Authors: Andre Norton
“You can find your way back?”
“Yes, Lady. But we had best be on our way quickly. There are parts that are hard going in the dark. Were it not summer and the dusk later in coming, we could not do it.”
Their food heartened me, and their company even more. Also I found that the precautions I had taken to turn my skirt into breeches aided my going, so I was able to set out at a pace I could not have held the night before. Before I went, I returned the gryphon into hiding under my mail, for to me it was a private thing.
Our way was rough, and even my guides had to pause and cast around at times to find landmarks by which they
could sight their way, for here there was not even a sheep track for a road. We climbed as the night grew darker. It was colder here, and I shivered when the wind struck full on. We talked very little, they no more than giving me a word of guidance when the occasion arose. My weariness was returning. But I made no complaint and did the best I could, asking nothing from them. In this hour their companionship was enough.
We could not take the last climb through the pass in the dead of night, so once more I sheltered among rocks, this time with Rudo on my right, Angarl on my left. I must have slept, for I do not remember anything after our settling there until Rudo stirred and spoke.
“Best be on now, Lady Joisan. There is the dawn, and we do not know how high those murderers range in their search for blood on their swords.”
The light was gray, hardly better than twilight. I sighted gathering clouds. Perhaps we were to face rain—though we should welcome what washed away our tracks.
It did begin to rain with steady persistence. There was not even tree cover as we slipped and slid down from the pass into the valley beyond. I knew this country only vaguely. At the level of the dale, if one traveled through the lower pass, mere was a road—heading toward Norstead. Though the lords cared for it after a fashion (mainly by chopping back any undergrowth for three spear lengths on either side so mat the opening might deter ambushes by outlaws), it was not a smooth track.
The river was too wide and shallow hereabouts to provide for any craft save when the spring floods were in spate. And this part of the country lacked settlers. It was grazing ground, and in winter the grasses on the lower lands helped to feed the stock. But no one lived here, save seasonally.
Our people are few in the western dales. And dalesmen
cling to company. Those who do turn hunter, forester, or trader are misfits who do not rub well against their fellows and are usually looked upon as being but a grade or two above the outlaws, since they are wandering, rootless men of whom anything may be expected. Thus we largely keep to the richer lands and within arrow flight of our dales. Our people dales are scattered. Norsdale, perhaps five days’ journey westward by horse, more on foot, was the nearest settlement of which I knew.
But we did not descend to the road to Norsdale, being warned by fire smoke on the valley floor. Our people would not light such. Again we kept to the upper slopes, angling south. So we came near to being the targets of crossbow bolts from our own kin.
There was a sharp challenge from a screen of bush; then a woman came into the open to face us. I knew her for Nalda, whose husband had been miller at Ithkrypt, a tall woman of great strength in which she took pride, sometimes in her way seeming more man than woman when compared to the chattering gossips in the village. She held her bow at ready, the bolt laid on, and did not lower it as we came up. But on seeing me, her rough face lightened.
“My Lady, well come, oh, well come!” Her greeting warmed my long-chilled heart.
“Well come in truth, Nalda. Who is with you?”
She reached forth to touch my arm, as if she needed that to assure herself I did indeed stand there.
“There be ten of us—the Lady Islaugha and the Lady Yngilda, my dad Timon and—but, Lady Joisan, what of Stark, my man?”
I remembered that red slaughter by the river. She must have read it in my face. Her own grew hard and fierce in an instant.
“So be it,” she said then, “so be it! He was a good man, Lady, and he died well—”
“He died well,” I assured her speedily. I would never tell any dales woman the manner of dying I had seen. For the dead were our heroes, and that is all we needed to know to hold them in honor.
“But what do I think of! Come quickly—those demons are in the valley below. We would have moved on, but the Lady Islaugha, she would not go, and we could not leave her. She waits for the Lord Toross.”
“Who will not come now. And if the invaders are already hereabouts we must move on quickly. Ten of you—what men?”
“Rudo and Angarl.” She nodded to my companions. “Insfar, who was shepherd in the Fourth Section. He escaped over the rocks with a hole in his shoulder, for these thrice-damned hunters of honest men have that which kills at a distance. The rest are women and two children. We have four crossbows, two long bows, our belt knives and Insfar's wolf spear. And among us food for mayhap three days, if we eat light and make one mouthful do the work of three.”
And Norsdale was far away—
“Mounts?”
“None, my Lady. We took to the upper pass and could not bring them. That was where we lost the rest Borstal guided—they went ahead in the night. There are sheep, perhaps a cow or two running wild—but whether we can hunt them—” She shrugged.
So much for all our plans of escape. I only hoped that some other parties of our people had gotten away sooner, been better equipped, and could get through to Norsdale. Whether they could rouse any there to come to our rescue, I doubted. In spite of my own need I could understand that those there would think a second time before venturing forth on such a search. They would be better occupied making ready their defenses against the invaders.
Thus escorted by Nalda, who seemed to have taken command of this small band, I came into their camp, though there was little about it of any camp. Seeing me, the Lady Islaugha was on her feet instantly.
“Toross?” Her cry was a demand. In her pale face her eyes glowed as the gryphon globe had glowed, as if within her was a fire.
My control was shaken. As I tried to find the right words, she came to me, her hands on my shoulders, and she shook me as if so to bring my answer.
“Where is Toross?”
“He—he was slain—” How could I clothe it in any soothing words? She wanted only the truth, and no one could soften that for her.
“Dead—dead!” She dropped her hold on me and stepped back. Now first there was horror in her expression, as if in me she saw one of the invaders bloody-handed from slaughter, and then a hardening of feature, a mask of hate so bitter it was a blow.
“He died for you—who would not look to him. Would not look to him who could have had any maid, yes, and wife, too, if he only lifted his finger and beckoned once! What had you to catch his eye, hold him? If he gained Ithkrypt with you, yes, that I could accept. But to die—and you stand here alive—”
I had no words. I could only face her storm. For in her twisted way of thinking she was right. That I had given Toross no encouragement meant nothing to her. What mattered was that he had wanted me and I had stood aloof, and he had died to save me.
She paused, and now her mouth worked and she spat, the spittle landing at my feet.
“Very well, take my curse also. And with it the oath of bearing and forebearing, for that you owe to me—and to
Yngilda also. You have taken our kin-lord—therefore you stand in his place.”
She invoked the old custom of our people, laying upon me the burden of her life as a blood-price, which in her eyes it was. From this time forth I must care for her—and Yngilda—protect them and smooth their way as best I could, even as if I were Toross himself.
13
Kerovan
Once more I stood on heights and looked down to death and destruction. Wind and wave had brought death to Ulmsdale, but here destruction had been wrought by the malice of men. It had taken me ten days to reach the point from which I spied on Ithkrypt, or what remained of it. One whole day of that time had been spent in reaching this pinnacle from which I could see a keep battered into dust.
Oddly enough there were no signs of the crawling monsters that breached walls in this fashion. Yet there were few stones of the keep still stacked one upon the other. And it was plain an enemy force was encamped here.
They had come upriver by boats, and these were drawn up on the opposite shore of the river.
My duty was divided. This landing must be reported, yet Joisan was much on my mind. No wonder I had sighted her in that vision clad in mail and gentle with a dying man.
Was she captive or dead? Back in the trackless wilderness through which I had come, I had crossed trails of
small groups moving westward, refugees by all evidence. Perhaps she had so fled. But where in all those leagues of wild land could I find her?
Lord Imgry had set me a duty that was plain. Once more I was torn between two demands, and I had one thin hope. There were signal posts in the heights. Messages could be flashed from peak to peak—in the sun by reflection from well-burnished shields; at night by torches held before the same backing. I knew the northern one of those, which could not be too far from Ithkrypt. If that had not been overrun and taken, Imgry would have his warning, and I would be free to hunt for Joisan.
Using scout skill I slipped away from the vantage point that had shown me Ithkrypt. There were parties of invaders out, and they went brashly, with the arrogance of conquerors who had nothing to fear. Some drove footsore cattle and bleating sheep back to slaughter in their camp; others worked to the west, seeking fugitives perhaps, or making out trails to lead an army inland even as Imgry had feared, that they might come down on us to crush our beleaguered force between two of theirs.
I found Hiku an excellent mount for my purposes. The pony seemed to follow by his own choice that country into which he could merge so that only one alerted to our presence there could have been aware of our passing. Also he appeared tireless, able to keep going when a stable-bred mount might have given out, footsore and blowing.
That these dales had their natural landmarks was a boon, for I could so check my direction. But I came across evidence that the invaders were spreading out from Ithkrypt. And I knew that I would not be a moment too soon. Perhaps I was already a day or so too late in sounding the alarm.
I found the crest on which the signal niche was located and there studied with dismay the traces of those come
before me. For it was the order of such posts that there be no trail pointing to them; yet here men, more than two or three, had passed openly, taking no trouble to cover their tracks.
With bare steel in my fist, my war hood laced, I climbed to the space where I should have found a three-man squad of signal-men. But death had been before me, as the splashes of clotted blood testified. There was the socket in which the shield had been set so it could be readied to either catch the sun or frame the light of a torch—there was even a broken torch flung to earth and trampled. I looked south, able to make out the next peak on which one of our outposts was stationed. Had those attacked here been able to give the alarm?
Now I applied my forest knowledge to the evidence and decided that battle had been done in mid-morning. It was now mid-afternoon. Had they wings, perhaps the invaders could have flown from this height to the one I could see, but men, mounted or on foot, could not have already won to that second point in such time. If no warning had gone forth, I must in some manner give it.
The shield had been wrenched away. I carried none myself, for my activities as scout had made me discard all such equipment. Signal—how could I signal without the means?
I chewed a knuckle and tried to think. I had a sword, a long forester's knife, and a rope worn as a belt about my middle. My mail was not shining, but coated over on purpose with a greenish sap which helped to conceal me.
Going forth from the spy niche I looked around—hoping against hope that the shield might have been tossed away. But that was rating the enemy too low. There was only one thing I might do, and in the doing I could bring them back on me as if I had purposefully lashed a nest of Anda wasps—set a fire. The smoke would not convey any precise
message, as did the wink of reflection from the shield, but it would warn those ahead.
I searched the ground for wood, carrying it back to the signal post. My last armful was not culled from the ground under the gnarled slope trees, but selected from leaves on those same trees.
I used my strike light and the fire caught, held well. Into it then I fed, handful by handful, the leaves I had gathered. Billows of yellowish smoke appeared, along with fumes that drove me coughing from the fireside, my eyes streaming tears. But as those cleared I could see a column of smoke reaching well into the sky, such a mark as no one could miss.
There was little or no wind, even here on the upper slopes, and the smoke was a well-rounded pillar. This gave me another idea—to interrupt the smoke and then let it flow again would add emphasis to the warning. I unstrapped my cloak, and with it in hand went back to the fire.
It was a chancy business, but, though I was awkward, I managed to so break the column that no one could mistake it was meant for a signal. A moment or two later there came a flash from the other peak that I could read. They had accepted the warning and would now swing their shield and pass it on. Lord Imgry might not have exact news from the north, but he would know that the enemy had reached this point.
My duty done, I must be on my way with all speed—heading westward. To seek Joisan I could do no more than try to find the trail of one of those bands of refugees and discover from them what might have happened to my lady.
If so far fortune had favored me, now that was not true. For I learned shortly that the pursuit was up, and such pursuit as made my heart beat fast and dried my mouth as I urged Hiku on. They had out their hounds!
We speak of those of Alizon as Hounds, naming them so for their hunters on four legs, which are unlike our own dogs of the chase. They have gray-white coats, and they are very thin, though large and long of leg; their heads are narrow, moving with the fluid ease of a serpent, their eyes yellow. Few of them were with the invaders, but those we had seen in the south were deadly, trained to hunt and kill, and with something about them wholly evil.
As I rode from where that smoke still curled, I heard the sound of a horn as I had heard it twice before in the south. It was the summoning of a hound master. I knew that once set on my trail, those gray-white, flitting ghosts, which had no true kinship with our guardian dogs of the dale keeps, would ferret me out.
So I set to every trick I knew for covering and confusing my trail. Yet after each attempt at concealment, a distant yapping told me I had not escaped. At last Hiku, again of his own accord, as if no beast brain lay within his skull but some other more powerful one, tugged loose from my controlling rein and struck to the north. He half slid, half leaped down a crumbling bank into a stream, and up that, against the current, he splashed his way.
I loosed all rein hold, letting him pick his own path, for he had found a road which could lead us to freedom. It was plain he knew exactly what he was doing.
The stream was not river-sized, but perhaps a tributary to the river that ran through Ithkrypt. The water was very clear. One could look down to see not only the stones and gravel that floored it, but also those finned and crawling things to which it was home.
Suddenly Hiku came to a full stop, the water washing about his knees. So sudden was that halt that I was nearly shaken from my seat. The pony swung his head back and forth, lowering it to the water's edge. Then he whinnied and turned his head as if addressing me in his own language.
So odd were his actions I knew this was no light matter. As he lowered his head once more to the stream I believed he was striving to call my attention to something therein and was growing impatient at my not understanding some plain message.
I leaned forward to peer into the water ahead. It was impressed upon me now that Hiku's actions were not unlike those of someone facing an unsprung trap. Was there some water dweller formidable enough to threaten the pony?
Easing sword out of sheath, I made ready for attack. The pony held his head stiffly, as if to guide my attention to a certain point. I took my bearing from him in my search.
Stones, gravel—then—yes! There was something, hardly to be distinguished from the natural objects among which it lay.
I dropped from Hiku's back, planting my hoofs securely in the stream bed against the wash of the current. Then I worked forward until I could see better.
There was a loop, not of stone, or at least of any stone I had ever seen, blue-green in color. And it stood upright, seemingly wedged between two rocks. With infinite care I lowered sword point into the flood, worked it within that loop, and then raised it.
Though it had looked firmly wedged, it gave to my pull so easily I was near overbalanced by the release. And I snapped the blade up in reflex, so that what it held could not slide back into the water.
Instead it slipped down the length of the blade to clang against the hilt, touch my fingers. I almost dropped it, or even flung it from me, for there was an instant flow of energy from the loop into my flesh.
Gingerly I shook it a little down my sword, away from my fingers, and then held it closer to my eyes. What
ringed my steel was a wristlet, or even an archer's bow guard, about two fingers's wide in span. The material was perhaps metal, though like no metal I knew. Out of the water it glowed, to draw the eye. Though the overall color was blue-green, now that I saw it close, I made out a very intricate pattern woven and interwoven of threads of red-gold. And some of these, I was sure, formed runes.
That this had belonged to the Old Ones I had not the least doubt, and that it was a thing of power I was sure from Hiku's action. For we dalesmen know that the instincts of beasts about some of the ancient remains are more to be relied upon than our own. Yet when I brought the armlet closer to the pony, he did not display any of the signs of alarm that I knew would come if this was the thing of a Dark One. Rather he stretched forth his head as if he sniffed some pleasing odor rising from it.
Emboldened by his reaction, I touched it with fingertip. Again I felt that surge of power. At length I conquered my awe and closed my fingers on it, drawing it off the blade.
Either the flow of energy lessened, or I had become accustomed to it. Now it was no more than a gentle warmth. And I was reminded of that other relic—the crystal-enclosed gryphon.
Without thinking I slipped the band over my hand, and it settled and clung about my wrist snugly, as if it had been made for my wearing alone. As I held it at eye level, the entwined design appeared to flow, to move. Quickly I dropped my hand. For the space of a breath or two I had seen—what? Now that I no longer looked, I could not say—save that it was very strange, and I was more than a little in awe of it. Yet I had no desire to take off this find. In fact, when I glanced at my wrist as I remounted, I had an odd thought that sometime—somewhere—I had worn such before. But how could that be? For I would take blood oath I had never seen its like. But then who can untangle the mysteries of the Old Ones?
Hiku went on briskly, and I listened ever for the sound of the hound horn, the yap of the pack. Once I thought I did hear it, very faint and far away, and that heartened me. It would seem that Hiku had indeed chosen his road well.
As yet he made no move to leave the stream, but continued to plow through the water steady-footed. I did not urge him, willing to leave such a choice to him.
The stream curved, and a screen of well-leafed bushes gave way to show me what lay ahead. Hiku now sought the bank of a sand bar to the right. But I gazed ahead in amazement. Here was a lake not uncommon in the dales, but it was what man—or thinking beings—had set upon it that surprised me.
The water was bridged completely across the widest part. However, that crossway was not meant for a roadway, but rather gave access to a building, not unlike a small keep, erected in the middle of the water. It presented no windows on the bridge level, but the next story and two towers, each forming a gate to the bridge, had narrow slits on the lower levels, wider as they rose in the towers.
From the shore where we were, the whole structure seemed untouched by time. But the far end of the bridge, reaching toward the opposite side of the lake, was gone. The other bridgehead was not far from us and, strange as the keep appeared (it was clearly of the Old Ones’ time), I thought it offered the best shelter for the coming night.
Hiku was in no way reluctant to venture onto the bridge, but went on bravely enough, the ring of his hoofs sounding a hollow beat-beat which somehow set me to listening, as if I expected a response from the building ahead.
I saw that I had chosen well, for there was a section of the bridge meant to be pulled back toward the tower, leaving a defensive gap between land and keep. Whether that could still be moved was my first concern. Having crossed, I made fast the end of my rope to rings there provided.
Hiku pulled valiantly and, dismounted, I lent my strength to his. At first I thought the movable bridge section too deeply rooted by time to yield. But after picking with sword point, digging at free soil and wind-blown leaves, I tried again. This time, with a shudder, it gave, not to the extent its makers had intended, but enough to leave a sizable gap between bridge and tower.
The gate of the keep yawned before me darkly. I blamed myself for not bringing the makings of a torch with me. Once more I relied on the pony's senses. When I released him from the drag rope, he gave a great sigh and footed slowly forward, unled or urged, his head hanging a little. I followed after, sure we had come to a place where old dreams might cluster, but that was empty of threat for us now.