Ширли Мерфи - The Castle Оf Hape. Caves Оf Fire Аnd Ice. The Joining Оf Тhe Stone

How had Skeelie crossed the barrier into Time? Why had she? Had she been flung so, against her will? Or had she, stubborn Skeelie, somehow crossed the barrier on purpose? He did not want to ask himself why.

In what time was she, then, in that moldering stone house? And why had the wraith gone to her? Ram reached out to her, but could no more guide himself to her than to Telien. The wraith had the runestone now and would surely be the more powerful because of it. What was that creature? Was it linked to the same evil as the dark Seers? As the Hape? Was all evil linked in some patterning of forces he could not yet comprehend? Surely that evil touched Skeelie. He forced his powers out blindly across Time to drive the wraith away from her. But he felt as clumsy and helpless as a babe.

*

Skeelie stood staring across the littered room at the wraith as it regained consciousness, but her thoughts were all of Ram. Was Ram injured, badly hurt? She could touch no vision now from the wraith’s mind. Had it taken the runestone? If it had, did that mean that Ram did indeed lie wounded?

The wraith opened its eyes, watched her coldly. She felt its longing for death, knew it wanted her to kill it. It rose slowly and, without changing its expression, began to stalk her. She backed away from it, bow drawn. It shuffled toward her. She spun, pushed the table at it, twisting, and knocked the wraith flat. It lay writhing beneath the upturned table for some moments before it rose, and again moved toward her. Its shoulder drooped now, and its wounded arm hung loose. It moved silently and steadily with hatred so strong she thought hatred alone might stifle her breath. It began to whisper hoarsely. She could not at first make out the words. Was it saying, Our way? Yes. “ Our way. Our way,” over and over. Its voice was dull and muted, insistent as a heartbeat. Perhaps its voice replaced the heartbeat, in the emptiness of that inhuman void. “ Our way. Our way. Our way. You will come into me our way, as the others have come. You will be part of us. We will live in you. Healthy. Young. We will have strength in you, strength . . .” It ended hissing, pushed toward her, its bony hands reaching.

She backed away from it. Its eyes never left her, never blinked. She glanced around the room, searching for anything that might help her. How could you fight something you dared not kill? Her hands trembled. She brought all the strength of her mind to bear against it. But her Seer’s power seemed not to touch it. She began to lose her nerve.

Stop it, Skeelie! Kill it if you must, then battle its dark spirit! But don’t quail before it! You’ve killed Herebian soldiers. What makes you afraid now? The dark, she thought, quailing in spite of herself. The death-face, the cold evil that it stinks of. She backed away, her eyes never leaving it, her arrow taut in the bow. If I kill it, I can defeat it! I will defeat it! If only she had her sword, her clean-silver sword. She remembered coldly Torc’s stubborn thought, Do not kill it, sister! If it dies, you cannot defeat it! But I will defeat it! She shot without waiting or thinking, pinned her arrow through the side into the table with one swift act that released all her fear, that made her predatory again and aggressive. She watched the wraith squirm, heard its scream, thin and faint like a pinioned rabbit; the arrow was deep, it would not loose itself. The wraith struggled against the table, continued to scream, its blood flowing onto the stone floor as it wrenched ineffectually against her arrow. Quickly she ripped the blanket from the bed into strips. She would tie the creature and leave it. If it died of thirst and hunger and loss of blood, she would be well away, where it could not claim her body.

Yet still she was loathe to touch it. If she touched it, would it possess her? Come into her body through her touch and destroy her? She went sick at the thought of handling it, yet knew she must touch it, must tie it, and more: knew she must search for the runestone among the folds of its clothing.

Did it have the stone? What had happened when Ram fell? She could only see in her memory HaGlard with his sword drawn, then the wraith close and attentive. Think of the stone, Skeelie! Find the stone! Had the wraith snatched it up? She tried to touch some sense of that moment from its mind; but the creature shielded and she could see nothing. She stared at it with repulsion and then with resolution. At last she began to tie it, holding her breath against its stench. It was less like a man than a corpse was. Parody of a man. Parody of death. She tied its hands tightly, then twitched a fold of cape aside and felt along the wraith’s body, drew away quickly, sickened. It did not speak, seemed to have lost all desire to speak. Never had she felt such disgust for anything, not even for the dark Seers of Pelli.

At last she forced herself to search its clothing: the folds of cloth, the pockets, and inside the small, once-elegant boots. She found nothing, and turned away retching. The room seemed very close, dank and fetid. Her senses seemed awry, dull and confused, as if something had twisted and warped them. She had to get out of this place, would turn to emptiness if she stayed. She could not bring herself to search further, to examine its body. Grabbing up her pack and bow, she fled the house, bolting the door behind her, jamming the rusted lock through the bolt with relief.

She stood a moment trying to collect herself and put down the sickness, knowing she should go back to search further but unable to do so.

She wandered across a small patch of ground that must once have been Gredillon’s garden, confused and uncertain, not knowing what to do. An ancient zayn tree stood tall and sheltering. Ram had spoken of a young zayn tree standing near the house when he was small. There should be a grave nearby, of the small boy with red-dyed hair who had been disguised as Ram and buried here to deceive HarThass in his search for Ram. She found only an indentation in the earth that might have been a grave, sunken in. The marker would long since have rotted. She felt there was a body here, felt the sense of bones, of pale dust, said a short prayer for that unknown child who had helped Ram to live. Standing beneath the zayn tree, staring up at the mountain, she could almost see young Ram running there, surrounded by foxes. The sense of him in this place was so very strong; the sense of his learning years, the sense of his reaching out to mysteries still beyond him, to skills he meant, stubbornly, to make his own.

Gone, now, that childhood. Gone into Time. And yet it would be a part of Ram always. A part she would hold dear to her.

She turned at last, paused before the bolted door, sensed the wraith with distaste, then headed down the trail that would lead to the city of Zandour, walking fast, wanting now only to put space between herself and that dark shadow. As she walked she suddenly remembered Torc, felt fear for the great wolf. Torc had followed the wraith and the Herebians. Why, then, was she not at Tala-charen? Why had she not killed the Herebians as she had meant to do, then dispose of the wraith? What had happened to her?

But Ram had been there; Torc could not have killed the wraith while it could enter Ram’s body. Still, she would have attacked the Herebians, helped Ram. Skeelie’s pace slowed with her concern for the golden bitch wolf. She stood staring off down the mountain, wondering, worrying.

*

High up Tala-charen, Torc lay looking down the cliff to where Ram stood over the two dead Herebian raiders. Her strength was at low ebb, her body light and weak with loss of blood. The painful arrow in her side prevented her from lying out flat in any semblance of comfort. She must go down to Ram now, he was alone. She rose and started down to him.