The Master of Heathcrest Hall (3 page)

As they approached the cave, Layka’s gaze had been drawn to the trees. Some branches were shedding yellowed leaves even as others bore green, as if the trees did not know whether it was autumn or spring. Regardless, their branches were lithe and supple as they tossed in the wind—which meant it would not be wise to venture too close to the trees. Some of the older men told stories of foolish hunters who had gone into the woods in summer, pursuing a fat buck, and were never seen again. And in winters past, as they gathered around a crackling fire in the cave, Nesharu would speak of the time when the leviathans walked the land. This was long ago, before there were any people. So large were
these great beasts that their shoulders stood as high as the tallest tree, and they grazed upon the forests as aurochs graze upon the grassy plains.

But just as a berry bush grows sharp thorns to ward off bird and squirrel, so the trees grew their own defenses. They learned to strike with branch, to bind with root, and to beat back the great animals that would feed upon them. In time, the leviathans dwindled in number, until there were none left upon the land. Though whether this was due solely to the actions of the trees, or to some other change in the world, Nesharu did not know.

As a girl, Layka had wished she could have seen the great beasts, and wondered if any yet lived. Once, while wandering far along the shore, she had come upon a massive bone jutting out of the sand, and she had thought maybe it was from a leviathan. But when she described the shape and size of the bone to Tennek, he had said it was only a whale jaw.

Now, as the people huddled together in the darkness, Layka listened. The wind rushed past the mouth of the cave, carrying the sound of the trees with it. The noise sent a thrum of excitement through her, though she did not know why. Perhaps it was because she had never been in the cave when the trees were not bare with winter, and she had never before heard the sound of wind passing through the forest. The noise was like the surging of ocean waves—except that she had never been able to hear words in the sound of the waves against the shore.

Something is wrong
, the trees were saying.
The light has changed. The ground trembles. The rain is bitter. Something is wrong.…

There was a shout, and this time the voice that rose on the air was not that of the trees, but rather belonged to Tennek. Layka opened her eyes and let out a gasp as a flash of yellow lightning illuminated the shapes of a man and a woman standing at the cave’s mouth.

Tennek had been keeping watch at the entrance of the cave, but the gloom of the storm had made the world outside as dark as within, and he had not seen the others approaching. Now he fumbled with his spear, but before he could thrust it, the woman
lashed out an arm, quick as the strike of a snake, and caught the wooden shaft, stopping him. The lightning faded, but as the thunder followed, Layka realized she could still see the strangers, for the man held a burning brand in his hand.

No, it wasn’t a piece of burning wood, she realized as her eyes adjusted to the light. Instead, it was from a clear stone that the red glow came. The people shrank back from the unnatural light. Tennek tried to pull his spear free, but the woman flicked her dark gaze at him, and he let go, staggering back as if struck.

“Who are you?” Nesharu said, leaning on her walking stick as she approached.

“We mean you no harm,” the man said. “You need not fear us.”

His words were peculiar. They were spoken in the tongue of the people and were easily understood, but the cadence and tone were wrong. Or rather, they seemed too carefully, too exactingly formed. All the same, his voice was deep and calming, and Layka felt her heartbeat slow. The man was taller than any of the men of the people, and his face and body were well made. He wore the gray fur of a wolf across his wide shoulders.

“Why should we not feel fear?” Nesharu said.

The woman made a low sound: like a laugh, but not. “He said you need not fear us. He did not say you shouldn’t feel fear.”

Layka’s heartbeat quickened again. The woman’s face was as pale, smooth, and hard as the inside of a cockleshell. Her black eyes reflected the strange crimson light, and she wore supple hides that had been cut and laced together, tightly fitting the curves and angles of her body. Layka had never seen anything like them.

“What do you want of us?” Nesharu said, squinting against the light. “If you need food, take some fish, and then go.”

“We do not need food,” the man said in his soothing voice. “We need your help.”

“Our help? For what?”

“To fight against the shadows.”

Nesharu frowned. “Why should we help you when you come in the night like shadows yourselves?”

The man hesitated, then reached into the pouch at his belt and
took out a small flint knife. He drew the knife across the palm of his hand, so that a line of dark red blood welled forth. The people let out a sigh.

Nesharu studied him a long moment, then nodded toward the white-faced woman. “What of her?”

The tall man grinned. “You can try to cut her if you wish, but I do not think you will succeed. However, she is with me, so you need not be wary of her.”

“I think you are wrong in that,” Nesharu said, eyeing the woman. “But you should come in from the storm.”

And the strangers did.

The man spoke a word, and the red stone in his hand grew brighter. He set it within the fire ring on the floor so that its glow filled the cave, pushing back the dark, and despite its peculiar source the people were glad for the light. Layka dared to reach out a hand toward the stone. She could feel no heat coming from it, but before she could touch the stone to be sure, the tall man gave her a look. It was sharp, but not angry. Indeed, the corners of his mouth seemed to curve upward a bit.

She quickly drew her hand back and found herself smiling as well. He was, she thought, more handsome than any of the men in her band. Even more than her brother, Tennek, who all agreed was good to look at.

Nesharu offered the strangers food, and they accepted it. However, while the man sat around the fire ring with the others, the pale woman took her fish and went back to the mouth of the cave to stand there, gazing outward with black eyes.

“I have never seen a coal like this,” Nesharu said, gesturing to the red stone. “It gives light but not heat, and it seems never to burn up.”

The man nodded. “You are right. It is—”

He spoke a word Layka did not know, one whose strange sound struck her ears harshly and caused her to flinch.

“Magick,” Nesharu said, doing her best to repeat the word, though her lips could not exactly reproduce the odd sound of it.

The man smiled. “Close enough.”

“Is it like the
wayru
?” Tennek said, using the word of the people that referred to that kind of wisdom that Nesharu had—knowledge of the pattern of the seasons, and the habits of animals, and which plants could ease pain or cool a fever or make a poison.

“No, it’s different from that,” the tall man said.

Tennek squatted by the fire ring, his face bathed by the crimson light. “Can it cause harm to the shadows?”

“It can. But there are many shadows, and I am only one.”

“What of her?” Nesharu said. “She looks as if she could fight things. Your
sar valak
.”

She used the words of the people that mean
pale, white
and also
pointed barb, thorn
.

The man laughed.
“Sar valak,”
he murmured. “I like that name. Yes, my White Thorn can fight these things. She can fight many of them. But again, she is only one.”

“And how many shadows are there?”

His face grew grim, and he held up one of the small dried fish. “How many of these dwell in the sea?”

The people stared at him, and some trembled.

Nesharu, however, kept her gaze firmly fixed upon the tall man. “If there are so many, how have they not overcome us all?”

“Because they are not all here yet. There is yet time—time before the night wanderers stand as one in the sky.”

There were two kinds of stars in the night sky, Nesharu had told Layka before. There were the stars that shimmered and which all moved together on the same path. Then there were the wanderers, the stars that glowed steadily, which traveled as they pleased to and fro across the sky, sometimes even turning around and going backward.

“I have seen the wanderers moving nearer to one another,” Nesharu said. “Sometimes they dance away for a time, but then they turn and move toward each other again, always closer than before. It all began when the red moon appeared in the sky.”

The man shook his head. “It is no moon. It is a planet, a wanderer, but one from a far-distant place. When it was brought here—when it was made to suddenly appear in the sky you see—the
movements of the other wanderers were disrupted. But now a harmonic is beginning to emerge: a new pattern. Very soon now, the others will fall into line behind the red planet. When they do, they will push it even closer to this world.”

“I do not understand. What does this mean?”

“The shadows are only able to cross over into this land when the red wanderer draws close.” He brought his fists together. “Since it appeared, the wanderer’s gyrations have, several times, brought it just near enough for a few of the shadows to make the leap. But when the wanderers all stand as one, the red planet will come much closer, and few will become many. Already it is beginning to happen.”

“So it is from the red moon they come,” Nesharu said softly, nodding as she stroked her chin.

“Yes, and when more of them come, in a dark flood, they will destroy everything in this land—all its plants, all its animals, all its people.”

Nesharu tilted her head to study the tall man. “You know much of them, stranger. How?”

“I know because that is what they did to my own land.”

Nesharu drew in a breath, but before she could speak there was a sudden motion at the mouth of the cave. Like a spirit, the pale woman appeared in the opening. She must have gone outside without anyone noticing and now had reappeared.

“They are coming,” she said to her companion. “A great many from the north. And their masters are with them.”

Layka felt a pain in her chest, and she thought of the band of people they had met, the ones who had been journeying northward to find shelter.

“How do you know this?” Nesharu said, scowling at the pale woman.

“She can sense them,” the tall man said, then he stood. “It was what she was made for. Come, we must leave this place. We are not safe here.”

Frightened murmurs ran through the people.

“If they are coming, then we should stay in the cave,” Tennek said. “We can defend ourselves here.”

The white-faced woman glared at him. “Your spear cannot stop them from entering this cave. You could better hold back a river with a twig. Besides, for all you know, one of them is already in here.”

The people cast wide-eyed looks at one another. Tennek gripped his spear and said nothing.

“No, the gray ones are not here, not yet,” Nesharu said, her words sharp. “I know the eyes of my own people.”

“Then get them out of here while you still can,” the tall man said.

Nesharu gazed at him a moment, then she rose and leaned upon her walking stick. Without a word, she passed through the mouth of the cave, and the rest of the people followed.

The queer storm had passed as suddenly as it came, and remnants of clouds scudded across the night sky. The red moon loomed large above, and as Layka looked up she saw the orange, blue, and yellow dots of some of the other wanderers hovering close to the edge of the crimson circle, like insects drawn to some livid bloom.

Now that they were outside, the surging sound of the forest was louder. The storm was over, and the wind had died away. All the same, in the red light, the trees continued to sway back and forth. Layka shut her eyes, and the voices of the trees grew clearer.

Something is wrong. The light has changed. The ground trembles.…

“There, we have left our cave,” Nesharu said.

Layka opened her eyes. Nesharu stood before the stranger, glaring at him as if he were not half again taller than she. “Now where should we go?”

“Look,” the man said and pointed at the edge of the forest.

Nesharu did nothing to conceal her scorn. “You know not what you speak,
laru telaka
,” she said, using the words that meant
one who wears the wolf
. “Do you not see how they bend and sway? It is not the wind that causes them to do so! Something has disturbed
them. Were we to attempt to enter the forest now, our intrusion would not be borne. They would lash out and slay us all.”

“No, they won’t,” the man said. “Not if someone calls out to them and tells them not to. It is the nature of the trees to defend themselves against threat and peril, and they have sensed that a great wrong has entered into the world. Only they do not understand what it is—they do not know its source. They must be told what it is that threatens this land. They need to be taught who their enemy is—that it is the shadows they must fight now.”

Tennek spat on the ground. “You are a fool. We cannot talk to trees.”

“No, we can’t, not you or I,” the
laru telaka
said. “Nor can any man, as far as I know. But there are others who might be able to. Aren’t there?” Now he cast a look at Nesharu.

For a long moment her wrinkled face was thoughtful. “It is so,” she said at last. “If a woman is very strong in the
wayru
, it is possible for her to hear the voices of the trees, and even to speak to them in turn. So it has always been, since the first people.”

The others gasped as they stared at her.

“That is why you would watch us when we would hunt in the edges of the forest in winter,” Tennek said, wonder on his brown face. “You were asking the trees not to harm us.”

Nesharu gave her head a firm shake. “No, I was only watching them, for I could tell the difference between a branch moving in the wind, and when it was moving of itself.”

“Then you cannot communicate with the trees?” the tall man said.