by Andre Norton
The point was above the casket and the bird. Tirtha understood. What lay within the guardian's hold was to remain secret. Yet it was also a focus for the power that had been summoned. There was nothing they could do but watch and wait, for they were only a very small part of another's plan. Perhaps in the end they would be discarded. One did not strike bargains, make pleas to such as this.
There was something about the shadow sword. Even as the Falconer's weapon bore unreadable symbols along its length, so did similar markings appear here. And those in part she recognized. Some of these were written on the dead man's scroll! She marveled at that for a long moment.
Alon, no longer holding the bird, had dropped his hands to lie limp on his knees where he sat cross-legged. His eyes, taking on a kind of luminance, not from those flames lashing over his head, but rather from the Falconer's weapon, were fixed upon that shadow sword, and there was that in his face which no child could know nor feel. He was gathering what he had not yet learned properly to garner, fighting a private battle of his own.
The Falconer stood as might a defender, waiting for a last fatal charge meant to bring down all he would protect. His weapon of power was held point up as if to engage that shadow weapon should it strike.
“Nirel.” Into that Tirtha put what strength she had left. “Take the scroll, for it is a part of this, though I know not how.”
The Falconer did not move, but Alon, as if he were well aware of what she carried and recognized its value, opened her pouch and pulled forth the metal rod thrusting it upward into one of the empty dart loops on the man's shoulder belt.
Within her mind the face of carven beauty withdrew as by a click of fingers, though Tirtha was sure that what it represented had not yet put them out of mind. Instead she felt, through the stone on which she lay, adding to her torment, a quivering of the rock, a tremor. Again she found voice, this time to cry a warning.
“Away from the walls!” She was not sure in what direction what was coming might strike, and they might all be buried. In that fashion, what she still held would be made safe.
The Falconer threw himself forward. With his clawed arm he swept the boy flat to the floor, thrusting him against Tirtha, while she cringed from the pain the contact caused her. Then the man was on his knees, arching his own body over the two of them. His mailed chest nearly flattened the bird as he tried to protect them.
A second tremor moved to the floor. The flames flared out fiercely, still there was no heat in them. Now the shadow sword tilted in the air, though perhaps Tirtha, lying face up as she did, was the only witness. No longer did it hang point down; rather it stretched horizontal, and it grew longer, wider, casting over the three of them a shadow.
The ragged tapestries on the walls swung as they might have had a tempest caught them. Pieces of cob-web-thin fabric tore loose, to settle on the three so entwined.
There came a crash. Behind a fall of the rotting fabric, a widening break in the wall showed, stones loosened, fell outward and away. In the dark beyond, a second wall came into sight. That, also cracked, swayed out, to crash. The light of day flooded in—a day of sullen skies and great bursts of lightning, which sent force whips lashing across the sky. Thunder was war drums beating up an army.
Tirtha saw that opening. They could go, these two, the way was open. In so much had the Power which had brought her here answered her plea. She tried to break her hold on the casket with one hand, thrust the Falconer up and away from her so that he could see that door to freedom and take it—he and Alon. Yet she could no longer detach her flesh from the box. There was movement; the bird swept across her face, though she felt no brush of feather. It passed out from under the hanging sword, turning in the air, sped like a well-thrown lance out into the midst of the storm where its gray body became one with the half-light, gone from their sight.
“Go . . .” Tirtha tried to raise her voice above the violence of the thunder. There came another crash, another portion of that outer wall disappeared. Now there was a strange smell in the air, though it held none of the noisome stench of the Dark. She was sure that lightning had struck very close, perhaps somewhere on the building.
The Falconer levered himself up. The flames that had played about their heads had been snuffed out; the outline of the shadow sword was gone. It would appear that all manifestations of that other Power had been withdrawn. There was an open door to freedom, yes, but one she could not take.
Tirtha was enough of a healer to be sure that her back had been broken and that, even if they moved her (which she believed they could not do), it would only prolong the end for her, in turn putting them into greater danger. Better she had been buried under collapsing walls, taking with her what she was born to guard.
The Falconer was on his feet, pulling at remnants of the tapestry. There were lengths here and there, which, when he dragged them free of the broken walls, seemed stouter. These he smoothed out on the floor, Alon scrambling up to help.
They had at length a padding of four or five thicknesses, as long as Tirtha was tall. She could understand their purpose and knew it would fail. But also she realized now they would not go forth and leave her. Perhaps death would come swiftly when they attempted to move her; she could wish for nothing more than that.
They were done at last. Now Nirel stooped above her. Tirtha bit her lip until she tasted blood. She gathered all her last strength to make certain that she would not give tongue to her agony. He knelt, and she felt his hands slip slowly under her shoulders. There followed such a wave of torment as made all her earlier suffering seem as nothing.
“My . . . belt . . . pouch . . .” She mouthed the words, and Alon must again have heard them first, for she saw his hands swift in their movement. “The . . . bag . . . with”—she had to swallow before pushing the last words out—“the dragon sign . . . put all . . . in . . . my . . . mouth. . . .” This was the last mercy she hoped for. So powerful was this drug one used it with great care. To swallow all she carried was inviting the end. Let it come fast and free the two of them.
Alon had the smaller bag open. He held the mouth of it to her lips, shook free dried leaves that struck her tongue like a spoonful of dust. Tirtha choked, swallowed, choked, and fought to get the full portion down. Rightly, it should be taken as a brew. Swallowed dry in this fashion, she did not know how long it might need to work—she could only hope. Since the portion was far more than had ever been advised for use, she trusted it would serve.
Pain again, but through its piercing agony she continued to fight the dusty mouthful into her throat, swallowing convulsively. Then the world went scarlet with another protest from her broken body, and from that she passed into blessed nothingness.
She became aware not of her body, but of the self that had only before ventured forth in dreams and far-seeing. The relief of being free of pain was so great that she exulted in nothing else for a period of time. This, then, was what came afterwards—what mankind had so long speculated might lie at the end of the Long Road—freedom indeed.
Only she was not free. Dimly, through her relief, she felt the tug of some tie. At once she opposed it. Might a geas last past the very fact of death? How could she still be entrapped? Tirtha knew fear and then rage, and her rage was a fire blazing up about that inner self. No! She would answer to no one, to nothing!
Nothing, not even that call.
Call? Yes, from a far distance there was a call, a demand, an urgent command.
Then she knew that she was indeed not free, that her body still encased her. It was immobile, that body of hers—dead—while within it she was hopelessly imprisoned. There was no longer any pain, only the deadness. She was looking up into the sky from which rain fell in great sheets, though on her dead body she could not even feel its beat. It filled her eyes, and so she could only see as through a heavy mist.
Yet she saw and she heard.
“Take it, fool—it is what we have sought!”
“Take it and die, is that the way of it, L
ord? You saw what happened to Rudik . . .”
“She is dead. Have you not proof of that by the bite of your own sword?”
“I have also seen Rudik. I do not seek what happened to him, Lord. This is of your desire—do you then take it.”
“Fool! Have I not said many times over, to each his own Powers? This is not of my knitting, and should I reach for it, it will be destroyed and none of us thereafter shall have the good of it. There are laws of the Talents and those may not be broken.”
“It was perhaps wrong to shoot down the bird-lover. We might have used him then . . .”
“Not so—you saw his weapon. It was well that your dart struck first, for that was a thing bound to him, and thus the same rule would have held.”
“Then use the boy. He has no weapon and he . . .”
There came an angry laugh. “Why must I be plagued ever by the service of fools? The boy—he is perhaps near as great a catch as this trinket box you so fear to meddle with. There will be pleasure for the Great One in meeting him! No—take up that box and now! I have held my hand because I know that you are short-gifted in wits and courage—you ravagers of an undone and ruined land—but need I compel you?”
“Lord, remember you are still only one among us, for all your talk of mighty forces that will come riding at your call. And Rudik is dead, in such a way as none of us here has any desire to follow. There is that other . . .”
A moment of silence and then, “Perhaps you are not so great a fool as you would seem, Gerik. Yes, he is still alive, even after your kind attentions and earnest discussions. I think he has enough of a hand left to do our bidding. He may not be a true Hawk, but there is a part of the proper blood within him, unless that was all spilled during our time of reasoning. So he may be able to achieve what must be done. Get him forth and try! I do not like this storm, there is the smell of Power here, such as is no friend to the Great One.”
Tirtha lay within her shell of death and tried to understand. The bird man—Nirel—dead? It would seem so. For a moment she felt a thrust of strange pain, though not from her dead flesh and splintered bones but rather from another part of her. And the boy—that was Alon—him this “Lord” would take as captive to present to some greater doer of Evil. But it would seem that the casket was still hers, or at least within the guardianship of her dead body—and it had already caused death to one who would take it from her. That was true—the guardianship might pass only by right and by free gift, she knew, perhaps had always known in some hidden part of her.
So—one of the Blood? One to take from her even in death if it could be . . . And she had not the power—no longer any command. Again she knew the swelling fire of anger—a rage that filled her world. She could not be foresworn—she was the Hawk and in her hold this . . .!
Still the rain blinded her eyes which she could not close or blink; but she could hear, even as she heard voices now, whimpering sobs of pain, the cries of one broken and vanquished. She saw approaching her three shapes half hidden by the storm, two dragging a third between them. The two, who carried rather than led that helpless one, hurled him to the ground beside her, so he fell out of her range of sight. Then one of his captors stooped and caught a fistful of hair, drawing him up into her murky vision once again.
She saw a face bearing such scars and mutilations as made it a mask of horror, yet that part of her imprisoned in death felt emotion only vaguely, as if it were such a distance from her now that it was one with the helplessness of her own body. The other guard grabbed at the limp and helpless man, seizing an arm down the scorched and beaten flesh of which water runneled. There were fingers on a hand that was fire-shriveled. All but two of them were bent at impossible angles, but the hand was dragged forward above Tirtha, and though she could see only a fraction of movement, she realized that it was being made to reach for the casket, which must still lie upon her breast, perhaps tight in the hold of her dead hands.
The guard dropped that hand. She heard a scream such as could be torn only from one suffering the deepest agony that the Dark might devise. His body arched into her sight, nearly won to its feet in that last terrible torment, then fell back and away. There was silence, save for the battering of the rain and the distant beat of the thunder.
“You see, Lord, even your half-blood could not do it.”
There was a sound in answer that was no word, rather a hissing of sheer rage. Then he who had been so addressed apparently mastered his flaming anger.
“Well enough. The puzzle remains. We shall take the dead with us, since no one seems like to master her. Sling her over a pack pony and let us be gone. There are those who can be summoned by the very smell of Power, and we are in debatable land.”
“You ride for Escore, Lord?”
“Where else? Get your men together, Gerik, and let us be about our business. As for the cub—I shall see to him. She, at least, will need no guards.”
“Lord, my sword-oath serves only this side of the border. We do not ride crosswise into what lies eastward.”
Again that snarl. “You will discover, if you try otherwise, Gerik, that your oath is more than you deemed it at its taking. When I speak, you ride where and when it is my desire that you do so.”
Once more a length of silence. Tirtha discovered that while she might no longer sense by physical means or judge by what she saw, still she was keenly aware of all about her. That Gerik was cowed was untrue. He was in a little awe of the one he addressed as “lord,” but already a wily and subtle mind, well melded with cruelty and ruthlessness, was twisting and turning to find a way free. Murder was the least, perhaps, and the most forthright of the thoughts now in the outlaw's head.
However, for the time being, he was willing to adopt an outward show of being completely under the other's domination. She heard stamping of hooves on stone. Moments later she was lifted, and inwardly waited for the pain to strike—no, she must have been right. Her body had died, and it did not matter how roughly slack flesh and broken bone was handled. She felt nothing save that she was indeed lying across a pony's back and that she had been lashed in place there.
Alon had made no sound. She wondered then if once more he had fled back into that hiding place he had found during the attack on the garth. But he had certainly not become invisible, for they spoke of him as booty to be carried off.
They rode under the fall of the rain, eastward bound. Behind them they must be leaving the dead. She had no idea what might have happened to the unfortunate Rudik, but that the Falconer had found the end of his journey and that the tortured rag of humanity they had brought to rob her had been finished, Tirtha did not doubt.
She hung in her bonds unfeeling, and at length she was able once more to flee imprisonment from the shell of her inert self, sink back into the darkness. Still she was not free. Even in death the casket rode with her, and she came to believe that she would be bound in essence of spirit as long as it existed and was not returned to the one who could claim it by full right.
Was that the woman figure she had seen in her mind—the one the bird had called upon as Ninutra? If the bird had flown free from the keep to summon help, help had not come. Tirtha wondered about what had happened when Nirel and Alon had gotten her out of the destroyed secret chamber. But all that was very far away and had no more meaning for her. She need only wait and hope that that wait would not be long, until the final meeting wherein it would be decided once and for all whether a blood-oath might hold past death and how strong such a tie would be against the Dark.
Tirtha thought once more of the woman—not to make any plea—that was no longer in her power. If this Ninutra was the prime mover who had set the geas into action, then it must be her time and place and power that would bring the end into view. Surely there would be freedom thereafter, but perhaps even yet—though she no longer had a body worth the struggle—a final battle lay ahead.
16
PERHAPS time and death had no meeting place; or perhaps it was that, even though de
ad, she was still held to the world she knew. Tirtha drifted between a place where she knew nothing and was at rest and being remotely conscious of what lay about her. There was the rain and storm, winds that buffeted the land, vicious strikes of lightning, though the fury of the unleashed weather led the commanded of this party to make no concessions. They rode through the worst of it as if there were clear sky above.
Tirtha's vague touches of the outer world caught strange, floating fragments of thoughts that were not her own. She did not try to gather or consider them, yet she knew that those who rode were certainly not united. There were fears here, anger, dour resentment, weariness, but above all fear. That emotion gathered force, aimed in one direction, toward the leader under whose orders they journeyed.
During one of her feeble contacts with the world she was transfixed, caught. Not by any confused emanation from those whose prisoner she now was, but by a far more vigorous and demanding force.
“Tirtha!” That came like an arousing shout uttered in her very ear, drawing her into far keener awareness than she had had since they had fought that battle for the casket across her body. “Tirtha!”
The call, having found her, fed energy to awaken and strengthen her.
“You live . . .” That was no question, rather a demand. “You live!”
Which was folly. Still that bit of her which was able to respond could not say this was not true. She wondered if the fact that she still must fulfill a guardianship, that she had not been absolved of the geas, kept that small ember of life aglow in her.
What sought her—this was not the Great One who had rent open their prison. Nor was it the Dark Lord who commanded here. The Falconer was dead. Alon?
As if she had asked that aloud, there came an instant strong reply—wordless, yet unmistakable. The boy lived, nor had he retreated so far into his inner hiding place that he could not reach her.
