Maze of Moonlight by Gael Baudino (top 20 books to read txt) 📗

apparently dawned on him that he was alone. After staring for a moment at Mirya and Christopher, he turned to run, but his escape was blocked at the transept doors by a half dozen village women who had seen too much killing in the last few minutes to be bothered with the fact that they were facing a man with a sword. Between him and the west door, though, stood only Vanessa and Charity. The old weaver was unarmed. Vanessa had but a candlestick.

He lunged for them, sword flashing, looking for something to kill. Vanessa stepped in front of Charity, raised her weapon. Christopher shouted for them to get out of the way, but the girl stood her ground; and as the big man rushed at her, she prepared to strike.

But when the sword fell, Charity threw herself on Vanessa, shoved her out of the way, and took the heavy blow herself. Blood was suddenly everywhere, bursting from the gash in her head, flooding from her mouth. She fell, twitching, eyes glassy, dead before she hit the floor; but she had slowed the soldier's run sufficiently for Mirya to catch up with him and plant her sword in the middle of his back.

He staggered on a few more paces, then tumble to the floor in a clatter of metal and leather. Mirya herself, her dispassion and tranquillity gone, dropped to her knees beside the body of the old woman, put her bloody hands to her face.

“Ai, Elthiai!” she sobbed. “Once . . . I could only save you once, and now . . . oh, Charity . . .” The Elf looked up, and her streaming eyes found Christopher. “Many years ago, she told me that she had . . . things to do. I . . . did not foresee that this would be among them.” Her eyes closed in pain. “I did not foresee anything.”

Vanessa was cradling Charity's gashed and lifeless head in her lap. Her homespun was heavy with blood and smears of brains. Her head was thrown back, her face contorted, and Christopher knew that, behind her clenched eyes, Vanessa saw nothing—no patterns, no futures, no peace—nothing save the ending of the haven that she had found for a time, a little time, in Saint Brigid.

Other men and women of the village were arriving at a run, their wooden shoes and leather shoes clattering down the length of the too-silent nave. Some recognized their sisters and children among the living, some found them among the dead. Abel saw what was left of his mother lying in Vanessa's lap.

He knelt and, shaking, touched the blood-smeared face. Vanessa regarded him mutely, her voice silenced by sorrow, and he put his free arm about her shoulders. Blond and dark, fair and swarthy, they put their heads against one another, and wept.

Christopher, drained, bit back curses and shrieks and let the living grieve for the dead without accompanying antics and capers. Paul delMari had left his doddering humor behind in Shrinerock; and in the blood-soaked church of a village with which he was linked by fate, history, and elven intervention, Christopher delAurvre left his madness.

But Mirya bent, kissed Charity's bloody face, held Vanessa and Abel for several minutes. And then, to Christopher's surprise, she rose and approached him.

“Did you say once, my lord, that other barons had joined you in your efforts?” she asked. Tragedy screamed from her eyes, and though her voice was controlled, even, there was a weight of terrifying purpose behind it.

“Yes.” Christopher's voice was hoarse. “They're gathering at Shrinerock. I hope.”

“It is in Saint Brigid that they are needed, messire.”

Surrounded as he was by the blood and bodies of the innocent, his ears filled with the cries of grieving men and women, Christopher wanted to strike her for her complacent truism. “You don't think I know that? I'd fetch them in a heartbeat if I could get out of this town.”

Mirya shook her head. “I . . . will take you to Shrinerock.”

“But . . . the sentries . . . the soldiers . . . Berard's got the fields crawling with them.”

Jaws trembling, the Elf met his eyes. “I saved the Free Towns from your grandfather's plots, and I made sure that he could not further them. Berard's meshes are but loosely woven in comparison, and my debt to you is as yet unredeemed.”

Christopher stared, stunned, unable at first to grasp what she was telling him.

“I will take you through the free company camp tonight,” said Mirya slowly. “And then we will journey to Shrinerock.”

Chapter Twenty-eight

With the coming of night, the streets of Saint Brigid were silent and empty. Chains spanned the intersections, guards kept watch at the crossings. On the wall, anxious men strained their eyes and ears into the darkness that lay between the town and the deeper darkness of the forest, searching for movement or sound. Within the houses, women cared for the dead, sewing shrouds, waking the bodies of husbands, sisters, sons, daughters, friends, singing softly over the still forms the long, slow melodies of plainchant.

Charity's house was empty and still. Christopher could hardly believe that a single, aging woman had been able to fill a home with so much life and light, but it was true. With just Vanessa and himself within its walls, it was as a husk, an empty shell.

Vanessa was angry, crying, and he held her while they sat by the fire. “They killed her, Christopher. They just killed her! They killed them a'. There wan't any reason for it. They just wanted to kill!”

Her faces was pressed to his chest, and that was good, for he did not want her to see how utterly helpless he felt. In a few minutes, Mirya would come for him, and she would lead him through the rings of eager-eyed robbers that surrounded the town, but there was no smack of empowerment to that particular turning of his personal and ephemeral maze, for it was by an elven hand