King's Dragon (Crown of Stars #1)

King's Dragon (Crown of Stars #1) Page 185

“Dragons!”

He lifted a hand sharply, silencing her. “You will remember them. They were the ones who saved us when we first rode into Gent a month ago.”

“Sturm,” she murmured. Her cousin, if report was true.

“They cut through a company of Eika, freeing us.”

“And then?” she demanded.

He frowned, almost wincing, as if the memory did not bear recalling. “Then they rode into the city by the west gate, to join with their fellows.”

Liath shut her eyes.

“Attend,” said Wolfhere. “We have no luxury for grief, Liath. We must see with Eagle’s sight. That is our duty.”

“Through fire and stone?” she whispered.

“Not every Eagle has such skills, it is true. Now. Attend.” He shut his eyes and raised his hands, shoulder width apart, palms facing in toward the fire.

“But it’s true,” she said, interrupting him. He had to understand. “I can’t see that way. In the crypt I saw nothing, not because there was a shadow, but because I saw only the stone. And the Eika—There is an enchanter, and he is Eika, not any other kind of creature.” This memory hurt, it was still so raw. Remembering how Sanglant had seen and named the Eika chieftain. “That is how the gates were breached. He wove an illusion. It wasn’t Count Hildegard’s forces at all.”

Wolfhere opened his eyes and stared at her. “Go on.”

“It was an illusion. Everyone saw the banner and the count and her people. Everyone. Except me. I could see through the illusion.”

“What are you saying?”

‘I am saying that I am deaf to it, as Da said. Or else guarded against it. I don’t know which.” Immediately she cursed herself inwardly for confessing to him. But she had been so happy to see him. Surely that joy meant he could be trusted, or trusted in part. He had saved her from Hugh. He had treated her with unrelenting kindness and good will. And she had, she realized, come to care for him. Reflexively she rested a hand on the warm leather of her saddlebags, feeling the book hidden within. She waited.

Wolfhere looked truly startled. “Bloodheart,” he said. “Illusion. I understand now. I did not before. I wondered why I had seen nothing of Count Hildegard’s soldiers within the city, even the last survivors of that force. I wondered how the gate had been breached. For I saw it, too, Liath. I saw her banner, and her retainers, pursued by Eika. From the palisade at the mayor’s palace I saw them reach the bridge, and then I saw no more. And yet you say you saw through the illusion.”

“I did.”

“I cannot explain it, either to you or to myself. Attend me, Liath. Tell me what you see.” He lifted hands again and shut his eyes, then, after a moment, opened them, staring into the fire.

Yellow-orange flame licked the air. Liath stared hard at it. She envisioned in her minds’ eye a circle branded into the air—the Ring of fire, fourth step on the ladder of the mages. Through this she viewed the flame.

She saw nothing but the lick and spit of fire. And yet, had she not once seen salamanders, their blue eyes winking in the coals of the hearth? Had she not once seen butterflies called up by her father in the summer garden? Once, years ago, before her mother died, she had seen magic. Before her mother died. Then everything had changed.

Da was protecting me.

He had given his life to protect her. To hide her.

There are spirits burning in the air with wings of flame and eyes as brilliant as knives. At their backs a wall of fire roars up into black night, but there is nothing to fear. Pass through, and a new world lies beyond. In the distance a drum sounds like a heartbeat and the whistle of a flute, borne up on the wind like a bird, takes wing.

Wings, settling on the eaves. A sudden gust of snow through the smokehole. Bells, heard as if on the wind.

“Where is she?” said the voice of bells.

“Nowhere you can find her,” said Da.

The fire blazed higher, growing, engulfing the logs until it burned like a storm. And in the flames she saw battle, the steps of the cathedral, the Dragons in a last ragged line, so few of them now, the last, their horses and their comrades strewn like so much refuse along the course of their retreat. Dogs—those who were not raging in the thick of battle—fed voraciously. She shuddered, convulsed by nausea.

A last knot of city militia fought desperately by the mint and then finally were overwhelmed. Behind them, the palisade of the mayor’s palace and the timber roof of the great hall burned in sheets of flame, a terrible bright backdrop to the last killing field.