The Anvil of Ice

by Michael Scott Rohan

  When his song was ended, Kermorvan smiled apologetically. He drank again when the bottle came back to him, and appeared to grow happier, and joined in the songs Ils and Elof sang. Ils sang in her low sour-sweet voice, strange old songs of the dwellers under stone, rendering the words into northern speech for the men.

  Cold, cold the winds through caverns blowing, Dark the waters as under stone they run, But soft is the glow of the lamps at journey's ending And the gold is warmer than the sun.

  Fade, fade the leaves upon the branches, As the winter comes, till there are none. But deep under earth the stone is ever fruitful, And the gold is brighter than the sun.

  Fall, fall the suns as summer passes,

  Short there is life and love grows cold.

  But here far below a love need know no season,

  For her eyes are brighter than the gold.

  Elof in his turn sang a few songs as they drifted through the darkness, though to him his deep voice sounded rougher and less pleasing than theirs. He taught them the old round songs he remembered from his childhood, simple boisterous songs of herding and fishing, and a few strange snatches he had come upon in his wanderings.

  So they made merry on their lightless road, not guarding their lanterns or laughter or song, for in that dark vein of the duergar realm there could be none to hear, save the many small things that scuttled away before the light, and the bats their voices scared out of the roof. They were young, as their different folk counted youth, and they were gliding day by day from danger to danger, but for now they were at peace. They only excitement came at the times when they saw the rock ahead close down like the gullet of some great beast, and must stand ready by sweeps and fending poles. But as the seventh day, by their rough reckoning, wore on into the eighth, Kermorvan, who was on watch, began to grow more and more uneasy, scanning as much of the shore as he could with the lanterns. At last he awoke the others, who in the close air preferred to sleep out on the deck.

  "This had better be good!" growled Ils from within her blankets.

  "Hush!" said Kermorvan. "You who grew up here below, do you not feel it? A change in the air…" Ils sat up. "It grows cooler, indeed. And yes, it moves!" She looked at them. "We may be drawing near the end of the journey, at last."

  "What then? Do we simply leap ashore? I have seen no likely place among the teeth of these rocks for a good three leagues gone. Or would your folk have set a proper landing stage in a safe corner?"

  "That, surely," muttered Ils. "But I see no sign of one anywhere near, and there is a sound growing I do not like. Almost I feel it, a deep rumbling sound—"

  "Rapids?" growled Kermorvan.

  "No. That sound I know, none better… this is smoother, steadier, with none of the chatter and roar. And we have no room to raise the mast!" She stood, still wreathed in blankets, and looked anxiously around. "I feel something may have changed, or been changed. We must be ready to escape if we can."

  Elof looked about him. "Where to? I see no bank to land on, no cave or crevice even in these walls. And we are drifting quite fast—"

  "You are right!" barked Kermorvan. "Much faster than a minute past. The current is drawing us along… and that sound—Ils, do whirlpools ever form in your rivers?"

  "In no channel we have cleared! Nor has it the deep thunder of a fall. Truly strange it sounds… We shall know soon enough, at all events!"

  So in haste and worry they gathered together their most precious gear, and a few of the sealed casks the boat carried as floats. That done, they readied the heavy sweeps, knowing they could not hold the boat back against this current; at most they might steer it past rocks, or fend them off. And then they waited, for that was all they could do, while they were drawn faster and faster on through a passage that grew more menacing by the moment, high rocks seeming to spring from the water like teeth around them. Yet the channel still seemed well chosen, for they were swept safely by and on into the depths of the cavern.

  Then Ils stood on tiptoe and shouted to Elof, who had taken station in the bows, "Light! I see light! Do you?"

  Kermorvan ran forward to join him. "I see nothing… black as pitch."

  "But her eyes are the duergar's, and like a cat's!" Elof reminded him. "And I, too, think there is something ahead… a glimmer…"

  Then the boat bucked under him, and he was all but flung overboard. Kermorvan grabbed at him, and would have gone over instead had he not caught the lantern staff. The roof seemed dropping to meet them, a giant's fury bellowed in their ears, and Ils shrieked in fear and delight. A sweep jerked upward, dropped and splintered against some unseen obstacle. Beyond the bows a tiny disk of light swelled in an instant as the boat was pitched at it like an arrow at a target, and seemed to burst around them. They sailed out into the very air, and tilted downward on a leaping, foaming hillside of water. For a mad moment Elof, sprawling on the deck, thought he was back in the lock, then the boat evened out once more and he saw that though there were still fangs of rock overhead, a gray light shone between them and mocked them with fantastic shadows. He heard Ils cry out for help, and saw her bent over the tiller with an arm across her eyes. He staggered aft, and a line swept down the deck with him, like a clear wave washing the grayness from the wood, dimming the lanterns to feeble embers and setting blinding highlights in the metal. As he reached Ils he saw astern the impossibly tiny cavernmouth that had spewed them out, the chute of water that had borne them, all so natural but no doubt cunningly contrived. As, surely, were the high walls they were gliding between, and the great stone slabs, irregular and dangerous-looking, that formed a roof. Or had formed it, for they were there no longer, and he knew, though he dared not look direct lest he be dazzled like Ils, that above them was only the open sky.

  A wind whipped around him, and he shivered, though once he would not have thought it cold. On the scents and sounds that rode it a host of memories came flooding back, the smell of salt and wrack, the gull cries echoing into emptiness, the endless beat of the ocean pulse. The walls widened suddenly, the wind grew fresher and the little boat was bouncing and bucking out into a wider body of water, a small fjord whose steep cliff walls plunged straight down into deep water on either side, without beach or bank or any other break, however small. The wind was at their bow, but lacking mast or sail they were easily swept down a fast current toward the mouth of the channel, not far ahead. And beyond it, vast and ominous, Elof saw the rolling grayness that was the open sea.

  Quickly he helped Ils away from the tiller, but turned at Kermorvan's shout. The swordsman, who had spent most time aboveground recently, was already wrestling with the sweeps. "You can see?" he grated. "Good! Rack the tiller, then, and leave it. A lee shore! Wind blowing toward the land, and only our good fortune that it is quite light! We will need all our sinews against the swell!" Ils blinked blearily about, her huge eyes narrowed. "What are you thinking of?" she cried shakily. "We can't take a boat like this out to sea!"

  "What else remains?" demanded Elof. "There is nowhere we can land! This place both hides that Seagate and defends it. Your ancestors must have chosen it for that—"

  "Aye, or shaped it so!" said Ils, and Elof looked up at the high weathered walls in sudden awe. "They would have expected any of our folk coming that way to have a seaworthy ship."

  "But we must risk heading out regardless," said Ker-morvan, "or be dashed back among the rocks—if we stay upright so long! We might get out under sail, on a close reach, but without a keel we would capsize for certain! Unless—" He stared ahead a moment. "The mast!" he cried then. "Ship the sweeps! We must raise it at once!"

  Swiftly they stepped and raised the mast, hauling on stay and halyard till their muscles cracked. Kermorvan kept casting anxious glances at the approaching sea as they made fast the last halyard. "You must keep her headed into the wind a while," he said. "As I remember, they carry plenty of spare gear, these caveboats." He turned and went clattering down the hatchway into the open hold.

  "What now!" demanded Ils a
ngrily. "I had sooner we risked it with the sweeps than chance whatever he plans! If I could only see! I am hardier than the old folk, I can endure even the bright sun in time… but I feel so helpless now—"

  "By Kerys' Gate!" echoed Kermorvan's voice from the hold. "That may do it!" He came bounding up on deck dragging with him a great length of wood, four stout planks some twelve feet long bound together with iron. Lashed to this with many turns of the duergar's strong cable was the shank of the broken sweep.

  Ils blinked. "The cargo plank? What would you with that?"

  For answer Kermorvan called, "Help me, Elof!" and together they manhandled the clumsy planking over the gunwale aft of the mast. Elof held it while Kermorvan bound the shank of the sweep into a rowlock, and wound lashings round the planking itself. Then he let it swing downward into the water beneath, which was already churning as the current warred with the wind-driven sea. Quickly he lashed the plank firm against the rail, and turned to the mast. "Mainsail only, till we learn the proper trim! That board may take some getting used to!"

  Quickly they lowered the mainsail, and Kermorvan ran aft to reeve the sheets. "Elof! To the bows, and watch! Keep you a firm hold, she may heel badly yet! Ils, how may I use these winding devices?"

  Elof heard the clank and rattle of the winches as he stumbled forward, the creak of the yard swinging around and the boom of the tautening sail. Suddenly the boat seemed to come alive beneath him, leaping forward through the creamy water, heeling slowly away from the wind and then back into it as Kermorvan fought to trim the sail. The water ahead seemed clear; he risked a look astern, and saw how Kermorvan was fighting to hold the little craft steady. He was playing the sail as one might a difficult fish, edging closer and closer to the wind till the boat threatened to heel, but never allowing it to go far over; his wooden planking thrummed and trembled in its lashing as if great forces strained against it, but seemed to be holding. They were coming out from between the cliffs now, and the wind was suddenly fresher, the sea more lively. The swell was higher, capped by brisk white crests that hissed angrily at the cutting bow beneath him, and slapped hollowly against the boat's lean flanks.

  "We are through!" called Kermorvan. "Deep water under us! How does the board hold?"

  "Well, I'd say!" Elof called back. "That was a timely idea, friend!"

  Kermorvan shrugged. "I should have remembered sooner. It is only a simple leeboard, such as my people use on smaller boats that must pass through shallows yet sail well in deeper waters. They mount theirs on pivots, one on either flank, so that they may be raised or lowered at need." Ils slapped her hands together. "Of course! I have heard we used such a device on our few seagoing boats, but mounted in the center of the hull, the better to mimic a keel. I have never seen one, though, let alone sailed it."

  "If it handles no better than this, I would not pine! Still, it has brought us this far, and that will serve. Do you see anywhere we might come ashore, Elof?"

  But Elof, already scanning the cliffs, was shaking his head in dismay. This was a rough and craggy coast, its cliffs raw and steep in their newness, its beaches few and far between, save in deep bays where rivers might lay them down. Kermorvan twisted round to look, and cocked his head. "I know this part of the coast! There are places to land in the marches, a little way south. We are far enough out now; I'll bring her about and we can turn that way. Hold on, and keep watching!"

  Elof felt the boat's way slacken as her bow moved to meet the wind head-on. For a moment she bounced helpless in the waves, then the yard creaked about, the sail thrummed again, and she swung slowly round and set off more sedately southward, wallowing against the waves. As soon as she was stable he clambered up on the rail for a better view, and stood clutching the carved stempost, wet now with salty spray. So they were at the north of the marshes now! He smiled, a little grimly, and rubbed his unshaven chin. It had been a long time, in his young life. Somewhere over to his left, then, if it still stood, was a tumbledown house by the Causeway, its hearth cold, its store of tools left free for any who came by. Had Kara, perhaps, passed by again, found the door banging loose in the damp wind, and looked in, to find only desolation? But he had seen her, if it was her, pass south on some mysterious errand that might or might not be her own, and in the Southlands he would start his search. A thought settled upon him, and blackened his vision. This you must first do . . .

  He remembered the Mastersmith as a scared boy had seen him, a vision of power and mystery, and part of him still quailed before it. He searched for something to set against it, and found Ansker, sturdy, plain of speech and manner, and yet cloaked about in a mystery far greater than the Mastersmith's or any mere man's, the inheritance of a secret, ancient folk. He could count Ansker and Ils his true friends, he was surer of nothing else, and yet in all his time of living with them he had never, he knew, been able to look beneath the surface of the duergar people; he had seen only what in them was akin to human, not what was alien. Perhaps he had not had enough time, for what is two years to beings who might live through four lives of men or more? Or perhaps their strangeness was simply too alien to be seen from a human viewpoint, as blank as the cliffs he scanned now. From farther out to sea their narrow openings might be more apparent, the chinks in the armor. But from here they appeared a wall of grayness as solid as the dark line of shadow on the horizon.

  But as his eye settled on that, he forgot about all else, duergar, beaches, cliffs, and stood where he was, staring out into the dim afternoon light as if it still blinded him. When a hand tugged at his leg the shock almost overbalanced him.

  "What is it, Elof?" yelled Ils hoarsely, and he realized his friends must have been shouting to him already. But all he could do, at first, was point. "What?" she shouted. "There's nothing I can make out but a black streak on the sky, miles off. Does it mean a storm?"

  "It does!" said Elof curtly, and sprang down. "Ker-morvan, do you see that?"

  "I do, though my eyes still dazzle. It seems almost to hang above the horizon, like the black fume of earthfires. But the wind drives it far south of us, it cannot harm—"

  "Can it not then?" cried Elof. "Are you also grown blind under the earth, to see it as a cloud? Look again!"

  Kermorvan rose and stared, and then looked quickly to Elof. "It cannot be! Not stretching so far as that!"

  "It is, I tell you! Do you think I do not know that sight? Black sails, black hulls, mastheads, pennons fluttering halfway from here to sunset, and more ahead! You know their fleets—have you ever seen a greater?"

  "Not since first I took sword in hand against them!" groaned Kermorvan. "The assault is launched at last, the final blow! And we come too late!" For an instant it seemed he would let fall the tiller and all else. But even as Ils made to grab the tiller from him, his back stiffened; spots of scarlet blazed in his cheeks as he measured the black line on the horizon, weighing up its distance and its numbers. "Not too late! Not yet! They cannot overwhelm Kerbryhaine the City in a day, in a week even, with or without the Mastersmith's weaponry. And beyond that lies all of the Southland."

  "But we're north of the marshes! It would take us weeks on end to work our way south from there!"

  Kermorvan nodded. "I think we must keep to the water as long as we can." Ils looked at him, shielding her eyes. "You know the sea, I do not. But how long will these light timbers hold out? Not long, I think. Already they complain at the rough play these high waves give them."

  "Yes. And this is light weather enough. But I can see no other way. A few hours, a few days, a week, even— we must grasp at whatever time we can save, great or small."

  Elof flexed his fingers, thinking of the gauntlet stowed carefully in his pack. "We risk losing everything, our lives included. But what good will any of it do, if we arrive too late?" He thought of Kara, caged in by the shadow of fear, and clenched his fist. "You be the judge." Ils nodded wryly. "Anyway, it's rare weather for a dip."

  Kermorvan settled down by the tiller once more, and stretched out his long
legs with a contented sigh. "Then we sail on," he said calmly, and the cold glitter of the waves shone in his eyes.

  Chapter Nine - The Voices

  The Chronicles say then that they set course southward, and on the horizon before them rode the dark line of sails. But the great warships of the Ekwesh were far fleeter than the little caveboat, and before night on the first day the line had vanished.

  "They are into Southland waters now," muttered Ker-morvan bleakly. "They will sail on as fast as they may, through day and night, allowing no ship of ours time to spread the alarm. And so must we!"

  "But there are only two of us!" protested Ils, who was taking the tiller as darkness came, when she could see better. "And I am little used to this harsh sea sailing. We must beach her sometimes if we are to rest!"

  Kermorvan shook his head. "Beach this cockleshell? We dare not. We might never be able to launch her again. It will be weary labor, but we must endure it—"

  "Teach me!" said Elof. "I cannot simply sit by and let you two exhaust yourselves!"

  Kermorvan wagged his head doubtfully. "You would not find this crazed little boat easy to learn on…"

  "Better a novice than nobody!" insisted Elof. "I can share your watches at first, and then take the helm on my own when you feel I am ready."

  So it was that Elof joined Ils on watch, and first learned the handling of a boat. He must have been an apt pupil, for he could be trusted with the helm almost at once, and was very soon left on his own. He took watches in the uncertain hours between light and darkness, for he seemed to see better then than either of his companions. Like them, he would sit for long hours bowed over the tiller arm, not only watching, but listening, feeling, alert with all his senses for the changes in wind or water that constantly threatened to upset the unstable little craft, to split the light sail or snap the mast. Most of all, though, he had to learn to listen to the rush and slap of the ocean under the thin planks, and how they groaned and creaked in response, wary for the faintest sound of yielding joints or splitting timbers. It was an unnerving sound, for it brought home to them all how fragile was the barrier between them and the envious sea. "But the very lightness of the boat aids us," said Kermorvan, "for feel how it flexes and twists! It moves with the water, like a living thing, instead of against it, and so the force of the waves does not war against it. But that cannot last. Every twist loosens the seams a little more, we take in a few drops more water. If once a seam goes altogether, we can do little to bail a craft this size. The number of our days at sea is already written, though we cannot read it. We dare not sail too far from the coast."