Warlock of the Witch World (16 page)

“You have done what must be done.” For the first time in long minutes Orsya’s thoughts reached me. “We do not see the patterns woven by the Great Ones, only a thread now and then which belongs to us. You have taken on you more than a sword; may the bearing of both be not too heavy a burden.”

I wondered if her people shared the Sulcar beliefs concerning dead men’s weapons. But the blade did not seem heavy. Instead, handling it was fired with a sense of impatience new to me, a desire to push on, to hurry about my self-appointed task.

Already I had turned to the door. But Orsya did not follow me. Surprised, I glanced back. She was slowly circling the throne and the misty figure, surveying the moldering treasure boxes. Had she been emboldened by my appropriation of the sword to go hunting on her own? I would have protested but had a second thought. Orsya must do as she believed best, with no right of mine to question.

She was behind the throne now, and she lingered there.

When she came forth she carried in her hand a short rod. It was cone shaped, rising to a sharp point at the tip she held upright, and it was not smooth, but ridged with corrugations which spiraled along its full length. In color it was ivory-white, and, when she moved her hand, I thought I saw a spark of white light or fire dance for a second on its point.

It was not long enough, nor shaped to suggest a weapon. Nor was it bejeweled, set into any precious base. What it was, or its purpose, I could not guess. But Orsya held it carefully as if it were to her as meaningful as the sword to me. Now she faced the misty figure. She did not kneel as I had to take the sword and make my half plea. She spoke—not by mind touch—in that curiously toneless audible speech of her people.

“I am Orsya of the Krogan, though they no longer own me as daughter or friend. I am one fit to hold what I have taken from its casket. Powers I have, if not great ones, and weapons I have, if they are not forged by fire out of molten metal. This I take because I know it for what it is, and what it may do, and because I am what I am, and I go where I go.”

She lifted the cone-rod, holding it out between her and the shrouded one. This time it was no spark which showed at the tip, but a darting streak of white fire. Then she turned and came quickly to join me.

We did not speak as we went back to the platform outside, to look back along the road we had come, past those faceless statues with their holes for eyes. I was about to retrace our path, when Orsya stopped me with uplifted hand. Her head was forward a little, turning slowly from side to side, her nostrils expanded as if she were testing for some scent. But all I could sniff was that odd smell which hung about all these water-logged caverns. It was plain she was alerted by something I could not detect.

“What. . . ?” I asked in a half-whisper.

“Thas,” she replied in a sound as muted, “and something else.”

I unslung the sword I had taken. Underground was the Thas’ home. I, and perhaps Orsya, would be at as great a disadvantage as I was underwater. I tried to pick up any scent in the air, but my sense was not as acute as hers.

“They come—that way.” She pointed along the way of the statues with her cone-rod. “Let us go this—” Her choice ran to our right along the front of the building. I did not see how that could favor us, but Orsya had been here before, and there was a chance she knew more than she had shown me.

I put on my boots, even as she latched her scaled foot coverings. To dim the light of our going was a prudent move. Then we hurried past those blank oblongs of windows to the end.

The tomb had been constructed to the fore of the platform which ran on back for quite a distance more, to a shadow which might denote the wall of the cavern. Again Orsya held her head high, sniffing.

“Do you feel that air?” she asked aloud.

Even as she spoke, I did. There was a distinct inward flow of air current coming from the rear of the platform.

“Water—fresher water.” She began to run while I lengthened stride to keep up with her.

As we retreated from the tomb, so did the light recede. Orsya’s shell lamp was useless out of the water, and we headed into a dark which increased near to the thick black of that first passageway through which we had come. I listened, as we went, for any sound behind us. How about ahead? The Thas must burrow; what if they waited for us wherever Orsya led?

“No Thas.” She picked up my thought. “I do not think that this is a place they have ever visited before. They leave their stench wherever they push their foul runways. But—I wish I knew what they brought with them, or what ranges before them now, for its like I have never scented.” We reached the end of the platform. Orsya moved beside me and there was a glow of light: enough to show that she had shed one foot covering and planted her flesh against the floor to give us that gleam.

The wall of the cavern was there, arching up and back over our heads. Between it and the platform was a channel in which ran water. This came from an archway to our right and gurgled on, to be lost in the dark. Orsya replaced her boot and that momentary glimpse was gone.

“That scarf—the one you use to sling the sword—hold one end; give me the other. Now get down into the water.” I did as she bade, feeling the sharp twitch as she gripped Kaththea’s scarf, lowering myself gingerly into the water which I hoped was not deep enough to close over my head. But it was only waist-high. Once more immersed, Orsya’s shell lamp came to life.

She headed for the archway. I discovered that this water had a current, and we were walking against that force. After a few moments I was aware of something else; the shell lamp was radiating a dimmer illumination and I feared that it was actually dying away. At my questioning Orsya confirmed that alarming fact. The quasfi shells did not hold their natural illumination for long after they were emptied of their indwellers. Soon the light would be completely exhausted.

“Do you know this way?” I asked, for reassurance.

She held the cone-rod tight against her breast with the scarf end, while with her free hand she scooped up a little of the water and touched her tongue tip to it. “No; but this is water which has run in the open air, under sun, and not too long ago. It will lead us out.”

With that I had to be content.

The increasing dark was hard for me to take. Never have I favored underground ways, having to fight a feeling that around me walls were moving in to crush. Perhaps because we walked in water Orsya did not appear to be affected in the same way and I hid my feelings from her.

There was an urgent jerk on the scarf. I stopped, listened. She did not try to reach me by mind touch, rather did her hand slide down the scarf to close upon mine, and I did not need the cramping of her fingers to know this was a warning.

My senses in this deep hole might not be as acute as hers, but now I could hear it too; a splashing ahead. The last glimmer of our shell lamp was quenched and we were in the dark. I swung out my sword in a short arc ahead and to the right. Its point scraped wall and with that as my guide, I drew to it, bringing my companion with me, feeling somehow the safer with a solid surface to my side. In spite of my wishes to deny it, that splashing sounded nearer. What kind of monsters patrolled these darksome ways?

For the first time Orsya spoke. She was very close to me, so that her breath was against my cheek as she whispered:

“This is none of my knowing. I cannot reach it with a hail call. I do not know if it is of the water world at all.”

“Thas?”

“No! Thas I know,” There was loathing in that. We listened. To retreat before it was still possible, but we might reach the cavern of the tomb, only to find Thas waiting for us. In that moment I longed for Kyllan’s gift, for it was in him to touch and act upon the minds of beasts, bringing them under his will. He could have turned that splasher, sent it off from us—always supposing it was an animal and not some unknown abomination loosed by the Shadow in this place.

Suddenly Orsya’s grip tightened. Though we now stood in utter dark, yet ahead were lights—two grayish disks just above water level. From them came a little diffused glimmering. Those disks were set in a line—Eyes! But eyes which glowed, which were equal in size to the palm of my hand: eyes far enough apart to suggest a head of proportions beyond any beast I had ever seen!

I pushed Orsya against the wall behind me. The sword was in my maimed hand; now I tried to transfer it to my left. But found, to my dismay, that I could not clasp it as well, that even with my stiff fingers it was better in my right hand.

The eyes, which had been close to the surface of the water, now suddenly jerked aloft to a level above my own head. We heard a sibilant hissing as the thing came to a full stop. I had no doubt that it had sighted us, though the beams of light those eyes cast ahead did not reach to where we now stood.

Since the only target I had were those gray disks, those must be my point of attack. The hissing grew stronger. A fetid puff of air struck me full face, as if the creature had exhaled. I brought up the sword and, though I have used a blade since childhood, it seemed to me that never had I held one before which felt like an extension of my own body.

The eyes swung downward, and now, though still at water level, they were much closer. Again a puff of stinking breath.

“Kemoc!” Orsya’s mind thrust was harsh. “The eyes—do not look into them—Ahh! Keep me . . . keep me with you . . .”

I felt her move stiffly, trying to break the pressure of my body, to slip from between me and the wall.

“It wills me to it! Keep me—” Now she cried aloud as if terror had filled her.

I dared not wait any longer. With a push from my shoulder I sent her stumbling back and heard a splash as she must have fallen into the water. But whatever compulsion those eyes exerted on her, they did not hold for me.

One could not rush nor leap through the current of this stream. It was rather like wading through slipping sand and I dared not lose my footing. Those eyes, at the level of my own waist . . . if the thing had a skull shaped in proportion to their size, its jaws must now be submerged. “Sytry!”

That was no word of mine, but it had come out of me in a cry like unto a war shout. Then it was as if I were no longer Kemoc Tregarth, but another, one who knew such fighting and was not dismayed by either the dark or the nature of the unseen enemy. In my mind I seemed to stand aside and watch with a kind of awe the action of my body. Just as my maimed hand was put to use it had not known since that wound years ago, so did I thrust and spring in waves in which I had never been trained.

The golden sword went home in one of those gray disks. A bulk arose high, with a terrible scream to tear through one’s head. But my hand held to hilt, and, though I was hurled away with a punishing stroke from what must be a great paw, yet I kept my weapon and struggled up to my feet again, back to the wall, facing straightly that bobbing single disk.

It struck at me and I flung out my arm, the sword straight-pointed, in what I deemed a very short chance at any victory. My blade struck something hard, skidded down, to slash open that other disk. Then I was crushed back against the rock wall as a vast, scaled weight fell upon me. Had I been pinned below the surface of the stream I would have died, for that blow had enough force to drive both wits and breath out of me. When I struggled back to full consciousness I felt a weight across me waist-high, but it did not move.

Cautiously I used my left hand to explore: Scaled skin, and under that the general shape of a limb, now inert. Revulsion set me to working for freedom. I wavered finally to my feet, the sword still in my hand as if nothing but my conscious will could ever dislodge it.

“Orsya! Orsya!”

I called first with voice and then mind. Had she been caught in the struggle, lay now perhaps crushed under the body of the thing I had apparently killed?

“Orsya!”

“Coming—” Mind touch and from some distance. I leaned against the wall and tried to explore by touch any damage I had taken in the encounter. My ribs and side were sore to any pressure, but I thought they were not broken. My jerkin was rent from one shoulder.

But I had been very lucky, too lucky to believe that it had been good fortune alone which had brought me through. Were the Sulcarmen right? When I had taken that sword into my hand, had I also taken into my body some essence of the one to whom it had once belonged? What meant the strange word I had hurled into that face (if the monster had a face) when I attacked? I would not lose it now . . . I never could . . .

“Kemoc?”

“Here!”

She was coming. I put out my hands, touched skin and instantly her fingers were about my wrist in a fierce, hurting hold.

“I fell into the water; I think I was dazed. The current carried me back. What—what happened?”

“The thing is dead.”

“You killed it!”

“The sword killed it. I was merely one who held it for the kill. But it seems we have picked a dangerous road. If we have met one such surprise, there may be others ahead.”

“The Thas are coming—and with them that other . . .”

“What other?”

“I do not know. Save that it is of the Shadow. It is not even remotely human-kind and they even fear it, though they are bound to its company for the present.”

So our road must still lie ahead. We struggled over the monster bulk of the dead thing. Behind it the waters of the stream arose, partly dammed by the body. Where the current had washed only a little above our knees, now it rose rapidly. We quickened pace for I feared it might choke the passage.

“The eyes—you said that the eyes drew you.” I questioned as we went.

I read her surprise. “Did you not feel it? That there was naught to do but to surrender to it—to go to it as it wished? But, no, you could not, or you would not have fought! Truly, you have your own safeguards, over-mountain man!”

As far as Orsya could explain, tile gaze of the creature had overpowered her will, drew her to it. I wondered if that was not the manner of its hunting in these dark passages, so that it brought its prey easily within reach. Yet my own immunization to the spell puzzled us both. It might have something to do with the sword. For, folly though it might be, I was convinced that the blade had in the past been used against just such a monster and what had come to me was a memory of that other battle.