An owl hooted nearby, and Shobbat flinched. His injuries were painful but not grievous. Already the arrow wound was clotting, and the bleeding from the knife thrust had slowed to a trickle. His beast form was strong, but more than ever he was determined to find the wayward sorcerer Faeterus and force him to lift his curse. Shobbat was Crown Prince of Khur. With the nomads defeated and their fanatical Weyadan dead, Khur would be ready for a new leader, a prince who (at least outwardly) revered the old gods and decried his father’s corruption.
He loped away through the destroyed camp. The fires had died. The pass was once more cloaked in darkness. Shobbat circled the end of the unfinished wall and trotted north, into Inath-Wakenti. The owl did not speak again. But a cloud of bats whirled overhead, squeaking like a palace full of rusty door hinges.
* * * * *
The elves were camped atop a knoll surrounded on three sides by titans of stone. At Gilthas’s command, bonfires had been kindled along the open fourth side and in the gaps between the monoliths. The fires would be kept burning all night. Guards on top of the stones reported will-o’-the-wisps darting in the darkness, but none came near the encampment. The light or heat of the bonfires seemed to keep them at bay, for the moment.
The first day’s trek had proceeded without incident. Since no other goal had presented itself, Gilthas had decided they would make for the center of the valley. The lifelessness of Inath-Wakenti was disrupted by the tramping of feet, by elf voices, by the bleat and snort of the few domestic animals they retained, and by the occasional calls of Eagle Eye and Kanan circling overhead. Royal griffons and Goldens were rivals in nature, competitors for territory and food, and Kerian hadn’t been sure how the two would get on. Alhana had suggested that Kanan, being young, would submit to the elder beast, and pining for his rider, would be glad of Eagle Eye’s company. She had been proven right.
Soon they came to a wall of massive white blocks. Kerian said it ran for more than a mile in each direction, northwest and southeast. Blocks up to twenty feet long and eight feet high lay end to end, but there were plenty of breaks between the blocks. Hamaramis commented on its unsuitability as a defense and Kerian shrugged.
“I don’t think it was meant to defend,” she said. “None of the ruins make sense. They don’t connect. They don’t seem to be parts of buildings, just enormous blocks of stone dropped at random.”
Gilthas let himself be carried to the wall, then ordered the bearers to rest while he left the palanquin to study one of the blocks more closely. The stones were noticeably colder than the surrounding air, neatly dressed, with precise corners and smooth surfaces worn by the passage of a great deal of time. He identified the stone as snowy quartz. Nothing marred the white surface. Normally a boulder exposed to such a climate would be studded with lichens and moss and have a vine or two wedged in its fissures. All the blocks in sight were so clean, they might have been recently scrubbed. And as enormous as each was, rising above the turquoise turf, Gilthas knew from Kerian that quite a bit of each was buried in the ground.
As his palanquin was carried through the gap in the wall, Gilthas glimpsed someone at the far end of the block he had touched. He had a fleeting impression of dark eyes, a shock of brown hair, and tanned skin, but when he turned to see better, the figure was gone. Taranath and Kerian investigated, but found no one. The general was inclined to think the Speaker had been mistaken, but Kerian disagreed.
“The ghosts in this valley are real, Taran, make no mistake. It troubles me they’re showing themselves in broad daylight. Sunlight used to keep them away.”
They were witness to even stranger things as the night wore on. Slender, luminescent forms drifted out of the trees, passing on either side of the knoll on which the elves had camped. To those on the ground, they resembled nothing more than luminous fog, but the watchers on the monoliths saw them as upright, walking shapes. Like the will-o’-the-wisps, the glowing ghosts did not try to enter the fire-girded camp. After midnight the lights and phantoms went away, but the bonfires were kept burning. Wood ran low three hours before sunrise. As the flames died back a bit, the elves saw the most ominous manifestations yet.
Figures appeared outside the camp, in the deep shadows beyond the firelight. In shape they were both like and unlike elves. They were shorter than an adult elf but stockier than children. Their faces were brown, like those of nomads, and their unblinking eyes reflected the bonfires in red and orange. The strangers did not move or speak. At one point Taranath and Kerian counted fifty of them. Their silent vigil cast a pall over the camp, smothering all conversation. Warriors and civilians alike nervously watched the empty faces watching them.
Gilthas’s calm voice and confident presence eased the tense silence. He moved through the camp, speaking to elves of every station, calling each by name. When he reached the place where Kerian, Taranath, and Hamaramis were keeping an eye on the phantoms, he greeted them loudly.
“Has everyone decided not to sleep this night?” he said. “If so, this is the dullest party I’ve ever seen.”
“We have grim guests, Great Speaker,” Taranath said wryly.
Leaning on his staff, Gilthas looked beyond his wife’s shoulder at the far-off, vacant faces. “What sad creatures.” The others regarded him in surprise. “Don’t you feel their terrible loneliness?”
Kagonesti warrior and Qualinesti generals traded skeptical looks. Over Kerian’s protests, Gilthas had himself boosted atop a head-high monolith. From there he found the impression of sadness to be even stronger. Although the strangers said nothing, made no moves, something about them conveyed to the Speaker a desperate sense of abandonment. Their loneliness was so palpable, he was moved to address them, despite the warnings of his generals.
“Hello! We don’t mean to intrude, but we’ve come to live in your valley! We wish to live in peace! Spread the word! The elves have returned to Inath-Wakenti!”
As he climbed down, his legs betrayed him and he stumbled. Kerian steadied him.
“Do you honestly think those things understand you or care what you say?” she muttered.
“Who can know? Maybe no one’s ever tried to speak to them.”
Whatever else he accomplished, his actions broke the spell of fear on his own people. Seeing their Speaker face the ghosts on their behalf made them less afraid. Conversation resumed, hushed and tentative at first, then more and more normal. Elves gave up their worried watching, drifted away from the fire-lit ring of standing stones, and returned to their simple beds at last to rest.
Outside the camp something quite singular occurred. The phantoms went away. Their staring eyes closed, the red and orange reflections winking out two by two. The dark silhouettes remained a moment then, without fanfare or fury, submerged into the surrounding shadows. The elves were alone once more.
“How do you do it?” Kerian whispered to Gilthas.
He sighed and shook his head. “If I knew, I’d do it more often.”
6
Dawn brought good news. No elves had vanished during the night. Gilthas accepted that news with quiet satisfaction. Perhaps the valley was learning to accept them, he said. Kerian’s view was less rosy.
“Whatever lurks here is not stupid, Gil. It learns from its mistakes. We puzzled it last night, probably because there were so many of us. It will adapt, and people will disappear again. That’s what happened to us the first time we came here.”
He frowned. “It? Who or what is ‘it’? The ghosts? I always heard spirits were moved by an unresolved need for revenge or justice. Are the ghosts here of a different order?”
“How should I know? I’m no mage. But whatever it is, it will learn.”
They’d been climbing slowly all morning and were crossing a forested plain. Unlike the majestic trees of their homeland, these were spindly evergreens, pines and cedars mostly, and widely spaced. Gilthas traveled in his palanquin, and Kerian walked at his side. A few hundred yards ahead rode a squadron of cavalry led by Taranath. The mounted elves
combed through the sparse woodland, keeping an eye out for trouble. All they found were more megaliths, each as inexplicable as the last. These here on the plain had a somewhat different character than the ones left behind in the lowlands near Lioness Creek. The lowland monoliths were square-cut, cyclopean blocks. The upland stones had rounded contours. Vertical stones tapered to blunt points, looking for all the world like enormous teeth growing out of the ground. Riders found cylinders, and even perfect spheres twenty feet in diameter. One feature they shared with the lowland monoliths was their seemingly random arrangement. It was as if they’d fallen from the sky with no more plan than raindrops.
A warbling cry caused Gilthas to look up. The two griffons, Eagle Eye and Kanan, wheeled overhead. Eagle Eye was a mature adult and the younger griffon’s attempts to match his flying prowess afforded Gilthas a welcome distraction from the lifeless terrain. When Eagle Eye executed a particularly deft turn and roll, placing himself above and behind Kanan, the latter flared his wings and screeched. In flight against the cloudless blue sky, the creatures were a beautiful sight and offered a measure of reassurance. If danger lurked nearby, the griffons would spot it before the elves did.
Pulling his attention earthward once more, Gilthas said to Kerian, “You’re no wizard, that’s true. So look at Inath-Wakenti with your warrior’s eye and tell me what you see.”
“I see a valley where no one lives. No cities, no crops, no herds. It’s completely empty, yet defended against all comers. Who is defending it?”
“The ghosts of its long-ago inhabitants.”
“I don’t think so.” She eyed a towering, hourglass-shaped block of white quartz ahead. “There are at least two stories here. First are the ghosts, the tunnels, and the giant stones. They’re connected to each other somehow.”
Her expedition had found the tunnels after accidentally upending a monolith. Beneath it was an entrance to the underground passageways. And the ghosts seemed to enter and leave the tunnels at will.
“But I believe the will-o’-the-wisps are different,” she added.
When similar lights had claimed Kerian on the battlefield outside Khuri-Khan, she thought she was destined for oblivion, like the warriors who’d vanished during her initial trip to the valley. Instead, she found herself dumped into the loathsome Nalis Aren, the Lake of Death, in Qualinesti. Her adventures with Porthios, Alhana, and the griffons followed. Why the lights had transported her away from Khur remained a mystery but she’d decided they were different from the lights here. Inath-Wakenti’s will-o’-the-wisps flew meandering, irregular courses, drifting and dawdling until their target was lulled into a false sense of safety. The lights that had kidnapped her were larger, faster, seemingly more direct of purpose. Their source, she felt, was different from whatever drove the valley lights.
“They are attracted to living creatures,” she reasoned. “Over the centuries, they’ve eliminated every living animal from this valley, right down to the flies and fleas.”
“What does that suggest?”
“They’re guarding the valley—not only to keep people out, but to keep the residents in.”
Gilthas nodded slowly. “The inhabitants of the valley were not intended to have contact with outsiders. I imagine they never did. One by one they died, as we all die, and their spirits haunt the land. They don’t present a threat like the lights. If we could find a way to persuade the will-o’-the-wisps to leave us alone, we’d be a long way toward making this place home.”
“Maybe you can talk to them,” Kerian said dryly.
Whatever he intended to say was swallowed up by a furious bout of coughing. So wracked was he by the spasm, Kerian ordered his chair lowered and the healer summoned. Truthanar brought more of his palliative drink, but Gilthas could swallow very little.
“Great Speaker, you must rest!” Truthanar declared. “If you continue on like this, I will not be responsible for the consequences.”
Gilthas’s answer was some time coming, but at last the coughing subsided and he wheezed, “I’m in a chair already. How more rested must I be?”
Blood oozed from his nose. Kerian, kneeling at his side, carefully wiped it away with her fingers.
“Sire, you must lie in a warm bed and sleep,” Truthanar insisted.
“Soon, noble healer. Soon.”
Kerian followed Truthanar as he returned to his place in the milling throng. “Tell me plainly,” she said in a low voice. “What is his condition?”
The aged Silvanesti was blunt. “He is burning his candle at both ends, lady. Even if he took to a bed right now and kept warm and quiet, his life still would be measured in months.”
She had known her husband’s health was bad, but hearing the prognosis aloud was still a shock. Returning to the palanquin, she found Gilthas had succumbed to the medicine and was slumped in the chair, sleeping, chin on his chest. The cup had fallen from his slack fingers. Kerian picked it up and handed it to one of the Speaker’s aides.
“Follow the scouts,” she told the bearers, gesturing at Taranath and the cavalry. The bearers lifted the chair and resumed walking. They were not the same four who had carried the palanquin at the beginning of the journey. Every hour or so, a new quartet replaced those carrying the chair. It had required Kerian’s intervention to put such a rotation in place. The bearers were volunteers, and none wanted to give up his or her place. If Kerian hadn’t insisted, they would have carried on until exhaustion dropped them in their tracks.
When the palanquin resumed its progress, the crowd of elves behind it picked themselves up too and continued their steady tramp toward the center of the valley. None knew what, if anything, might be there, but it was the Speaker’s will they go, and for him, they would walk into the Abyss.
While Gilthas slept, Kerian decided to reconnoiter ahead. She whistled loudly and Eagle Eye, circling above her, landed a few yards away. She swung into the flat saddle and urged the griffon aloft. Kanan followed them but a sharp scream from Eagle Eye sent the younger beast back.
They flew northeast, just above the low trees. The late-morning sun was in their eyes, and their combined shadows chased behind. The cavalry waved as griffon and rider flashed over them. Kerian easily picked out their leader, although he wore nothing to set him apart. Taranath was out in front, as usual.
The mountains ringing Inath-Wakenti were high and very rugged. Shreds of cloud drifted over their peaks, pushed by an east wind. The air was warmer aloft than on the ground. One of Inath-Wakenti’s many oddities was the chill of its soil. The elves quickly learned the ground drew off the heat of their bodies, so they slept on padding made of whatever was at hand—blankets, spare clothing, pine boughs. Fires died quickly too, and the embers went cold faster than normal. Cruising five hundred feet over Inath-Wakenti, Kerian was warm for the first time in days.
White monoliths crouched among the low trees or towered impudently above them. There still seemed no rhyme or reason to their placement. Favaronas had told her the stones were not native to the valley, so they must have had been hauled in for a purpose. What weird, useless purpose, she could not imagine.
The farther she flew, the more numerous the monoliths became. At last night’s campsite, the sarsens had been ten to twenty yards apart. Now, only a handful of yards separated them. The stunted trees thinned, then ended. Abruptly the ground below Eagle Eye’s driving wings was solid white, like a plain of snow. The griffon reared back, hovering, startled by the blinding reflection of sunlight from the enormous field of dressed white stone.
Kerian turned the griffon’s head and they flew along the edge of the pavement. It was perfectly circular, at least a mile in diameter, and from this height, featureless. Grass and weeds grew up to its edge, but as with all the other stone structures, nothing encroached on the pristine surface. The assemblage of monoliths stopped thirty yards or so from its edge, leaving clear ground in between. Judging by the position of the mountains and the distance the elves had come, Kerian realized she must be looking at t
he center point of Inath-Wakenti.
Her circumnavigation of the enormous disk complete, she steered Eagle Eye toward the center. He balked, tossing his head and fighting the reins. She couldn’t blame him. A wave of cold air rose from the pavement and hit the soles of her shoes. When she let the griffon have his head, he flapped hard to get back outside the perimeter of the stone pavement. She had him land a few yards from its edge. He lay down facing away from the circular slab, and she proceeded on foot.
The pavement was knee high, its edge cut square, but worn by the elements. Although white like the monoliths, it wasn’t made of snowy quartz, but a denser rock. A series of tremendous pie-shaped wedges had been neatly joined to form the mile-wide disk. Gingerly she climbed onto the platform. The flow of cold air she’d felt aloft was discernible at ground level too. Air temperature atop the platform was noticeably colder than the usual chilly feel of the valley.
On closer inspection, the stone wasn’t unmarked after all. The surface was covered with carved lines. Weathering had softened them, but their intricate patterns of curlicues and flowing curves was still visible.
Her journey to the center of the platform took a while, and the farther she went, the more isolated she felt. The mass of featureless, flat stone seemed to steal her sense of direction and distance. When she checked her position relative to her sleeping griffon, she realized she’d been walking in a circle. She sought one of the radial joints between the wedge-shaped slabs and used it as a guide to the center.
Sounds of whispering came to her ears, and she stopped immediately. In a silent land infested with ghosts, every noise was significant. Unfortunately, the sounds were too faint for her to understand, so she resumed her trek.
The center of the great disk was marked by nothing more than the simple confluence of all the joints, but as she drew near it, the voices became louder and more distinct. She kept going but slowly, turning her head left and right, alert for she knew not what. When her foot touched the center point, the voices instantly became comprehensible. They were nothing more than mundane conversations—about fresh water, clean clothing, the health of the Speaker.
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