He stopped in such a field and ate, found the grapes dripping with water from the night's rain; they tasted as succulent as the first grape must have tasted to the first man who ate it.

The river here was wide, a broad silver ribbon gleaming beneath the green fields. Borenson had thought last night to leave himself bloody, but now he did not want Myrrima to see him this way, to ever guess what he'd done.

He went down to the river and swam, naked, unmindful of the pig farmers who herded animals past on the road.

When the sun dried him, Borenson put on his armor, but threw his bloodied surcoat into the water, letting the river carry away the image of the green knight on the blue field.

Surely, he thought, Raj Ahten's troops have reached Longmont. I'm so far behind them, I'm too late to join the battle. In truth, he no longer cared. No matter what the outcome at Longmont, he planned to renounce his lord.

In assassinating innocent Dedicates, men and women who had committed no crime but that of loving a good and decent king, Borenson had done more than any master had a right to ask. So now he'd renounce his vows to Orden, become a Knight Equitable. Of his own free will he'd fight as he deemed best.

Borenson went on to a pear tree beside an abandoned farm, and climbed, taking the fattest pears from the top--same for himself, some for Myrrima and her family.

From the treetop he saw something interesting: over a rise lay deep pools with steep sides beneath a grove of willow trees, pools as blue as the sky. Yellow willow leaves had fallen into water in great drifts, floating over the surface. But also on the pools were roses bobbing, red and white.

A wizard lives there, Borenson realized, dully. A water wizard, and people have thrown roses into the water, seeking its blessings.

He climbed quickly down from the tree, ran over the rise to the still waters, and approached solemnly, hopefully. He had no roses or flowers to sweeten the wizard's water, but he had pears that it might eat.

So he went to the edge of the pool, where the willow roots twisted down a gravel bank, and there he sat on a broad black root. The crisp leaves of the trees above him blew in a small breeze, rustling, and Borenson called for long minutes, "O wizard of the water, lover of the sea, O wizard of the water, hear my plea."

But the surface of the pool remained unperturbed, and he saw nothing in the shining pool but water striders that skated over its flat surface and a few brown newts that floated beneath, watching him from golden eyes.

In despair, he began to wonder if the wizard had died long ago, and people still sweetened the pools in hopes that someday another might come. Or if this was a haunted place, and the local girls threw roses in the water to placate someone who had drowned.

After long minutes of sitting on the willow root, and calling with no results, Borenson closed his eyes, just smelling the sweet water, thinking of home, of Mystarria, of the peaceful healing waters in the pools of Derra where madmen might go to bathe, and have their troubling thoughts and memories washed from them.126 As he lay thinking of that place, he realized that a cold root was brushing his ankle, and thought to move his foot, when suddenly the root wrapped round his foot, squeezed tenderly.

He looked down. At the water's edge, just beneath the waves, was a girl of ten, skin as pale blue and flawless as ceramics, hair of silver. She stared up at him from beneath the water with eyes as wide and green as all the seas, and her eyes were unblinking, completely motionless. Only the crimson gill slits at her throat pulsed slightly as she breathed.

She withdrew her hand from his foot, instead reached underwater and grasped at the willow roots.

An undine. Too young to be of great power.

"I brought you a pear, sweet one, if you will have it," Borenson said.

The undine did not answer, only stared up at him and through him with soulless eyes.

I killed girls your age last night, Borenson wanted to tell her, wanted to cry.

I know, her eyes said.

I will never have peace, Borenson whispered wordlessly.

I could give you peace, the undine's eyes said.

But Borenson knew she lied, that she'd pull him down into the waves, give him love, and that while she loved him, he could survive beneath the pools. But in time she'd forget about him, and he would drown. She could give him only a brief few days of pleasure before death.

I wish that, like you, I could be one with the water, and know peace, Borenson thought. He remembered the great seas of home, the white breakers rolling over a green as deep as aged copper.

The undine's eyes went wide at his memories of the sea, and a smile formed on her lips, as if grateful for the vision.

Then he took one of his golden pears, reached down to the water, gave it to the undine.

She reached for it with a wet, slender blue hand, with long nails of silver, but then grasped his wrist and pulled herself up enough so that she could kiss his lips.

The move was unexpected, quick as a fish jumping for a fly, and Borenson felt her lips brush his for only a moment.

He placed the pear in her hand and left, and for a long hour afterward he could not quite remember what pain had brought him to that pool, with roses of red and white bobbing among the golden leaves.

He managed to find his mount, then rode at leisure, letting the horse graze as it walked; soon enough he reached the little meadow outside Bannisferre where Myrrima's cottage lay among the wild daisies.

Blue smoke curled up from a cooking fire, and one of Myrrima's ugly sisters--Inette, he recalled her name--stood feeding grain to the scrawny black chickens at the front door.

As he rode up, Inette looked up at him, a smile on her ruined face. The smile quickly faded. "You all right?"

"No," Borenson said. "Where's Myrrima?"

"A messenger came through town," Inette said. "Troops are gathering. Lord Orden is at Longmont. She--Myrrima left last night. Many of the boys from town have gone to fight."

All the ease of heart he'd felt for the past hour now drained from him. "To Longmont!" Borenson shouted. "Why?"

"She wants to be with you!" Inette answered.

"This--this won't be a picnic or a day at the fair!" Borenson shouted.

"She knows," Inette whispered. "But--you're betrothed. If you live through it, she wants to live with you. And if you don't..."

Borenson hung his head, thinking furiously. Sixty miles. Nearly sixty miles to Longmont. She could not have walked there in a night, even in a pair of nights.

"Did she travel afoot?"

Inette shook her head numbly. "Some boys from town went. In a wagon..."

Too late. Too late. Borenson spun his horse, raced to catch her.

Chapter 35.

BETWEEN STRONG ARMS.

Gaborn heard Iome cry out as he rode toward Longmont. Her cry was so startling that at first he feared that she'd been shot with an arrow. For hours now they had been traveling, stopping every few minutes to switch horses, and Iome had not made a single complaint. He slowed and turned in his saddle to look back.

He saw at first that King Sylvarresta sat in his saddle, head nodding. The King clutched the pom of his saddle with both hands. He wept softly, breathing in gasps. Tears streamed from his eyes.

Iome, too was hunched. "Gaborn, stop. We've got to stop!" she cried, taking the reins of her father's horse.

"What's wrong?" Gaborn asked.

"Gaagh," King Sylvarresta said.

"Our Dedicates are dying," Iome said. "He...I don't know if my father has the strength to go on."

Gaborn felt an overwhelming sadness envelop him. "Borenson. I should have guessed." He felt dazed. "I am so sorry, Iome."

He rode up next to the King, took the King's jaw in his hand. "Can you ride? Can you stay on the horse? You have to ride!

Hold on!"

Gaborn pushed the King's hands firmly to the pommel of the saddle. "Hold! Like this!"

King Sylvarresta looked into Gaborn's face, clutched the pommel.

"Do you have strength to ride?" Gaborn asked Iome.

She nodded grimly in the dark.

Gaborn let the horses canter lightly, kept a close watch on his charges.

King Sylvarresta was gazing up at the stars as they rode, or watching the lights of a town as they passed.

Five miles later, they rounded a corner, and King Sylvarresta went flying off his horse. He landed on his hip, slid in the mud and grass at the side of the road. Then just lay, sobbing.127 Gaborn went and whispered soft words to him, helped King Sylvarresta back on his horse; then Gaborn rode behind, cradling King Sylvarresta between strong arms.

Chapter 36.

THE SERPENT RING.

Through the long night, King Orden waited impatiently for sign of his son. It was hard, this waiting, the hardest thing he'd ever done.

Orden's men carried all two hundred thousand arrows from the armory to their perches along the castle's battlements. On the wall-walk beneath the west tower, they set a great bonfire, a message of distress, in an effort to call aid from any who might see its light or smoke. Near that fire, his men set great cauldrons of oil to boil, so that the putrid scent of them filled the castle.

Orden commanded five men to go north three miles, to set a similar fire on the peak of Tor Loman, so everyone within twenty leagues might see it. Duke Groverman had not heeded Orden's petitions. Perhaps sight of the battle pyres would shame him into it.

Just before dawn, two thousand knights arrived from Groverman, explaining their delay. Groverman had heard of the fall of Longmont, and thought to retake it, but had sent word to Sylvarresta. Apparently his messengers never made it to the King alive. After a day of waiting, he'd sent a hundred scouts on force horses to Sylvarresta and learned that the castle had fallen.

Orden wondered which road the scouts had taken, thought it odd that his men hadn't spotted them. Which meant that the knights had taken trails through the forest.

Then the scouts had returned with the ill news of Sylvarresta's defeat, and Groverman waited still for reinforcements from distant castles.

The knights Groverman sent were good men, solid warriors. But despite his best efforts, Orden did not feel prepared. He suspected this battle would bring trials he couldn't prepare for.

The Earl of Dreis gave King Orden no comfort. The man was incompetent. He had been in the castle for less than an hour before he tried to assume command. One of his first tasks had been to order the artillerymen to push the catapults back into the shelter of the towers, foiling all the work the artillerymen had done setting the ranges.

Orden found the Earl lounging in the Duke's old quarters, letting a body servant massage his feet while he sipped warm tea.

"Why have you ordered the artillery stored?" Orden asked.

The Duke seemed to struggle to decide whether to affect an imperious tone or become defensive. "A stratagem, my dear fellow, a stratagem. You see, I realized that if we keep them hidden until the heat of battle, we can whisk them out suddenly, and the sight of them will dismay Raj Ahten's forces!"

King Orden did not know whether to laugh or weep at such stupidity. "Raj Ahten has seen many catapults," he said simply.

"He has taken a hundred castles by force. His men will not be dismayed at the sight of these."

"Yes, but--"

"Indeed, Raj Ahten has seen these catapults, for he came here not a fortnight ago. He knows they are here."

"Ah, of course! Point well taken!" the Earl said, shoving his masseuse away as he struggled from his chair.

"We need to put the catapults back, then let our men test the settings once again, and their ranges."

"Well...all right," the Earl grumbled, as if considering some other plan.

"Also," King Orden said, "you've ordered your men to defend the castle gates, and my men to man the walls. Is there some reason for this?"

"Ah, of course!" Dreis said. "You must realize that my men are fighting for home and country. It is a matter of honor for them to defend the gates."

"Your Lordship," Orden tried to explain patiently, "you must understand that in the thick of this battle, all our men will be fighting for their lives. My men fight for their homes and their countries, as well as yours do. And I've brought my best force warriors, men with ten and twenty endowments each. They will fight better than commoners."

Dreis rebutted, "Ah, your men may fight with swords and hammers, but our men will fight with heart, and with a will!"

"Your Lordship--"

Dreis raised a hand to stop him. "You forget your place, Orden," he said fiercely. "This is Heredon, not Mystarria. I command this castle, until some greater lord takes my place."

"Assuredly," Orden said with a slight bow, though a bending of his back had never come harder. "I did not mean to seem presumptuous. I merely hoped that some of my better guards might fight beside yours. It would show Raj Ahten...our unity."

"Ah, unity!" Dreis said, taking the bait. "A noble concept. A fine ideal. Yes, yes, I'll order it immediately."

"Thank you, Your Lordship," King Orden said with another bow, then turned to leave. He felt he had just got a handle on how Dreis' counselors must have had to work him.

"Ah," Dreis said, "do not leave. If I might ask: I understand you are recruiting men for a serpent ring?"

"Yes, Your Lordship," Orden answered, dreading the next question.