The Sage

by Christopher Stasheff

  He shook his leg, snarling, but she held on long enough for Kitishane to come up and throw her arms about his chest. “Yes, enough and more, O Brave One! You have rendered the poor thing unconscious; have pity on its empty life! Let us pass it quickly now.”

  Culaehra stared down in amazement and saw only her eyes, huge and brown, staring up at him. Then, a moment later, the whole of her face registered, seeming small and fragile, chin little, forehead high, nose a temptation that he suddenly ached to kiss, even more than the moist, full lips below .. .

  She saw her effect on him and smiled as she stepped away.

  “Come, then!” She held out a hand, even as she turned away to pass the fuchan.

  She did not see Lua's face, a strange mixture of sorrow and tenderness, tasting the sweetness of seeing love begin as well as the bitterness of seeing one whom she had loved now discovering another.

  Yocote saw, though; his face went hard, impassive, as he felt the blow of knowing she loved another—but his love for her overcame the hurt, and he stepped to her, saying softly, “Don't you dare tell them, Lua, or they'll say you're wrong and start a fight just to prove it!”

  She turned to him in surprise, then managed to laugh even as her eyes filled with tears. “Oh, Yocote! Must you taste all of life?”

  For a moment the longing was naked in his face, and he touched her hand. “All that I can—but the sweetest is denied me.”

  Lua stared, then blushed and turned away. Yocote gazed after her a moment, face somber, then pulled down his goggles and followed.

  They passed the prostrate fuchan, harmless now that it was unconscious. Lua almost tarried to tend to it, but Illbane reached down and urged her along. When they were a hundred feet farther along the pass, he let her pause to look back.

  Kitishane turned to gaze, too, and shivered. “It seems as if it should be so helpless, yet it is lethal! You did amazingly to best it, Culaehra.”

  “Only because of the example you set me.” It was hard not to take all the credit, but the hunter would have done that, so Culaehra did not. “Yours was the insight, gentle one.”

  Kitishane stared at him, amazed, but he did not notice; he had turned to Yocote. “You were right, gnome,” he said grudgingly. “We could never have defeated it by force alone.”

  Yocote stared in surprise, but Illbane nodded, smiling in his beard. “Well said, and very true, Culaehra! No one of you could have defeated the poor thing alone, but together, you were easily a match for it.”

  His praise made Culaehra uncomfortable. He turned to glare at the old man. “Why did you not aid us, Illbane?”

  “Because,” the sage said, “there was no need.”

  Culaehra stared at him, amazed, then whipped about to stare at his companions—and found them all staring at him.

  Illbane saved them all from embarrassment. “It stirs, it wakes! Quickly, we must be out of its sight, or it will pursue us!”

  None of them wanted that. They turned to hurry away. Culaehra stood staring at them a minute, struggling with unfamiliar feelings, then realized that Kitishane had recovered her sword, but Illbane had left his blade lying there in the path. Culaehra scooped it up, feeling a surge of triumph and a great relief, stuck it through his belt and hurried after them. Time enough to recover the scabbard later.

  As he caught up, Kitishane was asking, “You called it a 'poor thing,' Illbane.”

  “Would not you call it poor,” the sage returned, “if you had no sex nor companionship, and your whole life was spent in waiting to stop folk who might never happen by?”

  “Then how did it come to be?” Yocote asked.

  “I shall tell you when we sit about the campfire, but let us first come to a place where we may light one in safety! Hurry—the monster even now crawls to the rock face to pull itself upright!”

  Culaehra glanced back, but they had begun to descend; the path sloped downward, and its rising behind them hid the fuchan from sight. How could the old man know what it did?

  Illbane called a halt when they were a mile farther down the path. By that time, it had darkened enough so the gnomes led them, their goggles up. They chose a wide, flat area with a rock face at its back, and small, stunted trees that yielded enough dry cones for a fire—though Culaehra found himself wondering if Illbane really needed wood for a blaze.

  There was little or no game so high up; dinner would be jerky, stewed to soften it, and hard biscuit. As they waited for the water to boil, Illbane explained, “Bolenkar, being an Ulharl, is half human and half Ulin, so he was born with magical powers, though nowhere nearly as strong as those of his father Ulahane. The human-hater taught all his halfling children the use of those powers, and they are strong enough to work a great deal of mischief.”

  “But how could he make so warped a creature as this fuchan?” Yocote asked.

  “Even as you have said—by warping one that the Creator had made. In this case, he took an unborn child, divided it in two, removed any glands that might have given it desires of its own, and wiped its mind of all but the desire to please him. When it was grown, he taught it fighting of a limited sort, then set it to guard the pass, making sure the sole thought in its mind was to gain his pleasure by stopping any who sought to come by.”

  “And that it would earn his displeasure if any came through?” Lua asked softly.

  “Regrettably, yes—but Bolenkar is no Ulin, and may not know.”

  “If he learns, we might have been kinder to slay the thing,” Culaehra grunted.

  Lua cried out in protest, but Kitishane seemed unsure.

  Yocote, however, had another question. “Why did Bolenkar wish to keep folk from coming through that pass? It cannot be only to ensure that they would not escape the Vanyar and the other marauders!”

  “I cannot say with any certainty,” Illbane said reluctantly.

  “Certainty?” Culaehra sat bolt upright in indignation. “Give us your best guess, then! Surely we have earned that much— and your guess is so close to knowledge that it makes little difference! Why did Bolenkar set a guard on that pass?”

  Still Illbane was silent, his lips pressed hard and thin as he stared at the fire.

  It was Yocote who asked it. “He knew we would be coming, did he not?”

  “I think so,” Illbane told him. “I think he has guessed that much, yes.”

  There was a numbed silence around that fire, so small in the vastness of the mountain night.

  At last Lua asked, her voice small, “How can we be so important?”

  “Because,” Yocote answered, “it is Illbane who leads us.”

  The wind blew cold indeed around their shoulders.

  Chapter 12

  Strangely, they slept well that night—so well that Illbane's shout of warning yanked them from so deep a sleep that they were all thick-headed as they leaped up, looking about frantically, trying to clear the fog from their eyes. “What is it, Illbane?”

  “Where is the danger?”

  “What?”

  “Into the trees, quickly! An ogre comes!”

  They needed no chivvying. Lua and Yocote scrambled up the nearest oak while Culaehra caught Kitishane about the waist and fairly threw her up to catch the lowest branch of an elm. He ran around to clamber up the boughs of a large fir, crying, “Stop him with your magic, sage!”

  “He works,” Yocote called, “but the defense could be as devastating as the attack!”

  Sure enough, Illbane stood by the fire, sawing the air with his hands and chanting—but not quickly enough. A hand the size of a knapsack swung out of the shadows and sent him careening into a tree. Culaehra almost shouted with rage, but throttled it as the monster itself stepped into the firelight, grinning and drooling. It stood ten feet tall or more with hunched shoulders that were balks of muscle, arms like the limbs of a century-old oak, and legs like its trunk. Its torso was blocky and lumpen, swag-bellied and hairy; its head was so low-slung that it almost seemed to grow out of its broad, hairy chest. It
was so hairy that at first Culaehra thought it wore a tunic and leggings of fur. Then the light flared up; he saw the moth-eaten hide that served it for a loincloth, and could see how it contrasted with the creature's own pelt. Lua gasped with horror at the sight, and the ogre turned its head to look up, catching the firelight. Its head was like a huge melon with a gash of a mouth, foul and with wide-spaced, blackened stubs of teeth, its nose scarcely more than a shelf with nostrils beneath, its eyes small and glinting with malice under a very low brow. Even Culaehra had to repress a shudder.

  High in his tree, Yocote gestured and mumbled with frantic haste.

  The ogre apparently decided the sound had come from a night bird or something equally beneath its notice, for it turned to waddle to the campfire, yanking the spit from the flames and running it through its mouth, cleaning off the roasted fowls in one bite. It sniffed, following a scent to Kitishane's pack, which it tore apart, jamming the store of rations into its maw, then caught up the wineskins and tossed them in, too. It bit hard, swallowed, then spat out the empty skins. After that, it battered down their tents and swatted packs flying, grunting in disgust as it found no more food. Finally it turned to go—but as it went, it bumped into the oak, and Kitishane let out a small cry as she clung to her swaying branch in fright. The ogre looked up, saw her, and grinned its widest. It reached up to pluck at her, but Kitishane clung all the tighter, crying out. Culaehra shouted in alarm and scrambled down from his fir, but the monster merely broke the limb off the tree and stripped Kitishane from it as if she were a flower. She screamed as the ogre lifted her toward its mouth.

  Culaehra hit the ground, bellowing, “Put her down, fiend! That morsel is mine to take or leave!” He leaped high, lashing a kick into the monster's negligible buttocks.

  Negligible, but tender; the ogre howled like a whole pack of wolves, dropping Kitishane and turning on the outlaw. Huge fists swung at Culaehra, so huge that he could have seen them coming a mile away and had no trouble dodging. He sprang aside from the left, then from the right; then both hands slapped the ground beside him, and Culaehra jumped on one with his full weight. The ogre bellowed and tried to swat him with the other hand, but Culaehra leaped aside, and the ogre roared as he slapped his own hand. Thinking the monster was distracted, Culaehra leaped high and grabbed hold of a huge ear. The ogre went on roaring, but one huge hand swung up and knocked him away as if he were a gnat.

  Culaehra flew through the air, trying to somersault, to get his feet under him; but he only succeeded in landing flat on his back. Pain wracked him; he could not breathe, and he saw the ogre towering above him as it straightened up, then turned toward him, lifting a huge foot—

  An arrow struck its nose, an arrow that bounced off but made the monster roar with pain. He turned toward the source just as another arrow lanced up and struck his forehead. Culaehra would have admired the marksmanship—it wasn't a very large target—if the monster hadn't been advancing on the archer with blood in its eye. And the archer was Kitishane! He scrambled to his feet and dove at a huge knee.

  He struck behind it like a boulder, and the monster shouted with surprise and fright as the leg folded under it. It sat down hard, and for a moment Culaehra was squeezed so tight that he felt his head must burst—but the ogre fell onto its side, and the pressure eased enough for Culaehra to wrestle himself free.

  The ogre was roaring in baffled rage as it pushed itself back to its feet, trying to swat aside the arrows that stormed upon it. Culaehra saw, with surprise, that some of them were only half the length of the others, then realized they were flying from two different directions. Somehow one of the gnomes had gained a bow, too!

  None of them struck a vital spot, though—the ogre's eyes were so small that only luck would send a shaft to them, and he was batting most of them out of the air with his horny palms. But the few that struck through seemed to hurt enough; he roared with pain as well as anger as he advanced on the biggest archer.

  Culaehra couldn't let the monster reach Kitishane! He dashed in and launched another flying kick at its knee. He struck it on the side, then leaped back as the joint bent and the ogre roared in anger, turning to flail at him even as it fell.

  The ground gave way beneath it; it fell into a pit.

  “Well done, Yocote!” Culaehra cried, then picked his place and waited. A huge arm slapped down over the side of the hole; then a huger head followed—

  Culaehra spun, kicking it right in the eye.

  The ogre bellowed again, but the other hand came up and caught Culaehra, drawing him toward its mouth even as it fell.

  An arrow struck from the side, straight into the monster's maw.

  It howled with pain, dropping Culaehra, who leaped up and lashed a kick at its nose, then turned and ran a dozen paces. He turned back as the ogre finished climbing out of the pit. It roared and thundered down on him, huge fist swinging around to crush him. Culaehra leaped aside, but too slowly; the blow glanced off his arm and side, sending him staggering. His arm and shoulder flared with pain, but he managed to stay on his feet, turning to face his foe—and saw Yocote at the end of a limb, gesturing furiously, while Kitishane stood by with a drawn bow.

  He hoped they liked him tonight.

  The ogre pivoted, fist swinging out like the limb of a whirlwind, but Culaehra ducked under it easily and drew his sword, managing to get the point up just as a great foot came swinging at his belly. He jabbed and stepped aside. A roar of pain shook the forest as the ogre limped around the campsite, then turned back to him with fiery eyes. It started toward him, claws hooked to seize and hold—then whirled aside, clenching its fists, and slammed a blow that sent Kitishane flying. Culaehra bellowed with anger and charged, sword first, all finesse forgotten. The monster whirled back, grinning now, a huge ball of a fist swinging straight toward him—but the campfire suddenly roared into a towering flame that singed the back of its leg and hip. The ogre gave a yelp of pain and scurried away, then turned back with an ugly look. It scanned the trees ...

  Realizing what it was looking for, Culaehra ran, sword first, to distract the monster, but too late—it saw Yocote on the end of his branch and swatted at him as if he were a fly. The gnome cried out and went tumbling a dozen feet, to land in a thicket.

  “All right, Illbane!” Culaehra shouted, hating himself. “I admit it! An ogre is more than we can handle by ourselves! Now will you help us?” Then he had to leap back, for the ogre turned to charge at him.

  It was unkind, really—the sage was just managing to get back on his feet. But he strode up to the ogre without the slightest sign of fear. His staff whirled, and the ogre doubled over, clutching its belly in sudden pain. The staff whirled again, catching the monster right behind the ear. It stumbled forward and fell, then pushed itself up, roaring and shaking its head.

  Yocote crawled out of his bush, climbed to unsteady feet, and began to gesture and chant. Illbane turned, saw, and took up the same gestures, the same chant, in unison.

  The ogre climbed to its feet with a bellow of anger, stepped toward the two magicians, stepped twice before its legs gave way and it collapsed to the ground with a roar of agony.

  Lua, gentle Lua, dashed in brandishing one of Kitishane's arrows like a spear and drove it into the ogre's eye, through the orb and deep into the brain. The monster's bellow cut off; its body convulsed once, then went limp.

  So did Lua. She sank to the ground, head in her hands, weeping.

  Yocote dashed to her, putting an arm around her shoulders, Kitishane right behind him. “Don't mourn, little one, don't be frightened,” the gnome said in a soothing tone. “Poor thing, you did what was best!”

  “I had to!” Lua sobbed. “It was in so much pain!”

  Culaehra stared, dumbfounded.

  “And I couldn't try to heal it,” the gnome-maiden wailed, “or it would have slain us!”

  “Yes, we know, we know, brave lass,” Yocote said, his voice a caress. “You have done the kindest deed for all of us. You could not have d
one otherwise.”

  “Sometimes kindness means giving the lesser pain, sister,” Kitishane said, her tone soothing, too. “You have saved us all.”

  “Yes, you have,” Culaehra said, amazed, “but most remarkably of all, you have saved me!” Sheer relief flooded him, and bore “Thank you!” with it on the flood. “Thank you most extravagantly, from the bottom of the hide that is whole because of you! But you had no cause to aid me, Lua—if you had reason to do anything to me, it would have been to return hurt for hurt!”

  She looked up at him, appalled.

  “So had you all.” Culaehra looked from one to the other, still unbelieving. “Yet you fought to save me, and I thank you most earnestly, for without you that monster would have slain me! But I have beaten you, demeaned you, insulted you, and.. .” He glanced at Kitishane, reddened, and glanced away. “I would have done worse, if it had not been for Illbane. So why would you save me now? Why?”

  Kitishane, Lua, and Yocote looked at one another, and from the looks on their faces, he could almost hear their thoughts: He has a good point. Why did we help him?

  Yocote tried the first answer. “Perhaps because you fought to save us, Culaehra—or Kitishane, at least. Why did you do that?”

  But Culaehra chopped the implied thanks away with impatience. “There is no virtue in that, for I fought to save what I regarded as mine!”

  “Perhaps we did, too,” Kitishane said, and the gnomes looked up at her in surprise.

  Culaehra stared in amazement. “You cannot mean that you think I am your property!”

  “Not property, no,” Lua said, “but I think I know what my sister means. It is not a question of owning, but of belonging.”

  The consternation on his face was answer enough.

  “Yes, belonging.” Yocote nodded with firm understanding. “It is not that you belong to us, Culaehra, but that you belong with us now.”

  “Yes,” Kitishane agreed, with some relief of her own. “We have shared hardships, Culaehra, and have fought the fuchan together. Whether we like one another or not does not matter as much as that.”