Andre Norton - Year of the Unicorn

Bane-bloom, and the Lash of Gorth, the Candles of the Weres—come you back!”

Loud were the words now, an imperative call I could not nay-say. I opened my eyes. Light about me, not that of day, but of green flames. A sweet scent filled my nostrils and the petals of flowers brushed my cheeks as I turned my head to see him who spoke. Herrel stood against a silver pillar, his body to the waist pale silver too, for he had stripped off mail and leather and was bare of skin to his belt—save that across his upper arms and shoulders were welts, angry, red, and on some of them stood beads of blood. Between his hands was a whip of branch broken in the middle. “Herrel?”

He came quickly, fell to his knees beside me. His face was that of a man who has come from a battlefield, gaunted by exhaustion, too worn to care whether he held victory in his hand, or must taste the sour of defeat. Yet when he looked down at me he came alive again. His hand came out as if to touch my cheek, then dropped upon his thigh.

“Gillan, how is it with you?”

I wet my lips. Far within me something was troubled, as if it had reached and been denied. I moved my arm; faint pain, the lingering memory of that agony which had rent me earlier. I sat up slowly. He made no move to aid me. There was a bandage about my arm and I smelled the sharp odour of a salve I knew well; so he had plundered my bag. But as I so moved a covering of flowers cascaded down my body, and with them leaves hastily torn into bits, from which came the scent of herbs. I had lain under a thick blanket of them.

Herrel made a gesture with his hand. The green lights snuffed out. Nor could I see from what they had sprung, for they left no sign of their source behind them.

“How is it with you?” he repeated. “Well, I believe well—”

“Not wholly so. And the time—the time grows short!”

“What do you mean?” I gathered up a handful of that flowery covering, raised the bruised blossoms, the aromatic leaves to sniff them.

“You are two—”

“That I know.” I broke in.

“But perhaps this you do not know. For a space one may be made two—though it is a mad and wicked thing. Then, if the two do not meet once again—one fades—”

“That other Gillan—will go?” The flower petals dropped from my hand, once more I felt that cold within me, that hunger which could not be appeased by any food taken into the mouth, swallowed by the throat.

“Or you!” His words were simple, yet for a moment the understanding of them was not mine. And he must have read that in my face, for now he got once more to his feet, brought down his bare fists against the side of the pillar as if he smashed into the face of an enemy.

“They—wrought this—thinking that you—this you—would die in the waste—or in the mountains. This land has mighty safeguards.”

“That I know.”

“They did not believe that you would live. And if you died, then would that Gillan they had summoned be whole—though not as you, save in a small part. But when you came into Arvon—they knew. They learned that a stranger troubled the land, and guessed that it was you. So they turned again to the power and—”

“Sent you—” I said softly when he did not continue.

He turned his head so that once more I could read his face, and what lay there was not good to behold. There were no words in me which I could summon to assuage that wound as my balms and salves could have healed torn flesh for him.

“I told you—at our first meeting—I am not as they are. They can, if they wish, compel me, or blind my eyes, as they did when they brought forth that other Gillan who turned aside from me to welcome Halse—as he wished from the beginning!”

I shivered. Halse! Had that other me lain happily in Halse’s arms, welcomed him? I put hands to my face, knowing shame like a devouring fire. No—no—

“But I am me—” I could not set my bewilderment into words clear enough even for my own understanding. “I have a body—am real—”

But was I? For in this land I was a wraith, as its people were wraiths to me. I ran my hand along that bandaged arm, welcoming the pain which followed touch, for it spelled the reality of the flesh which winced from finger pressure.

“You are you, she is also you—in part. As yet a far lighter and less powerful part. But, should you cease to exist, then she is whole, whole enough for Halse’s purpose. They fear you, the Pack, because they can not control you as the others. Therefore they would make one by sorcery that they can.”

“And if—if—”

Again he picked the thought from my mind. “If I had done as they intended and slain you? Then they would not have cared had I learned the full truth, once I had accomplished their purpose. They do not fear me in the least, and if I had done myself harm on discovery of the murder they set me to, well, that would have merely removed another trouble from their path. To their thinking this was a fine plan.”

“But you did not kill.”

There was no lighting of his face. Still he was as one who had fallen into Hound hands and been subjected to their cruel usage.

“Look upon your arm, Gillan. No, I did not kill, but in this much did I serve their purpose. And should this hurt keep us from the road we must take, then I have done as commanded—”

“Why?”

“Time is our enemy, Gillan. The longer the twain of you are apart, so will you fail in strength—so finally you may not reach uniting in time. I speak thus that you may know what truly lies before us, for I do not believe that you are one to be soothed with fair words and kept in ignorance.”

Perhaps he paid me a compliment in that judging. I do not know. Only then I wished that he had not thought so highly of my courage, for I was shaken, though I tried not to let him know it.

“I think,” I tried to push aside fear for a space and think on other things, “that you are more than you believe—or they give you credit for being. Why did you not carry through this geas they set upon you? I have heard, by legend, that a geas is a thing of great power, not lightly broken.”

Herrel came away from the pillar, stooped and took up from the ground a shirt which he drew on over his welted shoulders.

“Do not credit me with any great thing, Gillan. I give thanks to the forces above us, that I awakened from their spell in time. Or that you awoke me—since your voice came to me in that darkness where they had me bound. If you believe you can ride, then we must be gone. To catch up with the pack is what we need to do—”

He donned leather under-jerkin and then his mail, belting it about him. But when he picked up his helm he stood for a long moment, staring down upon the snarling cat crest and his eyes were hooded as if he looked upon that which he would like to thrust from him. However, after that short pause he put it on his head.

Then he turned to me, aiding me to my feet, putting about my shoulders not the heavy rug, but his own cloak. Then he half led, half carried me from the mound.

The moonlight was waning; it must not be far from dawn. Herrel whistled and his horse came to us, snorting a little, glancing from side to side, as if it perceived more lurking in the forest shadows than we could see. Yet Herrel displayed no interest in the woodland. He lifted me to the saddle and then mounted behind me. The stallion showed no distaste for a double burden but set off at a steady, ground covering pace.

“I do not understand.” I began. Herrel’s arms were about me warm and safe, the mail of his sleeves not harsh to the touch but rather reassuring in its rigidity. “I do not understand why Halse wanted me. Was it because his pride suffered when you fared well and he went bride—less?”