Shadow of the Seer

by Michael Scott Rohan

  Upon scale and hide, behind that hideous head, he drove the ancient blade, and through the flesh and bone beyond. And as if it was no longer a sword alone that struck, the force that was lent the dragon for its unnatural existence, as his had been to him, crumbled before it.

  Through vent and channel, through cavern and chasm, the earthfires leaped up roaring, rebellious, rejoicing at their liberation from the long containment of the Ice. Through the overwhelming, overbearing walls they blasted, striking the cold glaciers to shattered shards for long leagues about; and Alya’s sword struck right through Tugarin’s neck.

  The severed head flew out with the force of that blow, turning in the air, and crashed down against the ruined walls. The body, already rearing, spouted flame from all its wounds now, and sank down, almost slowly as it seemed, in a growing mass of fire. It struck the ground with a massive, reverberating crash that must have travelled through that mean place like the herald of doom; and the ground shook in answer. The great wings folded, and with a rush like collapsing sails they fell limp.

  Ice came cascading from the high walls of the vale, splintered, impotent, shapeless, down into the sheltered valley. The shoddy walls and crude towers tottered on their foundations, and one by one they sank down and collapsed. A great shuddering wave seemed to course down the vale, and a cloud of destruction and collapse arose in its eddy. Only the palace was left standing, fair, untouched; but the crude town over which it had stood overlord was laid waste. It reigned in emptiness now, lord and master of nothing but ruin, assailed by the very ground it stood upon. The air grew hot with spreading fire, and the fallen Ice hissed and steamed, while high above it the rippling currents blasted what remained upon the slopes, and the long stalactites began to glisten, trickle and melt.

  All around that place, and the others like it that the Ice had turned to their advantage, the fires from below struck upward in a blow of massive, mocking power, a sharp reminder of what the living cold had not yet touched, and might never, in that ancient age of the world.

  But the folk caught up in these events saw in them only the fall of Tugarin, son of Zamai, and its echo. Ruin encompassed the writhing, monstrous shape, consumed and shrivelling in its own yellow flame, its own funeral pyre; and Alya felt a fierce satisfaction for the fallen cities he had never known, for the images of devastation that haunted his visions. Indeed, those images never came into his dreams again; but something different took their place.

  He held his sword high, and its blade dripped dying flames; and he shouted aloud: ‘Tugarin is fallen! The way is open!’

  And after one amazed breath a great shout went up from the crowd, a wordless cry of acclamation, of liberation, of unbelievable release. Thrall and warrior alike, they surged forward across the shuddering ground, out of the crumbling streets, and on to the clean black hillside that led up and out of the vale, out towards freedom.

  Across the town that shout was heard, and so potent was it, so directly it spoke to the deepest feelings of men, that all fighting, all enmity was forgotten, and the cold dominion of the Ice was for that time broken. The town emptied of its last people. The lame, the sick, the wounded, the dying, all who were conscious strove to rise, to run, even if their last breath failed them in the attempt. Streaming like a river too long pent up, the human servants of the Ice fled its bitter dominion, free of orders, free of fear.

  And with them, half unbelieving, ran Savi, and behind her Vansha, and Alya at her side, swept along all three by the outrush that was as much in the hearts of men as their bodies. Out they ran on to the free hillside, crying like the rest without words, for no words could match what the moment meant, for them above all. Behind them, in the ruined town, with a crash like thunder the earthfires fountained high from every seam, and blazing rock came raining down upon the palace.

  And though, as the exultant hordes of men came clambering out above the valley wall at last, they saw the enormous expanse of the Ice stretched out before them, yet they saw also the cracks that crazed its surface, the steams that arose from beneath. And out on to its glittering whiteness they all of them streamed without fear or hesitation, an irresistible dark tide trampling its sterile perfection into earthy slush.

  From these heights they could look out beyond it. They could see that it ended, they could see the path stretching out before them, down its narrow outthrust arm. And they could gaze out, in blue and misty distance, upon where it led, upon what to many was only the dimmest memory or the least credible legend, the infinite breadth of the still greater and more marvellous living world.

  Out they poured, out without let or resistance, mocking the Ice that crunched and cracked beneath their feet, out, and down, and away. What became of them all thereafter is not told by any Chronicle, in any detail. Perhaps some perished there, in the barren lands with little food or shelter; but by their own choice they died free. But that some escaped – that much is known, some seeking their lost homes, others simply a place to live in quiet; and it is certain that many succeeded, for their tale and their descendants’ reached many lands, and their kin preserved the story in all honour.

  As well they might. It was no lasting victory; for it was the last rebellion against the power of the Ice in those lands, and its cold rule was scarcely affected. The palace still stood, though sadly marred; and the town, in time, was renewed. For many a century its tyranny endured, in these lands and others, its bitter walls towering unchallenged; and its servants the Ekwesh, forever renewed and bred afresh in their many other settlements, tightened their grip upon the lands that Alya and his friends had known. No realms revived there, no great campaigns were waged. Free men were few, and lived in hiding and constant fear.

  Yet that day was a bitter check for the elder Powers, none the less. And it must have been felt as such, for the Ice itself never advanced its walls far beyond the limits of that day, fearing perhaps to force any further confrontation with the forge beneath the earth, and its ultimate Master. And in that, perhaps, lay the foretaste of their defeat that was to come, more than a thousand years hence – to the Ice, a time much sooner than to men.

  But in these fortunes the three young folk who had most largely brought them about were not to share; for their fate was different, and set apart.

  They ran with the rest, exulted with them, straggled out over the Ice in the direction of the downward road. And Alya, forgetful of all else, reached out and caught Savi’s hand as they ran, and they looked in one another’s faces and laughed in gladness.

  Then it was as if the world exploded into darkness and agony. Alya dimly felt his legs crumple beneath him, and fell helpless, as if he were falling once more into the dark valley of the Citadel, a lifetime as it seemed ago. But he landed in snow, heard Savi scream, and struggled to move his legs. Gasping, he rolled over into her arms, and felt the scalding well of blood beneath his mailshirt, soaking his back. He stared up at her anguished face, and saw the blue sky behind her blotted out by boiling clouds of black smoke, seamed with red and yellow light, and the white steams of melting ice. Against them towered Vansha in his ragged cloak, his broken sword in his hand; and his handsome face, seamed and scarred by the flamelight, was a mask of stone.

  ‘What—’ began Alya; but it hurt too much to get the words out. ‘Brother …’ he croaked.

  ‘I am not your brother,’ said Vansha, calmly. ‘Not any more. I swore my oath till Savi was freed. And now she is.’

  ‘I feared this!’ breathed Savi. ‘I feared it! When I saw you together, I wondered, when you called him brother—’

  Alya threshed his limbs. A voice rang in his ears: he fears you, and what he fears, he strikes out at …

  The fires had too little left to work with. ‘By both…’

  ‘Freed by both of us?’ Vansha shook his head slowly. ‘Did I have a gift of power given me, so unfairly, so stupidly? I’ve been faithful to my oath, I’ve swallowed your slights and endured your follies, let you play at leading. Oh, you were good enough company
on such a quest, I’ll allow! Always nice to have a friendly face. But by the Powers, if they’d given me such a fire as burns in you, I’d have known how to use it! I’d have raised such a storm as they’d have been proud of! Yet I played my part with my own strength, I won through just as you did. And so I – I – am the better man. I did the most! I kept my oath without help.’

  ‘You stabbed him in the back!’ raged Savi.

  Vansha smiled tautly. ‘But only because I needed to,’ he said, shrugging, as if that explained all. ‘Believe me, if the Powers had only been fair, I’d have happily settled you face to face, boy, as I failed to on the cliff that day. Don’t think I haven’t been tempted to, since, a hundred times, when you slighted me, and went against my will! But you were too useful, and too dangerous, with that gift; and I keep my word, after all, as a chieftain must. If I’d had a whole sword and remembered that mailshirt, I’d have made a cleaner job of you now.’ He reached out, and hauled Savi to her feet. ‘Still, it lets me show you what must happen. She’s mine now, as she always was before you came along and sneaked her away!’

  ‘It’s my choice!’ snarled Savi, flailing and tearing at him, striving to break free or to claw at his eyes. But he only stood there, still calm, clutching her wrist with increasing strength until she cried out and slipped to her knees.

  ‘Go ahead,’ he said, relishing the words. ‘You’ll learn better soon enough. When I show you what a real man is. And not another woman, or this weakling puppet, propped up by borrowed strength, not even able to stand up in the snow. I didn’t hurt him, I just revealed what he really is. You’ll forget him, just as I will, and you’ll surely forget her! And you’ll learn to look up to me as you were supposed to.’

  ‘Never!’ she spat, and struck at him again, clawing at his groin. He dropped his broken sword and snatched her other hand.

  ‘Now, now,’ he chided, with the airy satisfaction of a man living out a cherished dream, and struck her so hard across the face that she sprawled back in the snow. ‘Must I tame you now? Right here in front of him?’

  Alya fought to move, and the fires blazed; but it taxed him even to breathe, and he was sick and dizzy. Vansha had his own strength, all right. Even that blunted blade would have run him through, if not for the mail; and the difference might be little enough, now. Had he gone mad, his late brother? No. Vansha had always been mad, mad enough to pretend not to be, mad enough to play roles to perfection even though he did not really understand them. To play the lover, the hero, the brother in arms …

  No wonder Kalkan had fascinated him so. Vansha had been studying another role, striving to understand the kind of person he wanted to be, perhaps; and never seeing how different he himself was, not realising that all men’s feelings were not as false. And all women’s. No wonder he was furious with Savi! He would never really understand why she could not ever love him, she who had seen through him from the first; and he would take it out on her, forever, with none left in this darkening world to protect her.

  The fires roared. Perhaps they were helping to heal him, or perhaps the chill snow had staunched the blood, but suddenly Alya had a flicker of strength. His own sword, the hero’s sword, lay beyond his reach, stuck in the snow, and he threshed frantically to reach it; but still he could move no swifter than a crawling infant, and in great pain. And Vansha planted his boot on the blade.

  The icy wind plucked at Vansha’s straggling hair; his face was unmoved, expressionless. ‘You’ve seen enough, boy. I’d have left you to die, but with a rat like you it’s best to make a clean end.’ He seized the sword, staggering a little at the weight of it; but he could manage it. ‘This should have been mine, too. With the chieftaincy! It’ll be happier in a hand that’s worthy of it!’ Casually, brutally, he swung it high, one-handed; and Savi screamed. But she was not looking at him.

  As far as sight stretched beneath that lurid sky, a tide of fleeing figures still covered the Ice, pouring out of the vale, ignoring this little drama in their desperate flight. But suddenly they were scattering to either side, shouting, as something swept among them, some thing unseen, as if a brief cold breath played across the shattered glacier. In its path, swift as a heartbeat, the snow flew up in flurries, the dark deep cracks in the Ice glazed and grew white again; and an icy blast whipped suddenly around them. Between Alya and Vansha the snow exploded and flew up in a cloud, and up through the Ice, in a hail of stinging splinters, like a white marble spear thrust up from below, arose a strange stiff shape. A statue, in the form of a woman, naked, stiff, unliving, in pure translucent ice.

  Yet even as it stood, colour raced through it, an infinitely fine tracery of scarlet hues that branched and grew with blinding speed, seaming its surface like marble indeed, suffusing it with the flush of life. Around it the falling snow whirled and settled into the folds of a robe. The pale eyelids snapped open.

  Vansha’s cry mingled fury and fear. ‘You! Witch! I settled you! I tell you, she’s mine—’ And he struck, the blow that he meant for Alya, hewed hard with the ancient sword at Louhi’s slender throat.

  The blade that had cloven a dragon’s bones sang a high note and flew up out of his hand, notched. Vansha staggered, as if jarred, took a half-step back, his handsome face ashen and gaping. He stiffened, and the breath erupted out of him as if he were being squeezed, in a high, thin scream. And then, all over him from head to foot, the crystals of ice burst outward from his skin, through his clothes, like a thousand spears, impaling him on the very waters within his body. The blood on them froze instantly white; and without another sound he toppled face down in the snow.

  Louhi ignored him. She looked much as she had in that first moment Alya saw her, a woman young and fair; yet she stood taller now, taller than human height, and of her wounds there was no trace. Her face was a mask of cold wrath, but fixed wholly upon Savi.

  The fires raged within him, but he felt hollow now, as if there was nothing else within him but them; and his wound hurt terribly. Gritting his teeth, drawing what he could from the flame, he seized the fallen sword and levered himself shakily to his feet. Savi, startled, clutched him as he swayed. ‘No, Alya! You mustn’t—’

  ‘You won’t hurt her …’ he grated, struggling to heft the sword. ‘I have a gift of strength …’

  She seemed to notice him at last. ‘Indeed you have,’ she said, with little trace of feeling. ‘Ilmarinen was generous in his folly. You have used his generosity foolhardily enough. But you are in my realm now, boy, and you can neither hide from me nor fight me. I sensed you, most easily of all, the moment you set foot upon the Ice. And what a Power has given, a greater Power may take away.’

  She did nothing, that he saw, not so much as blink her wide eyes. But in that moment the fires within him, like the merest candle-flame, blew out. They vanished, extinguished, as if doused in dark cold waters; and with them vanished both the feeling and the strength in his legs. They gave beneath him, and he crumpled down into the snow, striking fearful agony in his wounded back.

  His sight reddened, he could not speak; but through dim eyes he saw Savi spring across him, lithe as a hunting animal, and stand defiantly.

  ‘You,’ said Louhi; and her voice was no longer calm. ‘You promised to show it me, this human love, to show me what it felt like. Why it was important. What it was worth. Well, you have taught me its worth, indeed! Lies, wounds and betrayal!’

  Alya, helpless, could see Savi’s legs shaking; but she stood firm, and her voice was low and quiet. ‘The wounding was none of my doing, and you have more than repaid it. And I did not betray you.’

  ‘I felt the pain!’ raged Louhi, though her face held little expression. ‘And you fled with these vermin! How could you do it? You dealt me the worst wound of all! Why? Why? Did I not love you, in return?’

  ‘Alya I dreamed of, but I thought him dead. The other—’ Savi shook her head. ‘Him I never expected. I would have stopped him, if I could. He never learned to love, only to possess. When he hurt you in his jealo
usy, I feared your wrath would overtake us all, that you would not stop to listen, to understand. There was nothing then but to flee. You are who you are, after all. Say, lady, was I so wrong?’

  Louhi said nothing, at first. ‘You loved them. You lied to me.’

  ‘I did not lie,’ said Savi, still quietly. ‘You were so lost as a human, so bewildered, so helpless, so much in need. I was sorry for you, moved by you, intrigued by you. You wanted something from me, yet it was something you could not understand. A thing that you with all your power and wealth and wisdom could never for one moment command, yet something I already had. I gave it you because you needed it, and because I hoped that you might come to understand its power – the power that brought this boy so far and so perilously to my side! And that in loving, you might come to hate and despise us the less. But what I gave to you, I could not take from him; or all my love would be false, indeed. I chose him long ago, and he has kept faith with me – how he has kept it! I must keep faith with him.’

  Louhi’s eyes blazed. ‘And not with me?’

  ‘As I would have with you,’ said Savi, undaunted. ‘I loved you sincerely. But I was still your prisoner. You have not learned the whole meaning of love. You have learned to take, but not yet to give, as I gave, despite all that you and your kind had done to me.’

  ‘Give, girl? I would have given you life, as I promised! Life, without limit! Immortality! As a Power! Who could give more than that?’ She looked at Alya, and laughed. ‘Can he? Could the other?’

  Savi glanced down a moment at Vansha’s remains, then away. ‘He could give nothing. He knew less of love than you. Yet even he would have understood that there is more to life than just existing. As you would, if you truly loved – if you were not so fettered by your own hatred for the living. My lady, you also have taught me many things: to think, to ponder, to understand. I do indeed want life – but not in any fetters, however dear. I want life as I understand it, not you. I want my own life, and I want it to the full. Life I can embrace, from the heights to the depths!’