Rond said, impatiently, “Woman!”
She pressed her knuckles to her forehead. “How did the tale go? Once, a rain wind blew into the inner dales through a pass in the Hills of Night. But King Lakanahan caused a wall to be built, to keep the rains on this side of the Great North Land, and so the inner dales dried up to deserts. One goes through that pass, climbs the wall, and, on the other side, makes smoke signals for the Wild Women of the Desert to — ”
Rond sighed, deeply. “Fables, fables, fables and legends. Even if true — smoke signals! For those savages to find us by? Northeast, southeast, woman, what lies southwest?”
To the southwest lay nothing but scrublands, day after endless day, until the shores of the Silent Sea. There dwelt only a scattering of fishermen, so primitive that they could build no boats, who lived by the scanty catch of their inshore fishing; so poor and mean were they, that Dame Darra had levied on them a token tax to be paid in fleas!
“But,” O-Narra said, “northwest — ”
“Indeed! Indeed! Northwest?” demanded Captain Rond. “What lies northwest?”
She was evidently pondering, nodding her head, her mass of red-gold hair quivering in its loose gatherings, so different from the tightly coifed way it had been only yesterday under the hideous battle-mask. “The High Keeper, Dame Hanna, will have alerted the Warders of the Border Marches by now,” she said. “They have no septs among them, and still reckon descent by clans in the primitive manner; so each Warder holds his fief entirely at the Dame’s pleasure. It is not to be expected that they will be as effective as the real warriors. Not for all the threats in the world, not for any sept city as fief, would they venture out at night, Father. They fear the darkness worse than death. So — ”
She knelt on one knee and drew in the sand with her finger. Jory placed one hand lightly on her shoulder, bent to look. “We are … approximately … here. As Rahan guided us up, I daresay he can guide us down — by the yonder slope, of course. We are still a half-day’s journey ahead of the Dame’s true troops. Suppose we can reach … there — ” she drew a curling line, dotted her finger in the sand — “by nightfall. The River Lin. Its meadows will be empty at this time of year, the herdswomen will be up in the hills. We go by night as far as we can … say, to here. And — ”
Rond interupted her. “And where does all this here to there lead us, eventually?”
She took hold of Jory’s hand, pulled herself up. “To the Temple of the Clouds,” she said. “To the Holy Court — and — I hope — to sanctuary.”
• • •
Rahan-Joe had refused the chance to return to his household and his herd.
“Why should I return?” his question was. “Before, I was happy, even though I was only a servitor. I used to dream dreams like all the others. ‘Perhaps a Great Lady will pass by and see me and fall in love with me.’ ‘Perhaps I will find a treasure and be able to pick my own wife.’ But, really, all the while, I knew that sooner or later the bailiff would some day come and tell me that the awk-butcher or the soap-boiler had asked the Lady for a husband, and she had told the bailiff to find one, and she would pick me. Well, every man wants a wife, and if I got daughters enough, mine might be kind to me.”
They were making their way down a dry watercourse. Boulders strewed the bed of the stream, making the going slow. Now and then a tan or arptor would startle them, the one with its swift and darting flight; the other with its shrill, questioning cry “Arp-tor? … Arp-tor? … Arp-tor?” The sun was hot, and growing hotter.
“But now,” he said, “I am a fellow of the Great Men. Children will know my name hundreds of years from now. Why should I go back?”
Levvis, his long legs scissoring their way around the huge, rounded stones, said, “I see what you mean, Little Joe. Well, if we get out of this, maybe we can take you with us. There’s a place you never heard of — Humboldt’s Two Worlds, in the Lace Pattern — where nobody is bigger’n you are, men nor women. It’s a nice place. Of course,” he said, dodging around a boulder half the size of the pettyboat, “I guess this is a pretty nice place, too … or would be, if they had a more peaceful form of government.”
The subject of the governance of the Great North Land was under discussion in officer’s country, some several paces behind, as well.
Jory said, “What do you think, Captain?”
Rond smiled, wryly. “At the moment,” he admitted, “I was thinking of a tall, cold drink of greensleeve. ‘Spaceman’s ruin’ — eh? As a matter of fact, Aysil Stone didn’t fall apart because he drank. He drank because he was falling apart…. An ill-starred voyage, Cane — a bad smell to it from the start. However — well. I think that I don’t care much for the prospect of walling ourselves up in the temple precincts with a clutter of barbarian philosophers.”
The cliff fell away to one side at that point, leaving the whole country open to view for scores of leagues around. It was rugged terrain, with no sign of any of the cultivated fields visible in the early morning toward City Sartissa. It was woodcutters’ country — minus the woodcutters. Far, far-off, across all but bottomless valleys with thin silver lines of streams snaking along them, on a jagged crest, they saw a ruined castle: snub tower and curving battlements, Properly supplied, properly armed, there in that relic of what Rahan-Joe and O-Narra called the ban-o-thy — the “time of kings” — they might, few as they were, be able to hold off all the Dame’s armies and all the Dame’s women.
But they lacked both facilities.
“We’d be safe,” Jory said. “Both of the Val people insist on that.”
Rond compressed his lips. “I have come to be as fond of the small man as if he were my own son. And I am glad that you and the young woman are suited. But, Mister Cane, our object is not to be safe. We were safe on the island. Our object is to get away. And I don’t think that will be easy while we are, so to speak, clutching the horns of the altar.”
Jory wriggled out of his shirt, wiped his face with it, tied it around his neck. The land had begun to form a great series of shelves, like giant and crumbling steps. Down they went, carefully, carefully, down, down, down.
“Of course,” said Rond, “I don’t see that at the moment we have any choice.”
Early afternoon brought them out of the rocks and sun and onto a wooded plateau.
“I think we might call a halt for rest and refreshment, Mr. First,” said Rond. And then several things seemed to happen at once. A creature of some size came loping out of the trees diagonally across their path. There was a shout. A thud. The beast stumbled, rolled over, lay still. Someone cried, “Oh, good, Moha!” The same voice said, almost at once, in an entirely different tone of voice, “Lady-Narra!”
A small man in a flowered kilt held out his hands, then, more in bewilderment than fear, let them fall. O-Narra said, in a careful voice, “Lord Clanan.”
He stared, open-mouthed. Then his eyes observed Jory’s naked chest. He flushed, put his hands to his mouth. “Men!” he said.
And two women, both bearing cross-bows, came out of the woods.
• • •
Lady-Moha was on a week-long hunting trip with her principal husband, Lord Clanan. With them was a younger friend — Lady-Sejarra. Their retinue was, by choice, small. The cares of Fief-Moha had been too much on its Lady’s mind, and her husband had persuaded her to advance their annual holiday by three weeks, and to reduce its party’s size. They had been here now for three days. Hunting was good, Lord Clanan played the traditional music of the Vales of Lan (his original home) on the five-stringed gor, the Ladies sang. Maid Thila, the infant heiress to Fief-Moha, slumbered in her cradle.
Rahan-Joe tactfully parted from his new friends, and went to be of use to the servitors. The sudden appearance of seven guests was perhaps not balanced by the equally sudden appearance of one thrall, but Moha’s retinue — torn between the problem of making the food and table-settings go almost twice more, and the irresistable desire to see the Giants — made little complai
nt.
The members of the hunting party rose as well to the occasion as could be expected — indeed, Jory thought to himself, better. Observing Lord Clanan’s courteous attentions as he directed his manservant to lay out soap and towels and water, he wondered if he himself would be able to keep from staring if seven strange men, twelve feet tall, came to call on him. He decided that he would have had a difficult time to keep from running like hell. Lady-Moha and Lady-Sejarra, with an outward calm they could hardly be feeling at heart, politely discussed the journey hither from Fief-Moha, the details of the hunt, and similar small talk with O-Narra as she made her own toilet.
They never alluded by word or glance to her informal attire and appearance.
Not until the meal was over (“Excuse the informality,” said Lord Clanan, with every appearance of sincerity, waving his hand in deprecation toward the ornately set table, the elaborate garb of the servitors, “but one of the advantages of getting off into the woods is that much ceremony can be dispensed with”), did anyone bring up what must have been uppermost in most minds.
“Now there must be speech,” said their hostess, Lady-Moha, simply. Suspicion did not form part of her nature. She merely wished to know more.
O-Narra nodded. “Sword-Moha has had the honor,” she said, “of being the first to give food to the Great Men, newly come once more to the Great North Land.”
“I thought as much,” Moha said. She and her husband bowed down at once; Lady Sejarra bowed more slowly. Plainly, she was far from liking it; plainly, she had no choice. As she straightened up before her host and hostess did, Sejarra put a question.
“Why does Sword-Narra wear armor-clothes, but no armor?”
From O-Narra, in clipped tones, came the answer. “Sword-Sejarra does not as yet know the customs of greeting the Great Men” — which was incontrovertable — “but I shall presently share with her what little knowledge has lately been taught to me” — which had to be swallowed.
“Let us not be so courtly and formal,” Lord Clanan begged. “Unless,” he said, uncertainly, “such is the proper custom. In which case …” His voice ended on a troubled note.
“The custom which Lord Clanan has kept at this first meal,” O-Narra said, “is proper, and henceforth will be known and taught in the name of Lord Clanan.” The little Lord’s rosy face beamed, his wife looked infinitely honored, and Lady-Sejarra at least kept silent. Moha was a big bulk of a woman, though she moved with an ease which bespoke practice and exercise; Sejarra was thinner, bony, sallow. Hers was obviously not a happy nature.
The silence was long. Had it not been for Sejarra’s sour presence, Jory might have said it was luminous.
At length, Moha spoke. “When I was very young I remember my old grandfather telling me of the times before time, when the Great Men were in the land. Of course, he told me many things which one might say were nothing but old daddy’s tales — sword-demons, were-tans, nightleapers and such. But no one has ever denied the tales of the Giants, the Great Men. I mean, if such a thing had not been true, who would have invented it? And why? No, no — now we see that it was all true.”
Her husband clapped his hands. “To think that we are privileged to live in the days of the return of the Great Men! and to have given them our food for their first meal! The children of our children’s children will tell of this!”
Rond shifted slightly in his place, whispered to Jory Cane, in Inter-Gal, “Will you take a look over the terrain with your farseer?”
Jory nodded, rose. But he had not counted on custom, curiosity, and Lord Clanan. Lord Clanan immediately rose, too — and so did his wife and her Lady guest. Jory smiled, moved off to the highest point at hand. So did everyone else. And there, before Jory could think what else to do, Sejarra squinted — frowned — pointed.
“Look there!” she exclaimed.
Jory had not counted on such clear vision. He himself could see nothing until he lifted his glass, but Moha at once exclaimed, “A courier! See the white band on her helmet! … I wonder what — it must be for me. It will be hours before she can get here.” Her finger pointed far down into the depths of the land.
It was O-Narra who spoke.
“I can tell you what tidings the courier brings,” she said. Moha swung around, her face eager, wondering. “It is only the formal confirmation of the tidings I bring. Forgive me for saving the surprise. Fief-Moha, kneel.”
And, while Moha obediently knelt, and the others drew back, O-Narra said, “The Dame, the Great One, Hanna, High Keeper of the Castles of the O-Ban, bids you conduct at their pleasure the Great Men to the Temple of the Clouds, and to be their guide and guard until relieved of such task by the Holy Presence Himself. She has said it.”
Whatever astonishment Moha himself was feeling, it could hardly be less, Jory thought, than his own. But it took him only a moment to recover. A warm wave of appreciation washed over him. Try as he might have, he could have thought of no better scheme than the one which O-Narra had so deftly brought into being — so deftly, and so quickly, too; making the occasion suit her purpose.
Moha had bowed her head to her knees. Then, grudgingly assisted by Sejarra, she rose.
“What is the pleasure of the Great Ones?” she asked, diffidently. “When shall we break camp and be off to the Holy Court of King Mukanahan?”
For the first time Rond spoke to her. He flung out his hand in a wide, sweeping gesture. “Now!” he said.
five
AGAINST THE FACT THAT THE COURIER, HER FANTASTIC and barbarous war mask topped with a knot of white cloth, was making her way up the slope, while the rest of them were heading down, there had to be balanced the fact that they were burdened with baggage and gear — plus Lord Clanan’s palanquin. It would be a near thing, much too near for comfort.
“Should we leave someone behind to kill the courier?” Jory inquired, as hasty preparations for breaking camp were made.
O-Narra considered, briefly. Then, “No,” she said. “Your man might never find us. We’ll have to try to decoy her…. Ho! Lady-Moha! A note for the courier — shall I take care of it for you?”
“My thanks, my thanks!” Moha called, hastily, her full face redder than usual. Red — except for one scar which stood out, whitely: gotten, O-Narra told him later, during one of the periodic feuds which were both encouraged and strictly controlled by the Keeperate as a means of maintaining the warrior class in martial spirit and practice.
In only a few minutes they were off, at an easy trot; a cleft stick with a streamer attached to it thrust into the ground and the note slipped in it. Rond grumbled. “Surely we can go faster than this?”
“Yes … but we could not keep it up,” O-Narra pointed out. “Believe me, this pace is best.” To Jory’s inquiring look she replied that, while the courier might think it odd that the party was heading back for Fief-Moha so soon, as the note left for her said, it would not occur to her that she was being deceived. “Undoubtedly, she will try and save time by going cross-country to the road, thinking to meet us there. And she will wait … How long, I don’t know. But long enough.”
The courier, then, represented a potential rather than an actual, present menace. There was no lack of the latter; there was no way of telling whether they would be able to make it to the royal precincts, within which no sword was allowed, no creature ever put to death; from which no one seeking sanctuary was ever expelled. Soldiers of the septs might cross their path from the east, and — since it was not possible, without betraying themselves, to persuade Moha to travel by night — there was an almost equal danger from the Border forces as soon as word should reach them to mobilize.
Meanwhile, with enforced appearance of calm, they trotted at an easy pace through the peaceful countryside. Their route was on a downward grade still, but would not always remain so. Once, as they paused on a bluff for refreshment and relief, O-Narra pointed. “Jory — look — ”
He looked, but not, at first, where she had pointed. He looked at her. This was
the first time she had addressed him by name. Moha had lent her one of the green hunting-costumes which she and Sejarra wore, and, Jory now observed, it deepened the green of her own eyes. She caught his look, flushed slightly, but her smile did not change.
“See there,” she said, still pointing.
Long away and down a great stream curved in an oxbow. A thin thread of smoke rose from an island, and a line of sailing-barges floated restfully against the slow current.
“The River Lin … and there are the meadows where I thought we would hide. We won’t hide, now.”
“Suppose we are overtaken?”
“We would have to be overtaken by the Dame herself before Moha would allow her guests to come to harm.”
Preparations for resuming the journey were being made with less speed than Jory found comfortable, when Sejarra raised her hand for silence. After a moment, Moha asked, “What do you hear?”
“I thought … I am almost sure … a war-rattle.”
Jory tensed. O-Narra laughed. “Was this what you heard, Lady-Sejarra?” She shook the pouch of bullets at her belt. Moha chuckled. Sejarra looked unconvinced.
Rond said, “I am eager to look upon the face of the Holy King.” And, indeed, he did look eager — as he, and all of them, Jory thought, had every right to look.
Hastily, apologetic, Moha said, “Pardon our delay, Father. Ho! We move on!”
As the bearers swung up Lord Clanan’s palanquin, who held the infant in his arms, and they all resumed the journey, the little Lord called out, “Moha, wasn’t there talk, before we left, that the bad feeling between Fief-Lanna and the Heiress of old Menna might break out into an open feud?”
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