The Return of the Sword tcoh-5

by Roger Taylor

  ‘What!’ Loman exclaimed. ‘That’s not possible.’

  ‘Seemingly, it is,’ Gulda retorted.

  ‘I was here,’ Antyr interjected. ‘How I came here, I don’t know. But having entered it just now, felt it, heard it, I’ve no doubts about it, even though it was pitch dark when I came here before.’ He held out a small concession. ‘If I wasn’t here, then there’s another place identical to it somewhere.’

  Loman grimaced and turned from side to side as though looking for a way to escape, but Antyr’s unassuming certainty held him there. ‘I’m not impugning anyone’s sincerity,’ he said eventually. ‘But this business of being in two places at once is giving me trouble. It makes no sense. I’m a simple smith. I bend and shape iron. The things I know are solid and here. They can’t be here and there. They…’

  He threw up his arms in frustration.

  Gulda tapped her stick on the floor. ‘You’re as simple a smith as Hawklan’s a simple healer,’ she said. ‘But your point’s taken. Little of this makes sense. The only thing that stops any of us dismissing all these tales out of hand is the presence of too many reliable witnesses – too much hard information. Sumeral is working to return, beyond any doubt, and, whether they make sense or not, these things both are, and are part of, His struggle. We can’t afford the luxury of not accepting them just because they offend our common sense.’

  Loman turned to Andawyr and Hawklan but found no relief there.

  ‘In the very smallest and the very largest of things, what we call common sense vanishes, Loman,’ Andawyr said, almost apologetically. ‘Impossible things become possible.’ He fumbled unconsciously with the papers in his pocket and repeated softly, as though to himself, ‘Impossible things become possible.’

  ‘The Memsa leaves us no choice, Loman,’ Hawklan said. ‘She’s right. You and I probably know more than anyone else about the Labyrinth. I know this place disturbs you. I can’t say I enjoy it myself. But it holds no threat for us except what we choose to make of it. We can listen to what’s being said, can’t we?’

  Loman growled and clutched at a final straw. ‘Anyway, there’s nowhere I know in the Labyrinth that’s completely dark. This hall is always lit, as is the Armoury. It’s dim in there, but there’s enough light to see where you’re going.’

  ‘On the path,’ Gulda said.

  ‘Yes, obviously, on the path.’

  ‘And off it?’

  Loman hesitated. ‘Off it, you die,’ he said categorically. ‘I doubt you’d make ten paces before you were down.’ He almost snarled his final words. ‘If your eyes were open, you’d see the light as you were dying.’

  Gulda nodded. She held out her hands as though measuring something. ‘How big is the Labyrinth?’

  Loman mimicked the gesture unthinkingly and puffed out his cheeks, relieved to be dealing with a practical matter. ‘I’ve no idea,’ he concluded. ‘There are precious few plans of any part of the castle and certainly none of this place. And I’ve never had any desire to measure it. In fact, it can’t be measured from the inside and it’s too far below ground to be measured from the outside. Why?’

  ‘Just curious. It could be vast. Plenty of places where the light doesn’t reach.’

  ‘I suppose so, yes.’

  Gulda turned back to Antyr. ‘Anyway, let’s…’

  Her words were cut short by a sound coming from the Labyrinth.

  A howling.

  Chapter 27

  All five started violently at the sound suddenly surging out of the darkness of the Labyrinth. Before any of them could speak however, it was all around them, ringing and echoing about the hall.

  ‘It’s Tarrian and Grayle,’ Antyr cried out, though he could scarcely hear his own voice. ‘They must have wandered in there after we left.’

  Panic seized him and instinctively he reached out to them. Almost immediately he touched Tarrian’s consciousness, but even as he did, the wolf rebuffed him so strongly that, though the blow was only in his mind, the fear and the wildness in it sent him staggering backwards into Loman.

  ‘Are you all right?’ the smith shouted at him above the still-mounting noise.

  Antyr’s panic redoubled. ‘They’re in there! Get them out!’ He tried to run towards the Labyrinth but, on seeing his intention, Loman’s grip, at first sustaining, tightened and held him firm.

  ‘If they’re in there and off the path there’s nothing you can do. It’ll kill you too if you go after them.’ Loman’s voice cracked with dismay as he struggled to make himself heard, but his grip on Antyr did not falter.

  Then there was movement amid the clamorous columns and, flanked by the grey frenzy of Tarrian and Grayle, a figure stumbled into the hall. He had a knife in his hand. Gulda’s stick flicked out protectively with unexpected speed as Hawklan, the nearest to the man, took a rapid pace backwards. Loman released Antyr to move to help Hawklan but it was immediately apparent that the man was a threat to no one.

  Indeed, he would have fallen headlong had not Hawklan stepped forward quickly and caught him. The knife clattered to the floor. Gulda’s stick swept down and knocked it deftly towards Loman who stooped and picked it up with an agility that belied his bulk.

  Tarrian and Grayle left the man and ran straight to Antyr who dropped to his knees to embrace them. Both animals were frantic with excitement.

  The noise from the Labyrinth fell away abruptly into a low swooping moan punctuated by what sounded like distant cries and dull percussions. Not that anyone noticed, for they were all too occupied with the cavorting wolves and the mysterious arrival.

  A black shape flapped into the hall, the lanterns flickering its shadow over the walls and ceiling to add to the confusion.

  ‘Heard the noise, dear boys. What’s happening?’

  Gavor landed awkwardly by the now supine figure of the man as Hawklan was examining him. ‘Oh dear. He doesn’t look very well, does he?’ he offered.

  The man was wearing heavy boots, a jacket secured by a stout leather belt, and loose-fitting trousers. Though made from a heavy and obviously hard-wearing fabric his clothes were stained and torn and impregnated with dust that rose up in small dancing spirals each time Hawklan touched him. A sword and another knife hung from his belt. Hawklan removed it and handed it to Loman who inspected it curiously.

  Of average height and build, there was nothing about the man to indicate who he might be, but his face was strained and drawn as though he had been starved or was being driven by some terrible inner demon.

  ‘I think he’s only unconscious,’ Hawklan said. ‘Exhausted.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ Loman said. ‘Where could he have come from? His clothes and his weapons aren’t Orthlundyn – or Fyordyn for that matter. And look at this.’ He held out the knife he had retrieved. It was bloodstained. Hawklan grimaced but did not speak. ‘And how could he have come out of the Labyrinth?’ Loman went on, rubbing his hand tightly across his brow as though that might erase his confusion. He gave Antyr a questioning look but Tarrian and Grayle were still careering wildly around the Dream Finder.

  ‘They’re too excited,’ Antyr said. ‘I can’t reach them when they’re like this.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter at the moment,’ Hawklan said, gathering up the man. ‘Let’s tend to this one first.’ He paused and looked thoughtfully at the now silent Labyrinth. ‘Loman, get the Goraidin together and arrange to have a permanent guard in this place. The Labyrinth has always had a way of springing surprises on us in difficult times and I’d like both sure swords and clear-eyed witnesses here after this.’ He looked again into the gloom of the Labyrinth, then spoke quietly to Gulda. ‘Memsa, would you try to seek out the Alphraan? See if they know anything of this?’ Gulda nodded slowly, without speaking. ‘Thank you,’ Hawklan said. ‘Gavor, go with her.’

  * * * *

  By the time the stranger had been laid on a comfortable bed in a sunlit room overlooking the Orthlundyn countryside, Gulda was trudging purposefully into the mountain
s, Gavor circling high above her; Yatsu and Jaldaric had lost the draw for first duty in the Labyrinth hall and Loman was pacifying the other Goraidin.

  Having assured himself that although his patient was bruised, scratched and probably undernourished, he was indeed only unconscious, Hawklan sat down beside him and prepared to wait. Nertha was sitting on the opposite side of the bed. Antyr had sought out Vredech and she had come with him. Intrigued by Hawklan’s healing skills since she had first met him, she had watched him intently as he examined the man and had asked many questions. Andawyr and Dar-volci were by the window, the one leaning on the sill, the other stretched out luxuriously affecting a studied indifference to this strange happening. Vredech and Antyr were in an adjacent room with Tarrian and Grayle talking urgently. The rumbling tones of their conversation drifted into the otherwise silent room.

  After a little while, the man stirred and opened his eyes. They widened as he looked around. He cried out and made to sit up. Nertha laid a restraining hand on him.

  ‘Don’t be afraid,’ she said. ‘You’re safe here.’

  The man tried to push the hand aside. Hawklan moved to intervene, but it was unnecessary. The man was no match for either Nertha’s experience or her determination. Hawklan smiled as he caught the glint of resolute compassion in the physician’s eyes. ‘You’re safe. And uninjured,’ Nertha insisted with gentle forcefulness. ‘My name’s Nertha, this is Hawklan and that’s Andawyr. The felci pretending to be asleep on the windowsill is Dar-volci. This place you’re in, in case you don’t know, is Anderras Darion and you just arrived in a most unusual fashion from what I hear. Lie still for a few minutes while you gather your wits. Is there anything you want immediately? Food, drink?’

  The man glanced from Nertha to Hawklan and back, his eyes fearful and doubting.

  ‘Do you want anything?’ Nertha asked again.

  ‘Water,’ came the reply after another unsteady inspection of the room and its occupants.

  ‘I’ll get it,’ Andawyr volunteered.

  The man closed his eyes, then slowly opened them as if to reassure himself that what he was seeing was actually there. ‘I’m all right,’ he said after a while, slowly pushing himself upright. ‘At least, I think I am.’

  Andawyr returned with a glass of water which the man drank greedily before handing the glass back with a guilty, almost fearful look.

  ‘There’s plenty more,’ Andawyr reassured him with a laugh.

  The man was running his hands over himself as if testing the reality of what he was seeing. ‘Has it all just been a dream?’ he said to no one in particular. ‘A nightmare?’ He looked at the window, then hesitantly swung off the bed and walked over to it. ‘The sun,’ he said softly as he gazed out. ‘It’s back.’ For a moment it seemed as though he were about to break down in tears. ‘I never thought I’d see it again. This is a dream, isn’t it?’

  Hawklan and Nertha both frowned in response to his obvious pain but Andawyr’s expression was one of bewilderment at what he was saying. The man turned sharply. ‘Or am I dead? Did they catch me – kill me? They were close – very close. I felt them, right behind me. Is this some kind of afterlife?’ He put his hand to his head.

  ‘You’re not dreaming and you’re certainly not dead,’ Hawklan said. ‘I think you’ll find you’ve got as many cuts and bruises now as when you left wherever it was you left. And we’ve got as many questions to ask of you as you have of us. Nertha told you our names; what’s yours?’

  The man hesitated before replying, still very uncertain.

  ‘I’m Gentren, Gentren Marson,’ he said eventually. ‘My father’s Andeeren Marsyn. He’s… hewas… the Protector of the Land of…’ He faltered, then gave a short bitter laugh. ‘Of nowhere now, not now there’s nothing but desert, tortured land and tainted skies.’ He turned back to the window. ‘Where is this place?’

  ‘Anderras Darion. The land you see out there is Orthlund. And you came here by some means that we’d dearly like to know about. Can you tell us about it? And who they are, the people who were pursuing you?’

  ‘The Riders, who else? The three Riders.’ Gentren’s voice was a mixture of surprise and irritation, as if he were dealing with foolish children, though it softened almost immediately as he continued looking through the window. ‘I’ve never heard of Orthlund and I’d no idea there was anywhere like this still left. I thought we were the last.’ He turned back to Hawklan. ‘And I don’t know how I came here. None of this makes any sense.’

  Andawyr gave a wry shrug. ‘That’s becoming a very familiar remark,’ he said, dropping into a chair and swinging his legs up on to the end of the bed. It was a deliberately casual movement that had the effect of easing much of the tension in the room. He motioned Gentren towards the bed. ‘Sit down and relax. I think it would be a good idea if you told us about yourself. So far, we’re as mystified by you as you are by us. Tell us about these Riders.’

  Gentren looked at him suspiciously. ‘How can you not have heard of them?’ he said, his voice suddenly full of both anger and despair. ‘They’ve swept across the entire world, destroyed almost every living thing, transformed land and sea into vast, dead obscenities, blotted out the sun, fouled the air itself. Hardly any of us are left – people, animals, birds – all dead – or dying.’

  The power in his voice seemed to darken the room and it was a few moments before Hawklan said, very gently, ‘There was a war here several years ago but nothing such as you describe. Nor has any remotely like it happened. Wherever you come from…’ He hesitated. ‘Doesn’t seem to be any part of this world.’

  Gentren looked at each of them in turn, then seemed to wilt. He took Andawyr’s advice and sat down on the edge of the bed.

  ‘Not part of this world,’ he echoed to himself. He ran his hand idly over the embroidered sheets. ‘Is it really possible?’

  ‘We believe so.’

  ‘Believe so,’ Gentren echoed softly to himself as he looked at Hawklan. He leaned forward. ‘Before the Riders came, some of my father’s advisers – his savants, his sages, his learned men – believed so. Or rather, conjectured so – that other worlds might exist at the same time and in the same place as our own.’ He smiled bitterly. ‘It was an interesting notion with apparently much to commend it in the way both of reasoned argument and observation, I believe, though it was all beyond me. And it wasn’t particularly important, was it? An academic matter – sufficient in itself. An elegant idea, apparently – exciting, even – a newer understanding.’ A haunted look came into his face and he became agitated. ‘Then some of them were suddenly concerned. They began telling a tale that might’ve come from times when blind superstition had to suffice for knowledge. A disaster was coming – the end of the world, no less. A deep flaw had somehow been made in the heart of things long ago – an imbalance. The least of things in itself, at the very limits of what could be measured. But it had grown for generations and was growing ever faster. Now the consequences of it were no longer small. A terrible alignment was about to happen – these many separate worlds would come together.’ He threw up his hands. ‘Or something like that. I couldn’t make anything of it – and it was all theoretical enough to be dismissed as a bookish storm in a wine glass, wasn’t it? Until it became real, that is.’ His searching hands patted his midriff urgently. ‘Where’s my sword?’

  Hawklan reached out and took the belt and sword that were leaning against the wall. ‘Here,’ he said, putting them on the bed beside him. ‘Though I doubt you’ll be needing a sword here. Or this.’ He handed him the bloodstained knife.

  Gentren took it and stared at it. His face was unreadable. ‘I attacked one of them with this,’ he said, his voice full of vicious self-mockery. ‘A dismal piece of iron. Against the power that they had. I suppose if I was insane enough to do that then I could still be mad, couldn’t I?’

  ‘You could be,’ Hawklan agreed. ‘But you neither look nor sound mad to me, and, in my experience, mad people rarely ask that question
. Besides, it seems from what you’ve said so far that, figments of your imagination or not, we’re preferable to the company you’ve just left. Finish your story before you ponder your sanity. What did your father do about this advice he was receiving?’

  Gentren gave a slight shrug. ‘What could he do? He was concerned. These men were capable and highly respected. But they offered him no advice about what he should do. Their researches told them nothing except that this… alignment… was coming, and coming soon and that it would bring great destruction – possibly the destruction of the entire world. Concerned or not, he was a practical man. How could he prepare for a disaster whose nature was completely unknown to him? There was nothing he could do but politely ignore them – hope that it was just an error in their theories… their measurements. It wasn’t an unreasonable hope, they weren’t unanimous in their thinking. And it was all so improbable, so fantastic – the end of the world – I ask you – it had to be nonsense, didn’t it? Despite the credentials of his advisers it wasn’t something a busy Protector could pay serious attention to, was it?’ He fell silent.

  ‘Then?’ Hawklan prompted.

  Gentren began trembling. He wrapped his arms about himself in an unsuccessful attempt to stop it. ‘Then, suddenly, they were there. No one knew how or when they came, still less from where. They were just there. Three Riders. No great armies – no worlds crashing into us, tearing the sky open, splitting the earth apart. Just three people on horseback! But what they could do – what they did! – was beyond belief. They rode effortlessly about our world, destroying all they came near to with seemingly nothing more than a wave of the hand. Towns fell, cities fell – literally fell – flattened – razed. There were no sieges, no battles, no parleying, no demands, nothing. No one knew what they wanted. They just swept places and people aside with no more thought than a man might give to scalding out an ants’ nest. Some people tried to fight, some sent heralds to speak to them, most just fled – the country, the sea, everywhere was alive with panic-stricken people. But all to no avail. Those that they saw, they slaughtered out of hand with the same ease and indifference that they used on buildings and city walls.’