The Hammer of the Sun

by Michael Scott Rohan

  But as his body healed itself his thoughts grew more agitated. They fluttered like dry pine-needles in the wind, shivering, scattering withering; only two visions stayed fixed and clear, the dark wings shining in the rising light, and the tears that gleamed upon a milk-pale cheek. Kara! He was sure of her now in any shape. She had come, but to save him or assail him, which? Either was possible, but he feared the worst - the more so if she knew what he had been about with Louhi. Though surely she must realise he had succumbed only to seek a chance of escape… Except that he had not. He had told himself that to justify it, and he had lied in his teeth; he wanted Louhi, he had ached for her even as he hated her, and the memory of it was a writhing torment. What had he done, lusting after an unhuman shadow? No, that at least was rubbish! That body was no false seeming, it was the expression in human terms of what she truly was, perilous and fair; and the peril had only added a sensual sting. Had that alone been enough? Surely not. Perhaps she had drugged him with those unguents; equally possibly she had not needed to. He had gone too long without love, thinking only of Kara, hardly noticing other women; no wonder Louhi had made such an impression when she thrust herself at him. Yet still… Still, there had been something else. It could not have been, surely not, the thought of Kara and she… if they… He clamped down hard on the half formed thought, and damned himself for it; but if he was honest, there had been something… Her vulnerability. Of all things, that was it! He had been drawn to her for all those reasons, even the worst; but it had been sympathy for her, sudden and instinctive, buried till now in the depths of his heart. He felt, as he had never once felt in all the fervour of their coupling, a sudden pang of compassion for that lost creature, half formed shadow of a greater self, tormented by the urges of a body she both loathed and scorned to understand. She too was driven to love; yet for all her boasting she could not possess that love, save by force. Kara belonged to neither of them, whatever bonds they might impose, but was at heart only herself. Now, when it was too late, he had come to understand; but he doubted if Louhi ever would. Till then he had thought of her only as trying to ensnare him; but he wondered suddenly if Louhi might not have been drawn to him in just the same way…

  Weak and feverish, wrapped in his imaginings, he failed to hear the footsteps till it was too late; those who made them were practised hunters, and accustomed to moving quietly. Only the sudden crash of bushes upslope alerted him, and the guttural bark of triumph. He wanted to spring up, but hesitated; better they thought him unconscious still, and stayed off their guard, especially if they sought to carry him off. Instead he was left lying. Puzzled, he let his eyelids fall open a hair's-breadth and saw them, tall Ekwesh warriors standing casually by, some four or five at least. One pointed with his spear to a long dark stain upon the steeply sloping forest floor, and they both laughed, a short cruel laugh. Then he understood; that strange stain was his own blood, and they thought him dead already. As well he had lain still; if they left him, if they did not seek to plunder his body… Then one grounded his spear in the soft earth and plucked a short axe from his belt, and Louhi's words came back with sickening impact; they were about to execute her command, and he did not even know whether he could move.

  But the footsteps crunched among the needles a span from his head; he had no choice but to try. With an agonized groan of effort he thrust himself up on his arms and lashed out desperately to ward off the blow he feared. None came. He managed to lift his head, and was astonished to see the axeman frozen in the act of raising the weapon, his eyes glaring wide, the clan-scars standing out livid on his graying cheeks; from his fellows came only yells of sheer terror. A blood-boltered corpse, as it appeared, had come to life, and there were few things the Ekwesh feared more than the dead; for if their victims could arise, they had much to fear indeed. Spears clattered as they fell among the bushes, and the axe dropped from its wielder's hand. Had Elof been whole, he might then have ventured escape, but the effort even of rising was so great he could only stumble back against a tree, retching with the sickening reek of clotted blood that choked his mouth. Dimly he saw the moment pass, the flicker from fright to fierce resentment in those cold eyes, resentment at being fooled into showing fear. As one they snatched up their weapons to blot it out, and with faces twisted into sneering masks of anger, slowly, contemptuously, they closed in around him.

  The sound then might have been a bird cry, a whistling soft yet shrill, and they paid it no heed. But Elof had heard it before, and it woke wild memories in his muddled mind, told him the best thing he could do; he threw himself flat amid his own blood. A sudden soft sussuration filled the air, and his enemies turned uncertainly. Then they yelled in earnest, and threw up their arms to ward their heads; but the hail of stones that came whistling down upon them through the pines brooked no such slender shields, and shattered both together where they struck. Elof saw one warrior's brains dashed completely from his skull, another dance grotesquely under a dozen impacts, a dead pulp before he fell; the axeman whirled about with three arrows through his leather cuirass, wrenched one out, sank down and died with it in his hands. Elof, braving the stones to grab his axe, saw that it looked familiar somehow, graceful yet roughly worked. Ekwesh raced about the clearing, one with an arm drooping limp from the shoulder, but they found no way out; arrows and sling-stones felled one, the other made a mad dash at the bushes, stopped short with a horrible yell and sagged down upon the spear that transfixed his stomach.

  The sight was too much for Elof in his weakened state; he was violently sick, and almost fainted with the pain it caused him. He lay helpless as feet rustled across the clearing, and he was seized and lifted in strong hands. A strong odour flooded his nostrils, familiar yet unpleasantly altered, a scent he knew grown rank and harsh; that spurred him enough to force open his eyes. But he thought he was wandering in fever then, for the first face he looked upon was Roc's.

  "Easy there!" said Roc breathlessly as Elof sagged with the shock in the arms that held him. "Gone to Hel's own trouble to get you out of here, don't go turning your toes up on me now! You see, dammit?" he added swiftly to the shadowy shapes behind him. "He can't even talk, let alone walk! We'll have to carry him… "

  "Not yet!" said a harsh deep voice from behind him, and he was shouldered aside. A burly shadow took his place, slightly shorter than he but as broad or broader. A hard hand clutched Elof s hair and forced back his head so that a face could stare into his, a dark-bearded face that seemed twisted out of a mass of browned cordage, set with eyes of black opal that burned beneath heavy brows. A fine fillet of twisted gold crowned them, and the unkempt beard bristled over a thick golden collar. Those eyes glared deep into his own, and the sunken cheeks seemed to grow hollower still, as if eaten away by those fires within. There was no trace of mildness or mercy in that look; it was hard, proud, suspicious, and above all it was voracious. "Well?" said a voice whose accents had the same half familiar ring to them; but by the face, even by the odour, Elof had already recognised the race of the speaker. The words were heavily sarcastic. "What token can you show us, smith among men? What marvels to amaze us?"

  Elof spoke with difficulty. "None… none but this." And reaching inside his torn tunic, he pulled out the little oval of onyx that the great duergh Ansker had hung around his neck. Gnarled fingers plucked at it, rubbed it, the opalescent eyes peered closer and looked up in startled disbelief.

  "Whence stole you this? By what right bear you it?"

  Elof forced himself to stand upright, though the trees seem to be swaying too violently around him. He looked the dark one in the face, and demanded "I am the Mastersmith Elof Valantor. Will you not give me your name? Ti shkazye khto?"

  Duergar voices rumbled their astonishment that a human should speak any tongue of theirs, and he relaxed a little; he had been afraid they would not understand him. The gold-crowned one glared at him a moment, then nodded curtly. "Ieh tyak, uznye. Ildrya-nye korolye! Iye!"

  "Then hear my answer, Lord Ildryan. That stamp
I was awarded by right as a journeyman, after two long years of service; and by the achievement of mastery was confirmed in that right!" Again he heard astonished words, mingled with disbelieving sniggers; but he concentrated his gaze on Ildryan. "For myself and my helper I claim the shelter of that right! Is it granted? Or do we tarry here till the man-eaters return? Khazhto myetdylas!"

  Out of the shadows around they crowded in around him, and there were fewer sniggers. Elof saw for the first time that the gold-crowned one seemed surprisingly ill-clad for any of the Elder Folk, let alone one of authority; he wore a shirt of the fine-meshed duergar mail, ornamented in gold, but it looked to have been altered from one shaped to fit another's form, and the leather breeches beneath were worn and stained. But then the garments of the others were as rough, and even less clean; bags of game, bunches of roots, even a brace of hares hung from their belts, and many of their mail shirts were ill-fitting. Only their weapons were well made and richly ornamented, even when they hung from rawhide baldrics. He felt his mind whirling with the puzzle of it, and suddenly that dark face was all he could see; it seemed to hang unsupported in space, and he forced himself to hold those unreadable eyes with his own, until at last they lowered in a quick, unwilling nod. "We waste time indeed!" growled the voice. "The price is accepted! Talyazkha na zyevar! Nazh skary-enje!"

  Elof let himself collapse with relief; Roc supported him, and demanded what had been said. "He said we should go with them," croaked Elof, and added, as quietly as he could, "Or ordered it, rather… and told us to hurry up!" The idea of that seemed suddenly hilarious to him; he could hardly put one foot in front of the other, and that stupid ringing in his ears was drowning whatever Roc was saying. Unease swelled in him. "But what did he mean, the price…" Suddenly the trees were whirling around him, and the ground surged up beneath his feet.

  For much of the time that followed he hovered uneasily in the shadowland between consciousness and unconsciousness, dimly aware of being borne on some kind of litter, swaying on broad shoulders, of lines of tall trees looming over him, with moon and stars between them. At other times he was swirling once more in that awful tide-rush, or seeing Louhi's face contort with wrath, or feeling that sickening agony of the sword thrust, or walking paths that were darker and more confused still. Then, very suddenly, his eyes were staring up at a circle of blue sky, and he was wholly awake.

  Roc was bending over him, waterbottle in hand; as Elof stirred he nodded as curtly as Ildryan and sat back against a tree, but gave no greater sign of relief. "Well," he said, "Had a good sleep, have we?"

  Elof stirred and looked around him. All he could see were bushes, and above them, picked out between black outlines of limb and leaf, patches of deep blue sky strewn with the rose-hued clouds of sunset, and the high summit of some cliff or crag of greyish stone. It gave him a welcome sense of peace; uneasy and shortlived perhaps, but still peace. The air was full of a strong resinous scent, and as he moved he saw he was lying on a long heap of soft spruce tips, a comfortable woodland bed. There were trees in the background, but Roc sat at the base of the only one near, a substantial pine, with Gorthawer and their packs by his side. "Yes," Elof said, and though dry his voice rang already stronger in his ears. "Yes, I have. I feel… strengthened."

  "And so you should," said Roc severely, "the rate you've healed. We guessed Louhi had muffed it; but she didn't did she?" He saw the look that crossed Elof s face, and sat back. "Calm down, my lad; take your ease. We're safe enough here for now. Ildryan and his lads say Louhi doesn't control this land. They're holed up in a nice shady place nearby, waiting for night; but I thought the sun might do you more good, and they seemed glad enough to be shot of us."

  Elof sat up gingerly, feeling his head clear. "Roc, how did you fall in with that crew? What happened to you after -"

  "After you lost hold of your shape? The Powers know how you held it that long, but I'm bloody glad you did. Well, I was swept off, whirled down; then I saw the Tarnhelm go by me…"

  "You saw it? Did you get it? Roc, is it safe…"

  "Easy does it, there! Aye, I found it; I saw it dashed away among the rocks, and dived for it as it sank. Got myself swept off in a current for my pains, but I brought it ashore all right. Much use I. thought it, without you! And I didn't know whether you were alive or dead. Then our friends found me." He snorted. "Friends I call them; that's giving naked truth clothes. They're not fond of men, those ones. They'd have settled me on the spot if they hadn't come upon the helm, and seen there was something about it; that made 'em more ready to listen. Afraid I sounded off a bit about it and you, to bait them into helping me look for you; they wouldn't have cared a toss otherwise. But the Ekwesh got to you before we could… Tried to warn you, but well, too late. And there you were, prisoner; and there we were."

  Elof smiled. "My own fault! At least you tried."

  Roc grimaced. "We saw you taken, but they wouldn't attack the patrol, not in that open land; can't blame 'em, there were too many others about. But they tracked you neatly, every step, and when the man-eaters took you to the castle we were near enough to see you then - and me close to tearing my hair out, or rushing into that tower after you. But they said we'd get closer round by the rear walls, and that I might scale them by the mountain's flank and slip in, that place being built to keep folk out to the front…"

  "Slip in?" laughed Elof weakly. "Roc my lad, What'd you ever hope to do in there? You must've seen it's a crawling hive of the man-eaters…"

  "Well…" Roc grinned, a little self-consciously. "I thought I might just nose around a bit; make myself out to be a thrall, like…"

  "Ass!" growled Elof, to cover his real feelings. "Even after weeks on short commons you'd still look like the best fed thrall I've seen!"

  Roc chuckled quietly. "Ach, maybe they fatten them up now and again. But I'm glad you saved me the swink, with that acrobatic act of yours…"

  "You saw that?"

  "From a ways downslope. Couldn't miss it, when it started raining Ekwesh! Then you. Hella's teeth, I thought you'd had it that time! Born to be hanged, you are. But it seemed as well to look a bit closer, just in case; and you saw the rest." He shrugged. "Mind you now, it's as well these tykes aren't friendly enough to be interested or they might start thinking, from a scar front of your breastbone and another back of your spine. Quite a wound; and we all saw it made. Might even say a mortal wound; yet here you are. It's happened again, hasn't it?"

  Elof swallowed and nodded, remembering the unhappy gulf that strange incident had opened between him and his friends. "Yes. It has. And I still don't know why…"

  Roc reflected. "See, now. You can be hurt, just like the rest of us, that's certain. Right from your first days prentice at the anvil, when you'd smite your thumb or burn your fingers, I've seen it. And you wouldn't so much as swear, not aloud, so bent you were on acting like our Master." He chuckled at the memory, though it made Elof shrivel. "But you bled right enough, and took as long as any to heal. And as a grown man, too. Except these two times. Now what was so special…" Then his eyes widened with wonder, and Elof began to see the drift of his thought. "Both wounds made with swords; and both swords from under your hand… You who so often make your work more powerful than you mean. As if you'd poured so much of your craft into them that they'll not wound you properly, but heal the breach they've made, seal it with the fire that forged them…" He whistled softly. "It sounds damned unlikely, but of you… aye, of you I could believe it."

  Elof shook his head. "Ach, Roc! I set no such virtue upon either blade!"

  "There's spells in your very blood."

  "Then I've left the forest floor well enchanted! Listen, Roc, it may be as you suggest; who am I to say? But this I know, it did not stop me shedding that blood, I'm kitten-weak and starved; is there any food to be had?"

  Roc chuckled. "Very well then, you're on the mend." He pulled over the packs, rummaged within them and handed over leaf-wrapped lumps. "Let's see, we've meat, bread, some kinds of root
, strange but wholesome enough. At least they haven't stinted with food, our short friends; and no more they should, the damned price they - "

  Elof, tearing ravenously at the tough grey bread, looked up sharply. "Price? And now I remember, Ildryan said something about a price being accepted. What price, Roc? And for what exactly?"

  Roc twined a dangling lock of red hair around his broad fingers. "Well… That's the rough side to it. Hadn't meant to mention that till… well, till you were better."

  "Roc, I'm better now. What price?"

  "Better? Grey as that bloody bread you were, and weak you still are. Ach, what's the use? The price -well, it's that helm of yours - no, do you lie back there and let me explain!"

  "You've got it? And yet you're bartering it away…"

  "Elof, hear me out! It was the price of our lives…"

  Elof exploded. "Roc, you stupid bitch's get, that helm's the most powerful thing left me! It's mine, and to Hel with your damn-fool bargaining! I've got to have it, d'you hear me? Got to! I can't hope to catch Kara without it - "

  Roc's eyes screwed up till they almost vanished, and his cheeks flamed. "Catch her, is it? Where's all your repentance fled to, then, eh, sir cock-a-hoop? Haven't you thought a sight too much of catching already? And would we he here in this stinking midden if you hadn't?" Abruptly Elof bowed his head, and Roc blew out his breath impatiently. "Ach Mastersmith, I'm sorry. But what was I to do? I couldn't rescue you on my own; I can't work that thing! What profit in hanging onto it and losing you, then? They had it already, anyway; there was nothing to stop them just hanging onto it, taking it without another thought and leaving me high and dry. Or slitting my throat. And so far at least they've been honourable; they've taken nothing else, nothing we had in our packs or anything."