Tarlach's mind was slow in returning, but it held steady when he again woke to his surroundings.
He sat up, clutching at his head as he did so, and leaned back against the stone wall for a few minutes, his eyes tightly closed, until the world ceased spinning and he was able to take some rudimentary stock of himself.
Physically, he could be far worse off. His body felt as though it must be a mass of bruises, and his head ached abominably, but he could discover no sign of broken bones or other serious injury. There certainly were no spurting arteries or deep puncture wounds, or he would scarcely be in any condition to search for them at this stage. There were no symptoms of shock to indicate internal injury, although only time would confirm that.
That was about the sum of his good fortune, he thought as he looked about him.
The half-conscious instinct which had driven him deeper into the cave had saved or at least prolonged his life, for a vast amount of material had fallen between the time of his passing out and his awakening. The pit had been nearly completely filled in, was totally filled for all practical purposes. Only a chink a few inches across remained open to the outer world. The single ray of light it admitted was his sole source of illumination, not much in itself but sufficient for his needs and even brilliant to eyes already adjusting to the deadly blackness all around.
The air remained good and flowed too strongly to be coming through that tiny crack above, so he could feel certain that he had fallen into part of a reasonably large cavern system.
Whether or not it connected with the outer world, he could not say. That made no real difference anyway. He could not crawl through miles of what were probably highly complex tunnels, tunnels very likely littered with countless perils, without a light or more food and water than the small amount he had taken with him from his saddlebags to sustain him until he returned to Lady Gay and hope to find his way home, not unless greater fortune than he had any right or reason to expect should be with him. Even without the ghost to contend with, he simply did not believe it could be done. The chance of coming upon another exit under such conditions was simply too slim to be considered as a viable option for his escape.
What then? He still had his weapons. They could free him very quickly of thirst and hunger and the terror of a slow and utterly lonely death.
His hand did not go near sword or knife. That was for later, when hope was exhausted and the actual pangs were upon him. Far better to crawl a while through the eternal night than to claim such release prematurely.
There was yet another possibility.
He was not so very far below the surface, no more than fifteen feet or so, and that air hole above showed that the roof was not thick. He might just be able to breach it.
Tarlach examined the debris which had followed him into the pit. It was mostly small stuff, he decided, the gravel and dirt that had accumulated in the low place to form a loose crust over the fissure and the ground around it. There seemed to be almost no big rocks with it.
Such material was likely to be treacherous, but he felt that it could be managed with the few tools he had or could fashion. Theoretically, he should be able to mount it and work his way through the roof plug to the surface.
The actual attempt would not be so simple, of course. It would be far more a dig than a climb, and he would have to fashion a succession of shelves as he went, a crude scaffolding system to provide himself with a reasonably secure workspace for each phase of the operation.
He licked already dry lips. He had one chance, two at best. If his strength did not give out by then, the roof and what remained of the crust would. Their already fragile hold would shatter under his continued worrying, and the whole mass would fall, either burying him outright or sealing him still living in what was well nigh certain to become his tomb.
Perhaps all of this was irrelevant. A horror stalked these caves that was independent of landslide, independent of the endless night or the agony of physical want. How long did he have before the killer spirit of which Aden had spoke came upon him and touched him with her blight? How much time remained before the flesh began to rot from his still-living body as if it were already a corpse long abandoned by its soul?
He put the thought of that danger from him since there was nothing he could do to avert it and set to work with all the speed and force he dared throw against the unsettled mound of debris.
The task the Falconer had set himself proved more physically trying and far slower even than he had anticipated. The material comprising the landfall was difficult to dig with the knife and flat stone he was compelled to use in place of pick and shovel. The wet autumn and winter had imparted enough cohesiveness to the gravel for him to be able to work with it, but even so, hours passed during which he felt he made no progress at all.
He was very close to panic. It was growing late, and he would be able to keep on with this only while light continued to pour through that very small opening.
Tarlach glanced fearfully up at it and shook his head. Night would come quickly down here once the evening advanced and the invisible sun began its descent in earnest.
And then? He bent his aching back to lift out another scoopful of damp gravel. Then he must sit huddled against some stony wall until the sky far above brightened enough for him to begin his digging anew.
Daylight would come again if another cave-in did not close him off from it completely, but he knew in his heart and soul that the Ghost Child would reach him first.
He tried to tell himself that this was probably a safe area, no more than a hole in the ground, but he knew it was not so. It was part of the caves, and he could expect no mercy, not when darkness reigned supreme once more, perhaps not even before then.
His eyes closed, and he had to battle himself to keep on working. The healer had told her tale all too well. Death in battle, he did not court but could at least accept as part of the road he had been bred and trained to travel, but there was too much of horror in this. All his resolution could not hold him firm in the face of it.
His mounting terror worked against him, making his movements jerky and hasty, robbing his shaking hands of fine control, but it was beyond his will to master it completely. He could only set his teeth and press on, battling himself and the flying time and the damnably uncooperative stuff he must somehow mold to fit his need.
The light failed him abruptly, as he had guessed it would.
Although expected and even overdue, its loss finished him. He cast himself against the mound of debris, his body wracked by tearing sobs.
The wave of hysteria ebbed after a few moments, and Tarlach was able to grip himself again. He dropped to his knees and felt his way out of the pit area to the more secure stone-roofed tunnel beyond.
He lay down there and removed his battered helmet, resolving to rest, to sleep if he could. He was ashamed of his momentary breakdown, yet he was grateful for it, too. It had released some of the terror building inside him. The fear was still there but not the panic. If he could keep that chained during the following hours—and avoid the doom that had given it birth—he should be able to finish the work on the mound fairly early the next day, probably before noon. Then, of course, he must tackle the roof.
One thing he did know, he wanted desperately to live, and he would fight for life as long as the power to do so remained his.
7
Tarlach groaned and opened his eyes.
A soft light filled the rocky chamber, and an elfin face was peering curiously into his own. The combination of mischief and merriment in it was so irresistible that, before he was even half awake, he had laughed and tapped the upturned nose with a playful finger as he had often seen Rufon do with his small granddaughter at Seakeep.
Then his heart froze in its beat, and he shrank back as all his horror returned to him in full force.
This was not the bright face of the Seakeepdale child with her laughing eyes and cheeks a creamy tan after a summer spent running wild on her father's farm. The li
ttle maid before him was undeniably lovely with rippling masses of brown hair and great, pale green eyes, but she was wan as no living being could be. The folk around Lormt were right to have named her a ghost, for this she indeed seemed to be.
The light appeared to be—was—emanating from her.
The spirit had started to reach for his hand but had stopped when he pulled away from her, and she was now looking at him in hurt amazement.
The man sat up quickly. “I am sorry,” he said, attempting to control the shaking of his voice. He had heard that the first to speak sometimes gained an edge in such an encounter. “For a moment there, I thought you were another little girl.”
“Your little girl?”
“No. Just someone I know.”
“Oh.”
She appeared to study him, cocking her head to one side. “Are you cold?” she asked at last.
“Not very. Why?”
“Because you are shivering so.”
He stared at her, then smiled despite himself. “I suppose you frightened me,” Tarlach told her with perfect honesty.
The Ghost Child laughed in delight at that.
She seated herself beside him, smoothing her dress carefully as she took her place. He noticed it for the first time and found it to be cumbersome, not like those worn by women or female children in either Estcarp or High Hallack, not now. It might be very old, given the age of the legend concerning her, but he knew nothing of women's fashion to be able to put a date on it.
The small face lifted to look directly into his. “You were asleep a long time.” A new thought occurred to her. “Did I wake you?”
“No, at least I do not believe so. I was probably just slept out and woke by myself.” Or his warrior's senses had reasserted themselves and roused him.
“I am so glad! I tried to be very quiet. Kathreen says that I chatter so and must not always be troubling people.”
“Kathreen?”
“My sister. She is very big and very wise.” Her face lighted with pride. “She is pretty, too.”
“That I do not doubt if she is like to you.”
The ghost vigorously nodded her agreement. “I am Adeela,” she said, as if she had suddenly remembered the training in courtesy she had received.
Here the Falconer hesitated. He did not want to frighten the child and something within him did not want to hurt her, but knowledge of another's name gave a measure of power over that person in certain forms of sorcery. He was not about to reveal his to this or any other spirit even if it were not against his kind's custom to do so with those not of their own race. Only to Una …
Suddenly he recalled the title the Holdlady had put on him. “I am called Mountain Hawk,” he told her, then inclined his head as he had seen lords in the Dales do. “I am pleased to greet you, Adeela.”
The man blinked, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. He realized that he meant what he had just said.
Adeela did not notice the change in him this time. She was staring at their surroundings as if she were seeing them for the first time.
She turned back to him. “Why were you sleeping?”
“Because I could not keep my eyes open.”
“No!” she exclaimed in exasperation. “I mean why were you sleeping here?”
“I fell in and got very tired trying to find a way out again.”
“Were you looking for diamonds?”
“No,” he answered with some amusement. “I stepped in a hole, and down I came.”
The Ghost Child was quiet a long time. She kept looking around her and pressed close to him, as if she were growing afraid. Unaccustomed as he was to offering such comfort, he put his arm around her and was rewarded by feeling her grow less tense.
“Do you have any cousins?” she asked suddenly in a very low voice.
“Probably. Why?”
“I do not like cousins. No-el is my cousin.”
Tarlach felt a chill settle in his stomach. He did not want to know why the small spirit disliked this No-el.
Memory had caught her, however, and she went on, almost oblivious to him in her agitation. “No-el told us we would find diamonds for mother in the cave. It was to be a grand surprise, and we were to tell no one until we came back with them, but the cave looked so dark and the door was so tiny that I started to cry, and Kathreen said she was sure we could find our diamonds outside if we looked hard enough.”
The big eyes seemed to grow larger still as they suddenly fixed on him. “No-el picked up a stone and hit her with it until her head got all red. Then he pushed her into the cave and pushed me in, and he rolled a big, heavy rock in front of the door. He would not take it away, and I could not move it no matter how hard I tried.”
Her lip was trembling, and tears coursed down her cheeks, but she was too gripped by her old fear to wipe them away. “Kathreen was asleep. She would not wake up even though I called her and called her. I called everyone, but no one would come.”
Adeela rubbed at an eye with a small, balled fist. “I was so hungry and thirsty, and I wanted mother to take us out of that horrible dark. …”
The warrior's eyes closed. He picked up the child and held her tightly to him. Her body seemed solid enough in his arms, but it was cold, and he could not feel what should be a wildly slamming heart.
He did not really notice her strangeness now, not in the face of her fear and misery and confusion. “Your mother could not hear you, Adeela,” he said softly, “and … and neither could Kathreen. That is why they could not help you.”
She stopped crying. “Mother was down in the big hold where we were stopping, but Kathreen was right there with me. …”
She paused and then looked up at him. “Had Kathreen gone away? Like my grandsire?”
“Yes.”
The child rested her cheek against his chest. “No-el made her go?”
“Yes, he did.”
“He must be very wicked.”
“Unbelievably wicked.”
She pulled a little away from him. “Was he punished?”
“Probably,” he replied. He stroked the soft, thick hair and sighed deeply. “That was a long time ago, Adeela. Your mother and Kathreen would not want you to be still crying over it.”
He fought to keep the fury burning inside him from reaching his voice, knowing she did not need more anger and hate. She was little more than a babe, and to have suffered so much and then be condemned to this. …
She had not deserved any of it. She certainly had not deserved to become what she was here.
Remembering the doom she carried only caused Tarlach to hold her the tighter. If he was to die through her, so be it. The fault—the guilt—was not hers that he should hate her, and he had the means of gaining release before the horror became too much. In the meantime, he would not, could not, refuse her the comfort she had already been denied in her first great need. Even terror could not make him that savage.
The little maid grew very quiet, and he felt certain she had gone to sleep.
He gazed down at her, and the fear left him. Adeela was a child again, whatever her physical state. The horror and violence of her death, the unfulfilled need to lash out at the one who had done such wrong to her and perhaps at those who could not help her, had combined to overpower a soul too immature to deal with them, had frozen awareness and humanity and had somehow made her a force of destruction in her turn. Now that curse was broken. Of that, he was positive.
The Captain hoped he had in some way helped to bring about her release but supposed that the time for it had probably just come. Otherwise, he was at a loss to explain his own escape, unless the unlikely sight of a man sleeping peacefully in such surroundings had managed to reach Adeela's numbed mind and returned the spark of life to her paralyzed humanity.
He wondered what would happen next. She should probably begin her journey down the last, long road now that she was free and knew herself once more, but she was very obviously still here.
He smiled tenderl
y. Maybe she just needed to rest a bit after her countless ages of weary wandering.
Tarlach dozed again himself and had gone quite far into sleep when he felt Adeela leap from his arms.
“Kathreen! It is Kathreen! Can you not hear her?”
He shook his head but released his little companion's hand. He did not doubt that she had faculties unknown to him.
He started, his heart beating fast. The moment of her final release must be upon her! “Go find your sister. Hasten! She has been waiting a long time for you.”
Adeela needed no further urging. She raced from his side. Her small body seemed to waver and then vanished completely from his sight.
The pale light disappeared along with her, plunging the cave tunnel into utter darkness.
The mercenary did not really miss it. The night was well on, and he knew morning would bring him its glow before much more time had elapsed.
His head sunk upon his breast. He was very glad for Adeela, but by the Horned Lord, he had loved having her here with him. He could too easily still meet his death in this place, and now the loneliness of it seemed magnified a thousandfold.
8
Pyra sought out Una of Seakeep where she was working in the long reading hall shortly after the Captain had left Lormt.
She sat down beside the Daleswoman. “Duratan has told me your purpose in coming here,” she said after a brief hesitation. “He learned of it from your Falconer before he rode off to meet you.”
“He should have told you sooner,” the other replied, concealing her surprise that the healer would broach this subject with her.
“It is a noble aim, but one that I fear is foredoomed. However he fares with his comrades and the Commandants, I doubt he will have much success in the villages, assuming he meant that part about gaining the consent of the women in the first place.”
“He means it. Any force, and he loses access to Seakeep. There can be no permanent Eyrie unless he has the use of both Dales.”