Storms of Victory (Witch World: The Turning) Read online

  Storms of Victory

  Witch World: The Turning

  Andre Norton with P.M. Griffin

  Seakeep is dedicated to Maria Franzetti, a friend.

  —P. M. G.

  The Chronicler

  THERE was a time when the hilt of a sword or the butt of a dart gun rested more easily in my grip than this pen. Now I record the deeds of others, arid strange tales have I gathered. That I find myself a chronicler of others’ deeds is one of those tricks which fate can play upon a man.

  In the backwater of quiet which is Lormt a man must make his own work. I have been fortunate in that I am drawn more and more to the seeking of knowledge, even though it chances that I am but a beginner and must do so vicariously through the recounting of the deeds of others. Though sometimes, more and more, it comes to me that I have not yet done with an active role in that eternal war of the Light against the Dark.

  My name is Duratan and I am of the House of Harrid (which means nothing now). Though I take commissions these days to search family rolls for many divided clans, I have never found any bloodkin to my house. It is sometimes a lone thing not to call any kin.

  I came into Estcarp as a babe, having been born just at that black time when Duke Yvian horned all the Old Race and there was a mighty bloodletting. My nurse brought me hither before she died of a fever and I was fostered.

  From then my destiny followed the pattern known to all my exiled people. I was trained to arms from the time I could hold a weapon made to my measure—for there was no other life then when the Kolder devils loosed all our enemies upon us.

  In due time I became one of the Borderers, adding to my knowledge of weapons that of the countryside and survival in the wilderness. Only in one respect did I differ from my fellows—I seemed able to bond with animals. Once I even faced a snow cat, and we looked eye to eye, before the impressive hunter of the heights went his way. In my mind it was as if I had dwelt for a short moment within his furred skin, kin to him as I was to no other.

  For a time thereafter I was wary and disturbed, fearing that I might even be were, one of those who divide spirits—man arid animal, able to be each in turn. Yet I showed no tendency to grow fur or feather, fangs or talons. So at length I accepted this as a minor talent—to be cherished.

  In border service I met also the younger Tregarths, and from that grew in me a desire to something more than a triumph at arms and always more bloodletting. Of those two storied warriors it was Kemoc, the younger, to whom I was most drawn. His father being Simon Tregarth, the outworlder, his mother the Witch Jaelithe, who had not lost her power even when she wedded, bedded, and bore. There was also another unheard-of thing—that their children, all three, were delivered at a single birthing. There was Kemoc, and Kyllan, and their sister, Kaththea, who was taken for Witch training against her will.

  Her brothers rode to prevent that but were too late. Kemoc returned from that aborted mission very quiet, but henceforth there was a deadliness in his eyes when he spoke of his sister. He asked questions of those who rode with us, and any we met. However, I think he gained little of what he wanted, for we who had fled Karsten had retained even less of the old lore than was known in Estcarp.

  Then, in one of those swift forays which were our life, Kemoc suffered a wound too serious for our healer to deal with and was taken from the heights we guarded. Shortly thereafter there came a period of quiet, almost a truce, during which our captain wished to send orders for supplies and I volunteered for that. With Kemoc gone I was restless and even more alone.

  I carried the captain's orders but it meant a gathering of material which would take some time and I had nothing to do save find Kemoc. In me there bias never been the gift of easy friend making and with him only I had felt akin. I knew that since his sister's taking he had been searching for something, and in that I also felt I might have a part. When I asked concerning him I was told that his wound (which had left him partly maimed) had healed well enough for him to go to Lormt.

  Lormt was then to us mainly legend. It was said to be a repository of knowledge—useless knowledge the Witches avered—but it was older even than Es City, whose history covers such a toll of years that it would take the larger part of a lifetime to count. The Witches avoided it, in fact seemed to hold it in aversion. There were scholars said to have taken refuge within its walls, but if they learned aught from their delving they, did not share it abroad.

  I followed Kemoc to Lormt. It is true that one may be laid under a geas, set to a task from which there is no turning back. I had angered no one (that I knew of) with the power to set that upon me. But I was firmly drawn to Lormt.

  Thus I came to a vaster and more unusual group of buildings than I had ever seen. There were four towers and those were connected by Walls. Yet no sentries walked those walls and there was no guard at the single gate. Rather that was ajar, and must have been so for some time, as there was a ridge of soil holding it thus. Inside were buildings but not like those of a keep, and around, against the walls, smaller erections most little more than huts—some of which were a-ruin.

  A woman was drawing water at a well as I dismounted and, when I asked her where I might find the lord, she blinked and then grinned at me, saying here were no lords, only old men who ruined their eyes looking at books which sometimes fell to pieces while they did so. So I went searching for Kemoc.

  Later I discovered that the affairs of housing were managed by Ouen (leader by default of the scholars, he being a younger and more active man) and by Mistress Bethalie, whose opinion of the domestic arts of most men was very low indeed. There was also Wessel, a jewel of a steward. It was because of these three that Lormt flourished as well as it did.

  Nor were there only males among the scholars. For I heard of a Lady Nareth, who kept much to her own company, and one Pyra, a noted healer, whose country and clan were unknown but who Kemoc revered for her knowledge and help with his own injury.

  Five days I stayed with him, listening with growing excitement to his discoveries. Those about him were for the most part so elderly that they might have been our grandsires. Each had a quest of his own and no time for us.

  The night before I left Kemoc faced me across one of the timeworn tables, having pushed aside a pile of books bound in worm-eaten wood. He had a small pouch in his hand and from this he scattered between us some beads of crystal which lay winking fire in the lamplight.

  Without any thought my hand went out and I pushed one here, and one there until a pattern I did not understand lay before my eyes. Kemoc nodded.

  “So it is right, Duratan, knowledge lies here for you, also. And believe it or not, you have talent.”

  I looked at him openmouthed. “I am no maid—” I protested.

  He smiled at me. “Just so, you are no maid, Duratan. So let me say this to you. There may be secrets within secrets and the Witches are mortals for all their powers. There is infinitely more in this world than they know. I have discovered much here and soon I shall be able to follow my own road. Take these.” He swept up the crystals, returning them to the pouch. “You shall find use for them.”

  When I left at dawn the next morning he was at the gate to see me forth.

  “If peace ever comes to this land of ours, shield mate, ride you here again, for I think that there is to be found a greater treasure than any wrecker lord of the eastern coast can dream of. Luck be with you and fortune your shield.”

  But his wish did not hold. Within a month of my return to the mountains a rock moved under my mount's feet when I was on scout, to plunge both me and the poor beast into a narrow valley. The chance I would be found was sl
im and pain sent me drifting into a darkness I welcomed.

  Yet I had not come to the Last Gate. I was discovered by a deaf-and-dumb beast of a man who carried me forth, though his rough handling was a torment. I awoke in the house of a wisewoman he served. With all her skill she fought to save my crushed leg Heal it did, but I knew that I would never stride easily again and the Borderers would ride without me.

  With a knotted stump of cane in hand I made myself walk daily. I had fallen onto a stool after such a push when she came to me, in her hand Kemoc's bag. She held that out and for some caprice I fumbled within arid drew out a few of the crystals, throwing them on the floor. By some chance they were all of the same color—blue—and, as they fell, they shaped, as cleanly as if I had pushed them, into the shape of a dart head pointing to the door. I felt as if someone had given me a sharp order. It was time to be about business as yet unknown to me.

  “You have,” the woman said to me, “the talent. This is uncanny—ward yourself well, Borderer, for you will find few to welcome you.” She tossed the pouch to me as if she wished it quickly away from her.

  I decided it was time I searched for Kemoc in Lormt once more but first I helped that awkward servant enwall his mistress's herb garden. When I finally rode forth there was in me even a small hope that I might find knowledge to buy me freedom from my lurching steps.

  Only Kemoc was gone when once more I entered that uncloseable gate. Ouen told me that Kemoc had been greatly excited when he had ridden forth a tenth day earlier, nor had he mentioned Where he was going.

  Because I did not know his goal and because I believed that my handicap would make me a hindrance to him, I settled in the room which had been his, paying into the common fund of the scholars the last of my small store of coins. For a short time a shameful weakness of spirit took me and I railed at fete.

  But I roused myself to fight such despair and now and then I tossed the crystals. Thus I began to learn that I could influence the patterns which came, even movie separate ones by staring at them.

  That drove me to the reading halls, though I had no idea what I sought. I drew upon scraps I had found in Kemoc's room on which he had scrawled some results of his own delving. But I felt I faced amaze in which I could be easily caught, for I had no one purpose.

  I strove to speak to one of the scholars who seemed more approachable than the others, Morfew, who welcomed me as a pupil.

  When it seemed that I must have action, for it was not easy to settle into a niche of books and scrolls, I went into the fields of the farms which fed the establishment and worked, exercising my leg and forcing myself to walk without a staff. Though I had not sought her out, Pyra came to me and offered surcease from pain, greatly in agreement with what I strove to do for myself. She was a woman of great inner strength and it was only by chance that I discovered what else she was. For one day, when a stumble in a field brought back a measure of my pain, she found me sitting in the hall, crystals in hand.

  I threw them in idleness and those of blazing yellow separated from the others and formed a pattern to seem a pair of eyes. Such eyes I had seen in a bird's head and these appeared to live for a moment and gaze at Pyra. I heard a quickly drawn breath and at that moment, as if I had heard it shouted aloud I was sure. I glanced from those eyes on the table to the eyes in the woman's head, and I said to myself, “Falconer!” Though few, if any, men not of their own breed had ever seen one of their women.

  She put out her hand and caught mine, turning it palm up, and she studied that calloused flesh as one might study the roll on the table. There was a frown on her face; as she abruptly dropped her hold on me she said only:

  “Tied, Duratan—how and why I do not know.” Swiftly then she left me.

  But tied to the bird warriors I was though I did not guess it then or for years to come. Time passed and I did not count the days.

  However, my power grew. That which had stirred in me when I had fronted the snow cat strengthened by use even as did my limb. I began to put more thought to such things, casting my crystals, seeking out birds and small field creatures. Then I gained a liege one of my own.

  There had been a storm arid after its fury had passed I rode out to the edge of the wild lands. These were hedged by forest which made a living wall around Lormt save for where the road (somewhat overgrown) passed and where the river Es curled. There came to me a whimpering, and it was the space of several breaths before I realized that I had caught that, not by ear, but by thought. I took it as a guide and it led me to where, trapped much as I had been in the mountains, lay a thin, shaggy-coated hound. It was a beast of fine breeding though it was all bones and its long hair showed neglect. Nor did it wear a collar. As I knelt it drew lip to show teeth and I noted a mark across its muzzle as if a whip lash had left a scar. I looked into eyes which were fearful and I loosed thought to calm and comfort. It sniffed my .fingers and then licked them.

  Luckily it had shared my fate no further, for it was only a prisoner and Wounded by the matter of a scratch or two. I worked apart the branch of bramble which was its last binding and it arose to four feet and shook itself, took one step and then two away from me. Then it looked over its shoulder and came back, while from it to me flowed gratitude.

  Thus I found Rawit and she was no common hound, but one that had been hardly used and had come to know my sort only as an enemy who punished. Though from the moment she came to me there was no barrier between us. Her thoughts flowed, even if sometimes they were hard to understand, but there was exchange between us and I found this a wonder which seemingly was as great a one to her.

  We had visitors—mainly a trader or two who brought that which could not be raised in our well-tended fields, salt, scrap iron which Janton, the smith, used with great expertise. Also there were Borderers passing and from them we learned of the war. I asked of Kemoc and only once did I have news. That came from a horse dealer who had sold him a Torgian. But more than that I did not know.

  There was a time when restlessness gnawed at me. I took to riding the woods’ boundaries, Rawit running by my side. Though we were well away from the mountains and no raiders came, still I felt a need for such patrols.

  Morfew told me once-that the ancients who had built here had set over the whole site a guard of Power and those sheltering within the walls need have no fear. Still I borrowed a spade and smoothed out that ridge of earth which kept the great gate: from being closed.

  As my unease increased I fell into the habit of each morning throwing the crystals as I arose. Oddly, Rawit always came from her bed at the foot of mine to watch. And each day I threw only those which were the red of blood and the smoke grey of dying fires. Yet when I tried to share my foreboding with Morfew, he shook his head and told me the ancients guarded well their own.

  My wariness was given credit when a troop of Borderers came. These were no scouts nor being sent to turn some raid. Rather they carried with them all that they owned packed on ponies. From both men and animals—even more from the animals—I sensed some strange peril.

  Their captain gathered those scholars who would heed him, and the farm people, to share the warning which had sent them on the move. Pagar of Karsten had set on march the largest army that men in this part of the world had ever seen. Already their van had penetrated well into the mountains across so wide a front that there was no way Estcarp could hold against them.

  “But it is no longer our war,” the captain said. “For the Council has sent forth the Great Call and we are for Es City. If you would have safety prepare to ride with us. But do not think we can linger long for you.”

  Ouen glanced from one to another of his fellow scholars and then spoke up.

  “Lormt is guarded well, Captain.” He gestured to walls and towers. “I do not think we can do better than to trust the guardianship which was set here when the last wall stone was fitted into place. We have-no life beyond these walls. Also there is among us a wisewoman, Mistress Bethalie. She is strong in power though no Witch.”<
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  The captain grimaced and turned to Janton. “Your people then—” he began.

  Janton looked around but brie head shook and then another. He shrugged.

  “Our thanks to you, Captain. But we've lived here father-son, son-father, for so long we would be like wheat pulled up untimely from the fields—to wither into nothingness.”

  “The folly is yours then!” The captain was sharp. His gaze lighted on me and he frowned again. For, that morning having thrown the fire and ash twice and felt a great weight of oppression, I had put on my scale shirt, and fastened my arms belt over it.

  “You—” I caught his thought and felt anger, then also knew that he had the right to resent a fighting man to be at this time apart from any troop.

  I answered that thought easily as I limped forward.

  “Captain, how came that Great Call?”

  “The seeresses,” he answered, “and the falcons of the Falconers. The Council move but they have not told us how or what. We have heard that Sulcar ships are in the bay and perhaps they wait for those who must flee.”

  Then he added, “Do you ride with us?”

  I shook my head. “Captain, I found refuge here when there was no other to bid me welcome. I take my chance with Lormt.”

  They rode on towards the river and I heard them speak of rafts. I laid hand on the gate. I had-freed and wondered how well it would serve us as a barrier if Karsten fury spilled into this pocket nigh forgotten by the world.

  The next day was awesome. I awakened before light and heard the whines in Rawit's throat, her shadow fear heightening mine. There was that about us which fairly shouted of Power, Power aroused, Power brooding, Power about to leap.

  Even the most dreaming and woolywitted of the scholars felt it and so did those on the farms, for they came, family by family, to gather within Lormt's walls.

  Ouen and I welcomed all within. Even old Pruett, the herbmaster, did what he could to bring forth those gifts of nature which would do the most good in times of trouble. While Mistress Bethalie and Pyra stood together, a strange look lay upon them both, as if they strove to see what lay before us.