To Light a Candle

by Mercedes Lackey

  These Demons—nobody called them anything but Them—were nothing like the Armethaliehan nursery-tales he’d been terrified by as a child. He managed to figure that out, though nobody wanted to talk about them much. Cilarnen doubted that the Centaurs he’d talked to knew much more than they’d said; and he wasn’t quite ready to try questioning any of the Elves.

  He suspected that Kardus knew more, but the Centaur Wildmage would not answer any of his questions. “This is neither the time nor the place,” was all Kardus would say. “Wait for better.”

  Remembering the sight of the Demon at Stonehearth, Cilarnen reluctantly decided to take his advice.

  THEY were two days away from Ysterialpoerin when the blizzard struck.

  The Wildmages traveling with the army had been warning of truly bad weather to come—in a day, perhaps two. Cilarnen knew that Linyesin was hoping that they would at least reach the edge of the forest before it began, so that they would have some shelter and protection from the storm. The Centaurs had rejoiced when the Wildmages told them that weather magic had been done by the Wildmages with the Elven army, pushing back the storm and giving them an extra day’s grace.

  But then the storm struck without warning, and far too early.

  It was an hour or two past noon. Cilarnen was riding beside Kardus near the supply carts when suddenly he heard the horns begin to blow.

  “What is it? Are we being attacked?” he demanded in alarm.

  “No,” Kardus said, puzzled. “It’s the signal to make camp.”

  Suddenly the temperature dropped sharply, and the sky turned black.

  Cilarnen looked up, alarmed.

  The sky was … boiling.

  There was no other way to describe it. He heard a rumble, and a sudden crash of thunder, and saw lightning flash across the sky.

  A wall of wind—fierce enough to make Kardus stagger—came howling down out of the north. Oakleaf began to sidle and balk as thunder boomed again and heavy wet flakes of snow began to sheet down out of the now-black sky.

  Belatedly, Cilarnen realized what the horns had meant. The promised blizzard had come now. And if they all didn’t get under cover they were going to freeze.

  He swung down off Oakleaf’s back. The mule fussed and balked, but Cilarnen managed to lead him over to the wagon and tie him fast.

  THEY formed the supply carts into a windbreak, and fought to get the shelters up, for without shelter they would freeze, and quickly. But it was useless. The wind was too strong.

  It was the Mountainfolk who realized what must be done to save them. They emptied the supply carts, flinging the contents haphazardly into the snow as the Elves struggled to unhitch the mules so that they could be brought to shelter. So great was the force of the wind that the wagons’ contents blew everywhere. Already snow was mounded against the windward side of the wagons, and no one could see more than a few feet in any direction.

  Every coil of rope they found, the Mountainfolk passed to the Centaurs, who used it to link themselves together, so that none would be lost in the blinding snow.

  Cilarnen found himself unceremoniously lifted—he didn’t see by whom—and tossed into one of the now-empty carts. He landed hard, and immediately tried to scramble back out again.

  “Stop that, boy. Do you want to freeze? I’ve never seen a storm come up this fast—not even a Called one,” an unfamiliar voice said out of the darkness. It was one of the Mountainfolk. Others crowded in quickly, and then pulled the tarp closed over the end of the wagon.

  “But, Kardus—” Cilarnen said. The wagon shuddered with the force of the wind.

  “Your Centaur-friend is warm and safe in the middle of the herd,” the stranger said. “Which is more than you or I would be out there just now; they’re hardy folk. Have patience. The worst of this should blow itself out in a day or two and we can be on our way. And then, I admit, I’d like to have a word or two with whoever Called this blizzard.”

  “Called?” Cilarnen said blankly.

  “Of course,” the stranger said calmly. “You don’t think this came naturally, do you? This weather was supposed to come tomorrow, or the day after—and not a storm this hard, either. A Wildmage called this up, and I’d like to know why.”

  As the wind howled around them, and Cilarnen buried his head under the shelter of his cold arms, he decided that he wanted to know why, too.

  Very badly indeed …

  “I need to get back,” Kellen mumbled aloud. He was exhausted from the healing but he thought he might as well rest back at the cavern as here. Where he was supposed to be right now anyway.

  “You’re exhausted,” Shalkan told him, not unkindly, as Kellen sat at the front of the unicorn’s tent, wrapped in blankets and drinking a cup of soup someone had brought him. “You’re not thinking clearly. If you insist on going tonight, wait for Ancaladar to get back. A horse won’t be able to make it even as far as the main camp in this weather—and don’t make eyes at me. Even if I were willing to take you—and I’m needed here—you’d freeze by the time I could get you there.”

  He knew Shalkan was right—the snow was coming down even heavier than before, if that was possible, and in full darkness, even a unicorn might get lost. And getting back to the cavern camp wasn’t really an emergency.

  “Why is it snowing?” Kellen finally thought to ask. “The weather wasn’t supposed to turn so soon.”

  “The Shadowed Elves tried to burn the forest. Jermayan is pretty sure they used the ever-burning metal you stopped them from using before. He had to bring the storm to stop the fires from spreading. Kindolhinadetil’s foresters are out looking for the pieces now. Perhaps they will be able to save the individual trees that were set afire. But whether they can or not, the forest itself is safe.”

  “I should go and help,” Kellen said groggily, trying to get to his feet.

  “You should stay where you are, and drink your soup,” Shalkan said firmly, lowering his horn meaningfully. “I will wake you when Ancaladar returns.”

  Kellen had no intention of falling asleep—especially here. Not when there was so much to do. But Shalkan was right. He needed a little more strength, and he could get that from the soup. It wouldn’t hurt anything or anyone just to sit there until he finished it.

  SHALKAN woke him a few hours later. “Come on,” he said, prodding Kellen with his horn; it was the prod of the horn, rather than Shalkan’s voice, that stirred him out of an unrestful sleep.

  Kellen was glad to be awakened. He was as groggy as if he hadn’t slept at all. His dreams had been unsettled, filled with shadowy menace and battles. He’d woken with the same feeling he had all-too-frequently these days: that time was running out; that while they spent their energy on inessentials, Shadow Mountain was winning the larger war.

  He got unsteadily to his feet and staggered after Shalkan into the thigh-high snow, pulling his heavy cloak tightly about him. The snow was still falling heavily and steadily; there was a narrow trench where others had walked, but even that was filling quickly, and the snow showed no sign at all of stopping. If the wind kept up like this, they’d have snow dunes up to a dragon’s eye before long.

  Ancaladar and Jermayan were waiting for Kellen in the same clearing as before. Balls of Coldfire hung in the trees, illuminating the blowing snow and very little else.

  “The forest is secure,” Jermayan said, raising his voice to be heard over the sound of the wind. “The foresters have found every ring of the Shadowed Elf metal.”

  “Good,” Shalkan said, shaking to rid himself of the snow that clung to his fur. “And Kellen has done what he came here to do. So you may take him back to the caverns—as he insists.”

  The cold had woken him thoroughly at last, which was a mixed blessing. Kellen clambered up onto Ancaladar’s back, slipping on the dragon’s ice-covered side. He wondered if Ancaladar even noticed the cold. He wished he didn’t.

  Jermayan seated himself in the forward saddle with a great deal more grace, and pulled the riding str
aps tight. But they didn’t take off at once. Instead, Ancaladar trotted quickly through the trees, to Kellen’s initial puzzlement. At last he figured out the reason.

  Of course. He can’t just jump into the air. He may be able to land straight down, but in this wind, he needs more room than there is here to get into the sky. Kellen made sure his own riding straps were tight. Having experienced several of Ancaladar’s takeoffs, he had no desire to fall off, especially in this weather and at night.

  Soon they reached an area where there were fewer trees, and Ancaladar spread his wings, springing into the wind. The force of the storm spun him like a kite, and he used its power to pull him into the sky, rising in a tight swooping spiral. It seemed to snow harder the higher they went, until suddenly the snow was gone, and darkness was replaced by light: the brilliance of the moon and the stars. Beneath them, the clouds looked like the snow-covered landscape.

  “We have paid a heavy price for victory this day,” Jermayan said quietly, as Ancaladar leveled off.

  Petariel. Gesade. So many of those Kellen had ridden with, fought beside, dead or terribly wounded in these last battles. And how long until Idalia, Vestakia, Jermayan and Ancaladar, were added to the list? Everyone he knew, everyone he loved …

  “Yes,” Kellen said, tightly. The last thing Jermayan needed was a display of emotion when he himself must be feeling worse than Kellen. He must have known his friends and fellow Knights for—a century, at least! These were Elves who should have been spending the next several centuries contemplating their gardens, practicing their arts, making beautiful things, and perfecting themselves. And now—now they were gone.

  “We must take what comfort we can in having won,” Jermayan said somberly. “For the consequences of defeat are too great to bear.”

  But are we winning, Jermayan? Kellen looked at his friend’s back, heard the weariness and near-despair in his voice, and did not ask his question aloud.

  THE following day, Kellen, Vestakia, and Keirasti met with Adaerion to discuss the best way of ridding the caverns of duergar. By now both their units had been brought up to full strength again, as Redhelwar reconfigured the hard-hit skirmishing units, and formed new ones.

  The blizzard still hammered the land. The pavilions of the cavern camp were all half-buried in snow, and ropes had been strung between them to allow people to find their way between them. Without that, there was every chance of becoming lost, even in the few feet that separated one pavilion and the next.

  “Kindolhinadetil has opened the archives at Ysterialpoerin to Redhelwar, so we now know something more than we did of the habits of duergar. They are not accustomed to luring many victims at one time, so if you approach them in force, at least some of you should be safe from their call, and able to attack them while the others are held in thrall.” Adaerion said.

  “But our light will drive them into hiding, as it did the last time we entered the caverns,” Keirasti said.

  “You will not have light,” Adaerion said. “The Wildmages have worked upon this problem since we understood we would have to hunt duergar. They have crafted Darksight hoods—enough for both your troops. They will not render you invisible as tarnkappa would, for we now know that would be useless, but you will be able to see your prey and approach him in darkness. And Artenel’s artificers have made you spears and nets, which will be of more use against these creatures than your swords.”

  “So we can hunt them,” Keirasti said with grim satisfaction. “But it would be pleasant indeed to hear how we will find them.”

  “The Crystal Spiders will tell us,” Kellen said. “They’re as eager as we are to free their home of what they call Dark Ones. They said they would give us aid. If we go into the caverns—past the village cavern—I think they’ll come out and speak with us.”

  “All that remains is getting there,” Keirasti said. She glanced at the doorway of Adaerion’s pavilion and winced faintly as the wind shook the fabric vigorously.

  “We might as well move into the caverns until we’ve cleared them,” Kellen said reluctantly, although the last thing he wanted to do was to move underground. “The big chamber near the entrance would do for a base camp. If we light up enough of the caverns—I can cast Coldfire on the walls, or Jermayan or one of the other Wildmages can—we’ll be safe from the duergar. And we won’t have to keep coming back and forth through the snow.” The camp was a mile away from the cavern mouth—close enough in ordinary winter weather, but not something he wanted to ride through twice a day in a storm. And it would be warmer underground as well; so much of their energy was being wasted in keeping warm that everyone was exhausted.

  “A reasonable suggestion,” Adaerion said, with equal reluctance.

  “Will the Crystal Spiders be able to tell you when the caverns are … empty?” Vestakia asked, speaking up for the first time.

  “I’m not sure,” Kellen admitted. “They’re not very much like anything we’ve ever seen before, though they’re not Tainted. So when they say the caverns are empty, that’s when I’d like you to check and see what you feel.”

  “Nothing, I hope,” Vestakia said. “But … you did say they could talk to each other, didn’t you? That the one lot in the trapped caverns talked to the ones here?”

  Kellen nodded, frowning faintly in puzzlement, wondering what she was thinking.

  “Well,” Vestakia said, “once the cavern is clear, maybe someone should find out just how far away they can talk to each other. Because the weather’s getting so bad now—if these storms keep up—that Jermayan and Ancaladar and I won’t be able to fly to search for the next Shadowed Elf cave, but if there are Crystal Spiders living in all the caves in the Elven Lands, and they know everything that goes on in their caves, and they all talk to each other, maybe they can tell you where the next cave you need to go to is.”

  Everyone stared at her. It was such a simple, practical, obvious solution that none of them had thought of it. And it would save them an enormous amount of time—and danger to Vestakia.

  If it worked.

  “That is an excellent notion, Lady Vestakia,” Adaerion said with grave enthusiasm. “It is certainly something we must try, once the caverns are safe to enter.”

  Kellen felt a sense of relief. Not so much at the thought that Vestakia wouldn’t be in constant danger—though that thought was never far from his mind—but at the thought that, if her plan worked, she would no longer be completely irreplaceable.

  “Well,” Kellen said, “once we’ve gotten rid of the duergar and you tell us the caves are clear, I’ll introduce you to a bunch of giant glowing spiders and you can ask them yourself. How would you like that?”

  Vestakia grinned at him. “Better than flying around for sennights freezing my … feet off, to tell the truth! And spiders certainly won’t care a bit what I look like, so we won’t have to persuade them that I’m not Tainted!”

  KELLEN and Keirasti moved their troops into the caverns. When the blizzard blew itself out, they barely noticed—their days had settled into a wearying, hideous routine as they searched the caverns, hunting duergars. With the darksight hoods the Wildmages had made for them, they could approach their prey in darkness and still see and hear one another, and the Crystal Spiders kept their promise, letting them know where to hunt.

  The creatures had approached them eagerly as soon as they had ventured past the now-empty Shadowed Elf village. Remembering what Idalia had done, as soon as he saw them approach, Kellen pulled off his gauntlet and held out his bare hand

  The enormous spiders had climbed over him eagerly, until he was covered in them. Though they looked as insubstantial as thistledown, the whole swarm of them was surprisingly heavy. One of them walked out on his arm, and settled its body in his palm.

  :You return.: He heard the voice in his mind. It tickled faintly. :Now we can help. You hunt the Black Minds. We know where they are.:

  Show me, Kellen thought.

  Pictures appeared in his mind—parts of the cave system
he hadn’t seen yet. They were blurred, impossible to decipher.

  The Crystal Spiders must have sensed his bewilderment, for the pictures ceased. :We will take you—near. And then you will know.:

  Know? How? Kellen thought in bewilderment.

  : You will know,: the voice in his head repeated.

  The carpet of spiders ebbed from his body, and the Crystal Spiders began to scuttle away with surprising speed.

  “We follow them,” Kellen said to the others.

  Soon enough he understood what the Crystal Spiders had meant. After they had followed the Spiders for a while—being careful to mark their trail at intervals in order to find their way back—two of their party simply dropped their weapons and began walking forward.

  “Rhufai!” Reyezeyt said sharply. “Janshil!”

  “Let them go,” Kellen said quietly. “They’ll lead us right to where we need to go.”

  The first kill was easy: though the duergar held ten of them spellbound at the end, it didn’t seem to understand that it was still vulnerable. The others rushed forward, confusing it, and Kellen and Keirasti spitted the duergar on their long wooden spears. In death it dissolved instantly, filling the cavern with the same gagging sweet-sick stench Kellen remembered from his first duergar kill.

  It was the last time their hunts were to be this easy. The duergar seemed somehow to be able to silently communicate with one another. Once Kellen and the Elven Knights had killed the first one, the others seemed to understand there was a need to hide.

  And if they could not hide, attack.

  “WATCH him! Watch him!” Kellen shouted. His voice echoed eerily in the vastness of the cavern.

  A dozen of the Elves stood like sleepwalkers. The duergar was backed into a small alcove just off a larger chamber deep within the mountain. It crouched and snarled, revealing a mouth filled with formidable teeth.