Haven Magic (44 page)

“The Rainbow!” he gasped. Telyn looked to him in shock. “He has summoned the Rainbow! Just as Oberon did in Gudrin’s story!”

“It marches to meet Herla,” said Telyn. “It is the most terrible beauty I’ve ever seen.”

Indeed, thought Brand, it was a beautiful thing. A shimmering giant that shown with every color, the Rainbow was the entity that dragged the reluctant lightning with it. It was the eye of the storm. It came to the walls and passed over them without breaking stride. With each footfall lightning struck, blasting to blackened husks trees, mounds and merlings alike.

Tomkin made a strangled sound. He sprang up and ran out into the lashing storm and down the slope toward the walls.

Brand started after him, but Telyn tried to stop him. “It’s too dangerous, Brand! We can’t face such powerful beings!”

“We must not lose him!” exclaimed Brand. “If Corbin and the others are with Dando, then perhaps we can slip by and help them escape in the confusion.”

“You’re mad, Brand! The axe is addling your wits again!” cried Telyn.

Her words were lost on his back. He heard them, and knew the truth of them, but the call of Ambros was too great. The battle of its siblings had perhaps excited and strengthened it. He was all but helpless to resist it.

As he rushed down the slope in the rain, half-falling, half-running, his eyes rarely left the towering image of the Marching Rainbow. The only part of it that didn’t rapidly shift colors was its eyes, which shone a steady blue. Brand knew in his heart that the pure, deep blue of its eyes exactly matched the color of the Jewel Lavatis.

He was hard put to keep up with the bounding form of Tomkin. Even Telyn couldn’t have run with greater speed or agility. Tomkin bounded like a wild hare, like a hunted deer fleeing for its life. He headed not for the gates that crossed the river as if it were a road, but instead toward the spot where the Rainbow had stepped into the town. There, its foot must have brushed the wall, for the top of it had been blasted by lightning, and great chunks of steaming earth were all that remained in the breach.

Brand reached the breach and plunged through it, running into a sludgy marsh of interconnected ponds. Running not as roads, but as boundaries between property lines perhaps, were relatively dry pathways a few feet across. Brand raced after Tomkin along these toward the center of the town, where the lodges were larger and multi-story and where the Rainbow stood now, laying about with its great fists.

In the center of town, the Wild Hunt met with the Rainbow. Stooping to smite the galloping horsemen, the creature blasted craters in the earth and muck of the merling town. The largest lodge in the town was splattered with flying mud and wet burning sticks. Clouds of white smoke and steam rose from the scene, but Brand could make out the relatively tiny forms of the huntsmen, slashing and stabbing at the shimmering stuff of the Rainbow’s legs. Hunks of flashing intangible flesh were cut from the creature’s legs. The gauzy material lay steaming and shimmering in the mud, the chasing colors of it dying slowly, dimming like a guttering lamp that drinks and burns the last of its oil.

Brand was close now, so close that one of the coursers galloped past him, and could easily have struck him down from behind. But the huntsman was clearly intent on charging the Rainbow’s legs. Shrieking a weird, inhuman battle cry, it thrust its boarspear into the mass of the leg. A swinging fist swooped low as the huntsman passed and swept the rider from his mount with an explosive blow. Brand watched as the rider melted, still shrieking, into the earth. The undying horse, now riderless, took a few trotting steps before it too, stumbled on brittle legs and turned into a heap of dust on the wet earth. Brand vowed silently to never doubt the truth of Gudrin’s stories again, should he be so fortunate as to hear another.

Brand soon was near enough to the Rainbow to make out the tiny figure that stood beneath it. Between the vast spread of its shimmering legs, Dando stood, working his limbs even as the Rainbow itself did. It was as if the Rainbow were a great puppet and Dando its puppeteer.

Then Brand saw the Jewel in the amulet that Dando bore on his breast and which flashed rhythmically, perhaps with the beat of the Wee One’s heart. As if in response to the sight of its sibling, the axe squirmed in his knapsack.

Take it.

Brand licked his lips. Abruptly, it seemed to him that the rest of the battle quieted and dimmed. Ghost-like, the huntsmen continued to circle and cut at the legs. The Rainbow twisted and stooped, swinging its great limbs at them. Brand saw all this only as a set of flickering, dream-like images. Nothing other than the throbbing light of Lavatis mattered.

Cut the Rainbow’s feet from under it and take the Jewel.

Brand’s hand moved up of its own accord to hover over the haft of the axe. He paused there, trembling.

“Hold it, Brand,” said a voice in his ear.

Startled, he twisted around. A leering face met his eyes, and he wanted to strike it, but soon recognition set in.

“Myrrdin?” he asked. Then he felt a strong hand clasping his wrist. Twisting the other way, he was shocked again. “Corbin?”

They paused only to smile before urging him to take cover with them behind the blasted ruins of a great merling hall. Modi was there too, and gave a rare slow smile at Brand’s gaping mouth.

“How did you escape?” asked Brand.

“How did you find us?” asked Corbin in amusement.

“I followed the Rainbow,” said Brand with a grin. He pointed up at the monster that all of them gazed at.

“Shhhh!” admonished Myrrdin. “If you can contain yourselves, we might yet live through this day! Watch the waters at our backs!”

Even as the reunited party hunkered down, the merlings finally made a counterattack against these invaders of their town. A jostling, croaking horde of them rose up from the waters of the nearby ponds and charged into the whirling melee. They fought bravely, but most of them were quickly cut down as if out of hand by the huntsmen. A few perished beneath the swinging limbs of the Rainbow. A few managed to thrust their weapons into the Rainbow and once three of them pulled down a huntsman with their barbed cords. Horse and rider melted together into the earth, but the merlings knew this victory only briefly, and were soon routed from the scene. The few that splashed out into the safety of the waters dragged their flopping wounded and dead comrades with them.

“A brave assault for merlings. It does them credit,” said Myrrdin.

“Better that they all die so that we’d be free of them,” grunted Modi.

“Perhaps we should find a way to retire before one side or the other wins this fight,” suggested Corbin. “It seems that there is little we can do.”

“I could wield the axe,” said Brand. He couldn’t hold back the words. The urge to charge in and face two of Ambros’ siblings in open conflict was all but overwhelming.

Myrrdin looked at him with great concern. “No, no. You aren’t ready yet. Have you wielded it on your journey here?”

“Yes, twice,” replied Brand. He eyed the Rainbow speculatively. The axe had great cutting power. A few low sweeps could perhaps sever the monster’s foot. Then finishing it would be easy.

“Twice!” exclaimed Myrrdin, shocked. “Have you slain with it?”

“Yes, two merlings.”

Myrrdin shook his head in amazement. “It is indeed a wonder that you live. You have not yet been attuned to the Jewel fully. To attempt to use it again without proper instruction will almost certainly drive the Jewel feral and leave you dead soon after.”

“What do you mean?”

“When the wielder of a Jewel isn’t strong enough to tame it, the Jewel takes over, going feral. It performs with mindless aggression in most cases until it destroys its master. Ambros is particularly famous for acts of savagery that eventually kill its champion. But we have no time for this talk now, we must retreat. Where is Telyn?”

Brand blinked in surprise. He had all but forgotten his beloved. This bothered him, as it showed the intense grip the Jewel had over him. “I—I left her in the hills outside the town—”

A great crash interrupted him. The merling king’s palace had fallen in upon itself and now burned with great choking clouds of steamy smoke. Flaming sticks and smoldering chunks of earth splashed over the battlefield. Dando was taken by surprise and hurled to the ground. The huntsmen took this opportunity to dash in and hack desperately at the creature’s legs. One of them finally gave way at the ankle and the Rainbow dropped to one knee. It grasped about itself like a fallen man, destroying whatever it touched. A howling sound, like that of a hurricane wind whipping around stone crags, erupted from it. It seemed to go mad then, flailing with its limbs. Grabbing up merlings and burning them with its very touch, it hurled their crushed, smoking bodies far out into the outlying ponds of the town.

Beneath the monster, Dando struggled up and moved again. A shock ran through the Rainbow. It reached down beneath itself and grabbed up Dando. Brand thought he could hear a tiny shriek of pain, but it might have been the wind. In a long sweep, the arm rose up to the gaping maw. Dando disappeared within it. Brand gave a gasp, wondering what it might be like to tumble down that cavernous, incorporeal throat.

The Rainbow shuddered again and struggled to rise. Its missing foot made it topple again. Reaching down, it grabbed its lost foot and placed it back onto the end of its leg. The torn, shimmering material of its body flowed together. Making smoothing motions, it melted the leg and foot back together again as if molding clay. In moments the foot was reattached.

“How does one kill such a thing?” asked Brand in a hushed voice.

“Elemental spirits can’t really die,” replied Myrrdin. “How can you kill a rain cloud? How do you destroy a gleam of sunlight? It is the same with the Rainbow.”

“But what will it do now that Dando is dead? Will it carry the Jewel in its belly forever?”

“No. If Dando dies, the creature will soon lose form.”

“If?” said Modi with a grunt of amusement. “How can you say if? How could anything live after having been devoured by a monster?”

Myrrdin shrugged. “I’ve never been in the belly of the Rainbow myself, so I can’t say.”

“Stranger things have happened while one bears a Jewel,” agreed Gudrin solemnly.

“Whether Dando is dead or not, it seems clear that the creature no longer has a master, and thus knows not what to do,” added Corbin.

“Yes, it has gone feral,” agreed Myrrdin, his face grim.

There was no doubt of that.

Chapter Twenty

Escape

They watched as the gigantic living rainbow rose up again to its full height. A look of uncomprehending agony remained fixed on its face. It gave off a wailing sound like that of storm winds over sea rocks then set off toward the river. Each tremendous foot swept forward as it picked up speed into an incredible run. Every footfall shook the earth and sent up explosions of sparks, water and mud. The Wild Hunt gave chase, their mounts gliding over the waterways and ponds as if they galloped across hard earth. Herla winded Osang again and its long, clear note rang from the walls and the hills beyond. Brand was reminded of hunters chasing down one of the rare great elk that were sometimes found in the Deepwood.

“How can they do that?” exclaimed Corbin. “What keeps the Wild Hunt from sinking into the mire as any creature should do?”

“Osang does,” replied Brand, bringing startled looks from Myrrdin and Gudrin. “Herla wields the Lavender Jewel, which has power over sight, sound and movement.”

“Well said,” Myrrdin grinned. “You have learned a thing or two since last we talked, Champion.”

Modi gave a grunt of disgust at the title and began to stump off toward the river. “We’d best be after them,” he said.

Myrrdin looked after him. “Quite true, but I believe it will take special aid for us to catch them before events have come to a conclusion beyond our control.”

They all looked at him. He made no further comment, but set off at a loping run toward the river. All of them followed.

Brand watched as the chase led the huntsman right into the river itself. The Rainbow crashed through the town gates and waded downriver. Only the Wee Folk seemed fleet enough of foot to catch up to the creature. They circled it and even ran ahead of it, playing at death with the great crashing feet. They urged and dared one another to dash across its path even as each tremendous step was taken.

“Tomkin!” shouted Brand, pointing.

“Where?” asked Telyn, running alongside him.

“There, playing tag with the others at the Rainbow’s feet! I —” he faltered. “Telyn! Where did you come from?”

“Did you think I would let you chase Wee Folk, the Wild Hunt and the marching Rainbow all by yourself?” she laughed.

Brand grinned. “I’m glad you didn’t.”

“What about Tomkin?”

“I saw him at the Rainbow’s feet. At least, I thought it was him. He was the only one wearing dappled fawnskin rather than a top hat and waistcoat.”

“But I see several like that,” said Telyn.

Brand shook his head. “I don’t know then, perhaps I was mistaken.”

“Or perhaps our little companion is just as big of a traitor as we suspected at first,” said Telyn with uncharacteristic cynicism.