by Andre Norton
With the coming of the spring they alternated field work with scouting, taking it turn about. The scouting being a venture to be desired. At first it would seem that the whole of the country immediately below the Heights had been deserted.
Cautious exploration of deserted garths and manors proved that certainly no one else had ventured there during this season so far. They gathered what they could in the way of tools which could be reshaped into arms of a sort and twice drove back lean-flanked varges that had been left to winter.
They came across more signs of wakwolves and wild things than any had seen that far into the lowlands before. The watch on the highway was reestablished. But this silent land in itself made any man wary and restless.
It had been fully expected that with the coming of better weather the Temple slaves would be sent to the upper lands and they laid plans for the possible taking of such convoys and freeing their people. Yet none such appeared.
Three times Jarth called council and each time they had once more heated the message stones but they could learn nothing more.
“They are not asleep,” the young Lord of Garn commented. “One can feel it…. ” He was silent a moment and Kryn knew that prickle of excitement which roughened his skin momentarily as if he had stepped into one of the icy mountain pools. “If we but had a Dreamer!” Jarth brought his fist down on his knee.
Kryn tensed. A Dreamer—did not the Voice proclaim that all dreams came from his One? To deal even marginally with such craft was to risk being drawn into some net of the priests.
Hasper must have noted his reaction. “You think a Dreamer would serve us ill?”
“I believe that a Dreamer would be a key—to open the door to the hell that One is supposed to keep for us. Unchancy things are for the dark and the priests!”
“Not all are of the dark,” Jarth returned. “In the days before Valcur made his One the center of all worship, Dreamers were welcome and honored. Lives were saved by dreams. But—in this much you are right, younger brother, such knowledge is tainted in our land. Perhaps it is not so however, elsewhere…” He stared musingly into the fire. And then he spoke more abruptly.
“We have salt, the seeds from the Rosclare garth. I think it is time we seek some news elsewhere.”
He did not explain, nor did any one comment when the next morning, Jarth and Rolf were missing from the cave, their trail packs with them. Kryn’s curiosity was tinged with wariness—what had salt or seed to do with their present quest for what was happening on the lower lands? Had the Lord of Garn gone to the shrine of some other power, which perhaps was supposed to favor his bloodline after such a mixed offering? But Kryn refused to give in to that curiosity and ask questions when there had been none from the others.
Jarth and Rolf were away for four days and slipped back into their quarters at nightfall as if they had never been gone. They ate heartily of the deer which had been luckily brought down that day and then became the center of a circle of listening men.
On a square of worked hide Jarth had stretched smooth on the rock floor before him, the young lord shook out four packets from the pouch he had carried in the front of his jerkin.
“Fever seal…” He pushed one of those packets to the side.
An herb Kryn recognized, having picked up something of the lore of what the growing things could do to alleviate the ills of men earlier from the foresters and, within the past few seasons, from these new comrades.
“Mold hold.” The second packet joined the first. “Tongue leaf.” The third packet was given a name. But Jarth sat for a moment holding the fourth.
His fingers loosed its cord fastening and he spilled out the contents freely on the hide. The message stones— but they had tried those over and over with no better results any time. However, with them this time there was a flake of glittering crystal, a thin sliver which was half a finger long and hardly more than a needle thick. And the stones appeared to have fallen naturally in a circle about that pointer. Had he not seen it with his own eyes, Kryn would not have believed what followed.
Jarth had set his hands back on his knees. No one else was in touching distance of the hide. But that glitter of tiny rod was moving of itself—it must be of itself. And in its going it touched each of the stones with its tip.
There was no fire needed this time to bring the symbols to life. Temple stone flared and it appeared to Kryn that the black mark across the One’s hated symbol thickened and pulsed almost as if it were a vile worm, as did the brand across the king stone. But the stone with the sprinkling of crystal blazed high, almost as if it were afire. On swept the point and came almost to the final stone—that which had the sullen, ugly heart spot. That stone it did not touch, but it wavered back and forth before it as might an armsman seeking the best way to attack a well-armed foe.
“So it is,” Jarth said slowly. “Temple—king—both driven by that greater than either. We stand on the brink of a dark struggle, comrades, and one which we defeat or die—no, worse than death awaits us when we face— that!” He pointed to the heart stone.
The sliver had ceased its twitching and lay quiescent, the emblems had faded from the stones. They were all dead and dull again.
“What else?” asked Hasper. “She dreams—what has she dreamed then?”
“She dare not seek the dreams—she swears that there is that awakening—that which felled all good before and would move again if it is threatened, and she thinks it might sense any use of the power now. We must wait and judge for ourselves. However, that which she has sought for years has been with her for some seasons now—new power—different and so perhaps more equal for the battle.”
“What manner of power?” Hasper asked.
Who was this “she,” Kryn wondered. A Dreamer? But apparently Jarth and the rest were ready to accept her as untainted by the Temple. Another outlaw—such as themselves? But power-tainted—all this talk of power was playing into the hands of the Temple. The priests sought out any who had the old knowledge and disposed of them quickly. They said that a sniffer could detect the taint of power for far distances. Such a sniffer as Bozi…
Kryn knew Bozi well enough. He had been of the family line—distant—of Qunion. When a youth younger than Kryn at his outlawing, he had entered Temple training. He was not a priest—but rather one of the hunters—those determined, vicious ones who turned their own kind over to Temple slavery—or the fires. He had never doubted that Bozi in some manner had brought down the House of Qunion—for Bozi had hated and envied and planned far ahead—that much Kryn was sure of.
But who was “she”? The medical herbs must have come from her—thus she at least was a healer. In that small way she could be a help and not a hindrance. But at that moment Kryn was glad she had not dreamed at Jarth’s asking—they wanted no such beacon set to bring disaster on them.
As the warm season advanced the upper farms remained unworked. There were two slave convoys on the highway, heading to the mines. One was too well guarded to be taken by their force. The other they ambushed by night and found their number increased by near twice. Since they could not sustain such a number, they sent them westward, Kryn learning that beyond the broken lands were wide prairies where the cancer of war had not struck. Once there, he heard, those they had rescued had joined a traders’ caravan headed for the main trade city of Kasgar.
Then their scouting parties, daring to range even farther eastward, reported the signs of large companies on the march as if an army were assembling.
“We are not their intended prey,” Jarth said. “A large force sent into these hills, where we can make good use of every crevice and trail, would be speedily at a disadvantage. And they are moving south. Perhaps King and Voice have decided at last to seek the empire both have dreamed of. Yet they will pass through the Ryft, and beyond that lies desert these days, for the river is swallowed at the end of the valley and continues underground, no longer watering the plains beyond. They needs must prepare a supply train such as will t
ake them some time to assemble, perhaps even until next spring. Meanwhile what we can do to delay them, we must.” Thus the Outlaws of the Heights split into small bands and ventured on expeditions into the plains lands, farther and farther. Now they did come on land under cultivation—all Temple owned, slave worked. What small loot they could carry on captured stock they did—fields just beginning to ripen were put to the torch. The garths and manors were often too well guarded to be attacked by small parties, but before they learned caution Templers and overseers were cut off and killed and the slaves urged to make themselves free of whatever they wished.
Those of the Temple could never be sure where they would hit next, and twice bodies of well-trained cavalry with some knowledge of such kind of warfare were sent out to bait traps—one of which nearly caught the squad of which Kryn was a member.
He had gained man’s height in the mountains and the hardness of his life had made him as lean and dangerous to deal with as the wakwolves whose hide made his winter cloak. But he did not carry Bringhope. Much practice with the veteran armsmen of the band had made him sword sure and swift but he would not risk that badge of his House in such combat—the heavy blade being made more for the smashing attack of full battle than this quick skirmishing and retreat.
They were cut off from a clear path back to the Heights, having had to elude pursuers with a roundabout circling. And they had two men with bandaged wounds; only dogged determination was keeping them on their feet and going. The command of their small party lay with an armsman who had served well in the north, and coming south had been the key to freedom for Jarth and Hasper when they had had to flee before the Temple hunters.
Lars was a dour man, quick to light upon the smallest mistake, sour of speech and sullen of visage. But even Kryn had come to know that underneath this unattractive packaging there was a man who, had he been hall born, might have led an army with honor and ease. He was now one of the two who wore an improvised bandage, his arm tight trussed to his own bow stave to hold it immovable.
Kryn dropped to rearguard as they went. He was quick enough of eye and he had learned caution early. Now he would select some vantage of copse or rock and lie up while the others made their way along, all his attention for their back trail.
So it was that he first sighted the rathhawk. It circled on wide-spread wings—but this was not its land—and Kryn was wary enough for anything out of the ordinary to note that circling. The more he watched it the more he became convinced that this was no common predator from the outer wilds new-come to the lowlands.
Though it appeared to be at hunt, yet it did not make any strike, only continued to circle, each round it made tacking more and more out over the country through which their own party passed now. Circle, glide, but never strike. Yet that was uncanny for Kryn’s own moves, wilderness trained as he was, had stirred up two fat ground pigs before he had reached his present cover. Surely hawk sight could pick up such easily—for the rathhawk was noted for its far-sight.
Now the bird hung so above him that he had to look up at an awkward angle to keep it in sight. And having come that close, it gave him sight of something else. Rathhawk plumage was uniformly dull grey, though dark edging on some of the larger wing pinions gave it at times a curious mottled appearance. Its head bore a crest which did not rise except when it attacked, a beak could tear the hide in strips from the back of a colt, its claws could clasp the life out of small prey with one grasp of talons.
This circling thing now above him showed something else. Against the feathers of its broad breast sparked a glint of red. Then, as it made another turn, that swung out and away from the body for an instant. Long enough for Kryn to be sure that the bird wore about its neck some object suspended on a thong.
Any departure from the norm here was to be instantly distrusted. He had never heard of rathhawks being tamed to the will of man, but those of the Temple were ever about a search for new ways to spy, and new servants to do so. If this was Templer launched, then indeed it was the worst threat which his own kind had yet faced.
The copse in which he sheltered had several trees of good girth and height. Kryn worked his way around the base of the nearest, taking good effort to keep leaves and lace of branch as coverage against hunter eyes from above. He shucked off his war pack, stripped himself of sword and all else which might impede his climb, and hitched his way up the tree.
Though the movements of leaves and branches might now indeed alert the winged spy, for such he believed the rathhawk to be, still the bird could not get a good look at him—yet.
Kryn worked his way a little out along the first branch which offered some support. He steadied himself, shoulders against the bole of the tree trunk and loosed the grip of his hands. What he would do was chancy and it had little chance of succeeding perhaps but he could try.
With his left hand he reached out to another small branch and began to pull at it, using what strength he could to send it swaying. Rathhawks were hunters of the open country but they had one prey they would follow even into the woods. How good might he be in counterfeiting that?
Pursing his lips, Kryn gave voice to a call—hoarse enough from the strain of what he would do, but also akin to the proper pitch of sound. His right hand was ready with the knife he had carried up in the front of his jerkin.
There was a scream from overhead—much closer. Kryn cried an answer to that challenge. He jerked sharply at the bough and cleared a space for sight. Against the tree in which he sat there came a sharp blow. Leaves fluttered down. There was a tearing… the rathhawk was acting according to his kind and after the female he believed was hiding from him.
There was a heaving, a swaying in the boughs above. The hunter had landed, was working his way into denser foliage savagely aroused now. Kryn waited until he saw a segment of grey-feathered body, and, with all the patiently learned skill he had acquired during the past seasons, he threw.
A hoarse squawking, then a weight came bouncing down from branch to branch until the rathhawk fronted him. The knife still hung from one dropping wing but the darting head with its cruelly curved beak, the upheld and flexed talons of one foot were not to be lightly dismissed, even with the difference in size.
Kryn kicked, felt a sharp pain as claw and beak scored through his hide boot, but his attack, as quickly decided upon as it had been, won. The rathhawk vanished with widely beating wings, screaming as it fell, enmeshed in boughs and torn leaves.
Near as quickly Kryn dropped after it. There was a moment to seize sword, to strike at the creature beating on the ground and then he stood panting, looking down at the enemy lying with its head nearly shorn away.
He rolled it over with the toe of his boot to discover that his eyes had not deceived him. There was a light cord about that twisted neck and on the ground lay a disc of gleaming red. Kryn stooped, reached, and then jerked back.
Instead he picked up an edge of branch and with it worked that cord free from the body of the bird, brought it free to dangle the disc in the air. A tracking device? A control for the hawk itself, to send it into attack? He could not be sure of either—only that it was something better left alone. The unknown in this country was suspect.
He draped the thong over a branch of sapling and left it awhirl in the breeze and turned to follow, at the distance-eating lope, the rest of his squad.
However, by nightfall they had made sure of something else: That the force which had nearly taken them was pushing on, heading determinedly south toward the Ryft, and it was moving at such pace as to suggest that not only a strike at them had brought it here but that it had business in the broken lands to the south.
When they had skulked along enough to make sure of that, and that the force would not turn again to hunt them down, they withdrew back to their own headquarters. Kryn told his tale of the bird which had searched through the sky and no one had any answer to that.
Once more Jarth consulted the stones, and this time the sliver of light he had brought back from
his trip turned to the stone with its sprinkling of crystal dust and blazed high, the small particles embedded in the stone itself answering with sharp sparks as if flint had met with steel.
“So,” Jarth said. “There is a new way before us. She calls and that call will be answered.”
Thus at daybreak their band split. Lord Jarth, with Rolf and Kryn and three of the most experienced and woodwise of the outlaws, were the trailers again. It was midday when they came down into a new country where no hunt nor enemy had drawn Kryn before. A stream curled over a gravelly bottom, thickets of brush masking part of the banks.
Kryn scented the thin trace of smoke though he saw no fire, but on the other side of that river there were certainly two who waited—their dull clothing half disguising them except when they came closer to growing greenery. The taller stood in quiet waiting, her companion crouched by her side, and Jarth splashed into the stream toward her, the others following him.
CHAPTER 9
Those approaching did not wear the hated color of scarves or helmet quills Nosh remembered. Armed—yes—they had arms, although the swords remained in their scabbards and they came to shore before Dreen with bared hands. It was plain that the woman had no fear of these, in fact had perhaps sought them out.
He who now swung up on the low riverbank to confront Dreen was young, and unlike most of those who were at his back he was clean-shaven; also the bow he made to the waiting woman was that of lord. How did Nosh know that? one small part of her mind asked. What did she know of lords save what she had heard of those beings who dwelt apart and looked upon such as won their living with their hands as less than the blooded animals tended in Keepmounts. There was another like the firstcomer in carriage—younger and with a bitter twist to his mouth, a heat in his eyes as he looked from Dreen to her as might a wakwolf choosing prey.