Fireshaper's Doom

by Tom Deitz

  —And struck: launching itself abruptly toward him by force of legs and massive tail.

  David leapt back—too late.

  The creature was upon him, above him; he was lying on his back with one three-clawed foot pinning his chest and right arm to the floor, a single talon inches from his unprotected throat; while the other foot poised above his stomach for what he very much feared was to be a quick disemboweling stroke. The sound of his own heartbeat echoed back at him through the stone floor, even as he scrabbled vainly for the sword he had dropped a few feet away.

  The claw flexed; raised. Opened.

  He closed his eyes and prayed.

  The lizard made frantic chirping sounds by his ear.

  —But the claw did not fall.

  Through slitted eyes David looked up—and saw a puzzled expression widen the wyvern’s eyes. The grip on his body relaxed a fraction.

  Incomprehensible thoughts buzzed in his mind, seeming more curious and confused than threatening.

  He risked a movement, tried to slide out from beneath the creature.

  Its grip relaxed, but a tug at his throat told David it had tangled its claws in the fabric of the cloak. Another tug, though, and it freed itself, leaving a visible rent in the material.

  Carefully he stood up, and to his surprise the wyvern bounced away to stand by the open entrance to the domed chamber. It bowed its head slightly. David was reminded almost exactly of the doorman in one of those fancy Atlanta hotels.

  David took a deep breath. Heeeere we gooooo! All or nothing—before it changes its mind.

  He ducked inside—and caught his breath in wonder. Gold was everywhere, in bars or coins or armor or weapons, or vast, jeweled chalices and massive flagons and bowls. And there was silver as well, and every surface was carved or jeweled or inlaid or wound with wire in an infinity of shapes and patterns. He could have spent a lifetime there—two lifetimes—and never seen it all. A thousand pieces called out for examination. Ignoring them was the hardest thing he had ever done.

  And in the exact center of the chamber, on a plain pedestal of black stone, stood the ornate ivory curve of the Horn of Annwyn, its jeweled bands flashing even in the subdued light. Almost without conscious volition, David found himself reaching toward it.

  Still too easy—far too easy.

  He had it then, and slung the plain leather strap across his shoulder under the cloak.

  The sudden effusion of elation and relief that filled him was almost more than he could contain. He had completed the first part of his quest, even if he could not trust the means of that completion. He was almost high, high as only certain books had ever made him, books like The Lord of the Rings or Gods and Fighting Men. He was Frodo and Aragorn and Angus Og and Finn MacCumhail all in one.

  He made himself slow down, though; for he still had to escape and the wywern had damaged his cloak. He didn’t know how much longer it would be useful.

  As he reached the entrance, he paused, peering outside to see if the wyvern was still there. And as he did, something caught his eye in a rack immediately to his right, something that sent an unexpected thrill racing through his body—or was it simply the lizard’s sudden excited trilling in his ears? He frowned and turned to take a closer look.

  It was a bow of plain white wood, bound with gold about the tips. There were others with it of far finer apparent workmanship, yet he found himself drawn to that one in particular. It looked vaguely familiar. Completely by reflex he found himself reaching toward it, then hesitated, puzzled at his own action; for an instant it had seemed as if some other will had controlled his body. That bow is so damned familiar . . .

  Sudden realization dawned as he gave in to the compulsion and lifted the weapon from its place. It was Fionchadd’s bow! Goibniu the Smith of the Tuatha de Danaan had made it, the boy had told him. It was the most precious thing he owned. A piece of master weaponwork worthy of the High King of the Sidhe in Tir-Nan-Og—especially when its original owner conveniently seemed to have left no heirs.

  Perhaps Morwyn would like it as a reminder of her son, David decided, as he took the smooth wood into his hand. She had more right to it than Lugh, after all.

  The decision made, he sheathed his sword and slung the bow over his shoulder, adding a moment later the quiver of white-fletched arrows that lay beside it. And thus encumbered with sword and Horn, pouch and water flask, quiver and bow—and a cloak of invisibility bunching in and out of the multitude of straps—David began to thread his way out of the vault.

  Something whirred in his ears, and he realized finally that it was the lizard humming happily inside his cowl. Well, if the lizard was happy, so was he.

  The wyvern had resumed its place amid the carvings on the dome. David shrugged and hastened on his way, finding a path out of the maze of shifting floors and walls and doorways more quickly than he had earlier by the simple expedient of walking against the rotation of the walls, so that the openings came up more quickly.

  Up the stairs now, and onto the Iron Road, suddenly acutely aware of the thump of his tread, of the dry hiss of his panting as he struggled to maintain a quick pace up the slope.

  The slit of doorway lay before him; freedom beyond—and he was through!

  Sunlight hit him; his shadow flickered before him as he ran down the hillside.

  His shadow! Not full dark, as it should be in so intense a glare, but his shadow nonetheless. The cloak was beginning to fail.

  Down the slope at a sliding run, the quiver bouncing on his back, the sword pounding against his thigh, one hand firmly fixed on the hard curve of the Horn of Annwyn.

  It was all downhill now. He would go overland, he knew the way. A fringe of lower trees reared ahead. In a moment he would be among them, free from casual observation. In a moment he would be safe. In a moment—

  “Thief!” a clear voice sounded behind him. “Thief! Thief! Thief!”

  David spun around just in time to see a file of armed warriors issuing from a door concealed in the marble wall above him and to the left.

  And as his last shred of invisibility faded, those warriors lowered their swords one by one.

  Chapter XXXVIII: A Debate in the Night

  (Sullivan Cove, Georgia)

  JoAnne O’Brian Sullivan eyed Katie McNally dubiously. “I can’t go with you, I gotta stay here an’ wait for my boy.”

  Cold dew sparkled on the grass at her feet. She curled one set of toes across the other absently.

  “I can’t go alone.”

  The younger woman bit at her upper lip and stared at the ground. The arcane light in the sky gave her an unearthly shadow and imparted a greenish sheen to Little Billy’s blue eyes. She clutched his wrist firmly.

  “Then don’t go. Stay here. I got at least one extra bed, God knows.”

  Katie reached out shy, knotted fingers and touched JoAnne’s hand. “Why won’t you believe me?”

  “Believe what? I seen the cross in the sky, same as you. But I don’t take it as no sign. It scares me, if you want to know the truth about it.”

  “You ever know a woman my age t’ lie?”

  JoAnne heaved a weary sigh and rubbed a bare wrist across her forehead. She shook her head.

  The Trader looked up at her: so tall, so pretty—so closed to the wonder of living. “I’ve seen some things, girl. Eighty years an’ two countries. I’ve seen things most folks say can’t be seen, ’cause they ain’t there to see. But they are: I’ve seen the Fair Ones—once as a girl, and once as you see me now—an’ they scared me to death both times, but I’m still here. An’ I heard the banshee cry when my grannie died, an’ that scared me worse than I ever been. But lightnin’ I’ve seen crashin’, too; an’ storms at sea; an’ heard the thunder, and they’re frightenin’ things as well, ’cause they come when God wants ’em to, and leave by His will, and there ain’t nothin’ none of us can do but wait ’em out. But I rode in a airplane to get to this land, an’ that wasn’t no pleasure, let me tell you. An’ I been n
inety miles an hour in a box o’ flimsy tin an’ rubber, with my drunken son a’drivin’.”

  “But what makes you think that thing in the sky’s got anything to do with Davy?”

  The old woman’s brow wrinkled further. “I told you. I saw him this evenin’, saw his friends again a little later, an’ them scared to death ’cause he’d vanished. Saw a pretty red-haired girl so eaten up with love an’ fear for him she’d risk everything to find him, an’ a brown-haired boy near as bad. I ain’t got time to make things like that up. An’ I sure don’t go a’botherin’ honest folks in the middle of the night.”

  “That ain’t no proof.”

  “Well, I seen the ones who went with ’em, too. I seen the old man with the whiskers. He believed.” She glanced down at Little Billy. “This boy believes old Katie.”

  JoAnne found tears welling up in her eyes as worry and confusion warred within her.

  Katie reached into her heavy canvas bag—too shapeless to be called a purse—and felt for a hanky. Her nails clinked against metal.

  The chains. She’d forgotten about them; her mind wasn’t what it once was, even with a mission from God at hand. Or was it God? Or Those Ones—or both? Or were they all the same in the end? The stars shone on them all.

  Katie handed David’s mother the square of soft linen, then set the bag on the ground, and drew out one of the lengths of chain. “Ever see this?”

  “That’s Alec’s!” Little Billy squealed. “Or Gary’s or Runnerman’s one! I seen ’em all wearin’ ’em!”

  His mother’s eyes widened and she snatched it up.

  “Where’d you get this?”

  A trace of self-righteous arrogance ghosted Katie’s face. “Fell out of the sky. Out of that cross in the sky.”

  “Well, it belongs to one of my boy’s friends. I’ve seen them usin’ chains just like this for belts.”

  “It fell out of the sky,” Katie repeated. “As the Lord is my Witness.”

  JoAnne eyed the old woman suspiciously. “How do I know you didn’t steal it? Or find it? Hell, how do I know you didn’t kill them for it, an’ it just cheap chrome steel?”

  Katie reached in her pocket, pulled out her cross and her rosary. Held them straight before JoAnne Sullivan’s startled eyes.

  “Because Katie McNally does not lie!”

  Little Billy tugged free, started to run toward the logging road that snaked into the mountain behind the farm, then paused, bouncing from foot to eager foot.

  “Let’s go, Ma!”

  His mother had snagged him in an instant. “Go where, honey?”

  “Lookout Rock, Ma!” Little Billy cried, pointing. “It’s Davy an’ Alec’s special place. An’ that cross is right over it!”

  “You’re mighty sure, ain’t you?”

  “Come on, Ma!”

  Very, very slowly JoAnne Sullivan nodded. “Well, it’ll just take a little while to find out one way or the other, won’t it? An’ twenty years from now I’ll never miss the time. Maybe a walk up the mountain’ll help take my mind off things.” She glanced back at the old Trader woman. “I’ll put Little Billy to bed, an’ go tell Bill, an’—”

  Katie shook her head. “You was hard enough to convince.”

  “Okay, then,” said JoAnne Sullivan, as she squared her shoulders and stared first at the chain, then at her fractious son, and finally at a fading cross in the sky. “I’ve got a pair of britches a’hangin’ on the line.”

  Chapter XXXIX: Between a Rock and a Hard Place

  (The Land Beyond the Lake)

  A fluff of damp ferns brushed Liz’s face. She stopped in mid-stride to wipe a hand across her brow, looked for a dry place to rub it on her pants; found none, then dashed forward again. A little way ahead she could barely make out the hunched shape of Regan supporting the unconscious Nuada on Snowwhisper’s back. Closer in, Gary was pushing through another mass of shoulder-high fronds. One of them flipped back toward her. She slapped at it. “God, it’s sticky here,” she muttered irritably.

  “Yeah,” Alec agreed, as he trudged along behind her at the tag end of the weary company, “but at least all these leaves’ve managed to wipe off most of the blood Froech couldn’t magic away. We look almost human.”

  “You may think so.”

  Alec didn’t answer; he had slowed and was gazing around at the surrounding verdure.

  “You know,” he mused after a moment, “you could almost forget you were in another World sometimes. Places like this, for instance; it’s like the Pacific Northwest, or something. The Olympic Rainforest and all that. You know: moss all over everything, and these confounded ferns and bushes, and all this mist, and—”

  “I don’t forget, McLean,” Liz snapped, spinning around to glare at him. “I remember why we’re doing this, even if you don’t!”

  “I remember too, girl,” Alec flung back, startled at the unexpected vehemence of Liz’s remark. “He was my best friend, in case you’ve forgotten!”

  “Was? That makes him sound like he’s dead, Alec!”

  “Is my best friend, then. Satisfied?”

  “Stuff it!”

  “The hell I will! You think I don’t care? I’ve known him longer than you have!”

  Liz’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “Shut up, Alec. Just shut up!”

  My pleasure, lady. My absolute pleasure!”

  Alec paused, blinking rapidly; then: “Dammit, Liz, all I was trying to do was to take your mind off things.” A tear oozed down his cheek. He brushed it aside and looked up doubtfully, smiling an embarrassed smile.

  Liz sighed heavily, reached over to take his hand. “It’s okay, Alec. We both know what we really mean, and why. But we’re tired—tired as convicts, as Granny used to say. God knows what time it is, how long we’ve been traveling, where we are, when we’ll get food or rest.”

  “And God don’t seem to be saying,” Alec replied as they rejoined the company. “Ho! What’s that?”

  A noise reached them: muffled by vegetation at first, but becoming a louder roar as they continued forward. The earth began trembling beneath their feet. Then the thick screen of overreaching leaves and branches that obscured both the sky and the view ahead fell back.

  “Oh my God!” Liz gasped.

  It was a waterfall: plunging freely a thousand feet or more from atop a ragged rampart of glowering gray stone that erupted from the earth maybe a hundred yards ahead. A wide black pool lapped about the bottom.

  Liz found her eyes tracing the Track toward that water, hoping that some trick of perspective would deny what she now feared: that the golden road led straight beneath the torrent. “Crap,” she muttered in Alec’s general direction. “We can’t go under that!”

  “It may be we have no choice,” Regan said. “For that way lies Ailill’s trail, and it is fresher than it has ever been.”

  “Lady, look!” Froech cried from the trail ahead. “I think he fell here.”

  Keeping her arms wrapped firmly around Nuada’s waist, the Faery lady bent over to stare at a patch of matted grass.

  “How long, Froech?”

  “Not long ago at all, I think; maybe a tenth of the sun’s arc.”

  “Hear that, Liz?” AJec whispered. “Just a little way ahead of us. And then we can look for David.”

  “If he’s not dead.”

  “Don’t even think that!”

  “Sorry.”

  They said no more as Froech followed the Track to the edge of the pool, then skirted around it to the fall itself. Mist veiled him for an instant. A moment later he was back.

  “Both trail and Track lead beneath the falls,” Froech said. “But the Track has Power enough to turn aside most of the water’s force. There is a cleft in the stone behind the fall, and at its entrance I found more footprints.”

  “Any clue as to what might lie within?” Regan asked. “I do not like the notion of traveling underground with Nuada as he is.”

  Froech shook his head. “Alas, I cannot say. But Ailill’s antle
r marks show clear against the rocks to either side. He passed that way; we must therefore follow. And as for your other concern, I think it might be best if you remained here with Nuada while the rest of us go on ahead. You are, after all, our best healer; perhaps if you do not have to worry about keeping Silverhand in his seat you can help him more.”

  “Not a bad idea,” Uncle Dale observed. “I ’spect me or you could do the trackin’ now, anyway. If that there cave’s like most I’ve seen, why, ain’t but so many places a deer could get to in there. You folks get me some light, I’ll follow that trail for you. This here mountain don’t look too thick. Oughn’t to take us long to figger out whether to go on or turn back. If we go on, we can send somebody back to tell Miz Regan.”

  Liz’s eyes widened in horror. She gazed up at Nuada’s closed eyes, his slack limbs, the poison-ravaged body still encircled in Regan’s arms. “You mean you’re just going to let them stay here? With the shell-beasts somewhere back there!”

  “There is little need to worry,” Froech replied. “This is not the World that was; the Watchers do not come into this one. Our friends will doubtless be safer here than we, if we are as close to Ailill as I think. But Nuada should not go on, that much is certain.”

  “But—” Liz began.

  “Enough,” the Faery youth said. “His fate is no concern for mortals.”

  Liz stared at him, teeth gritted as she sought to control her anger.

  Froech looked away deliberately, glanced toward a stand of rushes that grew by the edge of the pool. “I think I can make torches from those.”

  “Torches? Can’t you magic us some light?” Gary asked.

  “I am nearly out of Power,” Froech replied. “I used much to dispose of the blood, since you mortals insisted on it; what little was left I have been directing toward my tracking—or to Nuada.”

  He set himself to breaking off bundles of reeds.

  Regan was eyeing the margin of the pond where a variety of small weeds and bushes twined. “Katie has taught me of the healing arts of men,” she said. “Some of those plants may have some virtue, if I can just recall . . . Gary, if you will help me with our friend?”