Straken (17 page)

“I have traveled through these caverns often,” he advised, glancing around at the darkness. He sat cross-legged before her and wedged the torch upright between two stones. “That’s why I know
where torches can be found to light the way. Most of them, I put there. I used these passages to leave the Keep undetected when I was Catcher for Tael Riverine. Sometimes secrecy was best.”

He shrugged. “Of course, these tunnels are home to things you don’t want to take chances with. That is why I said it is dangerous. We don’t have to worry, though. I know what they are and how to avoid them. Mostly. Some are very large, some very small. Some have no eyes, they have been down here so long. Some are things no one but me has ever seen.”

Her breathing had steadied enough that she could respond. “This whole world is filled with things I have never seen.”

“I suppose that’s so.” He thought a moment, rubbing his fingers across his wrinkled features. “I will not be sad to leave this world,” he said suddenly. “I will be happy to leave.”

She nodded, saying nothing.

“I was never meant to be here.” He shook his head emphatically. “I was born into this world, but it was a mistake. I should have been born into yours. If I had been, I would not have done the things I did. I would not have eaten my young. I would not have been a Catcher for Tael Riverine. I would have done something important.”

He smiled, showing off a frightening display of teeth. “I will be much better when I am living in your world, Grianne of the kind and gentle heart. I will serve you. I will be your friend and helper. Whatever you need me to do, I will do it. I am good at many things. I can find anything. That is why I was such a good Catcher. That is why I was able to find you—both times. Nothing escapes me once I set my mind to finding it. It is a gift. I am lucky to have it.”

“I have to sleep,” she said.

“When I am in your world, I will not do bad things,” he continued, apparently not hearing. “I will not eat things I shouldn’t or hurt those I care about. I will work hard. I will become your most trusted companion because I know how important that is. I have never had anyone I could trust before. I have not even had a friend. In the world of the Jarka Ruus, friends are hard to find. Mostly, we have alliances with those we protect or who protect us. Everything hunts or is hunted. It is not safe to have friends.”

She was stretched on the ground now, barely aware of what he was saying. She felt his hand touch her arm. “But you are my
friend, little Straken. We are friends, you and I. We shall always be friends.”

A moment later, she was asleep.

S
he dreamed of dark creatures and long chases, of being hunted relentlessly, of each pursuit ending in a fall that segued into the next. She never knew exactly where she was. She never knew what it was that was after her. She caught shadowy glimpses of her surroundings and of the things that hunted her, but both changed shape and size so often that she could identify neither.

She woke groggy and out of sorts with Weka Dart shaking her. “Wake up, little Straken!” he hissed. “Something’s coming!”

She could hear the fear in his voice, and it brought her all the way awake. “What is it?”

“A Graumth! A cave wyrm!” He glanced over his shoulder quickly, then back at her. “There hasn’t been one in these tunnels for years. They live deeper underground; you don’t see them ever here. But this one scents us. It comes!”

She scrambled to her feet, still unsteady, still aching and worn. She took a moment to gather her thoughts and test her balance.

“What should we do?”

His teeth showed in a glistening line. “Run from it! If it catches us, we will be eaten. Have you ever seen a cave wyrm? Very big. Not afraid of anything. I saw one destroy an entire company of Goblins once. There was nothing left but their armor and their weapons when it had finished feasting on them. Come!”

She didn’t require any further urging. Weka Dart was already moving away with the torch, and she hurried after him. They cleared the cavern and plunged into a fresh set of tunnels. But they were going back down into the earth again, and she realized that the Ulk Bog had been forced to alter their escape route to avoid the Graumth. She guessed there was nothing she could do about that, but she wasn’t sure how she would hold up if the detour proved lengthy. Her headache and sense of disorientation had returned. The food, water, and sleep had helped, but she was not yet herself.

Behind her, something huffed powerfully, like an angry bull or an explosion of steam. Only much, much, louder.

“This thing is big?” she asked, panting.

“Very big.”

“Then it can’t get down into these smaller tunnels, can it? We should be safe!”

She saw the glint of his eyes in the torchlight as he glanced back at her. “Graumths can squeeze themselves down to a quarter of their size to get through small spaces. We are not safe anywhere, Straken.”

They hurried on, not at running speed, but perhaps at half, which was dangerous enough under the circumstances. Even with the torchlight to guide them, the way was treacherous, strewn with knobs and depressions, spits in the rock floor, outcroppings, and occasional drops. Running was dangerous, but easier for the Ulk Bog than for her. She did not possess his agility or his strength. With her balance already uncertain, she soon found herself unable to keep up.

“Weka Dart!” she called to him. “Not so fast.”

As if in response, the Graumth’s huffing burst out of the darkness behind her in a wave so unexpectedly loud that she almost screamed. It was much nearer, rapidly closing the distance between them.

Weka Dart rushed back to her and seized her arm. “If it catches us, Grianne of the clever tricks, I have no weapons with which to fight it! Can you bring your Straken magic to bear?”

In truth, she didn’t know. She hadn’t tried to use her magic since the ordeal with the Furies, and she wasn’t sure what part of it would respond in her present condition.

“Keep running!” she said, pushing him ahead.

They cleared the narrower tunnel and emerged into a broader one, its ceiling fully twenty feet high. Ahead, the walls opened wider still, the beginnings of another cavern. There was movement behind them now, a kind of sibilant scraping that suggested something heavy and slick. The huffing was all around them, the sound of breathing, heavy and anxious.

They ran on through the broader tunnel to the entrance to the cavern, and then she grabbed Weka Dart’s arm and pulled him around.

“We’ll make a stand here.”

She was played out. She had nothing left. She pushed him behind her, then summoned her Druid magic. It would not come. It resisted her call, locked away deep down inside her where it refused to budge. She had not had that happen since she was little and in training with the Morgawr during the early years of her life as the Ilse Witch.

In the darkness of the tunnels they had just come through, the Graumth was moving rapidly, sensing their presence. For a moment, she panicked.

“Straken!” Weka Dart hissed suddenly, thrusting the torch at her. “Use this! It cannot see in the light! Graumths live in the dark and never see the sun! Perhaps this torch—”

“Keep it!” she snapped at him, furious with the interruption, her concentration completely broken. “Use it yourself if it gets past me!”

She resumed her efforts at summoning the magic, burrowing down inside herself, breaking down barriers one by one. It was her fear of becoming a Fury again that most resisted her efforts. That fear closed about her as she worked to reach her recalcitrant magic. It threatened to make her lose control completely. She understood its power. She would do anything to avoid becoming a Fury again, anything to escape the terrible madness that becoming one of the cat creatures would cause. If she was to do it again, she did not think she could reverse the effects. The madness would claim her, and she would be lost. That fear permeated everything about her need to call up the magic, and she could not seem to separate it out.

“Straken!” cried Weka Dart.

Writhing and twisting, the Graumth burst from the darkness of the smaller tunnel. It was a huge insectlike creature covered with bony plates that gleamed with an oily lubricant. Mandibles clicked at the center of its flat, featureless head, and short, spiky legs ended in huge claws that supported its narrow, reticulated body. It seemed to grow larger right before her eyes, and the forward part of its body lifted right off the cave floor, filling the tunnel with its bulk, undulating as it advanced on them.

As she fought to bring magic to bear, Weka Dart lost control. Whether from fear or impatience or out of desperation too overpowering to resist, he gave way. With a terrifying howl, he burst past her, waving the torch wildly at the Graumth, sparks flying from the flaming brand in long crimson streamers. The Ulk Bog went right at the monster, a bothersome gnat waiting to be crushed. The Graumth made the familiar huffing sound, then jerked back from its tiny attacker, clearly bothered by the presence of the light from the torch.

“No, don’t!” Grianne screamed.

Weka Dart was right underneath the monster, rushing it and then backing quickly away, waving the torch as if it had magical powers,
howling as if he were the magician who could make them come alive.

In that instant, driven by her fear for the little Ulk Bog and her rage at her own impotence, she broke down the last of her resistance to the summoning of her magic. She smashed through her hesitancy and her reticence, tore down her fears and doubts, wrenched the magic free, and brought it to bear. The wishsong, its blood heritage both a blessing and a curse to generations of her family, but to no one so much so as to herself, surfaced.

Like a tidal wave.

Release me!

Terrified by its unexpected force, by the immensity of it, she fought to contain it. The magic’s powerful response was something new, entirely different. It roiled inside her like the winds of a storm, breaking down everything in its path, threatening massive destruction. She clutched at herself with both hands, trying to contain it, to keep it inside until she could control it. For she had no more control over this than she had over her Fury self. She was enveloped. She was consumed.

Release me!

She could not stop it. The magic exploded out of her. Responding instinctively to her needs, it swept through the dark and the damp like a hammer, slamming into the Graumth, striking it with such force that the creature was lifted off its crooked legs and thrown back against the rock of the tunnel walls. The result was instantaneous and devastating. The Graumth didn’t merely collapse on impact; it shattered. Armor plates, legs, and body parts flew everywhere until all that remained were bits and pieces that twitched with slow jerking motions in the faint light of Weka Dart’s flickering torch.

Then the magic simply faded until no trace of it remained.

Drained of her strength and stunned by her body’s response to the magic’s implacable surge, Grianne Ohmsford sank to her knees. The wishsong had come out of her with more power than she had ever experienced. It was as if she had been storing it away for weeks on end, had accumulated and hoarded it, waiting for just that moment to set it free. The wishsong had been put to the test countless times over the years, but she had never seen it respond that way.

What had happened to make it do so?

Weka Dart was standing before her, wizened face bright with unrestrained
exultation and wild-eyed glee. Holding out the torch in a kind of salute, he bent his head in crude submission.

“Straken Queen,” he whispered, the awe in his voice unmistakable. “Yours is the greatest power. Yours is the supreme magic. I bow to you. I salute you. You have no equal.”

She closed her eyes against what she was feeling and made no response. She did not pretend to know if the extent of her power was as vast as it appeared. But she knew without question that it was strong enough to have revealed their presence to the Straken Lord, and that he would be there quickly enough to test it for himself.