Maggie Furey - Harp of Winds

The weather-wise Hreeza growled low in her throat. “I don’t like the look of that,” she muttered.

“If you don’t like that, I suggest you take a look in the opposite direction.” Shia’s mental voice was choked. The old cat turned away from the baleful sunrise—and her breath grew still in her throat. Up, she looked, and up, at soaring walls of stone . . .

“Well, what do we do now?” Khanu repeated, keeping a wary distance between himself and Hreeza. “I can’t see how we could possibly climb up there.”

“I don’t know.” Shia glared at the Staff of Earth where it lay on the snowy ground, fighting the furious urge, born of pure frustration, to chew the wretched, troublesome thing into splinters. Her breath huffed out in a crystal cloud as she sighed. “I suppose we must wait until Anvar awakes—perhaps he knows of some way up.”

Hreeza looked again at the smooth, sheer curtains of stone that soared straight upward and disappeared into the clouds above.

Shia could sense a strange reluctance in her old friend’s mien, and wondered what was coming. “Well?” she said at last. “Are you going to chew on that thought like an old bone for the rest of the day, or will you spit it out and share it with us?”

The old cat refused to meet her gaze. “Are you so certain,” she said slowly, “that the human merely sleeps? What if he is dead?”

Flame kindled in the depths of Shia’s eyes. “I will not accept that.” Her voice was laden with quiet menace. “Aurian’s foes need Anvar as a hostage—why would they kill him?”

“Yet I sense your doubt,” Hreeza persisted. “Anything may have happened. An accident—a change of plan ... To stay up here, exposed to the weather and our enemies is folly!”

“Anvar is not dead!” Shia bared her teeth, advancing threateningly on the old cat.

“Why not wait a while, and see?” Khanu broke the tension between the bristling females. “After all,” he added, “we did not come all this long and arduous way just to give up so soon. And while we wait for Shia’s human to wake, we can always explore the foot of this cliff. Perhaps there may be an easier place to climb, farther along.”

Shia looked at him gratefully. Khanu was beginning to develop both the sharper wits of a hunting female and the common sense of an older, more experienced beast. Right now, she appreciated his intervention. It was imperative that Anvar be released before the birth of Aurian’s child, in order to give the Mage freedom to act to save the cub’s life. The slow and difficult journey to this place had driven the great cat into a fever of anxious impatience, but that was no excuse for her unreasoning anger at Hreeza’s prevarication. With unswerving loyalty, the old cat had followed her all this way—only to be defeated, in the end, by this last unconquerable obstacle. Even if Khanu and I can find a way to climb that cliff, Shia thought, Hreeza cannot—and she knows it. That is the true reason behind her obstructive attitude—she can’t bear the humiliation of being left behind.

“You think there might be an easier way up elsewhere?” Hreeza was demanding of Khanu. Bless him, Shia thought, for restoring my old friend’s hope—if only for a time.

Khanu twitched his whiskers forward in the cat equivalent of a grin. “Why not?” he said cheerfully. “I certainly hope there is—for though you may be able to scramble up there, the climb is far beyond my skills!”

“Let us go, then, youngster, and try to find a place that won’t overtax you!” Hreeza’s eyes were bright again. Before Shia picked up her burden of the Staff once more, she briefly touched noses with the young male in a heartfelt gesture of thanks.

“Shia? Is it really you?”

Anvar’s mental tones were ringing with joy and relief, though the cat was certain that no one in the world could be more relieved than she, to make contact with the Mage at last. It was worth this long and dreadful journey to feel his hope blaze up, renewed, when she told him that Aurian had sent her with the Staff of Earth.

“Dear Gods,” Anvar cried, “I saw you, in a dream, as you were crossing the mountains—but I thought it was only the fever!”

But Anvar was anxious for news of Aurian, and could listen to nothing else until she had told him what little she knew. Because of her stronger link with the Mage, Shia hoped to establish mental contact once Aurian’s powers returned, as did Anvar himself. Whether this would prove possible over such a distance, only time would tell.

Unfortunately, Anvar could offer the cat no help with her present difficulty, “The cliff is utterly sheer for as far as I can see,” he told her. “To my left there’s a waterfall, about the length of a bowshot away from the cave, but that won’t be much use to you—the torrent is very swift, and it doesn’t look as though you can get behind it.”

“At least it will tell us where to find the human,” Khanu pointed out to Shia. Although he could “hear” Anvar, he had not yet found the confidence to address this alien creature directly.

“Your friend has a point,” said Anvar, when Shia passed on the young cat’s contribution.

“He certainly does,” she agreed. “We’ve been searching since sunup, and found no trace of any way to ascend. I was hoping for a tunnel, perhaps, but—”

“No, it won’t be as easy as Dhiammara. I’ve explored this cave thoroughly, and there’s no other exit. Gods! Shia”—Anvar’s thoughts were tense with frustration—“are you sure you can’t scale the cliff?”

“Never fear, we’ll keep looking,” Shia told the Mage “These low clouds will shield us from any watchers above.”

“These clouds are also ready to drop another lot of snow on our heads’ Hreeza pointed out, but no one was paying her any attention. Shaking her head in dismay, the old cat limped stiffly in the wake of the others, as they set out to search once more.

An hour later, Shia was wishing she had listened to Hreeza’s warnings. The cats had worked their way along the base of the cliffs until they found the massive waterfall, and it was then, as they explored the churning green pool at the foot of the cascade, that the snow began to fall.

Thick and fast came the whirling, heavy flakes. Whipped into flurries by the rising wind, they drifted deeply in the angle at the foot of the cliffs, making it impossibly dangerous to seek shelter there. Indeed, the only shelter on this windswept plateau lay far behind them—the gorge where they had made their original ascent.

“Well, it’s no use trying to get back there now’ Hreeza pointed out, “We would perish long before we reached it,”

Despite her thick, shaggy coat she was shivering violently, her black fur already plastered white with a clinging sheath of snow. “We may as well keep going, and try to find a place to shelter somewhere along the foot of the cliff.”

Shia looked doubtfully at the growing drifts. “Even supposing there is shelter, it will be buried out of our sight,” She took a tighter grip on the Staff of Earth. “There’s only one thing to be done, I must climb up the cliff to Anvar now, before this cold seeps the last of my strength!

“Shia, you cannot! No one could hope to climb that cliff!” Hreeza protested. “Would you die for naught?”

“Far from it.” Shia held the old cat’s eyes with an unwavering gaze. “Hreeza, this matter is greater than all of us. Anvar must have the Staff, or not only the lives of my friends will be lost, but the entire world besides.”

Shia’s quiet determination robbed Hreeza of words. She looked away from her friend. “Very well,” she mumbled, her mental voice hushed with emotion. “You must do as you must, my friend. But Shia—be careful. If you lose your life in this climb, I must avenge you, and these new enemies of yours are too much for one old cat to handle!.”