Kingmaker's Sword (Rune Blades of Celi) by Ann Marston Read Free Book Online

nobody dared attack them. I made myself as invisible as possible whenever they came. Just the thought of them made me shiver. I wanted nothing whatsoever to do with their kind of magic. With any kind of magic. Then or now.
    “You’re going after them?” I asked. “Won’t it be dangerous?”
    He laughed. “Aye, well, Tyra and Maedun have been uneasy neighbours for centuries,” he said. “We’ve learned a thing or two about them in that time. A few tricks here and there.”
    In spite of myself, I grinned. “A fractious and vexatious lot, those Maeduni,” I said.
    He laughed again. “A true clansman’s attitude, that,” he said. He gestured toward the blood stains and scuffed ground. “This wasn’t that long ago. Not much more than an hour or two. We should catch up to them by dusk.”
    “What about your business in Honandun?”
    “It can wait one day more if necessary.”
IV
    We lay well hidden behind a low outcropping of rocks on the top of the hill and looked down at the encampment. We had left the horses back in a small copse of alders so they wouldn’t disturb the horses in the camp and betray our presence. Sunset was a little over an hour gone. The moon would not rise for several hours, and the darkness was almost complete. The faint glow of a campfire led us to this ridge overlooking the stream.
    Eight men sat around the fire in the shelter of a wide bend in the little burn, their backs to the steep embankment. There were more men we couldn’t see outside the circle of light cast by the small fire, perhaps four or five more, judging by the tracks Cullin and I had followed.
    “You were right,” I said softly, mindful of the still air and quiet night, and the propensity of sound to travel. “Maeduni mercenaries.”
    “Aye,” Cullin replied. “Such a tedious lot, these Maeduni. Now, the question is, do they have a warlock with them?”
    “I could tell you if I could get closer,” I said.
    He glanced at me in the dusk. “Could you now?” he murmured.
    I felt myself blush. “Aye, I could,” I said, unconsciously mimicking him. “Magic like theirs leaves a stench on a man.”
    The look he gave me was decidedly brimming with thoughtful appraisal. “It does, does it?” he said. “Aye, well, I suppose it might at that. D’ye think you can get close enough to find out without them noticing you?”
    I had spent all of my life practicing the art of invisibility. Surely creeping up on a camp would be little different from avoiding the quick and brutal hands of the Stablemaster or the guards at Lord Mendor’s Landholding. “Yes,” I said positively.
    Cullin nodded. “Then give it a try, lad. But in a moment. We need to take a good look first.”
    The troop was camped in a hollow formed by the wide bend of the stream. Low bushes of willow, alder and silverleaf grew thickly against the rocky outcropping behind them. The hillside below us was bare but for the coarse, dry brown grass and the occasional thorn bush. The air was thick with the smell of water, and the sharp, resinous scent of burning thornwood.
    The Maeduni had not picked the best place to settle for the night. Although the steep embankment offered shelter from the winds that swept down from the mountains of the west and north, it turned the camp into a trap in the event of an attack. But it was typical of what I had heard of the Maeduni in high country. These hills were not mountains, but they were considerably higher than the coastal plain. The Maeduni disliked mountainous regions. Some say it’s because their own country is so featurelessly flat; others say it’s because the magic of their warlocks and wizards is weakened by the high country.
    I moved slightly to ease myself away from a sharp rock that dug into my hip. Cullin pointed to something barely out of the circle of firelight. Following his pointing finger, I saw the prisoners. Two men and what looked like a young boy. They lay bound ankle to wrist, wrist to ankle, without