Before The Mask by Michael Williams Read Free Book Online

object before it tumbled, then set it, almost reverently, beside his
     master's open hand.
    “The druidess,” Daeghrefn muttered absently, glaring at the flames. “What did she say?
     What?”
    Robert blanched as he steadied the cup. He recalled the druidess as wellwhen the Lord of
     Nidus had returned with Abelaard and the infant, he sent Robert himself away into the
     mountains.
    He could not do what Daeghrefn had asked. He found the druidess crouched among the
     evergreens, shaking the weight of snow from their branches. Her green robe and
    auburn hair shone against the faceless white of the drifts. She was lovely, a candle of
     warmth in the cold dusk.
    He had slipped from behind the rock, sheathing his weapon even as he turned away. But she
     had seen him, had known he was there all along. She called him back, and they spoke
     briefly, their words falling amid wary silences. His heart had melted within him.
    For the first time ever, Robert had disobeyed his lord. And though the druidess had
     promised her silence, had assured him that none other in Daeghrefn's service would see her
     again, he thought of her uneasily when the subject of druidry arose in the hall, or when
     the snow lay heavy on the juniper and blue aeterna.
    Wide-eyed, pressing heavily against the back of his chair, Aglaca watched the pale
     seneschal steady the glass. It was like the jaws of Hiddukel, this dining hall-each man at
     the table doomed and damned, trapped in his own fears and gloomy thoughts. No one else
     seemed to notice Daeghrefn's outburst, and eyes and faces bent into the candlelight, to
     the bread and cheese and old venison, as fervently as if there were nothing else to eat in
     the castle.
    His father had told him to be brave, that the war with Neraka would last but a matter of
     months. But he was only twelve, and the promised time in Nidus stretched before him like
     an eternal desert.
    What would come of him here?
    He whispered a prayer to Paladine over his untouched food. The childlike words were almost
     audible above the clatter of cutlery, the gurgle of pigeons in the eaves.
    Cerestes did not hear the boy praying, but his fingers burned sharply at the words, and
     the knife shook in his long, pale hand.
    Difficult. Aglaca would be difficult, with his Solamnic training and his mooning over
     Paladine and Huma and Kiri-Jolith.
    The other one was a different matter. Verminaard had been lodged in these deep mountains,
     motherless and virtually tutorless, his father lapsed from the Order and no longer a
     believer in Oath and Measureor even the gods themselves.
    And yet the easy one was not always preferable. The Lady had taught him as much. Better to
     wait and watch and bide his time. Speratus's “unfortunate” fall and Aglaca's arrival had
     given Cerestes all the time he would need.
    He leaned back in the chair, savoring the golden wine. Tilting the glass, he peered
     through the crystal toward the boy Verminaard, who stared back at him, his expression lost
     in the wavering candles and distortions of the wine.
    But Verminaard, as he always did when someone new entered the fortress, was sizing the
     company, following the elaborate dance of eye and gesture with the hope that something
     would be revealed, some secret emerge from a sidelong glance, a subtle tilt of the hand.
    He had learned this caution long ago in Daeghrefn's castle, where the violent, almost
     explosive moods of the knight were as unpredictable as the mountain weather. The angered
     Daeghrefn was a force to be skirted avoided entirely, if he could manage it. There were
     alcoves in the halls where Verminaard could step aside from the dark processions of armor
     and torches and glowering stares; there was Robert's lodgings, as well, where a certain
     shelter could be found among the old seneschal's neatly arranged battle trophies, where
     the room smelled of oiled leather and fruity wine. But mostly the boy had learned