The Unforsaken Hiero

PROLOGUE: A CHANGE OF MISSION

There were two fires burning in the night, providing the only lights on the dark plain. A small group was scattered about one. A short distance away, Hiero and Luchare sat by the other, facing Brother Aldo. The old man was staring into the flames, his tightly curled white beard standing out brightly against skin that was as dark as that of Luchare.

“I must go north at once,” Brother Aldo said at last. “I must arouse those of my Brotherhood. We have sought peace for many lives, but now there is no peace. Destruction is coming upon us, and we must take action against it, It is no longer enough to watch and study the foe.” Sadness deepened the lines on his face, momentarily revealing his great age.

Hiero waited in silence. His skin was lighter and redder in hue than that of his companions, and his black hair was coarse and straight, trimmed just below the ears in a short bob. With his hawk nose and sturdy, lithe frame, he might almost have been one of his remote Amerindian forebears, save for the neat mustache; the facial hair indicated the Caucasoid admixture of his once despised ancestry.

Beside him, Luchare seemed to be drowsing, her head resting against his shoulder. He tightened his arm around her waist, smiling fondly. To his right, he could see that Captain Gimp and the sea rovers were still talking around their fire. Off to his left, the line of the great forest towered in the dark. He wondered what the strange women of the trees and their queen Vilah-ree were doing. Would he ever see one of them again? With an effort, he brought his mind back to the present as Brother Aldo began speaking again.

“We have done well, this far,” the old man said. “We’ve blocked the Unclean, destroyed many of them, and we have this.” He pointed to the packet that held the lost volumes of the ancients. “You have accomplished your mission, Per Hiero. But your work is not done. The next danger comes from the South. And it is there that you must go—you and Luchare!”

“What about the books?” Hiero protested. “I am supposed to get them to Abbot Demero as fast as I can. These southern wastes are not my territory. I came here only to get the knowledge we need in the North.”

The Elevener smiled faintly. “Don’t worry about Demero, my boy. The books will go north with me. Your abbot will approve. I know Demero—have known him longer than you have lived. Who do you think put me on watch for you? Why do you think I was so handy when you were trapped in the drowned city? Think about it for a moment.”

Hiero grunted in surprise. But Aldo’s words explained many things. It had been no accident, no fortunate coincidence, that had brought the Elevener to aid them so opportunely. How many others had somehow been alerted to watch over this mission? Hiero grinned ruefully. “I should have guessed that Demero would have a few extra tricks he never told me about,” he admitted.

Brother Aldo chuckled, then sobered quickly. “I’ll leave for the North at dawn. I’ll take Gimp and his men with me. We’ll get a boat somehow; there are many ways. But I must also take Gorm with me. Call him.”

Hiero sent a rapid mind call on the wavelength of the young bear. A moment later, the burly shape of Gorm padded up to them from where he had been curled in apparent sleep. Does no other ever sleep around here? came a mental mumble as the bear flopped his bulk down beside them.

Hiero laughed. You do nothing but sleep while we have to do all the hard thinking and planning. He eyed Gorm appraisingly, It was fantastic that this strange folk had hardly been noticed by the Abbey students. Their brains were quite as good as human minds, and only their desire for privacy had kept them so long hidden. The Death had caused strange and horrible mutations, but it had also created wonders, and one of those was the race of Gorm, the silent and hidden bear folk, whose Wise Ones had sent Gorm out to gather knowledge.

You want me to go north with the Old One here, came Gorm’s thought. He seemed quite placid, and his brain waves were clear and undisturbed.

“I don’t want you to go anywhere away from me,” Hiero said aloud, then put the idea into thought. He was conscious of how much he would miss this furry friend. But Brother Aldo thinks it might be best if you went north with him and got back in touch with the Wise Ones of your folk.

To Hiero’s surprise, Brother Aldo had picked up his thoughts, those he meant to be private as well as those to the bear. Now the old man sent a message meant for both Hiero and Gorm.

Listen well, both of you. This is a great struggle between that which is evil and vile and that which we believe to be good and blessed. The high Councils of the Unclean are sealed to us. But my Order has watched them for many years, back beyond the life span of the remotest grandsire of any here. They seek universal domination and they would restore the evils that brought The Death to the world.

We must work together, we of the honest and life-preserving ones of whatever form. We must fight them wherever they appear. There is great evil rising in the South, in D’alwah and its neighbors. I want Hiero to go there with Luchare, to her ancient kingdom, the nation where I was once a native and which I know well. And you, Gorm, I want to go north and make report to your Elders, to tell them of our need. What say you?

There was an instant of mental silence. Then an ursine thought came in answer. I must go. I understand some of what you think. It must be so, for it is the charge laid upon me by the Wise Ones of my people. Now can I sleep?

Suiting action to thought, Gorm got up and wandered off into the dark, where they could hear him curling up again.

“Well, Hiero,” Brother Aldo said, “we can use speech again. All this thought sending wears one out, eh?” He smiled.

Hiero found little to smile about. “Even if Abbot Demero might agree to let me go, what do you think I can do down in the South? I know little of D’alwah, save for what Luchare has told me. How-can I help in a strange country with unknown laws and rules of behavior? What can I do in a foreign land without friends, except for this one?” He bent his cheek to nuzzle the mop of tight black curls that lay on his shoulder.

Luchare looked up at him with eyes that were clear, with no sign of sleep in them. “What can you do? Look, Per Hiero Desteen, have you forgotten who I am? My father is King Dariyale of D’alwah, and I’m his only heir. You’re my husband. You’ll be a prince of the unknown North. Everyone will accept you.” She looked over at Brother Aldo. “You have many Eleveners there, don’t you? I’ve seen them helping the village people when there’s trouble. That means we have allies there—though not in public. And we’ll have Klootz.”

She whistled sharply and waved an arm over her head. Hiero smiled as a towering shape paced up to the girl, massive hooves clicking on bits of gravel as it came. A giant head with blubber lips and a drooping snout lowered itself so that the huge, soft nose touched her hair briefly. Then the morse stood quietly waiting to see why he had been summoned.

When humanity began to pick itself up after The Death, the horses were gone, vanished without a trace. In the far North, the reviving structure of the Abbeys and their dependent farms tried many other animals and found these mutated descendants of the moose to be best. Hiero and Klootz had chosen each other at the annual calf-pick years before, and they had never been separated.

I wonder how he’ll like the South, Hiero thought to his mate and the older man. Nothing like him there. Will the people be afraid of him.?

“Not afraid,” Luchare answered, stroking a leg of the morse. “He would be admired as a creature no one had ever seen before. He would add to your prestige.”

Hiero stood up and began to stroke the enormous, palmate antlers with careful fingers, peeling off the velvet where it came away easily. He could feel the heat underneath where this outer cover of the new antlers was not ready. Klootz lipped his shoulder affectionately.

Aldo resumed his argument. “Consider what you have already done in a land foreign to you and with only the help of friends you found along the way. You’ve saved a princess, crossed the great Inland Sea, and fought and beaten some of our worst enemies. And you’ve accomplished a nearly impossible mission.”

“You’ve done what no one else could have done,” Luchare added when Aldo stopped. “You have defeated the one who calls himself S’duna, the chief of their horrid Blue Circle. Now you can go on to be a leader of my people.”

Hiero looked down at her, and his heart filled with this love that was greater than he had ever known before. Then he thought of Abbot Demero, the grim old warrior who had sent him on this mission. Would the ruler of the Abbey Council approve of his going south with a new wife and a new task? He seemed to see the lined old face in his mind, and it was smiling at him. A sign? Hiero shrugged at the idea and then thought again. Perhaps he was picking up a vague and transient thought from far away. He smiled and looked at Brother Aldo, another wise old man who had gone to war because he had no choice in his own soul.

“Tell Gimp that you’ll leave for the North at dawn. Luchare and I will go south on Klootz. I assume that you can communicate with your Eleveners in the South? Then send me word and we’ll open a channel of messages.” He laughed a little sourly. “You say you know Abbot Demero. Then you can keep him off my back and not let me be cursed and expelled from the church. Now let’s get a little sleep.”