Well of Shiuan (37 page)

"We must find the Well," Vanye observed softly; "I trust that is where we will find Roh."

"Road's-end," answered Kithan, and nodded toward the way ahead, that began to wind up to the shoulder of the mountains. "The Old Ones built high."

Somewhere a horn sounded, thin and far, a lonely sound off the mountain-slopes. Over and over it sounded, sending the echoes tumbling off the valley walls; and about them the camp began to stir. Voices began to be heard, strained with excitement; fires began to be extinguished, sending up plumes of smoke.

Jhirun looked from one side to the other in apprehension. "They are beginning to move," she said. "Lord, surely the Well is open, and they are beginning to move."

It was true: everywhere men were stripping shelters and gathering their meager belongings; children were crying and animals were bawling in alarm and disturbance. In moments, those lightest burdened had begun to seek the road, pouring out onto that way that led them to the Well.

Roh's gift, Vanye thought, his heart pained for the treason he felt, his human soul torn by the sight of the overburdened folk about him, that edged from the path of their horses. Morgaine would have doomed them; but they were going to live.

He came, to bow at Roh's feet—and one day to kill him; and by that, to betray these folk: he saw himself, an evil presence gently threading his way among them, whose faces were set in a delirious and desperate hope.

He served Morgaine.

There was at least a time you chose for yourself, she had said.

Thee will not appoint thyself my conscience, Nhi Vanye. Thee is not qualified.

He began to know.

With a grimace of pain he laid spurs and the reins' ends to the black gelding, startling Shiua peasants from his path, frightened folk yielding to him and his two companions, that held close behind him. Faces tore away in the dim light before him, stark with fear and dismay.

The road wound steeply upward. An archway rose athwart it, massive and strange. They passed beneath, passed through the vanguard of the human masses that toiled up the heights, and suddenly rode upon forces of qujal, demon-helmed and bristling with lances, whose women rode with them, pale-haired ladies in glittering cloaks, and, very few among them, a cluster of pale, grave-eyed children, who stared at the intrusion with the sober mien of their elders.

A band of qujal amid that mass reined themselves across the road, where its turning made passage difficult, with a dizzying plunge into depths on the right hand. Authority was among them, bare-headed, white hair streaming in the wind; and his men ranged themselves before him.

Vanye reined back and reached for his sword. "No," Kithan said at once. "They are Sotharra. They will not stop us."

Uneasily Vanye conceded the approach to Kithan, rode at his shoulder and with Jhirun at his own rein hand, as they drew to a slow halt before the halflings, with levelled pikes all about them.

Little Kithan had to say to them: a handful of words, of which one was Ohtij-in and another was Roh and another was Kithan's own name; and the Sotharra lord straightened in his saddle, and reined aside, the pikes of his men-at-arms flourishing up and away.

But when they had ridden through, the Sotharra rode behind them at their pace; and Vanye ill-liked it, though it gave them passage through the other masses of halflings that rode the winding ascent Hereafter was no retreat: he was committed to the hands of qujal, to trust Kithan, who could say what he wished to them.

And if Roh had already passed, and if it were Hetharu who must approve his passage: Vanye drove that thought from his mind.

A turning of the road brought them suddenly into sight of a round hill, ringed about by throngs of halfling folk: the horses slowed of their own accord, snorting, walking skittishly, weary as they were.

It grew upon the senses, that oppression that Vanye knew of Gates, that nerve-prickling unease that made the skin feel raw and the senses over-weighted. It was almost sound, and not. It was almost touch, and not.

He saw the place to which they went, in a day that yet had a murkiness in its pastel clouds: there were tents; there were horses; and the road came to an end in a place shadowed by slanted spires.

And the Well.

It was a circle of Standing Stones, like that of Hiuaj: not a single Gate, but a gathering of them, and they were alive. Opal colors streamed within them, like illusion in the daylight, a constant interplay of powers that filled the air with uneasiness; but one Gate held the azure blue of sky, that was terrible with depth, that made the eyes ache with beholding it.

Kithan swore.

"They are real," the qujal said. "They are real."

Vanye forced the reluctant gelding to a steady walk, shouldered into Jhirun's mare by a sudden rebellion of the horse, and saw Jhirun's eyes, dazed, still fixed upon the horror of the Gates; her hand was at her throat, where bits of metal and a white feather and a stone cross offered her what belief she knew. He spoke her name, sharply, and she tore her gaze from the hillside and kept by his side.

The camp at the base of the hill was already astir. Shouts attended their arrival, voices thin and lost in that heaviness of the air. Men fair-haired and armored gathered to stare at them: "Kithan Roktija" Vanye heard whispered: he unhooked his sword and rode with it across the saddle as they rode slowly past pale, gray-eyed faces, forcing a way until the press grew too thick to do so without violence.

Kithan asked a question of them. It received quick answer; and Kithan raised his eyes toward the edge of the hill and reined in that direction. Vanye stayed beside him, Jhirun's mare at his flank as the hedge of weapons slowly parted, letting them pass. He heard his own name spoken, and Bydarra's; he saw the sullen, wondering faces, the hateful looks, the hands that gripped weapons: Bydarra's accused murderer—he kept his face impassive and kept the horse moving steadily in Kithan's wake.

Riders came through the crowd, demon-helmed and armored, spreading out, shouldering the crowd aside, spreading out athwart their path. An order was shouted: and among them, central amid a hedge of pikemen, rode an all-too-familiar figure, silver-haired, with the beauty of the qujal and the eyes of a man.

Hetharu.

Vanye shouted, ripped the sword free and spurred for him, into a shielding wall of pikes that shied his horse back, wounded. One of the pikemen fell; Vanye slashed at another, reined back and back, and whirled on those threatening his flank. He broke free; Hetharu's folk scattered back, forgetful of dignity, scale-armored house guards massing in a protective arc before their lord.

Vanye drew breath, flexed his hand on the sword, measured the weakest man—and heard other riders come in on his flank. Jhirun cried out; he reined back, risked a glance in that quarter, beyond Jhirun, beyond Kithan—and saw him he hoped desperately to see.

Roh. Bow slung across his shoulders, sword across his saddlebow, Roh had reined to a halt. Ohtija and Sotharra gave back from him, and slowly he rode the black mare into what had become a vacant space.

Vanye sat the sweating gelding, tight-reining him, who turned fretfully this way and that, hurt, and trembling when he stood still.

Another rider moved in; he cast a panicked glance in that direction: Hetharu, who sat his horse sword in hand.

"Where," Roh asked him, drawing his attention back, "is Morgaine?"

Vanye shrugged, a listless gesture, though he felt the tension in every muscle.

"Come down from your horse," said Roh.

He wiped the length of the sword on the gelding's black mane, then climbed down, sword still in hand, and gave the reins of the horse to Jhirun. He sheathed the sword then, and waited.

Roh watched him from horseback; and when he had put away the weapon, Roh likewise dismounted and tossed the reins to a companion, hung his sword at his hip and walked forward until they could speak without raising voices.

"Where is she?" Roh asked again.

"I do not know," Vanye said. "I have come for shelter, like these others."

"Ohtij-in is gone," Kithan said suddenly from behind him. "The quake took it, and all inside. The marshlands are on the move; and some of us they hanged. The man Vanye and the Barrows-girl were with me on the road, else I might have died; my own men deserted me."

There was silence. There should have been shock, outcry—some emotion on the faces of the Ohtija qujal who surrounded them.

"Arrest," Hetharu's voice said suddenly; riders moved up, and Vanye turned in alarm.

Two helmless men were beside Hetharu: scale-armored, white-haired, and alike as brothers—shameless in their change of lords.

"Yours," Kithan murmured, and managed an ironical bow. The accustomed drugged distance crept into his voice.

"To protect my brother," Hetharu answered softly, "from his own nature—which is well-known and transparent. You are quite sober, Kithan."

"The news," said Roh, from the other side, "outran you, Nhi Vanye. Now tell me the truth. Where is she?"

He turned and faced Roh, for one terrible moment bereft of all subtleties: he could think of nothing.

"My lord Hetharu," Roh said. "The camp is on the move. Uncomfortable as it is, I think it time to move your forces into position; and yours as well, my lords of Sotharra and Domen, Marom and Arisith. We will make an orderly passage."

There was a stir within the ranks; orders were passed, and a great part of the gathering began to withdraw—the Sotharra, who were prepared already to move, began to ascend the hill.

But Hetharu did not, not he nor his men.

Roh looked up at him, and at the men that delayed about them. "My lord Hetharu," Roh said, "lord Kithan will go with you, if you have use for him."

Hetharu gave an order. The two house guards rode forward and set themselves on either side of Kithan, whose pale face was set in helpless rage.

"Vanye," Roh said.

Vanye looked at him.

"Once again," Roh said, "I ask you."

"I have been dismissed," Vanye said slowly, the words difficult to speak. "I ask fire and shelter, Chya Roh i Chya."

"On your oath?"

"Yes," he said. His voice trembled. He knelt down, reminding himself that this must be, that his liege's direct order absolved him of the lie and the shame; but it was bitter to do so in the sight of both allies and enemies. He bowed himself to the earth, forehead against the trampled grass. He heard the voices, numb in the Well-cursed air, and was glad in this moment that he could not understand their words of him.

Roh did not bid him rise. Vanye sat back after a moment, staring at the ground, shame burning his face, both for the humiliation and for the lie.

"She has sent you," Roh said, "to kill me."

He looked up.

"I think she has made a mistake," said Roh. "Cousin, I will give you the sheltering you ask, taking your word that you have been dismissed from your service to her. By this evening's fire, elsewhere—a Claiming. I think you are too much Nhi to forswear yourself. But she would not understand that. There is no pity in her, Nhi Vanye."

Vanye came to his feet, a sudden move: blades rasped loose all about him, but he kept his hand from his.

"I will go with you," he said to Roh.

"Not at my back," Roh said. "Not this side of the Wells. Not unsworn." He took back the reins of the black mare, and rose into the saddle—cast a look toward the hill, where row on row of Sotharran forces had marshalled themselves, toward which the first frightened lines of human folk labored.

The lines moved with feverish speed behind: those entering that oppressive air hesitated, pushed forward by the press behind; horses shied, of those forces holding the hill, and had to be restrained.

And of a sudden a tumult arose, downtrail, beyond the curve of the mountainside. Voices shrieked, thin and distant. Animals bawled in panic.

Roh reined about toward that sound, the least suspicion of something amiss crossing his face as he gazed toward that curving of the hill: the shouting continued, and somewhere high atop the mountain a horn blew, echoing.

Vanye stood still, in his heart a wild, sudden hope—the thing that Roh likewise suspected: he knew it, he knew, and suddenly in the depth of him he cursed in anguish for what Morgaine had done to him, casting him into this, face to face with Roh.

Vanye whirled, sprang for his horse and ripped the reins from Jhirun's offering hand as the qujal closed on him; a rake of his spurs shied the gelding up, buying him time to draw. A pike-thrust hit his mailed side, half-throwing him; he hung on with his knees, and the sweep of his sword sent the pikeman screaming backward, that man and another and another.

"No!" Roh's voice shouted thinly in his roaring ears; he found himself in ground free of enemies, a breathing space. He backed the gelding, amazed to see part of the force break away: Roh, and his own guard, and all of fifty of the Ohtija, plunging toward the hill, and the Sotharra, and the screaming hordes of men that surged toward the Wells, lines confounded by panicked beasts that scattered, laboring carts, and a horde that pressed them behind. The Sotharra ranks bowed, began to break. Into that chaos Roh and his companions rode.