by Roger Taylor
The man looked at her impotently and offered no reply, but another pushed forward to the front of the crowd.
‘Memsa, how long should we wait then?’ he said simply.
Gulda stared at him. His eyes were anxious but de-termined. She bowed slightly, in acknowledgement of the aptness of the question then looked up into the mist.
‘You heard, Alphraan?’ she said. ‘How long? How long before we know your will?’
The crowd fell silent.
Slowly, the babble that had surrounded Gulda and Tirilen rose up until it seemed to hover over the whole camp. It was like a myriad tiny voices all talking at once and it was laced through with doubt, recrimination, regret, grief, anger, countless emotions of every intensity.
Gradually however, one sound, angry and sour, wove through the confusion turning it into a single coherent pattern that finally became one voice. ‘Leave us,’ it said. ‘Go from our mountains, and take your corrupted hearts and your corrupted wares with you. We will not allow your folly.’
‘Have you learned nothing from those wares amp;mdashHis work?’ Gulda said. ‘Or from what you’ve seen here amp;mdashour work. Or from the results of your own work? Did you learn nothing from Tirilen’s blessing?’
‘Go,’ said the voice. ‘We will talk with you no more. Go, or we will punish you further.’
Gulda’s hand shot out to silence the angry gasp that rose up from the crowd.
‘If you will not talk now, then you leave us with no alternative but to pursue you until you will talk,’ Gulda said. ‘You understand that, don’t you? The Orthlundyn, of all people, cannot be dominated.’
Silence.
Gulda turned back to the young man. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said.
The man held her gaze. ‘Don’t be,’ he said softly.
Then the temporarily subdued anger of the crowd broke through, and for several minutes nothing could be heard over the shouting.
Gulda stood motionless, leaving Loman struggling to restore order.
‘You’re Orthlundyn,’ he shouted over the din. ‘And would-be soldiers. You’re supposed to be disciplined and ordered. Is this how you intend to behave when we meet a real enemy? Like a quarrelsome rabble?’
The noise subsided a little, but not to Loman’s satis-faction. ‘Attention!’ he thundered furiously. His voice echoed even through the mist and the crowd fell silent abruptly.
He leaned forward. ‘Have you learned so little?’ he said. ‘We have an enemy who can use our anger as a weapon against us, and you give them all this.’ He extended his arms and shook them powerfully, fists clenched. ‘Understand. Only your discipline and your knowledge that the man or woman next to you is disciplined also, will sustain you through the terror of battle and ensure you stand any chance of walking unhurt from the field. If this is how you behave when someone opposes you just with words, how are you going to behave when arrows and stones are falling around you? When horses and angry men are charging you?’
Gulda moved to stand next to him.
‘What we will do is this,’ he continued, more quietly. ‘We’ll consolidate into three large forces, and carry out a methodical search of the mountains until we find where these people live. Then, equally methodically, we’ll take possession of their domain just as they’ve done of ours.’
A hand went up. Loman nodded.
‘If we go in large groups, and they take control, couldn’t the damage be worse than before?’ asked the questioner.
‘I don’t know,’ Loman replied. ‘But we’ll go in as the duty patrol approached camp three. We’ll go in as free of anger as we can. We’ll go in doing what we do best.’ He smiled a little. ‘Or at least, what you do best. You’ll go in like carvers. Listening to the rock song. Using your shadow vision.’ He bent forward and his voice fell almost to a whisper. ‘Full of the great silence of your craft.’ He raised a finger. ‘The Alphraan can’t use a weapon that we aren’t carrying.’
Doubt rose up from the crowd, but no one de-murred. The manner of the rescue of Tybek at camp three had been circulating freely.
‘But we don’t know where they are,’ the questioner said.
Loman straightened up. ‘The Alphraan have re-mained hidden because we’ve never looked for them,’ he replied. ‘Why should we?’ he added with a shrug. ‘We didn’t even know they existed. They probably hide the entrances to their… caves?… tunnels?… in some ingenious way.’ His voice rose. ‘But can anything be so cunning or subtle that it can deceive the shadow vision of the Orthlundyn?’
No answer was needed, but another hand went up.
‘And when we find them?’ asked the new questioner.
Loman made an airy gesture. ‘We’ll continue to reason with them until they agree to return the arsenal and leave us alone.’ He looked at certain individuals in his audience. ‘No vengeance,’ he said darkly.
Then he raised his hand to forestall any further questions. ‘I don’t know whether this is going to work,’ he said. ‘But I think it’s the best we can do, and it has a clear rightness to it. However… ’ amp;mdashHe looked round the crowd amp;mdash‘There may be a price to be paid, I can’t deny it. If any of you wish to walk away from this, then do so now amp;mdashwithout reproach. But those of you who choose to stay must accept that you’ll be under military discipline. Once committed, we’ll pursue this wherever it takes us.’
No one moved.
Loman nodded. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘All patrol com-pany leaders come to Athyr’s command post immediately so that we can work out details. The rest of you amp;mdashcarry on with your normal duties and try to think quietly about what we have to do. Try to put aside your view of yourselves as fighters and warriors about to face an enemy.’
He lowered his head for a moment and when he looked up, his face was oddly sombre. ‘This is a sad, unnecessary skirmish in a battle against a far greater enemy than these… neighbours of ours. We’ll settle for peace with them, but I’d prefer their friendship and help. Sooner or later they’ll have to stand by our side or His. There’ll be no other place for them. Let us show them the value of our friendship and our ways, before He shows them the power of His shackles.’
The following day, the Orthlundyn quietly buried their dead, and three days later, the first of the three forces left the central camp in a loose and casual formation, with Loman and Jenna at its head. A watery sun shone through high thin clouds, and the mountains stood sharp and clear in the cool, moist air. But in that same air, rising and falling menacingly, rang also a faint but definite warning note.
Chapter 27
Hawklan stared along the tunnel that stretched ahead of him. It went far beyond the light of the torch he was carrying. The walls were dry and smooth, and the floor was covered with dust much like that in the cave in which they first encountered the Alphraan.
The guiding sound was clearer here though, with increasing frequency, it wavered as if its source were wearying. Its urgency was now clearly audible.
Gavor tapped him with his wooden leg. ‘Come on, dear boy,’ he said, his curiosity overcoming his reservations.
Hawklan, however, needed no encouragement. He strode forward a few paces and then almost immediately broke into a run, obliging Gavor to extend a wing from time to time to steady himself.
As he ran, Hawklan felt the strange sound almost pulling him forward, although it was growing increas-ingly weaker. The tunnel twisted and turned and he found himself passing by side tunnels and through elaborate junctions where groups of tunnels met. Although he did not slacken his pace, part of him, hard and calculating, took note of these, telling him that this headlong dash was unwise and that he may yet have to return this way in flight.
Then suddenly, as if in confirmation of this counsel, everything was gone. The sound stopped abruptly and the walls and roof of the tunnel disappeared. The impetus of his chase, however, took Hawklan some way into the silence before he skidded to a halt, startled and alarmed. Gavor tumbled off his shoulder with an oa
th but, with a great flapping, just managed to regain his equilibrium before striking the ground.
He landed, flustered and indignant, just outside the circle of light cast by Hawklan’s torch. ‘Really, dear boy,’ he muttered irritably, moving quickly back into the light.
But Hawklan was not listening; he was gazing round into the darkness. Wherever he was, the light of his torch seemed at first to be insufficient to illuminate more than the ground beneath his feet.
Gradually, however, he began to detect faint shad-ings in the blackness. To one side at least, there were shapes that might be part of a wall, while overhead he sensed rather than saw a vast echoing roof-space hidden in the gloom. Behind him, his footprints in the dust led towards a deeper darkness that was presumably the mouth of the tunnel he had just run along.
He had come into a large cavern. Or was it a great hall of some kind? The vague images told him nothing further.
He stood uncertainly for a moment, then asked, ‘Where are you?’
His voice echoed distantly and gave him an impres-sion of the immensity of his surroundings far more vividly than his eyes were doing. For an instant, he felt more exposed and vulnerable than if he had suddenly found himself on a mountain top.
Then he repeated his inquiry, more forcefully.
‘We are here, here, here… ’ said countless voices all around him, echoing about the unseen chamber.
The suddenness of the sound and its confusion made him start and he raised his sword into a defensive position.
‘Trap,’ he mouthed softly, unconsciously voicing Dacu’s words as they came to mind again, though he felt no real menace. Gavor flicked the sheaths off his spurs and, extending his wings, floated off into the darkness and began circling just outside the dome of light-formed by Hawklan’s torch. Hawklan too began to turn round slowly in anticipation of some attack.
But nothing came. Nor did the aura that shimmered around the still echoing voices indicate any threat. They spoke again. ‘We are here, here, here… Help us, Hawklan, help, help, help… ’
Hawklan lowered his sword. ‘You startled me,’ he said, as if his action might have caused some offence. ‘You must guide us. Your voices are everywhere. We don’t know which way to go. We’re lost.’
As the last words left his mouth the voices began to cry out in fear and despair. Hawklan gazed around, seeking some guidance, but nothing stirred in the darkness and his inability to focus clearly on anything began to disorient him.
‘Stop it,’ he roared, swinging his right arm in a wide arc, making the black sword hiss menacingly. The sound rose up, cutting through the swirling pandemonium as if it were as sharp as the edge of the sword itself.
‘I can’t help you if I can’t see you,’ he shouted. ‘I can’t help you if I don’t know what’s happened. You must speak to me properly.’
The noise fragmented briefly then came together as a single voice again, though it was strained and fearful.
Near complete panic, Hawklan sensed.
‘Can you hear us now, Hawklan?’ said the voice. ‘To speak thus is difficult when… has happened.’ Hawklan turned away from the noises of death and horror that filled the darkness.
‘Stop it,’ he shouted again, though this time angrily. His voice boomed and echoed, and the noises stopped abruptly. ‘Tell me what has happened,’ he repeated into the silence, his voice still angry. ‘And tell me so that I can understand. Is it easier for you to face this amp;mdashthing amp;mdashthat has happened to you on your own than it is to talk simply to a human being?’
There was a brief silence, then, ‘Follow, Hawklan. We forget the inadequacy of your language. Violence is not our way. It has… ’ The voice struggled. ‘It has… unsettled… us.’
Hawklan was mollified by the effort in the voice. He moved cautiously towards it, still feeling disoriented by the darkness. Gavor floated down to land silently on his shoulder.
‘What is this place?’ Gavor asked.
‘One of the… Halls of the Song,’ replied the voice. ‘One of the Halls of the Great Song.’
The fear was still in the voice, but it was submerged for the moment under layers of excitement amp;mdashof awe and wonder.
‘This is your Heartplace?’ Hawklan said, still moving towards the voice.
‘No,’ said the voice. ‘But the Heartplace is near.’ A note in the voice made Hawklan pause. Anger? Distaste? Not quite either. Resentment? That was it: resentment.
‘But you asked me here,’ he said defensively, though no words had reproached him.
Sounds of surprise and contrition surrounded him briefly. ‘You hear more than you know, Hawklan,’ said the voice, this time very close. ‘We are sorry for what you heard.’
Hawklan peered in the direction of the voice but still he could see nothing. ‘It pains you that a human should come near your Heartplace?’ he said. ‘Even to help you?’
‘Yes,’ the voice replied simply. ‘We are sorry,’ it said again. ‘But you give us hope too. We have many things to learn. Help us, please.’
The voice moved on, and Hawklan followed it quickly, until he found himself at the foot of a broad flight of steps. They were small, as though they had been built for children, and, like the floor he was standing on, they were covered in dust.
‘Up,’ said the voice ahead of him. Hawklan hesitated and frowned slightly. There were no tiny footprints in the dust to indicate the previous passing of his guide.
‘Please tell me where you are and what’s happened,’ he said yet again, starting up the stairs.
‘We are here, Hawklan,’ said the voice, without fur-ther explanation. ‘As we neared our Heartplace, His creature attacked us and… ’
It fell silent. Hawklan tightened his grip on his sword, and quickened his pace. The steps wound around a wide bend and then divided into three separate flights.
‘What was this creature?’ he asked.
The question was ignored. ‘We could not defend ourselves,’ said the voice, along the central of the three flights. ‘There were killings.’ A terrible grief slipped briefly into the voice.
‘Songs were ended… ’ The voice faded into a long sigh and then became silent.
Hawklan found himself on a wide landing, facing several tunnels. ‘Which way?’ he said impatiently into the silence.
There was a long pause. Hawklan thought he heard distant noises rising up faintly from below, but he dismissed them.
‘We cannot ask this of you,’ the voice said abruptly, very close. Startled, Hawklan spun round, expecting to see his guide standing nearby, but still there was nothing.
‘What do you mean?’ he said, bewildered by this unexpected statement.
‘It is our Heartplace. Its cleansing is our burden,’ said the voice, gabbling almost.
They fear to be in your debt, said the cold pan of Hawklan’s mind.
His anger burst out. ‘Stop this nonsense, and answer my questions,’ he shouted. ‘What kind of a creature is it that’s attacked you? And where is it?’
His angry voice rolled into the tunnels facing him and faded away without echo.
There was a long silence, then a strange high-pitched scream came from one of the tunnels. Gavor tightened his claw on Hawklan’s shoulder. ‘Dear boy, I think perhaps we ought to… ’
But Hawklan was not listening. He was running forward, following the dying thread of the scream. Gavor relinquished his perch and flew a little way behind him.
Then they were in an open space again.
Hawklan stopped and Gavor floated down a few paces from him.
There was a fearful, breathless silence around them, and Hawklan noted smells; vaguely familiar animal smells mingling with a retching sweetness that stirred dark shadowy memories in him.
Something nearby was watching and waiting, he knew. But what? And why? And most important of all, where?
He peered intently into the darkness, holding the torch high, and his sword horizontally in front of him.
‘Look,’ Gavor whispered very softly, tapping the floor with his wooden leg.
Hawklan looked down. As far as the torch shone, he could see that the dust which overlay the floor here too had been disturbed by countless tiny feet.
Cautiously he bent down to examine the footprints.
As he leaned forward, every part of him suddenly sensed the attack rushing towards him, but before he could move, a great weight crashed onto his shoulders, knocking him to the ground and sending the torch and the sword rattling in opposite directions.
Distantly, Hawklan heard Gavor cry out in alarm and then rage, but his immediate preoccupation was with whatever had dropped on him. It was large and heavy and its snarling breath stank inches from his face. He had a fleeting glimpse of bared yellow fangs and green eyes, cruel in the now faint torchlight, as the creature recovered from its jump and launched itself at him again.
Instinctively he threw up his hands to protect him-self and then rolled over desperately in the direction his sword had fallen. He was not fast enough, however. The creature landed heavily on him again, and he felt powerful, bone-crushing jaws beginning to close around his upper arm. He cried out as they tightened pitilessly and in sheer terror smashed his free hand into where he presumed the creature’s head was.
The blow landed with some considerable force, and the grip on his arm slackened momentarily, but before Hawklan could react, the jaws seized him again. A deep growl underscored the creature’s intent.
Hawklan twisted and turned to escape the relentless pressure, trying frantically to gain some point of leverage to use his own weight against the creature. Abruptly, as if tiring of this irritating prey, the creature shook its head from side to side violently. Hawklan felt himself almost lifted off the ground by the creature’s strength, and somewhere he heard himself screaming at the pain in his arm. The darkness around him was flooded with a myriad bursting colours.