The Pillars of Creation (19 page)

“If I’m not harming you, your business at earning a living—”

“No,” he put in. “No, you’re not—not at all.” He gestured back toward the plateau. “We made a good profit today and we can afford a short rest. My brothers don’t mind at all. We travel all over and buy whatever goods we can find at a reasonable price, everything from wine, to carpets, to spring chickens, and then we haul it back here to sell. It would really be doing my brothers a favor, giving them a break.”

Jennsen nodded. “I could use the ride, Tom.”

He turned serious. “I know. A man’s life is at stake.”

Tom scrambled up onto the wagon and held down a hand. “Careful, ma’am.”

She took his big hand and put a boot in the iron rung. “I’m Jennsen.”

“So you said, ma’am.” He gently drew her up to the seat.

As soon as she was seated, he pulled a blanket from behind and placed it in a pile in her lap, apparently not wanting to be so presumptuous as to spread it out over her. As she arranged it on her lap, she smiled her appreciation for the warm wool cover. Reaching behind again, he rooted around under a pile of well-worn packing blankets and came up with a small bundle. Tom grinned his lopsided smile as he presented her with the pie wrapped in a white cloth. He was as good as his word; it was still warm. He recovered a waterskin, too, and set it on the seat between them.

“If you’d prefer, you can ride in back. I brought plenty of blankets to keep you warm, and they might be more comfortable to sit on than a wooden seat.”

“I’m fine up here for now,” she said. She lifted the pie in gesture. “When I get my supplies back, and my money, I want to pay you back for everything. You keep a tally, and I’ll pay you back for it all.”

He released the brake and flicked the reins. “If that’s your wish, but I don’t expect it.”

“I do,” she said as the wagon lurched ahead.

As soon as they were under way, he turned from her westerly course to a more northwest line.

She instantly reverted to her suspicion. “What are you doing? Where do you think you’re going?”

He looked a little startled at her renewed mistrust. “You said you wanted to go to Althea’s, didn’t you?”

“Yes, but I was told to go west until I reached the tallest snowcapped mountain, and then on the other side to turn north and follow cliffs—”

“Oh,” he said, realizing then what she was thinking and why. “That’s if you want it to take an extra day.”

“Why would that woman tell me to go a way that would take more time?”

“Probably because that’s the way everyone goes to Althea’s and she didn’t know you were in a hurry.”

“Why send people that way, if it takes more time?”

“People go that way because they fear the swamp. That way puts you in closest to Althea’s at the end, meaning you have to go through the least amount of the swamp. It was probably the only way she knew about.”

Jennsen had to grab the rail for support as the wagon bounced over a crease in the rocky ground. He was right, the wooden seat was hard sitting and with a wagon made for hauling heavy loads, it bounced more when empty.

“But, shouldn’t I fear the swamp, too?” she finally asked.

“I suppose.”

“Well then, why should I go this other way?”

He looked over, again, taking the briefest glance at her hair. It was a behavior she was used to. Most people couldn’t help but to look.

“You said a man’s life was at stake,” he said, his timidity gone. “It takes a lot less time this way, cutting the corner off the route by going this side of that peak she told you about and not having to go up that twisting canyon beneath the cliffs. The problem is, you have to go in the swamp from the back, so you’ll have more of the swamp to go through to get in to Althea’s.”

“And that doesn’t take more time, going through more swamp?”

“Yes, but even with having to go through more swamp, I’m betting you’ll still save a day each way. That’s two days saved.”

Jennsen didn’t like swamps. More to the point, she didn’t like the kinds of things that lived in swamps.

“Is it much more dangerous?”

“You wouldn’t strike out alone with no supplies if it wasn’t pretty important—a matter of life and death. If you were willing to risk your life to do that, then I figured you’d be looking to save any time you can. If you’d rather, though, I can take you the long way, with less distance through the swamp. Up to you, but if time is important, it’s two days more by going that way.”

“No, you’re right.” The meat pie on her lap was warm. It felt good to have her fingers around it. He was a thoughtful man for bringing it. “Thank you, Tom, for thinking to save time.”

“Who is it that’s at the other end of life and death?”

“A friend,” she said.

“Must be a good friend.”

“I’d be dead, now, if not for him.”

He was silent as they rolled toward the dark band of mountains in the distance. She brooded about what might lie in the swamp. Worse, she worried about what would happen to Sebastian if she didn’t get Althea’s help soon enough.

“How long?” Jennsen asked. “How long till we get to the swamp?”

“Depends on how much snow is in the pass, and on a few other things. I don’t go this way often, so I can’t say for sure. If we ride all night, though, I’m reasonably sure we can be to the back reaches of the swamp by morning.”

“How long to get to Althea’s, then. Through the swamp, I mean.”

He glanced over uneasily. “Sorry, Jennsen, but I don’t know for sure. I’ve never been in Althea’s swamp before.”

“Any guess?”

“Just knowing the lay of the land, I don’t think it should take more than a day to go in and come back, but I’m guessing. And that doesn’t count how much time you’ll be spending in there with Althea.” His uneasiness returned. “I’ll get you in to Althea’s as quickly as I can.”

Jennsen had to talk to Althea about the Lord Rahl—both her father, and the present Lord Rahl, Richard, her half brother. It would not be good if Tom were to discover who she was, or her purpose. His helpfulness would evaporate, at the least. She also thought that a reason for him to stay behind might be in order, lest he get suspicious.

She shook her head. “I think it would be best if you stayed with the wagon and horses. If you drive all night, then you’ll need to get some rest to be ready as soon as I come out. It will save us time.”

He nodded as he considered her words. “That makes sense. But I could still—”

“No. I appreciate the ride, the food and water, and the warm blanket, but I won’t let you risk your life in there, too. It would be the most help if you waited with the wagon and were ready to drive back when I come out.”

She watched the wind in his blond hair as he thought it over. “All right, if those are your wishes. I’m glad you let me help you with my part of it. Where to after you see Althea?”

“Back to the palace,” she said.

“Then, with good fortune, I’ll have you back at the palace day after tomorrow.”

That was three days for Sebastian. She didn’t know if he had three days, or three hours. Or even three minutes. As long as there was a chance he was still alive, though, she had to go into the swamp.

Despite Jennsen’s misgivings about the job ahead of her, the meat pie tasted wonderful. Hungry as she was, nearly anything would have tasted good. She pulled a big piece of meat out of the pie, and, holding it between a finger and thumb, fed it to Tom.

After he chewed, he said, “The moon will be up not long after sundown, so by the time I reach the pass through the mountains, I should be able to see well enough to keep going. There’s plenty of blankets in back. When night comes, you should probably crawl back there and, if you can, get some sleep for tomorrow. You’ll be needing the rest. In the morning, I’ll catch a nap while you go in to see Althea. When you come back, I’ll drive all night and get you right back to the palace. I hope that way we can save enough time for you to help your friend.”

She swayed in the seat along with the big man she had only just met, who was doing all this for a stranger.

“Thank you, Tom. You’re a good man.”

He grinned. “My mama always said so.”

Just as she took another bite, he added, “I hope Lord Rahl thinks so, too. You’ll tell him when you see him, won’t you?”

She didn’t know what he could possibly mean, and feared to ask him. As her mind raced, she chewed, using her mouthful as an excuse to delay. Saying anything might inadvertently get her into trouble. Sebastian’s life was at stake. Jennsen decided to smile and play along. She finally swallowed the mouthful.

“Of course.”

By the slight but sublime smile that lent a curve to the line of his mouth as he tended the reins and watched out ahead, it had been the right answer.

Light suddenly hurt her eyes. Jennsen held a hand up against the brightness and saw that Tom was pulling the blankets back off her. She stretched and yawned, but then, realizing fully why she was in the back of a wagon, where they were, and why they were there, her yawn cut short. She sat up. The wagon was stopped at the edge of a grassy meadow.

Jennsen put a hand on the side of the wagon, on the coarse plank worn smooth along the top edge, and blinked as she looked about. Behind them, craggy gray rock rose up, holding in its cracks and fissures low stalwart bushes, gnarled and hunkered low, as if against an enduring wind. Her gaze rose up the weathered rock to where it dissolved into mist. Tangled growth lay at the foot of the walls beyond the edges of the meadow and beside the narrow chasm that cut through the rock. Tom had somehow jockeyed the wagon between those steep cliffs. The two big draft horses, still standing in their harnesses, cropped at the shaggy grass.

Ahead, beyond the meadow, the ground descended into the gloom among spreading trees, trailers of vine, and hanging moss. Strange calls, clicks, and whistles came from under the verdant shroud.

“In the middle of winter…” was all she could think to say.

Tom lifted the feed bags from the back of the wagon. “Might be a nice place to spend the winter, too”—he gestured with a nod down the hill, under the tangle of growth—“were it not for what people say comes out of there. If it weren’t true, I’d bet there would be some fool who by now would have tried to give it a go, here. But, if they have, they were pulled in there by some nightmare creature and never made it back out.”

“You mean, you really think here are…monsters, or something, in there?”

He rested his forearms on the wagon’s sides as he leaned in, right over her. “Jennsen, I don’t hold with scaring ladies. When I was a boy, some of the other boys enjoyed waving a wriggling snake at the girls just to hear them scream. I never did. I’m not trying to frighten you.

“But I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I just allowed you to go bounding in there as if it were some lark and then you ended up never coming out. Maybe it’s just talk; I don’t know; I’ve never gone in there. I don’t know anyone who has ever gone in there without being invited in—and that’s from the other side. People say you can’t go in the back and live to tell about it. If anyone would insist on attempting it, it would be you. I know you’re here for an important reason, so I don’t expect you’re going to sit around for days, waiting for an invitation.”

Jennsen swallowed. Her tongue tasted sour. She nodded her thanks, not knowing what to say.

Tom swiped back his fall of blond hair. “I just wanted to tell you the truth of what I know.” He hoisted the feed bags on his way to the horses.

Whatever was in there was in there. She had to go in, that was all there was to it. She didn’t have any choice; if she wanted to get Sebastian away from his captors, she had to go in. If she ever wanted to be free of Lord Rahl, she had to go in.

She reached under her cloak and touched the hilt of her knife. She wasn’t some town girl, scared of her own shadow, unable to defend herself.

She was Jennsen Rahl.

Jennsen pushed the blankets the rest of the way off her and climbed out of the wagon bed, using a rear wheel spoke for a step. Tom was coming back around carrying a waterskin.

“Drink? It’s water—I kept it hooked over the hame so the horses would keep it from freezing.”

The cold had dried her out and she drank eagerly. She saw Tom wipe sweat from his brow and realized only then how warm it really was. She supposed no proper self-respecting swamp full of monsters would allow itself to be frozen over.

Tom pulled back the folds of cloth of something he held in one hand. “Breakfast?”

She smiled at seeing a meat pie. “You’re a thoughtful man, besides being a good man.”

He grinned as he handed her the pie and then turned to undo the trace chains from the horses. “Don’t forget, you promised to tell Lord Rahl,” he called back to her.

Rather than be pulled into any kind of a conversation having to do with her hunter, she diverted him from the subject. “You’ll be right here, then? When I come back, I mean? You’ll be waiting, so we can get back?”

He peered back as he lifted the breaching strap over the horse’s rump. “You have my word, Jennsen. I won’t desert you here.”

By his expression, he was swearing an oath. She smiled her appreciation. “You should get some rest. You’ve driven all night.”

“I’ll try.”

She took another bite of the meat pie. It was cold, but good, and it was filling. As she chewed, she glanced at the wall of green beyond the meadow, at the darkness within, then appraised the iron gray sky.

“Any idea what time of day it is?”

“Sun’s been up an hour, at most,” he said as he checked the joints on the leather straps. He gestured back the way they had come in. “Before we started down into this low place, we were up above this fog and mist. It was sunny up there.”

As somber as it was below the dark overcast, such a notion amazed her. It looked like dawn had yet to arrive. It was hard to believe that the sun was shinning not far off, but she had seen such heavy blankets of fog before as she looked down from high places.

After she was finished eating the meat pie and had brushed the crumbs from her palm, Jennsen stood waiting until Tom turned from unbuckling the girth strap from around the deep, powerful chest of one of his horses. Both big, well-kept animals were gray with black manes and tails. They were horses as big as any she had ever seen. They seemed out of scale, until she took in Tom working beside them. He made them seem not quite so imposing, especially as he gave them affectionate strokes. They appeared to welcome his familiar touch.

Both horses looked back occasionally at Tom as he removed all their gear, or rolled a dark eye toward Jennsen, but both kept much closer watch on the shadows beyond the edge of the meadow. Their ears were at attention, and fixed on the swamp.

“I’d better get going. There’s no time to waste.” He offered a single nod. “Thank you, Tom. If I don’t get another chance to say it, thank you for helping me. Not many people would have done as you did.”

His shy grin appeared again to show his teeth. “Most anyone would have helped you. But I’m pleased to be the one who was able to.”

She was sure he meant something that she didn’t quite understand. Whatever it was, she had bigger worries.

Her eyes turned toward the echoing calls coming out of the swamp. There was no telling how big the trees were because the tops disappeared up into the mist. As large as they looked, the trunks would have to be enormous. Vines descended out of the mist, along with any number of other twisting climbing plants enshrouding the limbs of the huge trees, as if trying to wrestle them down into the darkness below.

Jennsen searched the rim and found a ridge descending from the edge of the meadow, like the spine of some huge beast beneath the ground. It ran down in under the spreading limbs. It wasn’t a path, exactly, but a place to start. She had lived in the woods her whole life and could find a trail others would never know existed. There was no trail into this place. Nothing, it appeared, ever went in. She would have to find her own way.

Jennsen turned back from the edge of the meadow and shared a long look with the big man’s blue eyes.

He offered her a small smile—respect for what she was doing. “May the good spirits be with you, and watch over you.”

“And you, Tom. Get some sleep. When I get back, we’ll need to ride hard back to the palace.”

He bowed. “By your command.”

She smiled at his surprising manner, and then turned to the gloom and headed down in.

The swamp held heat gathered under its skirts. The humidity was like a presence waiting to push intruders back. With every step it grew darker. The quiet was as thick as the damp air, and the few calls reverberating through the darkness beyond only accentuated the hush and the vast distance that lay below.

Jennsen followed the spine of the ridge as it twisted this way and that, going ever lower. Branches of trees off to each side drooped with the weight of mosses and vines draped over them. In some places, as she stepped along the exposed rock of the ridge, she had to squat down to duck under the limbs. In other places, she had to push vines aside to make progress. The stink of decay drifted up to her through the dead still air.

Turning, looking back, she saw a tunnel of light back up to the meadow. In the center of the circle of dull light at the end, she could see the silhouette of a big man, standing, hands on hips, watching down at her. As dark as it was, he had no hope of seeing her. She could only see him because he stood against the light. But he stood watching, anyway.

Jennsen couldn’t decide what she thought about him. He was difficult to figure out. He seemed a kindhearted man, but she trusted no one. Except Sebastian. She trusted him.

As her eyes adjusted to the dim light, she saw, looking back, that the way she had come in was the only way to enter, at least anywhere close that she could see. There were steep walls where the rock dropped downward. The meadow had been like a mere shelf in the mountainside’s descent into the swamp. Below the meadow, the walls held a wealth of plants that used the rock for support as they climbed upward from the swamp below. The ridge she used for her descent was a mere fold of rock that provided a way for her to climb down. Without it, the walls were too steep.

Taking a deep breath for resolve as she gazed about, Jennsen started back down, following the ridge of rock as it twisted its way down, deeper and deeper in among the trees. In places, there were frightening drops to each side of where she walked. In one place, there was only darkness to each side below, as if she were on a thread of stone spanning a rupture in the world. After peering down into the depths, and imagining the Keeper of the underworld below awaiting the unwary, she trod more carefully.

She soon came to realize that many of the trees she had seen up higher had only been the canopy of towering, ancient oaks rising up from ledges in the rock. She realized that she had mistaken some of their upper limbs for trunks. Jennsen had never seen trees so big. Her fear was almost replaced by awe. She gaped at the layer upon layer of massive limbs as she climbed down past them. In the distance she saw nests, large clumps of twigs and stalks draped with downy moss and lichen, perched in the crotch of limbs. If the nests were occupied, she didn’t see what sort of bird could have built such imposing havens, but she guessed they had to be raptors.

As she stooped while clambering over rock to squeeze herself under a tightly woven net of limbs drooping down close over the spine of the ridge, the vista opened onto a vast land hidden under the thick leafy layers of the upper canopy. It was like a whole new world hidden away, unvisited by anyone before. Shafts of muted light hardly dared penetrate down this far. Here and there vines hung down out of the dark growth above. Birds drifted silently through the cavernous gloom. An animal she had never heard before called from the distance. A faraway answer returned from another direction.

As primitive and foreboding as the place seemed, she also thought it was darkly beautiful. It put her in mind of being in a garden of the underworld, where plants basked in eternal gloom. The underworld might be the Keeper’s cold domain, but the Creator’s everlasting light nourished and warmed good souls.

In a way, the swamp reminded her of so much about D’Hara—dark, threatening, and dangerous, but at the same time achingly beautiful. In the same way, her knife embodied the ugliness of the House of Rahl, yet it was undeniably exquisite.

Trees clung to the rocky slope around her with clawlike roots, as if fearing to be dragged down to what might lurk in the lower reaches. Some of the ancient pines, long dead, lay partly fallen, caught by their brethren before they could topple to the ground. The nearby trees embraced them, as if trying to help them up. Dead gray wood was visible in places under the covering of growth climbing up the tilted trunks. Many, though, had collapsed to the ground. One old tree lay across her way, as if it had melted there, conforming to every contour, every rise and fall of the ridge. The disintegrating wood was spongy underfoot, and teeming with insects.

Up in the branches, an owl watched as she scrambled ever downward. Ants marched along the ground, carrying bits of treasures from the damp forest. Roaches, big, hard, and glossy brown, skittered across the leaf litter. Things off in the dense undergrowth disturbed branches as they moved away from her.

Jennsen had spent a lifetime in forests and had seen everything from huge bears to newborn fawns, birds to bugs, bats to newts. There were things that worried her, like snakes and bears with cubs, but she knew the animals well. For the most part, they feared people and usually wanted only to be left alone, so they generally didn’t frighten her. But she didn’t know what animals might be lurking in this dark and damp place, what poison things with fangs. She didn’t know what conjured beasts might prowl the nether reaches of this sorceress’s lair, beasts that feared nothing.

She saw spiders, fat, dark, and hairy, their legs slowly raking the dank air, descending smoothly on threads anchored somewhere above. They vanished into the ferns growing in sprawling mats across the ground. As warm and humid as it was, Jennsen kept her cloak closed around her and the hood covering her head to better protect herself from the likes of spiders.

The bite of a spider could be as deadly as any animal. Dead was dead, no matter the cause. The Keeper of the dead gave no special dispensation because the deadly poison came from something small and seemingly insignificant. The Keeper of the dead embraced with eternal darkness those come into his domain—for whatever reason. No grace was granted for how you came to be dead.

As at home as Jennsen felt in the out-of-doors, and as hauntingly beautiful as the swamp was, the place still kept her eyes wide and her pulse racing. Every vine or green wisp she touched seemed threatening, and more than once made her jump.