On the hill-slope I, Kerovan of Ulmsdale, faced the wayfarer in
trader's clothing, who was no trader, as I knew when his staff
beckoned me out of hiding against my will. I put my hand to sword
hilt as I came, but he smiled, gently, tolerantly, as one might
upon a frightened child.
"Lord Kerovan, no unfriend faces you." He dropped the point of
the staff.
Instantly I was freed from that compulsion. But I had no desire
to dodge back and away again, for there was that in his face which
promised truth.
"Who are you?" Perhaps I demanded that more abruptly than
courtesy allowed.
"What is a name?" he returned. The point of his wand now touched
the ground and shifted here and there, though he did not watch it,
as if he wrote runes in the dust. "A traveler may have many names.
Let it suffice for now that in these dales I am called Neevor."
I thought he gave me a quick, searching look, as if to see if I
knew that name. But my want of understanding must have been plain
to read. I thought he sighed, as if regretting something lost.
"I have known Ulmsdale in the past," he continued. "And to the
House of Ulric I have been no unfriend — nor do I stand aside when
one of his blood needs aid. Where do you go, Lord Kerovan?"
I began to suspect who — or what — he might be. And I was awed.
But because he stood in the guise he did I felt no fear.
"I go to the forest lodge, seeking Riwal."
"Riwal — he was a seeker of roads, worshiping knowledge above
all things. Though he never entered the wide door, he stood on its
threshold, and those I serve did not deny him."
"You say of him 'was.' Where is he now?"
Again that wand-tip, which had come to rest, scrabbled across
the earth.
"There are roads amany. Understand only that the one he has
taken hence is not yours to follow."
I snatched at what might lie behind that evasion, believing the
worst, because of all I had seen and heard, not only this night but
in the months in the south.
"You mean he is dead! And by whose hand?" Once more that cold
anger possessed me. Had Hlymer also taken this friend from me?
"The hand that dealt the blow was but an instrument — a tool.
Riwal sought certain forces, and there were those who stood in
opposition. Thus he was removed."
Neevor apparently did not believe in open speech, but was fond
of involvements that veiled the question rather than revealed
it.
"He turned to the Light, not Dark!" I spoke for my friend.
"Would I be here otherwise, Lord Kerovan? I am a messenger of
those forces he sought, to which he was guiding you before the war
horns sounded. Listen well. You are one poised upon a mountain peak
with before you two paths. Both are dark with danger; both may lead
you to what those of your blood speak of as death. It is in your
fate that you can turn to either from this night onward. You have
it in you to become as your kin-blood, for you were born in the
Shrine of — " Did he utter some name then? I believe that he did.
Yet it was one not meant to be spoken by man. I cowered, putting my
hands to my ears to shut out the awful echoes from the sky
above.
He watched me closely, as if to make sure of my reaction. Now
his wand-staff swung up, pointing to me, and down its length came a
puff of radiance that floated from its tip through the air and
broke against my face before I could dodge the touch, though I felt
nothing.
"Kinsman," he said, in his gentle voice, losing that majesty of
tone he had held a moment earlier.
"Kinsman?"
"It seems that when the Lady Tephana wrought her bargain, she
did not understand what she achieved. However, she sensed it; yes,
she sensed it. You were a changeling, Kerovan, but not for her
purposes. In that she read aright. She had set to fashion an
encasement of blood, bone, and flesh for her use. Only the spirit
it enclosed was not of her calling. It does not advantage one to
take liberties with Gunnora. I do not know who looks through your
eyes. I think that he yet sleeps, or only half-wakes. But the time
will come when you shall remember, at least in part, and then your
heritage shall be yours. No, not Ulmsdale — for the dales will no
longer hold you — you shall seek and you shall find. But before
that you must play out what lies here, for you are half dalesman."
I was trying to understand. Did he mean that the Lady Tephana had
worked with some Power before my birth, to make my body a vessel
into which to pour some manifestation of the Dark? If so my hoofed
feet might be the mark. But — what was I?
"Not what you fear in this moment, Kerovan," he answered my
unspoken thought swiftly. "Halfling you are, and your father's son,
though he was under ensorcellment when he begot you. But where that
seeker of Dark Knowledge strove to make a weapon to be used for her
own purposes, she gave entry to another instead. I cannot read the
rune for you. The discovery of what you truly are, and can be, you
must make for yourself. You can return now, ally yourself with
them, and find she cannot stand against you. Or — "
His wand indicated the barren hillside. "Or you can walk into a
world where the Dark and what you call death will sniff at your
heels, ever seeking a way for which there is no guide. The choice
is yours."
"They speak of calling wind and wave to defeat the invader," I
said. "Is this good or ill for Ulmsdale?"
"To loose any Power carries great risk, and those who strive to
follow the old ways but are not of the blood, risk double."
"Can I prevent them then?"
He drew back. I thought his voice colder as he answered, "If you
so wish."
"Perhaps there is a third way." I had thought of it once or
twice as I climbed these slopes. "I can claim kin-right from
Ithkrypt and gain a force to retake Ulmsdale before the enemy
comes." But even as I spoke, I knew how thin a chance I had. Lord
Cyart was fighting in the south and must have stripped his dale of
forces, save for a handful of defenders. There would be none there
to be spared, even if I went as a beggar.
"The choice is yours," Neevor repeated. And I knew he would give
no advice.
My duty in Ulmsdale was part of my training. If I turned my back
now upon my father's land, made no attempt to save those dwelling
in it from disaster, either by enemy hand or the spells of that
witch and her brood, then I would be traitor to all bred in me.
"I am my father's heir. I cannot turn my back upon his people.
Nor do I take part in their witchery. There may be those to follow
me — "
He shook his head. "Try not to build a wall out of shifting
sand, Kerovan. That Dark biding within the walls of Ulmskeep has
spread. No armsman will rise to your summons."
I did not doubt that he knew exactly what he said. There was
that about Neevor which carried full belief. So — it must be
Ithkrypt after all. At least I would find shelter there from which
to gather men and support. Also I must send a message to Lord
Imgry.
Neevor thrust his wand-staff through his belt. Then he turned to
his led pony, tumbling from its back the small pack that had been
lashed there.
"Hiku is no battle charger, but he is sure-footed in the hills.
Take him, Kerovan, with the Fourth Blessing." Once more he reached
for his wand and with it he tapped me lightly on the forehead,
right shoulder, left, and over my heart.
Straightway then, I had the feeling my decision had pleased him.
Yet I also knew that I could not be sure it was the right one. For
it was laid upon me that I must choose my own road for myself and
not by the advice of another.
I had forgotten my bare hoofs, but now as I moved toward the
pony, my boots swung against my thigh and I caught at them. As I
loosened them from my belt, ready to draw them on again, I had a
strong revulsion against hiding my deformity — or was it so? It was
a difference, yes, but what I had seen in my father's chamber this
night, a deformity of spirit, seemed to me the greater evil.
No, I was done with hiding. If Joisan and her kind turned from
me in disgust, then I was free of them. I hurled the boots from me,
holding to that sense of freedom I had had since I shed them.
"Well done," Neevor said. "Be yourself, Kerovan, not ruled by
the belief that one man must be like another. I have hopes for you
after all."
Deliberately he urged the second pony on a few paces and then,
standing with one hand on its shoulder, he drew a circle on the
earth around the animal and himself. Following the point of his
wand there sprang up a thin, bluish haze. As he completed the
encirclement, it thickened to hide both man and beast. As I
watched, it faded, but I was not surprised to see that its going
disclosed emptiness — that the trader and his mount were gone.
I had guessed that he was one of the Old Ones. And that he had
come to me was not by any chance. But he left me much to think on.
Half-blood was I then, having kinship to the mysterious forelords
in this land? I was a tool of my mother's desiring, though not to
her purpose — yes, so much he told me fitted with the facts I knew
and answered many questions.
I clung to the human part of me now: the fact that I was in
truth Ulric's son, no matter what that sorceress had done to set it
awry. That thought I cherished. For in death my father had come
closer and dearer to me than ever he had been in life. Ulmsdale had
been his. Therefore I would do what I could to see it safe, which
meant I must ride for Ithkrypt.
I could not even be sure that the pony was of the natural order
of beasts, seeing by whose hand he had come to me. But he seemed to
be exactly like any other of his breed. He was sure-footed. Still
there were stretches where I must go afoot and lead him.
By dawn I was well into the heights. As I made a rough camp, I
lifted off my gift-mount something Neevor had not removed along
with the pack, a stout hide bag. In it was a water bottle of
lamantine wood. But it did not contain water, rather a white drink
that was more refreshing and warming than any wine I had ever
tasted. There was also a round box of the same wood with a tightly
fitting cover. I worked this off, to find inside journey cakes that
had been so protected by their container they seemed fresh from the
griddle. Nor were they the common sort, but had embedded in them
bits of dried fruit and cured meat. One of them satisfied my
hunger, as great as that now was, and the rest I kept for the
future.
Though sleep tugged at my eyelids and my body demanded rest, I
sat for a while in a niche between two rock teeth, thinking on all
that had happened to me this night. My hoofed feet stretched before
me. I studied them, trying to put myself in the place of one
sighting them without warning. Perhaps I had been foolish to cast
away my boots. No, in the same instant as that thought entered my
mind, I rejected it. This I would do and so I would go — Joisan and
her people must see me as I was and accept or deny me. There must
be between us no untruths or half-truths, such as had filled my
father's house with a web of dark deceit and clung there now as a
foul shadow.
I unlatched my belt-purse and for the first time in months
brought out that case, deliberately opened it, and slid into my
hand Joisan's picture. A girl's face, and one painted nearly two
years ago. In that time we had both grown older, changed. What was
she like, this maid with large eyes and hair the color of autumn
leaves? Was she some subdued daughter-of-the-house, well-lessoned
in the ways of women but ignorant of the world outside Ithkrypt's
stout walls? For the first time I began to think of her as a
person, apart from the fact that by custom she was as much my
possession as the sword at my belt, the mail on my back.
My knowledge of women was small. In the south I had listened to
the boasting tales men tell around the campfires of any army. But I
had added no experience of my own. I thought now that perhaps my
mixed blood, my inheritance from the Old Ones, had marked me with
more than hoofs; that it had set upon my needs and desires some
barrier against the dale maids. If that was so, what would become
of my union with Joisan?
I could break bride-oath, but to do such would be to lay a stain
on her, and such a trick would be as evil as if I stood up before
her assembled House and defamed her. That I could not do. But
perhaps when we at last met face to face she would look upon me and
make such a repudiation, and I would not gainsay it. Nor would I
allow thereafter any dale-feud to come from my dismissal.
Yet at this moment when I looked upon her face in the dawn
light, I wanted to see her, and I did not relish her breaking
bride-oath with me. Why had I sent her the englobed gryphon? Almost
during the past months I had forgotten that — but my interrupted
journey to see Riwal brought it back to mind. What had lain so
heavily on me then that I had sent that wonder to her, as if such a
gift was necessary? I tried to picture it in my mind now — the
crystal ball with its gryphon within, a warning claw raised —
But —
I was no longer looking at the dale below. I could no longer see
the pony grazing. Rather I saw — her!
She was before me so clearly at that moment that I might have
reached out and touched her skirt where she crouched. Her russet
hair was in wild disorder over her shoulders, and through its
straying strands I could see the gleam of mail. On her breast hung
the gryphon, and it blazed with light. Her face was bruised, and
there was fear in her eyes. Against her knee rested the head of a
young man. His eyes were closed, and across his lips bubbled the
froth of blood that marked a wound from which there was no healing.
Her hand touched his forehead gently, and she watched him with a
tenseness that meant his life or death had meaning for her. Perhaps
this was farseeing, though I had only once had such a gift or curse
set upon me before. I knew that the face of the dying man was not
mine, and her sorrow was for another. Perhaps therein lay my
answer. Nor could I fault her if it was. For we were naught to each
other but names. I had not even sent her the picture that had been
her own asking from me.
That the gryphon blazed so clearly puzzled me a little after I
had schooled myself to accept the meaning of what I saw. It was as
if life had poured into that globe. So — perhaps now I knew the
reason why I had been so strangely moved to send it to her. Though
I had been the finder and had treasured it, it was not mine to have
and hold, but was meant rather to lie where it now rested, and was
truly hers and not mine. I must accept that also.
How long did that farsight or vision last? I did not know. I
knew only that it was true. The strange youth was dying, or would
die, and she would mourn him thereafter.
But such a death argued that Ithkrypt was not the refuge I had
looked to find. It was not usual for a daleswoman to wear a mail
like a warrior, but we did not live in ordinary times. She was
armored, and her comrade was dying; to that there could be only one
explanation. Ithkrypt was either attacked or soon would be. Still
that knowledge did not deter me. Rather it drew me — for I had a
duty also to Joisan, whether or no she would ever now turn to me
happily. If she were in danger, there was even more reason I should
cross the ridges to her. Ulmsdale, once my father's and now under
the hands of those I knew to be of ill intent; Ithkrypt perhaps
overrun — I was traveling from one danger to another. Death was
surely sniffing at my heels, ready to lay claw-hand on my shoulder.
But this road was mine, and I could take no other.
The vision was gone, and with its going my weariness settled so
heavily upon me that I could not fight it. I slept the day away in
my hole, for when I roused it was already dusk.
I wakened to the pony nudging against my shoulder, as if the
beast were a sentry on guard.
Dusk—yes—and more. There was a gathering of thick clouds, such
as I had seldom seen. So dark and heavy was that massing that I
could not now sight the Giant's Fist! And the pony crowded in
against me as I scrambled to my feet.
The beast was sweating; the smell of it was rank. He pushed his
head against my shoulder, and I gentled him with neck-stroking.
This was fear the like of which I had seldom seen before in any
animal. Emotion gripped me also: a vast apprehension, as if some
force beyond understanding gathered, a force that was inimical to
all my kind and could, if it would, sweep us like grains of dust
from its path.
I backed against the rock wall, my hands still on the pony,
waiting. I did not know for what, except I feared it as I never had
feared anything before in my life.
There was no wind, no sound. That terrible stillness added to my
fear. The dale, the world, cowered and waited.
From the east there was a sudden flash of light. Not the usual
lightning, but rather a wide swath across all the heavens. Eastward
— over the sea — Power of wind and wave they had spoken of — were
they about to summon that? Then the invaders' ships must lie near
to Ulmsport, and they had had little time to ready their plans.
What would happen?
The pony uttered a strange sound such as I had never heard from
any mount before. It was almost a whimper. And that oppression
increased until it seemed that the very air about us was kept from
our lungs and we could not breathe freely. Still there came no
wind, but sheet lightning flashed seaward. Now came a long roll —
as if a thousand war drums beat together.
Above the clouds was a night of such darkness I could see no
more than if I were blindfolded. Surely this was no ordinary storm,
at least like none I had seen before in my lifetime. My lifetime.
Deep in me a thread of memory stirred — but it could not be memory
— for it was not of this life but another.
But that was foolishness! A man had but one lifetime and the
memories of that — one lifetime —
My skin, where it was exposed to the air, itched and burned as
if the atmosphere were poisoned. Then I saw light — but not in the
sky — rather auras about rocks as if they were palely burning
lanterns, their light a foggy discharge.
For the third time, sheet lightning blanketed the east, and
after it came the drum roll. Then followed the wind —
Wind, but such wind as I swear the dale had never felt before. I
crouched between the rocks, my face buried in the trembling pony's
rough mane, the smell of the beast's sweat in my nostrils. He was
steaming wet under my hands. There was no way I could shut out the
sound of that wind. And surely we would be scooped out of our small
refuge by its force, whirled out to be beaten to death in the
open.
I braced my hoofs deep in the ground, used the rock at my back
and side as best I could to anchor me, and felt the pony,
iron-tense in my hold, doing likewise. If the poor beast whimpered
now, I could no longer hear him, for the sound of the elements was
deafening. The drum beat had become a roar to which there was no
end.
I could not think; I could only cower in dull hope of escaping
the full fury. But as it continued I grew somewhat accustomed to
it, as one can when the first sharp edge of any fear is dulled by a
continuation of its source. I realized then that the wind blew from
east to west, and its power must be directed from the sea upon
Ulmsport.
What such a storm might do along the coast I could not imagine,
save that it would utterly devastate everything within its hammer
blows. If there had been an enemy fleet drawing to port, that must
be completely overwhelmed. But the innocent would suffer with the
invader. What of the port and those who dwelt there? If this storm
was born of the Power those in the keep thought to summon, then
they had either lost control of it or had indeed drawn hither
something greater than they had planned.
How long did it last? I lost all track of time. There was no
night, no day — only black dark and the roaring — and the fear of
something that was not of normal nature. What of the keep? It
seemed to me that this fury could well shake even those great
stones one from the other, splitting open the firm old building as
if it were a ripe fruit.
There was no slacking off as would occur in a true storm. One
moment the deafening roar, the fury — then silence, complete, dead.
I thought at first that the continued noise, the pressure, had
deafened me. Then I heard a soft sound from the pony. He pushed
against me, backing into the open.
Above, it was once more dawn. The dark clouds, tattered as my
father's death banner, faded into nothingness. Had it been so long
we had been pent there? I stumbled after the pony into the quiet
open.
The air no longer held that acridness which had tortured our
breathing, but was fresh and cool. And there was a curious — I
could only define it as emptiness — in it.
I must see what had happened below. That thought drove me.
Leading Hiku along the narrow rim of the dale, I headed back toward
the Giant's Fist. These heights had been scoured. Vast areas of
trees and brush had been simply torn away, leaving scars in the
earth to mark their former rooting.
So obvious were these signs of destruction, I was prepared in
part for what I did sight at the foot of the heights. Yet it was
far worse than I expected.
Part of the keep still stood, though its outline was not that of
a complete building any longer. About it was water — a great sheet
of water on the surface of which floated a covering of wreckage,
perhaps part of it ships, part the houses of Ulmsport, but too
tangled to be identified with any surety. And that water came from
the east — the sea had claimed most of Ulmsdale.
Had those below escaped? I could see no signs of life. The
village was under water save for a roof or two. So the disaster
those below had wantonly summoned had fallen.
Were they caught up in the maelstrom of the force they could not
control? That I hoped. But that Ulmsdale as I had known it was
dead, was manifest. No man could have a future here. For I believed
that what the sea had won, it would not surrender. If the invaders
thought to use this as a foothold, they were defeated.
I turned my face from that lump which had been the keep, and so
from the past. In a way, I still had a duty laid upon me — I must
learn how it fared with Joisan. And then — there lay the south and
the long, long battles to come.
Thus I tramped away from the Fist with no desire to look again
at the ruin in the dale, and my heart was sore, not for any loss of
mine, for I had never truly felt that it was my holding, but for
the wreckage of all my father had cherished and sought by every
means he knew to protect. And I think I cursed as I went, though
silently, those who had done this thing.
On the hill-slope I, Kerovan of Ulmsdale, faced the wayfarer in
trader's clothing, who was no trader, as I knew when his staff
beckoned me out of hiding against my will. I put my hand to sword
hilt as I came, but he smiled, gently, tolerantly, as one might
upon a frightened child.
"Lord Kerovan, no unfriend faces you." He dropped the point of
the staff.
Instantly I was freed from that compulsion. But I had no desire
to dodge back and away again, for there was that in his face which
promised truth.
"Who are you?" Perhaps I demanded that more abruptly than
courtesy allowed.
"What is a name?" he returned. The point of his wand now touched
the ground and shifted here and there, though he did not watch it,
as if he wrote runes in the dust. "A traveler may have many names.
Let it suffice for now that in these dales I am called Neevor."
I thought he gave me a quick, searching look, as if to see if I
knew that name. But my want of understanding must have been plain
to read. I thought he sighed, as if regretting something lost.
"I have known Ulmsdale in the past," he continued. "And to the
House of Ulric I have been no unfriend — nor do I stand aside when
one of his blood needs aid. Where do you go, Lord Kerovan?"
I began to suspect who — or what — he might be. And I was awed.
But because he stood in the guise he did I felt no fear.
"I go to the forest lodge, seeking Riwal."
"Riwal — he was a seeker of roads, worshiping knowledge above
all things. Though he never entered the wide door, he stood on its
threshold, and those I serve did not deny him."
"You say of him 'was.' Where is he now?"
Again that wand-tip, which had come to rest, scrabbled across
the earth.
"There are roads amany. Understand only that the one he has
taken hence is not yours to follow."
I snatched at what might lie behind that evasion, believing the
worst, because of all I had seen and heard, not only this night but
in the months in the south.
"You mean he is dead! And by whose hand?" Once more that cold
anger possessed me. Had Hlymer also taken this friend from me?
"The hand that dealt the blow was but an instrument — a tool.
Riwal sought certain forces, and there were those who stood in
opposition. Thus he was removed."
Neevor apparently did not believe in open speech, but was fond
of involvements that veiled the question rather than revealed
it.
"He turned to the Light, not Dark!" I spoke for my friend.
"Would I be here otherwise, Lord Kerovan? I am a messenger of
those forces he sought, to which he was guiding you before the war
horns sounded. Listen well. You are one poised upon a mountain peak
with before you two paths. Both are dark with danger; both may lead
you to what those of your blood speak of as death. It is in your
fate that you can turn to either from this night onward. You have
it in you to become as your kin-blood, for you were born in the
Shrine of — " Did he utter some name then? I believe that he did.
Yet it was one not meant to be spoken by man. I cowered, putting my
hands to my ears to shut out the awful echoes from the sky
above.
He watched me closely, as if to make sure of my reaction. Now
his wand-staff swung up, pointing to me, and down its length came a
puff of radiance that floated from its tip through the air and
broke against my face before I could dodge the touch, though I felt
nothing.
"Kinsman," he said, in his gentle voice, losing that majesty of
tone he had held a moment earlier.
"Kinsman?"
"It seems that when the Lady Tephana wrought her bargain, she
did not understand what she achieved. However, she sensed it; yes,
she sensed it. You were a changeling, Kerovan, but not for her
purposes. In that she read aright. She had set to fashion an
encasement of blood, bone, and flesh for her use. Only the spirit
it enclosed was not of her calling. It does not advantage one to
take liberties with Gunnora. I do not know who looks through your
eyes. I think that he yet sleeps, or only half-wakes. But the time
will come when you shall remember, at least in part, and then your
heritage shall be yours. No, not Ulmsdale — for the dales will no
longer hold you — you shall seek and you shall find. But before
that you must play out what lies here, for you are half dalesman."
I was trying to understand. Did he mean that the Lady Tephana had
worked with some Power before my birth, to make my body a vessel
into which to pour some manifestation of the Dark? If so my hoofed
feet might be the mark. But — what was I?
"Not what you fear in this moment, Kerovan," he answered my
unspoken thought swiftly. "Halfling you are, and your father's son,
though he was under ensorcellment when he begot you. But where that
seeker of Dark Knowledge strove to make a weapon to be used for her
own purposes, she gave entry to another instead. I cannot read the
rune for you. The discovery of what you truly are, and can be, you
must make for yourself. You can return now, ally yourself with
them, and find she cannot stand against you. Or — "
His wand indicated the barren hillside. "Or you can walk into a
world where the Dark and what you call death will sniff at your
heels, ever seeking a way for which there is no guide. The choice
is yours."
"They speak of calling wind and wave to defeat the invader," I
said. "Is this good or ill for Ulmsdale?"
"To loose any Power carries great risk, and those who strive to
follow the old ways but are not of the blood, risk double."
"Can I prevent them then?"
He drew back. I thought his voice colder as he answered, "If you
so wish."
"Perhaps there is a third way." I had thought of it once or
twice as I climbed these slopes. "I can claim kin-right from
Ithkrypt and gain a force to retake Ulmsdale before the enemy
comes." But even as I spoke, I knew how thin a chance I had. Lord
Cyart was fighting in the south and must have stripped his dale of
forces, save for a handful of defenders. There would be none there
to be spared, even if I went as a beggar.
"The choice is yours," Neevor repeated. And I knew he would give
no advice.
My duty in Ulmsdale was part of my training. If I turned my back
now upon my father's land, made no attempt to save those dwelling
in it from disaster, either by enemy hand or the spells of that
witch and her brood, then I would be traitor to all bred in me.
"I am my father's heir. I cannot turn my back upon his people.
Nor do I take part in their witchery. There may be those to follow
me — "
He shook his head. "Try not to build a wall out of shifting
sand, Kerovan. That Dark biding within the walls of Ulmskeep has
spread. No armsman will rise to your summons."
I did not doubt that he knew exactly what he said. There was
that about Neevor which carried full belief. So — it must be
Ithkrypt after all. At least I would find shelter there from which
to gather men and support. Also I must send a message to Lord
Imgry.
Neevor thrust his wand-staff through his belt. Then he turned to
his led pony, tumbling from its back the small pack that had been
lashed there.
"Hiku is no battle charger, but he is sure-footed in the hills.
Take him, Kerovan, with the Fourth Blessing." Once more he reached
for his wand and with it he tapped me lightly on the forehead,
right shoulder, left, and over my heart.
Straightway then, I had the feeling my decision had pleased him.
Yet I also knew that I could not be sure it was the right one. For
it was laid upon me that I must choose my own road for myself and
not by the advice of another.
I had forgotten my bare hoofs, but now as I moved toward the
pony, my boots swung against my thigh and I caught at them. As I
loosened them from my belt, ready to draw them on again, I had a
strong revulsion against hiding my deformity — or was it so? It was
a difference, yes, but what I had seen in my father's chamber this
night, a deformity of spirit, seemed to me the greater evil.
No, I was done with hiding. If Joisan and her kind turned from
me in disgust, then I was free of them. I hurled the boots from me,
holding to that sense of freedom I had had since I shed them.
"Well done," Neevor said. "Be yourself, Kerovan, not ruled by
the belief that one man must be like another. I have hopes for you
after all."
Deliberately he urged the second pony on a few paces and then,
standing with one hand on its shoulder, he drew a circle on the
earth around the animal and himself. Following the point of his
wand there sprang up a thin, bluish haze. As he completed the
encirclement, it thickened to hide both man and beast. As I
watched, it faded, but I was not surprised to see that its going
disclosed emptiness — that the trader and his mount were gone.
I had guessed that he was one of the Old Ones. And that he had
come to me was not by any chance. But he left me much to think on.
Half-blood was I then, having kinship to the mysterious forelords
in this land? I was a tool of my mother's desiring, though not to
her purpose — yes, so much he told me fitted with the facts I knew
and answered many questions.
I clung to the human part of me now: the fact that I was in
truth Ulric's son, no matter what that sorceress had done to set it
awry. That thought I cherished. For in death my father had come
closer and dearer to me than ever he had been in life. Ulmsdale had
been his. Therefore I would do what I could to see it safe, which
meant I must ride for Ithkrypt.
I could not even be sure that the pony was of the natural order
of beasts, seeing by whose hand he had come to me. But he seemed to
be exactly like any other of his breed. He was sure-footed. Still
there were stretches where I must go afoot and lead him.
By dawn I was well into the heights. As I made a rough camp, I
lifted off my gift-mount something Neevor had not removed along
with the pack, a stout hide bag. In it was a water bottle of
lamantine wood. But it did not contain water, rather a white drink
that was more refreshing and warming than any wine I had ever
tasted. There was also a round box of the same wood with a tightly
fitting cover. I worked this off, to find inside journey cakes that
had been so protected by their container they seemed fresh from the
griddle. Nor were they the common sort, but had embedded in them
bits of dried fruit and cured meat. One of them satisfied my
hunger, as great as that now was, and the rest I kept for the
future.
Though sleep tugged at my eyelids and my body demanded rest, I
sat for a while in a niche between two rock teeth, thinking on all
that had happened to me this night. My hoofed feet stretched before
me. I studied them, trying to put myself in the place of one
sighting them without warning. Perhaps I had been foolish to cast
away my boots. No, in the same instant as that thought entered my
mind, I rejected it. This I would do and so I would go — Joisan and
her people must see me as I was and accept or deny me. There must
be between us no untruths or half-truths, such as had filled my
father's house with a web of dark deceit and clung there now as a
foul shadow.
I unlatched my belt-purse and for the first time in months
brought out that case, deliberately opened it, and slid into my
hand Joisan's picture. A girl's face, and one painted nearly two
years ago. In that time we had both grown older, changed. What was
she like, this maid with large eyes and hair the color of autumn
leaves? Was she some subdued daughter-of-the-house, well-lessoned
in the ways of women but ignorant of the world outside Ithkrypt's
stout walls? For the first time I began to think of her as a
person, apart from the fact that by custom she was as much my
possession as the sword at my belt, the mail on my back.
My knowledge of women was small. In the south I had listened to
the boasting tales men tell around the campfires of any army. But I
had added no experience of my own. I thought now that perhaps my
mixed blood, my inheritance from the Old Ones, had marked me with
more than hoofs; that it had set upon my needs and desires some
barrier against the dale maids. If that was so, what would become
of my union with Joisan?
I could break bride-oath, but to do such would be to lay a stain
on her, and such a trick would be as evil as if I stood up before
her assembled House and defamed her. That I could not do. But
perhaps when we at last met face to face she would look upon me and
make such a repudiation, and I would not gainsay it. Nor would I
allow thereafter any dale-feud to come from my dismissal.
Yet at this moment when I looked upon her face in the dawn
light, I wanted to see her, and I did not relish her breaking
bride-oath with me. Why had I sent her the englobed gryphon? Almost
during the past months I had forgotten that — but my interrupted
journey to see Riwal brought it back to mind. What had lain so
heavily on me then that I had sent that wonder to her, as if such a
gift was necessary? I tried to picture it in my mind now — the
crystal ball with its gryphon within, a warning claw raised —
But —
I was no longer looking at the dale below. I could no longer see
the pony grazing. Rather I saw — her!
She was before me so clearly at that moment that I might have
reached out and touched her skirt where she crouched. Her russet
hair was in wild disorder over her shoulders, and through its
straying strands I could see the gleam of mail. On her breast hung
the gryphon, and it blazed with light. Her face was bruised, and
there was fear in her eyes. Against her knee rested the head of a
young man. His eyes were closed, and across his lips bubbled the
froth of blood that marked a wound from which there was no healing.
Her hand touched his forehead gently, and she watched him with a
tenseness that meant his life or death had meaning for her. Perhaps
this was farseeing, though I had only once had such a gift or curse
set upon me before. I knew that the face of the dying man was not
mine, and her sorrow was for another. Perhaps therein lay my
answer. Nor could I fault her if it was. For we were naught to each
other but names. I had not even sent her the picture that had been
her own asking from me.
That the gryphon blazed so clearly puzzled me a little after I
had schooled myself to accept the meaning of what I saw. It was as
if life had poured into that globe. So — perhaps now I knew the
reason why I had been so strangely moved to send it to her. Though
I had been the finder and had treasured it, it was not mine to have
and hold, but was meant rather to lie where it now rested, and was
truly hers and not mine. I must accept that also.
How long did that farsight or vision last? I did not know. I
knew only that it was true. The strange youth was dying, or would
die, and she would mourn him thereafter.
But such a death argued that Ithkrypt was not the refuge I had
looked to find. It was not usual for a daleswoman to wear a mail
like a warrior, but we did not live in ordinary times. She was
armored, and her comrade was dying; to that there could be only one
explanation. Ithkrypt was either attacked or soon would be. Still
that knowledge did not deter me. Rather it drew me — for I had a
duty also to Joisan, whether or no she would ever now turn to me
happily. If she were in danger, there was even more reason I should
cross the ridges to her. Ulmsdale, once my father's and now under
the hands of those I knew to be of ill intent; Ithkrypt perhaps
overrun — I was traveling from one danger to another. Death was
surely sniffing at my heels, ready to lay claw-hand on my shoulder.
But this road was mine, and I could take no other.
The vision was gone, and with its going my weariness settled so
heavily upon me that I could not fight it. I slept the day away in
my hole, for when I roused it was already dusk.
I wakened to the pony nudging against my shoulder, as if the
beast were a sentry on guard.
Dusk—yes—and more. There was a gathering of thick clouds, such
as I had seldom seen. So dark and heavy was that massing that I
could not now sight the Giant's Fist! And the pony crowded in
against me as I scrambled to my feet.
The beast was sweating; the smell of it was rank. He pushed his
head against my shoulder, and I gentled him with neck-stroking.
This was fear the like of which I had seldom seen before in any
animal. Emotion gripped me also: a vast apprehension, as if some
force beyond understanding gathered, a force that was inimical to
all my kind and could, if it would, sweep us like grains of dust
from its path.
I backed against the rock wall, my hands still on the pony,
waiting. I did not know for what, except I feared it as I never had
feared anything before in my life.
There was no wind, no sound. That terrible stillness added to my
fear. The dale, the world, cowered and waited.
From the east there was a sudden flash of light. Not the usual
lightning, but rather a wide swath across all the heavens. Eastward
— over the sea — Power of wind and wave they had spoken of — were
they about to summon that? Then the invaders' ships must lie near
to Ulmsport, and they had had little time to ready their plans.
What would happen?
The pony uttered a strange sound such as I had never heard from
any mount before. It was almost a whimper. And that oppression
increased until it seemed that the very air about us was kept from
our lungs and we could not breathe freely. Still there came no
wind, but sheet lightning flashed seaward. Now came a long roll —
as if a thousand war drums beat together.
Above the clouds was a night of such darkness I could see no
more than if I were blindfolded. Surely this was no ordinary storm,
at least like none I had seen before in my lifetime. My lifetime.
Deep in me a thread of memory stirred — but it could not be memory
— for it was not of this life but another.
But that was foolishness! A man had but one lifetime and the
memories of that — one lifetime —
My skin, where it was exposed to the air, itched and burned as
if the atmosphere were poisoned. Then I saw light — but not in the
sky — rather auras about rocks as if they were palely burning
lanterns, their light a foggy discharge.
For the third time, sheet lightning blanketed the east, and
after it came the drum roll. Then followed the wind —
Wind, but such wind as I swear the dale had never felt before. I
crouched between the rocks, my face buried in the trembling pony's
rough mane, the smell of the beast's sweat in my nostrils. He was
steaming wet under my hands. There was no way I could shut out the
sound of that wind. And surely we would be scooped out of our small
refuge by its force, whirled out to be beaten to death in the
open.
I braced my hoofs deep in the ground, used the rock at my back
and side as best I could to anchor me, and felt the pony,
iron-tense in my hold, doing likewise. If the poor beast whimpered
now, I could no longer hear him, for the sound of the elements was
deafening. The drum beat had become a roar to which there was no
end.
I could not think; I could only cower in dull hope of escaping
the full fury. But as it continued I grew somewhat accustomed to
it, as one can when the first sharp edge of any fear is dulled by a
continuation of its source. I realized then that the wind blew from
east to west, and its power must be directed from the sea upon
Ulmsport.
What such a storm might do along the coast I could not imagine,
save that it would utterly devastate everything within its hammer
blows. If there had been an enemy fleet drawing to port, that must
be completely overwhelmed. But the innocent would suffer with the
invader. What of the port and those who dwelt there? If this storm
was born of the Power those in the keep thought to summon, then
they had either lost control of it or had indeed drawn hither
something greater than they had planned.
How long did it last? I lost all track of time. There was no
night, no day — only black dark and the roaring — and the fear of
something that was not of normal nature. What of the keep? It
seemed to me that this fury could well shake even those great
stones one from the other, splitting open the firm old building as
if it were a ripe fruit.
There was no slacking off as would occur in a true storm. One
moment the deafening roar, the fury — then silence, complete, dead.
I thought at first that the continued noise, the pressure, had
deafened me. Then I heard a soft sound from the pony. He pushed
against me, backing into the open.
Above, it was once more dawn. The dark clouds, tattered as my
father's death banner, faded into nothingness. Had it been so long
we had been pent there? I stumbled after the pony into the quiet
open.
The air no longer held that acridness which had tortured our
breathing, but was fresh and cool. And there was a curious — I
could only define it as emptiness — in it.
I must see what had happened below. That thought drove me.
Leading Hiku along the narrow rim of the dale, I headed back toward
the Giant's Fist. These heights had been scoured. Vast areas of
trees and brush had been simply torn away, leaving scars in the
earth to mark their former rooting.
So obvious were these signs of destruction, I was prepared in
part for what I did sight at the foot of the heights. Yet it was
far worse than I expected.
Part of the keep still stood, though its outline was not that of
a complete building any longer. About it was water — a great sheet
of water on the surface of which floated a covering of wreckage,
perhaps part of it ships, part the houses of Ulmsport, but too
tangled to be identified with any surety. And that water came from
the east — the sea had claimed most of Ulmsdale.
Had those below escaped? I could see no signs of life. The
village was under water save for a roof or two. So the disaster
those below had wantonly summoned had fallen.
Were they caught up in the maelstrom of the force they could not
control? That I hoped. But that Ulmsdale as I had known it was
dead, was manifest. No man could have a future here. For I believed
that what the sea had won, it would not surrender. If the invaders
thought to use this as a foothold, they were defeated.
I turned my face from that lump which had been the keep, and so
from the past. In a way, I still had a duty laid upon me — I must
learn how it fared with Joisan. And then — there lay the south and
the long, long battles to come.
Thus I tramped away from the Fist with no desire to look again
at the ruin in the dale, and my heart was sore, not for any loss of
mine, for I had never truly felt that it was my holding, but for
the wreckage of all my father had cherished and sought by every
means he knew to protect. And I think I cursed as I went, though
silently, those who had done this thing.