Pain, cold, pain, and still I held and now Jervon called to me and somehow I found the strength to give to him even as earlier he had loosed his for me. Together we stood, and because of that both of us were the stronger, for in our union was the best part of us both—mind and spirit.
Darkness, cold, pain—and then a sense of change, of being lost. But I would not allow fear to stir. A god who was naught could not slay.
I opened my eyes—for I saw with them now and not with that special sense I had had in that other place. Before me was a column of light, but it was wan, sinking, growing paler even in the space of a blink or two. I moved; my body was stiff, cold, my hands and feet had no feeling in them as I slid forward on the wide seat where I had awakened, looking about me for something familiar and known.
This—this was the round chamber where I had found Jervon.
Jervon!
Stumbling, weaving, I staggered to that other chair, fumbling with my dagger so that I might cut the ropes which bound his stiff body. His eyes were closed, but he had not tumbled flaccidly down as had the outlaw who had been drained. I sawed at his hide bonds with my numb and fumbling hands, twice dropping the blade so I had to grope for it in the half light. For the flaming pillar in the center gave forth but little radiance now—more like the dread glow which sometimes gathers on dead bodies.
“Jervon!” I called to him, shook him as best I could with those blockish hands. His body fell forward so his head rested on my shoulder and his weight nearly bore me tumbling backward. “Jervon!”
It seemed in that moment that I had lost. For if I alone had won out of that evil place then there was no further hope for me.
“Jervon!”
There was a breath against my cheek, expelled by a moan. I gathered him to me in a hold, which even the false god could not have broken, until his voice came, low and with a stammering catch in it:
“My dear lady, would you break my ribs for me—” and there was a thread of weak laughter in that which set me laughing too, until I near shook with the force of that reaction.
I almost could not believe our battle won. But before us, where we crouched together on the wide seat of that throne, the last glimmer of light died. There was no gateway now into elsewhere. Outside the outlaws of the Waste might be waiting, but we two had battled something greater than any malice of theirs, and for the moment we were content.
THE TOADS of GRIMMERDALE
1
The drifts of ice-crusted snow were growing both taller and wider. Hertha stopped to catch her breath, ramming the butt of the hunting spear she had been using as a staff into the one before her, the smooth shaft breaking through the crust with difficulty. She frowned at the broken hole without seeing it.
There was a long dagger at her belt, the short hafted spear in her mittened hand. Under her cloak she hugged to her the all too small bundle which she had brought with her out of Horla's Hold. The other burden which she carried lay within her, and she forced herself to face squarely the fate that had been brought upon her.
Now her lips firmed into a line, her chin went up. Suddenly she spat with a hiss of breath. Shame—why should she feel shame? Had Kuno expected her to whine and wail, perhaps crawl before him so he could “forgive” her, prove thus to his followers his greatness of spirit?
She showed her teeth as might a cornered vixen, and aimed a harder blow at the drift. There was no reason for her to feel shame, the burden in her was not of wanton seeking. Such things happened in times of war. She guessed that when matters worked so Kuno had not been backward himself in taking a woman of the enemy.
It remained that her noble brother had sent her forth from Horla's Hold because she had not allowed his kitchen hags to brew some foul potion to perhaps poison her, as well as what she bore. Had she so died he could have piously crossed hands at the Thunderer's Altar and spoken of Fate's will, and all would have ended neatly. In fact she might believe that perhaps that had been his true intention.
For a moment Hertha was startled at the grim march of her thoughts. Kuno—Kuno was her brother! Two years ago she could not have thought so of him or any man! When yet the war had not neared the Hold. But that was long before she set out the Landendale. Before she knew the world as it was and not as she had believed it
Hertha was glad she had been able to learn her lesson quickly. The thin-skinned maid she had once been could not have fronted Kuno, could not have taken this road—
She felt the warmth of anger, a sullen, glowing anger, as heating as if she carried a small brazier of coals under her cloak's edge. So she went on, setting her rough boots firmly to crunch across the drift edge. Nor did she turn to look back down at that stone-walled keep which had sheltered those of her blood for five generations. The sun was well westward; she must not linger on the trail. Few paths were broken now; times in number she must halt and use the spear to sound out the footing. But it was easy to keep in eye her landmarks of Mulma's Needle and the Wyvern's Wing.
Hertha was sure Kuno expected her to come creeping woefully back to accept his conditions. She smiled wryly. Kuno was so very certain of everything. And since he had beaten off the attack of a straggling band of the enemy trying to fight their way to the dubious safety of the coast, he had been insufferable.
The Dales were free in truth. But for Kuno to act as if the victories hard won there were his alone—! It had required all the might of High Hallack, together with strange allies from the Waste, to break the invaders, to hunt and harry them back to the sea from which they had come. And that had taken a score of years to do it.
Trewsdale had escaped, not because of any virtue, but by chance. Because fire and sword had not riven, there was no reason to cry upon unbroken walls as gamecocks. Kuno had harried men already three-quarters beaten.
She reached the divide, to plod steadily on. The wind had been at work here, and her path was free of snow. It was very old. that road, one of the reminders to be found all across the dale land that her own people were latecomers. Who had cut these ways for their own treading?
The well-weathered carvings at the foot of the Wyvern's Wing could be seen easily now. So eroded they were by time that none could trace their meaning. But men—or intelligent beings—had shaped them to a purpose, and that task must have been long in the doing. Hertha reached out her mittened fingers to stroke one of the now vague curves. She did not believe they had any virtue in themselves, though the field workers did. But they marked well her road.
Down slope again from this point, and now the wind's lash did not cut at her. Though again, snow drifted. Two tens of days yet to the feast of Year Turn. This was the last of the Year of the Hornet, next lay the Year of the Unicom, which was a more fortunate sign.
With the increase of snow, Hertha once more found the footing dangerous. Bits of broken crust worked in over the tops of her boots, even though she had drawn tight their top straps, and melted soddenly against her foot sacks. She plodded on as the track entered a fringe of scrub trees.
Evergreens, the foliage was dark in the dwindling light. But they arose to roof over a road, keeping off the drifts. She came to a stream where ice had bridged from one stony bank to the other. There she turned east to gain Gunnora's Shrine.
About its walls was a tangle of winter-killed garden. It was a low building, and an archway faced her. No gate or door barred that and she walked boldly in.
Once inside the outer wall she could see windows, round as the eyes of some great feline regarding her sleepily, flanking a door by which hung a heavy bell-pull of wrought metal in, the form of Gunnora's symbol of a ripened grain stalk entwined with a fruit-laden branch.
Hertha leaned her spear against the wall that her hand might be free for a summons pull. What answered was not any peal of bell, rather an odd, muted sound as if some one called in words she did not understand. That, too, she accepted, though she had not been this way before, and had only a few whispered words to send her here.
The leaves of the
door parted. Though no one stood there to give her house greeting, Hertha took that for an invitation to enter. She moved into gentle warmth, a fragrance of herbs and flowers, as if she had, in that single step, passed from the sure death of midwinter into the life of spring.
With the warmth and fragrance came a lightening of heart, so that the taut lines in her face smoothed a little, and her aching shoulders and back lost some of the stiffening tension.
What light there was issued from two lamps, set on columns, one right, one left. She was in a narrow entry, its walls painted with such colors as to make her believe that she had truly entered a garden. Before her those ranks of flowers rippled and she realized that there hung a curtain, fashioned to repeat the wall design. Since there still came no greeting, she put out her hand to the folds of the curtain.
Before she could finger it, the length looped a side of itself, and she came into a large room. There was a table there with a chair drawn up to it. Before that place was set out dishes, some covered as if they held viands which were to be kept warm, a goblet of crystal filled with a green liquid.
“Eat—drink—” a voice sighed through the chamber.
Startled, Hertha looked about the room, over her shoulder. No one. And now that hunger of which she had hardly been aware awoke full force. She dropped the spear to the floor, laid her bundle beside it, let her cloak fall over both and sat down in the chair.
Though she could see no one. she spoke:
“To the giver of the feast, fair thanks. For the welcome of the gate, gratitude. To the ruler of this house, fair fortune and bright sun on the morrow—” The formal words rang a little hollow here. Hertha smiled at a sudden thought.
This was Gunnora's shrine. Would the Great Lady need the well wishing of any mortal? Yet it seemed fitting that she make the guest speech.
There was no answer, though she hoped for one. At last, a little hesitatingly, she sampled the food spread before her and found it such fare as might be on the feast table of a Dales Lord. The green drink was refreshing, yet warming, with a subtle taste of herbs. She held it in her mouth, trying to guess which gave it that flavor.
When she had finished, she found that the last and largest covered basin held warm water on the surface of which floated petals of flowers. Flowers in the dead of winter! And beside it was a towel, so she washed her hands, and leaned back in the chair, wondering what came next in Gunnora's hall.
The silence in the room seemed to grow the greater. Hertha stirred. Surely there were priestesses at the Shrine? Some one had prepared that meal, offered it to her with those two words. She had come here for a purpose, and the need for fiction roused in her again.
“Great Lady.” Hertha arose. Since she could see no one, she would speak to the empty room. There was a door at the other end of the chamber but it was closed.
“Great Lady,” she began again. She had never been deeply religious, though she kept Light Day, made the harvest sacrifices, listened respectfully to the Mount of Astron at Mora Service. When she had been a little maid, her foster mother had given her Gunnora's amulet and later, according to custom, that had been laid on the house altar when she came to marriageable age. Of Gunnora's mysteries she knew only what she had heard repeated woman to woman when they sat apart from the men. For Gunnora was only for womankind and when one was carrying ripening seed within one, then she listened—
For the second time her words echoed. Now her feeling of impatience changed to something else—awe, perhaps, or fear? Yet Gunnora did not hold by the petty rules of men. It did not matter when you sought her if you be lawful wife or not.
As Hertha's distrust grew, the second door swung silently open—another invitation. Leaving her cloak, bundle, spear where they lay, the girl went on. Here the smell of flowers and herbs was stronger. Lazy curls of scented smoke arose from two braziers standing at the head and foot of a couch. That was set as an altar at the foot of a pillar carved with the ripened grain, the fruited branch.
“Rest—” the sighing voice bade. Hertha, the need for sleep suddenly as great as her hunger had been, moved to that waiting bed, stretched out her wearied and aching body. The curls of smoke thickened, spread over her like a coverlet. She closed her eyes.
She was in a place of half light in which she sensed others coming and going, busied about tasks. But she felt alone, lost. Then one moved to her and she saw a face she knew, though a barrier of years had half dimmed it in her mind.
“Elfreda!” Hertha believed she had not called that name aloud, only thought it. But her foster mother smiled, holding out her arms in the old, old welcome.
“Little dove, little love—” The old words were as soothing as healing salve laid on an angry wound.
Tears came for Hertha had not allowed them to flow before. She wept out sore hurt and was comforted. Then that shade who was Elfreda drew her on, past all those about their work, into a place of light in which there was Another. And that one Hertha could not look upon directly. But she heard a question asked, and to that she made truthful answer.
“No,” she pressed her hands to her body, “what I carry I do not want to lose.”
Then that brightness which was the Other grew. But there was another question and again Hertha answered:
“I hold two desires—that this child be mine alone, taking of no other heritage from the manner of its begetting, and of him who forced me so. And, second, I wish to bring to account the one who will not stand as its father—”
There was a long moment before the reply came. Then a spear of light shot from the center core of the radiance traced a symbol before Hertha. Though she had no training in the Mysteries, yet this was plain for her reading.
Her first prayer would be answered. The coming child would be only of her, taking naught from her ravisher. The destiny for it was auspicious. Then, though she waited, there was no second answer. The great One—was gone! Elfreda was still with her, and Hertha turned to her quickly:
“What of my need for justice?”
“Vengeance is not of the Lady.” Elfreda shook her veiled head. “She is life, not death. Since you have chosen to give life, she will aid you in that. For the rest—you must walk another road. But—do not take it, my love—for out of darkness comes even greater dark.”
Then Hertha lost Elfreda also and there was nothing, only the memory of what happened in that place. So she fell into deeper slumber where no dreams walked.
She awoke, how much later she never knew. She was renewed in mind and body, feeling as if some leachcraft had been at work during her rest, banishing all ills. There was no more smoke rising from the braziers; the scent of flowers was faint.
When she arose from the couch, she knelt before the pillar, bowing her head, giving thanks. Yet still in her worked her second desire, in nowise lessened by Elfreda's warning.
In the outer room there was again food and drink waiting. And she ate and drank before she went forth from Gunnora's house. There was no kin far or near she might take refuge with. Kuno had made loud her shame when he sent her forth. She had a few bits of jewelry, none of worth, sewn into her girdle, some pieces of trade money. Beyond that she had only a housewife's skills, and those not of the common sort, rather the distilling of herbs, the making of ointments, the fine sewing of a lady's teaching. She could read, write, sing a stave—none of these arts conducive to the earning of one's bread.
Yet her spirit refused to be darkened by hard facts. From her waking that sense of things about to come right held, and she thought it best that she limit the future to one day ahead at a time.
In the direction she now faced lay two holdings. Nordendale was the first. It was small and perhaps in a state of disorder. The lord of the dale and his heir had both fallen at the battle of Ruther's Pass two years gone. Who kept order there now, if there were any who ruled, she did not know. Beyond that lay Grimmerdale.
Grimmerdale! Hertha set down the goblet from which she had drained the last drop. Grimmerdale—
/> Just as the shrine of Gunnora was among the heights near the ancient road, so did Grimmerdale have a place of mystery. But no kind and welcoming one if rumor spoke true. Not of her race at all, but one as old as the ridge road. In fact, perhaps that road had first been cut to run there.
Hertha tried to recall all she had heard of Grimmerdale. Somewhere in the heights lay the Circle of the Toads. Men had gone there, asked for certain things. By report they had received all they asked for. What had Elfreda warned? That Gunnora did not grant death—that one must follow another path to find that. Grimmerdale might be the answer.
She looked about her, almost in challenge, half expecting to feel condemnation in the air of the room. But there was nothing.
“For the feast, my thanks,” she spoke the guesting words, “for the roof, my blessing, for the future all good, as I take my road again.”
She fastened her cloak, drew the hood over her head. Then with bundle in one hand and spear in the other, went out into the light of day, her face to the ridges behind which lay Grimmerdale.
On the final slope above Nordendale, she paused in the afternoon to study the small settlement below. It was inhabited, there was a curl of smoke from more than one chimney, the marks of sleds, of footprints in the snow. But the tower keep showed no such signs of life.
How far ahead still lay Grimmerdale she had no knowledge, and night came early in the winter. One of those cottages below was larger than the rest. Nordendale had once been a regular halt for herdsmen with wool from mountain sheep on their way to the market at Komm High. That market was of the past, but the inn might still abide, at least be willing to give her shelter.
She was breathing hard by the time she trudged into the slush of the road below. But she had been right, over the door of the largest cottage hung a wind-battered board, its painted device long weathered away, but still proclaiming this an inn. She made for that, passing a couple of men on the way. They stared at her as if she were a fire-drake or wyvern. Strangers must be few in Nordendale.