There was a tiny church in the bend of the road. Although from the outside it was dark and undistinguished looking, the inside blazed with candle light on luxurious silk hangings and golden reliquaries. “Both those thankful to be coming down out of the mountains,” read Joachim from his guide, “and those starting the hard and perilous climb up into them, have traditionally left a small offering here.”
But I would have been happy to stay in the mountains. As we wound down toward the distant plain, I once again began worrying about how to protect our party. I had been brought along as a wizard to do so, but so far was rather short on success. In odd moments I tried to work out new variations of spells, wondering which ones might stop an army. Back when the wizards in the west had stopped the Black Wars, I thought, they had either been much more proficient at magic than I, or else they had not had their best friends held hostage by the enemy.
As we came down the final steep slope into the eastern kingdoms, the rocky outcroppings on either hand yellow with gorse, we saw that the road ahead of us went through a massive stone gate. It was, I thought, rather useless as a gate, because there was no wall, but as a symbol of a boundary it was very dramatic. It was at least twenty feet high, and sprouting from the top were the carved stone heads of wolves.
As we approached the gate from one side I saw a dusty cloud rapidly approaching from the other. With a little quick magical probing, I discovered it was three mounted knights.
In a moment, the others saw them too. Hugo, Dominic, and Ascelin glanced at each other and drew out the swords they had bought, at what they all said were highly inflated prices, up in the mountains.
But I said, “Wait a minute,” and rode forward, shielding myself and my mare with what I hoped was a suitably strong protective spell. When the riders were thirty yards away, I acted.
I pulled out a pebble to which I had earlier attached an almost fully-completed illusion and threw it as hard as I could. It bounced under the arch of the gate and turned into a dragon.
My dragon reared up, shooting fire, though the dramatic impact was somewhat lessened when its head passed directly through the stonework of the gate. The riders pulled up hard, as well they might, desperately circling their horses as they tried to stay on. But showing surprisingly good discipline, in a few seconds they dropped back and raised their spears.
I was ready for those too. I used magic to jerk their spears in quick succession from their hands, and sent them arching harmlessly away. They reached for their swords, with a presence of mind I admired, but I bellowed, “Stop!” in a voice amplified by magic.
Dissolving my dragon into a shower of sparks, I rode slowly forward, one empty hand raised before me. They had certainly stopped. Following King Warin’s example, I tried to pierce them with my eyes, at the same time adding a few strengthening details to the spell that surrounded me.
“What do you mean, Wizard, trying to enter this kingdom with an act of undeclared war?” demanded the leader of the knights before me.
“I am not at war with anyone,” I said with dignity. “We are peaceful pilgrims. But when I saw armed men galloping to attack my party, I felt I must act at once to protect us.”
The knights looked at my cloak, embroidered with the cross, then past me to the others. “You’re armed men yourselves, in spite of your pilgrim’s tokens.”
“Only in self-defense,” I said. “We were recently set upon by bandits who nearly killed our chaplain.”
The leader looked at me thoughtfully. I decided not to try to look honest and trustworthy for fear it would appear an unconvincing mask. “If you mean no harm,” he then yelled to the rest of the party from Yurt, “put up your swords and approach slowly.”
King Haimeric, I was pleased to see, kicked his horse forward immediately, and the others were forced to follow. We all met under the arch of the gate where my dragon had stood a moment before.
“We are, as my wizard told you, simply pilgrims,” said the king. “You can see I’m not even wearing a sword myself. At the moment we’re making for the Church of the Holy Twins.”
“The Holy Twins?” asked one of the knights facing us. He hesitated for a moment then said slowly, “They don’t get very many pilgrims there any more.”
“Why not?” said Dominic, quickly and brusquely.
The leader eyed him for a moment. “It’s probably just a foolish story,” he said, “but hardly anyone’s been buried there for a good fifty years.”
“What’s a story?” Dominic persisted. I, like him, had the chilling impression that there was something terribly wrong about the church, and these knights knew it.
“Just a tale of the sort told to frighten children. Supposedly a long, long time ago, in the darkest part of the night, an evil wizard, steeped in the black arts, brought the dead body of a magnificent warrior there for burial. There was something about the wizard, a sense that he might even be able to communicate with the dead, that made other people much less willing to see their relatives lying there … But I told you it was just a silly story,” he finished briskly.
“Our wizard practices only white magic, and we wish no evil to anyone,” said King Haimeric. “Are you going to let us proceed?”
“All right,” said the leader in sudden decision. “But I warn you, Wizard, that you’re going to get your group into trouble if you go through the eastern kingdoms attacking border guards without provocation. At least in this kingdom, we’re not at war right now, and we don’t intend to be.” He wrote us out a pass which he said we should show to any patrols we met.
“I admired your dragon,” King Haimeric said to me as we rode on. “And I know Dominic and Ascelin think it necessary to carry weapons. But shouldn’t you have told the knights we were pilgrims right away, rather than threatening them?”
Given another chance, I would do exactly the same thing. I started attaching a new spell to a new pebble and thought complacently that if I had lived during the Black Wars, and the other wizards had needed me, I would not have embarrassed myself.
II
The church where Dominic’s father was buried was in the center of a small town. Both Ascelin and I kept glancing suspiciously to either side as we rode through the noisy, twisting streets, but it was impossible to pick out potential enemies from so many people.
A final twist of the street led us to a covered passage and then to an open square, with the church in the center. Here, unlike the rest of town, it was quiet and peaceful. I had expected something sinister, but we found nothing of the kind. The church was built entirely of cobblestones, with alternating layers of darker and lighter stone. What should have been the main entrance, under the front porch, was bricked up, but Hugo found a small, unlocked door at the far end.
“The twin saints to which this church is dedicated,” read Joachim from his guidebook, “were soldiers in their youth, until Christ appeared to them in a fiery vision in the middle of battle and they repented of their sinful ways. But soldiers in battle still call on their aid in time of peril, and many are buried in their church.”
The Holy Twins, I thought, must not have listened to Dominic’s father-or, for that matter, to a number of other soldiers either. It was an enormous though rather dusty church, and virtually all the stones with which the floor was paved and many of the lower blocks in the side walls were inscribed with the names of warriors buried over the centuries near their saintly patrons.
“The guidebook suggests this was a very busy pilgrimage church,” said Joachim, “but it must have been written before the incident the border guards mentioned.”
“This end is all old graves,” said King Haimeric. “The inscriptions are almost worn away. Let’s try the other end.”
Hugo, who had gone ahead, suddenly called back to us, his voice echoing under the high stone roof. “I think I’ve found him!”
Set into the wall about halfway down was a stone with newer carving than most in the church. The king fumbled with his eyeglasses and bent closer. Even in the dim afternoon light, we could read the inscription easily. “Hic iacet Dominicus princeps Yurtiae,” it said in the old imperial language: “Here lies Prince Dominic of Yurt.”
King Haimeric stood with his hands folded, silently contemplating the grave of his younger brother.
