by Andre Norton
But—no answer . . . She had been so sure of instant contact that that silence was like an unexpected blow. Jaelithe opened her eyes and gazed up at the roofing of the ship’s timbers so close above her head. The Wave Cleaver was truly cleaving waves and the motion about her—perhaps that was what broke the contact or kept her from completing it.
“Simon!” Her call searched, demanded. She had had long years of training as a witch, to center and aim her power through that jewel which was the badge of her office. Was this fumbling now because she must do it all without a tool, with the skepticism of those she had long revered eating at her confidence?
She had been so sure that morning when she had had that sending concerning Loyse and when she had ridden to Es with that flaming desire to be one of the Power again—only to find doors and minds closed against all her knocking. Then, because she had been so sure she was right, she had gone apart, as dictated by her past training, to study this thing, to strive to use it. And when she had had the tidings that Simon had acted against all nature, she had guessed that the Kolder blight had touched him, then she had used that new power, little as she knew about it, in the fight for Simon which dropped him into the forbidden tangle of Tormarsh. After that, she had tried again with purpose. But were the Guardians right, was this new thing she thought she had found merely the dying echo of the old power, doomed to fail?
Simon. Jaelithe began to consider Simon apart from a goal at which to aim thought. And from the fringe consideration of Simon she looked inward at herself. She had surrendered her witchdom to Simon when she wedded him, thinking this union meant more to her than all else, accepting the penalty for that uniting. But why then had she been so eager to seize upon this hope that her sacrifice had been no sacrifice at all? She had left Simon to ride to Es, to best the Guardians and prove that she was not as others, that she was still witch as well as wife. And when they would not believe, she had not sought out Simon, she had kept to herself, intent upon proving them wrong. As if—as if Simon was no longer of importance at all! Always the power—the power!
Was that because she had known no other force in her life? That what Simon had awakened in her was not lasting emotion, but merely a new thing which had been strange and compelling enough to shake her from the calm and ordered ways of her kind, but not deep enough to hold her? Simon—
Fear—fear that such reasoning was forcing her to face something harsh and unbearable. Jaelithe concentrated again on Simon: standing so, with his head held high, his grave face so seldom alight with any smile—and yet in his eyes, always in his eyes when they met hers—
Jaelithe’s head turned on the hard pillow of the bunk.
Simon—or the need to know that she was still a witch. Which drove her now? As a witch she had never known this kind of fear—not without—but within.
“Simon!” That was not a demanding summons for communication; it was a cry born of pain and self-doubt.
“Jaelithe . . .” Faint, far off, but yet an answer, and in it something which steadied her, though it did not answer her questions.
“We come.” She added as tersely as she could what she had done to further his plan for tracking.
“I do not know where we are,” he made answer.
“And I can hardly reach you.”
That was the danger: that their bond might fail. If they only had some way of strengthening that. In shape-changing one employed the common linkage of mutual desire to accomplish that end. Mutual desire—but they were only two. Two—no. Loyse—Loyse’s desire would link with theirs in this. But how? The girl from Verlaine had no vestige of witch power. She had been unable to perform the simplest spells in spite of Jaelithe’s coaching, having the blindness in that direction which enfeebled all but the Old Race.
But shape-changing worked on those who were not of the Old Race; it had once worked on Loyse in Kars. She might not be able to pull on the power itself, but it could react upon her. And was this still the power?
Without answering Simon Jaelithe broke the faint link between them, set in her mind instead the image of Loyse as she had last seen the girl weeks ago in Es and using that as anchorage she sought the spirit behind the picture.
Loyse!
Jaelithe had a blurred, momentary glimpse of a wall, a scrap of floor, and another crouching figure that was Simon! Loyse—for that single instant she had looked through Loyse’s eyes!
But possession was not what she wanted, contact rather. Again she tried. This time with a message, not so deep an identification. Foggy, as if that wisp of tie between them fluttered, anchored for an instant, and then failed. But as Jaelithe struggled to make it firm, it did unite and become less tenuous. Until it held Loyse. Now for Simon—Groping, anchorage! Simon, Loyse—and it was stronger, more consistent. Also—she gained direction from it! What they had wanted from the first—direction!
Jaelithe wriggled from the confines of the bunk, kept her footing with the aid of handgrips as she sought the deck. There was wind billowing the sails, the narrow knife of the bow dipped into rising waves. The sky was sullen where the sun had gone, leaving only a few richly colored banners at the horizon.
That wind whipped Jaelithe’s hair about her uncovered head, sent spray into her face until she gasped as she reached the post beside the rudder where two of the crew labored to hold the ship on course, and Captain Stymir watched narrowly sky, wind and wave.
“The course,” Jaelithe caught at his shoulder to steady herself at an unexpected incline of the decking. “That way—”
It was so sharp set in her head that she could pivot in a half turn and point, sure that her bearings were correct for their purpose. He studied her for a second as if to gauge her sincerity and then nodded, taking the helm himself.
The bow of the Wave Cleaver began to swing to Jaelithe’s left, coming about with due caution for wind and wave, away from the dark shadow of the land, out into the sea. Somewhere under the surface of all this turbulence was that other vessel, and Jaelithe had no doubts at all that they were going to follow the track of that, as long as that three-fold awareness linked Simon, Loyse and herself.
She stood now wet with spray, her hair lankly plastered to her skull, stringing on her shoulders. The last colors faded from the sky or were blotted out by the cloud masses. Behind them even the shadow of Estcarp’s coast had gone. She knew so little of the sea. This fury of wind and wave spelled storm, and could storm so batter them from the course that they would lose the quarry?
Jaelithe shouted that question to the captain.
“A blow—” His words came faintly back. “But we have ridden out far worse and still kept on course. What can be done, will be. For the rest, lady, it lies between the fingers of the Old Woman!” He spat over his shoulder in the ritual luck-evoking gesture of his race.
But still she would not go below, watching in the fast gathering darkness for something she knew she would not be able to see with the eyes of her body, making as best she could an anchor past breaking for the tie.
13 KOLDER NEST
TIME WAS hard to measure in this ship’s cell. Simon lay relaxed on a narrow shelf bunk, but still he held to that ribbon of communication which included not only Jaelithe, but now Loyse in a lesser degree. Though the girl no longer shared his quarters, she was present in his mind.
Simon had seen none of his captors since, shortly after this voyage had begun, Aldis appeared and took charge of Loyse, leaving him alone. A second inspection of the narrow cabin had provided some amenities: a bunk which could be pulled out and down from the wall, a sliding shelf on which, from time to time, a tray of food appeared—coming from the wall behind.
The food was emergency rations, he thought, thin wafers without much taste, a small can of liquid. Not appetizing but enough to keep hunger and thirst under control. Otherwise there was no break in the long, silent hours. He did sleep a little while Loyse took over, holding the tie. Simon gathered that she now shared Aldis’ cabin, but that the Kolder agent was l
eaving her alone, content that she was passive.
Seven, now eight mealtimes. Simon counted them off. But that gave him no reasonable idea of the number of hours or days he had been here under the unchanging glow of the walls. They could be feeding him twice daily, or even once; he could not be sure. This was a period of waiting, and to any man who had depended most of his life upon the stimulation of action, waiting was a harsh ordeal. Only once before had it been so—during a year in jail. Waiting then, warped by the bitterness of knowing that he had been duped into taking punishment for those he hated, he had spent that time striving to work out schemes for repayment.
Now he was facing a blind future without even a good knowledge of the nature of the enemy. All he had was that mental picture from the past of the Kolder leader dying in Gorm, a narrow valley down which strange vehicles dashed while those in them fired back at pursuers. There had been another world for the Kolders and something had gone wrong there.
Somehow they had discovered a “gate” and come through—into this time and place, where the civilization of the Estcarpian Old Race was on the wane, a slow slip into the age-old dust which already rose about Es and the villages and cities of their kind. Along the coast—in Alizon and Karsten—a more barbaric upswing was rooted, newer nations, elbowing aside the Old Race, yet so much in awe of their legendary witches that they dared not quite challenge them—not until the Kolder began to meddle.
And if Kolder was not uprooted, Alizon and Karsten would go the way of Gorm: ingested into the horror of the possessed. Yet Kolder played upon this older enmity and fear to make their future victims their present allies.
The nature of Kolder. Simon began to concentrate upon that. Their native civilization was a mechanical, science-based one—that fact had been amply proven by what they had found in Gorm. The Estcarpian command had always believed that the Kolder themselves must be few in number, that it was necessary for them to have the possessed captives in order to keep their forces in the field. And now that Gorm was gone and Yle evacuated—
Yle evacuated! Simon’s eyes came open, he stared at the ceiling of the cabin. How had he known that? Why was he so very sure that the Kolder’s only stronghold on the coast was now an empty shell? Yet certain he was.
Were the Kolder now drawing in all their forces to protect their base? Kolder manpower—there had been five left dead in Gorm, the majority in their own apartments—not killed by any sword or dart, but as if they had willed their own dying—or some animating spark, common to all, had failed. But five! Could the death of only five so weaken the Kolder cadre that they would have to pull in all their garrisons?
Hundreds of the possessed had died in Gorm. And then there were their agents in Karsten—Fulk—and the others such as Aldis who were still alive and about their business. Not true Kolder, but natives who had come to serve the enemy—not as mindless possessed, but with wit and awareness. Not one of the Old Race could be so bent to Kolder use; that was why the Old Race must go!
Again Simon wondered at whence that emphatic assertion had come. They had known that the Kolder wanted no Old Race captives for their ranks of possessed. They had suspected that this was the reason, but now it was as clear in his mind as if he had had it from Kolder lips.
Heard it? Did the Kolder have their form of communication such as that he now held with Jaelithe and Loyse? That thought shook him. Quickly Simon sent a warning to she who followed and caught her unease in return.
“We are sure of the course now,” she told him.
“Break. Do not send again unless there is great need.”
“Great need . . .” That echoed in his mind, and then Simon became aware that the vibration which had been so steady in the walls about him was muted, humming down scale as if the speed they had maintained was being cut. Had they reached their port?
Simon sat up on the bunk, faced the door. Would they lock him with the same stiff control which had kept him prisoner before? He had no weapons, though some skill in unarmed combat. But he hardly thought that the Kolder would try a scuffle man to man.
He was right, even as the door to the cabin opened, the freeze was on him. He could move—by another’s will—and he did, out into the narrow corridor.
Men there, two of them. But looking into their eyes Simon controlled a shudder only because he could not move save on order. These were possessed, the dead-alive of the Kolder labor horde. One was Sulcar by his fair head, his height; the other of the same yellow-brown skinned race as the officer who had brought Simon on board.
They did not touch him, merely waited, their soulless gaze on him. One turned and started along the passage, the other flattened back against the wall to allow Simon by, and then fell in behind him. Thus, between the two, he climbed the ladder, came out on the surface of the submarine.
Above was an arch of rock. The water lapped sullenly against a waiting quay and Simon saw here a likeness to the hidden port beneath Sippar, evidently a familiar pattern for the enemy. Still moved by remote control he walked ashore on the narrow gangway. There was activity there. Gangs of almost-naked possessed shifted boxes, cleared spaces. They worked steadily, as if each man knew just what was to be done, and the quickest way of doing it.
No voices raised, no talk among the work gang. Simon stalked stiffly behind his guide, the Sulcar bringing up the rear, and no one looked at them. The quay was long and two other subs nosed against it. Being unloaded, Simon noted. Signs of withdrawal from other posts?
Before them were two exits, a tunnel and a flight of stairs to the left. His guide took that way. Five steps and then a waiting cubby. Once they were inside the door closed and they arose in an elevator such as had been in Sippar.
The ride was not long, the door slid open upon a corridor. Sleek gray walls with a metallic luster to their surfaces, outlines of doors, all closed. They passed six, three to a side, before they came to the end of the hall and a door which was open.
Simon had been in the heart center of Sippar and he half expected to see here again the seated Kolder, the capped master at a cross table, all the controls those men had run to hold their defenses tight.
But this was a much smaller room than that. Light, a harsh burst of it, came from bars set in the ceiling in a complicated geometric pattern Simon had no desire to examine closely. The floor had no discernible carpeting, yet it yielded to cushion their steps. There were three chairs, curved back and seat in one piece. And in the center one a true Kolder.
Simon’s guards had not entered with him, but that compulsion which had brought him out of the submarine now marched him forward a step or two to face the Kolder officer. The alien’s smock-like over garment was the same gray as the chair in which he sat, as the walls and the flooring. Only his skin, pallid, bleached to a paper white, broke that general monotone of color. Most of his head was covered by a skullcap, and as far as Simon could see, he had no hair.
“You are here at last.” The mumble of an alien tongue and yet Simon somehow understood the words. Their meaning surprised him a little, one could almost believe that they were not captor and prisoner but two who had some bargain in prospect and needed only to come to a final agreement. Caution kept Simon silent—the Kolder must reveal his game first.
“Did Thurhu send you?” The Kolder continued to study Simon and now the other thought that there was a spark of doubt in that question. “But you are not an outer one!” The doubt flared into hostility. “Who are you?”
“Simon Tregarth.”
The Kolder continued to hold him with a narrowed stare.
“You are not one of these natives.” No question but an assured statement.
“I am not.”
“Therefore you have come from beyond. But you are not an outer one, and certainly not of the true breed. I ask you now—what are you?”
“A man from another world, or perhaps another time,” Simon saw no reason not to tell the truth. Perhaps the fact that he was a puzzle for the Kolder was to his advantage.
“What world? What time?” Those shot at him harshly.
Simon could neither shake his head nor shrug. But he put his own ignorance into words.
“My own world and time. Its relation to this one I do not know. There was a way opened and I came through.”
“And why did you journey so?”
“To escape enemies.” Even as you and yours did, Simon added in his mind.
“There was a war?”
“There had been a war,” Simon corrected. “I was a soldier, but in peace I was not necessary. I had private enemies—”
“A soldier,” the Kolder officer repeated, still appraising him with that unchanging stare. “And now you fight for these witches?”
“Fighting is my trade. I took service with them, yes.”
“Yet these natives are barbarians, and you are a civilized man. Oh, show no surprise at my guess, does not like always recognize like? We, too, are soldiers and our war brought us defeat. Only it has also brought us victory in the end since we are here and we hold that which shall make this world ours! Think you on that, outsider. A whole world to lie thus—” He stretched forth his hand, palm up, and then closed his fingers slowly as if he balled something tangible within his fist. “To serve as you will it! These natives cannot stand against what we have to back us. And—” he paused and then added with slow and telling emphasis, “we can use such a man as you.”
“Is that why I am a prisoner here?” Simon countered.
“Yes. But not to remain a prisoner—unless you will it. Simon Tregarth, March Warder of the south. Ah, we know you all—the mighty of Estcarp.” His expression did not change, but there was a sneer in his voice.
“Where is your witch wife now, March Warder—back with those other she-devils? It did not take her long to learn that you had nothing she cared to possess, did it? Oh, all that passes in Estcarp, Karsten and Alizon is known to us, to the minutest detail it is known. We can possess you if we wish. But we shall give you a choice, Simon Tregarth. You owe nothing to those she-devils of Estcarp, to the wandering-witted barbarians they control with their magic. Has not that witch of yours proved to you that there can be no loyalty with them? So we say—come with us, work in our grand plan. Then Estcarp will lie open for your plucking, your terms—or strike any other bargain you wish. Be March Warder again, do as Estcarp wishes, until the word comes to do otherwise.”