The Rose of Sarifal Read Free

Crane Point, each of their outstretched talons the length of a man.
    “I’m glad I could see that,” said Valeanne. She let the girl down to the sand and then dismounted stiffly. She’d spent a long day in the saddle. The girl was docile now, looking up in wonder as the darkness closed in again, her eyes full of tears, her red hair wild. On her neck, above her collarbone, Valeanne could see the rose tattoo.
    As the second hippogriff came in and landed on the sand, the girl smiled and clapped her hands. Valeanne tried to soothe her mare as it shied away, patting her once on the rump and letting her go. Then she reached up to touch her shoulder, where a drow arrow had grazed her, deflected by her leather armor. It had scarcely broken the skin. But it was enough. Her arm felt stiff and cold.
    The rider was also hurt, his armor cooked along one side, caught in the blast. He reeled in the saddle, holding on to the horn between his knees. His helmet was black with soot.
    “Come,” said Valeanne. She lifted the girl up behind the rider and buckled her in. She slid a final gift into the girl’s pocket, something to lighten the darkness. Then she stepped back, and drew her short sword awkwardly with her left hand.
    “I’m not going without you,” said Lady Amaranth.
    New tendrils of shadow had gathered overhead, hiding the stars. “There’s no room for me,” she said. “Tell Queen Daressin that—”
    But the rider touched the beast with his goad. It raised its beak, screamed once, and flung itself into the air, golden wings outstretched. Valeanne watched it climb up in a spiral of darkness out of sight. Then she walked down to the still water of the Ulls, bent to touch it with her sword’s point, and settled down to wait.

C AER C ORWELL
    T HE ONLY NATURAL HARBOR ON THE WEST COAST OF Gwynneth Island is the long firth that leads up to the ruins of Caer Corwell, once the seat of the House of Kendrick and the prettiest city of the Moonshaes. Elsewhere, in the long channel between Gwynneth and Moray, the granite cliffs tumble to the sea, without a beach or an inlet for more than ninety miles. Or else the poisonous bogs and fens blur the distinction between sea and land. Only in the extreme southwest could any boat hope to find shelter, after beating back and forth against prevailing winds and picking through the shoals and pinnacles that formed the harbor’s natural defenses, the only ones it still retained.
    A hundred years ago the firth would have been crowded with merchant ships and ships of war. The harbor itself would have been full of barges and chandlers’ coracles. Any intruder would have had to pass under the towers of the fort, now roofless and abandoned. But on this crisp spring day, as the
Sphinx
came about inside the breakwater, the only creatures Lukas had seen weregulls and otters, and the dolphins following in his wake. As the crew left the boat and pulled their skiff along the reach, all he could hear was the ringing silence, for the wind had died as they had crossed the bar.
    In the clear water he could see the hulks of old ships, sunk at their moorings by the fey and their mercenaries more than a hundred years ago. Now, the skiff crunched ashore. They pulled it up the dry sluice and stowed the oars, then climbed up the great stairs to the first of the stone courts, dotted with statues of ancient heroes. The gnome was first, then the Savage, then Lukas and Marikke, then the shifter and the watersoul genasi, his skin glowing with energy and cold blue-green lines of fire. Last came their leader, the only one of them unarmed as befit his rank—a solicitor from Alaron, and a distant cousin of the king.
    “They should be here to greet us.” He frowned. Not yet thirty years old, emaciated and weak chinned, Lord Aldon Kendrick clapped his hands. “Hello!” he cried out. “Hello there!”
    “This is stupid,” muttered Lukas, his longbow in his hand. He and Marikke had once tried to defend Kendrick to the