Prophet of Moonshae

And as the mage concentrated, the waves before them parted, and though heaving swells still tossed and smashed on each side of them, a narrow, straight gap had been carved in the sea.

Along this sleek highway, the Gullwing sprang forward as if the ship herself felt the exhilaration of the wizard's triumph.

'Lady Deirdre! Earl Blackstone! What is the trouble? Are you hurt?' The demanding questions were accompanied by persistent pounding on the doors of the Great Hall. The princess recognized the voice as belonging to young Arlen, the castle's burly sergeant-at-arms.

Deirdre blinked, looking quickly from Malawar to Blackstone. The latter still gaped at the place where the intruder's body had disappeared. The former looked mildly at the confused, hesitating princess, and finally he spoke.

'You must send him away, my dear, but reassuringly.'

She nodded dumbly, but then her mind began to work.

'All is well, Sergeant,' she called, pleased that her voice sounded level and calm. 'It was a mild commotion, but the matter is concluded.' She crossed to the doors and lowered her voice. 'And please, Arlen, I would desire that you keep this matter in your confidence. No harm has been done.'

'As you wish, my lady.' The sergeant's voice quite clearly indicated that the resolution was not as he wished. Nevertheless, she heard him order several other men-at-arms away. She pictured the strapping warrior taking the position as door guard himself, and she knew that she could trust him not to intrude.

'He-he was dead! It's the same man… but I saw him die! I killed him!' Blackstone recovered his voice, but the brawny earl's tone quavered as his words groped for some kind of understanding. He pointed at the spot where the man had vanished, and they all saw that no spot-no mark of any kind-indicated the place.

'He seemed to be quite alive,' said Malawar dryly. 'Perhaps you are confused as to his identity.'

'But … he sounded the same, said the same sort of things!' Blackstone shook his head, then looked up. 'Of course, though. . you must be right. He was dead. . '

The earl turned to look at Deirdre, his eyes wide. 'How, lady, did you slay him? What power do you have?'

For the first time, the princess recalled the explosion of might with which she had taken a life. The memory frightened her, yet the sense of triumph gave her a strange thrill as well.

'It-it comes from within me,' she stammered.

'You have summoned the Bolt of Talos, an enchantment controlled by the will of a very potent sorceress,' Malawar explained. The priest turned to Deirdre and placed his hands upon her shoulders. 'Now, my dear,' he declared, 'you must tend to your country.'

'Raise an army?' she asked reluctantly.

'Any further delay could be disastrous,' he observed. 'You know that the northmen are on the march!'

'I'll notify the lord generals,' she said. 'They'll have all the cantrevs mustered. It'll take a few days.'

'The captains will do quite well,' the priest noted. 'You can be certain that the war will begin with a vigorous attack.'

'I'm concerned about my cantrev,' Blackstone announced. 'I have to be there in case that column comes over the mountain.'

'Yes,' agreed Malawar. 'You should go.'

'Can you stay here for a time?' Deirdre asked Malawar. 'As a guest of the castle? I have chambers that are ready even as we speak. You'd be very comfortable.'

'I don't doubt that in the least, my lady. But, alas, comfort is not a luxury I can currently afford. No, I have to leave you. There are other matters to which I must attend. I will return to you before the moment of decision.'

'As you will,' Deirdre concluded unhappily. Before she had completed the last word, her mysterious companion had faded to nothing before her eyes.

'I hate it when he does that!' growled Blackstone, gesturing at the place where Malawar had disappeared. 'It gives me the shivers, thinking he might be anywhere, whenever he wants to be there!'

Deirdre paid little attention. Instead, she stared at the place where Malawar had been and thought about the eternal hours that must pass before she would see him again.

Darkness of his second night in the highlands found Hanrald seeking shelter in a low vale protected from wind and rain only by the craggy tors on all sides. During his wanderings since the death of his horse and the fight with the trolls, the knight had realized that he was totally lost.

A small, dark pond indicated the possibility of fish. Hanrald, who had grown up in country well-laced with trout streams, was able to tickle a fat rainbow from the water by lying very still above an overhanging bank and holding his hand in the water. When one of the trout unknowingly swam across his fingers, he flipped it out of the water and quickly bashed its head on a rock.

No trees grew in his rocky vale, but he found enough dried brush to build a small fire. He decided that if his fish could not be called cooked, neither was it entirely raw-and never had he enjoyed a meal so much.

Leaning back against the rock that he would use as his pillow, the knight placed his drawn sword across his lap, where he could raise it with an instant's notice. He stared at the fading embers of his fire, and his mind turned-as it did so often-to the Princess Alicia.

Where was she? During his days of wandering, Hanrald had become convinced that she would no longer be found in the highlands. Nevertheless, he had no regrets about making his impetuous search, for during this time, he had clarified much in his own mind. Solitude, he decided, did that for a man. It allowed his mind to look at things with a clarity that was often denied by the bustle of society.

Foremost among his realizations had been a full understanding of his own loyalty. He was devoted to his king, and if this meant a betrayal of his own family, then so be it. Such a betrayal could only come about because of treachery on his father's part, and Hanrald felt fairly certain that such treachery figured prominently in the earl's plans.

The knight's thoughts turned to his father, the Earl of Fairheight. Since Hanrald's first awareness, he remembered striving to please the man, but always he fell short of Blackstone's harsh goals. The older Currag and Gwyeth, dark and brooding like the earl, had been his father's favorites in everything.

Gradually, however, the young knight had realized that the differences between them ran much deeper. Of course he had heard the rumors spread by the servants and old guardsmen, the claims that the earl's wife had been unfaithful and Hanrald was not his true son after all. But he had always dismissed that speculation as mere gossip, else he couldn't imagine why Blackstone would have raised him in the manor. His wife, after all, had died in the act of bearing Hanrald.

Now he wondered if the tale might not have some credence after all. The differences between himself and his brother and father seemed so profound that perhaps they required an explanation such as this. Not in a physical sense, of course-Hanrald had inherited his fairness and blue eyes from his mother but morally. How could they be men of the same stock?

His musings were interrupted as he caught sight of a sudden brightness in the night, a gleaming spot of light that appeared and then as quickly vanished. Hanrald's hands clenched around the hilt of his massive sword, and he slowly rose to his feet. He could see nothing through the darkness, and even his fire was now a mere bowl of cherry-red embers.

But he felt something out there, and a shiver passed along his spine. There! He saw it again, this time a pair of spots, yellowish green and glowing dimly in the faint, reflected light of his pathetic fire. The glowing points were close together, unmistakably the eyes of a large animal.

Hanrald bent his knees, holding the sword before him in a fighting crouch, expecting momentarily that some horror would come lunging from the darkness to tear at his throat. He intended that the beast would meet its death on his blade before its slavering jaws ever got close to his neck.

He heard a movement behind him and looked around, but all was darkness. Nevertheless, his senses began to confirm that he faced more than one of these creatures. Indeed, by listening and remaining perfectly still, he