Three Hands for Scorpio (31 page)

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Authors: Andre Norton

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W
rind whistled about us, burdened with the stench released by violent death. Fear, rage, and pain tainted the air almost as thickly, as well as other emotions I could not determine.
Bina, Cilla, and I stood together, as did Mother and Ison. Zolan held himself a little apart, just as he had remained aloof from Father's forces, though Climber sat beside him. The focus of our company, its core, was Arthter, Duty at his right hand.
I kept my eyes fixed on the two of them, not daring to look about, though I was sure I knew where we were. The buildings of Kingsburke walled us in, and beneath our boots we could feel the earth of the open space before the palace. Cilla's hand gripped tightly the rod with which she had drawn a map of this place on the floor of the defense tower.
I was not even sure that we existed as more than wisps of identity, delivered here by such high Power as only the greatest of adepts could summon. We had been in the tower, and now we were in the city—that was all I could swear to. Still, none of the storm clouds of raging color surrounded us such as had heralded the arrival of Arvor.
The gray of early dawn gave us a measure of light. Light—I fixed my gaze upon the gem I held with all the focus I could summon. It was as cold
now as any dew-wet stone, seemingly dead. Had the Power that had transported us here burnt it out?
The foulness, rising from the lifeless things lying on the cobbles, continued to intensify until it choked our nostrils and throats, and the aura of terror and suffering grew more oppressive with it.
“Ready—” The adept did not turn to address any of our group, but his tone alerted us. Bina's hand was on me, catching mine in her hold, as she linked also with Cilla. We were tightly three in one again, and so we would be—we
must
be—until the end came, one way or another. And our joining was but the beginning of a melding with the others that increased steadily in strength.
As yet there was no opposition; Kingsburke might be a long-deserted ruin. We felt a pulsation, like the beating of a great heart. Then we sensed a Gathering begin.
Four streets fed into the blood-spattered square, one at each corner. Movement was commencing on each, and it was easy to sense, though none of us looked to see what advanced. Instead, the palace looming before us held our attention.
It must have begun as a defensive castle, that pile, for some of its stones were dark with age, while others, marking later additions, were lighter. Wide steps led up to a door so large that a full company of armsmen might enter it four abreast.
The vast door had the sheen of metal under the strengthening glow of approaching day. It was shut, and we saw no sign of guards on duty.
“Hicar vorlun tee.
Iscar, wun, inze …”
The ancient words rolled easily from the combined tongues of Duty and Arthter. I had thought I knew our old nurse well, but this seeress was strange, her Gifts beyond those we three had ever learned or practiced.
The largely unseen motion down the streets was increasing, a darkness rising with the light. Its flow was now edging out into the square. Yet, strangely, the sickening stench that had plagued us was now being overlaid by cleaner odors. I felt no breeze, but I smelled the scent of herbs and other healing, growing things; of earth freshly plowed after rain; of pine; and of
flowers—not the blossoms tamed for a garden but rather the shy ones that hid themselves in the wild places.
“Evo—EVO!”
That cry voiced no threat, no order, rather a welcoming hail.
The things that had poured in from the streets like a fourfold tide did not advance farther into the open square but clustered together. Even now I could not look directly at them. Surely if they were the monsters I had seen in Mother's viewing mirror, we were now nearly surrounded by danger. Yet we were held in this place.
“Sansong, Lare”
—Duty and Arthter again mingled voices.
Zolan strode forward, one hand resting on Climber's head. His head tilted back a fraction as he shouted:
“Strength to strength, Dealer-in-Death!”
He was not greeting the Wild Ones as I was sure the Wisewife and the adept did, but rather addressing the door.
From the two side streets that paralleled the palace now trooped forth beings whose like I had only seen pictured in books of ancient legends. A great bear shambled on its hind legs behind the much smaller form of a girl, her greenish white hair by turns hidden, then revealed, by a gold veil that floated about her. Coming to meet them from the opposite side of the open space was an armored figure, his war-gear that of an ancient time. Drifting from his closed helm like a plume was a vine studded with small flowers. With him strode a massive cat wearing a gemmed chain that gleamed through long neck fur—not a collar of service but a decoration of honor.
Others came into sight, two by two, each different from the others of their company. Here were none of the monsters we had seen; rather, all these beings had the appearance of those able to walk in the Light without fear. I understood then that even the Wild Magic had its good and evil and that its followers had—as did we—a choice of two paths to follow.
None of us greeted the newcomers, nor did any of them look to us. However, Duty and Arthter moved forward a step or so. Behind them Mother, myself, and my sisters did likewise. Zolan showed no interest in either our group or the Children of Earth. He stood now at the foot of the stairs leading to the palace door.
“In the name of the Nine Daughters of Lazar, by the Blood of the Sooks, and by the Kinship of the Last Ship, Tharn—let it be decided between us, here and now, in this place. Dishonored bones cry out!”
I could not see the object he held, but he hurled it. The missile struck
against the steely surface, to be answered by a reverberation such as a mighty blow would waken from a great drum.
“Come forth!”
Metal rasped, grating over stone. Slowly that barrier opened. None of the daylight penetrated within; the portal was only a wide aperture filled with the black of a moonless, starless night.
Then that darkness was pushed aside like a curtain, and a single figure appeared.
I GASPED, AND my hold on the hands of Tam and Cilla tightened. Before us stood neither a hermit nor a human with the stature and presence of an adept—even a Dark one. This was indeed an enemy, but not the one we expected—it was Maclan, wearing the smile of the successful hunter planting a triumphant boot on the carcass of a fresh-killed stag after a royal hunt.
He laughed as he raised a hand to beckon Zolan forward. Just so he had behaved when we lay captive. And suddenly I was healed, not only by my own anger but by that which overflowed from Tam and Cilla. I dropped linkage with my sisters; my fingers curled, then straightened to curl again. Within the flesh, the heat of Power was rising. The old rules could not hold now—we were entitled to our vengeance. This time the predator would face no helpless prey!
Maclan/Tharn addressed Zolan. “Pharsali favors me,” he observed, eyeing our companion. “She sends me her treasure: the fool! Yes, I have taken another body. This husk”—he shivered affectedly to draw attention to the stolen form he wore—“is wanting in some ways. Yours is more to my taste, youngling. Do not think you can deny me this time, even backed by these cringing Light-lickers you dare to mistakenly depend upon.”
He extended both hands and gestured imperiously. “Come, you believer in Power, and discover what it may truly be.”
Zolan remained exactly where he was; however, he swayed in his struggle to hold his ground, and the outmost cord of the flung noose of force he dodged touched us.
I did not deny I had been wrong. As a man would change his garments
or assume armor to work his purpose, this Tharn from the Dismals now wore the body of Maclan the Breaksword. For a brief instant I wondered what had chanced with the true Reiver.
Then we three became one again: Tam became me, and became Cilia, as I became each of them. During our sharing, however, unlike the possession performed by the Evil One, our bodies remained our own. We sharpened our Talent, fastened our attention once more on the one before the door. His smile faded, and I could see his lips beginning to shape words unheard. Much of what had been Maclan was gone. Force boiled in that stolen body, as the renegade from the Dismals grew ever stronger, calling down Power into himself that he did not yet wish to use.
Whatever spells he might be muttering were completely drowned out by a great coughing cry. Climber had reared onto his hind legs, in that posture almost matching Zolan in height. His long tail lashed out like a fiery war banner.
Zolan caught at the roll of thick fur and flesh at the animal's neck. The cat-creature tried to turn his head, snapping vainly at the air, but he was unable to reach the restraining hand.
He-who-was-not-Maclan advanced a step forward and laughed again.
“You remember, do you, Lebrek?” he shouted jeeringly. “Yes, I see you have not forgotten!”
Climber roared and twisted, fought for freedom. Zolan was manifestly struggling hard to keep his hold.
“Loose him, youngling, if you wish!”
Zolan had now embraced the beast that was still on hind legs.
“Like to like!” Maclan nodded encouragingly, beckoning once more.
Climber grew still; however, Zolan did not loose his hold.
“You test my patience.” The Dark One's grin disappeared, and his right hand came up. Save for a forefinger, it was curled into a fist.
We were one, united in what we would do. Tam swung up in turn her own left hand, the light of the gem glowing between her fingers.
Maclan pointed directly at the two below him, and from the tip of his forefinger speared greenish flame. It met the beam Tam had loosed—met it, and sprayed back to engulf the fisted hand.
“Yaaah!”
he screamed, the throat-tearing sound no part of any spell but an animal scream of pure torment. His arm dropped back to his side, and even from this distance we could plainly see blackened flesh.
He took a stride to the very edge of the top step. Now whatever was clothed in the Breaksword's body turned to us.
THE FACE OF our enemy twisted, and he flung both arms above his head as if to seize a storm and pull it down upon us. And indeed he might have done so, for suddenly the sunlight was gone, darkness descended, and thunder rolled. Then a flash like lightning struck. Again, as she had forestalled the green ray, Tam swept high into the air the gem to deflect that lance of light. This time, however, no beam answered from her weapon, but a curling strand of golden fog that spread about our company.
I saw Zolan's hands moving in slow gestures, graceful as a Shrine dancer's at the time of the Turn of the Wheel, summoning the New Year's birth.
Lightning flashed again, struck the slow movement of the fog, and was hurled back once more. From the two companies of the Earth Ones rose shooting stars of blue, vivid as the skies of high summer. The Wild Ones had raised their own shelter!
Then, in a single moment, the battle was done, and we stood before the palace as we had before. Zolan turned his head, looking not at us but to Duty and Arthter. I felt the touch of a Send, but its message was not one I could translate.
Without a word, our companion ascended the steps, Climber at his side. None of us tried to stop him. Maclan's arms dropped to his sides, and I saw the fingers on his unharmed hand crook possessively, as might the claws of a raptor settling upon its prey.
Then a tremendous outpouring of Power was loosed, its waves flooding over us like the surge of a river in full spring spate. Tam still held fast to the gem, but its light had died. In that instant, I realized what was happening as clearly as if Zolan had shouted it aloud to us all—he was giving the Dark One what he most wanted: a body!
How our companion had been overcome I could not guess, but I knew that we had to make our own attack, raise all the Light we could to thwart this new soul-theft. The three of us broke linkage. Tam nursed the gem,
and Mother stepped into Bina's path. I, however, slid to the other side so that no one stood ahead of me any longer.
I did not step, rather half threw myself forward. Both my hands closed about Climber's tail; then I was up on the lowest of the stairs that led to the door. My act, futile as it might be, served to attract Maclan's notice. As he glanced in my direction, Zolan reached the topmost step.
Maclan brought his hand down toward me, and I crumpled as though he had struck a physical blow. Then Zolan made his final move. He did not use fists but closed his hands on the Dark Lord's shoulders and pulled him forward into the same restraining embrace he had used on Climber.
Maclan's broken teeth showed in a wolf's grin. In turn, he wrapped his own arms around Zolan, and the two grappled weirdly together, motionless and in utter silence. About the frozen figures hung an uncanny radiance, a light forged of Darkness—I could find no other words to describe it.
Into me flowed a new wave of Power so great it doubled me over, set me gasping. All sense of identity was swept away from me as its intensity mounted—I was merely a conduit for its swift-rising force.
Terrifying though the feeling was, however, I knew that not only was it born of Talent but wielded by one in the service of the Light. But it was also unfamiliar and, because I could not flow easily with its pattern of Power, painful. Indeed, with its second surge, I felt as though a blazing liquid fire had been poured into me. And I could not escape—even the right of refusal to submit was raped away, leaving me only a weapon for another's use. A weapon, or—a mirror like Mother's, but for alien eyes?
I could still see what lay about me—I was yet held captive where I had gone to crouch. Zolan and Maclan stood locked fast, no movement even of breathing visible in their statuelike pose.
Up built the force. Now I was half-blinded by light—a rainbow radiance of many colors. Some shafts of this luminance stabbed toward the figures on the steps from behind me, others from either side. My breath came in great gasps—this light also had weight, and I was being crushed!
Now the two by the palace door began to sway; then out of that blackmouthed portal arced a vast limb of scaled skin. What appeared to be the body of a giant serpent reached for Zolan, then twisted viciously in the air.
A streak of red, Climber flashed forward, setting jaws on that roll of scale-sheathed flesh. But, though he brought the first monster down, it was
only the advance guard of the Dark's forces. Things that had no place in any world we knew began to pour from the opening.
Again an agonizing pain, which I now sensed was anger in my possessor, ripped through me, aimed at the silent combatants above. At the same moment, the Wild Ones took up the battle against the nightmare creatures, an Evil they knew. Struck by the massed Power of the Green Magic, the horrors began to glow; then, one by one, they burst. However, the men, who seemed locked indissolubly together, remained as they stood.
The entity that had taken me over now set its will even more firmly upon me. I received no orders; I was simply used. Now, though I did not stand, I was urged to drag myself upward, step after step.
Climber, having no more monsters to harry, was circling the two; but, strive as he might to find an opening for another attack, Maclan and Zolan seemed Warded, untouchable.
Haltingly I lifted my hand, the same one with which I had struck my own opening blow in this war. My fingers, worked by another's will, clawed the air; there, clutching at a substance unseen, they worked it into an object visible. I now held a dagger of light. And suddenly, with the making of that knife, I knew the one who had made her weapon of
me
—indeed, I had once dream-met her. Pharsali!
Drawing all my last strength, the Jug Woman used my hand to hurl her gift—but not at the Dark Lord—at Zolan! The force-blade struck him full in the back, pierced through clothing and flesh, and disappeared from view.
What had I done?
Light, gold as the glow from Tam's gem, flared, enclosed the men and the beast beside them in a cylinder of brilliance. I crumpled onto the step, though I sensed I had not yet been released.
Out of that column of radiance fell a body; at least, the object had a human outline. Then the light-cylinder melted downward and puddled on the stone, where it was swallowed. Zolan swayed, eyes closed. But—was he still the companion we had known, or had the Evil One accomplished his will? For there was something about the man from the Dismals—
My suspicion was dashed away by the wave of joy that now filled me, but, while I felt it, it was not my emotion. She of the cave of jars was rejoicing, calling on deities who were not mine, while my eyes wept, torn by her fierce pride and joy. The truth was plain: Zolan, too, wore a body not his by birth—he was Pharsali's son.

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