Andre Norton - Ware Hawk

“This is an old land, very old,” she returned. “It hides years upon years of secrets. Perhaps the mountains, when they leaped at the Call of the Council, merely moved into a pattern once known before. At any rate, this is a protected place.” She brought up her hand, stretching the fingers to form a sign of recognition. “Here we can be safe. He might have been,” she glanced over her shoulder at the mound, “had he reached it unwounded. We cannot tell what may be abroad now. Would you still move on, or shall we give our beasts a chance of rest and good forage?”

He still studied the sign on the cliff side. “You speak of years—and I think those may have piled up beyond counting. Does any ensorcellment last so long?”

“By the legends it may. Let us see…” She pushed on until she could touch the stone of the cliff wall. The symbol was well above her head. Looking about, Tirtha caught up a branch half embedded in the earth, jerked it free. From her pouch she took the record rod they had found. There could be yet another reason why the dead man had fought so valiantly to reach this place, if he knew of the symbol and had not come here by mere chance or the wandering of the Torgian bearing a near-conscious rider.

In her belt pouch was a looping of leather for the mending of her boots, and she selected one strand to bind the record rod to the branch end.

“These holders,” she explained as she worked, the Falconer watching her closely but plainly without understanding what she would do, “are made charged with certain powers. They cannot be fashioned in these days for their secret had been lost. But I was at Lormt two winters since, and one can learn how things may work, if not why—that being forgotten. The symbol there is wrought of charged metal—worked by smiths who had talent, who knew their witchery, as you would say. It is a very old knowledge that like answers to like. If the power still lies in these two workings, the cliff and the rod, different as they may seem, then we shall have proof of it. Now!”

Having tested her lashing, Tirtha stood to tiptoe, one hand braced against the cliff side, the other raising the branch as far as she could, so that the record rod did, indeed, reach the bottommost looping of that inlay. She nearly cried out.

Feeding downward, even through the dead wood she held, came a surge of power, while both symbol and rod gave forth a thin bluish light. She jerked the stick away, afraid that perhaps such an awakening might consume the rod itself. But she had been right! Blue was the color of protective Power always. There were many accounts at Lormt concerning places of refuge which could be so identified, though those must lie in Escore since Estcarp boasted none that she knew of. And if the rod had also blazed blue, then what it contained held Power, was not just some simple message!

Her hand stung as a queer prickling ran along her fingers. Quickly taking the branch into her left fist, Tirtha flexed and bent those fingers. An exclamation from her companion brought her attention away from her own reaction, from knowing that she meddled with what she did not understand and had probably been too reckless in trying.

He had seized upon the branch above her own hold and nearly shook it free of her grasp in his excitement. Then she saw, also. The hair-thin line which had marked the sealing place on the rod was not only wider, but it was ringed by a slim blue line of fire, as if energy ate the old metal.

“Don’t touch it—not yet!” Her cry came swiftly, as he was about to free it from its lashing. “Not unless you want, perhaps, to lose another hand!”

He loosed his hold to stare at her, suspicion again in his face. Tirtha laid the branch and rod carefully at the gravelly foot of the cliff and watched. It was true! There was an ever-increasing opening. She looked at her hands, at her sword. If that blue light did not continue, she might try to force it more. However, the reaction that had reached her even through the length of dead wood was a warning. They must wait until whatever had begun worked itself out.

She glanced up. There was nothing to be read now by the lines on the rockface. Their shining was as it had been at her first sighting. The influence, whatever it might be, had passed into the rod. Now that was failing also. At least the blue strip about the one end was losing brightness. As it failed she could see a dark space, and she was sure that the sealing had been sprung. That she had succeeded in such an act was as surprising to her as it must be to the Falconer, who watched the cylinder of metal intently, even as he might look into the eyes of an enemy, with the same wariness and readiness for battle.

It had been only experimentation, a wild guess on her part. That it worked…! Had this been the reason to draw the dead man here with his last failing strength—that he might read a record as important to him as life itself?

The blue light vanished. Tirtha knelt, stretched out her hand, very cautiously, toward the lashing of the rod. She could sense no heat, nothing of that energy which had touched her before. The gap in the rod remained apparent.

Very carefully she worked at the knotted thong, moving gingerly when she had to touch the rod itself. When there followed no pricking, she took confidence, twisted it free. Gripping the cap in her fingers, she gave a sharp pull. There was resistance, but only slight. Then the small round of metal came free, the rod remaining in her other hand. She dropped the cap, upended the rod to shake it above her left palm. Nothing was forthcoming. When Tirtha inspected it more closely she could see a roll inside, tight against the wall of the small cylinder. That had to be worked out very carefully. If this scrap was old, it might well vanish into dust under rough handling.

She held a roll of what could only be several layers of the same reptile skin as formed her money belt, glued one to another to make a sheet akin to parchment, but infinitely more durable. She spread it wide to view a jumble of symbols that made no sense at all.

Her disappointment was so keen, she gave a little cry of disbelief. A thing of power this doubtless was, but as locked against any use by her as if she had never freed it from the rod! None of the symbols on it were familiar. Not even at Lormt had she come across such meandering lines, such swirls, as were inscribed here in red paint or ink. They did not even form lines as if they were some enciphered message—rather sprawled here and there, some large, some small, in no reasonable pattern.

“Perhaps it is a map.”

Almost, Tirtha had forgotten the Falconer. He moved beside her again to stare at what she held, his slanting brows drawn together in a half-frown.

“A map!” Tirtha had reason to consult such in the past. Though nothing had been done since the writhing of the mountains to lay out guides for travelers into the borderlands, she herself had contrived to fit together bits of information which she believed would guide her to her future goal. She had set down, memorized, and destroyed them methodically. Nothing she had ever seen or heard of matched this peculiar scrawl. Yet it had not been done roughly, she could perceive that the longer she studied it. The pictured symbols must have definite meaning, yet it was a meaning that eluded her.

“Not of this.” With a wave of his hand her companion dismissed the countryside around them. “I think it is a different kind of map—perhaps of a place, a hold even, rather than the countryside.”

“But there are no lines for walls, no—” she began her protest.

His frown had lightened. “I think everything that might have been used in that fashion was deliberately omitted. So that the place could not be identified. This is a seeker’s guide, one pointed at a special place, perhaps a treasure.”