Storm rising

by Mercedes Lackey

  Silverfox already had one hand on Sartra's shoulder, and appeared to be deep in mental conversation with her. The last Companion, another female, slim, with a long forelock half hiding her eyes, stepped shyly forward, and scraped at the snow in front of An'desha with one hoof.

  :This is Idry,: said Florian. :She is my younger sister, and was the first to volunteer.:

  An'desha smiled. "Then I shall be twice as glad to have her company, Florian."

  "Well, that certainly solves your transportation problem," Elspeth said dryly. "If they can't get you there as fast as a gryphon can fly, it can't be done at all."

  "Rrr, ssso we will rrracsse?" Treyvan asked, then gape-grinned. Hydona bumped her beak against his side.

  "Excellent, I admit that I am very pleased," Sejanes called, "Now, can we get on with this?"

  After seeing so many Gates opening over the past several days, even the heart-stopping magic of Gate-construction felt like a routine. Karal paid no attention to the goings-on, taking the time instead to make certain that his pack was secure and that Florian's saddle and halter were comfortable. It would be a long trek down to the bowl of the Plains with no place to stop on the trail, and anything loose could rub poor Florian raw. The others were taking their packs and securing them behind the saddles. Treyvan and Hydona already had their flying-harness on, and whatever gear they thought they would need was fastened to it. Jerven and Lytha, their half grown youngsters, would be staying behind. According to Hydona, it was time for them to start serious fledgling lessons, and those were best given by someone who was not their parent.

  Given what a full-time job those two were, Karal wondered if the two might not be using this as a chance for a vacation away from them!

  He completed his inspection at about the same time that the mages made contact with the anchoring Gate in the ruins above the Plains. When he looked up, it was to see snow-covered heaps of tumbled stones below a sky so blue and clear it hurt to look at it, all framed in the arch of weathered stones on their side.

  "Quickly, please!" Sejanes shouted. "We can't hold this all day, you know!"

  Karal mounted, glad to feel a saddle beneath him again, and started for the Gate, but Treyvan and Hydona were already there ahead of him, dashing through with alacrity. He wondered why they were so eager, then remembered—Clan k'Leshya had settled there, in the ruins as well as in the old Vale! They were probably eager to see some of their old friends before taking the trek to Urtho's Tower.

  He followed right on their heels, with An'desha behind him. He had never actually crossed large distances by means of a Gate before, and he braced himself for the unpleasant stomach-tumbling sensations of a Jump.

  But there was nothing of the kind; he felt for a split second as if he was falling, and there was a strange darkness that was laced with fiery multicolored ribbons of power and light all around him. Then Florian's feet came to rest on the stone on the other side with a little jolt, as if the Companion had made a small hop over an obstacle in their path.

  :Like that better than jumping, do you?: Although Altra had not been with them on the Valdemar side, now he appeared.

  "Much," he said shortly, as Florian moved out of the way for the rest to come through. Although snow lay everywhere, it was cleared away from the places that had once been streets in what looked like the ruins of a substantial town. Though still in ruins, there were signs of habitation here and there—places where walls showed signs of rebuilding, and farther in the distance, conical, shingled roofs poking up above the snow-covered piles of rubble. Just at the moment, there were gryphons flying in from every direction to meet their two. There were at least a dozen, but it seemed as if there were hundreds; gryphons in a group, Karal soon learned, were not quiet.

  This was not a social gathering, however; the gryphons landed, had a brief conference while the rest of the party traversed the Gate, then flew off again. Without knowing where in relation to the Plains this ruin was, Karal had no idea which way they were going, but their flight was purposeful, as if they each had a task to perform.

  The Shaman was the last through the Gate, and it closed behind him.

  "The way isss clearrr," Hydona called from her perch atop a ruined wall. "The Ssssworrrd-Ssssworrrn arrre all along it and will rrride with usss in rrrelays. "Grryphonsss fly ahead to ssscout. The worrrrssst parrrt isss the trrrail down; icsssed, they sssay."

  Lo'isha shrugged. "That is to be expected, but I am glad our white friends have agreed to bear us. I am more confident with them than I would be with even the best Shin'a'in stock."

  Evidently he knew precisely where he was; Kayka set out at a brisk walk, and the rest followed, except for Treyvan and Hydona, who took to the air. Karal and An'desha took the rearmost position.

  There were gryphons overhead constantly; as the trail wove in and around the ruined buildings, Karal became completely lost. He would have been certain that the shaman was, too, but with all the help in the air, that was extremely unlikely.

  Soon enough, they turned another corner, and suddenly there was nothing in front of them but blue sky. They had come to the edge of the ruins, and before and below them lay the Dhorisha Plains.

  Karse was a land of mountains, so Karal was no stranger to height—but it is one thing to look at something on a map, and quite another to stand on the edge of a sheer precipice and look down—and down—and down—

  Intellectually, he had known that the edge of the crater that formed the rim above the Plains was hundreds of lengths above its floor. Now he knew it with his gut, and he gulped.

  Florian seemed nonchalant. :It's not that bad. Take a closer look; there's a switchback trail going all the way down.:

  He didn't really like the look of the trail any better than the long drop. It was barely wide enough for a single rider;, they would have to go single-file the entire way, and may Vkandis help anyone who slipped.

  :I'll see you at the bottom—unless you'd like to Jump with me now,: Altra said smugly. :Feel like a Jump?:

  Thinks I won't take him up on it, hmm? "Sir!" he called to the shaman, "Altra has volunteered to jump us down, one Companion and rider at a time!"

  :I did not!: Altra cried indignantly, but it was too late. Lo'isha turned to them both with a look of grave gratitude, and it was not possible to back down without looking ungracious and ungraceful. That, Karal knew, was something that Altra's pride would never permit.

  "If you would be so kind, Firecat," he said in his deep, impressive voice, "I do not like the look of this trail. I would rather we did not lose anyone to something that could be prevented."

  Altra grumbled mentally at Karal, but accepted the task with outward grace. :Just for that, you can go last, when I'm tired,: he added, as he jumped up on the pack behind the Shaman.

  Then they were gone—and a tiny dot appeared against the snow far below them.

  It took exponentially less time, even going down pair by pair, than it would have if they'd taken the trail. And even though Altra was tired when he got to Karal, and his control was a bit shaky, the resulting Jump was no worse than the ones he'd made getting out of Hardorn. That resulted in nausea, but not the gut-racking illness that had been the result of the flight from Tremane's study.

  And when he "landed" beside the others, it was clear that the Shin'a'in had been there before them, breaking a clear trail through the relatively light snow so that they could proceed as fast as possible without worrying about getting lost.

  When Karal looked up, he saw circling dots that were the gryphons. When he looked outward, he saw moving dots that must be the Sword-Sworn, riding a protective patrol ahead and to both sides of them. He'd wondered how they were going to manage without supplies, for no one had packed anything in the way of food or shelter and not even a Companion could cross to the center of the Dhorisha Plains in a single day; now it came to him. The Shin'a'in and the gryphons would take care of that, if they had not already.

  Lo'isha looked about with satisfaction—even if
his lips were a little white. "The trail is clear, the wind is at our backs!" he cried. "Now, let us ride!"

  After the first day, Karal looked back on the grueling trip he and Ulrich had made from Karse to Haven with nostalgia. Florian saved him as much as he could—and indeed a Companion's pace was blissful compared to that of a horse—

  But this was still riding from an hour past sunup to far past sundown, in bitterly cold weather, without a break. Companions did not need rest the way that horses did, and the shaman saw fit to make use of that endurance.

  The brilliantly blue sky of day became a huge black bowl studded with enormous stars by night. When the half moon rose, it flooded the featureless Plains with white light that had the effect of making Karal feel even colder than before. But the flatness of the Plains did have one advantage—they saw the fires and torches of their resting place from a vast distance away, as the only spots of warm color in all the icy whiteness. Just looking at the pinpricks of warm yellow gave Karal enough strength to hold onto Florian's saddle. His cold fingers had long since grown too numb for any pretense of holding to the reins.

  When at last they reached the shelters, they found a single round felt tent awaiting them, with torches all around it, a fire in front of it, and black-clad Shin'a'in tending a stewpot over the fire. Karal fell out of the saddle rather than dismounting; he stumbled toward the tent, and Florian followed him right inside.

  Evidently the Shin'a'in were prepared for the idea that the Companions should share their shelter; the tent, lit by three oil lamps suspended from the roof poles, was divided in half, with half of the floor covered in old, damaged carpets, with piles of hay and grain and leather buckets of water on top of the carpets. Treyvan and Hydona were already there, fast asleep, curled together in a single ball of feathers with no sign of limbs or heads. The other half had bright new carpets with bedrolls laid out neatly for them, in a semicircle with a charcoal brazier at their feet. It might not have been very warm by the standards of the Palace, but compared to the bitter cold outside, it was quite toasty. There was a Shin'a'in Sword-Sworn waiting inside, unsaddling and wiping down the Companions and throwing warm blankets over them as they ate and drank. Florian joined the others. As the last human inside, Karal found the others already wrapped up in their blankets, eating bowls of stew and sipping at mugs of something that steamed. Karal didn't know what it was, nor did he care. He took the last of the bedrolls, pulled off his boots and shoved his legs down into the warmth of the blankets, and accepted the bowl and mug handed to him with a murmur of thanks.

  Then he ate as quickly as he could shovel the stew in with the aid of a piece of tough, flat bread. The tea had an odd, astringent taste, but it was curiously soothing to his raw throat.

  As soon as he had finished both tea and stew, the same Shin'a'in took bowl and cup away from him. The others were already curled in their bedrolls for sleep, and he followed their example. The Shin'a'in blew out the oil lamps on his way out of the tent, leaving them in darkness.

  At some point before he went to sleep, Altra appeared, lying beside him and half over him, creating a swath of heat at his back. The Firecat purred quietly and said just one thing.

  :Karal... I'm proud of you.:

  With that added comfort—in more ways than the merely physical—he fell instantly asleep.

  The Shin'a'in woke them before dawn, and they broke their fast with more stew, bread, and tea. Then they were in the saddle again, and pushing outward.

  The second day was a repetition of the first, as was the third. Karal's eyes grew sore from the reflection of sun on snow, and from the red eyes that met his every time anyone—except the shaman and An'desha—turned to face him, the others must be suffering the same. The cold, dry air made his lips crack and chap, and his throat sore. After the second day, Lo'isha gave them each a little vial of aromatic oil to moisten their lips with, and advised them that they might want to anoint their whole faces. Karal took him up on the suggestion; Firesong resisted at first, but by midafternoon, with his cheeks flaming from wind-chapping, he had given in and done the same.

  Karal lost track of time; he was either riding or sleeping—too much of the former, not enough of the latter. The landscape they traversed was always the same; not quite flat, but close enough for a young man from the mountains, rolling hill after snow-covered, rolling hill, with scarcely a tree or a bush in sight except where they marked the passage of watercourses or the location of a spring. The cold numbed all of him, and he never was really warm except the moment that they awoke him. Firesong looked miserable, Silverfox looked resigned, and only An'desha and Lo'isha seemed to thrive.

  But then, this is—was—his home.

  The gryphons rarely appeared, and when they did, they were fixated on the goal and could talk of nothing else. At last—after how many days he could not tell, that goal loomed up on the horizon.

  It was singularly unprepossessing, for something they had chased across half a continent—an odd, melted stub of silvery-gray rock, poking up out of the top of yet another rolling hill.

  Then, when it didn't get any closer, he realized that it must be much larger than he had thought.

  Then he finally spotted the tiny dots of more Shin'a'in swarmed about the base, and the equally tiny dots of two gryphons circling it, and he understood how large it was.

  There was a long pile of something dark against the snow at the foot of the Tower-rich, turned earth. It looked as if the Shin'a'in had been digging for something.

  The closer they got, the more his skin crawled. The Tower simply didn't look melted, it had been melted. The great force that fueled the Cataclysm had made the rock of the Tower run like liquid wax. And they were about to play with forces worse and more hazardous than the one that had done this, weapons that the Mage of Silence, who had created this, thought were too dangerous to use!

  What am I doing here? he thought, aghast.

  It would not be the last time he had that thought.

  They rested and slept for what remained of that day and all suicidal to the next night; it would be stupid, and perhaps suicidal to enter the Vault with their minds fogged with fatigue. But the moment the sun rose, so did they, and one of the Sword-Sworn led them to the opening the Shin'a'in had been working on since this expedition had been decided on.

  The old door to the Tower lay somewhere beneath several hundred tons of melted, fused rock. The Shin'a'in had taken a more direct route to the Vault beneath the remains of the Tower. There must have been hundreds of them working on it to get it done in so short a period of time.

  They had burrowed down in a long slanting tunnel into the side of the hill supporting the Tower, straight to the ancient Vault wall. That was only stone blocks mortared together, and the mortar, after so many centuries, was old and weak. Urtho had never bothered to put any sort of armoring or defensive measures on the wall of the Vault—after all, anyone who got this far would still have to dig a hole in the full sight of the guards, the army, the Kaled'a'in, the gryphons....

  Not likely.

  The Shin'a'in, with advice from the miners of k'Leshya, and additional help from the gryphons, had been working nonstop; together they had made an impressive tunnel, chipped out the weak mortar between the stones, and pried out enough of the latter to create an entrance fully large enough for Treyvan and Hydona, not to mention Florian, who insisted on coming below as well. The other Companions were perfectly happy to remain outside and rest, and Karal caught them casting many glances askance at Florian as he prepared to descend the precipitous tunnel with the party of mages. They all had lanterns, but the light didn't help the feeling of being trapped beneath tons of earth and stone. The tunnel itself had been shored up quite expertly, and for a moment Karal wondered where they had gotten the timbers.

  The gryphons, of course. They must have flown them in from k'Leshya.

  A formidable task, equal to the task of digging this tunnel.

  Karal concentrated on keeping his breathing stead
y, reminding himself that as long as his lantern flame burned brightly, there was more than enough air down here for them all to breathe.

  At least I'm not cold. There's no wind blowing. There's no snow-glare.

  How much longer does this tunnel go on?

  He hadn't begun by counting his steps, but he started at that point. Fifty... one hundred... one hundred and fifty shouldn't they have reached the wall by now?

  His chest felt tight; was the light a little dimmer? The flame of his candle a little lower?

  :Karal. I'm right behind you.: The voice in his mind warned him, so when a head bumped against his thigh, he didn't jump and screech. :It's all right. There's air, and if anything happens, I can Jump you out.:

  Immediately the invisible bands tightening around his chest loosened. of course! Altra could get him out, even if the roof collapsed! He relaxed, and the flame in his lantern brightened again. Or perhaps it had never been dimming in the first place.

  "We're at the Vault."

  The shaman's voice, muffled by all the other bodies between him and the Shin'a'in, alerted him so that he didn't run into An'desha when An'desha stopped.

  The line ahead of him shuffled forward, step by step. "Watch yourself," An'desha warned, as the light from his lantern caught on the regular shapes of stone blocks. "There's debris in the way."

  An'desha moved forward and vanished into a hole a gryphon could barely squeeze through. There was a litter of stone pieces and other debris in front of the hole, as if it had just today been made. Perhaps it had!

  He stepped over the edge of the hole, following the gleam of light—and stepped into another world.

  The floor was smoothly polished white stone with a pattern, a compass rose of eight points inset in it, made of a rose-colored granite. This was a large, round room with white stone walls that rose in a conical shape to a point about two stories above their heads. Hanging down from the center by a silver chain was a large sphere of crystal, which shone softly in the reflected light from the lanterns.