Wit'ch Fire

by James Clemens

  She and Uncle Bol spun around. The blackness behind them now had a glowing eye. A spark of light swung in slow swoops, searching.

  “Who—?” Uncle Bol began.

  Er’ril hissed him quiet.

  The eye of light stopped its wavering and stood fixed in the wall of darkness, then darted toward them.

  Er’ril slipped like a ghost beside Elena and shoved her back. All three ducked to the wall. Elena, protected by the two men, cringed. What new horror now?

  Then it was upon them. Elena gasped, not with horror, but with awe. A bird aglow with a light the color of sunshine on water swept before them, wings spread wide, plumage bright with a soft radiance. As it winged closer, subtler hues of rose and copper could be seen playing across its feathers. It hung in the air before them, slightly rising and falling with unseen currents of air, wings flexing as it rode the darkness. Eyes like pebbles of coal studied them where they hugged the wall.

  “Amazing!” Uncle Bol said, his voice low with wonder. “I thought them long dead to our lands.”

  Er’ril still had his sword raised toward it, ever cautious. “What is it, some cave bird?”

  “No, it is a creature of the upper world. It traps moonlight in its feathers, giving it light to hunt the darkest night.”

  “In all my centuries of travel, I have seen many sights, but none such as this.”

  “It is from before your time, Er’ril, long before even your oldest ancestor.”

  “What is it then, Uncle?” Elena asked. By now the worry of danger from the intruder had faded. The men had relaxed their guard on her and allowed her to push between them to get a closer look at the bird as it continued to hang above the well of the chasm. She stood near the edge of the stair—but not too near, mindful of her uncle’s warning.

  “I believe it’s a moon’falcon. I have only seen them described on ancient, crumbling parchments.” Her uncle’s words took on a faraway tone, as if he was searching deep within himself. “The nature of the beast is spoken in some texts as a glorious creature of noble intent and in others as a fiend of foul omen.”

  Her uncle continued droning on, but Elena heard little past the naming of the bird—moon’falcon! Drawn by its beauty, Elena found her hand reaching over the stair’s edge. If only she had a crust of bread to lure it to her as she did the fat goose on the pond near Maple’s Corner. Or maybe a piece of meat, she corrected herself, for surely from its hooked beak and sharp talons this was a hunting bird. But what did it hunt in so dark a cavern?

  She reached even farther toward the bird, leaning slightly. The falcon banked on a wing tip and swung toward her. Moonlight flashed brighter as it beat its wings and pulled higher above her. She stretched her arm up, following its flight. She could almost reach it, her fingertips close enough to brush the azure light it shed. Cooing sounds of comfort slipped from her lips. She prayed for it not to fear her.

  “Careful, Elena,” her uncle warned as the bird slipped a breath lower.

  Elena’s hand was now awash in its glow. Delight crowded the traces of fear from behind her breastbone—until the falcon screamed.

  The bird had seemed about to alight upon her outstretched hand; then its intended roosting spot had vanished.

  Elena’s hand was gone!

  A cry escaped her own throat, mimicking the falcon. The screeching bird fluttered upward. Elena ignored the creature, her attention focused on her arm. Beyond her wrist lay only darkness, as if the chasm’s blackness had swallowed her hand.

  Yanking back her arm in fright, she expected a flood of blood and pain. But as she pulled her arm to her chest, her hand reappeared, attached to her wrist as usual.

  She groaned. The skin of her hand, bright in her uncle’s lamplight, again flowed a ruby red. Whorls of deeper red, almost black, swirled across its surface.

  A sob escaped her throat. Not again! She held her hand out to her uncle in supplication, her eyes begging him to take it away. With her arm held up to her uncle, the falcon swooped in a streak of moonlight and landed upon her blood-colored hand. The suddenness of its weight almost caused her arm to drop. But before the bird could be dislodged, its black claws dug deeply at her palm, fierce enough to pierce the skin for a heartbeat. Blood welled like fat tears around the talons of the falcon. With an effort she steadied her arm, and the bird loosened its tight grip, its claws slipping from her flesh. The claws now shone silver in the lamplight. Wonder at the bird’s beauty momentarily muffled her shock.

  The falcon cocked its head from side to side as it studied her fingers. A sudden thought that perhaps it was considering one of them as a meal flitted across Elena’s mind. But it merely bent its head down and rubbed its crown of feathers on her trembling hand.

  Satisfied, it suddenly perched straighter on her hand, spread its wings wide, and screeched a cry of triumph across the cavern, light bursting brighter from its flared plumage.

  “SO WHAT DO your ancient texts say of that?” Er’ril asked Bol. He nodded to the falcon perched on the child’s wrist. After its raucous outburst, it had quieted down and begun simply to preen its feathers with a hooked beak. Er’ril was unsure what bothered him more, the bird’s behavior or actually witnessing a wit’ch ripening to power. His eyes kept drifting to the girl’s red hand. He had accepted the old man’s claim of Elena’s heritage, but to see it proven still startled.

  “As I said,” Bol scolded, drawing Er’ril’s eyes from the child’s hand, “concerning the moon’falcons, the scrolls speak different tongues—some bright, some dark.”

  “And what about her hand? I thought mages required sunlight to initiate a quickening. How did she manage to renew her Rose in this pit?”

  Bol scratched behind an ear with a finger. “Perhaps the bird’s light.”

  “Moonlight?”

  “I remember reading a text of a long dead alchemist which supposed that moonlight was merely reflected sunlight.” Bol waved the fingers of one hand dismissively. “Of course, the alchemist was burned for such blasphemy. Still, one wonders.”

  Both men’s eyes settled on the bird. Elena caught the direction of their attention. “Can I . . . may I keep him?” she asked, her eyes aglow with reflected moonlight from the bird’s feathers.

  “It’s a wild creature,” Bol answered. “I don’t think I, or anyone else, can control its heart. It makes its own choices, and for some reason, it has chosen you.”

  “Do you think he’ll stay with me?”

  Bol shrugged. “Who can say? But I’m afraid, honey, that the bird may just be spooked by the dark halls. It probably wandered into these tunnels to escape the storm outside and became lost. Once out in the forest, I expect it will take to wing again.”

  Er’ril turned his back on the two, his eyes again studying the dark stair. Enough about some stray bird. Rare or not, it did not bear on his pursuit of the iron ward. The thieving goblin was by now far down these stairs and likely impossible to find among the warren of halls and passages. Further pursuit was probably futile, but Er’ril could not forsake his trust. The ward, one of only two, had been bestowed on him by the Brotherhood as an honor to his family . . . and for his sacrifice. He felt an itch at the stump where his right arm once sprouted. His eyes closed with the memory. The price of the ward had been a costly one.

  He shuddered, opened his eyes, and raised his sword. No, he would not leave the ward to these slinking, hissing creatures. “We should continue. The trail grows cold.”

  Bol nodded and picked up his lantern, which he had set down on the stair. “Well, at least we now have two sources of illumination,” he said, raising his lamp and nodding to the moon’falcon. “Perhaps we can better light this cold trail.”

  “If we wait much longer, even the midday sun won’t help us.” Er’ril swung forward and led the way down the stair. His boots stomped on the rock, followed by the lighter tread of the others. As much as he regretted the delay due to the bird, Er’ril found Bol’s words proved true. With the increased light, the mud and gri
me now glistened with the growing dampness, warning of treacherous footing. The light also revealed small prints with wide-splayed toes patted into the thin layer of silt.

  Er’ril pointed to the prints with the tip of his sword but kept silent. Bol nodded. To see evidence of the creature they pursued hushed the party. Here was proof that what they chased was not an illusory phantom, but a creature of bone and blood. As they continued in silence, the air itself dampened with a thickening mist. Soon Er’ril found the dense air difficult to breathe; each lungful had to be bit and swallowed.

  Bol whispered behind him, his breath wheezing between his words. “Are you . . . sure . . . there’s not another way to . . . unlock A’loa Glen’s magickal walls? Do we really . . . need this ward? Perhaps Elena’s magick—”

  “No!” Er’ril cracked at him. “I must . . . we need the ward.”

  “I don’t want to do any magick,” Elena said, bolstering Er’ril’s words, her voice sour with dread.

  Her uncle patted her on the head, trying to reassure the child, but instead raising a sharp chirp of warning from the falcon. The bird’s chest puffed out, and its black eyes needled toward the old man’s fingers. Clenching his knuckles, Bol pulled his hand back. “I guess I’m outnumbered.”

  Er’ril increased the pace down the stairs, worried that further delay might fade the feeble track they followed. But another concern sped his pace. With enough time, the old man might eventually convince him to abandon his pursuit. His mind already dwelled on Bol’s words. Perhaps there were other ways into the lost city. Perhaps Elena’s wit’chings could pierce the magickal veil around A’loa Glen. Maybe they didn’t really need the ward.

  Gripping the hilt of his sword until his wrist ached, Er’ril marched down the steps. The ward was his!

  “Slow your pace, Er’ril. My bones are not as agile as yours.” Bol’s words had a strained edge, and the old man’s breath rasped in the thickened, damp air. “This rock is as slick as a salamander’s back.”

  Er’ril slowed his pace. Not so much at the old man’s request, but because the last of the stairs had appeared out of the gloom ahead, lit by the twin fires of bird and lamp.

  They had reached the bottom of the chasm.

  He raised a warning hand to keep Bol and Elena from following until he checked what lay ahead. With his back gliding along the wall, he slid down the last of the steps and crept to the limit of the lamplight with his sword slicing the way forward. Gloom forced his eyes wide.

  At the bottom of the stairs, a wide floor of tumbled rock and littered rubble spread ahead. A thin path wound through the debris. Barely discernible on the far wall of the chasm was a rip of blackness far blacker than the dark rock. Was it the entrance to another tunnel? Er’ril guessed the narrow path led to that spot.

  As he studied the way ahead for hidden attackers among the scattered boulders, he heard the scuff of boot on rock behind him. The light brightened as his two companions disobeyed his command and crept closer.

  Bol stepped to his shoulder. “Well, what do you think?” he whispered.

  Er’ril restrained the sharp retort on his tongue. Why couldn’t they simply mind his directions and stay on the stairs? He kept his eyes focused forward. His gaze settled on the distant tunnel. With Bol’s lantern now closer, the improved light illuminated the opening in the far cliff wall.

  It was a tunnel opening, not like the man-made halls of the old school, but a natural fissure in the rock. A crack in the rock face started at twice the height of a man and split wider as it reached for the floor. Sudden motion near the wide entrance to the tunnel caught his eye.

  Er’ril tensed.

  He saw a small, dark shape dart down the last of the path. It paused at the entrance of the tunnel. Somehow Er’ril sensed that it stared right back at his own face, laughing at him. Then the diminutive figure bounced into the fissure and was swallowed away.

  “Hurry!” Er’ril said, his voice thick with threat. “We’re close! But watch the shadows. I don’t trust these goblins.”

  ELENA ALLOWED THE falcon to climb up to her shoulder. Its claws dug through the thin fabric of her shirt and pinched her skin as if refusing to let even the wisp of the woolen cloth stand between it and Elena’s flesh. It nestled close to her neck, but as if obeying the swordsman’s warning, its head kept swiveling back and forth, studying the chasm floor ahead.

  Without further instruction, Er’ril led the way into the tumble of rocks and boulders. His heavy boots thudded forward down the path. Bol gently nudged her to follow, though she noted his hands kept well away from the bird’s beak. She also noted that her uncle’s breathing had become alarmingly raspy in the damp, heavy air. Even she found herself having to suck air through her mouth to keep from feeling suffocated. She glanced up to her uncle, who offered a weak smile. His color seemed more ashen, but maybe it was just the lantern’s light making his face appear so pale.

  “We’d better not let Er’ril get too far ahead of us.” He nodded for her to proceed ahead while he kept watch on their back.

  Elena marched after the retreating swordsman, who set a furious pace across the flat ground. Without the fear of breaking a neck on slippery stairs, the need for a cautious gait had vanished. Elena almost had to run to keep up with Er’ril.

  Glancing over her shoulder, she noticed her uncle lagging farther and farther behind. He walked hunched over, wiping at his brow with the back of a hand. Was his hand trembling? Maybe she should call for the swordsman to slow down. Just as she was working up the courage to speak, Er’ril raised his hand in warning.

  She was relieved he was calling a break in their hurried march. She closed the distance to Er’ril. “My uncle—” she said, pointing behind her. She swallowed another mouthful of air, surprised how short of breath she was herself, and continued. “—he needs to rest.”

  The swordsman made a noncommittal grunt, his eyes studying a group of large boulders clustered like dragon’s eggs to the right of their path. “Stay here,” he said and started toward the boulders.

  She stood, shifting from one foot to the other. She twisted her neck. Uncle Bol was still several spans away, and he walked with one hand clutching his left side. He slowed even further once he realized they had stopped. Grimacing, Elena crept after the swordsman.

  He must have heard her footsteps or maybe noticed a shift in the light. He swung to her. “Listen, lass. You need to stay put. I must check the boulders ahead for any ambush, and I don’t need you to slow me down if there’s trouble.”

  “But it’s dark over there. My light will let you see better.” Tears threatened at the thought of abandonment. She glanced far back to where her uncle had stopped and was leaning on a large rock.

  “No, if there are any of those goblins out there, your light will signal my approach like a hundred flaming brands. I go alone. Return to your uncle.”

  She nodded acquiescence and pushed back her shoulders to show she wasn’t scared of anything. Her lower lip trembled slightly and ruined her effort at bravery.

  He gave her a tiny smile. His usually stark features cracked in lines of sympathetic amusement, lines well worn into his face. She realized his face must once have smiled easily, though that had clearly been a long time ago. “We all fear, Elena,” he said. “Sometimes we have to put it aside and go on. Don’t let it control you.”

  “Are you ever frightened?”

  He stared at her wordlessly for the longest time, then merely shrugged. His eyes seemed to look far away, and his voice was small. “Since I lost my brother, I don’t think I’ve ever felt completely safe.”

  She touched him on the elbow. “Me, too,” she said meekly.

  Her words seemed to puzzle him, then realization dawned behind his eyes. “We’ll find your brother.”

  “I miss Joach so much.”

  “Well, we’re not going to find him down here. We need to forge ahead. Now go help your uncle—it looks like he could use a shoulder to lean on—while I check the boulders ahe
ad.”

  She nodded, her trembling calmed. He studied her for a moment, then swung on a heel and continued toward the maze of boulders, his sword raised. She watched him duck and disappear behind a rock the shape of a small cottage. Waiting for several heartbeats, she searched for any sign of the swordsman. Nothing moved, but the shadows clung everywhere among the boulders. Anything could be lurking there, hidden from sight. Standing with the moonlit bird, she realized how she must blaze like a star to any eyes watching from the cluster of rock.

  A shiver passed down the back of her neck, as if someone lightly waved a finger over the tiny hairs of her nape. She suddenly felt hidden eyes staring at her. She backed from the line of boulders, toward where her uncle was waiting.

  Was that something moving in the shadows below the rock shaped like a broken barn? As she moved, all the shadows shifted with the movement of her light. The shadows themselves seemed alive, wriggling with foul intent. Maybe they had swallowed the swordsman and now wanted more.

  Her feet began retreating faster. Her heel struck a loose stone, and a yelp escaped her throat as it skittered away. It wasn’t a stone! She watched it scuttle from her, its claws ticking open and closed. The creature—some sort of cave crab—vanished into the shadows.

  Her flesh crawled now with imaginary cave creatures. She sped away toward where her uncle had last stood. A medium-sized boulder blocked her view of Uncle Bol, but his light shone like a beacon just beyond.

  “Uncle Bol,” she called as she rounded the edge of the boulder. She spotted her uncle just a few steps away and skidded to a stop. His lantern lay on its side, and her uncle sprawled beside it. He lay limp on the cold stone.

  Shock froze her feet for several heartbeats, her breath trapped in her throat. Uncle Bol! She could not face the thought of losing another of her family. She even took a step away, as if fleeing from the sight would undo it. Then she saw his chest move up and down. He wasn’t dead! He still breathed, but consciousness had fled him. Relief almost cut the cords holding her upright. Her knees buckled slightly, but she fought to keep her feet. She half stumbled, half fell down beside her uncle. The falcon squawked a warning at the sudden motion, flapping its wings in agitation. Moonlight bloomed brighter on her uncle.