by Robert Ryan
He sensed a change in the air over the next few hours. It grew cooler. The colors of the moors and the woods became muted, and he felt something pressing at him and enveloping the fortress. The horizon blurred and dimmed with a greyness that was not fog.
Aratar looked at him. “Do you feel it? It’s the spirit world cutting us off from life.”
Lonfar gave no reply. Nothing could be added.
20. Nightmare
Lanrik rolled over on the hard ground. He wanted to sleep, but his Raithlin cloak was uncomfortably damp, and his boots, which he dared not take off in case Mecklar and Gwalchmur found the camp and attacked, were cold and clammy.
The travelers had stopped by the edge of a willow-rimmed tarn. It had been drizzling for days, and everything from the misty tops of the trees to the root-bound soil was saturated.
He curled his knees up to his chest but still shivered under the cloak. There was no fire. Aranloth might have been able to start one but had remained true to the lòhren principle of using lòhrengai only at need.
For over a week, they had ridden hard and kept the northern bank of the Carist Nien in view. The lands they journeyed through were lush and green. Aranloth said the sea was only some fifty miles away, and its influence caused heavy rainfall between the coast and the river.
They were further away from the sea now, in the hills of Lòrenta, but the rain had followed. Of the enemies that pursued them there was no sign. This only served to worry Lanrik more. He knew Mecklar and Gwalchmur would not give up and would be somewhere in the surrounding wilderness. Ebona was also on his mind. He had rebuffed her, and she was obviously a dangerous enemy.
They had lost sight of the river when they reached the hill country and started toward the interior of Lòrenta. Aranloth led them unfailingly, for this was the land of the lòhrens. They had lived here since long before the founding of Esgallien or any of the eastern cities, and while they wondered all over Alithoras they always returned. Aranloth rode with lingering glances at the misty hills and wild moors, yet his love of the land had not slowed his pace.
The area around the tarn was uneven, and the dank soil was strewn with rocks and moss-covered boulders. Some places were crowded with green bracken while others were darkened by stands of gloomy willow trees. Their long branches drooped over the stagnant pond and dripped slow beads of water onto its scum-crusted surface.
Lanrik had woken Erlissa when it was her turn to keep watch and had tried without success to sleep. He pulled part of the Raithlin cloak over his head so that he could no longer see the low clouds scud across the dark sky or feel the fine drops of rain on his face.
Eventually he went to sleep with one hand on the hilt of the shazrahad sword. Though he was asleep, his mind remained strangely alert, and he could think rationally. Everything was vivid and clear. His dreams were dark though, and when he felt himself plunge from a great height, he desperately tried to wake himself up.
He fell with a crash that should have broken his body, but instead his dream-self surged upright. He was in the deep bottom of the tarn, but it was now empty of all water. Far above the willow trees still dripped, yet the beads of moisture had turned to blood. They dropped onto the parched soil near his feet and also ran in long rivulets down the woven roots in the walls of the pit.
Stepping back, his boots crunched on the ground. He turned to look and saw that the bottom of the tarn was littered with ancient bones. Scores of carrion crows perched atop skulls, their plumage velvety-black against the bleached surface. Fat-bodied adders lay coiled in the shadows and tested the air with long tongues. Far away on the fells, he heard wolves howl and then the answering echo from rocky crags within the lonely hills.
He looked up at the rim of the pit and searched for a way of escape. Crows had replaced the leaves of the willows. There were thousands of them, and they hung upside down from the branches and made them lurch and sway. Instead of the rustle of leaves, he heard only their croaking, and when they opened their beaks drops of blood dribbled from the sharp tips.
A disembodied voice cried his name. The crows with him in the pit flapped their wings and hopped from skull to skull while the adders uncoiled and hissed.
It was Lathmai, and her words stabbed into his heart.
When will you fulfil your oath?
He fell to his knees.
Why have you betrayed me?
He clamped his hands to his ears.
I want blood. Blood! Blood! Blood!
The hair on his head prickled. The willows leaned over the tarn as though sealing the entrance of a tomb, and the wolves howled again. They were closer than before, and he knew they had his scent and hunted him. His heart thudded wildly in his chest, and he drove himself upright and ran along the base of the pit. He stumbled over rocks and bones while the crows swarmed up and battered his face with their black wings.
The roots of the trees writhed, and their tips broke through the dry ground beneath his feet. They snatched at his ankles. He suddenly sensed his body in the camp and felt it thrash beneath the Raithlin cloak. There were hands on him too, but in the tarn he was on his feet and leapt and dodged. He attempted to climb the side of the pit, but everything he gripped turned to dust in his hands. He fell back and ran once more.
This time he heard the pound of hooves behind him. He turned and was frozen by the horror of a white mare that towered over him. She was fleshless: a creature of bone, sinew and tattered hide.
The mare reared, and her bones creaked and rattled. She snorted silently, and the stench of rotted flesh filled the air. The bones in her long neck lengthened, and she lunged and nipped at him with the sharp incisors at the front of her skull. He found the will to move and leapt back, thinking the mare would chase, but her teeth merely clicked together, and she stayed where she was. Her head turned though, and she eyed him with one of the empty sockets of her long skull.
She drummed the hoof of a foreleg against the brittle bone and rock of the dry tarn bed, and he heard Ebona’s voice in the sound.
“Die! Die! Die!”
The words grew clearer with each beat, and even as he listened in terror the dark walls of the tarn began to cave in and fill the pit. Dirt and bone-dust clogged his nose, and he could not breathe. He was being buried alive.
Hands gripped his arm and shook him urgently. He screamed and his eyes flicked open. The misty stars were above, and Erlissa was leaning over him.
“Wake up!” she yelled.
Her fingers dug into his flesh, and she continued to shake him. He gasped and shuddered as he drew in ragged breaths of clean air. He was drenched with icy sweat, and his tunic and hair were dank. Slowly his breathing returned to normal, and Erlissa loosened her grip but did not let go. There was something in her look that he had never seen before. It was worry. Deep worry. She had appeared less disturbed in the shazrahad’s tent or during any of the moments of danger since then. She felt for him, and her care blazed unguarded in her eyes.
“Are you all right?” she asked.
He shivered. “It was a nightmare.”
Drawing calmer breaths, he spoke again. “I dreamed of . . . Lathmai. Then things got worse. It all seemed so real.”
Erlissa rubbed his arm soothingly.
“It was so real,” he repeated.
Aranloth stood behind her, the oaken staff held tightly in his hand, and he also looked concerned. Lanrik realized that he must have made a lot of noise in his sleep, maybe even screamed before Erlissa had managed to wake him. He felt ashamed.
He closed his eyes for a moment and tried to relax. The hilt of the sword in his hand was burning to the touch, but he did not let it go. Somewhere in the nearby hills the wolves howled excitedly. He had heard them in his sleep, and the nightmare still felt real. He tried to shake off the feeling, but with inexplicable clarity he knew the wolves hunted them in truth.
He staggered to his feet and drew the sword.
Erlissa stepped back. “What is it?”
“T
he wolves!” he said.” They’re hunting us!”
“It was just a dream, Lan.”
She stepped slowly toward him again, but he shook his head adamantly. “No. I feel it. They’re coming for us. That part of my dream was real.”
“Wolves aren’t likely to attack a group of people,” she said reasonably.
Lanrik gritted his teeth in frustration. He could not make her understand; he did not understand himself, but he knew it was true. Aranloth peered at him closely then wheeled around to face the night.
“It may be as he says,” the lòhren stated with his back to them. “I feel Ebona’s touch in this. Get the horses and tether them near the edge of the tarn.”
They did as Aranloth asked, and then waited. The horses were secure, and no harm could come to them from behind. Standing in front of them they looked outward into the darkness. The howling increased until it seemed the hills were alive with wolves.
“The spirit of Ebona cannot come into the camp,” Aranloth said. “Yet even so, she might have found a way into Lanrik’s dreams. Sending nightmares is one of her skills.”
Erlissa looked concerned. “Can she hurt him that way?”
“Not really. For all her power and wisdom she can be spiteful though, and distressing him would have been her main purpose. Yet if so, it was foolish. Her mind would have been linked to his in order to do it. And just as some of his thoughts would be open to her, some of hers would be open to him, and he might have discerned her plan. Especially now that he wields the shazrahad sword and the lòhrengai in it.”
Lanrik did not know how he knew. It might have been the sword or something else, but he knew the wolves were coming. By the time he spotted the first one the last remnants of his nightmare had slipped away, and he was ready to fight.
“There!” he pointed.
They all saw it. A great white wolf padded toward them from the darkness and surveyed them before retreating into the night. There were scuffling noises, and soon dim eyes appeared all about them.
Several wolves ventured into view. They were smaller but just as white as the first. Deep ruffs of fur encircled their necks, and compared to the wolves Lanrik had seen in Esgallien they were heavy and of a more rounded body shape. Their muzzles were short, and their ears were thick tufts of fur rather than long and pointed.
“They’re strange wolves,” he said.
Aranloth did not look at him and kept his gaze on the shapes moving about the perimeter of their camp.
“They’re not the wolves of Lòrenta,” he replied. “Around here they’re lean and grey like most in Alithoras. And as Erlissa suggested, they avoid people. These come from the cold mountains of Anast Dennath, a haunt for evil creatures, some of them otherworldly.”
“They’re a long way from home, then.”
“Yes,” agreed the lòhren. “Which means they’ve been called here.”
“Ebona?” Lanrik said.
The lòhren did not have a chance to answer. One of the wolves raced sleekly toward them over the rock-strewn ground.
Aranloth lifted his staff and stabbed lòhren-fire at it. The animal dodged and turned back swiftly into the darkness.
Lanrik took a tight grip of his sword. He knew Ebona was behind the attack. The blade had given him sensitivities, and he had felt her presence in the nightmare. He thought of Lathmai. Was her apparition also Ebona’s doing? Had she seen into his mind and found what most troubled him? His hands trembled with anger, and when the wolves rushed he strode forward to meet them.
Lòhren-fire seared the night, and the shazrahad blade flickered with its own killing light. The wolves howled and yelped but seemed driven beyond reason and continued to attack until there was a pile of white bodies. Only the great white wolf that must have been the leader of the pack was left.
Lanrik charged toward it as it leapt at him. His blade sang through the air and cut through the thick rough of fur about its neck. He could feel ùhrengai in the creature’s blood, and it flowed up through the sword and into his body. He felt dizzy with power.
The corpse thumped to the ground, its snow-white coat red with blood. He looked at the dead animal and laughed. The urge left as suddenly as it came, and he turned his face to the sky, greying with the coming dawn.
“Ebona!” he screamed.
All the frustration and anger he felt flooded his voice, and his arms and legs trembled. When he turned back to the others, he saw that Aranloth leaned on his staff and surveyed him watchfully. Erlissa, wide-eyed and white-faced, dragged her gaze away from his eyes and refused to meet his glance anymore.
He realized that the sword was changing him. He would do anything to have Erlissa look at him as she used to, even cast the blade aside and go back to being his true self. But the hilt was warm and comforting in his grip, and he felt its strength infuse him. He would need it when he finally fought Mecklar and Gwalchmur. That he would do so was beyond doubt. He must fulfil his promise to Lathmai, whatever the cost. Without a word, he wiped the blade clean and sheathed it.
They did not speak as they broke camp in the growing light. Quickly and efficiently, they packed up and left the willow-rimmed tarn behind. Lanrik tried repeatedly to catch Erlissa’s glance, but she looked steadfastly ahead. After a while, he gave up and used the silence to think.
He noticed that Erlissa, however unwilling she was to look at him, had no such reluctance when it came to Aranloth. She stared at him often, and her eyes bored into him angrily. The lòhren pretended not to notice. He rode calmly, finding the easiest paths through thickets, dells and meadows. He took them up onto the high moors and always knew exactly where he was going and the quickest way to get there.
It was a lonely and wild land. The drizzle soon ceased, but grey clouds hung low and oppressive in the sky. Occasionally the horses disturbed quail, and the drab colored birds burst into flight like arrows thrumming from a score of bows. Hares, crouching and hidden, stayed still until they were nearly trodden, then zigzagged away at speed while agile-winged kestrels hovered and banked in the air, studying all below with eyes that saw everything.
Aranloth turned aside. He avoided a hollow that was spongy with water that seeped into it from higher ground, and Erlissa caught his eye and spoke.
“The sooner we’re finished, the better,” she said.
“We’re getting close,” the lòhren replied casually. “See how the ground is turning boggy? We’re nearing the source of the Carist Nien, and beyond that is the fortress of Lòrenta.”
“I didn’t just mean the fortress,” she said. “I’m done with the whole venture. I’ve had enough of being hunted and attacked.”
Aranloth gave no answer, but his silence did not stop Erlissa from speaking her mind.
“And the lòhrengai is the worst of it.”
Lanrik felt her glance slide over him and quickly shift away.
“Nothing with lòhrengai is as simple as it seems,” she continued. “I’ll find the Morleth Stone, but that will be an end to it. I’ll do no more.”
Aranloth stiffened as she spoke, but he eased back into his saddle and rode on.
Lanrik had not seen the lòhren react like that before. Erlissa looked away and went silent without noticing the effect of her words. But there was an effect, and Lanrik had the sudden feeling that there was more going on than what the lòhren had told them. Her words were about the sword, but he felt that Aranloth’s reaction had something to do with Erlissa herself. He knew the lòhren would never hurt her, but he also knew that he did what was necessary. Would he lie though? Lanrik did not think so, but that did not mean he had told all of the truth. The more he thought about it the more he knew he was right. He fondled the sword hilt absently as he searched for answers.
The day drew on. The headwaters of the Carist Nien came into view, and then late in the afternoon Lòrenta itself appeared against the horizon. It was a mighty fortress, white walled and many towered. Legends described it as shinning with an inner light, and while he could see
why that was so, with his hand on the sword, he realized there was also a greyness about it that was neither mist nor fog. He felt the otherworld; he sensed elùgai, and at the same time Aranloth let out a long sigh.
“We’re nearly too late,” he said quietly. “The fortress is assailed, and all that is in her, the artefacts of the lòhrens, the wisdom of the ages and the people dwelling there, are imperiled.”
He spoke with a catch in his throat. The fortress and the danger it was in meant something more to him than just a battle against enemies, however important that was. This was his home. It was a place that he loved, but one that he may never see again.
Lanrik understood how he felt.
21. On the Brink
The afternoon light faded swiftly, and darkness veiled the remote hills. Night shadows swallowed Lòrenta, but Aranloth, deep in thought, stood unmoving and stared in the direction of his fortress home. Lanrik and Erlissa set up the camp and did not disturb him.
They lit no fire. The lonely wilderness pressed in, and Lanrik could scarcely remember his last hot meal. He did not complain though. Food was the least of his troubles, for somewhere nearby were elùgroths. Nor could he forget Mecklar and Gwalchmur. They troubled his thoughts constantly, and he would have no peace until he fulfilled his promise to Lathmai.
They eventually ate a meagre meal. Aranloth, the oaken staff resting in his lap, spoke when they were finished.
“The Morleth Stone has nearly done its work,” he said. “We must hurry, yet we can’t be sure where our enemies are. The elùgroths are likely to be at the front of the fortress, but Mecklar and Gwalchmur could be anywhere.”
“Could they have beaten us here?” asked Erlissa doubtfully.
Aranloth shrugged. “We travelled fast, but they’re driven by Ebona. If they’re not here already, they’ll arrive soon. They won’t spare their horses.”
Lanrik had no doubts. Their own alar mounts and the lòhren’s roan had been pushed hard, harder than most in Esgallien could have endured, but Mecklar and Gwalchmur had quality horses and would squeeze every drop of life out of them. He knew they were close by somewhere. And there was Ebona too. She would arrange more trouble if she could.
