Escarpments of broken rock offered scant protection from the fury of wind and water. Soaked already, and uninterested in standing while the Kielmark wrapped his sword steel in oiled rags, Jaric wandered the beachhead. Rain spattered the ground. Pebbles and small stones tumbled in the run-off, to be battered in turn by surf. The Firelord squinted through the storm and made out the jagged outline of a cliff face; wild and untenanted though that shoreline was, something about the place seemed familiar. As a gust momentarily parted the curtains of rain, he realized why. This was the site of Anskiere's curse against Ivain, following the destruction of Elrinfaer by the Mharg.
Jaric listened, but heard only the voice of the storm. Wind here no longer repeated the curse Anskiere had pronounced against his betrayer. Perhaps the completion of the geas' terms had unbound the spell; or maybe the words on the wind had been nothing more than a tale invented by sailors. Shivering in the cold, Jaric stepped into the lee of a ledge that jutted beyond the tide mark. Barnacles crusted the stone, white as old bones where the waves threw feathers of spray. Saw grass clung in those cracks not swept clean by weather, except in one place. Once a sorcerer had marked the cliff, to leave a message straight and bitter as vengeance. Ivainson blinked droplets from his eyes and beheld the inscription his father had left scribed in rock.
* * *
'Summon me, sorcerer, and know sorrow. Be sure I will leave nothing of value for your use, even should my offpsring inherit.'
* * *
Jaric knew a moment of paralysing cold. The mad malice of his father seemed to emanate from the stone, choking breath from his lungs, sapping life from his body. Wounded by hatred and spite, the son stumbled backwards, into the cleansing fall of the rain. He stood for an interval, shuddering, his eyes stinging with water and tears. Then he stirred and lifted his hand. Alone in rainy twilight, he raised Earthmastery and smoothed the letters from the surface of the cliff.
Surf slammed unabated against the headland, and rain still whipped the strand. Yet somehow the squall seemed less savage, the landscape not so forsaken under the crazed onslaught of elements. Jaric made peace with the memory of his father and turned back toward the beach. He had one goal for comfort: should he and the Kielmark succeed at Shadowfane, mankind might survive to discover an answer to the threat posed by demons. Then Keithland would have no further need for sorcerers, and the agonies of the Cycle of Fire might be abandoned forever.
* * *
The crossing of the northern Corine Sea passed smoothly after Northsea, with brisk winds and fair sky seldom interrupted by squalls. The yawl sailed more handily than Callinde, which was well, for the waters off the coast of Felwaithe were a maze of shoals and islets that few mariners dared to navigate. Jaric learned more than he cared to know about charts and current as the yawl threaded the hazardous channels across Wrecker's Bay.
Twice their presence was challenged by corsairs flying the red wolf of Cliffhaven. The Kielmark kept the north coast under vigilant patrol, to dissuade merchant ships who thought to evade tribute by avoiding Mainstrait. Captains under his banner carried standing orders to plunder and sink any ship found bearing cargo; but often such tactics proved unnecessary. The reef-ridden channels between islands offered no sea room to fight, and many a hapless merchanter found ruin on hard rock instead. While searching the beaches for firewood, Jaric found rigging among the tide wrack, and the weather-bleached timbers of ships.
Autumn's warmth waned; the sky turned overcast and silvery as a fish's underbelly. On an afternoon that threatened rain the Kielmark beached the yawl on the farmost point of Felwaithe. Chilled in his wet boots, Jaric wondered as he stowed sails whether the two of them would survive to need the small boat again.
'My captains will spot her on the beach,' the Kielmark said, as if answering the Firelord's thought. 'One or another will pick her up.' He did not belabour the fact that such a contingency would be necessary only if they failed to return; instead, he squinted at clouds, adjusted his sword belt, and turned his back to the sea.
Jaric followed, his fine hair stiff with salt crystals, and a knapsack of provisions slung across his shoulders. Since the fells north of Keithland sustained neither forests for cover nor forage for horses, the final leagues to Shadowfane must be crossed on foot. Kielmark and Firelord pressed forward through spiky stands of scrub pine, crosshatched patches of briar, and ravines of loose shale that crumbled and slid underfoot. By sundown, both thorns and pines thinned to isolated thickets. The soil became poor and sandy, pierced by sharp tongues of rock, and knee-high clumps of saw grass and fern. A fine drizzle began to fall. Grimly set on his purpose, the Kielmark seemed inured to the damp, though moisture matted his hair and soaked patches in the calves of his leggings.
Jaric walked alongside with less confidence. Troubled by foreboding, and yearning for Taen's company, he felt every icy drop that slipped off the pack and rolled down his collar. The warded sword at his side chafed his hip like common steel, and boots blistered his heels after weeks of barefoot comfort at sea. Still, he continued without voicing his fears. Day wore gradually into night, and fog cloaked what little visibility remained. Between one step and another, ferny hummocks gave way to stone crusted with lichen. Beyond that point, as if a knife had divided the land, wind moaned over hills unbroken by any living thing.
'We've reached the borders of Keithland.' The Lord of Cliffhaven paused and rested his back against a table of black rock. 'Sailors say the whole of this world is barren, except for Keithland. I've seen oceans grow strange fish away from inhabited coasts.'
Jaric slung off his pack. Inside he scrounged a hardened loaf of bread, which he hacked in two with his knife; he passed half to his companion, who seemed to be listening to the wind. Explanations for Keithland's existence were many. Kor's priesthood claimed the Divine Fires had seeded lands for men to raise crops, and country folk said forests, meadows, and wildlife were the magical gifts of the Vaere. Whichever philosophy a man chose to believe, none who beheld the edge of the growing earth ever felt less than a shiver of dread.
Mist and rain overhung the rock like a shroud. The bread grew soggy in Jaric's hand; in disgust he tossed the last bit away, then dragged the pack onto tired shoulders with a muttered curse at the weather.
'Sky'll be clear before midnight.' The Kielmark adjusted his sword sheath, and shook his head. 'You'll wish for dirty weather then. We'll stand out on these fells like fleas on a whore's sheets, and Shadowfane's watchtowers are manned by creatures with eyes on both sides of their heads.'
Jaric received this comment with a sceptical expression, wasted, because of the dark. 'You've been there?'
The Kielmark's teeth gleamed in a brief grin. 'Never. But the fellow who told me was sober.'
'My sword to a bootlace he wasn't.' Jaric shook water out of his hair. 'No sailor ever enters your presence who isn't full of beer to bolster his courage. You've the reputation of a shearfish, all teeth and bite.'
'And a good thing that will be, if we meet Scait's four-eyed beasties in a fight.' The Kielmark pushed to his feet. Spoilingly impatient, he said, 'Are you ready?'
They proceeded, and the air grew colder. The breeze shifted northwest. Rain and clouds gave way to a star-spiked arch of sky. The rock of the fells extended in all directions, windswept and deserted, except for a single gleam of scarlet near the horizon. The sight raised chills on Jaric's flesh; a stronghold arose as if chiselled from a hilltop, all angled battlements, with silhouettes of spindled towers bleak and black against the indigo of the heavens.
'Shadowfane, sure's frost.' Grimly the Kielmark loosed the lashing on the tip of his scabbard, that his sword might be ready for action.
Ivainson Firelord had no words for the occasion. No longer the scribe who had apprenticed at Morbrith, nor the boy who had trapped ice otter in Seitforest, he bowed his head. His hands glowed blue in the darkness as he summoned Earthmastery to sound the stone underfoot. From the images drawn from Dreamweaver and Llondelei, he knew that a chain o
f caverns riddled the ground beneath Shadowfane. Through them, a combination of sorcery and sailor's luck might permit entry into Shadowfane unobserved.
* * *
Far south, drizzle still cloaked a fortress under a red wolf banner. A sentry paced restlessly, his beat altered slightly to avoid a rumpled figure in Dreamweaver's robes of silver-grey. Taen sat with her head cradled on her forearms, her shoulders framed by the rough stone sill of Cliffhaven's watchtower. She had drifted into sleep while tracing Jaric's progress northward through Felwaithe, but her rest was troubled.
She dreamed of a chamber floored in dark marble where red-paned lanterns burned. There a Thienz in green beads and armbands bowed before a throne built of stuffed human limbs. 'Lord-mightiest, the Firelord and his companion have crawled beneath the earth. My kind can no longer track them, but their intent is plain. They will emerge within the dungeons of Shadowfane, to the sorrow of us all.'
The figure stirred on the throne, silencing the toadlike creature on the rug. Yellow eyes opened, evil and narrow and set like a snake's; razor rows of teeth gleamed in shadow as the Demon Lord responded. 'No sorrow, but the humans', for Shadowfane is prepared for them. Firelord and Kielmark walk into an ambush. If we introduce a third Sathid to Ivainson's body, how long do you suppose he can maintain control? Very soon his powers shall be ours to command.'
Scait added in mind-speak that through Jaric even the Morrigierj might be managed. He hissed with laughter, and his sultry gaze seemed to focus directly upon the watchtower at Cliffhaven where Taen wakened, screaming.
The sentry gripped her shoulders in mail-clad fists, vainly trying to comfort. Shivering, chilled by more than cold, Taen shook him off. 'Fetch Anskiere. Tell him we must abandon the children held captive at Shadowfane. Scait has learned of our plan to steal the Sathid.'
The sentry hesitated, scarred features pinched in a frown.
'Hurry!' Taen wasted no more words, but snapped her talents into focus and sent north, to warn. Her probe coursed rocky fells, windy and empty of life. The man she loved and the tempestuous King of Pirates had already entered the caverns. Since dream-search could not reach through solid stone, disaster was unavoidable. Firelord and Kielmark would walk into a demon trap ready and armed against them.
XVI
Stalkers
Fading enchantments lent rock walls the fleeting glimmer of faery gold; then darkness fell, in a swirl of cold air. Ivainson Jaric stepped through an archway still hot from the shaping of his Earthmastery. Sweating from the warmth thrown off by the rock, he took a deep breath. The passage he entered smelled muddy and damp. Underground springs trickled over channels worn smooth by erosion, the echoes like whispers in the dark; all else was still. No living creature inhabited the cave.
There's still rock dividing us from Shadowfane's dungeon.' Reverberation splintered the Firelord's words into multiple voices as he concluded. 'This is the last sealed cavern we'll cross if you want to enter through the lowest level.' He lifted his hands, and controlled flame speared the air above his fingers.
The illumination sparked mad glints in the Kielmark's eyes. Black, unruly hair bound back with a twist of linen lent Keithland's most powerful sovereign the appearance of a brute peasant. 'Just so there's headroom. Can't swing a blade while grubbing along on my belly.'
Metal whined in shadow as he cleared his sword from his scabbard. 'On, then.'
Jaric started forward, more like a scribe caught out of his element than the Vaere-trained sorcerer Keithland's survival depended upon. He fretted at the hazard presented by his companion, who might stumble on the rough footing and slice him through with three spans of unsheathed steel. But as always, the Kielmark moved like a cat. Except for his weapon, he might have been enjoying a holiday procession in Kor's temple, so blithely did he keep pace at Jaric's shoulder.
Ahead, the cavern loomed dark as a grave. Ivainson adjusted his mastery, and flames flared brighter from his fist. The passage crooked through buttresses of stone and widened into a troll forest of stalagmites, coloured bone and ochre, and sleeked like slag with run-off. A black maw opened underfoot, where streams carved into the unknown deeps of the earth. Jaric jumped the crevice. His heels grated on sand as he strode to the far wall and applied his Earthmaster's touch. The fingertips of both hands flared blue as he traced an area encrusted with limestone. Sathid-born powers resonated through the cavern. Ivainson's features tightened, and the hotter fires that leapt above his knuckles suddenly extinguished.
'You play havoc with a man's night sight that way,' carped the Kielmark. His boots scraped over stone as he closed the last stride by touch, disoriented only slightly by the sudden dark.
Jaric disregarded the complaint. 'Beyond this barrier lies Shadowfane.' Harrowed by sudden uncertainty, he lowered his arms to his sides. Anskiere's distrust, Taen's love; all that he strove to change or cherish in his life within Keithland seemed remote as the lushness of spring when snows lay deep over the land.
Air winnowed, sliced by steel as the Kielmark raised his sword. 'Nothing to gain by waiting, sorcerer. Either you make spells, or I shove you aside and start chipping rock.'
The ruthless arrogance in the words startled like a blow, until Jaric recalled the six companies of Cliffhaven's men who had perished with Morbrith. The Kielmark's grudges inevitably resolved in bloody vengeance; whether the offenders were human or demon made no whit of difference.
Jaric raised hands that once had penned copy for the archives of an Earl's library; those pages were ash, now, and mourned not at all, unless by the ghost of the master scribe tortured to his death in Morbrith's bailey. With more sorrow than anger, Ivainson Firelord marshalled his powers. He touched, and where his fingers passed, a livid red line seared the stone.
Fumes scoured his nostrils. Jaric directed his Earth-mastery through the sheen of tear-blurred vision. Presently the line parted, frayed into light like the edge of a smouldering parchment. Draught rushed through the gap. Ivainson shielded his face behind one arm, his cheek whipped by the laces of his cuff. The Kielmark sweated impatiently; heated air sang across his swordblade as the stone dividing Shadowfane from the wild caves of the fells crumpled away under the influence of sorcery.
A corridor gaped beyond, still as old dust; the one visible wall was patterned in hexagonal brick, pierced by a lintel streaked with rust from a torch bracket. No cresset blazed in the socket. Not even water drops disturbed the quiet. Jaric's enchantment fizzled into sparks, then darkness. Firelord and Kielmark paused, unbreathing, but no outcry arose; no lantern flared to expose the presence of intruders and no sentry leaped forth to make outcry. Though all but a few demons avoided the confining properties of stone, the absence of security in the dungeons under Shadowfane came as a profound relief. Fortune perhaps had seen two humans through the vulnerable moment of entry.
Jaric shifted his weight, but found his step prevented by a crushing grip on his shoulder.
The Kielmark whispered softly as a breath in his ear. 'Let me go first.'
Startled by an expression of trust, Ivainson conceded. Other than Corley, he had never known the Kielmark to tolerate an armed man behind him.
'Go left, then.' Jaric let his Earthmastery range a short way ahead. 'You'll pass a row of cells with studded doors, then a stairway. If there's a sentry, we'll probably find him on the first landing.' Distressed that he still felt unequal to whatever perils might await, the Firelord summoned a spark to guide the way into Shadowfane's deepest dungeons.
'Belay the light. I'd best go on by touch.' The Kielmark pushed past, his sword a flash that vanished as the Firelord closed his fist to muffle his spell.
Jaric crossed the gap on the heels of his companion. As his boot sole scuffed blindly against brick on the far side, contact touched off an explosion of energy in his mind. Evidently the passage was warded. Jaric's hand hardened instantly on his sword hilt. He groped to restrain the Kielmark, but his companion had already passed beyond reach. To call aloud might bring demons. Left no
better alternative, Ivainson Firelord crossed quickly into the passage.
The air grew palpably dense, as if shadow had somehow gained substance. Jaric strained to breathe. Left in no doubt that he had triggered defences conjured by demons, he opened his fingers. Weakened to a dull gleam of red, the spark's thin glimmer revealed a corridor choked with mist. The Kielmark was nowhere to be seen.
Mortally afraid, his body slicked with sweat, Jaric attempted another step. Sorcery rippled around him. The fog vanished in the space of a stride, and darkness thinned to normal. The simple spell in his hand brightened like a beacon star. In the sudden splash of light, Jaric sighted the Kielmark. Vital, indomitable, the sovereign Lord of Cliffhaven poised beneath the stair with his sword raised en garde. On the landing above, rank upon rank, lurked a clawed and hideous pack of demons. The fact they carried no weapon did not reassure; like the Llondelei, their ability to manipulate the mind could be lethal.
The Kielmark reflexively back-stepped. Braced against the wall to avoid being surrounded and struck down from behind, he shouted orders. 'Jaric! Leave these to me.'
But retreat was already useless. Thienz were telepaths; what one saw, all demons within the fortress would share in the space of a thought. The Kielmark must know that enemy reinforcements could be expected at any moment. Jaric decided their only chance of escape lay through his powers of Earthmastery. He strode forward and drew his sword.
The wards flared active and rinsed the corridor with orange light. 'Fall back!' the Firelord called to his companion. In another moment the fullness of his powers could be focused. Jaric fused his awareness with the stone, prepared to seal the passage against the enemy.
But the Kielmark paid no heed. Sword angled at the ready, he beckoned to the Thienz on the stair. 'C'mon, spawn of malformed lizards. In remembrance of Corley's companies, it's time to visit the butcher.'