Skull Gate (32 page)

To the unicorn, she said: “If you twitch or make a sudden move...” She let the threat hang. Then, flexing her knees, she leaped.

Both hands locked around the old rope. She swung her feet up, crossed her ankles over the rough, scratchy line. For a frantic moment Onokratos's hand-twisted cord began to slip from her shoulder, but she trapped it with her chin.

Like a fly with its wings pinched off
, she thought of herself, suspended in her peculiar position. A splashing caught her attention; Ashur slogged back to firmer land. She glanced at the mire below and frowned.
And this is the pleasant part
.

She inched up the rope until she touched the huge, complicated knots that anchored it to the tree. They would afford her a perch from which to do her work. She tightened her thighs and wrenched herself into a sitting posture on the rope, crawled forward until she straddled the knotted section. It was uncomfortable, clumsy, but allowed the best possible seat. She leaned back against the trunk of the tree.

“Are you all right?"

She looked down on Kimon as he rode out toward her. “So far,” she answered, and tossed him the end of Onokratos's line. “But this damn thing is made of thin, braided vines, and they've gotten kind of coarse with age.” She adjusted her seat ever so delicately. “And you know how little I'm wearing."

“Afraid of splinters?” he teased.

“With all the time we've spent in the saddle?” she replied. “I doubt if I'd feel them.” She tied her end of the cloth line securely around the larger ferry rope, hoping her knots would hold. “Make sure you don't lose your end,” she called to Kimon. “There's a lot of tension on this thing. When I cut it free, it's going to snap out into the water. If you let go, or my knots aren't good enough”—she made a face—“then it's going to be a long and messy swim for everyone."

“Tras Sur'tian is just about finished with the raft,” he informed her. “But the sun's nearly gone. Think we'll make it?"

She studied the sky. The sun's fading rays cast a shimmering path of liquid fire over the water, pointing the way to Skodulac. “We'll make it."

Her blade hissed free of the sheath, and she began hacking at the rope. The vibrations her blows caused nearly unseated her. She gripped tighter with her thighs, placed one hand on the tree trunk to steady herself, and chopped away.

Kimon backed off a bit. “This is going to be so funny!” he called up to her, grinning.

Tras Sur'tian and Onokratos were watching as well. She spied them safe and dry on the solid land. The raft they had made from the wagon's bed lay near the edge of the murky swamp water. She could see the smirks they wore on their faces.

“One laugh out of any of you!” she warned. Hack, hack, hack. “And I'll cut your tongues out, I swear—Oh!"

The old rope parted more easily than she'd expected. Down she fell,
splash!
in the mire. She scrambled to get her footing, sputtering and spitting mud, soaked with filth and slime.

All three men doubled with laughter. She cursed them, brandishing the sword she had remembered to keep hold of. The guffaws only increased; they clapped each other on the backs.

She waded toward them, wiping the muck from her arms, face, and chest. “I'll get even!” she promised.

“Not too close!” Tras Sur'tian shouted, pinching his nose. “By the One God, you smell like a charnel pit!"

She snapped at Kimon, “Did you hang on to that line?"

He held it up to show he had.

“Then get Aki and Kalynda before we lose the sun.” She squeezed water and mud from her long hair.

Kimon and Onokratos hurried back for the children while Frost and Tras Sur'tian lifted the raft, which was really no more than the bottom of the wagon, and set it gently into the water among the reeds. They stepped onto it. Water seeped up through the boards.

“Tras?” she cried, feigning alarm. The Korkyran noted the seepage and took a hasty step back toward shore. She hooked his foot with hers. With an awkward shout, he plunged headlong into the clammy brink. He clambered out, flecked with slime, mouthing Korkyran expletives, ready to drink her blood.

She put on a mask of innocence. “Now, how could that have happened?” Her eyelashes fluttered, head tilted, lips pouted sweetly. She stepped lightly ashore. “You have to be so careful on these things,” she advised. Then she gave a look of smug satisfaction.
Laugh now, old hyena
, she thought.

The other two returned with the children in their arms. Kimon took note of Tras Sur'tian's condition and clucked. “No time for a swim, sir,” he said smartly.

Frost interrupted the Korkyran's sharp retort. “You're going to take a swim yourself, sir. Our combined weight proves too much for these few boards."

Onokratos frowned. “Then what good is all our work?"

“I never
really
expected us all to ride across,” she assured him. “The raft was necessary for Aki and Kalynda. You'll ride it, too."

His frown deepened. “I see."

She took notice of his dour expression. “You object?"

He drew his shoulders back, straightened his spine. “Do you think I'm too old to swim? Why should I stay safe and dry? You're a woman; you ride with the children!"

She laid a hand on his arm. “No insult was meant.” In fact, she doubted he could make the swim, but best to hide that thought. “You'll have the tough job of hauling the raft over on the rope.” She indicated the other two. “But we're warriors, and we're stiff and sore from too much time in the saddle. A swim, even in this malodorous brine, will loosen us up for the contest ahead."

His old temper flickered briefly, then subsided. He mocked her habit of biting her lip, then said: “You're quite a liar, my dear.” He hesitated, and his features darkened with an unvoiced fear. “Gel could carry us over on a whirlwind,” he added wistfully.

She clucked her tongue. “At what expense of power?” She turned back to the raft. “We're doing fine on our own. When we reach Skull Gate, then you can summon him."

“What if he doesn't come?"

She gazed out toward Skodulac, feeling a chill dread close around her heart. Like Onokratos, she had kept that fear under guard for the past few days. “I made the first bargain, didn't I?” she answered with false bravado. “If he doesn't come, I'll just have to strike another."

She didn't want to discuss it further. There were still things to do, and she gave orders. Kimon and Tras Sur'tian placed the children on the raft, then all their weapons, their boots, and the two special waterskins. Onokratos hobbled the horses and left them to wander along the bank. But Ashur fled when he approached, refusing such an indignity.

When the old wizard finished he stepped carefully onto the raft, kneeled near the center between the sleeping girls, and clasped the line of shredded blankets firmly in his hands.

They watched as water seep up through the boards. The riders would get wet, but the raft would float. Frost waded out into the bog. “We'll push you out as far as we can. If you pull too hard, some of those knots in the blanket strips might slip before we find the ferry rope."

Kimon and Tras Sur'tian looked on dubiously from the shore.

“Do I have to push by myself?” she added with a trace of caustic humor. She stared at Tras and winked, “You already stink from your first bath. Come on, make it squish between your toes."

They looked at each other, shrugged, and joined her. The murky water lapped at their thighs. The mud indeed squished between their toes. The reeds and swamp grass parted reluctantly as they forced the raft through.

As the swamp gave way to open lake, the bottom dropped away unexpectedly. Kimon yelped and went under, surfaced with a wild thrashing and splashing. As he treaded the water to stay afloat, he gave Frost a look to burn stone, then forced a sheepish grin. She and Tras shifted easily to a kicking motion, still pushing the raft.

Then, a loud splash far to their right: all stopped, seeking the source. “There!” Onokratos cried, pointing.

Frost slapped the water, exasperated, amused, proud. “Ashur!” she shouted as the animal swam for Skodulac. “You stubborn half cousin to a plow mare!” She looked at her comrades, rolled her eyes in relief. “For a moment,” she confessed, “I thought someone or some
thing
had us,"

“This is no place for a fight,” Tras agreed.

They redoubled their efforts to reach the island. Onokratos strained with all his aged might, hauling on the rope, making a growing coil between his knees. He uttered no complaint and wore an expression of earnest determination.

A familiar trumpeting made her look up. Ashur waited impatiently on Skodulac's shore.

There was barely a hint of sunlight remaining when they dragged the raft up on the rocky beach into the shadow of a high, stout tripod of old logs where the secured end of the ferry rope was anchored. They donned boots and buckled on weapons. Frost strapped Demonfang over her left hip, sword upon her right. Tras Sur'tian had only his broadsword and a dirk. Kimon donned his long sword, then for the first time since she'd returned it to him at the manor house, he unwrapped the cloth that concealed the beautifully wrought short sword. He held it up, and the sun's last rays rippled along its gleaming edge. He had no sheath for it but eased it inside his belt.

Ashur trotted over and nuzzled Frost, his great horn sliding just past her shoulders. She pretended to ignore him, then relented and gave him a playful scratch on the nose. The unicorn nickered and ran down along the shoreline, kicking up mud and small stones.

“I'll never get used to those eyes!” Kimon exclaimed, staring after Ashur.

“What about the children?” Tras Sur'tian said.

“They come with us,” Onokratos insisted, “at least my Kalynda.” He scooped up his slumbering daughter in his arms, allowing no debate. “I'll not leave her alone for a moment in this place.” His gaze raked the inland skyline. “Do you feel it, woman? The very earth tingles with evil."

“You have a talent for the dramatic,” Frost scoffed. But she repressed a shudder. She
could
feel it. And now that she opened herself to it, the air fairly sang, an indescribable sensation that made her instincts scream, made her want to run back into the water where it seemed not to reach. Kimon and Tras were not aware of it, but Ashur was. She saw the creature's restless pacing for what it truly was. The unicorn sensed the island's special nature.

Skodulac was a locus, one of those very rare places where the natural energies of the earth were amplified to supernatural levels.

“It's not evil,” she said, not bothering to explain to her friends, “but it is power, raw and primitive. Can you manipulate it?"

“I dare not try,” Onokratos answered, pressing Kalynda's head into the soft part of his shoulder. “It's too wild; I couldn't control it. I'm a wizard. My sorcerous skills are quite limited."

It
was
wild. She could feel it prickling the soles of her feet, aquiver in the air she breathed, rippling like a soft wave on her skin.

She could have shaped such power once, or at least tried. But she was a witch no longer. Onokratos was right to shut himself against this force. Even an adept might well fear to bend such energy to his will.

“The first bright stars,” Kimon said, disturbing her reverie. Darkness was upon them.

Tras Sur'tian slung the water-skins over his shoulder. Kimon gathered Aki in his arms. “Which way?” Frost inquired.

“Inland,” answered the Korkyran. “Skull Gate lies at the island's heart."

They trudged slowly up a rise and down between the yawning walls of a narrow canyon. Dyre Lake was quickly lost from sight, but its smell remained in the air. The terrain was rugged; stones turned treacherously underfoot as the seeing grew harder. Night swallowed them. Still, they kept moving.

“Wish we had a torch,” Tras Sur'tian grumbled once.

“Save your wishes,” chided Onokratos. “Or spend them on important things, like the souls of our children or the contest to come."

“Wish we had a torch,” Tras repeated.

Frost didn't know how long they walked. It seemed like forever, though the island hadn't appeared that large in the daylight. She began to fear that they were wandering in circles and made an effort to remember any strange shape in the darkness that she could use for a landmark.

An outcropping of rocks and boulders rose on her right. The course took them near, and as they approached she realized it was not a natural formation. The largest stones were chiseled smooth. Strange characters were chipped into the surfaces. She traced the glyphs with her fingertips, trying to make some sense of them in the darkness. She counted the stones: three monoliths with smaller boulders piled around for support. Farther on, she thought she glimpsed a similar construction.

“This must mark the outer perimeter,” Tras Sur'tian said suddenly. “According to tales, these things form a ring. The characters are probably warnings. No outsiders were allowed closer to Skull Gate than we are right now."

They moved out upon a broad mesa. No grass grew, nor weeds or trees of any kind. The land had a blasted look. They walked unhampered by roots or loose stones. The stars burned with uncanny brilliance in the vast expanse of sky.

They passed another of the stone constructions. Like the first, the individual boulders had been sculpted flat and engraved with runic figures.

“This would mark the inner perimeter,” Tras Sur'tian claimed, running a hand over the stones. “The old stories must be true. These characters, if we could read them, would tell the histories of the people who once lived here, their births, marriages, deaths, and complete genealogies. Women would bring their babies newborns here, and priests would carve their names. Beyond this point, only the men were ever allowed."

Frost spat and promptly stepped past the marker. “So much for another taboo,” she said stiffly.

“How much farther?” Kimon asked, shifting Aki's weight to his other shoulder.