Julian May - Sorcerer’s Moon - Part Three of the Boreal Moon Tale

As our valiant warriors proceed inland in the conquest of High Blenholme Island, I command that all inactive moonstone amulets discovered on the dead bodies of our Salka foe be smashed into dust and scattered to the Boreal Winds, for the sorcery they conjure is an abomination and a mortal danger to all thinking creatures – be they human or nonhuman.

– BAZEKOY, Emperor of the World

Cover Page

Title Page Sorcerer’s Moon THE BOREAL MOON TALE BOOK THREE Julian May

Epigraph As our valiant warriors proceed inland in the conquest of High Blenholme Island, I command that all inactive moonstone amulets discovered on the dead bodies of our Salka foe be smashed into dust and scattered to the Boreal Winds, for the sorcery they conjure is an abomination and a mortal danger to all thinking creatures – be they human or nonhuman. – BAZEKOY, Emperor of the World

Prologue

ONE

TWO

THREE

FOUR

FIVE

SIX

SEVEN

EIGHT

NINE

TEN

ELEVEN

TWELVE

THIRTEEN

FOURTEEN

FIFTEEN

SIXTEEN

SEVENTEEN

EIGHTEEN

NINETEEN

TWENTY

TWENTY-ONE

TWENTY-TWO

EPILOGUE

About the Author

By Julian May

Copyright

About the Publisher

With evening, the incessant warm rain that had plagued us for three days stopped, the sky cleared at last, and I caught a glimpse of the rising moon. Its position confirmed the fear that had haunted me since morning. We were traveling in the wrong direction, going north instead of south. We were lost.

Even worse, I was now positive that something was stalking us. It was very large, clever enough to stay hidden in the thick brush along the shore, and it betrayed itself only rarely by unnatural movements of the greenery or a slight sound –

Like that! The faint crack of a broken stick.

I stopped paddling and the skiff drifted to a halt. I peered into shadowy undergrowth a dozen ells away and cupped a hand about my ear, straining to listen. There was no wind. The waters of the lake were flat calm. Save for the faraway wailing cry of a black-throated diver bird, the silence was absolute. My normal senses perceived nothing. Once again, I tried without success to summon my talent, but my uncanny abilities were still too weak even to scry through the flimsy barrier of reeds and shrubs into the boreal forest beyond.

Yet instinct assured me that the stalker was there, watching us.

The sky overhead had turned to deepest blue, with a few scattered stars beginning to appear. On my right hand the full Harvest Moon rose, brilliantly white, through the raggedy ranks of spruce trees that topped the ridge alongside the narrow lake. I looked toward the opposite shore and beheld a wonderful thing in the sky above it – a great arc of pearly light spread across the retreating bank of rainclouds in the west.

I must have exclaimed at the sight of it, waking her. Induna stirred in the bottom of the boat, uncovered her head, which had been shielded from the rain by blankets and an oilskin cloak, and lifted herself painfully on one elbow.

‘Deveron?’ Her voice was low and anxious. ‘Is something wrong?’

For the moment, I dodged the question. ‘Look over there. It’s a moon bow.’

‘How beautiful. I’ve heard of them but never seen one before. They’re supposed to portend great good luck.’

I thought: We have sore need of that, beyond doubt!

Even as we watched, the marvel began to fade. It was gone almost as soon as it had appeared. I took up the water-flask and bent over the woman who should have been my wife sixteen years ago, who had already given up so much for my sake and who now might be rewarded only with gruesome death. Induna lay with her head pillowed on a pack. She had been asleep for hours, still recovering from the sacrifice made shortly after our arrival in this forsaken wilderness three days earlier.

I said, ‘Take some water, love. I’ll help you to sit up.’

The boat rocked as we shifted position. It was a flat-bottomed skiff of the unique Andradhian style, made of tough sheets of thin bark, pointed at both ends. The Boatwright I’d bought it from had intended it for the jungle streams of the distant Southern Continent; but being lightweight and easy to portage, it was also the perfect craft for voyaging among the bewildering maze of bogs, rivers and chains of lakes that comprised the forbidding Green Morass of northern Didion.

Induna drank only a little before sinking back onto her improvised cushion with a sigh. ‘I feel stronger. The sleep did me good. I think I’ll be able to eat something tonight. Will we be going ashore soon? My poor bladder is nigh bursting.’

I pointed to a small wooded island that lay off the bow. ‘We’ll camp there, rather than on the mainland. I…think something might be following the boat along the shore, keeping out of sight.’

Her eyes widened. ‘Is it an animal?’

‘Perhaps not. It tracks us very slyly. It’s best that we not take chances.’

‘So you can’t oversee what it might be?’

I began to paddle again, digging briskly. ‘My wind-sensibilities are still useless, even though my physical strength now seems completely restored, thanks to you.’

‘How long has this creature been trailing us?’

‘God only knows. I became aware of it this morning, shortly after we embarked from the last campsite, but it might have been pursuing us for longer, hidden by the mist and rain. It’s a sizable thing, probably much larger than a human being. I pray it’s only a curious brown bear or wandering tundra-lion. I can fend a beast off easily with a few firebolts from my crossbow.’

She spoke hesitantly. ‘Could it possibly be a Salka? You recall that I told you that the forces of the Sovereignty believed that the monsters’ main force was massed many leagues to the north of here, around Beacon Lake. But they might have sent out scouts.’

‘I think not. The amphibians move clumsily on land, as this thing does not. And Salka would be more likely to follow a small boat by swimming underwater. Our pursuer is something else.’

Induna and I both suspected what it might be. But neither of us wanted to name the dire possibility aloud, nor did we voice the uncomfortable thought that we might have been under observation by the supposedly extinct Morass Worms almost from the first disastrous moment of our arrival.

Like most citizens of Cathra, I’d known almost nothing of the giant horrors until I came to live in Tarn. Induna’s mother had told legends of them as we shared the folklore of our disparate homelands during long winter nights in the Deep Creek Cove manorhouse. No Tarnian had laid eyes on a Morass Worm for at least three hundred years, but their memory lived on through grisly tales relished by the simpler people of the northlands. The storytellers could not even agree upon the fabled creatures’ appearance, describing them variously as huge fanged eels, scaly serpents, slime-covered salamanders, or even colossal centipedes with writhing multiple limbs. Like the Salka, the Green Men, and the Small Lights, they were said to be prehistoric inhabitants of the island who were driven into the waste lands by invading humankind. The worms were intelligent, not mere animals. Supposedly they were able to appear out of nowhere and kill their prey by breathing fire. The hardheaded Didionite foresters who dwelt in the far northern parts of High Blenholme mostly scoffed at the old tales and were certain that the worms no longer existed – if they ever had. But then, humans almost never ventured into the trackless depths of the Green Morass…