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

Meatha made the tea, replaced the tin kettle on the back of the clay stove, and found some seed cakes in a crock. When she returned to the table with the tray, Tra. Hoppa looked strange. “I’ve made out a few lines more,” she said, frowning. “But—what can it mean? I always thought the ballad of Hermeth was myth, embroidered from some incident long ago twisted out of its original shape. But perhaps . . .” She settled back, sipping the welcome tea. “Meatha, this book tells the same tale as the ballad, copied from an old, old manuscript. It tells of NilokEm and Ramad fighting beside the dark tower nine years after the battle of Hape—we have always known that NilokEm was killed in that battle. But now—this says that Hermeth of Zandour fought beside Ramad in that battle. Hermeth—who was not yet born. It says then that when Hermeth fought in that same dark wood eighty years later, it was the same battle. That the two battles were one. That men fighting in that later battle saw Ramad there, surrounded by wolves, fighting by Hermeth’s side. A young Ramad, no older than Hermeth himself.” She looked up at Meatha, her blue eyes lit with puzzled excitement. “What have we found, Meatha? Can we believe these words? That Ramad . . .”

“That Ramad moved through Time,” Meatha whispered, “just as the ballad says. That—that the ballad speaks truly.” She stared at Tra. Hoppa, shook her head uncertainly.

Tra. Hoppa rose and began to pace, slim and quick, her coarsespun gown whirling around her sandaled feet. She paused at last beside the window to stare down at the sea, and when she turned back, her face held that look of stubborn determination that both Meatha and Zephy knew so well. “Meatha, could you . . .” but her voice died, she clutched at the sill as the tower was jolted by earthshock. Meatha caught the cups before they slid to the floor.

It was only an instant, dizzying them. Then the tremor was past. They looked at one another, trying to put down their fear, for fear of the erupting earth was a powerful force in Ere’s heritage—fear of the Ring of Fire, whose eruptions had shaped men’s lives since times long, long forgotten. Quickly Meatha reached out to Carriol’s other Seers, felt them join and exchange their experiences of the tremor, and finally she relaxed. “It was only a small local one; there was hardly a shudder in the north.”

Tra. Hoppa nodded, took up her question as if nothing had happened. “Could you read more of the book through the power of Seeing? Could you decipher these pages with the Seeing?”

“I don’t—I’ve never tried such a thing.” And again a strange unease gripped her. “A stronger Seer could, perhaps, a master Seer . . .”

“There is more power in you than you know, child. Hux tried, when he bought the book from the little gutter lady in Zandour, but he—Hux’s skills run more to charming young women into his wagon than to such subtleties as taking the meaning direct from the pages of a book.”

Meatha grinned. Hux’s success with women was as much a part of Carriol as was fair day or the novice games. Hesitantly she picked up the little book of loosely bound pages.

Wind riffled the parchment sheets, then was still. She touched the script delicately, as if she touched a living thing. Reluctantly, and then with growing excitement, she tried to encompass the pages with all of her being, to encompass the sense of the writer as if she were one with him.

After a few moments she began to feel unusually warm. Her hands began to tingle. Then came strange smells, the dry, dusty smell of old wood, the smell of drying hay, then the shadowy sense of a small room, a wooden shed. Slowly she felt herself possessed by another who leaned over parchment, writing. The outlines of Tra. Hoppa’s room had faded until only shadows remained. Words were forming in her mind in dark flashes. An allusion to Time, to warriors— “ Come together out of two different times!” She whispered, “Yes, Ramad!” and she didn’t know who she was speaking to. “Ramad came forward in Time.” She felt the shock of this—and the truth of it. The scenes of battle were sharp. The scenes of Zandour itself rang true for her. Her voice shook. “Hermeth gave to Ramad the runestone.” She felt as if she were writing the words. “Hermeth gave him the stone that had passed down from Hermeth’s great-grandfather who was NilokEm.” She spoke on, not even looking at the pages. “And Ramad carried a second stone taken from his true love, taken from . . .” but the words were fading in her mind now as a voice fades. Soon only the sense of some terrible grief remained with her.

She came awake in Tra. Hoppa’s room, stood staring at the old lady in confusion.

Then she said softly, and with infinite sadness, “Ramad hit Telien and took the stone from her. And Telien vanished from that Time and that place. . . .” She was shaking, felt cold and sick. “And Ramad wept,” she said. And she was weeping, too. Tears poured down uncontrollably; shuddering sobs shook her. Tra. Hoppa gathered her in. Meatha wept against the old lady’s shoulder until at last she was spent, shivering with anguish and cold.

“Come, child, you need rest. More than this vision alone is bothering you.”

She shook her head. “I can’t—”

“Come. I know you have not slept well. You do not look well. I saw you out early this morning. I saw you pacing the cliff the night before Zephy and Thorn left, in the cold wind with only that light cloak. Come, you can miss weapons practice for one day.” The old woman took her hand in a strong grip and led her from the room and down the stone stairs to her own room, where she kindled a fire, then called one of the girls whose turn it was to serve to fill a hot tub. When the jugs had been brought and the tub was steaming, Tra. Hoppa helped Meatha to bathe, to warm herself, then got her into her narrow little bed and covered her up warm. Meatha, torn with a storm of emotions, did not resist. Tra. Hoppa drew another blanket close, where she could reach it. “You are sickening for something. You must rest.” The old woman, without Seer’s skills, could only see the surface of her distress. “Try to sleep, I’ll see that an early noon meal is brought.”

“But I must—it isn’t even the middle of the day, I can’t . . .”

“Do as I say. Your morning’s work belongs to me, and I direct you to stay in bed. I will send a message that you will not appear at weapons practice. And Bernaden will take your class of children.” Tra. Hoppa touched her cheek lightly, more worried than she wanted to show, and left her. Meatha lay staring at her ceiling, numb and confused, not wanting to think, yet unable to stop thinking.

Why was something deep within her frightened by the tale of Ramad? Why were her new, exciting powers shaken by that tale? Oh, but those powers could not be shaken. They could not. Too much depended on her. Too much—she was so drowsy, relaxed at last, the revulsion and fear fading, not really important . . . One thing was important, one thing. The mission she would accomplish for Ere. Nothing, no imagined fear, could change that.

Was she asleep when the image came? She jerked upright and sat staring around her, not seeing her room but instead a deep chasm and a fiery river running between jagged cliffs, the sky heavy with smoke. She felt a presence, but she saw no one at first, only after a moment became aware of a wolf, gray against gray stone, watching her. Then she saw in the dark shadows beside him a second wolf black as night. They were terrifyingly beautiful, both staring at her with eyes as golden as Ere’s moons. She could feel the intricacies of their minds probing her thoughts delicately. She quailed before their stares, before the touch of those minds. But suddenly they turned and vanished, and in their place stood a tall young man with tangled red hair, every color of red, and eyes black and fierce. He seemed so angry, had the look of an animal, predatory as wolves, half ready to attack something—but half at bay, too. And she thought, with a burning purpose eating at him, a cold unshakable purpose—not unlike her own. She wanted to reach out, to speak to him. Something prevented her. She crouched on her bed not seeing her room, trapped by the seething abyss and by the sense of him wild and appealing. And then the force she knew so well blurred her mind, and she closed her eyes and knew nothing more of him.