The Castle Оf Hape. Caves Оf Fire Аnd Ice. The Joining Оf Тhe Stone

ONE

She had been seven days in the caves, wandering in darkness. There was light enough in the great central grotto, daylight, then the light from Ere’s moons on most nights. But away from the grotto, deeper in the mountain, in the small caves and tunnels where she searched, no light came, and her oil lamp hardly cut the darkness. The silence in the low, tight tunnels was absolute and cold. She had squinted over stone tablets carved with the history of Ere, crouched frowning in the dim light to unroll and study parchments stacked one atop the next, row on row of them in stone niches in the cave walls, but had found as yet no trace of the runes for which she searched. Patiently she rolled each one up again, more discouraged each time.

Her food was nearly gone. She was sick of dried mountain meat, dry mawzee cakes, the metallic tasting cave water. And the lamp oil was running low. Soon she would have to leave the caves to hunt, or there would be no fat to render into oil. She could not search for anything in darkness. But hunting would take precious time, for all the rising peaks had been black and withered when she came up the mountain seven days before. There would be little game. In the caves, the air still smelled of smoke. She fingered her bow, ran an exploring finger over the silver hilt of her sword and remembered painfully when Ram had forged it. They had been children then, come recently out of Burgdeeth. She had carried it all these years, fought and killed with it, had fought the Herebian raiders these last months, with the sword so much a part of her she hardly remembered it had been made by Ram’s hand. Now she remembered, sharply and painfully, as Ram’s face filled her thoughts, his dark eyes intent and serious, a thatch of his red hair falling across his forehead, the line of his long, lean face caught in firelight as she had last seen him in painful vision, before he was swept into Time.

She picked up the lantern, sighing, and turned deeper into the mountain.

He did not love her, could never love her. Because of Telien. If she found him with Telien in some idyl far in Time, she could only turn away again to lose herself in Time unending, in desolation unending. And yet she must follow him, she could do nothing else.

Who knew where Time had swept him, or to what purpose? Truly to follow Telien? Or had some evil reached to touch Ram, to open Time to him?

She searched for long hours, hardly pausing to eat. She had all but lost her sense of time. Night was no different than day. She slept little, wrapped in her cloak for an hour or so, always cold. Woke and went on until she grew exhausted or very discouraged, slept again. There was enough lamp oil for perhaps four more fillings.

Then came the moment when she woke from a light sleep suddenly, startled, struck her flint hastily to the lamp. What had awakened her? There was a difference in the cave, she felt a new sense, a sense of something pulling at her.

Confused and yawning, trying to collect her wits, she rose, jumbled her scattered belongings into her pack, and began to make her way toward that beckoning hope, prodding her anew. Her dark hair, bundled into an untidy bun, had slipped down to her shoulder. Her bow and quiver hung crooked across her pack. Her leather tunic was wrinkled, her wrists protruding from her sleeves. Her dark eyes were intent and haunted. What had reached out so suddenly to wake her, to pull at her? She followed with growing urgency. Had her need to search out the secrets of Time at last awakened some magic deep within the mountain? But why? She had found no key, yet, to unlocking those secrets. Nor did she carry one of the starfires, such as Anchorstar had given to Ram, to quicken the magic of Time. What called to her, then, from deep within the mountain?

And if she found a way into Time’s reaches, where would that way lead her? To Ram, or a million years from Ram? Once she crossed Time’s barrier, would she have the skills to find Ram? Uncountable centuries swept away to a future unborn and backward to incredible violence and turmoil. How could one enter Time, enter a future unborn? Yet it had happened to Skeelie and Ram when they were children— Time rocking asunder, future and past coming together. That moment had changed the very history of Ere, that moment on Tala-charen when the runestone of Eresu split, when men and women came out of Time to receive the shards of that shattered jade.

She knew she should turn back to hunt and replenish the lamp oil, but could not deny the power that drew her. She followed the beckoning sense down a dark, narrowing tunnel, pushing always deeper inside the mountain. She had been so tired, but now she moved quickly, the chill gone, hunger unheeded. She remembered the quick vision she had had ten days before of Ram standing beside his supper fire, then suddenly Telien with him, her pale hair caught in moonlight as she reached out of Time itself to hold Ram. Then the sense of the night twisting in on itself, Ram swept out of Telien’s arms shouting her name over and over, uselessly. Ram alone, and the trees only saplings once more—and then the hill empty as Ram himself was swept away in Time’s invisible river.

The tunnel became so low she had to walk bent over, her hair catching in the stone of the roof, very aware suddenly of the weight of the mountain above her, tons of stone above her. She turned the lamp lower to save oil, knew she must save two fillings to return to the main grotto or be trapped in darkness. The press of stone against her shoulders made her want to strike out, want to drive the mountain back. She controlled herself with effort, pulled urgently forward by something insistent, something compelling. Something evil? Was that which beckoned to her evil?

At last the tunnel ended, and she stood in a cave that seemed not bounded by walls, seemed to warp and to hint of distant, terrifying reaches. Her guttering light caught at uncertain shadows and at dark so thick that light could not penetrate it. Nothing was clear, but the cave seemed to extend far beyond any area the mountain could possibly contain. A terror of infinite space yawned beyond her vision, and suddenly she could not bring herself to go forward, was terrified of the very thing she sought, terrified of falling into Time, of being lost in Time. All her determination disappeared, and the fear she had kept at bay so long overwhelmed her. She wanted to turn back, wanted to run blindly. She stood with clenched fists, trying to control herself. You’ve come this far, Skeelie. You can’t turn back. You can’t run away now. She was caught between her sudden horror of the unknown and her need to become a part of that dark emptiness in Time where Ram was. She moved on at last, shivering.

Soon she could make out something painted on the walls. She held the lamp up. Scenes of farms and villages, of battles, scenes shifting between shadows, then changing as she moved on. Who had painted such images so deep in the caves? Her lamp sputtered and grew dim.

Then the scenes came clearer and seemed larger suddenly, crowding toward her between the chasms of darkness. Scenes of war and violence leaped out at her; men opened their mouths in silent screams as swords flashed. She heard the din of war faintly, then it rose in volume until it deafened her. She smelled blood and death. Had she moved into Time suddenly? Clouds raced across dark skies. All was movement and shouting, a dozen places in a dozen times. She was caught like a fly at the center, suddenly mad with desire to thrust herself into those scenes. She searched for Ram’s face among infinite battles, searched for a flash of his red hair. Once she reached out her naked hand toward a battle, then snatched it back and pressed it to her mouth to stifle the cry that rose: for the shadows had changed to form themselves into a twisting tree. The battles faded. The tree filled the cave, huge and pulsing with life. It pushed gnarled branches against the cave walls, forcing up, bending against the dirt roof. Its bark was rough and dark, its roots humped like twisted, naked legs across the cave floor. Its trunk was wrinkled into seams and angles that formed the face of an old, old man. His eyes watched her from some terrible depth. Eyes cold and knowing, eyes like windows into Time. His voice was like the rasp of winter wind.

“I watched you come. I watched you search. I know what you seek here. You will find it, young woman. You will move through Time unending, and you will suffer for that. Time cares nothing for your suffering. And you care nothing for reason if you plunge into Time’s reaches”.

“I do what I must. I can do nothing else.” She held her shaking hands still with effort. “Who are you? What—sort of creature are you?”

“I am Cadach. 1 have dwelt in this tree since my death. Fear of him flickered in her eyes despite her bold stance. My soul dwells here. I have no strength to move toward what you call joy and fulfillment. I have no stomach for atonement. Traitor in my life, traitor to Ere and eager slave to evil, I am left filled only with the dark and twisted, I hunger only for the dark. I do not choose joy, I have no use for joy, it is too bright, I do not choose to be born anew.

“My children wander Time endlessly. My children atone for me. His sense of agony filled Skeelie. My children know not that I exist here. They know only that their need is to reach out, to hold a light to the darkness that comes again and again upon Ere. For they, each one, carry within them the higher spirit that I would have become, that I denied with my evil. They carry that spirit which I will never carry, my five white-haired children.”

His voice went silent. His face seemed carven once more, then collapsed as it began to recede back into the bark. Skeelie stood staring, shaken, wanting stupidly to cry out for him not to leave her. His eyes, dull and lifeless now, disappeared last. She backed away from the trunk. His fading voice breathed out once more, hollow now, hardly a whisper. “Follow through the maze of this cave as your mind bids you, Seer.” She strained to hear. “Follow you the path of the starfires. Find the Cutter of Stones who made them, for he will give you strength. Follow to the source of Ramad’s beginnings, touch the place of his childhood and his strength. And know you that Ramad must search through Time for more than his lost love, know you that he must search for the lost shards of the runestone of Eresu if he be true to himself.” She could hardly make out his words, leaned closer to the hoary bark; and one question burned in her.

“How do I know I can move into Time? I do not carry starfires. I do not touch Time’s secrets, nor have I found a rune.”

“You are one of the few born to weave a new pattern into the fabric of the world. Those so born are not anchored to a single point in Time.”

“I do not understand.”

But he was gone. The ancient tree slept, retreating into a million years of repose whence its core had risen. Skeelie moved past it into the darker shadows, wondering, trying to make sense of his words. How could the old man know of Ram, of the starfires? Surely he was a Seer. A Seer trapped, his immortal soul taken. A Seer of evil? A traitor as had been BroogArl, and HarThass before him? A traitor trapped so, never to be born again? She shivered. And his white-haired children . . .

Could Anchorstar be one of Cadach’s children? Anchorstar—my white-haired children . . .

Anchorstar had carried the starfires, had given one to Telien, had given three to Ram. Follow you the path of the starfires . . .

Her stomach was knotted. Her hand clutched her sword hilt. Her mind raced eagerly ahead between the dark reaches, seeking now with awe, pushing toward those other worlds that had begun again to shine around her, toward the cries of men in battle, listening for Ram’s voice. Voids and piercing space threatened to swallow her. She left each scene behind her for she could not find Ram. She sought deeper and deeper into the mountain.

There she came suddenly to a pillar carved with runes that made her catch her breath, for three words shone out at her. Words so familiar, so very painful: Eternal. Will sing. Those words had been carved on the splinter of the runestone that Ram had brought with him out of Tala-charen, the splinter that now lay at the bottom of the sea, lost when the Hape had nearly killed Ram. They had never known the whole rune that appeared on the complete, unbroken stone. Ram had not had time to read it in that instant before it shattered. But these three words were part of it, and they blazed at her like fire from the pillar.

Eternal quest to those with power.

Some seek dark; they mortal end.

Some hold joy; they know eternal life,

Through them all powers will sing.

Were these words the whole rune that was carved into the runestone? Who had carved it here in this buried place? She reached out, shaking, to touch the carved pillar. What linking did this tablet have to the runestone? What linking to Ram, in whose hands the stone had shattered? She turned suddenly, feeling watched, feeling another presence.

Or was it only the old man, still watching her? Her nerves were strung tight. Imagining things. Imagining for a moment a sense of dark evil drawing in around her; and then gone. She returned to puzzling over the carved tablet. The lantern was burning low, would soon need refilling. Were the words on the tablet the key for which she searched, the key into Time? She stood repeating the words, then turned away at last confused and dizzy, and felt space wheeling around her and sudden heat searing her. Then winds came, and scenes overlapped in wild succession. She felt she could not breathe. She saw children running in terror before a river of fire, saw volcanoes spewing out against the sky. She searched wildly for a glimpse of Ram as a hundred scenes overwhelmed her. She knew she must move, must launch herself into this melee if she was to hurdle Time’s barrier—but into which scene? She dared not fling herself a thousand years from Ram, yet how could she know? She searched frantically, could not see his face, was stifled by fear, by indecision. Her lantern sputtered, the flame died. But the scenes were dimly lit, taunting her, terrifying her. She dropped the lantern, heard the precious glass shatter. She wheeled around in impotent panic—and felt something brush her arm, solid and huge; leaped back in terror, sword drawn.

The flashing scenes were gone. Dim light shone above her from a star-struck sky. A black cliff rose beside her. She touched it again. The cliff of a mountain. She let out a long breath. She was no longer in the cave, had been swept without volition across the abyss. She was ashamed now of her fear and confusion. Looking up at the sky, at the stars, she felt their vast distance. A cold wind touched her face. The caves were gone, perhaps centuries gone. She had come at last into the unfathomable, where she could search for Ram.

Then she saw the fire.

It was some distance away, down to her left, a very small fire, like a campfire. Her heart was beating wild and quick with the knowledge that she had come through the impossible barrier. That campfire might mean anything: people or creatures beyond her comprehension.

The fire flickered, then was lost for a moment as something dark moved across it. Surely it was a campfire. The sharp tang of painon-wood smoke made her press her finger to her nose to keep from sneezing. The smell of searing meat brought water to her mouth. She was wild with hunger suddenly, like an animal. She stood staring down at the bright, small glow, trying in vain to make out figures or a shelter. Surely someone must be sitting huddled in shadow waiting for supper to cook. When a sharp, high noise cut the night, she startled terribly, swallowed, her hand tight on her drawn sword in quick mindless reflex.

But it had only been a goat, the high shrill bleat of a doe goat. The fire blazed bright as if its builder had laid on more wood. The meat smelled wonderful. She could see no one. She stood quietly, but her pulse still pounded wildly with the realization that she had at last left her own time. Suddenly a voice spoke. She spun and stared at the man before her, her sword pricking his chest.

“Good even,” he repeated.

How had he come so silently, slipping up on her? Her muscles were tense and ready to thrust, her blood surging with warlike reflex. Then she felt embarrassment, for he was only a small, elderly herder staring up at her, gentle of face, surprised by her quick, violent action. His voice was soft and even now, as if he spoke to a nervy beast.

“Sheath your sword, lad.” He stepped back away from the tip of her blade. “Sheath it, I’ve no quarrel with you, nor mean you harm.” He watched her lower her blade a trifle. “Hungry? Are ye hungry? Come on to the fire, then, lad. Don’t be standing here staring, riling my goats all to thunder. Come down to the fire and settle. Who be ye, lad, coming out of the night so?”