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and quickly heeded.
Leaving their horses, the two spread their arms before the doors. They sensed
the might of the doors, the Masters first test.
 Masters of Salam�, Gabrielle challenged,  we are for earnest combat. For
preliminaries, we care no more than this! With that, she spat on the doors.
Where it landed, blue essence of her magic sizzled and popped, spreading to
the hairline crack between the two portals, racing up and down. The doors
quaked, caught in the conflict of wills between the deCourteneys and the Five.
Thick hinges rang like tuning forks. In that first contest, the Masters found
that the new Trustee was indeed worthy of her office. The Five didn t exert
every effort, but let the deCourteneys put theirs forth. The doors burst open,
swung wide.
Andre and Gabrielle walked together into lightlessness. When they were within,
the cyclopean portals swung shut. No one outside tried to stop that, nor could
they have done so.
* * * *
Though Dunstan kept the ride as smooth as he could, the passengers were still
swayed and jounced. Gil was feeling cold, his respiration shallow and fast,
his chest screaming for air. Hightower seemed to have lost consciousness.
There was a yelp from Ferrian who, for some reason, stared back across a flat
landscape at Salam� rather than ahead.
 The glows of thaumaturgy are there, the Horseblooded shouted. Dunstan hauled
on the reins. Ferrian, with a hair-raising Horseblooded whoop, dropped through
the rear hatch while the dray was still rolling. He pointed back toward the
Necropolis, calling jeers to the Five.
The others looked. Ripples of enchantment and anti-spells disrupted one
another, sending multicolored distortions through the skies over Salam�.
Springbuck and the others turned worriedly to Ferrian, and Dunstan clapped a
hand to his shoulder.
 Kinsman, have your senses fled?
The other Rider shook his head, the long tail of his hair flying.  Oh cousin,
no. I held back a secret from you all, for the Masters hear every word and see
every deed here, in their inner domain. But their battle with the siblings
deCourteney is in full career. I will explain all, as I dared not do before.
They heard him out in assorted states of skepticism or befuddlement, even Gil,
who watched through the rear hatch.  When I was recuperant at Ladentree, I saw
a strange thing. The Birds of Accord had brought forth hatchlings, yes, a
thing they can do only under influence of the Lifetree. I bespoke Silverquill,
the Senior Sage, and he remembered the Birds had lit on the Crook of the
Trustee. We reasoned the rod of her office was wood of the Lifetree itself.
 The Crook was consumed, Katya pointed out,  stopping Evergray. Springbuck
closed his eyes in sorrow, seeing salvation appear and disappear in moments.
 But hold, Swan objected,  the Trustee had been many times in Ladentree. Why
did the birds not respond before?
 The same occurred to us, and so that scholarly process of elimination came
into play. We started with a different, theoretical answer, and proved it by
diligent research through the library, piecing together Rydolomo s secret in
reverse, as it were, and had a bit of information even Bey lacked. At the
Lady s instigation, a limb of the Lifetree, cut to Her likeness, went
northward as figurehead to the bow of a ship. Do you understand?
Gil blinked. Shaped like the Bright Lady?  Angorman s axe, he blurted. It lay
where Ferrian had put it, under Hightower s bench.
 No other. The helve comes of a fragment of that figurehead. Wildmen burned
the rest but did not know, and hence Bey never learned, that one vestige
survived. Ferrian drew the greataxe out of the dray, its haft looking like
ordinary ashwood.
 The Lifetree, he declared,  come south by dint of the Trailingsword, when
the Masters think it safely consumed. He pointed eastward.  And under that
hill are those healing waters it will call forth, and in which it will thrive.
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We must take it there, sink it into the ground. If our star fails us not, it
will flourish again.
Hightower, clinging to life by insistence alone, produced from somewhere in
his ruined depths a spasm of a laugh.  Now must yon webmakers of Salam� be
a-spin! Duped, like any bumpkin, by the Lady!
 I should have brought more troops, Springbuck muttered.
 Untrue, Ferrian corrected.  The Masters can only stop us by their arts, if
at all. Thus, I took this. He handed the axe to Springbuck and showed Andre
deCourteney s sword from its scabbard at Dunstan s side. Unscrewing the
pommel, he pulled out the mystic gem-stone Calundronius. He held it up,
chatoyant on its chain.  This will negate all spells, but can protect only a
few. So, I contrived a purpose to keep our number small. Our only word now is
haste, our one purpose to see the Lifetree replanted. Not all our lives nor
any other price matters against that.
 We should tell the Trustee, Swan suggested.
 No time, Gil coughed, head spinning.  It s just us. Springbuck?
 Precisely. If no one objects, I will go in the fore with the stone, and let
the rest range round the dray.
As Ferrian relinquished Calundronius, Katya asked,  What if the Five muster
some pursuit? Were it not sound policy for one or two to stay back, to repel
that? Edward and I are well suited. Van Duyn cleared his throat, resettled
the M-1, and agreed. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]