Farland, David - Runelords 02 - Brotherhood of the Wolf by Farland David

Author:Farland, David [Farland, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fantasy, Fiction, General
ISBN: 9781841495613
Publisher: Orbit
Published: 2007-02-01T08:53:39+00:00

CHAPTER 28

A PLOT UNMASKED

By the time Erin Connal reached Castle Groverman on the banks of the Wind River, she felt no desire to celebrate. True, Gaborn had wakened from his faint an hour before and given the good news: The Darkling Glory was dead--or at least disembodied, made much less dangerous.

But Erin had been left horseless, and Prince Celinor had been injured by a falling brand. The skin on the back of his neck had burned and bubbled. With his endowments of stamina, the Prince would live, but he'd not have an easy recovery. By the time Erin had dragged him from under the burning logs, the pain of his wounds had Celinor gibbering and weeping like a child. He'd fallen unconscious shortly afterward, and so had been carried behind the saddle of one of Duke Groverman's men, and had gotten lost from Erin's sight during the ride.

Erin rode behind a knight from Jonnick into the bailey outside Duke Groverman's keep. Upon entering, she learned that she was not the first to arrive at the keep--far from it.

Hundreds of knights had already arrived and were feasting. Groverman's servants had brought baskets with loaves of bread into the bailey and dispensed the food freely while a serving woman opened flasks of ale. A great bank of fires lined the east wall, where cooking boys turned whole calves on spits. Minstrels played from a balcony of the Duke's Keep, and a crier beside the city gate welcomed them by shouting, "Eat your fill, gentleman. Eat your fill!"

The Duke spared nothing for the Earth King's army. But Erin was not yet ready to eat.

She went to find Celinor. Duke Groverman's men had laid him on a saddle blanket near a dark wall of the keep. Moonflowers grew along the wall, and now their pale white blossoms opened wide to the night air and the moths that fed on their nectar. A well-intentioned soldier was hunched over Celinor, trying to force whiskey down his throat.

"Drink, good sirrah," the knight said..."It will ease your pain."

But Celinor clenched his teeth, and, with tears of pain in his eyes, turned his head away. The knight tried to wrestle Celinor's head around, to force him to drink, obviously believing that the Prince was delirious.

"I'll have at him," Erin said, urging the knight to leave. "He'll take the poppy better."

"Perhaps," the knight said, "though I don't know why he'd prefer a bitter poppy to sweet whiskey."

"Find a physic and ask for the poppy," Erin said wearily, and she knelt by Celinor, brushed his brow. He was sweating, and looked up at her with pain-filled eyes.

"Thank you," he managed to whisper.

The Earth King had bidden him to put aside strong drink. Now Erin saw that he really would avoid it at any cost. "It's nothing," she told Celinor, then she held him a moment. He seemed to sleep.

At times he spoke deliriously, as if in evil dreams. Once he shouted and tried to push her away.

But after several long minutes, he woke.

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