The Sheri S. Tepper eBook Collection

by Sheri S. Tepper

  She set herself to watch the shadows instead of ignoring them. How did they lie? How did they move? She watched them for many long leagues, and it seemed to her they moved only in random ways, piling here and there, singly here and there, floating like fragments of gray glass between copses and hills. She tried to foretell where floating flakes would fall. Beneath that tree or upon that clump? Upon the other shadow, or beside it? Where that flock of birds sought seeds among the hedgerows, or beyond them? After a time, she thought she was beginning to be able to predict where the shadow would fall. There was a strange, hazy pattern, if not to their movement, at least to their disposition upon the earth.

  If there were any sizable living thing, any bird or small beast, the shadow would not descend upon that place but in a place near adjacent. The large the animal or bird, the more thickly the shadows would pile around it, but never upon it and never completely surrounding it. There was always a way out, a trail of light leading through the dark.

  She remembered the bird upon the hill. The shadow had not fallen upon it. The shadow had lain there, waiting – waiting for the bird to intrude upon the shadow. And then…

  Himaggery had intruded upon the shadow. So said the Dervish.

  So had the drugged Chamferton, presumably, though in such a condition that the shadows had not recognized him as a living thing. She saw that the shadows did not seem to bother very small forms of life – beetles and worms went their way beneath the shadow undisturbed.

  But larger creatures near which the shadows fell almost always chose the unshadowed way as they hopped about, even when that way was very hard to see – as when the sun was hidden behind clouds, or when the haze of dusk made all things gray and shadowlike.

  So. So. One could walk, if one were careful, among the shadows. One could walk, if one were alert, safely away from the road. She stopped to get food from her pack, to feed Singlehorn, all the time keeping her eyes fixed upon patches of gray in a little meadow to the west of the road. There were gobble-mole ditches druggled through the meadow, dirt thrown up on either side in little dikes, a shower of earth flying up from time to time to mark the location of the mole as it druggled for beetles and worms and blind snakes. The tunnel wound its way among the shadows as though the mole had a map in his snout which told him where they lay.

  Could the shadows be sensed in some other way than sight? Perhaps even in the dark? Did they exist in the dark? If one were unaware of the shadows, would one find a safe way among them, without even knowing it? Useless consideration, of course. She did know about them, all too well. But did Harpies – ah, yes, she thought – did Harpies know about the shadows?

  Dusk came at last, but well before that she chose the place they would spend the night; a half cave beneath a stone which bulged up from moss and shrub into a curled snout. Shadows lay about it, true, but not in it, and a tiny pool of rainwater had collected at the foot of the stone. They would be comfortable enough, well fed enough, with water to drink and to wash away the dust of the road. They would be unseen from above also, and could lie quiet against the stone, invisible beneath the mixed browns and grays of Mavin’s cloak.

  Deep in the night she awoke to the first Harpy’s cry. Now the variety of cries was unmistakable; the Harpies had returned in force. Why they flew at night she could not tell, unless they relied upon some other sense than sight to find their quarry. Perhaps they, like the huge ogre-owl of the southern ice, cried out to frighten and then struck at the sound of things which fled. Perhaps they did it only to terrify.

  “It won’t work on me, Pantiquod,” she said between gritted teeth. “Go eat a Ghoul or two and die of indigestion.” Ignoring the fact that her nails had bitten bloody holes into her palms, she forced herself to sleep. When next she opened her eyes it was day.

  Dull day, overcast day, day in which nothing moved and no shadow could be seen against the general murk. She stood at the mouth of the cave, refusing to feel hopeless about the matter but tired beyond belief, wondering what path they might take back to the road. “No panic,” she grated. “No hysterics. Quiet. Sensible. You can camp here for days if need be…”

  She drew the Singlehorn close beside her, feeding him from her hand. “Fon-beast, sit here by me and keep me warm. We must take our time this morning. I have trapped us by being clever. We must spy out a path.”

  Which they did, little by little, over the course of an hour, spying where moles moved in the grass, where birds hopped about, where a bunwit mother ran a set of quick diagonals, her two furry kits close behind. They stepped onto the road at last, Mavin with a feeling of relief, the Singlehorn placidly walking behind her. Twice during the afternoon Mavin thought she heard Harpies screaming, but the sound came from above the overcast, remote and terrible, making the Singlehorn flinch and shy against the halter as though he connected that cry with pain.

  Toward evening the sky began to clear; and by dusk it held only a few scattered traces of cloud, tatters of wet mist upon the deeper blue. They came to the top of a rise which overlooked a league or more of road, endless undulations of feathery forest, and to the west the encroaching blue of the sea. Mavin began to put landmarks together in her mental map of the area. Schlaizy Noithn lay to the east. Below them the coast began its great eastward curve, and several days to the south they would come to Hawsport, lying at the mouth of the River Haws, full of little boats and the easy bounty of the ocean. Her heart began to lift as she thought of protective roofs and solid inns, sure that the shadows could not gather thickly where there were so many men.

  Her elation lasted only for a few golden moments, long enough to make one smothered cry of joy and draw the Fon-beast close to surprise him with a kiss. Then the cry came from the sky behind her, triumphant and terrifying. The Harpies once more.

  Harpies. Many more than one. They would not give her time to reach Hawsport and safety. They had played with her long enough, followed her long enough, and now that she was almost within sight of safety they were readying for the kill.

  The kill.

  Which she might defeat, even now, by Shifting into something huge and inexorable. They were still circling, still flying to get above her. There were a few moments yet. There was time, still, to gain enough bulk for that. Tie the Fon-beast somewhere hidden. Retrieve him later. Build oneself into a wall of flesh which could gather in one Harpy, or a dozen, or a hundred if need be.

  An easy, accustomed thing to do.

  And then there might be no Himaggery’s child and her own.

  She considered this for some time. It was by far the easiest solution. Behind her, Singlehorn tapped the stones with his hooves, a jittery dance from one side of the road to the other. Mavin went on thinking, adding to a plan half formed the night before.

  “Himaggery,” she said at last. “This is as much your doing as mine, and you must share the risk. Come out, Himaggery.” She remembered the Dervish’s words: Make him hear you, and her voice was so high-pitched in fear that she would not be able to, in haste and danger.

  But the Singlehorn reared to his hind legs, faded, took the form of the man she remembered, the face she had seen a thousand times in reveries, had imagined night and morning over twenty years. His face was full of confusion and doubt. Beyond him on the hillside the air was suddenly alive with shadows, boiling in a frenzy, collecting more thickly with every moment – as she had hoped.

  “Go back, Himaggery,” she commanded in a stentorian voice allowing only obedience. “Go back!” The man dropped to all fours to become the Fon-beast once more. It stood with its head dragging, discomfited at this abrupt transformation. The shadows, seeming confused, piled in drifts at the side of the road. The Dervish had been right. The shadows had been seeking Himaggery, and now they were fully alerted to his presence. Her hazardous play depended totally upon what these alert and ravenous shadows would do now with any creature which intruded upon them.

  The Harpy cries came once more, nearer. Whirling around, she saw them descending from the
north, close enough that she could recognize Pantiquod in the fore. The next step, she reminded herself. Quickly. Do not look at them, do not become fascinated by them. Do not think of them at all, only of what you must do next.

  She spun to search the area near the road. There had to be an appropriate battleground near the road, a patch now occupied by some living thing which the shadows had left clear. It had to be close! And it must have a clear trail of light back to the road. She searched frantically, hearing the sound of wings in the height, the cawing laughter of the Harpies as they circled, savoring their intended slaughter.

  There it was! A gameboard of light and shadow to the left of the road. A bunwit’s burrow in the light, the shadow piled deeply about it, alternate bits of shadow and light leading to it, jump, jump, jump. She pulled the Fon-beast close behind her – he unresisting but unhelpful, subdued, his usual grace gone, almost stumbling after her – hauling him by main strength to keep him away from the shadowed squares, only remembering when she straddled the burrow that she could have tethered him at the road. Well and well. No, the Harpies might have attacked him there. Here at least they stood together upon this tiny patch of sunlight surrounded by piled shadows on every side.

  She pushed him to the ground and stood astride him, bellowing a fishwife’s scream at the falling fury of wings. He lay dumbly, nose to the ground. “Ho, Pantiquod! Filthy chicken! Ugly bird! Die now as your foul daughter did, and her kin, and her allies. Come feel my claws…”

  She had Shifted herself some claws and fangs, needing them badly and considering it no major thing. It was only fingers and teeth, nothing close to the center of her. If so little a thing could destroy the baby within – well, then so be it. Without this much, there would be no chance at all. She danced over the recumbent Singlehorn, screaming abuse at the skies, trying to make the women-creatures furious, frantic, mad with anger, so they would fall to encircle her, come to the ground to use their teeth and talons. They must not drop directly upon her if she could prevent it. She made a long arm to snatch up a heavy branch from the ground, whirling it above her head.

  She had succeeded in infuriating them. Their screams were shattering. They slavered and shat, the nastiness falling around her in a stinking rain. Their breasts hung down in great, dangling udders, swaying as they flew. Beneath Mavin’s knees the Fon-beast trembled at the sound of them, even dazed as he was, drawing his legs tight against his body, as though to get out of her way. Mavin whirled the branch above her and taunted them. “Filthy bird. Stinking fowl. Drag-breasted beast!”

  Directly above her, Pantiquod folded her wings and dropped like a flitchhawk. Remembering that other flitchhawk which had dropped upon her at the Lake of Faces, Mavin whirled the branch in a whistling blur of motion.

  The whirling branch stopped Pantiquod in her stoop, wings scooped back to break her fall. Around her the other Harpies touched ground, started to strike with talons and teeth only to stop, half crouched, mouths open, panting, panting. Almost all of them had landed in the shadow. Those few which had not beat their wings and leaped on stork-like legs to come at Mavin, stepping across their sisters as they did so. Then they too squatted to pant, tongues hanging from wide-opened mouths before they turned their heads to bite at themselves. Then all but the one were so occupied.

  She, Pantiquod, was still in the air, still fluttering and screeching threats at Mavin, eyes so closely fixed upon her prey she had no sight to spare for her sisters.

  “Filthy chicken,” Mavin grated again from a dry throat. “Cowardly hen. When I have finished with you, I will seek out your other children and put an end to them…” This broke the bonds of caution which had held the Harpy high, and she plummeted downward again like a falling stone.

  “Strike well, girl,” Mavin instructed herself, holding the branch as she had done as a child playing at wand-ball. The stink of the birds was in her nostrils. Her skin trembled with every moment. She gritted her teeth and ignored it. “Strike well…”

  As it was, she waited almost too long, striking hard when the foul mouth was only an armspan from her face, swinging the branch with all her strength, unwinding herself like a great, coiled spring.

  The branch caught the Harpy full upon her chest. Mavin heard the bones break, saw the body fall away, half into the shadow. Only half. On the clear ground the head and feet. In the shadow the body and wings. Slowly, inexorably, while the mouth went on screeching and the talons grasped at nothing, the wings drew back into the shadow, back until they were covered.

  Mavin looked at her feet. She herself stood within the width of one finger from the shadow. Gulping deeply she drew herself away, drew the Fon-beast away, carefully, and slow step by slow step found a safe path back to the road.

  Once there she looked behind her, only once. The shadows were lifting lazily, as though well fed. Behind them on the grass the Harpies flopped, as headless chickens flop for a time, not knowing yet they are dead. Pantiquod was eating herself, and Mavin turned from that sight. Something within her wanted to call out, “Remember the plague in Pfarb Durim, Pantiquod? This is your payment for bringing that plague, Harpy!” She kept silent. She was sure that no creature within the shadow could hear any outside voice. She prayed she would never hear the voice that Pantiquod must be hearing; the voice of the shadow itself.

  For a long time she lay on the road, at first heaving and retching, then letting her stomach settle itself. The Fon-beast was utterly quiet, not moving at all except for a tiny tremor of the skin over his withers. At last she drank some water from her flask, gave the Singlehorn a mouthful from her palm, then went away down the long slope, pausing to rest once more at the bottom of it as she smelled the salt wind from the sea.

  After a time she raised her head, habit turning her eyes to inventory the shadows. She sought them first where they had been easiest to see, along the edges of the road. None. Reluctantly, she looked behind them, seeing whether the shadows followed them only now from that battlefield at the top of the hill. None beneath the trees, or on the stones of the hill. None moving through the air in that lazy glide she had learned to recognize.

  None. None at all.

  Well, Mavin thought, it is possible. Possible they sought a certain creature; possible they found that certain creature, thus triggering some kind of feeding frenzy. Then they had fed. Would the shadows know that the creature which triggered their frenzy was not the one they ate?

  Possibly not. Only possibly. Mavin wondered if they had really gone for good. She considered bringing Himaggery back again. She thought of it, meantime stroking the Fon-beast who had at last recovered his equanimity enough to tug at the halter, eager to be gone.

  “No, my love,” she said at last, patting him. “I can handle you better as you are. Let us come to Windlow’s place and ask his help before we risk anything more. Truth to tell, Singlehorn, I am mightily weary of this journey. In all my travels across the world, I have not been this weary before. I do not know whether it is the child, or my own doubts, or you, Fon-beast, and I do not want to blame you for my weariness.”

  Which I might do, Himaggery. Which I would do. She had said this last silently to herself, wary of using his name. She believed the shadows were gone, but she could be wrong. Himaggery had come out of the Fon-beast shape more easily than she had expected. She would not risk it again. It would be foolish to assume … anything.

  “I will remember what you told me, Chamferton,” she vowed. “There is much I will tell Windlow when I see him at last, and there is much I will not tell Himaggery at all. Let him find some other quest to keep him busy.”

  They came into Hawsport on a fine, windy day, the wind straight across the wide bay from the west, carrying elusive hints of music; taran-tara and whompety-whomp. Singlehorn danced, tugging toward the shore to stand there facing the waters, adding his own voice to the melodic fragments which came over the waves.

  Mavin bought meat and fruit in the market place, where children pursued the Fon-beast with offers of
sweets and bits of fruit. “Is there a bridge south of here?” she asked the stall-holder. “One which connects the shore with that long peninsula coming down from the north?”

  “Never was that I know of,” said the stall-holder offhandedly, leering at her while his fingers strayed toward her thighs, making pinching motions.

  Mavin drew her knife to cut a segment from a ripe thrilp and did not replace it in her belt. The stall-holder became abruptly busy sorting other fruit in the pile. “No bridge there,” he said, putting an end to the matter.

  “Oh, yes,” creaked someone from the back of the stall. “Oh, yes there was. It was built in my granddaddy’s time. My granddaddy worked on it himself. They took boatloads of rock out into that shallow water and made themselves piers, they did, and put the bridge on that. Fine it was to hear him tell of it, and I heard the story many times when I was no bigger than a bunwit. It had a gate in the middle, to let the boats out, and the people used to go across it to all the western lands…”

  “What happened to it?” Mavin asked, ignoring the stall-holder’s irritation at his kinswoman’s interruptions.

  “Storm. A great storm. Oh, that happened when I was a child. Sixty years ago? More than that even. Such a great storm nobody had seen the like before. Half of Hawsport washed away. They say whole forests came down in the east. Dreadful thing. My granddaddy said a moon fell down…”

  “A moon fell down!” sneered the stall-holder. “Why don’t you stop with the fairy tales, Grandma. I didn’t even know there was a bridge. Was you planning to go over there? My brother has a boat he rents out. Take you and the beast there in a day or so.” He leered again, less hopefully.