Kellanved's Reach

Chapter 13

Dancer followed Kellanved through Shadow. The geography of this particular region was one of dry washes, steep canyons, and twisting erosional gullies that cut through multicoloured layers of compressed sands and gravels. They were rushing, but the quickest the seemingly aged mage could manage was a frustratingly slow shuffle. His patience with his partner near exhausted, Dancer asked again, ‘Is it there?’

‘I believe so,’ Kellanved answered, though his tone said he wasn’t certain.

They were searching for a gate – a permanent constructed archway, or portal, call it what you will, that allowed access to other Realms, other places. They had come across a few such ancient constructs during their explorations of Shadow, and Kellanved was leading them towards the nearest he could recall.

As they hurried, or rather limped, along, Dancer asked, ‘So, carrying one of these items while passing through one of these active arches – this should take us to the Imass Warren … or Realm?’

‘Not usually, I think,’ the mage puffed in answer, winded despite merely scurrying along. ‘I’ll have to have my Warren up and working on it. It must be deliberate … I think.’

So, not a sure thing. It sounded to Dancer a bit like trying to pick a lock. Then the last thing he wanted to hear echoed through the surrounding canyonlands – the deep hunting bay of the Hounds. He and Kellanved froze and exchanged glances. His was one of narrowed questioning, Kellanved’s of surprised alarm, quickly veiled.

‘I thought you had these things in hand,’ Dancer accused him.

Kellanved was tapping his fingertips together. ‘Ah, of course! Certainly … I believe so.’

Dancer snarled at the man’s prevarication and drew his heaviest parrying gauches. He urged Kellanved onward. ‘Keep going.’

They shuffled on, Dancer with a hand at Kellanved’s back, pushing him forward, all the while glancing about. He spotted the beasts soon enough; they had them surrounded. Two on sand ridges ahead, the other two blocking either end of the gully they traversed. Growling his frustration, he halted, put his back to Kellanved. ‘What do you think?’ he demanded over his shoulder. ‘Have they come for us?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Wonderful.’

The beasts let out one last howl that shook stones from the steep eroding canyon walls, then came on. One was the larger, dirty-white female – possibly the matron of the pack – the others were the lean brown one, the tawny one, and the muscular black one, so dark as to be a shiny blue.

The black hound approached, its muzzle lowered, head close to the ground, eyes blazing differing colours: a hot amber and a bright cerulean blue. Closer now, Dancer made out the fresh splashing of blood upon it, gaping cuts at shoulders and head, and patches of torn fur.

The others halted a good few paces distant and seemed content to just glare, their great broad chests working, their black lips drawn back.

Crouched, weapons raised, Dancer glanced from one to the other, uncertain. Then, silently, without a sound, they turned as one and bounded off. Dancer eased up from his ready stance. He turned to Kellanved, his gaze narrow. ‘Did you do something?’

The mage lowered his gaze and fiddled with his walking stick. ‘Well, I may have let them know about Jadeen, and—’

‘You sicked them on Jadeen!’

The mock-elderly Dal Hon winced, his greying brows crimping. ‘Not exactly – well, sort of. Kind of. I guess. Yes.’

‘You should not have done that.’

‘Why ever not?’

‘You saw them! I’m sure they came here to let you know they were not happy.’ Dancer kicked at the dry dusty ground. ‘Do that again and you might lose them.’

Kellanved looked to the iron-grey sky. ‘Well, what ever else are they for then, pray tell?’

‘Pick an easier target! Let them taste some blood – that was the deal, yes?’

Kellanved huffed. ‘I do not need help with easier targets, thank you very much.’

‘Whatever. You know what I mean. Throw them a bone.’

The little mage shot Dancer a glance. His mouth quivered. Dancer suppressed a snort, and they both broke out laughing. Kellanved poked Dancer with his walking stick. ‘That was a good one. I liked that one.’

Continuing onward, Kellanved led the way to a seemingly unremarkable heap of stones amid a desolation of wind-blasted ruins. ‘The nearest remnant of a gate that I know of,’ he announced.

‘Very good. Let’s go.’

The mage raised a hand for a pause. ‘In time, in time. Just a moment.’ He withdrew the stone fragment and held it up close to his eyes, squinting at it. While Dancer watched, the fellow spat upon the flint piece, rubbed it, squinted again through one eye, turned it this way and that.

Finally, his patience worn away, Dancer asked, ‘What in the Enchantress’s name are you doing?’

Kellanved peered up, distractedly. ‘Hmm? Tricky magical things beyond your ken – now be quiet.’

The mage continued to fuss over the object. He rubbed it between the palms of his hands, blew on it, muttered over it, seemed even to whisper to it. Dancer was about to walk off to sit down when all about them dust began to rise from the ground. It swirled upwards and coalesced towards the remnants of the ‘gate’, forming a sort of gyre.

‘A pressure differential,’ Kellanved observed. ‘We’re getting somewhere.’

Ever careful, Dancer drew two blades. He noted now that the dust was indeed disappearing over the footprint of the gate; it appeared to be falling into nothingness.

‘Try it,’ Kellanved invited.

Dancer pointed to himself. ‘Oh? I’m supposed to go first, am I?’

‘Do your part.’

‘My part?’ he grumbled. ‘I don’t think much of my part.’ Then something came to him. ‘I don’t have the spear-pointy thing.’

Kellanved mouthed a curse, his shoulders falling. ‘Fine! Very well. Together then.’

Dancer and the mage stepped on to the stone flags of the ruin’s threshold. The next instant Dancer gasped as if stabbed; he hugged himself, his breath pluming, teeth chattering, and saw they now stood amid blowing snow on a dark snow-covered landscape below thick black and grey clouds.

The little mage groaned into the savage wind. ‘Ye gods! I shall die!’

Dancer pointed behind: domed hide tents shuddered in the wind, their bases secured by rings of heavy stones. He steered a stiff and shivering Kellanved towards the nearest, pushed aside the heavy hide flap and shoved the mage in before him, then fell in himself.

It was dark within, and stank of rotten fish and animal fat – but it was exquisitely warm, and Dancer just lay panting, grateful, clenching his numb fingers.

As his eyes adjusted to the dark he made out the faces of three elders staring at them in open wonder round a small central hearth. One spoke, an old man, his wide, blunt face lined and seamed. Dancer did not understand the language.

His vision improved and he saw that the three wore crude hides, painted and sewn with beads and bones. Their hair was grey and long and hung in greased tangled lengths; he wondered if this was the source of the sour animal fat stink.

The eldest spoke again. Kellanved roused himself and sat up. He gestured, grasped Dancer’s shoulder, and asked the trio, ‘Do you understand me?’

The oldster grunted his assent. ‘You are not spirits?’

‘No,’ Kellanved answered. ‘We are men.’

‘You are strange men.’

Kellanved nodded. ‘Well … I suppose we are. Now, where are we?’

‘Our village is named the Place of the Booming Ice,’ said another, an old woman – or so Dancer thought. The three appeared quite identical.

Kellanved shot Dancer a look. ‘How very helpful.’

‘What do you want here?’ the woman asked.

‘We seek a throne, a seat, a place of authority – do you know of what I speak?’

The three eyed one another, uncertain. One said, ‘We will take you to our eldest.’ They rose, and Dancer was startled by how squat they were; squat but wide. They searched about the hut and produced hide blankets that they offered to him and Kellanved. Then the eldest pushed aside the flap and exited. Dancer and Kellanved followed, wrapped in their blankets.

Their guide led them into the driving snow. Through the blowing whiteness a huge looming bulk took shape. Because of the darkness Dancer couldn’t be certain of the scale, but it appeared gigantic. They entered an opening, broad and low, like a cave mouth, except that the stone was worked smooth and dressed.

They walked a tunnel, of sorts; very broad, with slim descending steps cut into the solid rock of the floor. Snow and dirty wet straw littered the channel. Light glowed ahead – the flickering amber of firelight. The tunnel ended at a large chamber, one so huge that Dancer had no idea of its dimensions, as the walls and ceiling were hidden in darkness. A meagre fire lay ahead; their guide headed for it.

Something of the proportions of this structure, whatever it was, troubled Dancer. It didn’t seem built to a human scale, but for something far larger. Noises rebounded, echoing from the distant unseen walls: the tap of Kellanved’s walking stick, the crackling of the fire, and the booming of distant surf.

At the fire sat a single, tiny figure. A young girl wrapped in a crude hide similar to their own. Tiny she might have been, but her features were not gracile: her brow was much too thick, her cheeks too wide, and her nose far too large. Their guide bowed to the girl, and Dancer was quite startled when the fellow greeted her as ‘Grandmother’.

The girl peered up at them with sharp brown eyes that soon flicked aside, dismissing their guide, who bowed again and withdrew.

‘And you are?’ Kellanved asked.

‘Jahl ’Parth,’ the girl piped. ‘Bonereader to the tribe.’

‘Ah,’ Kellanved observed. ‘We are—’

‘I know who you are,’ the girl interjected. ‘And I know why you are here.’

‘Indeed …’ Kellanved mused, sharing a troubled look with Dancer.

‘And where is here?’ Dancer asked.

The girl opened her arms, the wrap falling away to reveal that despite the terrible cold she wore only a hide vest, leaving her thin arms bare. She eyed Kellanved, and her lips quirked, almost mischievously. ‘Where are we, mage?’

Kellanved made a show of studying the silver hound’s head of his walking stick. Eyes downcast, he answered, ‘Well … broadly speaking, we are in the Warren, or Hold, of Tellann. Perhaps in the past – or in a moment held from the past.’

The child offered the mage a lofty, arched look of acknowledgement that only an ancient could summon. ‘Well done,’ she granted.

‘That old fellow called you grandmother,’ Dancer said, eyeing her now more carefully.

Jahl shrugged. ‘That is because I am his grandmother – many times removed.’

Dancer shot Kellanved a questioning look that the mage declined to acknowledge. Instead, he said, ‘You carry your years well, Jahl ’Parth.’

She smiled. ‘Your humour is welcome – you know I do not speak of the flesh.’ The Dal Hon inclined his head, and Dancer was struck by their dissimilar similarities: he a false ancient, and she a false youth. ‘At my birth the elders identified me as Jahl ’Parth returned,’ the girl continued. ‘Ancestor to many here.’

Kellanved rocked now on his heels, back and forth, and Dancer recognized that he was done with the pleasantries. ‘Well … greetings, Jahl. We are here—’

‘As I said – I know why you are here,’ the girl cut in once again, but far more sharply this time. ‘And I asked you where we were.’ Her thick lips hardened, drawing down. ‘So far you have declined to answer.’

Kellanved tapped the silver hound’s head to his lips, looking away to the surrounding darkness, almost pained. ‘Ah …’

Dancer managed to catch his eye and mouthed: Time – we must go.

The mage raised a hand, but not peremptorily, rather a begging for indulgence. ‘Well,’ he began, drawing out the word, ‘if I were to guess … an immense structure, strange larger-than-human dimensions … arcane mechanisms hinted at in the dark recesses … I would have to offer the guess of a Mountain that Walks.’

Dancer could not help but snort a laugh. ‘Children’s tales. Mountains that walk? Just stories.’

Jahl turned her narrowed gaze on him. ‘And were not structures that flew similar stories to you?’

Dancer coughed into a fist. He rubbed his neck, almost wincing. ‘But an entire mountain?’

The ancient – a true ancient – returned her piercing eyes to Kellanved, and Dancer followed the gaze to see the mage nodding. ‘And who built them?’ she asked, almost accusingly.

Kellanved cleared his throat, clearly uncomfortable. ‘The K’Chain Che’Malle,’ he murmured, half under his breath, as if afraid to say the name aloud.

Jahl ’Parth nodded now, her gaze softening, as if some sort of test, or threshold, had been passed. ‘You are not entirely ignorant, I see. Good. Indeed, the K’Chain. This was one of their cities, their bases. My tribe was tasked with destroying it. It was our bloodline’s only purpose. Eventually, over the span of twenty generations, we succeeded. It was a war to the death between them and us.’

‘You being the Imass,’ Kellanved observed.

Jahl nodded. ‘Indeed. And in the full knowledge of such a history – which is but one chapter in a library of wars beyond your comprehension – you would still dare meddle in this? Is your lust for power that blind?’

For his part, Dancer was beginning to reconsider. He remembered Tayschrenn’s own appalled reaction once he understood their goal. Kellanved, he noted, was now shaking his head.

‘I do not seek power,’ the mage said. ‘I seek knowledge.’

Jahl also shook her head, almost in disappointment. ‘Do not pretend that knowledge is neutral. It can be dangerous.’

‘And ignorance isn’t?’

Dancer cocked a brow – that almost sounded like a good point.

Jahl lowered her gaze, as if considering, then raised her head, chin out-thrust. ‘I know where the throne lies,’ she announced. ‘But I choose not to tell you.’ She tilted her head speculatively, eyeing Kellanved. ‘What will you do now, seeker?’

The mage blew out a breath, tapped his walking stick on the stone floor. ‘Oh, blunder about searching for it. Be a terrible pest. Knock things over. Cause all sorts of problems and upset and generally make things worse than they need be as I meddle everywhere in everything. And everyone will blame you for it all.’

The grandmother who looked like a girl threw back her head and barked a laugh. ‘In other words, be an ass until you have your way.’ She shook her head anew, almost in wonder. ‘Very well.’ She rose, but stiffly, as an ancient, groaning and rubbing her legs. Seeing them eyeing her, she shrugged, ‘Memories. This way.’ She led them back to the entrance.

Outside, they once more pushed through the howling winds. The girl wore nothing more than a leather vest and tattered hide skirts tied about her emaciated waist by a belt of woven cord. Dancer offered her his hide wrap. She blinked, surprised by the gesture, appeared about to say something, but reconsidered, lowering her gaze. Frowning, she continued walking.

Eventually they came to a coastline of bare black rock, wet with spray from a frigid-looking iron-grey sea. By this time Dancer’s face, hands and feet were numb and he hugged himself beneath his hide wrap, shivering uncontrollably. The girl gestured across the water to the darker jutting spur of a small island. ‘There. On that hilltop rests the throne. Once we could walk to it. But over the centuries the waters have risen. Soon it will lie beyond the reach of all, submerged.’

Kellanved’s greying brows climbed very high indeed. ‘Oh dear. Just how do we get to it?’

Jahl ’Parth shrugged. ‘That is not my concern.’

‘Can’t you just do your Shadow thing?’ Dancer suggested. ‘Walk us out?’

The mage grimaced a negative. ‘This is Tellann we are in now.’

Jahl ’Parth moved to go, but paused, and turned back. She took a breath. ‘You do not seem the usual sort who come here seeking the throne. Take my advice: do not go. None who have gone have ever come back.’

Kellanved bowed to her. ‘My thanks. But it looks as though we shan’t be going in any case.’

Dancer saw the girl’s gaze flick down to the shore; then she turned away to disappear amid the fat swirling flakes of blowing snow.

‘I don’t know about you,’ Dancer stuttered to Kellanved, ‘but I’m not going to last much longer.’

‘Agreed,’ the mage sighed. ‘Thwarted once again.’

‘Perhaps not,’ Dancer offered. Wincing, he opened his thick hide wrap to clamber down among the wet black rocks where the waves washed and sprayed. A short time later he called Kellanved down to him.

When the mage arrived, using his walking stick to help him balance on the slick icy rocks, Dancer motioned to what he’d found: a small boat of wood and hides. Kellanved sniffed.

‘I am not going out in that.’

Dancer dropped his extended arm. ‘Fine. Back to Nap.’

Kellanved looked at the thick clouds above them and flapped a hand. ‘Oh, very well. If I must.’

Dancer struggled to push the boat into the water. ‘Looks as if we have to.’

Within, he found two hand-carved paddles. He motioned Kellanved to the bow, and the spindly mage crouched down awkwardly. Dancer pushed off and crouched at the stern, paddling. ‘Use the other paddle,’ he told Kellanved.

The mage waved his hands. ‘I don’t know how.’

Dancer snarled curses under his breath and dug into the waves with even more power. Fortunately, they were not too high, though the water was so frigid the spray seemed to burn when it touched him. His hands became frozen blocks on the wood of the paddle. ‘They’re not making this easy,’ he grumbled.

‘We’re closing,’ Kellanved announced.

Dancer nodded, concentrating on powering them forward. The hide boat was taking on water and his legs were numb from resting in the icy wash.

A dark cliff-wall of wet rock emerged from the blowing snow. He peered right and left, searching for a place to land. ‘Which way?’ he mumbled, his lips and face frozen.

Kellanved pointed the walking stick right and he turned the boat that way. They rounded what appeared to be a tall headland, which descended to a bare rocky slope. The boat was now sluggish with water and Dancer drove it straight in to land. They struck submerged rocks and Kellanved was pitched forward into the waves; Dancer leapt for the shore.

He bruised himself on the rocks and turned to search for Kellanved. He saw the mage floating face down in the surf and staggered through waist-high icy water to reach him. Grasping the fellow’s sodden jacket, he dragged him like a wet rat out of the waves and laid him on the bare, scraped-smooth stone slope, then sat and hugged himself, shivering savagely, and felt the pull of a dreamy exhaustion.

Yet he knew that to fall unconscious now would mean death, and so he shook Kellanved, yelling, ‘We have to keep going!’ Or something like that, as his lips were completely numb.

The mage’s walking stick emerged to point, shaking, up the slope. Dancer squinted and just made out a darker shadow ahead – a cave mouth in the rising cliff face?

He took hold of a squelching Kellanved once more and half dragged, half pushed him upward. They fell into the cave and Dancer blinked, frowning, as he felt something smothering him. It took a moment for him to recognize warmth; with that realization he could fight off unconsciousness no longer and he allowed himself to slip down into oblivion.

He awoke with a start and peered about; it was still the pewter grey of a snowstorm without, and he couldn’t tell if it was night or day. Kellanved still lay asleep amid a litter of dry branches and leaves. Dancer flexed his fingers – he was warm. The heat seemed to be coming from the very rock of the walls and the floor beneath them. He threw off his hide wrap and was amused to see actual steam rise from his sodden sleeves.

He shook Kellanved. ‘Well, at least we won’t freeze to death.’

The seeming ancient peered up blearily, grumbled, ‘Cold comfort, that.’

Dancer ran a hand through his short hair, then rose and began searching the cave. ‘It leads to a tunnel,’ he announced. ‘Damned dark.’

The mage appeared, a dry torch in hand. ‘Try this.’

Dancer gaped at the thing. ‘You weren’t carrying that, were you?’

‘No. I was lying on it.’

‘Oh.’ He crouched down, gathered together a bunch of the dry twigs and leaves, pulled out the tiny flint and steel he always carried, and set to work.

In a short time he had the torch lit and he rose, adjusted his weapon-baldrics and belts, and offered Kellanved a nod. The mage tapped his walking stick to his shoulder and pursed his lips, answering the nod; then they started down the tunnel.

The passage was very rough; they clambered over uneven jutting rocks and ducked through narrow throats of stone. Along the way Dancer noticed that the natural walls had been widened here and there to allow easy passage, but the gouging and scraping was not smooth. It was as if a harder stone had been used rather than a metal tool.

After quite a long time Dancer saw a weak flickering glow ahead: more torch-light, in fact. Wary, he drew his best throwing blade and switched the torch he carried to his off hand. He went first, crouched, blade held behind his back.

The tunnel opened on to a wider natural chamber, or cavern. Multiple torches lit it, their sooty smoke rising to a distant ceiling hidden in darkness. Kellanved slipped in beside him and the dark-skinned mage’s breath caught.

For there, across the cavern, against a wall of natural stone, sat an object that could only be the throne of the Army of Bone. It was assembled from gigantic antlers and tusks of bygone beasts; leather straps wove the pieces together, forming a seat of sorts. Natural precious stones glinted upon it, as did shells and beads, and rotting animal furs lay heaped about, some obviously taken from huge animals of legend, such as the cave bear, or the great-toothed cat.

But what probably drew the gasped breath from Kellanved was the Witch Jadeen sitting upon it.

The hungry smile on the woman’s lips drew them even further from her teeth, and she raised a hand, beckoning them closer. ‘I knew you’d turn up quite soon,’ she said. ‘And so I prepared the place. Come here.’ She pointed to her other arm, the sleeve of her robes torn and blood dried black upon her hand. Her eyes narrowed upon Kellanved. ‘I have a bone to pick with you, little Shadow-mage.’

Dancer looked to his partner and their eyes met, and for the first time it seemed to him that Kellanved had been caught at a complete loss as to what to do.