Golden Trillium

by Andre Norton

  “Noble One!”

  To Kadiya’s surprise and discomfort he dropped before her, one hand reaching out, but not quite touching her robe’s edge. Fear had come with him, she could feel it. On the mat bed Jagun rolled his head from side to side and gave a low sound which was not quite a moan.

  “There is a stirring—” Gosel stared up at her as if the very intentness of his look could wring from Kadiya some answer he needed.

  “Quave has dreamed,” he continued after a moment. “Deep dreamed. There is evil on the move—though where and how the dream did not reveal. But Quave is sore disturbed. Noble One, use the Power and tell us what comes and what we may do!”

  They would not listen, they still thought that she was of the Vanished Ones. How could she make them believe she had no such powers?

  “Gosel.” Kadiya tried to order her thoughts, to make them clear. “I have told you—I am not one of those you think I am. My race has no great powers …” She thought of Haramis and corrected herself. “Most of us do not, and I am one lacking. A geas brought me here—who laid it upon me and why I do not know. But—” She bit her lip.

  “When I was offered a crown, Gosel, I chose instead the mire lands. Perhaps I did so believing that most of the Dark had departed out of the swamps when we dragged down Voltrik and Orogastus. Yet I made that choice and I hold to it.

  “In this place you have showed me a storehouse of knowledge which I believe runs far beyond that my people ever dreamed of—yet it is not my knowledge. I have wielded Power—but it was by the will of something which stood outside the person who was Kadiya, daughter of Krain. You must not be deceived. I cannot summon up thunderbolts, nor wrest the very winds into my service. I cannot raise demons, nor call upon any strange life to form guards for you or any of this land.

  “However, what I can learn, what I can do, that I shall.”

  He was standing now, his head turned a little to one side so that the lamplight drew a queer shadow against the curve of the shell bed.

  “Quave dreamed, Vasp dreamed, Thrug dreamed, and before them there was Zanya, Usita, and Vark and more, back and back—Those who once were shall come again. And what more should bring them than such a stirring as Quave has shadow-seen this night? Only one who was meant could come here. You have been before—you were seen. But then we knew also that the time was not yet.

  “Now we ask it of you, Noble One: stand between us and what will come.”

  Kadiya sighed. She had done her best. And it was perhaps true that she was doomed now to failure—but her old will stirred in her. To think of disaster was to call it into one’s presence. If the Hassitti would not accept the truth she must do the best she could. But without knowledge of just what she faced she was doubly at a disadvantage.

  “What manner of evil stirs?” she asked.

  Gosel shook his head. “It was not made plain to Quave—only that it is old and dark. It has lain long in slumber—”

  “Those who once dwelt here had records. If this thing was old, could those not be searched?”

  There was a quick eagerness in the Hassitti’s answer.

  “That can be done, Noble One. It is true that one needs a lamp to search out what must be found. Also, the dreamers will try again! This very hour they shall try!”

  With a swirl of his drapery he was gone.

  Kadiya had drawn her dagger. The reality of that cherished weapon was an anchor in this world of dreamers and shadow threats. The records she had seen in one of those rooms crammed with the memorabilia of the Vanished Ones—could the Hassitti read them? She was sure that such a task was beyond her own talents.

  “Farseer—”

  She turned quickly to Jagun.

  “What may I do for you, comrade?”

  She saw his wide mouth shape a half smile. “It is rather, King’s Daughter, what I may do for you. These skitterers with their dreaming and their hoarding of what they themselves do not know—do not let them draw you into standing for them.”

  “What do you truly know of these little people, Jagun?” she questioned.

  His smile was gone. “Farseer, very little. Until I saw them for myself I believed that that knowledge was of the same stuff as swamp mist—or even less. They are from the fashioning of the Vanished Ones, even as were we of the Kin—and the Skritek—but they were said to have gone with the Great Ones into the unknown. They were thought to have had no real life apart from those others, whereas we were given the swamp mires to hold and rule. They are not of our kind any more than the Skritek—though they are not of the Dark as are those.”

  “You have dreamed also, hunter.”

  He was silent for a moment, and turned his head a little away from her.

  “Yes, I dreamed.” She saw him shiver. “Though I cannot remember it now. Perhaps all this,” he made a motion with his hand, “is a place of dreams. Farseer, we would be better out of it.”

  Kadiya shook her head wearily. “I might say well to that—save there is the sword. It remains, and while it does I am not free to go my way. But you are not bound, Jagun.”

  Now he looked straight at her and she felt shame for those last words.

  “Comrade,” she hastened to say, “I would not have you away except by your own choice.”

  “Which I have made long since,” he answered.

  7

  Kadiya had left one lamp burning. Even in its subdued glow she could see some reflections from the patterns on the robe she had discarded in folds across the end of the bed. Within that shell hollow were not the sleep mats she was used to but rather a fluff of stuff she decided must be culled from the seed puffs of mak reeds, and into this nesting apparently the occupant was supposed to burrow.

  She lay with her wrists crossed behind her head and tried to face squarely what might lie ahead. This was a blind seeking, unless she could find something in that mass of records she had only glimpsed when the Hassitti had taken her on the tour of their storage rooms.

  She had never been a delver into old records, even if they were inscribed in words she could read—which she greatly doubted. This should be Haramis’s task.

  Haramis—

  Kadiya’s hands went now to the amber amulet at her throat. Cupping it in both her palms, she closed her eyes and tried to reach her sister using the mind speech. There was no touching, no sense of anything beyond. She had had only a small hope that there would be.

  Yet the amulet fed a warmth to her hands, down her arms, into the very heart of her body. Kadiya, clasping the amulet tight against her breast, no longer struggled to use that which she did not understand. Instead her thoughts drifted to the garden. In the morning she would go there—

  She awoke as suddenly as if she had been aroused to sentry duty. The lamp still shone, a beacon against the night. Kadiya fought her way out of the puffy fibers of bedding which had arisen like waves around her.

  Crossing the room, she discovered that even in that short time the Hassitti had dealt with her traveling clothing. What could be cleaned had been; what could be mended was. She could bear to wear it again.

  The summons which had brought her out of sleep still rang in her head. Pausing only for a moment to assure herself that Jagun slept, she crept out of the room.

  There was a faint radiance from below as if another lamp had been left there. She descended the flight of stairs to ground level. There was a solid door—the first she had seen—but it yielded to her push and then she was out in the night.

  Once more she held the amulet in hand. Even as it had guided her moons ago to Binah’s tower, so now was it aglow. That spark of light within wreathed the tiny Black Trillium, waning and waxing as she swung it carefully this way and that.

  Binah’s birth gift was of the magic of the Vanished Ones. In this, the heart of their territory, she believed it could be trusted anew. Obeying the impulse with which she had awakened, the girl moved off through the mists of the night. She divided her attention between what she held and what lay about her,
remembering very well the vine trap.

  Though she could see but little as she went, Kadiya was certain she was beginning to retrace the ways which had brought her here. And she was not surprised when at last she stood again before the garden stairway with its silent and motionless Guardians.

  Then she was among the columns, looking down to where the sparks of insects wove patterns between bloom and bloom. The perfume seemed stronger than even the spice lamps of the Hassitti as she descended the inner stairway. One of the sparks, a vivid blue-green, swung toward her, hovered for a second or two over the amulet as she held it outstretched.

  “I have come.” Kadiya spoke aloud. She had moved to stand beside the sword which still stood planted and unchanging.

  Yet—something had changed. Ever since the blade had come again into her hands after its service as part of the Great Power, the lids had appeared locked tightly in place over the three eyes. Now they showed slits as if about to lift.

  Kadiya shrank from touching the talisman even as she knew that she had no choice. She stooped and closed hand about the blade just below the pommel. It came loose easily from the earth, as if it leaped of its own will into her grasp.

  A burden she did not want, yet one she must bear. Kadiya held it up for a closer sight. Yes, the eyes showed slits. Hurriedly she sheathed it, having no desire to awaken the Power which lay within. There was no feeling of any threat here; she could not believe that danger lurked now.

  However, she was not rid of that geas-born burden.

  Kadiya retraced her way as far as the steps. She sat there, watching mist flow in the garden. Though near middle night, she was able to pick out bush, tree, plant. Once more, longing a pain in her, she held out both hands to all which grew there, all that might ever come …

  “Tell me—let me know what wills this? Binah set one geas upon me. Who would use me now?”

  There was a rustle, a swaying of branches she could only half see. Spark flyers shot toward each other as if they were frightened and would face the danger in a body. Kadiya held her breath for a long second, sure that the one she had met before would appear.

  But all she could see was the passing of the wind in the branches, the clustering of the sparks. Then those broke apart, whirled each on its own chosen path as if what had disturbed them was gone.

  Anger rose in her, that same anger which she had known in the past when she had met with frustration. This was like standing before an open door and yet being barred entrance.

  Kadiya trailed back to the outer columns. Mist seemed to have thickened since her previous passage. She could see the forms of the Guardian statues only as shrouded figures. Yet as she descended the steps she faced one and then the other—even holding out the amulet, as if its still steady glow could reveal more clearly those watchers. Once she went closer to a form at her right, reaching out to lay fingers on the chill body.

  There plucked at her the belief that these statues had a meaning, one which she must master. If she were only not so ignorant! That inner dull anger was turning against herself.

  With the sword again in hand, Kadiya found her way back through the silent city, once more ascended to the tower room. She had seen no Hassitti during her travels and thought that perhaps they had some quarters of their own in which they slumbered. Did they also dream?

  As she once more took to the bed she drew the sword from its scabbard to rest it beside her. The eyes had opened no farther; neither had they closed. The Power might slumber, but it had not gone.

  If any dreamed the rest of the night Kadiya was not among them. In spite of her taking once more the sword, she was oddly more at peace with herself. Jagun was on his feet again, sharing (to the unspoken but nevertheless clear disapproval of Olla and Runna) her morning meal.

  The treasure house, or more exactly, the room in which she had seen the many books and reading rolls, was foremost in Kadiya’s mind. If she knew more of the past perhaps she could sift out better what was needful in the present.

  “Our Speakers have their time weavings,” Jagun remarked when she told him where she would search. “Some of the villages possess very old rolls. But only the Speakers can weave and thereafter translate those. Such knowledge seems to come by birth—for when a hatchling is of a proper age it is tested. What to some remain a locked mystery is for others a storehouse of knowledge.”

  “What of you, hunter? These woven histories, are they clear to you?” Since the Oddlings had their way of preserving the past, perhaps it was based on some form of learning their mentors the Vanished Ones had used. If so, Jagun’s help would be invaluable. Somehow she doubted she would find much aid among the Hassitti, for Kadiya had the impression that they had relentlessly saved much they could not understand.

  “No, Farseer, my knowledge lies in other directions—the ways of the beasts, of the swamp growth, of the seasons. I came to that knowledge, for, as a hatchling, I was put to prenticeship with Rusloog who was one of the greatest swamp travelers my village knew. Some other things I have learned from your people since I dwelt in the Citadel and served the King. But of these ancient mysteries which have to do with memories and weaving—do not expect much of me.”

  Kadiya pounced upon that. “You say ‘much.’ Then you have a fraction—”

  Jagun squirmed a little and reached hurriedly for a goblet, drinking down its contents as if he needed time to consider.

  “Farseer, the Speaker of my clan is one who wishes always to know more. When I was a swamp runner and a hunter of old things, she showed me what to look for among such finds. I can recognize some of the old signs. That is all.”

  “But that is something!” Kadiya put aside her emptied bowl of mush, licking her spoon for the last particle. “There was much I could have learned. But I did not like the hours spent in the mustiness of the library any more than I relished those I was supposed to spend in the ladies’ bower seaming up pretty cloth pictures. Haramis had the learning, Anigel the clever fingers; I had the swamp.”

  The room of stored learning was daunting. Kadiya had merely glanced into it from the doorway when the Hassitti had swept her through their storehouses. When she had asked to be brought here for a second time three of the small people had formed an escort, two of them bearing lamps.

  To search would be a massive task—the worse because one would not know exactly what to look for. The lamps from the doorway showed only a portion of the chamber. What shelves the girl could see clearly were crowded with record rolls—some in casings, some without—left to the ravages of time and perhaps insects. There were piles of boxes against the walls under those shelves. Sharing the already crowded space were massive books such as she had seen several times brought back by traders and eagerly taken by her father even though their contents might be unreadable. The covers of these were slabs of wood and some were bound about with metal clasps.

  Where to begin—and what did she really seek? Not the mysteries of magic and strange lore which had been in Haramis’s keeping—rather the history of those who stored these records. They had magic but Kadiya wanted to know more of them, of where they had gone and why. Something told her that the dreamers who prophesied an evil to come were tied with what had been, that the present was growing out of the past.

  The Hassitti made no attempt to enter the room. They chittered angrily among themselves when Kadiya took a lamp from one and handed it to Jagun, reaching for the second for herself. They moved, almost as if they would bar her way with their own bodies; but when she strode purposefully on they drew to one side.

  She held the lamp high. Jagun went on to the nearest wall, his own light picking out scrolls, boxes, and the dull metal fastening on books. Her light was limited—just enough to show her that there was a table not too far away (its top near covered with scroll boxes), before it a chair thickly carved (dust lying white in the carvings).

  Here was a work place. Kadiya swung her lamp lower to illume that surface. There was an empty hollow among the boxes, directly be
fore the chair. Yet a wink of light there caught her attention. A small tube of metal stood upright in a pot. A single strip of parchment, now nearly as dark as the surface on which it lay, was uncurled next to it. The worker here might have been called away in the midst of a task.

  Kadiya swept a finger across the surface of that parchment, carrying away a film of dust. There were marks to be seen—weaving lines such as those which enhanced the wall of the first building they had entered.

  “Jagun,” she summoned the hunter, “what do you make of this?”

  The hunter peered down at it, then ran one finger along beneath the top line, as if tracing its path would supply a clue.

  “This,” he reported a moment later, “is a sign for mountains.”

  Kadiya was surprised. The mountains to the east and the north had once formed the impenetrable defense for Ruwenda until Orogastus’s magic and the treachery of men had breached it, loosing death on the only world she knew. Haramis had gone to the mountains to learn her powers, had returned to them by choice to hone and augment further what she had learned.

  Kadiya had seen the heights only at a distance when she had visited the polders. There were inhabitants of those sky reaching lands, but none had ever contacted the lowlanders, nor had men intruded upon them.

  “What else?” she demanded eagerly.

  Jagun chewed his lower lip as he held closer his own lamp. Suddenly that jerked as if from an uncontrollable move of the hand which held it.

  “This!” His voice was urgent. He stabbed a finger down on another point—one in wavering line which showed no individual words or letters. “Evil … great evil. A warning!”

  Once more his finger traced the line and then he shook his head. “Farseer, there is no more that I can read.”

  “Someone was writing here,” the girl mused aloud. “It was of importance, I am sure. Then it was left laying openly … on purpose? To warn any who came after? Mountains and evil—a foreseeing? Orogastus had his hidey-hole in the northern mountains. He was a gatherer of strange learning—he would even have gathered Haramis, had she willed, because she might hold knowledge of things new to him. A forewarning against Orogastus?”