The Riddle and the Rune
Page 21
All at once, the vortex slowed, the soundpitch fell, and the light faded.
But the trees remained, towering about him, slowly straightening and settling back their branches in the aftermath. They were real!
Gom gazed at them in awe.
Their ancient mossy trunks and limbs were looped with hairy creepers thick as his arm. Letting go of Stormfleet’s mane, he reached out, felt rough, cool bark and moss soft as a mouse’s ear.
Gom let out a deep breath, his heart filling with admiration. “I was born in a wood, I was raised in a wood, and I’ve seen woods a-plenty on my travels, but I’ve never seen your like,” he declared. “You must be the greatest wood in all Ulm.”
A gentle wind touched his face, lifting the leaves above his head with a soft, soothing sound. Not the Wind he knew, but a gentle, dreamy cousin.
Gom looked down, saw his other hand still stiff about his mother’s rune. One by one, he relaxed his fingers, lifting them from the little stone until it fell against him, dangling from its crudely knotted thong. Soon, any moment now, he’d lift it from around his neck for the last time. Unconsciously, he laid his palm across his chest against his coming loss.
Stormfleet stirred under him. “What happened? Where is this?”
Gom shook his head. “I don’t know. His voice was hushed. “I think—I think my mother brought us here.” He peered through the dim trees, waiting for Harga to emerge. She was very near, he felt it. “Mother!” he called. “Mother, I’m here!”
The call rang through the greenwood.
Here... ere... ere...
But Harga didn’t come.
With a sigh, Gom turned back to the cito. “Stormfleet, what do you know of my mother?”
“Not a deal. All wizards are secretive folk. And she’s of the Brown Order, the most secretive of all, for those folk work alone.” Stormfleet gently butted Gom’s shoulder. “Had I dreamed you were her son, I’d have taken to you sooner. Save present company, she’s the only human I’d tolerate.”
“Why?”
“She’s friend to all creatures, and she speaks all tongues. Of course,” he went on, “I can see your connection now, for no one else in all Ulm knows the languages of beasts!”
“You didn’t know that she had a son?”
Stormfleet blew out his cheeks. “No, no more does anyone else. Harga dropped from sight a good while back. They say she was caught up in some high wizardry east of the Vargue, where no man goes.”
East of the Vargue? If Gom remembered rightly, the High Vargue had stretched to the very edge of Carrick’s map. He tried to make sense of what Stormfleet was saying, but was too hungry to think.
Gom looked around at the trees, the creepers, the knee-high ferns they were standing in. Nothing here to eat. They’d have to forage.
“Come, Stormfleet.” Gom strode toward a gap in the trees.
Stormfleet raised his head, sniffed the air cautiously, then followed.
They had not gone above three dozen paces when gloom exploded into brilliant sunshine. Before them was a small bright clearing, thick-carpeted with tender grass and, glory, dark wineberries, round, yellow breadberries, and plump strawberries bright as rubies in the light; clumps of cob blooms, ripe brown nuts already crowding the high spiked stems, and golden grapes on vines. To wash all this down? At the clearing’s edge, a spring splashed over pebbles. Gom gazed wide-eyed at this summer feast—nay, banquet. A gift from Harga, for sure.
But where was the giver?
He frowned faintly. Of course. He’d still not solved the riddle. But not long now, he thought excitedly. Not once he had food inside him to fortify his thinking...
Gom plucked and ate until he could eat no more. Then, while Stormfleet nibbled on, he sat and leaned against a tree. There, with the sense of Harga strong and warm about him, he turned his mind back to the puzzle.
From Air and Earth comes seed... That first line he now knew. Air was Harga, Earth was Stig, and he was the seed sprung from the two.
By Fire and Water is tempered...
Fire and Water? Hmm. Gom pursed his mouth. Two opposing elements. One destroyed life, the other nurtured it. But back home on Windy Mountain, Pinkie the blacksmith had needed both to strengthen iron into steel.
Exclaiming softly, Gom sat up. By fire and water he’d conquered Katak, and he’d danced to the fire of the whip on the plain—and thus had his “path of experience” strengthened him!
In Wood is kernel's secret essence known,
And purpose comes to light.
Wood.
He reached for the staff and looked the sparrow in the eye, the little bird who’d spoken with his mother’s voice.
“Is it you?” he whispered. “Are you the Wood?” He’d thought so since the night in the cave. But he could be wrong. Come to think, the sparrow had said in wood. Not from or by wood.
He set the staff down, leaned back again, thinking of when he’d chopped Hort’s wood. The axe, cleaving the weathered bark, had exposed the bright, the hidden grain, the inner stuff. The secret essence?
Maybe, but of a thing full grown.
If he read the riddle right, then he, Gom, possessed some secret essence. An essence with a purpose important enough for Harga to risk her precious rune, her own son’s life to have him find her.
In Wood is secret essence known... He gazed into the trees... and came up slowly.
The answer was all around him: this was a wood. And he was in it! Right here he was about to discover his own secret essence. And his purpose!
Stormfleet trotted over to stand by him.
“Master Gom: if your mother brought us here, where is she?”
Gom turned from his thought with an effort. “Don’t know,” he said. “But she’s close.”
“Then why doesn’t she come?”
“She—gave me a task. It’s not yet done. She won’t come until then.”
“What sort of task?”
Gom remembered Ganash’s warning. “I can’t say.”
“You’ll finish it here?”
“Any minute now.”
“Is there any way that I can help you along?”
Gom shook his head. “Thank you, but the answer’s here,” he said, and laid a finger on his brow.
A cool breeze blew over them, setting the vines swaying. Gom looked up, glimpsed stars twinkling in an evening sky. The day gone by already?
Darkness fell, the moon, edging into view, flooded the space with light.
Gom gazed around at the majestic trees, thinking of Stig in a rush of longing. He began to hum quietly to himself, then to sing.
On the day my father died,
I raised up on high—
Stormfleet snuffled softly. Still singing, Gom glanced up to find the horse standing alert, ears pricked, looking out into the darkness. Gom followed his direction, saw nothing but wide mossy trunks, and creeper, and—the strangest creatures he’d ever seen: part man, part bear, tall and shaggy, and crowned with antlers like a stag’s.
Gom faltered, then stopped altogether. The creatures ceased swaying, yet stayed put, their eyes fixed on him. So well did they merge with the trees now that Gom wouldn’t have seen them had he not known they were there. What were they doing, standing like that, staring at him? Why, Gom’s face grew warm. They were waiting for him to go on singing.
“It’s all right—I think,” Gom murmured to Stormfleet. Clearing his throat, he began his song anew.
On the day my father died,
I raised up on high his cairn of stone;
And left behind my homely mountainside,
For to roam about the world alone.
Now I must seek and I must find
The riddle’s hidden key:
The treasure locked within my mind,
To bring my mother to me.
In spite of his reassurance, Gom noticed, Stormfleet didn’t move, but remained watchful until he was satisfied for himself that all was well. Not until Gom finished his quest son
g did the cito finally stir, and bend his head once more to his grazing.
The strange creatures remained, waiting.
For more? Gom sang on, songs that his father had taught him. He began a woodchopping song, then remembering where he was, hastily dropped that for another celebrating the coming of summer.
The creatures stood throughout, swaying as if in ecstasy, until Gom had sung all he knew three times around. Then, in Stig’s honor, he repeated his quest song, adding more verses, turning the tune’s sad overtones into a hearty ballad of his travels, finishing on a happy note just as Stig would have wanted, for his father had been such a cheerful soul.
The last notes faded, and so did the mysterious visitors, without sign or word. Gom ran to the edge of the clearing, to where the creatures had stood, found no sign that they’d ever been there.
He took off the rune and held it up to the moonlight. Harga’s rune. And yet in a way his, too, having worn it so long. And hadn’t he worked magic with it? He sighed. Harga’s magic, not his.
He gazed out into the darkness. The idea of making magic intrigued him. It also made him smile. He, a woodcutter’s son, making magic? There I go again, he told himself. Am I not also Harga’s son?
Like her, he knew the tongues of beasts. He’d also bet he’d gotten his gift of waking dreams from her.
He paced about the clearing. Power, inherited from Harga... He stopped still. His “secret essence”! As his mother was a wizard, so would he be, his mother’s son!
He paced again, this knowledge raw upon him, until it stretched a little, softened, settled about his shoulders more comfortably.
Of course, he should have guessed it sooner. It was so obvious now. But what of his purpose? Not simply, to make his own magic one day. No. There must be more to the riddle’s mystery than that. What? Gom put his hands to his head, in a fever now.
“You look tired,” Stormfleet whickered, looking up. “Try to rest.”
Rest? With his mind a vortex? Gom lowered his hands. Stormfleet was right. He was past thinking. He stroked the cito’s neck, bade him good night, and lay down. Maybe tomorrow, he thought, and closed his eyes.
But sleep didn’t come easily. Over and over the question turned on its axis, around and around, for hours. To what purpose... purpose... purpose...
He galloped across the plain, Stormfleet moving swiftly under him. But ever ahead the gray cloud crawled, blocking the sun. "Faster, Stormfleet!” Gom cried. “Katak spreads his blight!” The horse's hooves flew over the grasses, but fast as they flew, the cloud flew faster.
Gom glanced up.
Overhead, a wide dark shape flew with powerful wingbeats, and, even as Gom looked, it swooped, straight for the rune.
Gom closed his hand about the stone and lashed out with the staff.
The dark form twisted, fell. And as it fell, the ground opened to receive it. Then Katak’s cry rose from the depths.
“You have overcome...”
"... the world's dark doom this day!” cried Ganash, suddenly appearing, but Katak’s fading shout prevailed:
“... yet you have not destroyed me...”
The sun was just up when Gom awoke, his dream strong upon him.
“Mother,” he said drowsily. “At last I know.”
Far from ending, it was only just beginning, his purpose, his task. When or where it would lead, he could not even venture to guess. But at the mere thought of it, a faint spark of excitement kindled within him. He got up, stretched, and looked about the clearing to find Stormfleet already awake, grazing at its far side.
Not ready yet for morning talk, Gom walked to the spring where, kneeling, he drank deeply, then dunked his head.
The icy water hurt his very bone. He came up spluttering and shivering, but wide awake now.
A warning snort from Stormfleet brought Gom upright, turned him from the water’s edge. He held still, not daring to breathe. From the middle of the clearing, a small brown figure raised her outspread arms toward him.
“Gom?”
He swallowed. “Mother?”
At his voice, she moved to meet him, broke into a run.
“Gom! My dear, dear son!” she said.
Balladeer's Song
* * *
Mudge's Song
* * *
Chant of the Solahinn
* * *
Gom's Quest Song
* * *
Table of Contents
THE RIDDLE AND THE RUNE
Part 1
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Part 2
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Part 3
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Balladeer's Song
Mudge's Song
Chant of the Solahinn
Gom's Quest Song