Warautumn by Tom Deitz Read Free Book Online Page A

coup in Tir-Eron, do you?”
    Avall looked up sharply. “What coup?”
    “Simply stated,” Rann replied, “Priest-Clan staged a coup. It was Mask Day, and they used the chaos that’s so pervasive then as a cover to contrive the assassination of most of the existing chiefs—including some of their own, apparently. They’ve taken over the Citadel, and, as far as I can tell, it’s martial law in Eron George—Priest Law, better say. We’ve been busy with the siege and couldn’t help—either way we’dhave had an enemy at our backs and we were closer to Gem when we got the news.”
    “And to me,” Avall gritted. “You should’ve gone back to retake the Gorge, not forged ahead to retake me.”
    “It’s over and done,” Rann flared. “And I did nothing against the advice of my Council. In any case, Tyrill
is
alive—or was—but she wasn’t in a position to regain her chieftainship, never mind the stewardship you gave her when you left. We’ve had a few messages from her, however—she’s a survivor, that one. As to whether the problem has spread to the other gorges, we don’t know. It makes a certain amount of sense for the same thing to have happened everywhere, but it makes as much sense for some of the other Gorge-Chiefs to act unilaterally and try to oust Priest themselves. Granted, the cream of your army is at Gem, but there are still able men and women elsewhere. Remember that Vorinn’s as good as you have right now, and he missed the last war entirely. He’s also got a brother who’s martially inclined
—and
is somewhere in the north.”
    “So to cut to the core,” Avall concluded, “the army can do as much good where it is as back in Tir-Eron, and the heart of the realm is at present a theocracy with two surrogate governments thrown in: one in Tir-Eron under Tyrill, who’s my legal representative there, and one at the front—probably under Vorinn, if I know anything.”
    “Vorinn in fact,” Myx confirmed. “It was announced in camp shortly after Rann abdicated.”
    Avall rounded on Rann fiercely. “You
abdicated
?”
    Rann looked him straight in the eye. “The choice was how and when I saw you die. That wasn’t a choice I could make.”
    “Oh, Rann, Rann,” Avall groaned, burying his face in his hands. “I’m not worth that. I’m not worth you ruining your life over.”
    “It’s done,” Rann whispered. “And you’re still King.”
    Myx exhaled listlessly and stood. “Not that this isn’tinteresting or important, but … shouldn’t we take better stock of our situation? Avall said he’s seen this place in a vision, but that’s the only proof we have that we really are on an island in the uninhabited west. There could be a twenty-towered palace right above us and we wouldn’t know it from here.”
    “True enough,” Rann agreed. “But from what we saw in what little daylight was left, there were no signs of habitation anywhere out there. No lights, no roads. Which is not to say they don’t exist, but any exploration should probably wait until daylight. At that time … we should split up. Someone will have to stay here with Kylin, I suppose, but one group of us should go down to the lake, another group should see what’s above us, and we also need to explore laterally. I’d say we do the first two in the morning—with an eye to finding fresh water that isn’t lake water—and if we have time, check out the other in the afternoon. That should keep us busy. We also need to see what we have in the way of bows, as they’ll probably be our most effective hunting weapons.”
    “And tomorrow night”—Avall looked troubled but went on—“tomorrow night, much as I despise the notion, I’ll try to bond with what’s left of the gems. I don’t think I have it in me to try that before then, and I refuse to let any of you try.”
    “And tonight?”
    “Tonight,” Avall said through a yawn, “we set watches, while the rest try to get some sleep. I don’t know