3. Ashling.pdf

(1501 KB) Pobierz
Ashling
by Isobelle Carmody
Determined to forge an alliance between the Misfits and the rebel forces that
seek to overthrow the authoritarian Council, teenager Elspeth embarks on a
diplomatic journey to meet with their leaders. But will the rebels accept the
Misfits as allies?
At great risk Elspeth makes her way to Sutrium. But not even her enchanted
mental powers can prepare Elspeth for the greatest danger of all….
For Shane
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank my editors, Kaye Ronai, Erica Irving, and Jenna Felice,
for their enthusiasm and gentle precision, and Donato, for the enchanting
mystery of his covers.
Part I - The Days of Rain
I
At first sight, the gypsy woman appeared to be embracing
the stake. Her
languid pose and mocking smile made it seem impossible that she was about
to be burned. Blood dripped steadily out of slits from elbow to wrist, yet she
showed neither pain nor fear.
The gray-gowned Herder lifted his palms to the sky as he chanted the
purification prayer. The band sewn on the left sleeve of his gown showed he
was a fifth-level priest. Not one of the inner cadre, but powerful nonetheless.
He was old, bald-scalped and toothless, but his eyes glowed like live coals as
he made the warding-off signs.
“Beware, demon,” he hissed. “You have found an easy vessel in this foul
gypsy’s body. Yet I will drive you out.”
Shockingly, the woman laughed aloud.
“You know I am not possessed, Herder. Say the truth and be done with it. Tell
them that you burn me because I tried to heal a baby when your own
worthless treatments failed.”
The villagers, standing in a cluster about the stake, rustled like leaves with the
wind passing through them, but no one spoke in the woman’s defense, and
none met her eyes.
“You used herb lore,” the Herder said, with hissing emphasis. “It was such
dabbling in forbidden lore that brought Lud’s wrath onto the Beforetimers for
their conceit. The Herder Faction heals with humility, trusting to Lud’s
guidance instead of sinful pride. The plagues were Lud’s warning that the
Landfolk tread the same dangerous and prideful path when they close their
ears to the Faction, for Herders are the voices of Lud.” He blinked and
seemed to rein in his religious fervor. “The woman who allowed you to defile
her child will also be burned for heresy.”
A woman screamed and fainted, but no one moved to her aid.
“You are a fool,” the gypsy’s voice rang out. “You will not be allowed to burn
her when the Council can have her sweating her life out in one of their
stinking farms.”
“I am a Herder. Lud and the Faction rules me, not the Council,” the priest
snapped. There was a sullen mutter from the crowd, but the Herder glared
them to silence. “She invoked the black arts. Council lore grants me the right
to burn her and any who treat with her.”
“What black arts?” the gypsy demanded contemptuously.
The Herder turned back to her. “You told the woman her child would die and
one day later it died. You cursed it and thereby revealed the demon within.”
“I treated the babe, but saw quickly by its symptoms that it was too late to
save it,” the woman said. “It could not tolerate the potions you fed it. I told
the parents it would die on the morrow, so that they might say their farewells
and not waste the child’s final hours.”
“Do not waste your own final moments with lies,” the Herder jeered, pushing
a gloating smile into me woman’s face.
Her hand snaked out suddenly and the priest wrenched back with a strangled
cry. She gave a throaty laugh of triumph. “What are you afraid of, old goat?
Do you think my gypsy skin might be catching?”
“Beg, demon! Proclaim your guilt, and the cleansing will be swift,” he
screamed, almost hysterical with fury.
She laughed again, a humorless bark. “Cease your ranting, old man. Kill me
so that I don’t have to see your ugly face anymore.”
Even from the back of the crowd, I could see the Herder’s face mottle with
outrage. Then his lips folded into a vindictive smile. “Evil must not be
permitted to think itself triumphant,” he said silkily, and turned to speak a
word to his acolyte, eyes glittering with malice.
The boy proffered a selection of long-handled metal tools.
“Th’ bastard’s goin’ to brand her before he burns her,” Matthew hissed into
my ear, his highland accent thickened with anger.
“Am I blind?” I snapped. The amount of blood pooled about the woman’s feet
told me she would be lucky to live long enough to feel the flames of
purification, let alone to be rescued, even if we could manage it. In spite of
her defiance, her face was as white as smoke.
“We mun do somethin’,” Matthew whispered urgently. He gestured to our
gypsy disguise, as if it made some point of its own.
“Be silent and let me think.” I sent the thought direct to his mind.
The sensible thing to do would be to accept that it was too late to save her,
and withdraw before anyone noticed us. I looked at the gypsy again. Her chin
lifted in defiance as the Herder approached with the brands.
I cursed under my breath and slid down from Zade’s back, mentally asking
the horse to stand quiet until I called. I told Matthew to turn the carriage and
take himself back to the main road, not trusting his instinct for drama.
“Wait for me out of sight”
“What will you do? An’ what about th’ wheel rim?” he asked eagerly.
“It will hold,” I said shortly. “If not, we’ll free the horses and leave the
carriage.”
As soon as he was gone, I pushed my way through the crowd, at the same
time extending a delicate coercive probe. Fortunately the Herder was not
mind sensitive, so he was not aware of my intrusion.
“Where is her wagon?” I demanded aloud.
He swung to face me, eyes slitting at the sight of my gypsy attire. “By what
right do you question a voice of Lud?” he snarled.
“By right of blood,” I said.
It was Council lore that blood kin might speak in defense of their own. In the
past, this had not stopped Herders doing what they wished and later making
excuses to the Council for excessive zeal. But with the rift between Faction
and Council, the priests’ power had waned and they were less wont to openly
flout Council lore. In any case it was only a stalling tactic, since I had no
proof of kinship to the gypsy.
“Her wagon has been burned, as have all her Luddamned utensils and
potions,” the Herder said grudgingly, but his memory showed him rifling
through the wagon and removing this and that piece before the thing was
flamed. My probe slid sideways into a memory in which he had tortured to
death the gypsy’s bondmate and I shuddered inwardly.
“You have proof that you are related?” he demanded.
“All gypsies are brothers and sisters,” I answered, not wanting to be caught
openly in a lie.
“Do not taint my ears with the practices of your foul breed,” he hissed. “I
asked for proof of kinship—you have shown me none, therefore be silent.”
I saw his mind form a plan to report me to the soldier-guards for Sedition,
thereby ridding himself of me in case I was related by blood. He turned back
to the gypsy and snorted in annoyance at finding her hanging limply from her
bindings.
Alarmed, I reached out a probe, but her body still pulsed with life. She had
only fainted.
The Herder cast down the brand and reached for a torch to fire the woodpile
at the foot of the stake. A great rage seared me. Throwing off caution, I
reached into the bottom of my mind for the darkest of my Misfit Talents to
stun him.
But before I could summon it, an arrow hurtled through the air to bed itself in
the center of the Herder’s sunken chest. He sucked in an agonized breath and
clawed at the wooden stave, trying vainly to withdraw it. Then his eyes
clouded and he collapsed, blood bubbling obscenely from his lips.
I disengaged my probe with a scream, almost dragged to my own doom by his
swift spiral into death. Panting, I stared down at him in astonishment and, for
a moment, silence reigned in the village clearing.
“The Herders will kill us all for this,” a woman wailed, shattering the
stillness, her eyes searching the trees for the archer.
“Not if we kill these gypsies and throw the bodies in the White Valley. We can
say we saw nothing of what happened,” a man began, but before he could
outline his strategy, another arrow whistled through the air, piercing his neck.
He crumpled to the ground with a rattling gurgle.
That was enough for the rest. It was one thing to watch someone else die, and
quite another to risk your own life. People scattered in all directions, crying
out in terror.
I did not know who had loosed the arrows and there was no time to find out.
Situated on the border of the high and lowlands, Guanette was visited
regularly by off-duty soldierguards seeking amusement. At any minute a

Plik z chomika:

Inne pliki z tego folderu:

Inne foldery tego chomika:

Zgłoś jeśli naruszono regulamin