"Let's see." Biscuit's big, rough hand lifted him and felt. "Something there, all right! I'll take it out and we'll have a look."
"Ohh," Kelvin groaned again. He felt as if the chime had grown a serpent mouth and sunk its fangs into him. Then he felt the fangs pulled away.
"Gods, look at this!" Biscuit exclaimed. He held the chime, releasing it so that it made its sound, as if celebrating its release. "Talk about your lack of sense! Dumb foreigner!"
"He didn't know," Jac said.
"Poor man," Heeto soothed, stroking Kelvin's forehead. "Poor man, not to beware of magic."
"He'll die with the sun," Biscuit said. "Like a snake's tail at sundown. When the sun goes, so does he."
"Poor, poor man," Heeto mourned. The dwarf made a whispering sound that had the quality of whimpering.
"I've heard of something," Jac said. "I don't know if it's true, but I've heard that if the chime is taken back to its tree and properly hung there before nightfall, the victim lives."
"Old wives' tale," Biscuit offered.
"But maybe true. It does make sense, because the point of a curse is to prevent molestation of the thing it guards. That's no good if people steal chimes and then throw them away or sell them when they get sick. You've heard the legend, Heeto?"
"No, Master. I've never heard of a chime being taken."
"Nor I. But it could be. Since it's our only hope, we'd better try it. Kelvin, where did you get this?" He touched the chime, and it sent out peals that went round and round inside his head.
"I—I—" Kelvin struggled to recall. "I found it in a big oaple. Three together. I took only one. Near the river, before the mountain."
"Hmm, three chimes together. Big oaple. Mountain. I know that place. It's too far."
"Maybe not, Master. Maybe if I ride your horse—"
"You, Heeto? Alone?"
"I'm light, Master. Your horse can carry me faster than anybody."
"But, Heeto, to get there before night you'd have to start now and ride hard all the way."
"I will, Master. And I'll rest and feed the horse before starting back."
"I guess you have to try. I guess we all do. But it may not save him even if you get there in time."
"As you say, Master, we all have to try."
Biscuit snorted. "Huh! If the idea is to save him so he can save Hud from King Rowforth, I say don't ride. Save yourself, Heeto. For something important that can work out."
"You're a skeptic, Matt. But come along and help me get him started. That light saddle you had the other day…"
Rolling his eyes toward the tent flap, Kelvin saw that all three had exited. He closed his eyes, alone. It was hot in the tent; globules of sweat formed on his forehead. There was nobody to wipe it off for him, and he no longer had the strength to do it himself. A fly buzzed noisily and lit on his nose. Heln, Heln! he thought. Oh, Heln!
By and by he heard a horse's hooves pounding sand as it raced by the tent. Then silence as he fought with himself not to sleep—because he feared there would be no waking.
The sun was right at the top of the mountain as Heeto rode Betts down the ridge. He had spotted the two spirals in the big oaple from above, the sun glancing from the twin spirals in bright flashes.
"Please hold back, Sun. Please!" Heeto said. He spoke aloud, not bothered by the thought that it was insane. His thighs hurt from the saddle's chafe and he sympathized with Betts as she wheezed and blew back foam from her lathered mouth. Such a long ride, such a great effort for them both, and almost certainly for naught.
Bring, Brinnng. BRRRRRIIIIINNNNNGG! the chimes sang, urging him on with their companion. But the sun was already hiding, a dark shadow creeping relentlessly down the mountain at his back. "Please let me save him! Please let me save us all," Heeto prayed. He did not think of what he might be praying to, he only prayed.
The young man from another world was a hero. His brother had said that Kelvin had saved his own land, so similar to Hud, and might save Hud as well. But the young man looked like a tall boy almost too slight to wield a sword. Yet he had come here just as his brother had, and if there was a way for him to live and to recover the Mouvar weapon—well, then all might not be in vain.
But first Kelvin had to be saved himself. He had to be saved by Heeto.
The sun was but a crescent at the top of the ridge, letting no more than a fingernail of light escape. The tree was almost shadowed, but stood where it caught the last of the rays. Urging Betts nearer with sharp jabs of his heels, Heeto continued to pray: "Sunlight stay! Sunlight stay!"
He stood up on the saddle, swaying, almost overbalancing, and grabbed the limb. Quickly with his free hand he wrapped the leather thong, tied it, and fell free of the limb and the horse.
Bring, Brinng, BRRRRIIIINNNG!
Had he succeeded? Had he done right? Had he done anything?
Bring, Brinng, BRRRRIIIINNNG!
The last glint of sunlight was gone.
CHAPTER 20
Pact
KIAN WAS SURPRISED WHEN Gerta and Herzig returned to him as soon as he had eaten. Somehow he had thought they intended to keep him in this small room indefinitely. Possibly (and the thought squeezed his guts) they had a hungry serpent.
"Kian, do you wish to be with your father?" Herzig asked.
He nodded. Silly question.
"Then the three of us will leave immediately for Hud's capital. Do you feel you can walk?"
He did. Their food and medicine were wonderfully restorative. The days (this was a sheer guess, falling between hours and months) he had spent in the serpent tunnels were as if they had never been. But what of Lonny? Was she still wandering around with the glowrooms, or, worse still, in the dark?
"You look troubled, Kian," Gerta said.
"There's someone else," he confessed. "Someone who was with me underground."
Gerta and Herzig looked at each other. He wished he could read the significance in that exchange!
"I wouldn't fear for her," Herzig said. "She will survive."
"But—"
"A little magic, Mortal. Magic spells can protect anyone we choose from the ancestors."
"The ancestors. You mean the serpents?"
"That is what we call them among ourselves. We believe that our people descended from serpents, while yours descended from apes."
Kian was startled. It was almost like his father talking! He had conjectured on the different lines of descent for roundears and pointears. But he had also said that the two were closely linked because they could interbreed. When Kian, then very young, had asked what that meant, John Knight had laughed and said, "You're the proof of it, son!"
Kian doubted that there could have been any physical descent from serpent to manlike creature. But his experience as an astral presence in the serpent suggested that there was indeed some kind of compatibility between them. Could the early flopears have taken astral residence in the early serpents, and could the minds of the serpents have come to the bodies of the flopears? Then the present flopears would indeed have serpent ancestry on the astral level, and the serpents would have flopear ancestry. It made a certain sense, especially considering the serpentlike power of the flopears' gaze, and the way the serpents cooperated with the flopears.
"We will go, then," Gerta said. "Walking, as is our way."
Walking to the capital? That, Kian thought, was going to take days! But once there he would be reunited with his father. Then perhaps he could find out about his mother and what kind of alliance the king had with the flopears. He was ready, and he felt quite excited about the prospects.
At the end of the second day they had left the mountains and were paralleling the river. The big oaple with the three silver chimes Kian remembered was somehow a welcome sight. He listened to their music for as long as he could. It was as though the chimes welcomed their approach and then bade them an affectionate farewell.
"You remember being in a chime?" Gerta asked him, seeing his attention.
"W
ell," he said, "I remember everything until after I was part of a serpent, and then my memories are blurred."
"That is because serpents have simple minds. You were becoming part of the mind you were in."
"But that serpent was dead—or had been! We killed it with the spear! How could it have a mind?"
"It was not dead, only badly hurt. We tended to its body, and healed it to the extent we were able. Then we put your mind in it, and the other, and you revived its mind as a new spark revives an old fire."
"What would have happened to me and—and Lonny?"
"You would have been absorbed. Generations from now you might have been part of a new intelligent serpent, or you might not. We serpent people have much magic, but we do not know all there is to know about the life force. There are mysteries even our wisest members have not penetrated."
"When I was in astral form I was me," Kian mused. "As alive and conscious of being alive as I had ever been. Yet in the serpent—"
"In the serpent you were changing, becoming more like the body you inhabited—but not entirely. This is why we put you there: we knew you would enhance the serpent after it had lost so much of its own mind. Whether you would pull it up beyond its natural level we could not judge, but certainly you would help it."
"Yet I felt as if I had a body when I was astral, and in the serpent, too, in different form. Nothing that hurt or could move objects, but a body. When Lonny and I—" But he did not care to discuss that merging, though probably the flopears already knew.
"That we think is mainly illusion. You are accustomed to a body, so you think of yourself as having a body. But then our spirits simply return to the serpent ancestors voluntarily and are absorbed into them. Your spirits—who can say?"
"Not I," Kian confessed. He plodded on, conscious that his feet hurt, and musing on the nature of things.
The capital, when they arrived, was just as he remembered. So was the palace. He would feel right at home here. But Herzig was speaking to a servitor, and then two palace guards were escorting him away from the flopears and toward—he recognized this route!—toward the dungeon.
For a moment he fought hard not to panic. Then he forced himself to relax, thinking: Wily serpents! They do after all have a pact with Rowforth. They didn't bring me here just for my own good Rowforth is a bad man here; I was told as much.
Their footsteps rang hollowly down the long, twisting stair. Dank, dusty dungeon smells assailed his nostrils. Oh, this was going to be fun! Just as it had been back home, only here it was he and his father, rather than his father and brother imprisoned.
Light coming down from a high barred window revealed the ugly cells. In the first cell, a battered and obviously injured Smith, one of Jac's crossbowmen he recognized but did not know very well. In the second cell was a tall, haggard man who looked at him with wide-eyed recognition.
"Father!"
"Kian!"
The guard unlocked the door and pushed him inside the cell and into his father's arms.
Herzig watched with Gerta, his misgivings rampant, as the soldiers took a dazed Kian to join his father. They stood on the palace grounds, their firm legs supporting them with customary indifference. Soon they'd be ushered into the palace itself and have their audience with King Rowforth. For his part, Herzig was not looking forward to it.
"Cousin Herzig, will they put them together?"
"Almost certainly, Gerta. So they can talk and a guard can spy on them and listen. So that father can be tortured before son or son before father."
"Are they really that cruel, Cousin?"
"Rowforth has been in the past. Dunzig should have known, but Dunzig was cruel himself. If the king knew all our mind abilities, he'd want us to get the information. Only Rowforth is so cruel that he would probably torture them anyway."
"I am glad we are not mortals," Gerta said.
The servitor from the palace was approaching, his manner solemn and purposeful, as befitted his position. He stopped, inclined his head in a short half bow, and said, "You may come. His Majesty will see you now."
They followed the man as he strode off. A couple of guards joined them, one on either side, and a couple more marched in back. Rowforth took no chances with guests. Getting him alone and probing into his murky mind was going to take planning and luck. True, guards could be treated with the serpent-gaze at any time, but it was necessary that Rowforth not suspect.
Herzig stole a look at his cousin. She was looking askance at the inferior sculptures, tapestries, and paintings the palace held. The lowest of the serpent people artisans could greatly improve on the best of mortal work, Herzig thought, eyeing a broken-armed statue as they passed.
The great audience room was empty except for Rowforth on his throne. They approached him slowly, inclined their heads as was the custom, and waited.
"Welcome, friend serpent people," Rowforth said. It was about as sincere a welcome as anyone ever got from his mouth. "I am pleased at your gift of the stranger mortal, and now bid you welcome to Hud's royal palace."
"Thank you, Your Highness," Herzig said. "We are honored to be here in your presence."
The king nodded to Gerta. "And this is your wife?"
"Cousin. She nursed both the stranger mortals and restored them to health." So that they may be tortured by you, Herzig thought, thoroughly disgusted by the fact.
"Ah." His Majesty seemed interested. "And can she perhaps reveal things that they have said?"
"Your Majesty," Gerta said, "I spoke to them only as needed. What you would be interested in—military secrets and affairs of state—was not discussed."
"Pity," Rowforth said. His eyes moved back to the leader, seemingly evaluating him as he once must have evaluated his predecessor, Dunzig. "I suspect we shall need to make plans. Errotax, our neighboring kingdom, is becoming quite vexing to me. I plan on taking over that throne, and I believe you might occupy it for me."
"I'm afraid, Your Majesty, that serpent people have no wish to govern mortals. That, Your Majesty, is your responsibility."
"Hmm, yes. But surely you will want something. Dunzig did."
"Dunzig and I were not directly related," Herzig replied. "Nor did we always bask in the same light. He wished power over mortals for himself and for the serpent people. His wish for power drove him to make the alliance. One mortal sacrifice a year, he decreed, given freely by Your Majesty. In return we would freeze with the serpent-stare any enemy who opposed you."
"You are bound by Dunzig's word?"
"I am bound," Herzig agreed.
"But now you do not wish to rule mortals?"
"I never have wished that, nor have most of the serpent people."
"You would have wealth?"
"We have wealth already." More than you dream of, Mortal!
"Then, aside from the sacrifice and the goods delivered to your valley, only friendship?"
"That is sufficient," Herzig said. Rowforth hardly looked pleased; he did not trust those who weren't greedy.
"I, ah, see. But perhaps in the future?"
"Possibly. But for now, only friendship."
"Good." Rowforth seemed appeased. "When you want something, you will ask?"
"Yes."
Rowforth nodded sagely, as only a monarch can. "Tomorrow we will talk further of my plans. For now, you and your lovely cousin enjoy the palace grounds, the fruits of its orchards, the shade of its trees. When you get ready to leave, I will bestow on you a scrumptiously outfitted carriage, horse, and driver."
"Thank you, Your Majesty, but my people prefer to use only their own legs. We allow ourselves to be carried but seldom, and then only for pressing reason."
"I, ah, see." The distrust had returned. "Whatever you wish during your stay, simply ask it of a servant. Any special foods, drinks, entertainments, anything at all that you desire. The dungeon where the stranger mortals are now will be locked and guarded, but if you wish you may tour."
"No need, Your Majesty. One dungeon is like another,
and the fate of the mortals does not concern the serpent people." He felt unclean, speaking like this!
"Enjoy your stay, then." The monarch made a gesture, and the servant and soldiers escorted them from his presence.
That night Herzig slipped from his bed, dressed, and rapped lightly on the adjoining door. Gerta joined him in a moment, looking to his eyes as though she had never slept.
"Be ready with the serpent-stare," he whispered. Outsiders thought that the stare was merely a function of looking, but this was hardly the case; it required a singular effort of will, and was best if prepared for. "Even this late at night there may be servitors, even guards."
She nodded, and together they left their room and climbed the stairs. They were almost to the king's chambers when, by a shaft of moonlight coming through a window, they saw a tall woman approaching in a filmy white gown. The woman had red hair and green eyes, and neither of them had encountered her before. Yet there could be no doubt who she was: the queen.
Herzig debated the matter only briefly. Then he used his stare to intercept the queen. They could not afford to have her spying on them! It would be a simple matter to cause her to forget that she had seen them.
She froze. Then it occurred to him that the queen could be a source of useful information. Should he take the time and energy to read her? He hesitated but a moment; then, standing on tiptoe, he cupped her chin in his hands, tipped her head forward, and probed deep, deep into her glassy eyes.
It was a shock. He had gotten much more information than expected! He withdrew, shaken. He turned to his cousin, controlling himself as well as he could.
"We will not need to go on to the king's chambers," he said. "He is asleep there with another woman. He taunts his virtuous queen constantly with his infidelities and the evil he does. He is the most evil of all evil mortals. There is no need to awaken him, for I have found what he intends."
"He intends to conquer?"
"Everything. Even our valley. Every land that he and his armies can reach. The stars themselves he would conquer. Only death or displacement will cause him to stop conquering. And the queen has a father—a father we must now go to see."