Nightpool by Shirley Rousseau Murphy Read Free Book Online Page A

day. I promise
you. I will bring you all the armed men I can muster.”
    “But how can I stay there so long and not be
discovered? For years, until I grow up? So close to the palace
. . . just stay—with a stranger?”
    “He is your subject, Teb. Merlther will take
the best care of you. And there are ways of hiding someone—cellars
no one has seen, passages between the houses . . .”
    “I never heard of—”
    “Such things can be built in four years.
Auric, young prince, has taken a lesson from Ebis the Black. Auric,
too, will rise again. Do you think I got myself sent down to the
coast for nothing? All it took was a little judicious criticism, a
little too much complaining. I know my value as horsemaster well
enough to be pretty sure he wouldn’t kill or imprison me, just get
me out of his hair. And he did need the colts from down there. Now
mount up, lad, before they get curious. I don’t trust any of them,
except Pakkna. But they all wanted to be free of Sivich. Maybe
they’re all right—time will tell me.”
    “But you—what will you . . .
?”
    “We’ll get away. When Sivich trails us, it
will not be you he follows, but us. And we’ll lose him all
right.”
    “What about the jackals? Did you kill
them?”
    “Only one. I couldn’t find the other two in
the dark; they dropped down to sleep somewhere, full of
deermoss.”
    “How long will they sleep?”
    “Eight or ten hours.”
    “The men, too?”
    “Yes. You should be deep in the caves by
that time, maybe through them.”
    It was not long after they joined the others
that Garit called a second halt, and the riders moved close
together, their horses nosing one another, as Garit gave Teb the
false instructions. They had moved up behind boulders now, where
sight and sound were shielded from the plain below. Starlight
touched the cliffs, and now Teb could see that the sixth rider was
a tall, thin soldier called Sabe, a pale, saturnine man whom Teb
had never liked. Six riders and seven horses, the seventh laden
with pack. Garit put a gentle hand on Teb’s shoulder.
    “Sivich’s men will follow us as soon as they
wake and see we’re gone. There was no way to hide our tracks in the
wet meadow. They will follow our trail, Teb. You must leave us now.
You must go to the caves of Nison-Serth and hide there. Pakkna
tells me you know the caves well.”
    Teb nodded.
    Garit pulled at his red beard. “The plan is
this. You will go on foot from here up across the rocks, where you
will leave no trail. You will wait in the caves of Nison-Serth and
watch the meadow and the camp from there.
    “You must wait until Sivich has sent out his
trackers and the two jackals after us and has himself moved on
toward Baylentha. I don’t think I misjudge; I think he will take
the main party there, he’s that eager for the dragon. He’ll want
the troops who trail us to kill us, all but you, and bring you
there to him.
    “When the meadows are clear of him, you must
move down across the border to Ratnisbon at night, and seek safe
sanctuary from Ebis the Black. He will be happy indeed to shelter
the Prince of Auric, for he has no love for Sivich, as you well
know.”
    Teb nodded again and swallowed. Who among
this group did Garit not trust, that he must lay a false trail?
Hibben? Sabe? Surely not Lervey; he was only a boy, hardly older
than Teb himself.
    “It will be well if we leave a clue or two
for Sivich’s trackers,” Garit said. “We have a length of chain for
Lervey to wear when we camp, to drag through the dirt, for his feet
are like in size to yours. If you will take off your tunic, Teb, I
have a clean one for you in my pack. Yours will carry your scent
with us, for the jackals.”
    Teb stripped off his brown cloth tunic. It
smelled pretty high, all right. He’d worn it a long time. He put on
the leather one Garit offered. It was warmer and well made, though
very big for him.
    Garit settled his horse, which had begun to
paw. “You’d best go, Teb. Climb