The Forge in the Forest

by Michael Scott Rohan

  And then he realized with a little tremor of shock that the world outside scarcely seemed real anymore. Once again, far from his shielding forge, he could hardly imagine a world beyond the trees. For the passing of two seasons he had been immured within them, more than half a year of travel and of rest. Or was that all? He seemed to have resisted the Forest's timeless thrall better than his fellows, but might not that be an illusion also? Might not a century have passed out there while he had shaped and schemed in the shadows? Kerbryhaine might be long since fallen and overrun, mere circles of overgrown ruins haunted by owl and wolf, or torn down piecemeal to surround the Ekwesh stockades… He shuddered. A sudden horror of the outside passed through him, of haste and peril and problems he could not solve with study and cunning and skilled labor; he did not want to face it, he wanted to lurk and lair among the trees, and forget. Then the touch of a hand jolted him alert, a silent signal passing among the shadowy shapes in the leaves. He peered down; he could see little save bushes, but he could hear the snort and grunt of the onehorn all too loudly. A bush jerked noisily aside, and a shoulder of tangled white hair came into view, too close for his comfort. Slowly, silently, he unslung the halberd, made sure his pack would not hitch upon the branches. To his left he heard a faint sound, and saw there Borhi, sweating and shaking, green with fear. The young corsair had balked violently at the idea of leaving the castle, but had decided he liked being left there rather less. Elof gestured reassuringly, but himself began to shiver. He would have been tense enough simply with the prospect of facing that beast. But far more than that was about to happen.

  Another touch, a sharp one, and then a sudden fierce springing in the branch beneath him. There was no time to think, to hesitate; Elof simply kicked out his legs, the whipping branch jerked out from under him, as the trap below the gibbet, and into empty air he plunged. But the ground was nearer than it looked, his feet were ill prepared. It slammed into his soles with bruising force, he fell aside and rolled on his back, holding the halberd high. There was a snort and a crash and he sprang up to find the light before him blotted out by a wall of tangled whiteness that reared and plunged among a flurry of greenery, shaking the earth. A figure bounced past, caught his arm; Roc, and beside him Bure and Tenvar, jabbing with their halberds at the mountainous beast that wheeled and bellowed defiance, unable to find a clear path to charge. "This way!" screamed Roc. As they had planned, they were not attacking the beast, but keeping it between them and the startled alfar. Elof was only too ready to turn and bolt under the trees; he saw Ils and Kermorvan there, but where was Borhi? The corsair stood still where he had dropped, staring aghast at the travelers as they ducked past the plunging onehorn.

  "Borhi!" yelled Elof. "This way! Now!" The corsair seemed to hear, turned and ran a few steps, then halted, hesitated, shaking his head and gesticulating frantically. "No!" he wailed. "I can't, I won't! I'm safe, I'm safe here! Come back, you'll all die, all die—"

  Cursing, Elof tore free of Roc's arm and whirled back after Borhi. Then he had only the fraction of a heartbeat to throw himself aside, as the maddened beast at last ducked down its immense head and charged. Borhi, unmoving, seemed not to see it, or to understand what he saw, the monstrous thing bearing down on him like the corsairs's own gallery with outthrust ram. The great conical horn, the length of his own body, struck into the center of him and hurled him torn and spilling through the air. A trampling hoof shattered the half-frozen earth a handbreadth from Elof's head, the great flank whirled past him, red-streaked from halberd thrusts, and then a huge hand was scooping him up; Gise's. "Run!" growled the tall forester. "While you can!" He all but hurled Elof into the arms of his friends, and spun about to fling his halberd at the beast. It whirled and charged again across the path of the alfar, who had to dive for cover among the bushes. Then Kermorvan's clear voice called and the travelers were running, running with abraded throats and agony in their sides, chests working like Elof's bellows, the fire of his forge in their tortured lungs.

  Behind them the uproar grew, trampling and smashing in the brush and shouting they could hear even over the roaring in their ears. The hunters would have to slay the thing before they dared follow; Elof found himself hoping it would not slay any of them. As Gise had said, in themselves they were gentle enough folk; it was the Forest's power that made them shadows of malignity, woodsprites working dark secrets within the tree-gloom. Better to evade them thus if they could, than come to open fight. A stream gleamed among the trees ahead, and Kermorvan gestured to them; into the water they must go, and upstream. But as they splashed into the icy shallows, he himself ran right across and out onto the far bank, leaving a fine trail of muddy footprints, then as the ground grew hard underfoot he leaped for an overhanging branch and swung himself back with the others, into the stream.

  On and on they trotted, their feet soaking and numb, their packs and weapons turning to lead about them, their heads bowed down and staring at the water that seemed to suck the heart out of them. At last it dawned on them that they were walking, and slowly at that; Bure and Tenvar were weaving as if about to fall down in the water, and Ils, whose legs were shorter, suffered badly from the cold. With wordless gasps Kermorvan drove them up the bank among thorny bushes, and there they collapsed, numbed to stab and scratch, deaf to anything save their own whooping gasps. Elof heard somebody retching, and his own stomach turned over; his feet turned slowly from numbness to fire.

  "So," wheezed Kermorvan at last. "We have some small advantage of them. And we must not lose it! To the Forest's edge, by Gise's guessing, was a good day and a half's march. Up, all, and to the north!"

  There was a chorus of groans, but nobody failed to stagger to their feet, or to keep up with the brisk marching pace Kermorvan set. Indeed they seemed almost more enthusiastic now, weary as they were, as if some burden invisible and intangible were lifted from their shoulders. After a while, when he was sure enough of his breath, Elof mentioned this to Kermorvan, who nodded. "I feel as much myself. We draw near the Forest's rim. May that shield us from Tapiau's sight!"

  All that day the dwindled company marched at a relentless pace, until the sun, hidden hitherto beyond the leaden clouds, blazed angry orange behind the dark treetops around them. Mercifully the undergrowth grew thinner the further they went, for now it was chiefly a forest of pines, firs and spruces, with only a few hemlock and cedar and cypresses; their soft needles carpeted its floor, and few lesser things grew in their shadow. The brief spring of those climes was not yet come, to fill shrubs and grasses with a short spasm of life and growth ere the chill closed in once more. The air was still but raw, burning in their nostrils and on their cheeks, and, with their wet boots, draining the warmth from their bodies. As night fell they chose a dry spot to camp; fire would have been infinitely welcome, but they did not dare build one, lest it drew down the alfar or worse upon them. A shelter of pine branches was the best they could contrive, and they huddled together to keep warm. They ate little, for they had not been able to bring much food with them, and knew it might have to last some time; then, too weary to set a watch, they slept. But it was a poor night's sleep, for the Forest was full of strange noises, and many things unknown passed close by them. And some way past the middle hours dreams of conflict and tumult jolted Elof awake. Parting the branches, he peered out at the sky in the hope of seeing some trace of dawn, and caught his breath. For a faint light shone through the treetops, but it was cold and constant, and it paled not the eastward but the northward stars. So once again, after many years and many other perils, he beheld the sign and banner of their fountainhead, the eerie glow of the Ice.

  Morning, gray-bleak as ever, found them chilled and aching and uneasy, eager only to be gone from there. Walking loosened their muscles but brought them little warmth and less comfort, save that there was no sound of pursuit. "So they have not found our trail," muttered Kermorvan. "I hardly dared hope it…"

  "Maybe they search the wrong way," suggested Ils, "eastward or south. The
y might not guess we'd take the way north, that they fear."

  Kermorvan nodded. "That must be it. But when Tapiau's eye turns this way… Still, we should be within an hour or two of the margins, and those they will not cross." So the travelers cast nervous glances at the trees about them, expecting every moment to be shot at from the branches, or fallen upon like the onehorn. That nothing came only made them the more uncertain. The borders of the Forest might be minutes away, or hours, and all manner of ambushes set between. But suddenly, as they came out into the bank of a dank little streamlet, Kermorvan stopped and pointed. "See! The far bank, beyond the trees!"

  That there should be anything beyond trees, save more trees, was a hard thing to realize. Yet they did indeed seem thinner, further apart; light as cold as the sky above shone pale upon their trunks, unhindered. It must be a wide clearing, for the trees of the far side were an indistinct black line; the Forest was growing thin indeed. Down the bank they hurried, splashing through the water without seeking a drier crossing. Elof stopped short, gasping; it was as if some chill weight had suddenly settled on his heart. Bure, limping along last, missed his footing on the bank and all but fell back in; Roc and Elof, turning to haul him in, looked back, saw the pines bend and sway, and heard the rushing as of a great wind, that they knew was no wind. "Kermorvan!" they yelled.

  "I hear!" he cried, and sweeping out his sword he urged the others past him. "Now for it! Run, and stop for nothing! Run to the light!"

  Only when Bure went crashing by him, with Roc and Elof on his heels, did Kermorvan turn and run with them, leaping and bounding. The way was further than it looked, and there was more undergrowth here, frost-browned grasses and low tangled bushes that grew in the lee of fallen trunks; it seemed almost to rise up and snag them as they went, and the branches whipped and lashed across their faces. Kermorvan hewed at them furiously, and Elof drew sword also. It was like fighting some live enemy, some beast with a thousand entangling arms above and below. And at their very heels now was the windrush, all but overhead. Elof winced, expecting arrows in his back any moment. But all the time the light grew stronger, the open space seemed wider, the other side more distant. Then suddenly, staggering from one tree to another, Elof realized there were no branches overhead, nothing but the gray sky, and that the trees beyond were even further apart, a gap wider than the longest arms. Ahead of him he saw a root snag Ils' ankle, tipping her into his path, and Kermorvan scoop her up almost without breaking stride. A jagged stump snagged Elof's cloak, and in one whirling movement the black blade hewed flying splinters from it, and he was sprinting after the others. Ahead of them was open space, and they were slowing, staring, almost stopping. "Too near!" he yelled. "Still within bowshot!" Then he also slowed, and stared. It was no clearing they were in.

  Trees ahead there were, as line of them tall and dark, impenetrable as the densest Forest. But to left and right, where the line should have curved back to surround them, there was only open space. Near at hand it was flat grassland streaked with half-thawed snow, sparse stands of scrub, wiry and stunted, poking up here and there. Beyond it was grayness, with a glimmer that might be water. There were other lines of trees, but none more than stands, clumps, scarcely linked to one another across the snowy scrubland and dismal pools, and nowhere to the trees of the Forest. Elof, turning to look back, saw the outermost trees bend and tremble, yielding tall figures that stalked and paced within the bounds of the treeshadow, like menacing specters afraid of day. They would not step beyond the fortress of the Forest, the immense wall of trees outflung to either side, set like vast uneven ramparts against this chill open land. He knew then that they had reached the bounds of Tapiau's power. They were out of the Forest at last, free as he had fought to make them. What was this heaviness upon his heart, then, this faint nagging ache within him which was no pang of honest weariness? Why could he not rejoice?

  By him Kermorvan stood, his face as gray and grim as this land they had come to, and as desolate. "Genhyas, a'Teris!" he was muttering. "Genhyas, a'Korentyn!" Then he lifted up his sword, as a salute. But from the Forest a single arrow came curving, to plunge into the icy soil some way short of them and there shiver to pieces, as against a stone.

  "Come!" said Ils hastily, drawing them both away. "That may have been a ranging shot. Let us not await a volley!" But in a lower voice she added, "I am sorry about Teris. Could she not have come with us?"

  Kermorvan's face was set, but Elof was shocked by the deep unhappiness in his voice. "I did not dare ask her. She who had dwelt so long in Tapiau's thrall, she might have betrayed us. I could not risk us all for her alone, when there was no certainty she would come, or be happy if she did."

  Elof swallowed. "Believe me, I am sorry. I… was never sure how much she meant to you."

  The tall man's mouth twisted. "No more was I. And I to her? Something new, perhaps, to be tempted, teased out, made to last as long as might be lest it grow stale. To be lured ever within the hand, yet kept from the heart…"He shook his head. "No more was I. Matters are better as they are, lesser now than greater to come. Day advances, and we must go." And swiftly he turned his back upon the Forest, and strode out at a fierce pace across the gray ground. Elof and Ils looked at their companions, and fell in behind him. Thus it was that they entered Taoune'la-an-Arathans, Taoune'la the Wastes, the gray and shadowy marchlands of the Ice.

  Certainly it was no hospitable land they saw stretching out before them. Kermorvan stamped on the snow-spattered earth as he walked, and it rang and crunched beneath his boots. "This will be a swamp soon, when the thaw comes," he remarked, his voice more normal now. "As well we left our flight no later; we would surely have been mired here, and taken."

  Elof gazed around him uncomfortably. "Save for the trees, it reminds me of the Saltmarshes. The worst parts."

  "Small wonder in that!" said Ils. "For both that land and this are shaped and sustained by the outflowing meltwater of the Ice. The same shadow lies over both."

  "It is less flat than the marshes," said Elof thoughtfully, "though the rise and fall is very slight. But if anything it is wetter, and that means the water has pooled in the valleys and dips, and cuts channels between them."

  "A land of pools and rivulets and little lakes," agreed Kermorvan, "of mists and mires and quags. All bitterly chill, and hard to cross. There will be no fixed paths in such a place, not even animal tracks. We will have to go around and about so much it will be hard to keep to anything like a straight route."

  "Let us not be drawn too far northward, all the same," warned Ils. "Remember the evil name of this land!"

  Nevertheless, even on that first night they found themselves with little choice. For in their way they came upon a wide swampy area that ended only under the eaves of the Forest itself, and was already more than half thawed. When they climbed to the top of a low slope to spy out its extent, Elof, whose eyes were keenest in the ashen dimness of afternoon, exclaimed in dismay. "A river flows through it!" he cried. "Down from the north, in among the trees!"

  "Aye!" said Tenvar. "A vast river, twice as wide as the Forest River! There is no fording it here, even if we dared go back among the trees! That water flows fast, and it is very dark."

  Ils squinted into the grayness. "Dark indeed!" she muttered. "There are tales among my folk of such a river, that flows from the Black Lakes in the northern Wastes down through the Forest, and they are darker yet. The Kalmajozkhe it is to us, River of the Dead."

  "Yet the living must cross somewhere," muttered Kermorvan. "Or they will not long remain so; there is little to eat in this land. What is that, upriver there? An island?"

  "It seems so," admitted Elof, straining his eyes. "A large one, covered with trees; there are more along the banks. We might try there for rocks or shallows."

  Kermorvan nodded. "We might, though the current may be faster." He saw the others looking to him expectantly, and shrugged. "You wish me to choose? I see no choice. We may at least find somewhere more sheltered than this to slee
p."

  They turned northward then, skirting the margins of the cold swamp, and plodded wearily on into the barren lands. Even over the short distance they could make out ahead they saw the lines of trees grow fewer and shorter, the land flatter and more desolate. Only coarse grass covered the soil, and a few bushes that cowered low to avoid the searing wind, their tough strands running through the grass like entangling tentacles; it was a miracle no ankle or leg was broken in the gathering gloom. They feared lest it might grow too dark to go on, even with Ils to guide them, but around sunset there came a fierce gusty wind that drove the clouds like sheep to the horizon and there tore them to bloody shreds. It gave the keen air an edge like jagged glass, and for all their warm hunting garb it cut the travelers to the bone. The rough ground leached their strength away as they stumbled and faltered over it. In the clear sky the stars appeared like frost-flecks upon cold stone, the full moon rising rained down its sterile light upon the bleak lands. And all across the sky to the north, in answer or in mockery, there arose the shimmering curtain of the Iceglow.

  But when they lifted their streaming eyes against the blast, they saw tossing black against it the tops of a thick-meshed wood, upon which the moonlight fell without lightening its solid gloom. "The island!" cried Tenvar. "The island's thick with trees! Shelter, and fuel!"