Alan Foster - Krull

The words he'd prayed for. The spider stopped, frozen by the movement of sand in the widow's strange glass. It would remain motionless until the sand ran out. Ynyr didn't know how much time had been given to him. He wasn't sure he wanted to know. Instead, he concentrated on making his way as rapidly as possible over the unsteady cables toward the mass of silk suspended at the center of the web.

The silk clutched and tugged at his body and limbs as if conscious of his presence, trying to hold him back until its spinner's spell was ended. He slashed at the cables with his arms, forcing a path where none existed. One wave of a groping hand uncovered a globular white mass. The skull showed two widely spaced punctures, one above each earhole. Ynyf knocked it aside and it went tumbling down through the web. A faint, final crash indicated how far it was to the rock below.

The sticky silk gave way reluctantly, but he adroitly avoided the worst spots, keeping to the dry cables the spider used itself. The central cocoon was close now.

Then he slipped. He'd rushed his approach. As he fell, he grabbed frantically for an overhead strand. It was thinner than the cables he'd been traversing, but it held long enough to enable him to swing into a net of thin webbing just beneath the cocoon. At the same time the spider seemed to regain its composure as well as its senses. It lunged across the gap, landing in the webbing just below the white sphere. But by then Ynyr had started to pull himself up into the cocoon.

The spider turned a slow circle, moving in short, erratic starts, pulling on various cables in an attempt to relocate the prey that had so mysteriously vanished. It rested there, sensing in its dull fashion that its supper was out of sight as well as out of reach.

Gasping for breath, not daring to glance back, Ynyr finally pulled himself up into the cocoon. The surface he relaxed against was unimaginably soft. He lay there a long moment before rising, then stood and inspected his surroundings. He likened the sensation to walking on a feather mattress ten feet thick.

The light that illuminated the cave was slightly brighter here, as though it emanated from the silk itself. There were chairs, a mirror, other implements of human design. A bed of spun silk lay off in one corner. There was no suggestion of wood in its frame. It appeared to have been woven rather than built. He smelled freshly cooked food and his mind told him not to inquire into the nature of the ingredients.

Across the room sat a table. Various utensils decorated the top. Some were familiar to him, others not. A large hourglass squatted on the far side of the table. The old woman who sat there staring at him rested one hand atop the device. All the sand had collected in the bottom of the glass.

She didn't smile as she studied him. A finger tapped the side of the glass, marking thoughts as well as time. "I gave you the sand. You nearly used it all."

"I am not as sprightly as I once was and this body works not as well as the one I remember."

"None of us is young anymore."

He walked toward her. "Lyssa." Yes, it was she who shared name and more with the young woman betrothed to Colwyn. Age could not hide the resemblance.

What must she think of my appearance, he thought? Have I changed that much? From her stare he felt certain that he had.

None of us sees ourself true, he mused. It lies only in the power of others to do that. But I can see the past as well as the present in her eyes. She remembers. Whether that is good or ill we will soon know.

"I was young when I last heard that name."

He moved nearer, took a chair across the table from her. "I was young when last I spoke it to you."

"My face was as beautiful as my name then."

"More beautiful. You were renowned throughout the Fifty Kingdoms and men came even from across the seas to court you."

"None of them was suitable. Many were handsome, all were wealthy, others brave and valorous. But none was suitable. Only you were suitable, Ynyr, and you would not stay with me."

He did not turn away. This was not the time for turning away. But the memory was still painful. Let her take some solace from my pain, he thought. I too have suffered. Loneliness is a poor companion.

"I could not. You know that, Lyssa. There were many responsibilities, duties."

"Ambition," she said tightly.

"It had nothing to do with ambition. Perhaps I was too forceful at times in expressing my hopes for the future. Some might interpret that as ambition. But for myself I wished nothing." He smiled gently. "And as you can see by my appearance, that is precisely what I have gained. There were more important things to attend to. The fate of Krull was placed in my hands."

"Ambition," she reiterated stubbornly.

"Is it ambition that one should wish to see Krull restored to its rightful place? Is it ambition that makes me sorrow as I watch the Slayers ravage quiet towns and villages and murder for pleasure? Is it ambition that I should want to see men rule their own lives and determine their own destinies instead of leaving them to the whims of the Beast?''

"You make it sound so noble," she murmured. "So inevitable. As if you never had a choice." Her eyes flashed and beneath the age and the exhaustion and the bitterness there was a hint of the woman who had been. "You had a choice. Every man has a choice. As for me, I grew tired of waiting. I despaired of you, Ynyr."

"Great things can come to pass only if one exercises patience and caution."

"Love does not make room for patience and caution. It burns wild for an instant and if not captured, it dies."

"Do you think I don't know that? Do you think that while dreaming all my dreams and planning all my plans, I didn't think of that? Of you? My life has been as lonely as yours. Knowledge is little comfort on a cold night. I have lived a life as solitary as your own, without wife or children. You see, Lyssa, though I encountered many women from many lands who came to learn from me, you and I were too much alike. None of them was"—his smile twisted—"suitable."

She turned away from him. "You were not as alone as you believe. You had a son."

Here was the thing he'd feared most, the thing he had not prepared for, could not prepare for. No wonder her greeting had been so much harsher than he'd anticipated.

"You said nothing. You told me nothing. You let me leave in ignorance."

"I would not use such a thing to place a hold on you, Ynyr. There is no place in true love for such manipulation. I was alone when you left. I was alone!" She gestured weakly toward the woven bed.

"I killed him."

"You killed our son?"

"I killed him at birth. I was angry, mad with anger at you and what you'd done to me. I could not strike at you, so I struck at him. With him went the last vestige of my hope and my humanity." She gestured at the silken prison that enclosed them. "I know you cannot forgive me.

"This small room is my life now, my life and my punishment, and the web-spinner is my jailer. I am left only with wisdom I cannot use. Men come in hopes of stealing it. They leave the mouth of the cave in terror. Those who try to enter never leave at all."

She bent over the table. For the first time in many years, she cried, though whether the tears were for herself, for her slain son, or for what might have been, Ynyr could not say.

He reached out to her, touched her gently.

"I cannot forgive myself. I have already forgiven you. I did what I felt had to be done. .. but if I'd known it would cause you this life of pain…"

"It matters not. You cannot forgive a woman who has killed your son."

There was a small mirror nearby. The effort cost Ynyr some of his remaining strength, but he could feel the surge of love rising from deep within, reaching out to her.