The Outcast

by Louise Cooper

‘No! I wouldn’t dare -I wouldn’t presume to try to see into such things. I’ll read for you, Drachea - but I’ll go no further.’

  He shrugged his careless shrug. ‘Very well, then. Let’s not waste any more time - show me what the charlatan could not!’

  Cyllan felt in her belt-pouch and pulled out a handful of small, smooth stones of varying shapes. Ideally, she needed sand as a base on which to cast the pebbles, but she had worked without it before and doubtless could do so again.

  Drachea leaned forward, staring intently at the stones as though trying to divine something from them without her help. And suddenly, as she gathered them in her palm ready for the first cast, Cyllan stopped. Something was tugging insistently at her mind, a warning, as clear as if it had been spoken aloud in her ear.

  Whatever happened, she must not read the stones for Drachea Rannak!

  ‘What is it?’ Drachea’s voice broke querulously in on her, and she started violently, staring at him as though she had never seen him before. ‘Come now, Cyllan - either you’re a fortune-reader, or you’re not! If you’ve been wasting my time - ‘

  ‘I haven’t!’ She rose unsteadily to her feet. ‘But I can’t read for you, Drachea - I can’t!’

  He rose too, suddenly angry. ‘Why not, in the name of seven hells?’

  ‘Because I dare not! Oh, gods, I can’t explain; it’s a feeling, a fear - ‘ and suddenly the words were out before she could stop them. ‘Because I know in my bones that something terrible is about to happen to you!’

  He was stunned. Very slowly, he sat down again, and his face was ashen. ‘ You - know … ?’

  She nodded. ‘Please, don’t ask me anything more. I shouldn’t have spoken - doubtless I’m wrong; I have no real talent, and - ‘

  ‘No.’ She had been moving away from the table and suddenly his hand shot out and gripped her arm painfully. ‘Sit down! If there’s something afoot then by all the gods you’re going to tell me what it is!’

  One or two of the tavern’s other customers were watching them by now, grinning with amusement and no doubt putting their own interpretation on the argument.

  Anxious not to draw further attention to herself, Cyllan reluctantly sat.

  ‘Now, tell me!’ Drachea commanded.

  The stones felt like hot coals in her hand. Reflexively, she let them fall, and they scattered on the table in a disturbingly explicit pattern. Drachea stared at them and frowned. ‘What does it mean?’

  Cyllan, too, was looking at the stones and her heart thumped. She didn’t know this pattern, and yet it seemed to speak to her, call to her. A faint tingling sensation assailed the nape of her neck and she shivered.

  ‘I - don’t know -‘ she began to say, then gasped as an image flashed across her mental vision, so quickly that she could barely grasp it. A star with seven points, radiating indescribable colours -

  ‘No!’ she heard herself hiss vehemently. ‘I can’t do it!

  I won’t!’

  ‘Damn you, you will!’ Drachea countered furiously.

  ‘I’m not about to be made a fool of by some outland peasant! Tell me what you see in those stones, or I’ll have you before my father for trying to hex me!’

  The threat was real enough. Cyllan looked at the stones once more, and suddenly their pattern crystallised in her mind. She knew, with an unerring instinct, what they meant - and Drachea’s arguments had no power to sway her.

  Abruptly, she swept up the stones and deposited them back in her pouch, rising to her feet again.

  ‘You must do as you think fit,’ she said quietly, and turned to leave.

  ‘Cyllan!’ Drachea shouted after her, and when she didn’t hesitate she heard the scrape of wood on stone and his footsteps coming after her. He caught up with her just before she reached the door. ‘Cyllan, what do you think you’re doing? I won’t have this! You promised to read for me, and - ‘

  ‘Let me go!’ She twisted free as he tried to catch her arm and pull her back, but as she made for the tavern entrance she collided with a tall, burly merchantsailor who was hastening in with his three companions.

  ‘Look what you’re doing!’ the man snapped, pushing her aside. She mumbled an apology and hurried on, Drachea following, but the sailor called out again. ‘Hey - you two! Where in the name of all the devils of darkness d’you think you’re going?’

  They stared uncomprehendingly at him, and he jerked a thumb towards the door, where more people were hurrying in. ‘Haven’t you got a quarter-gravine of sense between you? There’s a Warp coming! Whole place is in an uproar - market day, and a whorespawned Warp decides to descend on us! As if storms in Summerisle Straits weren’t enough -‘ He stamped irritably towards the counter, shouting for a drink.

  Cyllan’s face had drained to a grey pallor. At the sailor’s mention of the Warp she felt as if her stomach had turned to ice inside her. A terrible fear had taken hold of her reason and was growing with every moment - she was safe in the tavern, but she didn’t feel safe. And if she had interpreted the stones’ portent rightly -

  Drachea, meanwhile, had moved to the door and was looking out. Everywhere people were running for shelter; somewhere a child wailed in fright. Beyond the crowding roofs of the houses in this narrow street the sky was no more than a thin band of brilliance, but already the brilliance was clouding, tarnished with sickly shadows that marched across the blue. And over the noise of rushing feet and shouting voices came an eerie, thin wailing, like a chorus of hellhound souls in torment.

  ‘Gods!’ Drachea stared at the fast-changing sky with a morbid fascination. ‘Cyllan, look! Look at it!’

  Their quarrel was forgotten, and Cyllan was suddenly afraid for his safety. ‘Drachea, don’t! she pleaded.

  ‘Come in! It’s dangerous!’

  ‘Not yet, it isn’t. We’ve a few minutes more before it’ll be on us. Look - ‘ and then in an instant his expression changed and his voice with it, rising in incredulous horror. ‘Oh, by Aeoris, look at that!’

  He had caught hold of her, and dragged her forward so that she faced the door. Outside the street was deserted and shutters were being slammed at all the windows. Drachea was pointing down the length of the alley to where it ran out into Shu-Nhadek harbour, and his hand shook violently.

  ‘Look!’

  Cyllan looked, and blind terror overcame all reason.

  At the end of the street a solitary figure stood like a statue. Some shroud-like garment hid its frame, but the cruel, fine-boned face was clear enough, and the halo of gold hair, shot through with coruscating light. A dark, misty aura shimmered around it, and even as she watched it raised one long-fingered hand, and beckoned.

  She had seen that nightmare image before … Cyllan tried to step back, away from the hypnotic figure and its commanding hand, but couldn’t move. Her will was weakening; she was overcome by an insane desire to step through the tavern door, out into the street, to obey the summons. Beside her she heard Drachea whisper ‘what is it?’ in the voice of a terrified child, and she shook her head, unable even to grope for an answer.

  The figure beckoned again, and it was as if invisible strings pulled at Cyllan’s limbs. She fought the compulsion with all her strength, but her left foot slid forward, propelling her …

  ‘Cyllan, what are you doing?’ Drachea cried out.

  ‘Come back!’

  She couldn’t go back. The call was too strong, swamping fear and self-preservation. And from the grim apparition’s heart a ghastly light flickered to life and grew, flowering into a harshly brilliant star that blotted out all but the slowly beckoning hand.

  ‘Cyllan!’ Drachea’s voice was a scream of protest as she suddenly broke free and plunged forward, out of the tavern. Not stopping to think, he raced after her - and the shimmering apparition vanished.

  Cyllan gave an animal shriek that echoed the length of the alley, and skidded to a halt so that Drachea cannoned into her. He shook her as though she was a rag doll, yelling to make her understand.

  ‘Cyllan, t
he Warp! It’s coming! In the name of all that’s holy, move!’ As he shouted the final words he spun her round, meaning to drag her if necessary back to the safety of the tavern before it was too late. He turned -

  The wall of darkness hit them full on as it swept the length of the street with the speed and ferocity of a tidal wave. Drachea heard the voice of the Warp rise to a howling crescendo of triumph, and glimpsed a maelstrom of twisted forms and shapes that hurtled at him out of nowhere. For an instant he felt Cyllan’s hand gripped in his own; then a hammer blow of agony seemed to smash every bone in his body - and with it came searing, white-hot oblivion.

  Chapter 2

  The shock of swallowing something that burned her throat and lungs brought Cyllan violently back to consciousness. She tried to scream, but choked as her mouth and nose filled again with the burning stuff. For a nightmarish moment she thought she was dead, plunged into some green and black hell that roared in her ears and through which her body twisted and turned helplessly - but then realisation struck her returning senses.

  She was drowning!

  With a savage self-preservation instinct she jack-knifed her body and struck in the one direction from which a faint light glimmered. If she had chosen wrongly, she would be dead within minutes - but seconds later her head broke clear of the water and she was lifted on the swell of a black wave, spluttering and gasping as she dragged air into her lungs.

  She was in the sea - and it was night! The insanity of the fact numbed her momentarily as she trod water, struggling to stay afloat. Overhead the sky was a vast bowl of darkness tinged with nacreous green, and around her restless waves humped threateningly, monstrous silhouettes that tossed and carried her willy-nilly on their swell. There was no land, no Moons - and no Warp.

  Shocked and confused, she didn’t see the breaker until it bore down on her, plunging her underwater again. Kicking out, she fought back to the surface. She must rally her mind to survival, or she’d drown like a rat in a bucket! But how could she survive? There was no shore, no direction - she had been hurled somehow through the Warp, thrown into this unimaginable nightmare -

  And then she heard a cry. It was faint, but not far away, as though someone were calling from an invisible safe haven. Cyllan turned, striking out in the direction from which the sound had come and thankful for the salt water which gave her buoyancy - and a moment later she saw him.

  He was clinging to a spar of wood and almost submerged by the waves that battered him relentlessly.

  Drachea! Memory of the last seconds before the Warp struck surged back - he had been trying to pull her towards the tavern; they had been hit together -

  ‘Drachea!’ Her voice was weak as she tried to cry out to him, and he didn’t hear. Saving her breath for swimming she propelled herself towards him, aided by a wave that rose on a cross-current and swept her almost to his side. She caught him under the arms, holding him against the pull of the sea, and instantly he panicked and began to struggle.

  ‘Drachea!’ she screamed in his ear. ‘It’s Cyllan! We’re alive, we’re alive!’

  He took no notice, but continued to writhe in her grip, hitting out at her with flailing hands. She had to stop him, or he’d drown them both - reaching out, she snatched the spar to which he’d been clinging. It was waterlogged, but small enough for her to heft, and clumsily she brought it down on his skull. He slumped, and Cyllan hauled with all her remaining strength as his body began to slip beneath the waves.

  Turning on to her back, she dragged Drachea’s inert form behind her and began to kick out. The water held her up - but she couldn’t sustain this struggle for long.

  Like all Eastern coast-dwellers Cyllan had learned in childhood to swim like a fish, but her strength was ebbing fast; the water was ice cold, already numbing her hands and feet, and with the added burden she could make only painfully slow headway.

  And if she found no landfall? a small voice whispered in her head. What then?

  Then she and Drachea would drown, as surely as the Sun would rise tomorrow. She might increase her own chances if she let him go and preserved all her energy for herself - but she couldn’t. It would be tantamount to murder; she couldn’t abandon him now.

  She took a firmer grip on her limp burden and struggled on, battling against the tide which, capriciously, seemed to change the direction of its pull every few moments, as though a dozen different currents battled for supremacy. The roar of the sea was a ceaseless dinning in her ears, wearing her down; the icy drag of the water seemed to grow greater with every kick and her limbs were slowly losing all sensation as the cold penetrated to her marrow. And soon the constant surge and fade of the swell, as she tried to keep a rhythm to her swimming, became dangerously hypnotic. Strange, dreamlike images flowed across her inner vision, until she thought she saw the prow of a boat looming out of the darkness towards her; she raised one arm and shouted, then her mouth and nostrils filled with stinging salt water as, losing way, she slipped under. Instantly the shock snatched her out of the dream, but it was all she could do to drag Drachea’s dead weight back to the surface. She gulped air, sobbing with terror and relief in equal measure, and when her streaming eyes cleared she realised that there had been no boat, no salvation; only the delusion of an exhausted mind.

  She was weakening. The mirage had almost killed her, and one more such mistake could be her last. And still there were no white crests on the waves to tell her she was nearing land; the vast, implacable ocean stretched endlessly around her and she visualised a sudden, terrible image of herself and Drachea bobbing like tiny, insignificant flotsam on a gigantic expanse of nothing. She forced the thought away, knowing that if it took hold it would sap the last of her will to survive. But that will couldn’t sustain her for much longer.

  Without warning, a heavy black swell borne on a vicious cross-current slapped her sideways, and this time she couldn’t regain her momentum. Drachea’s body was pulling her down, and her limbs were almost completely numb. In an instant of hideous clarity Cyllan faced the knowledge that she was defeated. She had tried but she had no more resources of strength, and even without her burden she’d no longer be capable of saving herself. The hungry sea had won, as part of her had known it must.

  She was going to die …

  And then, in a dazed corner of her mind, she remembered the fanaani …

  The chance was so slender that she almost abandoned it. It would be better, surely it would be better, to give herself up to the inevitable and let the cold, surging depths take her now, rather than prolong the agony with a hope that couldn’t be fulfilled. But an echo of her desire to survive still remained, enough to make her failing senses fight back in a final, desperate attempt to live. She struggled to focus her mind, rally her will, feeble though it was.

  Help me … The silent telepathic plea flowed from deep within her. In the name of all the gods, please help me …

  The sea surged around her, its booming voice mocking her desperation. If her call went unheard, she’d be dead within minutes …

  Help me … please help me …

  Suddenly she felt it - the first faint stirring of another presence in her mind, a detached curiosity as to the nature of this strange creature that struggled through the water with its unconscious burden. Cyllan redoubled her efforts to call, and the presence grew stronger, closing in.

  When she heard the first bittersweet harmony of the fanaani’s song she almost cried aloud with joy. The silver notes echoed against the sea’s roar, rising and falling, calling to her, and a moment later she felt something sleek and alive brush by her legs.

  The first one rose beside her, its blunt-nosed, catlike face only inches away from her own. The limpid brown eyes gazed sorrowfully into hers, and the fanaan-bigger than she was, brindle-furred and almost phosphorescent in the darkness - twitched its short whiskers and whiffled, blowing fishy breath into her face. Then another joined it, and from below she felt a third rising, taking Drachea’s weight on its back and supporting h
im.

  Cyllan twisted in the water and clutched at the heavily muscled shoulder of the sea-mammal beside her. The fanaan lifted its head and called in a sweet, plaintive voice, and the second creature moved in so that between them they held her, bearing her up against the swelling waves. She glimpsed Drachea being carried likewise between two more, and her exhausted mind gave silent and fervent thanks. Her last desperate plea had been answered - these strange, rare, telepathic beings had answered her call and, in their enigmatic way, had chosen to help her. They had come from the gods alone knew where, to aid an alien being in distress, and the debt she owed was one that could never be adequately repaid.

  The first fanaan called again, and its companions joined in the chillingly beautiful song. Exhaustion washed over Cyllan as the creatures surged forward, and the eldritch singing of her saviours tumbled into a miasma of bizarre sea-dreams as she slid thankfully into unconsciousness.

  She woke, to find herself lying face-down on shingle.

  The world was still again - in the background the sea still beat and boomed relentlessly, but the rocking of the cold tide had ceased. She had been brought to shore and the fanaani were gone.

  Slowly, Cyllan pulled herself up until she was kneeling on the hard shale. Water streamed from her hair and clothes, and her limbs shivered involuntarily with the saturating cold. It was still night - a white sea-mist permeated the darkness and made phantoms out of the jagged rocks that surrounded her. At her back, the shingle sloped away to a dully roaring tideline, strewn with jetsam that the sea had rejected. Before her -

  Before her, a black granite wall rose sheer into the sky, reflecting no light. The shore stretched dismally away to either side, offering no sanctuary, and when she struggled to focus her eyes upward she saw only the cliff, towering beyond the boundaries of vision. The fanaani had brought her to land - but a cruel, harsh land that bore no resemblance to anything she knew.

  Something moved nearby, rattling the shingle, and Cyllan turned in shock. Five paces away, Drachea Rannak sat with his back propped against the rock face. He was staring at her, but his eyes were glazed and she was sure he didn’t recognise her. Shock … the ordeal had proved too much for him … but at least he, too, lived.