Dark Horse

15

Nara stepped carefully onto a sand bar and snorted when she sunk up to her knees in quaking mud. I am sorry, Gabria. I can go no farther.

Gabria glared at the river in frustration, but she understood Nara’s predicament. The giant mare was coated with mud and had already been mired once, and they were barely into the fringes of the great delta. Since daybreak they had been following the Goldrine as its banks eroded away to mud bars and beds of reeds. The river had quickly sunk into a morass of shallow channels, quicksand, and insecure little islands.

When Gabria and Nara arrived at the river the night before, they had camped in lowlands thick with thorns, brambles, and grasses. But in the morning, as the Hunnuli had traveled deeper into the wetlands, patches of rushes and giant marsh grass with silvery tassels crowded out the thickets. Just a little farther ahead, Gabria had been able to see where the pale gray of the tassels turned to a solid mass of tossing green. Sadly, the illusion of solidity was quite treacherous, for the grass was a shifting quagmire where no Hunnuli or horse of any kind could go.

Nara heaved her front legs out of the silt and-lunged to a more solid bank. Her head down, she stood breathing heavily, her massive strength already drained by the leeching marsh.

Gabria slid off the mare unwillingly. She had hoped the Hunnuli would be with her when she faced the Woman of the Marsh, and she had relied on Nara’s wisdom to seek a path through the dangerous mires. But it was obvious Nara could not go on.

She sighed. “How do I find this woman?”

The woman will find you.

The girl yanked her hat off and thrust it in her bag, then she crossed her arms, feeling very disgruntled. “And how can I be sure she’ll help?”

She will help you. She is a magic-wielder. Like you.

Gabria looked away. Until that moment, no one had told her the woman was a sorceress. But her intuition had already informed her of that possibility long ago.

Nara’s eyes glittered like black crystal. She nudged the girl gently. I will wait nearby.

Without another word, Gabria fastened the food bag to her belt, gritted her teeth, and stepped out bravely. The mud oozed to her ankles and water seeped into her boots, but she did not sink like the Hunnuli. She heard Nara plunging away behind her and, for a moment, her resolve almost crumbled. She faltered in midstep and thought of running after the horse. Then her foot slipped and she fell headlong into the river.

The water was warm and brackish and smelled of rotting vegetation, yet it cleared her head. Sputtering, Gabria stood up and looked down at herself ruefully. She was muddy from head to toe and smelled like a swamp; the sleeves of her tunic were black with mud and her bag was soaked. It serves me right, she thought irritably. I’ve come too far to panic now at the idea of facing my dreads alone.

Her jaw set, Gabria struggled downstream toward the heart of the marshes. The morning sun turned hot, and a smell of moldering vegetation began to rise from the river. Gnats and mosquitoes plagued her. The water spread relentlessly over the land and the ocean of marsh grass loomed closer. She soon found that what looked like one vast fen of grass was really an endless network of pools, quaking mires, and winding, half strangled channels. Through these a cunning eye and foot could find a wandering, unsteady course over patches of mud, tiny islands, and sand bars. However, as the hours passed and Gabria floundered deeper into the marsh, she began to despair of her cunning.

The journey grew very tiresome. Great reed beds often blocked her path, forcing her to wade or swim in deep, scummy brown water. Thickets of grass towered over her and shut her into a green rustling world. She knew the wind was blowing above, for the tassels rippled in sun-drenched waves, yet nothing stirred the water’s surface but the swirl of a fish or the leap of a frog. Soon, Gabria was perspiring heavily, which only drew more fascinated insects.

The day dragged on as Gabria floundered south into the marsh. She looked for anything that would help her find the woman: a path, a hut, even a footprint or a small item dropped in passing. But the marshes hid their secrets well. She found no sign of any other human being, only water and reeds and herons that watched her with jaundiced eyes.

At last, filthy and exhausted, the girl came to a long, dark mere, where the water was deep and obscure and barred her way on either hand. She stared at the water for a while and wondered if Athlone would laugh if he saw her like this: more mud than sense. It would hardly matter if he did, Gabria decided. She was too tired to care or to swim the mere. Weary and numb, she crawled onto a dry-looking tussock and curled up in the middle of the grass. Her food was ruined, so she drank a few swallows of water, laid her head on the bag, and tried to rest.

Darkness came and with it the noises of the marsh increased to an uproar. Frogs croaked everywhere. Mosquitoes hummed. Thousands of creatures that sounded like rusted crickets squeaked incessantly until Gabria was in a frenzy. The biting Insects were out in force, too, and they covered every pan of her exposed skin. She swatted and squirmed, but nothing would keep them away. She was cold, wet, miserable, and very lonely.

At last she decided she would have to move or go mad. But Just as she was about to sit up. Gabria heard a distant noise in the mere. She froze and held her breath.

The noise came again—a soft splash like a creature paddling in the water—or a snake hunting. She had heard of the huge carnivorous snakes that inhabited the marshes, and although they rarely reached sizes capable of devouring a human, she had no desire to meet one. Silently, Gabria’s hand crept to her dagger. The moon, an old shaving, had not yet risen and the night seemed utterly lightless. Her eyes strained through the black to see, her ears listened fearfully.

Suddenly a small, lithe animal popped out of the water by her feet. Gabria leaped back like a stung cat and whipped out her dagger. The animal churned and bobbed its head. She stared at it in amazement. It was shaped rather like a short, fat snake with a blunt nose and tapering tail. However, it also had four webbed feet and a whiskered nose. Its round eyes glittered in the starlight. It chirped again in obvious inquiry, and Gabria eased her dagger back into her belt. It was only an otter.

“Hello,” she said tentatively.

The otter chittered.

Gabria suddenly felt foolish. It was bad enough to be startled out of her wits by a small, harmless animal, but to talk to it in the middle of the night? She squatted down and shook her head. The marsh was wearing her to rags.

All at once, the otter snapped alert and, before Gabria could blink, it dove into the water and vanished.

Gabria sighed. She leaned back and stared at the Stars beyond the walls of grass. The Khulinin would be watching those same stars, and she wondered if they saw them from the walls of Ab-Chakan. She had only been gone three nights and it seemed like years stretched between her and the clan. They were far beyond her reach and time was slipping fast.

A splash interrupted Gabria’s thoughts and, to her surprise, the otter bounded back onto her island. It was holding something in its mouth, and it contentedly crunched through its meal before it washed its face and paws and chirped again at Gabria.

“I’m hungry, too,” she muttered.

The otter glided to her side, tugged at her pants, and bounced to the edge of the grass. Gabria watched with growing curiosity. It called demandingly and came back to pull at her. Hesitant, she stood up.

The otter ran to the edge of the grass tussock.

A suspicion grew in Gabria’s mind; she stepped forward. The otter squeaked happily and moved on. Gabria’s suspicion changed to a certainty, and she bent over and followed the animal into the thick growth. It was difficult to see the dark furred animal, for it seemed to blend into every shadow and shade. The going was exceedingly slow for Gabria, but the otter moved unhurriedly, keeping dose in front of her as it chose its way unerringly through the treacherous paths of the marsh.

For hours, Gabria stumbled after the creature, through reeds and fens, around meres and beds of marsh grass, until she was bone weary and sick to death of the smell of stagnant water.

Still, the otter led her on, even when she was floundering in waist-deep water or struggling through grasping mud that sucked at her legs. Occasionally the animal turned around and chirped at her encouragingly before it plunged deeper into the marshes, along paths only it could see.

After a while, the water imperceptibly changed from black to dark pewter to pale gray, and the shapeless masses of night silently regained their form and hue. Gabria blearily glanced toward the east and saw the red rim of the sun ignite as it touched the edge of the sky. The otter saw it, too, and chittered at Gabria.

The girl staggered to a stop. Panting and exhausted, she held up her hand. “I’m sorry, but I’ve got to rest. I . . .”

Before she could say more, the otter bobbed its head, whisked into the reeds, and disappeared.

“No, wait!” Gabria yelled frantically. But the otter was gone and she was too tired to follow. She sank down on the driest patch of reed and mud she could find and put her head in her hands. She could only hope that the otter would come back. Gabria was not certain the animal was leading her to the marsh woman, but it had a definite purpose, and it was the only guide she had in this dangerous place. .

Fortunately, she did not have long to wait. The sun was barely up above the horizon when the otter returned. The animal was swimming down a narrow channel, tugging at a rope floating in the water. Gabria staggered over to help. She pulled the rope and a small, slim boat floated out of the tall grass. The craft was light, flat-bottomed, and the color of a faded reed. The otter climbed into the boat and chattered at Gabria.

“Are you serious?” she asked, horrified. Plowing through, the mud was bad enough, but she had never been in a boat and didn’t want to try one now.

The otter squealed and patted a long pole lying on the bottom of the craft. Gabria looked aghast, but she climbed gingerly into the boat and sat down. A slow current pulled the craft into deeper water. After a short time, when the boat didn’t show signs of immediately tipping her into the water, Gabria relaxed a little. She stood up very carefully, grasped the pole, and pushed it into the water. The pole hit the muddy bottom of the channel and the boat moved forward. Gabria grinned at the otter and pushed the pole in again. Very slowly, they moved down the channel.

“Where to now, little one?” Gabria asked the otter.

As if in response, the animal dove off the gunnel into the water. Its small brown head bobbed up in front of the boat. Gabria followed in the otter’s wake.

The sun was well up by that time, and the marshes glowed green and gold in the morning light. The day grew hot. Gabria was tired and her head was heavy with sleep, but she could not relax. Her stomach was twisted into knots of tension and her thoughts kept returning to the look on Athlone’s face when she had asked about the Woman of the Marsh. His reaction was born of an ingrained fear of magic-wielders, but Gabria wondered what he would think of her when he knew the full truth of her powers. She stared at the water. She wondered too, what her family would have thought if they had known of her heretical talent. Would they have understood that her obsession for vengeance was leading’ her to a sorceress to learn the ways of magic?

Gabria felt the tears in her eyes and forced them back.

Gabran would have understood. Her brother had loved her unconditionally, and she knew that he would have supported her decision to seek the Woman of the Marsh. Piers and Cantrell supported her, too. She realized now that the bard had sent her to this woman to learn to use her natural talent, not to subdue it. And Gabria finally decided that it was the right choice. Whatever the consequences, she wanted to learn every strength and weakness of sorcery, to find a way to destroy Medb.

The otter chittered.

Gabria started out of her thoughts and glanced ahead. A line of trees blocked her way and, as she followed the otter closer, the line became a dark, heavy wall of mangrove. The strange trees grew close together, their prop roots pushing into the stagnant water. Under their branches, the air was stuffy, and very little light forced its way through the dense foliage.

Gabria poled her boat with care through the tangled roots of the mangroves, following a twisted path only the otter could see. The trees grew close together, and open spaces of water became fewer and farther apart. The air was stifling and fetid.

At last, the otter crawled onto something solid and came to a stop. Gabria glanced up in surprise. They were at the foot of a huge framework of roots. In the center, the prop roots merged into a mangrove unlike any other. It was tremendous; its roots delved deep into the waters of the river. Its branches spread out in a vast, gloomy canopy.

The otter waved a paw at the tree and chirped. .

“There?” Gabria asked in disbelief.

Reluctantly, the girl climbed out of the boat and teetered on the slippery roots. Before she could protest, the otter whisked away into the water and vanished. Gabria was left alone. She looked around. There were no insects or birds or frogs, and the gloomy swamp around her was .completely silent. Gabria shivered. She would have given anything to be safe and dry in Piers’s tent, instead of wet, filthy, and clinging like a snail to a slimy mangrove root in the heart of a sorceress’s domain.

Gabria gathered her courage and clambered over the roots to the main trunk. The tree was incredibly wide; compared to other trees, its trunk was a massive column in a forest of sticks.

Where would a sorceress live in a thing like this? Gabria looked up into the branches, around the roots, even into the water, but there was no sign of any life, human or otherwise. The girl was beginning to think the otter had deceived her, when she saw a narrow, horizontal crack in the side of the tree. It was barely wider than a handspun and ran several lengths above her head. Gabria peered in. Although it was completely dark within the tree, she sensed it hid a cavity large enough to enter.

There was no other possibility. Gabria squeezed through the crack into pitch darkness. The air was stifling. It seemed quiet within the tree, but as Gabria’s senses sharpened in the, darkness, she became aware of a soft rasping and, even softer, a creaking rustle like tiny whispers. Gabria waited—for what she was not sure.

After several moments, a single shaft of red light struck down from somewhere above and illuminated the sorceress. The old woman sat on a chair, which in turn rested on a platform that hung from an unseen ceiling. She was more like a corpse than a woman, hunched and wizened and incredibly pallid. Her unblinking eyes shone red in the light. She had a beautiful, mad-looking face, and she stared down at Gabria with a triumphant sneer.

“So, you have come at last,” she said, her voice harsh from disuse. “I have waited too long for a magic-bearer to find me.”

“I—,” Gabria started to say.

The woman cut her off. “You have come to learn. I know who you are . . . but I do not know if you are ready to pay my price.”

Gabria stared up in fascination. She was both horrified and awed by the feverish power that blazed in the woman’s red eyes.

The sorceress met Gabria’s gaze, and her face contorted into rage. “I know what you’re thinking,” she cried. “You think I am only an old hag hiding in a swamp, tripping through my ancient skills and feeding on old grudges. Well, I was a powerful sorceress once, a Shape-Changer. My power brought men to their knees. Behold!”

She threw her arms wide and sang a chant in a strange tongue that reverberated to the rootlets and twigs of the great tree. Gabria pressed back against the wood. The interior began to waver and fade; the air hummed like a harp string. The woman’s voice rose to a cry of triumph as a vision formed in the chamber. To Gabria’s gaze, the tree was transformed to a palace where gold gleamed on mirrors, water sprang from a thousand fountains, and the walls shimmered with the silk banners of a noble house. Before Gabria stood a woman, a sorceress as she had always imagined one to be: fair yet dangerous, lovely and fell, clothed in gowns of velvet and bejeweled like a queen.

But as quickly as the vision formed, it dissipated to a thin mist and vanished in a puff. The woman, diminished to an ancient crone, sagged back in her chair with a groan of exhaustion. “My strength is almost gone,” she whispered.

Gabria stared about bemused, half expecting to see the dark-haired woman still standing nearby. But the vision, whether the truth of the past or the dream of an aging hermit, was gone. The girl leaned back slowly and tried to keep her face expressionless. It was obvious the woman was a sorceress, and though she had lost the strength to wield her powers, she still had knowledge.

“It takes more wisdom than strength to use magic,” Gabria said, trying to placate the old woman.

The sorceress glared at her irritably. “Foolish. What do you know of sorcery? I have watched you since the massacre of the Corin. All I saw were your paltry attempts to discourage a few overenthusiastic men.”

“Discourage’” Gabria cried. “I killed a man.”

“You see? Discouragement would have been better. But you bungled it. You know nothing of magic.”

Gabria forced her anger back and said, “That is why I came to you.”

“I take no more neophytes.”

“Not even for a price?” asked Gabria after a moment’s hesitation.

The woman looked down at her. “What price are you willing to pay?”

“Whatever you ask that is within my means.”

“Your means. That is limited indeed.” The sorceress waved her hand through the red light and her platform descended slowly to the floor of the tree chamber. Her hand, spiderlike, crept over Gabria’s wrist and pulled her down to sit on the platform beside the chair. Gabria flinched at the dry, dusty touch, but she did not withdraw her hand.

“What is it you seek from sorcery, clanswoman? You know the practice is forbidden on pain of death.”

Gabria could feel her blood pulse beneath the woman’s grip. She knew without question that it would not avail her to hide the truth. “I seek vengeance for the murder of my father, my brothers, and my clan.”

“Ah, yes. Is that your only reason?” Her eyes pierced Gabria’s like needles, dissecting every layer of thought. “Vengeance is a dangerous motive for sorcery; it can warp your will and turn on you like a snake.” The woman turned her nose up and her eyes slid sideways to watch the girl. “But it can also precipitate one’s learning.” She paused. “This Medb you wish to destroy, he has grown powerful of late and will require much cunning and will to overcome.”

“He is also overconfident. He thinks he is the only sorcerer in the clans.”

The woman nodded in agreement. She had studied Gabria for some time and was pleased with what she saw. “At the moment, he is. But the man is a savage. It is because of sorcerers like him that the people rose up against us and purged magic from the plains. Now, only I remember the bright days of grandeur and wisdom, when magic was a glory and its wielders were worshiped with honor.” Her voice began to rise in fury. “But, now. . . Now, I hide my power from the eyes of men in the reek and mire of this foul swamp.”

The woman’s face twisted with rage, and her words screeched in her throat. Suddenly she began to laugh—a rude, maniacal sound that terrified Gabria. “A just punishment he shall have for doing this to me. We will topple this self-satisfied malefactor into the muck.”

Gabria straightened and asked breathlessly, “You will help me?”

“Did I not just say that?”

The girl nodded, uncertain whether she was pleased or frightened. “Thank you.”

“Do not thank me yet.” She released Gabria’s hand and sat back, her rage still embedded in her ancient face. She studied the girl for a moment and a sharp gleam, like a hungry rat, lurked in the sorceress’s red eyes. Oh, yes, she would teach the girl the secrets of using magic. She would give Gabria enough knowledge to defeat that upstart, Medb. Then, if all went well, the girl would pay the price of her training. The Woman of the Marsh smiled, a slow, wicked twist of her lips, and cackled with anticipation.