by Andre Norton
“Do you warn and in the same breath tell us that we are foredoomed?” the Falconer asked. “Was this the meaning of your statement to Una that our time was short when you tried to draw her to your will?”
“It was not, to answer your second question first the peril I foresaw then came of reason only and was of a more general nature, stemming from the disturbance of old guards and old balances taking place all around us. This other situation has just come to my attention, for only the most recent slaughter at the Cradle made of it a threat sufficient to activate my danger senses. Before that, I was as ignorant of it as you.”
Her eyes measured him, as if wondering if he was in any sense fit to carry the charge fate had laid on him.
“No, I do not say you are foredoomed, but take care to end this man's evil quickly, then seek aid from both the Amber Lady and the Homed Lord—who is her consort, Falconer—to help cleanse the place and set secure seals upon it.
“Above all, Una, my sister, see to it that this rock is not again used as an altar to receive the blood and the lives of butchered men.”
Once more, she became still. Her look was sorrowful when she gave her attention back to the mercenary.
“I have no certain information for you or yours, Bird Warrior, but I am possessed of knowledge not open to you of shorter memory, and I can tell you this much. The curse which you have so long feared may someday relatively soon be brought to an end, either that or come to life once more. For my part, I believe it shall be the former since many races populate this realm and no other is as susceptible to, that doom as your own.”
She saw him start and nodded.
“Your history is known to me. It was the Shadow and the destruction its coming caused which was responsible for the loss of so much of our world's lore, and I am what would be had we been spared that plague. Your people are old in this realm, one of the earliest to reach it, and you should be one of the best fitted to live with it. You have been blighted, and now the shade of extinction looms over you all. I say this to you, though, as a gate once brought you to this place, yet another may be your saying, or the saving of those and that which is best amongst you.”
She turned to Una.
“From you, sister, I crave pardon for my earlier, harsh·words. You were right to fear what was of the Dark. Only believe that I had not seen the supposed solution to my hunger which I proposed as such until I pondered our break. I wronged you, and yours is the right to shun me, yet our association is old, the friendship of two lonely little girls and, later, of two lonely women. I would not see that shattered even for so strong a cause.”
“It is not,” the Holdlady replied firmly. “The place you have ever held in my heart is yours still.”
“Thanks given, dear sister, for that and for air your regard. We may not meet again, and I would wish you now fortune in the struggle ahead and fortune in your life, be it long or very short.”
With that, almost without warning, the alien Una rose to her feet arid stepped into her passage gate. In another moment, she was gone from their sight.
Tarlach held the Holdruler against him, as if fearing she might even now be swept into the closing gate. Only when all sign of it had vanished from the chamber did he release her.
“Una, I would have you march with your people…·.
Her eyes locked with his, and there would have been more yielding in the heartstone of Seakeep's mountains.
“Under no circumstances will I allow you to take that weight of responsibility upon yourself. We share it between us, you as my war leader, I because it is my Dale and my will that presses this war, and we shall witness and share the consequences of our warring since continue with it we must” Her voice softened. “Would I survive long if the Dark were loosed, Tarlach?”
“No. If the gate opens, we are all slain,” he conceded “Soon or late, it would swallow us.”
“Then say no more. I, for, one, prefer to know and meet my fate at once.”
His shoulders squared.
“It is time to go.—Would you have me tell the others this news?”
Una thought for a while.
“No,” she said in the end. “Not my folk, at least. They must fight in any event. Why throw this added terror on them when naught they can do will alter what we risk?” She paused. “It may be otherwise with your comrades. They will press the attack at the Cradle itself.”
He shook his head.
“Like you, I would not blight their spirit with the dread of a possibility over which they have no control. Let them remain free to concentrate on fighting men without having to bear the fear of waking ultimate evil.”
The pair found all in readiness when they entered the great hall. They quickly made their farewells to those who were not to accompany them and then started for the door and the vessel which would carry them to battle and, perhaps, to the deciding of their world's fate.
Elfthorn was standing with his crew at the entrance of the tower, but instead of merely, wishing them fair fortune as did the rest, he matched his pace with theirs.
“A boon if you will, Captain “
“What would you have of us, friend?” Tarlach asked, already guessing what he would say.
“A crewman's place aboard the Tern. I told you Gunwold and I were rivals and that there was no hatred between us, but I did not say that we had lived as fosterlings on one bark. I would avenge his death and avenge also the suffering this Lord of Ravenfield has caused you both, who gave me and mine our lives arid then received us so kindly.”
‘The place is yours and a place with the boarding party as well. Your strength and courage will be welcome to us in the fight ahead.”
24
Tarlach stood on the deck of the Tern watching Ravenfield's harsh, beautiful coast. He had lain aside his helmet once more, and the cloak in which he was wrapped was one such as any of Seakeep's mariners might have worn. With their mission so near its crisis, he would do nothing which might announce his true intentions to his enemies. Most particularly, he did not want to reveal the presence of Falconers aboard this vessel before the time of attack was upon them.
He had felt somewhat nervous at first, remembering his short-lived but paralyzing panic aboard the Dion Stair, but the unpleasant reaction had not recurred, and he felt sure now that he was free of it.
All the same, his spirits were low. If his plan failed, there could be months of slaughter before the Dale he had come to love. That was a dark prospect and one on which none of his company liked to dwell. Of that, he was certain.
He could be sure of little else regarding his comrades’ feelings about Seakeep. That they liked the holding he knew, but he would not be greatly surprised to find that all or the most of them fully shared his own attachment to it. The power of these highlands was very great… .
He shook his head. Perhaps he was but covering, excusing, his other, greater weakness by trying to lay something of this outrider of it upon the rest as well.
His eyes closed. The terror he had been battling surged through his defenses, gripping him so powerfully that he had to grasp the rail to keep himself from doubling over under its lash.
What did any of this matter if the slaughter soon to take place near the Cradle should prove the final feeding that demon Dog needed? He believed the spirit. Una. He believed the sincerity of her warning and the accuracy of her reading of the threat looming over them all, and he trembled that this assault he commanded might open the gate to doom for High Hallack and perhaps for the whole of this world. It was too much. Too much responsibility for any man to have to bear… .
“Tarlach?”
His head turned at the soft call. So engrossed, had he been in his thoughts that he had not heard the Holdlady's light step.
“It was bad enough before,” he told her, paying her the compliment of not concealing the fear that he felt. She endured it as well, after all. How should they not quail? No sane being could face this challenge without dread.
“We
did rightly to keep this from our peoples,” she said. “I have no experience in the waging of war, but I think the knowing would only reduce their ability to fight even against men.’’ She drew a deep breath. “Should we go on with it, Tarlach? Una told us to stop Ogin, but the cost could be the ending of us all.”
“We must,” he replied firmly. “His continued existence and that of his butchers must in itself feed the Dog since they have gone so far in rousing it. If I. did not feel certain of that in my very bones, Ì should not risk a contest in the cove, even if it meant letting both him and the wreckers escape our vengeance.”
His head lowered, and he stared unseeing into the ocean.
“That is one of the great torments of our situation. So much rides upon, us, and yet we have little or no choice as to the action we must take.”
The captain shivered and huddled deeper into his cloak as a sharp blast of wind bit through the heavy material as if it were no more than a layer of summer lawn.
He glanced skyward in some alarm but found no threat there. This cold breeze was but part of the rapidly advancing fall and not any signal of a coming storm.
Una shared his thought.
“It looks as if winter will be early this year and harsh when it does come.”
“Aye.”
“If the fighting drags on any length of time …”
“It is riot my intention that it should drag on,” Tarlach responded rather too sharply.
He gripped himself.
“Your pardon, Lady.—Try to rest easy on that point at. least. Assuming fortune favors us at all, we should be able to bring Ravenfield to terms before the Ice Dragon bites at us in earnest.”
He raised his eyes to the shore and studied the great cliffs somberly.
“Prepare yourself now, my Lady. There is only a little time left before our assault must begin.”
Both Seakeep leaders were on deck once more as the small vessel glided noiselessly toward the deadly cove.
Tarlach's heart hammered in the wild, sharp manner he always associated with imminent battle, and he silently sent forth the short, intense prayers of a man who might soon be seeking admission into the Halls of the Valiant.
A few minutes more. Only a few …
The all-too-familiar curve of the headland screening the wreckers’ harbor came suddenly into view, only the tip of it but he knew it at once. Its form was not likely to fade from his memory for a long time to come.
Others came up from below, Falconers and crew. Working in a silence as deep as death, they loosed from her bindings the launch which had been riding the Tern's deck like some great barnacle and, when she was fully manned, lowered her into the sea. She would follow after the larger vessel, landing her cargo of warriors to secure beach and cliff while the mother ship engaged the black wrecker.
The evening was well on, and the darkening sky stained the ocean beneath a deep grey. Tarlach comforted himself with the thought that it would take eyes as keen as his falcon's to spot the two tiny craft against such a background. Their worst danger lay in sky lining themselves, and even that risk was minimized by the artful mottling which broke the outline of the sails.
The daylight, although fading, was still more than sufficient to give them a clear view of the tiny bay.
Nothing blocked its entrance now; the Dion Star had vanished as if she had never been.
No visible barrier lay between them and the harbor, the captain amended in his mind. The Cradle remained, a dire menace waiting under its concealing coyer of water for its next victim.
He shuddered despite himself. With the tide high as it was now, scarcely an abnormal ripple troubled the surface to reveal its lair to even the most practiced eye.
His thoughts did not stay long with the obstacle nature herself had set there. That was the concern of the mariners. His work was before him.
The wrecker vessel was in and apparently moored for the night. She was resting in the center of the harbor, held in place by her anchor, and her sails were furled. A few men moved about her deck with the casual air of those who anticipate no trouble from weather or their own kind. The others were most likely below. None were on the beach, which was almost covered by the tide, and he did not believe there would be any in whatever shelter they had constructed for themselves on the windswept cliff above. Of sentries, he saw no sign, nor had he expected to find them. Life here had been too secure and unruffled for anyone to feel much inclined to court discomfort in apparently needless guarding.
The Falconer's hand was on his sword. They were very near now. How much closer would they be able to come to their quarry without being sighted?
No farther! One of the seamen aboard the wrecker looked suddenly in their direction and stared as if he believed madness had seized his mind, then he scouted the alarm to his comrades.
The Tern was in the channel, almost parallel to the Headboard, by that time.
Tarlach's mouth was dry. Would she pass? This was the route the wrecker followed, but the Seakeep ship was somewhat larger and deeper of draught.
The Tern was through, sailing freely in the bay. Without pause or delay, she bore down upon her prey.
The defenders strove desperately to ready their craft for combat, but the attack came too swiftly. The invaders were upon them before they could do much more than weigh anchor.
The captain recalled all too well the efficiency of their archers. These were felled at once by his own bowmen, then eager hands made fast the two ships, and his warriors leaped to the killers’ deck.
The fighting was furious, vicious, for the wreckers knew the fate awaiting them if they were taken, and Tarlach had not misread Ogin's power to induce men of his own ilk to do battle for him. With his presence to rally them, they fought as they might not otherwise have been capable of doing.
The Falconers warred as was their wont, hard, cleanly, and with consummate ability, though they did conduct their assault with more fire than was usual with them. The crimes of which their opponents were guilty were particularly repugnant to them, as they were to all who frequently rode the waves, and each of them felt a personal need to avenge the Cormorant's death and the sufferings their commander had endured in its aftermath.
For Elfthorn, hatred and the will to vengeance were paramount, although never did he permit himself to grow careless or wild in his desire to exterminate the renegades who had betrayed and slaughtered the crew of the Dion Star.
He used skill and raw strength in equal measure. Tarlach saw him drive his blade through the breadth of a man's body, lift him on the sword, and then cast him over the side as if he had been no more than a small ham gone putrid.
That was one of the few coherent glimpses the captain managed to get of any of his companions during the course of the engagement. He had been the first to leap aboard the killer vessel, springing into the very midst of those clustered on her deck to resist the assault. He succeeded in dewing their attention for that moment from his comrades, allowing the first of them to gain their target relatively unscathed, but he himself was surrounded, and so he remained.
His position was a bad one. The men before him, around him, were capable fighters, and his own comrades could not break through their massed ranks with any speed. The wreckers appreciated that whatever little hope they had lay in their ability to support one another, and they battled mightily against the newcomers’ efforts to separate them into smaller, more readily dispatched groups. Their determination gave Tarlach neither, hope of release nor respite in his struggle to remain alive in their midst.
As seconds wore into minutes without help reaching him, his situation grew ever more desperate. No man could shield himself simultaneously on every side, and he knew his death would soon claim him.
He parried a thrust coming at him from the right. It turned from his trunk but sliced through his upper arm. A moment later, he was struck in the back. It was a glancing blow, readily deflected by his mail, but it unbalanced him, leaving him helpless for a moment b
efore the one facing him.
The wrecker lunged, but his wolfish grin of triumph turned to a scream of terror and agony as Storm Challenger dove, a fury incarnate so rending face and eyes that his ravaged victim died gladly in the next moment on the Falconer's blade.
The press against him eased abruptly. Brennan and Elfthorn each forced their way through to him, the latter using both the power of his arm and his sharp sword to throw his foes down.
Now Tarlach was able to look about him, seeking the one man his hate demanded that he kill.
He soon located him and began cutting his way through the struggling throng in order to confront him.
The Lord of Ravenfield was a doughty swordsman in his own right, and several warriors had gone down by his hand before the mercenary leader was able to reach and challenge him.
Ogin did not know who it was that he faced. He did not even suspect that anyone had escaped from the Cormorant, and, like most of those not of their race, he could not tell one Falconer from the next and so did not recognize Tarlach as the warrior who had ridden escort to Una the day they had met near the Square Keep.
He did read all too clearly the cold, implacable purpose in the mercenary. His death was determined in those half-shadowed eyes, and his own heart chilled. He knew he was not likely to walk away from this encounter.
Even without the purpose that seemed to be driving his opponent, Ogin recognized that the disadvantage was his. He was ho longer fresh. He had been wounded in the earlier fighting, and now pain and lost blood combined to give a still-sharper edge to the Falconer's basically greater skill.
For all the bitterness of his hate, Tarlach did not play with his foe once he realized the victory would be his, for that was not the way of his kind, and they strove together only a few minutes in all before the wrecker lord fell to his sword, dying before his body struck the deck.