked her lips as if tasting the last of the brew. “Show your trust, stranger. Let my children guide you out into the fens. They will show you the holy island and the queen’s camp, and you can judge for yourself if the fight is worth it.”



XIX



A PRISONER OF POWER



1



THIS reunion was not going as she had expected. Sanglant’s anger was palpable, and because Liath simply had no idea how to respond, she turned around and left the tent. His hostility and Blessing’s illness were too much to take in at once.



The shaman followed her outside, herding her toward the crest where they could see the landscape spread below them.



“Why do you allow this male to speak to you so disrespectfully?” she asked.



“He is my husband!”



“He is not like you,” said the shaman reasonably as they strolled up the hill.



Grass pulled along Liath’s thighs. The sun shone down. There was not a single scrap of cloud in the heavens. She had never seen a sky so vast, hills tumbling away on either side and the blue dome stretching away to the ends of the earth.



“No,” she agreed at last. He was no scholar; he was not bookish or thoughtful, not educated, not restful, a man interested more in action than in words. A good soldier, an excellent captain, and a loyal prince. Hugh had taunted him with the title “prince of dogs,” after his year as Bloodheart’s captive, and there was something to the name. But she did not know what he was now. He had lived for four years without her, years which to her had seemed scarcely more than a week. “I don’t know how he has changed while I walked the spheres.”



“It is best to set aside a pura which has become unpredictable and dangerous.”



“That isn’t our custom. He needs time to recover from his wound.” From his anger.



The shaman flicked back her ears. Reaching the crest, they turned to look down at the centaur encampment settled near the base of a hollow.



“How can I save my daughter?” Liath asked.



“She did not die when the thread was severed. That must give us hope that she may yet recover.”



“She must eat and drink in order to live.”



“It may be possible to sustain her for a time by means of sorcery.”



“My father said that a cocoon changes a caterpillar to a butterfly. It’s a magical binding in and of itself. Would sorcery change her?”



“I do not know. But if we cannot wake her, it may be the only way to keep her alive until we discover how to heal her.”



Liath sighed.



To the east the land fell away into the valley; the distant river winked at them, light dazzling on the flowing water as it cut through the grass in giant curves. Farther east, the crags shone where the afternoon sunlight played across them, catching glints of color. To the west the sun blinded, but if she squinted she made out a countryside of hills rumpled up like the ridges in a furrowed blanket.