Shelley fell faster and faster until the wind was whipping at her clothing and hair. Part of her was oddly detached, and was bemoaning gravity, and wishing that the part of her which was falling to certain death could fly, as even the smallest bird could do. Now she was bumping against bushes and sliding on loose ground, and while the detached part of her was still wondering if she would die instantly when she hit the bottom, she landed in cold water with a stinging, bone-jarring impact. She felt herself going under, but the paralysing hornet venom was taking effect, and she could barely move. She began to despair of her life, and to give in to drowning. ‘So this is what it’s like,’ she thought, almost dreamily.
Then she felt strong arms bearing her up to the surface. It was Korman. ‘He’s alive!’ she thought. The relief at not being alone was wonderful. She still couldn’t speak or even breathe, but as they bobbed in the icy turbulent water, she felt his hand pressing her chest, squeezing life back into her lungs. She spluttered, limp and cold but unable even to shiver. Now Korman was treading water, supporting her as they sped down a narrow watercourse under high cliffs. ‘If we are in Firewater Springs… which I guess we are…’ she heard Korman gasp, ‘there is a waterfall ahead. Must get out…’
Far back at the head of the cliff a little creature launched itself out into midair and plummeted, grunting and growling, head over heels into the foaming pool below.
Shelley could hear a distant rumble in the darkness ahead, getting louder as they were swept along without hope of stopping. Then they heard baying behind them. ‘The Dagraath have jumped in after us!’ cried Korman as he struck out for the bank. But the rocks were smooth and gave him no handhold. They bumped along the bank, Shelley feeling helpless as a rag doll, dragged along by the torrent towards the roar of the Firewater Falls thundering louder and louder.
Now the shock of the cold water was helping Shelley; the poison was slowed enough for her to speak. ‘Look, a branch! Reach up now!’ she gasped. Korman blindly reached up with his powerful left arm, and the branch hit his hand as they sped past. He gripped with all his might, and they swung around and jerked to a stop, the current now pulling relentlessly at their bodies. The first wardog was swimming straight for them, jaws open. It snapped at Korman’s robe and held on, lashing at him with its powerful claws. Shelley tried to scream but had no breath.
‘Reach down for my belt!’ cried Korman, ‘My knife…’ Shelley made a huge effort and found her arm could move, slowly, like in a nightmare she had often had when her legs wouldn’t move fast enough to run away from some pursuer. At last she had the knife, cold in her frozen grasp. She raised it and slashed weakly at the horrible snout of the Dagraath. Enraged, it let go of Korman and snapped at her, an inch from her face, its bark deafening even over the roar of the falls. But in letting go of Korman, it was caught by the current and swept away. It yelped, gulping in water as it spun off into the torrent and disappeared over the falls, howling. Now the other Dagraath were coming down the river at them. One snapped at their heels, biting Korman as he painfully dragged himself, and Shelley, onto the overhanging branch of the gnarled tree that grew out of a ledge almost at the very brink of the waterfall, where the water began to curve downwards. He managed to kick the creature off his leg, and it fell back with a splash, growling, its jaws still clamped onto a piece of Korman’s clothing. Then it was gone.
Just at that moment another jaw clamped angrily onto his ankle – a much smaller one. He realised with relief what it was: Bootnip, growling ferociously as Korman reached down and heaved the miserable little bundle off his ankle onto the branch. He felt sharp little teeth sink into his hand. ‘You are not the only one with problems, Bootnip!’ he growled back, loosening the jaws by squeezing them hard, then rubbing the wiry little head to placate him.
The other Dagraath, three of them, swam under the branch for a while, snapping at the air, but one by one the current took them away, and they disappeared over the smooth crest of water, hurtling to their deaths on the foam-pounded rocks far below.
High above them on the clifftop, his skin now black to blend with the darkness about him, Hithrax sniffed the air. He sensed the deaths of his dogs; his thorny heart was clutched with something like grief, a feeling which he strangled in the moment of its birth and turned into cold lightning-bolts of anger directed at the fugitives. His sharp fingernails clawed at the air, and his mindbolts rolled away down the chasm, but they were extinguished in the dark rushing waters. He knew that mindbolts would not work down there anyway, on the borders of the enchanted land of the Ürxura. He would have to send the hermits the long way round, and find them on foot, before the Ürxura got wind of it. The hermits would keep trying, until death intervened, but they were not suited for this kind of work. Tracking took stamina, not just sorcery and night ambushes. If only he had not stepped into that accursed wizard’s fire, he would lead the way… He tightened his singed belt, and turned one hawk-like eye to the sky. There was no Blue Moon yet; this would help. He felt the pressure of his master’s will from the Tor Enyása. And he felt the opposing force of the enchantments of the accursed Ürxura… Their impenetrable mindwebs blocked the way, fogged his thinking.
He snapped at the pale hermits as they gathered round, ‘Go! Find the tracks which lead to the Vale of the Ürxura, below the waterfall! The accursed ones are there somewhere. Hunt them down, encircle them, bind them in the Void, and bring them back to me. I will await you in the crater. There is no burning staff to help them now! Death! Revenge! The Void! Go now!’
The hermits feared to go down the misty paths to the land of the Ürxura. But they feared Hithrax more, and revered him as the very Angel of the fiery Void. So they began to tread the long and winding path down the mountainside into the night-shrouded Vale of the Ürxura Narábadrim.
Shelley awoke in the tree that had saved them, in the cold light of morning. It was misty and damp, and the air vibrated with the roar of the waterfall. Memory returned, and she looked up in concern at Korman lying in the crook of the branch, cradling her. He was still blind – at least, his eyes were closed and swollen, his silver skullcap dented and blackened, his face peeling from the dark fire of the Void. He seemed deep in thought, facing towards the Vale of the Ürxura which was near, yet separated from them by the chasm of the falls. Bootnip was with them too, fast asleep between Korman’s feet, a piece of leather from Korman’s boot between his paws. ‘So, we still haven’t managed to shake you off,’ Shelley thought, smiling grimly. The little anklebiter twitched and stirred in its sleep.
She tried moving her arms, and they responded, but with a tingling feeling. She knew the only way down, apart from falling to certain death, was to climb down. Her head swam at the thought. Her feet tingled with pins and needles. Her stung heel throbbed when she tried to move it. It was puffed up and the skin felt nastily tight.
‘Good morning, Shelley,’ said Korman, not turning his sightless head.
‘How are you, Korman?’
‘Well, my headache is gone!’
Shelley laughed, but she was wondering how they could go on – now that he was blind. ‘And fear not,’ he added. ‘I know what you are thinking. Yes, we must climb the cliffs of Firewater Falls. We have escaped through fire and hornets by the grace of the Lady, and now I will walk like a mountain goat, with your eyes, and tread the ledges which only you can see.’ He flexed his right hand. ‘Not only my headache was healed last night. Look! The palsy has lessened. My arm is healing!’
Tears came to Shelley’s eyes. ‘Oh, Korman! I knew it would heal, one day. There’s such magic here in Aeden! But last night, as you knelt before the sword, I had this feeling, that you’d have to go through terrible things for me, and for Aeden. I didn’t know it would be so soon though. Why can’t your eyes be healed too?’
‘It does not always work like that.’
‘Oh, it’s not fair. When will things turn out right?’
‘We will see, one day.’
‘Is that one of your
jokes, Korman?’ She punched him, and he gasped. The anklebiter, now clinging to Korman’s shoulder, growled at her.
‘Oh, sorry! Are you hurt there too? How are we ever going to get down from here?’ she cried. Korman’s answer was to lift her in his arms and stand on the trunk of the tree, as Shelley gasped in fright and Bootnip squealed.
‘It is all right,’ he said. ‘Just tell me where to place my feet. One foot after the other. Just like life.’
‘A piece of cake!’ said Shelley.
And so they inched along the gnarled tree, a mountain oak with scarred and twisted trunk, still sloping down over the torrent hundreds of years after being knocked over as a little sapling by a falling rock. Soon Korman’s boots, wet and cold, came down firmly upon the hard rock shelf from which it grew, and so they went on, around the cliff on the south side of the falls, which ceaselessly thundered away below them. The morning sun shone on the white foam and made a rainbow halo around their combined shadow. Step by step, Shelley nervously directed him as they descended the narrow ledges and overhangs until, just as Korman’s legs would take no more and began shaking and buckling under him, they were down. He let Shelley tumble to the ground, stood up and stretched his back with a great sigh of relief.
The falls thundered on as they sat on the steep pebbly beach in the wind and spray at the base of the falls. Shelley was shivering from the cold, while Korman was sweating with the exertion of carrying her down the cliff. They both laughed with relief, but Korman’s breath caught in his injured ribs. ‘Look well on the sight, Shelley, for both of us!’ he said. ‘Few mortals have seen these sacred falls.’ She looked, and tried to take in the whole atmosphere of the place. ‘It’s awesome, Korman,’ she said. ‘It feels as though the air is charged with electricity, or something.’
‘Yes, without sight I can see other things more clearly. I see that energy all around us. It is a healing place, and I am sorry we must leave so soon.’
They drank from the ever-foaming pool, and Korman bathed his burnt face in the soothing water. Bootnip waddled down to the water and swam in circles, lapping the water and spluttering before waddling out again. Shelley helped Korman tuck the wet anklebiter into Korman’s robe, since his pack was gone. Then they were off again, to seek the plains of the Ürxura, and the apple trees, wild roots and herbs that would renew their strength. They were hungry, stiff and tired but refreshed by the waters and feeling hopeful.
After a while they left the river, since Korman said it went down into a forested lake, where the Ürxura (which they needed to find and beg for help) rarely went. So they headed south under tall trees and sparse underbrush. Shelley limped along, and Korman, blind and in pain but trusting her guidance, walked in her footsteps.
And where Shelley had trodden, small white flowers opened. They were padmaësta, hopeflowers, as the faithful called them, a sign of the Kortana and of hope, like the Edelweiss of Earth. Neither Korman nor Shelley saw them, but their perfume was in the air, reminding them of things almost forgotten – of Faery and its deep joy.
The rest of that day became a blur in Shelley’s mind as the aches and pains increased. Her head, and especially her heel, began to throb. She wondered how much pain Korman was in, but she was too intent on struggling on, leading him by the hand, to even ask. She wished Quickblade would turn up, and give them horses to ride on.
‘So this is what it’s like to be the leader: hard work and worry and headaches!’ she thought. Time seemed to slow to a crawl as they stumbled on and on. She remembered her father’s migraines. ‘I wonder what it’s like being him? He was always worrying about the world. He looked like he was carrying it on his shoulders… I don’t want to end up like him! Still, I guess he’s not my real father anyway. And what did he have to worry about, compared to me, or Korman? I suppose he worried about mum, and keeping up the lie that he was my real father. He sure seemed upset when we went through Silverwood, even before the unicorn appeared. They both did. As if they knew something. I bet they didn’t know all this existed, or they’d really have worried! I wonder what they’d do if they were here now? Would dad get a huge migraine and crack up, or would he become a hero? I know what mum would do: she’d find a nice little hidden valley somewhere and start a garden, and live happily ever after! It is beautiful here! Apart from the Aghmaath… And the Dagraath… And those horrible magician hermits!’ She forced herself to stop thinking about the horrors she had seen, and returned to musing on her family. ‘I wonder who my real dad is. Imagine meeting him one day!’ That thought made her heart leap, but her head thumped even worse, and she tried not to think about that either.
As they struggled on, slowly the land grew more open and the tall trees further apart, until they were walking in the high parts of the Vale of the Ürxura, and the long blue-green grass and clover and wildflowers under their tired feet swept away down to the dark blue sea in the distance.
Their clothes were now dry and it was warm, but a cooling sea breeze fanned the grass. Around midday Shelley saw an apple grove and led them towards it. They stopped in its pleasant shade, sniffing the scented air. Then all their weariness seemed to catch up with them at once. They sat down painfully, but with great relief.
In Aeden some kind of apple was always in fruit, and in this grove it was a variety like the Pacific Rose, crisp, sweet and full of a wild aroma that reminded Shelley of her own Northland. She reached up and picked one. Its perfume and coolness were irresistible. But she hesitated, fearful of more sorcery.
‘Is it safe to eat the apples?’ asked Shelley.
‘Yes, I am sure. This is one of the sacred groves, planted many centuries ago in the Golden Age of the Order,’ said Korman. She picked one for him too, and they feasted on the crisp apples, their munching the only noise in the stillness around them.
Then Shelley chose an especially large rosy-looking apple and recited the chant:
O vapastra Pagy’avalastra
Pagya’vala elrápaön
O vapastra, vapaäm éim
En Gha v’Ürpama
O Star-key in the applestar
In the apple shining!
O Star-key, open us
To Life and Love’s entwining!
Korman joined in, wearily at first, then with fervour. His voice was a rumble that seemed to reverberate in the grove and bring it to the verge of Faery. Shelley felt a thrill as she cut the apple carefully ‘starwise,’ that is, across the core. ‘Maybe this one will have a Star-key seed,’ she thought. The knife hit something hard in the core. She cut around the obstruction. The apple fell into two perfect halves, and in one half was a shiny golden seed, a little larger than a normal appleseed, fluted with five ridges that if cut across would form a perfect five-pointed star.
‘Hold out your hand!’ she cried excitedly, and Korman smiled as she flipped the precious seed into his gnarled palm, and he felt it lovingly, counting the ridges.
‘I cannot see it, but it has the right shape, and the ridges. Golden, you say? Then it is surely a Jeweltree seed! We will plant it in the centre of this old grove. Take my sword and make a hole with it.’ He offered her the hilt, and Shelley tremblingly drew the great shining blade. She dug a hole as Korman told her, by lifting the sword and dropping it into the ground. She took the seed once more from Korman and dropped it into the hole, then pushed some leafmould and topsoil over it, pressing it down with her hands, wishing it luck. Bootnip jumped out of his robe and began trying to dig it up, and nipped at Shelley when she kicked him away.
Korman held Bootnip firmly as he sheathed his sword and blessed the seed: ‘May you grow tall, and see better days!’ Then he told Shelley, ‘Keep the other pips, and we will plant them as we go across the plain. Remember always:
Ennaya na-math, heth na magn’Edartha
Nine for mankind; one for Mother Earth.’ He traced the lines of the ancient carved stone on which he sat, half-buried in the fertile earth. ‘So much history, lost! But this place is not yet polluted by the seed
of the thorns. The magic of this land is strong; it still withstands the enemy. The new seed will grow!’
As they rested in the cool shade he nursed Bootnip (who had eaten a whole apple and was now snoring curled up on his lap), and told Shelley more of the history of Aeden, and of many wonders now lost. ‘The bubble trees, for example, which once grew here, were made by the Makers from the pomegranate tree, for sheer delight. They put forth bubbles filled with the lightest gas which floated up into the golden sunlight, sparkling until they vanished on the breeze, to land somewhere far away and be burst by children for the perfumed seeds they contained.’
The apples had refreshed them, but it was hard to get to their feet and leave that pleasant place, testing their endurance again in the hot sun, limping on into the unknown. As they walked, however, a feeling grew on them that they were entering into an enchanted past, and the cares and fears lifted from their hearts. Still, Korman knew there was still the threat of pursuit. He said, ‘Tonight we may expect an attack by the hermits, I fear. Hithrax drives them on ahead to flush us out. He himself fears to come far into this land, for it will drive him mad if he does, or the Ürxura will catch his smell and come with hooves and horns to kill him.’
‘And the Dagraath are dead, I suppose. What about the hornets?’ Shelley asked.
‘Their range is short; perhaps three miles at the most.’
‘Thank goodness. But what about the hermits? Won’t they be stopped by the Ürxura’s enchantment too?’
‘Perhaps not. They are men, or were once. It may be they will resist long enough to find us and encircle us again.’
‘And your staff is gone now.’
‘Yes. It will be hard to resist their enchantment this time. We must go forward with all haste, until dark.’
‘And then?’
‘Then we will climb a tree, and spin mindwebs about us, and hope.’
He did not mention that he had spun a mindweb about the crater the night before, in vain.
They walked wearily on into the heat of the afternoon, and then the late afternoon and sunset. Korman’s eyes were still closed and even more swollen – he could no longer even open them – and Shelley’s leg was puffed up and throbbing. Finally she had to lean on Korman and hobble along, guiding him on into the twilight while he supported her.
They heard a noise like distant thunder, and stopped, anxiously. ‘It is a herd of wild horses, perhaps,’ said Korman.
‘Or unicorns!’ said Shelley. The land about them was now flat and open, apart from some patches of herbs and bracken.
‘We could eat the roots of the bracken, but it would take time – and a fire – to prepare,’ said Korman. So they went on, hoping to find a stand of trees before nightfall. But they stopped at intervals to rest, and each time scratched a hole and planted an apple seed, and Korman wove a blessing about it.
For a long way there were no more trees, and the breeze grew cold and sighed in the grass as the sun went down. Then in the distance ahead Shelley saw a dark treetop on the far side of a slight rise. She steered Korman towards it, and for a weary long time it seemed to get no closer. But at last there came a moment when they both stopped, swaying with exhaustion, under its spreading canopy. It was a huge old hollow oak, with knotted branches trailing pale lichens.
In the remaining twilight, Shelley guided Korman up into a fork in the great trunk. Then she found herself a branch nearby, where she could lay her head back on the main trunk and stretch out on the wide, level branch. She could hear Korman muttering as he wove a mindweb around the tree.
It was bliss for a while, to be able to relax with the weight off her aching legs and throbbing foot, and to feel the living branch beneath her. But as the night breeze eerily rustled the canopy above, the roughness of the bark and knots and bumps on the branch began to dig into her. ‘It’s not very comfortable, is it?’ she called to Korman who was half-way around the huge bole, on a slightly lower branch.
‘Quiet!’ he whispered back. ‘There is something out there.’
With a sinking feeling she realised he was right. They were surrounded again. The mindweb had failed to keep out whatever it was. Pale shapes were closing in.
‘The Void! The Void!’ came the sudden chant, and the black wands were raised. It was the ghastly hermits again. This time there was no fire in their hands, just the deadly blackness growing around them, closing in on them, seeming to drop from the dark leaves above and seep like mist from the hollow trunk. Ghostly rustles came from the inside of the tree, converging on them. Below was the black vortex of the Void; above was fear and horror. She felt the insistent voices in her head, like bony fingers reaching into her mind, calling, ‘Jump! Let go! Fall into the everlasting arms, the endless rest…’
She heard Korman call, as if from far away, or as if through the noise of a waterfall in her head, ‘Hold on, Shelley!’ She felt ill, and in the darkness she heard Bootnip being sick.
The hermits’ call was growing in intensity, a siren song, offering peace and rest, while above the very mouth of hell had opened up. Writhing snakes began to materialise and swarm down the branches toward her, forked tongues slowly flicking in and out. She screamed, and began to slip off the branch. She heard Korman’s muffled voice crying, ‘Hold on! The Ürxura are coming!’
Her legs slipped off the branch. She looked into the bleary, earnest eyes of the hermits. They were willing her to let go. Somehow she clung on another agonising second, and another. She felt her shaking hands slip over the rough bark as she started going down. Pale withered hands reached up for her.
At that moment with a thunder of hooves, a large white shape shot into the dark space below the canopy, scattering the hermits. The Ürxura had found them in the nick of time. Korman, who had been swooning in a deadly darkness, jumped onto the mighty stallion, guided in his blindness only by the sound of its hooves and snorting breath, and its wordless command. Then the unicorn, its long spiral horn shining like polished ivory in the starlight, bore him on light feet that seemed to float over the earth, and stood under Shelley. ‘Let go!’ cried Korman. She closed her eyes and let go with a scream. He caught her, groaning with the effort, swaying on the broad back of the unicorn.
‘I don’t… know how… to ride bareback!’ gasped Shelley, clutching at the mane of the Ürxura. The pale hermits were closing in again, and she heard their urgently commanding voices in her head. ‘I’ve got you!’ Korman cried, as the white stallion sprang away, scattering the hermits. Other Ürxura followed them. A hermit standing in their path, black wand upraised, was skewered through and tossed in the air. He fell to earth with a horrible thud. Then they were through the deadly ring of enchantment, galloping away into the night.
Shelley felt the magic of the Ürxura shielding them from the mindprobes of the hermits, and the sickening Void vanished into the darkness behind them as they thundered away. She remembered how she had ridden the white unicorn out of Silverwood, and began to feel more confident of her riding instincts. Besides, Korman would not let her fall. She felt her heart beating wildly and her breath catching as the power of the galloping herd swept her up into its wild ecstasy. Neighing broke out around her, and she found herself crying out like a crazed Boy Raider, ‘Yippee, yahoo!’ Korman, humming a Guardian war song, steadied her as they rode, but the big unicorn sped smoothly on into the night without missing a beat.
It began to feel like a dream, like when she first rode the white unicorn in Faery on the pathway through the stars from Earth to Aeden, and she wondered if they were going home. ‘But what on Earth would Korman do?’ she thought in her dream, and she woke again, and realised that she had been dozing. The wind of Aeden was still rushing past them, fresh and invigorating. But it was not long before she began to feel drowsy again, and her eyes closing in spite of all her efforts. She nodded off once or twice, then awoke a third time to find that they had halted. There was a salty smell in the air, and a sighing like the wind in the trees. Korman dismounted, then Shelley
slipped off into his arms.
They were at the edge of a little village of thatched huts by a great sweep of the shore. The silver moon had risen over the sea, and the unicorn stamped his hoof and turned with a swish of his long mane and tail. Then he and the herd were gone.
‘We heard the Ürxura… you rode on the White Ürxura! Its horn appeared to us and we were afraid. Who are you?’ The voice, ringing, confident, but full of wonder, came from the direction of the village. A tall young man came out of the shadows towards them, barefoot, wearing a loose tunic and a wrap-around skirt. He was holding a many-pronged fishing-spear.
Before Korman could speak, Shelley replied, ‘I’m Shelley, and this is… Nimmath. We’re tired and hurt. I’ve been stung by a black hornet, and Nimmath has been blinded. We’ve been attacked by hermits. Can you help us, please?’ The man ran up and supported them with strong arms, dropping his spear.
‘Welcome to Sanmara! I am sorry to hear of your injuries. I’m Sandpiper. Friends call me Pipes. I’ll bring you straight to the meeting hut. You can sleep there. I’ll bring food and drink, and call for the medicine woman. She has good herbs. And in the morning,’ he added, smiling at Shelley, his white teeth flashing in the moonlight, ‘you can tell us about yourselves.’
They were laid on comfortable beds which swung by strong ropes from the roof poles along the side of the oval hut. To the seaward side the building was open, with a veranda supported on sturdy posts. To Shelley’s amazement there were things that looked remarkably like surfboards, leaning against the walls under the veranda. But her head was beginning to spin with tiredness, and she asked no questions.
The medicine woman came in carrying a hurricane lamp. She gently covered Korman’s burned eyes and hands with ointments of aloe vera and other healing herbs which eased the pain, and bandaged them lightly. Then she put a poultice on Shelley’s swollen heel. ‘Will Nimmath be all right?’ Shelley whispered.
‘We shall see,’ the woman replied in a soft, low voice, ‘Your friend appears to be hardy. I think he will recover. But he may never see again.’
Then Pipes (as he insisted on being called) brought them some dried fish and pottery bowls of some kind of root vegetables, and bottles of blue glass containing scented water. ‘Eat a little, drink plenty of the healing spring water, then sleep,’ said the medicine woman to Korman. ‘And chew on these leaves if you are in pain.’
‘Thank you. Since we are at your mercy, I must tell you: my true name is Korman. I am Guardian to this girl, though she has been guiding and protecting me since… this! Look after her well, if I should…’
‘Hush! We will look after you both, and you will recover. Eat and sleep well under our roof, and have no fear now, Korman the Guardian!’ She left them the lamp and went out with Pipes. Shelley noticed that she turned and looked back at Korman as she went out the door
They ate and drank thankfully. Shelley had to put the bowl and fork in Korman’s hands as he lay on his bed. She adjusted his blankets and looked down at his peaceful face, which looked very different with the bandage over his eyes, and reached out, bolder than she would have been if those keen eyes were on her, and gently put her hand to his forehead. It felt hot. He smiled and murmured, ‘Your hand is very cool.’
She smiled back at him. ‘Sleep well, Korman. And don’t bother trying to wake me in the morning. I’m so sleeping in.’
He murmured, ‘I think we both can, just this once.’
She blew out the lamp and went to her bed, which swayed gently in the night breeze that came in from the veranda, and she fell asleep to the sound of the surf on the beach below.
With the help of the pain-killing leaves, Korman was asleep before her for once, snoring slightly, his singed beard rising and falling on his deep chest. And Bootnip slept curled up at his feet.
Book Three
The Valley of Thorns
Chapter Thirty-six
The Waveriders