What Lies Within (Book 5) (16 page)

   'Your intervention was perfectly timed, and I thank you both again from the bottom of my heart,' said Leth as he ate. 'But how did you find us?'

   'It was partly luck that Gorro returned within an hour of your being taken away,' Bicault said. 'I was itching to do something but Dame
Anacissia said - quite rightly - that I couldn't go after you alone. I was burning myself up wondering what to do, and then Gorro came. We wasted no time in getting after you, and you weren't difficult to track. But when we found you, just before you stopped by the stream, we were stuck. Even with Gorro's talents with the bow we didn't think we could disable all six of those bastards. I can use a bow myself, but my eye's not so sure nor my hands so steady as they once were, and I'm no great swordsman. We decided to wait, hoping that at some point the guards might separate or something. But when the shademorgs came we made the most of the opportunity.'

   'What are these shademorgs?' enquired Leth. 'I have never encountered their like.'

   'Dire things,' said Bicault. 'Enchantment creatures, almost certainly. Fortunately they're rare, and not quick. But they're deadly if they get a grip on you. People believe they come up unformed through the earth, like a vapour, and materialize only when they reach the surface. You can feel them coming, though. Like a sixth sense.'

   Leth nodded pensively. 'A tangible emanation of evil, unlike anything I have experienced.'

   'Aye, that it is. After the first encounter, if the shademorgs didn't catch you, you learn to get out quick the moment you feel it.'

   Leth was silent a moment, then said, 'You risked a lot, coming after us.'

   'Oh, but Sir Clun, do you truly think we could have left you to the mercy of those fiends?' Bicault nodded towards Galry. 'We saw what they had done to your boy. To think that they might now plan to finish the job . . . .' Tears misted his eyes and he shook his head emphatically. 'No, we could not permit that.'

   Jace, sitting alongside Leth, finished eating and laid her head upon his thigh. He stroked her fair hair, his mind for a moment far away. Galry snuggled up on his other side.

   'What now, Sir Clun?' Bicault asked with an anxious smile

   'I must carry on,' said Leth, though he was not certain where. If Giswel Holt had truly fallen and Enchantment's Reach was under seige or maybe worse, he did not know how he could hope to get back into the capital with the children. Where was Orbelon? How might he find him again?
And Issul?

   Leth recalled what Anacissia had said the night before: that the woman he sought, the mother of his two children, was alive and seeking him. She had spoken with such conviction, though she could not truly know of whom she spoke. How could he give credit to her words? And even if he did - and his need was so great that he clung more fully than he was aware to the hope that she had inspired - even if he did, where was he to begin to search? And what perils was he subjecting Galry and Jace to?

   The notion passed briefly across his mind of leaving the children temporarily in the care of Anacissia and Bicault. He had little doubt that the kindly couple would be more than happy to take them, and it would leave him better able to concentrate on the tasks that lay before him. The childrens' lives were at risk as long as they remained with him. Count Harg, if he had survived the shademorgs, would stop at nothing to find Leth again. And if he had perished, Urch-Malmain would send others, equally heartless and determined. Thus, would Galry and Jace not be safer for the time being with Anacissia and Bicault?

   Leth pondered this,
then abruptly rejected the idea. He could not bear to be separated from his children again. Bicault's situation was far from safe. Leth had already made provision for him and his family to leave their home. If they did so, and took Galry and Jace, how would Leth ever know where they had gone?

   'Sir Clun, take Linka,' said Bicault, breaking the flow of Leth's thoughts. 'You will need her. We can purchase another mare - indeed, with what you have given us we can buy a whole herd and more!'

   Leth shook his head. 'You have yet to realize coin from the ring and wristlet, and there is nowhere close by where you can safely do that. You will have need of Linka. I want only what I came with, plus perhaps a few provisions to keep hunger at bay.'

   'Well then, you must take this also, and I will accept nothing but 'yes',' Bicault urged. In the flat of his hand he held a small leather pouch, open at the neck. Leth saw coin within. 'Gorro did well at market. It will enable you to buy a horse of some description along your way, to ease your journey. Take it. We have sufficient coin.'

   Leth hesitated, for a moment embarrassed, then accepted.

   'The village of Little Sprike lies about two leagues northwest of here,' Bicault said. He pointed into the woods. 'If you go that way you will come to a forest road that leads directly there. Seek out the farmer, Jalibir, and
mention my name. He will sell you a decent mount at a fair price. Can you use a bow?'

   Leth nodded. Bicault unslung his own bow and quiver of arrows. 'Then take these. I have another at home.'

   Leth took the bow and arrows, then rose and gently coaxed his two children to their feet. He took the sapphire armour and some items of food and a water flask from Linka's back. Bicault helped him to strap on the armour. Gorro had climbed down from his tree and joined them. He passed his eyes admiringly over the armour. 'Such craftsmanship. I’m no expert, yet I would say it has been fashioned by an extraordinary hand.'

   'I think you would be right,' said Leth, but offered no further explanation.

   'The warriors who held you captive, Sir Clun,' Gorro said, 'if they live are they likely to come to our home again, seeking vengeance?'

   Leth considered. 'They did not set eyes on either of
you, hence they have no reason to connect you with our escape. Nor will they expect me to return to you. No, they believe me bound for Enchantment's Reach, so I see no reason why they would seek you out. All the same, there are good reasons why you should leave your home, at least for a while, reluctant though you may be. I have explained as much to your father. These are troubled times, Gorro. Wyslow Water is no longer a safe haven for you. I charge you with the task of prevailing upon your parents to heed my advice.'

   Gorro nodded sombrely,
then held out his hand. 'Go well then.'

   They grasped hands,
then Leth turned and warmly embraced Bicault. 'A man is rich when he knows he has friends such as you.'

   Bicault stood tearfully, but could barely find words. He ruffled the children’s hair. 'You be careful now. All of you.'

   He turned, taking Linka's tether, and walked away with Gorro behind. Leth watched them go, holding his children’s hands, his heart full in his breast. Bicault and Gorro stopped once and turned and briefly waved, then moved on and were quickly swallowed by the forest's deep.

   Leth heaved a sigh. He looked up through the trees at the bright sky, then slung Bicault's bow and quiver across one
shoulder, and with Jace and Galry once more at his side, walked away into the shadows.  

SEVEN

i

   In Triune's tower, somewhere within Enchantment, Queen Issul paced feverishly back and forth. The three Triune children were before her, making meticulous adjustments to the golden disks which hovered about the edge of the energetic haze within its circlet of incandescent filaments. In the haze two scenes could now be discerned, alternating in accordance with Triune's modulations of the disks.

   The first scene was static. It showed the dense woodland where the tail of the worm hung in the air: the opening of the Portal from Orbelon's world through which the knight clad in armour of sapphire blue had tumbled with Issul's two young children, Prince Galry and Princess Jace. The portal opening had faded from the flaring purple glare that had marked their arrival, to become a barely perceptible cloudy smear again.

   Triune had declared that the worm's tail had been stabilized. 'It is not by our doing. For reasons we cannot be sure of Urch-Malmain has elected to hold it steady in this one place, wherever that may be.'

   The second scene also showed the forest, but it was not stable. It presented the view of the second seeking eye which, in response to Issul's and Orbelon's requests, Triune had dispatched to the worm's tail in the hope of tracking the sapphire knight. This second eye had arrived at the site of the portal opening within a couple of hours of the knight and children coming through. The seeker immediately commenced combing the surrounding forest, but it was a device designed for observation rather than tracking. It lacked the ability to seek out with any degree of precision the minute telltale signs left by the sapphire knight. Hence within minutes its search had become more or less random.

   Sometime later there had been another event at the worm's tail. Six warriors were seen to arrive through the portal. Their leader was a tall man of notable pallor, quite young, with long dark hair, a neat black moustache and eyes almost as vibrant blue as Triune's. The other five were grim-visaged fighters by their appearance, of non-human origins.

   The six acted with immediacy and purpose. They scoured the area in the close vicinity of the portal, quickly determined the direction the sapphire knight had taken, and set off in pursuit.

   'Call back the second eye!' Issul had cried. 'It must follow these warriors. They will be easier to track and are plainly searching for the knight.'

   Triune had complied, but it took almost an hour for the second seeking eye to return to the portal. Issul had pleaded with Triune to send the first seeker - which still observed the tail of the worm - after the six warriors while their trail was fresh. But Triune feared losing the portal, and refused. By the time the second seeker arrived the six were long gone. Hence the seeker set out after them with barely any more success than before.

   But earlier, minutes before the appearance of the sapphire warrior and Issul's children, the observers had witnessed another curious phenomenon. Orbelon had positioned himself beside Triune's circular black tablet in order to briefly observe Urch-Malmain. Urch-Malmain had been seen to be in a cell-like chamber in which, from all appearances, he was unwillingly confined. He was hammering at the door and shouting, though no sound was actually carried via the black tablet. Also in the chamber were two bloodied warriors, one apparently dead, the other grievously injured. And lying upon a litter to one side was, to Issul's mystification, a Karai corpse.

   'What is happening here?' she had whispered, and no one answered. All eyes were glued intently to the scene before them.

   Then the middle-child Triune had stepped over and passed a hand above the tablet. Its surface rippled and was returned to vertiginous empty obsidian in which nothing could be seen, though a sense of endless depth prevailed. 'Prolonged surveillance increases the risk of Urch-Malmain's detecting us, and hence taking steps to avoid us,' Triune explained. 'We must not lose him now. We will observe again in a little while.'

   Triune moved away; the three children mused to themselves. 'This is most extraordinary. Urch-Malmain, trapped within a chamber? His powers must be greatly reduced.' All three turned to Orbelon. 'Does he remain within you? Are you sure?'

   'In regard to Urch-Malmain I feel as I felt before. It is my belief that he remains trapped within my world.'

   'But within a cell?' The three white-haired child heads shook questioningly.

   Subsequently, as the tripartite god worked with the golden disks, Orbelon stationed himself again at the black tablet. With Issul and Shenwolf beside him he reported that Urch-Malmain was no longer in the cell. The Noeticist was apparently instructing the six warriors who, moments later, came through the Portal.

   'This sapphire knight, then, whoever he may be, has fled Urch-Malmain with my children,' declared Issul. 'And these others have been sent by Urch-Malmain to find them, or him.'

   'That would be my estimation,' Orbelon agreed.

  
'And . . . what? Bring them back? Kill them?'

   Nobody answered.

   'And the sapphire knight - he is the one I saw in the forest, when I was Gordallith's prisoner. Does he menace Jace and Galry, or is he their saviour? And Leth? Orbelon, where is he?'

   Orbelon slowly twisted his bundled head from side to side. 'Nothing is clear just now.'

   'We must consider this,' Triune said. 'We wonder, why did Urch-Malmain stabilize the Portal?'

   'Can it have been the knight who stabilized it?' enquired Orbelon. 'And Urch-Malmain now maintains its stability while his warriors pursue and reclaim the knight, and perhaps the children?'

   'The entities who comprise the Portal should take instructions only from their employer, Urch-Malmain.'

  
'Unless he has greatly displeased them, or broken their compact in some way.'