by Sandra Waugh
“The Troths! They are running from Dark Wood! Hurry!”
“Hush, Lark. Breathe.”
I gasped and choked and writhed out the horror until I had nothing left to expel and lay spent on the hard ground, feeling my own tears thin, then dry. Everyone was quiet; only Twig paced back and forth—his little steps sending tiny vibrations against my cheek.
My voice was ragged. “They’re coming—”
“Lark.” It was Taran. “How many Troths? What else?”
“Too many.” I rolled, my head coming against something firm—Gharain’s leg. He kneeled at my side.
“Not good, not good.” Twig was near, still pacing. His voice came close and retreated. “Too soon this comes. Too soon!”
“Hush, old man!” Brahnt exclaimed. “Let Lark calm!”
“No!” I gasped. “He speaks truth! They come too soon; I saw it!”
“No, no, no, no …,” Twig muttered. “No.”
“Lark, this warning: How soon? How much time?” asked Laurent.
“There was fire.” I wasn’t making sense. I wanted Grandmama desperately. I pushed my forehead against Gharain’s thigh. “Please, we need to go.”
He murmured, his hand on my hair, “We will go, Lark, but rest a moment.”
There was no option but to obey. I could not stand. Evaen brought me his blanket to wrap against the shock, but even Gharain’s nearness did not calm my trembling. I felt sick and filthy from the violence, while around me a buzz of concerned voices discussed speed and enemy and ugly tactics.
“We’re heating the balm,” Wilh called back from somewhere. “It helped her before.”
“No fires!” I cried out, but was hushed by Gharain, who moved a strand of hair back from my face. The gesture made me weep again.
“How do we stop this?” Gharain gritted, hand tensing against my cheek. And since no one answered him, he snapped loudly, “Can you not hurry?”
“Gharain, take yourself in charge, man!” Marc was pointedly forceful. “You do no help by letting your emotions run away!”
“Too soon it comes. What to do, what to do …” This was Twig, still in his pacing, muttering anxious things.
“You too, little man,” growled Marc in ill humor. “Your worry helps no one.”
Twig glared and moved off a distance.
Quiet then sank over our group as they waited for me, save for a harness toss or the firm steps of a Rider. This was not camp, and the Riders were restless. The air vibrated with barely contained urgency; they needed to move to task. There were lower murmurs between men, and then at last a clink of metal—of a cup hitting stone—and I was propped up, the drink put in my hands, and I gratefully swallowed the fragrant balm and let it heal me.
A moment later I pushed off the blanket. “We go,” I said abruptly. Too much time was already wasted. Gharain stood quickly and reached to help me up, but I shook my head. I’d not let them think I remained weak. He dropped his hand and went to get Rune.
The others looked at Laurent, who, after giving me a long, assessing stare, nodded. They turned to their horses, to the marshes.
“Lady Lark,” Twig called loudly.
The gnome was standing some paces away, facing west. I strode to him quickly, anxious to get started. “The pack,” I said, pulling it from my back and offering it for him to climb into. “I hope I did not crush you when I fell.”
“I am quite resilient,” he answered. And then, “Cargh should not have lit the fire.”
He was too slow; I was impatient. “Yes, but it was very little fire. Cargh has already put it out. Let us hurry.”
But Twig was staring into the tangle of Dark Wood. “It comes too soon,” he said softly. “I hope you are ready.”
He walked a few steps forward. I followed with the pack. “Twig! We have to go.”
He turned to me and said, “I know.” He looked sorry.
A thunderous roar, and then all of us were knocked to our knees as the earth gave a great leap. There was a tearing screech, and like a bubble bursting open, the rock and grass exploded.
I scrambled to my feet, the earth still trembling beneath us, and cried out. The ground was split, a long crack parting Twig and me from all the Riders.
“Lark! Make haste! Jump to us!” Brahnt and Gharain were at the edge on the other side, joined by Laurent and Wilh and Ian, and then the others. “We’ll catch you.”
I reached, but then the ground heaved wider with an enormous groan and we all fell back. “Quickly!” they shouted, leaping once again to their feet.
On knees and elbows, I wriggled to the edge, gasping. It was not so far, maybe only the length of my body. I had no doubt they would all pull me up safely should I fall short. But then, as I gauged it, the gap doubled in width and I was flat on my belly looking for something to hold. Don’t let it take me, I begged silently. I would disappear like old Harker into that blackness, into the yawning emptiness of Erema’s smile—
“Lark!”
I gritted my teeth, pushing against my fears, and stumbled into a crouch, ready to spring. But then I hesitated, stunned. I heard the Riders’ shouts, watched the gap widen further. The grass crumbled away, little pebbles dropping into the nothingness that opened below.
“Lark! You can do this!” Gharain was there across from me, thinking I was too terrified to jump. “I will catch you!”
Twig had lurched his way next to me, and I turned to him, saying in disbelief, “You knew this would happen, didn’t you? You called me over to you—you meant to divide us.”
He said, “Lady Lark, I am here to help you.”
“Help!” I hissed. “How does it help to separate me from the Riders?”
“I remind you, my lady, that is not your battle.”
The earth rumbled; we all struggled to catch our balance.
“Lark!” This was Laurent. His voice was commanding.
“I should be there! I should be over there!”
“My lady,” Twig said, barely above the noise of the heaving ground, “that way madness lies.”
“Madness!” The roar of the earth was very loud. Now I shouted at him, “Madness, in the company of the Riders?” I looked to them, to him; I said frantically, “What am I to do?”
Twig closed his eyes and looked away. “I point the path. You make your choice.”
I glared at him. The little man stood at my feet, eyes shut, betraying nothing that would tell me his purpose. Twig—the gift of help, at my request. I looked back over the gap, at the Riders standing poised on the edge and Rune, who shifted nervously by them.
And then I remembered: I’d not been on Rune’s back in my vision of Merith.
I wanted to go home. I wanted to help my village. And I wanted to be with the Riders; I wanted their safety, strength, and companionship. And, despite a promise, and death, I wanted Gharain. But I looked at Laurent and slowly shook my head.
“Lark!” Gharain cried.
“My journey lies another way!” I shouted over an ominous rumbling, across the widening crevasse. “Take care of my horse.”
“Lark, don’t!”
The earth buckled, tipping all of us again. I smashed my hands against the ground to gain some sort of hold, feeling it shudder and deflate then under my weight, and come to a sighing rest. I dragged myself up, still feeling the last tremors in my palms, gasping relief as we all did at the sudden calm.
Twig spoke from where he’d tumbled. “We must go.”
Rune reared, grounded, and broke into a canter running along the length of the gap and then back again.
“Stay with the Riders!” I yelled. Then I had to turn away.
Gharain shouted my name once more, but I held my arm up in a final wave without turning back, and looked down at Twig instead. “I hope you speak truth, little man.”
“Are you afraid?” he asked me.
I snapped at him, “Yes!”
“Fear belongs to the Breeders. They will use it to prey on your sanity.”
&n
bsp; “Well, thanks for that,” I muttered.
“Lady Lark,” Twig said, “fear is only when you believe you don’t know how to respond. You’ve done well thus far. Trust yourself.”
I’d heard all that before.
“And your truth,” he continued, “will be your greatest aid.”
“We’d better go.” I began to walk back the way we’d come.
But Twig said, “Not that way, Lady Lark.”
Before I could ask what he meant, there was a shout from the other side. We wheeled around and I screamed out, “Gharain!” He was leaping the gap. He’d run, and jumped, and as I screamed, he was suspended in the space between the two edges, caught in midair. And then in a tumble he was down, hard, on our side, but only just—half of him was hanging over the edge, with feet scrabbling for a hold, swearing and digging his fingers into the stubby grass even as he slid backward, the earth crumbling beneath his body.
I was before him, dropping to my knees, grabbing his arms. “Hold on!” I yelled. It was a ridiculous display of effort. He was too heavy for me; I had nothing with which to brace myself.
“Lark,” Gharain gritted out, “my fault—I misjudged. Let me go. I’ll not pull you down with me!”
“No!” I shouted at him above the others. “No!” I gasped against the weight. “Twig! What do I do?”
“Lark, you are connected with Earth; you know what to do!” Twig shouted at the other Riders, “Stay back! Do not cross!”
I screamed at Twig, “I don’t know what—Gharain, don’t let go!” I couldn’t tell anymore if Gharain was trying to clamber up the edge or push me away.
“Trust yourself, Lark. Trust!” Twig called.
I had no idea what Twig was saying to me; I could only feel my fingers slipping on Gharain’s sleeves, his beautiful, warming, needful energy sliding from my grip. I cried out.
Gharain looked up at me. There were beads of sweat on his brow, but he managed to say, “This was my doing. My error. Let me go, Lark.”
With a groan, I locked my gaze with Gharain’s, dug my toes into the ground, gritted my teeth, and pulled. Pulled with a desire and desperation that was beyond anything I’d needed before. It burned fiercely through my body, igniting into something I didn’t recognize. My toes rooted into the earth, my hands wrapped like vines around his arms, and I wrenched him back the way a birch springs a child who swings from it. “I … will … not … let … you … go!” came from somewhere inside me, but it didn’t matter, because we were up and out of the chasm, flung far back on the grass, tumbled together, panting and sweating and disbelieving what I’d just done.
Gharain had landed hard on top of me, smashed flat to my chest before he tipped to one side and rolled back to stare up at the sky, gasping for breath. “What was that?” he forced out after a moment, and turned his head to me.
I could not answer him. I could not believe the strength I’d drawn. I simply stared back.
“That,” said Twig, who waddled over to us, “is making use of power. And did I not tell you, Rider, that your passions might do you harm?”
“Gharain! Lark!” The other Riders were calling from across the divide. Eleven men on horseback and two unseated horses stood on the other side, poised to leap or leave us behind.
Twig spoke. “Go, Riders. The Guardian takes her own journey hereon.” He bowed to them hand to heart. And when the Riders looked to me, I could only nod that it was so.
They understood. A return bow from all of them, then they wheeled their horses and cantered away into the Niler marshes. Rune and Petral each gave a final whinny, and with a toss of mane dove into the wet behind them.
And it was only a moment later that the reeds stopped rustling and the silence of the place closed round once more.
“They’re gone,” I said softly. The Riders were fulfilling the task I’d set out to request of them. How utterly different it was from my original expectation.
I looked over at Gharain. He’d dropped onto his back once more and was staring up at the clouds, still breathing hard.
“Why did you do that?” I asked.
His head turned and curls fell over his brow. “I’m not leaving you.”
“Some at Tarnec think that you are consumed with guilt for your mistake with Erema. I rather thought you were hoping I’d let you go.”
One side of his mouth curved. “I rather hoped you wouldn’t.”
Twig came to my side. “Do not choose your rest here,” he said with annoyance. “This is not the time. Your journey is long, and this is only its beginning.”
“I wish I’d not stopped Rune from leaping the gap.” I said this to Twig while Gharain had walked away to find the end of the earth rift.
“Dark Wood is no place for a horse,” he replied with one eye on the sky and one on Gharain’s retreating figure.
“Dark Wood!” I stared down at him. “We do not go in there.”
Twig said, “By foot is best.”
“Twig!” I said more firmly. “The amulet I seek is in the Myr Mountains, to the north!”
He snorted. “North is north and east is east, but direction does not necessarily determine route.”
“I do not understand you, gnome.”
“How will you go north from here? Would you attempt to jump that rift?” Twig shook his head. “What is that young man doing? He’ll find no way across. The split is wide and long.”
“No way across?” I was startled. “Then how do we get to the mountains?”
He pointed. “That way, of course. ’Twill have to be.”
My breath went out. I sat down. “No. I cannot.”
“You merely think you cannot. Remember, fear is only when you—”
“Stop! I know what you’ve said. I—I just cannot; I will not go into Dark Wood. There is wild energy in there; it brews inside—”
“It is Breeder energy. Chaos,” Twig acknowledged with a little nod. “Harder for you, I am sure. Nonetheless, I am with you, and your Rider is with you. We will watch your path.”
One thing, at least, I could refuse. I said flatly, “The Rider is not mine.”
Twig raised a brow. “Of course he is yours, Lady Lark. He was made your Complement. As said, you are not alone.” Twig turned and walked from my stunned expression, back to where we’d left our packs. He could move faster than he’d shown before.
I picked myself up and ran after him. “Complement? What do you mean, made my Complement?”
The gnome shook his head at me and opened Gharain’s pack. “Do they teach the Guardians nothing these days?” He stuck his head inside, rummaging.
“Twig, stop for a moment and speak plainly. What is a Complement?”
There was a sigh, and he pulled his head from the pack. “You did the bond seeking, did you not?” At my silence, he fumed. “How is it they send fledglings to face the most difficult of challenges?”
“Twig …!”
He tsked at me, and reached now for my empty pack, turning it inside out to inspect the seams. While he scrutinized the rough stitching, he said, “The bond seeking is the awakening of a Guardian, and the purest proof in determining she is a true Guardian. As well, it has secured your connection with the Keepers, for the one who awakens the Guardian becomes the Complement.” He looked up at me, still squinting. “Balance, of course. Pairs are good.”
I kneeled next to him. “The touch of marks.”
He nodded. “The first touch of marks. That is a bond seeking. It does not have to be a formal ritual; a seeking can happen sometimes by accident. But the connection is made.”
“Are there only four who can be Complements, the way there are only four Guardians?”
“One for one?” He snorted. “That would hardly offer choice, would it? Nay, many Keepers bear special marks. So do”—Twig’s voice dropped for this—“many Breeders.” He brightened. “Good thing the Riders found you first! Though the king’s choice is an interesting one.”
“That he made Gharain do the bond see
king, be my Complement?” Forced him, rather. I remembered the terrible resignation on Gharain’s face. The king’s choice; what choice was that? I looked at the gnome. “Does Gharain know this? Does a Complement want to be a Complement?”
“No more than a Guardian necessarily wants to be a Guardian. And yes, Lark, your Rider knows what he is. Do not look so distraught. Perhaps the king was wise to choose this, fates being intertwined and all that.”
“What do you mean fates intertwined?” Gharain had said that too.
“Oh, a complex business it is, how one person’s twist of fate can send so many others’ into wholly different directions. Everyone’s story is changed.”
“Twig!” I stamped my foot. “Speak plainly.”
“The Breeder, Erema, read Gharain’s fate. She looked into his future, adapted herself to fit his yearnings, and so stole the amulets. Now look where we are! And, no, Lady Lark, she will not read your future; your book is safely held at Tarnec.”
“What book?”
“The one of your fate. You saw it in the king’s hands. The verse the king read, the one used to find you—that is the opening of your tale. What, did you not know that the story of one’s destiny is held between the covers of a book? You are woefully ignorant! We all have tales told of us; each of us has a book—a fate. The Guardians’ books are held at Tarnec now. So, not to fear, they are safe from any meddling.”
“My fate is held in Tarnec? This is what the king would not show me?” I spluttered in surprise and impatience—not that such a book existed, but rather that it languished in Tarnec’s possession. “Why do we stand here, then, ready to plunge blindly into Dark Wood? Why did we not read this book, find out where the orb lies and how to retrieve it?”
Twig looked at me as if I’d stabbed him. “If you turn so quickly to learn the ending, what happens to choice along the way? I shall tell you: ’twould be manipulated, changed, the way Gharain’s fate was changed by the Breeder and so all of ours as well. No, you must not tamper with books of fate!”
“But the king is allowed to hold my book? Why?”
“It does not belong to the king! Loaned, only! Oh, the ignorance!” Twig stamped around a bit to control his temper. Then he came back to me and said more calmly, “That is old Harker’s tale to tell, not mine. What is important is that the Guardians’ fates are safe in Tarnec now. It is one small relief in this grave business of retrieving amulets.”