The Guardian by Angus Wells Read Free Book Online Page B

not be recognized as your daughter.”
    “No,” Ryadne agreed, and set a hand on my forearm. “Thank you for this, Gailard. I know it is not easy for you, and you’ve my everlasting gratitude.”
    I sought fine words in response and could fine none, so I only shrugged and smiled and said, “You’re my sworn liege now, my queen.”
    There was a sadness in her eyes as she answered, “Yet Ellyn’s mother still. Guard her well, eh?”
    “My word on it,” I said. “And my life”
    S o it was that we quit Chorym in that hour before the sun’s rising, when the air hangs still and grey, seemingly undecided between the relinquishment of night and acceptanceof the new day. Ellyn rode the chestnut I’d chosen, dressed in boots and breeches, shirt and tunic, her cloak wrapped about her. Her hair was shorn as I’d advised, tucked beneath a peaked leather cap into which she’d set a defiant feather.
    This last indignity she’d protested fiercer even than the rest. “I give up my home,” she’d cried, “and leave my mother to her fate. I must dress like some … some vagabond. I am told I cannot ride my own horse—and now you’d have me shorn. It’s too much!”
    She had turned to Ryadne for support—and found none, for we had agreed this final measure. She’d not easily pass for a boy, surely not on close inspection, but she looked less like a princess than what our masquerade demanded—a wandering hire-sword’s surly offspring.
    Ryadne—cloaked and hooded that none recognize her—accompanied us to the East Gate. Our farewells had been said within the confines of the palace, and when we reached the gate she only ducked her head and raised a hand, then turned her horse away and left us to wait for the opening.
    I did not see her again.
    I felt a great sadness, and a curious excitement. I am no sorcerer—no seer or mage—but I sensed that I rode out toward some great adventure, and must I find it in company with the sullen girl who fidgeted irritably alongside me, then still it was as the gods willed. I only hoped Andur had been wrong when he told me the gods had forsaken us.
    The dawn-bells tolled and the gate was opened; we rode through. I heeled my mare to a trot, glancing back at Ellyn. She scowled ferociously, but she came with me, and we took the East Road to whatever fate awaited us.

CHAPTER FOUR
    T alan Kedassian, Lord of Danant, stood admiring his reflection as servants buckled on his golden armor. He made, he thought, a splendid figure, impressive and suitably military, as befit the conqueror of Chaldor—which soon enough, he had no doubt, he would be. He savored the title as he savored his own image: the Lord of Danant and Conqueror of Chaldor. Or perhaps, more modestly, the Lord of Danant and Chaldor. The armor was contoured to his slender frame, a snarling lion’s head embossed upon the breastplate and reproduced in smaller size upon the greaves and pauldrons. In the light that shone through the cabin’s window, the bejeweled eyes glinted ferociously. Talan beamed as his sword was belted around his waist, the jewels in the hilt matching the rubies that shaped the lions’ eyes.
    He nodded approvingly, then shook his head as his helmet was lifted. He was too handsome, he decided, to hide his features beneath the casque, and opted to carry the helm; that would be more suitable. After all, he came ashore as conqueror, and there could not be any threat left in Antium—Nestor’s Vachyn magic and the blades of the advance guard had surely seen to that. So he tucked the helmet beneath his left arm and turned about, admiring himselffrom all angles, then bowed mockingly to the head floating pickled in a glass jar.
    “Think you I look well, Andur?”
    The head offered no answer. The skin was very pale, like that of a drowned man, and the yellow hair and beard floated like tendrils of riverweed. The eyes that stared blindly back at Talan began to grow milky, spilling out cloudy streamers of ichor where