Judgment at the Verdant Court Page 11

  “What do you know of a father’s grief?” Beric’s voice was not strong now. It was barely more than a whisper.

  “Nothing,” Christopher admitted. “But I know enough of a husband’s.”

  “What is it you would have of us?” A different man, not as old as Beric, but ramrod straight with power and responsibility. By the tone of his voice, both measured and commanding, Christopher guessed this must be the Lord Ranger Einar. “Should we set him free, and bury our sorrow in an empty grave?”

  “Not empty.” Christopher slowly reached into his pocket and extracted a tiny wooden box. “I brought something to trade. The real villain.” Opening the lid of the box, he let sunlight glitter on gold and sink into black stone.

  Another woman of indeterminate age stepped forward, disgust written across her hard, sharp features. Her status was even less mistakable than Lord Einar’s. “That abomination must be destroyed.”

  “I agree, Lady Sigurane. I brought it to you for that purpose. Take your vengeance on it.”

  The High Druid stared at him with her bright, birdlike eyes, and he wondered how he had ever thought of Lady Io as intimidating.

  “You charge us with this task as well? Have we not trod under your yoke long enough? Have we not suffered enough on your behalf?”

  He stood there, utterly mystified. She took pity on his stupidity.

  “The ring was meant for you. Is this not clear? The Shadow reached out its hand once it found a fitter glove than Baron Bartholomew. It set out to capture you as its pawn. You shirked this fate, letting lesser men take the blow. And we paid the price. In precious blood.”

  Black Bart’s incoherent last words came back to him. “I will show I am the stronger servant.” It had all been a ploy. His improbable victories, his temporary defeats, arranged by some hidden power to this end, that he should gain the ring and lose his soul.

  At every turn he had placed the people around him into terrible danger. He had been a lightning rod, and it had been his friends and allies that suffered the strokes. He dropped the box, horrified. The ring rolled onto the grass, winking in the sunlight.

  He turned to those who still stood with him. Gregor was white-faced with shock; Lalania had her hand over her mouth, fighting back tears.

  “I should have . . .” she said, the words muffled through her hand. “I should have seen.”

  “There is much you should have seen,” Lady Sigurane said. “There is much you have yet to see. The Shadow has espied you, and yet you are blind. You build up castles and ranks like a child stacking toys, thinking they will protect you. All they do is stoke the hunger of the Lords of Night, and trap their prey in a stone bowl.”

  She softened her voice, like a lioness growling to a cub.

  “Your people are as thick as swine in a pen. Rank piles on rank until even the gods must be tempted by the tael-price of your great lords. Can you not see the wisdom of restraint? Can you not imagine that we might pass under the scythe by being too low for the harvest?”

  Christopher could see. But it was not in his nature to cower, even in the face of the hurricane. And besides, there was the matter of the ring.

  “Lady Sigurane, it appears the Shadow came for me when I was only first rank. How much lower can I stoop?”

  “Then we should cast you off.” Lady Sigurane had no mercy in her eyes.

  Lord Einar had none for his wife. “And yet, honor remains. We are bound to Kingsrock by sworn oath and shared blood. When the harvest comes—if it comes in our lifetimes—we will do our duty.”

  It occurred to Christopher that this might be his true task. The battle for the fate of the entire Kingdom was being played out, even if few could see the score. It was, perhaps, too early to despair. The ring had failed. Having lost his head, he still lived; having breached every custom of the Kingdom, he still gained in power every day. He had a god on his side. Perhaps it counterbalanced the machinations of the Shadow. Perhaps the difference between ultimate victory and final defeat lay in how hard he could tip the scales.

  That was a responsibility he did not want, a burden he was not sure he could bear. Knowing that he had already been carrying it unawares did not lighten it.

  Cannan rejoined the conversation by collapsing in a heap as the spell ran its course and released him. The huge man lay on the ground, weeping silently.

  Beric walked closer, like a man in a dream, his gaze locked onto the ring. “You bring me a blood-price in gold. But can you bring me blood? Can you restore my daughter to me?”

  A rhetorical question, as everyone there would know.

  “Strange priest of a foreign god, I beseech you. You returned my son. Can you return my daughter?”

  Or perhaps not so rhetorical. Christopher hadn’t known that they had known. He would not have guessed that they would care to reveal the fact of D’Kan’s raising. But Beric’s grief was overwhelming, and in his quavering voice Christopher heard only a heartbroken parent.

  “Not without a miracle. But I am in the market for a miracle myself.” It was the only way he would ever see his wife again. In the calculus of miracles, one seemed as likely as two. “Should I find another, I would gladly trade the second for Niona.”

  “Blasphemy,” hissed Lady Sigurane.

  “And the price of this succor?” Beric ignored the High Druid, his gaze lifting from the hated ring to bore into Christopher’s eyes.

  “We have a common foe. Cannan can still help us with that, maybe even more so now that he has passed through its grasp. Give him back to me, to continue the fight.” Christopher could see that none of these perfectly rational arguments had any effect on Beric, so he launched his last and greatest bolt. If this did not save Cannan’s life, he had nothing left. “I don’t know much about death. I don’t know where Niona is now, or what she is doing, or if she is anywhere at all. But I do know this. She will never return to this world if Cannan is not in it.”

  On the ground, Cannan clawed the earth in agony, tearing up clods of brown and black dirt that crumbled between his fingers.

  “For the price of a cold and useless vengeance, my Lord Vicar will sell you hope.” Lalania spoke up, entirely unexpected.

  “Easy enough to promise what you may never have to pay,” answered Lord Einar.

  “Not so easy for the White, whose word is their bond. What ordinary men say in passing, the priests of the Bright Lady carve in adamantine. As you already know.” Dimly Christopher was aware that Lalania had set this up, had lured Einar into questioning his integrity, solely so she could play this trump card.

  “The Bright Lady has no authority here.” Lady Sigurane bit off her words like pieces of meat.

  “Nor do you, woman!” cried Beric in sudden fury. “Nor do you have power here. You talk at me of cycles and wonders, but my daughter is still dead. Your words are no comfort to an old man and an empty hearth.”

  “Blasphemies upon blasphemies!” Lady Sigurane met the old man, fire for fire. Christopher felt the situation slipping away, tilting crazily into some internecine conflict he did not understand.

  “Peace, my lord brother, my lady wife.” Lord Einar put out his hand and addressed the crowd. “Beric has the right of it. This is the Verdant Court, and we men are charged with enforcing justice. The fate of the murderer is in the court’s hands, and the court will do as Beric chooses. Mercy or destruction, it is his call. We owe this much to a grieving father.”

  Christopher looked at Einar with respect. He’d been terrified of the hissing druid just because she was standing next to him, but Einar had to share a bed with the woman.

  “I need not listen to the Mother insulted.” Lady Sigurane turned the heat of her blaze on her husband, but the Lord Ranger was apparently made of asbestos.

  “Then you may leave, if you wish. You are only here by courtesy in the first place.”

  Amazingly, astoundingly, Sigurane backed down. Christopher watched in fascination as she banked the flame in her face until it only smoked, and then ret
reated back a step.

  Lord Einar now turned on Christopher.

  “You will parole this man? If we release him, you will accept responsibility for his conduct, until such time as your charge is fulfilled?”

  Christopher wasn’t entirely sure what that meant, but he knew the only possible answer, so he said it. “Yes.”

  Now Lord Einar faced Beric. “Then the choice is yours, lord brother. Death, mercy, or if you cannot choose, you may submit it to a vote.”

  “I can choose. I am not so grieved that I cannot wield my will. Priest, I take you at your word. Take this wretched ring, and take this wretched villain, and return to me my daughter, should chance and miracle favor you.”

  Christopher knelt on the grass and closed the wooden box around the ring. It clicked with finality, the sound a seal to the contract they had just made. The box seemed heavier now that he understood what it truly contained. He put it back in his pocket as he stood up.

  Lady Sigurane apparently felt she was still allowed to berate Christopher. “Niona will not return for you, priest. She was always true to her faith.”

  Christopher glanced around at Niona’s family. Beric stood unchanged, as if he had not heard the High Druid’s words, but Lady Io and Ser D’Kan wore a blush of the most shameful red. Now he began to comprehend the outlines of this rift, and how much D’Kan’s revival had challenged the druids and their dogma. Lady Io worst of all, since she was trapped between a druid’s faith and a mother’s love.

  “I’m not interested in faith,” he said. “I just want what’s best for Niona.”

  “And what of what she wants? How will you pluck her from eternal death and then reconcile this boon with her? What of all the others she has lost, aunts and uncles and cousins, who will not share in your generosity? How can you expect her to bear the burden of this special favor?”

  Christopher had no answer. He hadn’t even thought of the question yet. But Gregor had one that left the Rangers unconsciously nodding in agreement.

  “Cannan will earn it for her.”

  Reflecting during the walk back, Christopher thought he understood why Gregor’s words had ended the court on what seemed to be friendly terms—at least, from the men’s point of view. This was the deal. This was the contract society made with heroes. They put their lives on the line, faced indescribable horrors in defense of the realm, and in exchange they got first pick of the rewards. That included miracles.

  It seemed fair enough, from one perspective. Christopher admitted that. But at the same time, the question Sigurane had asked continued to bother him. Gregor’s answer was good enough for everyone else, and probably as good as this world would ever have. To be honest, it was even good enough for Christopher. He’d seen what heroes were expected to face, and they did it with pointy bits of steel instead of rifles and artillery. They were due some compensation.

  But Christopher wasn’t sure it was supposed to be good enough for him. He wanted to discuss it with the Saint, although he was pretty sure that Krellyan would shrug and expect Christopher to solve his own moral quandaries.

  All of this theorizing was a way to avoid the problem immediately at hand. Cannan walked behind him, clanking with every step, the chain still bound to his collar. The knight carried the links and the ground spike in his arms, a great bundle of weight, without complaint, although his arms trembled with fatigue. Christopher looked at Gregor, imploring him to help the other knight, but Gregor shook his head. This was something Cannan had to do on his own.

  Sadly, Christopher knew it would be only the first of many trials that Cannan would have to do on his own. To accept help from anyone else would invalidate Cannan’s right to claim his miracle. The red knight would have to endure, suffer, and succeed at every task from now until he died, knowing that a single failure would doom not only himself but all hope of Niona’s resurrection.

  A cruel hope that had sprung from Christopher’s lips. Promising what he might never have to pay had become a bad habit.

  Gregor, in his simple strength, spoke as if everything were normal.

  “Gods preserve me, Christopher, but I thought your days were done. I thought the High Druid was going to turn into a dragon and bite your head off, then and there.”

  “Ha,” muttered their guide. “Dragons wish they could turn into High Druids.”

  “How does—” Christopher realized it might be an indelicate question, but he couldn’t help himself. “How does Lord Einar . . . cope?”

  “It’s a poor knight who can’t master his horse. You have that saying in your lands, yes? Well, a Ranger is expected to master all beasts, tame and wild and fey to boot, and a Lord Ranger is a master of men as well. She may fly off in a huff, but she’ll come to his whistle when he calls her. He wouldn’t be a Lord Ranger if he couldn’t tame one hot-blooded woman, for all her Mother’s power.”

  Christopher gaped in awe at hearing so many words from their previously laconic guide. Perhaps they’d finally found a topic the man felt worth discussing.

  Lalania couldn’t resist the bait, though. “I imagine your womenfolk have a different take on the matter.”

  “I imagine they do, Lady. As well they should. Men and women were made by the Mother to be different. And thank the Mother for that!” The guide turned to wink at Lalania, crudely suggestive, but juvenile enough that Christopher couldn’t imagine taking offense.

  When Lalania stuck her tongue out, Christopher started worrying about the situation resolving itself in an entirely different way. Then he had to remind himself it wasn’t his place to object.

  When they finally reached the pasture, D’Kan was already waiting for him. The young Ranger knelt at his feet silently. Christopher was exhausted with protocol, with judging and punishing and forgiving, and so he decided to skip it all and get on with things.

  “Can we make the border by nightfall?” he asked.

  “With hard riding, my lord, we can reach Palar, where you can find accommodations for the night.” D’Kan spoke without looking up.

  “The north road to Kingsrock, after all?” Karl said.

  Christopher and Cannan both needed to see the Saint, one for questions and the other for atonement. Lalania may have made Christopher uneasy with the process, but Cannan in his current state was useless to anyone. Something had to be done, and Krellyan was the man to do it.

  Instinctively Christopher knew Krellyan would never let him pass off his responsibility for the red knight, but right now he needed a destination. Kingsrock was as good as any.

  “The north road,” he said, and swung into the saddle.

  9

  APPEAL TO BETTER NATURE

  They couldn’t buy a horse for Cannan, not for love or money. Not that there was any love lost between the druids and Cannan. One farmer went so far as to suggest that Christopher tie the knight to his horse and drag him.

  Karl fared no better. The peasantry loved their horses too much to sell them “across the river,” which apparently was a fate worse than death. They made it clear they would rather eat their animals than sell them to heartless brutes who would think of nothing but how much value they could get out of the beast before it died. When Karl, in exasperation, complained that a farmer was valuing his horse as if it were his sister, the man looked at Karl with complete seriousness and said, “Well now, she very well might be.”

  Now Christopher had Lalania behind him, clinging to him for dear life, as he had once clung to her when paralyzed. It was intensely uncomfortable for him. But the destriers were the only horses strong enough to bear two, and Christopher couldn’t inflict Lalania on Gregor. Not if he wanted to be able to look Disa in the eye again.

  Cannan rode Lalania’s horse like a sack of potatoes. The druids had at least removed the collar and chain, but only because the metal was too valuable to give away.

  They rode into Palar well after dark. It was a pretty town, set on a hill that gazed out over fields to the west and forest to the east. Lalania said they were h
alf druid here, but they had an inn, so Christopher forgave them for their injudicious choice of parenthood.

  In the morning he haggled with the innkeeper over the bill while Karl raided the town for horses. The innkeeper smiled and told jokes and adamantly refused to charge less than three times the normal rate for the rooms he had let. The steep price annoyed Christopher until Karl presented him with the staggering bill for the train of animals he’d picked out. Karl was, as always, unsympathetic.

  “Your cavalry has an inexhaustible appetite for fresh horses, and these are the best in the Kingdom. You’d eventually buy them anyway, at twice the price, once they’d made it to the market in Kingsrock.”

  At least now they made good time, changing mounts every few hours to give all of the horses a break. Christopher felt a little strange riding a horse other than Royal. It felt like infidelity. Royal didn’t seem to care, though.

  When they finally climbed the winding road to the gates of Kingsrock, Christopher detected a change in the gate guards. They forewent giving him a hard time, concentrating all of their hostile stares on Cannan.

  Inside the city, the reception was more subtle but no less dismaying. People glanced their way, and then casually disappeared, entering the nearest shop or turning down a side street.

  Gregor unlimbered his shield from its normal resting place on his saddle, and let it hang from his left arm instead. Christopher had been here long enough to see that the simple act transformed the blue knight from road-weary traveler to combat-ready soldier.

  Lalania followed suit in her own way, shaking her hair loose and taking her lute out from its case. The destriers, ever alert to the moods of their masters, flattened their ears and stepped a little higher.

  “What the dark is going on?” Christopher asked.

  Cannan answered, the first time he had spoken since the court.