Ibryen and Isgyrn walked slowly through the forest. With no destination in prospect they seemed tacitly to have agreed that nothing was to be gained by moving quickly. Ibryen’s gait however, was markedly at odds with his racing thoughts. What had happened? Where were they? How were they to return? Could they return? But worst of all, clutching coldly and tightly at his stomach, his many and long-carried responsibilities returned with unusual force. What would happen to his beleaguered people if he could not return? He tried desperately to keep the speculations that cascaded frantically from this question from overwhelming him with guilt and shame, but with little success.
Unexpectedly, and despite his many other dark thoughts, he also found himself burdened with an acute sense of responsibility for Isgyrn, though the latter, now that he was whole again, seemed to be accepting this further inexplicable and bewildering change in his circumstances with remarkable equanimity. Ibryen glanced around at the sunlit forest. Stern and logical was he, this man? he mused bitterly. I wonder how calm he would be if our surroundings were not so idyllic? Then he grimaced and inwardly apologized.
‘We must try to find a high place,’ he said. ‘See if we can get some idea of where we are.’
Isgyrn agreed readily. ‘The higher the better,’ he said.
They talked as they strolled. Ibryen told Isgyrn of his land and of the Gevethen who had treacherously ousted him and now held the people in thrall with brutality and terror. And he told too, of the strange call that had carried him alone up on to the ridge to meet the Traveller. The story of the Gevethen seemed to disturb Isgyrn disproportionately and though he seemed reluctant to discuss his own concerns, either from fear of further burdening his host, or because the memories and uncertainties were too recent, he told enough to show a common bond between their fates. For the evil that had usurped some of the Culmadryen lands had also come at first in the guise of good will offering betterment to the people.
‘It seems that for all our many differences, our peoples are tragically alike in their folly,’ he concluded.
Ibryen was less harsh. ‘Alike in our willingness to trust and reluctance to see evil in others.’
They had not pursued the debate. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ Isgyrn said. ‘We warriors have no excuse. We must bear the guilt. It’s our task above all to see things as they are, even when we can’t see why they are, and to defend those less able when the need arises.’ Ibryen nodded. That could not be disputed. They continued in silence.
Though their arbitrary path carried them over undulating ground, they came across no consistent inclines nor even any broad clearings that might give them an indication of the land beyond the forest. And it was with mixed feelings that they encountered signs that others frequented this place. One was a broad grassy track, obviously used by horses. Another was a carving of a face ingeniously worked so that it was peering out between the branches of a tree.
Ibryen looked at the mischievous face. ‘This is not my land,’ he said unequivocally. ‘Nor any that I know of.’
The possible implications, both bad and good, of meeting strangers in this forest flooded into a mind already awash with doubts and fears, and, despite himself, he sat down on a nearby embankment and put his head in his hands. He could not think any more.
Isgyrn looked at him for some time then crouched down in front of him. ‘At the height of my people’s despair, I found myself in two places at once. Speaking with a man, himself fighting an awful battle. A strange man who, like you, had had a great and unwanted responsibility thrust upon him. I spoke to him as I speak to you now, at one with him in the middle depths and yet, at the same time, soaring above my land.’
Ibryen looked up and met his gaze. ‘I remember,’ he said flatly. ‘You told me. The sword bearer, you called him.’
Isgyrn nodded. ‘Who he is… was… is of no great import here. Whatis important is that without any witting action on my part, such a thing happened to me – a Warrior, frantic with battle fever. I had never heard of such a thing. Not even happening to Hearers, silent and secluded and at peace, surrounded by comfort and friends.’
He looked down guiltily. ‘Whatever’s troubling you, be as clear in your mind as I am that it’s my fault we’re here. I don’t know why I left your camp secretly, like a thief. Perhaps it was because I didn’t wish to burden you with my helpless presence when you had a war of your own to fight, perhaps it was just a quiet desperation to learn what had happened to my Land. Perhaps I just wasn’t thinking clearly.’ He looked up again and met Ibryen’s gaze. ‘But even when I was floundering, maybe about to die, in the Culmaren’s world, a small part of me knew that it was real, that it was true, that it was not just a frenzy in my imagination. I was suffering because of my ignorance about where I was, not because I was suddenly crazed. I was untutored in the ways of the place, not insane.’ He gave a rueful smile. ‘Not that the knowledge served me much, but it was there.’
Ibryen frowned a little and made to speak but Isgyrn waved him silent. ‘You and I have strange skills – you more so than me – skills that we’re barely aware of and certainly don’t know how to use. Wherever this place is, and whatever people live in it, it’s real and so are we. Yet we’re also still on that cold mountainside where the Culmaren brought me and tended me.’
‘You seem suddenly very knowledgeable,’ Ibryen said acidly.
Isgyrn took no offence but shook his head. ‘No,’ he admitted. ‘I’m guessing, but guessing with a part of me that I trust – a part that I trust in battle. Knowledge deep and long-learned. Some things come only with time.’
The remark struck Ibryen like a winding blow and he started perceptibly. Despite the urgency of his immediate concerns, the phrase carried him across the years to bring him again to the feet of his old instructor and he felt a lightness spreading through him. He clapped his hands softly and smiled. ‘Let’s go. Only dead things are rigid, and rigid things shatter,’ he said.
Isgyrn eased back a little, nervously. ‘Are you all right?’ he asked.
Ibryen stood up. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Just remembering an old lesson.’
Isgyrn’s eyebrows rose, but he opted for a pragmatic response. ‘Has it told you where we are?’
‘I’m afraid not. It just reminded me not to worry about things I can’t change.’
‘We’re to continue awaiting events, then?’ Isgyrn said with some irony, though his face remained serious. ‘Still, not worrying about the unavoidable isn’t as easy as it sounds.’ He levered himself up. ‘I’ll confess I don’t know what I said to remind you of such a valuable lesson, but shall we continue?’ He indicated the grassy track.
They had not walked far along it before the sound of running water reached them.
‘Well, at least we’ll not perish of thirst in this place,’ Ibryen said.
When they reached the river however, they encountered another reminder that they were not alone in this land. It was a timber bridge, built with considerable skill and decorated with bright colours and many carvings. They stood for some time admiring it and Ibryen took some consolation from the fact that a people who spent time on such work were perhaps not given to spending time on excessive warring and feuding. Nevertheless, he reminded himself, he must still be very cautious in approaching anyone they might meet.
They decided not to cross the bridge, but moved instead upstream, Isgyrn seeming to have a strong natural inclination to move always upwards. After a little while they came to a clearing where the river meandered quietly between shallow banks. They sat down.
Ibryen looked around and frowned. ‘There’s an unease about this place,’ he said, answering Isgyrn’s unspoken question. ‘Like a thunderstorm coming.’
Isgyrn cast a glance up at the sky. It was cloudless. ‘There’s no thunder about,’ he said confidently. ‘And I sense no ambush being laid for us. But this is even less my land than yours so I don’t know to what extent my instincts can be trusted here.’
‘It’s not a feeling of threat,’ Ibryen said uncertainly. ‘It’s just…’ He gave a shrug and left the sentence unfinished. Then he leaned over the bank and looked down into the water. Isgyrn joined him. The water, eddying slowly, sent back their reflections, sharp and clear.
Jeyan froze as the sound of the dogs rolled over her. The hovering lights became angular and jagged, and began to dance to the hunting rhythm being sounded. Then she could feel the spirit of the dogs bounding all about her, wild and savage, yet bursting with affection and joy at finding her again. She wanted to cry out to them, to embrace them, but her brief time with the Gevethen had already taught her to judge her every action carefully, and even as she recognized the dogs, she knew she must force herself to affect an ignorance of what was happening until the Gevethen responded.
She did not have long to wait. Their response was swift and alarming.
And full of fear.
They began to tremble and, to her considerable surprise, Jeyan could feel flight building up in them. Their fear seeped through into her. Who could say what the consequences would be, should they abandon her in panic and flee screaming through this bizarre world with the spirits of the dead hounds pursuing them? Already she could sense an instability around her that she had not felt even when the ill-fated tunnel had crashed to its end. Then she noted that the faint images of her room which lingered at all times, were wavering. What was happening to the mirrors there?
‘Don’t move!’ she cried out, ignoring caution. ‘They’ll pursue you. It’s their nature.’ She reached up and seized the hands gripping her shoulders.
‘They’re His creatures come for us!’
‘We have failed!’
Jeyan tightened her grip malevolently on the faltering hands. It was good to know the Gevethen were feeling what they so readily subjected others to. But still she must not let them run amok.
‘Whatever they are, if we run, they’ll follow. They’re hunters, I can feel it.’
It was to no avail however, for as the dogs continued their barking, the Gevethen suddenly tore themselves free and were gone. Jeyan spun round. The Gevethen were nowhere to be seen. There was only a disorienting confusion of lights and shapes swirling in their wake.
‘Excellencies! Masters!’ she shouted, but her voice fell dead in the twisting air and there was no reply. She swore. Then the spirits of her two dogs were clamouring about her again, demanding attention. She reached out and embraced them, though their enthusiasm did little to ease her alarm at what would be the outcome of the Gevethen’s flight.
An inspiration came to her. Quickly she quietened the dogs then gave them the command that would set them hunting again, though this time silently. The dogs were away, Jeyan following them, attached to them in a manner that she could not determine, but which was quite different from the crude holding by which the Gevethen held her.
Sniffling, snuffling, twisting, turning, the two dogs moved through the unseen chambers and avenues of the world within the mirrors, their erstwhile mistress following, unseeing but trusting.
Then, in front of her, were the Gevethen. Silently dismissing the dogs, she fell to her knees. ‘Forgive me, Excellencies. I’ve not the skill to move as you do.’
‘Are they gone?’
‘They vanished just as they came, Excellencies,’ Jeyan lied.
‘It was your fault, trying to open the Way again,’one of the Gevethen hissed softly to the other.
As before, Jeyan kept her head lowered and gave no indication that she had heard this remark.
‘No, it couldn’t be.’
‘The Way must be guarded by His creatures.’
‘No!’
‘Yes!’
‘No!’
Once again, Jeyan felt that she was in the presence of squabbling children. She had scarcely registered the first occasion but now came the frightening revelation that the Gevethen’s lust for power might be rooted not in the familiar arrogance of over-ambitious men but in childish vindictiveness – a trait quite without restraint. A cold shivering threatened to overwhelm her but she remained absolutely still and silent – it would take very little to end the quarrel and bring their combined anger down on her. Assh however, did not have this perception. Disturbed by the dispute in the immediate vicinity of his pack leader, he growled. The hissed exchange stopped immediately.
Jeyan’s tight-gripped fear goaded her into action.
‘Be still, Excellencies,’ she whispered urgently. ‘They’re back.’
To her considerable relief, no reproach came for this brusque order. Instead, the Gevethen took her shoulders again, though this time the hands were conspicuously unsteady.
Petty in your viciousness, jealous of each other, and afraid of dogs, eh? Jeyan found herself exulting in these continuing indications of the Gevethen’s vulnerability, but she was sufficiently in control of herself not to allow any outward sign to manifest itself. She reached up and took the two hands firmly.
‘Hold me, Excellencies,’ she said, as if pleading. At the same time, she reached out to Assh. The dog growled again. The hands tightened and she felt another flight pending. ‘Do not move, Excellencies,’ she said. ‘They haven’t attacked. Perhaps they’ve been sent to warn us of something.’ Her own viciousness took command. ‘Do you know what they are?’ she asked. ‘Are they often in this place?’
The solitary voice that replied was almost trembling.
‘Lord Counsellor, we must leave here quickly.’
‘We must not flee,’ Jeyan insisted. ‘If we move or run then they’ll follow and attack us for sure. It’s the way of all hunting animals. I learned this in my exile in the Ennerhald.’
Tightening her own grip on the Gevethen’s hands, she reached out to the dogs again. They both growled menacingly. As she had expected, the Gevethen’s meagre control broke and they began to run. This time however, she clung to them, crying out, ‘Excellencies, no, wait!’ while bidding the dogs to continue their barking pursuit.
There followed a buffeting nightmare as she was dragged in the wake of the fleeing Gevethen. Every sensation in her body told her that she was moving at great speed, falling almost, yet she saw no sign of this in the colours and flitting shapes that moved endlessly about her, other than that they seemed to change in character, becoming pale and frayed. She knew nothing of this place, and must not be abandoned here. Who could say what happened when the mirror through which she had been carried became two again? And what had Hagen said about the place? ‘A rough-hewn ante-chamber, crude and ill-formed – and so dangerous.’ No, she must return to the real world with these foul creatures, enhanced in their eyes perhaps by her conduct here, and wiser by far about them.
She made the dogs break off. It was not easy, either for them or for her. She could not conceive of where they were, or even what they were now, still less what journeying had brought them back to her, and leaving them again was almost unbearable. But they would be here again, she knew. She had heard them the first time she had been brought here and now they had found her. They would find her again, she was certain.
‘Guard,’ she cried out silently to them in the end. She might know nothing of this place, but that command would make some part of it hers irrevocably.
The dogs stopped their pursuit and their barking began to fade as the Gevethen’s unseen flight bore them relentlessly away. Jeyan allowed it to continue for a little while, then she began to cry out, ‘Excellencies, they are gone.’ It was some time however, before her message penetrated their blind panic and when eventually all felt still again, she sensed a marked difference in the atmosphere about her.
‘Excellencies, your courage and will defeated them, they are gone,’ she gasped before either of them could speak, anxious to assure them that she had not noted their cowardice.
But to her surprise and alarm, though she could hear them breathing heavily, they did not respond.
‘Excellencies?’
‘Gateway.’
‘Too close.’
The words, spoken very softly, seemed to take form in the air and hang there. There was a fear in them that was even greater than their fear of the dogs.
‘Something here…’
‘… here.’
‘Drawing us…’
‘… Drawing us.’
They released Jeyan and moved to her side. They were staring at something. As she watched, Jeyan saw the lights about them forming a coherent pattern. It was blurred and vague, as though seen through sleep-filled eyes, but it was unlike anything that she had seen since entering the mirrors.
Then she gave a startled gasp, as the pattern came suddenly into focus. The Gevethen cried out and, arms extended, lunged forward.
The reflections broke and scattered as Isgyrn and Ibryen reached down into the water with cupped hands. The walk had made them hot and they drank noisily and with relish.
‘Cold,’ Ibryen said, wiping his hand across his mouth and then down his tunic. ‘Perhaps not too far down from the mountains. Shall we go back to the bridge and the path or continue upstream a little further? See if we can get a view of this place.’
Isgyrn chuckled softly. ‘I’m afraid my instinct down here seems to be always to move upwards. But I’ll accept your judgement in such a decision.’
Ibryen leaned back over the bank and looked down into the water, now smooth again after the disturbance the two of them had made.
‘Well, I suppose…’ He stopped abruptly. Behind his reflection in the water was a great agitation, as though storm clouds had suddenly appeared in the sky. He cast a quick glance upwards for reassurance, but there was only the cloudless blue that there had been since they arrived. As he turned back, a sharp intake of breath from Isgyrn drew his attention. The Dryenwr was staring, wide-eyed, into the water.
Ibryen followed his gaze. Though the surface of the water was still smooth and untroubled, the turmoil in the reflected sky was growing, moving faster and faster. He started back in alarm, but his silhouetted reflection did not move. Disconcerted, he reached out a tentative hand to stir the water. A powerful grip seized his arm. It was Isgyrn.
‘It’s Him,’ he said hoarsely. ‘I can feel His presence. We must get away from here.’ He made to stand but Ibryen resisted, staring fixedly into the water.
‘For Svara’s sake, Ibryen…’
Isgyrn’s oath faded as the turbulence suddenly stopped and the reflection cleared. Except that where he and Ibryen had been staring up out of the gently rippling water, there were now the faces of the two Gevethen. He opened his mouth to cry out, but no sound came. His gaping mouth was mimicked by the two moon faces.
Ibryen’s face was suddenly a mask of fear and rage. He reached for his sword but had scarcely begun to draw it when, like ghastly leaping fish, glittering and sparkling with what should have been cascading drops of water but which seemed more like a myriad shards of broken glass, four arms burst up through the water. The summer air filled with a terrible screeching. Ibryen’s head jerked back violently to avoid them, but one of the clawing hands caught the loose front of his tunic. Unbalanced, and arms flailing, he lurched forward as it dragged him down. Only one hand just catching the edge of the bank prevented him from plunging immediately into the water. His other hand thrashed wildly at the remaining three, still clawing out to reach him, but balanced as he was, he could not resist the pull of even the single hand for more than a moment. The screeching intensified.
Then, Isgyrn had wrapped determined arms around him and, with a great cry, was hurling himself backwards. For an eternal moment, it seemed that this effort was going to drag the Gevethen themselves across the worlds, as a cracked, crazed and glittering dome swelled up out of the water. Isgyrn had a fleeting vision of the two faces, distorted and awful, at once frantic and triumphant. Then the grip on Ibryen was gone and he and Ibryen were tumbling backwards on the grass. On the instant their roles were reversed and it was Ibryen who was on his feet and dragging a stumbling and shocked Isgyrn along. ‘This way! This way!’ he was crying.
And they were gone.
As were the Gevethen.
Both the Traveller and Rachyl cried out in alarm as the two motionless figures of Ibryen and Isgyrn burst suddenly into life and lurched forward, arms flailing.
The Traveller held out a hand to restrain Rachyl as she made to move forward to help. He spoke powerfully to the two gasping men. ‘You’re safe now. You’re back with us on the mountain.’ He had to say it several times before recognition came into their eyes.
Isgyrn reached out and took hold of Ibryen, turning him so that he could peer into his face. ‘It was a dream,’ he said. ‘A nightmare?’
Ibryen clutched the front of his tunic convulsively. ‘A nightmare, yes,’ he shuddered. ‘But real. The Culmaren’s world, the place of lights between, and the forest. All real.’
‘And those creatures?’
‘Real too. The Gevethen.’
Isgyrn tightened his grip on Ibryen’s arm. ‘Hiscreatures, Ibryen. They were His creatures. The war continues. I must find my land – any land.’
Arms raised to protect her head and eyes screwed tight shut, Jeyan spun round and offered her cowering back to the scene she had been watching as it shattered into a blizzard of brilliant, jagged edges. But these, like the awful noise that accompanied them, raked through even the darkness behind her eyes.
As the din faded she straightened up and turned round slowly, shaking as she examined herself in the terrifying expectation of seeing great gaping wounds all over her body. But she had suffered no hurt. She gazed down at herself and, still shocked, her mind relived the last few moments for her – the sudden appearance of the Count and a companion staring down at her and the Gevethen – the Gevethen’s frantic lunge and the brief, frenzied struggle… Ibryen’s rescue by his companion and the startling vanishing of both of them as they turned and fled. Then there was the terrible noise and the shaking which had seemed to rack the entire world that was held in the mirrors. A noise and a shaking that were continuing, she realized, as senses long-developed in the Ennerhald gathered her wits together for her and roused her with urgent warning signals. Whatever had happened, had happened. Questions would have to wait. All that mattered was that she had survived, and survived uninjured. Now she must turn to the next danger. And danger there was, for much of the continuing noise was that of the Gevethen shouting and screaming a tirade of unbridled obscenity.
Though she was no delicate bloom, she nonetheless shied away from the horrific intensity of abuse that was pouring from them, addressed to each other and to Ibryen and to fate in general. Slowly, Jeyan sank to her knees and lowered her head.
‘He has the gift! Our enemy has the gift!’was the dominant gist, though it was heavily larded with reproaches in the form of‘You let him escape!’ and‘You were too slow!’
As before, a childish quality in the exchanges served only to heighten the horror of what she was hearing. And it seemed that they might continue thus for ever, each spiralling off the other into greater excess. She began to feel more afraid than at any time since she had been captured. If even the slightest portion of this mounting odium were directed to herself she would be snuffed out with less thought than a guttering candle.
Then, as if the thought itself had been sufficient, it happened. She was suddenly the focus of their attention.
‘Ah. Lord Counsellor.’
Jeyan quailed. There was such hatred in the voice that it seemed as though the continuing buffeting shaking everything around them were merely a reflection of it. Death was heartbeats away, she knew. Gone was any pretence at subtle torment. Now there was only bloodlust, and though she was less than dust to them, she was nearby and would serve as a beginning.
In response, a choking knot of her own hatred formed within her and, almost unaware of what she was doing, she braced herself to make a final spring at her enemies with the intention of seriously harming, if not killing, one of them.
Yet she did not. Instead, without thinking, she prostrated herself and began shouting passionately, her inspiration scarcely two words ahead of her speech. ‘Beyond our imagining are His ways, Excellencies. His hounds have led you here so that you might both know the secret of your enemy and find your guide to the Way.’
There was a long pause. Jeyan held her breath, bracing herself for a blow. Then she felt the fury about her alter. A whispered exchange began which she could not hear at first. It rose in intensity very quickly however.
‘He has led us here. Ibryen is to be our guide through the Ways. Our enemy shall be our salvation and our slave. We shall come to Him once again. And in triumph.’
The manic fervour that had fired their anger returned, though now it was sustaining an excited and frantic elation.‘He must be found and brought to our service.’ Over and over.‘He must be found.’
No praise came down to the still-prostrated Jeyan, but she knew that she was safe for the time being.
Yet, despite this change in the mood of the Gevethen, the shocks and vibrations that were continuing to shake their strange world were undiminished. In fact, just as they had seemingly resonated to their anger, so now they resonated to their excitement.
And they grew worse, though the Gevethen seemed to be oblivious to them.
Then, there was a sudden, jarring jolt and, for the briefest of moments, there was terrifying chaos. Jeyan felt as though she was being torn in half. She could hear herself screaming – screaming with two voices. And she could hear the Gevethen screaming too, though with countless numbers of voices. She had a fleeting vision of a line of Gevethen figures, arms thrashing frantically, disappearing into a distance that seemed to outreach the stars. Then the vision was gone, almost before she could register it, and at the same instant, she was whole again.
Slowly, the world within the mirrors reformed. The moving, intangible shapes and lights returned to pursue their own mysterious, bewildering paths, the sounds became again the rising and falling of a senseless chorus. And finally, she noted the faint reflected images of her room hovering about her.
For a moment she thought she was going to be violently sick. Then the hands of the Gevethen closed about her shoulders.
‘We are served by flawed creatures, Lord Counsellor…’
‘… Lord Counsellor.’
‘The offenders must be punished for their weakness and folly…’
‘… weakness and folly.’
Jeyan did not know what they meant, though she suspected, from their tone and their returning control, that it was associated with what had just happened rather than anything previously.
Then they were moving. Very quickly. Though not in flight, as before, but in furious excitement. It filled their voices when they spoke again.‘He shall be ours, Lord Counsellor. He shall be our guide. The traitor Ibryen shall bring us again to His feet.’
‘He must be found. He must be found.’