Foster, Dean - Spellsinger 02 - The Hour of the Gate

"It's not too far to the bank, and you look like a pretty good

swimmer, for a human. I think you can make it without any

trouble."

Flor started to finish her comment, got the point, and

resumed her seat near the craft's bow. She was fuming, but

sensible. It was Bribbens' game and they had to play with his

equipment, according to his rules. But that didn't mean she

had to like it.

88

THE HOUR OF THE GATE

The boatman puffed contentedly on his pipe. "Interesting

group of passengers, more so than my usual." He tapped out

the dottle on the deck, locked the steering oar in position, and

commenced repacking his pipe. "Wonder to me you haven't

killed one another before now."

It was odd, Jon-Tom mused as they drifted onward, to be

moving downstream and yet toward mountains. Rivers ran out

of hills. Perhaps the Sloomaz-ayor-le-WeentU dropped into an

as yet unseen canyon. If so, they would have a spectacular

journey through the mountains.

Occasionally they had to set up the canvas roofing that

attached to the railings to keep off the nightly rain. At such

times Bribbens would fix the oar and curve them to a safe

landing onshore. They would wait out the night there, rain-

drops pelting the low ceiling, until the sun rose and pushed

aside the clouds. Then it was on once more, borne swiftly but

smoothly in the gentle grip of the river.

Jon-Tom did not fully appreciate the height of Zaryt's

Teeth until the third day. They entered me first foothills that

morning. The river cut its way insistently through the green-

cloaked, rolling mounds. Compared to the nearing moun-

tains, the massive hillocks were merely bruises on the earth.

Here and there great lumps of granite protruded through the

brush and topsoil. They reminded Jon-Tom of the fingertips

of long-buried giants and brought back to him the legends of

these mountains. While not degenerating into rapids, the river

nonetheless increased its pace, as if anxious to carry those

traveling upon it to some unexpected destination.

Several days passed during which they encountered nothing

suggestive of habitation. The hills swelled around them,

becoming rockier and more barren. Even wildlife hereabouts

was scarce.

Once they did drift past a populated beach. A herd of

unicorns was backed up there against the water. Stallions and

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Alan Dean Foster

marcs formed a semicircle with the water at their backs

protecting the colts, which snorted and neighed nervously.

Pacing confusedly before the herd's defensive posture wa

a pack of perhaps a dozen lion-sized lizards. They were sleei

as whippets and their red and white scales gleamed in th

sunlight.

As the travelers cruised past, one of the lizards sprang

trying to leap over the adults and break the semicircle

Instead, he landed on the two-foot-long, gnarly hom of one

of the stallions.

A horrible hissing crackled like fresh foil through the day

and blood fountained in all directions, splattering colts and

killer alike. Bending his neck, the unicorn used both forehooves

to shove the contorted body of the dying carnivore oflf his

head.

The boat drifted around a bend, its passengers ignorant of

the eventual outcome of the war. Blood from the impaled

predator flowed into the river. The red stain mindlessly

stalked the retreating craft....

90

VI

It was the following afternoon, when they rounded a benc

in the river, that Jon-Tom thought would surely be their last.

The foothills had grown steadily steeper around them. They

were impressive, but nonexistent compared to the sheer

precipices that suddenly rose like a wall directly ahead

Clouds veiled their summits, parting only intermittently to

reveal shining white caps at the higher elevations; snow and

ice that never melted. The mottled stalks of conifers looked

like twigs where they marched up into the mists.

It was a seamless gray cliff which rose up unbroken ahead

of the raft. Solid old granite, impassable and cold.

Bribbens was neither surprised nor perturbed by this im-

passable barrier. Leaning hard on the sweep, he turned the

boat to port. At first Jon-Tom thought they would simply

! ground on me rocks lining the shore, but when they rounded

a massive, sharp boulder he saw the tiny beach their boatman

was aiming for.

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Alan Dean Foster

It was a dry notch cut into the fringe of the mountain.

Warm water slapped against his boots as the boat's passen-

gers scrambled to pull it onto the sand. Driftwood mixed with

the blackened remnants of many camp fires. The little cove

was the last landing point on the river.

On the visible river, anyway.

The wind tumbled and rolled down the sheer cliffs. It

seemed to be saying, "Go back, fools! There is nothing

beyond here but rock and death. Go back!" and a sudden

gust would send Talea or Mudge stumbling westward as the

wind tried to urge their retreat.

Jon-Tom waded out into the river until the water lapped at

his boot tops. Leaning around a large, slick rock, he was able

to see why Bribbens had rowed them into the protected cove.

Several hundred yards downstream, downstream was no

more. An incessant crackling and grinding came from the

river's end. An immense jam of logs and branches, bones,

and other debris boiled like clotted pudding against the gray

face of the mountain. Foam thundered on rock and wood like

cold lava.

He couldn't see where the water vanished into the moun-

tainside because of the obstructing flotsam, but from time to

time a log or branch would be sucked beneath the brow of the

cliff, presumably into the cavern beyond. The thickness of the

jam suggested that the cave opening into the mountain couldn't

be more than a few inches above the wateriine. If it were

higher, he would have been able to see it as a dark stain on

the granite, and if lower, the river would have backed up and

drowned out, among other things, me cove they were beached

upon.

But the opening must be quite deep, because the river had

narrowed until it was no more than thirty yards wide where it

ground against the mountainside, and the current was no

swifter than usual.

92

THE HOUR OF THE GATS,

"What do we do now?" Flor had waded out to stand next

to him. She watched as logs several yards thick spun and

bounced off the rock. They must have weighed thousands of

pounds and were waterlogged as well.

"There's no way we can move any of that stuff upstream

against the current."

"It doesn't matter," he told her. "Even if Clothahump

could magic them aside, the opening's still much too low to

let the boat through."

"So it seems." Bribbens stood on the sand behind them.

He was unloading supplies from the boat. "But we're not

going in that way. That is, we are, but we're not."

"I don't follow you," said Jon-Tom.

"You will. You're paying to." He grinned hugely. "Why

do you think the Sloomaz-ayor-le-WeentU is called also The

Double River, The River of Twos?"

"I don't know." Jon-Tom was irritated at his ignorance. "I

thought it forked somewhere upstream. It doesn't tell me how

we're going to get through there," and he pointed at the

churning, rumbling mass of jackstraw debris.

"It does, if you know."

"So what do we do first?" he said, tired of riddles.

"First we take anything that'll float off the boat," was the