by Andre Norton
Woven—yes. But her “seeing” hands built no mind picture of human fingers at the business. No, strangely ill-formed were those members engaged in the weaving. And so swift were they also that they seemed to blur. No woman, as Dairine knew women, had fashioned this. But female—strongly, almost fiercely female.
“Spider silk—” She was not aware that she had spoken aloud until she heard the sound of her own words. “Yet not quite spider. A woman weaving—still, not a woman. . . .”
She raised the riband to her cheek. There was a wonder in such weaving which brought to life in her a fierce longing to know more and more.
“You are right.” The Captain’s voice broke her preoccupation with that need to learn. “This comes from Usturt. And had a man but two full bolts of it within his cargo, he could count triple profits from such a voyage alone.”
“Where lies Usturt?” Dairine demanded. If she could go there—learn what could be learned. “And who are the weavers? I do not see them as beings like unto our own people.”
She heard his breath hiss again. “To see the weavers,” he said in a low voice, “is death. They hate all mankind—”
“Not so, Lord Captain!” Dairine answered him then. “It is not mankind that they hate—it is all males.” For from the strip between her fingers came that knowledge.
For a moment she was silent. Did he doubt her?
“At least no man sails willingly to Usturt,” he replied. “I had that length from one who escaped with his bare life. He died upon our deck shortly after we fished him from a waterlogged raft.”
“Captain,” she stroked the silk, “you have said that this weaving is a true treasure. My people are very poor and grow poorer. If one were to learn the secret of such weaving, might not good come of it?”
With a sharp jerk he took the riband from her.
“There is no such way.”
“But there is!” Her words came in an eager tumble, one upon the other. “Women—or female things—wove this. They might treat with a woman—one who was already a weaver.”
Great, calloused hands closed upon her shoulders.
“Girl, not for all the gold in Karsten would I send any woman into Usturt! You know not of what you speak. It is true that you have gifts of the Talent. But you are no confirmed Guardian, and you are blind. What you suggest is such a folly—Aye, Vidruth, what is it now?”
Dairine had already sensed that someone had approached.
“The tide rises. For better mooring, Captain, we need move beyond the rocks.”
“Aye. Well, girl, may the Right Hand of Lraken be your shield. When a ship calls, no captain lingers.”
Before she could even wish him well, he was gone. Retreating, she sat down on her hard bench by the loom. Her hands trembled, and from her eyes the tears seeped. She felt bereft, as if she had had for a space a treasure and it had been torn from her. For she was certain that her instinct had been right, that if any could have learned the secret of Usturt, she was that one.
Now, when she put a hand out to finger her own weaving, the web on the loom seemed coarse, utterly ugly. In her mind, she held queer vision of a deeply forested place in which great, sparkling webs ran in even strands from tree to tree.
Through the open door puffed a wind from the sea. Dairine lifted her face to it as it tugged at her hair.
“Maid!”
She was startled. Even with her keen ears, she had not heard anyone approach so loud was the wind-song.
“Who are you?” she asked quickly.
“I am Vidruth, maid, mate to Captain Ortis.”
She arose swiftly. “He has thought more upon my plan?” For she could see no other reason for the seaman to seek her out in this fashion.
“That is so, maid. He awaits us now. Give me your hand—so. . . .”
Fingers grasped hers tightly. She strove to free her hand. This man—there was that in him which was—wrong—Then out of nowhere, came a great, smothering cloak, folded about her so tightly she could not struggle. There were unclean smells to affront her nostrils, but the worst was that this Vidruth had swung her up across his shoulder so that she could have been no more than a bundle of trade goods.
2
SO was she brought aboard what was certainly a ship, for in spite of the muffling of the cloak, Dairine used her ears, her nose. However, in her mind, she could not sort out her thoughts. Why had Captain Ortis so vehemently, and truthfully (for she had read that truth in his touch), refused to bring her? Then this man of his had come to capture her as he might steal a woman during some shore raid?
The Sulcarmen were not slave traders, that was well known. Then why?
Hands pulled away the folds of the cloak at last. The air she drew thankfully into her lungs was not fresh, rather tainted with stinks which made her feel unclean even to sniff. She thought that her prison must lie deep within the belly of the ship.
“Why have you done this?” Dairine asked of the man she could hear breathing heavily near her.
“Captain’s orders,” he answered, leaning so close she not only smelt his uncleanly body, but gathered with that a sensation of heat. “He has eyes in his head, has the Captain. You be a smooth-skinned, likely wench—”
“Let her be, Wak!” That was Vidruth.
“Aye, Captain,” the other answered with a slur of sly contempt. “Here she be, safe and sound—”
“And here she stays, Wak, safe from your kind. Get out!”
There was a growl from Wak, as if he were close to questioning the other’s right to so order him. Then Dairine’s ears caught a sound which might have been that of a panel door sliding into place.
“You are not the Captain,” she spoke into the silence between them.
“There has been a change of command,” he returned. “The Captain, he has not brought us much luck in months agone. When we learned that he would not try to better his fortune—he was—”
“Killed!”
“Not so. Think you we want a blood feud with all his clan? The Sulcarmen take not lightly to those who let the red life out of some one of their stock.”
“I do not understand. You are all Sulcar—”
“That we are not, girl. The world has changed since those ruled the waves about the oceans. They were fighters and fighting men get killed. The Kolder they fought, and they blew up Sulcarkeep in that fighting, taking the enemy—but also too many of their own—on into the Great Secret. Karsten they fought, and they were at the taking of Gorm, aye. Then they have patrolled against the sea wolves of Alizon. Men they have lost, many men. Now if they take a ship out of harbor, they do it with others than just their kin to raise sails and set the course. No, we do not kill Sibbald Ortis, we may need him later. But he is safe laid.
“Now let us to the business between us, girl. I heard the words you spoke with Ortis. Also did I learn much about you from those starvelings who live in Rannock. You have some of the Talents of the Wise Women, if you cannot call upon the full Power, blind as you are. You yourself said it—if any can treat with those devil females of Usturt, it must be one such as you.
“Think on that spider silk, girl. You held that rag that Ortis has. And you can do mighty things, unless all those at Rannock are crazed in their wits. Which I do not believe. This is a chance which a man may have offered to him but once in a lifetime.”
She heard the greed in his voice. And perhaps that greed would be her protection. Vidruth would take good care to keep her safe. Just as he held somewhere Sibbald Ortis for a like reason.
“Why did you take me so, if your intentions are good? If you heard my words to the Captain, you know I would have gone willingly.”
He laughed. “Do you think those shore-side halflingmen would have let you go? With three-quarters of the Guardians dead, their own Wise Woman laid also in her grave shaft, would they willingly have surrendered to us even your small Talent? The whole land is hard pressed now for any who hold even a scrap of the Power.
“No matter
. They will welcome you back soon enough after you have learned the secret of Usturt. If it then still be in your mind to go to them.”
“But how do you know that in Usturt I shall work for you?”
“Because you will not want the Captain to be given over to them. They do not have a pleasant way with captives.”
There was fear behind his words, a fear born of horror, which he fought to control.
“Also, if you do not do as we wish, we can merely sail and leave you on Usturt for the rest of your life. No ship goes there willingly. A long life for you perhaps, girl, alone with none of your own kind—think of that.”
He was silent for a moment before he added, “It is a bargain, girl, one we swear to keep. You deal with the weavers, we take you back to Rannock, or anywhere else you name. The Captain, he can be set ashore with you even. No more harm done. And a portion of the silk for your own. Why, you can buy all of Rannock and make yourself a Keep lady!”
“There is one thing—” She was remembering Wak. “I am not such a one as any of your men can take at his will. Know you not what happens then to any Talent I may possess?”
When Vidruth answered her, there was a deep note of menace in his voice, though it was not aimed at her.
“All men know well that the Talent departs from a woman who lies with a man. None shall trouble you.”
“So be it,” she returned, with an outward calm it was hard for her to assume. “Have you the bit of silk? Let me learn from it what I can.”
She heard him move away the grate of whatever door kept snug her prison. As that sound ceased, she put out her hands to explore. The cubby was small, there was a shelflike bunk against the wall, a stool which seemed bolted to the deck, nought else. Did they have Captain Ortis pent in such a hole also? And how had this Vidruth managed so well the take-over of the Captain’s command? What she had read of Sibbald Ortis during their brief meeting had not been such as to lead her to think he was one easily overcome by an enemy.
But she was sitting quietly on the stool when Vidruth returned to drop the length of riband across her quiet hands.
“Learn all you can,” he urged her. “We have two days of sail if this wind continues to favor us, then we shall raise Usturt. Food, water, what you wish, shall be brought to you, and there is a guard without so that you need not be troubled.”
With the silk between her hands, Dairine concentrated upon what it could tell her. She had no illusions concerning Vidruth. To him and the others, she was only a tool to their hands. Because she was sightless, he might undervalue her, for all his talk of Talent and Power. She had discovered many times in the past that such was so.
Deliberately, Dairine closed out the world about her, shut her ears to creak of timber, wash of wave, her nose to the many smells which offended it. Once more her “sight” turned inward. She could “see” the blur of those hands (which were not quite hands) engaged in weaving. Colors she had no words to describe were clear and bright. For the material she saw so was not one straight length of color, but shimmered from one shade to another.
Dairine tried now to probe beyond that shift of color to the loom from which it had come. She had an impression of tall, dark shafts. Those were not of well-planed and smooth wood; no, they had the crooked surface of—trees—standing trees!
The hands—concentrate now upon the moving hands of the weaver.
But the girl had only reached that point of recognition when there was a knock to distract her concentration. Exasperated, she turned her head to the door of the cubby.
“Come!”
Again the squeak of hinge, the sound of boots, the smell of sea-wet leather and man-skin. The newcomer cleared his throat as if ill at ease.
“Lady, here is food.”
She swirled the riband about her wrist, put out her hands, for suddenly she was hungry and athirst.
“By your leave, lady,” he fitted the handle of a mug into her right hand, placed a bowl on the palm of the other. “There is a spoon. It is only ship’s ale, lady, and stew.”
“My thanks,” she said in return. “And what name do you go by, ship’s man?”
“Rothar, lady. I am a blank shield and no real seaman. But since I know no trade but war, one venture is nigh as good as another.”
“Yet of this venture you have some doubts.” She had set the mug on the deck, kept upright between her worn sandals. Now she seized his hand, held it to read. For it seemed to Dairine that she must not let this opportunity of learning more of Vidruth’s followers go, and she sensed that this Rothar was not of the same ilk as Wak.
“Lady"—his voice was very low and swift—"they say that you have knowledge of herb craft. Why then has Vidruth not taken you to the Captain that you may learn what strange, swift illness struck him down?”
There was youth in the hand Dairine held and not, she believed, any desire to deceive.
“Where lies the Captain?” she asked in as low a voice.
“In his cabin. He is fevered and raves. It is as if he has come under some ensorcelment and—”
“Rothar!” From the door, another voice sharp as an order. The hand she held jerked free from hers. But not before she had felt the spring of fear.
“I promised no man shall trouble you. Has this cub been at such tricks?” Vidruth demanded.
“Not so.” Dairine was surprised her voice remained so steady. “He has been most kind in bringing me food and drink, both of which I needed.”
“And having done so—out!” Vidruth commanded. “Now"—she heard the door close behind the other—“what have you learned, girl, from this piece of silk?”
“I have had but a little time, lord. Give me more. I must study it.”
“See that you do” was his order as he also departed.
He did not come again, nor did Rothar ever once more bring her food. She thought, though, of what the young man had said concerning the Captain. Vidruth’s tale made her believe that the whole ship’s company had been behind the mate’s scheme to take command and sail to Usturt. There were herbs which, put in a man’s food or drink, could plunge him into the depths of fever. If she could only reach the Captain, she would know. But there was no faring forth from this cubby.
Now and again Vidruth would suddenly appear to demand what more she had learned from the riband. There was such an avid greediness in his questions that sometimes rising uneasiness nearly broke through her control. At last she answered with what she believed to be the truth.
“Have you never heard, Captain, that the Talent cannot be forced? I have tried to read from this all which I might. But this scrap was not fashioned by a race such as ours. An alien nature cannot be so easily discovered. For all my attempts, I cannot build a mind picture of these people. What I see clearly is only the weaving.”
When he made no answer, Dairine continued:
“This is a thing not of the body, but the mind. Along such a road one creeps as a babe, one does not race as one full grown.”
“You have less than a day now. Before sundown, Usturt shall rise before us. I know only what I have heard tell of witch powers, and that may well be changed by the telling and retelling. Remember, girl, your life can well ride on your ‘seeing’!”
She heard him go. The riband no longer felt so light and soft. Rather, it had taken on the heaviness of a slave chain binding her to his will. She ate ship’s biscuits from the plate he had brought her. It was true time was passing, and she had done nothing of importance.
Oh, she could now firmly visualize the loom and see the silk come into being beneath the flying fingers. But the body behind those hands, that she could not see. Nor did any of the personality of the weavers who had made that which she held come clear to her, for all her striving.
Captain Ortis—he came in the reading, for he had held this. And Vidruth also. There was a third who was more distant, lying hid under a black cloud of fear. Was this day or night? She had lost track of time. That the ship still ran before the wind, she
sensed.
Then—she was not alone in the cubby! Yet she had not heard the warning creak of the door. Fear kept her tense, hunched upon the stool, listening with all her might.
“Lady?”
Rothar! But how had he come?
“Why are you here?” Dairine had to wet her lips with her tongue before she could shape those words.
“They move now to put you ashore on Usturt, lady! Captain Ortis, he came up leaning on Vidruth’s arm, his body all atremble. He gives no orders, only Vidruth. Lady, there is some great wrong here—for we are at Usturt. And Vidruth commands. Such is not right.”
“I knew that I must go to Usturt,” she returned. “Rothar, if you have any allegiance to your captain, know he is a prisoner to Vidruth in some manner, even as I have been. And if I do not do as Vidruth says, there will be greater trouble—death—”
“You do not understand.” His voice was very husky. “There are monsters on this land. To see them even, they say, makes a man go mad!”
“But I shall not see them,” Dairine reminded him. “How long do I have?”
“Some moments yet.”
“Where am I and how did you get here?”
“You are in the treasure hold, below the Captain’s own cabin. I have used the secret opening to reach you as this is the first time Vidruth and the Captain have been out of it. Now they must watch carefully for the entrance to the inner reef.”
“Can you get me into the Captain’s cabin?” If, in those moments, she might discover what hold Vidruth had over Captain Ortis, she perhaps would be able to help a man she trusted.
“Give me your hands, then, lady. I fear we have very little time.”
She reached out, and her wrists were instantly caught in a hold tight enough to be painful, but she made no sound of complaint. Then she found herself pulled upward with a vast heave as if Rothar must do this all in a single effort. When he set her on her feet once more, she sensed she was in a much larger space. And there was the fresh air from the sea blowing in as if through some open port.
But the air was not enough to hide from her that telltale scent—a scent of evil.