The Royals

Chapter 27

'Tom grunted as if he'd been hit in the gut. Thanks for the reminder. Any other jolly thoughts?'

'It'll be just like the grand opening of a whorehouse more pretty ladies than you can service."

He thought of Forty-nine witches dressed in sheer lace veils and grimaced. 'Strike that. Don't give me any more thoughts. Just let me run the plan through. I climb the wall, cross the grounds, find where they're keeping her. You circle overhead, come down when you see us outside, and swoop us away.'

Grosik nodded. 'That's it.'

'Sounds like it's got a beggar's chance in a grave yard.'

'I'm aware that you prefer not to skulk around.'

'Sure, but this is Ginni and these are witches."

'Got anything better?'

Wanton Tom stared hard at the dragon. 'You know I haven't. But this is Ginni and she hasn't exactly been her self lately. And that's not even mentioning the witches.' 'You're repeating yourself, Tom. Don't worry,' the dragon assured him in a voice meant to do the reverse. "They should love you after all you've done for them in the past."

'Oh, you mean corrupt the best apprentice to wander their way in generations. Yeah, they've always appreci ated that. Why is it that every time I talk to you these days I end up feeling worse? Just wish me luck.'

'What kind? Dragon or human?'

'Never mind.' Before he could lose his nerve, Tom threw the rope over the top of the wall. He made sure the grappling-hook caught securely and began to climb. Behind him bare branches rattled in the wind as the great beast took flight.

There was no sane reason for anyone (let alone a runaway goatboy) to climb the mountain at the top of the world. Only those seeking divine inspiration would dare move so close to the Sisters. Few made the hard journey in summer; none but the arrogant and the desperate made it in winter.

Goatboy thought he was the latter and feared he might be the former.

Up here the very air could kill. Light winds could suddenly whip into gales that snatched grown men from the steep trails - and Sister help the insolent fool trapped among the iced and treeless crags when a true storm blew in. Even for people accustomed to living far above the sea, ordinary breathing became shallow and fast.

The horror of the trolls' transformation wiped all else from Goatboy's mind. He came to the foothills and began the ascent. He who had lived all his life in the gentle valley now struggled to succeed where many failed.

Corpses left to spend eternity exposed to the primal elements warned him away.

Still he climbed. He needed pardon for his part in the transformation. He had not willed their punishment. Yet he had stood by afraid and made no move to stop it. That Tabor and Theron would have rejoiced in his t*****e made no difference. The rightness of a situation lay not in what others would do, but in what one did oneself.

He had wrapped himself in layers of clothing, leath ers and furs, goat-hair knitted tight to block the wind, goat-hide cured well to repel the snow. Hands and feet he covered once, then twice, then a third time to honor the three Great Sisters.

More likely to pay homage to the twenty great fingers and toes, Notti thought, giddy with exhaustion. This was no attitude with which to approach the Sisters. He might as well jump from the nearest precipice into a snow-bank and lie down for death as ask forgiveness with such lack of piety. He forced his mind into a properly somber state and stepped forward into the wind.

His shoes were not suited to the terrain. They were meant for striding across deep snow in flat plains, not hardened ice. He slipped and slid his way up the approach. Again and again he was saved by frantically thrusting his stolen knife into the mountainside.

Notti lost sight of the trail. Somewhere, somewhen the wind had picked up. The snow blew horizontally he could not see his hand spread wide-fingered before his face.

He took a dispirited step. Goatboy didn't know whether he headed up or down. It suddenly didn't matter, for he'd fallen on his rear and was tumbling. Downhill? He mus! be moving down. There was nothing to grab onto. No trees grew this high up. He'd dropped the knife.

The Sisters had rejected him.

He slammed against the mountain and stopped moving. Slowly his mind grappled with the need to do something. Walk or die. It was the byword of all who climbed the Great Peak. Forgiveness had no part in it. Atonement was irrelevant to the wind and rock.

Without life there could be no atonement. He must live. Clumsily, he rose to stand. There was no pain, only numbness. Fingers, toes, legs, arms, all responded as if another master pulled the strings.

The Sisters may well have spurned him, but he had not given up. He would triumph.

In the meanwhile, Goatboy carefully picked his way. He told himself stories as he had always done and he spoke to his one-time friend the dragon so that he might put order to his world.

'Just as there are no plants on the Great Peak, there are no animals. Why struggle to dig roots into frozen rock? Why fight to cling to a mountain where the winds can topple away even the most determined of beasts?

"There are many more hospitable climates,' he told his dragon friend. 'Droughts and fires, floods and rock-slides are of little moment against the trials of the Great Peak.'

So did Goatboy endure, traveling down toward the place where he had left his favorite goat. As the sur rounding seemed more familiar, he sought out the refuge he had prepared before the ascent. It was a tiny cave, barely more than an indentation to block the wind.

He expected to find it around this bend. Or was it the next? He turned again. The slope wasn't as flat as he remembered. Should it be this steep?

He circled and circled, assuming any motion might at least keep him alive. The wind still bit at his cheeks and nose.