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these wretched creatures, totally at their mercy. There was nothing to stop them from doing whatever they wanted Stop that. Start panicking now and you may as well tell them to cut your throat now. Which they'd do after they'd had their fun. Grimly Gwenlyn forced herself to come to grips with reality. The idea of a ransom was all nice and civilized, something to be arranged between noble foes, not with ragged men like these, ruthless simply because they had nothing left to lose. No, she couldn't sit around waiting for a messenger to arrive with payment She didn't dare. And, Gwenlyn thought with a flash of spirit, damned if I'm going to be stupid enough to try waiting for some gallant to miraculously show up to rescue me! So. She had to get out of this herself. Gwenlyn swallowed drily, struggling to squash her growing panic. Think, she told herself fiercely. Think, dammit! What advantages do you have? All right. Start with the most obvious things. Her riding clothing was good, Page 38 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html sturdy stuff. An asset: she wasn't going to freeze. Her boots were reasonably suited for walking. Another asset. But she had no weapons, not even a belt knife, and no means of making fire. That was most certainly not good. Wait, now. Gwenlyn, subtly moving her hands under cover of the cloak, froze suddenly, realizing for the first time that the bandits had done a sloppy job of binding her arms. And they hadn't thought to bother tying her feet. After all, they must have reasoned, where would she go while they were all wide awake to watch her? Awake. Gwenlyn felt a little shock run through her, a little spark of memory. When she'd been a small child, missing her mother, too lonely to fall asleep, her old nurse (who, it was rumored, had a drop or two of elven blood) used to sing an odd little melody, the tiniest of magic charms, to make her sleep. It had worked every time, whether Gwenlyn had wanted to sleep or not. And one day, when Gwenlyn was a bit older, her nurse had taught her the tune and words. I haven't needed them for years. Can I possibly remember them? And oh, can they possibly be strong enough to work on grown men? No way to know without trying. Doing her best to ignore the bandits, more of whom seemed to be staring at her with every moment, Gwenlyn tried to put herself back into the mind of the child she'd been, listening to her nurse, hearing... hearing what? A trace of melody. Something like this... yes. "Hey!" someone snouted. "Stop that stupid humming!" A rough hand slapped her, hard enough to send Gwenlyn sprawling, tears of pain and shock springing to her eyes. Someone chuckled. Someone else started to laugh, then fell to coughing, harsh, ugly sounds that probably meant the onset of lung disease. Struggling back to a sitting position, Gwenlyn hastily wiped her eyes dry: dangerous to show signs of weakness to wild beasts. And obviously the bandits' idea of "unharmed" didn't include a little rough handling. But I have the melody in my mind now. At least 7... think I do. Now, if only I can remember the words, too! They never had made too much sense to her; presumably they were human corruptions of elven words. But she'd better think of them, and think fast, because from the smoldering light in the bandits' eyes, they thought the idea of slapping a noblewoman about was a fine bit of fun. "Lessen spring, fashion ring..." No, no, that wasn't right! "Lessen spring, fleshen sing Yes, that was it, and and oh gods, she had the rest of the song now, too! One of the bandits was getting to his feet, muttering something to the others that made them snicker. Seeing him starting towards her, Gwenlyn hastily began to sing. No, wait, her nurse had always sung the charm at a slow, deliberate pace. Even though every nerve was shouting at her to hurry because the bandit was coming dangerously close, Gwenlyn slowed her song as much as she dared. And to her delighted astonishment, as she sang the nonsensical, Powerful words, she felt a small, oddsome-thing stir in the air between them. The bandit stopped suddenly to give an enormous yawn. 'Yes, oh yes, it's working! As Gwenlyn continued her song, the man sat down where he'd stood, blinking ather like a bewildered, sleepy owl. The other bandits were yawning and blinking, too, and as Gwenlyn, hardly daring to believe what was happening, kept singing, repeating the charm over and over, they dropped off, one by reluctant one, into slumber. Even though by now she was thoroughly sick of the silly words, Gwenlyn sang the whole song through one more time just to be on the safe side, then fell silent, staring in astonishment at the crumpled heaps of snoring men. It it worked! I don't believe it! Yes, but she was no trained spellcaster, and whatever magic was in the song Page 39 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html was slight at best. It wasn't going to hold a whole group of grown men for very long. Gwenlyn fumbled with the ropes holding her till she'd squirmed free, and scrambled to her feet, glancing quickly about the forest. Gods, she hadn't the vaguest idea of which way to go! No time to worry about it. Already one of the bandits stirred in his sleep as though he was about to wake up. Gwenlyn turned and ran. Ohgods, theyreaOywerewakmg up behind her! Hie tiny spell had run its course already. "She bespelled us!" a frightened voice cried. "Never mind that!" someone else snapped. "She's getting away!" "Let her!" "No, you idiot! Want a witch loose in the forest to get revenge on us?" With a roar of fear and fury, they started after her. Terrified, Gwenlyn raced on. She couldn't find a safe place to hide, not with them so close behind her. All she could do was run with all her might, and pray she wouldn't break an ankle or her neck! How am I going to get out of this? she wondered. Dear gods, how am I ever, ever going to escape? Rualath hissed in fury. But her rage was bluster; she was struggling to cover the cold terror seizing her heart. The Gate Spell, the risky, experimental, not-tested-enough Gate Spell, had gone wrong, wrong! It had nearly caught its prey, but "nearly" was as useless as dangerous! as a clean miss. Somehow Naitachal had eluded the Gate, somehow he had escaped. Rualath clenched the scrying crystal so fiercely the facets nearly cut into her hands. Who would have predicted a SL human would interfere? When he had passed through the Gate instead, curse him to the Utter Dark, the fragile spell had shattered like a mirror. Shards of its magic were spiralling wildly out and out, fracturing into ever smaller, ever more chaotic Gates spilling throughout the forest! If the whole thing hadn't been of such vital importance to her, Rualath knew she would have been watching the disintegration in pure scientific fascination. How incredible! Those ever-changing Chaos Gates were confusing distance and direction throughout the forest in such unpredictable fashion. Anyone or anything passing through one of them would be thrown into odd, random teleportation jumps. What do I do now? How do I explain to Haralachan that my spell failed and "So..." purred a voice in her ear, and Rualath drew in her breath in sharp shock. Haralachan! "I never thought your spell would cause such widespread effects." Neither did I, curse you. "Intriguing, is it not?" Rualath said, thinking busily. "We have the chance to weaken an entire forest." "What a pity that isn't what you meant to do." Rualath glanced sharply his way. "Do you question my sorceries, my lord?" "Not the sorceries, my lady. Merely their result. Where is the traitor?" "Ah, that." "Where is Naitachal, Rualath?" Where, indeed? "It would have been far too simple to just bring him straight here," Rualath bluffed. "Oh?" Yes, yes, she had it now: even though Naitachal might have escaped the [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] |