The Seven Towers, Page 2

  CHAPTER 2

  As soon as he realized that he was awake, Jermain opened his eyes. He was lying in a narrow bed near one wall of a large, rather cluttered, circular room that smelled of cloves and honey. Directly across from him was a solid wooden door; beside it a flight of stone stairs led upward, curving partway around the wall of the room to vanish into an opening in the ceiling, just above the foot of the bed. A rough-hewn table occupied the center of the floor. Three mismatched chairs stood around it, and a large black bird was perched on the back of the tallest, preening. A squirrel sat on a window ledge nearby, scolding noisily.

  Someone had bandaged Jermain’s side while he’d slept; he could feel the tautness of the linen as he breathed. His side still ached, but the pain was no longer insistent. Perhaps he had only bruised his ribs after all, not broken them. Jermain sat up carefully. He was considering what to do next when the door swung open.

  “Be quiet, Garren,” said a female voice, and the squirrel stopped chattering at once. An instant later, the woman who had rescued Jermain from the guards appeared in the doorway. She went straight to the table without bothering to shut the door behind her. She set down the armload of plants she was carrying, then turned to observe the air in Jermain’s general vicinity.

  “I’m so glad you’re feeling better,” she said. “That is, if you are. You haven’t said anything about it, so perhaps you aren’t, which wouldn’t be at all surprising, what with losing all that blood and breaking a rib and so on, though possibly you’d rather I didn’t go into detail. Still, I do think it’s a mistake not to talk about unpleasant things, even if people are sensitive; after all, if one worried all the time about offending people, one would never say anything, which in some cases would be a very good thing.”

  “I am glad of the chance to thank you for your timely rescue, lady,” Jermain said. He rose and bowed, wincing. “My name is Jermain Trevannon.”

  “How nice for you,” the woman said. “Mine is Amberglas. Do sit down again; you really aren’t recovered yet, and it would be inconvenient for me to have to put you back together again.”

  The bed creaked as Jermain sat down. The squirrel made a disapproving noise. Amberglas pulled out one of the chairs and seated herself at the table. She picked up one of the plants she had brought in and blinked at it, then set it aside and took another.

  “Lemon verbena is quite out of season,” she said. “Still, it ought to be good for something, if I can only think what; nearly everything is. Except skunk weed. If you can think of a use for a skunk weed plant, you may have the one growing at the edge of my garden. I can’t imagine why I leave it there, but if you take it, then of course I’ll know. Why ever were all those unpleasant people chasing you?”

  Jermain hesitated. “I’m an outlaw,” he said at last. He was surprised by the bitterness in his voice; he’d thought he was used to it by now.

  “That has nothing to do with it,” Amberglas said firmly. “There are a great many outlaws in the mountains, and the Sevairn Border Guards never bother with any of them, which is extremely shortsighted but quite understandable since most of the outlaws are far better at fighting than the guardsmen. It really reflects rather poorly on King Marreth’s training program, but perhaps he doesn’t care about outlaws.”

  “Well, he cares about this one,” Jermain said shortly.

  “Yes, I know. Or at least, I’d know if you would tell me, which isn’t the same thing at all, but is actually quite close, if you think about it.” Amberglas was still sorting plants, seemingly at random. “Why?”

  Jermain studied the woman. Her questions seemed innocent enough, but experience made him reluctant to be too trusting. On the other hand, he had no reason to believe that Amberglas would suddenly hand him over to the very people she had helped him escape. Furthermore, he owed her some explanation; however much he would prefer not to answer, the woman had a right to know whom she had rescued. “King Marreth fears I may return to Leshiya,” Jermain said at last.

  “Yes, of course,” Amberglas said to the black bird. “If he didn’t, he wouldn’t send guards after you. Although it does seem a little unusual for a king to be afraid of an outlaw, but then, I haven’t known very many outlaws, so perhaps it’s more common than I’d thought.”

  “Most outlaws don’t come from the King’s court in Leshiya.”

  “No, that’s quite true. At least, I think it is. I knew a thief once who was from the capital of Tar-Alem, and there are quite a few murderers who come from good families, but that isn’t exactly the same thing. Still, a great many things turn up precisely where one doesn’t want them—rats in bakeries, for instance, and those large green worms on cabbages—so I suppose it’s quite possible for a king’s court to have outlaws. What were you before you were an outlaw?”

  “I served King Marreth,” Jermain said. “I was his Chief Adviser for six years.”

  “You must be very good at giving advice.” Amberglas dropped a small blue-flowered plant on a pile of middle-sized red flowers and looked up. “Why did you become an outlaw?”

  “I had very little choice,” Jermain said. “Between Terrel and Eltiron, I never had a chance. You talk of outlaws at the King’s court; well, Terrel Lassond fits the description. He’s the sort who would sacrifice the whole country if it would help him get what he wanted. I wish Marreth joy of his new adviser.”

  “He doesn’t sound pleasant,” Amberglas agreed. “I don’t suppose there’s any chance of Marreth’s discovering this for himself?”

  “Oh, he’ll find out, all right,” Jermain said with renewed bitterness. “When it’s too late. Marreth deserves what he’s going to get. He’s made his stew; now he can eat it. For all I care, he can boil in it.” Jermain stopped. For six months he had schooled himself not to think of Leshiya, Marreth, Terrel, or Eltiron; the violence of his reaction to Amberglas’s questions shocked him.

  “I see.” Amberglas studied one of the plants she was holding. “I don’t suppose you would be inclined to explain just what it was that all these people did? Because you haven’t, yet. You may not have realized it, so I thought I would point it out to you.”

  Jermain snorted. “Terrel and His Royal Highness Prince Eltiron convinced Marreth that I was guilty of treason. As a result, Marreth stripped me of my lands and position and awarded them to Terrel. Isn’t that enough?”

  “I do see that you might think so,” Amberglas said. “Were you?”

  “Was I what?”

  “Were you guilty? Of treason, I mean; there are a great many other things you could be guilty of, but since you weren’t accused of any of them, they don’t really matter. Well, no, they do matter, certainly, but I’m not particularly interested in them at the moment, though if you happen to think of anything else you want to mention, it’s quite all right with me.”

  “I am no traitor,” Jermain said stiffly.

  “I didn’t think so. But of course, you could still be guilty of treason. That’s why I asked about it,” Amberglas said.

  “No, I was not guilty,” Jermain said after a moment. “Unless it’s treason to believe an old friend’s warning, and counsel that preparation be made.” Absently, he fingered the place where the short scar on his left arm was hidden by his sleeve.

  “That doesn’t sound much like treason,” Amberglas said. “Of course, it would depend on the friend. And the warning. Telling someone that his dinner is burning isn’t treason, at least, not in most places, though I couldn’t say for certain about Navren. The King there has made such extremely peculiar laws that one never knows what is treason in Navren. Or what isn’t,” she added thoughtfully, and looked at Jermain.

  For a moment Jermain hesitated, then he nodded. He had no reason to remain silent. If safety was his main concern, he had already told Amberglas more than was wise; finishing the tale would make no difference. Besides, there was always the chance, however slim, that she might be willing to help him.

  “Judge for yourself,” he said. “Ranlyn is
one of the Hoven-Thalar, who roam the wasteland between Mournwal and the South Marnish Desert. He . . . owes me a debt, and among his people debts are a grave matter. So when he came to Leshiya seven months ago with the news that his people were beginning to move north, I believed him. I told Marreth, and advised him to prepare the army, and to send messengers to Gramwood, Mournwal, and Tar-Alem as well. Marreth refused to believe me. Terrel and Eltiron made it seem that Ranlyn lied and that I wanted war only to serve my own ambition.”

  “How very sad,” Amberglas said absently. “Did you?”

  “No!” Jermain almost shouted. “If Sevairn doesn’t join Mournwal, the Hoven-Thalar will sweep right over it, and Sevairn will be next! Even with Gramwood and Tar-Alem to help, it would take luck to stop a determined movement north. And the Hoven-Thalar are determined, believe me. I’ve spent the past six months in the south with Ranlyn, to see for myself. Does that sound like personal ambition?”

  “Not precisely, though sometimes it’s hard to tell,” said Amberglas, even more absently than before. She tilted her head to one side. “You’re quite certain Marreth won’t change his mind?”

  Jermain’s lips tightened. He shook his head, and his voice was harsh as he said, “You saw those men. Marreth couldn’t quite justify killing me publicly, but now that I’m safely forgotten, he’s willing to send his men to murder me in secret. Marreth can’t bear to be wrong; he won’t change.”

  “Dear me. He must not like you at all.” Amberglas rose from her chair and began gathering up the piles of plants. “I suppose it is entirely possible that you are mistaken, although I must admit it doesn’t seem like it. But then, of course, it wouldn’t. People who are very sure of themselves never sound as if they are mistaken. I met a girl once who insisted that she was the Queen of the Thieves. Really, she was very bad at stealing. But very good at making up stories. She was quite convincing, if you didn’t know better.”

  “Who was she?” Jermain asked, half from curiosity and half from a desire to turn the conversation in a new direction.

  “The Princess of Barinash,” Amberglas said. “But she promised not to do it anymore—tell people she was a thief, I mean—so it’s quite all right now, though not exactly the same as being mistaken, now that I come to think of it.”

  Amberglas finished gathering up the plants and started for the stairs. She stopped at the bottom step to look back at Jermain. “I really do think you had better lie down and rest a little more. That was quite a bad wound in your side; in fact, it still is, though I’ve seen worse, but only on people who had been in battles, and I don’t believe you can call a fight with Sevairn’s Border Guard a battle. At least, you could call it that, but it wouldn’t really be proper.”

  Depression and weariness swept over Jermain in a sudden wave. “Perhaps you shouldn’t have stopped them,” he said.

  “If you mean that I should have let them kill you, you are being exceedingly silly,” Amberglas said. “I certainly should not, which ought to be plain even if you are feverish. Though I had rather hoped you wouldn’t be; still, it’s not surprising considering the blood loss and the damp ground and those extremely rude people.”

  Jermain shook his head. Amberglas frowned in his direction. “I have no intention of allowing you to die here,” she said severely. “If you really want to, you’ll simply have to do it somewhere else, which of course you can’t until you are well enough to leave. So you had very much better stop this foolishness and rest instead.”

  Amberglas started up the stairs. Jermain lay back, watching her with weary bewilderment. She moves with grace, he thought. Marreth’s ladies would envy her. Who is she, and why is she helping me? Amberglas’s silent tread upon the stone stairs gave him no answer, and presently he slept.

  The next two days brought Jermain no closer to understanding Amberglas’s motives. He found it hard to believe that she could be a sorceress, but how else could she have saved him from the Border Guard? Jermain was certain he had not imagined the brown fog that had come from nowhere to engulf Morenar and his men. He tried, once, to ask her about it, but Amberglas’s answer—which involved mist, the River Nor, rowan trees, smoke, and a woman with two dogs who might have been taken for a witch if the dogs had been cats—so thoroughly confused him that he did not bring up the subject a second time.

  Jermain was also worried about Blackflame, in spite of Amberglas’s confused assurances. The horse was practically the only thing Jermain had been able to bring out of Sevairn, and Jermain prized him highly. And what, really, could Amberglas know about caring for a warhorse? Jermain was not reassured until Amberglas took him to a small building just outside the house and showed him where Blackflame was stabled.

  To his surprise, Jermain found the horse comfortable, clean, and well provided for. His saddle and bridle had been cleaned and polished; they hung on a peg just inside the door. Jermain examined everything carefully, partly from habit, partly to justify his earlier concern, but he found nothing to complain of. Finally he looked up from beside Blackflame. Amberglas was watching the horse. Jermain rose.

  “I think I owe you an apology,” he said. “You were quite right; you need no advice from me. The King’s stables could do no better.”

  “Well, I don’t suppose you could have known that,” Amberglas said as they started toward the stable door. “It is rather difficult to be sure of such things when you can’t see them, which of course you couldn’t since you were lying in bed most of the time. Actually, you really should go back; this is the first time you have been up—not counting meals, of course, which is quite reasonable, though not strictly accurate—and you really shouldn’t do too much just at present. So of course you were concerned about your horse.”

  “I do feel a little—” Jermain broke off in midsentence and froze in the center of the open stable door.

  “Dear me,” said Amberglas from slightly behind him. “Whatever is the matter?”

  Jermain hardly heard her. He was staring incredulously at the building in front of him. Amberglas’s home was no house but a tower; and line for line, stone for stone, it was an exact duplicate of the Tower of Judgment in Leshiya. The Tower of Judgment, where King Marreth’s Council met. The Tower of Judgment, where Jermain had been sentenced to disgrace and exile.

  A hand touched his arm lightly. Jermain swung around and found himself blinking at Amberglas. “You do seem quite upset,” Amberglas said. “I don’t suppose you would care to answer my question after all?”

  Slowly, Jermain forced himself to relax. This was not Leshiya; no castle rose behind the tower, and he was surrounded by trees, not a city. “I am sorry,” he said at last. “I had not really looked at your tower before, and it brought back . . . unpleasant memories.”

  “The tower? Why?”

  The woman’s voice was almost sharp, and Jermain’s head turned in surprise. A slight shock went through him as he realized that Amberglas was looking, not past him or through him, but at him. Her gaze was clear and intense, and highly unsettling. Suddenly Jermain had no difficulty at all in believing she was a sorceress.

  “Ah, it reminds me of a place in Leshiya,” Jermain said.

  “What place?”

  “The Tower of Judgment.”

  “I see,” Amberglas said. She smiled, and her eyes took on the same slightly out-of-focus look that they had had before. “Under the circumstances, that would be quite unnerving, though this isn’t Leshiya, of course, or even Sevairn, which I think is quite a good thing. But then, some people think I have peculiar taste.”

  Jermain was still too unnerved to think of an adequate answer. Amberglas, however, did not appear to require one. In silence, they crossed the open space between the stable and the tower.

  Amberglas did not mention Sevairn, Marreth, or the tower again. Jermain was puzzled, but he remembered that odd, intense gaze too well to bring up the subject himself. He spent an uneasy night, and he awoke early. He was sitting at the table, watching the squirrel eat nuts on the bac
k of one of the chairs and trying to decide whether to take his leave of Amberglas and the tower, when he heard a shout outside.

  Almost at once, Jermain was out of his chair heading for his sword. The shout came again, more clearly this time. “Amberglas!”

  Jermain slowed. The voice sounded too young to be a real threat. Still, he picked up the sword and fastened it in place before he took his seat again. A moment later the door banged open and a small, windblown figure burst into the room.

  “Amberglas! Where are you? You won’t believe—” The girl stopped, staring at Jermain from inside an incredible mass of tangled brown hair. Her eyes were a dark, vivid blue. “Who are you?” she demanded. “And where’s Amberglas?”

  “My name is Trevannon,” Jermain said. He rose and bowed slightly. “Will you honor me with yours?”

  “Crystalorn,” the girl said a trifle less hostilely. “Would you tell me where Amberglas is, please?”

  Jermain blinked, thinking he must certainly have heard wrong. The girl’s clothes were rich enough, and surely there was a suggestion of court training in her mannerisms, but what would the Princess of Barinash be doing alone in the middle of a forest? He realized that she was still waiting for an answer and opened his mouth to reply.

  “I’m right here,” said Amberglas’s voice from behind him, “which of course doesn’t really say much, but as long as you are, too, it can’t matter a great deal.” Crystalorn and Jermain both started and turned to find her standing at the bottom of the stairs.

  “Amberglas! I’m so glad I found you. I have to—” Crystalorn stopped again and looked at Jermain. “Amberglas, can you come outside where we can talk? I have to decide what to do, and they’ll find out I’m missing before too long.”

  “That’s quite all right, dear,” Amberglas said vaguely. “Do sit down and explain. It’s really much more comfortable in here, if you’ll only persuade Garren to take a different chair. Not that the other one isn’t quite as comfortable, but—”