Lost Lands of Witch World (37 page)

She took me out through the underwater tunnel and we sheltered warily in a thicket of reed growth, rooted where the water swirled. It was early morning and a mist clung to the surface of the river. Orsya sniffed, drawing deep breaths into her lungs and expelling them slowly, as if in that way she tested for some message which eluded me.

“The day will be fair,” she announced. “That is good—clouds favor the Shadow; sun is the enemy to
those
.”

“Which way do I go?”

She shook her head at me. “Way
we
go, Kemoc. To let you blunder helplessly in this land is to pick a possel from its shell and throw it to a vuffle. We go by water.”

Go by water we did, first swimming with the current of the river, and then against the push of ripples in a smaller side stream to the south. Although the land seemed open and smiling under the sun, yet I paid close attention to all Orsya's directions. We lay in a reed bank once—she underwater, I with a hollow reed in my mouth for air—while a small pack of Gray Ones lapped water and growled to one another within arms touching of our hiding place.

It was irking to my guide that I could not take wholly to the water as she was able, but needed air for my laboring lungs. I am sure she could have made that journey in a third less time than we took. At night we sheltered again in another river dweller's abandoned burrow, one not finished with the skill of the aspt dwelling, merely a hole cut in the bank.

There she spoke of her people and their like. I learned that she was the first daughter of Orias' elder sister, so by their way of ranking kinship, thought closer to him than his own children. She was more adventurous than most of her generation, having slipped away from her home on numerous occasions to explore waterways where only a few, if any, of the males had ever ventured. She hinted of strange finds in the mountains, and then said impatiently, that with the coming of war such searching must be abandoned. Mention of the war silenced her and she curled into sleep.

It was midmorning before the stream we had followed dwindled to a size so we could no longer swim. Then she motioned to the heights ahead and said:

“Guide your way by that peak, Kemoc. If you take care and make haste, you will reach your Valley by sundown. I can abide for short periods of time in the open air, but not for long. Thus, this is our parting place.”

I tried to thank her. But what are adequate thanks for one's life? She smiled again and waved. Then she splashed back into the water and was gone before I could finish what I was stumbling over to say.

Setting my attention on the peak she had pointed out I began the last stage of my journey.

T
he winged sentries of the Valley had me in view long before I sighted them. A Flannan appeared out of nowhere to coast along over my head, then was gone with beating wings. I came up, not the road entrance I had known before, but a notch between two standing stones. Back door to the Green domain this might be, but here were also inscribed the Symbols on each wall. One of the lizard folk who helped patrol the heights peered down on me, jewel-eyed.

“Kemoc!”

Kyllan came running, throwing his arms about my shoulders, mind and eyes both meeting mine. In that moment our old closeness was as if it had never been broken.

It was like unto a high feast day as they brought me to the feather-roofed houses, asking questions all the way. But what I had to tell them of Krogan enmity made them quickly sober.

“This is ill hearing!” Dahaun had poured the guesting cup for me. Now she put the flagon back on the table as if she saw some evil picture. “With the Krogan ranged against us . . . water can be a bad weapon to face. But who can be these Great Ones of the Shadow whom Orias fears so much that he tries to buy their favor with a captive? The Krogan are not a timid folk. In the past they have been friends to us. Perhaps a seeking—”

Ethutur shook his head. “Not yet; not until we can learn in no other way. Remember, those who so
seek
may also find themselves the sought, if they are detected and the power on the other side is equal to, or greater than, their own.”

In the first excitement of my return I had forgotten something, but no longer. Kaththea—where was my sister? I looked to Kyllan for an answer. Surely she was not avoiding me . . . ?

He was quick with reassurance. “She rode east yesterday, when we believed you dead. It was her thought to go to a place, known here, where certain forces can be tapped; and where, with her witch knowledge, perhaps she could read your fate. Believe this, Kemoc; she was sure that you were not dead. For she said that she and I would know it if your life had been taken from you!”

I dropped my head into my hands. Suddenly it became so needful that I reach her, that I sent out a call, believing that here in the protected Valley, it could cause no harm. Kyllan's thought twined with mine, making it twofold as it went forth, joyfully seeking.

Into that seeking I poured more and more strength. I felt the tide of Kyllan's rise with it—out and out. . . . Yet there came no answer. It was not as if Kaththea was absorbed in some spell of her own, for still we would have touched her mind and been warned off. No, this was a total absense of all Kaththea meant to both of us—as total as if the walls of the Wise Women's Secret Place had once more closed about her.

Now my spear of thought grew swifter, shot in all directions. But there was no target, only that emptiness which in itself was ominous. I raised my head again from trembling hands and looked to Kyllan, saw the grayish shade beneath the weathering of his face and knew we were united in fear.

“Gone!” He said it first, in a whisper which still must have reached the ears of those about us, for they, too, looked startled and dismayed.

“Where?” To me that was most important. When I had called Kaththea from
the island of the Krogan lake, her answer has been faint and hard to read, coming across miles of territory which the enemy held; still, I had reached her and she, me. In this protected Valley where there would be no barriers, I could not reach her at all.

I turned to Dahaun. “This place of power to which she went, where does it lie?”

“At the eastern tip of the Valley, up against the Heights.”

The Heights—Dinzil! To me the answer was as plain as if written out in fiery runes across the air between us. My thought was clear to her.

“Why?”

So Dahaun did not dispute the possibility of my guess; she looked for a reason.

“Yes, why?” That was Kyllan. “Kaththea looked upon him with favor; that is true. But she would not go to him thus without speech between us, especially after saying that she wished to seek you through the power.”

“Not willingly,” I answered aloud, between set teeth.

Dahaun shook her head. “Not unwillingly, Kemoc. One with her powers could not be drawn unwillingly past our defenses. And those guard every gate of this Valley.”

“I do not believe that she agreed—”

“How know you what arguments may have been used with her?” Kyllan asked.

I turned on him, and some of my fear became anger, to be directed at one within my reach: “Why did you not keep mind touch, to know what chanced with her?”

He flushed. But when he made answer he kept a rein on his temper. “Because she wished it so, saying she must hoard her energy to use in the seeing. She said that while she was learned in much, yet never had she taken the Witch Oath, nor received the Jewel, been admitted into full company. Thus she doubts at times and needs all her strength.”

That sounded as Kaththea's own words, and I knew that he spoke the truth. Still . . . that he might have protected her, and had not, burned unfairly in me. I spoke now to Dahaun:

“Can Shil bear me to where Kaththea went?”

“I do not know. That he can go in that direction, yes. But whether you, who have little protection against the forces which gather there, can reach it, that is another question.”

“Which only trial may answer! But let me try—”

Only I was not to have that chance. For, even before I finished speaking, one of the birds swooped down to perch on Dahaun's shoulder. Instead of the usual trilled greeting, its cries were a scream, plainly meant to announce some disaster. Ethutur and the rest were on their feet, crowding for the door. Dahaun looked to us from Estcarp.

“They move upon the Valley, even as the Krogan maid warned you, Kemoc.”

So began our siege time and it was a bitter one. While the Symbols might bar the gates, yet there were miles of cliffs, and against those a motley crew of monsters climbed, flew, scrabbled to find a way at us. Storm clouds gathered about the rim we defended; wind and torrents of rain lashed at us. The gloom hid those who strove to make the ascent. The lightning strikes of the force whips were undistinguishable at times from the true lightning of the storm.

It was a wild series of battles. There would come lulls, even as the most vicious hurricanes know lulls. Then once more the rush, so we had to be on the alert, for we never knew when the next attack would muster.

Some of the enemy I had seen before. While the Rasti could not climb the cliffs, the Gray Ones put on their quasi-human shapes to find holes. There were other things . . . drifting mists which were perhaps the more feared by us from overmountain because they had no substance to be hewed by steel, nor shattered by dart . . . and vast, armored things prowling about the base of the cliffs, unable to climb, but digging with taloned paws at our natural wall with sullen ferocity.

Flying things fought airborne over our heads where Flannan, bird, Vrang of the peaks cut and slew in turn. It was a struggle out of a nightmare; even those among our recruits who had gone up against the frightening otherworld might of the Kolder long years past found this a more fearsome battle.

For how long we held that defense, I do not know, for day was nearly as darksome as night. When day came pillars of fire flamed green, high into the sky, from cressets along the cliff. In that light our adversaries seemed less inclined to press forward.

The Green People had their own magic that they called upon. Dahaun and others did not take actual part in the fighting, but summoned and marshaled forces which were not of any earth I had known.

I knew that the Lady of Green Silences feared the waters within the Valley, that some disaster might come from them since the Krogan were against us. But, though the lizard folk patrolled there, they found no sign that Orias had taken the field openly under the Shadow.

Once, when Ethutur spoke to a handful of the Old Race, he said, in a puzzled fashion, that all who had been sent against us were only the minor servants of evil and no Great One from the Shadow had given us a blow. This he thought sinister . . . unless the Great Ones had indeed withdrawn so far into their other worlds that they could not be easily summoned again.

We suffered losses in those grim hours. Godgar fell, taking with him a warrior's guard of the enemy. There were gaps in the ranks of the Green People also, and among their four-footed and winged allies. No one kept count of the casualties for there was no time to think of anything but dogged defense. Although Kyllan fought a distance from me, I knew all was still well with him. But, even
through this, my thought for Kaththea was a gnawing. That she had gone out of the Valley, I was certain.

Some of the men from the Heights fought in our ranks. But among them Dinzil did not show. Nor did I expect him to, no matter what excuse his followers could offer for him.

Perhaps what Dahaun called down was what came to our succor at last. Or perhaps the enemy had just so many fangs, claws, bodies, and wills to throw against us, and those had become so thinned they were ready to retreat. But at last the clouds broke and the sun shone. Under that glory the hosts of the Shadow drew back. They took their dead with them, so we could not tell how great a toll we had exacted. However, they had been beaten this time, of that we were sure.

We took counsel then and knew that our own losses had not been light. Nor could we withstand many more such concentrated attacks. So in the breathing space now allowed us, we must fortify and scout, strike back where we could.

But I had another task. And so I told them.

Then Kyllan arose and said that this would be his road also: for the three of us were one, and when that bond was broken, then we were all lessened.

Then I spoke to him alone, saying that once before we had been parted, and he, the warrior, had held to his duty, when I had been maimed and Kaththea rift from us. Now, here again, was a time when we must be what we were called upon to be. Warrior he was, and in this place his skill was needed. But with me was Kaththea even closer linked, and upon me the need to go to her was the heavier.

I think Dahaun and Ethutur understood. But those from Estcarp did not. For, to them, long nurtured in the harshness of border war, the life of one woman weighed as nothing against the good of all. That she was a witch tipped the scales even more, for among those who fled from Karsten the Wise Ones were feared but not esteemed.

I expected no support. I took only a small supply of food, a sword, and a spark of hope, to travel east. Shil's strength was offered me, but I said I would ride only to the borders of the Valley; beyond that I risked no life save my own.

Kyllan parted from me reluctantly. I think—I know—that he was hurt by my frankness concerning the stronger bond between me and Kaththea, though he knew that I spoke the truth, and that his skill was needed here.

In the Valley it seemed that our bloody struggle, of the days just past, was an ugly dream. Shil went at a steady gallop along the river bottom. There were no traps here to be evaded and his going was swift and smooth. I saw the lizard sentries who still watched for any Krogan menace. I wondered about Orsya and what her people would do when they discovered, if they did, that she had freed me from the prison islet.