Andre Norton - Web of the Witch World

“Oh, they wait,” she agreed. “They have waited, a long time they have waited. And now come those who would hunt for us—only there will be a second hunt.” Again that titter which was worse than any cry of pain or terror.

But what she said was not insane; it made sense. The Kolder could be coming through the gate to hunt for the three of them. And these—these things—which lingered here were gathering to meet them. Did the Kolder know what they faced?

Simon gave a hasty glance along the edge of the drop. To go out might make them the quarry for those who were moving in. but only so could they see the gate in action. And the nagging fear which had ridden him since they had crashed through had been that return might be denied.

There was a solid-looking base out there, perhaps it had once supported a superstructure of which only a single rod pointing skyward remained. With their backs to that base they would have a vantage point from which to watch the gate. Cradling the rifle in his arm, Simon caught at Aldis and pulled her along, Jaelithe following fleetly.

What Simon had believed during the storm to be a stream bed now showed as the remnants of a paved road, half covered by falls of debris from the heights. A stream still ran down its middle. A little to the right of their present stand, but down on the level of the road, the wall of the cut, on either side, had blocks of green metal set as pillars.

“The gate,” Simon said.

“And its defenders,” Jaelithe added in a half whisper. Those were to be seen now, moving along the cut. For all their unearthly, unhuman aspect, they were setting up an ambush with the cunning of intelligence, or what had been born from intelligence which had once existed. Here and there Simon marked such weapons as the one he held in his own hands.

“They are coming through!”

There was no change in the metal pillars, no sign that the gate was in use, until those men suddenly appeared as if from the air itself. Possessed fighting men, yet they showed caution as they fanned out, moved up the break. There was no hint from those in hiding. And the controlled warriors of the Kolder advanced without facing attack. A full company of them came through, were well along the cut from which every sign of those in ambush had vanished. Now the nose of one of the crawlers appeared, followed by the rest of its ponderously moving bulk. One of the possessed at the controls, but beside him a Kolder agent.

Around, from below, from across the cut, Simon sensed that upsurge—an emotion in the air, dark and heavy. “They hate—” Jaelithe whispered. “How they hate!”

“They hate,” Aldis mimicked her tone. “But still they wait. They have learned to wait, for that is what they have lived to do.”

A second truck crawled out of nothingness. Now the invaders’ foot force was well down the old road. This second vehicle had a larger cabin on its body, the top of which was a transparent dome. And in that sat true Kolder, two of them—one wearing a metal cap.

The smoldering cloud of emotion was so strong now Simon expected it to rise as a visible fog. But still those in ambush made no move. A smaller party of possessed, marched stolidly along—labor ready for the need.

Then—nothing more.

“Now!”

Sound, lower than thunder but with a bestial hate which made it one with elements, which owed nothing to intelligence or human understanding. The fury which had been building boiled into action as the possessed shivered, jerked, fell.

There was not enough room in the cut for the trucks to turn. But the one bearing the Kolder officers reversed, crawled backward, so that the possessed who followed it were crushed and broken beneath its treads. Then the driver jerked and quivered in turn. He fell out of sight in the cabin, yet still the truck retreated, or strove to withdraw, though its backward run was now far more unsteady. At last it crashed into one of the piles of debris and slowly tilted, as the treads clawed vainly to keep it upright.

The Kolder wearing the cap had not moved, even his eyes remained closed. Perhaps it was his will which had kept the truck going, even protected him and his fellows now as neither seemed affected by the attack which withered and slew those about them.

His companion turned his head from side to side, studying the route. But no expression Simon could read crossed his white face.

“They have what they want now,” Aldis again with that tittering laugh. “They have caught a Master to give them a key to the gate.”

They had come out of hiding, those skeletons—the bait of the Kolders drawing them free of caution. Many of them were bare-handed as they swarmed about the truck, strove to climb to the bubble-topped cabin.

Mewling cries—half that company fell back, their bodies blackened, their limbs moving spasmodically. But still more gathered, not quite as unwary now. Until several came together, bearing with them a loop of metallic chain. Three flings before it fell into position about the bubble. Then fire ran around it in a spitting line. When that was pulled away and they climbed again, there was no trouble. The bubble shattered and they were at their prey.

Jaelithe covered her eyes. She had seen the sacking of cities and the things done in Karsten when the Old Race had been horned into outlawry. But this was something she could not watch.

“Only one—” Aldis babbled, “he must be saved for the key—they must have their key!”

The metal-capped Kolder hung limply in his captors’ clutches, his eyes still closed. The skeletons were gathering along the cut, to form up as a grotesque demon army behind that captive and those who held him. There were the alien rifles among them, but others had armed themselves with the weapons of the possessed. And their hate was still high and hot. Then, holding the Kolder to the fore, they marched, as if a forgotten training was revived in their union of purpose—for the gate.

Simon moved as the first of them stepped between the pillars and vanished. The Kolder—now these—what evil would be loosed in the world he had come to consider his own?

“Yes, oh, yes!” Jaelithe cried. “A wind, then a whirlwind—and we must face the storm!”

ONLY THE DEAD lay in the cut, that sense of alien presence had accompanied that sinister army through the gate. How many had been in that force? Fifty. A hundred? Simon had not counted them, but he believed not over a hundred. And what could so few do against the entrenched might beyond? This was not to be a matter of laying an ambush.

But the Kolder should be too occupied now to remember the fugitives, and this was the time to return with the force before them.

“We go back—”

Aldis gave one of those eerie, tittering laughs. She had crept away from them, was moving along the edge of the ravine, looking at them over her shoulder, a sly grin on her lips. Almost she was coming to resemble the skeletal inhabitants of this land. The last vestiges of beauty had been bleached from her.

“How will you go?” she called. “Door without key, door you cannot batter down. How do you go, mighty warrior and lady witch?”

She was running in a zigzag, fleetly, back into the waste.

“After her!” Jaelithe scrambled by him. “Do you not see? That talisman—it is the key—for her—for us!”

If she were right—Simon followed. Light as it was to carry, the alien rifle was an awkward burden as they smashed through brush. But he clung to it. In spite of the veil of vegetation growing over the debris of the buildings, the ruins were impressive. This had been, if not a city, a fort or settlement of some size. And the number of hiding places among the broken walls were beyond counting. As he and Jaelithe burst into an open space, Simon stopped her with an outthrust arm.