Sister of the Dead - By Barb Hendee & J. C. Hendee Page 0,37

her own past. Welstiel willed that she remain ignorant.

As the guards passed from sight around the stables, the crumbled keep appeared still as a headstone in a forgotten, hallowed place. This illusion of peace and serenity masked a long-ago madness, and Welstiel's mind slipped back....

IIt was nearly twenty-six years earlier, and Welstiel's father dragged Magelia from her village home. She rode behind Welstiel, clinging silently to his waist all the way to the keep. Her sister ran after them as far as she could, screaming Magelia's name in a frenzy of fear and anger. Someone loves her, Welstiel thought without feeling. Someone was frightened for her.

It hadn't mattered. It hadn't changed anything.

Lord Bryen Massing was tall, but Welstiel had not inherited his father's imposing height. They shared dark brown hair, square faces, and the shallow bump at the bridge of their noses, but heritage and a few features were all they had in common. Most notable to all who saw them together, the father did not have the white patches of hair at his temples that the son wore.

The fief his father had been assigned was primitive compared with others they had tended over the years, with a squat tower keep of mortared rock with crude barracks and stable attached, built near the central village of Chemestuk. Welstiel rode into the keep's muddy courtyard that night following his father. Their family retainer, the robed and masked Master Ubad, stood waiting for them.

The torch-lit courtyard was alive with activity. Men-atarms and a few conscripted villagers attempted to unload the contents of five sturdy wagons. Along with family baggage, each wagon carried a square crate at least two-thirds the height of man and covered by a thick canvas tarp. Seeing the lord and his son arrive, the men grew openly nervous and too hurried in their tasks. They pulled a tarp aside to reveal one of the crates.

It was constructed of oak held together with steel straps and bound to the wagon bed with chains instead of rope. As two guardsmen unhooked the chains, a deep muffled voice howled out from within the container: "Shairsnisag mi, na mi taitagag craiui ag shiui ag cher!"

The words Welstiel heard sounded Elvish but were more guttural, and he could make no sense of them. A thunderous boom issued from the crate's walls, and it slammed sideways into one guard. The impact crushed the man's legs against the wagon's side with an audible crack of bone. His companion leaped out the other side and scrambled clear. The guard screamed and toppled over to dangle against the rear wheel with his legs pinned against the vehicle's sidewall.

Master Ubad glided toward the wagon. His dark robe showed no sway from footsteps.

"Fools!" he hissed, ignoring the trapped man's squeals of pain. "The contents are worth more than all your lives. Take care—and have all five crates brought to the lower chambers. "

Ubad's face was covered by an aged leather mask with no eye slits. Only his withered mouth and chin were visible. When he moved, strange markings shimmered briefly across his char-colored robe in the torchlight.

Welstiel heard less articulate growls coming from the crate, as the men returned to pulling it free from the wagon. All were careful not to pass too near Master Ubad, who watched them closely. The maimed guard was quickly dragged from sight.

Welstiel and his father dismounted, and Lord Massing lifted Magelia to the ground and grasped her wrist to drag her inside. Her black hair hung in waves to the middle of her slender back, and her blue dress made her skin appear ivory. She struggled and tried to jerk away, but her captor kept walking, unhindered by her efforts.

Master Ubad's bony hand motioned Welstiel to follow, as he moved smoothly toward the keep's main doors. Welstiel abhorred being so close to the creature, but he had little choice and followed.

"I can walk on my own!" Magelia shouted. "Leave me be. "

Some part of Welstiel was capable of pity, but this woman was just a peasant. He found these unfolding events more and more distasteful. They entered the main hall, furnished only by an aged table, a few chairs, and dusty rushes covering the floor. Welstiel shivered in the cold. He was always cold in this foreign land and rarely removed his cloak even when indoors.

His father suffered no such discomfort, not since Wel-stiel's youth and the first appearance of Ubad in their lives. Lord Massing released the woman and removed his own cloak