by Andre Norton
Spittle dripped from its half open jaws, where tusks showed yellow-green. It gave a guttural grunt.
Once more Vestel clicked ringers and the hellish thing was gone. Illusion, guessed Twilla, and yet she could not altogether be sure. Did illusions leave such a stink behind to foul the air? However, had that appeared she could well believe that any plain dweller would have taken to his heels—if he had not been totally frozen in place by fear.
“Effective,” commented Oxyle, “but the invader got in one blow. Slow—Vestel—too slow.”
“Yes,” the other agreed. “Too slow. That shall be seen to.”
“We leave you to that task,” Oxyle commented. Before Twilla could move he was on her, drawing her up against him as the mist curdled about them.
Then they were back in that feasting hall where the table still bore most of its burden of food and drink. But Twilla wanted only to rest, to rest and perhaps forget, if sleep was given to her, that what she still clung to might now be dead of any power and she left defenseless among a people she did not understand and could fear—if she let herself.
They might have guessed her state for Karla came to her, putting an arm around the girl's shoulders and drawing her away, back down those treasure-walled halls, seeing her at last established in a chamber where there was a bed formed like a well-open lily, fashioned of some pearl gleam material, into which she crawled, the petals seeming to close a little as if in protection around her worn body.
She dreamed she was back in Hulde's room of many mysteries, sitting on her stool, polishing her mirror. Greykin watching her with great eyes. And she was singing again that childish rhyme as her fingers moved without ceasing:
"Up and down, out and in.
Sun's path and widdershin.
Power answering to the call
Of flesh and blood and inner all.”
Only when she looked down at her work she saw only a dull platter-like piece, there was no answering life in it.
She called to Hulde, fear rising in her. But there was no answer. Greykin yawned as if this was no affair of his.
Twilla turned again to the polishing, first as fast as she could move her hand, and then, remembering Hulde's often repeated warning of haste making waste, she set herself once more to follow the slower rhythm of her jingle.
Somehow she was sure that what she held was not truly dead, the fault lay in her not this focus for power. She had overstepped the boundaries of her learning, tried too much. Would it ever answer to her again?
“Up and down, in and out—”
She could feel the heavy beat of a heart set pounding by growing fear. No—that she must control, even as she controlled the movements of her fingers.
“Hulde?” She called as she had always done in her time of need.
There was no answer. Greykin yawned once again and then looked straight at her as if in reproof.
No, the mirror was her magic, had been since Hulde had given it to her and only she could deal with it. Once more she set her hand to the slow even strokes of the polishing. Her fingertips burned, there were no protecting pads on them now, yet she still kept to what she must do—
Do? There was nothing to be done. Around her now enfolded darkness even as the mists could enfold the forest people and she lost touch and hearing also—finally lost herself.
12
SHE DID NOT return to Hulde's safe world. Though the darkness about shifted as if it had taken on the powers of the forest mists. Twilla sensed menace in that shifting. She could no longer feel the mirror or was aware of her own body—only that which was the inner part of her was now threatened.
Something as beastlike as that illusion set to guard the Wood prowled about in that dark. Moon—mirror—she sought them both with all her strength. The dark shifted again, pushing in upon her first on one side and then the other. But for all its slavering hunger it could not reach her.
Twilla made a great effort, reached—for the body which seemed gone from her. A hand—she envisioned a hand, a stretch of fingers, the wrist from which it sprung, the arm of which that wrist was a part, the shoulder—She was back—back in her body!
Now she opened her eyes. Above her was a puzzling pearl-lustered curve, she blinked at that but it did not vanish. Then memory returned and she pulled herself up in that flower bed, looking out into a room which was carpeted with the thick green of what might be moss, walled by entwining screens of ferns.
Her fingers rasped on a light cover which was over her and had now slid to her waist. She flinched at sudden pain and looked down. Her fingertips were raw, skin broken, with small clots of blood.
There Was a weight resting on one knee near that hand. The mirror. It was no longer blank, dead. Nor was it the bright silver she had always seen either. Instead it gleamed now with a coppery glint as if the substance of it was co-mingled with her blood, brought so to a brazen state.
Twilla was wary of the change—afraid at first to touch it. When she nerved herself to that she found that it lived again, though the throb which answered her held a different beat, heavier.
Raising it she held it to view her own face—her own face? Or the face she had drawn upon herself? One she was not sure now she could ever banish again.
There was a reflection there, but clouded, showing no more than a faintest of shadows. Instinctively she rubbed her fingers across the mirror surface and winced at the pain in her abraded flesh.
The passage of those had left traces of blood which sank instantly into the coppery shine. Blood was a mighty source of power, to be used very sparingly. The Dark called upon blood to feed it. Had she taken a misstep down the Left Path which Hulde had so often warned her against doing? Even if the blood so shed was her own and not that of any sacrifice—?
Trembling Twilla hung the mirror once more in its place and pulled herself out of the cupped embrace of the flower bed. She felt as weak as if she had walked all the way over mountain, and when she tried to stand she had to hold onto the petals at her side. She knew hunger too, like a gnawing in her middle, and her mouth and throat felt as dry as if she had not drunk in days.
As if it had been known that she would waken so there was a table not far away on which were set out a goblet in the form of the same pearl white flower image as the bed, a disk which might be formed of leaves chipped from emeralds.
Twilla lurched a step or two, reached a stool set beside that table and dropped heavily upon that seat. Her hand shook as she picked up the goblet so that its clear contents swished back and forth, slopping over to spatter her fingers and she had to steady with the other to bring it to her lips.
It was that same drink which had refreshed her at the feast. Now it seemed even greater as a restorative. She gulped it down, so fast some of it dribbled across her chin. But even as she felt it descend her dry throat she knew a strengthening renewal—it might be some much-trusted concoction of a healer's brewing.
With half of it down her she was able to sit straight, reach with a hand which no longer shook for the cakes on the plate. They were crisp and flavorsome, and she ate with a greed new to her until she had cleaned the plate, emptied the goblet.
Once so refreshed Twilla felt herself again. But she remained seated, glancing about the chamber. There were no windows to break the fern screens nor was there any door. Beautiful as it was, this place could be as much a prison as that rough-walled cell in the keep.
With care she forced herself to open memory wide. All which had happened since she and Ylon had fled the invaders’ village she tried to recall in detail. However, had not Oxyle named her Kin-saver?
Lotis—
That flick of memory might have been a summons for a section of the wall screen pushed to one side. However, she who stood there was not Lotis but Karla.
“You are yourself once more, Moon daughter—” the forest woman said—not a question, a statement she seemed to know was the truth.
Twilla opened her mouth to assent to that, and then remembered t
he mirror. What powers this other woman might possess she could not record, but if she herself was to claim more than she could summon it might well be dangerous for the future.
“I am restored in body.”
Karla had come to stand before her. “Those who drink of the forest's life,” she made a small gesture to the goblet, “find it good. But one is more than body—Moon's Daughter—”
“Moon!” Twilla caught up that word. “Have you any check upon the moon, you who live beneath the trees? Does it wax, does it wane, hangs it in full glory now?”
“It begins to wane. We are not blinded to the night power. If you would see, come—”
Twilla arose quickly but she was not to follow Karla down one of those corridors, rather the mist swirled in and again they were transported in the strange way of this other race.
When the tendrils of the mist again released them they were in a far different place than that luxurious chamber where Twilla had rested. This chamber had walls of rock and in its center was a pool. Overhead was the open sky—a night sky—and in the pool shimmered indeed the disk of the full moon, so bright, so easy to be seen in all its glory as Twilla had never looked upon it before. It might have been drawn nearer to the earth it encircled at this spot alone so that the strange markings, which dimpled its surface, were plain for any eye to see.
She fumbled to bring forth the mirror. There was no reason to try to keep it hid since she had put it to use to save Fanna. The sullen coppery surface of it looked dirty, flawed, when she held it out over the water. Then, because she could only grope and test, strive to find her way through that which she did not understand, Twilla turned it over so that the brazed, blooded surface it showed might reflect the glory in the water.
It cast no shadow upon the moon reflection there, she was a little surprised. Sing—but what song would draw the virtue of that reflection up into the smirched mirror?
"Silver bright, in the night,
Give freely of the light.
Let blood and pain
No longer stain—”
Child's words, a child's rhyming, but all she had ever been able to summon for spell singing.
She did not rub her sore fingers across the surface now, for she would have had to withdraw it from the moon in the pool to do that. Rather she turned the mirror itself around and around, spinning it first right then left and then back again.
Into her need for what must be done Twilla poured all of her strength. Nor dared she look at the mirror's surface, rather she kept her attention fixed upon the pool.
There was an odd sensation beginning, a tingling in her hands. And—out of the air about her sounded a contented whir like the song of a spinning wheel.
She dared look now. The brazen stain was gone—silver bright again. Had the moon in the pool pulled from it the poison even as it had drawn that death from Fanna? How could she tell—she had so little knowledge.
With a cry of joy she clasped the mirror once more tightly to her and looked at Karla with shining eyes.
“Healed!”
The forest woman nodded. “Are you not a healer?
Why do you then doubt what can be done when it must?”
“You—helped.” Twilla arose from her knees. “You—have power, like Hulde—you have it.”
Karla smiled. “To each her own talents, Moon Daughter. Ours lie with the Wood and within the Wood—yours draws nourishment from a different source. There are ill powers also and those have come into the land—those of your blood have brought them hither. Though they do not know as yet just how much harm they can do—”
“With the iron?” Twilla interrupted.
“That and perhaps other things. We can only wait and see.”
They entered the mist again and it bore them away from the moon chamber. When it released them they were in a corridor. Instead of the walls bright with niched treasures and jeweled banding, these were plain of decoration. As they went they passed three doors. Each had no sign of latch or way to open, each was dust-marked, and on each there was inlaid a symbol in red and black, something oddly threatening when one looked upon it.
Karla must have noticed Twilla's curious glance at each as they passed, for now she spoke:
“Time has a way of turning upon itself as a serpent coils. Once we faced another danger—not from over mountain but within our own holding. We won a victory then—at a cost. What you see are in truth set there to remind us that even though we won, we also lost. For in no warfare is there ever a true victory.”
She said no more as if it were a subject that made her uncomfortable. A turn to the right brought them out of that corridor, through another wandering swirl of mist into the same bright luxury which seemed to make up the living quarters of the forest people.
They came by such ways out of the castle and into that land of gem flowers and trees and the small flitting spirits. A number of those sped toward them as they came into the open, encircling them and Twilla could hear faint high-pitched sounds which must mark speech. Though they looked human as to form, except for their wings, she believed that they were of a different species altogether.
She impulsively held out her hand and one of the spirits, a female, landed on tiptoe. The tiny body had some weight, but it was very light. Twilla's fingers had curled up a little unconsciously though she was careful not to try to grasp the creature. The winged one reached up and touched one of Twilla's abraded fingers. She turned her head a little and shook it as if to signal pity. Then she whirled about and was gone with a flash of rainbow wings, two of her companions taking off as swiftly after her.
There were forest women seated on cushions in the open. One held a book as if she had been reading aloud and the others sat with busy hands. Before each was a short trough of some green stone and into these they were pressing seeds taken in what appeared to be set order from the circle of bowls set within reach. They looked up to beckon and Karla went to join them, Twilla following somewhat uncertainly after. She still felt ill at ease with these women. Though none of them except Lotis had shown any hostility, still she knew that she came from those they bitterly resented and hated, and it was hard to believe that they would accept her presence willingly among them.
Karla dropped down beside the reader and then made an urgent motion for Twilla, which she could not overlook. But she settled herself outside their circle. However, no sooner had she done so than the flyers gathered once more about her and three of them—surely the three which had left so abruptly—reappeared. Each embraced an armload of leaves almost as long as their slender bodies. Twilla caught a familiar scent—Ill Bane—the herb so precious, the answer for so many ills. Wonderingly she placed her injured hand on her knee palm up. Straightway the three came down around it, twisting the leaves between their tiny hands and then rubbing the half pulp on her fingers.
Ill Bane—she could feel the virtue of the herb as they so carefully anointed her fingertips. Ill Bane was so rare that Hulde had only a few brittle bits of dried leaves which she guarded above all her healing harvests. And this was fresh—perhaps other herbs could be found—Her healer's bag, long gone, and without it she felt that a portion of herself was missing; it might be assembled again.
The sprite had taken half-pulped leaves from her two companions and carefully anointed all the fingers. Twilla cautiously raised her other hand and held the index finger out to the flyer as she had done with the last leaf, letting its mangled remains drift down to Twilla's knee.
“Heart thanks to you, small healer,” Twilla said softly, feeling somehow that full voice might seem a roar to those small ears.
The sprite looked up at her, gave a brisk nod, which in its way reminded Twilla strongly of Hulde. Her lips parted and Twilla caught a very high trill of sound, far beyond her powers to hear in full. Then a small hand was laid for a moment on the finger she had held out, bringing warmth which was fleeting as the sprite took wing.
There was another sound now, a murmur from the gathered forest wom
en. They were all giving her full attention, their tasks forgotten for a moment. It was Karla who spoke so that Twilla could catch words.
“The Asprite wish you well.”
Twilla turned her injured hand around. Some of the bruised leaf pulp still clung to her skin. The feeling of heat and dull pain were gone.
“I am indebted,” she said slowly. “They used Ill Bane—that is very rare and hard to find. In my country it is a treasure. I have lost my healer's bag, with it went what I have to serve my talent. Tell me, are there other herbs to be harvested here? Feverbanish, sleep giving, those to heal and those to cherish the weak?”
“You have another healing tool—” Karla looked to where the mirror again hung against her body. “What need you of leaves, roots, flowers and their like?”
“I would deal with what I know best until I learn more,” she answered with the truth. “Can the ills of your people be ended as this was done?” She raised her hand, palm out, so they could see that the redness had gone from the fingertips even as the pain had been drawn out.
“We have our healing, yes. Perhaps in a little it may be akin to your herbs, Moon Daughter. Darsia,” she spoke to the woman still holding the book, “such things are more truly of your knowledge.”
The woman regarded Twilla level eyed. There was neither welcome nor rejection to be read in her beautiful mask of a face.
“Time and enough for many things,” she said ambiguously.
There was a stir of those who had been listening to her. Now they handled spindles, ready to draw thread from masses of substance over which played rainbow lights that appeared to have no true color any more than water of a forest pool.
“How goes the hunt?” one of them asked suddenly giving a graceful twirl to her thread.
Darsia spread the book flat on one knee, pressed her hand flat on the open pages, and closed her eyes. Her lips were moving but there was no sound, if she read in this strange way Twilla had not the ability to understand.
