The Forge in the Forest (22 page)

The cedars grew so close to the sides of the way that high above it their branches met and entwined, lightest and airiest of vaultings, but nowhere did their roots intrude upon the smooth grass. So strong was the feeling of order that in the gloom Elof could almost believe himself walking in duergar halls or the calm cloisters of Kerbryhaine, between pillars of stone, beneath arches of carven foliage. But ahead of him a sudden light spilled out along their trunks, outlining a tall gate opening, and out from it, in slow procession, came files of lesser lights, torch and twinkling lanthorn. Into the way they streamed, and by their shifting light he saw more clearly those who bore them. Very tall and stately they stood, grace and dignity in their bearing, and the torchlight flickered mellow over rich patterns and broideries in their garments, picked out rich jewels adorning the shadowed faces. Scant sound they made, save the soft sigh and rustle of gown and robe against the short grass, the murmur of fair voices lowered as at some solemn occasion; a woman's laughter bubbled up, light and clear as moonlight, and as swiftly vanished. Along the flanks of the walk they ranged themselves, as if the shabby travelers were a procession that must pass between and through the open gate.

The travelers stared wide-eyed; some might have hesitated, had Kermorvan not strode on so firmly, his keen eyes alive with wonder. Elof, dry-mouthed, fought down his own unease; what else, after all, could they do? At their backs loped the ones who brought them here, and all around them was the trackless Forest. But that thought only heightened the unreality of all he saw, this noble hall and lordly company before him; it was too much like a dream.

Suddenly Kermorvan halted, so sharply Elof almost barged into him. Out of the gathered ranks a tall figure had stepped, and advanced toward the company; he doffed the cap he wore, and bowed deep before the travelers. Elof studied him keenly, seeing a face longfeatured but wholly human, lined and weary, yet serene. Tall and slender he stood, unusually so for a man yet far less than the woodfolk; hand and limb were of human measure. He gazed at them for a moment; then he spoke, and his speech was warm and clear. "
Korhemyn, arlathain! Er heroth devyes lysaiau 'an aithenl Korhemyn!"

The language was Sothran, and less archaic than that the woman had spoken. Elof swallowed his astonishment, and whispered urgently to Kermorvan, "He welcomes us as lords! And names himself—"

"I heard!" said Kermorvan crisply. "As chosen herald of these woodland halls! Chosen by whom, I wonder? But we must answer him, in all courtesy." And speaking as clearly as he could, he returned the greeting, and named one by one each member of the company, making as much of their qualities as he could, and last of all those who stood by him. To each the herald bowed, but when Kermorvan named Ils a great lady of the duergar, a ripple of excited comment ran through the ranks of watchers; many among them sank to one knee or made solemn obeisance.

Ils' eyes widened, and she hastily bowed in return; Elof saw how greatly such courtesies impressed her, she who had found scant honor among ordinary men. It was to Elof next that Kermorvan turned, naming him a smith of great lore and greater craft for all his youth, and a valiant fighter at need; that also seemed to impress the watchers. "For myself, I have led this company out of the distant West-lands, and Keryn, Lord Kermorvan, is my name." And as he spoke it the woman of the woodfolk darted forward, sank on one knee before the herald and held out the breastplate in her long arms, shining clear in the torchlight.

It seemed then that a single gasp, a single sigh, arose from the shadowy watchers, running like a rushing breeze among the torchflames. Even the herald stared as if bereft of words. Then they surged forward, torches held high, and some among the company laid hand to weapon, though they could never hope to fight such a throng.

But the press parted suddenly, and a man taller than most shouldered his way through. They fell silent and drew back; seizing a torch, he strode toward the travelers, looming up over them like a young tree, his mantle and hose flaring dark green in the yellowish light, and rich goldwork gleaming in his tunic. "Keryn!" he cried, "Keryn, is it truly you? Do I find you here at long, long last? Where I had long since lost hope of your coming?" His deep voice faltered as he looked upon their uncomprehending faces, Kermorvan's set grim as granite, "Keryn? Is aught amiss? Do you bear some grievance against me? Or are you ill, then, that you offer me no greeting? I, your own brother!"

Elof stared around at the few faces he could make out, seeking laughter or pity in them, as at some harmless dotard or madman. But nothing of that did he see in the long countenances, nothing but a deep interest, a tinge of concern. Kermorvan's gray eyes glinted wide in the torchlight, and his voice dripped a bitterness Elof had hardly believed the man could feel. "I can give you no other answer than this. My parents are dead, my mother in bearing me, her firstborn and her last. I never had a brother."

"But how is this?" demanded the newcomer. "Does some thrall of blindness lie upon you? Oh, this is bitter cruel, bitter as the very heart of the Ice! Do I not know your voice, your face, as well as my own? Look upon my own, and tell me I lie!" He held the torch high, and the first Elof saw by its light was the gray-flecked bronze of the man's hair, the tracks of tears upon his gaunt cheek. Kermorvan stared up into those long features, and slowly his stern mouth lost its set, his lips parted, seemed to tremble. Ils gasped aloud, almost a cry; a sudden deep chill sank into Elof s stomach. Distort either face, lengthen Kermorvan's or shorten the other, and they would mirror one another. It was as if each mocked the other, yet both were noble, proud, even fair in their way, inescapably akin.

But Kermorvan shook his head. "Sir, I have never set eyes upon you in my life."

"No!" stammered the man. "How may this be? You are Keryn as I remember you… But that should not be! As if no time had passed! As if you… he… had grown no older, while I, I who was younger… How? How?" His voice cracked in horror and confusion, and the torch shook violently in his hand. Deep lines were scored on his face, wrung as if by agony. Kermorvan, without thinking, reached out reassuringly. The sudden gesture startled them both, and they stared at each other again; it was almost an intuitive acknowledgment of their kinship.

"You… he… remained," murmured the stranger, and to Elof it seemed that a tension grew among the watching throng, the string of a tuned instrument wound slowly tighter. "Remained behind, when our last defense was overborne, when the Ice itself came finally against our very walls, and all along the shore the stout stones cracked and shattered like nutshells. There was a fearful sight indeed! Did we deem something so weighty would move slowly, as till then it had done, inching its way forward day by relentless day? No; not in this, its final assault; not after that night, clear and cold, without wind or cloud. So still the Waters lay, still as a mirror under the moon, on the far horizon reflecting those cruel white crags that reared over once-fair fields and woodlands. Yet even their turmoil, their storms and roaring avalanches, whole ice cliffs collapsing into the Waters to become great floating mountains, even that was stilled then awhile. Fair I thought it, and an omen of peace…" He shivered suddenly, violently. "Then… it was as if the moon breathed upon the Waters. For that whole great landlocked sea clouded as would a mirror. And in the very beat of my heart it turned all to silver, and thence to white! I knew then that our doom stood at our gate. Our very ships were crushed in their harbors, our islands overwhelmed; terrors flooded across the Ice, troll and dragon and other fell beasts and fell men and half-men behind them, that then laid siege to our very walls. And behind them, whom we might yet have withstood, the crags themselves advanced. No longer did they inch along; across that frozen sea they glided, as fast it seemed as a man might run, and a howling gale was their herald, their banners a vast wave of rubble and stone they bore before them. Its own creatures the Ice overwhelmed and cared not. It bore up against our shoreward walls, and the stones, the strong stones, cracked like shells, shells… Then my brother bade flee all the followers that were left him, his loyal lords and counselors, his soldiers and his people, all their families who remained. And when we would not, he commanded us with all his force to fare, some eastward with tidings to my own realm, but most, myself among them, westward. For thither he had already sent his young son, in charge of our sister Ase and the great Lord Vayde. His son must grow up to build a new realm in the west, far beyond the reach of the Ice, and there reunite the sundered kindred; he had sent the high scepter with him, but he would have need of more tangible force if he was to assert his kingship and his power." The man stared at them now with eyes that burned. "We were to make our way west as best we could, and if we could come there, serve the holder of the scepter, his rightful heir. But my brother, he himself would not come, for in his city, he said, lay his destiny, to live or die with it. And he took the crown, and two old warriors of his guard, and went from among us. What could we give him then, but our last obedience? We took what we might gather and made a great sally from the landward gates, scattered the besiegers there and won free. But even as we ran free across the hills, we turned and looked back and saw the white crags grind across our walls, scrape them from sight as the edge of a hand wipes clean a slate. The tall towers, the bridges and battlements, the rows of rooftops, we saw them leap up in thunder and turmoil before the advancing walls, and topple or be crushed. Then all was ground down into silence. All that had come down to us across long centuries, that only days past had seemed to us mighty enough to withstand as many years more, strong enough to scorn the challenge of mere Ice, all that we saw crumble and vanish before us in a mere shred of time. All the mountains of the earth falling could not have obliterated it more completely; the very dust that escaped the Ice its gales took and scattered in mockery. Many among us slew themselves upon their own weapons at the sight, or cast themselves down from the heights. For it seemed to us that all the shielding Powers had forsaken us, and that the world's ending was come."

Elof, standing silent and dumbfounded, heard a soft sigh arise from the watchers, like an echo from some dark deep of pain revisited. It awakened in him memories he hated, the destruction of the little town of Asenby where he had grown up, his guilt at having so fervently wished it. Beside him Kermorvan, left gaping as wide as any, at last found voice. "M-my lord… who
are
you?"

The gray-blue eyes so like his own flashed at him, and the voice rang like some dark-toned horn. "I? I am Ko-rentyn Rhudri, Prince of the House of Kermorvan, High Steward of the Realm of Morvan, Sealord of Kermorvan-nec. All this by the will of my brother Keryn, High King of Kermorvan the City and the realm of Morvan, one hundred and sixty-fifth in that line since the Flight from Kerys."

Elof, torn between anger and amazement, could not forbear. "How can any of this be?" he burst out. "Tell me that, my lord, when he who stands by me is well-nigh two hundredth of his house, the thirtieth born in the Western Lands! And when, since the realm of Morvan fell beneath the Ice, nigh on one thousand years have passed!"

A rumble of disquiet ran among those who watched, and the man rounded on him, his face a set mask of anger. It was alarming how like Kermorvan the expression made him, but Elof met the cold gray eyes firmly, and almost at once the anger faded. "Elof you name yourself," murmured the man, "One Alone, that would be, in the ancient tongues. Strange, then, that you also should remind me of someone… not so closely… of whom, I cannot think, but it is strong… and what you say… ach, this is madness, madness…" Again the man's face knotted and twisted, as if in the throes of some terrible struggle; he lifted shaking hands to his temples, choked as if some word trembled on the edge of speech, some word that failed him. The silence among the watching throng hardened, as if no breath should stir the air. Then a sudden trilling note, liquid and beautiful, broke it, the call of some nightbird in the whispering foliage around. The tall man raised his head as if to listen, and Elof also harkened in great wonder, for it seemed to him that in the song there was a tremor of meaning which shaped itself into words within his mind.

Within the woodshade I sing of all life Ever renewing Coming to flower.

Worry is folly Doubt is deceiving Serving what lives not, Slaves to its power.

Look to the Forest Here in its hallow Time shall bring fullness Never decay.

Under its shelter Fear not the season This and this only Passes away.

The rain had ceased now, and the clouds parted upon a cool summer night. As Elof listened to the birdsong, he felt less oppressed by the Forest, less wary of it, ever more acutely aware of its living beauty. On a nearby bush a cobweb's pattern was picked out in raindrops which the emerging moonlight turned to white gems; he found the craft of it almost heartbreaking, it and the silvered leaves that bore it far surpassing any counterfeit from human hand. The air itself was so fresh it seemed to sparkle as he breathed it, rich with the myriad scents of the wood. He felt weariness and hunger fall from him like soiled mantles, and new strength flow in his veins. The tautness faded from Kermorvan's stance, and he flexed his weary back and limbs; Roc gawked around him open-mouthed, as if seeing the place for the first time, and all the others of the company seemed suddenly more at ease. Ils breathed deeply, and rubbed her eyes gratefully; even after so long above ground she much preferred moonlight to sun. The man called Korentyn listened most intently, as if hearing even more than did Elof in the song; little by little the anguish faded from his face. The last liquid trills died away among the bushes, and he turned to them with nothing in his face but grave courtesy and concern.