Jiriki extended his hand to the prince. "Come, Prince Josua. I have some food and water. Take some nourishment, then we will find him."

As the prince looked at him some of the hard edge of worry softened. "Thank you. I am grateful you found me." He took Jiriki's hand and stood, then laughed, mocking himself. "I thought ... I thought I heard voices."

"I have no doubt you did," said Jiriki. "And you will hear more."

Tiamak could not help noticing that even the impa.s.sive Sithi did not look entirely comfortable with Jiriki's remark.

Slowly, almost imperceptibly, Tiamak's surroundings began to change. As he and Josua followed the immortals through the twisting pa.s.sages, he first noticed that the floors seemed more level, the tunnels a little more regular. Soon he began to see the undeniable marks of intelligent shapers, hard angles, arches of stone that braced the wider crossings, even a few patches in the rock walls that seemed to have been carved, although the decorations were little more than repet.i.tive patterns like waves or twining gra.s.s stems.

"These outermost reaches were never finished," Aditu told him. "Either they were built too late in Asu'a's life, or were abandoned in favor of more useful paths."

"Abandoned?" Tiamak could not imagine such a thing. "Who would do all the work of gouging through this stone and then abandon it?"

"Some of these pa.s.sages were built by my people, with the help of the Tinukeda'ya-the dwarrows as mortals call them," she explained. "And that stone-loving folk carved some just for themselves, unconcerned with finishing or keeping, as a child might make a basket of gra.s.s stems and then toss it away when it is time to run home."

The marsh man shook his head.

Mindful of their mortal companions, the Sithi stopped at last for a rest in a wide grotto whose roof was covered with a tracery of slender stalact.i.tes. In the mellow light of the globes, Tiamak thought it looked entirely magical; for a moment, he was glad he had come. The world below, it seemed, was full of wonders as well as terrors.

As he sat eating a piece of bread and a savory but unfamiliar fruit the Sithi had brought, Tiamak wondered how far they had come. It seemed they had walked most of a day, but the full distance on the surface between where they had begun and the walls of the Hayholt would not have taken a fourth of that time. Even with the circuitous track of the tunnels, it seemed they should have reached something, but they were still wandering through largely featureless caverns.

It is like the spirit-hut of Buayeg in the old story, he decided, only half in jest. he decided, only half in jest. Small outside, big inside. Small outside, big inside.

He turned to ask Josua if he had noticed the same oddity; the prince was staring at his own piece of bread as though he was too tired or distraught to eat. Abruptly the cavern shuddered-or seemed to: Tiamak felt a sensation of movement, of sudden slippage, but neither Josua nor the Sithi seemed to move in response to it. Rather, it was as though everything in the grotto had slid to one side, but the people inside had slid effortlessly with it. It was a frightening wrench, and for a long moment after it had pa.s.sed Tiamak felt as though he occupied two places at the same time. A thrill of terror ran up his spine.

"What is happening!?" he gasped.

The obvious uneasiness of the Sithi did nothing to make him feel better. "It is that which I spoke of before," said Aditu. "As we draw closer to Asu'a's heart, it is getting stronger."

Likimeya stood and slowly looked around, but Tiamak felt sure that she was using more than her eyes. "Up," she said. "Time is short, I think."

Tiamak scrambled to his feet. The look on Likimeya's stem face frightened him badly. He suddenly wished he had kept his mouth closed, that he had stayed above ground with the rest of his mortal companions. But it was far too late to turn back.

"Where are we going?" Miriamele gasped.

Yis-hadra, who had replaced her wounded husband as leader, turned to stare. "Going?" said the dwarrow. "We are fleeing. We run to escape."

Miriamele stopped, bending over to catch her breath. The Noms had attacked them twice more as they fled through the tunnels, but without archers they had been unable to overcome the terrified dwarrows. Still, two more of the stone-tenders had fallen in the fighting, and the white-skinned immortals had by no means given up. Since the last struggle, Miriamele had already spotted the pursuers once when she had entered a pa.s.sageway long and straight enough to permit a backward look; in that glimpse they had truly seemed creatures of the lightless depths-pale, silent, and remorseless. The Norns seemed in no hurry, as if they were merely trailing Miriamele and her companions until more of their kind came bearing bows and long spears. It had been as much as she could do not to sink to the ground in surrender.

She knew that they had been lucky to escape the dwarrows' cavern at all. If the White Foxes had antic.i.p.ated any resistance, they had doubtless expected it to be close combat in a narrow corner. Instead, the dwarrows' desperate attack in the dark and the avalanches of falling stone they had engineered had caught the immortals by surprise, permitting Miriamele and her companions to flee. But she had no illusions they could trick the cunning Norns twice.

"We could be forced to run this way forever," she told Yis-hadra. "Perhaps you can outlast them, but we can't. In any case, our people are in danger up above."

Binabik nodded. "She speaks truth to you. Escaping is not enough for us. We have need of finding our way out from this place."

The dwarrow did not reply, but looked to her husband who was limping up the pa.s.sageway toward them, trailed by the last of the dwarrows and Cadrach. The monk's face was ashen, as though he had been wounded, but Miriamele saw no injuries. She turned away, unwilling to waste sympathy on him.

"They are a distance behind us, now," said Yis-fidri wearily. "They seem full content to let us run ahead." He leaned back against the wall, letting his head rest against the stone. Yis-hadra went to him and probed gently with her wide fingers at the arrow wound in his shoulder. "Sho-vennae is dead, and three others," he groaned, then fluted a few words to his wife, who gave a cry of grief. "Smashed like delicate crystals. Gone."

"If we had not run, they would all be dead anyway- and you and the rest of us would be, too." Miriamele paused to fight back her anger and her horror of the pursuing Norns. "Forgive me, Yis-fidri. I am sorry about your people. I am truly sorry."

Sweat beaded on the dwarrow's brow, glimmering in the light of the batons. "Few mourn for the Tinukeda'ya," he replied softly. "They make us their servants, they steal from us the Words of Making, they even beg our help when they are in need-but they seldom mourn us."

Miriamele was ashamed. Surely he meant that she was as guilty of using the dwarrows-and Niskies, too, she thought, remembering Gan Itai's sacrifice-as even their one-time masters, the Sithi.

"Take us to where we can reach the world above," she said. "That is all I ask. Then go with our blessing, Yis-fidri."

Before the dwarrow could reply, Binabik suddenly spoke up. "The Words of Making. Were all all the Great Swords being forged with these Making-Words?" the Great Swords being forged with these Making-Words?"

Yis-fidri looked at him with more than a little suspicion, then winced at something his wife was doing to his shoulder. "Yes. It was needful to bind their substance-to bring their being within the Laws."

"What laws are these?"

"Those Laws that cannot be changed. The Laws that make stone be stone, make water be water. They can be ..." he searched for a word, "stretched or altered for a short time, but that brings consequences. Never can they be undone."

One of the dwarrows at the rear of the tunnel spoke anxiously.

"Imai-an says he can feel them coming," Yis-hadra cried. "We must run."

Yis-fidri pushed himself away from the tunnel wall and the group began its uneven progress once more. Miriamele's weary heart was racing. Would there never be an end to this? "Help us reach the surface, Yis-fidri," she begged. "Please."

"Yes! It is more than ever important!" It is more than ever important!"

Miriamele turned at the distraught tone of Binabik's voice. The little man looked terrified. "What is it?" she asked him.

Sweat was running on his dark forehead. "I must think on this, Miriamele, but I have never had such fear as I do now. For the first time I believe I see behind the shadow that has been all our consideration, and I am thinking-Kikkasut! To be saying such words!-that the monk may have spoken rightly. There may be nothing left for our doing at all."

With those words hanging in the air, he turned from her and hastened after the dwarrows. As though his sudden despair had pa.s.sed to her like a fever, she felt hopelessness enwrap her.

29.

The Hand of the North

The winds shrieked around Stormspike's summit, but beneath the mountain all was silent. The Lightless Ones had fallen into a deep slumber. The corridors of Under-Nakkiga were nearly empty. around Stormspike's summit, but beneath the mountain all was silent. The Lightless Ones had fallen into a deep slumber. The corridors of Under-Nakkiga were nearly empty.

Utuk'ku's gloved fingers, slender and brittle as cricket legs, flexed upon the arm of her throne. She settled her ancient bones against the rock and let her thoughts move through the Breathing Harp, following its twistings and turnings until Stormspike fell away and she became pure mind moving through the black between-s.p.a.ces.

The angry Dark One was gone from the Harp. He had moved himself to the place-if it could be called a place-where he could act in concert with her to enact the final step of their centuried scheme, but she could still feel the weight of his hatred and envy, personified in the net of storms that spread across the land above.

In Nabban, where the upstart Imperators had once ruled, snow piled high in the streets; in the great harbor high waves flung the anch.o.r.ed ships against each other, or drove them into the sh.o.r.e where their splintered timbers lay like the bones of giants. The kilpa, frenzied, struck at everything that moved across the water, and even began to make sluggish forays into the coastal towns. And deep within the heart of the Sancellan Aedonitis, the Clavean Bell hung silent, immobilized by ice just as the mortals' Mother Church was frozen by fear.

The Wran, although its interior was sheltered from the worst of the storm, nevertheless turned chillingly cold. The ghants, undeterred as a group, though countless individuals died in the harsh weather, continued to boil out of the swamps and harry the coastal villages. Those few mortals of Kwanitupul who braved the icy winds to walk outside went only in groups, armed with iron weapons and wind-whipped torches against the-ghants who now seemed to be crawling in every shadowy place. Children were kept inside, and doors and windows were shuttered even during those few hours when the storm abated.

Even Aldheorte Forest slept beneath a blanket of white, but if its ageless trees suffered beneath the freezing hand of the North, they did so in silence. In the heart of the woods Jao e-Tinukai'i lay empty, misty with cold.

All the mortal lands lay trembling beneath Stormspike's hand. The storms kept Rimmersgard and the Frostmarch an icy wasteland, and Hernystir suffered only a little less. Before the Hernystiri could truly reclaim the homes from which they had been driven by Skali of Kaldskryke, they had been forced back into the caves of the Grianspog. The spirit of the people the Sithi had loved, a spirit which had flamed high for a short time, sank back to a guttering flicker.

The storm hung low over Erkynland. Black winds bent and broke the trees and piled snow high on the houses; thunder growled like an angry beast up and down the length of the land. The storm's malevolent heart, as it seemed, full of whirling sleet and jagged lightning, pulsed above Erchester and the Hayholt.

Utuk'ku noted all this with calm satisfaction, but did not pause to savor the terror and hopelessness of the hated mortals. She had something to do, a task she had awaited since her son Drukhi's pale, cold body had been set before her. Utuk'ku was old and subtle. The irony that it was her own great-great-grandchild who had led her to her revenge at last, that he was also a scion of the very family that had destroyed her happiness, was not lost on her. She almost smiled.

Her thoughts raced on, out along the whispery threads of being until they pa.s.sed into the farther regions, the places only she of all the living could go. When she felt the presence of the thing she sought, she reached out for it, praying to forces that had been old in Venyha Do'sae that it would give her what she needed to accomplish her final, long-awaited goal.

A flare of joy pa.s.sed through her. The power was there, more than enough for her purposes; now all that remained was to master it and make it hers. The hour was approaching, and Utuk'ku had no need to be patient any longer.

"My eyes are not good at the best of times," Strangyeard complained. "And with this sunless day and the blowing snow, I cannot see anything! Sangfugol, tell me what is happening, please!"

"There's nothing to see, yet." They were perched on the side of one of Swertclif's foothills, looking down on Erchester and the Hayholt. The tree beneath which the pair huddled and the low wall of stones they had made provided scant protection against the wind. Despite his hooded cloak and the two blankets he had wrapped around himself, the harper was shivering. "Our army is before the walls and the heralds have blown the trumpets. Isgrimnur or someone must be reading the Writ of Demand. I still don't see any of the king's soldiers ... no, there are some shapes moving on the battlements. I had begun to wonder if anyone was inside at all...."

"Who? Who is on the battlements?"

"Aedon's mercy, Strangeyeard, I can't tell. They are shapes, that's all."

"We should be closer," the priest said fretfully. "This hillside is too distant in weather like this."

The harper darted a glance at him. "You must be mad. I am a musician, you are a librarian. We are too close as it is-we should have stayed in Nabban. But here we are, and here we will stay. Closer, indeed!" He blew into his cupped palms.

A faint clamor of horns drifted over the wind. "What is it?" Strangyeard asked. "What is happening?"

"They have finished the Writ and I suppose they've gotten no answer. That is just like Josua, to give Elias a chance to surrender honorably when we know already he will do nothing of the sort."

"The prince is ... determined to do the right thing," Strangyeard replied. "Goodness, I hope he is well. It makes me sick to think of him and Camaris wandering lost in those caverns."

"There is that Nabbanman," Sangfugol said excitedly. "He does look rather like Josua-from here, anyway." He turned suddenly toward the priest. "Did you really suggest I I should mimic the prince?" should mimic the prince?"

"You look much like him."

Sangfugol stared at him with disgust and bitter amus.e.m.e.nt. "Mother of G.o.d, Strangyeard, do me no favors." He huddled deeper into his blankets. "Imagine me riding around waving a sword. Ransomer save us all."

"But we all must do what we can."

"Yes-and what I can do is play my harp, or my lute, and sing. And if we win, I will most a.s.suredly do that. And if we don't-well, I may do that anyway if I live, but it won't be here. But what I cannot do is ride and fight and convince people that I am Josua."

They were silent for a time, listening to the wind.

"If we lose, I fear there will be nowhere else to run to, Sangfugol."

"Perhaps." The harper sat unspeaking a while longer, then said: "Finally!"

"What? Is something happening?"

"They are bringing forward the battering ram-save me, but it is a frightening thing. It has a great iron head on it that looks like a real ram, with curling horns and all. But it's so big! Even with all those men, it is a miracle they can push it along." He took a sharp breath. "The king's men are firing arrows from the walls! There, someone is down. More than one. But the ram is still going forward."

"May G.o.d keep them safe," Strangyeard said quietly. "It is so cold up here, Sangfugol."

"How can anyone shoot an arrow in this wind, let alone hit anything? Ah! Someone has fallen from the wall. That's one of theirs gone, in any case." The harper's voice rose in excitment. "It is hard to see what is happening, but our men are close to the walls now. There, someone has put up a ladder. There are soldiers swarming up it." A moment later he made a noise of surprise and horror.

"What do you see?" Strangyeard squinted his eye, trying to see through the swirling snows.

"Something was dropped on them." The harper was shaken. "A big stone, I think. I am sure they are all dead."

"May the Ransomer protect us," Strangyeard said miserably. "It has begun in earnest. Now we can only wait for the ending, whatever that may be."

Isgrimnur held his hands close to his face, trying to shield himself from the wind-flung snow. He was having great difficulty keeping track of what was happening, although the Hayholt's walls were less than five hundred cubits up the hillside from where he watched. Hundreds of armored men floundered in the drifts before the wall, busy as insects. Hundreds more, even dimmer shapes from Isgrimnur's vantage point, scurried about atop the Hayholt's walls. The duke cursed quietly. Everything seemed so d.a.m.nably distant!

Freosel climbed onto the wooden platform the engineers had built between the bottom of the hill and the empty, storm-raddled husk of Erchester. The Falshireman was visibly struggling against the wind. "Ram's almost to the gates. The wind, it'll be our friend today-hard on their bowmen, it be."

"But we're not able to shoot any better," the duke snarled. "They've got free run of the walls and they're pushing our scaling ladders off easy as you please." He smacked his fist into his gloved hand. "The sun's been up for hours and all we've done is wear a few trenches in the snow."

The Falshireman looked at him quizzically. "Pardon, Sir Duke, but seems you think we should knock these walls down 'fore sunset."

"No, no. G.o.d knows the Hayholt is built strong. But I don't know how much time we have." He looked up into the murky sky. "That cursed star they all talk about is right overhead. I can almost feel it glaring. The prince and Camaris are gone. Miriamele's gone." He turned his gaze to the Hayholt, peering through the snow flurries. "And our men are going to freeze solid if we keep them out there too long. I wish we could knock the walls down by sunset-but I don't hold much hope."

Isorn pointed upward. The soldiers gathered around him looked up.

"There. On the walls."

Beside the helmeted heads peering through the crenellations were more than a few whose heads were bare; their faces were ghostly, and their white hair blew in the strong wind.

"White Foxes?" asked Sludig. He made the sign of the Tree.

"Indeed. And inside the Hayholt. Cursed things!" Isorn lifted his black-painted sword and waved it back and forth in challenge, but the distant figures on the walls did not seem to notice. "And curse Elias for whatever foul bargain he made."

Sludig was staring. "I have not seen them before," he cried above the tumult. "Merciful Aedon, they look like demons!"

"They are are demons. And now the Hayholt is their nest." demons. And now the Hayholt is their nest."

"But they are doing nothing that I can see."

"Just as well," Isorn replied. "Perhaps they are too few. But they are fearsome archers. I wonder why none of them seem to have bows."