A faint Send came from him, an urging for us to follow.
With a gagging distaste, I set the dagger in my belt, feeling that I had taken on a touch of evil, as I began to search for handholds in the leafcurtained vines.
My climb was both awkward and slow, however I found no looseness of vine or indwelling creature to fear. As Zolan’s companion had done, I pulled myself over the ledge to lie panting for a moment while the beast’s tongue flicked across my cheek.
The vine was shaking—someone had followed me. On hands and knees I crawled away and for the first time saw that this spot was closely akin to the one we had found earlier. The ledge was deeper than one might guess from below.
Not too far from me lay blackened stone bearing signs of past fires, and piled against the cliff were bags and bundles. This must be the camp we sought.
I made no move to investigate by myself but, a moment later, Tam was with me. After her came Zolan, and last of all Cilla. I was trying to understand how and why the Breakswords had chosen this site.
Tamara
IT WAS GOOD to stand armed properly once more. The hilt of the blade I had found was firm in my hand as I breathed deeply. I had not realized how the lack of customary weapons would be so frustrating. Zolan had never known such skill. That would be another problem we must solve, but it could wait.
Almost as one, the three of us turned to the gear piled along the cliff. Never knowing what we might be forced to handle in the future, we did not slash the ropes that held the bundles and bags, but worked patiently at the knots to free the contents.
Indeed the Breakswords had made a profitable raid! They certainly had not plundered a mere tower hold—they must instead have taken some helpless merchant. The prize was sober clothing and, though the garments were of dull shades and plain of adornment, the stuff was honest wool and recently woven. Such would not betray us to any we would meet.
“New made,” Cilla commented as she stroked the folds of a sturdy gray cloak.
“Merchant’s trade goods,” I returned firmly. “Fortune has dealt well with us! A chapman can travel in a small party without attracting too much attention, so we might well pass with little notice.”
Bina shook her head. “But without mounts and pack ponies, are we to drag our wealth along the ground?”
I laughed. “Bina, you have ever been the practical one! Yes, animals we must have—”
There came a sharp hissing sound from above. Glancing up, we saw that Climber had reached the top of the outer cliff. We looked to Zolan for interpretation. He laid his sword carefully on the ledge and, giving us no explanation, set himself to another laborious climb. If he had possessed the clawed feet of his beast, he might have made a faster job of the journey. We watched him go at a creep, testing and retesting each hold before trusting to it.
Until we knew more, we had no desire to follow. However, we set aside exploration of the packs but rather sat with our heads at a painful angle to watch him. I caught up a handful of grit that some past wind had deposited in a place between two packs and began to rub it along the spotted blade.
I had not known how deeply I had missed weapons until I once more held a sword hilt in my hand. Yes—I had drawn upon the Power, yet I had always been aware that true control of that was a chancy thing. Steel, though, was a tool I could be sure of.
But I nearly dropped the weapon when I was hailed by a Send I knew by now, only that alien shading did not accompany it.
“Up!” Zolan made an order of that.
We were in no way in a hurry to obey but lingered to roll the plunder back into the covering that had protected it.
“Up!” A shade of anger darkened the message.
Zolan had always curbed any emotion he might feel, except when Climber had been injured, but not this time. Was he threatened by some danger?
The cat-creature had swung into sight again and was descending with the same skill that he had used to go aloft. We had moved to cliffside and I, for one, was trying to make out handholds. However, our red-coated fellow traveler did not even look at us. Determinedly he made for the booty, set his needle-tipped teeth in a rope end, then leaped back and began to climb again, trailing the rope behind. Once more he disappeared over the rock edge above and was gone.
The rope flapped against the stone wall behind him, gave a short tug upward and settled again.
“Rope!” The message of the Send was no longer “up,” but it was easy enough to understand. We need not fear trusting ourselves to those shallow, sometimes only fingertip holds Climber and Zolan had used—we would also have this support.
The thick cord was still twitching, and I guessed that Zolan was making fast the other end as swiftly as he could. I looked to Bina and Cilla, made my sword tight as possible without proper sheath, and reached for the rope that at last had stopped swinging.
As I climbed, I marveled that Zolan had made his ascent without a rope. I considered that I was well trained in the martial arts and that I subdued once and for all the uneasiness with heights that I had fought desperately when younger, yet I had the feeling that some force in this place, albeit one weak enough to be withstood, had pressed against me all the way. A neardissipated Warding? I fought down that first flicker of fear and, with my hands on the rope and the toes of my boots searching for chinks in the wall, I continued.
From above a hand reached down. Steely as a chain it closed about my wrist and, in a breath or two, I was drawn painfully over a rocky edge, feeling my clothing tear.
Now two hands were set on my shoulders, lifting the forepart of my body to drag me along. My sight had blurred, and I felt suddenly so weak that I lay flat where I had been dropped, able only to shift my head to one side, so that I did not rest facedown.
I could do no more than lie there panting. A short while later I heard sounds behind me, surely announcing the arrival of one of my sisters. I tried a mind-message and met only confusion.
Weaker and weaker I grew. I attempted to draw on Power, however, not only did nothing answer but clouding of mind now joined diminished sight. Even as I had been thrust here, so another compulsion arose—one that strove to push me backward. Yet I would not yield until darkness fell, perhaps to enclose me forever.
Drucilla
THE ROPE AND the rock that faced me I could no longer resist, nor did I really wish to. Tam had gone and then Bina. The rope pulled taut, and I judged that an order to be followed.
As I fought my way upward I realized I was meeting opposition from without—a challenge set not against the body but rather the Talent. It was surely a Ward and, though nowhere near as strong as those we had found elsewhere in the Dismals, it still tried to repel me, so that I had to put forth twice the effort I might have used. I began to mutter my desire for aid.
Several days had elapsed between our meeting with the Jugged One and the making of this climb. I did not think that Pharsali intended us to shrink from what we did now. Perhaps Wards grew weaker with the passage of time, and this might be old by human reckoning, nonetheless a force so used might have been partly the reason for the carnage to be seen on the floor of the world below.
It grew necessary for me to pause longer and longer in my search for toeholds as I proceded. Without the rope I could not have done it at all. However, I was aware of what lay about me when Zolan reached to draw me onto level ground. The air was much cooler and I was shivering, regretting that good cloak I had left behind; but with his help, I was able to totter over and drop down beside my sisters.
Tam had managed to lever herself up straight-armed, though she was blinking oddly and showed no sign of recognizing me. Bina was twisting back and forth as if to bring herself also into sitting position.
Having made sure of us, Zolan stood a little away on a plateau that stretched for what might be leagues beyond toward distant mountains. I could not see what had caught his attention, but he suddenly began to stride away from where we were clustered.
We watched as our guide co
ntinued to grow smaller before our eyes. By the sun, the time must have been well past the midpoint of the day. This place held no cave or other shelter, and the wind freshened to roughen our skin; however, no one suggested returning down that rigorous climb to raid the loot on the ledge-camp for other clothing.
Tam got to her feet and Climber raised his head from his paws. She made no move to push past him but shuffled instead to the rope, which lay slack across the mixture of rock and sun-baked earth. She stooped, caught at the cord, and tugged. The far end did not come free; it appeared to be securely anchored.
As if she were too tired to return the few steps to us, she sat down there. The front of both her jerkin and her leggings were scraped, and small tears showed in the fabric, yet she made no effort to examine them. Zolan was no longer in sight. We might attempt to follow, save that none of us three had the strength for such action.
Bina did not get to her feet, but she moved to face us at the rim of the Dismals. She was frowning.
“The other side—” She spoke as if assuring herself of the accuracy of a memory. “Maclan dropped us from the other side. Must we get all the way around the Dismals?”
I found that possibility too overwhelming to answer at once. She was right, our enemies’ approach had been from the east, not the west. But such concerns did not seem to matter anymore; I, for one, could stir for no action whatever. The thought of having to tramp forward for an unknown number of leagues, guided by the dizzying edge of the canyon rim, was too exhausting a prospect for me to consider at present.
That Ward, for force-barrier it must have been, still possessed enough power to limit us. I was cold, hungry, and thirsty. The answers for all of those wants lay below. Perhaps this was not the route Pharsali had promised us. We were out of the Dismals, yes, but were still almost as helpless as we had been when we were sent there. Zolan had gone off. If he had spoken the truth, he was as ignorant of the land that stretched about us as we had been of his world.
Tam looked out over the country where our host had disappeared. Once more she grasped the rope and gave a sharp tug; this time, though, it did not come free here where its end was twined around two large stones pushed together.
“We cannot go down again,” I protested. “The Ward is not exhausted but we are.”
Bina nodded. “That is so.”
Tam turned to face us squarely. “Now we ought not to attempt it, no, yet it must be done. Without supplies and warmer clothing it is useless to—”
She stopped nearly in midword. We felt it, too—a pull, a compulsion. Oddly, it brought no fear but rather a sensation of expectation totally free of any emotion but a feeling of goodwill.
We moved together, though none of us rose to our feet. Now we were crouched shoulder to shoulder, hand clasping hand, and waiting—
This was unlike anything I had felt—we had felt—before. I tried to sift the feeling, believing it could not be intended for me. It radiated warmth, not for the body but the mind. Someone—or thing—wished me well but also desired my presence. I looked at Bina and to Cilla. They were watching the land, whose openness was broken only by clumps of trees here and there.
Climber was on his feet again, his head up. He gave a cry that was neither yelp nor purr, yet no challenge.
“Zolan!”
I was sure I was right. Then I saw distant movement. We sat, still handlinked, waiting. Out among the sparse stands of trees, the sprouting grass of late spring, shadows began to move. No, not shadows—solid forms, and they were coming at such a good pace that they grew quickly before our eyes.
“Horses!” I cried aloud.
At the front of the small herd there was a mounted figure. Zolan, it must be the man from the Dismals, but how—?
That compulsion now centered upon the rider and the animals which followed him. The mounts looked unlike the horses I had ridden; then I understood. Though there were indeed three or four taller animals among them, Zolan was astride the bare back of one of several small, tough ponies, such as had been known and cherished centuries long in Gurlyon for their versatility.
In a moment they were level with us. Zolan slipped from his seat, turning to draw one hand down the nose of his mount before he faced us. Though none of them appeared tired, neither did any stray, but remained in an uncertain half-circle.
Zolan still did not address us. Instead he looked to Climber, and I felt the brush of that alien Send. The red-coated beast walked toward the man slowly. Some of the ponies snorted and backed a little, but not one bolted. Climber reached the horse Zolan still kept hold of by the ragged mane, matted with leaf fragments and a twist of vine.
Talents—! This was true Talent, but it was not one we shared. I had heard of horsetalkers, men who could walk out to even a nervous stallion or battle destrier and, within moments, establish bond. Perhaps that was how, originally, a fierce hunter such as Climber had become his companion.
I was on my feet now, walking toward him. This pocket-sized herd was not from any proud stable—the closer I drew, the more visible that fact became. They were of the wild, untended by any currycomb, perhaps never having felt the weight of a saddle.
Eighteen
Sabina
So Zolan performed an act of Power which answered our most pressing problem. The herd he had found and ensorcelled spread out a little to graze, pawing at the dry winter grass, seeking to uncover the new growth still low to the ground. Zolan appeared unaffected by the energyleaching barrier that had tested us so severely, but then he had also walked through the one in the cave, which had been an iron wall as far as we were concerned. When Tam spoke of the difficulty we had in passing this Ward, he only shrugged. Nor did he give any explanation of how and where he had discovered the horses and ponies. He made no effort now to keep them within our reach, but rather set about at once to retrieve the plunder from below.
We would have joined, although reluctantly, in the effort, but he waved us away, even as he readied for what we opined was a descent as dangerous as the climb had been. Climber flashed down at twice the man’s speed, though Zolan seemed well fitted for what he must do. We tossed the free end of the rope over the edge at his call and waited until it twitched, whereupon we labored to draw it up, discovering that we must work together to raise the two bundles it held.
Though in spring the days had begun to lengthen, twilight was drawing in, and we could not continue in the dark. After we had untied the fourth load and dropped the rope once more, there came no further signals; instead Climber joined us. Lashed to the red fur of his back was a small bundle, which he brought directly to me.
He sat there staring up into my face, and I received a fleeting mind-picture of the waterfall in Zolan’s cave. The suggestion was both plain and effective—I was so dry I could scarcely gather enough moisture in my mouth to swallow. My hands had been busy, and I was now holding the contents of the bag he had brought me: four waterskins, flat and dry.
Climber’s tongue lolled out. Seeing that I was watching him, he rose and turned. As I gazed at him, he looked over his shoulder. I took the hint.
Tam and Cilla were at the cliff edge watching Zolan’s ascent. I nodded to Climber, and he trotted off with me moving slowly and weakly in his wake. By my calculation we headed north. As we moved out, I began to hear bird cries; a moment later my fogged mind and muffled senses connected to give me an answer. Months before, as the pitiless Gurlyon winter approached, I had heard such vocal flocks flying south in gatherings so vast they could not be numbered. Now they must be on their way back to their summer range.
Can the human nose, so inferior to that of animals, pick up the scent of water? I was certain now that I moved towards that life-giving source, and my pace quickened as my body’s demands overcame my weariness. We were a good distance away from the cliff, and the way was dipping gradually lower so that I did not have to look for hand- and toeholds as I moved. Below stood trees, of the sort that did not shed in winter but held their dark needlelike foliage all
year long. They raggedly surrounded a circular pond of respectable size.
I lifted my cupped hands a little later, to relish a draught of cool water. I gulped and sputtered as it drained down my chin and throat. Then my father’s warning surfaced in my mind: Drink sparingly at first, if you have been long thirsty. But simply to sit there and allow the water to trickle through my fingers, watch the migrating birds float and wade a little distance away, and to take a sip now and then was blessedly renewing. For a time, I forgot all else.
Climber came to nudge against me, taking the edge of one of the waterskins and tugging it away. I roused myself and set about filling them; it was near dark now, and guilt spurred me on. When the bags were bulging, I shouldered the straps while Climber waited impatiently for me a little way along the return trail.
Drucilla
THERE APPEARED TO be no end to Zolan’s energy; perhaps our erstwhile host was better able to call on his own sense of Power than we could now do with ours. He pulled and positioned the larger bundles we had drawn up the cliff into an uneven circle. The cloak I had wished for lay now about my shoulders, and Bina had given me some crumpled leaves to rub between my rope-burned palms.
She had returned, before the light failed, with news of nearby water, and four skins of it burdening her back. What food supplies the unfortunate merchant and his attackers had left were no longer fit for use. But Climber had brought in a grass-runner, while Zolan supplied some roots to bury under the coals of the fire, above which chunks of meat seared on sharpened sticks.
Tam’s hands were surely as painful as mine, but she was still hard at work. She had hacked off another thick lock of her hair with the dulled sword and now strove to knot it into a small bag. Muffled exclamations of frustration and anger burst from her from time to time, but she persevered, hunched close to the fire to catch the best light.