Blood of Ambrose Read online

  “Do they have bowmen?” was his unexpected reply.

  “I don't think so,” she said. “Bowmen are infantry.”

  “Bad tactics,” he observed.

  “Shut up.”

  “We'll make it.”

  “We won't!”

  “You'll see.”

  They struck the ground and rebounded, leaping over the crown of the hill where the imperial riders were gathering. Velox's scream broke through a storm of horn calls. Ambrosia felt Wyrth's hands tighten reflexively on her arms. Morlock suddenly shouted, a refrain of nonsense syllables carried on a deep-throated roar. When they struck the ground in the center of where the cavalry group had been, there was nothing there but dead hillside and some clouds of dust. Ambrosia could hear the hoofbeats of the imperial riders departing in various directions through the dusk.

  “What was that spell?” Ambrosia demanded as they sprang up toward the first stars of evening.

  Morlock cleared his throat, seemingly embarrassed.

  “An Anhikh cattle call, I believe,” Wyrtheorn observed.

  “We'll have Wyrth shout next time—,” Morlock began.

  “Cattle call? Next time?” Ambrosia felt the conversation was getting away from her.

  “It might be anything,” Morlock explained. “So long as they believe dire Ambrosian magic is being worked on them.”

  “It won't keep working, Morlock,” Ambrosia said. “These are imperial soldiers.”

  “Oh, I think you underrate your reputations, Lady Ambrosia,” the dwarf disagreed cheerfully. “Some of the stories I heard about you in the Great Market were enough to make one swear off sausages.”

  “Sausages?”

  “You haven't heard that one? Well, never mind. The point is, these soldiers are quite prepared to see Ambrosii exact a dreadful revenge by means of dreadful magic. They have their heads crammed full of such stories from the time they're born. And here we have a flying horse screaming horribly as it hurls through the darkness while on its back a three-headed silhouette chants ominous but unintelligible words—oh, yes, they'll run like rabbits.”

  “But a whole cavalry wing…”

  “The more do run, the more will run,” Morlock said flatly. “Our chief danger is that Velox will break a leg, or overturn in his enthusiasm. I think as it gets darker we will even be safe from bowmen.”

  “They won't have bowmen.”

  Morlock shrugged.

  “Shut up!” Ambrosia insisted.

  Velox spotted another group of horsemen deeper in the hills. Snorting, he lowered his head and—as they fell toward the ground—struck off with all four hooves, bounding toward the hapless enemy.

  After dispersing the greater part of the cavalry wing, Velox seemed to grow restless, and even a little bored. At that time, well after full night had risen into the sky, Morlock managed to persuade the charger to direct his bounds toward the smudge of light on the western horizon that was the imperial city.

  “That was rather easy,” said Wyrtheorn suspiciously.

  “New horizons,” Ambrosia speculated. “Think of all the traffic he can disrupt in the city. What do you say, Morlock?”

  Morlock grunted. From Ambrosia's viewpoint his expression looked even more saturnine than usual.

  “I see what you mean,” said Wyrtheorn reflectively. “I hadn't thought of that.”

  Ambrosia held her silence through two more long leaps. Not even Velox screamed. The lifeless hills below issued no noises into the night air; the only sound was the chill persistent sea breeze, whispering over the dead lands toward the south.

  Eyeing the western horizon she said finally, “We're not headed directly for the city, are we?”

  “Gravesend Field, I think,” said her brother, in a burst of volubility.

  Ambrosia grunted.

  It became obvious as they left the Dead Hills behind them (a ragged shadow on the moonslit eastern horizon) that Morlock's guess was correct. Velox's leaps over the plain separating them from Gravesend were the long low ones that covered the most ground in the least time, and he had resumed his enthusiastic screaming.

  “You know what it is,” the dwarf said, in a speculative tone of voice.

  “Say it,” Ambrosia replied.

  “He's not satisfied with the outcome of the joust. You saw how Morlock got knocked right off his back. Maybe that's a point of pride with warhorses.”

  “My fault,” Morlock said matter-of-factly. “I never was a great spearman. You may be right, though.”

  “Is your warhorse wounded by self-doubt? Your palfrey pained with an inexplicable distress? Your charger changeable in his moods? Consult Brother Wyrth, ministering to the emotional needs of the equine even now in yonder booth!”

  Morlock grunted.

  “Well, it might pay better than being your apprentice.”

  “Anything would. I suppose Urdhven and his soldiers will have left Gravesend by now.”

  Ambrosia resisted the temptation to grunt enigmatically. “Think again, brother. Note yon trail of dust the sea breeze is carrying south.”

  “Um. Well observed.”

  The trail of dust was now somewhat distorted by the wind, but clearly its trail began in the Dead Hills and led toward the edge of Gravesend Field, the anchor building now visible, black against the night-blue western sky.

  “A messenger?” Wyrth guessed. “From the cavalry war-leader to Urdhven.”

  Ambrosia laughed aloud. “What would you give, Wyrtheorn, to hear the delicate phrasing of that message? ‘You see, Your Worship, there was this horse…’”

  “Ah, Lady Ambrosia, what wouldn't I give? An aethrium spike for each of Urdhven's lordly earlobes. A bowl of chicken blood for his slightly shopworn golem. A stirrup-cup of phlogiston to lend, shall we say, a mellow glow to his last and longest ride—”

  “Morlock!” Ambrosia shouted. “What are you doing?”

  Her brother had leaned forward abruptly and was speaking in a low voice to Velox. In the silence following her cry, Morlock's brisk lilting syllables rang clear.

  “Westhold dialect, isn't it, Lady Ambrosia?” Wyrth remarked. “I never could follow it, but I'm not the horsey sort.”

  “Oh, Wyrth, you're lying to me again.”

  “No, really. But I guess Morlock is putting the finger (or the hoof?) on our Lord Protector. That must be him standing there, at the edge of the lists….”

  They struck the ground; Velox pushed off with something like deliberation, changing their direction slightly, putting them in a short high leap. Velox screamed again, the cry of battle. They would next strike the ground within Gravesend Field.

  Had Velox not been screaming Ambrosia would have pounded on Morlock's crooked shoulders and demanded an explanation. She would have advocated the course of prudence, deliberation, and the better part of valor.

  Uselessly! After all, she realized, that rug had already been pulled out from under their feet. It was too late to think of caution when you had spent the early evening chasing cavalry detachments through the hills on the back of a battle-mad, laughing, middle-aged flying horse. Wasn't it?

  Morlock looked back over his crooked shoulder and gave a crooked grin. Then, turning, he threw back his head (nearly braining her) and began to chant loudly in Dwarvish. Wyrth joined in at the third syllable. Ambrosia herself recognized the song, though she did not know Dwarvish well. It was perhaps the most common “Praising of Day,” sung each day at dawn by the dwarvish clans of Thrymhaiam. She didn't know the words, but she wordlessly lent her own cracking voice to the simple tune.

  Heolor charn vehernam choran harwellanclef;

  wull wyrma daelu herial hatathclef;

  feng fernanclef modblind vemarthal morwe;

  Rokh Rokhlanclef hull veheoloral morwe.

  Dal sar drangan an immryrend ek atlam,

  dal sar deoran an kyrrend knylloram—*

  So singing, they returned to Gravesend Field.

  When the horse and its three singing riders f
ell out of the dark sky, the King instantly ceased to disbelieve in all the outlandish stories that he had heard about his ancient Ambrosian kin. They might not all be true. But for every false one there would be an even more unlikely tale that was true.

  He had time to think this. He had time, open-mouthed, to watch the Lord Protector roll in the dust to keep from being brained by one of the descending horse's hooves. Then he squawked and rolled in the dust himself for the same reason.

  The horse's right rear hoof struck the ground not an arm's length from the King's head. Something between the hoof and the ground glowed like molten glass. He glanced up as the hoof left the ground, and he met the eye of his Grandmother, seated between her brother and the dwarf Wyrtheorn. The King's Grandmother waved cheerily at him (her hand was all bound up with cloth) and shouted something he couldn't hear.

  The King wondered if he was dreaming. The horse and its riders were gone, and he was left behind in a cloud of dust.

  Then a soldier seized him by the ankles and hurled him like a sack over his shoulder. What breath the King had was knocked out of him. He lay unresisting with his head against the soldier's back, watching the man's boots flicker in and out of sight as he ran desperately into the night. Clearing the lists in a single amazing bound, he circled around the field to lose himself in the myriad graves of Ontil. He didn't pause from running for a long time—more than long enough for the King to regain his breath and his wits. When the soldier, gasping painfully, slowed to a halt in the shadow of a mausoleum, the King was not surprised by the voice that spoke to him.

  “Think we'll be…all right here…Your Majesty,” Lorn gasped. “For a bit…begging your pardon…Majesty…set you on your feet—”

  “Never mind, Lorn,” the King said quickly. “Just let me go and I'll roll off.”

  But Lorn lifted the King carefully back over his shoulder and put him down on the ground. Then the Legionary leaned back against the tomb and gasped helplessly. In a few moments these exertions subsided and Lorn was able to speak again.

  “Beg your pardon, Your Majesty,” said Lorn. “It's been a night-and-a-flipping-half for me.”

  “Please, Lorn,” said the King. “I'm just glad we're both alive. When I saw you lying on the field I was sure Urdhven had killed you.”

  The shadow that was Lorn nodded sharply, and the King could hear the smile in his voice when he spoke. “The Protector knocked me down in the fight; I thought it best to let him think he'd knocked me out. I'm not half the swordsman he is.”

  “But ten times the tactician, Lorn.”

  “Ssh, Your Majesty,” Lorn replied, sounding pleased. “My old dad taught me that trick, and maybe half a dozen others. I'm not one for these great prancings and politickings. But I know where my duty lies, Your Majesty.”

  Silence fell. The word “duty” had an unpleasant effect on the King. He realized their escape was only temporary, that Lorn intended them to return to the city, with its prancings and politickings. He'd half hoped the loyal soldier would recommend a flight into the Empire, or even beyond it. But he hadn't the courage to suggest it himself. “What should we do now?” he asked.

  “Well, Your Majesty,” said Lorn, intent on the problem. “There's a band of soldiers at Upriver Gate I think we can trust to let us into the city. Once there…”

  The King sighed.

  “Scattered like rats,” Ambrosia said reflectively, as they flew over the anchor building. “The army's not what it was.”

  “It's the weird,” Morlock replied. “The weird is always terrifying.”

  “Particularly when it comes out of the Dead Hills after dark,” Wyrth observed. “I think he's right, Lady Ambrosia. If we'd merely been a military force of superior strength, those soldiers would have fought like madmen.”

  “It's still a weakness,” Ambrosia insisted. “In the old days it never would have happened. You remember, Morlock.”

  Her brother grunted concessively, and there was silence for a time as the horse made long ground-spurning bounds. The bright cloud of the city grew visibly nearer, over the chaos of tombs.

  “You know,” Wyrth said presently, “I hate to say this…but I think we're going to have to abandon horse.”

  “Yes,” Morlock agreed reluctantly. “He's not responding to the bridle. We can't ride him till he tires out.”

  Ambrosia, who had come to that conclusion some time ago, said, “Let's wait a bit, though. The tombs thin out in the hills, just under the city's walls—it's supposed to be bad luck to bury people there. There'll be less chance of bashing out our brains on a grave marker.”

  “We should leap just after Velox lands and jumps off again,” Morlock remarked thoughtfully. “Momentum. We'll hit the ground at a slower speed.”

  Wyrtheorn said something in Dwarvish, and Morlock replied, “No. I don't think so.” Ambrosia began to ask a question, then realized she didn't want to know.

  Velox landed atop a mausoleum and kicked off again. The city grew visibly nearer.

  Wyrth began to unbuckle Morlock's pack, which was strapped behind the saddle, and called forward to Morlock, “I'll drop this off just before we jump, shall I?”

  “Some time before,” Morlock corrected. “You must not miss the moment.”

  “You don't want your tools damaged.”

  “You're more important, Wyrtheorn,” Morlock said dispassionately.

  “Soon, now,” Ambrosia said, to break up this display of sentiment. “There are no graves beneath us anymore.” Velox landed on soft grass and leapt up into the sky.

  “Yes,” Morlock said. “The next leap will take us too close to the city walls. Drop the pack now, Wyrth.”

  A thump from below announced the pack's arrival below and behind them.

  “Just after the next landing,” Morlock said. “And when you jump, clear well away from the horse.”

  “Why?” Ambrosia asked suspiciously.

  There was a pause as Morlock obviously gauged whether there was time enough for an explanation. “You'll see,” was all he said, in the end.

  “Hmph!”

  The city rose like the ragged edge of a dense field of stars over the last remaining hill. Then, as they descended, it was occulted by the hill again. The charger fell downward; his hooves struck the ground.

  The three riders left the horse at practically the same moment, Morlock and Wyrtheorn leaping off the left side and Ambrosia off the right. She was chiefly intent on landing on her shoulder, to spare her hands and wrists, but she couldn't help but be aware that as they left the horse, he plunged straight up as if an invisible hand were drawing him into the sky. He screamed delightedly, and it occurred to Ambrosia that without his riders as counterweights, the phlogiston in his shoes would lift him even farther.

  Then she struck the ground, on her shoulder indeed, but the jar sent bolts of pain shooting to the tip of each broken finger. She rolled downhill a ways before she managed to slide to a halt. Above her she heard the continuous scream of the warhorse fade away as he fell upward into the endless abyss of the star-thick sky.

  How far would he go? she wondered. Would he reach the paths of the moons and the sun?

  Silence settled over the hillside. Ambrosia, as her pain and wonder faded, became conscious of two breathing heaps slightly farther down the slope.

  “Morlock!” she said.

  The larger of the two heaps grunted.

  “I'm never going to have you rescue me again.”

  After a pause Morlock said reflectively, “It was worth it, then.” The silence persisted through another brief pause, until a faint snoring announced that Morlock had fallen asleep.

  * * *

  *Blindly Death takes hold of the timid and the brave;

  vermin devour the evil and good alike;

  Maker and miner sleep in the same silence;

  dragon and dragonkiller fall under the same fell.

  There is one darkness that ends all dreaming,

  one light in which all living will
awake—

  ne day Lorn returned to their room in the city with what the King had learned to think of as his “bad news” expression. The first time the King had seen it was almost half a year before, perhaps ten days after their escape from Gravesend Field. The city Water Wheel, where Lorn did the day-labor that paid for their food and lodgings, was closed for repairs. They lived from hand to mouth, with no savings, and that meant there was no supper that night, nor the next either. On the third day the wheel reopened, and they gorged that night on fresh wheat bread, slices of roast meat, and cheese. It had been wonderful, worth the fast. But that first day! Lorn had taken forever to break the news to his King, afraid the fragile boy would collapse in hysterics at the thought of hunger. But the King had often gone without meals for days at a time, for fear of poison, and as it happened he handled the fast better than Lorn (who was used to regular fare and plenty of it at his legion's refectory). And it would always be that way with Lorn's “bad news.” The badness was mostly in Lorn's own mind.

  So as soon as he saw the renegade Legionary, the King smiled and said, “Out with it Lorn. It can't be so bad.”

  Lorn smiled tentatively—as usual—and said, “Well, Your Majesty…no supper tonight, I'm afraid.”

  “We've still got salt beef and flatbread from last night,” the King replied. He always laid a little by, now.

  “Pretty dry, they were,” Lorn said wryly. “They'll be drier tonight. I forgot to bring up water, too.”

  “Lorn,” the King said patiently, “what is it? Was the wheel closed again?”

  “No, Your Majesty. I worked and was paid.” He paused, then blurted out, “I spent the wages.”

  “Oh?” The King was surprised and a little embarrassed. This seemed very unlike Lorn.

  “Yes, Your Majesty. I…I bought something.”

  “Well, it's not important.”

  “But it is, Your Majesty. I think it might be very important.”

  He had it in his hand, now—a linen bag about twice as long as one of his thumbs. There was something inside it. He reached it and took it out: a beautifully detailed model of a crow.