Tad Williams - Shadowheart

They walked back across the dark lands for what seemed like years. At times, he saw and heard things that made him think they had almost found their way out, but the Fireflower voices warned him not to trust these phantoms, that it was only the lonely, bitter things that lived in this place laying snares for him. At last, Qinnitan became restive and began to fight him. He struggled with her for what seemed hours, trying to calm her but unable to do so. At last, overwhelmed by her terror and pain, he admitted to himself that he could not impel her any farther.

The Fireflower voices urged him not to give up, insisted that he keep fighting.

“No.” He said it for them much as for her. “I will no longer force you. Why are you frightened, Qinnitan? I am trying to help you back toward the light. Why do you fight against me?”

But she couldn’t hear him, or if she could she didn’t understand, and only went on struggling like a frightened child. Barrick feared that if he continued against her will, he might lose her—might even destroy what little remained of her. He could think of nothing else to do, though it terrified him, so he let go of her hand.

“I am going on,” he told her. “Follow me if you can—if you wish—and I’ll lead you out of here.”

And then, with the startled Fireflower chorus crying its anguish until his head echoed, Barrick again began to walk.

The voices gradually fell silent, but more from surprise than despair. Barrick felt his fear ease a little. Qinnitan must be following.

Now was the hardest time. He pushed his way through tangled branches that clawed and tore, and forded streams as cold and black as the river in which he had found her. He made his way down a long, dangerous slope into a valley where he saw lights twinkling in the dark, but when he got there, the place was empty but for a field of leaning stones.

Dozens of times he stopped himself from looking back. The Fireflower voices were almost completely silent now, but he felt certain he would know if Qinnitan fell away from him, whether they told him or not. Hadn’t they found each other time after time in their dreams? Hadn’t he found her here as well, on the very border of death’s inescapable kingdom?

Then at last she did stop—he felt her warmth diminish. He stopped, too, and it took all his strength to keep looking forward.

“We’re almost there,” he told her. “Only a little farther. Don’t fear!” But it was not her courage that had deserted her, he suddenly realized, but her strength.

They had been walking through a valley of high cliffs and deep darkness; now he moved slowly ahead, groping along the side of the path until he found what seemed like a crevice in the rocky wall.

“Come,” he called to her. “Follow me inside. You can rest here and be safe from any… hunting things.”

He made his way into a narrow space scarcely his own height and only a little wider and longer than he was, but he heard her moving behind him, and his heart once again grew light. He lowered himself to the cold ground, and when she reached him he opened his arms so that she could curl herself into his embrace like an ailing child. He could smell her now, a scent he had never known before but which seemed utterly familiar. He could even hear her breathing in his ear, fretful at first but slowing as she let sleep (or whatever passed for sleep in this nameless place) claim her.

Soon Barrick felt himself sliding away as well, and wondered whether he would wake again in this world or any other.

He didn’t understand at first what was happening. He had been deep in an unremembered dream, but now he was awake in darkness. Something was wrapped around him. He reached out and found her face, let his fingers trail across her cheek to her mouth.

“Barrick?” she asked, startling him.

“Qinnitan! Yes, it’s me. Can you really hear me?”

She did not answer for a moment. “Yes. But you seem far away. Why do you seem so far away when I can feel you next to me? Where are we?”

He didn’t really know—even the Fireflower voices could not tell him exactly where he was. He also did not want to frighten her, because if he lost her now, it would be forever. “On our way home.”

She touched his face. “Can you see me? I can’t see anything.”

Barrick was taking no chances—he kept his eyes tight-closed, even in utter blackness. “No, I can’t see you, but that’s only because we’re in a dark place. Do you remember anything?”

“I remember you.” She pushed herself close against him. She was taller than he would have guessed, her head just beneath his chin while her legs curled around his legs and her body pressed against him chest to chest and belly to belly. He had forgotten what it felt like to hold somebody, to be held. “And I remember the fire,” she said. “Something burning. Something big.”

Barrick remembered those terrible last hours in the deeps below the castle very well, but he had no urge to talk about it. Who knew if the god of lies was even dead? What if Zosim now roamed these dark places, too? “Don’t think about it,” he told her. “Think about leaving this place. Think about coming with me.”

“But I’m so tired.” She said not as someone asking for help, but as a matter of fact. “I can scarcely hold you.”

“Actually, you seem to be doing that quite well.” Unexpected joy bubbled up inside him. “You’re holding me very tightly.”

“Because I don’t want to lose you in the dark. Do you realize how long I’ve waited to hold you… to touch you… ?” She tensed a little. “I am sorry. You must think I’m terrible. What kind of girl would say such things?”

“The right kind.” He was afraid to speak now, fearful of anything that might end this moment. “You didn’t recognize me before,” he said. “When I found you in the river. Do you remember?”

“I don’t remember anything except waking up here,” she said. “Will you kiss me?”

“Kiss you… ?”

“No man has ever done that. I don’t think we need to be able to see, do you?”

His heart felt as though it would burst in his chest. “No. No, I don’t think we need to be able to see to do that.”

Barrick marveled at how he could feel everything so completely, the warmth of her skin, the sweetness of her breath, the downy hairs of her cheek and the tickling softness of her eyelashes… even the wetness of her tears.

“Why are you crying?”

“Because I never thought this would happen—I prayed for it but I didn’t believe the gods would let it happen. And I don’t want it to end,” she said. “But it is going to end, isn’t it? You and I will never be together.”

“No!” But at that moment he could not make himself lie. “I don’t know, Qinnitan, truly I don’t. Don’t ask me to say more than that.”

“I won’t.” But her cheeks were still wet. She pushed herself so close against him that she seemed to be trying to push herself into him as well, as though their separated flesh could somehow be blended into one body, their hearts into one pulse. “Kiss me again, Barrick. If we cannot be together, let’s make a memory that neither death nor fire can take away. Stay here with me. Make love with me.”

He kissed her again, as she asked. The darkness might have hidden them from other eyes, but it revealed far more to them than light would have, and the hours fled like minutes.

When he awoke again, Barrick was alone. Terrified, he scrambled out of the bower they had made for themselves with nothing more than the bliss of being together at last. At the last moment he remembered to close his eyes and thus escaped a more certain doom. “Qinnitan!” he called. “Where are you? Come back!”