Read Online Summoned to Tourney by Mercedes Lackey; Ellen Guon - Free Book Online Page B

it’s still only a dream.”
    “But Kory could be right.” Beth sat up suddenly. “Eric, have you ever used your Bardic magic to look into the future?”
    “Bethie, I’ve only been a Bard for a year! Give me a break!”
    She gave him a look. “Well, you could give it a try,” she said. “Take a look into next week and see if it turns out like your dream.”
    Oh God, I hope not. “Okay, okay, I’ll try it, if only so you won’t sign me up at the local psycho ward. Now, I think we all could use some more sleep, right?”
    He lay there in the darkness, listening to Beth’s quiet breathing, the waterbed shifting as Kory turned over onto his side.
    I can’t be seeing the future, he thought. That can’t be what’s going to happen to us. San Francisco destroyed, Nightflyers everywhere, all of us dead…
    I won’t let that happen.
    In his mind, he thought about a particular melody, light and airy: “Southwind.” A gentle tune, one that had always reminded him of quiet pleasures and warm evenings with friends. Good memories. That was the tune he would use to look into the future.
    He could hear the lilt of the melody, adding just a touch of ornamentation at the end of the B part, a little trill to wind back into the melody. He imagined the way his fingers would press on the flute keys, the exact timing of his breath.
    “Oh, what the hell,” he muttered, moving carefully so he wouldn’t wake Beth or Kory. “I’ll never be able to get back to sleep tonight anyhow.”
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CHAPTER 4:
A Moonlight Ramble
    Once upstairs, he retrieved his flute from its stand, then moved quietly down the stairs and out into the garden. There was one place that he loved most in Kory’s garden, a small stand of birch trees that circled a grassy area in a ring.
    Eric sat down under the leafy trees, which had been scrawny saplings until two months ago, when Kory had “convinced” them to grow more quickly.
    As always, he had the same sense that he had felt that night, years back, in the old oak grove at the destroyed Southern Fairesite, that feeling of magic lying just beneath the surface, woven into everything around him.
    Just enough moonlight shone through the night fog to reflect off the flute as he brought it to his lips. It was his favorite kind of San Francisco night, the city finally quiet and sleeping as the fog swirled through it.
    Little tendrils of fog moved around the trees; he could taste the fog, thick and damp, as he breathed in the night air. And over all of it was the sense of belonging; this place was his, this was his home.
    He’d never felt that before, not during his childhood or all the years of traveling. Now, in the perfect stillness, he played for himself and for the sleeping city.
    He frowned at the first note he played: fiat, and very thin. He adjusted the flute accordingly, and played another note, clear and vibrant, followed by the first few notes of “Southwind.”
    The tune unfolded before him, lilting notes fading into each other. He concentrated on the tune, on the coldness of the flute’s metal against his fingers, on the way his lips shaped each note. After a few moments, the world faded from around him, and he was alone with the music, playing out his soul to the birch trees that bent closer to hear him.
    All right , he thought, now let’s take a look Elsewhere.
    He began weaving that into the tune, the future that he wanted to see, letting the dancing notes build it out of moonlight and fog. Suddenly, it was there, shimmering before him.
    Ria Liewellyn?
    She stared at him, an image of mist and fog. Behind her, he could see the outline of a motel room, neon signs flickering beyond the window. Her eyes were bright with astonishment, and more than a little fear. He followed her look to the other side of the room, where he saw…himself, wearing a pair of silk pajamas and looking more than a little bewildered.
    Eric was surprised, too. Too surprised to keep playing, he missed a note, then another.