by Andre Norton
The foundation of that was iron-hard clay with drifting sand about weird, heat-tortured growths of strange vegetation or the skeletons of such which a touch would reduce to powder. This was a different kind of blasted country but I could not help comparing it to that other which now lay a sea away.
In spite of all my efforts, my head nodded and my eyes closed. At some point in that struggle sleep won and I must have fallen forward on a pocket of sand.
Through the dark in which sleep held me there came sound—a thin wailing which had all the great sorrows of a country spun into that single thread. I thought I had dreamed it, but when I blinked awake, bemused and disorientated, not sure of where I was, that wailing continued.
There was a night wind blowing from the south and its strength must have carried that plaint. The moon was up but its light was not reassuring. As I looked, bleary-eyed, around it seemed to me that the copses I could clearly see cast very odd and disturbing shadows on the ground. Something a-wing blundered near me. I was instantly alert, picturing in that air one of the monsters. But if that were so the creature made no attack. Rather it dropped in a hunter's strike and a thin squeal cut the pattern of the wailing for an instant, before the flyer arose again, prey which was no more than blot as far as I could see clipped between its taloned feet.
I heard then a clicking which came from upstream. There were stones heaped there, so thickly drawn together (and absent elsewhere along the water's run) that one could believe that tumble was the last of some ruin so far gone that only traces remained. Out of what seemed to be the heart of that tumble was something emerging. I got groggily to my feet, but for the moment I moved no farther.
There was a patch of full moonlight uncut by any shadow between me and that place of stones. To my eyes the creature pulling itself out of the rubble was large, and growing larger as it continued to scramble free. Once it slid down the fringe of the stone it stood erect!
The thing was humanoid from the outline of its dark body and it walked on two hind feet, its upper limbs swinging free by its sides. Then it passed from out of the fringe of the stone into that patch of moonlight. There it stood, hunched over, its head thrust forward, seeming to rest on very little neck but rather on the shoulders. There was no bulk to it, rather it was painfully thin, both upper and lower limbs hardly more than skin-covered bones, though the body was bloated and as round as if it had swallowed whole a rock such as those it had sheltered among.
The thing was female. Once it might have worn clothing, for there were a few remaining tatters of foul stuff hanging from a belt which confined the top of that paunch. Long hair was matted on the head and fell in clotted strands about face and shoulders. In fact the face was so veiled by that that I could not make out the features.
Not until the thing threw back its head and opened jaws to give forth a howl such as might rise from some starving animal. As with the arms and legs the facial skin was drawn tight over bones, the lips so stretched as to show teeth even when the mouth was closed, as it was after that ululating cry had gone forth.
I tightened grip on my rod as the head moved forward a fraction. At that moment I found myself unable to either attack or retreat. Yet I knew that it had seen me. Arms moved, hands with long nails, some raggedly broken, came up, those fingers spread as if to tear at my throat.
It leaped forward and I slashed with the rod, which struck one of those hands so that the arm fell limply to the creature's side. It did not howl this time, rather it slavered words which I did not; understand. Then it halted to begin a short sidewise movement.
I turned also, to keep facing it. It was plain that even if my blow had given it a wound, it had no intention of abandoning the hunt. For that was what it was doing—it played hunter and I was the prey. Since I had left Estcarp I had seen the creature of the sea, and the airborne hunters, both unnatural by the standards of the northern lands. But this was not wholly strange; it was the worse because it aped my own species, and yet it was such a foul thing as I could not imagine any woman of my kind becoming.
It snarled. I saw the shoulders hunch a little more and I was sure that it was preparing once more to attack. This time I went to meet it, swinging my rod with a whistling note in the air. I landed a second blow which fell on shoulder.
It cried out and strove to raise the injured arm, with the fingers of the other hand making clawing motions in the air as if it thought to reach me but was miscalculating the distance between us. Once more I raised the rod—
This time it cowered back, halfway into a blot of shadow. It was mewling like a voiceless beast, yet here and there came a sound which was not unlike a word. When I took a determined step forward it retreated, backing towards the rock pile from which it had come, stumbling over one of the stones and falling to its knees.
Shaking its head from side to side, it clawed at the stones seeking aid to get once more to its feet, yet that effort seemed too much for it. Then it squatted there unmoving. Its head went back so that the face was wholly exposed to the sky. I could see tear trails on its sunken cheeks. Bracing a shoulder against the rubble it held forth its unhurt hand, not in menace as before but rather as if begging mercy or help. For a long moment we faced each other so and then it slipped sidewise, going limp upon the outer fringe of stone.
Its breath was coming in flutters and it clutched at one of the flat breasts on its bony chest. Twice it raised its head a fraction, the sunken eyes fast on me, and both times its mouth moved to shape what I thought must be words.
The hair-matted head fell back as the breast heaved once, twice, and then the creature was very still. I waited but it did not move again. Then I ventured on towards it. I had been aware earlier of the stench, but now it seemed a hundredfold and I could not bring myself to touch the quiet body, even being near it I gagged and fought nausea.
I circled to approach the pile of rocks from which this foul caricature of a woman had come. There was a dark hole there like a well opening. When I reached it from the back, on the opposite side from that point where lay the dead, the smell was even worse. However, I sighted something which continued to draw me.
Between two or three of the stones on this side of the pile there was a faint glow of light which had not been cast by the moon. Its source must lie within that pile. That the dead had some form of light, a fire, was hard to believe. I only knew that that was a treasure worth the peril of invading any den it might have used.
So I climbed the pile of stones with all care and stood by that well entrance. The odor was near overpowering yet, looking down now, I could indeed see that glimmer. I lowered myself into the hole. The moaning on the night Wind, which had awakened me, continued but it was interrupted now and then by stretches of silence. During one of those I entered the den, listening for any sound which might suggest that there was a second inhabitant.
The stones were so roughly set together (yet they did not shift under my weight) that it was like descending a ladder. I was out of the well passage and into a room. That it was a room I was sure by the regularity of the walls and the fact one could trace the joins between massive blocks. This was indeed a remnant of some ruin made for defense or living quarters. The light continued to hold my attention. On the floor stood a cylinder, part glass—at least it was frosted and yet the light came through—and part metal.
it had been set close to a heap of what looked like broken-off branches of the copse boughs and mashed wads of the net stuff I had seen on the stream rocks. In that noisome nest there lay a shrunken thing which I looked at only once and then turned from in a hurry. Whatever the huntress had once been she had not stayed alone in this den—those were the remains of a child!
I caught up the lamp ih a hurry and went to reclimb into the night. In me there Was turmoil. I could not believe that the mother had lived such a beast life—what had brought her to this hole with her child? Of what people was she?
Outside I put aside the lamp on the ground, finding by experimentation it could be tu
rned on and off by pressing a button on one side of the base. Leaving it off and setting aside my rod, I pushed myself into a task I could not leave undone.
Though my whole body shrank from What I did, I made myself pull the corpse of the woman back to the edge of the well. Having no rope nor any to hold me I could only push it over, to fall to the floor of that age-old chamber. Then I hurried to move stones, to cover over that opening. I was weeping when I had done, for sorrow had grown within me as I worked. After I had set the last stone to close that tomb chamber I took forth Gunnora's amulet. There was no glow from it, but, as always, it was warm in my hand. I held it out and passed it back and forth across the heap of stones.
“Let that which is of earth return to earth.” I drew from memory words I had heard in the past. There had never been a time when I had said such for any I had ties upon, for even when I had been a fosterling, I had not been heart welcome to those with whom I abode. Why should the dreary death of that creature which was no longer human put such a spell on me that I must do this thing?
“Let the inner spark which is life return to THAT WHICH SENT IT. May she who lies here be troubled no more and may SHE WHO GUARDS all womenkind welcome this one into the House of Peace through the last of all gates!”
In my hand the amulet blazed, the blue light of it seeming to seep through the cracks which my rough covering had left, as might spring rain falling to nourish waiting seed. Then that which had come from Gunnora vanished and by the pile of stone, with the morning star shining slowly, I was alone.
That pile of stone was not the Only sign that once there had been more here than barren land. As the sky grew lighter, and I was able to see farther ahead, I noted other heaps of rubble fanning put from the river into the plain. Yet only the stones eroded by the ages remained and none of them held anymore any shape from which their original purpose might be read.
I had no desire to search farther for any remnant of life for I was sure that she whom I had found here had been alone, starving, and hopeless. Had she like me been brought here through some disaster at sea, marooned on this coast Without any hope of rescue? Could she even have been from such a ship as the derelicts which had been found? There was no telling now.
Once more I hunted in the stream and made a meager morning meal of the armored things which lurked among water-worn rocks. With such to tend why had the dead one starved? Unless she had had no training at all in living off the land.
In me once more awoke the urging to be on my way. Still I did not yield to it at once. My meeting with the victim of this place might have loosened in a little the geas laid on me. I cupped the amulet and for the first time dared that which the Lady Jaelithe had warned against—I sent out a mind call, striving so to find the craft which had brought me here. Had that kept on the course which I had last seen it follow it must already have touched the shore—perhaps finding some temporary anchorage there—before I myself had made my perilous journey.
So recklessly I sought a mind, any hint of there being, survivors of our expedition within range of my sending. And I picked up—
No! That was none of what I had always known as human kind. This was Power of a sort but none that I could put name to. And it came not from the seashore behind me but rather from some source to the south of where I stood in the rising of the sun.
I jerked back instantly and strove to raise my shield, expecting a probe in return. None came. It was almost as if die source was asleep or so engrossed in some purpose of its own that my touch had not betrayed me. I still could not think of it being emitted by something that had life as I knew it. However, for all my wandering, what did I know of this world? Not even the Sulcars had plied their trade this far south—or if some ship had recklessly penetrated hereabouts it had not returned to tell of it. Only Captain Harwic had seen the barren islands and he and the Wave Skimmer had not lingered long.
I thought of Laqit, that fabled last guardian in our lore. All the tags and tatters of very old tales which I had heard during my wanderings had never hinted at the nature of Laqit. I was tempted to use the amulet, to try to raise again that face which I had seen. That, indeed, had human features. But there were entities of whom I had heard that had the power of full glamorie, who might take any form they wished and so present themselves to those they wanted to beguile, even as there were beasts do battle in either human or animal form. Though those did not become their animal parts except when danger threatened. And what danger could I be to anyone with my half gifts, one of which always carried calamity with it?
One thing did follow my reckless meddling, there descended swiftly upon me now the full force of that compulsion which had set me traveling. Whether I would or no I strode among and between those piles of rock heading not due south but angling to the west more than I had the day before.
This trail was taking me away from the stream upon which I had come to depend both for the food and Water it could offer and for a guide which could not be lost. I fought to keep beside it, only to have increasing pressure applied on me to leave it behind.
There was no way I could carry water with me. As for food—the dead-alive land about me gave no promise of any successful hunting. I did have the unusual light I had found in the dead woman's den slung to my back by a cord I had made from the networks on the stones twisted together. That I did not need with the sun climbing higher in the sky at my back. It did not take long for the heat of that to become an evil instead of a welcome good. The rays striking my skin through the tatters of my skirt were burning worse than even those of the harvest fields. Yet except for those dire-appearing copses of interlaced, towering shrubs there was no place which promised any relief from the sun.
I had perforce left the stream well behind me and could pick out a dark line to the west which marked a continuation of the cliff wall when I caught a small touch of life force. One more step and it was as if a portion of the ground itself, directly before me, took wing and flew ahead but no higher than I could reach with my rod, uttering sharp cries. .For a moment I nearly tripped over my own feet. The flying thing was clearly some species of bird, having nothing of the winged monsters about it. Nor did it keep to the air long; perhaps it was not accustomed to extended or soaring flights for it settled back to the ground and immediately thereafter it vanished. The plumage which was its cover was also its defense for that was the same greyish shade as the earth, even carrying spots and lines which mimicked that of the ground thereabouts. However, having once seen it, and had its life spark register on my mind, I was able to take this gift of fortune with a swift blow by the rod. Preparing it for the eating was a much harder task, and there was no way of cooking it. Again I ate raw the fruits of a hunt.
Having Once picked up this touch of life force I was sure I could pinpoint it again. I went on pulled by that tie, yet relieved that I did not face such a fate of sheer starvation as had that pitiful thing back by the river.
Water I came across at the same time as I made my kill, in fact the bird fell to my blow because it must have been absorbed in appeasing its own thirst. It had pulled up the soil from around one of those repulsive insect-capturing plants to bare a large bulb that was studded with holes and oozing liquid. With infinite care I put finger to that moisture, smelled it. To my nose it had no scent, and then I licked on that dribble of sap. It had a sharp, sour taste but it allayed my heat-born thirst. I had the whole bulb but of the ground swiftly and punched a larger hole in it. The liquid actually spurted and I caught and swallowed as fast as I could the bounty it yielded.
So having my bodily wants answered, I went on—though my unwillingness to going so at another's will grew. I did not struggle. There might be a very good reason for me to conserve such Power as I had against some future confrontation. I knew only too well how helpless I always was after I had drawn upon my talent to the utmost. Nowhere here were to be found the herbs and tending which a farseer must have after such an ordeal.
Though whatever moved me apparently had ca
re enough to allow me to rest and take my own pace. It was late afternoon and the sun was a blow against my face and eyes when I stumbled forward a last few steps and came to my knees in the shade of a tall outthrust of what was mingled hardbacked clay and stones. I sat there, panting, for some time, looking but not seeing, content just to have this much alleviation from the burning heat I had been facing this day.
I do not know just when my unseeing stare tightened into a seeing one. There was a curved length of what could only be bone protruding from the side of-that hillock. Beyond that marker there were, other such, some half buried in the ground, some lying in the surface. While within reach there was a skull, its empty eye sockets turned toward the wasteland over which I had been traveling. These were not the remains of just one body. On my hands and knees I crawled partly around the hillock that I might see the other side.
There stood another such outcrop and beyond more reaching back to the cliff which did rise again before me. While bones were piled thickly about, some lying one over the other. There were whole skeletons which had been laid out correct to the last small bone and in other places bones were scattered as if flung about heedlessly.
Only what caught my eyes now were not these remains but what lay among them, about them, under them. There was the glint of metal, even the brilliant flash of gem-stones, and shreds of cloth, rotted and rendered colorless by time.
I did not feel as I had when I had buried as well as I could that wasted body by the stream. So old and fleshless were these that I felt no kinship with them. Thus I dared now to do what many of my species would have done. I foraged among the long-dead.
It is a firmly held belief among the Sulcars—and perhaps among the fighters of other races also—that to take up dead-held weapons was to invite into one's own inner life he or she who had last borne the sword, or knife, or spear. I would be deemed unclean, doubly suspect to Dark blood, had any of my late shipmates watched me now.