Krull

by Alan Dean Foster

  Ynyr's hand tightened, pulling Colwyn close. "You must reach it there or you will never find it again."

  Gently Colwyn loosened the old man's fingers and tried to make him relax. "We'll reach it. Have no fear of that. And you'll be with us, to guide and counsel me."

  Ynyr slowly shook his head. Everything was happening too quickly now. "No. My race is run." He twisted to gesture feebly at the weapon that hung from Colwyn's belt. "Remember all I have told you about the glaive. It does not make you invincible, but it is the second most powerful weapon remaining to the people of Krull. Use its power wisely. Do not squander it. When it is gone it cannot be restored."

  "I've learned of power and its uses from you, Ynyr. I won't forget."

  "And I've learned a little more of life from you. A hermit's existence facilitates study but the intensity of one's focus creates a narrow vision." He lifted his head slightly to look past Colwyn to Torquil. "You chose men I would not have chosen, but they were the right men." Torquil shifted uneasily at the compliment.

  Ynyr's eyes locked with Colwyn's. "There is much I should have told you, many things you deserve to know that I saw fit to withhold from you. Now you must learn them for yourself. The time of teaching is past."

  Frustration filled Colwyn's face. "I don't understand."

  "You will. You must. Your marriage . . ." He drew in a wheezing breath. "Your marriage to Lyssa was necessary;"

  "Of course it was. The alliance between Eirig and Turold—"

  Ynyr was shaking his head. "No, no! Truly you do not understand, for which you cannot be blamed. So much was kept from you. It was necessary that you mature and reach decisions uncontaminated by too much knowledge. The marriage . . . you must rescue Lyssa!"

  "I know. Just rest now."

  "No," Ynyr said violently, "you don't know! You don't know that . . . that . . ." He hesitated, staring through Colwyn for a moment. Then his gaze dropped from Colwyn's face to his own right hand. There was a look of surprise on his face. He opened his fingers. When he spoke again, it was in the voice of a young man: "The sand is gone."

  Colwyn looked. The night wind scattered the few remaining grains from the old man's palm. When he looked again into Ynyr's face, the wizened old eyes had closed for the last time.

  He rose. There was no anger in him and less sorrow than he'd expected. Ynyr had chosen this moment, as surely as Colwyn had determined to marry Lyssa. He desperately wanted to know what the old man had been so frantic to impart before his passing. Now it seemed he would never know, unless . . .

  "You must learn them for yourself," Ynyr had said.

  Torquil put a comforting hand on his shoulder. "I understood very little of what he said, and I knew him not overlong, but for a wise man he seemed like a decent chap."

  "He was the wisest of the wise," Colwyn muttered. "I wish he had not chosen this course. I will miss him."

  "If you believe in his wisdom, then you won't stand here regretting its loss. You'll make use of it, as he instructed you to." He glanced back toward the camp. "I wish he'd been wise enough to tell us how we're supposed to get from here to the Iron Desert in a day and night."

  "We'll get there." Colwyn's assurance was so palpable that Torquil elected not to argue the point further.

  Instead he turned and started downhill. "Then we'd better wake the others and get started. I haven't made a long run in a year. I don't know how many of the others are in shape for such an attempt."

  "First we bury him." Colwyn nodded toward the now peaceful form.

  "We waste time, Colwyn."

  "No time spent on Ynyr the Wise is wasted."

  "Colwyn," Torquil said evenly, "Ynyr the Wise is dead."

  "His spirit will travel with us. I want that spirit laid to rest in comfort. First we bury him."

  Torquil sighed. "As you command."

  Rell turned away from the sight. There was much he'd hoped to ask of the wise man. Now he would be denied that opportunity. That had always been his people's curse; failing to ask the right questions in time. Now there was only one opportunity left to him, and he had no intention of wasting it.

  The cairn they raised above the grave was simple and devoid of decoration, as Ynyr would have wanted it. The old man had a horror of waste when he was alive.

  Ergo spoke the words and for a change lived up to his sobriquet, the Magnificent. When he'd finished and the last rock had been piled in place, Colwyn turned his attention to Torquil.

  "I did not mean to appear obstinate in this matter. Your concern is justified, of course. Has he died in vain? The Iron Desert is a thousand leagues away."

  Torquil was certainly no optimist by nature, but neither was he the kind of man to quietly accept defeat. "We'd better get started. Perhaps we can somehow reach the place."

  "No man can cover that distance in a night and a day," said Kegan. "Not the greatest runner on all Krull could do it, and I am not he."

  "Nor am I," added Colwyn, "but we are bound to try. Perhaps we can find additional horses along the way."

  "Not even a horse could make such a journey,"

  Rell stepped out of the brush, spoke quietly: "No normal horse." All eyes turned to him. "But the fire-mares might do it. They do not run in the manner of normal steeds."

  "No, and they don't behave like normal steeds either," Torquil snapped. "No man has ever saddled a fire-mare."

  "Someone must always be first. I have saddled and ridden them. It can be done, though not for much more than a day. Longer than that and you lose the strength to hold on."

  "We would all have to have mounts," Torquil continued to argue. "What you suggest is impossible."

  "An impossible task confronts us; Rell proposes an impossible solution. I see no conflict there." Colwyn turned to the cyclops. "I have heard stories that speak of such a herd living to the south of here, near the place where the great plain meets the foothills."

  Rell nodded. "Your storytellers speak truth. There is time, if we move quickly and prepare."

  "Enough debate, then. Titch and Ergo will remain here with Merith."

  Ergo stepped forward. "They most certainly will not, I have traveled a long way with you, Colwyn of Eirig, or Turold, or wherever you choose. Perhaps I haven't always lived up to the claims I've made for myself, and I am no seer when it comes to practicing the arcane arts, but I know a few things. That makes me valuable to a party of thickheads like this one." For once no one took him to task.

  "You once said that I had courage. It hasn't deserted me." He looked around with an amazed expression on his homely face. "Am I really saying all this? By Krull, the man offers a chance to back out with honor and I'm actually arguing to go with him!" Laughter burst from the assembled thieves.

  But when Ergo turned to face Colwyn again, his tone had grown serious. "It is not your decision to make, Colwyn. I've earned the right to go on with you to the end."

  "The end may be death."

  Ergo shrugged. "So be it. I've lived a short life but a full one." He grinned. "I have experienced the lord of all gooseberry trifles, have consumed the supreme dish. I claim the right to go from dessert to desert."

  Colwyn nodded his approval. "How can I resist in the face of such brilliant oratory? I concede."

  A small voice sounded from behind Ergo, and Colwyn could see the boy peeping out at him. "I want to come, too."

  "No, Titch," Colwyn told him. "You're too young. Ergo may have lived a short life, but you've lived none at all. It would be wrong to throw away what you don't have."

  "I haven't been in the way. If the seer was still alive," he hesitated, fighting back tears, "he'd say that I should go so that I could learn. Besides, Ergo told me that you were my family now." He looked around at them. "All of you."

  "It's true that the boy has nowhere else to go," Ergo pointed out.

  Colwyn considered, reluctantly gave in. "You're right again. All right, Titch, you can come, but stay clear of trouble and mind what you're told."

  "I will,
sir," the boy said solemnly.

  They hurried to break camp. Merith moved to embrace Kegan.

  "I know that I can't make you come back to me only," she murmured, "but if you survive, I ask you to consider it. I'd make you as happy as any one woman could."

  "Be damned if I don't think you're right about that," he admitted. "No promises, but I'll think on it."

  She smiled and kissed him. "That's all I ask."

  The journey was not long and the canyon itself a rainbow of breathtaking shapes and colors, but there was no time for sight-seeing.

  Colwyn crawled to the edge of the cliff, stopping only when he could see clearly over the edge. They had no time to waste and there must be no mistakes. Everything had to work perfectly on the first attempt, Rell warned him, or they would have to think of another way to cover the distance between the plains and the Iron Desert. The herd would not give them a second chance.

  The cyclops bellied up alongside him. Below lay a narrow canyon, its water-worn tributaries twisting and curving in the moonlight, a valley of sedimentary serpents.

  "You must know," Rell whispered, "that they can leap any barrier. But they still think and react like any horses. The surprise and shock caused by our trap should make them react without thinking. That is our only ally. If we delay in taking them and give them time to consider their situation, they'll gallop straight out of this canyon despite anything we can do to block them."

  "Everyone knows what he has to do," Colwyn replied. "We'll work as fast as we can, but you're still the key to our success, Rell."

  The cyclops nodded. "Don't worry about me."

  "I don't plan to. Besides, that boy is probably doing enough worrying for all of us."

  Rell looked wistful. "A good lad, little Titch, for a two-eye. I do not frighten him the way I do most human children."

  "He hasn't had a usual childhood. When this is concluded I have to see that some is given to him." He would have said more but the cyclops forestalled him, raising a huge hand.

  "Listen!"

  A faint rumble from the far end of the canyon; a distant pounding coming closer, growing steadily louder. Hoofbeats they were, and yet somehow different, as though the wind itself fled before them. Court storytellers had often regaled the young Colwyn with fanciful, highly embroidered tales of the many wondrous creatures that roamed Krull's open plains, but being a sheltered youth he'd never had the chance to seek any out. Many times he'd sought assurance from his father that the storytellers were telling him the truth and not simply entertaining him with images drawn solely from their imaginations. His father had assured him they were not.

  "The fire-mares are real, my son. As real as Turold, as real as you or I or this castle. What a cavalry we would have if they could be broken to the saddle! All our enemies would fall before us. But alas, no man has been able to master them."

  Colwyn remembered as he studied the canyon and listened to the thunder rising from within.

  "What must be done?" he asked Rell.

  "The leader is the key. Once she is taken and saddled, the others will follow. Our trouble rises from the fact that this is no normal herd.

  "There is little to distinguish between leader and followers. They are crafty and wise and have been known to play tricks on would-be captors, such as placing their true leader not at the herd's head but in the middle."

  "Then how will you know her?"

  "I will know. I told you once that there are times when one eye can see more clearly than two. This is such a time. Leave that to me and make certain the others are ready. The more noise they can make, the more confusion we can cause, the easier it will be for me to isolate the leader."

  Then there was no more time for talk, for the objects of their search suddenly appeared in the canyon. Colwyn was struck speechless by their beauty. Independence glistened in their eyes while rippling flanks and pounding legs bespoke immense strength and endurance. In size they were larger than the largest horses he'd ever seen. Truly there was much power here, for those who could make use of it.

  He stared intently into the milling herd as two men rode in behind them, shouting and hooting and cracking their whips, but he could not determine which among them was the leader. It was as confusing as Rell had promised.

  Was it the black one with the white markings out there in front? But according to the cyclops, position within the herd meant nothing. There—that immense older mare trotting lightly in the second rank, the one with the golden tail! Or the mottled gray nuzzling her?

  Then Rell's fingers were clutching his shoulder and he rose, cupping his hands to his mouth. "Down and at them!"

  As the robbers plunged down among them, ready with ropes and saddles, the herd twisted about in disarray, searching for an exit. Oswyn threw his saddle over one mare's back so quickly that she couldn't avoid him, but both rider and saddle held their position only long enough for the mare to send both flying to the ground.

  It was the same everywhere else. One man would get a noose around a powerful neck or a bridle over a bucking head for a few seconds before they were dislodged, or another would find himself riding a broad back one second and hard ground the next.

  Confused and uncertain, the herd wheeled in uneven circles around the middle of the canyon. The men continued their spirited shouting, waving their arms and trying to back their quarry still farther up the steep slopes. But the delaying action could not work forever. Before long, the leader would determine that there was more noise than threat in all the activity. Then she would take to her heels and lead the escape in spite of anything mere men could do.

  Even as the herd slowed and milled about, waiting for their leader to give them direction, Colwyn was whirling the rope and its heavy noose overhead. Patiently he kept it in motion as he sought to isolate the mare Rell had selected. If he'd guessed wrongly and she wasn't the herd leader, then all the carefully coordinated effort would be waste. He didn't dwell on the possibility.

  He flung the loop. It soared cleanly between two bucking fire-mares to settle around a piebald neck. The mare whinnied loudly, loud enough so that her cry rose above the echoes of falling rocks and shouting men. She kicked and turned even as Rell grabbed hold of the rope, pulling both men flat and dragging them across the rough ground. Colwyn had the rope looped several times around his right arm. The mare might pull the arm out of its socket, but he was determined she would not separate it from the rope.

  Gravel and sand pitted his skin and stung his eyes as she pulled them across the canyon floor, but he clung grimly to the rope, trying to get to his feet and dig in. Torquil tried to help but was too far behind to reach them.

  All around the bandit leader, his men were being thrown aside, and they were good riders, too. The cyclops was wrong. Mere men couldn't ride these cursed creatures! In his mind's eye he recalled the difficulties they'd already overcome to get this far. Now it seemed they were to be defeated for taking the word of a one-eye.

  But even as he began to despair, Rell struggled to his feet. His weight and strength slowed the leader. Then Colwyn was on his feet next to him, fighting his way along the line toward the great beast. She snorted and reared angrily before him and he had to dodge hooves and teeth.

  Rell slid sideways until he stood behind a rock firmly anchored to the earth. With his feet thus braced and muscles straining, he managed to keep the fire-mare under control.

  "Hurry!" he urged Colwyn. "I will not break, but I can't vouch for the rope, and if she thinks to snap at it she may bite it through."

  Colwyn kept the Cyclops's warning in mind as he approached the bucking mare with saddle and bridle in hand. His eyes stayed on those flying hooves and he was mindful not to approach too quickly. The herd milled nervously around them, perhaps aware now of the way out of the trap, but unwilling to try it without direction from their leader.

  "Easy, my beauty, stand easy," Colwyn murmured consolingly as he drew near. "Temper your impatience. A day's ride and then you'll be free again."<
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  By the time he came alongside, she'd relaxed a little, winded by her fight with the rope. Rell kept it taut as Colwyn slipped onto the fire-mare's back. Then he was safely in place.

  Making sure of his seat, he nodded to Rell. The cyclops let loose of the rope and backed clear as the mare immediately galloped off. The herd began to flank her, whinnying their concern.

  For an instant Colwyn feared she'd bolt for the exit, but a touch of his heels and a tug leftward on the reins changed her mind. By the time he directed her back toward his friends, he felt he had her fairly well under control. Still, he did not relax. It would be presumptuous to think he knew her. A flick of massive back muscles could still send him flying.

  The longer he rode her, however, the less likely that seemed. She had turned into a model of equine decorum.

  "Gentle as a baby," he said to Torquil, who watched him approach warily, ready to retreat if the mare charged. He eyed those pacing hooves uneasily.

  "Some baby." He turned, shouted commands. "Saddle the others! Quickly!"

  Some of the chosen fire-mares still resisted, but most did no more than canter nervously around their docile leader. They were not broken, but the fight had gone out of them. As long as their leader stood placidly in their midst, there seemed no more reason for alarm, not even when strange things like saddles and surcingles were placed on their backs.

  As the last mounts were being chosen, Rell walked up to Colwyn. "I must remain here."

  This was not expected. "Why? We'll need you when we assault the Fortress. You're worth any half dozen in a fight, Rell. Why withdraw your support now that—" He broke off, remembering what Ynyr had told him about the one-eyes and their bad bargain of ancient times.

  "Forgive me, Rell. I've been so involved with my own problems that I tend to forget other men have their own. Is it time, then?"

  Rell nodded somberly. "Before night falls again, my night will come for me."

  Colwyn leaned down to grip the Cyclops's shoulder. "You've done enough. More than enough. More than could be asked of any man. Stay here. In peace." He straightened in the saddle and looked around the canyon. "This is a quiet place. A good place. None should disturb you here, not even Slayers."