Sean Russell - The Shadow Roads

In a moment she turned and hurried away, breaking into arun. She dashed up the stairs and slammed the door behind her, almost droppingthe lantern to the door.

“Your grace?” came the voice of her maid of the bedchamber. “Issomething wrong? Your grace is as pale as a cloud.”

“Call a guard. Quickly!”

Two guards came, at the run, and Llyn’s servant led themdown into the garden.

“It is just here,” Llyn called from a shadow, as the guardsapproached the place where the path had opened. The two guards stumbled intothe bushes, breaking branches and trampling the flowers. Llyn drew nearer andwatched them go, their lantern growing smaller and dimmer, as though theywalked off into a wood. And then it disappeared altogether, though there was awall not three yards away.

It was some hours later when the two guards returned,looking flustered and out of sorts. They had followed the path into the woodfor some distance, but when they tried to retrace their steps they could not.Instead, they found themselves several furlongs away, near the river-and theyhad not walked a tenth that distance they were certain.

In the garden the path could no longer be found.

Llyn shut herself up in her room and bolted the doors,looking around as though the walls might open up, or a man appear out of thinair. That night she did not go to bed but sat up, awake, feeling as though shewere being torn apart, like everyone in Castle Renne could walk unannouncedinto her little kingdom.

For many hours she paced, forth and back, like an animal ina cage. Finally, she stopped before the window where her reflection floated,faint and ghostly, against the night. She turned her face so that only the goodside could be seen, peering out of the corner of her eye.

Half a beauty , she thought.

Very slowly she turned her head, seeing the teeth clench andthe lips turn down, bracing herself. The ruined landscape of her face appeared;the eye with its lid greatly burned away, the bubbled skin across her cheek,red and coarse. Even her lips were reduced to thin red lines, as though someonehad made her mouth with the haphazard slash of a dull knife.

She realized the thing floating in the dark glass lookedlike a creature out of nightmare. “You will have no pity from me,” shewhispered to the creature and a tear rolled down its ruined cheek.

They did not wait for morning but set out by the light ofthe waning moon, which lit the road faintly and made monsters of tree stumpsand spies of every bush. Above them, a small flight of crows swarmed from treeto tree like a wayward breeze. Alaan set a good pace, as though the shatteredmoon was bright as the morning sun, and the night passed with hardly a wordbetween them. Many times they dismounted and led their horses through shadow,and twice Alaan used a flint to light one of the torches he carried. The smellof burning pitch assailed Tam’s nostrils, but a small province of light spreadaround them. Beyond this, the kingdom of night lay hidden.

“The land between the mountains is behind us now,” Alaansaid quietly, “but we mustn’t relax our guard. Once I’ve opened a pathway itremains open for some time. We could be followed.”

Tam had not asked where they were going, assuming it wasinto the hidden lands, and any destination there would mean nothing to him, butas their horses trotted along the dark road the Valeman pressed his mountforward, drawing up beside Alaan.

“Where is it we go, Alaan?” he asked. “What place could bemore perilous than the places we have been?”

Alaan did not answer right away, but kept his gaze fixed onthe dark ribbon of road. “We go into the borderlands of Death’s kingdom, Tam.A place from which only one man has returned.”

“Who? Who returned from Death’s kingdom?”

“No one who passes through the gate returns, but I went onceinto the borderlands. We will try our luck again.” He glanced up at Tam, hisface ashen in the moonlight. “I will tell you honestly, Tam-Death will notsuffer our presence there. He will send his servants to find us.”

Tam let his horse drop back, falling in behind Alaan. He foundhimself wishing that he’d never left the Vale of Lakes, that he was there stillin the late-summer light, walking through the ripening grain or drawing waterfrom the spring that murmured the names of newborn children-or so it was said.Anywhere but following Alaan to this place he had named.

They carried on by torchlight, stumbling over rock and root,until faint light began to devour the shadows, and the stars overhead snuffedout, one by one. By a small lake, Alaan stopped to water the horses and leteveryone rest. Cynddl kindled fire, and they made a meal as the morning spreadwest across the world.

Alaan had produced enough gold that night to buy them horsesand tack, arms and supplies. No one asked where this wealth had come from. Nannhad given them new bows, and Tam decided to try his, stringing it for the firsttime. Light reflected off the polished grain of the yaka wood, as he nocked anarrow and drew back the string. The sound of an arrow hissed over the grass, followedby a sharp thwack as it lodged in the bark of an old butternut.

“You won’t get that one out Tam,” Cynddl said. “The grainwill be too tight and old.”

“I took care not to shoot it that hard. How is your new bow,Cynddl?”

In a moment there was an archery contest under way, with everyonebut Alaan and Crowheart involved. Tam noticed that Alaan watched over themwithout a hint of a smile, his eyes darting often to the tree line, then alongthe shore of the lake.

He is a wary traveler, Tam thought. And we should take a lessonfrom that.

Cynddl was the best archer that day, though only slightlybetter than Tam. Fynnol came third, but did not seem to mind, as thecompetition was very stiff, and he had acquitted himself well.

“Time to go,” Alaan announced, as Fynnol proposed a rematch.

Their horses had been grazing nearby, and were soon saddledand packed again. As Tam tightened the girth strap on his horse, Fynnol andCynddl came near.

“So what did Alaan say last night?” Fynnol asked quietly. “Didyou ask him where we go?” He stroked the nose of his horse, which he hadpositioned to shield their conversation from Rabal and Alaan.

Tam lengthened one of his stirrups, the worn leather warmand supple in the sun. He realized he did not want to be the bearer of thisnews. “We go into the borderlands of Death’s kingdom, Fynnol.”

Fynnol blinked several times. “But no one returns from Death’skingdom.”

“Alaan said we will not pass through the gate-and that hemade a journey there … once.” Tam hesitated. “Dangerous, but not more so thanother places we’ve been.” He tried to smile reassuringly, but neither of hiscompanions appeared to be reassured.

By the time they set off around the lake and up the slopeinto a shady wood, the morning was advancing. Beyond, Tam thought he could makeout hills, all but obscured by haze.

A whole morning’s toil was needed to break out of the trees.The wood began to thin, then turn to scattered pines and firs. Weatherwornrocks broke through the surface, here and there, like the backs of ancientwhales. And then the tree line was behind them.

They were on the side of a low, rounded mountain, the worldspreading out below.

For a moment, they all stopped to let the horses catch theirbreath. They had traversed the slope back and forth, not attacking it directly,but even so, the climb had been difficult. An empty wind blew at thiselevation, and the only sound was the occasional call of a distant crow.

“Well, Tam,” Fynnol said, breaking the silence, “we set outto trade for horses and look! Did you ever expect to own ones as fine as these?And they were free.”