by Andre Norton
“To go by ship is folly!” burst out the Sulcar. “And over the ice mountains? What fool would try to set a trail? And . . .” he paused to scowl at the plaque, “who knows what awaits at the other end?”
“We shall see,” Stymir said quietly. “This is perhaps a key. We know of gates; which one will this one open?”
“Enough!” The Trade Master ended the discussion. “All this talk of evil is enough to unsettle any stomach. Tell us of how things go in Korinth, what trade has come in from the Dales.” And he gazed at them from under bristling brows.
Captain Stymir was the first to grin in answer. “Well enough. You have heard the worst; now let us turn to the best. The Dale lords squabble as usual among themselves. Though since the Falconers have established an Eyrie in the north there are no more sea raiders thinking to fill their chests with the products of honest traders’ labor.
“Lord Imry works to bring all the forces under him, but the southern holders who suffered the most in the Alizon invasion are not so ready to relinquish any authority. The three major ports have been largely rebuilt and there is a steady stream of traders—especially in wool and artifacts from the Waste.”
Lady Gagna shivered. “Such are unchancy,” she commented.
The captain agreed. “True, but none are taken aboard until they have been examined by a sage or one of the Dames of the Flame abbeys. And they have their own way of dealing with that which is cursed. Estcarp is quiet now—Koris is a good lord and justly esteemed, and Simon Tregarth sits at his right hand.
“Escore boils now and then and perhaps always will, but the Tregarth sons and those of the Green Valley are good guardians. In the far south several seasons ago the Port of Dead Ships was destroyed, and there is much talk now of an exploring expedition to head farther than Var in that direction, after the search for the gates is behind us.
“So far, outwardly, all follows the usual pattern.”
But, Trusla though, why? At least the Trade Master knew what occupied the minds of most thoughtful people now, talented or untalented.
She and Simond had been offered quarters in one of the empty houses, the owner of which had gone off for the summer harvesting of whatever this land had to offer. The misty rain had stopped and they did not need a lantern to guide them, for the strange light which held in this north during the summer season was still giving the impression of day.
Trusla gave a sigh which was partially of happiness when she shed again her cloak and left it to dry, draped over two wall hooks.
“You are tired.” Simond, having shed his own cape, came to her.
“I am very proud,” she said, and linked her arms about his neck, drawing him as close as she could. “For my lord presented our cause as no one else might have. You do not deal in power and thus you see matters as most of these people do. Their Watcher . . .” She ended that with a long kiss and savored the good feeling of his touch along her small body.
“Their Watcher . . .” he said, having marked her chin line and down to her throat with his lips, “you do not like her.”
“I do not know her. But, my lord, this night let us forget all guests and Powers, witches, shamans, and Watchers, and keep some hours for us alone.”
He laughed softly. “Always you are the wise one, my lady. So be it. The Lady’s moon lamp may not shine upon us, but Her grace will fill us.”
• • •
In this odd light Trusla did not know how long she slept—for it had certainly been late when, with her head on Simond’s shoulder, she had sunk into the deepest and sweetest sleep she had known for what seemed a very long time.
At first she was puzzled when she opened her eyes. She lay alone on the wide bed and this was certainly not the cabin of the ship with its cramped space. No—she rubbed her eyes—this was a house, or so the people here deemed it—and they had reached port. But this would be only the beginning, and perhaps the easiest portion of their traveling was behind her.
There was a soft rap at the door and, when she answered, one of the women who appeared to fuse Sulcar and alien features came in carrying a pitcher of water from which steam arose.
“Your lord said you were greatly wearied, but now it is the noon time for eating.” She was pouring a portion of the water into a basin, laying out a coarse strip of weaving as a towel.
“I am indeed a lazy slugabed.” Trusla laughed and hurried to wash. Then she hunted out clean underclothing, even if it was sadly wrinkled, and she felt at ease as she came to join the others at the Trade Master’s hall.
For the first time she saw Audha among that company. Youth seemed to have been drawn out of the wavereader’s face. Her jaw was set and she gazed ahead as if she saw nothing of what was about her. Kankil sat close to her, paw hand on her knee, and Inquit was just beyond, keeping a close eye on the girl.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
The Reading of the Runes
T here was no talk of their mission or the immediate past among those gathered there. Most of the conversation concerned a promising run of flat fish which could be harvested with ease as the predators which followed such schools drove them into the shallows. Once pulled out of the sea, they were quickly prepared and put on smoking frames—a harvest which would help the trading station survive during the winter to come. In addition there was some excitement over a report brought in by a young hunter that some of the great horns had been sighted not too far away.
There were also comments on the possible luck of the backcountry trackers, those who mined the ice streams, and those driving the horses to summer pasturage. Trusla had already seen those small beasts which seemed to be the only domesticated animals those of this Border settlement had.
In general appearance they were horses right enough, but far removed from even the hill ponies of the south, being hardly larger then the great hounds some of the Dales lords and noblemen of Karstan kept for boar hunting or to beat off attacks from the vicious Gray Ones. Their coats were shaggy in rough patches, as they were shedding the thick hair which covered them in winter, and they were gaunt. No one larger than Kankil could hope to mount one, and they were used for packing alone.
A woman near Trusla, as she sat to accept a ship biscuit coated with a tart-sweet jam, was discussing with a friend the fact that several of the small beasts had been returned lately with injured hooves, needing special attention, and that she hoped there would not be an epidemic of such to curtail the summer work.
However, Trusla’s attention kept returning to Audha. Though Trusla had tended the girl on shipboard, the wavereader’s eyes had passed over her with no sign of recognition and the Estcarpian sensed that Inquit, too, was disturbed by her aloofness.
Those gathered here—mainly, Trusla believed, to give reports of one or another of the town’s activities—began to drift out again. There was no sign of Captain Stymir, but Frost was settled among the cushions a little away from the others. She had smiled and nodded to Trusla, yet about her was an aura of waiting—though if she were truly impatient she kept the signs of that hidden.
Simond appeared in the doorway, gave lordship hand greeting to the Trade Master, and bowed to the others. He was quickly followed by Odanki, the Latt taking a place against the wall, leaning a little on his harpoonlike spear.
The Trade Master clapped his hands. At that signal three more of the people gathered there got to their feet and left. The master of the Sulcar town now held between his knees a small drum, not unlike, Trusla thought, that which she had seen carried for the wisewoman in Korinth.
With the very tips of his big fingers he tapped out a series of small raps and there followed silence. Only Audha turned her head, as if aroused for the first time out of some deep well of thought, to look at him searchingly.
Three times the Trade Master used that signal and as the sound of the last beat died away, the Watcher came. At first Trusla thought she was wearing a mask and then realized that those splashes of color were paint, so arranged as to make the woman’s fe
atures no longer human in appearance but rather like some dream thing.
The Trade Master placed the drum on the floor now, and Svan went to her knees before it.
“The moon is not lit.” There was ice in that.
“Neither is your Power hidden by day,” he answered her levelly. “Do you say that you control less in the way of forces than this lady witch or this shaman and dreamer of the Latts?”
There was conflict here; Trusla could feel the tension. No one questioned the abilities of a talented one unless it was in the form of a challenge. Yet this Sulcar was goading his own Watcher.
“So be it.” Svan shrugged slightly. Her head swung slowly so that she eyed each gathered there. “The reading will be of your demanding. Now . . .” she had slipped out of her sleeve a short, slender knife and held it to the Trade Master.
He applied the needle tip of that to his forefinger and a drop of blood answered. Then he shook his hand so that it spattered down upon the surface of the drum.
“Let those who search now pay,” she said stiffly.
Inquit reached for the knife and followed the Trade Master’s example, squatting forward so her blood drop also landed on the drum top. She passed the blade to Simond.
He shucked off the gauntlets he had been wearing and prepared to draw blood. Trusla half raised her hand. She knew nothing of the nature of the Watcher’s power. Would this act lock them to the will of the Sulcar wisewoman? Simond had no talent shield to stand between him and such usage.
Svan looked beyond Simond to her, and the heavily painted face seemed to express something which was beyond the girl to understand.
“You are already bound to this mission; for the runes all blood must be read,” she said.
Trusla caught a glimpse of Frost and the witch was nodding encouragingly, so she did not protest Simond’s contribution to the drum and made her own. However, the Watcher did not look to Frost. Perhaps this was a matter of Power so alien that one could cancel out the other—of such she had heard.
But another moved, and before Trusla could return the knife, it was snatched from her hold and Audha stood beside the drum.
“I claim blood debt!” Her voice was high and thick with challenge. “By all the Laws of the Wave, Wind, and Sea, I am now a part of any hunt which will bring down that which has slain kin and shipmates. By the Deep Mother do I swear this.”
And her drop of blood fell to the taut top of the drum. Trusla could almost believe that there had been the faint whisper of sound as it struck and spattered.
The Watcher nodded. “Such is your right, since you alone have come from a life-shedding. May the Lord of Storms use you as you wish.”
Audha subsided once more among the cushions. There was now life in her face, and her eyes were on the Watcher as if she must not miss anything Svan might do.
The Watcher pulled the drum to her. She was sitting cross-legged, the drum midway between her knees. From the front of her robe she brought out a pouch stained a dull black but with a fringe of scarlet feather tips around it.
Loosening its string, she shook out into her hand what Trusla thought were a palmful of rounded pebbles. Four she inspected and dropped back into the pouch, the rest she closed her fist upon, but before she moved again she looked first at Inquit as if she considered her the lesser danger, and then to Frost.
“Still what you hold, Shaman and Witch, this is not a stew in which you have the stirring.”
Having sent each of them a final fierce glance from her paint-rimmed eyes, she tossed the pebbles onto the bloodstained cover of the drum.
There was a loud roll as if the fall of those stones had been instead a heavy beat. And the sound echoed. Trusla felt a tingle of the skin—Power was awake, and here.
Though the drum remained stationary, the pebbles continued to roll. They appeared drawn (in an unpleasant way, Trusla thought) to the blood drops and each moved like a sentient thing until it had touched each of those splotches.
They gathered—like hunters in conference. Then that tight cycle broke and they began each to spin, the whirl taking it away from its fellows. At last they were quiet and Trusla thought she could distinguish something which might be a pattern not unlike the wildly laid-on paint which masked the Watcher.
They waited in silence. Svan displayed no wish to continue to the next part of the ceremony. Almost, Trusla thought, like a sulky child forced to show off some art before strangers.
She herself could see now the pebbles were deeply slashed with markings in most of which blood now drew thin lines. Svan’s hand came up and she waved it with an odd motion as if she mimicked the passing of sea waves over the stones.
One or two pebbles seemed to tremble but did not leave their chosen place. However, something else—something beyond sight and hearing—had awakened.
Svan’s mouth was now near a snarl. She mouthed words. But that feeling of being looked upon continued. It was Frost and Inquit who answered. The shaman swung about on her pillows, Kankil giving a muted cry, plastering herself against the broad breast of the Latt woman. The shaman’s hands raised and moved. One did not need too much imagination to guess that her gestures were those of a tried and trained hunter throwing darts.
Frost cupped her jewel so that no gleam of light moved in the Watcher’s direction, but Trusla could see it was alive and bright as the full midsummer moon.
That which had come unbidden flinched. Trusla could feel it even as if her own body had responded so. Then it was gone.
“North,” Frost said. Inquit nodded. The Watcher’s shoulders seemed to draw together as if she would avoid some blow. She leaned further over the rune stones.
“The Dark awaits,” she said. “It will take such knowledge as all the talent here cannot raise to lay it. But we are left no choice, for that which has been awakened seeks prey—it hungers and would feed. You will go to it, because you are oathed and chosen, but you are but blades of summer grass before the first frost. Death—death and ending—”
“Not so!” Frost’s voice rang with authority. “We are but the point of the spear and behind us stands an army. Do not forget that there is greater knowledge now being hunted, hunted by those who know how to use what they can find. By this”—Frost’s fingers caressed her jewel—“can I speak with my sisters, and they in turn have very ancient and powerful knowledge to draw upon. There are many talents, each having its own force. As a smith forges a sword, sometimes choosing pieces of very old and famous weapons of the past to unite with all his skill to the new, so shall we in the end face this blight. It lies to the north. . . .”
That was more statement than question but the Watcher answered, “It lies north in the land where no tracker can go.”
“Yet,” pressed the witch, “you can give us more information than that, Rune Reader.”
“Already the knowledge of the trail is yours. Hunt out Hessar and ask of his ice river. Your captain flourishes that which he names a key for the unlocking of mysteries. Very well, follow that lead and come upon the rightful gate—if you can.”
She was on her feet and stooped to sweep up the pebbles, returning them, still bloodstained, to their pouch. Then she caught up the drum itself before the Trade Master could move—if it were his to reclaim.
“I have read the runes—you will go and there is no turning back. Nor do I believe any return!” Settling the drum on her hip, she swept out of the room.
Simond’s hand closed on Trusla’s arm. “Let us be out of here,” he said in a voice so low as to be hidden under the broken sentences of the other. “It does no good to see the Dark before it comes upon one. I have been at arms practice with the shipmen this morning. Come and let me show you what this land can be with summer upon it.”
She was pleased enough to go. There was no drizzle of rain, but a fair day under the sun. There was the ever-present scent of the sea in short breezes which ruffled her hair and plucked at the collar of her jerkin. But there were other scents also, and she drew a deep brea
th of wonder and delight.
For the world around them, including the rounded tops of the burrowlike houses, was a vivid green, and that green was broken by patches of flowers like jewels on the feast dress of some Dales lady. The green and flowers reached as far as she could see, broken only here and there by workers.
She saw ground which had certainly been put to the plow, and looked to Simond questioningly, for surely the growing season was too short for any grain.
“It is a kind of root thing they grow,” he explained. “And it serves them well, for it is best eaten when it has been frozen and needs to be dug out. There are berries, too.” He pointed to a number of children, more than she had seen before in the town, who were out in one section of the green land, basket in hand, hunting under the low-growing leaves for the fruit. Most of them, she noted with a smile, already had a chin streaked with juice.
Down a beaten trail of a road came a train of the small horses. They had pack racks on their backs, but the bags were not full, rather looped up. Three drovers accompanied them: a Sulcar, a young woman of the native people, and a half-grown girl who combined features from them both.
One of the pickers arose and came running. “Helgy?” She greeted the girl. “But it is not time for return—is there something wrong?”
Unconsciously Simond and Trusla had drawn closer. The woman glanced at them and then gave a longer look, but the Sulcar snapped his fingers at the fruit picker. “Off with you, Ragan, or you will get the rough side of your aunt’s tongue for a half-full basket.”
He spoke in a pleasant, bantering tone, but there was a shadowed expression on his face which suggested darker thoughts.
Somehow the day no longer seemed so bright. And the child who had come running to greet her friend did not return to her picking at once but stood looking after the small train as it entered the town.