by Kyra Halland
Carden frowned. “Gobby, untie her.” Gobby came forward and undid the knots. When Lainie was freed, Carden gave her a shove forward. “Go on, now. Stay to the front, where I can keep an eye on you.”
Lainie looked up into the narrow upper portion of the canyon. Yellowbird Creek was running fast and deep in this part of the canyon. The canyon walls were rocky and steep, rising ten measures high or more. An uneven ledge, maybe just wide enough for two men side by side, clung to the wall on the left, a few hand-widths above the water level.
She started forward, moving carefully on the ledge, which was slippery with spray from the rushing creek and the remnants of last night’s rain. As the crew of miners followed her, the man who’d worried about the horses said, “Boss? I feel like something’s watchin’ us.”
“Don’t be stupid, Mooden,” Gobby said. “No one’s around.”
“No, there’s someone!” Mooden said. “I’m sure I saw someone – a blueskin! Boss, there’s a blueskin up there ahead of us, watchin’ us!”
Lainie looked up at the rim of the canyon. Among the pine trees growing along the edge, she thought she saw a vaguely man-shaped shadow. She blinked, and there were only trees. Then something long, furry, and low to the ground skittered away between the trees. “There’s nothing there,” Carden said. “Just some animal.”
“Just some animal?” For such a big man, Mooden’s voice was high and thin and nervous. “That was a grovik! One of them’ll eat a man alive down to the bones!”
“You want to wait back with the horses, Mooden?” Carden asked. “It’ll cost you your share, but at least you’ll be safe.”
The other men laughed while Mooden stammered that no, he wasn’t scared and he wasn’t staying back with the horses. They should be scared, Lainie thought. They weren’t nearly as frightened of the power in that ore as they ought to be.
As the upper canyon rose higher into the mountains, it grew so narrow that even though the sun had yet to reach midafternoon, the deep ravine lay more than half in shadow. It twisted back and forth so that Lainie could never see more than thirty or forty arm-lengths ahead. Distant rumbles of thunder told of storms higher up in the mountains, threatening more runoff down into the canyons and raising the danger that the creek would overflow onto the ledge.
After some distance, the party came to a feeder canyon on the right, across the creek. “Stop,” Carden said. He looked at the side canyon, then turned to Lainie, his hands in the pockets of his black trousers and a friendly expression on his face that she wasn’t buying for a copper bit. “So, Miss Lainie,” he said. “Which way do we go now?” He pulled out the pouch he kept the ore in.
Lainie knew what was coming. She tried to duck away, but Carden grabbed her arm. “Hold her, Gobby!” he ordered. Gobby grabbed her from behind in a powerful headlock, then Carden seized her right wrist in a painfully tight grip and dropped chunks of ore from his pouch into her palm.
Pain and frigid cold shocked through her body. Darkness filled with malice blanketed her senses; the harsh whispering of the beings whose awareness was contained in the ore swelled in her mind. You are ours; add your life-force to ours and we will give you our power. You will live forever with us, and be our hands to wipe out the foul infestation on the surface of our world. Icy fingers prodded and grasped and tugged at her, dragging her farther into darkness –
A sharp blow across her face snapped her awareness away from the dark beings. She was on her hands and knees on the ground, with Carden crouching in front of her. “I said, which way do we go?”
Shaking, Lainie stared at him. A thin veil of darkness still hung between her and the world. She opened her mouth, but found no words within herself. She seemed to have forgotten what words were.
Carden slapped her again. “Tell me!”
She shook her head. She couldn’t go to them, they would trap her in the dark and turn her into a monster…
“Gobby,” Carden said, “since she refuses to cooperate, she’s no longer of any use to me. Go ahead and do whatever you like with her.”
“Yes, sir, Mr. Carden! Thank you, sir!” Gobby’s packs of gear clanked and clattered as he dropped them to the ground, and he began fumbling with the buttons of his pants.
“What about the rest of us?” another miner asked. “Do we get a turn?”
“As many of you as it takes to get her to see reason.”
Lainie frantically looked around for an escape route. Twenty miners, all armed, and Carden with his magic, in the narrow canyon with the rushing creek no more than an arm-length away and the canyon walls rising ten measures nearly straight up – There was no way out. “No!” she cried. “Wait! I’ll try, I’ll see what I can find out.”
Carden smiled at her. “Smart girl. Looks like you’re going to have to wait a little longer, Gobby.”
Grumbling, Gobby started buttoning up his pants again.
Like before, Lainie had dropped the ore while she was overcome by the maelstrom of darkness and voices, but she could still feel living tendrils of cold slithering up from where her hands and knees touched the ground. She remembered how, at Mr. Vendine’s suggestion, she had been able to feel the power of the earth of the Wildings beneath her feet. Holding the ore seemed to have created a link between her and the darker power which lay even deeper under the ground. This way, the contact wasn’t quite as painful as holding the ore directly. If she could tell Carden what he wanted to know without having to go through that again –
She hated to do it. She should resist. But he would force her to hold the ore again, and then he would turn her over to Gobby and the other miners. She wasn’t strong enough to fight them all off, and they were armed and she wasn’t. If she was going to stay alive and unharmed long enough to find a way out of this, she had no choice but to do what Carden said.
She closed her eyes and cautiously followed the sensation of cold from her arms down to where it disappeared into the ground. Her physical senses stopped there; to get beneath the surface of the earth, she had to draw on her power and extend her magical senses. The strain on her mind as she reached down felt a little like trying hard to remember something she had forgotten.
Then a thought came to her – Mr. Vendine had sensed her power while he was still days away from Bitterbush Springs, even though she didn’t use it very often and then only in small amounts. If she used plenty of it whenever she had the excuse of doing what Carden wanted, it might act as a beacon to help Mr. Vendine find her, if he was alive and coming after her.
She reached deeper for more of her power, until all at once it began to flow freely, as though she had primed a pump to get the water running. As she extended her increased mage senses into the earth, a warm, vibrant, amber-colored sensation of life and power surrounded her; the Wildings magic she had sensed before. It felt so safe and comfortable, she wanted to stay there; but it wasn’t what she needed. Her power might be related to and shaped by that living, amber warmth, but she couldn’t use it, and it couldn’t tell her what she needed to know. Reluctantly, she left it behind and went deeper, following the cold and the voices through layers of energy that darkened into brown and eventually to black, until utter darkness, a denial of even the existence of light, surrounded her.
A multitude of voices, which yet were one voice, filled her hearing with their whispers. Sister, come join us and be one of us.
Even frightened as she was of them, she couldn’t help being curious. Who are you?
We are Sh’kimech. We were before the light. The earth was ours. Then the light came, burning and blinding, and with it the infestation. We left our bodies, joined our mindsoul as one, and found refuge beneath the earth. Come join your life-force to ours and live with us. Cold fingers tugged at her, trying to entangle her within them.
No, she said. With an effort of her will, she pulled herself away from their hungry grasp. Tell me where there are more of you. That man commands me. They called her Sister; would it matter to them what happened to her? He’ll
destroy me if I don’t tell him.
That one, they said, their contempt as clear as if they spoke with physical voices. The one who thinks he commands us. Who thinks our mindsoul is his to take. Show him, Sister. They sounded almost gleeful as they pulled at her. This way. Bring him! Go back and bring him to us!
And then the dark hold upon her let go without her having to fight it. She opened her eyes and looked up at Carden. The Sh’kimech were eager for her to come to them, and for her to bring him. She remembered their hatred for all that lived in the sunlight and their yearning for destruction. “This is dangerous, Carden. You don’t know what you’re messing with. You think you can handle it, but you can’t.”
His foot caught her in the side. She doubled over, gasping for breath; he yanked on her braid, forcing her to look up at him. “Stop lying to me, and tell me.”
He might not kill her if she didn’t tell him what he wanted to know, but he would certainly make her wish she was dead. She shrank away from the thought of what he could do to her, and looked in the direction the beings, the Sh’kimech, had drawn her in. If she couldn’t stop him, would they destroy him for her? “Farther up Yellowbird,” she said.
He stared hard at her, as though trying to decide if she was telling the truth, then ordered the group to continue up the canyon.
About thirty measures after the first feeder canyon, they came to a second canyon, this one on the left, the side of Yellowbird they were on. At Carden’s instructions, Lainie knelt, reached for the Sh’kimech, felt the tug pulling her farther on up Yellowbird Canyon.
The creek rushing down from the side canyon was too deep and swift and wide to be crossed safely at that place. “We keep going that way,” she said, pointing up Yellowbird. “But we have to find a safe place to cross.” Carden scowled, and she added, “Unless you want to try to swim across here.”
“All right, then. But I warn you, no tricks.”
Without bothering to answer, Lainie turned left and led the group several measures up the side canyon until she found a line of rocks in the creek big enough and close enough together to make a crossing. Carefully, she stepped across the wet rocks, rounded and smoothed by countless years of water rushing over them, then waited for the others, hoping that a surge of floodwater would come tumbling down the canyon and wash them away, or at least that Carden and Gobby would fall in.
No such luck; everyone crossed safely.
They returned to Yellowbird Canyon and continued climbing. As the canyon cut higher into the mountains, the way grew rockier, steeper, and narrower. The rush of water in the creek drowned out most conversation, and thunder rumbling higher up in the mountains gave warning of more flooding to come. A hundred measures or so farther up they reached a third feeder canyon, also on the left, out of which flowed another swiftly-moving creek. Again Carden had Lainie check their direction. The Sh’kimech greeted her eagerly, and prodded her farther on up Yellowbird Canyon. Again Lainie turned aside in search of a safe crossing, and found a place where that creek was narrow enough to step across.
Back in Yellowbird Canyon, after a distance of another couple hundred measures they came to yet another side canyon on the left. Lainie again knelt to check the path, and the dark beings tugged at her to turn aside and head up into the smaller canyon. “That way,” she told Carden, pointing.
“Are you sure?” Carden demanded. “Or are you just trying to get us lost?”
“You want to ask them yourself?” Lainie snapped. “If I get you lost, I’ll be lost too.”
Carden frowned, but he gestured for her to continue on.
As Lainie climbed through the narrow cleft that led higher up into the mountains, a certainty grew within her that she was leading the group to their doom. If it was only Carden’s doom, and Gobby’s, she wouldn’t care. But the Sh’kimech wanted to drag her down to live with them and use her as their hands to destroy the people who lived on the surface of the world. So far she had managed to fight them off; would she still be able to once she was in their home? Maybe it would be better to force Carden to kill her now, or to throw herself into the flooded creek and be drowned or bashed to death on the rocks…
And leave her Pa alone and bereft, and never see Mala again, or Bunky and Snoozer and Rat, or play cards, or have children, or see Mr. Vendine’s cocky grin directed at her one more time…
Carden was desperate for that ore. He said he needed her help, but unless kidnapping her had been part of his plan from the beginning, he hadn’t originally figured on having help. Even if she refused to cooperate and sacrificed herself, she had no doubt that he could continue searching for the ore anyway, and that he would eventually find more of it.
She wouldn’t give up. Not yet. As long as she was alive, there was a chance that she would find a way to beat both the Sh’kimech and Carden and get away safely. Sending up prayers to the Provider for a way, and to the Defender for protection, she pushed onward.
Behind Lainie, the miners were breathing hard with their heavy loads and the steepness of the climb. Some of them cursed under their breath and muttered that she must be leading them wrong. Only Carden seemed to have no need to stop and rest. A couple of brief, heavy showers came and went, then the sun went down behind the mountains and the last few patches of warm sunlight disappeared, replaced by a chill wind that rushed down through the canyon, making Lainie shiver.
In the dusk, they passed one feeder canyon on the right, then came to a second. Like the other times when Lainie had knelt and reached down to check which way to go, she didn’t stint on the use of her power. Each use of her magic would send a signal to Mr. Vendine, if he was searching for her. Deep under the earth, the Sh’kimech tugged her in the direction of this new canyon, then let her go without resistance.
Lainie pointed up the side canyon. “That way.”
Carden scowled at the flooded creek. “Find us a way across.”
Several measures up, a line of rocks offered a place to cross. It was tricky footing on the slick, smooth rocks in the dim light, but, despite Lainie’s silent prayers to the Avenger that Carden, or Gobby, or preferably both, would fall in, everyone made it safely across, and they headed back down to the side canyon.
This new canyon widened a bit as it made a broad curve to the left. The creek bed here was steep and running full as well, fed by a number of small streams. The canyon straightened out again into a narrow gully down the side of the mountain, and the head of the canyon became visible up ahead. The entire mountainside was in shadow, but it seemed to Lainie that there was a line of deeper darkness up at the very end of the gully among the pines covering the mountain slope. It might be a cave opening, but it was more completely black than a simple crack in the ground. The trees nearest the darkness had a gray, sickly look to them. The cold seeping out of the opening wasn’t the kind of cold she felt with her body – she was too far from it to feel it with her physical senses – but it chilled her to the depths of her spirit. She didn’t need to ask the Sh’kimech to know that was where they wanted her to go. “Up there,” she said, pointing to the head of the canyon.
“Stupid birdie,” one of the miners said loudly. “Leading us into a dead end. This whole thing is crazy as a rabid squirrel. I’m going back.” He turned and tried to push his way past the others, and lost his balance. With a shout of alarm, he tumbled into the rushing creek. Before anyone could react, he disappeared down the creek, his head and his cries soon buried by the water.
The other miners stared after him, shocked into silence. Then Carden cursed. “That was probably five gildings’ worth of equipment he took with him! The rest of you, watch your step. And anyone else who wants to turn back’ll meet the same fate as him, only after I get my gear from you first.” He turned to Lainie, taking out his pouch of ore. “You wouldn’t lead us into a dead end, would you?”
“No!”
“I think I’d like to make sure.” He grabbed her hand, dropped a few lumps of ore into it, and forced it closed.
Burning cold agony shot through her arm, her chest, her whole body, and darkness folded around her. This way, come with us, bring them with you. They tugged her forward.
I’m coming. Let me go!
Soon you will be ours, Sister, they said, then loosed their grip on her and slid away.
Lainie opened her eyes and found herself hunched on the ground, icy pain still shooting through her arm. Carden still had her hand in his grip, squeezed shut around the ore. She jerked her hand free and threw the ore at Carden. “Yes, it’s that way. If you don’t want to believe me, why’d you drag me up here?”
Carden picked up the lumps of black rock from the ground. With a look of intense concentration, he murmured a few liquid-sounding words and seemed to inhale deeply. He opened his hand to reveal that the ore had turned to ashy dust. A new darkness showed in his eyes.
Lainie stared, horrified at what Carden had done to the living beings within the ore. He had taken the power – their lives – into himself. No wonder he was so strong, and no wonder the Sh’kimech were furious with him; he must have been doing that all along. What he intended to do with so much power, Lainie couldn’t even begin to guess. She could only hope the Sh’kimech really did mean to destroy him if she brought him to them.
But taking him to them would also mean giving him access to huge amounts of the power, and it would risk her falling under the Sh’kimech’s control.
Carden let the dust that was the spent ore trickle to the ground. “I’ll have no more backtalk from any of you.” A new coldness, an even darker, harder, more merciless note, had entered his voice. “Understand?”
“Yes, sir,” the miners said, some of them with more heart in the words than others. Lainie sat as though frozen, paralyzed by her dilemma. Carden grabbed the back of her shirt collar and hauled her to her feet. “If you’re lying, I’ll know soon enough. Now, move.”
Lainie could only nod silently. Her feet heavy as lead, her eyes fixed on the darkness at the top of the canyon, fear worming through her insides, she took a step, and another, and then another.