by Hugh Cook
'It's not Hearst we're after,' said Phyphor. 'It's the prince.'
'All in good time,' said Alish, carelessly. 'His hunt should end by evening. Come, we'll find you quarters.'
'We'll sleep in our towers,' said Phyphor. 'We'll be quite comfortable there.'
'Of course,' said Alish. 'Do you know the way?'
'I've been here before,' said Phyphor.
He was glad to get away. So there were Rovac in
Estar! Never before had he met the ancient enemy face to face. Despite his laughter at the time, he was rather shaken by the speed with which Alish had attacked and mastered Garash. And he was appalled to think that a Rovac warrior now had the protection of his oath.
Well, despite what Garash had said, oaths could be broken . . .
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Arl: one of the most powerful of the eight orders of wizards, having power over light and over fire.
* * *
From the fifth level of the gatehouse keep the wizards exited onto the battlements, which were twenty paces wide, with the flame trench moat on one side and a four-storey drop to the flagstones of the central courtyard on the other. Overhead the gatehouse keep towered skywards for another sixty-six levels, terminating at the seventieth floor.
'You should have killed him when he attacked me,' said Garash, speaking of Alish. 'He might have killed me.'
'And I might have been grateful,' said Phyphor. 'You need me! You can't kill Heenmor on your own!' 'I could use help - but you were no help at all when the dragon attacked us.' 'Neither was that wizard of Nin,' said Garash. 'Please allow me - ' began Miphon. 'Quiet!' shouted Phyphor.
For once, they obeyed - the word came out as a howl of anguish, shocking them to silence.
Phyphor stood there, trembling. With an unaccustomed sense of hopelessness, he remembered so many similar situations from the past, when wizards, ranting, raging, burning white-hot with unreasonable fury, had embroiled themselves in their own little melodramas, while about them empires fell and the world rode down the wide road to ruin. Without a word, he led them on.
Five hundred paces took them from the gatehouse keep to the tower of the order of Seth, pierced with a gateway which anyone could use - though only a wizard of Seth could enter the tower. Next came the tower of Arl, where they stopped; beyond lay the tower of Nin.
'Miphon,' said Phyphor. 'Come inside with us.'
'Are you mad?' said Garash. 'We can't have a wizard from another order in our tower.'
Phyphor turned a cold eye on his apprentice.
'For the last time,' said Phyphor, 'remember your place.'
'I won't stand for it! The order of Arl has never - ' 'Garash! Enough!'
'You may be the master here and now,' said Garash, heatedly, 'but what will our order say if they hear you've let the order of Nin into our tower - the order of bird-callers and fish-ticklers? There's no precedent for such a thing.'
'I've heard you out,' said Phyphor. 'Now you hear me. There's no precedent for our mission. Never before has a wizard ventured to the Dry Pit. Who knows what Heenmor found there? Who knows what he left in the tower? Maybe twenty different kinds of death. The more of us and the more skills we have between us, the better. And while I'm about it, don't despise bird-calling and fish-tickling - that talent has fed us often enough on this mission.'
Garash nodded as if he agreed - then grabbed for the chain round his neck.
Phyphor's staff thwacked against his fingers. Then he jabbed Garash in the ribs. Garash squealed. The staff chopped into his kidneys. Garash fell to the ground. The staff swept back for another blow.
'No,' said Miphon, restraining Phyphor. 'You'll kill him.'
'Perhaps I should,' said Phyphor, breathing heavily. 'My best efforts to teach him - and he turns out like this. Kill him, yes. It's not a bad idea.'
But he did not strike.
Garash, curled up in pain, moaned.
'On your feet," said Phyphor. 'Come on! Up! Now! Up up up! Stop snivelling! Get up! On your feet, yes, that's better. Now look me in the eyes. In the eyes!'
Garash could not or would not meet his gaze.
'What was your plan?' said Phyphor. 'Kill me, then go home? Listen. There's no excuse for going back. Our mission is too important for that. We'll follow Heenmor if we have to track him all the way to Chi'ash-lan. If we've lost his trail, we'll search until we pick it up again, even if that means quartering the Ravlish Lands and searching Tameran entire.
'If I offend against protocol, you can prosecute me in front of the order when we return. But if you return to the Castle of Controlling Power without completing this mission, the order will kill you on arrival.'
'I'll be pissing blood for a week,' moaned Garash. 'I'll be pissing blood for a week.'
'Pox doctor, heal thyself,' said Phyphor, without sympathy. 'Now let's go in. You first. Now!'
He shoved Garash toward the wall. Garash stumbled, tried to turn, and fell backwards. The wall parted like mist around him.
'Come,' said Phyphor, 'Take my hand.'
Taking Phyphor's hand - to get into the tower of Arl he needed physical contact with a wizard of Arl -Miphon walked through the wall as if through fog, and was inside.
Garash was on the floor.
'I'm blind!' screamed Garash. 'Blind!'
The air stank of burnt hair. The back of Garash's head had been singed and the back of his cloak had been scorched.
'You were lucky you fell backwards,' said Phyphor. 'Heenmor must have set a blast trap here. If you'd walked in facing forward, you might have lost your eyes.'
'Don't you hear me? I'm blind.' 'It's only flash-blindness,' said Phyphor. 'You'll get back your sight in a day or two.' 'Help me up,' said Garash. Phyphor laughed at him.
By the ochre everlast light of the firestones of the tower of Arl, Phyphor's mouth showed heavy brown sheep-teeth in a mirthless grin. Standing there, tall figure in robes and skullcap, scars on his chin and lines of age seaming his face, he looked like a deathmessenger.
'Upstairs,' said Phyphor. 'You first, Garash. If there's any surprises, they're yours.'
At first Garash demurred - but soon yielded to Phyphor's blunt methods of persuasion.
The tower of Arl rose from the battlements in fifty levels. The first thirty, windowless, held nothing but clasp-sealed jars of water and urns of siege dust. The next twenty were bare but for some stone furniture. As they climbed, Miphon and Phyphor followed Garash at a distance. The stairs were shallow, as wizards might have to climb them through thousands of years of frail old age. The stairway walls were covered with strange markings: glyphs and star-symbols which Miphon had never seen before. He did not like to ask what they were, but Phyphor volunteered the information.
'All that you see is written in the Inner Language of the order of Arl,' said Phyphor. 'It's used for saying that which must not be overheard. You're probably the first wizard of Nin even to hear of its existence. Does Nin have anything like it?'
'No,' said Miphon.
He was not telling the truth. His order did have a special method for secret conversations. Theirs was the only order able to speak to and hear animal minds, so they would use the slow, clear mind of a tortoise. They would sit it down on a table, with a few lettuce leaves so it would not wander, then one wizard would put a
thought into its mind for the others to pick up. The thought would fade swiftly, allowing questions, answers or elaboration. Miphon kept this secret, guessing wizards of any other order would find this ceremony ludicrous.
'We've no great secrets like the other orders,' said Miphon. 'Everyone knows that.'
'Everyone presumes that,' said Phyphor. 'But I'm not so sure. Hurry up, Garash! You're not crippled, only blind.'
The murderous fifty level climb exhausted all of them. However, there were no more traps. In the uppermost level, they found a table, a couple of chairs and a chess set. On the floor was a stone relief map of the lands of Estar, Trest, Dybra and Chorst. The map showed the flame tren
ch on the southern border of Estar throbbing with red light.
'That's new since I was here last,' said Phyphor. 'It would have told Heenmor the southern fire trench was burning again. The day we reached the border, he must have known it.'
'What are you talking about?' asked Garash, from his blindness.
'Nothing that need concern you,' said Phyphor. Garash yelped.
'That's a chair,' said Phyphor. 'There's a couch to your left.'
Garash groped his way to the couch, then lay down. With a grinding-grating, the stone conformed, at least approximately, to the curves of his body. Phyphor frowned at the ugly noise: it suggested that time's decay was telling even on the tower of Arl. Garash, lying back, went limp, as if unconscious.
'What if his sight doesn't come back?' murmured Miphon.
'There's a drop-shaft on every level of this tower,' said Phyphor. 'They have their uses.' Miphon hoped he was only joking.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Name: Durnwold (brother of Valarkin). Birthplace: Little Hunger Farm, Estar. Occupation: soldier.
Description: a strong, swarthy young man who looks rather stupid but actually has all his wits about him.
Career: since leaving his father's house, has served Prince Comedo. Has trained with the sword under the tutelage of Morgan Hearst, warrior of Rovac.
* * *
Footling - knocked from his horse by a branch - fell with a cry. His horse, dismounted, stopped. But the chase went on.
Durnwold urged his horse: 'Ya! Ya!'
Hearst rode silent and intent, bent low beneath the whipping branches. The trail swung into undergrowth too thick to ride through. Durnwold and Hearst swung down from their horses. Bent low beneath branch and bough, they ran with swords drawn.
One of their quarry turned at bay. Durnwold was at him first. Sword clashed with sword as Hearst slipped past to follow the trail. Durnwold, on his lonesome, fought the Collosnon soldier.
The earth was damp. Their boots slipped and stumbled. Their mouths were open: breathing harsh. In the dim underbranch light they thrust and countered. Fear for fear they matched each other. The Collosnon soldier dared a cut which Durnwold only half-turned. The blade ripped his flank. It hurt! He parried another blow then hacked for the head.
Metal bit metal. The Collosnon sword shattered. The soldier looked at it - shocked, astonished. Durnwold's blade bit to the bridge of his nose. Durnwold sliced, thrust, hacked, chopped, grunting, sweating, swearing, butchering his enemy to a bloody mess of gore and bone. Then dropped his sword and staggered to the support of a tree, where he rested, clutching his wounded side, panting, gasping.
It was a while before he realised he was only lightly wounded, and not likely to die yet.
Meanwhile Hearst, now far out of sight, ran on along an easy trail of broken twigs, footprints, torn branches, and, once, a vivid red wound where a boot had ripped the skin from an exposed tree root. He saw marks where his exhausted quarry had slipped and fallen. Bursting into a clearing, Hearst saw his quarry: sprawled full length with an arrow in his chest. Hearst saw the archer: a dark-haired weatherbeaten man of middle years, and behind him .. . what? It fled, leaving him with a vague impression of large eyes and fox fur.
'Who are you?' demanded Hearst, speaking Estral.
'Blackwood,' said the archer.
'And what was that thing that ran away?'
'A fodden.'
'What's that? Paw and claw? Or thumb and fist?'
'Thumb and fist,' said Blackwood. 'But it lives like paw and claw. It finds game for me.'
Blackwood spoke the language of Estar well enough to assure Hearst that he was a native of the land. Hearst switched to the Trading Tongue, in which he was more fluent.
'Do you claim the head?' said Hearst.
'The head? Mister, I'm not that hungry.'
'The prince will want to see it,' said Hearst, chopping down on the corpse with his sword.
He gave a quick look round, sheathed his blade, then set off at a jog, holding the head by a fistful of hair. He did not look back.
Blackwood wondered about that warrior who had demanded his name before leaving without giving his own, who had cropped grey hair, cold eyes, and a brutal way with human flesh. He hoped they would not meet again.
The dead Collosnon soldier had discarded his sword, helmet and cuirass to be able to run faster, but the spider amulet at his throat told the world which master he served. Sighting that amulet, Blackwood had shot without hesitation. The arrow had caught the soldier just to the left of the breastbone; he had spun round and fallen dead.
The fodden crept out of the undergrowth and began to lick the blood. Blackwood nudged it aside with his boot.
'No,' he said.
'Why riot?' said the fodden, lisping, hissing, spluttering. Practice let Blackwood understand its distorted speech easily.
'It's not for eating.'
'Blood is blood. It was a bad man. It's sorry now, isn't it?'
'It's still not for eating,' said Blackwood.
The fodden swiped at the corpse with one fox-fur hand. Blackwood kicked it away. Hissing, the fodden shrank back into the trees. Blackwood knelt by the headless body and cut out his arrow, which had the barbed broadhead he favoured for hunting; its three flight-feathers were yellow for easy retrieval.
'Murmer,' said Blackwood. 'Come on.'
The fodden lingered, hunched in shadows.
'Come on!'
The fodden followed reluctantly. It was short, bandylegged and covered in red fox fur but for its bald-bone head. Its eyes were green slits; its teeth suggested it was
a carnivore with a vicious bite. Breeding colonies of foddens lived only in the Penvash Peninsular; this one was old, and young male foddens would have killed it if it had not left. It was always moody and foul-tempered for weeks after waking from hibernation, and liable to do ugly and spiteful things; this far into spring it should have got past that stage, but there was no sign of its temper improving.
Blackwood followed the track of smashed vegetation and leaking blood. He went slowly, not wanting to overtake the warrior. The fodden followed at a distance.
Blackwood was burdened with a roll of waterproof canvas as an emergency weather shelter; a quiver of arrows; a composite bow of wood, sinew and horn; a small food pouch; and, strapped to his belt, a case of black leather holding his hunting trousse: a large chopper, a small chopper, a saw, an awl, a knife and a sharpening stone. Many animals had been dismembered by that useful collection.
He discovered a second headless body, badly hacked about. A shattered sword-stump lay nearby. Obviously there had been a fight: the soft ground was scuffed and gouged where the combatants had braced and slipped.
'Another,' said Murmer.
'Yes,' said Blackwood. 'Don't touch!'
'So starve me then,' said Murmer, idling past, tongue touching greedy lips.
The dead did not shock Blackwood; he was familiar enough with mutilated bodies. He had not wept for the dead since the time when he had held in his arms the last of his stillborn children. At tax time, which began on the full of the Harvest Moon, Comedo's soldiers would hunt down defaulters and slaughter them. Blackwood had seen it. He knew all about the bloat and stink of corpses, the disintegration of the human face, the collapse of the body to scum and bones.
'Heel!' said Blackwood, as Murmer lagged behind.
Blackwood expected the hunters, who had betrayed themselves to him earlier by sounding horns when a kill had been made, would be gone by the time he reached the forest edge - but they were still there. He should have guessed: he had heard sounds of fighting when they had been ambushed, and should have known they would be delayed.
Crouching in the forest, he watched. Some of the men sat on horses chatting to each other; some were still searching corpses for anything worth taking. Two were exercised in keeping the dogs from tearing at the bodies of dead men and two dead horses.
Prince Comedo, laughing, sat high on a white horse with retainer
s around him. He wore a plumed helmet but no armour. He carried a spear on which a head had been mounted; the ears and nose had been sliced away, the eyes gouged out. Red stains from the prince's bloody hands had stained the mane of his horse where he had stroked it.
One Collosnon soldier, still alive, had been slung over the saddle of a horse and tied there for the journey back to Castle Vaunting. He had taken a scalp wound, but it was not bad enough to threaten his life - worse luck for him.
Laughing, smiling, Comedo gave the signal to head for home. Horns blared, men cheered. They set off with a jingle of harness, a racket of dogs. When all were gone, Blackwood ventured forth. Flies already buzzed around the corpses. He looked back at the forest. The fodden was nowhere to be seen.
'Murmer? Come here! Murmer!'
No answer.
Blackwood looked at the sky. He was running out of daylight. He started to walk east. The hunt had come from the east, as a cursory glance at their tracks made plain. Every step took him nearer to home; it was disturbing to have hunters come so close to his house. He always feared that on his return he might find the