Magic's Pawn

Quickly, before he could lose his courage, he bent and kissed the cold lips - hoping that this, too, would be forgiven, and caught in a grief too deep for tears. Then he knelt on the icy white marble of the floor beside the bier, and braced the hilt of the dagger between his knees, clasping his hands with the dagger between his wrists, resting them on either side of the blade-edge.

' 'Lendel, there's nothing without you. Forgive me - if you can,' he whispered again, both to Tylendel and the brooding Faces behind the altar.

And before he could begin to be afraid, he pulled both wrists up along the knife-edges, slashing them simultaneously.

The dagger was as sharp as he had hoped - sharper than he had expected. He cut both wrists almost to the bone; gasped as pain shot up his arms, and the knife fell clattering to the marble, released when his legs jerked involuntarily.

He sagged with sudden dizziness, and fell forward over his bent knees; his head bowed over his hands, his arms lying limp on the marble floor. Blood began to spread on the white marble; pooled before him under his slashed wrists. He stared at it in morbid fascination. Red on white. Like blood on the snowIt was only at that moment that Yfandes seemed to realize what it was he was doing. She screamed, and began kicking at the door. But it was far too late; his eyes were no longer focusing properly anymore, and his wrists didn't even hurt. But he was feeling so cold, so very cold :I'm sorry,: he thought muzzily at the frantic Companion, beginning to black out, and feeling himself falling over sideways : Yfandes, I'm sorry… you'll find someone… better than me. Worthy of you.:

'Gone?' Savil's voice broke. 'What the hell do you mean, gone?'

'Savil, I swear to you, the boy was asleep. I dozed off for a breath or two, and when I woke up he was gone,' Jaysen answered, one hand clutched at the side of his head on a fistful of hair, his expression frantic and guilt-ridden. 'I thought maybe he'd gone to the privy or something, but I can't find him anywhere.'

Savil swung her legs out of the bed and rubbed her eyes, trying to think. Where would Vanyel have gone, and in the name of the gods, why?

But in a heartbeat she had her answer - the frightened, frantic scream of a Companion rang across the river, and her Kellan's voice shrilled into her head.

:Savil - the boy - :and an image of where he was and what he had done.

From the stricken look on Jaysen's face, his own Felar had given him the same information.

'Gods!' Savil snatched her cloak from the chair beside her bed and ran out in her bare feet, through the common room, and headed for the door of Vanyel's room, Jaysen breathing down her neck.

She hit the garden door at a dead run, and it was a damned good thing that it wasn't locked, because if it had been, she'd have broken it off the hinges. The cold of the night slapped her in the face like an impious hand; that stopped her for a moment, but only a moment. In the next instant Felar and Kellan pounded up at a gallop. Felar skidded around in a tight pivot, presenting his hindquarters to his Chosen, who leapfrogged up into his seat with an acrobatic skill that would have had Savil muttering about 'show-offs' had the situation been less precarious. Instead, she waited for Kellan to come to a dead halt, and clambered onto her back anyhow, her bedgown rucked up around her legs. Kellan launched herself into a full, frantic gallop as Savil clung on as best she could.

Now Savil was a breath behind Jaysen, as the young Seneschal's Herald led the way across the nearest bridge and up the Field to the Temple of the Grove. Nor were they the only two summoned by the frantic screaming, mind and voice, of Yfandes. Heralds and trainees were boiling out of the Palace like aroused fire ants, rendezvousing with their Companions, and heading across the river at breakneck speed.

But Jaysen and Savil were the first two on the scene; it was their dubious privilege to see Yfandes trying to batter down the solid bronze door of the Temple single-handedly, and not budging it by so much as a thumbs'- breadth. Her hooves were screeching across the metal, leaving showers of sparks in their wake, and her anguished screams were far too like a human's for comfort.

Jaysen vaulted off Felar's back and hit the ground at a run, ducking fearlessly under Yfandes' flying hooves to make a trial of the door himself.

'It's locked from the inside,' he shouted unnecessarily, as Savil slid from Kellan's back to limp to his side. He put his shoulder against the door, and rammed it, with no more luck than Yfandes had had.

'Vanyel!' Savil put her mouth up against the crack between door and frame, and shouted through it. 'Van, lad, let us in!'

She put her ear to the crack and listened, but heard nothing :Kellan - :

:Yfandes says he's still alive, but unconscious and weakening,: came the grim reply, as Yfandes danced in place, her sapphire eyes gone nearly black with anguish.

'Somebody get me a mage-light on that damned tower!''

It was Mardic; he had his hands on Donni's shoulders and was staring up at the tower. Donni was holding a crossbow with a bulky missile cocked and ready.

Savil responded first, running far enough back from the door that she could see the top of the Belltower. It was glowing faintly, but obviously too faintly for Donni to make out a target. Savil raised her hands, and sent up such a burst of power that the entire top of the tower flowered with light.

While Mardic closed his eyes and scowled in concentration, Donni raised the crossbow, squinted carefully along it, and fired.

The oddly-shaped arrow flew strangely, and slowly, trailing something light colored behind it - and in a moment, Savil realized why and what it was. Donni had been a bright little apprentice-thief when she'd been Chosen; this was a grapnel-arrow, meant to carry a light, but strong line through an open window and catch on the sill. Mardic had a very weak, but usable Fetching-Gift; he had invoked it to help the arrow carry something heavier than a light line. A climbing-rope.

It lobbed through the loop of the Bell-house, clanging ominously off the Death Bell itself. Savil felt a chill, and made a warding-gesture, nor was she the only one. She could see most of the others shivering at the least, and Yfandes moaned like a dying thing at the sound of the Bell.

Donni, normally mobile face gone blank, was paying no attention to anything other than her arrow and line;