Ibryen [A sequel to the Chronicles of Hawklan]

by Roger Taylor

  There was an intensity in his voice that forbade any more questions. Ibryen closed his eyes. A gust of wind shook him. He felt the Traveller taking his arm to steady him. Danger, he thought nervously. Bewilderment he'd felt almost constantly at the strangeness of all that was happening. And fear, certainly, though that had been fear for his sanity and an inevitable fear of the unknown, not the skin-crawling fear of a silent night attack against greater odds, or the heart-pounding terror of pitched battle against an equally terrified foe intent on killing you. But he had never had any feeling that the very act of moving into these strange other worlds was intrinsically dangerous. Perhaps he was indeed protected by some great and ancient strength as the Traveller had said, for the change that had come upon him over these last few days did not have the character of a wrenching metamorphosis, but had been more like a simple opening of the eyes and a raising of the head to see for the first time what had been there all his life.

  Even as he pondered these ideas, the blustering mountainside slipped into the echoing distance and he became aware of the floating emptiness that he had entered when he separated the spirit of the Culmaren from Isgyrn. But this time there was a rippling disturbance moving through it—something calling, thrashing helplessly, like a drowning man. It jerked him back to the cold mountain. He opened his eyes and spun round to look towards Isgyrn. The tent had been crudely rigged and Rachyl was approaching.

  'Thanks for the help,’ she said caustically, but she did not pursue the observation when she saw the look on Ibryen's face as he strode past her. He crawled into the tent, motioning the others to follow. Rachyl and the Traveller could not enter the tent with Isgyrn kneeling in it and Ibryen settling himself on the rocky ground as comfortably as he could, but they were able to squat in the entrance out of the worst of the wind and rain.

  'Tell Rachyl what you just told me,’ Ibryen said to the Traveller. ‘I understand none of it, but I think you're right ... no, I know you're right. I can't leave him there, he's utterly lost. I'll try to fetch him back. I don't know how long it'll take, or what you can do. Just keep us both warm, I suppose.'

  'What's he doing?’ Rachyl demanded of the Traveller fiercely, but the little man lifted his hands in a plea for silence, as did Ibryen.

  Then, with no more thought than he would give to the taking of a single step, Ibryen was in both the cramped, rattling tent and the world beyond.

  Though he knew that Isgyrn was immediately beside him in the tent, the emanations of panic that Ibryen could feel in the world beyond were elsewhere—distant from him, in so far as distance existed in this place. The fear that he felt in them chilled him, so primitive and awful was it and he had to steel himself before he could move towards the disturbance.

  'Isgyrn,’ he called, though he had neither body nor voice ... such things had no meaning here. ‘Isgyrn. Be calm. There's no danger here except what your fear makes.'

  The fear shifted and changed but did not diminish. Ibryen moved steadily towards it, though even as he did so he could feel it infecting him. He repeated the call, this time as much for his own benefit as for Isgyrn's. ‘There's no danger here except what you make for yourself.'

  Then he was proved correct, for the danger that Isgyrn had brought was all about him. Tales flooded into him of men drowned as they had sought to rescue others, weaker by far, but given an adamantine embrace by primordial fear. Such was his position now. Isgyrn's fear clung about him, thrashing and clawing, beating out a battering rhythm which echoed that of the wind shaking the tent in the world where Rachyl and the Traveller sat watching, as helpless as they were unaware of what was happening.

  Ibryen found himself resisting with weapons and skills he did not know he possessed. He reached into the very heart of Isgyrn's terror, for he knew that the Dryenwr was no coward. He was a man, already desolated by events beyond his understanding, who had woken to find himself in one alien world and had now entered another, even stranger. A world that was vast and empty and dead and at the same time teeming with life and circumscribed by the merest mote. A world in which time did not exist yet in which it also flickered and was different in all directions. He was a man too, burdened by the lore of his people and by a lack of the sight that was needed here, Ibryen realized, as he contended with the corrosive contagion of the Dryenwr's terror. For though he saw this world with a strangely cold eye, he knew that Isgyrn could see it only as through a cracked and distorted lens.

  Yet still Isgyrn was whole. That which had made him Warrior Caste and had made him stand fearful but unflinching before his greatest and most feared foe, high amid the clouds, sustained him even now, though it was failing rapidly.

  Ibryen spoke, imbuing that which served for his voice here with such calm as he could muster, though Isgyrn's struggling was taxing him grievously. ‘Isgyrn. Hold to me. There is nothing to fear here. Nothing can harm. What you see are but shadows.'

  'Who...?'

  'I am Ibryen. The Traveller tells me your people would call me a Hearer. I see this place more clearly than you, and I see your pain. Hold to me, I'll take you back to the world where you properly belong.'

  Denial washed over him and, for a moment, Isgyrn's fear threatened to sweep them both away.

  'It is so, Dryenwr!’ Ibryen shouted. ‘Even now, Rachyl and the Traveller are watching our bodies, waiting for our return.'

  But Isgyrn was barely listening. Then, for the first time, Ibryen began to feel a fear which was other than that which was rising in response to the Dryenwr's. He had no words for the knowledge, but he knew that Isgyrn's wild thrashing must be contained or harm would be done that could destroy them both. Such as time was in this place, it was moving against them. Bounds were being strained which could tolerate little more. The very fabric of this world seemed to be groaning under Isgyrn's onslaught.

  For a moment, Ibryen teetered on the edge of panic himself, then, the ancient legacy of the battle-hardened transmuted his fear into anger. He blasted contempt into the Dryenwr's frantic spirit.

  'Is this the Warrior who led his Soarers against overwhelming odds and prevailed? Is this the Warrior who faced your white-eyed usurper and his screaming mount? Or is it some mewling child, fearful of the dark?'

  Briefly his mind was filled with a vision of Isgyrn's Soarers Tahren carried beneath their arching, many-coloured wings, as they swooped and dived upon the black ranks of their enemy, like great fighting birds. Though the vision was fleeting he saw the order and discipline and courage which sustained the fighters. He saw the long-trusted tactics of this extraordinary arena forged anew by vision and desperate imagination to turn the hitherto irresistible tide of the enemy. His heart both soared and cried out in pain as he saw too, and heard, the all-too-familiar consequences of battle as the sky rang with war cries and death screams, and was streaked with skeins of blood and gore. And he felt the deep injustice of the insult he had just offered. Then, the vision was swept away—his baiting had proved as effective as it had been crude and it was an unknown reflex that protected him from the first flush of Isgyrn's anger.

  It came to Ibryen that perhaps he had made a mistake.

  Isgyrn might not have understood the nature of the place where he now found himself but he understood honour and insult, and he understood fighting. And now, as Ibryen's fear had become anger, so did his—an awful, berserker anger—the anger of a man who has only death before him and who, with no further fear left, will carry as large an entourage of his enemy with him as escort into the shades as his strength will allow. It was also an anger re-doubled by shame for what he perceived as his previous cowardice and it seized Ibryen with a crushing power, threatening to extinguish him with a single monstrous effort.

  But just as Isgyrn's fear had threatened to infect Ibryen so now did his fighting frenzy, for Ibryen was no stranger to wild and desperate combat. Further, this was his world. Defeat was unthinkable.

  Thus, while Rachyl and the Traveller sat in the mouth of the tent huddled against the driving rai
n, and nervously watched the silent, apparently sleeping men, that part of them which existed in the world beyond wrestled in a manner that neither of them truly understood.

  Ibryen, the more aware of the two, defended himself while he sought for a way to overwhelm Isgyrn, though it was no easy task against the Dryenwr's primitive but battering attacks.

  'No, Isgyrn,’ he shouted, over and over. ‘Stop fighting. You'll destroy us both.’ Then a small inspiration floated into the mayhem. ‘Think Warrior, think. The Hearer in you has failed, the Warrior in you brings only pain here. Be a Seeker. Think. Think of your land, of your kin. Think of the Culmaren that died to bring you this far and keep you alive until help came for you. Is this a fitting reward for its sacrifice?'

  The onslaught faltered, though whether because of Ibryen's challenge or Isgyrn's exhaustion was not apparent. Part of Ibryen tensed instinctively, scenting victory and preparing to leap and seize the advantage. But the part of him that was a leader of his people, reined the urge back and waited. Twice, in the ensuing silence, Isgyrn seemed set to renew the conflict, but twice he hesitated and twice Ibryen remained still, carrying only the thought of the dead Culmaren in his mind.

  Then came a hesitant and bewildered voice. ‘Ibryen, is this truly you? How have you come after me? Where is this place? What has happened to me?'

  Ibryen winced as an acrid mixture of fear and shame touched him. He did not allow the Dryenwr to speak further, but reached out in reassurance and silent, unconditional forgiveness. ‘More questions than I can answer, Isgyrn,’ he said. ‘But I am Ibryen here just as I am Ibryen elsewhere. As to how I came here, I don't know, but I can take no more pride in it than in my black hair and black eyes, as it seems I was born with the skill to travel thus for all I've only just come to know of it.'

  Understanding suddenly washed over Ibryen. ‘I remember,’ Isgyrn gasped out. ‘I came here to call the Culmaren. To see if I could touch them and learn about my kin, my land.'

  There was such an aching loneliness in his voice that Ibryen could do no other than reach out to him again. ‘This is the place where the Culmaren dwell, but it's also a place where you do not belong,’ he said. ‘That you're still sane is perhaps a tribute to the Hearer's blood you carry within you.'

  There was a brief stab of sharp and fierce resentment that he, a Dryenvolk Warrior, should be addressed thus by this dweller in the middle depths, but it was gone almost before Ibryen could respond to it, though he felt a flicker of resentment of his own that he should be drawn into this predicament when his people were placing their trust in him to find a way of bringing down their own enemy. And, whatever else was happening on this strange journey, that prospect was as far from him as ever. He felt suddenly burdened.

  Though both remained silent, Ibryen sensed their combined anger coiling and twisting and shifting something fundamental in this world. No, he realized suddenly, not in this world, which was beyond disturbance by such trivia, but in his grip upon it...

  And in his grip upon his form that sat on the mountainside.

  He seized Isgyrn protectively, uttering again the injunction, ‘Hold to me.'

  A soft, haunting call echoed through the vast emptiness that was Ibryen's perception of the world of the Culmaren. Another followed it.

  But neither of the flickering consciousnesses that were Ibryen and Isgyrn heard it.

  They were gone.

  * * *

  Chapter 26

  Jeyan's second passage through the mirrors was no less frightening than her first, though this time it was quicker. The Gevethen moved to either side of her and led her forward as before. Despite the pressure of their grip, she could do no other than close her eyes and flinch away as her reflection strode towards her. The wash of bitter coldness passing through her made her gasp, then she opened her eyes to find herself once more in darkness. Vague reflections of the dimly lit room she had just left hung about her.

  There was little time for pondering these matters however, for the Gevethen's grip about her shoulders was urgent. Once or twice she felt them hesitate, and she caught the faint whisper, ‘Gateways', passing between the two unseen figures.

  Fearful that the Gevethen might learn that Hagen had in some way failed to perform whatever task it was they had set him, Jeyan searched frantically for some means of postponing what was presumably an imminent meeting. Escape was impossible. Even if she could break away from the Gevethen's grip—which felt very unlikely—where could she go in this place? She was not even sure that she would exist here without the presence of the Gevethen.

  Wisps of light began to appear. And hints of sounds.

  'What is this place, Excellencies?’ she asked, snatching at the first coherent idea to form.

  There was a short stillness as though everything about her was holding its breath.

  'This is the place between the worlds, Jeyan Dyalith.'

  'The place of the Gateways.'

  Jeyan risked again. ‘Forgive my foolishness, Excellencies, but I don't understand. What worlds? How can there be...?'

  The grip about her shoulders tightened painfully.

  'Seek not to understand.'

  'Obey.'

  Jeyan gritted her teeth against the pain. ‘If I understand, will I not be better able to serve you, Excellencies?'

  There was another stillness. Longer this time, and tense. There was a strange quality in the Gevethen's voice when they replied, as if they were reluctant to discuss the matter.

  'Obedience to His will is all, Jeyan Dyalith.'

  'What is needed, you will be shown.'

  'Understanding is His and His alone.'

  Jeyan bit back her inquiry about who He might be. Instinct told her that pain, even death or worse, lay down that road if she persisted.

  Though the vague reflections of her room were unchanged, the shifting patterns of light and the eerie chorus of sounds had been growing in intensity. And something was hovering in her mind, something small, but important.

  Suddenly, she knew what it was. It was the Gevethen's voices; there was fear in them! There had been a hint of it when she had been brought here before, but she had been too shocked and afraid to think about what it meant. It was taking the edge off that cold harshness in their tone. It was making them into ordinary men. Brothers. Wretched twins. Loving and hating one another at the same time, inextricably bound together.

  'The strange passageway you showed me when you brought me here before, Excellencies. Was that one of the Gateways to the other worlds?'

  'No, that is ...'

  'Hush!'

  The word, with its urgent sibilance, echoed into the movement about her, and arrowed off into some unknowable distance, all shapes and sounds drawn after it, twisting and dancing in its wake.

  Conflict! Her question had caused a conflict between the Gevethen! Even the hint of such a thing had never manifested itself in the time she had been with them. Had she thought about creating such, she would have deemed it impossible. Yet Jeyan allowed herself no triumph; there was no saying what she might have released. She braced herself for whatever might follow, becoming suddenly desperately fearful, and resolving to break away from the Gevethen if opportunity presented itself, regardless of the consequences. Better to wander lost in this mysterious place than to suffer what might come to pass at their hands.

  Then she became aware of a whispered dispute being carried on behind her. It was reflected in a quivering of the arms about her shoulders. For a fleeting instant she had the impression that the two men were pummelling one another, like spoilt children, but she wilfully tore her attention away by focusing intensely on what appeared to be a pale yellow mist that had floated into her view. Like everything else about her, the mist shifted and changed, both in shape and colour. And, she noted, the sounds that were hovering about it changed also.

  'We must try.'

  The soft voice floated into her awareness. She tried not to listen.

  'It will fail again.'

&nbs
p; 'We must try. He tests us ever. We must open the Way to come to His presence again.'

  'I am afraid of His anger. We have been so long.'

  'But the merest moment in His endless patience. We have much to tell Him. His will is being done in this place.'

  Then, very softly, and so full of fear that despite her own cruel hatred of the Gevethen, Jeyan felt stirrings of pity:

  'What if He is no more.'

  All about Jeyan froze. The endless moving stopped as if it had never been. She was alone in a frozen landscape. The voice continued and the landscape moved again.

  'The birds—our eyes—went. Vanished overnight. No warning, no message. Then the Way to His fastness closed against us and could not be opened.'

  Jeyan waited, terrified lest her heart beat again and reveal her as an eavesdropper.

  'You blaspheme, brother.' There was naked terror in the answer. 'He is the One True Light. He is eternal. He will come again to right that which was flawed in the Beginning.' Then there was venomous fury. 'It is your lack of faith that has brought this about.'

  'No!'

  'Yes. Have you forgotten so soon the great powers He gave us?'

  'No. I ...'

  'Curse you.'

  The voice began to cringe and plead. It lost all semblance of the cold, grating harshness that marked the Gevethen voice. 'No. I was just ... He is testing us, as you say. Many Citadels He was building to prepare the world for His coming, and ours was to be the finest and strongest. Remember? I use the power better than you—you've always said that. It's not my fault, truly. We'll discover how to open the Way eventually. I'll try harder. See, see!'

  'Wait!'

  But the injunction came too late and Jeyan could feel something reaching out into the disorder. Almost immediately, another power joined it. The Gevethen were one again, she sensed. As had happened before, she felt herself briefly touching a myriad other worlds, each one vivid and real, but gone almost before she could register it. Then she was standing before the long tunnel again. Its walls glowed and shimmered uneasily, and in the far distance, it seemed to waver as if searching for something.