The First Book of Lost Swords - Woundhealer's Story Read Online Free Page A

oldest of the young ones in the cave; maybe the most levelheaded, though there perhaps his sister may have something of an edge. Not much that one can hope to learn from children in a situation like this. Apparently none of them even made an effort to look out of the cave mouth while the enemy was there.”
           “Shall I send a messenger to bring Zoltan here? He and his sister are still at High Manor.”
           “No great hurry. There are other avenues of investigation I must try first. I have a strong suspicion now of who was behind yesterday’s atrocity.” Karel paused for a deep breath. “Burslem.”
           Prince and Princess exchanged looks. Mark had the feeling that their tiredness had frozen them both into shells, leaving them unable to communicate freely with each other. And his own tiredness, at least, was not of the kind to be swept away by a night’s sleep.
           Mark said to the wizard: “Worse than we thought, then, perhaps?”
           “Bad enough,” said Karel. “Just how bad, I don’t know. We can be sure that a man who once headed magical security operations for King Vilkata himself is a wizard of no mean capacity. And there’s been no word of Burslem for eight years.”
           “Where is he now?” the Princess asked.
           Her uncle signed that he did not know. “At least he doesn’t have an army lurking on any of our frontiers. Those were ragtag bandits he recruited somehow for yesterday’s adventure. Having spent much of the night with their corpses I can be sure of that much at least. I think he’ll wait to see if we’ve caught on to the fact that he was behind them.”
           “And then?”
           “And then he’ll try something else, I suppose. Something nasty.”
           “What can we do?”
           “I don’t know. I see no way as yet in which we can retaliate effectively.” And Karel shortly took his leave, saying that he had much to do.
           Husband and wife, alone again on the balcony, embraced once more then walked back into the room where their older son still slept. On the walls of Adrian’s room were paintings, here brave warriors chasing a dragon, there on the other wall a wizard in a conical hat creating a marvelous fruit tree out of nothing. The paintings had been done by the artist of the storybook, in those happy months before Adrian was born, created for small eyes that had never seen them yet.
           Princess Kristin said in a weary voice: “His mouth is bruised as well, I suppose from Elinor trying to keep him quiet in the cave. I never saw a child who bruised so easily.”
           Mark said nothing. He stroked her hair.
           Kristin said: “It’s only great good fortune that any of the children are still alive, that that cave was there for them to hide in while Karel’s elemental moved the river around outside. Otherwise who knows what might have happened to them?”
           “I can imagine several things,” said Mark, breaking a silence that threatened to grow awkwardly. “If Burslem is really the one behind it. And in the cave Adrian kept crying out, or trying to cry out, as Elinor told us. You realize it’s quite possible that he almost killed them all, betraying that they were there.”
           His wife moved away from him a little and looked up at him. “You can’t mean that what happened was somehow his fault.”
           “No. Not a fault. But already his blindness, his illness, begin to create problems not only for us, for you and me. Problems already for all Tasavalta.”
           “It is Burslem who creates problems for us all,” the Princess said a little sharply. “I will confer with Karel again, of course, but I don’t know what else we can do for Adrian. We have tried everything already. Are you going to make him feel guilty about being the way he is?”
           “No,” said Mark. “But if we