Dragonwitch (42 page)

“I can't save them,” he said, and she startled and turned to him, her eyes wide and black. “Thanks to you, they've gone beyond my help. But I can still guide you to the surface if you'll accept my aid.”

“Devil in the dark!” she snarled. “Shape-changer!
Amarok!
”

Then she whirled and darted away, possibly believing that she pursued
the upward path, possibly not caring even if she did not. Eanrin hastened after her, shouting, “I am not Amarok! Not all Faerie folk are your tormentors! Come back!”

She ran faster, her bare feet slapping on the stone. So Eanrin gave chase and paused only once to consider that he was racing headlong into the Netherworld. By then it was far too late.

The Chronicler felt his mind being slowly swallowed up by the roar of fire above and by the clamor of self-loathing within. Why had he hoped it would ever be otherwise? He'd vowed never to live on dreams. He would not cherish hope of ever being more than the disappointing son, the unnoticed lover, the disregarded and despised. He would spurn legends and prophecies and the idiocy of the chosen one trope. Such things weren't for the likes of him. One such as Alistair should have fulfilled that role!

But Alistair lay mauled at the bottom of the pit.

“I think I recognize this place.” Mouse's voice, no more than a whisper, should have been drowned out by the ongoing clamor above this world. But the Chronicler heard her clearly.

“I do too,” said Imraldera. “In fact, I think . . .”

She turned suddenly where Asha indicated, the blade of Halisa pointed before her. Mouse followed, still bearing the lantern. In their wake came the Chronicler, so heavyhearted he could scarcely drive himself another step. The darkness closed in, becoming a rough-cut tunnel through real, solid stone. Imraldera and Mouse began to run, and the Chronicler might have been left in the dark if the light of Asha had not been too strong for him to lose. So he caught up with them at a place where the tunnel broke into two parts. He saw a pile of rubble. Beyond it, he saw a broken doorway.

Beyond that, he saw a large black stone.

“This is the chamber,” said Mouse, “where the Speaker was buried. The cat-man must have got them out!”

“But where's Eanrin?” Imraldera said, Fireword held high in her grasp. “Where are the others?”

“Where's the Speaker?” said Mouse.

The Chronicler passed between them. Unsteady on his hands and feet, he climbed through the rubble and looked into the chamber. And he heard the roar. Not the roar of the Dragonwitch, which was the voice of fire. No, this was a deeper, darker, stronger sound.

Not fire but water.

“Call up the rivers, Smallman King.”

Stronger than death is life. Stronger than hate is love.

Stronger than fire is water.

“Give me the sword, Dame Imraldera,” the Chronicler said, suddenly turning.

The lady knight started, opened her mouth, then closed it again at the sight of his face illuminated by Asha. Without a word, she placed Halisa in his hands. It tilted. He staggered, adjusting his grip. It was still too heavy, and the blade fell with a clashing ring to the stones.

But the Chronicler held on to the hilt, his face set, his jaw clenched.

The black stone flaked away, revealing the silver beneath. Halisa began once more, gently, to glow. A light that reflected Asha's own, a light that it drew down into its heart, like blood racing through veins.

“Go,” said the Chronicler, staring at the blade. “Get out of here. Get to the surface.”

“What about you?” said Mouse.

“Run,” the Chronicler said, still without looking up from the blade. He took a step toward the doorway, dragging the heavy sword across the rubble. “Now.”

Imraldera grabbed Mouse's hand. “Wait!” Mouse cried. “He cannot do it alone! He cannot lift the sword!”

“That's not for us to say,” said Imraldera as she dragged Mouse and the lantern away from the door, leaving the Chronicler behind.

The roar of Hri Sora was dreadful in their ears.

A
STAR
'
S
VOICE
COULD
NOT
BE
IGNORED
.
It was far too many voices rolled into one being, and it was full of song.

Leta lay on the cold library floor on a pile of scattered parchments and an ink stain like red blood, staring up at the window through which the blue star gleamed. The air about her face billowed with the whiteness of her quick breaths.

How may I serve you?
said the star once more, and this time it drew near to her window.

She did not scream. She had enough presence of mind to recall her goblin guards without, and she did not wish to bring them running. So she clasped her throat with both hands as though to somehow catch her voice there as she watched the approach of the star.

In blinding whiteness, it moved from beyond the world Leta had always known, from a place where stars may have voices to be heard by all with willing ears. It was too huge for comprehension, yet it passed through the narrow window opening and stood before Leta. The walls of the library
seemed to fall away, for nothing so transient could contain the radiance of a star.

It has been far too long since I was able to stand in the Near World,
it said, its shining head turning this way and that, curious.
The goblin has made this slice of the mortal realm a piece of his own nation now, and for a space at least, I may manifest here.

“Please!” Leta gasped. “Please, don't talk! You'll kill me!”

Oh yes,
it said, and if a star may be embarrassed, this one was abashed.
I almost forgot.

The next moment, a unicorn took the place of the shining being, and it was so luminous and so fair in the world of broken mortality that Leta still found it difficult to look upon. But it was solid, and it stood upon the stone floor and cast a shadow. “There,” it said. “Is this better?”

Its voice was now like music Leta could understand, like the sweet strains of a flute at midsummer, full of lightness and warmth. Though her eyes were dazzled, she found the ability to stand. The coldness of the chamber melted away in the unicorn's presence. Even in her ragged gown, Leta felt warm. Furthermore, though she wore rags and her hair hung in straggling limpness across her face, she had never felt more beautiful than when standing before a creature far more beautiful still.

Its eyes, like the depths of an ocean in which stars have melted, fixed on her with all sweetness. “Tell me, fair maid, how I may serve you?”

She put out a hand. Without asking, she knew somehow that it was right for her to touch this pure being, to run her hands through the glossy strands of its mane, even to touch the coiled horn, though it turned away before she might prick her finger.

“Ceaneus,” she said, using the North Country name for the star, “I am imprisoned by the goblins.”

“So I saw from above. And so I sang with my brethren,” said the unicorn.

“I know where the House of Lights hides,” she said. “I saw by your light. Corgar will wrest the secret from me if I do not escape. I know he will.”

“It is not for Corgar to open the House of Lights,” said the unicorn. “That is for the Smallman King.”

“But he's not here.” Leta took hold of the unicorn's mane like a child
clinging to its mother's hand. “He's not here, and I am the one who holds the secret. I must protect this knowledge! I must escape Gaheris.”

“The door is not locked,” said the unicorn, delicate lashes sweeping as it blinked, momentarily hiding those luminous eyes.

“It is guarded,” Leta said.

“Ah.” The unicorn tossed its horn, and the movement itself was like song. “Very well. I will sing them to sleep, and then you must follow my light. I will show you a way from the castle and take you to the Haven of my Lord.”

Leta nodded. Anything the unicorn said seemed right. While moments before she had desperately considered death her final option, she saw now the possibility of life, of escape, and even—though this was a more desperate hope—of Gaheris's rescue.

“Lead me, Ceaneus,” she said. The unicorn, its soft oval ears cupped forward, stepped around her, cloven hooves gently tapping on the floor, and moved to the door. It passed through as though the heavy wood were mist, and Leta felt bereft without its light.

She hastened to put her ear to the door. She heard nothing. Without the unicorn directly before her eyes, it was difficult to believe what she had seen. But she closed her eyes, drew a long breath. Then she took hold of the latch and pulled.

The goblins sat one on either side of the door. Their heads were down, their jaws slack, and one snored as it slept.

Feeling as though she passed the very guards of hell, Leta stepped between them and stood free of the library in the cold corridor. Even in the dark, she could see how the goblins had scored its walls and destroyed all furnishings and tapestries.

A breath of wind touched her face. Ahead, up the passage, she saw a light like a white candle hovering in the darkness.

“Ceaneus,” she whispered.

Though her knees were weak as violet stems, Leta hastened after the light, pursuing it down the passage, down the stairs, and down another passage. Everywhere, she smelled the stench of goblins and felt the weight of her enslaved mortal kindred as though she herself wore their chains. But she followed the light as fast as she could. Down another stairway, her feet
making no sound on the stones. She saw no one either mortal or immortal, though sometimes she heard the heavy sounds of goblins.

Suddenly the light turned a corner. Pursuing, Leta rounded the bend in time to see a little gleam on a certain small door. Then, just as the unicorn had slipped through the library door, the light melted into the wood-and-iron fastenings of this one.

Leta put her hands to this latch and found it also unlocked. She pulled, and the hinges screamed in the cold, a sound like razors to her ears. She looked over her shoulder, expecting goblins to come running at any moment. She ducked inside and hadn't the courage to shut the door for fear of what noise it might make.

She stood in the damp chamber of the castle well.

“The most prized possession of all within Gaheris,”
Alistair had boasted to her that day long ago.

Leta looked at it now. It was like a mouth in the darkness, a mouth from which shone a light that illuminated that dank chamber with a ghostly glow. She stepped up to the opening and looked down and down.

Deep within, she saw the flicker of the star.

She'd come too far to second-guess her decision. Taking her courage in both hands, she found the bucket. It was big enough and strong enough to hold her, she thought, and the pulley was rigged in such a way that she might have the strength to lower herself into that black mouth.

“Lights Above!” she whispered. Then she sat on the lip of the well, her feet in the bucket, her hands on the chains, which bit into the flesh of her palms. Her fingers were so cold, she doubted she'd be able to hold on. But she swung out anyway, feeling the drop beneath her, the emptiness waiting to swallow her up.

The chains and her grip on them held.

Whispering prayers, she began to lower herself slowly, hand under hand. The metal bit into her shivering flesh. She dared not look for comfort down to where the star gleamed. She squeezed her eyes shut and focused on her work, and though the sides of the well were frozen with ice, her forehead dripped sweat.

Don't worry,
practical Leta said.
If you fall, you'll drown, and Corgar will never get the secret from you.

“Shut up and concentrate!” she growled aloud. And down she went, deeper and deeper.

Strangely enough, the farther she went, the less afraid she felt. Perhaps because she knew that the drop, however great, was no longer as great as it was when she'd started. Perhaps because the increasing brilliance of the starlight warmed her and melted the ice on the sides of the well so that it dripped with light
plink, plink
s to water below.

The bucket turned. The chain creaked. And Leta's eyes flew wide.

She had come level with a hole in the side of the well. A hole large enough for her to climb through. Furthermore, the starlight now shone from within.

Swinging her weight, Leta shifted the bucket enough to allow her to get a purchase on the hole and, after a thrilling moment when she thought she would lose her balance entirely, managed to pull herself inside. Here she discovered a tunnel just big enough to crawl through. The stone was sharp. If she'd thought she was dreaming until then, the pain of those biting stones would have convinced her otherwise. But the star winked on ahead, and she crawled after it, ignoring how numb her ears, nose, and toes were, or the dreadful crick developing in her neck and shoulders. She crawled until the tunnel opened up and she was at last able to stand.

Here she found a dark staircase carved of rock. The secret passage of Gaheris Castle, winding down to the river.

The starlight vanished. With it went all the warmth and comfort that had been holding Leta's fears at bay. She fell against the wall, feeling a wellspring of panic and despair swelling in her bosom, ready to explode.

“Don't be a fool, Leta,” she growled as she made her feet take the next few paces in the dark, feeling for the edge of the steps.

But two steps down, the stairway vanished. As did the cold and the dankness of heavy stone surrounding her. Leta stumbled and nearly fell as her third footfall landed on crackling twigs, leaves, and undergrowth.

Another step, and she stood in an old forest.

It was warm. It was full of shadows. It was still.

Leta stared about, her eyes disbelieving, fingers and feet aching as her blood warmed and began to rush through her body. “Ceaneus!” she called,
but somehow she knew the star was no longer near. It had served its purpose and guided her from Gaheris. But guided her where?

“Ceaneus!” she called again, without hope. Her voice was strangely small, as though the great trees around her and the heavy moss beneath her feet caught it up and swallowed it. She staggered forward, her head spinning with colors and smells and a quiet filled with the whispers of the trees.

Two steps more, and she stood at the doors of the Haven.