C. Cherryh - Gate of Ivrel

“I will give you this much,” said Erij, “that if she does not seem to need killing, I will not. I have never killed a woman. I do not like the idea.”

“Thank you for that” Vanye said earnestly.

And then, thinking of Liell: “Erij. If it comes to being captured—die. Those tales of Thiye’s long life are true. If they took you, your body would go on ruling either in Ra-hjemur or Morija, but it would not be your soul in it.”

Erij swore softly. ‘Truth?”

“For my sake, you have an ally if Morgaine is alive. Help me set her free and our chances of living become a thousandfold better.”

Erij merely stared at him, hard-eyed.

“I am almost as ignorant as you are,” Vanye protested. “I do not know the half of what is contained down there. I think she does. And for her own sake she would take our side. It is sure that no one else would. If you are going to start by killing our only possible ally in this business, or in keeping her helpless, well, then, you might as well tie me hand and foot before we go, since I am hers for a time yet... the hands, of which her science is the mind in this matter: and you would be wiser if you make use of both.”

Erij gave him no answer, yet it seemed he thought seriously about his words, and they rode down together into a wooded place where they could no longer see the valley.

“We will rest here a time,” said Erij, “and come in by night. Can Thiye resist Liell’s entry?”

“I do not know,” answered Vanye. “I think Morgaine thinks Thiye once was master and Liell his servant, at least at Irien; and that they had some falling-out. But if Liell brings Morgaine to Thiye, she may be the key that opens doors for him. And then, I think, if the same ambitions move qujal as move human men—which I do not know—then there may be treachery, and we may have either Thiye or Liell to deal with, whichever one wins the throw. I think perhaps Liell has waited a very long time to find some key that would admit him to Ra-hjemur. But this is my estimation: Morgaine said nothing of her own reckoning of their plans.” He added, as Erij sat still upon his horse, listening, “I am not sure that Thiye is qujal or whether he is not simply some human man who employed a qujal for a servant and is now about to reap his reward for meddling; meddler is what Morgaine called him, and ignorant, and the Witchfires have no healthful effect on anything living. For some reason, if rumor is true, at least, he has let himself grow old. So Thiye may not be qujal at all, and I know that Morgaine is not, whatever you believe—but Liell is. That is the sum of it, Erij. Thiye is the matter of my oath, but I extend that oath to Liell most of all: and in good sense, you will let me do that.”

“You wish to free the witch, that is what.”

“Yes. But in doing that, I will kill Liell, who is a threat to both our causes, and I want your help in it, Erij. I want you to understand that I have business in Ra-hjemur beyond Thiye, and that freeing Morgaine would not be treachery against you.”

Erij slid down. Vanye did not, and Erij looked up at him, face drawn against the winter sun. “There is one clear point in all of this: you will guard my life and help me take Ra-hjemur for myself. That is the sum of matters.”

“You have taken my oath,” Vanye said, miserable at heart. “I know that that is the sum of matters.”

There was no moon, and clouds had moved in. There was that help, at least.

Ra-hjemur sat upon a low, barren hill, a citadel surely of the qujal , for it was simply a vast cube, unadorned, un-towered, without protecting ring-walls or any defense evident to the eye. A stony path ran up to its gate; no grass grew upon it, but then, no grass grew anywhere on the hill.

They crouched a time by the bend of the knoll where they had left their horses, merely surveying the place. There was no stir of life.

Erij looked at him as if seeking his opinion.

“The sword can breach the door,” Vanye said. “But beware of traps, brother, and mind that I am behind you: I do not care to die by the same chance that Ryn did.”

Erij nodded understanding, then slipped from cover, seeking other shadows, Vanye quick to follow. They came not directly up the road to the gate, but up under the walls, and in their shadow, to the gate itself.

It was graven with runes upon its metal pillars, but the gate was iron and wood, like the door of many an ordinary fortress; and when Erij drew Changeling and touched its black field to the joining of the doors the air sang with the groan of metals. The doors parted their joinings, and the pillars too, and stone rumbled, loosed from its supports. Dust choked them, and when it cleared a mass of rubble partly blocked the entry.

Erij gazed but a moment at the destruction he had wrought, then clambered over the rubble and sought the echoing inside of the place, which burned with light no fires supplied.

Vanye hurried through, asweat with dread, snatched up a sizable rock in the process, and as Erij started to look back at him, smashed it to Erij’s helmeted skull. It was not enough. Erij fell, but still retained half-senses and heaved up with the blade.

Vanye saw it coming, twisted to evade the shimmer, kicked Erij’s arm so that it wrung from him a cry of pain, and the sword fell.

He snatched it up then, gazed down on his brother, whose face was contorted with fury and fear. Erij cursed him, deliberately and with thought, such that it chilled his blood.

He took the sheath from Erij, who did not resist him; and upon an impulse to pity for Erij, he cast down Erij’s own longsword.

Arrows flew.

He heard their loosing even before he whirled and knew they had come from the stairs, but Changeling in his warding hand made an easy path to elsewhere for the arrows, and they both remained unharmed. He knew the sword’s properties, had seen Morgaine wield it, and knew its uses in ways Erij did not. Erij would as likely have taken an arrow as not.

And perhaps Erij understood that fact, or understood at the least that continuing their private dispute could be fatal to them both: Erij gathered up the longsword with but a glowering promise in his eyes, and rose, following as Vanye began to lead the way.

Killing a man from behind was an easy matter, even were he in mail; but Erij needed more hands than one: he risked everything on it.

And quickly he dismissed the threat of Erij from his mind, overwhelmed by the alien place. Breath almost failed him when he considered the size of the hall, the multitude of doors and stairs. Morgaine had sent him here ignorant, and there was nothing to do but probe every hall, every hiding place, until he either found what he was seeking or his enemies found his back.

Save that, held straight before them, Changeling gave forth a brighter glow, and when lifted, sent a coursing of impulses through the dragon-hilt, such that it seemed to live.

Carefully, Erij treading in his wake, he took the stairs to the level above.

They found a hall very like the one below, save that at its end there was a metal door, of that shining metal very like the pillars of the Witchfires. Changeling began to emit a sound, a bone-piercing hum that made his fingers ache; it grew stronger as he neared it. He ran toward that gate, figuring speed their best defense against a rally from Hjemurn: and froze, startled, as that vast door lightly parted to welcome him.

And startled more by the sight of gleaming metal and light that stretched away into distance, glowing with colors and humming with the power of the fires themselves. Changeling throbbed, his arm growing numb from holding it.

The field directed at its own source of power would effect the ruin of all the Gates .