Then a new sound drew their attention. It was the tramp of a column of marching people, coming from the east. The marchers sang as they came. Echo recognized the sound.
"It's the axers," she whispered. "They're going to get a surprise."
Every week for many months now a band of axers had come marching through the forest, escorting a column of pilgrims dressed in white robes. They marched through the Glimmen and on out the other side, and there vanished into the region of mist known as the land cloud. What they did there no one knew; but they had never been seen coming back.
It was the pilgrims who were singing now. The words of their song became audible, though they were not yet in sight.
"Take me up into the harvest!
Take me up into the harvest!
Take me up into the harvest!
To live for evermore!"
The riders also heard the sound of the singing. Those in the lead slowed their mounts to a stop. Their hands went to their sides and untied the whips that were coiled there.
The approaching column of singers now rounded the bend of the road and came into view. There were about thirty of them, both men and women, their hands reached up above their heads, waving from side to side as they sang.
"Take me up into the harvest!
To live for evermore!"
On every face was the same look of ecstatic hope. Before them, and on either side, marched their escort of axers, tall men in heavy armor, the enforcers of the rich and cruel empire of Radiance. These giant guardians carried spiked chains, looped in their right hands, ready at a moment's notice to snake out and swing with devastating force. Echo and Sander kept very still in the high branches. Like all Glimmeners, they feared the axers, and Radiance, and its priests, and its worship of the sun.
Now both the white-robed pilgrims and the axers saw the mounted warriors massing before them, and they came to a shambling surprised stop. The axers stood with their legs apart and their chains at the ready, staring through the visors of their helmets. The pilgrims fell silent. All were speechless at the sight of the unfamiliar beasts.
Then the chief axer, recalling that his heavy armor and his immense strength made him invulnerable, boomed out through the slit in his helmet.
"Give way, in the name of our Radiant Leader!"
The mounted warriors made no answer. Their mounts frisked and capered, wanting to be moving forward.
"Clear the road!" boomed the axer. "Get your skinny cattle out of our way!"
Still the mounted warriors said nothing. The chief axer then loosed his chain with a jerk of his arm, which sent it hissing through the air into the space between them, at knee height. Echo gasped, in the tree above, terrified that the heavy iron links would snap the fine-boned legs of the fragile beasts. Instead, in a swift smooth movement, one of the mounted warriors slipped over the side of his mount and sent his whip curling at ground level to wind round the axer's ankles. A single tug, and the axer and his chain came crashing to the ground. The whip curled, snaking back to its owner, even as he was righting himself on his mount.
The other axers, seeing their chief felled, gave out a roar of rage and loosed their own chains. The mounted warriors responded with a flurry of movement and a snapping of whips. Shortly every one of the escorting axers was sprawled on the ground.
The white-robed men and women looked on in dismay.
"Who are you?"
"We are Orlans!" The lead warrior spoke in a harsh voice, in an accent they had never heard before. "We are the masters now."
The boldest pilgrim spoke up.
"We must go on down the road," he said. "We are the chosen ones."
The felled axers were now climbing back to their feet and grimly drawing their long-handled axes. The invaders were not big people, nor were the beasts they rode much larger than calves, and the axers towered over them. But Echo, watching from above, knew now that the beautiful beasts were in no danger. They were too fast and too skillful.
The leading axer plowed into the middle of the mounted army, swinging his weapon, but wherever he struck, all he hit was air. The Orlans danced round him like children taunting an aged bear. Their whips caught him round the helmet and the wrists and the ankles, and without quite knowing how it had happened he found himself on his knees, by the side of the road, his axe tossed far out of reach.
"Now you kneel!" cried the Orlan. "All men kneel before the Great Jahan!"
Mounted Orlans on every side loosed their whips and snapped them in the air.
"Kneel!" they cried.
The other axers and the white-robed pilgrims, awed by this display of power, dropped fearfully to their knees.
All the time that this confrontation had been taking place, more and more Orlans had been riding up, massing in a dense array of mounted warriors that stretched back through the trees as far as the eye could see. Now the ranks were parting, and a new sound was heard: the blare of trumpets, the beat of drums, the shrilling of pipes, and the clash of steel on steel. There came a flashing of lights from among the mass of the men, and the sound of cheering, and a ripple of movement as riders dismounted.
Echo, peering down through the foliage, saw the adoring faces of the riders as they fell to their knees; but she could not yet see the object of their adoration. She heard the beat of the music and saw the kneeling riders take up their swords and beat in time on their breastplates, and she heard them cry out.
"Jahan! Jahan! Jahan!"
The Orlans who had overpowered the axers now themselves dismounted and knelt, and joined in the chant. The white-robed singers, already on their knees, looked on in awe and terror.
"Jahan! Jahan! Jahan!"
The music was loud now, a pealing, clashing fanfare of praise, augmented by every man in earshot striking his sword against his breastplate. The flashing lights dappled the tall trees on either side. The warriors closest to their leader cheered wildly as he passed.
"Jahan! Jahan! Jahan!"
Echo and Sander, motionless as lizards in the trees above, watched in amazement. A striking figure was advancing slowly through the lines of kneeling men, seeming to glide over the ground, and bright lights illuminated his tawny face as he came. The light was reflected from some twenty mirrors, held in the skilled hands of riders who accompanied his progress on either side, angling their discs of polished steel to catch the pale daylight above and send it bouncing onto their leader. Beside the mirror bearers rode the musicians, the pipers and drummers and trumpeters, filling the air with their pounding fanfare. Behind the leader rode three young men with haughty faces. On either side the swarthy Orlans clashed their swords and cheered.
"Jahan! Jahan! Jahan!"
As the leader drew close, the axers and the white-robed singers alike could see that he was standing in a high open carriage, drawn by a team of four of the beautiful beasts. The carriage was so finely made, its two high wheels so slender, that he seemed to be floating through the air. He looked about him as he advanced, with a gaze of indifference that was almost contempt.
Echo stared at him in fascination. He was mesmerizingly ugly. Every feature on his broad nut-brown face was oversized, from his lowering eyebrows to his powerful chin. Hard black eyes stared ahead at nothing. A great jutting nose, a wide fleshy mouth. Thick springy black hair dragged back and bunched at the nape of his neck. Silver fur jacket and steel breastplate, like all his men. Hips and shoulders swaying to the beat of the drums, with the arrogant swagger of a monster who believes he is beautiful.
"Jahan! Jahan! Jahan!"
He raised one hand, in which he clasped a silver-handled whip, and the carriage came to a stop. The music and the cheering ceased. The Great Jahan cast his eyes over the axers and the white-robed pilgrims who knelt in the forest road before him. He made a sign to one of the three young men who rode behind him.
"Alva!"
The young man rode forward, to the axers. The other two, his brothers, looked on, glowering with envy.
"Explain your
selves," said Alva. "Speak clearly, and be brief."
"We are soldiers of the imperial army of Radiance," said the chief axer, trying his best to sound defiant while still kneeling.
"Who is your lord?"
"Radiant Leader, the beloved son of the Great Power above."
"Go back to your lord. Tell him that my father, Amroth Jahan, demands his submission. Tell him that when the Great Jahan enters his territory, he expects to be welcomed by him on his knees, as you are now. If he fails in this, he and all who follow him will be destroyed. Now go!"
The axers rose to their feet and looked at one another uncertainly. Then, all reaching the same decision at once, they turned and strode back down the road home.
Amroth Jahan had no more interest in the kneeling pilgrims. He motioned to his men that they should continue. But the boldest of the pilgrims rose to his feet and cried, "We are the chosen ones! What have we to fear?"
The Great Jahan's oldest son, Sasha, still angry that his father had picked one of his brothers, drew his whip and snapped it in the air.
"Clear the way for the Great Jahan!"
"But we must go forward! We go to eternal life! It's been promised to us. We've been chosen!"
"Let them pass."
This was the deep voice of Amroth Jahan himself. He showed his uneven yellow teeth in a wide smile.
"They've been chosen. Let them pass."
The white-robed men and women formed up once more into their marching column. The ranks of Orlans parted to make way for them.
"Eternal life, eh?" said the Great Jahan; and he laughed a rich booming laugh.
The column of pilgrims set off. As they began to move, they waved their hands from side to side above their heads and raised their voices once more in song.
"Take me up into the harvest!
Take me up into the harvest!
Take me up into the harvest!
To live for evermore!"
The Orlans too now resumed their forward progress. Echo and Sander kept up with them, slipping from tree to tree above, dropping lower and closer all the time. Echo was entranced by the four riderless beasts that drew the Jahan's carriage, and she longed to touch them.
"Oh, they're so beautiful!"
They were beneath her now, so close. She reached down a hand—
"Careful!" cried Sander.
Too late. For the first time in her life, Echo Kittle fell out of a tree.
She dropped directly onto the back of one of the four beasts. She was so light and her reactions were so fast that she was able to throw her arms round the animal's slender neck and so break her fall before tumbling to the ground.
Whips hissed out from either side and spun round her, binding her tight. She was then dragged to her feet, and there before her, gazing down at her, was the craggy pockmarked face of Amroth Jahan.
"A tree sprite!" he said. "Fallen from the sky!"
Echo knew she was in trouble and could do nothing to save herself, so she did what she always did: she pushed the distressing thoughts out of her mind. Her arms were bound at her sides by the whips, but she could move her head. She was close to the animal who had broken her fall. Its nose was reaching towards her, its nostrils flaring gently. Its coat was a soft fawn color, with a white mark in the shape of a diamond between its eyes. She laid her cheek on the animal's nose. She felt it snuffle at her, then nuzzle her with the softest of lips.
"You're perfect," she whispered.
Amroth Jahan watched, and a smile formed on his broad craggy face. The girl was extraordinarily beautiful, with her pale flawless skin and her symmetrical face and her delicate features. Also, she was showing no fear. The Jahan respected that.
"You like my Caspians?"
"Caspians?" She turned her gray eyes to his. "Is that what they are?"
"Horses. Caspian horses." He signed for the whips to be released. "Have you never seen a horse before?"
"No. Never."
"There are no horses in the world as fine as my Caspians."
"There are no horses in my world at all."
The Jahan made a sign to his men. He had made a decision about the girl: she would travel in his carriage. Echo found herself lifted up and deposited by the Jahan's side. She caught a flurry in the branches above and guessed that it was Sander racing away to get help. But they were far from their home village.
The carriage began to move forward once more. The entire great army advanced through the trees.
"Would you like to have a Caspian for yourself?" said the Jahan.
"Yes," she replied faintly, feeling as if she had fallen into a dream.
"Pick one."
Echo pointed to the one with the white mark on its nose.
"That one."
"An excellent choice. His name is Kell. What's your name?"
"Echo," she replied. "Echo Kittle."
"Then I give him to you, Echo Kittle. Kell is yours. Do you ride?"
"No."
"I will teach you. You have the frame of a good rider."
"Thank you."
But even in the midst of her confusion, Echo knew that she couldn't accept the gift.
"Please don't think I'm ungrateful. But I have to go home."
She looked around. Already they had covered far more distance than she had realized. These horses moved much faster than bullocks. She looked up into the branches above: no sign of her people.
"No, Echo Kittle. I've decided to take you with me."
The Jahan smiled as he spoke, but the tone of his voice told her that he meant what he said.
"Take me with you? Why?"
"Because it pleases me. It will give me pleasure to teach you to ride."
He turned and gestured to the young men riding behind his carriage. At his sign, they came forward.
"These are my sons. It pleases me to give you to one of them as his wife. You may choose."
At this Echo forgot her fear. Her mother was always proposing husbands for her. There was no surer way to provoke her anger.
"I don't want to marry one of your sons."
"Yes, they're not very attractive, are they? Still, it is my will."
"You can't make me."
"Young lady," said the Jahan, frowning, "I can do as I please."
"I'll run away. You'll never catch me. No one can race through the trees as fast as me."
"If you run away," said the Jahan, now greatly displeased, "I will burn every tree in the forest, and kill every man, woman, and child who lives there."
Echo gasped.
"You wouldn't! No man could be so cruel!"
"I do whatever is necessary to get what I want."
"Then you're no better than a monster!"
"I don't understand. How am I a monster?"
"You don't care how much you hurt other people, so long as you get what you want."
"And are you different? Do you care more for others than for yourself?"
"I don't go about burning and killing."
"Very well. We shall see."
He raised his whip hand high, and the advancing army clattered to a halt.
He turned to his oldest son.
"Sasha. Those singing fools. Ride back and fetch me one."
The young Orlan saluted his father, wheeled round on his horse, and cantered away down the road.
The Great Jahan stood silent in his carriage and tapped on the harness bar with the handle of his whip. Echo's father tapped like that when he was cross with her. Sometimes, after a period of silence, her father would explode for no reason at all and go into a long shouting tirade about all the things that were wrong with her, how she was selfish and stubborn and never said sorry and would end by driving everyone to distraction. At such times, she would stand quietly before him and not listen. This was her great discovery: when something unpleasant was happening, all you had to do was not think about it. If you didn't think about it, it might as well not have happened.
So they waited in a gathering drizzle that mi
sted the Orlans' armor and glistened on the horses' coats. Once or twice Echo looked up into the trees, but without any real hope of being rescued. Even if her people caught up with her, what could they do against these whip-wielding warriors who had overcome the giant axers?
In a little while Sasha Jahan returned with one of the white-robed pilgrims on his horse's back, slung sideways like a sack of grain. He rode up in front of the carriage and tipped the pilgrim down onto the ground. The poor man was white-faced with fear. He lay curled up on the ground, clearly expecting to die.
The Jahan smiled grimly and addressed Echo.
"Now, young lady," he said. "You see this man before you. I give you the power of life and death over him. Give the order for his death, and his throat will be cut. Here, on the ground, as you watch."
"Never!"
"Give the order for him to be set free, and he'll go free. But you must pay a small price for his freedom. The little finger of your left hand will be cut off."
"You wouldn't!"
"I'll do it myself."
Before she could stop him, he had gripped her left wrist in his massive hand and drawn a short sharp knife from his belt. Echo let out a stifled cry of fear.
The Jahan held the gleaming blade before him. The lightly falling drizzle began to bead on its bright surface.
"If you want this stranger to live, say: live. Then pay the price. If you want him to die, say: die. If you remain silent for as long as it takes for the rain to run off my knife, he dies."
Echo was paralyzed with horror. Her left hand felt numb, he gripped it so tightly. She looked once at the pilgrim crouching on the ground, then quickly looked away. She fixed her gaze on the knife. She saw the mist of moisture forming into droplets of water, and the droplets growing and merging. The sight hypnotized her. She shut her thoughts to everything else. She saw the droplets shiver and start to roll along the blade, gathering other droplets as they went, growing into a trickle. She followed the runnel of rainwater to the tip of the blade, and saw how it hung there, swelling into a fat shining pearl. She saw it shudder and drop, and heard the soft pat of sound as it struck the carriage floor.