Zarsthor's Bane

2

It was Uta who broke the silence following the dying away of that resounding and despairing word. The cat crouched to face that portion of the hedge behind which Brixia flattened in hiding. From her furred throat sounded what was near the scream of a a tormented woman. Brixia had heard such a shriek before—it was Uta’s challenge. But that it was aimed at her came as a shock.

The boy whirled, his hand slapping down on the hilt of his sword in instant reaction. There was no chance now for Brixia to slip away—she had waited far too long. While to continue to lie here only to be routed out of hiding like the cowardly skulker they might well deem her—No! That she would not wait for.

She arose, pushed through a thin place in that hedging, to advance into the open, her spear ready in her hand. Since there was no arrow on any bow string to provide menace, she believed her spear was fair answer to the other’s sword.

Uta had faced about after that betrayal, staring round-eyed at the boy. His face was taut, wary. Now his sword was out of the scabbard.

“Who are you?” There was wariness in his sharp demand also.

Her name would mean nothing to him. During the past months of solitary wandering it had come to mean little to her either. She was far from the dale of her birth, even from any territory where naming her House might have some proper identification. Since she had never heard of Eggarsdale it was logical to suppose that such an isolated western holding would never have heard in turn of Moorachdale or the House of Trogus which had ruled there before all ended in a day of blood and flame.

“A wanderer—” she began, then wondered if answering that demand at all would in a small way weaken her position.

“A woman!” He slapped his sword back into its sheath. “Are you of Shaver’s get—or Hamel’s—he had a daughter or two—”

Brixia stiffened. The tone of his voice—Pride she had forgotten made her stand straight. She might have the outward seeming of some field wench (which he had certainly deemed her by his manner) but she was herself—Brixia of Trogus’ House. And where was that now? There was a ruin as smoke blackened and desolate as this—nothing else.

“I have no tie with this land,” she said quietly, but her level return gaze was a challenge. “If you seek some field woman of your lord’s holding—look elsewhere.” She added no title of respect to that statement.

“Wolfhead wench!” The boy’s lip curled. He drew back a step, taking his stand before his lord in a gesture of defense. His eyes darted right, then left, striving to seek who else might lie in concealment.

“Those are your words,” she returned. It was as she had thought, he believed her one of an outlaw band. “Give not any name to another, youngling, until you are sure.” Brixia put into that all she could summon of the proper distance-speech she had once known. A Lady of the Holding would speak so in answer to such impertinence.

He stared at her. But before he could reply, his lord moved, got to his feet. Over the boy’s slightly hunched shoulder his dull eyes regarded the girl without interest, or perhaps even not seeing her at all.

“Jartar delays—” The man lifted one hand to his forehead. “Why does he not come? It is needful we be on the march before nooning—”

“Lord,” his eyes still on the girl, the boy backed another step, putting his left hand on his lord’s arm, “it is time to rest. You have been ill, later we shall ride—”

The man moved impatiently, shook off that touch.

“There will be no more resting—” a shadow of firmness deepened his voice. “There can be no resting until the deed is done, until we have the ancient power again. Jartar knows the way—where is he?”

“Lord, Jartar is—”

But though the boy once more grasped at the other’s arm, the man paid no attention to him. There was again a shadow of awareness on his face, a lifting of that cloud of dull unreason. Uta trotted toward the pair of them, come to stand before the lord. Now the cat uttered a soft sound.

“Yes—” Exerting himself, the man pushed aside the boy, went to one knee on the pavement and held out both hands to the cat. “By Jartar’s knowledge we can go, is it not so?” He asked that question, not of his human companion, but of the cat. His eyes met those of the animal with the same unblinking stare as Uta could focus for as long and steadily as she wished.

“You know also, furred one. Have you perhaps come as a sending?” The man nodded. “When Jartar is with us—then we shall go. Go—” The slight animation he had shown began to fail, knowledge slipped visibly away from him. He was like a man swiftly overcome by slumber he could not fight.

The boy caught at his shoulders.

“Lord—” He looked beyond the man he supported to the girl.

There was such hostility in the glare he turned upon her that Brixia took a stronger grip on her spear. It was as if he hated the sight of her enough to open attack. Then a flash of understanding came to her. He was moved by shame—shame that someone should see his lord so bereft of his senses.

Instinctively, at that moment, she also guessed that for her to make any sort of a move, say anything which would show she did understand, might in turn render matters worse. Totally at a loss Brixia met the boy’s glare with what calm she could summon. She wet her lips with tongue tip, but said nothing.

For a very long moment they stood thus and then his glare became a twisted scowl.

“Get out! Go—! We have nothing left worth the stealing!” He made another gesture towards his sword.

Brixia’s temper flared. Why that order seemed like a lash laid across her face she could not have told. These two were nothing to her. She had seen suffering and trouble enough, and had learned that in order to survive, she must go her own way—alone.

But she curbed that temper. With a shrug, she retreated toward the hedge from which she had emerged, caution telling her not to turn her back on the pair. Though she, nor no one else, need have anything to fear from the man.

The boy had him on his feet again, was urging him back towards the tower door with a steady murmur of encouragement pitched too low now for Brixia to hear. She watched them disappear before she went also.

It would be wise to leave the dale entirely, she told herself as she climbed the slope towards the ridge top. Yet she made no move to go. An expertly flung stone stunned one of the leapers in the grass, and she dressed the lean body skillfully, saving the skin to be worked upon at her leisure. Six such would form a short cloak and she had three already green cured and rolled within the journey bag at her hidden campsite.

Knowing that she might not be the only one to have marked those camped in the ruins, she took extra precautions at concealment herself. Had any outlaws seen the horse, the sword the boy wore—that would be loot enough to draw down a small raid. Brixia wondered if the boy realized how dangerous his camp among the forgotten hold buildings might really be. She shrugged. If he did not it was no responsibility of hers to correct that ignorance.

As she built her small fire of carefully selected wood which would give the least possible smoke, and then used a spark from her prized snapper to light it, her thoughts were with the two below. Brixia was reasonably sure there were only two.

The boy named this Eggarsdale and spoke of it as home. His Lord was plainly unable to care for himself—how then did they propose to exist? Yes, there was game of a sort to be found. But without a bow one had to have dexterity with a throwing stone to bring a leaper down. She had near starved—had eaten grubs and chewed on grass—until luck favored her and she had learned enough to remain alive. While a single leaper made hardly a full meal for one at best.

Brixia turned those bits of her own catch she had spitted in the heat of the fire, to be half cooked before she tore at them hungrily, and sat back on her heels. Though she had had no time to explore the long overgrown garden patches below she could well guess that few edible plants had seeded, or rerooted themselves during what was doubtless years of abandonment. There were herbs one could cull, and that she had done when and where she could. But those, if they could be found, would not show in any quanity. Unless those two had come supplied—how were they to fare?

Brixia turned her stick spits again, jealous of the fire which sputtered and leaped under the spill of juices she had no way of catching. Her mouth filled with saliva as she smelled the roasting meat.

There was a small sound to draw her attention to the opposite side of the fire.

“Unfriend,” she said, eyeing Uta sternly. “If you have changed your House Shield, lady, then go there and ask for a guest place at the great table—come not to me.” Still she flipped one of her meat sticks up, stripped its burden off, using a leaf to shield her fingers, letting the half-seared chunks lie on a second leaf for Uta to take or refuse.

The cat sat waiting for the meat to cool enough to mouth. Yet she glanced only now and then at the offering, rather watching Brixia the while in that disconcerting unblinking manner. The girl shifted. It was only Uta’s way—there was no reason to feel that in some fashion her own thoughts were being combed and shifted.

“Yes, go to them, Uta. The big one seems to like you well enough.”

The girl narrowed her own eyes and stared as straightly back at the cat. Uta’s actions in regard to the man had puzzled her. Not for the first time she wished there was some way of communication possible between them. Before that desire had been born of her own loneliness—at those times when that had formed a prison for her. Then the physical presence of the cat had not been enough to banish the girl’s dark thoughts, Brixia had longed for another voice—to shake her out of such aching emptiness.

Now she wished speech because of curiosity. In some way Uta had been able to pierce the clouded mind of this Lord Marbon—to bring him into some measure of awareness. Why—and how?

Brixia took up a skewer and waved it in the air, cooling the meat it impaled enough to chew at it.

“What did you do to him, Uta?” she asked. “He is as one moon-blasted. Did it come from a wound, I wonder, or some trick of the invaders? Perhaps a fever—Who is this Jartar upon whom he calls, and who the boy says is dead?” She chewed vigorously at the tough meat. Uta was eating, too, and had not even looked up at her questions.

That song—it could not be any of a swordsmith’s making—crude, ill fashioned—like it had been done by someone without skill, only a driving purpose. Brixia was slightly surprised at the turn of her own thoughts. But to her those carried the sense of truth. Purpose in that song? Zarsthor’s Bane—what else had the song named it? Star bane.

Someone called Zarsthor had taken up the sword against a foe and had been destroyed because the enemy had had this weapon. Brixia shook her head. There were legends in many about old wars and struggles. All of them held a small kernel of truth, but a truth which meant nothing today. Unless the dark touch of Zarsthor’s Bane still lay upon this dale.

Nothing was entirely improbable among the dales of High Hallack. The Old Ones, before they had withdrawn from the lands bordering the great sea (fading northward or westward beyond the Waste itself), had strange knowledge and many powers. There were places to be shunned and other places—She stopped eating as a sudden flash of memory struck her with such intensity that it was almost as if she herself had been whirled away in both time and distance.

The afternoon that they had fled from Moorachdale’s keep, when the warning came that the defense could no longer hold, Brixia’s breathing quickened. Running—running through the twilight—the soon-come leaping of destroying fire behind, the screams and shouts—It seemed that at this moment she could feel again a sharp pain beneath her ribs, that in her leg—as she fought against the drag of her long skirt, fear sour in her mouth.

On—up to the ridge. Kuniggod had run beside her, urging her on. Kuniggod—Brixia’s face twisted at that memory. She wanted to thrust it away from her—far away—but memory would not now be denied. Kuniggod, who had risen from her bed wheezing and coughing from the Deep Chill, but who had made sure her nurseling was out and away before death fought its way to the door of the ladies’ bower—using the inner stair of the hall—the bolt hole gate.

They had run through the night, apart from any others who had broken free. Thus Kuniggod had led her to that narrow way among tall stones where they had stumbled along, clinging to each other, Brixia then half witless with fear. She had been so unknowing of the way which they were taking that they had come into that Place before she noted truly what was about them.

No dalesblood willingly sought the sites which the Old Ones had once claimed for their own purposes—not unless such a seeker was a Wise Woman already learned in some of the unwritten knowledge. Even then that Wise Woman walked softly and with great care, for there were malific powers to be faced—sometimes rising without warning. Save that Brixia had always heard it whispered that such plague spots of the Dark had their own warning atmospheres and could be smelled, or felt, before the foolish were full into their nets.

Where Kuniggod had guided her was one of those shunned places, yet it seemed that her old nurse had had knowledge of it. For as she had sunk, coughing, with tearing gasps for breath in between, the woman had clutched at Brixia, holding her with all the strength she could summon when the girl, coming to her senses, would have run forth again.

“Stay—” she had gasped. “This is—not—of—any evil—”

Then Kuniggod had fallen forward on her face so that Brixia had in turn knelt to gather her into her arms, hold her, while the woman choked and struggled for breath. The girl knew that her old nurse could go no farther, nor could she go on and leave her. So she had huddled under the glow of a moon which was far too full and bright—for it appeared to hang directly above them—showing her every detail of the place.

It did not form a true circle she perceived by a closer study. Rather stones of a silvery gray-white, which shimmered in this light, formed two crescents, their pointed horns some distance from each other—leaving so two entrances to the inner part where the refugees crouched. Those stones were not rough, rather had been smoothed before being set so. Brixia could see that there were lines traced near the top of each. But whether those formed some design, or were the remains of inscriptions too weather worn to be any longer read, the girl could not tell.

However, the longer she studied those stones the more the light appeared to curdle and cling about them. They might, to her fear dazzled eyes, be giant candles, their light exuding from the sides as well as from those crowns where wicks should have been. Yet the light in the stones did not spread far beyond them, only furnished a glow to cloak each pillar.

Looking upon those steady glimmers of light Brixia’s first fear of the unknown had slowly seeped away. Her heart, which had pounded so fiercely as Kuniggod had drawn her here, slowed its beat. She began, without realizing, to breathe both more deeply and quietly. From somewhere came a numbing, a lassitude, which oddly comforted her. Her head nodded, she felt pleasantly drowsy, content.

At length she must have slid down to lie, Kuniggod’s head still pillowed on her arm, feeling as safe as if she rested behind the drawn curtains of her own bed. And so lying she fell gently into a deep sleep.

When Brixia had aroused the next morning she still lay with Kuniggod, and it had taken her time to realize where she was and what had happened to her. No stark fear returned to assail her. A curtain had dropped between her and what had happened the night before—as if years of time separated one part of her life from another. She had sensed a new strength, the restlessness of purpose which she could not understand, but her ignorance did not bother her.

Nor had the girl felt more than a shadow of sorrow when she knew that Kuniggod’s spirit had left her. Brixia had placed her nurse’s hands together on that quiet breast, kissed her forehead. Then she had stood and looked at the pillars. In the light of morning they were simple stone. Still there continued to abide in her this peace, or an absence of emotion—a new freedom from her fears. She knew then that it lay within her to survive—that survival in fact was demanded of her for a purpose which was not clear.

Whether that peace was of good or ill, she did not question. In that dawn light it gave her the strength to go on living, and enough of it she bore with her as shield and support through what lay ahead.

Now in this camp above Eggarsdale Brixia sat gazing into the flames and wondering. What had worked in her during that night she had spent encircled by the double sign of the new moon? Why had that memory now returned to her so exactly and in such vivid detail at this moment when somehow she had never desired to recall it before? Why did it seem that all which lay before that hour was of very little account in her life, rather that what she had done since had more meaning—would be of use to her?

Why—and why—and why—?

“There are many whys,” she said aloud to Uta. The cat was washing her face, but at Brixia’s words she stopped the swing of her paw, looked over at the girl.

“I am Brixia of the House of Torgus—or am I still, Uta? Oh, I do not mean the wearing of fine wool, the sitting in a seat of honor, the saying to man and woman—do this—and having it done. Those are not the signs truly of House birth. Look upon me,” she laughed and was startled, realizing how long it had been since she had voiced such a sound. “I look as such as might beg meat from a feasting, or be stoned from a village by those minded not to treat with suspicious wanderers. Yet it is true, I am Brixia of the House of Torgus—and that only I myself can take from me—by some act so unworthy of my heritage that I must judge myself and render punishment thereafter.”

“Your young friend in the valley rendered outward judgment upon me, Uta.” She shook her head. “I thought I had thrown aside pride as a useless thing. Pride does not put food in the mouth, covering on the back, keep breath within one’s body. Not that kind of pride. Perhaps I have rather the need to say ‘you cannot defeat me—you shadow of fear!’ That is the kind of pride you walk with, Uta. I think it is a good pride.”

She nodded emphatically. Still in the girl stirred a core of discontent. She had remembered too much, even though it was clouded and far away. And how that boy had looked at her—that now began to sting more than it had even when it first touched her.

“So be it!” Brixia balled her right hand into a fist and drove that into the cup of her left palm. “Those two are nothing to me, Uta. Nor can their thoughts touch me now. We shall be off with the morning coming and leave them to lord it over their tumbled blocks of stone.”

What she said was the best of good sense. Still—

As Brixia went about making her preparations for a night’s camp—finding a break in the ridge which was nearly half a cave and covering its floor with dried leaves and grass for the kind of nest she had come to use for her temporary lodging places, she paused now and then to glance at the tower below. Now she did not skulk or attempt to conceal her presence. For she was sure that the boy had no reason to seek her out, his care for his lord would occupy him fully.

She watched him come from the tower, take the horse to where a stream ran. After the animal had drunk, he led it back into a walled field. Then he went again to the stream side, bringing along a leather saddle bottle which he filled and carried back to the tower. Never did he look up, she might already be wiped from his mind.

Somehow, that, too, was like a prick against tender skin. Though why she should care, Brixia did not understand. His unconcern made her more bold. She took no cover as she herself went to that stream with her own worn water carrier. And she lingered to wash her face and her neck, wishing that there was a pool hereabouts which she could use for a mirror. Though perhaps it was just as well there was not, she decided as she combed through her thatch of hair with her fingers, picking out bits of leaf and twig left by her journey through the hedge.

Why she lingered—even arranged to camp here for the night—Brixia could not understand. Her stay had no purpose, yet, when she tried to plan going on, there was an uneasiness in her which would not let her leave that bed for far. Restlessly she prowled along the ridge above. Even when she, almost absentmindedly, brought down another leaper she took no pleasure in her skill or such excellent unexpected addition to her supplies.

When Brixia returned to her nest place, she found Uta crouched on the crown of one of the rocks which formed its sides—the cat’s head fixed so that she looked, not down at the tower, but rather along the ridge itself to the westward where the dale opened its other throat upon the dreaded Waste.

“What is it?” Brixia had seen that concentration in Uta before, and she had fast learned what it might well portend.

Though the girl’s senses, trained by the life as she was following, were keener than most of her kind, they were sadly limited compared to the cat’s. Brixia raised her head, used sight and her sense of smell, as well as hearing, for the task of finding what was serious enough to keep Uta so absorbed.

There was a trail of smoke from one vent in the tower. Those sheltering there apparently did not know the trick of picking the right dried wood to give as little sign of a fire as possible, or else they did not care if their occupation was noticed. No, not the Keep—then—

The girl dropped down in the shadow of the rocks, staying on her knees, the standing stone favored by Uta pressing against her left shoulder, exposing as little of her body as she could while she surveyed the dale. There were the broken walls which had marked the fields, the gardens, and the crop places. Brush made a thin screen, spreading ever farther, along some of those walls. To the west the fields ended in a copse of wood which no sight, unless it be that of a bird, could penetrate.

But up out of that wood now burst birds. Those wheeled and called hoarsely. Brixia snatched up her spear. She knew meaning of such alarm signs very well. There was an intruder in the woods—and these birds had very little to fear save—man!

Intruders—coming out of the waste? Had they been of the same party as the two below surely they would have ridden in from the east following the old road. Outlaws—rats and wolves from the Waste gathering to gain what scant pickings might still lie here—even as she had earlier thought to comb the ruins.

Rats and wolves they might be—but they had fangs and claws!

A boy with a sword—a man with blasted wits—and neither given any warning.

The two were nothing to her. And what had she—a knife thinned near to the point of breaking when she put any pressure on it—a hunting spear? It would be folly—rank folly—

Her thoughts hammered at her. But she was already slipping away from her hiding hole, heading down slope, using every fraction of cover craft she knew. Beside her Uta crept with the same caution.

This act was folly, but somehow she was bound to it.