by Roger Taylor
The whiteness trembled. From deep within, a knowledge told him he should not be here so totally, that to be here thus was to bring extinction to that part of him which was Ibryen. Familiar but forgotten, white woven threads drifted down to him, but he could not grasp them.
'Let me go,’ he heard himself calling silently, then he spoke as the Traveller had told him to previously. ‘You've done all that you could do. You've neither failed nor betrayed. Go to your own now and rest as you deserve. Find his true kin. We will tend him here.'
Doubt filled him.
Then, with an authority he did not understand he commanded, ‘Go. Release him. And release me also so that we can help him.'
The doubt wavered and the elusive dancing threads twisted and turned about him. As he reached for them he found that they were sounds—voices.
'Ibryen, Ibryen!'
He was kneeling by the strange figure again, the fabric slipping from his fingers and the Traveller's unexpectedly powerful grip about his wrist. The Traveller's voice was echoing around the cave, calling his name. What drew his attention however, was the stark fear in the little man's face.
'I was right,’ he said breathlessly. ‘You are ...’ He did not finish the sentence. Instead, he released Ibryen and took hold of the material and spoke to both his companions. ‘This is Culmaren,’ he said, his voice soft and full of awe. ‘The material, the plant, the ... creature ... that's the very substance of the cloudlands that the Dryenvolk dwell in. That lives both here and in the worlds beyond. That is many parts and a whole. And, if I'm any judge, this is dead, or almost so. I've never heard of such a thing.’ He stared at Ibryen. ‘How did you come back?’ he asked.
Ibryen stammered. ‘You ... you ... called me,’ he said.
The Traveller shook his head. The fear had been replaced by bewilderment. ‘Yes, but that wasn't what brought ...'
'Be quiet!’ Rachyl's command cut across the faltering reply, making the Traveller start. She was bending over the motionless figure, her hand raised for silence. ‘He's trying to say something.'
The Traveller placed a hand on her shoulder and leaned forward, bringing his head next to hers. The figure muttered something then fell silent. Rachyl shook her head, but the Traveller sat back and leaned against the cave wall.
'Well?’ Ibryen asked.
'I only caught a couple of words,’ the Traveller said. ‘They didn't mean anything, but he is Dryenvolk. Give me a moment.’ He closed his eyes and turned his face away to compose himself. Ibryen watched him unhappily. It was some time before he spoke and then there was an undertow of agitation in his voice. ‘He couldn't ever have been anything other than Dryenvolk. Everything pointed to it. But it's still a shock to find him here. Conjecturing in your Council Hall is one thing. Even growing more certain as we drew nearer ...’ He puffed out his cheeks and shook his head. ‘But actually seeing him ... how can it be? How can a Dryenwr be down here, in the middle depths? And wrapped in Culmaren.'
'Whatever he is and however he came here, doesn't really matter, does it?’ Rachyl said, impatiently practical. ‘We'd better decide what we're going to do to help him.’ She looked at the Traveller. ‘My healing skill's confined to stopping gashes from bleeding and strapping up damaged limbs well enough to get people safely back to the village. And Ibryen's precious little better. Do you know what's wrong with him? Can you help him?'
The Traveller grimaced. ‘I don't know,’ he said. ‘I didn't dare unwrap the Culmaren, it seems to be almost part of him. I could only check some of his pulses, and they're weak.'
'We can't just stand by and do nothing if he's ill,’ Rachyl insisted. ‘And we can't take him back to the tent in the dark without some kind of a stretcher. Still less back to the village.'
'There'd be no point taking him back to the tent, anyway,’ Ibryen said. ‘There's scarcely room for us and he's not small. At least he's out of the wind here and it's fairly dry.’ His hand hovered uncertainly over the white fabric, then pulled away. ‘Why didn't you unwrap this ... blanket?'
'I told you,’ the Traveller replied. ‘The Dryenvolk have a strange bond with the Culmaren. And it has healing properties, I think. I've heard it said that the Dryenvolk use it with weave and voice to cure all manner of ailments.'
'Well, we're not Dryenvolk, are we?’ Ibryen said. ‘Nor are we likely to come across any. He's the centre of all the strangeness that's drawn us here. You said his pulses are weak. If you know anything about healing, you must do something. He might be dying. We can't just sit around and watch.'
'But ...'
'Traveller, we came on this journey for answers—each of us. But there are only questions here. We must ...’ He stopped, and his hand hovered hesitantly over the fabric again. A pattern was beginning to form. ‘What you've been hearing has been growing weaker, what I've been ... feeling ... has been growing stronger—almost taking possession of me at times.’ He frowned as the pattern became a realization. ‘If this exists here and beyond—wherever beyond is—then its existence here must be finished. It's just clinging on. Lost, bewildered.'
His jaw stiffened as if he were preparing for a clash of arms, and, eyes wide, he reached out and gripped a handful of the fabric resolutely. The whiteness and the longing closed about him again and he felt its seductive power trying to draw him to its heart. There was no malice in it but he knew that to succumb would be to lose himself for ever. With a grim effort he forced his eyes to stay open, focusing them on the lean face of the Dryenwr. Then he took hold of the fabric with his other hand also and spoke into the whiteness as he had before.
'Release him. Your work is done. You hinder us in ours and he may die. We will tend him while you seek out his kin. Go now!'
The longing increased, but Ibryen kept his gaze fixed on the Dryenwr's face. No more could be said, no more would be said. Then, abruptly, the longing and the whiteness and everything about it was gone. Ibryen was aware of something vast fading into an unknowable distance, a haunting cry tailing after it. For a long moment, though he knew himself to be in a mountain cave with his companions, feeling the coldness on his face and hands, and the rocky ground hard on his knees, with the moaning wind echoing around him, he was also alone in another place, alone in a ringing emptiness. The one he knew, the other was strange beyond anything he had ever imagined. Yet he belonged to both.
He released the fabric, then, though he could not have said how, brought himself to the world he knew, as simply and easily as if he were passing over a friend's threshold. The Traveller took his arm anxiously.
'I'm fine,’ he said anticipating the question. ‘We'll talk later. Look after the Dryenwr.’ He stood up and moved away.
Tentatively, the Traveller eased part of the fabric from the man's face, then he nodded to Rachyl to help him. Carefully they began unwinding the blanket. As they removed it, a tall and muscular figure was revealed, clad in what was obviously a uniform, pale grey in colour with various ornate markings about the breast and on the arms. In his hand was a sword. Though the man's uniform was immaculate and the sword polished and bright, its edge was hacked and scarred. The Traveller turned up his lantern. Its light flickered brilliantly from the sword to dance about the cave.
'Warrior caste,’ he said, running a finger across one of the markings. ‘And a high-ranking officer at that, I'd say.'
Rachyl looked at the Dryenwr critically for a moment. ‘A fighter for sure,’ she said flatly, ‘if it was he who did the damage to the edge of that sword.’ Cautiously she took it from his hand and placed it on the ground, then she briskly folded the blanket and, kneeling down, laid it gently back over him with an oddly maternal gesture.
The Dryenwr's eyes opened.
* * *
Chapter 23
'Carver's Song. I heard the Carver's Song.'
Rachyl jumped backwards with a cry of alarm which became an oath as she tumbled over to land gracelessly on her behind.
The voice, deep and with an unfamiliar accent, was that of the D
ryenwr. It was weak, but there were clear notes of authority in it. Dark, unfocused eyes moved around the trio of watchers as he levered himself up into a sitting position.
'Through the mists I heard it. In a dream? It seems so long since I heard such, yet it can scarcely be a moon since I heard of their coming together again.’ The Dryenwr frowned and put a hand to his head. ‘Then I was walking in the darkness over land, hard and without life, Culmaren cape about my shoulders and Svara's will all about me, cold and angry, tearing at me. I answered the Song.’ He whistled faintly and smiled. ‘Never had the true skill—warrior caste is warrior caste—but the Culmaren fired me. I sounded a measure or two such as I couldn't begin to do if I were awake. Then ...’ He frowned again. ‘I was so weak. I was drawn back again, I think. Drawn into the waiting, into the mists ...'
His eyes were clearing. ‘Is this a dream, too? Is this the fate of the dead? An eternity of dreams?'
'You ask questions that none can answer, Dryenwr,’ the Traveller said. ‘But this is no dream, as far as I know, nor are we shadows in your imagining. This is Rachyl, this is Ibryen, Count of Nesdiryn, and I'm just a traveller, each of us as real as yourself. How you came here I can't say, nor how long you've been here, but you're in the middle depths, and I suspect your Culmaren has sustained you for some considerable time.'
The Dryenwr looked at him intently, then at the Culmaren draped over him. As he fingered the material, his eyes opened in horror and cried out, ‘Nightmare! Not a dream. Nightmare.’ He brought the Culmaren close to his face. ‘No, this cannot be.'
Ibryen eased Rachyl and the Traveller to one side and knelt down by the suddenly distraught figure. ‘Neither dream nor nightmare, warrior,’ he said. ‘But perhaps something stranger than you'd find in either. I doubt we can answer many of the questions you must be asking, but you're truly awake and in the real world, albeit perhaps in a place that's as profoundly alien to you as one of your high-flying cloud lands would be to us.'
The Dryenwr stared at him, his hands rolling the Culmaren, and his face full of confusion. Unsteadily he ran a hand over his tunic then over the rocky ground. He turned from Ibryen to look at Rachyl and then at the Traveller. ‘The middle depths?’ he said. The Traveller nodded.
'Here.’ Rachyl offered the cap of her water bottle. The Dryenwr reached out then hesitated. Rachyl smiled then drank a little of the water and offered it again. The Dryenwr took it. ‘Careful, it's cold,’ Rachyl said as he took a first cautious sip. ‘And I'm afraid we've no food with us. It's all down with the tent.’ The Dryenwr closed his eyes as he drank the contents of the small cap then he held it out for more. Rachyl filled it again. ‘That's enough,’ she said.
'The middle depths,’ the Dryenwr said softly to himself. ‘The middle depths. I am here. Svara protect me.’ His hand circled over his heart. He took hold of the Culmaren again and his face became pained. ‘But how could such a thing happen? How could the Culmaren die? This must be a fearful place.'
Ibryen's own face reflected the man's distress. ‘We know nothing of your ways, Dryenwr. In fact, only a few days ago I'd have laughed to scorn even the idea that cloud lands existed. But change is the way of things and I'm learning to bend to it or break as never before. So, I suspect, must you, now.’ He paused, uncertain how to continue. ‘This land of ours may be strange to you and, indeed, it can be a fearful place, but we mean you no harm and will not wittingly hurt or even offend you. Here, as a token of this ...’ He took the Dryenwr's sword from Rachyl and held it out to him, hilt first. Ibryen heard Rachyl shifting behind him as the Dryenwr took the sword and he held out a hand to restrain her. ‘I see from this hacked edge that there are terrors in your own lands also,’ he said.
The Dryenwr did not reply, but stared fixedly at the sword. Then there was a long and painful silence as the three spectators could do nothing other than watch the manifest return of awful memories—at first slowly and then, like water through a shattered dam, in a single engulfing flood. The sword began to tremble and, for a moment, it seemed that the Dryenwr was going to unleash a great howl of anguish. No such sound emerged, however. Instead, the sword wilted and his head dropped forward.
'My people, where are you? What happened?’ He looked at Ibryen and began a desperate plea. ‘We debated, agonized, even at the heart of the battle. Then the Carvers’ messenger—the sword-bearer—pressed in battle himself, spoke to me in my extremity. We'd sought no conflict, he said. We'd the right to be. All creatures have that. He and his corrupted flights had to be defeated or, with his foul brothers assailing the middle depths, sky, land and sea would have fallen to the Great Corrupter. We could do no other, could we?’ Ibryen made no reply. The Dryenwr looked up to the shadowed roof of the cave. ‘So I sent the word and we did as he did.’ He was almost whispering. ‘Moved the land against the will of Svara, hiding it high within the clouds. Then my Soarers re-doubled their attack, flight upon flight of us, a desperate venture now, to draw his attention away. Such a sight we were. The sky alive with glittering wings. Such discipline, such courage.’ He gripped Ibryen's arm, full of warrior pride. ‘And we held them. Despite their numbers. We held them. His corruption had taken more from them than it had given and their will was weak.’ He bared his teeth and both hands took the sword. ‘Then he was among us. He could not resist the victory he saw falling to him, so blood-crazed was he. At the height of the conflict he came forth. On his dreadful screaming mount. Cutting through our ranks as though we were mere fledglings. But I faced him.’ He shuddered. ‘Stopped his bloody progress. Stared into those dead, white eyes. Fear racking every part of me but freeing me of all restraints and burdens save one: that he must die even as he slew me. His creature shrieked in my face, but I saw only him.’ Ibryen could feel the Dryenwr trembling, his eyes focused on something far beyond the confines of the cave. ‘He raised his sword. Then he faltered. And I looked up. There was my land, emerging from the clouds, descending on to the land that this abomination had made his own.'
He closed his eyes and shook his head. ‘A blasphemy, yet magnificent ... and who would judge us?’ He fell silent. No one spoke, there had been such intensity in his telling. When he began again, his voice was distant. ‘I remember him turning with a fearsome cry. I remember feeling the great power of his true self being exerted. Then ... such a noise ... and the sky was torn apart, ablaze with a terrible fire. And I was being hurled downwards, ripped from my wings, helpless amid the forces that had been unleashed. Then there was only darkness, and dreams ... strange dreams.’ He put a hand to his eyes. ‘My people, my people. What became of you? What could have withstood that burning?'
Grief rose up to fill Ibryen. He had understood little of what the man had said, but his pain was all too familiar. Was this to be his own destiny? Lost and despairing in a strange land, all loved ones gone, their fate unknown?
'You must rest,’ he said hoarsely. ‘You're weak and shouldn't tax yourself thus. In the morning we can go down to our camp and eat, and perhaps talk a little more. Then you can come back to our village. It's only a couple of days away and you'll be welcome to stay there for as long as you wish.'
But the Dryenwr did not seem to be listening. ‘The middle depths,’ he said again, his voice a mixture of awe and disbelief, as he gazed about the cave. Many emotions were obviously struggling for primacy within him, but even as Ibryen watched, he saw a powerful will taking control of the man's features. ‘Forgive me,’ he said, grasping Ibryen's arm and looking at Rachyl and the Traveller in turn. ‘I burden you with my concerns, matters about which perhaps nothing can be done. As you say, change is the way of things, and at least I am alive, however mysteriously.’ He became suddenly agitated. ‘What of your own battle? I feel none of His taint about you. Is it over? Are you part of the sword-bearer's army? Can you use another blade?’ He shook his head and his expression became grim. ‘What bond brought us together in that way I don't know, but it grieves me deeply that there were mighty forces ranged against him on that snow-covered
shore, and he was sorely taxed when it happened. I hope it did him no hurt.'
Ibryen looked at the Traveller, who shrugged.
'We are at war,’ Ibryen said hesitantly, ‘but there've been no great battles here in many generations, nor in any of the lands hereabouts. And we're far from any shoreline.'
The Dryenwr frowned in bewilderment. ‘But ... the return of the Great Corrupter must surely have sounded about the whole of the middle depths?’ he said. He pointed upwards and his voice cracked. ‘And the destruction of His lieutenant's land—and perhaps my own—could hardly have gone unnoticed. It tore open the very fabric of the heavens.'
Ibryen did not reply immediately, there was regret in his voice when he did. ‘There's been nothing such as you describe,’ he said. ‘No uproar in the heavens, nor even rumour of a ... Great Corrupter.’ He hesitated. ‘The name itself has only the ring of something out of myth and legend.'
The Traveller laid a hand on his shoulder. ‘Perhaps not,’ he said, unexpectedly sombre. ‘It's a name that I heard in the carvings on the Great Gate. And there were rumours in Girnlant of an evil having arisen in the north.’ He spoke to the Dryenwr. ‘When was this battle that you fought?'
The Dryenwr looked surprised. ‘A few ...’ He faltered. ‘I don't know exactly. A few hours ago, I suppose. Perhaps a day or so. How long have I been here? It's still the second moon, isn't it?'
'I never had cause to learn the ordering of your months,’ the Traveller said.
'It's the second moon measured from the solstice,’ the Dryenwr said, with a hint of impatience. ‘The second moon of Ravenyarr.'
The Traveller pulled a wry face. ‘The year of the Raven. That leaves us none the wiser, I'm afraid, for the same reason.’ The Dryenwr seemed about to lose his temper. The Traveller took the edge of the white Culmaren thoughtfully. ‘How long would it take for this to die?’ he asked forcefully, looking squarely at the Dryenwr.