Lady Of The Helm (Book 1) Read Online Free PDF Page B

one of the men injured?”
    “Injured ?” Thren toyed with the idea.  “Not one of ours.  There is a man Captain Thackery has brought back from beyond the barrier.”
    Udecht’s brow furrowe d in puzzlement.  “Brought back? From beyond the barrier?”
    “Indeed,” Thren echoed the Bishop’s incredulity.  “It is a man I would have you cast an eye upon before I consider opening any gate.”
    “I am as curious as you, sire, to see this man that Captain Thackery sees fit to break every law and order for.”
    Udecht approached the gate on the other side of which the Captain Thackery awaited, a hoarfrost dusting his moustache, a perfect picture of misery.  “Well Thackery, where is this exile?”
    “’An it please your reverence, but he’s in the litter.  Could barely walk when we found him, said I should show you and the Prince this though.”  Thackery held up a ring, a gold ring set with a heavy ruby around which two golden serpents wound delicately carved bodies. 
    Udecht gazed at it in disbelief and held up his own hand which bore an identical ring, save that the stone was a deep green emerald. “Where….. where…. where did you get this?”
    “I asked the same question, uncle,” Thren grunted behind him.
    “Our mother had them made,” Udecht murmured absently.  “Her dowry paid for them.  A diamond for your father, a saphire for your Aunt Giseanne, an emerald for me and a ruby… a ruby for…”
    “Bring the prisoner over here,” Thren commanded.
    Four soldiers brought the stretcher over and laid it and its occupant lengthways along the side of the portcullis.  Udecht looked down in wonder at the strained features of the invalid as his head turned feebly from side to side.  His hair was lank and unkempt, his beard straggly.  He was thin and pale, the left hand that fretted at his side was missing the little finger.  He muttered incessantly.  “I have sinned, Goddess forgive me I have sinned.  I was a fool and I have suffered, I must suffer, suffering is my lot.”
    Udecht’s face was creased in a conflict of grief and joy.  He blinked damp ly at the form through the portcullis.
    “Is it him ?” Thren demanded impatiently behind him.
    T he Bishop heeded not his nephew’s question, speaking soft soothing words to the restless figure on the stretcher.  “It’s me,” he said.  “It’s Udecht.  It’s been so long, my poor brother.  Tell me, tell me you remember, you remember who you are?”
    The figu re stilled for a moment at the Bishop’s words and the eyes ceased their wandering, instead staring fixedly over his shoulder as though the answer to the question lay in the air behind him.  “I…. I was called Prince once… my name was Xander, Prince Xander and I have come home.”
    “So it is him then, Uncle Xander?” Thren demanded of Udecht.
    “In no great health, sire, but by grace of the Goddess yes, it is him, restored to us at last,” the Bishop confirmed mopping at his eyes with a silk handkerchief.
    “One last test though, let him unlock the gate himself,” Thren’s tone was gri m, the occasion far less stirring to his emotions than to the princely cleric beside him.
    Udecht looked at him in shock.  “You can’t mean…”
    Thren ignored him.  “Thackery press the prisoner’s hand against the gate seal.”  The veteran captain hesitated at first but then bade the stretcher bearers lift their burden and bring it to one side of the gate.
    “Sire,” Udecht interrupted.  “You know what peril awaits anyone not of Eardan’s bloodline who tries to unlock those seals.  In his condition the shock could kill him.”
    Kimbolt, a lowly witness to these proceedings, glanced at the life size palm print carved in stone at the right hand side of the gate.  An identical sigil lay on the far side of the wall in the gatehouse and it was this that his colleague Thackery was presenting the prisoner to. These were the ancient magical locks which Eadran the