by Martin Ash
Leth pressed on slowly and deliberately, pausing from time to time when his vantage allowed him to scan a reasonable distance ahead. He watched, listened, but the forest appeared still and undisturbed.
The sun, a wash of brightness beyond the cloud, rose to its zenith and began its long descent, and in due course Leth stood with his two children beneath the cover of trees fringing the shore of Ghismile Tarn. The roofs of a few of Ghismile village's cottages and outbuildings and the gloomy battlements of the old keep previously occupied by the brutal tyrant Baron Ombo were just visible through the trees in the distance. For a brief moment Leth was tempted to steal along the shore and investigate the village. The thought of both Grey Venger and the Legendary Child being holed up there was almost too tantalizing to bear. If he only had a force one hundred strong! How much might be resolved in a swift and sudden strike upon the village?
Ah, but it was a dream. Leth was alone with his children and the risks were too great. He turned his gaze to the northwest, across a wide wooded lowland. Beyond was a long low promontory, just as Issul had described. Leth studied it sombrely, feeling a welling in his gut.
Not so far now, but oh, so dangerous!
'There is where we must go,' he whispered softly.
With the children behind him he began to walk his horse away, keeping to the cover of the trees and moving parallel to the shoreline. They had gone barely ten paces - a shifting of the air. Issul appeared before them.
'Wait, a few moments. Triune is sending her seeking eye to investigate the village.'
'Triune? Seeking eye?' queried Leth.
'One of the Highest Ones, my darling. One of those who our people have called gods.'
'You are with this Triune?'
Issul nodded. 'And the seeking eye is the means by which we keep watch over you. Now listen, Triune has agreed that, when the eye returns, it will reveal itself to you. That will be the signal for you to continue on your way. Not before. Without the eye we cannot follow you. And when you continue, remember, tomorrow will bring you to the Karai camp. Assume at all times that the woods are watched, and set with deadly traps.'
'Are we walking into a trap?' said Leth with renewed concern.
'Pray not, my love. Pray not. We will do all we can.'
Issul's form shimmered and dissolved. Leth waited impatiently in the saddle, darting weighted glances back towards the little village and its dour keep. He spoke in guarded undertones to Galry and Jace, trying his utmost to explain once again their mother's painfully fleeting appearances and the reasons they could not touch her ghostly form. He struggled to reassure them that soon, very soon, they would all be together with her once more, and voiced nothing of the doubts and fears he felt.
In his mind his thoughts spun him through a torrent of emotions. Triune? One of the Highest Ones? It seemed that wherever he went he found himself consorting with the gods he had formerly denied.
No, not denied! Never denied! Questioned and enquired into their true nature, yes. Seeking knowledge, in the spirit of King Haruman's Deist Edict. Haruman had been wise. He had seen the factions rise, seen how they manipulated and dissembled to control the will of the people, invoking the names of beings they truly knew nothing of, pretending knowledge they did not possess. Haruman had seen through their deceptions. He had taken measures to curb their influence, the political power that they had accumulated, which was tearing Enchantment's Reach apart; and to simultaneously seek truth. Truth and enlightenment for all!
And now I have discovered these beings to be mighty indeed. But not gods. No, not gods. In their own way they reveal themselves to be as fallible, as subject to emotional frailty and the blindness of their individual wishes, desires and passions as we are.
And if we are truly to be pitched against one or more of them, then there, surely, must lie the means by which they may be overcome!
Could it be so? A flicker of hope and optimism lived briefly in Leth's breast, to be dampened almost in the same breath as he thought again of what lay before him.
Minutes passed. Leth grew uneasy. He peered back again towards the village, hidden now by the trees. Twenty paces away the chill, dark water of the tarn lapped testily at the shore, stirred by mounting breezes into small, fast-moving waves. The sky had darkened as if portending storms, and the trees and undergrowth had begun to whisper in discontent between themselves.
At last Leth's attention was drawn to a new, closer element. A small, silvery-dark orb hovered before his vision. It was not easy to focus on, being almost transparent and seeming to have no true substance of its own. Leth did not see where it had come from, but it had to be the seeking eye that Issul had spoken of. What else could it be?
He looked at it, a little uncomfortable in the knowledge that he was observed but not entirely sure by what. He wondered what the eye had spied in Ghismile. The orb offered no elucidation. It rose and moved swiftly away and was lost to sight. Leth stared into the trees, seeking it without success. He turned back and urged his horse onward.
Soon they had crossed the wooded lowland and mounted the slopes taking them to the promontory. Ghismile Tarn was a dark shine, glittering distantly between the trees at their backs. Before them the great forest deepened. Leth moved on, tension gripping his spine, wondering whether he was watched - by grullags, by Karai, by enemies unknown - wondering whether he was leading his children haplessly, trustingly into ever greater peril.
*
By nightfall Leth estimated them to be within a league or so of the secret camp. He found a hollow where massed, moss-strewn boulders at the foot of a crag offered protection and concealment. They ate, again with no fire to warm them or toast their supper, and Galry and Jace quickly settled down to sleep.
Sleep did not come so easily to Leth. Too much depended upon the morrow, and his mind would not allow him the rest he craved. He rose and left the nook where his children lay, and silently paced back and forth, then returned and lay down again. In time he did at last succumb to sleep, but it was fitful and he woke more than once, believing his enemies were upon him.
At last cold, grey dawn pierced the dark sky, showing the trees in black silhouette and the swift cloud wrack that had made its way down from the north. Leth and the children rose and began the final leg of their journey.
iii
'They are so close!' Issul squeezed shut her eyes, fighting down her emotion. She was drained. Many nights of little sleep, combined with the effort of repeatedly projecting her psychic body took her energy and resources. And now her fears and anticipation were flooding her.
She opened her eyes and looked again at the two scenes before her, the gaze of Triune's two seeking eyes. One continued to rest upon Urch-Malmain's portal, still static in the forest. The other followed close behind Leth and the children as they made their way towards the Karai camp.
'I have to go to them. It is so dangerous out there. I can’t stand here and just watch them. What if--' She shook her head to rid herself of the thought. 'I must be with them.'
The three Triune children had their backs to her. They were also observing the scenes. 'It is not recommended. The risk would be no less for you.'
'They need to be guided,' Issul protested. 'They can't be more than an hour from the camp now. If new traps have been set. . .'
Triune turned to face her with three matching, blue-eyed, bemused smiles. 'There is but one way for you to get there, and that is the way you came.'
'I know that.'
'We would caution you against it. It is you who will be trapped.'
'The Farplace Opening will be well-guarded,' Orbelon reminded her. 'The camp is filled with Karai.'
'I am hardly likely to have forgotten!' Issul snapped. 'Triune, you have to do something. Create a diversion that will allow me to meet them and bring them through.'
'A diversion? Of what kind?'
'I don't know. Think of something.'
'We are diminished here. We are broken and scattered, not yet One again.
We put all we have into holding this tower, keeping Strymnia at bay, containing the Reach Rider.'
'But you have said you could be with me in the realized world. Do it, then. Now, in some form.'
The three child-figures turned to commune with one another silently. Then the middle child looked back at Issul. 'We could send forth a dream. Yes. Yes. We could do that. But we don't know what it would do. And we are confused. We have no union with this action, and we ask, why? Why would we wish to do this?'
'Could it be as simple a matter as helping someone other than yourselves?' Issul replied caustically. 'Could it be as simple as being aware that other beings exist in this world? Beings less able, less powerful, less knowledgeable than you. Beings who might benefit from your intervention.'
'There is an interesting concept. Something that could only have come out of the realized realm. Hmm. But yes, it intrigues us.' The Triune children turned smiling to Orbelon. 'What are your thoughts on this?'
Orbelon leaned pensively upon his staff with two bound hands, and Issul sensed that his gaze behind his rags and bindings was focused on her. 'We should have Leth with us if we can.'
'For whose sake?' Triune enquired.
Orbelon sighed. 'Is it not plain to you? Leth has been within me. He knows my world, more surely than do I. And you know he has knowledge of Urch-Malmain. Who knows, perhaps he has knowledge of Strymnia too. Whatever he brings, it can only be of benefit to us.'
'Hmm.' The three children considered for some moments. 'Then let us dwell upon the dream.'
'You will aid me?' asked Issul. 'You will let me go to them?'
Triune nodded. 'We will not prevent you. But we emphasize again, the help we can give is limited. We guarantee nothing. For you, all may be lost in this endeavour.'
'I understand.'
'Prepare yourself, then.'
Shenwolf stepped forward. 'And I too.'
'You wish to accompany your Queen?' Triune enquired.
'Yes.' Shenwolf turned apprehensively to Issul. 'That is, if you will permit me.'
In his eyes she saw the uncertainty, and the naked question. He himself did not know whether he was to be trusted. She nodded with hardly a hesitation. 'I need you fighting at my side.'
'Then you too should prepare yourself,' said Triune. 'But do nothing without our word.'
The room shimmered and blurred. Issul was back in the chamber she had first stood in, the Farplace Opening glimmering before her. The air shifted in restless colours outside the window. Shenwolf stood at her shoulder. She took a deep breath and her hand went to the swordhilt at her belt. 'There could be any number of them on the other side.'
Shenwolf nodded tensely. 'What is your plan?'
She laughed mirthlessly. 'Plan? I have none. We must simply fight free of the bunker, making use of whatever diversion Triune can provide. Make for the woods and vanish if we can, then skirt around so as to meet Leth.'
She felt less confident than she sounded. She wondered now at her foolhardiness. What chance had she against so many Karai?
But anger burned like molten metal in her breast, and her fear for her children overcame any fear she felt of the Karai. She had come this far - Leth and the children had come this far.
She drew her sword.
'We may have surprise on our side.'
'Aye,' said Shenwolf. 'I have considered that. The Karai almost certainly do not know what to make of the Farplace Opening. The warriors they have sent through have either failed to return, or have returned with queer tales of slain comrades and strange folk and white-haired children who send them back whence they came. Are Karai superstitious?'
'I don’t know,' replied Issul, then, 'All folk are superstitious, surely even those to whom ordinary emotion is a stranger. And they, like us, must believe much and know little about Enchantment.'
In her mind a voice spoke from long ago. The voice of a brilliant teacher, who had taught her so well, who she now despised, possibly above all others.
Fectur.
Use surprise, his voice told her. Use it as a friend, an ally, a weapon. Use it to seize your enemy by the throat and hold him rigid for that brief moment it takes to drive your blade into his heart and spill forth his life. Give no quarter! Use it again, and again! Always, wherever it offers itself. For surprise is a good but fickle friend. It demands an alert and attentive lover, demands nothing less than your full and absolute devotion upon the instant it gives itself to you. Ignore it, disregard the instant, and it will desert you. Surprise gives no second chance. You will be lost.
Aye, Fectur, she thought to herself with sudden chill determination. I have not forgotten you.
She shifted her feet upon the stone floor, impatient to be gone.
'Strike instantly,' she said to Shenwolf. 'In the moment we arrive. Strike hard and fast, against whoever awaits us there.'
Shenwolf drew his own blade.
Issul realized then that Triune had joined them. The children’s pure white hair was bright in the unstill air, their fabulous blue eyes aglow and almost luminous.
'Triune is ready,' said the youngest child. 'Are you?'
Issul nodded.
Facing the Farplace Opening the child raised a hand and passed it in a smooth motion before her. The blue membrane that had days earlier gathered itself about the Opening to contain the Karai, peeled away like some diaphanous garment, and faded from sight.
'Go!' commanded Triune.
Issul leapt forward, into the clouded vagueness of the Opening. There was the briefest moment of disorientation. A rushing, a sense of all things changing. Then she was in the secret underground chamber of the Karai bunker, coiled, ready to spring upon the nearest enemy. . .
. . . but no enemies were there.
iv
Issul spun, peering into the shadows, all four penumbral corners of the chamber, where the glow of the Opening did not fully penetrate. But the chamber held only herself and Shenwolf.
She swore beneath her breath, almost staggered under the weight of tension and anticipation that gripped her. Then she moved, lithe and catlike to the door, and pressed her ear to its timbers. The smell of dank earth and roots and old, tarred wood filled her nostrils.
Shenwolf moved up beside her. There was no sound from beyond the door. Issul thought quickly. Could the Karai have left? Abandoned the camp? Surely that was unlikely.
No. What was more probable was that they had only withdrawn from the chamber of the Farplace Opening itself. Issul was willing to gamble that the Karai warriors sent to secure this place had little or no knowledge of the function of the bright oval contained within in the underground chamber. They probably feared it. Three of their number had passed into it and vanished. Four more had entered and been sent back, no doubt in some bewilderment.
In the swollen colours of the Farplace Opening Triune appeared and moved soundlessly to Issul and Shenwolf. Without speaking, Issul raised a finger to her lips then gestured beyond the closed door. 'Strike swiftly when I open the door,' she whispered to Shenwolf. 'Be silent and give them no opportunity to summon help.'
She steeled herself, took a breath, then wrenched open the wooden door and hurled herself into the gloom of the antechamber beyond.
Three startled Karai guards awaited her. The first fell to the onslaught of Issul's sword before he truly knew she was there. The second died quickly with a single lunge of Shenwolf's blade. The third drew his sword from its sheath but Issul was upon him, mercilessly hacking him down before he had chance to strike.
There was no moment to breathe or take stock. Other guards, two of them, were positioned at either side of the door, out of sight of either Issul or Shenwolf as they rushed in. Both launched themselves to the attack. Blades flashed and sliced, but to Issul's relief the Karai in their discipline did not call out.
Issul parried a blow, and another. She darted to the side. There was little space to manouevre in this small ante-chamber, and her longsword was an encumbrance. She was forced into a corner.
The Karai struck; she deflected the blow, lunged, struck only air. For a second she stared into the gorgeous blue-green eyes of the warrior, reflecting bright and unnatural lights cast by the shimmer of the Farplace Opening in the adjoining chamber. Then, for an instant, the Karai's gaze flickered away from her, drawn by the sight of the three white-garbed, white-haired children who had entered the ante-chamber and stood smiling in the strange light.
Issul took the moment. She slid beneath the warrior's sword-arm and slammed upwards with her free hand. The heel of her palm connected with the Karai beneath his chin. His head snapped back. She yanked his own dagger from its sheath and stabbed with all her force into his heart.
She drew back as he slumped, and spun to aid Shenwolf, who stood over the limp form of the last Karai, wrenching free his own shortsword from the pale warrior's chest.
Issul moved immediately to the door which let into the slooths' brooding chamber, and listened. She heard nothing, nor did the narrow gaps between the timber planks allow her to see anything of what lay beyond.
Shenwolf crossed to the other door, which gave entrance to the passage that led from the bunker to the former work compound. Issul signalled to him to join her. Triune watched with undisguised interest, six small white hands clasped, fingers loosely linked, upon three small white-robed bellies.
Issul eased the door open. The long brooding-chamber beyond was gloomier than the antechamber, being untouched by the light cast by the Farplace Opening. A little over halfway down a pallid shaft of grey light pierced the dimness via the opening which led up to the slooths' feeding ground. In this light Issul was able to make out the outlines of some of the stalls where the slooths had laid their eggs, and . . . something else.
