The Magicians of Night - By Barbara Hambly Page 0,5
one. According to Gall, Schloss Torweg had been likewise built upon a ley. Certainly the little hill upon which it stood, larger than this one but probably also artificial, had enjoyed a rather queer reputation in centuries past.
Standing among the three lumpish stones that crowned the hill—the Dancing Stones, they were called, one erect, two lying fallen and nearly covered with dew-sodden weeds—Rhion could feel no magic here at all.
And yet, he thought, that didn’t mean it didn’t exist. While the others moved about among the stones, Poincelles caressing the worn dolomite with his eyes half shut and Gall swinging pebbles on pendulum threads, their feet leaving dark-green swathes in the flashing diamond carpet of the dew, Rhion sat at one end of a fallen stone, breathing silence into his heart and listening. Though he was unable yet to detect the faint, silvery pulse of ley-energy through the ground, still the sweet calm of the April sunlight that warmed his face eased something within him. For the first time since his coming to this world, the hurt of losing Jaldis and the fear that he would never be able to find his way back lessened. He found himself thinking, If magic still exists here it might give von Rath and his partners another energy source, help them in their efforts.
Suddenly curious, he got to his feet, brushed the dirt and twigs from the hand-me-down Wehrmacht fatigue pants he wore, and turned his steps down the little hill. Pinewoods surrounded the meadow on all sides, rising to the west almost at the hill’s foot behind a tangled belt of laurel and blackberry brambles. Though Rhion still sensed no buried energy as he picked his way among nests of fern, bracken, and fallen gray branches, still the cool spice of the pine scent, the sigh of the moving boughs, and the occasional coin-bright warmth of stray beads of sunlight were balm to him. The land sloped gently toward the main ridge as he walked on. There was some hope, he thought, both for himself and for this world, for magic’s return...
“Halt!”
Startled, Rhion stopped and raised his head. A Storm Trooper in the black uniform of the Protection Squad—the SS—stood beside a boulder a few yards away. His rifle—another product of the magicless magic of this world—was leveled at Rhion’s chest. Like most of the SS, this man’s hair was fair, his eyes light, chill, and empty, reminding Rhion of something, of someone else...
“You will return to the meadow, please.”
Rhion blinked at him in surprise, pushed his spectacles more firmly onto the bridge of his nose. “I’m just investigating...”
“You will return to the meadow.” Dapplings of light strewed one sleeve of his black uniform jacket, made the silver buttons flash. Upon his left sleeve the sun-cross—the swastika—splashed black on a crimson ground, pointing backward, toward chaos, toward darkness, toward death. “This was Captain von Rath’s order.”
“Look,” Rhion said reasonably, “I’m sure Captain von Rath didn’t mean I needed protection from getting hit on the head by a falling pine cone...”
“It is not my business what Captain von Rath meant,” the young man said without change of inflection, though his pale arrogant eyes traveled over Rhion’s short, stocky form and his curly brown hair and beard with chill disapproval and suspicion. “Nor is it yours. He said you were not to be permitted to leave sight of the others. You will return, or I will take you back there myself. I assure you I will shoot you if you attempt to flee.”
“You’re making flight sound more and more appealing,” Rhion remarked, turning back toward the meadow, and realized the next second that the guard probably took his jest literally and had his rifle cocked and ready. He was conscious of it behind him, all the way back through the trees down the slope toward the sunlight.
“I am dreadfully sorry,” von Rath apologized, as the car picked its way along the rutted and potholed black pavement once again. “The young man was only following orders; he will be reprimanded for his lack of tact. But indeed, it does not do for you to wander too far alone. For one thing, you might have become lost and, having no identity papers... We are getting you some, of course, but these things take time.”
And, seeing the expression on Rhion’s face, he added gently, “The government has taken wizardry and all its workings under its protection, has given the Occult Bureau guards to make sure it is not