Trey of Swords (Witch World (Estcarp Series)) Read online

  Now I knew that I must prove that to myself. For that proof there was only one action—I must return to the cliff top, seek out that which was prisoned in the stone, and bring it forth. If I saw it, if I held it once more in my hand, then—then perhaps that knowledge that it had been mine, was meant to be mine, would come again.

  There sounded a hissing from Tsali. Slight as it was, it broke my concentration. He was still watching me, but not with that compelling intensity. Now he nodded, his crest head moving gravely up and down. And I knew that, if I could not read his thought, save in the faintest degree, mine had been far more clear to him.

  I spoke, though I did not know if his alien ears could pick up and sort out the sounds I made into an intelligible pattern.

  “I must go back—”

  It would seem that he understood. For once more he nodded solemnly. And that nod had something of a promise in it, as if he intended that I must do just what I desired.

  Now I was impatient for the healing of my ankle and pestered Crytha to be loose from the heavy cast of mud. Until she at last broke that and freed me. I could feel no pain, there was no swelling, no mark. And when I got to my feet, I felt nothing save what was normal.

  But time to do what I wished, that was a different thing. I could not walk away from the drilling, the constant honing of our small force into a weapon for defense. Oddly enough, I had in me the strong belief that I must not share with any—save Tsali—the story of my find. So that it was after three full days of frustration and impatience that I slipped away at dawn, to once more climb the cliffs. But before I reached the first handholds, the Lizard warrior appeared out of nowhere, flashing past me up the rough stone with an agility no man possessed.

  It was good that Tsali had joined me. For once aloft, I could pick out no landmark; I did not know in which direction to begin my search for the crevice into which I had so unexpectedly fallen. But it was plain Tsali did, for looking up to me and then bearing right, he made clear that he could guide me.

  In the day, with no storm clouds about, the rugged heights of the Valley were very visible. There were many crevices in these peaks and they looked much alike. However, Tsali had come to a halt by one, and with a full swing of his arm, beckoned me on.

  I got to my knees, peered down into the gash in the rock. From here I could see nothing. My find must lie farther back, under the half-shadow of the roof rock. To my belt I had fastened a small hammer which I had selected secretly from among the smith's tools, with it a sharp-bladed chisel. Though both were metal, I'did not know how they would cut this rock.

  With care I crawled down into the cut, Tsali lying belly down now on the lip of the crevice watching me with steadfast eyes. I might have missed what I sought, for it was near the color of the rock which held it. But the fact that it protruded was my aid.

  Though the rod had the feel of crystal, it was opaque, gray—like any jutting knob about. How then had the lightning revealed it with a glimmer? I fitted my finger to it. Yes, it moved, but a very little. I could see, peering close, that there was a line separating it a little from the rock which enclosed it.

  Delicately as I could, for I feared to break it, I began to work with chisel and hammer, tapping slowly, with care. Parts of the rock dropped away in very small and hard-won chips.

  But I schooled my patience and worked with a care I have never used in any act before. It was needful that I do this—that filled my mind, possessed me fully. I was not aware of the sun which blazed down, to make the crevice a caldron of glowing heat so that I doffed first mail shirt, then underjerkin of padded leather, and worked with my skin reddening in the force of that beam.

  My hands began to shake and I leaned back against the wall of the crevice, suddenly afraid that, with some off-center blow, I might shatter what I sought. There was a hissing from above. I looked up and Tsali held down to me a bottle fashioned of the tough valley gourds.

  Working out the stopper, I drank thankfully. My shoulders ached—but when I looked at the stone where I worked, my spirit was as renewed as my throat from that drink. It was indeed a sword hilt I had so painfully uncovered. I had it free now down to the cross hilt. But it would take hours more to manage the blade—if I ever could. How had any metal lasted through the heat generated by the molten rock into which my dream self had hurled this?

  I put out my hand, curved my fingers, and grasped the hilt. That which I had felt in the dream once more flooded into me. This was mine! Never before had I felt so strong an impression of ownership, as if some object had been fashioned only for my own handling, to be held jealously from all others.

  My grasp tightened, Without being truly aware of what I did, I pulled the hilt toward me. There was a moment of resistance, and then it came loose with such a snap that I overbalanced and fell back against the other wall of the crevice.

  But—what I held was only the hilt. No blade projected, strong and keen-edged, beyond it!

  My disappointment was so vast that for a second or two I could have wailed as might any child. It was mine—but what it had been was gone, lost in time and boiling rock, even as I had feared.

  Still, I could not toss it from me. My fingers curled and held as if now their will was apart from mine, or else they were commanded by a part of me I did not know nor understand.

  I held my find farther into the sun. Perhaps one of the valleysmiths could reset it to a blade. It was not a treasure in itself that I could see. In color, the crystal of the pommel was gray, yet in the sun I caught a faint rippling of inner light. It had been worked with a carving like a scrawl of runes, perhaps to keep it from turning in the hand. However, those were so worn they were now but a pitted pattern of unreadable lines. The crossbar was of the same crystal-like material. Yet I was sure this was no crystal nor quartz of which I had knowledge.

  I sighed. When I shrugged on my jerkin again, I stowed my find against my skin. A useless thing—still—there was something—

  Was it a scrap of before memory which stirred deep, deep in my mind? I could not catch it. I only knew that what I held had once been as needful as life to me and that it had come once more into my hand for a purpose.

  4

  In the days which followed I was tempted often to take the hilt to the smith and see if it could be fitted to any blade he had worked. Yet each time that thought came to me, I found that I could not do this- No, there had been only one blade which would fit. And time had taken that. So my find must remain useless.

  But I discovered that when I slept, for some reason, I brought the hilt out (always in the dark and in secret) to hold in my hand. Did I wish to use it as a key to unlock the past? Perhaps. Though another part of me did not desire that either. Still I kept it ever with me.

  Perhaps it carried with it some good fortune for a warrior. Or else growing older, and living under the sky of the Green Valley and its healing, brought about a slow change in me. I became more apt as a swordsman—once even disarming Imnar in practice. And that not by chance, for it was ever his way to make me seem awkward and without skill.

  Sometimes I believed that had my secret been whole I could have confronted any man in our company and not come out the worse, battle-trained veterans as most of them were.

  We of Hervon's House were not the only people to be drawn over-mountain into Escore. Others followed in time. Then we, with the Green People, went forth (for the Lady Dahaun had always knowledge, carried by her messenger birds, of those winning across the mountains.)

  This land was awake, and evil paced it, save those few places guarded by remnants of the Power. Thus were we ever on guard when we ventured on an assay. It was during one such, at night, though our people encamped by a place of Light, that the Thas attacked us.

  These live underground, seldom seeking the upper world, then only at night or on days well clouded. Though they had not first been reckoned among the followers of the Shadow, in these hours they listened to the call of the Dark Ones, thus becoming our enemies. During the n
ight attack they were defeated only by an outgush of water which was brought about by Lord Kemoc and Godgar of our own troop. However, Lord Kemoc was grievously wounded and, on our riding, he was swept from us in a flood of the same water which had earlier saved us.

  His loss was counted a sore one. For, though a man, he has studied the ancient records at Lormt. And it was a fact that he had called forth a summons and had been answered by one of the Great Old Ones, even though those had all been deemed gone from Escore. His sister, the Witch Kaththea, withdrew to a place of mysteries, striving there to find some answer as to whether he lived or died. For she believed that he had not departed on the Last Road as yet.

  Thus, Crytha became a closer companion to the Lady Dahaun, though she was not trained in witchcraft as had been the Lady Kaththea. So I saw even less of her. This was not a season for wedding, at least that thought heartened me. For lnhar could not claim her at a time when war raged around us.

  Twice we had driven off attacks of the Dark Ones. Monstrous forms had circled the valley walls, striven to climb and bring death to all. Those Gray Ones, who are neither man nor wolf, but the worst part of both, came to harry us; other, even more alien things with them. In the sky above wheeled and battled the great Vorgs who answered the summoning of our hosts. But what sometimes fought with them were such creatures even nightmares could not spawn.

  I found that Tsali took to accompanying whatever patrol on the heights I was assigned to. It followed that my companionship without words with the Lizard man became more a part of my life. When we were alone (though such times were few) he often let me know by gestures, in very dim impressions I could pick up from his thoughts, that he wanted to look upon the sword hilt. I would bring it forth (it always felt then a part of me), and he would stare at it intently.

  Perhaps, I guessed, he knew more of its history, buried in the rock though it had been, than I did. How I longed to speak mind to mind and ask this. Men have their legends—perhaps the Lizard folk also had their tales from an ancient past. Maybe even one about that dying man who had not been Yonan—

  I tried very hard to reach out with my thoughts, but it would seem that the talent was denied me. Yet in otherwise I was changing, as I was sure. And what might have happened had not another fate taken hand in my life I cannot fathom.

  It was Crytha who brought the end to one part of my life, the beginning of another. For there came a morning when she was missing from her couch in the Lady Dahaun's hall. And the Lady of Green Silences came to Hervon's cluster of tents with a sober face. She held out her hand, on the palm of which lay an image roughly fashioned from clay. Strands of hair had been embedded in its head, a scrap of scarf Crytha favored wrapped about it in a crude robing.

  The Lady Chriswitha, looking upon that thing, grew white. Her hands trembled as she reached forth a finger to touch, and yet did not dare. Then there arose such a wrath as I had never seen in her. She spat out:

  “We were told that this was a safe land!”

  ‘“So was it,” the Lady Dahaun returned. “This abomination was not fashioned here. I do not know how it was put within the bed place of your kin-child. I have learned that she went forth at first dawning, telling my people she would seek a bed of Illbane to be harvested as the dew still lay upon it, making it twice as potent for healings. She appeared as always, under no compulsion; though it seems that in this she was certainly moved by another's will.”

  The Lady Chriswitha looked about us, as if with the eye she could see Crytha's trail. Her lips came firm together as I have seen them upon occasion, as now her fear was under deep control.

  “You can follow?”

  “We have followed,” the Lady Dahaun replied. “But there is an end to her trail up there.” She gestured toward the heights which walled in the valley.

  “Why—why Crytha? And from whence came that—?” my foster mother then demanded, “She—she must be found!”

  “Why Crytha? Because she is who she is—one of budding Power, as yet untrained—at an age when that Power can be used by—others. From whence it came, it has about it the stench of Thas. They possess certain talents which it now seems they are developing to a degree we have not known. As to the finding, I have tried the scrying—there is a wall against the far sight—”

  I though of the Thas I had seen during our battle with them, when thev had attacked and been driven off by the gush of water. They were of the earth, smaller than men, dusky bodies covered with a growth which was tough and rootlike. As if they had indeed grown and not been born. To our eyes they were repulsive—like the legendary demons. And to think of Crytha taken by such!

  In that moment I forgot I was liegeman to my lord, that I was a warrior under orders. I moved without thinking to snatch that crude image from the Lady Dahaun.

  “Yonan!” The Lady Chriswitha stared at me as if I had suddenly myself taken on the guise of one of those deep earth dwellers. “What would you—?”

  But I was no longer the Yonan she had fostered, the weakling who owed life to her care. In that moment, as my fist clenched around the image, I felt deep within me a stir which I had known only in my dream. I was someone else struggling for freedom, someone with more certainty of purpose than Yonan had ever possessed. I think that I was no longer a youth of little promise. Instead, two halves of me came together to make me the stronger in that uniting. I did not even answer the Lady Chriswitha, for there was a need tearing at me which I could not control.

  “Where on the heights did they lose the trail?” I turned to the Lady of Green Silences, speaking to her as I would to an equal.

  I saw her eyes widen as she gazed back at me. For a moment, she hesitated. As she did, the Lady Chriswitha broke in:

  “Yonan—you cannot—”

  I whirled about, forgetting all courtesy. “This I will do. Either I bring Crytha back or else I die!”

  It was her turn to show an astonishment which overrode even her anger and fear.

  “But you—”

  I made a gesture of silence as I looked again to the Lady Dahaun.

  “Where?” I repeated sharply.

  Her eyes searched my face for what seemed to me far too long a time. Then she answered:

  “No man can hunt safely through the burrows of the Thas. The earth is theirs; for them, it fights.”

  “So? I do not believe this. Lady.” My left hand lay on my mail-clad breast and I could feel (and I knew I was not dreaming this time) a kind of throb against my body sent forth by the ancient sword hilt.

  She bit upon her lower lip. Her right hand arose and in the air she traced some symbol. There was a faint light following that tracing, gone again in an instant. But now Dahaun nodded.

  “The risk is yours, warrior. We dare not raid into the Thas’ burrows without greater protection than we have now. This act of theirs may be intended not only to gain control of a beginning talent which they hope to warp, but also to drain us of warriors needed for defense.”

  “One man may go without weakening your defense by much. Lady. With or without your leave will I do this thing.”

  “It is your choice,” she returned gravely. “But this much will I warn you: if the Thas are now governed by one with the Dark Power, there is little a man can do against such. You know nothing of what you may face.”

  “True. But who knows when he lies down at night what the rising sun will bring tomorrow?” I countered with words which seemed to flow into my mouth by the will of that shadowy other which the touch of the hill had awakened in me.

  There was a hissing, startling us both.Tsali reared up to my left. His bright eyes met mine for a single instant before he looked on to the Lady Dahaun. I knew that between them now passed that communication I could not understand. In my hand, I squeezed tight that ugly thing of clay, hair, and ragged cloth. I knew enough of the way of Power that this dare not be destroyed. For such a destruction might harm the one I would protect. However, it was a tie with her. Just as the sword hilt, now warm against my b
reast, was a tie with that other, greater self I could only dimly sense as yet.

  “Tsali will go with you.”

  It was my turn to be surprised. Though the Lizard men were of the earth, even as those of the Green Valley, still they are not like the Thas, who hate the sun and are not at ease save in their deep burrows.

  “He can be eyes for you, such as no man possesses,” Dahaun continued. “And it is his free choice to do this.”

  Perhaps I should have refused to draw another with me into an unknown governed by the Shadow. But at that moment the part of Yonan which was still uncertain, lacking in confidence, felt a surge of relief at that promise. Alone among the Valley People, Tsali shared my secret. It did not matter that his skin was scaled, mine was smooth; that we could not speak to each other. For he could project, and I could receive, a feeling of Tightness about what I must now do.

  I shouldered a bag of rations and two water gourds filled to their stopper levels, those stoppers being well pounded in. For arms, I had my sword. I would not take the dart gun, for these had very little ammunition left, and what remained must be for the defense of the Valley. The Lady Dahaun brought me a pouch which I could clip to my belt, holding some of her salves for wounds. But it was with the Lady Chriswitha, Lord Hervon still being absent on a patrol, that I had my final word before I left to face the unknown.

  “She is already hand-fasted, Yonan.” My foster mother spoke quickly, as if what she had to say made her uneasy and she would have this over.

  “That I know.”

  “If Imhar were here now—”

  “He would do as I am doing. But he is not, and I am.”

  Then she acted as she had not since I was a sickly little lad. She put her hands, one on either side of my face. The throat veil of fine mail which depended from my helm hung loose so that I could feel her touch warm on my cheeks.