The sudden outburst of vitality brought laughter to Elof s lips, and a spirit of mischief; it reminded him of festivities in his own village, clumsy but cheerful, in which he had often longed to take part. "Now there's a dance!" he cried. With a swift bow to Korentyn he sprang out among the dancers, and seized a pretty alfar girl as she went whirling by. He barely glimpsed Ils and Roc hopping out after him before strong arms spun him away into the dance. Tenvar bounded by him with a girl on each arm, his feet scarcely touching the ground, and as Elof came round the tree once more he was startled to see some of the castle folk hovering tentatively on the edge of the throng. He had thought they might be offended, but they seemed more intrigued than scornful at this sudden eruption. At last Svethan the Mariner actually seized a partner and plunged in with gusto; others moved hesitantly after him. Elof all but stumbled as Teris tripped lightly by him, long gown kilted into its golden girdle, pulling Kermorvan after her, laughing wildly; behind them Almayn bounced along with a tall lady of the court, dignity flung like flowers to the wind.
The whole court of immortals seemed to be reveling in its lost decorum. The dance whirled endlessly on, the musicians whisking from tune to tune, circles forming, breaking, re-forming, till many had to fall back to draw breath. Elof was among them; for all his strength, he was at a disadvantage among these longer legs. His partner brushed a kiss on his cheek and bounced back into the throng; he was content to slump down beneath the great tree and let his roaring pulse settle, his dizzy head clear. Round and round they swept, woodfolk and castle folk and his friends, and as he watched them hurtle by a strange thing happened. Half-formed thoughts he had held back took shape in his mind, became a vision. It was as if the dancers sped faster, ever faster, till they merged into a bright, painful blur with a single static figure at its heart, frozen at the crest of a leap. Before his eyes it changed, burgeoned like a tree; the outflung limbs grew longer, the trunk stretched and curved upward like a supple birch, the very feet and fingers stretched out like eagerly grasping roots and tendrils. Then the vision was gone, the dance clear before his eyes. But Elof felt a sickening chill swell up in him, a growing, uncontrollable shiver. He was looking at his vision made flesh, not in one body but in all that flashed by him, in a chain, a sequence, a progression from Kermorvan to Korentyn, from him to long-limbed Merau Ladan, from him to Morhuen. And from his drawn-out, unmanageable limbs to the graceful climbing bodies of the alfar. And what of their minds? At best from nobility and wisdom to kindly simplicity, at worst from man to beast? Was that the true dance in the Halls of Summer?
He cursed under his breath. It still made no sense, not as long as the alfar had children and knew old age. How could they then be linked to the castle folk, who knew neither? He slapped a hand furiously against the rough bark.
Abruptly the walls seemed to vanish around him, the windblown trees come rushing in on him. Deep in a distant pool, intent on a treasure of glittering scales, an otter plunged; high over the borderless carpet of treetops an eagle screamed and dived, clawing. The woodfolk are their children.
Elof swallowed, shook his head, scarcely able to speak. This was not the fluting of birds; it was the first voice he had heard, far off in the west. Only here it was no longer remote and dim; it was all around him, and it blew through his mind like a gusty wind. He should not have leaned against the tree; too much of his secret thought might al-
ready be betrayed. But it seemed that only his immediate thought was read.
You have clear sight, One Alone. The alfar are their children, or children of their kin, and they love and revere their elders, and delight in their service. But can that sight not also show you the reason for the change? For I do not hide it. Here life unending is offered to all, here they may live as they think best. Only offspring must be denied them, for children are a mirror of mortality. Nonetheless, many come to find that gift a burden; often those who grasped it most eagerly at the first endure it least easily in the end. Heroes alone may bear immortality for long, to wrest its glories from its pain.
Elof clutched at his chest, where it seemed that a sudden stab of pain pierced him. "So that is why so many of the great names of old are gathered here! Lesser men have long since… fallen by the wayside."
Deep in the mold beneath a rotting tree a nightsown spore took root and swelled. No. Not fallen. The longer men live, the less willingly will they embrace the idea of their death. Do not many even in hideous torment cling to that fragile cord of life? And yet they could not return to their old lives in the world outside, when all they knew there has long slipped away. So it is that 1 smooth their path before them. The wearier they grow of their lives, the less they are aware of time, the more pleasure they find in the passing moments, in the simpler things, growing more like children, like animals, as you guessed. They hunt with the alfar, live with them, like them; and as time, which dictates growth and change, fixes its claims upon them once more, they become more like the alfar in shape. The past slips from them, and they move into step once more with the great dance of nature. In the end they go off with the alfar, and never return; they mate with them, and bear children who are wholly alfar, and forget all that once they were. The mantle of mortality settles about them once again; they lead free and happy lives, knowing no difference, and in the end they die in peace, and rejoin the River.
"But…" began Elof sharply, and then stopped short. He could only say too much.
You need not fear such an ending, for yourself or your friends. You least of all, while you burn thus from within. But even if it were otherwise, what then? Is it not worth the venture, to live longer at least than the scant span of men, with naught to fear at its end but forgetfulness and peace? To have time to hone and perfect your craft, to fulfill it with all the resource of my realm at your disposal? Alone among the ancient Powers I truly care for men. I know what is best for them. Through the Forest floor, muffled among the rotten leaves, came the light sound of a footfall. A snake tensed its coppery flanks, its flicking tongue tasting the air for the scent of warm blood.
Elof bowed. "Not for nothing are you named the Preserver, lord. I will take heed of your bounty, and venture to stretch it further. I would go hunt metals in your mountains, with such of my friends as will come."
You have only to ask the alfar. They will guide you and serve you. May you find what you seek!
Elof bowed. "Thank you, lord. I believe I will."
But it was not until the third day of their hunt, high on the rocky slopes, that he did so. For though he found many rare substances he might have need of, it was a richer prize he truly sought, the minds of his companions. "It was for that reason I brought you here," he told them.
Kermorvan nodded. "Here where the alfar cannot hear us, where no birds perch, where nothing grows, away from the eyes and ears of the Forest. I guessed that much. Well? What more?"
Elof looked unobtrusively over the edge of the narrow rock shelf upon which such of the company as he could gather were huddled. Far below, the alfar were preparing a camp among a clump of bristlecone pines. One of them glanced up anxiously, but Elof waved back with a disarming good cheer he hardly felt. He had expected Kermorvan to be horrified at hearing of Tapiau's words, yet he was as calm as ever. "What more? Is that not enough?"
"Why, pray?" demanded Tenvar. "To live forever, that's a wonder! And yet still be able to escape from it and live in peace, what's so terrible about that?"
"Aye!" laughed Bure. "Like owning land on both banks of the River!"
Kermorvan nodded, though he looked a little unhappy. "I will allow it seems strange. I would prefer to end, if end I must, as my own man, with my own mind; but perhaps that is obtuse, and I would not expect all men to feel likewise. But for others… Borhi, how would you choose? And you, Roc?"
"To live…" whispered Borhi softly, without hesitation. "Never face dying no more…"
Roc hesitated. "It's a mighty temptation," he muttered. "I can see it might be a burden… it's a gamble… bu
t then so's every breath you draw…"
"Well then," said Kermorvan. "You hear the voice of the citizen." He shrugged. "I see no great harm in it."
"Do you not?" blazed Elof, so loud he feared the alfar below might hear. More quietly he added, "Then look at it as it has taken effect! That architect, Ils; that bard, Kermorvan. What became of them? A hall half built, songs half sung, is that not so?" Ils looked at him uneasily, making no reply, but Kermorvan only shrugged.
"There must be many who could not stay the course, even men worthy and gifted. What of that? Is it not better to fall in a venture, than never to have tried? The more so, when the fall is so merciful, the venture so worthwhile. Has it not saved for this day such as Svethan, as Korentyn?"
"Saved?" echoed Elof, very quietly. "And for this day? I wonder. What might they have achieved in the world outside, these folk, if they had not been prevented from reaching the west? King Keryn's son, your ancestor, would not have lacked support. Korentyn and Ase would have established his throne, as Keryn intended; they would have prevented the bitter sundering of north and south that has so weakened our folk. Instead, what have they done? They have survived; and that is all. Aye, they live. But as what? Shadows in a court of shadows, remote, ineffectual, powerless to help or harm. Korentyn is noble, aye, and kind; he could not be otherwise and still himself. But what else have all these centuries riven from him? Where is the fiery prince he once was, the strong warrior against the evils of the Ice? And Svethan, far from his seas, what meaning has he anymore? And the lady Tens, is she any more than once she was?" Kermorvan's eye grew bleak and cold, but he held it. "And what of you? How have you fared, since you came here? What plans have you laid to summon your folk hither, those who depend on you, little though they may know it? When will word be sent back to Kerbryhaine?"
Kermorvan frowned. "I cannot act in haste! Do you imagine Korentyn and I have not taken counsel over this, long and deep? This place must first be made ready to receive great numbers, folk must be summoned little by little, as Tapiau decrees, and their doubts resolved. We will need more than a few days to plan such matters, will we not?"
"A few days?" asked Elof quietly, though chill fingers traced out his spine. "How long do you imagine we have been here? Roc and the others have been away hunting, I have had a whole forge built for me; it did not take shape overnight!" He saw the bewilderment in their faces, in Kermorvan's most of all, and he thought back to the night of their coming. "I wonder how long it has seemed to Korentyn?"
"Ach, that's as Tapiau told you!" Roc objected. "No wonder his sense of time's a bit blurred, after all these centuries…"
"No?" muttered Ils uneasily. "When already it seems to be happening to us? Elof, how long were we gone? It seemed a night or two only."
"Three weeks, perhaps. Maybe even four; how should I know, if you do not? The forge was three in the building." The travelers stared uneasily at each other, but Kermorvan shaded his eyes.
"Perhaps our sense of time fades as our bodies cease to age," said Ils quietly. "Tapiau might not be aware of that, for it seems he takes no form, human or otherwise. But it makes it hard to trust him, now…"
"How am I to know?" Kermorvan burst out suddenly. "When you told me of Tapiau's words I believed we had found what we sought! That out of the horrors of the journey I had stumbled on something greater than I had ever dared hope, the past I dreamed of restoring come again…"
"Henceforth let none of us be deceived by phantoms of his vanished past!" quoted Elof, darkly. "Whose words were those?"
Kermorvan hammered fist against palm. "But how am I to tell? How can I delve for truth in this morass? What profit would Tapiau find in so ensnaring us, when he could sweep us from the earth with a gesture, or have his creatures tear us to shreds? It makes no sense, Elof! I must have proof! And even if he is our enemy, how shall we fight him, or escape him? How shall we raise hand or will against a living Power?"
Elof hesitated, but in the end, as all the others were silent, he dared to speak. "That will be hard, indeed. But it may be that I can help you. Now that I have my forge…"He did not look up, but he felt their eyes upon him.
"You would wield smithcraft against the Powers?" demanded Bure, in doubt and wonder.
"A man must use what he has! I would turn my craft against the Steerers of the Stars if they threatened… those things I care for!" The fervor in his own words startled him; speaking without thought, he had bared feelings he hardly knew he had. He was aware as never before of the craft within him, a roaring furnace flame hungry to be used; he bent his mind upon it, and it narrowed to a needle of devouring incandescence, precise, measured, irresistible. "But I had no thought of open battle. Guile is used against us, and is best repaid in the same coin." He turned then to Kermorvan, who had not answered him. "Well? It seems to me that we came upon this place at an evil time for you, when you had begun to doubt your own leadership, your own wisdom in making this journey; perhaps the Forest had already begun to work on you, as it had on me. But I am not of that mind! You are our leader yet. You ask for proof; I will try to find it, though the attempt may be perilous. So perilous that if you choose, if you deem we may trust the Forest so completely, I will pursue it no further. Say now! Which shall it be?"
Kermorvan stood up on the rock, and gazed out over the Forest in silence. But it was only a moment before he spoke, his voice crisp and calm. "You may try what you will."
They came down from the mountains laden under many a sack of ores and other stones, which they gladly left at Elof's forge on their way to the castle. But Ils lingered a moment, and Roc at once began to busy himself about the forge as he had so many times in the past. Elof looked at him. "You need have no part in this, if you do not wish to. Nor you, Ils."
Ils chuckled, and leaned against the workbench. Roc screwed up his florid features into a ferocious scowl. "Yours are not the only hands can wield a hammer! Could be ours grow a trifle itchy again, at that. And you'll be needing a brace of good forgehands, if only to pin down the top of your skull now and again. Eh, lady?"
Elof looked at them both, and he smiled. A great weariness seemed to lift from him, a cloud from his spirits. He hooked an arm round Ils' broad shoulders, and rumpled Roc's thick hair down into his eyes. "Ass! I'm blessed in the pair of you! But I doubt any such task will need many hands. Slow and subtle it will have to be…"
"Aye, and secret," said Roc quietly. "You were wondering yourself about the Forest's eyes and ears. We might distract it somehow…"
"And share the peril, yes; I know your mind too well now, my lad! But that may not be necessary." And he took up Gorthawer, which he was careful to leave outside, and showed them the dwindling of its shadow. "Tapiau said it would avail me little among the cold stonework of men, and indeed upon Kerbryhaine's walls it faded. There he betrayed a limit to the Forest's power! I guessed that was why Lys Arvalen was completed in wood, not stone; in stone his thoughts cannot dwell! And I guessed also that both he and the castle folk would be wary of fire. So for reasons innocent in themselves I shaped a place within which his power could not extend, a dark spot in his mind." He looked around the barren little hut with a feeling of grim satisfaction. "Within the Forest I built my forge. But within my forge the Forest cannot come."
Roc blew out an astonished breath. "Whew! So you've dared turn your craft against a Power already!"
"And succeeded!" said Ils quietly, her eyes shining.
"Only at the first step," cautioned Elof. "I do not think he has guessed yet, for I have spent little time in here. When I begin my labors he will find out, sooner or later; he will not do anything at first, I guess. He seems more concerned to win me over, for now. But he will not hold his hand forever; I will have only one try at my work. And I do not yet know what that will be."
Roc stared. "No idea at all?"
"I did not say that. I know what I need, and I know how hard it will be to achieve, subtler even than the mindsword. For it will brook no compulsion, but seek rather
to loosen chains…"
Ils drew breath. "I begin to see. But the craft that would take! And the time! You could use pattern-welding again, or alloying, but the one might be too coarse, the other too fine; you must needs try over and over till you hit upon the balance… Elof, little short of mastership will suffice."
"I know!" he said, striving to steady the tremor of desperation. "And how will I find it here? But I have to try!"
"Try indeed!" said Roc, chewing idly at a grass stem. "It's often enough you've surprised yourself in the past, let alone me. When you need us, here we are. For now, well, there's your fire lit, bread and meat by your books, your tools laid to hand. And us on our way down to the castle, I think."
Ils nodded, a little sadly. "Toward nightfall we'll be back. If only to see that you sleep. I know you, Elof!"
Elof smiled as he watched them trudge away through the trees. Somehow he felt strangely free once more, here in this crude cavern of a forge; he did not understand why until evening, when he looked up from his reading as shadows fell and birds trilled their twilight songs. In his mind's eye reeds hissed in the breeze, and mists rolled silently over them; it was very like his strange old marshland smithy here, that place where he had sought and found healing, and with it himself. He smiled; the memory was newly clear in his mind once more.
The Forge in the Forest Page 21
