A Gathering of Gargoyles

by Meredith Ann Pierce

Chapter 5 The Keeper of the Light

 

  Aeriel followed the keeper into the tower. A spiral stair ascended the wall. Aeriel and her guide emerged onto the top of the tower. A vaulted roof rose overhead. The wind gusting off the Sea-of-Dust was strong. At the center of the open chamber stood a dark dais, upon which lay a ring of silver metal, set with spires like a crown. From each point rose a small blue tongue of flame.

  "What is it?" Aeriel asked, leaning nearer. The flame burned scentless, clean of smoke.

  "What is it?" the person echoed, chafing both hands over the flame. Aeriel could feel no heat. "The beacon, of course. This is a lighthouse, wayfarer. What did you think it was?"

  "Lighthouse," murmured Aeriel. The word felt strange upon her tongue. "What is a lighthouse?"

  The other gave a snort and wheezed. After a moment, Aeriel realized that this was laughter. "It makes a beam to warn ships off the rocks and show the mariners the only safe landfall hereabouts - what else? How is it you have piloted all the way across the Sea-of-Dust and never heard of a lighthouse?"

  Aeriel had no time to make reply. The keeper sighed.

  "Ah, I remember, before they stopped coming, how the big ships used to lie off the coast.

  I with my raft ferried their goods in to shore. Then there was work - and never a wreck. "

  The keeper glanced sharply at Aeriel. "You'd not have wrecked your craft, either, wayfarer, if only you'd followed the beam. "

  Aeriel shook her head. "I saw no beam. "

  The person eyed her. "No one finds the gap by chance," it said. "The Ancients made these towers, you know. To guide the pilgrims over the Sea, and then inland across the steeps.

  They are all connected, deep underground, so that whenever one is fed, the others flare. "

  The keeper stood gazing off now, shaking its head. Aeriel could not quite follow - were there other towers such as this one? The keeper sighed.

  "But they do burn low now. Nothing to feed them since the pilgrimages ceased - oh, I don't know; I've been dozing so long - a hundred years ago. " It nodded then. "Yes, most perilously low. Well, I've a remedy for that. Keep wide. "

  Aeriel fell back at the other's gesture. It cast the seed of her apricok upon the dais, within the crown of light. The flame hissed, flaring, flickered from blue to violet, and then to rose.

  Aeriel stood watching. The tongues of fire grew longer, brighter, merging into a single, taller flame. Its color changed to green, to yellow, and still the fire increased until it was as tall as Aeriel.

  The flame changed one last time, to white, very brilliant and pure, yet Aeriel found she could look upon it without being dazzled. It stood steady now upon its crown, and though Aeriel still felt wind gusting off the Sea, the cool radiance did not flicker.

  "Ah, so much better," a voice beside her said, and turning, Aeriel saw the lighthouse keeper - but not at all as he had appeared to her before.

  His robe was neither ragged anymore nor dusty drab, but blue. The color deepened, growing richer as she watched. The person himself stood straighter, seemed neither disheveled nor ancient now, and lean rather than starved. The stick he held was not a gnarled crook at all, but a tall, straight staff.

  "Ah, yes, much better," he said again, holding his hands once more to the flame. "How cold one gets between travelers, and how sleepy. "

  Aeriel stared. "But - I feel no heat from it," she said at last, not knowing what to say.

  The person looked up, as though just then remembering her. "No, of course not. " He smiled. "You would not, for you have eaten of the tree, and so may see the beacon's light - as I cannot, for I have never tasted that fruit. Was it good, by the way, your apricok?"

  "Very good. " A little of its taste still lingered in her mouth.

  The keeper nodded. "So I have heard, from the travelers. I would not know. "

  "But why is that," Aeriel began, "when the tree grows at your door?"

  The person laughed, came away from the flame, moving with a slight haltness of step to one of the wide windows. He hardly seemed to need his staff.

  "Because I am no traveler," he said. "I was not made for journeying, and the tree bears only at need: one fruit for every traveler that fares across the Mare. " He sighed and tilted back his head. "They used to come in droves, the travelers. But no more. "

  "Is that the only thing which feeds the light?" asked Aeriel. "The apricok seeds?"

  The keeper nodded. "The tree feeds upon the heart of the world; the pilgrims feed upon its fruit, the flame upon the heart of the fruit, and I upon the flame. "

  Aeriel studied the person across from her. He had come back from the window now, stood closer to the flame. "And are you no mortal," she asked, "that eats no mortal food?"

  The keeper smiled and shook his head. "Mortal, yes, but not like you. Ravenna made me.

  I was not born. "

  Aeriel caught in her breath. "Ravenna," she whispered, "that made the Ions. You are the Ion of Bern. . . . "

  But again the keeper shook his head, laughing this time. "No Ion am I," he told her gently. "Bernalon is a great she-wolf that runs along the steeps and shore, warding the land - while I have never even ventured from this headland to the wood. . . . "

  But Aeriel could not keep still. A desperate urgency tugged at her. Perhaps she need not go to Orm. Perhaps she could learn of the Ions here in Bern. Her eyes found the keeper's again.

  "Where may I find her - Bernalon? For I must find her, soon, and the other Ions. "

  The keeper sighed. "I do not know. I have been dozing a hundred years. Not once in all that time have I heard the great wolf crying. The last pilgrim who came here spoke of a battle in the west. Upon the border of Zambul, a winged monster defeating Bernalon and carrying her away. "

  "A darkangel," whispered Aeriel. Not hers of Avaric, but his "brother," another of the witch's "sons. "

  "What's that?" the keeper said.

  Aeriel looked up. "There is a witch at desert's edge, who steals away babes to raise as her own, making them winged vampyres, the icari, who drink the souls of women. Six darkangels has she now, but her seventh in Avaric has been returned to the living before her magic on him could be made complete. Each icarus in turn overthrew a Ion. One of them I have found already, the Avarclon. But there are six more I must find within the year. One of them is Bernalon. "

  The keeper turned away again. "Bad times," he murmured, "that see witches and their sons among us. "

  Aeriel drew breath. "There is a rime," she said. The wild hope that had come to her only moments before was slipping away. She seized at it. "When the Ancient Ones withdrew from us, ages ago, Ravenna foretold the coming of the witch. "

  The tall, steep-burning flame threw her shadow before her. The keeper stood overlooking the Sea.

  "She made the rime, and sang it over the Ions at the time of their making. You are not a Ion, but perhaps you can tell me what it means:

  "But first there must assemble

  those the icari would claim, A bride in the temple

  must enter the flame,

  Steeds found for the secondborn beyond

  the dust deepsea, And new arrows reckoned, a wand

  given wings -

  So that when a princess royal

  shall have tasted of the tree,

  Then far from Esternesse 's

  city, these things:

  A gathering of gargoyles,

  a feasting on the stone, The witch of Westernesse 's

  hag overthrown. "

  Aeriel gazed at the keeper, but the other shook his head.

  "I was made long before the Ions, wayfarer. I have never heard that riddle before. I do not know its meaning. "

  Aeriel cast down her eyes. Disappointment bit her heart, and dread.

  "I must go on to Orm, then," she answered quietly, "and seek my answer there. " She hesitated, then made herself say it. "Can you tell me the way?
"

  "You must follow the coast road," the keeper said, "northward until you reach Talis. Get there by nightfall, for the city gates are barred at Solset. In the morning, take the road going west into the hills. That should see you through the pass and into Zambul, which is as much of the way as I know.

  "Do not stray from the road, for the woods are wild. Do not travel by night, and go with some caravan if you can, for in the time since Bernalon was taken away, the land hereabouts has grown thick with thieves. "

  Aeriel put on what smile she could. She gave the keeper her thanks for his warning of thieves, as he led her down the tower stair.

  "But before you go," he said, "take this, will you? The last traveler before you left it, and I have no use for it. "

  He laid one hand upon a peg beside the door. Aeriel had not noticed it before. The garment the keeper was holding out was very small, the outside pale cream or grey - its color seemed to move and shift. The inside was some darker thread.

  Aeriel threw it about her shoulders, found it, to her surprise, exactly the right size. The hem fell a little below her knees; the sleeves stopped halfway between her elbow and the wrist. The peaked hood, when she tried it, fitted, shadowing her face.

  "I thank you," Aeriel began, throwing back the hood. "But I have nothing to pay you with. "

  The keeper shook his head. "No need. Take it as my gift - to keep the road dust off. "

  They emerged from the tower into the morning light, and Aeriel noticed, with a start, that the weeds were gone. What had been rocky ground was covered now with fruiting creepers. A narrow path led to the road. Aeriel spotted five more fruits hanging upon the tree.

  "Keeper," she said, "what does it mean?"

  The keeper halted, a frown creasing his brow. "Five more travelers upon their way across the Sea-of-Dust?" A new feeling of unease overtook her - why she could not say. She expected no pursuit from Isternes. The keeper stood considering. At last he shook his head.

  "We saw no sail from the tower. And the tree fruits only at need. " He scratched his head a moment, glanced at her. "How do the fruits appear to you?"

  Aeriel gazed at them, puzzled. "They look exactly the same as the first one: reddish gold and shining in the light. "

  "They must be yours, then. The tree never fruits the same twice. A different gift for each that comes. " The keeper went to the tree, and Aeriel followed. "I have not seen such a thing before, that one wayfarer should receive so much. "

  He pulled the ripe fruits from the bough.

  "Take them," he said. "It must be you will have need of them. " Aeriel slipped them carefully into the yellow silk wrapping her bandolyn. The keeper walked with her as far as the road. "But save the seeds," he said. "There is great virtue in them. "

  Aeriel adjusted the cloak about her shoulders again; the hood lay flat along her back. She bowed to the keeper then, and he to her. She started away, but she had taken no more than a dozen steps when the other called, "What, a wayfarer that has no staff?"

  Aeriel turned, walking backward now, but her smile was full of rue. "I had one once, in Pendar," she said, "when I lived among the desert folk. But I lost it, returning to Avaric. "

  She turned again, walked along the road, shielding her eyes from low Solstar's glare. She raised the hood of her traveling cloak, glanced over one shoulder, her hand lifted to wave, but the keeper had already vanished, back into his lighted tower.

  Aeriel fared steadily north. The road threaded along between the wood's edge and the brink of the cliffs overlooking the shore. She walked for a very long time with neither hunger nor fatigue.

  Sometimes she unwrapped her bandolyn, reciting the tales she had learned in Isternes, how the young Lady Syllva had been courted by a stranger, a bold prince of Avaric, and gone with him for a time to be his wife in Westernesse, and other stories.

  She did not venture into the woods, but from time to time caught glimpses among the slender trees of wood-deer standing no higher than her knee, treerats with their double tails, and sweet-voiced flitterwings.

  Then suddenly it was noon. She had been walking with her hood thrown back, the past few hours. Aeriel halted, astonished, staring up at the black, starry heavens. Solstar, like a brilliant jewel, blazed nearly at its zenith. Raising her hood, she sat down against a tree at wood's edge. Its boughs leaned out over the road.

  "Have I truly traveled half a daymonth without pause?" she murmured. Even now the taste of apricok lingered in her mouth.

  She had no time to murmur more, for just at that moment, nearly directly overhead, she heard a great clapping and beating, like the slapping of a sail.

  "Now where can she have vanished?" a weary voice muttered. "I was certain I spotted someone very like her faring along this road. "

  Aeriel scrambled to her feet, peered up through the twining branches. A long-billed bird hovered with difficulty just above. It had a long neck and strong wings, snowy white, and was clutching something unwieldy, straight, and dark.

  "Could she have gone into the forest?" it panted, wingbeats becoming more labored still.

  It glanced the other way. "Perhaps she fell over the cliff. "

  As Aeriel ducked out from under the tree, her hood fell back. "Whom do you seek?" she called.

  "Odds!" cried the bird, starting upward in surprise. Its toes lost their grip upon the long dark object. Aeriel threw up her arms, fell back a step - realizing too late that only brought her more directly beneath the falling shaft. She felt a blow upon her head. The world went stars, then dark.

  "Duck," someone was urging her.

  Her knees buckled. She pitched face-forward onto the road.

  Aeriel awoke to the feel of some-thing tugging at her garment. She brushed at it groggily, and raised herself. Her vision was blurred. A sharp ache throbbed in the back of her skull.

  Something stepped lightly on the small of her back. Aeriel jerked, rolled, batted at the long, sticklike legs of the heron. The white bird danced awkwardly away.

  "Thank Ravenna," it exclaimed. "I thought I'd killed you. "

  "You came near it," Aeriel murmured, rubbing the lump on the back of her head. It was the size of a gamelizard's egg. "What fell on me?" "I beg your pardon," the bird answered. "It slipped. "

  Aeriel's vision cleared. "I know you," she said, suddenly.

  She remembered a heron-prowed boat the duarough had made her to escape the darkangel's keep. She had sailed as far as the little craft could take her, then had set off overland - and looking back, she had seen no boat, only a long-necked white bird winging low between the riverbanks.

  "Wind-on-the-Water!" she exclaimed.

  The heron lifted one wing and preened. "The same," she replied, "though my name in this form is Wing-on-the-Wind. "

  Aeriel remembered the lyon of Pendar telling her once how a heron of that name had come to him, bearing news of her coming.

  "You are she, then," the heron was saying, "Aeriel of Terrain?"

  Aeriel nodded.

  "Well, you must take this," the heron sighed. One-footed, she clutched the long, dark stave lying in the roadway, and hopped toward Ariel. "The Ancients made me for a bearer of tidings, not of heavy objects. I have searched all Wester-nesse for you for daymbnths. "

  Aeriel smiled a little. "I have been in Isternes. "

  The heron laid the object at her knees. Aeriel drew in her breath. She recognized the dusty thing at last.

  "My walking stick," Aeriel exclaimed, softly. "The one Orroto-to made me. "

  She ran her fingers over the straight, smooth-weathered shaft, remembering how that chieftess of the desert folk had fashioned this staff out of dark driftwood. As tall as Aeriel it stood, very slender, very strong, with a pointed heel to bite into the sand, and heavy knob upon its crown. She had killed a witch's jackal once, with this stick.

  She put it from her suddenly. "I should not have it. It was my own carelessness lost it in the
desert. "

  The heron scratched the side of her head a moment with one ungainly leg. "The lyon told me something of these staves," she said, "that are the throwing sticks and digging sticks, tent poles, and a thousand other things to the Ma'a-mbai, the people of the dunes. There is power in them, he said. "

  The heron cocked her head the other way.

  "Perhaps you did not truly lose yours, but only laid it by awhile, its task of the moment being done and it not yet time for you to take it up again. "

  Aeriel lifted her walking stick from the dust. She hardly could keep her hands from the shaft. She laid it across her lap, feeling the wood, its shape growing once more familiar in her grasp. Orroto-to had taught her all its uses. It lacked only a single thing to make it a true desert walking stick.

  "No figurehead," murmured Aeriel.

  In the beginning, when she had first been among the Ma'a-mbai, she had thought the heads of their walking sticks were nothing more than shapeless knobs. But gradually, as she had lived among that people longer, she had begun to see in each stick a figurehead.

  Vague shapes these all were, oddly half formed, as though their true forms lay a little deeper than the surface of the wood. But Orroto-to had given Aeriel a staff with only a blank knob on top, and when Aeriel had asked her why, the dark chieftess had drawn back a little, surprised.

  "I did not know your green eyes had learned to see the shapes in our walking sticks," she had said. "It is not a thing we speak of much, even among ourselves, and our children may not be called grown until they have seen it. Only then may they be given a grown person's staff, with a figurehead. "

  "But Orroto-to," Aeriel had said, "am I a child, then, that my walking stick has no face?

  Yet, surely no child, since you have given me a long-stick and would teach me to use it. "

  Aeriel saw the wisewoman's eyes turn away then. She said nothing for a space. At last the dark headwoman answered.

  "Little pale one, I have made you no figurehead upon your stick because I have no inkling what to make. Your spirit baffles even me, the best seer-of-spirits among our band. "

  She turned and looked at Aeriel then.

  "But something tells me, sun-fair one who is growing now so tall, that you do not yet need a figure on your staff. When the time comes, you will find one. "

  "How is that?"

  Aeriel looked up, hearing the heron speak. The desert faded from around her, and she sat once more upon the coast road of Bern.

  "My staff has no figurehead," Aeriel said.

  "Easily remedied," the heron replied. Aeriel glanced at the bird, frowning, not following.

  She sat holding the staff across her knees. The heron took wing, alighting upon its knob.

  Aeriel darted to her feet in surprise, nearly dropping the shaft. The white bird settled, folding her long wings, nestling her long bill to her breast.

  "I have been figurehead upon a boat," she murmured. "I can do the same upon a staff. "

  And as she settled, she seemed to diminish. Aeriel held the stick fully upright now, staring at it. Smaller and smaller the heron grew until she was no longer than the knob itself, seemed to have merged with it. Aeriel could not take her eyes away.

  "How have you done that?" she cried. "I had thought it was the duarough's magic made you a boat, and then into a bird again. "

  The heron laughed, soft clucking laughter. "Oh, he merely conjured me out of storage and set me to working again. The rest I am able to manage myself. "

  Aeriel still studied her. "What are you?" she said.

  The white bird shrugged, seemed to have grown suddenly sleepy. "A mere plaything of the Ancients that they left behind - a bringer of tidings, a messenger. I can pick locks and open doors, gain access where the way is barred, find hidden paths and things disguised___But I am weary now. "

  The heron closed her eyes then, tucked her bill beneath one wing. Her color began to deepen, the texture of her feathers change. Before Aeriel could draw three breaths, it looked for all the world as though her staff were all dark wood from heel to crown, but that there the grain changed to a heron-shaped knot of blond.

  Aeriel turned the staff in her hands, gazing on it. "But," she murmured, half to herself, "if your name changes with each new form you assume, what am I to call you now - Bird-on-a-Stick?"

  The heron's eye snapped open. "You make light of me," she said, "who have headed the staves of wisewomen and kings. "

  "No, truly," said Aeriel, instantly rueful. "I meant not. "

  The heron settled her wing more comfortably over her bill. Her movements were growing sluggish and stiff, her voice like green wood creaking. "No matter," she muttered. "You will not need to call me anything just now. Flying about these many daymonths, so burdened, has wearied me. Now you may bear me for a little while, and I will sleep. "

  Her grey eye closed and her form became suddenly even more like the wood. Her outline faded and blurred so that after only a half dozen heartbeats, Aeriel could not tell without looking very closely that the staff's crown now had the shape of a bird.

  Aeriel felt lighter suddenly, renewed in strength. Her terror of Orm subsided a little.

  Though the road there might be long, she had a companion now - such as it was. Aeriel eyed the wooden head of her walking stick, then laughed.

  I will find the lost Ions of Westernesse, she told herself, before the White Witch does.

  She fetched her bandolyn from beneath the tree and started with a swift, sure step northward along the road toward Talis.