by Andre Norton
Then—
Pain such as I had never known before racked my body. I cried out.
Ursilla held the belt over the flames in the brazier, feeding the length of the strap to them little by little. As the fire licked at fur and hide, so did it also eat upon my flesh.
“Kill,” she cried. “Kill or die in torment!”
The victory might well be hers! I could not hold long my concentrated will as the agony ate into my mind and body. But while I could—that I would.
Of Sorcery Wrought and Unwrought and How We Learn Our Destiny
Through a red mist of pain I saw Aylinn lift her flower wand in my direction. There followed an instant or two of relief from torment. Only it did not hold. Again the flames engulfed me as they avidly licked the belt Ursilla dangled into their reach.
Then, in spite of my torture, I saw the belt begin to writhe in Ursilla's hold, even as a living thing might fight for freedom. With a mighty jerk, it tore loose from her fingers and moved through the air. A hand arose, caught it.
Gasping, I stood free of the torment of those last moments. The belt lay in the hands of her whom Aylinn had named Gillan and Green Witch. Beside her crouched the snow cat, eyes aglare in the reflection of the brazier fire. Ursilla tottered. The force of the pull that had brought the belt out of her grasp had upset her not only bodily, but threatened her control of the force she had summoned.
She stared first, unbelievingly, at her empty hand, then raised her head slowly and looked at the two who stood just without the circle of the seated ones. No shadows of the dark concealed them. Perhaps the light, which made them so plain to our eyes, came from the Power, as well as the illumination generated within the circle.
I saw Ursilla's face change. No years had drawn the flesh from her bones, but, in the few moments she confronted the two, age settled deep upon her, so that her coif framed a face that was close to a skull's visage.
“Who—are—you—?” Her words grated forth rustily. She might have been speaking against her will.
“Those summoned—” the Green Witch replied. “Did you believe, Wise Woman, you might call one of kin, without others also coming?”
“Kin!” Ursilla was recovering from the shock that confrontation had caused her. She threw back her head, a cackle of hideous laughter loud in this place. “Claim you this one”—she pointed to Aylinn—“as kin? You are wrong, woman! She is no blood of your blood. You and your furred lord did not have the fashioning of her! If you would see the child you truly bore—look to this fool!” Now her pointing finger moved to me.
“So we have heard—” Gillan showed no surprise. “There has been free talk among you and we have ears. Son—” she looked past Ursilla straight at me. “Take what is yours!”
Through the air she tossed the belt and I caught it. It came to my hand as neatly as it had gone to hers earlier. I made haste to fasten about me the singed belt but, as my fingers caressed it, I could not now discover any signs of fire damage upon it.
Ursilla snarled as a beast would snarl. Her wand swept up as if to ward off an attack. But I had already locked the jargoon buckle. The sword was in my hand. My own gaze was for Aylinn. What did it mean to her to have this old truth now bared? She who was one with Gillan and Herrel—
But—still she was one with them! I knew it as I looked upon her, for I could sense the strong Power that united them. Daughter of their bodies she might not have been, but daughter of their hearts and minds, that she truly was. She showed no surprise, her serenity remained. It belonged to one secure in who and what she was.
“Did you think, Wise Woman,” Gillan asked, “that one could pass through the truth of Neave's own Fane and not learn even what sorcery strives to hide? This is our child by the will of those far greater than we ever hope to know—”
As I looked upon them, the Green Witch who was my mother, the Were who had fathered me, and Aylinn who was their chosen child, I could understand the justice of their choice. In me there was a cold desolation growing. Not from fear, but from the pressure of the loneliness I had known all my life, but that now was given meaning and completion.
I was no heir to Car Do Prawn. Maughus would have what he had always sought. Now I could be no tool for Ursilla's shaping either, since the truth was known. I was—apart and alone.
The retreat into self was my mistake. For Ursilla attacked. Her wand flashed up, its tip pointing at Aylinn. Fire burst, enwreathed my Moon Witch, hid her from sight. I heard a cry from out of the fire.
Then I leaped into flames that curled about me, caused a moment of raw agony. My lunge brought me to Aylinn.
I threw out my left arm to bear her back, away from the dancing tongues of flame.
We were together in a circle of fire, fire that burned not orange and red, but with hues a deeper, deadly color—the purple of the Shadow. We could not retreat farther, for our backs were against the rigid knees of the seated figure, about which the purple wall of shifting fire crept closer.
The Moon Witch held her staff against her breast. I could feel the rhythm of a chant throughout her body, though she did not open her lips. As she had done for me, so I tried in turn to do for her—to give her my strength to serve her purpose.
Then I moved swiftly, dropping the useless sword, catching her by her slender waist to toss her up upon the lap of the stone one. There was room there for her above the flames. Perhaps, before they could reach her, Gillan and Herrel might evoke an answer to the horror Ursilla had wrought.
Through the ever narrowing, creeping advance of the fire I could see the others. Ursilla worked feverishly, drawing about her feet with the tip of her wand another circle to enclose her, and the brazier. She threw something from the breast of her robe into the stone cup. More smoke arose to hide her. But her chanting I could hear—the hissing, slurred words to evoke the unknown sorcery of this place. Through the smoke I heard, a moment later, the shrill note of the bone whistle—a frantic summons.
“Kethan—up!” It was Aylinn's voice. She had curled up in her strange place of refuge and now reached toward me. But there was no room. And the purple flames gave off that which made my breath strangle in my throat, so that I choked and retched, as if all the evils of the world poured from within in a foul fog.
“Up!” Aylinn clawed at my shoulder. Her nails left red lines on my skin. I could feel the force of her will also, drawing me in the same way the spell Ursilla had laid had drawn me, first to her and then back to this cursed place.
Somehow her will did bring me up, so we huddled together on the lap of the seated one. It was not the figure that held the limp man-toy, for which I was dimly grateful. In its claw hand was a half-open flower. Now I saw Aylinn put forth her own hand to run fingertips across the stone petals, even as she might touch one of her moon-flowers.
She no longer was tense with the will to power which had been in her when first the fire ringed me round. Rather she waited—though for what event or signal, I did not know.
Ursilla's protective circle touched upon the base of the seated one with the man-toy. Now smoke whirled out in thick coils to enclose it along with Ursilla herself. I waited for more to flow around the circle, engulfing one of the faceless beings and then the next as it had done before. However, this time the puffs of smoke remained stationary. Through the upper reaches we could see, faintly, the flow of the globe face above us. In it colors spun with increasing force, growing ever darker.
The flames crept now to the foot of the statue on which we had taken refuge. It appeared to me that the fire burned with anger, if that can be said of fire, lashing out with many tongues in an attempt to reach us. Yet the highest flames were well below us.
For a moment (Though how long might that last?) we seemed safe. I gazed eagerly beyond the flames to see what chanced with the others. Ursilla remained hidden in her smoke veil. The three from the Keep huddled together, their eyes wide with fear. Whatever spell Ursilla had put upon Maughus was slowly passing. The Lady Eldris clung to him
. He had freed one arm and raised it before them both. Though he was weaponless, his gesture was one of defense. Beyond them, near their feet, crouched the Lady Heroise. All her arrogance had ebbed. She did not any longer even weep as she had when she had come at Ursilla's bidding. Her face was blanched with fear, her staring eyes fixed upon the smoke cloud that concealed the Wise Woman. It was that, which drew all their attention. None looked at us above the flames.
There was good reason for that. Even the most insensitive of living creatures, one with no vestige of talent, would certainly have been aware of the forces collecting in that long-forgotten shrine (if shrine it was). Ursilla had thrown open some Gate—
One of the Gates of legend? Aylinn's head turned against my shoulder as that thought slipped into my mind. I read the wonder in her eyes.
We, who were born after the great struggle between the Powers of Arvon, knew only through legends what had occurred in the dim years of long ago. We had Chronicles that spoke often of the Gates and what could be summoned through them. (It was far harder to expel such aliens back through the uncanny openings in the skin of our world.)
But of the nature of the Gates themselves, or the keys that opened them, or where they might be situated, that knowledge was never made plain in the tales. Such was forbidden, shunned by all who dwelt in the Power—unless the Shadow now meddled in some way; for a check upon these of the Greater Dark was ever hard to keep.
It was well within reason, I believed, that this place could mark one Gate. And, if Ursilla, in her madness, threw it open—
Where were the two from the Tower? I had been so bemused, first by Aylinn's great danger, and then by the sorcery of the Wise Woman, I had almost forgotten them. Now I shifted as well as I could in the small cramped space of our refuge trying to sight them. However, the bulk of the figure, on which we sheltered, cut them from view. Aylinn's hand closed on mine.
Her flowered wand shifted in her other hand, pointed toward the flower carved in the figure's hold. She tilted the rod carefully so that its tip rested in the heart of the stone flower.
“Give me,” she said in a voice so low it could not have reached beyond my own ears, “give me all you have to give—kinsman!”
She did not glance toward me, rather fastened her full concentration upon the flower and the wand tip. A moment later, I knew that she had now become a channel for force, some of it raised by her own calling, some drawn from me. Though I was not practiced in such matters, I strove, as I had to separate man and beast, to release to her what small aid I could give.
So intense was my desire, my whole world narrowed to the small point where wand touched the carven flower. I could feel the energy going out of me, caught up by Aylinn, refined, strengthened, interwoven with what she had to give in turn. Then only did it flow down her wand.
Brighter blazed the moonflowers, the pure white radiance clear and clean above the sullen purple of the flames that still strove to consume us. The wand changed to a shaft of moon fire, eye-hurting in its brilliance.
Still Aylinn called upon me, still I gave freely, not reckoning any future cost.
Now, where the point of the wand touched, there showed a pale circle of fire. That, too, grew, brightened, spread out and up, to make the petals of stone resemble those of the moonflowers, as if the rock carving was transformed by our force of desire into a living thing.
I was dimly aware, even through my concentration, of something else. There was a change in the figure where we sheltered. Vibration ran through the substance of the shrouded body, not the vibration of breath, or heartbeat—but—akin to that!
I dared not allow myself to think of anything but what Aylinn would do now. I willed away suspicion of such change.
The flower was fully alight, to the very tips of its petals, not as purely bright as the moon blooms, rather silver instead. From the petal tips broke thin spirals of radiance, until what we could see, in truth, was not just the stone flower, but a much greater and more wonderful bloom sketched in the air about it.
Slowly the stone petals began to open further, folding back, as might those of a bud in full warmth of day. The other radiant petals, which the first guarded as a core, did likewise.
Out of the core emerged a sliver of silver light, another, more. I had seen field flowers, after blooming, scatter seeds that bore tufts of stuff upon them to aid their wind flight. Out and out flew these bits of light. Some vanished into Ursilla's smoke wall, some dropped sooner into the purple of the flames at our feet.
Aylinn raised her wand. She looked up and around over her shoulder, seeming to seek out the globe face that hung above us. The drain of energy had ceased. I felt too weakened to move. Yet, somehow, I forced myself to do as she had done.
There was still the ceaseless roll and swell of color captured within the oval. But—there was something else!
Had I seen it? Or had my imagination only for a moment made me think that I perceived eyes marked there, eyes that regarded me as if from a very great distance—eyes to which I meant little or nothing, eyes drowsy from sleep? I am not sure, and yet I believed that I did see this.
If such eyes did look upon us, they were quickly gone again. In Aylinn's hand her wand grew dark and drab. From its length the moonflowers withered, falling in seared bits. The stone flower and the radiance around it were gone. Where the seedlings (if seedlings the splinters of light had been) had fallen, there had been other results.
Of those that had met our prisoning flames, we could see no remains, but their passing was marked. For in certain places the circle of fire was quenched, leaving openings that no outward surge of fire could cross and close.
Also, in Ursilla's wall of concealing smoke, other light seedlings had torn wide windows. Through these we could look upon what happened as she called upon all she had learned to serve her in this time and place.
Now I could see that Gillan and Herrel had moved forward, to one of the windows in the smoke. The snow cat crouched low. Pard memory tightened my own muscles as the black tip of the silver-white tail quivered.
He leaped—threading through the window in the smoke expertly. Behind him, Gillan thrust forward with her leaf-tipped rod, aimed at Ursilla's head.
The Wise Woman had been standing with head flung back, her eyes shut, pouring from her mouth the stream of hissing, slurring calls. Now her head rocked forward as if dealt a shock. Her words, if words they were, were choked for a breath or so. At that moment, her incantation hesitated, the snow cat swung out a mighty paw in a blow such as few even of that great breed might hope to equal.
Claws raked and then caught. The brazier was overbalanced and fell. Out of its hollow spewed the burning stuff Ursilla must have mixed with such care. There was no more smoke arising from the scattered bits, quickly fading to ashes. The cloud of smoke, already in the air, began to fade.
But—
A cry arose in my own throat, echoed hoarsely from the dark. For the seated figure near Ursilla had—moved!
From its claw hand the man-toy fell limply, tossed aside as something now without value. But the claws hovered above the snow cat, closing in. I heard a Were-roar of defiance. Saw Ursilla's mouth stretch over sounds that seemed to distort her human lips. She lashed out at the cat, and he retreated before her wand as she drove him back under the slowly descending hand.
What could be done? Aylinn cried from beside me. I could not listen coherently to what she said. Rather I concentrated upon what I must do.
Gillan's leaf point quivered now. The wand to which it was fastened wavered back and forth. Her face was drawn by fear, not for herself, but for Herrel.
Then—not knowing I had made the descent—I was on the pavement. My fingers closed about the hilt of the sword I had dropped at the foot of the figure. This in hand, I staggered forward, forcing my drained body to do my will.
The snow cat had easily made the leap through the opening in the smoke. But the wall, save for that, was still intact. I had no time to hunt another doorw
ay, nor did I have the strength to raise myself through the one that existed. I had only the sword—and to some sorcery iron was a deadly thing.
I drew on all the energy still in me, raised my arm shoulder high. Then I hurled the blade as I might have a spear.
Through the window in the smoke it carried. I had had such a short time in which to aim. And my weakness betrayed me. The point did not strike at Ursilla. Instead, it clattered feebly against her wand.
There was a brilliant flash of light, so great as to half-blind me. I threw up my arm to shield my eyes. So—I had failed!
“Kethan!”
Aylinn's hands were upon my shoulders. I knew her touch even though I could not see her.
I blinked, perceiving only a haze ahead, one shot through with color. Through it, in some strange fashion, padded on four feet an indistinct animal shape. The snow cat!
Gillan closed in upon my left, even as the cat reached us. I blinked again, rubbed my eyes, hoping to clear away the fog born from the flash.
Now the last of the smoke was whirled away by a wind that arose out of nowhere. Crouched against the feet of the figure who had answered her spell-call was the Wise Woman.
By her feet lay the sword, its blade half melted, blackened. Of her wand there was no sign at all.
Ursilla was the focus of that wind. Under its buffeting, she cowered close to the pavement—and—She was—
She was gone! There was a length of cloth that had been her coif, a tangle of robe. But she was gone. Over where she had crouched hung the empty claw hand that had reached for a new toy to hold throughout the centuries.
“Her power”—Gillan's voice reached me dimly through the wind that still wailed—“her power was broken and then recoiled! She is—finished!”
“So be it!”
That was another voice, one I knew. Maughus moved away from the two women, watched us with eyes in which there was little of sanity left.
“If you think to take Car Do Prawn—” All that had happened appeared to mean nothing to him, his own cause was all that mattered. And he spoke thus to Aylinn.