Although a part of Romilly was still linked with the bird, she knew there was no more need of it. She found herself closely linked in mind with Sunstar, as Carolin urged him forward; she knew the terror of fire, shuddering with the smell of burning grass and burning flesh; even in the rain which had begun to drizzle down again in the fitful sunlight, the clingfire burned on. But the great stallion, bravely overcoming that inborn fear, carried his rider forward … or was it Romilly herself, bearing the king into the heart of the fleeing enemy.
“See where Rakhal flies with his sorcerers!” cried out Orain, “After them, men! Take them now!”
Romilly let Temperance fly upward out of range of the fire; it was burning inward now, with a ring round it where there was nothing left to bum – so much had the leronyn of Carolin’s armies accomplished; but she, with Carolin, was away with the stallion Sunstar, forging to the heights, where the last remnant of Rakhal’s men, cut off between Carolin and the raging remnant of clingfire, fought with their backs to the fire. Sunstar seemed to fly forward with Carolin’s own will to take the height, and Romilly felt that it was she herself who bore him on to the last moment of success….
Then she stumbled – for a moment Romilly was not sure it was not she herself who had stumbled – recovered, and reared high in the air, Carolin’s hand guiding him up, then down, to trample the man who had risen, sword in hand, before him. His great hooves were like hammers pounding the man into the ground. Romilly felt the man go down, his head splitting like a ripe fruit beneath her hooves – Sunstar’s hooves – felt Carolin fighting for balance in the saddle. And then another man reared up with a lightning-flash of steel, she felt Carolin slip back in the saddle and fall, and in that moment Romilly felt sharp shearing pain as the sword sliced through neck and throat and heart, and blood and life spurted away….
She never felt herself strike the ground.
. . . rain was falling, hard cold rain, pounding down; the ground was awash with it, and even the smell of the clingfire had been washed away. The sky was dark; it was near nightfall. Romilly sat up, dazed and stunned, not even now fully aware that it was not she who had been felled by the sword.
Sunstar! She reached out automatically for his mind, found-
Found nothingness! Only a great sense of vacancy, emptiness where he had been. Wildly she looked around and saw, lying not far away, the stallion’s body, his head nearly severed, and the man he had killed lying beneath his great bulk. The rain had washed the blood clear so that there was only a great gaping wound in his neck from which the blood had soaked into the ground all around him. Sunstar, Sunstar-dead, dead, dead! She reached out, again, dazed, to nothingness. Sunstar, whose life she had shared so long….
And whom she had betrayed by leading him to death in a war between two kings . . . neither of them is worth a lock of his black mane . . . ah, Sunstar . . . and I died with you … Romilly felt so empty and cold she was not sure that she was still alive. She had heard tales of men who did not know they were dead and kept trying to communicate with the living. Dazed, drained of all emotion except fury and grief, she managed to sit up.
Around her lay the bodies of the dead, Rakhal’s men and Carolin’s; but of Carolin himself there was no sign. Only the body of Sunstar showed where Carolin had once been. Vaguely, not caring, she wondered if all Carolin’s men were dead and Rakhal victor. Or had Orain’s party captured or killed Rakhal? What did it matter?
What matters it which great rogue sits on the throne….
She began to get her bearings a little. As before the previous battle, the field was covered with the dark shapes of kyorebni, hovering. One lighted, with a harsh scream, on Sunstar’s head, and Romilly rushed at it, flapping her arms and crying out The bird was gone, but it would come back.