Andre Norton - The Gate of the Cat

“To the right—always the right—” She caught as a jog in the steps made her stumble and held on with both hands tearful for an instant at losing her step and plunging forward down this endless stair.

Yonan? Could that guiding have come from him? Somehow she could not tell. It was as if the mind voice which had sent it was hidden behind some distorting noise. Bait for a trap? She could not help but think of that. Yet if it were real and some other captive sought aid could she ignore it? There was always hope that the other would know more of this pile than she. and if she turned away she could be defeating the very purpose which had set her roving through the dark.

“Right—!”

The word faded and was gone. Kelsie took one step and the next with slow care, for here the yellow growth crossed the steps proving to be a jelly which gave forth a puff of foul decay. Then she had reached the level of another passage and sure enough it divided before her, right and left.

For the first time since she had awakened here she felt a faint warmth in the jewel and snatched it out. There was, in the very heart of it, a spark of light, far too small to aid her. But the very fact that it was able to project so much now heartened her. She turned right, one hand cupped tightly about the stone, following the direction given by that now silent voice. She made one attempt to use her own questing thought and then stopped that within almost the same instant. Among the terrors of this place there could also exist some method of picking up any mental communication and she did not have the use of the jewel strong enough to build up her call.

Again the way split and once more she tried the right-hand path. The eerie glow of the slime growths was augmented by a light from ahead—not the fearsome red of the basin chamber but more as if the flames of the leprous growths about her were increased a hundredfold. She was faced suddenly with a hole in the wall, but one which she must fall to her hands and knees to pass. Shrinking, sick from the odors which arose from the weird chamber before her instead of a passage.

There were growths here, also fungi perhaps, which had reached the height of small trees. Between them were smaller lumps of plants or mushroomlike things of different colors, as if in their misshapen bodies they aped flowers of the upper, clean world.

There was water also—or a liquid of some sort—which formed a small rivulet winding its way across the huge chamber. Its swollen looking waters were red and a haze arose above its length.

Through that she saw movement. Someone or something paced back and forth within the edge of the mist which spread out for a short space on either side of the stream.

Yonan! She dared not call his name, perhaps even think it. But she strode forward, trying to avoid contact with the smaller growth each of which when crushed added to the general foulness of the place.

There was no mail-protected fighting man across the mist-hung stream—though that other went clad in gray instead of in black as a Sarn Rider. There were rents in that long robe and hair hung in a tangle across the pacer’s shoulders. Though she had lost the iron-bound neatness and sobriety of her garments there was no trouble in recognizing—Wittle!

The witch came to a stop as Kelsie approached the riverlet and now she stood with both hands cupping her own jewel with such intensity as to leave her knuckles hard knobs in her pallid skin.

“So it is you—” there was no trace of welcome in her voice and there was certainly no expression of it on her angular features.

“How did you come here?” Kelsie returned. Was Wittle able to use her jewel—if so how did she end in this noisome place of the Dark Force.

“There was a trail—it proved false.” The witch replied shortly. “And how came you?”

“We were taken, outside.” She believed that the door in the monster’s belly had led her here. “Does your jewel aid you now?”

There was a flush up Wittle’s spare cheeks which was not a reflection from the blood-red stream. For a space of two breaths Kelsie thought she was not going to answer. Then she said:

“Its power is greatly diminished but it is not dead. And what of the one you so falsely wear, outworlder?”

“It is still alive.” Kelsie was sure of that spark of warmth which had arisen after she had left the cavern of the basin. “I cannot call it though.”

“Well you cannot!” snapped Wittle. “Would you have these creatures of the Dark realize what they have taken? Come hither and join me, perhaps the gems, stone to stone, will give us true sight in spite of what lies around.”

Kelsie had no intention of wading that steaming stream. She turned and walked along it to see if it narrowed enough tor her to essay a leap to the other side. Within short space of time it did—though the rank growth on the other bank suggested no fair landing. But what Wittle had half promised was worth the try.

She drew back again and then approached the stream at a run vaulting over it and landing in the mass of fungous material which burst and broke under her weight, smearing her with a stench borne by viscid splotches. She kept herself from trying to brush the stuff from her for fear of some poison—for she could not believe that such a loathsome medley of stinking smears would not also prove poisonous. Wittle awaited her but bore back a step or two as the fetid smells grew worse at every move Kelsie made.

She pointed to a bare space where she had paced. There was a patch of loose gravel there and Kelsie gingerly scooped up some of that to brush the worst of the stuff from her body.

“The jewel!” Wittle did not leave her much time to try to cleanse herself. She advanced, her own stone lying across both of her palms, and Kelsie obediently did the same with the gem on her own neck chain. They touched and immediately there was a small flare and thereafter a core of light in each of them.

“So—they can be fed!” Wittle was exultant. “Let us see.”

She settled down on the bare gravel, still careful that her torn robe did not touch Kelsie’s beslobbered garments. With one hand still on her stone she laid it down and motioned for Kelsie to do likewise. The girl hesitated.

“And if we awake the Dark?” Kelsie asked. “You, yourself, have said that this could be so—

“You would wait here for them to come? What profit for us in that? Already they know that they have a Witch of Estcarp.” She drew herself up proudly. “They will expect no more than that I try my strength against theirs. That it be doubled now—well, that may be enough to penetrate some of their barriers.”

Slowly Kelsie placed her own jewel beside that other one, taking care to have it touch Wittle’s. The result was like a small fire, for the heart flame in each shot upward for an eye dazzling space and then died down into a steady double glow.

“The way out—” Wittle leaned forward her tongue caressing her lower lips as if she had just drunk deeply of some restoring drink.

But Kelsie was as quick with her own demand. “Yonan!”

The witch snarled and put out her hand as if to snatch away her jewel, but she did not quite break the connection between them.

“The way out!” She put her face forward, so close to Kelsie’s that a small fleck of spittle hit the girl’s cheek. “The man is useless—we must be on our way.”

“Yonan,” Kelsie repeated with stubborn determination. If she had to choose between traveling companions she already was certain which one she would take.

It would appear that Wittle did not feel strongly enough to gainsay her now for as Kelsie centered her gaze on the two glowing stones and built up in her mind her picture of Yonan as she had last seen him, the witch did not protest again. Though if she added her own focusing power to that search Kelsie had no way of telling.