Three Against the Witch World ww-3 Read online

  “When?” Kemoc surrendered with that word.

  “What better time than here and now? Though first we must eat and drink. Strength of body means backing for strength of mind and will.”

  “The drinking is easy, but the eating . . .” Kemoc looked a little brighter, as if he had discovered in this mundane need an argument for abandoning the whole project.

  “Kyllan will provide.” Again she did not look at me. But I knew what must be done. And this I had never tried before, save when I had approached it with the Torgians.

  When one has even a small share of talent or reflection of the Power, one also knows that there are bounds set upon its use. And to willfully break one such for one’s own benefit exacts a price in return. Never since the time I had first learned I could control the minds of beasts had I ever used that to facilitate hunting. I had not sent the Torgians away into peril when I had dispatched them from our camp. Several times I had deterred wild things from attacking or trailing men. But to summon a creature to death for my profit. I sensed, was one of the forbidden things.

  But now that was just what I must do, for the good Kaththea would accomplish. Silently I took upon myself the full responsibility for my act, lest the backlash of this perversion of the Power fall upon my sister’s sorcery. Then I set myself, intently, to seek and draw the food we must have.

  Fish and reptiles, as I had long ago learned, had minds so apart from human kind that they could not be compelled to action—though, in the case of some reptiles, a withdrawing could be urged. But a mammal could be so brought to us. Prong-horns could swim . . . Mentally I built up as vivid a picture of a prong-horn as memory and imagination combined could create. Holding such a picture then, I cast out my thin line, seeking contact. Never before I tried to do this thing, for I had dealt with beasts directly under eye, or knew, from other evidence, were nearby. This seeking for no particular animal, but only one of a species, might fall.

  But it did not. My spinning thought made contact—and instantly I impressed will, needing to move swiftly to control the animal. Moments later a young prong-horn leaped down the river bank in full sight. I brought it out into the flood at the same angle we had used so that the current would bear it to the islet.

  “No!” I forbade Kemoc’s use of his gun. The kill was my responsibility in all ways; none of the guilt must go to another. I awaited the animal I had forced to swim to its death, and all I could offer it was a quick, clean end.

  Kaththea watched me closely as I dragged up the body. Out of my troubled mind I asked her:

  “Will this in any way lessen the Power?”

  She shook her head, but there was a shadow in her eyes. “We need only strength of body, Kyllan. But yet. . . you have taken upon yourself a burden. And how great will be your payment, I cannot reckon.”

  A lessening of my talent, I thought, and put it to mind that I must not trust that in any crisis until I was sure of the extent of my loss. Nor did I take into consideration that this was not Estcarp, that those rules which conditioned witchery in that land might not hold here where the Power had been set adrift into other ways.

  We made a fire of drift and ate, forcing ourselves past the first satisfying of hunger, as flames must consume fuel for some necessary degree of heat.

  “It is near to night.” Kemoc thrust a stick which had spitted meat into the heart of the fire. “Should this not wait upon daybreak? Ours is a force fed by light. Such summoning at the wrong time might bring instead a Power of the dark.”

  “This is a thing which, begun at sunset, is well begun. If a Familiar be sent forth by the mid-hour of the night, it may rove the farther. Not always are light and dark so opposed, one to the other,” Kaththea returned. “Now listen well, for once I have begun this I cannot tell you aught, or explain. We shall clasp hands, and you must join minds as well. Pay no heed to anything my body may do, save do not loose our hand clasp. Above all, no matter what may come, stay with me!”

  We needed to make no promises as to that. I feared now for her, as Kemoc did. She was very young, for all her seeress training. And, though she seemed very sure of her powers, yet she might also have the overconfidence of the warrior who has not yet been tried in his first ambush.

  The clouds which had overhung the day lifted at sunset, and my sister drew us around to face those brilliant flags in the sky, so that we could also see the mountains over which we had come into this haunted land. We joined hands and then minds.

  For me it was like that time when our mother had so drawn upon the three of us in her search for our father. There was first the loss of identity, with the knowledge that I must not fight that loss though it went against every instinct of self-preservation. After that—a kind of flowing back and forth, in and out . . . a weaving . . . of what?

  I do not know how long that period lasted, but I emerged suddenly, my hand jerking wildly. Kaththea was gasping, moaning, her body moved now and again in convulsive shudders. I caught at her shoulder with my free hand, trying to steady her. Then I heard a cry from Kemoc as he came to my aid.

  She gave small, sharp ejaculations of pain. And at intervals she writhed so that we could hardly keep the hold we had promised her we would not break. To make it more difficult, I was tired and drained of strength, so that I had to forced myself to every movement.

  Her eyes were shut. I thought that she must be elsewhere, her body remaining to fight against what she willed it to do. In the light of the now dying fire her face was not only pale, but faintly luminescent, so that we missed no outward sign of her torment.

  The end came with a last sharp outcry and arching of her body. From her sprang a dart of—was it flame? Perhaps the size of my hand, it stood upright, sharply brilliant. Then it swayed a little, as might a candle flame in a breeze. Kaththea shuddered again and opened her eyes to look upon what she had brought forth. The flame shape changed, put forth small pinions of light, and became a slender wand between those wings. Kaththea sighed and then said weakly:

  “It is not like—”

  “Evil?” Kemoc demanded sharply.

  “No. But the form is different. That which is here has had a hand in its making. Form does not matter, though. Now—”

  With our arms about her in support, she leaned forward to address the winged wand as she had spoken to the Flannan. In our minds we read the meaning of those unknown words. She was repeating ancient formulae, putting this child, or more-than-child, of hers under obedience, setting it to the task it must do.

  Back and forth it swayed as she spoke. Her words might have been wind bending it to and fro. Then she finished and it stood still and upright. Her last command came dart-swift:

  “Go!”

  It was gone and we sat in the dark. Kaththea withdrew her hands from ours and pressed them down upon her body as if striving to soothe an ache.

  I threw wood on the fire. As the flames climbed, her face showed in their light sunken, old, with a cast of suffering I had seen on men sore wounded. Kemoc cried out and drew her to him, so that her head rested on his shoulder, and his cheeks were wet with more than the sweat called forth by our efforts to feed her energy.

  She raised her hand slowly and touched his face. “It is over and we have wrought together very well, my brothers! Our child searches time and space, being bound by neither, and what it learns will serve us well. I do not guess this; I know it. Now, let us sleep . . .”

  Kaththea slept, and Kemoc also. But though I was weary yet still there was a restlessness within me. Fear for Kaththea, no—her travail was over, and anything which could have been perilous for her must already have struck during that struggle. Wariness of attack now? I thought not: we were on safe ground for this night. My own guilt? Perhaps.

  But for that I would not disturb the others. In due time I would pay for what I had done; for the present it would be best to put it out of mind.

  I settled down on my blanket, shut my eyes, and strove to invite sleep. Then I started up on one elbow, awake—
to listen to a long familiar sound through the night. Not too far away a horse had neighed!

  X

  I HEARD THE sound of hooves pounding turf. And did I or did I not sight the flash of lightning whip on the far shore of the river, that from which the rasti had swun for their attack? But lastly I fixed my mind on the thought of horses and what those might mean to us. In me grew the determination that with the coming of morning light I would go exploring . . .

  As if that decision were an answer to allay my uneasiness, I slept. For the sounds of the hunt, if hunt it could be, died away, while the murmur of the river made a sound to soothe overwrought nerves.

  Though I was the last to sleep, I was the first to wake. Our fire had smoldered into dead ash and the dawn was cold, with damp eddying from the water to touch us with moist fingers. I pulled the rest of the bleached wood we had gathered and coaxed a new blaze into life. It was while I knelt so that I saw him—coming down to the water to drink.

  Torgians were the finest steeds of Estcarp, but they were not beautiful. Their coats never gleamed, for all the grooming a man could give, nor were they large in frame. But here, raising a dripping muzzle from the water’s edge, was such a mount as a man may dream of all his days, yet never see save in those dreams. Big of frame, yet slender of leg, arched of neck, with a black coat which shone like a polished sword blade, a mane and tail rippling as might a maiden’s hair—

  And once I looked upon that stallion I knew such a longing as I could not stifle. Head raised he faced me across that current. There was no fear in him; curiosity, yes, but no fear. He was of the wild, and I thought he had never had reason to believe that his will could be subordinated to that of any creature.

  For a long moment he stood so, studying me as I moved to the narrow end of the islet. And then, dismissing me as harmless, he drank again, before moving a little into the river, as if he enjoyed the feel of the water about his legs. Looking upon him, his beauty and his proud freedom, I was lost.

  Without thought I tried contact, striving to win him so to wait for me, to listen to my desire. Head flung up, he snorted, retreated a step or two for the bank from which he had come. He was curious, yet a little wary. Then I touched what could only be a dim memory—of a rider he had once had . . .

  On the shore he waited, watched, as I plunged into the stream, helmless, without the mail or weapons I had laid aside. I swam for the shore and still the stallion stood to watch me, now and then pawing the earth a little impatiently, tossing his head so that the silky mane fluttered out, or flicking his long tail.

  He would stand for me! I exulted in my triumph—he was mine! My fears of losing my gift had been foolish; never had my ability to contact an animal mind been so sharp and so quickly successful. With such a horse as this the world was mine! There was only the stallion and me in the early morning—

  I waded ashore, unheeding water-soaked garments and the chill of the wind, intent only on the great and wonderful animal waiting for me—for me! He lowered his noble head to blow into the palm I held out to him. Then he allowed me to run my hands along his shoulders. He was mine as securely as if I had followed the ancient craft of training wherein a cake of oats and honey carried against my skin for three days and then moistened with my spittle had been given him to eat. Between us there was a bond of no breaking. That was so clear to me that I had no hesitation in mounting him bareback, and he suffered me to do so.

  He began to trot and I gloried in the strong motion of his body, the even pacing. In all my years I had never bestrode such force, dignity, beauty, authority. It carried with it an intoxication greater than any wine a man might savor. This—this was being a king, a godling out of early mists of forgotten time.

  Behind us was the river, before us an open world. Just the two of us, free and alone. A faint questioning rose somewhere deep within me. Two of us?—away from the river? But there was something back there, something of importance. Under me that mighty body tensed, began to gallop. I twined my fingers deep in the flowing mane which whipped at my face, and knew a wonderful exultation as we pounded on across a plain.

  There was sunlight now, and still the stallion ran effortlessly, as if those muscles could know no fatigue. I believed he could keep to that flight for hours. But my first exultation paled as the light brightened. The river . . . I glanced over my shoulder—that dim line far behind marked it. The river . . . and on it . . .

  In my mind there was a click. Kaththea! Kemoc! How, why had I come to do this? Back—I must head back there. Without bit or rein I should use my mind to control the stallion, return him to the river. I set my wish upon him—

  No effect. Under me that powerful body still galloped away from the river, into the unknown. I thrust again, harder now as my faint discomfort became active alarm. Yet there was no lessening of speed, no turning. Then I strove to take entire control wholly, as I had with the Torgians and the prong-horn I had brought to its death.

  It was as if I walked across a crust beneath which bubbled a far different substance. If one did not test the crust it served for a footing, but to strike hard upon it carried one to what lay below.

  And in those seconds I learned the truth. If what I rode carried to my eyes and my surface probing the form of a stallion, it was in reality a very different creature. What it was I could not tell, save that it was wholly alien to all I knew or wished to know.

  And also I believed that I had as much chance of controlling it by my will as I had of containing the full flood of the river in my two hands. I had not mastered a free running horse; I had been taken in as clever a net as had ever been laid for a half-bewitched man, for that I must have been from my first sighting of this beast.

  Perhaps I could throw myself from its back, though its pace, now certainly swifter than any set by a real horse, could mean injury, even death, to follow such a try at escape. Where was it taking me, and for what purpose? I strove frantically to pierce below the horse level of its mind. There was a strong compulsion, yes. I was to be entrapped and then delivered—where and to whom?

  Through my own folly this had come upon me. But the peril at the end could be more than mine alone, for what if the other two could then be reached through me? That enchantment which had held from my sighting of the horse was breaking fast, cracked by shock and fear.

  With me they would possess a lever to use against Kaththea and Kemoc. They—who or what were they? Who were the rulers of this land, and what did they want with us? That the force had taken me so was not beneficent I was well aware. This was merely another part of that which had tried to trap me in the stone web. And this time I must not summon any aid, lest that recoil upon those I wanted least to harm.

  The plain over which we sped did have an end. A dark line of trees appeared to spring out of the ground, so fast was our pace. They were oddly pallid trees, their green bleached, their trunks and limbs gray, as if life had somehow been slowly sucked out of them. And from this gaunt forest came an effluvium of ancient evil, worn and very old, but still abiding as a stench.

  There was a road through that wood, and the stallion’s hooves rang on its pavement as if he were shod with steel. It did not run straight, but wove in and out. And now I had no desire to leap from my seat, for I believed that more than just clean death awaited any who touched this leached ground.

  On and on pounded my mount. I no longer strove to contact its mind; rather did I husband what strength I possessed in perhaps a vain hope that there would be some second allowed me in which I could use every bit of my talent in a last stroke for freedom. And I tried to develop a crust of my own, an outer covering of despair, so that whatever intelligence might be in command would believe I was indeed now its full captive.

  Always I had been one who depended upon action of body more than of mind, and this new form of warfare did not come easily. For some men fear ignites and enrages, it does not dampen nor subdue, and so it is with me. I must now curb my burning desire to strike out, and instead harbor all my a
bility to do so against a time when I might have at least the smallest of chances.

  We came through the wood, but still we kept to the road. Now before us was a city, towers, walls . . . Yet it was not a city of the living as I knew life. From it spread an aura of cold, of utter negation of my kind of living and being. As I stared at it I knew that once I was borne within those gray walls Kyllan Tregarth as he now was would cease to be.

  Not only did my inborn rejection of death arm me then, but also the remembrance of those I had betrayed by my yielding to this enchantment. I must make my move—now!

  I struck, deep down, through the vanishing crust, into the will of the thing which had captured me. My will now, not to turn, to reach safety for myself, but to avoid what lay before me as the final end. If I would die it would be a death of my choosing.

  Perhaps I had played my part so well I had deceived that which would compel me to its own ends, or perhaps it had no real knowledge of my species. It must have relaxed its strongest force, for I succeeded in part. That steady stride faltered, and the stallion turned from the city road. I held to my purpose, despite a boiling up of that other will. Then came a petulant flash of anger which reached me almost as if I understood words shouted at me from the walls now to my left. Very well, if I would have it so, then it would let me choose—

  And in that was a hint of the wearing of age on the force in command. For, angered by defiance, it was willing to sacrifice a pawn that might be of greater value alive.

  The stallion ran smoothly and I had no doubts at all that I rode to my death. But no man dies tamely and I would not yield where any chance of a fight remained. There was a flash in the sky as a bird flapped overhead. The shimmer about it—

  Flannan! That same one that had visited us on the islet? What was its purpose?

  It made a sudden dart and the stallion veered, voicing at the same time a scream of rage, though he did not abate his pace. Again and again the bird dived, to change the path of the animal, until we headed north, away from the city, on ground which climbed to heights forest-cloaked and dark against the sky, but green and good, with none of the withered evil of that other wood.