We expected Zolan to make one of his quick vanishing moves again. He did not, however; instead, he reseated himself beside Climber, leaning forward to draw several breaths.

"Voreker berries, and groser oil-you also are healers." It was not a question but rather a statement of recognition. "Your Talent leads in several directions," he finished.

"That which beckons each the most is what we follow the first," I answered. He had given us much to think about. I was sure that presenting a calm front to him would be the most prudent course.

"My sister Sabina has healer hands and knowledge." I nodded in her direction. My recent show of anger might never have been. "And my sister Drucilla creates such needlework as people sometimes deem magic. She can also hold in her hands an artifact from a people unknown and speak of the one who fashioned it and those who used it."

Intrigue him-that was the best ploy now. He might even believe my words to be groundless boasting and underestimate me for that.

"And you?"

"If we had swords at hand, I could show you."

That was a statement of fact; I was not bepraising myself.

He smiled again. "I do not think I would choose to face any of you in anger, steel or no steel."

I relaxed a little. Keep him talking, explaining, even instructing. Having too much knowledge was impossible, and the more we could learn about the Dismals and its inhabitants, the better.

"Those things without-" I asked the first of many of my own questions, to test whether this openness would continue. "There are some like them to be found in the upper land, yet any such can be covered by a hand. The green bag-thing has small kin, weavers of webs that fill dark corners in our towers. We name it spider-it could be crushed between two fingers, if you would. How comes it about that, in the land we knew, such creatures are small and not to be feared, while here they are monsters that can kill men with ease?"

"I do not know," Zolan replied slowly. "Your topside life is as strange to me as the Dismals are to you. As I have said, the dangers to be faced here are many, and one must be ever on guard."

Bina rose and went to Climber, resting a finger lightly on his nose.

"Fever. Tell me this, Zolan. Could that flier poison as well as cut? If so, what might be the antidote for that? I used your supplies by scent and guess alone. Should I have made other choices?"

"Some creatures here carry poison in both fang and claw," our host answered, "but the urgle you call flier is not so armed. Those herbs you used were what I would have drawn upon for the same purpose."

Bina might have been rea.s.sured, but she was not finished. Now she pointed to the seated figures. "G.o.ds, past rulers, personification of virtues- or powers of Darkness?"

Zolan did not answer at once. I thought that he sought for the words he needed.

"Lady Sabina of the Scorpys, some things are not to be spoken. I will say this: after a fashion they have a part in Dismal life, even if they are only of hard-baked clay."

"If I offend," she said quickly, "grant me pardon."

Ah, when a road is abruptly closed, it is generally because some secret must be sheltered. It would be best not to probe any further here.

"Of what manner is life above?" He changed the subject.

Could our host indeed be utterly ignorant of what chanced in Gurlyon?

We launched into history, spoke of wars, of rulers weak or forceful, recounting the unending torment of the Border and those living there. Though we did not interrupt each other, we all had our part in that telling. We had no reason to conceal from Zolan the tumult above. It was better that he should know that the upper world was a land of armed men ready for any foray.

Once he got up and went to the supplies, returning with a stoppered jug, four small bowls stacked together, and a box of dried fruit. We balanced the bowls, sipped at the liquid he had poured into them from the jug, and rested for a s.p.a.ce.

"So." He swallowed a mouthful of the wine and spoke. "It would seem that those above know no more of peace than we do here. This hermit who you say came to the king: what part does he play?"

We told him, Cilla dwelling on the rules Forfind had given his followers and how those were used against women. Bina added proof with a swift description of that Udo Chosen, his follower, who had so broken custom. I added the fact that Udo had demanded us from our captors to answer purposes of his own.

"The hermit is said to have come from this mountain land." I delivered the most d.a.m.ning rumor last, watching Zolan closely as I did so. However, if he had known anything of that troublemaker, he did not show it. He made no comment concerning Udo Chosen. Instead he sat quietly, not looking to us three but rather somehow into the distance beyond us, as if occupied by thoughts of his own.

When no more questions were asked from either side, our host roused at last.

"You wish to return to that land, though it may be torn by battle?"

"It is our own," I made reply. "We know its ways and can foresee many dangers, even as you can here. There we have purpose, as you have your duties in this land we call cursed."

He was standing now. He still did not look to us but glanced again at those seated figures. "If it is indeed meant that you return, then a way will be opened."

Though he had insisted that no way existed out of the Dismals, now he seemed to be suggesting that there was. I did not push the question, for it appeared that he had understood our position and was somewhat moved by it. We must let the matter rest for now.

Bina once again brought stream water for Climber and held the bowl while he lapped.

Sabina

I had tended animals before. Though this red furred beast bore no resemblance to the sleuthhounds, still he seemed to be answering well to the same care I would have given one of those if they were injured. Zolan had recognized my healing usages, and he undoubtedly stored the supplies I had studied over. I might learn some further ministrations, if he would teach, for new skills are often developed under different circ.u.mstances.

Such were my thoughts as I made Climber as comfortable as I could.

"You know varca and thorble, quant, sizzal?"

Looking up, I shook my head. "I might well know such, but not under the names you give them."

I was all but certain he had touched my thoughts of a moment earlier. Dared I try an outright Send to make sure? No, I decided. There was no reason to let him learn any more of our Gift than he might already suspect. At the same time, I determined to indeed learn all I could without revealing too much in return.

Thus began our shaky partnership with this Lord of the Dismals. The three of us united quickly in agreement to the peace as well as we could.

Drucilla

Climber healed speedily. Though we had no way in this mountain pocket of recognizing the pa.s.sage of time, it was three sleeping-periods later that he found his feet and wavered unsteadily to stand by me, b.u.mping his head against my shoulder. I snapped off a word, which would never have been uttered in my mother's solar, as I dropped the needle and had to search for it by running my hands over the rock floor.

Having discovered that Zolan had a supply of cured skins available, with his consent I was endeavoring to add to our supply of clothing with better-fitting garments. I kept to the same general style: long breeches and laced jerkins. However, I found a pleasure of sorts in working the various skins and choosing the colors.

While I st.i.tched, I raised my eyes now and then to the seated ones. Zolan had never given us any real accounting of them. But I had dreamed-a dream from which Tam had shaken me awake because of my cries against the evil that was a part of it.

I stood in another cave, the floor of which was thick with fragments of fire-bitten clay. Here stood broken seats, figures partly crushed, heads snapped off, barrel bodies opened. From those jug bodies had been shaken blackened bones and stark gray ashes. This had been a place of burial once; now it was a place of terror and darkness. The evil curdled the air about, lapping at me greedily; a Shadow ent.i.ty slavered for feeding, but its hunger was frustrated.

At that point, Tam had become aware that I was threatened by a peril from beyond and had intervened with Power to awaken me.

Were those two on the shelf really hollow containers, filled with the remains of dwellers in the Dismals? Did not we of the South shape coffins of another kind, though we did not place them to oversee the daily activities of the living?

There was far too much of this place we did not know. I stuck the needle almost viciously through an odd piece of near-bluish scaled material I had found and was attempting to develop into a cloak; like the skin of a serpent, the hide would shed water. Such garments would be a necessity for future explorations, for rain was now falling heavily outside the cave. We daily visited that door on the world. Three times now we had faced downpours. These skyfalls did not appear to prevent Zolan from making what must be duty visits outside; however, he did have a cloak to cover most of him, tall as he was, of the same stuff I was working on.

Even now he came splashing along the water trail to struggle out of the straps that kept a bag safely on his shoulders. Climber limped slowly over to join him and thrust a nose into the bulging top of the bag.

"Lady Sabina!" He looked at me.

I shook my head. It seemed odd to me that he was unable to tell the three of us apart. However, he had never attempted to probe, so he might not even desire to identify us closely.

"She has washed bedding. You will find her and Tamara by the fire-hole drying it."

"Later, then." He had dug into the bag to produce a packet bound up in a piece of netting, which he laid to one side. Then came something larger, wadded in a large leaf. Climber inspected it and uttered a sound rather like the beginning of a purr.

"Later," Zolan promised the beast. Next to appear was a roll of clothlike stuff, and with it in hand, he approached me.

"What think you of this?" His question held a note of boyish pride. My father's youngest squire had spoken so on the famous day of the Wiltson Hunt when luck had stood beside him and he had brought down a prize boar. Tweaking the roll, Zolan shook the contents free and held what he had to show, shoulder high, to cascade down to his soggy boots.

Fluttering out in the air was a square of-could it be lace lace?.-of a size to cover a large table. I put aside my task and scrambled up to study it closer, reaching out fingers to touch and s.n.a.t.c.hing them back again as speedily when I identified the material.

"Web-it is spiderweb!"

He nodded, again with that air of pride. "One as perfect as this," he declared, satisfaction filling his voice, "is seldom found!"

I glanced to his hands. He was holding the gauzy weaving by the upper corners, but it did not seem to be clinging to his fingers. If that had been wrought as a trap, as most webs were, the lines should have been sticky to effectively imprison any creature blundering into it. Surely this must have been woven by that green bag-horror we had fought, or at least one of its kin!

"Does it not stick?" I pointed to his hands, but he was actually pleating the web. No, it did not adhere, either to his flesh or its own substance where line touched line.

"Not after it is laid overnight in rain-wet sorchti leaves. Here, see for yourself." He had rerolled the filmy fiber and now tossed it to me.

Without wanting to, I caught it, finding it soft as the finest Falligan lace from Isci Port overseas. I shook the web-cloth out a little and deliberately tried to tear at one of the threads. There was no give, neither was there any parting of its fibers.

What would the court ladies-even Her Majesty-give for such veiling! I, who loved new fabrics, was quickly won. For a fleeting second or two, I held a mind-picture of a booth merchant showing such to a gathering mob.

"That is true-weaving like this might well start another war!" Once more Zolan responded to an idea that had not been spoken aloud. "I have found and preserved parts of these webs, but even I have not before seen one entire. This is the trap set in the treetops by the gorm-the bag-thing you saw die on the riverbank. Gorms can catch creatures as large as Climber and others that dwell aloft. The females are the spinners, and among those they would entrap are the much smaller males."

I did not ask the reason why they would entrap those of their own species, for I thought I knew. The way of some of our own spiders must be followed by these noisome giants: to mate with, then destroy, any unfortunate male driven by nature to seek them out.

Folding the web with care, I put it down beside my work, to catch up a piece of the bluish, scaled stuff. "No web is this, nor skin nor fur of a beast-how got you it?"

He had been lightening his bag by emptying it of more leaf-wrapped contents, but he glanced up to see what I held. For a moment he stood very still, staring at the strip.

"That is belly skin of gars-a young one. A gars..." Now his eyes turned to me as if he wanted very much to know my reaction to what he would say. "A gars," he began again, "is a water dweller by day and a sh.o.r.e hunter by night, for it produces limbs along its undersurface to aid it on land. Full-grown, its length is near that of the second shelf there-" He was pointing to the one on which much of the supplies were piled. Truly the Dismals held monsters! He must have slain this creature also-or had he, as with the web, come upon a body which had already been torn apart? I suddenly had no wish to return to my sewing.

He approached closer to my workplace. "This is also gars." He was holding now a similar scaled skin; however, the new hide was not blue-silver but rather a brilliant purple, in color like to a court robe. "This was taken from a much older male."

Dropping what he held, he groped for another sc.r.a.p, then-"Wait!" He interrupted himself, sitting back on his heels. "You have the skill; perhaps you can put to good use another treasure!"

At once our host was off, heading to the other end of the cave, but he did not get as far as the fire-pit before he sought the wall to his left. How he used his hands there I could not see clearly, but he lifted out a section of what had seemed solid stone to draw forth from the opening behind it a sagging length, again wrapped in dark leaves. This he handled with a more delicate touch than he had even given the web.

It was rather an unwieldy armful, and Zolan had to struggle to keep it from dragging along the rock under foot. Then he unrolled it. I looked- and was ensorcelled as I had never been, even with the intricately woven silk from across the sea.

Color played over its surface, muted or shiningly alive. I knelt and ran my hands across the soft, unusually patterned surface. Not skin, feathers, or scales-it was more like thickly rooted fur with an upstanding nap. The background was a purplish gray, the hue of sky darkened by an approaching storm. Against this background gleamed what looked like eyes of a silvery hue, which carried a near-metallic sheen. Its texture was such as to cause one to desire to continue smoothing it without stop. I looked to Zolan for explanation.

"It is a quillian wing," he answered my unspoken question. "The air at night provides the hunting range. This is only part of a pinion."

Whatever its nature, the quillian, I knew, could not be a bird, for this substance had no kinship with feathers. Another giant insect of sorts?

Though the Lord of the Dismals had this wealth of wonders for me- and it made me start to plan what might be done to display each beauty to best advantage-so did he later empty out seeds, flower, roots, chunks of sap gum and other such products of his land before Sabina. He explained what plant or tree bore each specimen as he laid it out, also making clear what value it held for the harvester. As Sabina listened closely, so did we.

"You name this marsh lily." Bina looked down at the broad petals, white with green veins, of a bruised flower resting on her palm.

"Yes, wet your fingers; take a petal in this manner." He pulled at the blossom until, with her aid in holding it, he had it free. Dipping his prize in Climber's water bowl, he rubbed it vigorously until lather appeared and spread. At the same time, a fragrance arose. Soap, then, of a sort-and I, for one, was going to take advantage of that that as soon as possible! as soon as possible!

Tamara

I watched Zolan put forth effort to teach and entertain us. The more we could learn, the better. I could well understand how he managed to entrance Cilla and Bina by his display of what most appealed to their Talents.

But did this sweet coating conceal a bitterness waiting beneath? He had spoken of taking us exploring. The rain had given an excuse to postpone that promise. Did he, or whoever stood behind him-for I was sure that one Power did so-think to lull us in this manner into an acceptance of our lot, at least for a while?

I thought of the dream that had set Cilla crying out in small gasps before I had managed to rouse her. In those few moments, as I brought her back to consciousness, I had shared a small fraction of her ordeal. That cave of the disturbed dead-surely that must lie somewhere along the cliff walls. A people had been deeply offended against by what had happened there, for death should be treated with solemn dignity.

Had it been Breakswords such as Maclan, come treasure hunting, who had caused that destruction, mistaking the coffins of another race for vessels of wealth? Like it or not, we three were of the grave violators' kin. Hostages or scapegoats-to either role we would surely answer at some future time.

Twelve.