Then the water suddenly rippled. There snapped above the surface what looked like an end of rope. Upon sighting that, Ashen fled, no longer sure that she was on any hidden way. However, here the brush did not grow so thickly, and there were no tangles of willows. The mist surrounding her provided a fraction of light, so she could determine that here there were more tall-standing stones.
The cliffs were visible against the rapidly darkening sky.
She wound her way around piles of broken stone, not as thickly massed as those in the city on the isle, but still urging caution. As she went, she listened.
The other dwellers in the Bog were beginning their time of twilight hunting.
There were coughing roars, shrill peepings. Once she crouched tight against another pillar of stone while there came a loud splashing from close by, coupled with a bellow. But that sound led away from her and after a tense wait, she continued.
She caught, beyond the stones, the gleam of what could only be a watch-fire, and that drove her southward to avoid discovery.
At length, her body aching from the strain, she heard the flow of water. If she had reckoned true, that must be the river bounding the Bog here. With a scramble, she fought her way through more brush, to come out at its bank.
However, she could not use it as a guide, for she had reached the swallow-hole.
Water tumbled through a veiling of mist into a gap in the earth and was gone.
But she had also reached the edge of the cliff. It loomed as a dark wall beyond the hole.
The inner wall of the cliff showed other cracks and fissures in addition to that through which the water poured. Ashen went carefully, step by step, hoping to flank the stream, her goal still the cliff. Evening was gathering in, and from behind there came the louder sounds of the Bog's night-waking. She must have some shelter should any of the under-hunters come forth, seeking prey.
To the right of the stream-swallowing opening was a darker shadow, hinting at a cave. Shifting her pack, she looked for any hand- and footholds that might take her aloft.
The harsh edges of the rock scraped her hands painfully, but she was able to draw herself up and found that indeed there was a narrow fissure before her. A heavy roar from below gave strength to her faltering limbs. She vaulted up and fell sprawling into that opening. Nor did she try to look back, but rather, pushed inward as fast as she could.
Here the rock was not rough; some force in the past might have smoothed a passage. But the darkness was thick. She became aware of unfamiliar smells, curiously fresh, that must be borne from the sea beyond. Using her staff, she struck ahead, hoping to find the end of this pocket. Her explorations told her that she was indeed in a hollow of size enough to hold her without cramping.
A fire was out of the question, but she still had some dried trail food that she chewed vigorously as she tried to plan ahead. It was probably true, Ashen thought, that she had lost the trail and was no longer headed in the direction of the man she had followed. She did not hear the voice of any drum from the outer air, but that did not mean that the Bog-folk were not alert and on guard.
Best remain in this pocket of safety until the coming of morning, when her eyes could serve her better.
She loosed her woven ground-cover roll from her pack and spread it out by touch.
This would not be a soft bed, but what strayer in the Bog dared hope for that?
Taking a small sip from her water carrier, she swished it about in her mouth before she swallowed it, then stretched herself on her sleep-mat and closed her eyes firmly.
The dark enfolded her like a second mound of blankets, and she realized that her journey had tired her to the point that she was assailed by various aches and pains. Hunching up, she fumbled in her pack and carefully loosed one of the small bags lashed so carefully inside.
Though the dank breath of the Bog and the play of sea scent surrounded her,
Ashen could also smell the pungency of the herb within. With infinite care, she got the bag open, working blindly and afraid that she might waste its contents by spillage. With forefinger and thumb, she pinched the roughness of dried leaves and transferred them to her mouth. Then she closed the bag and returned it to her stores.
Ashen would have liked to spit out the small mouthful, as its acid taste burned her tongue and the insides of her cheeks. Instead, she forced herself to chew it into a paste and swallow. Now her mouth felt numb. She settled back on the mat and waited hopefully for sleep.
The soothing curtain of unawareness she sought did not come. She twisted and turned on the mat, trying to make herself more comfortable. Sounds from the Bog echoed, indicating plainly that the under-ones were out in full hunt. Ashen shivered suddenly as she thought of some one of the smaller monsters tracing her by scent and climbing to claw her out of this refuge.
But gradually she became aware of something else. It was no warning from without such as she now listened for, but rather, an uneasiness, as if there were some warning whisper in the blackness about her. The sense of it was beyond her power to understand.
At length, that strange message, if message it was, drowned out her surroundings. She lay quiet and slowly repeated scraps she had gleaned from the rituals Zazar had recited when they were together. Though she could not really believe that any aid from such bits of ancient and nearly unintelligible petitions could be summoned, she did discover that the sense of dread was retreating. She relaxed a little, knowing that there had come a kind of reassurance, not from her own thoughts, but out of nowhere.
Zazar? she wondered drowsily.
She opened her eyes once more to find herself surrounded by light coming through the opening in the wall's fissure. The light was dim, but enough to let her see around her. And now she discovered a second opening in her refuge—little more than a slit in the wall facing the break through which she had crawled. It had been easy to miss in the dark.
She sat up and studied it closely. Again she knew that strange sensation, as if a distant cry was summoning—
But Ashen did not have long to try to understand. Another cry, this one not imaginary, arose from just outside the cliff's opening. She had a jumbled impression of a huge head darting in and out of the aperture before she could see it plainly. Again the cry sounded, shrill but as threatening as any bellow she had ever heard. The river poured seaward not too far away. Was this some lurker in the waters emerging to edge across the cliff wall, having scented her?
Ashen drew her knife. It was clean-bladed and as sharp as careful honing could make it, but for her to use it effectively, she must be very close to her attacker. Her only other weapon was the staff she had used to test her
Bog-going.
Another screech echoed, and again something thrust in toward her. This time she could see what it was, and she drew a sharp breath. This creature was one of the giant Bog-birds. Years ago she had seen the large body that had taxed two hunters to drag back to the village, while their companions supported Batyon, who had met the bird and had his face nearly torn off. And another of these giants was now, apparently, intent on making her into its breakfast.
At least she knew exactly where she was now. Lucky for the Bog-folk that these birds were to be found only amid the southwestern cliffs and it was seldom that any villager ventured in that direction.
Again came the frustrated screeching. Ashen fingered the staff. If it had taken four hunting spears to bring down the creature Joal's people had killed, of what use would this be, having no hard shell or honed tooth- point to pierce the heavily leathered skin? Inevitably, she would be the bird's meal, unless—She turned once more to the other break in the crevice wall, visible only because it made a more profound blackness against the dark rock. There was no light in it.
Rolling the sleep-mat, she lashed it to her pack. It would not do, she decided, to try to shoulder it. The other opening looked to be narrow and perhaps she would have to drag the pack to work her way through.
With a last screech ringing in her e
ars, she started into the unknown. It turned out to be a kind of tunnel, not wide, but much longer than it had appeared from her sleeping place. Within a very short time, she was aware that the sharp scent of the sea was growing stronger. Since there was no light, she must move cautiously. Once, she tried to see if her direction amulet would aid her, but it remained stubbornly dull. She used instead the staff to tap out a way ahead, hoping that she could avoid any perilous surprises.
Ashen went slowly and with all the care she could summon. Then she became aware that her passage was tilting upward. She could no longer glimpse any light ahead; if the tunnel opened out on the sea face of the cliff, her goal still lay far ahead. Her staff struck an obstruction and she prodded both high and low. To her dismay, there seemed an unbroken wall facing her now. But as she continued to probe, she encountered no barrier to the right. So, the way turned here. But now she faced another difficulty. The tunnel ended abruptly. Her staff slammed against what could only be a rise, and a moment later, she used one hand as well as the willow branch to explore. To her astonishment, she found a set of stairs leading upward.
As she sat back on her heels to consider the wisdom of struggling up those stairs, she caught a glimpse well above her of a faint lightening of the heavy gloom. With this for a guide, she pulled up from one stair step to the next.
The grayness lightened and became weak daylight as she reached the top and saw before her another rock-walled pocket similar to the one in which she had taken refuge the night before. However, at the far end of this there was a much larger break for an exit, higher up on the wall, and into that there streamed daylight, as well as a steady pounding noise and a refreshing sea scent.
Ashen climbed out from the passage. As she got to her feet, she saw that against the wall to her right there lay a collection of bones, and she recognized another skeleton.
Not yet ready to examine this fresh mystery, she settled down to rest, as far from the remains as the cave would allow. The journey had exhausted her, and her stomach was demanding food. While she pondered that bundle of bones, she hunted for a portion of trail fare—there was little of it left—and allowed herself two sips of water.
These remains were similar to the other skeleton she had discovered. She could understand the impulse to leave the first one near the burial chamber in the stone ruins, in the company of others and in a place built for it—but this one was not the same. The first might well have met with an accident, but what had befallen this one, and why the bones had been so left, she could not guess. This one's skull was separated from the rest of the bones and had been set upon a pile of old ashes, to stare eyelessly at the rock overhead. Finally, she rose and moved to kneel down beside the remains.
The daylight reached in with probing fingers now; the air was brighter. A spear lay nearby, its shaft broken into several pieces. He had been buried with his weapon, set to watch—but to watch what? Had he been a sacrifice? What had caused him to be left here, his skull set apart from the rest of him?
Ashen could no longer look at the dead. Bare bones had little resemblance to the here and now. But the fate of this man spurred her onward. She got to her feet and went to that opening into day, turning from death to life as she looked through the doorway toward the sunlight and pounding sea below.
There had been once, she discovered, a kind of perilous path hacked into the rock a foot or so below the entrance. But it did not extend far. Some long-ago slide of rock had destroyed the way, shearing it off. She crept halfway through the opening and looked out upon what she had only heard about—the sea.
Even the stories had not prepared her for this vast, incredibly blue, marvelously clean stretch of water. It washed below, striking the root of the cliff with continued hammer blows. And, jammed amid a tumble of rock, perhaps those same stones that had been loosened by the past slippage, there lay a strange tangle of salt-bleached wood, as if some craft had been pounded to its ruin here.
There was no way down. She was on the very verge of the opening now. But, she thought, what about up? Yes, that way promised a path, not so evident as the beginning of the way down showed, but one she believed could be followed.
There remained the birds. She huddled down and set her thoughts to them. She looked out at the water, attracted by a movement. Something bobbed on the sea, and she realized it was a sailing vessel, like the wreckage below, only still whole. By dint of shading her eyes and straining to see, she could make out people on it.
Then, in a flash of insight, she realized the meaning of the tableau she had stumbled upon, and began to shiver anew. The wreckage below—obviously a large boat like the one now bobbing on the sea—had been lured by a light set to entrap it. And the man who tended this light had been killed and set as a warning least others practice the same deceit—
It really was a completely different world, outside the Bog.
Then came another outcry—but this one was from a human throat, not a scream but a shout. A man's voice, echoed by others, and the screeches of attacking birds…
Seventeen
Ysa at a little apart from her ladies. On her knee was stitching frame upon which was fastened a section of a roll of cloth marked with embroidery patterns.
She frequently found that planning came easier somehow when she was staring at needle and thread. Not that she ever accomplished much with her stitchery. Now she waited, her needle idle.
All had gone well, at least so far. She had her private news of Marfey—No, she must remember. Marcala. The lady's cortege, supposedly from the east, should arrive within this turn of the hourglass.
Harous had not yet returned from whatever business— it certainly was not hunting—that had drawn him to the border of the Bog-land. Perhaps Marcala could satisfy her curiosity on that question. Ysa had long speculated as to his choice of prowling, to no avail.
There was a respectful scratching at the door, and the Lady Grisella, nearest that portal, went to answer. A moment later, she turned and curtsied to the
Queen. "Your Majesty, the Lady Marcala desires entrance."
Ysa nodded, and as the ladies murmured to themselves, Grisella moved aside to admit a woman whose appearance put all within the room into dull shade. Even Ysa in her crimson velvet felt somewhat eclipsed. The woman's violet gown was of rich stuff, and vaux lilies were worked on it in a peach shade shot with silver threads. As counterpoint, the fragrance of the same blooms wafted delicately with her every movement.
She indeed proved true all the whispers about her legendary beauty. Such were not rumors at all. There was also floating about her, like a shadowy cloak, a seductive quality that was not quite by conscious will but exuded from her inner person, an enticement that worked upon men and women as well.
She dropped a deep curtsy before the Queen. Ysa did not rise, but waved Marcala closer.
"Welcome," she said in greeting, her voice cool and detached. Word of Marcala's arrival was already about, and she must make sure that no one at court could claim that the Queen favored a lady who caused such whispers as people spread only behind shielding hands. Ysa made another small gesture, and the least of her waiting ladies brought a stool for the newcomer—pointedly not the low chair to which her station entitled her. The visitor was not smiling, and the Queen knew very well that Marcala was aware of the gathering resentment among her ladies.
Ysa had no time to add anything to her greeting, for another scratching sounded at the door. She nodded to Grisella, who had taken up again her station nearest the door, to answer.
If the arrival of Marcala was a surprise to her women, the man who now entered had the effect of a thunderbolt. Royance strode in, bowed, and then stood awaiting acknowledgment of his presence. His very bearing radiated confidence, but as far as the Queen was concerned, he brought uneasiness with him.
Ysa struggled to remain impassive, though inwardly she was close to screaming at the terrible coincidence. There were too many questions that Royance might ask.
Her only cou
rse was to refuse to allow him to voice any of them in this company, and that was what she now chose to do.
"My Lord Royance, give you sun for the day," she said, granting him the most formal—and least meaningful— greeting.
"May the sun be warm, the day bright for Your Majesty," he replied in kind. But he divided his gaze between her and Marcala.
There was nothing for it but to be gracious. Ysa indicated the newcomer. "My lord, this is a welcome addition to our court, the Lady Marcala of Valvager."
The lady was already on her feet and dipped a curtsy of just the proper depth.
"Bright welcome to you, Lady," he replied. But he was eyeing Marcala as suspiciously as if she held some stealthy weapon in the wide folds of her skirt.
"May the sun be warm on you, my lord." Marcala's voice was soft, and Ysa thought she heard a murmur of beguilement in it. She would have none of that. Marcala was playing the role intended for her, yes, but she was to have only one prey here—Harous.
Ysa could guess also that it was not the newcomer who had brought Royance to her chamber. He would not have sought his Queen out unless it was of the utmost necessity. To end the flirtatious by-play, she decided to take the initiative.