Trillium - Sky Trillium Part 16

"No!" whispered the delighted Queen of Galanar.

"Yes," Anigel said. "Of the Three of us who wear the trillium-amber, I am the least courageous. But I will do my best, and if the Lords of the Air permit, my magic will effect our escape from this captivity."

"Never mind asking permission of the angels," Jiri said. "We should discuss the matter with our fellow-hostages."

"a.s.suredly. And we must do so soon, for I think we have a unique opportunity to escape while so many of the Star Guild's force are absent from the castle."

Jiri made up her mind in a trice. "We'll have a conference during dinner. I'll go right now and begin pa.s.sing the word, so that all will be present."

"Say nothing of your speech with that prisoner in the dungeon cell next to yours. Am I right in a.s.suming that the others did not know his name?"

"Quite right." Jiri's face was both puzzled and expectant. "They were all too occupied with their own troubles to care about him."

"I think I know who this man might be, and why he was imprisoned. It is possible that he may be of great help to us."

Anigel explained. Then she outlined the escape plan that seemed to have come to her in a single burst of inspiration, while Jiri listened with narrowed eyes.

"Magic," the Queen of Galanar muttered when Anigel was done. "And uncertain magic, at that!... Well, sweeting, I'm game to try. But we may have our work cut out for us convincing the others."

Anigel continued to stand at the window long after Queen Jiri departed, watching until the fires began to gutter and shrink. One by one the flaming geysers winked out, and finally only a single tall blue-gold plume remained, swaying in the night wind like a spectral dancer.

By the time a servant came rapping at Queen Anigel's door to tell her that the evening meal was ready, the last geyser had also faded and died, and the region surrounding the castle's hill had become a sink of poisonous darkness.

Chapter Seventeen.

"BUT why must we make the attempt tonight?" President Hakit Botal of Okamis complained. "Why, we're barely recovered from our stint in the dungeons! We haven't even had time to reconnoiter the castle and find the best escape route."

"There's only one way out, Son-in-Law," snapped Queen Jiri. "The way we came in, through the main gate."

Anigel added, "And the reason we must try tonight is because now is the time our captors will least expect it: when you are newly released from your cells, and I have just awakened out of my enchanted sleep... and Orogastus and his force are lately departed to make war upon Emperor Denombo."

The seven hostage rulers strolled in a casual manner from the dining hall where they had just eaten the evening meal. Each one carried a pewter cup and a full bottle of the strong, flinty wine they had been served at table. Following the plan Anigel had outlined to them while they ate, they pretended to drink and laugh tipsily as they made a show of examining the feathered hangings and the pieces of exotic statuary that stood in wall recesses flanked by blazing cressets. All the while, they moved along a wide corridor toward the great staircase that led to the lower reaches of the castle. Only a handful of guards lounged at their posts in a lax manner, paying no special attention to the wandering captives. Few other servants of the Star Guild were abroad. Most of the diners had remained in the hall to drink and revel.

"I don't know if I'm up to this adventure," Ga-Bondies whispered. "You lot may have to go on without me." The Duumvir, who shared the highest elected office of Imlit with his a.s.sociate Prigo, looked extremely pale. He was a man in late middle age, portly and with thinning sandy hair and a querulous manner.

"Buck up, old fellow," Prigo urged. Maintaining the pretense, he uttered a shrill laugh and affected to drink directly from his wine bottle. "If an expectant mother like Queen Anigel can make it, so can you."

"That wretched meal!" Ga-Bondies moaned. "Greasy sausage, nauseating boiled greens, bread so gritty it set one's teeth on edge, suet pudding, and only this atrocious plonk to drink! At least the adop and water we were served in the dungeons was fairly easy on the digestive tract. Right now, I feel so dyspeptic that I may puke at any moment."

"Oh, poor chap." Old Princess Raviya's eyes twinkled mischievously as she toasted the sufferer with her empty cup. "Perhaps you shouldn't have taken that third helping of sausage."

Somebody snickered. Ga-Bondies pulled out a handkerchief and patted his sweat-beaded brow. "Madam, I was starving after six days of vile incarceration. One might have thought that a sorcerer intent upon conquering the world would at least set a decent table. But no! We're fobbed off with a repast fit only for peasants."

"While the cook's away, the scullions play,' " Queen Jiri quoted. "I'll wager the whole place has gone slack since Oro and the army went off. Did you notice that the only two Star Men at supper were very young?"

"Apprentices left to hold the fort with the senior servants," Raviya judged, "and barely three dozen warriors. The hall could have held ten times as many people."

Jiri said, "Anigel and I saw around that number leaving the castle."

"I wonder how the wizard expects to conquer, using such a small force?" said Widd.

"He's going up against a mob of superst.i.tious barbarians," Prigo retorted darkly. "The odds may be just about right."

"The army probably took the best food along with them," Duumvir Ga-Bondies muttered bitterly, his mind still on his disordered innards. "Keep the morale of the fighters high and d.a.m.n the stay-behinds."

"I suspect that old Oro has the very devil of a time keeping this establishment in victuals," Prince Widd observed shrewdly. "You can't force superior provisioners to make daily deliveries through a miasmic inferno, you know."

"Doubtless the sorcerer obtains his supplies by black magic," President Hakit Botal said, "in the same way that he s.n.a.t.c.hed us away from our homelands."

"When Ga-Bondies and I were kidnapped," Prigo remarked, "we and our captors came out of the enchanted portal in the midst of a dense forest. Men-at-arms from a camp immediately adjacent were waiting to conduct us to the castle. It took us a day and a night to reach here, and nowhere along the way did I see a village nor even so much as a trapper's hut. The trail we followed was narrow and much overgrown, as though it were seldom used. Certainly no regular supply trains came along that way."

The others, excepting Anigel, related similar experiences. In spite of the differing venues of abduction, it was apparent that they had all emerged at the same location, from thence being taken to Castle Conflagrant. None save Anigel knew anything of the viaduct's working, nor did the others seem aware that more than one might exist.

"There is a crucially important matter that we neglected to discuss at dinner," Hakit said. He had paused, feigning interest in a tapestry depicting a beautiful seaside villa of the Zinoran style favored by wealthy Sobranians, all golden rooftiles and s.h.i.+ning white walls. "Supposing that we do manage to escape the castle and cross the basin of flaming geysers. Where then shall we go?"

"To Brandoba, the Sobranian capital," Anigel said. "We will ask sanctuary from our fellow-sovereign, Emperor Denombo- or, failing that, convince some s.h.i.+p's captain to give us safe pa.s.sage to Galanar, where Queen Jiri's warriors will defend us."

"But how shall we find the way through this unknown territory?" Hakit Botal persisted. "By following Orogastus?"

Anigel nodded. "My trillium-amber's magic will also guide us-and we may perhaps have help from another source as well."

"We do not even know how far away the Sobranian capital is!"

"It is approximately four hundred leagues," Queen Jiri said, "if my talkative prison guards told me the truth in exchange for my jewelry."

President Hakit's mouth dropped open. "Four hundred?"

"Oh, dear," Princess Raviya quavered. "So far?"

Prince Widd said, "Is there no place of refuge nearer?"

"None where we would be truly safe," said Jiri. "Apparently, the Star Guild has the local chieftains thoroughly intimidated."

Duumvir Prigo did not disguise his dismay. "But that's appalling! Why were we not told this before, as we were discussing the plan at table? I a.s.sumed-"

"It will take over a month to ride that distance," Ga-Bondies broke in. "I can't possibly do it. I am not a well man."

Hakit glared at Anigel. "Queen, you have been less than straightforward with us. None of us has experience in wilderness travel. It is madness to think we could reach Emperor Denombo's court if it is so far away. Pursuers from the castle would certainly recapture us."

"Not if my magic a.s.sists us, as I pray it will," Anigel bestowed a kindly glance upon the ashen-faced Ga-Bondies. "Nor will you have to endure an arduous journey, Duumvir. A few days at most."

"Surely you cannot think to reenter the infernal magic hole that brought us here!" Hakit exclaimed.

"No," Anigel said. "That viaduct might still be guarded, and we have no way of knowing where it would take us. I have been told that adept persons are able to change the destination of certain viaducts. The one used to abduct us is obviously one of the changeable sort. Not being sorcerers ourselves, we cannot hope to command it."

"Then what are we to do?" Hakit demanded. "Explain yourself, Queen-else I, for one, will decline to follow you."

The President of Okamis was a man of imposing stature, clean-shaven and with a jutting jaw that he delighted in thrusting forward to emphasize his words. He was accustomed to wield almost dictatorial powers in his prosperous homeland. Earlier, when Anigel described the initial phase of her escape proposal at dinner, Hakit Botal had at first demurred, chuckling with patronizing disdain at the very notion of entrusting their fate to the alleged power of an amber amulet. Then, seeing that the others saw nothing wrong with pitting benevolent magic against the dark sorcery of Orogastus, Hakit had demanded that he himself be designated leader of the escape, rather than leaving the undertaking in charge of "a delicately reared dame such as Her Majesty, who would have scant experience in such parlous adventures."

Queen Anigel had smiled sweetly at the Okamisi President, saying that he was certainly free to propose an alternative scheme of his own, and head it up if the others elected to follow him. However, since Hakit actually had nothing concrete to offer at all, he finally submitted with ill grace when everyone else pledged support to Anigel.

She now said to him, "I know you are anxious, but I have a good reason to keep the second part of my plan secret for now. It is for our own protection, in the melancholy event that one of us should... be taken by the enemy in the course of our escape."

There was an uncomfortable silence as the captives mulled over her words-for there was more than one implication. Unlike the royals, who had all demonstrated their personal enmity for Orogastus during dinner, the three leaders of the republics had hinted more than once at a willingness to accommodate the sorcerer and his Star Guild if it should be to their national advantage.

They walked on, avoiding one another's eyes.

Finally Prigo, speaking with elaborate casualness, changed the subject. "It seems obvious that the Star Men must have some magical means of transport if they intend to attack Denombo within three days, as the woman Naelore said to Queen Anigel."

"I believe this to be true," Anigel agreed. "And I hope that we may ultimately reach the Sobranian capital by using that same means."

"But how?"

Anigel said, "There is one who may be able to tell us that, Duumvir, along with other valuable information. Queen Jiri and I will go down to the dungeons and fetch this person shortly, so that he may accompany us in our escape attempt."

"Not that firebrand Ledavardis!" Ga-Bondies exclaimed, full of indignation. "Not the Pirate King!"

"We cannot leave him to languish here," said Anigel evasively.

Prigo gave a sniff. "It's Ledo's own fault that he's not free on parole with the rest of us."

"You intend to release him," Prince Widd inquired, "using that amber amulet of yours to open the locks?"

"Yes," said Anigel. "That is exactly what I hope to do."

"Do you also expect this enchanted geegaw of yours to whisk us to Brandoba in the wink of an eye?" asked Hakit, speaking with arch skepticism.

She made a mild reply. "My trillium-amber is unfortunately not capable of such a miracle. But with the grace of the Triune its powers may yet suffice to gain our freedom."

Hakit scowled. "May? This plan of yours may be the death of us!"

"Nothing is certain," the Queen said serenely, "save that someday we will all pa.s.s safely beyond. But I for one am not ready to die yet... nor am I willing to surrender my country and my authority to a base sorcerer, as certain other rulers may be. My two sisters and I know Orogastus of old, and the magic of our Black Trillium has saved us from him many a time. If the Lords of the Air smile upon us, we may be aided once again by the Flower."

"This escapade sounds more and more dubious," Hakit said, with a sour grimace. "I'm having serious second thoughts, especially since you refuse to demonstrate your magic to us."

Anigel nodded, as if to concede the point. "It was not possible earlier, since the amulet works only to save me from peril, or guide me in dangerous circ.u.mstances. Opening the dungeon doors for the rescue of Ledavardis will therefore serve as a crucial test of my plan. If the amber fails in that task, we will know that Orogastus has laid some overwhelming enchantment upon Castle Conflagrant that the Black Trillium is helpless to counter."

"Then what?" Prince Widd inquired.

"If the dungeon doors do not open, I will return chastened to my rooms, where I will pray for our eventual rescue or ransom and go straight to bed... I advise those of you who have no confidence in me to follow that course of action now! I do not intend to waste any more time in talking. Whoever is with me, resume the charade of drunken merrymaking, for we are near to the stairs and I spy a pair of guards on station there."

After a moment's hesitation, the others all came along after her. Widd and Raviya linked arms and began to sing an Engian ballad about a la.s.s who loved a sailorman. Prigo did a little dance around them and Hakit pretended to swig from his bottle, while keeping his thumb thrust into the neck. Ga-Bondies merely staggered along, looking more and more queasy.

At the head of the staircase, Queen Anigel bade a giggly good evening to the two guards, who gave amused salutes. "Good men, we are on our way to escape," she told them slyly. "Sound the alarm! Call out Orogastus and his crew of conjurers!"

The bored guards made no move to hinder the distinguished hostages, who proceeded down the stairs amidst tipsy laughter and song.

On the keep's ground floor was a large vaulted lobby having a well, water troughs, and hitching rails. Fronial droppings, a broken sack of grain, and other debris left by the sorcerer's small army lay on the pavement. A single broad pa.s.sageway led straight from the foot of the staircase toward the barbican and gatehouse, while other corridors to the left and right gave onto the inner ward surrounding the keep, where there were presumably barracks and stables, kitchens, a bakery, and other domestic offices of a well-found castle. Except for the pa.s.sage to the barbican, the area was dark and full of confusing shadows, only dimly lit by dangling fire-baskets. The only men-at-arms to be seen were over forty ells away, near the gate.

Anigel went and sat on the wide coping of the great was.h.i.+ng trough, where she cupped her hands, took water, and pretended to lave her face. "Now, if you please," she whispered, "gather closely around me, and we will review what we are to do."

"I still don't feel well," Ga-Bondies whimpered.

The Queen only smiled at him. "You, Princess Raviya, Hakit, and Prigo will go down to the barbican. There you must discover exactly how many guards are on duty in the vicinity, and the manner of their patrolling. Prigo must look carefully at the sally port in the gate, through which we will have to make our exit, and take careful note of the position of any bolts, locks, or bars that will have to be undone."

"The guards may become suspicious if we linger long," Hakit said.

"Maintain the pretense of boisterous intoxication," Anigel told him. "Tell any persons you encounter how happy you are to be out of the dungeons and free to walk about the castle-even though you find the place very eerie. Remember our plan! Ask the guards if the corridors are haunted. Say you saw something ghostly as you were carousing about. Ask if they are certain that the Star Master has banished all demons and harmful spirits from the place. When you have made the guards thoroughly uneasy, return here to the well, where Widd will be waiting for you. Accompany him and follow his lead from then on."

"It will all be done," said Princess Raviya firmly.

Anigel turned to the elderly Eternal Prince, whose pouched eyes were sparkling with excitement. "Dear friend, you recall that your job is to find the stable, which is doubtless in one of the enclosure buildings of the inner ward. Jolly up the grooms and hostlers you find on duty there. Ply them with drink." She handed over her own wine bottle to him, and Queen Jiri's also. "Contrive to examine whatever mounts are left in the stalls. Check out the tack room if you can, and try to find us some stormproof riding cloaks. We will require nine swift and st.u.r.dy fronials for our escape."

"Nine?" Widd said in surprise. "But there are only eight of us, including young King Ledavardis."

"Nine," said Anigel firmly. "When you have finished your investigations, excuse yourself to the grooms, saying that you are enjoying their company so much that you will find more drink for them. Return here, collect the others, and take them back to the stable with you, as if to admire the animals and meet the lads you have befriended. Give out the remaining bottles of wine. When the stablehands have their back teeth afloat, overpower them as quietly as possible, bind them, and gag them. But remember that we have all given our oaths not to harm any persons within the castle! Harness the mounts and fill saddlebags with whatever food and drink you can find. We will also need pitch-torches and a tinderbox. Each person must have a large hooded cloak of some sort, even if it is only a steed-blanket. You must all remain hiding in the stable until Jiri and I return."

"I'll see to everything," the Eternal Prince a.s.sured her.

"It would be better," Hakit broke in officiously, "if I were the one to undertake the tasks in the stables. I am more able-bodied than Widd, and if there should be trouble I would be better able to defend myself."

"But the Eternal Prince is so much more harmless in appearance," Anigel pointed out reasonably. "And so he is the perfect one to gain the confidence of the hostlers. Until their wits are slowed by drink, they might be wary of a stalwart man such as yourself."

Hakit gave a dubious grunt, but he said no more.

Anigel studied her trillium-amber. "Now I shall ask my amulet in which direction the stables lie." She held the droplet out on its chain so that the Eternal Prince and the others could examine it, and whispered her request. Within the softly glowing pendant a tiny line of light appeared; its blinking tip pointed to the right-hand corridor.

"Mercy!" said the awestricken Raviya. "It really is magic!"

"So it would seem," said Prigo. His gaunt face creased in a pedantic smile of approval.

"And now, Black Trillium," Anigel said, holding the amber steady and staring at the tiny fossil Flower within, "I pray you show me the way to the dungeons."

The glowing streak swiveled about and the spark migrated to its opposite end, indicating the area behind the great staircase, where a single cresset burned.

"That's it, all right," Jiri said. "The rest of us know the way only too well. Well, come along, la.s.s. Let's be off to rescue that Goblin Kinglet."

"First, we must see if my amber unlocks the upper dungeon door."