'I tell you I'm no slave-trader! You've completely misunderstood me! If I'm an unlicensed slave-trader, where's my gang?'

'That is what I would very much like to know - where and how many. But I warn you that my men are alert and we will resist you to the death.'

Kelderek sat down again.

'Sir, you must believe me - I am no slave-trader - I am a lord of Bekla. If we-'

The deep twilight outside was suddenly filled with clamour - men shouting, trampling hooves and the bellowing of terrified cattle. Women began to scream, doors banged and feet ran past on the track. The elder stood up as a man burst into the room.

'A beast, my lord! Like nothing ever seen - a gigantic beast that stands erect - three times the height of a man - smashed the bars of the big cattle-pen like sticks - the cattle have gone mad - they've stampeded into the plain! Oh, my lord, the devil - the devil's upon us!'

Without a word and without hesitation the elder walked past him and out through the door. Kelderek could hear him calling his men by name, his voice growing fainter as he made his way towards the cattle-pens on the edge of the village.

34 The Streets of Uriah

From the darkness of the plain beyond the village, Kelderek watched the turmoil as a man in a tree might look down upon a fight below. The example set by the elder had had little effect upon his peasants and no concerted action had been organized against Shardik. Some had barred their doors and plainly did not mean to stir out of them. Others had set out - or at least had shouted in loud voices that they were setting out - in an attempt to recover, by moonlight, as many of the cattle as they could find. A crowd of men with torches were jabbering round the well in the centre of the village, but showed no sign of moving away from it. A few had accompanied the elder to the pens and were doing what they could to repair the bars and prevent the remaining cattle from breaking down the walls. Once or twice, momentarily, Kelderek had seen the enormous outline of Shardik moving against the flickering torchlight as he wandered on the village outskirts. Evidently he had little fear of these flames, so similar to those to which he must have become accustomed during his long captivity. There seemed no likelihood whatever of the villagers attacking him.

When at last the half-moon emerged from behind clouds, not so much enabling him to sec for any distance as restoring his awareness of the great expanse of the misty plain, Kelderek realized that Shardik was gone. Drawing Kavass's short-sword and limping forward to an empty, broken pen, he came first upon the body of the beast which the bear had been devouring and then upon a trembling, abandoned calf, trapped by the hoof in a split post. During the past hour this helpless little creature had been closer to Shardik than any living being, human or animal. Kelderek freed the hoof, carried the calf bodily as far as the next pen and set it down near a man who, with his back turned, was leaning over the rails. No one took any notice of him and he stood for a few moments with one arm round the calf, which licked his hand as he steadied it on its feet. Then it ran from him and he turned away.

A confused shouting broke out in the distance and he made towards it. Where there was fear and clamour, the likelihood was that Shardik would not be far away. Soon three or four men passed him, running back towards the village. One was whimpering in panic and none stopped or spoke to him. They were hardly gone before he made out, in the moonlight, the shaggy blackness of Shardik. Possibly he had been pursuing them - perhaps they had come upon him unexpectedly - but Kelderek, sensing his mood and temper with the familiarity of long years, knew by nothing he could have named that the bear had been disturbed rather than roused to rage by these hinds. Despite the danger, his pride revolted against joining their flight. Was he not lord of Bekla, the Eye of God, the priest-king of Shardik? As the bear loomed closer in the moon-dim solitude he lay down prone, eyes closed, head buried in his arms, and waited.

Shardik came down upon him like a cart and oxen upon a dog asleep in the road. One paw touched him; he felt the claws and heard them rattle. The bear's breath was moist upon his neck and shoulders. Once more he felt the old elation and terror, a giddy transport as of one balanced above a huge drop on a mountain summit. This was the priest-king's mystery. Not Zelda, not Ged-la-Dan nor Elleroth Ban of Sarkid, could have lain thus and put their lives in the power of Lord Shardik. But now there was none to see and none to know. This was an act of devotion more truly between himself and Shardik than any which he had performed either on Ortelga or in the King's House at Bekla. 'Accept my life, Lord Shardik,' he prayed silently. 'Accept my life, for it is yours.' Then, suddenly, the thought occurred to him, 'What if it were to come now, the great disclosure which I sought so long in Bekla, Lord Shardik's revelation of the truth?' Might it not well be now, when he and Shardik were alone as never since that day when he had lain helpless before the leopard ?

But how was he to recognize the secret and what was he to expect? How would it be imparted - as an inspiration to his inward mind, or by some outward sign? And would he then die, or be spared to make it known to mankind? If the price were his life, he thought, then so be it.

The huge head was bent low, sniffing at his side, the breeze was shut off, the air was still as under the leeward wall of a house. 'Let me die if it must be so,' he prayed. 'Let me die - the pain will be nothing -I shall step out into all knowledge, all truth.' shall step out into all knowledge, all truth.'

Then Shardik was moving away. Desperately, he prayed once more. 'A sign, Lord Shardik - O my lord, at the least vouchsafe some sign, some clue to the nature of your sacred truth!' The sound of the bear's low, growling breath became inaudible before its tread ceased to shake the ground beneath him. Then, as he still lay half-rapt in his trance of worship and supplication, there came to his ear the weeping of a child.

He got to his feet. A boy, perhaps seven or eight years old, was standing a short distance off, evidently lost and beside himself with fear. Perhaps he had been with the men until they ran from Shardik, leaving him alone to save himself as best he could. Kelderek, trembling and confused now with the passing of the ecstatic fit, stumbled across the ground towards him. Bending down, he put an arm round the boy's shoulder and pointed to the distant flames of the torches round the cattle-pens. The boy could hardly speak for his tears, but at last Kelderek made out the words, 'The devil-creature!'

'It's gone - gone,' said Kelderek. 'Go on, don't be frightened, you'll be safe enough! Run home as quick as you can! That's the way, over there!'

Then, like one picking up once more a heavy burden, he set out to follow Shardik by night across the plain.

Still northward the bear went - north and something to the west, as he could see by the stars. They moved across the sky all night, but nothing else moved or changed in that loneliness. There was only the light, steady wind, the thrip, thrip thrip, thrip of the dry stalks round his ankles, and here and there a famdy-shining pool, at which he would kneel to drink. By first light, which crept into the sky as gradually and surely as illness steals upon the body, he was tired to exhaustion. When he crossed a slow-moving brook and then found his feet resting upon smooth, level stones, the meaning did not at first pierce his cloud of fatigue. He stopped and looked about him. The flat stones stretched away to right and left He had just waded the conduit that ran from the Kabin reservoir to Bekla, and was now standing on the paved road to the Gelt foothills. of the dry stalks round his ankles, and here and there a famdy-shining pool, at which he would kneel to drink. By first light, which crept into the sky as gradually and surely as illness steals upon the body, he was tired to exhaustion. When he crossed a slow-moving brook and then found his feet resting upon smooth, level stones, the meaning did not at first pierce his cloud of fatigue. He stopped and looked about him. The flat stones stretched away to right and left He had just waded the conduit that ran from the Kabin reservoir to Bekla, and was now standing on the paved road to the Gelt foothills.

Early as it was, he looked into the distance in the faint hope of seeing some traveller - a merchant, perhaps, bound for the Caravan Market and the scales of Fleitil; an army contractor from a province, or an Ortelgan messenger returning from the country beyond Gelt -anyone who could carry word to Bekla. But in each direction there was no one to be seen; nor could he make out even a hut or the distant smoke of a wayfarers' encampment. For much of its length, as he knew, the road ran through frequented country; might he, perhaps, be near one of the camping-stations for drovers and caravans - a few huts, a well and a tumbledown shelter for cattle? No, he could see nothing of the kind. It was bad luck to have reached the road at such an hour and to have struck so lonely a stretch. Bad luck - or was it the cunning of Shardik to have kept away from the road until he sensed that he could cross it unseen? Already he was some distance beyond it and climbing the opposite slope. Soon he would be across the ridge and out of sight. Yet still Kelderek lingered, hobbling and peering one way and the other in his disappointment and frustration. Long after he had realized that, even if someone were now to appear in the distance, he could not hope both to speak with him and to recover the trail of the bear, he still remained upon the road, as though there were some part of his mind that knew well that never again would he set eyes upon this great artifact of the empire which he had conquered and ruled. At last, with a long, sighing groan, like one who, having looked for help in vain, cannot tell what will now befall, he set off for the point where Shardik had disappeared over the crest. a few huts, a well and a tumbledown shelter for cattle? No, he could see nothing of the kind. It was bad luck to have reached the road at such an hour and to have struck so lonely a stretch. Bad luck - or was it the cunning of Shardik to have kept away from the road until he sensed that he could cross it unseen? Already he was some distance beyond it and climbing the opposite slope. Soon he would be across the ridge and out of sight. Yet still Kelderek lingered, hobbling and peering one way and the other in his disappointment and frustration. Long after he had realized that, even if someone were now to appear in the distance, he could not hope both to speak with him and to recover the trail of the bear, he still remained upon the road, as though there were some part of his mind that knew well that never again would he set eyes upon this great artifact of the empire which he had conquered and ruled. At last, with a long, sighing groan, like one who, having looked for help in vain, cannot tell what will now befall, he set off for the point where Shardik had disappeared over the crest.

An hour later, having limped painfully to the top of yet another ridge, nearly two miles to the north-west, he stood looking down upon a startlingly different land. This was no lonely plain of sparse herbage, but a great, natural enclosure, tended and frequented. Far off, round hillocks marked its further edge and between himself and these lay a rich, green vale several miles across. This, he realized, was nothing less than a single, enormous meadow or grazing-ground upon which, distant one from another, three or four herds were already at pasture in the sunrise. He could make out two villages, while on the horizon traces of smoke suggested others that drew their substance from this verdurous place.

Not far below him, in a low-lying dip, the ground was broken - riven, indeed - in a most curious manner, so that he stared at it in wonder, as a man might stare at a sheer cliff or chain of waterfalls, or again, perhaps, at some rock to which chance and the weather of centuries have given an uncanny likeness - a crouching beast, say, or a skull. It was as though, ages gone, a giant had scored and scratched the surface of the plain with a pronged fork. Three clefts or ravines, roughly parallel and of almost equal length, lay side by side within the space of half a mile. So abrupt and narrow were these strange gorges that in each, the branches of the trees extending from either steep slope almost touched one another and closed the opening. Thus roofed over, the depths of the ravines could not be perceived. The sun, shining from behind the ridge on which he was standing, intensified the shadows which, he supposed, must lie perpetually within those almost subterranean groves. All about their edges the grass grew taller and no path seemed to approach them from any direction. As he stood gazing, the breeze stiffened for a moment, the cloud shadows on the plain rippled in long undulations and in the ravines the leaves of the topmost branches, barely rising above the surrounding grass, shook all together and were still. riven, indeed - in a most curious manner, so that he stared at it in wonder, as a man might stare at a sheer cliff or chain of waterfalls, or again, perhaps, at some rock to which chance and the weather of centuries have given an uncanny likeness - a crouching beast, say, or a skull. It was as though, ages gone, a giant had scored and scratched the surface of the plain with a pronged fork. Three clefts or ravines, roughly parallel and of almost equal length, lay side by side within the space of half a mile. So abrupt and narrow were these strange gorges that in each, the branches of the trees extending from either steep slope almost touched one another and closed the opening. Thus roofed over, the depths of the ravines could not be perceived. The sun, shining from behind the ridge on which he was standing, intensified the shadows which, he supposed, must lie perpetually within those almost subterranean groves. All about their edges the grass grew taller and no path seemed to approach them from any direction. As he stood gazing, the breeze stiffened for a moment, the cloud shadows on the plain rippled in long undulations and in the ravines the leaves of the topmost branches, barely rising above the surrounding grass, shook all together and were still.

At this, Kelderek felt a quick tremor of dread, a gain-giving of some menace which he could not define. It was as though something - some spirit inhabiting these places - had awakened, observed him and quickened at what it perceived. Yet there was nothing to be seen - except, indeed, the arched bulk of Shardik making his way towards the nearest of the three clefts. Slowly he trampled through the long grass and paused on the verge, turning his head from side to side and looking down. Then, as smoothly as an otter vanishing over the lip of a river bank, he disappeared into the concealment of the chasm.

He would sleep now, thought Kelderek; it was a day and a night since his escape, and even Shardik could not wander from Bekla to the mountains of Gelt without rest. No doubt if the plain had offered the least cover or refuge he would have stopped before. To Shardik, a creature of hills and forests, the plain must seem an evil place indeed, and his new liberty as comfortless as the captivity from which he had escaped. The ravines were clearly lonely, perhaps even avoided by the herdsmen, for no doubt they were dangerous to cattle and like enough their very strangeness made them objects of superstitious dread. The tangled twilight, smelling neither of beast nor man, would seem to Shardik a welcome seclusion. Indeed, he might well be reluctant to leave it, provided he were not forced to seek food.

The more Kelderek pondered, the more it seemed to him that the ravine offered an excellent chance of recapturing Shardik before he reached the mountains. His weary spirits rose as he began to plan what was best to be done. This time he must at all costs convince the local people of his good faith. He would promise them substantial rewards - whatever they asked, in effect: freedom from market-tolls, from the slave quotas, from military service - always provided that they could keep Shardik in the ravine until he was recaptured. It might not prove unduly difficult. A few goats, a few cows - water might already be there. A messenger could reach Bekla before sunset and helpers should be able to arrive before evening of the following day. Sheldra must be told to bring with her the necessary drugs.

If only he himself were not so much exhausted! He, too, would have to sleep if he were not to collapse. Should he simply lie down here and trust that Shardik would still be in the ravine when he woke? But the message to Bekla must be sent before he slept. He would have to make his way to one of the villages; but first he must find some herdsman and persuade him to keep watch on the ravine until he returned.

Suddenly he caught the sound of voices a little way off and turned quickly. Two men, who had evidently come up the slope before he had heard them, were walking slowly away from him along the ridge. It seemed strange that they should apparently not have seen him or, if they had, that they should not have spoken to him. He called out and hastened towards them. One was a youth of about seventeen, the other a tall, elderly man of solemn and authoritative appearance, wrapped in a blue cloak and carrying a staff as tall as himself. He certainly did not look like a peasant and Kelderek, as he stopped before him, felt that his luck had turned at last, to have met someone able both to understand what he needed and see that he got it.

'Sir,' said Kelderek, 'I beg you not to judge me by appearances. The truth is, I am worn out by wandering for a day and a night on the plain and I am in great need of your help. Will you sit down with me - for I don't think I can stand any longer - and let me tell you how I come to be here?'

The old man laid his hand on Kelderek's shoulder.

'First tell me,' he said gravely, pointing with his staff to the ravines below, 'if you know it, the name of those places below us.'

'I don't know. I was never here before in my life. Why do you ask me?'

'Let us sit down. I am sorry for you, but now that you are here you need wander no more.'

Kelderek, so much dazed with fatigue that he could no longer weigh his words, began by saying that he was the king of Bekla. The old man showed neither surprise nor disbelief, only nodding his head and never averting his eyes, which expressed a kind of severe, detached pity, like that of an executioner, or a priest at the sacrificial altar. So disturbing was this look that after a little Kelderek turned his own eyes away and spoke gazing out over the green vale and the strange ravines. He said nothing of Elleroth and Mollo, or of the northward march of Santil-ke-Erketlis, but told only of the collapse of the roof of the hall, of the escape of Shardik and of how he himself had followed him, losing his companions in the mist and sending back a chance-found messenger with orders to his soldiers to follow and find him. He told of his journey over the plain and, pointing down the hill, of how Shardik - whose recapture was all-important - had taken cover in the cleft below, where no doubt he was now sleeping.

'And be sure of this, sir,' he ended, meeting the unwavering eyes once more and forcing himself to return their gaze. 'Any harm done to Lord Shardik or myself would be most terribly revenged, once discovered - as discovered it would certainly be. But the help of your people - for I take you to be a man of some standing here - in restoring Lord Shardik to Bekla - that will be acknowledged with the greatest generosity. When that task is done, you may name any reasonable reward and we will grant it.'

The old man remained silent. To Kelderek, puzzled, it seemed that although he had heard him with attention, he was nevertheless unconcerned either with the dread of revenge or the hope of reward. A quick glance at the youth showed only that he was waiting to do whatever his master might require.

The old man rose and helped Kelderek to his feet.

'And now you need sleep,' he said, speaking kindly but firmly, as a parent might speak to a child after hearing his little tale of the day's adventures. 'I will go with you -'

Impatience came upon Kelderek, together with perplexity that such slight importance should apparently have been attached to his words.

'I need food,' he said, 'and a messenger must be sent to Bekla. The road is not far away - a man can reach Bekla by nightfall, though I assure you that long before that he will be bound to meet with some of my soldiers on the road!'

With no further word the old man motioned to the youth, who stood up, opened his scrip and put it into Kelderek's hands. It contained black bread, goat's cheese and half a dozen dried tendrionas - no doubt the end of the winter's store. Kelderek, determined to retain his dignity, nodded his thanks and laid it on the ground beside him.

'The message -' he began again. Still the old man said nothing and from behind his shoulder the youth replied, 'I will carry your message, sir. I will go at once.'

While Kelderek was making him repeat two or three times both the message and his instructions, the old man stood leaning on his staff and looking at the ground. His air was one less of abstraction than of a detached, self-contained patience, like that of some lord or baron who, during a journey, waits while his servant goes to ask the way or question an inn-keeper. When Kelderek paid the youth, emphasizing how much more he would receive, first when he delivered the message and secondly when he had brought the soldiers back, he did not look at the money, expressed his thanks only with a bow and then at once set off in the direction of the road. Kelderek, suspicious, sat watching until he had gone a long way. At last he turned back to the old man, who had not moved.

'Sir,' he said, 'thank you for your help. I assure you I shall not forget it. As you say, I need sleep, but I must not go far from Lord Shardik, for if by chance he should wander again, it will be my sacred duty to follow him. Have you a man who can watch beside me and rouse me if need should be?'

'We will go down to that eastern cleft,' replied the old man. 'There you can find a shady place and I will send someone to watch while you sleep.'

Pressing one hand over his aching eyes, Kelderek made a last attempt to break through the other's grave reserve. 'My soldiers - great rewards - your people will bless you - I trust you, sir -' he lost the thread of his thought and faltered in Ortelgan 'lucky I came here -'

'God sent you. It is for us to do His will,' replied the old man. This, Kelderek supposed, must be some idiomatic reply to the thanks of a guest or traveller. He picked up the scrip and took his companion's offered arm. In silence they went down the slope, among the small domes of the ant-hills, the grassy tussocks and coneys' holes, until at length they came to the tall grass surrounding the ravines. Here, without a word, the old man stopped, bowed and was already striding away before Kelderek had grasped that he was going.

'We shall meet again?' he called, but the other gave no sign that he had heard. Kelderek shrugged his shoulders, picked up the scrip and sat down to eat.

The bread was hard and the juice long gone from the fruit. When he had eaten all there was, he felt thirsty. There was no water -unless, indeed, there might be a pool or spring in one of the ravines: but he was too tired to go and search all three. He decided to look into the nearest - it seemed unlikely that Shardik would be alert or attack him - and if he could neither see nor hear water he would simply do without until he had slept.

The tangled grass and weeds grew almost to his waist. In summer, he thought, the place must become almost impassable, a veritable thicket He had gone only a few yards when he stumbled over some hard object, stooped and picked it up. It was a sword, rusted almost to pieces, the hilt inlaid with a pattern of flowers and leaves in long-blackened silver - the sword of a nobleman. He swung idly at the grass, wondering how it came to be there, and as he did so the blade tore across like an old crust and flew into the nettles. He tossed the hilt after it and turned away.

Now that he saw it at close quarters, the lip of the ravine looked even more sharp and precipitous than from a distance. There was indeed something sinister about this place, unhusbanded and yield-less in the midst of the abundant land all about There was something strange, too, about the sound of the breeze in the leaves - an intermittent, deep moaning, like that of a winter wind in a huge chimney, but faint, as though far off. And now, to his sleep-starved fancy, it seemed that the sides of the cleft lay apart like an open wound, like the edges of a deep gash inflicted by a knife. He reached the edge and looked over.

The tops of the lower trees were spread beneath him. There was a hum and dart of insects and a glitter of leaves. Two great butter-flies, newly awakened from winter, were fanning their blood-red wings a yard below his eyes. Slowly his gaze travelled across the uneven expanse of the branches and back to the steep slope at his feet The wind blew, the boughs moved and suddenly - like a man who realizes that the smiling stranger with whom he is conversing is in fact a madman who means to attack and murder him -Kelderek started back, clutching at the bushes in fear.

Below the trees there was nothing but darkness - the darkness of a cavern, a darkness of sluggish air and faint, hollow sounds. Beyond the lowest tree-trunks the ground, bare and stony, receded downwards into twilight and thence into blackness. The sounds that he could hear were echoes; like those in a well, but magnified in rising from some greater, unimaginable depth. The cold air upon his face carried a faint dreadful odour - not of decay, but rather of a place which had never known cither life or death, a bottomless gulf, unlit and unvisited since time began. In a fascination of horror, lying upon his stomach, he groped behind him for a stone and tossed it down among the boughs. As he did so, some dim memory came rising towards the surface of his mind - night, fear and the bringer of an unknown fate moving in the dark; but his present terror was too sharp, and the memory left him like a dream. The stone tore its way down through the leaves, knocked against a branch and was gone. There was no other sound. Soft earth - dead leaves? He threw another, pitching it well out into the centre of the concave leaf-screen. There was no sound to tell when it struck the ground.

Shardik - where was he? Kelderek, the palms of his hands sweating, the soles of his feet tangling with dread of the pit over which he lay, peered into the gloom for the least sign of any ledge or shelf. There was none.

Suddenly, half in prayer, half in desperation, he cried aloud, 'Shardik! Lord Shardik!' And then it seemed as though every malignant ghost and night-walking phantom pent in that blackness were released to come rushing up at him. Their abominable cries were no longer echoes, they owed nothing to his voice. They were the voices of fever, of madness, of hell. At once deep and unbearably shrill, far-off and squealing into the nerves of his ear, pecking at his eyes and clustering in his lungs like a filthy dust to choke him, they spoke to him with vile glee of a damned eternity where the mere spectacle of themselves in the gloom would be torment unbearable. Sobbing, his forearms wrapped about his head, he crawled backwards, cowered down and covered his ears. Little by little the sounds died away, his normal perceptions returned and as he grew calmer he fell into a deep sleep.

For long hours he slept, feeling neither the spring sun nor the flies settling upon his limbs. The amorphous forces active in sleep, profound and inexpressible, moving far below that higher, twilit level where their fragments, drifting upwards, attract to themselves earthly images and become released in the bubbles called dreams, caused in him not the least bodily movement as, without substance, form or mass they pursued their courses within the universe of the solitary skull. When at last he woke, it was to become aware first, of daylight - the light of late afternoon - and then of a confused blaring of human cries, which faintly resembled the terrible voices of the morning. Yet, whether because he was no longer lying over the chasm or because it was not he himself who had cried out, these voices lacked the terror of those others. These, he knew, were the shouts of living men, together with their natural echoes. He raised himself cautiously and looked about him. To his left, out of the southerly end of the ravine, where Shardik had disappeared that morning, three or four men were clambering and running. Little, shaggy men they were, carrying spears - one cast his spear away as he ran - and plainly they were in terror. As he watched, another tripped, fell and rose again to his knees. Then the bushes along the lip were torn apart and Shardik appeared.

As, when villagers have taken away her calf from a strong cow, she bellows with rage, breaks the rails of the stockade and tramples her way through the village, afraid of none and filled only with distress and anger at the wrong she has suffered: the villagers fly before her and in her fury she smashes through the mud wall of a hut, so that her head and shoulders appear suddenly, to those within, as a grotesque, frightening source of destruction and fear; so Shardik burst through the tall weeds and bushes on the edge of the ravine and stood a moment, snarling, before he fell upon the kneeling man and killed him even as he cried out. Then, at once, he turned and began to make his way along the verge, coming on towards the place where Kelderek was lying. Kelderek lay prostrate in the long grass, holding his breath, and the bear passed not ten feet away. He heard its breathing - a liquid, choking sound like that made by a wounded man gasping for air. As soon as he dared, he looked up. Shardik was plodding away. In his neck was a fresh, deep wound, a jagged hole oozing blood.

Kelderek ran back along the edge of the ravine to where the men were gathered about the body of their comrade. As he approached, they picked up their spears and faced him, speaking quickly to each other in a thick argot of Beklan.

'What have you done?' cried Kelderek. 'By God's breath, I'll have you burned alive for this!' Sword in hand, he threatened the nearest man, who backed away, levelling his spear.

'Stand back, sir!' cried the man. 'Else tha'll force us -'

'Ah, kill him now, then!' said another.

'Nay,' put in the third quickly. 'He never went into the Streel. And after what's come about-'

'Where's your damned headman, priest, whatever he calls himself?' cried Kelderek. 'That old man in the blue cloak? He set you on to this. It was him I trusted, the treacherous liarl I tell you, every village on this cursed plain shall burn - Where is he?'

He broke off in surprise as the first man suddenly dropped his spear, went to the edge of the ravine and stood looking back at him, pointing downwards.

'Stand away, then,' said Kelderek. 'No - right away - over there. I don't trust you murderous dirt-eaters.'

Once more he knelt on the edge of the pit. But here, the first yards of the slope below him inclined gently. Not far down, half-concealed among the trees, was a level, grassy ledge with a little pool. Shardik, lying there, had flattened and crushed the grass. Half in the pool, face downwards, lay a man's body, wrapped about with a blue cloak. The back of the skull was smashed open to the brains and near by lay the bloody head of a spear. The shaft was nowhere to be seen. It might, perhaps, have fallen into the abyss.

Hearing a movement behind him, Kelderek leapt about. But the man who had returned was still unarmed.

'Now ye must go, sir,' he whispered, staring at Kelderek and trembling as at the supernatural. 'I never seen the like of this before, but I know what's appointed if ever they comes alive from the Streel. Now that ye've seen, ye'll know that the creature's passed beyond us and our power. It's the will of God. Only, in His name, sir, spare us and go!'

Upon this all three fell to their knees, clasping their hands and looking at him with such patent fear and supplication that he could not tell what to make of it.

'There's none will touch ye now, sir,' said the first man at last, 'neither we nor any others. If ye wish, I'll go with you, any way ye please, as far as the borders of Urtah. Only go!'

'Very well,' replied Kelderek, 'you shall shall come with me, and if any more of you dung-bred bastards try to betray me, you'll be the first to die. No - leave your spear and come.' come with me, and if any more of you dung-bred bastards try to betray me, you'll be the first to die. No - leave your spear and come.'

But after some three miles he turned loose his wretched, abject hostage, who seemed to fear him as he would a risen ghost; and once more went on alone, following warily the distant form of Shardik wandering northward across the vale.

35 Shardik's Prisoner

Little by little the knowledge grew upon Kelderek that he was a vagabond in strange country, without friends, far from help, straitened by need and moving in danger. It was not until later still that he realized also that he had become the prisoner of Shardik.

It was plain that the bear had been further weakened by its latest wound. Its pace was slower, and although it continued towards the hills - now clearly visible on the northern horizon - with the same resolution, it stopped to rest more often and from time to time showed its distress by sudden wincings and unnatural, sharp movements. Kelderek, who now feared less the sudden onset of its swift, inescapable charge, followed it more closely, sometimes actually calling, 'Courage, Lord Shardik!' or 'Peace, Lord Shardik, your power is of God!' Once or twice it seemed to him that Shardik recognized his voice and even took comfort from it.

The night came on sharp and although Shardik rested for several hours, lying in full view on the open ground, Kelderek for his part could not remain still, but paced about, watching from a distance until, when the night was nearly over, the bear suddenly got up, coughing pitifully, and set off once more, its laboured breadiing clearly audible across the silence.

Kelderek's hunger grew desperate and later that morning, seeing in the distance two shepherds settlng a fold of hurdles, he ran half a mile to them, intending to beg anything - a crust, a bone - while still keeping Shardik in sight. To his surprise they proved friendly, simple fellows, plainly pitying his want and fatigue and ready enough to help him when he told them that, although bound by a religious vow to follow the great creature which they could see in the distance, he had desperate need to send a message to Bekla. Encouraged by their goodwill, he went on to tell them of his escape the day before. As he finished he looked up to see them staring at one another in fear and consternation. 'The Streels! God have mercy!' muttered one. The other put half a loaf and a little cheese on the ground and backed away, saying, 'There's food!' and then, like the man with the spear, 'Do us no harm, sir - only go!' Yet here, indeed, they were more prompt than Kelderek, for thereupon both of them took to their heels, leaving their trimming-knives and mallets lying where they were among the hurdles.

That night Shardik made for a village and through this Kelderek passed unchallenged and seen of none, as though he had been some ghost or cursed spirit of legend, condemned to wander invisible to earthly eyes. On the outskirts Shardik killed two goats, but the poor beasts made little noise and no alarm was raised. When he had eaten and limped away Kelderek ate too, crouching in the dark to tear at the warm, raw flesh with fingers and teeth. Later he slept, too tired to wonder whether Shardik would be gone when he woke.

The singing of birds was in his ears before he opened his eyes, and at first this seemed natural and expected, the familiar sound of daybreak, until he recalled, with an instant sinking of the heart, that he was no more a lad in Ortelga, but a wretched man alone and lying on the Beklan plain. Yet on the plain, as well he knew, there were scarcely any trees and therefore no birds, save buzzards and larks. At this moment he heard men talking near by and, without moving, half-opened his eyes.

He was lying near the track down which he had followed Shardik in the night. Beside him the flies were already crawling on the goat-leg which he had wrenched off and carried away with him. The country was no longer plain-land, but an arboreous wilderness interspersed with small fields and fruit orchards. At a little distance, the wooden rails of a bridge showed where the track crossed a river, and beyond lay a thick, tangled patch of woodland.

Four or five men were standing about twenty paces off, talking together in low voices and scowling in his direction. One was carrying a club and the others rough, hoe-like mattocks, the farming peasant's only tool. Their angry looks were mixed with a kind of uncertainty, and as it came to Kelderek that these were no doubt the owner of the goats and his neighbours, he realized also that he must indeed have become a figure of fear - armed, gaunt, ragged and filthy, his face and hands smeared with dried blood and a haunch of raw flesh lying beside him.

He leapt up suddenly and at this the men started, backing quickly away. Yet peasants though they were, he had still to reckon with them. After a little hesitation they advanced upon him, halting only when he drew Kavass's sword, set his back against a tree and threatened them in Ortelgan, caring nothing whether they understood him, but taking heart from the sound of his own voice.

'You just put that sword down, now, and come with us/ said one of the men gruffly.

'Ortelgan - Bekla!' cried Kelderek, pointing to himself.

'It's a thief you are,' said another, older man. 'And as for Bekla, it's a long way off and they'll not help you, for they've trouble enough of their own, by all accounts. You're in the wrong, now, whoever you are. You just come with us.'

Kelderek remained silent, waiting for them to rush him, but still they hesitated, and after a little he began to retreat watchfully down the track. They followed, shouting threats in their patois, which he could barely understand. He shouted angrily back and, feeling with his left hand the rails of the bridge close behind him, was about to turn and run when suddenly one of them pointed past him with a triumphant laugh. Looking quickly round, he saw two men approaching the bridge from the other side. Evidently there had been a wide hunt for the goat-robber.

The bridge was not high and Kelderek was about to vault the parapet - though this could have done little more than prolong the hunt - when all the men, both those in front of him and close behind, suddenly cried out and ran, pelting away in all directions. Unassailable and conclusive as nightfall on a battlefield, Shardik had come from the wood and was standing near the track, peering into the sunlight and miserably fumbling at his wounded neck with one huge paw. Slowly, and as though in pain, he made his way to the edge of the stream and drank, crouching not more than a few paces from the further end of the bridge. Then, dull-eyed, with dry muzzle and staring coat, he limped away into the cover of the thicket.

Still Kelderek stood on the bridge, oblivious of whether or not the peasants might return. At the commencement of this, the fourth day since he had left Bekla, he felt an almost complete exhaustion, beyond that merely of the body, a total doubting of the future and a longing, like that which comes upon the hard-pressed soldiers of an army which is losing, but has not yet lost, a battle, at any cost to desist from further struggle for the moment, to rest, let come what may, although they know that to do so means that the fight can be renewed only at greater disadvantage. The calf muscle of his right leg was strained and painful. Two of Mollo's stab wounds, those in his shoulder and hip, throbbed continually. But more dispiriting even than these was the knowledge that he had failed in his self-appointed task, inasmuch as Shardik could not now be recaptured before he reached the hills. Looking northward over the trees, he could see clearly the nearer slopes, green, brown and shadowy purple in the morning light. They might perhaps be six, eight miles away. Shardik too must have seen them. He would reach them by nightfall. Weeks - perhaps months - would now have to be spent in hunting him through that country - an old bear, grown cunning and desperate by reason of earlier capture. There was no remedy but that the Ortelgans would have to undertake the most wearisome of all labour - that which has to be performed in order to put right what should never have gone amiss.

That morning he had escaped certainly injury; possibly death, for it was unlikely that the rough justice of the peasants would have spared an Ortelgan: and who now would believe that he was the king of Bekla? An armed ruffian, forced to beg or rob in order to eat, could pursue his way only at the risk of life and limb. Of what use, indeed, was it for him now to continue to follow Shardik? The paved road could not be more than half a day's journey to the cast - perhaps much less. The time had come to return, to summon his subjects about him and plan the next step from Bekla. Had Elleroth been caught? And what news had come from the army in Tonilda?

He set off southward, deciding to follow the stream for a time and turn cast only when he was well away from the village. Soon his pace grew slower and more hesitant. He had gone perhaps half a mile when he stopped, frowning and slashing at the bushes in his perplexity. Now that he had actually left Shardik, he began to sec his situation in a different and daunting light. The consequences of return were incalculable. His own monarchy and power in Bekla were inseparable from Shardik. If it was he who had brought Shardik to the battle of the Foothills, it was Shardik who had brought him to the throne of Bekla and maintained him there. More than that, the fortune and might of the Ortelgans rested upon Shardik and upon the continuance of his own strange power to stand before him unharmed. Could he safely return to Bekla with the news that he had deserted the wounded Shardik and no longer knew where he was or even whether he were dead or alive? With the war in its present state, what effect would this have on the people? And what would they do to him ?

Within an hour of leaving the bridge Kelderek had returned to it and made his way upstream to the northern end of the wood. There were no tracks and he concealed himself and waited. It was not until afternoon, however, that Shardik appeared once more and continued upon his slow journey - encouraged now, perhaps, by the smell of the hills on the north-west wind.

36 Shardik Gone