Runestone of Eresu

by Murphy, Shirley Rousseau

  Skeelie looked back at her, could only offer the silent sympathy that welled in her at the bitch wolf’s pain.

  I will follow the creature that killed them until I destroy it.

  “What is it, that creature?”

  It is a dark, unnatural shadow dwelling within the body of a dead man. Or, a man made mindless, as good as dead. When I returned from hunting and found my cubs, found the creature crouching over them, it vanished. Disappeared, sister. I could feel it later somewhere in the caves.

  Then, I could feel it following you. And so I followed it. I could feel it, sister, stepping into the whirling of Time as you stepped. It follows you, but I do not know why. And I will follow it, and kill it.

  A litany of hatred and suffering. Of promise by a great wolf that both frightened and heartened Skeelie. She felt the sense of the formless dark thing. It was this she had sensed in the caves and across the river. “I cannot sense it now, Torc. Not near to us.”

  No, sister. But it will return. I think it follows you as mindlessly as a skabeetle seeking prey.

  “But why?”

  I do not know. It came into those deep caves blindly, seeking something there, sensing something it seemed to need. I do not know what. It was confused and weak and fit only for killing cubs. But there are powers hidden within that creature, sister. Powers that can grow. After it disappeared from my den, I felt you come. I felt it begin to follow you. As if you, sister, held about you that which it sought. It came here seeking you, but now it is gone again. What do you bear, Skeelie of Carriol, that such a dark shadow yearns after? What weapon, what magic or what skill? Or, perhaps, what knowledge?

  Skeelie gazed into the wolf’s golden eyes and did not know how to answer. Had that creature followed her because of Ram, thinking she would lead it to Ram? But why? Yet well she knew that evil was attracted to Ram because of the power of the runestones, that evil coveted those stones perhaps beyond all else. Torc’s thoughts had plunged into an abyss half of wild emotion and half of conscious thought; and Skeelie plunged down with them through blackness to where the sense of the shadowy creature, and of its dark, latent powers, came cold around her.

  She shook herself free of the vision at last, stared at Torc, touched the wolf’s shaggy face with need and tenderness. And suddenly the thought of the tree man came into her mind, his words echoing . . . One of the few born to weave a new pattern into the fabric of the world. Those so born are not anchored to a single point in Time.

  “What did Cadach mean? Why do I think of those words now?” She knelt and laid her head against Torc’s shoulder, drew strength from her. She began to feel, with Torc, the incomprehensible patterns that formed life as together they reached to touch that web, needing to trace some new strand of meaning into their own fragile existence.

  At last Skeelie rose, took up the rock hares and cleaned them, and tied them to her belt. They started on up between black cliffs, pushing deep into the mountains as the afternoon sunlight thinned behind them, sending long shadows up the lifting peaks of the Ring of Fire.

  THREE

  Jagged peaks surrounded them. The afternoon sky grew gray and chill. The way was narrow between black cliffs, then sometimes only a ledge above a sheer drop, so Skeelie’s fear of height held her tense, and she must force herself on with stubborn will. Once as they rounded a narrow bend, Torc’s interest quickened, but was masked at once, leaving Skeelie uneasy. Torc stopped and turned to look at her. I do not hide anything, sister. I try only to calm my hatred. The shadow is there in that place, come there before us. I will kill it there. She let Skeelie feel the wild fury that drove her. Skeelie drew back, chastened, and followed Torc in silence.

  They came on the valley without warning. One minute they were squeezing between black rock walls, and the next they stood staring down past their feet to a valley cupped out of the cliffs, far below. Its edge was brilliant green where grass pushed against the cliffs, but it was bare and rocky at the center, and there lay the lake of fire, a pool red as blood seeping up out of the rock, like a wound upon the land. Skeelie remembered too vividly the burning lava river inside Tala-charen, where a wolf had nearly died, remembered lava belching from mountains down over the fields to burn beasts and men alike. What kept this lava from rising continuously out of the earth to spill over its banks? The flow seemed to her to have halted only temporarily, as if it must soon rise strongly again and drown the valley.

  As they made their way down the steep cliff, the wolf’s silence seemed a barrier between them; then Torc turned quite suddenly, went leaping up a cliff on the left and soon was out of sight. There was no contact between them, but Skeelie knew she was not meant to follow. Was Torc leaving her? Going on her own way alone, too intense with the need to kill to follow the slow descent that Skeelie must take? Skeelie could not tell what she, herself, sensed in this wild place. As she descended the steep cliff, she began to feel the lake’s hot breath, heavy and oppressive. When she stood at last close above the wide belt of grass that brushed against the rocky cliffs, she could see the dark mouths of half a dozen caves, below and to her left. She started along toward them, drawn, curious. Then suddenly Torc was before her, ears flattened and eyes flaming, baring her teeth. Skeelie backed away from her until she struck the cliff behind. Stay hidden, sister, there are men!

  Where, Torc? How many? She strained to hear voices, but could make out nothing, see no movement against the back cliffs. Had sensed nothing.

  Beyond that outcropping, at the end of the valley. Five men. Come, I will show you. Torc led her through a narrow cleft between jagged rock, toward the head of the valley. They stood at last, hidden and silent, watching five riders below them. Now she sensed them, evil and primitive, steeped in some lusting need she could not make out. Four were broad, heavy men, dark and bearded, dressed in fighting leathers. Herebian warriors. The fifth was a thin, pale creature, mounted, but with his hands bound behind him and his horse on a lead. Skeelie felt the cruelty of all five; felt the primitive strength of the warriors, and the weak, groveling avarice of the thin creature. Torc’s head was lowered as for attack, her ears flat, her expression predatory and cold, her mind seeking out to read the shadowy creature, to understand its nature. That is the one I follow, sister, that cold shadow of a man mindless and unliving. He is death, inhabiting the body of a man. I do not understand how. The ancient Seers would have called such a wraith, sister. One of living death. He seeks something here. Seeks something even as I seek him. He has abandoned following you, sister, for something he seeks more. And the greedy Herebians have seen his need and made him captive through his own lusting weakness. They seek what he seeks, they seek a treasure here.

  Skeelie could feel it now, the sense of the riders having been drawn to this place. What power had this valley to draw them? What did they seek? And what did she herself seek? She watched them dismount, felt the captive begin to quest out, intent, searching out blindly, then sniffing, turning its face from side to side.

  Torc’s eyes glinted, her lips pulled back in the silent snarl of a killer. Skeelie laid her hand on Torc’s rough shoulder and opened her mind wider to the great wolf, nearly reeled with Torc’s hatred and with the force of evil that Torc’s senses touched from the wraith. They stood pressed together, girl and wolf, strung tight; then Torc left her, began to creep forward between the stone cliffs.

  Don’t Torc! Four armed warriors. . . But Torc did not pause, and Skeelie followed her, sword drawn. They descended in silence, stood at last just above the men, so close that Torc could have leaped down onto any one of the horses and killed it. Skeelie felt the mind-shield that Torc placed against the beasts, so they did not sense her. The warriors had begun to prod the wraith impatiently; then they made it kneel. It began to crawl, snuffling at the ground like a hunting weasel, inching along smelling the dirt, changing direction again and again in search of some illusive scent, its thin body making jerky movements, its resemblance to a man all but gone. Was it something other than human
, in human shell? It doubled back, then thrust forward with an oily, reptilian motion, as if it had found a scent at last; groveled against its tether toward the caves.

  What does it search for, Torc?

  But Torc stood tense, her thought only a thin breath of meaning. Do not speak, sister. Not even in silence. That one has Seer’s blood. Skeelie felt Torc’s shielding of thought and tried to push out with a shield of her own, but felt clumsy and uncertain, as if the very unhealthiness of the creatures had laid a fog upon her mind. She watched Torc creep forward, felt the wolf’s cold readiness to attack. She followed, knowing this was madness; began to sense shadows from the creature’s mind, to feel the vague shape of that for which it searched: something small and heavy, something buried deep. She could feel the creature’s lust for that treasure.

  “She had a vision then of the wraithlike creature as it had stood beside the river Owdneet in darkness, watching her drink. Yes, it had sensed an aura about her, something it wanted, but she could not make out what. But then suddenly it had turned away, drawn to another trail, had followed the four Herebians who moved silently up the mountains searching—searching for what? The vision went dull and faded, left her with only the sense of the wraith sniffing and whispering around the Herebians, caught in its own mysterious greed. Skeelie could see clearly how the Herebians had stripped their pack animal, distributed the packs among the five horses and forced the wraith to mount; and the wraith, eager to search, had not resisted very strongly. She watched it now, knew that it sensed some power buried within this mountain, for it was pulling ahead eagerly toward the largest of the caves.

  What did it search for? What lay there among the caves, whispering out such an essence of power that the creature seemed unable to resist?

  And then she knew what it searched for, with a sudden sense that shocked her. Something small and heavy, something buried deep. She sensed the creature’s lust for that treasure: a jagged, heavy treasure, shining green, roughly broken, carved with the fragments of an ancient rune.

  Treasure of all treasures. That loathsome creature searched for, snuffled after, a shard of the runestone of Eresu.

  Three Herebians followed it. They had lit a lamp, held it high. Skeelie could feel their greed; and feel something more from them. Why are they afraid, Torc? They burn the lamp so brightly. Can’t you feel their fear?

  It has to do with the gods, sister. A fear bred of Herebian memory of the ancient caves of the gods. They fear the caves, fear the very mountains of the Ring of Fire. And sister, fear, in those selfish minds, makes them even the more cruel and bloodthirsty.

  I can never understand their evil, Torc, or why I feel they are different from other men of Ere—different somehow in the very facts of their birth, their beginnings.

  All souls born upon Ere are not of an age, sister. Some have lived many times on other planes. Some are new and untried. Some, perhaps, come upon Ere with a wash of evil already sucked into their natures, from willfully embracing past evils.

  The men pushed fearfully into the cave, the lamp burning brightly. The fourth Herebian remained behind, holding the five horses. Torc moved without sound; Skeelie crept close behind her, knowing that they could die here, that she could die fighting these men and never find Ram. But she would not abandon Torc. Torc’s hatred, her lust to kill the wraith, was overpowering. When the bitch stopped suddenly and drew back with one motion to lie flat beside Skeelie, Skeelie dropped down, too. Their faces were so close she could feel Torc’s warm breath, smell her musty smell. What do you sense? Why—you’re afraid, Torc! For suddenly Torc’s whole, intense being was caught in some horror that Skeelie could not fathom. She touched the wolf’s shoulder. What is it, Torc? What can make you afraid?

  I cannot kill him, sister. I dare not. Feel out, feel out and sense what I sense, and tell me I am wrong.

  Skeelie lay still, sensing the snuffling creature, trying to become one with it against all her instincts; though she shielded herself from it. She began to feel its physical weakness, the exhausted limits of its weak body. She felt the rough, rocky earth over which it crawled, smelled earth and the dampness of the cave. Then quite suddenly and with cold terror, she knew the nature of the creature in sharp detail. Sharp as pain came the knowledge, the reality of what it was.

  She understood that Torc must not kill it.

  For this creature could not die. Only its body would die. The evil within would, at the body’s death, be set free to take the body of another.

  The body of a Seer, sister.

  There were no Seers there among the Herebian warriors.

  You are the only Seer, Skeelie of Carriol. If I kill that creature, its dark, fetid soul will enter into your body. And you cannot prevent it.

  I would fight it, Torc! I—

  You cannot fight this. I think it is too steeped in evil. It is a dead soul that can never die again. I think it would possess you. It . . . without a body to possess, it would slowly fade into nothing. In that sense, I suppose it would die. But you cannot kill it. If a human tries, it will possess him. You must go away from here, sister. If they kill it, after it finds the runestone, it will come to possess you.

  I will not go away. It searches for a shard of the runestone. If it should find such, I must somehow take that shard. For Ram—for all of Ere. I could not leave a shard of the runestone.

  The Herebian beside the cave’s entrance tipped up a wineskin to drink. He held the five horses carelessly, their reins tangled in one hand. Torc watched him with cold appraisal. I could kill him with no trouble, the fat Herebian. Make one less to battle later, if the shard is found.

  Skeelie tried to sense the men inside the cave, but now no sense came clear except that of the wraith. The guard drank again. Skeelie took off her pack to make movement easier, laid it beside her quiver and bow behind a boulder. Then she started forward behind Torc, her hand on her sword.

  He has heard you, sister.

  I made no noise.

  He heard something, he’s looking up. He’s coming. Torc crouched, ready to spring.

  Don’t let him see you, Torc!

  Torc glanced at her with disdain.

  If he sees you, he will know you are a great wolf, and so know me for a Seer just as Gravan did. If he finds me alone, maybe . . .

  But Torc’s fury exploded; the wolf flew past her in a streak of dark violence as the warrior came up the last rise. She hit him so quickly he could not cry out, pinned him, her teeth deep in his throat as he fell, his only sound a gurgle of expended breath.

  He lay still beneath Torc’s weight, twisted once, then went limp. Blood gushed from his throat. The left shoulder of his tunic bloomed with spreading red stain as if a red flower opened. Torc turned to stare back at Skeelie, then spun away from the man, crouching anew, a snarl deep in her throat. Skeelie swung around, her sword challenging sword as a warrior towered over her, come silently out of the cave, perhaps at the small noise of scuffling; and he followed by another, so the two drove Skeelie back. Then one spied Torc, sheathed his sword and drew arrow. Get away, Torc! Get away! The wolf spun, leaped to disappear among boulders seconds before the arrow loosed. Skeelie parried one broad sword, then two, could not summon power to touch the wolf’s mind, so occupied was she; felt the sting of a blade, was backed against the cliff. Saw Torc leap on one of the warriors; and she was battling only one Herebian as the other rolled against her feet locked in fierce embrace with the snarling wolf. The Herebian swung his heavy sword at her like a battering ram. His dark face filled her vision, filled her mind. Black beard, stinking leathers. She dodged, plunged her blade at the man’s leather-clad belly, and felt her sword swept away, felt a dull blow along her neck, a fist across her face. She was falling, twisted with pain. Knew no more.

  *

  She woke, was lying on rocky ground, her hands tied behind her, her feet tied. She ached all over, as if she had been dragged down the cliff. Her sword was gone, the silver sword Ram had forged for her. She stared at the e
mpty sheath, then tried to roll over, pushed against stone, lifted her head to see she was lying against a boulder at the mouth of the cave. She could hear voices from the darkness, could not make out the words. When she twisted around, pain clutched at her like fire. She stared into the dark cave. Faint light moved there, and a voice rose shouting with anger, the words muffled by echoes. Another man swore—garbled, choppy sounds. Then a thin, querulous voice that must be the wraith’s. “I cannot! It is not the same! Not the same!” Shaking voice, nearly weeping. “I swear it! I swear!”

  “This is all you found! We came into the wretched cave for this?” A dull shattering, as if something had been thrown against the cave wall and broken. She felt dizzy, could not bring a vision or make sense of the exchange. The whining of the wraith pulled her back.

  “I swear there is nothing, I swear. It is buried in a mountain, maybe not this mountain, maybe . . .”

  “You’ll search every mountain in the Ring. You’ll find it, or die looking.”

  “It lies to the west, perhaps. Lies deep in a mountain, I promise . . .”

  Tala-charen? Did the wraith sense a shard of the runestone lying buried beneath Tala-charen, as she and Ram had always thought? It cried out in pain. The Herebian shouted. “Get up or I’ll kick you again!” Then, “Fetch the horses, BolLag! Why didn’t Stalg tie them before he—never mind, just catch them! We’re heading to the west reaches. Worse luck those two clods got themselves killed. If you see that wolf again, slaughter it.”

  Feet went by her. Large and heavily booted. She kept her eyes closed, did not move. “What about the wench?” the man called back.

  “Throw her over Stalg’s saddle. He won’t be riding again.”

  “She’s no good to us. What do we need her for?”

  “Stupid dolt. She’s female, ain’t she!”