“I won’t stop you,” she said a moment later. “Ride along the ravine, turning only to the left, always to the left. There’ll be a beechwood, then a glade and in it a stone cross. Directly opposite the cross will be a clearing. It’ll lead you to the Świdnica road.”

“Thank you, Sister.”

“Heed yourselves. So few of us remain.”

Chapter Eleven

In which the convoluted prophecy begins to come true in a convoluted way, and Scharley meets a friend. And reveals new, previously unrevealed talents.

A penitential cross, one of Silesia’s numerous reminders of crimes past and belated contrition, stood among the high grass beyond the beechwood, where the track met the clearing. Judging from the traces of erosion and vandalism, the crime happened long ago, was perhaps older even than the settlement, the ruins of which were still visible nearby in the form of hillocks and hollows densely overgrown by weeds.

“A very belated penance,” commented Scharley, now riding behind Reynevan on his bay horse. “Passing literally down the generations. Inherited, I’d say. Carving a cross like that takes quite some time, so it’s erected at the earliest by a son, who wonders whom his deceased father killed and what brought on remorse in his old age. What do you think, Reinmar?”

“I don’t.”

“Are you still angry with me?”

“No.”

“Aha. Let’s ride on, then. Our new friends weren’t lying. The clearing right opposite the cross, though it must date back to Bolko the Courageous, will surely lead us out onto the Świdnica road.”

Reynevan urged on his horse. Still saying nothing, although it didn’t bother Scharley.

“I must confess you impressed me, Reinmar of Bielawa. With the witches, I mean. Let’s face it, any old folk healer or wise woman can toss a handful of herbs on a fire, mutter an incantation and spell, even make a talisman. But that levitation of yours, why, that’s no joke. Come clean, where did you study in Prague? At the Charles University or with Czech sorcerers?”

“The former doesn’t rule out the latter,” said Reynevan with a smile.

“I see. You mean everybody levitated during lectures?”

Without waiting for an answer, the penitent made himself more comfortable on the horse’s rump.

“But it astonished me that you’re simply running away, hiding from your pursuers in the undergrowth in a manner more befitting a hare than a mage. If mages ever have to run away, they do it with more class. Medea, for example, fled from Corinth in a chariot pulled by dragons. Atlantes flew away on a hippogryph. Morgan le Fay used mirages to confuse her pursuers. Viviane… I can’t recall what Viviane did.”

Reynevan made no comment. He couldn’t recall, either.