Gryphon's Eyrie

9 Joisan

Kerovan’s voice was gentle, but his words were no request, rather a command. I knew as I gazed into his eyes, their amber darkened with concern, that it was time to part with at least one of my secrets. I sighed. “It was while you were gone that I began to dream. And in that dreaming I was no longer Joisan, but another, named Sylvya…”

So I continued, telling him of the sendings that had come to me, gradually revealing the story of Sylvya and her half brother Maleron, the Adept. Finally I reached the part of the tale that had begun today, in this courtyard facing the shrouded ruins of what must be Car Re Dogan. “I carried our gleanings into here, thinking only about kindling a fire for cooking; then, while I was standing over there, near the stone bowl, facing the arches, I could feel her, calling me. Never had our contact been so demanding, so real. I put the food down, and walked over to the opening…” turned my head to look at the arched emptiness cut into the blue stone. “I stood there, before it, knowing that Sylvya was out there, somewhere. That she needed to tell me something. But she couldn’t reach through—there was a wall between us. Then I felt a warmth on my breast, only to see my amulet glow, as though warding off the Shadow.”

Kerovan shook his head, as though he already realized what my next words must be. “Yes,” I admitted, “I took off the amulet, tossed it from me.”

His protesting “Joisan!” rang out at the same moment as Guret’s “Cera!”

“Don’t you understand—I had to know!” I cried. “Sylvya and her fate are important to me—to us. Somehow this is so.”

Kerovan made a brief, dismissive gesture. “Once done is done. What happened then?”

“I was back inside Sylvya’s body, seeing with her eyes, knowing I had just confronted Maleron with that terrible accusation of being Shadowed. He tried to deny that he had taken the Left-Hand Path—I think perhaps even he was not truly aware of just how many steps he had traveled down that route. But Sylvya defied him, telling him that he was the one who had meddled with spells to stop even Time itself, and thus had brought harm to the valley she loved…” I looked directly into Kerovan’s eyes. “This valley, my lord. The one and same.”

“What did Maleron do?”

“He naysaid his sister, accused her of being the one who was trafficking with the Shadow; then, when she would not retreat, would not take back her words, he became more and more enraged. Finally, Sylvya challenged him to prove himself untainted. Grabbing him by the wrist, she dragged him out of the room, taking him secretly down the ancient stone-chiseled road leading to the lowlands to the north, down the mountainside on the other side of that peak which is twin to this one we have claimed.”

I took a deep breath, my mouth dry from talking. Guret passed me a cup of the crystal liquid from the fountain, and he and my lord waited wordlessly while I drank. “Thank you, Guret. Ironically enough, this was Sylvya’s challenge—” I shook the last drops of water from the drinking vessel so they spattered onto the floor. “Water, running water. Most Shadowed Ones cannot cross it. Sylvya led Maleron to a tiny stream, skipped across it, and, once on the other side, dared him to follow.

“He tried. But as soon as his foot left the bank, he staggered back, sickened. Then, when he realized that his sister had indeed proved her point, won her challenge, his anger knew no bounding. He spoke words—words the like of which Arvon has not heard for long and long—mercifully. These words opened a Gate, and through that Gate came hunters and hounds, like unto none our world has known before. Maleron mounted himself on a steed spawned surely in some hellish otherworld, giving the order to loose those hounds.

“Sylvya panicked. The brook could not delay them indefinitely—sooner or later there would be a crossing place for them. She ran, that ghastly hunt racing after her.”

My eyes filled with tears. “Oh, Kerovan! That was long and long and long ago… and she has been running ever since.”

His horror of such a fate filled his eyes. “How could such a thing happen?”

“It was Sylvya’s doing. As she ran, she called out in desperation to Neave, begging the forces of Things As They Must Be to prevent the evil her brother had become from ever catching her. And those forces heard. Sylvya, Maleron—the entire hunt, quarry, hounds, and huntsmen alike—were transformed, shifted outside the bindings of Time as we know it. Sylvya could not be caught, but neither could she ever be free.

“Thus every night, at the same hour, that terrible hunt comes thundering up the ancient road, into the ruins of Car Re Dogan. They are part and parcel of no world, rather trapped in an endless existence somewhere between. But even their half presence is deadly.”

“Aye,” said Guret, with a quick, indrawn breath. “Any who stands in that path then must be drawn in and destroyed. As Jerwin was.”

I nodded at him.

“So that is the true nature of That Which Runs the Ridges in the night,” Kerovan said. “Poor Sylvya. To be trapped ever thus is a thing beyond any horror I have yet encountered…”

My hands knotted and unknotted the leathern thong holding Gunnora’s amulet. “I was shown all this for some reason,” I said. “There must be a way to free her!”

“How, when even passing contact with the thing kills?” my lord asked. “Such spells are far beyond our ken, Joisan. It would take one with the Power and learning of an Adept to undo this.”

I sighed, feeling weariness flood over me, having no answer to give him. I made to rise, but even as I did so, both he and Guret put out restraining hands. “Rest, Cera,” the boy said. “Our skill as cooks may not equal yours, but it shall suffice.”

Thus I rested, watching them bustle back and forth, chopping roots and vegetables, skinning and preparing Kame, building a crude but serviceable spit, making a fire in the stone fire-bowl we had discovered earlier.

The food they served seemed to strengthen me, restoring much of the energy I had lost. We all ate in hungry silence, then, our stomachs filled, sat back for a few moments of rest, gazing out at the deepening darkness. Finally Guret arose. “I will give the horses their grain tonight, m’lord,” he said, hefting the dwindling sack of feed.

“That is another thing we must trade for,” Kerovan observed, “if we want to keep the horses in riding trim. How many more feedings have we?”

“If I cut down gradually, perhaps three or four,” the young man said. His footsteps echoed slightly on the stone flooring as he left the courtyard.

Kerovan gestured at the eastern arches. “Can you still feel your Other?”

“Yes,” I made frank answer, “but as long as I wear the amulet, she can only reach me when I dream or let down my barriers.”

“I will sit up tonight and watch, lest you be plunged into another dream,” he said, his mouth set in a grim line. “Even though you say this Sylvya is not of the Shadow herself, it would not be well to chance another encounter.”

I hesitated, sorting through the impressions I had gained from this afternoon’s contact. “She has told me what it is needful for me to know,” I said at last. “The whyfor still puzzles me, but I—”

“Cera!” The shout echoed down the hallway toward us, accompanied by the beat of running feet. “Lord Kerovan!”

Together we rose as Guret plunged headlong into the courtyard, nearly toppling into the fountain in his rush. “The Great Hall!” he gasped. “There’s something there! Something…” He tried to steady his breathing. “Something that cannot be seen, or heard, or felt—but it is there, nonetheless! I swear it, by the Sacred Horsehide!”

My lord started for the entrance, his words reaching us faintly as we hurried after him. “I sense it, too, now. A questing, an opening…”

“As I started to walk past the throne, it was there—just there.” Guret’s words came quickly. “I could almost see something…”

I hastened my steps to a near run to catch up to Kerovan. “A questing? Nidu?”

“No.” He sounded positive. “I know not what it is, but there is no taint surrounding it, such as accompanied that one.” He frowned, the faint click of his hooves on the stone coming ever more rapidly. “But the boy has the right, there is something…”

“What?”

“Something familiar. I cannot recall—” He broke off as we burst into the Great Hall with its circular dais holding that huge, oddly shaped throne. As soon as I entered the room I, too, could feel the troubling.

Hesitantly, we began to walk around the chamber, to-ward the spot facing the throne—and as we took each step, that troubling grew stronger. There was Power alive here, ancient, growing evermore potent in the ages since it had last been tapped. It seemed to mist against our faces as my lord and I approached its center (Guret, perhaps wisely, having chosen to watch from the shelter ol the archway). I sniffed, detecting a sharp odor I could not put name to in the air.

Kerovan paused by the ramp leading up the dais to the throne, then, his face set, put out one hoof, beginning that ascent.

“Kerovan!” I made as if to grasp his arm.

“No,” he said, his voice ringing hollowly, overlaid with another, alien tone. “This is what I must do.”

I felt the resistance against my bone and flesh increase as I made to follow him, and stepped back, defeated. No spell I had ever enjoined could break down barriers of this kind. This, then, was for my lord to face alone.

Reaching that massive block of the quan-iron from which the seat had been carved, he hesitated for a long second, then, in one smooth motion, sat down. His hooves dangled by nearly a handspan, and he needs must squirm to find a comfortable perch thereon. Clearly, none of humankind had been the original occupant of the throne.

As if his presence in the seat were a signal, the mist before my eyes began to take on visible form, curdling in the center. Two widely separated blocks of the blue stone underfoot began to glow, azure light growing upward from between them, shimmering in the air. The Power centered between them, suspended like a web between pillars. It flickered, becoming visible as I backed away, suddenly frightened, thinking of the child. The forces uncoiling here in this room were vast—I had no wish to be trapped in some arcane backlash.

Violet trails uncoiled and crawled within that web of Power, coalescing, then stretching upward, moving into the form of a living creature—a gryphon!

Telpher! I thought, the image of the beast that had protected me during the battle with Galkur filling my mind. “Telpher?” I called, stretching out my hand toward that shape.

It turned eyes the color of gentle flames in my direction, opening its mouth as though to speak.

Joisan! Kerovan’s mindsharing reached through my concentration, bringing a warning. Touch it not—what you see is but an image of the Unlocker of Gates.

I turned to see him raise his hand, his fingers forming a sign I did not recognize; then, quickly, he sketched the winged globe that seemed to have been Landisl’s Power symbol. His mouth moved, twisting into an utterly alien shape as he spoke a word—one that I could not hear with my ears, except perhaps as a distant pain, but perceived with the inner sense.

I turned to see the gryphon image ripple in its center, then split and tear apart in lines of searing violet light. I put up a hand to shield my sight, and then Kerovan, with a sudden leap down, was beside me, his hand raised as if in greeting. “Come,” he called, using the ancient word from the Old Tongue.

He extended his hand toward the light—

There came a sudden clap of sound so high-pitched as to be only a sharp pain, and a wave of brilliance engulfed us both as a twig is swept by the spring floods.

Staggering back, I tripped over the edge of the dais, sitting down with a jar. My eyes watered and ran, my nose filled with the odor one can sometimes scent after a lightning strike. I struggled up, only to see not one, but two forms sprawled on the stones before me!

“Guret? Kerovan?”

There was the sound of running feet, then hands on my shoulders, helping me to rise. “Cera? What happened? Who is he?”

I swayed dizzily as I stood, looking up at the youth’s concerned face. If it was Guret who stood with me now, then who was the other man sprawled beside my lord? “My heart seemed near to fighting its way out of my breast .is I stumbled forward with the Kioga lad’s aid.

“Kerovan?”

My lord was sitting up, one hand to his head, dazed. The man beyond him groaned, rolling over, his sword and mail scraping against the stone flooring. He went helmed, and his equipment could have been forged at the same fires as my own sword and mail, or Kerovan’s…

A man of the Dales? Here, in Arvon? Brought to Kar Garudwyn by some sorcerous Gate, the like of which we had traversed?

Questions flooded my mind, but for the moment it was plain the man was in no condition to speak. I hastened to his side, touched fingers to his throat. His war helm made a half screen across his features, but my questing fingers found that our “guest” had a pulse, and a strong one.

“Who is he?” I asked as Kerovan made an unsteady way over to join us.

“I know not,” my lord answered. “The old Knowledge awakened and seemed to act through me—I knew what must lie done to assist the one trapped within the Gate, but as to whom our guest may be…” He shrugged.

“Help me with his helm,” I directed. “Guret, bring some water and a cloth.”

Carefully we removed the man’s helm. Beneath it was truly a Dalesman’s face, hair a shade or two lighter than my own, the weathered skin of a rover, well-cut, even handsome features. The man looked to be some years older than my lord—

I gasped as my mind suddenly rearranged those features into familiar lines—this man I knew! “Jervon!” I stammered, hardly believing my own sight. “How—what—”

Three years ago, when I had first followed my lord into the Waste, just before our entry into Arvon, I had met this man. At the time he had companied with a woman of the Old Race, Elys. The three of us had traveled the Waste for many days, searching after Kerovan, for, in their kindness, Jervon and his lady had been moved to aid me. Without their help I could never have made that perilous journey that had ended so abruptly as I was dragged down into a trap dug by the Thas, those repulsive Dwellers-In-Darkness. The last sight I had seen as the earth caved away beneath me had been this man’s anguished face as he strove vainly to reach me. And now he was here, in Arvon.

“Jervon?” I saw Kerovan frown, as if trying to remember, then his eyes widened. “It cannot be! Where is Elys?”

After I had been captured by the Thas, Jervon and Elys had aided my lord in his subsequent search for me. He had told me that at one point in their journey together, his two companions had been warned back by the Power—for Elys was a Witch, and one of no small talent. The time was not right, she had said, for the two of them to walk the road leading to Arvon. Sadly, he had bade them farewell and ridden on alone. Kerovan had told me of Elys’s wistfully expressed hope that someday the way into the ancient land might be opened to them…

Carefully steadying Jervon’s head on my knee, I wet the edge of the cloth Guret brought me and wiped his face. He seemed to rouse slightly, and when I gave him to drink, his eyes opened, blinking in the light. “You are safe, Jervon,” I said quietly. “Do you remember me? I am Joisan.”

“Joisan…” His eyes widened, and I could see memory rush in.

“Where is Elys, Jervon?” my lord said, bending over so the Dalesman could see him. “I am Kerovan, remember?”

“Kerovan? Here?” His eyes wandered around the circular chamber, plainly disbelieving. “Where—”

“You are in a place of the Old Ones,” my lord said. “You came through a very ancient Gate. Do you not remember? And where is the Lady Elys?”

“Elys…” For the first time he looked to both sides, then sat up with a jerk, though I strove to hold him still. “She isn’t here?” Panic awoke. “She must be—Elys! Elys!”

The Great Hall rang with his shouts, and it took the combined strength of the three of us to hold him down, lest he run wildly through Kar Garudwyn, risking a terrible fall if he suffered a misstep too near one of the open arches.

“Jervon!” I clutched at his shoulders. “Jervon, listen. If you would find Elys, you must listen to me!”

His eyes were frantic, and for a moment I feared he might plunge into madness, so terrible was the grief I sensed. Then he sagged. “Elys did not come through the gate with you,” I said as clearly as I could. “Where did you come from? It may be that Elys was left behind, and you must return for her.”

“In the Waste,” Jervon said dully. “We were in the Waste, in a portion we had never traveled before, and we came upon a road. A strange road. My lady said there were visions there, of the ones who had withdrawn out of High Hallack so long ago.” I heard a swift indrawn breath from Kerovan. “On either side were great faces of stone carved, and then something Elys called the Great Star—”

“The road!” my lord exclaimed. “That is the road where Riwal and I first found the crystal gryphon! What happened to you there?”

“We reached the end, where the road simply ran into a solid facing of cliff, and thus ended. But Elys said that it was no true end, rather a stepping-off place for one who possessed the Power to summon and open.”

“Did she try the Gate?” I asked.

“Yes,” he made slow answer. “And I believe it opened for both of us. We were hand in hand, before that cliff, then…” He shook his head. “We were… not. In a place between, a place where we possessed no bodies, rather only our spirits had meaning. I saw, but my eyes did not comprehend. But Elys was with me! I know she was! That was the one thing I could still feel—her handclasp!”

“What happened?”

“Time was strange.” He fumbled with words, as though he could not make them serve his meaning. “It stretched forever, it seemed, and yet no time passed at all. We were being drawn toward a violet light, and I saw what seemed to be a creature. One out of legend, with the wings and foreparts of an eagle, but the hindparts and ears of a lion. A gryphon.”

“That was the Gate,” Kerovan said. “Was Elys with you still?”

“She was—but then something seemed to pass between us, and I felt her hand torn away.”

“What was this ‘something’ like?” I asked, my throat tight. If Elys had been trapped between the Gate and its portal, how could we hope to find her?

“It was…” He frowned, as though the shock had partially erased his memory. “Of the Shadow,” he decided, horror settling in his eyes as if it had always been there. “I could not see it, but it seemed to make a droning noise, and its stench…” He shook his head. “It gave off a yellowish light. Its touch was… loathsome.”

“Oh, no,” I mumbled, feeling my heart dropping within my breast, till it lay like an anchor-stone.

My lord nodded soberly at me. “I am afraid so, my lady. Can you discover aught from Sylvya?”

I hesitated, remembering well that sleep that had claimed me almost past my waking again. Then I nodded. I owed Elys a debt that I had never paid, and the people of the Dales are raised to acknowledge and repay such, even as are the Kioga. “I will try,” I said. “But you must mindlink with me this time, Kerovan, so you can aid me if I go in too deeply.”

He nodded. “Agreed.”

As Jervon watched anxiously, Guret behind him, I sat down on the dais, with my lord sitting behind me, so that I could lean back against him. His arms came up to steady me. I tried to keep my face from betraying any inner fear or disquiet as I carefully removed the Amber Lady’s amulet. Guret moved forward to take it.

Even as it left my fingers, I could feel Sylvya’s presence quest inward, seeking, and knew that she again had something she must convey. Closing my eyes, I surrendered myself to the will of that Other, but this time I went conscious of Kerovan’s presence like the support of an arm around weary shoulders.

For long moments it was dark, then the otherness swept over me, whirling me away from the here and now to… where? I was no place I had ever seen or experienced, either in my life or hers. Though I was once more within Sylvya, this time she was not reliving moments out of the far past. Instead, I knew the turmoil and utter horror of what it meant to be caught outside the bounds of Time itself, of having no physical world to surround me.

I was running—but I had no feet, no legs, and my surroundings never changed. Still, within my mind, my body was running, my blood coursing through my veins, my breath catching in lungs that burned with each breath—but I had no blood, no chest with which to draw breath!

Sruggling to calm myself, I faced these conflicting messages from a body that did not exist—and all the while, I fled from that ghastly hunt dogging my footsteps (except that I had no feet, of course). Behind me, there was a massive wave of Power, an anger that knew no bounds nor leashing, and that anger flickered yellowish, lighting this uncanny not-place with a fetid, diseased glow. That wave of powerful anger was Maleron’s manifestation here between time and worlds.

But I knew—or Sylvya told me, it amounted to the same thing—that there was now come a change in the hunt. There was a force trapped here with us, a force of Power. That presence was like a clean light shining through the dank mists of a fen, and I knew that light was Elys. She was ensnared.

Could I free her? Take her back with me? Even as the question flickered within my mind, there came a fresh wave of knowledge from Sylvya—and experiencing that knowing, I was nearly lost in fear.

The spell holding this dreadful hunt between worlds and times had become faded with age, its arcane bindings stretched and pulled thin, as one may draw out the strands of linen from a spindle—but even the strongest thread has a breaking tension. Even as I focused the sight of my not-eyes on the bindings of that spell, they stretched, tore, then rippled away. I caught a faint backlash of Power from the world where my body still rested, then glimpsed a narrow, knifelike face, skull-thin, with long dark hair waving wildly in the night breeze.

Nidu! As I watched the Shaman, the roll of her drum reached my ears, and I saw the blood and fat-smeared rock upon which she had sacrificed to work her spell—her spell to loose the bindings holding That Which Runs the Ridges in thrall, releasing it onto an unsuspecting land.

She might never have accomplished such a feat of sorcery, had she not somehow used Elys to direct her summoning. The Wisewoman’s Power had served the Shaman as a focusing point in this deadly liberation.

I felt the Power that was Maleron waxing, swelling into a force so deadly, so inimical to all that I had ever known, that I panicked, struggling to free myself from such proximity. Kerovan! I shouted with part of my mind, using the name as my own focusing point. Kerovan! Reach me—

It was as though I was one trapped in a raging fire or a roaring flood, struggling helpless, until something akin to a lifeline began to tighten, drawing me back to safety. The grip of that malevolent Power swung in my direction, clutching at me, seemingly grinding the flesh from my bones—

Kerovan! Along that insubstantial but nevertheless real binding I felt strength flow, so that I was able to claw my way out, free myself—

With a rush that left me too dizzy to even move, I was back in the Great Hall of Kar Garudwyn, held tight in my lord’s embrace, with Guret clinging to one hand, Jervon to the other. My relief was so great I nearly sobbed aloud, to breathe again, smell clean air, feel my blood move in a warm, living body.

“Joisan!” Kerovan laid his cheek against my hair, clutching at me as though I was indeed one rescued from a physical death. “What happened?”

I was so wearied I could barely whisper, but managed to direct Guret to bring my collection of simples. There was a cordial within, distilled of a mixture of carnation and dragon’s blood, that, when two drops were mixed with a cup of water, would help me regain a measure of my strength for a while—and would not harm the child. Under my direction, the boy prepared the cup, then Kerovan held it for me while I sipped.

Gradually, steadiness gathered again in my limbs, my hands stopped their trembling, and I was able to sit without support, my head clear. Finally I faced my lord and Jervon, trying to summon the courage to deliver such devastating news. I was too tired to choose the easiest of words, so I expressed myself as bluntly as possible.

“I was within Sylvya’s body, as she was trapped inside that hunt. There was another force of the Light also trapped, and I recognized that presence as Elys. Nidu has drawn Power from her, using her as the focusing point of her spell-breaking. And she has succeeded in her attempt!”

I looked up at Kerovan, trying to control the shivers still threatening to wrack me. “She is mad, my lord. The anger she felt at us today has overcome any lingering traces of sanity. When she could not break the forces shielding this valley, she turned wholly to the Shadow for the worst fate she could find to unleash upon us! Tonight when that hunt wends its way up the mountainside, when it reaches the end of its set run in the ruins of Car Re Dogan, the bonds holding it out of time will be released by her drumming. It will be free to continue on as a flesh—and-blood threat—no longer a phantom manifestation—tonight, it will become real. All that stands within its path will be swept away, so great is the force the Shaman has unthinkingly released.”

Kerovan looked around blankly at the walls of the Great Hall, and I knew, even though his expression did not change, the depth of his feeling for this place—a place that had claimed him as lord, where he finally felt at home. “And we and Kar Garudwyn lie in a direct path from that other peak,” he said. “It will sweep over this place, then continue on through the valley, toward Anakue and, eventually, the Kioga grazing grounds.”

“It will be free to rove wherever it wishes—or Maleron chooses to take it,” I made swift agreement.

“And Nidu was the cause of this?” Guret asked.

“Aye,” Kerovan said. “But I doubt greatly that the woman has even the faintest idea of what she has so thoughtlessly unleashed. She can no more control such a Power of the Dark then she could stem a flood with her naked hands.”

“Who is Nidu?” Jervon wanted to know. “And how came you and your lady here, Kerovan?”

As my lord swiftly recounted the barest bones of our story to the Dalesman, I quietly arose and set about gathering up the herbs, candles, and other materials that might prove necessary in a contest of spelling, carefully placing them in my bag of simples. My hands shook as I did so, for I hated to even imagine myself pitted against Nidu’s sorcerous powers—not to mention the aroused wrath of one of the true Adepts, freed now after centuries of bondage.

“What are you doing, Cera?” Guret asked, coming over to watch me.

“Gathering together my materials,” I said, carefully locating my wand and placing it in the top of the bag.

“But Cera”—Guret was pale—“you cannot hope to stand against such a foe!”

Swift as a blade in battle, Kerovan was by my side, though there had been no true mindsharing between us—rather simple knowledge of a common threat to all we had gained at such hardship. “My lady has courage for two, but she will not stand alone. Kar Garudwyn is my home—our home—and I will not lose it after the finding of it has taken years of wandering and fear! We must stop that thing”—he looked down at me earnestly—“and stop it we will.”