Saga of the Old City (39 page)
“Now we must dismount and begin looking for a dry streambed,” Greenleaf instructed. “There is a way up the range along it, and it passes the valley we seek, too.”
“How do you know that?” Chert asked as the three began leading their horses through the rough terrain.
“A party fleeing the wrath of a Despotrix of Hardby came over these peaks and down into the Duchy. Eventually one of the few who survived ended up telling his tale, and somebody else wrote it down.”
“Fine, I suppose,” allowed Gord. “But how do we know it’s a true account? It could be a yarn spun for fun or profit.”
“We don’t actually know for certain. Iquander stressed that point repeatedly,” Curley answered. “So far, though, everything checks out, and the survivor’s description of the ruin in the depression matched exactly what I’d picked up from other sources. That, my boys, he couldn’t have made up. What we must do now is find the path that he claimed took their fleeing band down into Urnst’s green fields… the place from where we shall travel upward to our goal! A dry streambed heading up toward Ogre Peak is what we must find.”
“That makes sense to me, Curley,” said Chert. “Even though there’s no trees covering the tors ahead, I was raised in country nearly as rough as this. I can find what we’re looking for.”
Gord knew that was not an idle boast, and when the druid said he was fairly adept at such work himself, Gord reconciled himself to tagging along and letting the two of them worry about the matter. However, on Curley’s advice they split up, each staying within hailing distance of another, able to search more ground than if they traveled in a close group.
After less than an hour of walking and looking, Gord got a surprise. Had he not been holding tight to his horse’s reins, he would have tumbled headlong down a steep dropoff screened by weeds and grass. The narrow gully obviously served as a watercourse when rain fell on the mountains above and drained along its channel. Gord walked alongside the dropoff for a hundred yards and saw that its path seemed to curve upward. He called for the others to join him and continued moving along the wash. He called out excitedly several more times before Curley and Chert caught up with him. The city-bred thief had indeed found the purported route into the heart of the mountains-but he saw no need to reveal that he had merely, and quite literally, stumbled upon it.
Whether or not it would eventually take them to the vale of the ringstones, the streambed did enable the adventurers to take their horses upward. The work was slow, however. There were twists and turns at first, and then the gully became a canyon. There were boulders in heaps, and splits that had to be explored. The going was steep and rough, and the three were tired when the sun began to slip behind the jagged mountain-tops ahead of them. They started to look for a suitable place to camp and soon found a broad ledge jutting out from the canyon wall above them.
It took some arduous work for the men and the mounts they led to pick their way along an oblique route that took them gradually up the canyon wall until they reached the outcropping. It turned out to be well worth the trip; the ledge was sheltered on the sides and top, almost as if they were in a shallow cave with a projecting lip at its entrance.
Chert went out to gather forage for the horses, returning with a great armful of coarse grass and other shrubbery he found in the immediate area. The men ate a cold meal from their trail rations, washed down with a little water. When Gord complained about their shortage of drinking water, the druid pointed out that a rain would bring them more water than they might like. Gord shuddered as he considered the prospect of being caught in the big ravine as it flooded-this was a risky venture indeed!
Almost as if on cue, the stars were blanketed by clouds, and rain began to fall around midnight. It was a gentle rain, and it lasted for most of the night; then, when the sun began to rise, the light seemed to dissipate the precipitation.
By now, however, the canyon held a gurgling, rushing torrent of water, and for a few tense minutes the flood slowly mounted higher toward their shelter. Then, as it began to recede, thunder rumbled and another storm broke. This time the rain pelted down in fat drops, accompanied by gusty winds, rippling forks of blue-white lightning, and rumbling bangs of thunder that were intensified and echoed by the mountains around them. Here was a display that made the magic of seem mankind pale stuff indeed.
As quickly as it came, this storm ceased, but the water was again rising. This whole process continued throughout the day, penning the men and animals in their rocky shelter and threatening to sweep them away as the level of rushing water rose higher and higher.
Finally, when the torrent had come up over the floor of their shelter and they were standing in water that was nearly knee-deep, Curley Greenleaf resorted to use of his power. He called up a howling cyclone wind that pushed the flood down and away sufficiently to allow the party to escape with nothing worse than wet feet and a chill. They passed an uncomfortable night marooned on the ledge, but the druid’s enchantment had forced the waters to recede enough for the three to recline and sleep fitfully on the damp stone.
The light of morning revealed only a trickle of water in the canyon below them, and the bedraggled adventurers left their haven and pushed upward again, skirting pools and taking respectful note of the destruction caused by the pouring stream created by runoff from the slopes around them.
“Next time we camp on a higher ledge,” Gord said with finality as he observed the battered and drowned remains of a hill giant somehow caught by the onrush of water. His companions agreed.
With drinking water no longer a problem for some time to come, food became their next concern. They had sufficient quantities of iron rations to last them a week, and some grain for the animals too, but it was safer to augment the former by hunting, while allowing the animals to browse on the sparse vegetation that had survived the flash flood. After the group traveled for the better part of the day and found another likely place to camp, Gord was put in charge of the animals while the barbarian and the druid sought game for their evening meal.
The hobbled mounts knew what to do without direction, but Gord needed to be alert in case of attack by some hungry predator. A mountain lion, drawn by the scent of horses, did make an appearance, but several well-placed stones from the young thief’s sling sent the creature away amidst a great amount of hissing, spitting, and caterwauling. After calming the terrified animals, there was nothing else for Gord to do but wait. His friends eventually came back bearing a small goat, and that night they ate roasted meat instead of cold rations. The partially cooked portions left over from their feast would provide ample food for the following day as well, so at last the party felt confident in moving ahead.
Travel the next day was even more tortuous than it had been before. They were forced to scissor their way up the steeply rising slope, and at day’s end Curley estimated that they had walked five miles while actually only progressing about half that far toward their goal. The area was so barren that not even savage beasts or monsters cared to inhabit these mountains. That, at least, allowed them yet another night of undisturbed rest, although they kept vigilant watch nonetheless; all three still had vivid memories of the dead hill giant, and this made them alert to danger of all sorts.
Another half-day of similar trekking brought them to the virtual summit of the narrow range. Greenleaf made careful observations of the terrain as they struggled upward, and finally, as they approached the highest elevation, he pointed to the left, calling the attention of his companions to what he saw.
“At last! See that defile there, and the notch in the crest above? That’s where we must go,” the druid told them. “The account says that a hidden valley lies beyond, and therein is the depression and the ringstones. If we press on, we can be there before nightfall.”
Hurry they did, and they arrived at the place panting and sweating, but feeling exhilarated by success. Before them was the plateau, a gentle mound of stone and vegetation, surrounded by harsh cliffs and peaks. Gasping in the thin air, they worked their way up the rising ground to see what it hid from their view. When they arrived atop this mound, the last light of the sun showed them the unnaturally circular dell and the rings of stone within it.
“Now you trust my judgment, right, lads?” the exultant druid exclaimed with glee. “I knew it was here!”
“If we really thought you were taking us on a will-o-wisp hunt, Curley, do you think we’d have gone through all this crap?”
“Yah, Gord,” Chert agreed. “Screwing around in mountains is fun, but I came along on this one to get rich.”
While Gord’s opinion about clambering over mountains was at odds with that of his barbarian companion, the intent of both statements was the same. They had accompanied Greenleaf on the strength of his information and his conviction. Even if they had voiced occasional doubts, both adventurers had actually trusted in the druid and expected to find what they were now gazing upon. Gord thought it interesting that Curley seemed more surprised at the actual discovery than his associates were.
This night’s camp was a cheerful one, despite their meager meal of tough dried meat and coarsely ground grain softened with a bit of vinegar and water. Scant supper finished, they discussed the plan of action for the next day.
Curley wished to carefully sketch the whole place from their elevated vantage point before they actually approached it. Then he would make measurements and do more mapping when they went down to the site. The ancient place was an historical discovery, after all, in addition to being the probable repository of a most valuable treasure. The druid said that it would take two full days for this preliminary work, even with both of his companions assisting in the measuring and examination, and only on the third day should they attempt to penetrate the great pile of stone at the center of the rings.
At that, Chert and Gord set up a vehement protest. They demanded no more than one day be spent on scholarly business, and the next for adventure. Curley consented to get along without the sketching, reasoning that he could construct a drawing from memory, and resolved to head for the dale first thing in the morning. That compromise was agreed to, and they settled down to sleep.
But their rest on this night was uneasy. Nightmares and restlessness plagued all three, and a lethargic feeling persisted in each of them as they proceeded down the slope of the plateau, until the warmth of late morning seemed to burn the feeling away.
Each of them discovered these facts about the others as they went about the work that the druid directed. Conversations they had between drawing, pacing, and measurement with rope or hand revealed their mutual experiences of the previous night. It was evident, the druid concluded with a tone of deep concern in his voice, that the cairn was not a deserted ruin, but it contained something malign, and this was what had caused their unease.
Instead of camping near the depression that night, Curley had the group move to a place farther away, and assured Gord and Chert that this would lessen the evil effects of the guardian of the cairn. After another sparse meal, he sat them down and went into a lecture.
“I spoke only vaguely of a guardian,” the druid began, “for I half expected there to be none. Actually, you two had more confidence that this site existed than I did…. I suppose I feared to hope too strongly so as to avoid too great a disappointment if the tale proved to be fictitious. So, if only a part of me thought we would even locate the ringstones, then the existence of a relic and the thing said to protect it could receive still less credence in my mind.”
The druid-ranger paused for a moment to reflect, slowly stroking his chin in meditation. “The mention of a prize within the cairn was made to tempt you two to come along,” he confessed. “You are friends, and I wanted your company. But, what I thought might be only an illusory lure now seems most probable indeed. Unfortunately for all of us, that also indicates that the balance of the story I heard is likely factual as well.”
Before his companions could toss out questions and accusations about what they had just been told, Greenleaf launched into the rest of his tale quickly.
“According to the survivor’s account,” he said, “the fleeing men were much worn from climbing up the western side of this range, and when they accidentally found this place, they rested for a time and allowed their nearly dead steeds to graze and recover as well. Of course, they explored the stone circles and the sealed cairn in the middle, but found no means of easy access to the barrow’s interior. However, being robbers by nature, such a place was irresistible to them. They all voted to remain and find or force entrance one way or another, despite whatever bad occurrences they might encounter.
“The group was haunted by horrible night visions, and on the very first morning afterward one of their number went insane and threw himself off the edge of the slope into the dell, breaking his neck in the fall. That incident was passed off as merely a breakdown of nerves from flight and exhaustion. The next night another of these brigands awoke to find a companion staring at him with glowing, red eyes. The leering fellow attacked madly, and in the following struggle both attacker and attacked were killed. In a mere two days, three of the group had died, but the desire of the rest to find what was buried beneath the great stone slabs of the cairn prevailed over their fear-greed has that sort of power over foolish and evil beings.
“An entrance to the place was discovered the next day, and a number of the brigands were able to move the block concealing it and go in. What they found was not to their taste, however. After their torches gave them the barest glimpse of some sort of fabulous treasure, the flames of their brands were suddenly extinguished, and a terrible fear came over them. They stampeded back along the route they had taken, in a wild and confused rush through the lightless, narrow stone maze.