The Forgotten Beasts of Eld (3 page)

“Liralen...” The old woman’s face softened until it seemed dreaming and young beneath her curls. “The pennant-winged, moon-colored Liralen... Oh, child, when you capture it finally, let me see it.”

“I will. But it is very hard to find, especially when people interrupt me with babies. My father fed me goat’s milk, but Tam does not seem to like it.”

The old woman sighed. “I wish I could feed him, but a cow would be more useful, unless I find some mountain woman to nurse him.”

“He is mine,” Sybel said. “I do not want some other woman to begin to love him.”

“Of course, child, but— Will you let me love him, just a little? It has been so long since I have had children to love. I will steal a cow from someone, leave a jewel in its place.”

“I can call a cow.”

“No, child, if anyone is a thief it must be me. You must think of yourself, of what would happen if people suspected you of calling away their animals.”

“I am not afraid of people. They are fools.”

“Oh, child; but they can be so powerful in their loving and hating. Did your father, when he talked to you, give you a name?”

“I am Sybel. But you did not have to ask me that.”

The gray eyes curved faintly. “Oh, yes, my birds are everywhere... But there is a difference in a name spoken of, and a name given at last by the bearer. You know that. My name is Maelga. And the child’s name? Will you give me that as a gift?”

Sybel smiled. “Yes. I would like you to have his name. It is Tamlorn.” She looked down at him, her ivory hair tickling the small, plump face. “Tamlorn. My Tam,” she whispered, and Tamlorn laughed.

So Maelga stole a cow and left a jeweled ring in its place, and for months afterward people left their barn doors open hopefully. Tam grew strong, pale-haired and gray-eyed, and he laughed and shouted through the still white halls, and teased the patient animals and fed them. Years passed, and he became lean and brown, and explored the Mountain with shepherd boys, climbing through the mists, searching deep caves, bringing home red foxes, birds and strange herbs for Maelga. Sybel continued her long search for the Liralen, calling nights, disappearing for days at a time and returning with old, jeweled books with iron locks that might hold its name. Maelga chided her for stealing, and she would reply absently,

“From little wizardlings, who do not know how to use them. I must have that Liralen. It is my obsession.”

“One day,” Maelga said, “you will mistake a great wizard for a little wizardling.”

“So? I am great, too. And I must have the Liralen.”

One evening, twelve years after Coren had brought Tamlorn to her, Sybel went to the cold, deep cave Myk had built for Gyld the Dragon. It lay behind a ribbon of water, and trees about it grew huge and still as pillars vaulting a chamber of silence. She stepped over three rocks to the falls, then slipped behind it, the water running across her face like tears. Within, the cave was dark and wet as the heart of a mountain; Gyld’s green eyes glowed in it like jewels. The great, folded bulk of him formed a shadow against the deeper shadow. Sybel stood still before him, like a slender pale flame in the dark. She looked into the unblinking eyes.

Yes?

Thoughts rose slow and formless as a dark bubble in the Dragon’s mind, and opened to the dry, parchment rustle of his voice.
It has been a thousand years since I fell asleep over the gold I gathered from Prince Sirkel, and fell asleep watching his open eyes and his blood trickle slowly over coin piece and coin piece and gather in the hollow neck of a cup.
His voice whispered away. There was silence while another bubble formed and broke.
I dream of that gold, and wake to see it, and it is not here... I wake to cold stone. Give me leave to gather it once more.

Sybel was silent as a stone rising from stone. She said,
You will fly, and men will see you and remember your deeds with terror. They will come to destroy my house and they will see gold burning in the sun, and nothing, nothing will turn them back from my house.

No
, said Gyld.
I will go by night and gather it in secret, and if any man watches, I will slay in secret.

Then
, said Sybel,
they would come and kill us both.

No man can kill me.

What of me? And Tam? No.

The great bulk stirred, amorphous, and she felt the warm sigh of his breath.

I was old and forgotten when the Master woke me by name in the hollow veins of Eld, and brought me out of my dreaming with his song of my deeds... It was pleasant to be sung of once more... It is pleasant to be named by you, but I must have my sweet gold...

Quick and turning as a snake his thoughts fled away from her, slipping down, down through caverns of his mind to the dark maze of it. Swift as water draining into earth, stealthy as man burying man beneath moonlight, he carried his name down to the forgetting regions where he was nameless even to himself, but she was there before him, waiting behind the last door of his mind. She stood among the half fragments of his memories of slayings, lustings and half-eaten meals and said,

If you want this so badly, I will think of a way. Do nothing, but be patient. I will think.

His breath came once more, and his thoughts welled once more to the dark cave.
Do this one thing for me, and I will be patient.

She stepped out of the cave, water shining in her hair, and breathed deeply of the cool night air. She thought of the Dragon in flight, smooth flame in motion, and of the deep, peaceful pools of the Black Swan’s eyes, and the memory of the Dragon’s ground mind with the broken embers of his passions faded deep into her own. Then she heard a rustling behind her in the dark, still earth, sensed a watching.

“Tam? Maelga?”

But no voice, no mind answered. The black trees rose like monoliths, blocking the stars. The rustling faded like the breath of wind into silence. She turned again toward the house, a line between her white brows.

She went to see Maelga a few days later and sat on the skin by the fireplace, her arms around her knees, and Maelga watched her face as she stirred soup.

“There is Something in the forest without a name.”

“Are you afraid of it?” Maelga asked. Sybel looked up at her surprisedly.

“Of course not. But how can I call it if it has no name? It is very strange. I cannot remember reading about a nameless thing anywhere. What are you cooking? If I were not already hungry, I would be hungry from the smell of it.”

“Mushrooms,” said Maelga. “Onions, sage, turnips, cabbage, parsley, beets, and something Tam brought me that has no name.”

“Some day,” Sybel said, “Tam will poison us all.” She leaned her shining head back against the stones and sighed. Maelga’s eyes flicked to her.

“What is it? Does it have a name?”

She stirred. “I do not know. I am very restless these days, but I do not know what I want. Sometimes, I fly with Ter in his thoughts as he hunts. He cannot fly as high as I want him to, or so fast, though the earth rushes beneath us and he goes higher than Eld Mountain... And I am there, when he kills. That is why I want the Liralen so. I can ride on its back and we can go far, far into the setting sun, the world of the stars. I want... I want something more than my father had, or even my grandfather, but I do not know what I want.”

Maelga tasted the soup, the jewels on her thin hands winking. “Pepper,” she said. “And thyme. Only yesterday a young woman came to me wanting a trap set for a man with a sweet smile and lithe arms. She was a fool, not for wanting him, but for wanting more of him than that.”

“Did you help her?”

“She gave me a box of sweet scent. So now she will be miserable and jealous for the rest of her life.” She looked at Sybel, sitting still against the stones, her black eyes hidden, and she sighed. “My child, can I do anything for you?”

Sybel’s eyes lifted, smiling faintly. “Shall I add a man to my collection? I could. I could call anyone I want. But there is no one I want. Sometimes, the animals grow restless like this, dreaming of days of flights and adventures, of the acquiring of wisdom, of the sound of their names spoken in awe, in fear. The days are over, few remember their names, but they dream, still... and I think of the still way I learned, and how only my father, then you, then Tam, ever gave me back my name... I think... I think I want some days to take that mountain path down into the strange, incomprehensible world.”

“Then go, child,” said Maelga. “Go.”

“Perhaps I will. But who would keep my animals?”

“Hire a wizardling.”

“For Ter? No wizardling could hold him. When I was Tam’s age, I could hold him. I wish Tam were half wizard. But he is only half king.”

“You have never told him that, surely.”

“Am I a fool? What good would knowing that do? A dream like that could make him miserable. In the world below, it may even kill him. He is better off playing with shepherd boys and foxes and marrying, when he is old enough, some pretty mountain girl.” She sighed again, her white brows creeping into a little frown. Then she straightened, startled, as the door burst open. Tam stared down at her, taut, glistening with sweat, his pale hair sticking in points to his flushed face.

“Sybel— The Dragon—he hurt a man— Come quickly—” He flashed away like a hare. Sybel followed him out. She stood motionless as a tree in front of the house, and caught the current of the Dragon’s thoughts with one swift blaze of his name.

Gyld.

She felt him curled in the darkness of his wet cave, thoughts tumbling in his mind of flight, of gold, of a man’s pale face staring up at him, open-mouthed, then hidden suddenly behind his upflung arms. She gave a tiny murmur of surprise.

“What is it?” Maelga said, her hands clasped anxiously. Sybel’s thoughts came back to her.

“Gyld went to get his gold, and a man saw him flying with it, so Gyld attacked him.”

“Oh, no. Oh, dear.” Then her gray eyes pinpointed Sybel’s face. “You know him.”

“I know him,” she said slowly, and the frown deepened in her eyes. “Coren of Sirle.”

TWO

She and Tam carried Coren into the white stone house, with Maelga following after, long fingers pulling worriedly at her curls. Around them the animals stirred, murmuring, watching. Tam chattered breathlessly, his arms knotted under the weight of Coren’s shoulders.

“I was coming down from Nyl’s house—we brought the sheep in, and they were crowding together against the fence, and their eyes were rimmed with fear; we did not know why until I looked up and saw Gyld—like a great fiery leaf, a green flame—with gold and jewels in his claws. So I ran home but you were not there, so I was running to Maelga’s house when I saw the man watching Gyld—staring at him, and Gyld circled down to him, and the man flung himself down and Gyld’s claws scraped across him. I think Nyl saw Gyld— Where shall we put him?”

“I do not know,” Sybel said. “I am sorry he is hurt, but he should not have came here; yet it is partly my fault because I should have let Gyld have his gold. Put him there on the table, so Maelga can look at his back. Get a pillow for his head.” She brushed a piece of tapestry work off the thick, polished wood and they laid Coren on it. His eyes flickered open as Tam set a pillow under his head. His back, covered with a leather vest, was ripped and scored with claw marks; his bright hair was furrowed with tracks of blood. Tam stared down at him, brows peaked in his brown face.

“Will he die?” he whispered.

“I do not know,” Sybel said. Coren’s eyes sought her face, and she saw for the first time the light, vivid blue of them, like Ter’s eyes. Looking at her, he gave a little smile. He whispered something, and Tam’s face flushed.

“What did he say?”

Tam was silent a moment, his mouth tight. “He said it was cruel of you to set the Dragon at him, but he was not surprised. You did not. He had no right to say that.”

“Well, perhaps he did,” Sybel said judiciously, “considering that I set Ter Falcon at him the first time he came.”

“He came before? When?”

Sybel’s hands worked gently over Coren’s back, loosening torn cloth. “He brought you to me, after your parents died. For that I will always be in his debt. Tam, get some water and that roll of unworked linen. And then stay here to get Maelga whatever she needs.” Behind her, Maelga murmured, twisting her rings.

“Elderberry. Fire, water, fat and wine.”

“Wine?”

“My nerves are not what they used to be,” she said apologetically. Coren, limp under Sybel’s careful fingers, whispered painfully.

“Neither are mine.”

They finished a flagon of wine among them, as they washed and bandaged Coren, clipped his hair, and laid him to rest on Ogam’s long disused bed. Maelga sank into a chair beside the hearth, her hair in wild disarray. Sybel stood staring into the green flames in her hearth, her black eyes narrowed.

“Maelga, why has he come?” she said softly. “It must be for Tam. But I have reared Tam, and I have loved him, and I will not give him to men to use for their games of hatred. I will not! He is not as wise as I thought if he came here to ask that of me. If he mentions one word of war or kingship to Tam I will— No, I will not feed him to Gyld, but I will do something.” She fell silent, the green flames twisting and turning in the depths of her eyes, her long hair falling about her like a silvery, fire-trimmed cloak. Maelga pressed her fingers against her eyes.

“Old and tired,” she murmured. “He is finely made, a princeling among men, with the blue eyes and crow-black lashes of the dead Sirle Lord. Those were battle scars on his shoulders.”

Sybel shivered. “I will not have my Tam scarred with battle,” she whispered. She turned to meet the sudden, piercing lift of Maelga’s eyes.

“He could be a very valuable piece in their games. They will not yield easily if they want him badly.”

“Then they will have to reckon with me. I will play a game of my own, to my own rules. It may be long years before the Lord of Sirle sees his son again.”

“The old lord is dead,” Maelga said. “Coren’s oldest brother, Rok, is Lord of Sirle, lord of rich lands, walled forts, an army that has threatened the Eldwold Kings for centuries. My child,” she said wonderingly. “You have never cried before.”

“Oh, I am angry—” She wiped her face with her fingers impatiently. Then she looked down at their glistening. “How strange... My father said my mother wept, looking out the windows, before I was born, but I never knew what he meant... Why can I not just throw Coren to Gyld and have done with it? But I have his name and the sound of his voice, and the order of his words. He is a fool but he is alive, with eyes to see and weep with, hands to carry a baby and kill a man, a heart to love and hate, and a mind to use, after a fashion. In his own world, he is doubtless valued.”

“My child,” Maelga whispered. “We are all of one world.”

Sybel was silent.

She went to look at Coren before she slept. Tam was sleeping; around her in the dark night she felt the animals’ vague night dreaming, colorful and strange as fragments of old, forgotten tales. The white-pillared hall was silent under her soundless steps. The fire slept, curled in charred, pulsing embers. She opened the door softly, and beard the faint, breathless chatter of Coren as he lay burning with fever.

He turned his head to look up at her by the flame of the single, hunched candle by the bed. His eyes glittered like Ter’s.

“Ice-white Lady,” he whispered. “He was so beautiful, with amethysts and gold in his claws, but they say never, never look upon the face of beauty. And you are beautiful, ivory and diamond-white, fire-white, with eyes as black as Drede’s heart... blacker... black as the black trees in Mirkon Forest where the King’s son Arn was lost three days and three nights and came out with pure white hair... Black—”

“Arn,” Sybel said softly. “How would you know a tale like that? It is written in one place only, and I have the key to that book.”

“I know.” He blinked, as though she were wavering like a flame. He reached toward her, then dropped his arm with a hiss of pain. “I am hurt,” be said wonderingly. Then he shouted, “Rok! Ceneth!”

“Sh—you will wake Tam.”

“Rok!” He stirred restlessly, turning his face away from her, and she heard the sudden sob of his breath. Then he was quiet, as she bent over him, touched his hair, smoothed it away from his face. She wet a cloth with wine and wiped his damp forehead again and again until his taut hands loosened and she knew by his breathing that he slept.

She slept late in the morning, then rose, still weary, to check the animals. She walked through the vast sweep of walled grounds to the small lake Myk had built for the Black Swan where it glided proud and silent beneath the blue-gray sky. Wild swan, geese, ducks flying across the mountains from winter had stopped to feed with it. The huge Swan moved toward her as she stood on the edge, its eyes of liquid night. Its thoughts trailed into hers-flute-toned.

Sybel, you are beautiful these days as moonlit ice.

A smile flicked, wry, into her eyes.
Ice. Thank you. Are you well?

I am. But there are others of us who do not seem so content.

I know. I will see to Gyld.

Who will see to the lordling of Sirle? I have heard he comes to take back what he has given.

He will take nothing from me. Nothing.

So?
The great Swan glided a moment in silence.
Once when the child prince of Elon was in danger of his father’s enemies, I flew him by night and moonlight where no man could seek him.

I will remember that. Thank you.
She heard a flurry of leaves about her and found Ter Falcon, great talons winking in the pale light.

I smelled a familiar thing
, he said, and his clear, ice-blue eyes reminded her again of Coren.
Would you have me drop him off a cliff?

Oh, no. I think he is damaged enough. I think he has come for—
She checked, gazing into the sharp eyes, and her mind emptied swift as water flowing between stones. Ter’s feathers ruffled a little in the wind.

I have ridden on the boy’s fist and listened to his secret, late night murmurings that he gave to me because I could not answer. I have spent many years in the courts of men and I can guess what the lordling of Sirle has come for.

You will not harm him, Sybel said. Not unless I ask you. He thinks—he thinks I set Gyld at him.

What can it matter what such a man thinks or does not think?
Ter inquired. She was silent, searching herself.

It matters
, she said at last.
But I do not know why.
The Falcon was silent for a long moment. She waited, unstirring, while the winds pulled at the hem of her black dress. Then she felt the wrench at her mind, the sudden, dizzying soar of Ter’s thoughts away from her, like the swift Falcon’s flight toward a distant sky. But she kept her mind clear, still, her thoughts encompassing his thoughts’ flight like a ring that encompassed the earth and the air, growing outward, always just beyond the Falcon’s flight; until its flight faltered and broke, and spun downward, downward into a smoldering, fiery inward surge of rage and power that grew in her until her sinews were taut harp strings, and her heart aflame with Ter’s hot blood. Yet still, in the center of her mind, there was a cool, endless ring of quiet, holding her own name, that Ter could not reach. He yielded finally, his thoughts retreating like a wave, and she drew a slow breath of the winds. Her mouth crooked in a little, triumphant smile.

Now, why do you even try?
she asked.

For the boy’s sake. If you had broken I would have killed.

And you are the one that stopped me from throwing him off the mountaintop.

I am sorry, now.

I will not let him leave here with Tam.

Neither
, Ter said,
will I.

The great, black, green-eyed Cat Moriah dropped like a shadow from a tree while she walked back to the house. It padded at her side, and she trailed her fingers through its velvet fur.

There was a spell
, the Cat said at last, in its sweet, silken voice,
my former mistress had, that would dissolve a man so completely only the rings on his hands would be left.

I do not think Maelga would approve of that, Sybel said. Are you well?

Maelga has done many things.

She has never dissolved a man.
She stopped suddenly, impatiently.
Oh, why even think of it? Neither will I. My father and my grandfather did not like men, but they never killed them. I could not kill a man.

I can.

Well, he only has to be made afraid.

Cyrin met her at the door, his red eyes guileless under the autumn sun. She stopped and gazed down at him.

What do you think I should do with that man?

The silver-bristled Boar panted gently a moment.
A net of words
, he said at last,
is more powerful than a net of rope.

So?

So that man is talking to Tam and he has a tongue like a sweet-mouthed harpist.

Sybel’s heart fluttered suddenly like one of Maelga’s doves. She went into the house and ran to Ogam’s room. She opened the door, and Tam’s face turned away from Coren, toward her, oddly flushed. His eyes were vague with struggling, incomprehensible things.

“He says—” He . stopped, swallowing. “He says I am the son of the King of Eldwold.”

Sybel stood still beside the door, while a hot flash of sorrow welled in her and broke and died away. She said softly,

“My Tam, leave him for a while. He must rest.”

Tam rose, his eyes clinging to her face. “He says—is it true? He says— You never told me such a thing.”

She reached out to him, touched his brown face. “Tam, I will talk to you in a while. But I cannot now. Please.”

He left them closing the door quietly behind him. She sat down on the chair beside the bed and covered her face with her hands. She whispered finally into her palms,

“You told me to love him. So I did, like I have loved nothing else in my world. And now you want to take him from me, to use him in your war games. Tell me now: which of us has the heart of ice?”