The Coral Kingdom tdt-2

by Douglas Niles

  "Somewhere along here, off to our right, will be the valley that Tristan, Pawldo, and I came down when we left Synnoria," Robyn told them, describing as best she could her experiences of twenty summers before. "I'm not sure that I'll recognize it, though. We might have to try a few different routes."

  "One of them will take us there-I'm sure of it!" Alicia proclaimed, and the others found her confidence heartwarming, but not necessarily contagious.

  "It can't be that hard to find," suggested Hanrald. "After all, Gwynneth itself isn't very big, and we're talking about a good-sized, populous valley located in a specific range of highlands!"

  "It's not the size of Synnoria that gives it concealment," argued Tavish heatedly. "It has more to do with the nature of the place. Legends say that a person can walk straight toward it, and then turn aside without even taking notice of the fact that he is near it. You'll walk past and never know that you've missed it."

  "But surely farmers and herdsmen around here must have some kind of idea!" objected Alicia.

  "You've seen the state of the country," Keane pointed out, pleased with the verbal opening that would allow him to join the conversation. "We didn't pass a single farm once we moved beyond the Corwell Road. And the grass was long-I don't think the land is used by herdsmen either."

  "The Ffolk sense that this land is not for mundane employment," Robyn said. "Synnoria is a place of enchantment, of power that is drawn from the earth itself, not from the skills of mortal wizards. It's the same power that gives life to the goddess and makes the Moonshae Islands a place of special beauty."

  The queen paused, her face relaxing into a reflective smile. After a moment, she looked up, aware that the others waited for her to continue. "King-then he was 'Prince'-Tristan and I came through here near the start of the Darkwalker War. It was the detour through Synnoria that allowed us to reach Corwell Road before an invading army of northmen, and also to gain the aid of dwarves from Myrloch Vale, and even a company of the Sisters of Synnoria."

  The history of that war was well known to them all. The aid of the elven riders and their resolute captain, Brigit Cu'Lyrran, had proven decisive in stopping the original attacks against Corwell.

  "But the passage through Synnoria lingers in my mind," continued the queen. "Perhaps because I didn't see it. They blindfolded us, remember, Pawldo?"

  The halfling nodded, suppressing a shudder as he looked into the darkness beyond the camp.

  "They told us that the fabulous beauty of the place would surely drive us humans mad, and perhaps it would have, judging by the sounds we heard. Even those-the trilling of waterfalls, the mingling of birdsong and breeze-would have captivated us all. . "

  "Except for the bard!" finished Tavish with a smile.

  "Indeed. The harpist Keren banged against his harp and made the most awful sounds you could imagine. For a full day, he kept it up while the sisters led us along their trails. Those jarring notes, I'm sure, were all that kept us alive. Finally we came out on a broad and rounded ridge. Synnoria was behind us. …"

  Robyn's face grew sad as she remembered the darker moments in the path of her life since then. Suddenly she missed Tristan terribly, and it was all she could do to hold back her tears.

  "So you see, there's a lot of magic to contend with," warned Pawldo, wiggling a finger at Alicia. "I wouldn't be surprised if half of us are turned into bugs before this is over!" His face was jocular, but his tone indicated more than a little apprehension on this point.

  Alicia slumped backward but didn't concede defeat. "You can argue reality all you want," she said, "but I've never doubted, from the moment we started out, that we'd find our way into that valley somehow!"

  "Hold that faith, child," said Tavish with a soft laugh. "It may be all we need."

  "Arise, Ityak-Ortheel, and answer your master's summons!"

  The command of Malar rang through the ether, past the vortices of the gods and down-far, far down-into the Abyssal depths of the lower planes. Here the one known as Elf-Eater raised its muck-streaked maw from the primordial sludge that was its home and, upon hearing the call, uttered a rumbling belch of assent.

  Talos observed the activities of his ally with cruel pleasure. The discovery of the platinum triangle on the Moonshae Islands had infused Malar with vengeful hatred. The Beastlord would waste no time in setting his pet creature against those insolent elves-and this vengeance suited the Stormbringer's plans as well.

  The image of Malar's muzzled skull, bristling with fangs and resting upon huge, many-taloned paws, appeared before the Elf-Eater. Slowly, with gruesome majesty, Ityak-Ortheel rose from the sheltering sludge until it crouched before the figure of its god. Only the illusionary presence of the deity allowed Malar to loom over his pet, for Ityak-Ortheel was itself the size of a massive dragon.

  But size was the thing's only resemblance to those comparatively noble serpents. The Elf-Eater had a mouth but no teeth. Instead, the aperture was a moist, sucking hole in the side of the thing's domelike body. The maw was capable of expanding to a gaping width or compressing into a long, probing snout, and it was surrounded by many long tentacles, each equipped with multiple, weblike pods used to trap a victim and drag it toward that obscene orifice.

  And also unlike a dragon, Ityak-Ortheel had no tail nor wings-and only three legs, each as broad as a gnarled oak stump. Upon those limbs, however, it could lumber as fast as a galloping horse. It had no eyes nor ears, but it could sense the presence of warm-blooded beings on all sides, and could easily distinguish which were elves.

  With the summons of Malar, all the Elf-Eater's dim intellect focused on the gnawing emptiness within the great body. Quivering in eagerness, the elephantine shape awaited the further words of its god.

  The words it wanted to hear were not forthcoming. Instead, Malar seized the spiritual essence of Ityak-Ortheel and hauled it upward into the ether. Malar focused his attention on the target, and Talos used his still-awesome power to enact a powerful spell.

  Ityak-Ortheel, the Elf-Eater, shook its great body, exploding through a dark wall of stone to plant its three feet firmly on grassy soil. No longer did it fester in the pits of sludge, it knew. Instead, it had come to a place surrounded by a world of mortals. . a place called Synnoria.

  A place of elves.

  4

  The Elf-Eater

  Robyn awakened suddenly amid the stillness of the sleeping camp. For a brief moment, her mind flashed back to younger days. How long had it been since she had slept beneath a canopy of stars? Too long, she decided.

  But then, in the clarity of her growing awareness, she wondered what it was that had interrupted her slumber. Sitting up and pulling her woolen cloak about her shoulders, she looked around the silent camp.

  The outline of a large, broad-shouldered man was visible some distance above the rest of them. She recognized Hanrald and remembered that the Earl of Fairheight had taken the midnight watch. A swift glance at the stars confirmed her estimate of the time.

  The unseasonal chill remained in the air, but to the High Queen, the brisk weather was a bracing welcome, an embrace of nature, ushering her back to her favorite domain.

  No longer questioning, Robyn followed an instinctive sense, slowly approaching the glowing mound of coals that marked the place where their fire had blazed hours earlier. She stopped several feet away from the firepit but close enough to feel the radiant warmth on her face, and then she spread the blanket apart with her arms, allowing the heat to caress her entire body.

  Slowly the dull red of the coals began to brighten, though the steady radiance of heat remained comfortably constant. Robyn stared at the embers, watching spots of light grow from orange pinpricks to blazing yellow circles in her eyes, as if she stared at the sun near noon of a high summer day.

  Yet instead of feeling pain, she felt a powerful sense of exultation, a kind of energy she hadn't known for two decades.

  This was the power of the Earthmother, she knew, and it flowed into the willing woman
who again was the Great Druid of that goddess.

  Finally the power became too great, and Robyn fell to her knees. Still she did not lower her eyes, and slowly the lights that dazzled her shifted into cooler spectrums-red, blue, and finally a pale violet that seemed to linger for hours, soothing the druid's taut nerves and acting as a balm for the grave troubles that worried her.

  Then, when next Robyn raised her eyes, she saw a misty form begin to gather in the air above the fire. A whirling vapor coalesced in the night, growing more substantial as it slowed the rate of its rotation. Finally the mist solidified, just for a moment, into the image of a proud wolf's-head. Yellow eyes gleamed at Robyn, seeming to blink against the darkness.

  "There is evil…" The wolf spoke to her, in a voice like the hunting cry of a distant pack. It pierced her heart with a plaintive, savagely beautiful song. At the same time, Robyn heard a firm undertone of danger, of a deep and imminent menace that intruded into this place like a cancerous tumor.

  The long, narrow jaws seemed to grin, revealing ivory fangs that gleamed in the darkness. The yellow eyes stared with unblinking intensity, bright and powerful. Robyn Kendrick opened her heart and her mind, letting the sign wash over her. She listened, for the first time since she had been a very young woman, to the pure voice of her goddess.

  "Seek. . seek the evil. . ." Again the soft cry floated through the night. "For there you will find good. ."

  The sound and image faded for many wondrous minutes, as if the pack ranged over distant hills, each rise carrying the sound farther and farther, until nothing remained but the wind whispering among the full summer leaves.

  "I understand, my Mother," Robyn said softly.

  The coals had sunk to mere shadowy remnants of their previous warmth. But as the queen returned to her bedrolls and wrapped her blanket against the chill, the warmth of the fire glowed with the warmth of her spirit and her mind.

  Talloth cantered easily up the gentle forest trail, and Brigit felt the full joy of a Synnorian sunrise fill her body and her spirit. The morning had dawned clear, and the sun was no more than two handspans over the eastern horizon.

  These hours, when the mist still lingered among the trees and the flowers glistened with fresh dew, were the captain's favorite time to ride. Llewyrr gardeners who had begun to work their fields waved as the silver knight on her white mare rode past.

  She came to the trout farm and turned Talloth from the trail, riding among the clear pools that dotted this large glade in the forest. Several Llewyrr, breeders and netmen, looked up from their tasks. They were opening a sluicegate to fill a newly excavated pool.

  Brigit observed the brilliant fish darting back and forth in their clear pools. One pond held trout of purest golden color, each more than a foot long; another contained even larger fish, striped with the full spectrum of a rainbow. The fish would be introduced into the streams and lakes, ensuring that they remained a viable food source and a beautiful part of the natural scenery of Synnoria.

  After a few minutes, Brigit rode on, passing other Llewyrr who were hauling buckets full of fingerlings to the stream. Then, in a few moments, the full peace of the forest surrounded her again. She continued up the valley, intending to ride all the way to the Fey-Alamtine gate.

  Then she stiffened. A sound came to her, and Talloth halted instinctively. Hoofbeats approached down this same trail. In moments, she saw a flash of white in the woods, and then Brigit identified the form of one of her knights.

  The sister shouted at the sight of her captain.

  "Humans! They approach from the west, up the Vale of Clouds!" The knight's shout of alarm sounded a jarring note in the pastoral sunrise. Brigit recognized the rider as Colleen, one of the border patrol. The pounding gallop of the white horse drowned out most of Colleen's voice, but the urgency in the young scout's demeanor was apparent to Brigit even from a half mile away.

  The captain spurred Talloth, and the mare leaped forward. In a few moments, they met and Brigit reined in, taking the bridle of the scout's horse. The young Llewyrr rider, her blonde hair tossed raggedly by the wind in her ride, gasped for breath while Brigit gestured to her to collect herself.

  "I saw them myself," Colleen reported after a moment. "Humans, about six of them. They ride horses-two of the steeds are as white as Synnorian mares!"

  "They climb the western valley?"

  "The Vale of Clouds." The young sister nodded. She wore the mottled greenish tunic of a scout over her silver breastplate. Her helmet was lashed to the saddle of her horse, while a deep hood attached to her cloak could quickly be pulled up to cover her white-blonde hair.

  "They'll pass the boundary and turn aside," Brigit announced, more calm in her voice than she actually felt.

  It disturbed her, this sudden appearance of humans at the borders of Synnoria so soon after she had resolved to be especially vigilant against intrusion. "Still, it's best if I have a look at them. Lead on!"

  Colleen reversed her gelding and galloped back up the trail, Brigit close behind. The two sister knights rode without taking notice of the wonders around them. Even though the bright flowers and verdant woods were familiar sights, they rarely failed to attract the attention and delight of the Llewyrr who passed among them. But now the elfwomen remained still, intent upon the potential for intrusion.

  But those surrounding wonders were splendorous indeed. Waterfalls trilled from the slopes to either side, while a clear brook collected their spumes and carried them with laughing enthusiasm toward the blue waters of Crystaloch. Columbines, daisies, and fleabane all blinked among lush, windblown grasses, each type of flower blooming in a dozen different shades of brilliant color. Tall pines, their long-needled sprouts blanketing the forest in a soft, blue-green hue, waved from the slopes above them.

  The Llewyrr on their white horses followed a narrow track that generally traced the streambed up the valley bottom. Much of the ride took them through sun-speckled meadow, or among the few pines growing on the valley floor. After several miles, however, Colleen veered to the left, her gelding plunging between two tall pine trunks onto an almost invisible track in the woods.

  The winding path climbed steeply, and the two riders ducked their heads beneath many overhanging limbs. The strong horses bounded over the tangled ground, laboring hard, carrying the two elves steadily upward. After a few minutes, they paused for rest on a shoulder of the valley that gave them a splendid view behind them. The black cliff of the Fey-Alamtine gleamed in the sunlight at the head of the valley.

  Then, for many more minutes, they pressed higher through the enclosing forest. Finally the trees gave way abruptly to a rolling, rock-studded ridge. Below them, the wonders of Synnoria sprawled, pristine and heartbreakingly beautiful beneath the dome of blue.

  "A little farther," Colleen said. The horses broke into a gallop, approaching the top of the rounded ridge bordering Synnoria on the west.

  As they approached the crest, the jagged tors and rocky promontories of the Myrloch highlands came into view over the ridge and then, as the sisters reached the summit, the forested slopes and flat-bottomed valleys, many dotted with lake or fen. Still they cantered, past the crest of the ridge and down the gradual slope that soon grew steeper.

  Colleen halted, and the two dismounted behind a large rock. Leaving the horses behind, they slipped forward on hands and knees onto an outcrop of granite that jutted into the air over the twisting valley below.

  "I see them," Brigit announced immediately. The figures were still miles away, but she could clearly count seven of them, on five dark and two white horses.

  As the two observed from their lofty perch, the party of humans reached a small side valley that flowed into the wider vale they had been following. Without visible hesitation, the intruders turned into the narrow valley. Brigit watched them dismount, taking their horses by the bridles to lead them up the steep, treacherous-looking trail.

  "The magic still works," observed the captain with a wry smile.

 
"They believe that they follow the only route available to them?" asked Colleen. Though the illusionary barrier of Synnoria was understood by all adult Llewyrr, the young scout had never seen it in action.

  "Yes. The walls of the main valley appear to merge before them into a tight, cliff-sided draw. The apparent amount of water in the two streams is reversed. A mere trickle comes down the draw, while the humans will think for several miles that they follow a major channel. Imagine their confusion as they move away from Synnoria and it dwindles to its true dimensions!"

  "Then they are gone for now?" The scout studied the diminishing figures until they had disappeared behind the first twist in the narrow passage.

  "They'll follow that draw until it comes to a little valley with a marsh and a lake. That's the divide. From there, they descend and expect to find Synnoria. Instead, it puts them in the fenland of Myrloch Vale!"

  The two knights made their way carefully back to their horses, where they relaxed, safely out of sight of the valley. For a long time, they rested beside the sun-swept boulder, drifting toward a midday nap in the soothing warmth.

  Finally Brigit stirred, stretching easily as she stood. "Let's follow the ridgeline for a while," she suggested.

  For more than an hour, the two Llewyrr rode the heights, following the border between Synnoria and Corwell until they reached a craggy stretch too rough for the horses. Enjoying the scenery and the silence, they turned back.

  "Let's go look for those humans again, to make sure they haven't come back this way," Brigit said.

  Before Colleen could reply, both sisters stiffened. A long, ululating call reached their ears, carried clearly from the valley of Synnoria. Then the sound stopped abruptly, chopped away in midcry.

  "The Fey-Alamtine!" cried Colleen.

  "Let's go!" barked Brigit. The sound had been a Llewyrr distress cry reserved for the most dire of emergencies. The two white horses pounded forward, streaking over the crest of the ridge, racing back toward the pastoral Synnorian valley the two riders had left scant hours before. They galloped headlong down the steep trail, back toward the valley bottom.