by Eve Forward
“Fellows, I see a problem here,” she commented.
“Hmmm, yes, I see what you mean,” replied Valerie, looking from shaft to centaur. “Oh well, nothing else for it then.”
Robin shivered, ears twitching. “You’re not going to leave me down here, are you?” he asked, trying to sound indignant rather than plaintive and not quite succeeding.
He shifted uneasily. He swished his beautiful tail as he contemplated a march back down that long dark low tunnel, with the terrible figure of Orthamotch waiting at the other end. He’d barely been able to keep himself from bolting before, feeling the press of earth all around him, crushing him ... Kaylana saw his fear and shook her head.
“No, I do not think we shall. Do not faint on us again, Robin. Have you anything to suggest, Valerie?”
The sorceress flashed her cruel teeth in an evil smile.
“Well, of course we won’t leave the poor dear ... if he’s too big to fit through the opening, well, we could cut him up into smaller chunks-” Nightshade clacked his beak appreciatively.
“Valerie!”
“Oh all right,” amended the Nathauan crossly. “If you can widen that shaft a bit, Druid, I shall endeavor to levitate him with my magic. He’ll fit if he stands on his silly hind legs.”
“Does that meet with your approval, Robin?” asked Kaylana. Robin was wide-eyed.
“Ll-Levitate?”
“Good, I hoped you would agree,” asserted Kaylana.
She looked up the shaft. “Ho there, the two of you!” A pair of heads appeared in the circle of dim light above, peering down at them.
“Yes?” asked Sam.
“Move back from the edge, you rogues. I am going to make the sides cave in.”
“Won’t that be kind of hard on you down there?” asked Arcie.
“I should hope you all have more respect for me than that by now,” Kaylana retorted haughtily. “Step back, you on top, and the rest of you, back the way we came.”
The two heads vanished from the view above, and the knight, sorceress, and centaur backed down the dark pas sage. Kaylana gripped her staff, calling to mind the an cient powers. She was still rankled over her failure to save the Barigan’s life by her own skill, as well as the fiascoes in Ford and Fens. Rowan roots, this was supposed to have been her original quest, and she was making a right pigeon nest of it. Around her she felt the living earth, thrumming with root and worm and beetle, seeds ger minating out-of-season in the strange ever-present Light ness. The dirt of the tunnel and shaft was held in place by a thousand thousand tiny fibers and a hundred thicker roots. Fierce Druidic pride in her spirit, she drew her power together, the staff warm under her hand, and struck the far side of the shaft a light tap with the crooked knob, sending a wave of force through the soil.
Arcie and Sam were sitting by a tree, idly watching the hole. Suddenly there was a noise like a huge featherbed being shaken, and a great swath of clearing plunged downward in a cloud of dry dust. The far side of the hole and a good section of the farther passage beyond it seemed to have fallen in. They hastened over to get a better view.
Peering down what seemed to have become a low, sloping ramp into a tunnel, they saw a dirty, khaki-robed figure striding forward, staff in hand. Kaylana looked out of the tunnel at them. Arcie waved. Kaylana turned around and called back down the burrow.
“I do not believe we shall need the levitation, after all. Come along, Robin, you can get out this way.” The Druid led the way up and out of the collapsed tunnel, followed by the centaur, the knight, and the sorceress. Valerie inspected the collapsed tunnel thoughtfully.
“I suppose you could call that widening the shaft,” she said doubtfully. Kaylana adjusted a strap on her woven armor and looked coolly at Valerie.
“I meant to do that,” she informed the sorceress and strode out into the dim evening air. The renegades trailed after her, glad of the cool twilight air after the stuffiness of the long tunnel march.
They walked on through the dim light, tired but still vitalized from the Willowisps’ unusual benevolence.
Birds sang twilight songs, and a small silvery brook wound around and about their path as they followed the dim light of the setting sun. Night-blooming flowers filled the air with fragrance, lilac and violet and jasmine mingling with the cool scent of the roundtip blue pines. A low mist hung over the ground, the legendary mists of Kwart. The moon rose into the sky, and its light shafted through the trees in ghostly bands.
“A complete and Utter fiasco,” said Sir Fenwick crossly.
He and his remnant of men were gathered on the far side of the Fens, in the shelter of rolling hills. The green smudge of the Jogrel Forest was dimly visible. He looked about the campsite thoughtfully. Six men had been lost to direct confrontation with the renegades and ten more to the Fens. Fenwick didn’t like Fens at all, now. Only three of the lost men had been found; drowned in marsh pools, pale and shriveled ... the horses and Feyhounds who had lived had come back alone. Towser and the others killed in direct confrontation had been sent home to be resurrected by powerful healers, in accordance with the Company’s policy. But nothing could be done for those lost to the swamp, nor for the decapitated warrior.
Decapitation was one of the few ways to slay a person beyond the call of resurrection ... that was why, it was said, that assassins completed their contracts by delivering the head of their victim to their employer. Such violent, evil death was abhorrent to the noble Sir Fenwick, and he was much troubled. The Verdant Company rested and recovered and moved on in the light of early morning.
The Company journeyed through the woods. Though they were out of their jurisdiction-the villains had passed out of the no-man’s-land of the Fens and into the territory of the feudal states of Kwart proper-they were reluctant to leave without some victory. The discovery that afternoon of a strange tunnel plunging into the earth gave them the chance for glory they had been searching for. Drawing weapons and chanting spells, they plunged into it and ran along it, following back the trails left by the renegades. It was not often the Company had the chance to rid the world of yet another evil force, and they made the best of it. Enchanted blades and powerful spells filled the tunnels, and before the night was out Fenwick’s lost men were avenged and the terror of the children of an entire continent was nothing more than a pile of gristly, scaly meat. In the aftermath, the Company didn’t notice the almost imperceptible lightening of the sky, the feeling of goodness and perfection increased by yet another measure. But elsewhere, a red-haired Druid felt the tremor in the fabric of reality and frowned.
“So what should we be looking for now?” Sam asked when they camped that morning. Robin was still asleep, and they could discuss their plans freely. They were rightly wary of trusting anyone other than criminals like themselves with their full intentions. “If the Tests, as they seem to be, are each linked with the leading Hero of the respective land, we should be looking for something involving what’s-his-name. Prawns.”
“Pryse,” corrected Kaylana. “The paladin.”
“So where’s his castle, then?” asked Arcie. “The Test thingy’s prob’ly holed up in his wine cellar or some such.”
“He didn’t have a castle, fool,” retorted Valerie. “everybody with any learning knows he died soon after the Victory, supposedly something to do with somehow dishonoring himself. So Kwart’s still divided up into feudal states, the way it always has been, only more peaceful.”
“Well, I knew he were dead,” snapped Arcie. “He went hunting sea-worms in them far west oceans and got eaten.”
“I always heard he’d gone in search of some holy relic and never returned,” put in Sam. Blackmail had been listening to the conversation, and Sam now turned to him.
“You look like you might be from these parts, strangercompanion,” he said. “Feudal states, armor, tall ... know any local legends that might point us in the direction of... what was it? What was the verse we figured belonged to Kwart?”
“Let me check
...” Valerie unfolded her sheaf of notes. “The one that goes ‘Golden griffin’s homeward path/He who questioned, risked our wrath/Where he came to doubt, his shrine/Measures slow eternal time.’ “
“Aye, because the Golden Griffin were the device of the Hero of Kwart, Sir Pryse,” put in Arcie. “But what’s all this about questions and doubting?”
“Maybe Sir Pryse was doubting something, and then vanished in his quest to prove it,” suggested Kaylana.
“Maybe he was doubting something of the gods,” Sam speculated, not really paying attention to the discussion.
He was noticing the way the sun shone on Kaylana’s hair, turning it into waves of copper-crimson that flashed when she moved her head, so gracefully.
“Well, that’s no help,” grumbled Valerie. “Knights are always going off on stupid vigils and secret quests... No offense, Blackmail...”
The large dark-gauntleted hand waved a dismissive gesture. The knight had been more withdrawn since the death of his horse, and his stride lacked its previous proud tread. But slowly he had begun to respond to them again, and they were coming to know him better; a person of silent, deliberate wisdom, calm action, and with a keen sense of humor shown occasionally in a clattering tremble of armor, a laugh without breath. Fortunately Blackmail had no trouble keeping up with them in the march; despite his heavy armor he walked tirelessly and still seemed to have no need of sleep. Sam had seen him sometimes when he woke from his slumber midday; often the knight would be standing, staring back the way they had come, as he was doing now. They had seen no further sign of Fenwick and the Verdant Company, so the assassin could only assume he was remembering his lost equine companion, and perhaps hoping against hope to see it come galloping across the fields after them ...
But now Valerie was going on. “... How are we supposed to know where this Hero went to complain to the gods? There must be any number of little shrines and wooded glens and sacred fonts in this chessboard of a feudal country.”
“The sorceress is right,” Kaylana spoke up. “Does anyone have any ideas for where we might look?”
There was a long, awkward silence. Then, with a slow clanking. Blackmail raised one gauntleted hand. The Druid nodded.
“Very well then. Tonight, we shall follow your lead.”
Night brought a cool fog, typical of Kwart, and a sprinkling of stars. Sam did a few exercises to work the kinks out of sore muscles. The exertion flared the fire in his blood, and he let it flow; rich wild power and strength, predator-fire, stalk, kill... he scrambled up a tree at top speed and then flipped himself down and around the branches ‘til he landed, crouched on the ground, and carefully stilled his heart, his breathing. The fire slowly dimmed, flickered, wound itself back into the glowing embers of his soul, and rested. Though the fire ritual was not immediately necessary, he had to keep in trim, in training. He was on an assignment, against a target that could appear and disappear at will, with many mighty magics at its disposal. An assassin must be prepared at all times while on assignment. Not much of an assignment, he had reflected; a thousand gold tellins was a pitiful price for the life of anyone, much less a Hero; but, then, prices had gone down drastically when the demand for assassination began to fall off. In the heyday of the trade, Mizzamir’s head would have been worth more than five hundred times that amount, with of course the gratis blood-coin-the traditional oval-shaped disk of red-gold that was supposed to ward off the evil stigma of assassination, transferring it completely to the assassin rather than the employer. No assassin Sam had ever heard of had been cursed by taking a blood-coin; but such a large chunk of rare red-gold was a tidy retirement nest egg.
That and a few more missions would buy you a nice room near the Guild, with a featherbed and a full-length mirror, maybe even a set of real dishes to eat from.
As planned, Blackmail marched ahead, cautiously finding his way out of the forest, across a few hills, and then suddenly out onto a fair road. Satisfied, he started down along it.
“Be you sure this are a good idea?” Arcie said nervously, as they walked along. “We’re pretty obviously evil... wouldn’t it be better to keep out of sight and off the roads, like we has been?”
Blackmail waved a dismissive hand once again, and by a few gestures indicated that to travel the road rather than across country would cut their travel time down drastically.
“You do seem to know your way around,” Robin spoke up, from where he was idly strumming
“The Flowers of Thaulara” on his harp. “Are you from Kwart originally?”
The helmeted head nodded assent.
That explained a lot. Kwart was a land of magic far more subtle than any other; a land primarily concerned with keeping to itself. Any non-native who tried to find their way in Kwart would soon become lost in the mysterious fogs and similar terrain.
They traveled uneventfully ‘til dawn, when Blackmail led them to a small wayside inn. Though the tall, handsome proprietor was uncertain of his new guests, as most Kwartans were of outsiders, Blackmail’s regal presence and generous tipping made him more accepting. Many was the questing knight and retinue he had served in the past; perhaps the dark garb of these was due to some tragedy-the death of the knight’s lady or lord, perhaps.
So, he simply took the knight’s tellins and served the retinue their meals, and watched as they wandered upstairs to fall asleep, missing the best hours of morning.
Perhaps a forced march, he thought. The young redhaired woman was quite attractive, but the tall blond fellow had given him a look of death when he’d noticed him admiring her. The strange group left after dinner that evening, and the proprietor never saw them again.
As they set out, Sam held a silent, rogue’s cant conference with Arcie. He was concerned about how long they could keep the secret of their mission from Robin. It might be better, not necessarily to let him in on the secret, but to continue with their quest and hope that the minstrel would not decide to do anything more than write songs and pass out occasionally.
“What do about horse-man?” Sam began. “Continue secret?”
“Should,” was Arcie’s response.
“How long?” retorted Sam. “Soon will notice.”
“All right, not try. Not tell, not try.” Arcie sighed.
“Should kill him.”
“Not self. Working.” An assassin was loath to kill in cold blood when a target was already fixed in mind. Random killing diluted and confused the fire and dulled the edge.
“Self will, then,” replied Arcie. “Suggestions?”
“While sleeping. Cut throat,” the assassin recommended.
He thought a moment. “Two hearts, can’t stab. Throat.”
“Right.”
Blackmail’s lead took them out into the wilderness once more. The darkness, coupled with the dramatic fog that seemed to infest this country, made it nearly impossible to tell where they might be going, and even more difficult to speculate how they would get back. It was as if the countryside itself-tiny woods, rocky hills, and tiny twisty streams that all looked alike-was being deliberately confusing. But Blackmail plodded on, sometimes stopping atop the crest of a hill to look around or staring silently upward at the stars.
Finally, in a small woods at the base of a steep rocky hill, they came upon a miniature grotto, a glen dominated by the gentle rushing sounds of water. The sound came from a waterfall in the hillside, about ten feet tall, silver in the moonlight. The water flowed round in a shallow pool at the base, then hurried off to join with the myriad of tiny streams elsewhere. Blackmail walked up to this waterfall and beckoned them forward.
As they approached, the knight raised up his shield and held it over his head, and stepped into the waterfall.
The cascade was broken and fell widely around his shield, wider than logical physics should have dictated, in the same way that Lumathix’s breath had spread out and away. Revealed behind the waterfall was a dark opening, a faint glimmer shining inside. Cautiously they walked in.
&
nbsp; A short passage and then the tunnel opened out into a round chamber, a ceiling twice Sam’s height and walls worn smooth by centuries. A small altar stood against one corner, now almost worn away by a steady drip, drip, drip; a stream of pure water that fell from a spire on the ceiling and landed in a worn pool on the altar. The drops were soothingly regular. Sam noticed with a start that they came at exactly one-second intervals; slowly measuring time for all eternity.
Blackmail strode forward and splashed his gauntlet into the pool, then roughly broke the tip off the spire.
The drops and water splattered everywhere, losing count, losing time. The group startled as a sudden change in the air swelled forth.
A purple glow suffused the walls and water, and there came a clattering sound, as of stones dropping. In the wall behind the small altar a mosaic of tiles spun into place, tile by tile flipping around from its smooth back side to a colorful glossy front, scattering rock chips as it happened. They stepped back from the noise and chips; all but Blackmail, who stood and stared silently at the mural revealed.
When at last it clicked into stillness, the mural depicted a scene of dragons and battles, castles and fields. The famous battles of the War were shown, with vast clouds of swarming, bat-winged demonic fiends being driven by the shining armies of Light. The central figure in this case was a paladin, a human man in shining silver armor. The man had light brown hair and a regal mustache, just beginning to silver. His face was stern, with piercing gray eyes. His helmet, decorated with purple plumes, was tucked under his arm, and in one hand he held a shining sword, with a shield on his arm that depicted a golden griffin on a field of crimson.
