The Key of the Keplian

2

A bird was singing loudly somewhere close by as Eleeri sat up. Her eyes were busy about this new land. Legend had it that there was no going back, that no one who walked the road of the gone-before ones ever returned. She shrugged. She could get killed just as easily back there as here. At least here there was no welfare and her aunt and uncle couldn’t reach her. She’d be careful, though. There might be worse things than those that had sent her running. She folded her blanket, putting everything but some food back in the pack tidily. Then she began to walk as she ate.

The mountains drew her as they loomed in the distance. By her calculation it was some twenty miles before she would strike the foothills. She’d skirt them and continue east; there was something in that direction which seemed to draw her. She tramped cheerfully, eyes and ears alert. The land appeared deserted. It was strange: so fertile, so rich, yet without people or homes. She scanned the grass. Perhaps this area was like the plains her kind had roamed once. Perhaps there were other tribes here who would challenge her.

She rested and ate at sunhigh, then moved on. Slowly out of the heat haze, buildings began to appear. They were a little off to her right and she veered away, moving more slowly. She could hear no sounds. Workers usually made noise, but here there was only silence. She circled cautiously, in no hurry; this was all unknown territory—wise to be watchful. As she moved in toward the clump of buildings, however, she could see that they must be abandoned. Here and there a roof had fallen in; signs of fire showed. Finally she allowed her feet to drift up to where the main door had once kept out all intruders.

She slipped inside like a shadow, eyes flickering about. Her skin crawled. Something bad had happened here, and that not so very long ago. The wood still smelled of fire. She touched it, studying the black smudge that fouled her fingertips. She rubbed them together and sniffed. Whatever had happened here had occurred within the last year.

A wind shift brought a ranker scent to her twitching nostrils. She knew that one. It was the stink of meat close to bones. She shivered and moved quietly in that direction. Better to know what it was she faced here.

Her nose led her toward stairs that hung fire-blackened from stone supports. She padded upward, careful to test each step. Here was not the place to break bones.

In the largest room above she found the source of the stench and bit back a cry of horror. They’d been a family once. Now they were just bones clothed with rags of flesh, tatters of once-good clothing. From the way they lay and what she could see of clothing and bones, there’d been parents and three small children. Even for the children there’d been no mercy from whomever had struck here.

Now that she was face-to-face with the remains, she could better estimate the age of the destruction. Perhaps six months, more than four or five for sure. Was this an everyday occurrence here, or was the land at war? Eleeri padded lightly from room to room. In each she found death or signs that invaders had searched. This may have been a prosperous place once. She’d found enough signs to know that the occupants had been decently dressed, well housed, with several servants and a dozen workers.

By then her hunt had taken her through the outbuildings as well. All had died, servants with masters; but there were no animal bones. Nor could she find, on casual search, any signs of valuables. The place had been thoroughly looted, and from the signs she suspected it had been before the bodies had cooled.

She was eager now to be on her way. It might go ill for her to be found by those who had done this. Pack bouncing, she trotted briskly away from the roofless hold. She traveled far into dusk, halting only when it was too dark to see. She made no fire; a cold camp was better than an attack in the night.

By daylight she was on her way again. The land was changing as she walked. At first there were only isolated clumps of brush, but gradually they merged into large areas that clothed the flanks of the hills before her. Large trees formed outcrops, islands in the brush and grass. Eleeri felt more comfortable with cover available.

At midday she ducked into a patch of trees and found a small stream. Here she washed, lit her fire using dry wood, and settled to eat. Once the meal was ended, she checked her supplies. Plenty of tea, powdered milk, and salt remained, but most of the solid food was gone. She must find a place she could camp for a longer period and hunt. Meat must be dried or smoked, greens gathered, and a horse found.

She sighed for want of a horse; all her life there’d been horses. All but the period with her aunt and uncle, when they’d refused to allow her one. A horse, a horse, her kingdom for a horse. She giggled softly at the words. She didn’t have a realm, but if she did, she might well give it up for a really good horse.

A week later she was still skirting the mountains, but they had turned in a curve to the east, so it was now in that direction she traveled. Several times more she had found homesteads and searched. The results left her wary indeed. No two places had been destroyed at the same time. It meant that either war swept often over this land or there were some exceptionally efficient and unpleasant bandit bands out here somewhere.

From the evidence in one of the homes she knew that the attackers had played the same games with women as that sort did in the world she had left. If she fell into their hands with not even a common language to plead in, events would be probably lethal. She reached up a hand to touch her bow. She would not be taken easily. Those who tried would pay.

By now she was well east and, from the strong breeze, she knew she was traveling toward a sea. She crested a small hill to face that wind. It blew salt air in her nostrils, a promise of fish, driftwood fires, and salt to replenish her small supply. All these were hers in another day. She stood, staring out over the gray waters, wondering who sailed them and in what sort of ships. She had always been self-sufficient, but always before she had had her parents or her great-grandfather to fall back on. Now she was alone, and while it did not frighten her, she wished for company. A horse, Eleeri thought wistfully for the hundredth time. A horse would be wonderful.

She laughed to herself. She was gaining an insight into her ancestors. This must have been how they had once felt, with all the plains spread before them and no way to travel from water source to water source except by foot. Here there was water enough. But she moved so slowly it was as if she were an ant crawling across the face of the land. With a horse she could travel more swiftly, hunt more easily, run from danger faster. She could talk to the horse, care for it, revel in the company of a friend.

She looked ahead thoughtfully. Farther on the mountains seemed to close in towards the shore. They could prevent her continuing northeast. Yet that was the way she was drawn. She shrugged. She would travel in her preferred direction so long as she was able. She did not wish to take to the higher mountains above the foothills she now traversed. Those mountain heights had a strange look to them. The land there looked almost as if it had been wrung out and dried that way.

She had continued to follow the seashore and was not surprised to see a river flowing into the salt water ahead. Rivers, of their nature, flowed seaward. Her head jerked up. People, of their nature, settled in such places. She slunk through cover and turned to follow upriver. Maybe here in this isolated place she might find those still living? She headed deeper into the mountains with every step. It contented her. Of plains blood she might be, but she was mountain-born. Here was her natural home.

A day later she stood on the riverbank, ears alert, eyes watchful. At her feet hoofprints traveled before her, three horses carrying heavy loads, but not so heavy as to indicate double-riding. So, three men, all large and probably strong. There were no signs that others had come this way in a long time. This trio were either rovers or traders traveling to some settlement they knew upriver. But somehow she had the feeling they had not ridden this way to trade. She swung pack to shoulder, trotting swiftly but with ears alert for alien sounds. They came, a confused shouting followed by a man’s scream. A horse whinnied as Eleeri broke into a run. She halted within the edge of cover, staring at the scene below.

There was a hollow here, like a sort of shallow dish. Within it were the walls of a small hold and a tiny patch of growing grain. Berry bushes showed bright fruit in a line along one side of the walls. A flowering vine climbed another. But part of the sheltering wall was broken down. Smoke had stained the roof. The violence had reached here, too, but perhaps the people had returned to guide their home into a second, weaker flowering.

Below her a man lay sprawled. Beside him a scruffy pony grazed unconcerned. Her gaze swept on to where one man battled two more. Swords flashed in the weak sunlight and even as she watched, the man on foot staggered and fell.

Both horses had overridden him in the last attack. Now the attackers swung their mounts into a turn less than a hundred yards from where Eleeri watched. She could see their faces, alight with bloodlust and cruelty. Beyond them the man reeled to his feet again, blood streaming down his face and from an arm which hung limp. She watched as he tried valiantly to raise his sword again.

Ka-dih, a warrior fights before me. Eleeri acted without thinking. Her people had always esteemed courage above most other abilities. She reached for a dried stick and broke it with a loud crack that echoed in the trees.

Both horsemen reacted. They split, each spinning in a different direction to face the danger. Experienced, the girl noted. But the only weapons seemed to be swords. There was no sign of guns or even bows. She smiled dangerously, rustling the bushes about her in a quick line. Let them believe she ran in fear.

Like any predator, they reacted to a prey who ran from them, sending the horses in pursuit. They aimed ahead, believing they could cut off the fugitive. But Eleeri had not continued to run. Instead she had doubled back and cut to one side. The horsemen charged into the brush several yards in front of her. Her bow sang a soft death song and both men fell with screams. The first landed limp and motionless, the second thrashed, trying to get to his feet again and failing. He was hard hit but not yet dead.

The girl sprang forward, knife in hand, to be diverted back into cover as the horsemen’s previous quarry reeled into view. With a shout he leaped and swung his sword, and the surviving bandit lay still. Now the swordsman peered about and it was with difficulty that Eleeri repressed a gasp as she saw his face clearly for the first time. He looked very like Far Traveler. He was old, wrinkled with age and living, his eyes were gray even as hers, and his gray hair had once been black, or so she thought. Her eyes narrowed as he swayed, then his sword fell from shaking hands.

Before she could move, he simply collapsed. Well, he would come to no harm lying there for a few minutes. Better to secure the horses before they went too far. She shed the pack and ran quickly to cut off their departure. She leaped lightly into a saddle and sent the horse trotting toward the others. With them secured, she could look about her. She beamed at her loot: three homes and all their gear, packs, bedrolls, saddlebags that bulged, weapons, possibly even food. She swung her chosen mount back to where the swordsman had fallen.

Dropping quickly from her horse, she studied the man. It had probably been loss of blood that made him faint. The wounds were not of themselves serious. She bound up his head and tore the shirt seam. Under the torn shirt were the remnants of once-powerful muscles. Hough! This one had been a warrior. Remembering the scene which had brought her into the fight, she amended that. He was still a warrior. But not a young man anymore. He’d done better, despite his age, than the bandits had expected. One against three and he’d killed one man before they began to get the better of him. She nodded: the dead man’s gear and mount would now belong to this swordsman. It was warrior right. She now had twice as much; she’d be content with that.

She looked down, wondering how she was to get the man to shelter. Perhaps a travois? Knife in hand, she moved swiftly, and soon he was back at the gate of the ruined building. Eleeri unhooked the pony and exerted all her strength to drag the stretcher in through the door. Once inside, she allowed herself to rest for a few minutes, then rifled the bandits’ packs quickly. She laid out bedding and rolled the man onto it. It was filthy and probably verminous, but it would provide warmth. That was more important than a few fleas and a smell.

Both the man’s wounds had stopped bleeding by now. She bathed them in water heated over her small fire, then dusted on antibiotic powder. From what she had always heard, more people in primitive societies died from infection than almost anything else. She checked the packs for food. Dried meat with a foul taste, moldy cheese, stale water. Gods, if she hadn’t killed them, their food probably would have. She scraped the mold from the cheese and made soup from her own supplies. This she fed spoonful by spoonful to her half-conscious prize.

He sagged back when she finished feeding him, already asleep again as she rose. The horses should be cared for. Then she could explore while the light lasted. Moving about the beasts, stroking, talking, she allowed herself to relax. With that came the tears. She had wondered what it would be like to kill; now she knew. It felt . . . She paused to consider her own emotions. She hadn’t killed to survive. She could have walked on and left the old man to die. She’d chosen instead to fight.

She felt no guilt; the attackers had been killers, torturing and baiting a man old enough to be their father’s father. Then why was she crying? She had done right, she felt no great guilt at her deeds. She decided that it was only a relief of tension. She’d been wound so tightly for so many weeks now that it was relief just to relax and be a girl. Tears didn’t mean weakness here and now, she decided. Just as long as no one knew or saw.

She wiped her eyes and, with the horses roughly stabled, returned to the main house. This one was different from the others she had seen. It was bare, for one thing. No rotting tapestries, no clothes in chests—no bones, either. Perhaps being so far from the other places, so isolated up in these hills, the people had had time to flee whatever threatened. It was clear where the old man had been sleeping. The one upstairs room with an intact roof showed signs of habitation. For a good long time, too, she guessed. She drifted outside and peered at the berry bushes. She found a container and picked until it was full. Then she tasted one. It was tart but refreshing, bursting juicily under her tongue.

She ate a handful, putting the rest aside for later. She dropped more blankets over the sleeping form by the fire. Her fingers touched his forehead. No fever as yet. Good. She banked the fire carefully, leaving a large log to burn slowly, and placing other branches nearby to feed the fire as it burned down.

Then she slipped outside with her blanket. She’d sleep in the stable. A pile of loose hay was by a door and into that she burrowed, folded blanket beneath her. It was always possible that there were more bandits around. She had no intention of being wrapped in a hampering blanket if they appeared. Hay piled on top of her would provide warmth and concealment. The blanket beneath would keep off the chill of the stone floor.

She slept lightly, but nothing disturbed the night. Waking at dawn as usual, she slipped back to the house. Her charge must have woken at least once during the night. The berry-filled pot had emptied. She picked it up and walked outside. She drifted about the bushes, enjoying the sunshine before returning with a filled container.

Old eyes surveyed her as she entered. He spoke, a slow series of words ending on a rising inflexion that seemed to signify a question.

Eleeri shook her head and spoke in turn. “I don’t speak that language. But I’ll learn if you teach me.” She waited.

The old man looked surprised and spoke again. Eleeri could tell it was not the same tongue as before, but it was still one she did not know. Again she shook her head. A third try, and a third shake of her head. He lay peering at her in bafflement. Then his hands began to move. He reached out for the pot and tapped it, slowly speaking a word. The girl grinned, repeating it carefully. He corrected her pronunciation and moved on.

A week later she had the rudiments of a vocabulary in two languages. By then her new friend was working beside her a short time each day. Twice Eleeri had gone hunting so that now meat dried in the smoke from the hearth.

She learned of the land gradually as her vocabulary grew. Once Karsten had been rich, thinly populated but at peace. But then invaders came and persuaded the ruler to attack some section of his people. A Horning the Ruler had called it, thrice horned to death and destruction.

Cynan, he told her, had been old even then. A neighbor had escaped to warn, and old or not, Cynan had rallied his kin to gather all they had and flee. In Estcarp, those who survived the pursuit had scattered. Grieving for those slain, the old warrior had slipped back across the mountains to hunt a different prey. His hunts had exacted a high blood-price for his dead.

He had gone back then to seek out other fugitives and with them he had traveled again to Estcarp, where distant relatives held their lands. But it was not his land or his home, and he had fretted. He had almost determined to go back when . . . Eleeri was unsure of her understanding at this point. Cynan appeared to be saying that witches had changed the mountains to trap the Karsten army. She shivered. In school they had taught her that superstition was an enemy. But when she looked at these mountains, she feared this was no superstition.

Weeks passed and became months as she stayed with the old man. Winter would be on them soon, and she must increase the food store. Grain now filled one bin, hay the loft above the ancient stable. Smoked and dried meat hung in a larder with apples and other fruit and berries put by for the snows.

From a clay deposit by the river, Eleeri had made dishes fire-baked. To those she had added cooking pots and water containers. Well-washed bedding and hay-stuffed mattresses provided comfort, and the three bandit horses were sleek with good living. Their gear shone, supple with her care, and all three would come at a call to nuzzle her affectionately.

Cynan had noticed that right from the first the beasts had trusted the girl. She might know nothing of witchcraft, but there was power there of some sort. She was the best rider he had ever seen, but beyond that the horses obeyed her in strange ways. She spoke to them, and her requests were granted as if the words were understood.

He and the girl sat by the fire one night. It had snowed for the first time that season and the air beyond the fire’s warmth was chill.

“Eleeri, be careful who you approach in this land. The memory of what was done to us lies heavily on Karsten still.”

The girl raised eyebrows. “What has that to do with me?”

“Your looks,” the old man said bluntly. “You may be no witch, you say you have no power, but you look like one of the race. Gray eyes, black hair.” He ticked the points off on his fingers. “Your cheekbones are high and your chin more pointed than blunt. You are slender, as we tend to be.” He nodded. “I know you are not of our blood, but from the outside and to one who may have only heard a description, you appear to be of Estcarp. Be very wary. Karsten blames the witches for what happened to their land.”

Eleeri snorted. “Oh,” she said sarcastically. “It was their duke who went crazy and ordered a massacre. As far as I can see, all the witches did was defend their land and their people.”

Her friend sighed. “I know that. But after the turning of the Mountains, I think few were left in this land who were sane. The army died almost to a man in that turning. Women bereaved do not reason, they simply hate. With most of the leaders dead and our duke slain, those left turned often to violence to settle their needs. Those who escaped turned to kill in reply. It became a cycle from which Karsten has never broken.”

“Tell me more of the Horning. Why would a ruler murder his own people?” Eleeri questioned.

The old man sighed. “It’s a long story, but I will tell you what I can briefly,” he said. “Karsten has always been a divided land in some ways. It was my people, the Witch People of Estcarp, who held a portion of it for long years before others came. But we are slow to breed, with long lives.”

“Is one the reason for the other?”

“No. It is the witch gift. The women who have it leave home and family as small children. The witches school them to the use of power.”

“Are power and gift the same, then?”

“No, my dear, but one is born from the other. The gift you have. That is the ability, the talent. But power is gathered to it over long years of work and learning. Power exists in many things also and may be tapped by one who has the gift. It is like to, say, your gift to handle horses. If you had never used it, the gift would still be there, dormant. But each time you used it, learned what you could do, it grew.”

Eleeri reflected. That made sense to her. She returned to the Horning. What had divided the people?

“Our people settled here in Karsten. The capital, Kars, grew on an excellent port where the Sulcar come. They are a race of sailors. Their women and children travel with them on all but the dangerous trips which explore unknown lands. Then others came. They took much of the land we had not used. For very many generations we lived side by side in peace.”

“But what changed it?”

Cynan sighed softly. “Nothing stays the same forever. I think perhaps there were some who had always been jealous of the witch gift. When the Kolder came, they used power of another kind to turn the duke against us. Their power could not break us; because of our touch of the gift, our people could stand against it. To rule Karsten and the other lands they coveted, they must be rid of all with our gift. Thus they set the duke to run mad. We were thrice horned as outlaws. The hands of all were against us and no matter what might be done to us, there was to be no accounting.”

Eleeri shivered. With license like that she could well imagine some of what would have been done. Cynan touched her shoulder in understanding. “It was all a long time ago. Other things came of it all. Some were good to balance evil.”

She looked her question.

“If some of Karsten feared and resented us, others were our friends. In the days when we died for being what we were, some of Karsten stood beside us. They hid us, risked their lives and all they had to keep us safe and smuggle us away over-mountain to Estcarp. None of us forget that not all were greedy for what we had.

“Nor was that all.” He smiled gently at her. “You are not the first to enter these lands through a gate. Long before you came Simon Tregarth. He wed a woman of the gift and much power.”

“But I thought the witches had to stay virgin.”

“So they do; that is why our people grow less. It is also why the witches cast out Simon’s wife from their midst. Yet, perhaps because Simon was not of our race, his wife retained her gift.”

Eleeri flung back her head, laughing. “I bet that annoyed them.”

“It did in truth. Still Simon wed Jaelithe his witch lady. Then came an event almost unheard of among us. At one birth she bore three children, two boys and a girl.”

“Triplets!”

“Just so. But all of that is a long story, too. Suffice it to say the girl had the gift. The witches had her away to their place of learning, but her brothers rescued her. They fled to the mountains. There to the east there is a very ancient land over-mountain, Escore. There even now they live and fight against evil.”

“What evil?”

The old man sighed. “Am I to tell you the whole history of all the lands? Generations ago, Escore was our land, in part. We shared it with many creatures, and other races, too. But adepts rose. They learned great power, and with it came evil. Some turned to the darkness to aid them. Others battled them to save the land and those who inhabited it. Still others chose to withdraw, either through gates they created or into their own strongholds. Eventually my people fled Escore. There were others who chose to remain.”

His mind wandered back. Both to the tales of his boyhood and those later stories he had heard. “There was another race. Like us but tied more strongly to the land. They chose to stay. They are led by the Lady of the Green Silences: Duhaun, Morquant, and other names she uses in the old tales. She is one of great gifts and power. Now she or one of her line rules the Valley of the Green Silences, where good strives always against the evil many adepts unleashed.”

“You said other creatures and races? Do you mean that there’s more than one? What are they like?” Eleeri was leaning forward in her interest.

“There are Gray Ones, or so the word comes. They are not men but have affinities with wolves. They fight with teeth and talons, not swords, nonetheless they are formidable fighters and intelligent to some extent.”

“Who else?”

“Keplians and Renthans. The Renthans are both beautiful and intelligent. Often they act as mounts for those of the valley. They fight always for the Light.” He sighed. “I know little of the other, the Keplians. They look like black horses in many ways. They may come to one who has lost his mount, appearing tame to the eyes. But if you mount, then they bear you away to be devoured by evil. The adepts who turned to darkness often used them as mounts. It is said that despite their beauty, the only good Keplian is a dead Keplian.”

“But what about Karsten here?” Eleeri queried. “As I came toward this place, I found keep after keep which had been destroyed. None of that was old. I’d say most of it had been done within the past year.”

“When it looked as if we’d lose, the witches turned the mountains,” Cynan said slowly. “They used the power to wring them out into new shapes. The current duke and all his army were within the mountain trails. I suspect very few could have escaped. After that, others tried to become duke. Each time they must fight against those who reject them. For more than thirty years now the people of this land have looted and been looted in their turn. Here and there men have gathered families and sufficient fighters to make some sort of peace in their lands. But those places are few. Even Kars is lawless, so I hear.”

Eleeri was bewildered. “How can people live like that? The land will end up with no one, surely.”

“In many places it has. How many living did you see as you crossed the land?’

“No one.”

“You see. To the north and east the land is empty. It is to the west and south, along the seacoast where traders still come, that people are to be found.”

“Traders?”

“The Sulcar ships sometimes touch port. They come armed and wary, but they do come now and again.”

The girl nodded, remembering all he had told her of that race of seafarers. “What about the Falconers you spoke of? Are any of them still around?”

Cynan sighed softly. “That I know not. They left the mountains before the turning. They took service in many places and with many people. I think they would live yet as a people; they are strong fighters and proud.” His eyes met hers. “But never mind others. What do you plan? You will not stay here beyond the snows. I feel your restlessness even now. You could travel over-mountain to Estcarp. I could give you places where you would be welcome in my name.”

Eleeri blinked. “Are there still trails?” Then she snorted at her own stupidity. “Of course there must be; otherwise you wouldn’t have been able to get back. How does the land lie there?”

She watched as he drew a burned stick from the fire and drew on the stone floor. “I see,” she finally said. “If I return along the mountain edge to the west and cross north, then I’ll be in Estcarp.” She laid a slim finger on the blank portion. “What land lies here?”

Cynan was silent for a long time. When he finally answered, she was conscious of a rising desire. There was something in the name of Escore as he said it, something which drew her even as the east had originally drawn her here to this secluded valley. She studied the map silently before she spoke.

“Our river—if I followed that, I would arrive in time in this land?”

“So I think, but I do not know for certain.”

Eleeri stood and walked to her bedding. She hauled firewood, banking the fire for the night as she thought. The pull, the feeling of rightness grew stronger. She settled into her bedding and allowed her body to relax.

From his bed the old man watched her face. Just before sleep claimed them, he spoke again. “You’ve decided, haven’t you?”

“Yes. When spring comes, I will go to Escore. Will you come with me?”

“No. I was born here in this hold. I came back to die here. But if you meet any who knew me where you go, tell them I still live.”

“I will.” She drifted into sleep then. A destination determined. Escore . . . she would go to Escore.