Nightpool (20 page)

As they drew near, the horses began to stir.
Teb heard one snort and knew they were watching the dark shadows
creeping toward them. He tensed to run, or to fight. He could see
the way the horses moved that they were tied to a common tether
rope, each on its own short rope that he would have to jerk
free.

As he fumbled at ropes, whispering gently to
the horses, loosing one and calming it, then loosing the next, he
could see the dark shapes of the otters moving among the sleeping
men, see the occasional glint of a steel blade as they confiscated
weapons. A soldier snorted and turned over, and everyone froze.
Several of the men snored. A soldier moaned, and Teb saw an otter
back away. He had loosed one line of horses and begun on the other,
the first animals moving off softly into the night. They had likely
been loose on the pastures a long time; they wouldn’t linger here.
Near to him a sleeping man rolled over, sighing. There was the tiny
clink of metal against metal as someone worked too hastily. But the
wind hid many mistakes. The horses stirred as he loosed the last of
them. Then the owl came swooping and one horse bolted, then
another. “Run,” someone whispered. “They’re
waking. . . .” The horses wheeled and went galloping
off, and even the wind couldn’t hide that thunder. Teb and the
otters fled, the otters clanking now with their burden of weapons.
Teb grabbed a handful from someone, another, until he, too, was
loaded down. There was a shout behind them, some swearing, sounds
of confusion, and then of running feet, too
close. . . .

But there was the cliff, and they plunged
over its side, tossing the weapons down to the sand, grabbing at
the stone as they climbed and slid down; and they grabbed up
weapons again from the sand and dove into the waves and down, and
it was very easy to dive, to sink, so loaded with heavy
weapons.

They came up inside the cave, Teb flanked
and guided on both sides by swimming bodies. He sucked in air. He
could see Thakkur now, a pale smear among invisible swimmers. He
kicked hard to keep afloat, with the burden of the weapons. Then
someone was pushing him toward the cave wall, and he clung there
with one hand, clutching the weapons with the other.

They stayed in the cave until the moon had
set, then headed home through the black water, pulling the weapons
behind them tied to driftwood logs scavenged from the beach. They
had captured thirteen spears, eleven swords, and five good knives,
as well as four good bows and two quivers full of arrows. They took
the weapons to Thakkur’s cave, cleaned and dried them with moss,
and polished the blades with fish oil to keep rust from starting,
after their salty bath in the sea. Then they all slept the day
around and ended with a big meal at sunset. Teb laid his fire in a
niche in the rock above his cave and brought a pot full of steamed
clams to the feast in Thakkur’s cave, where Thakkur hefted a sword
and thrust with it, looking very pleased.

“We will form teams of soldiers and train
with the weapons until we are skilled both in the sea and from the
cliffside.” His dark eyes shone with purpose. “And perhaps, in our
own way, we will help against the dark.”

For days afterward, otters crowded in to
look at the weapons, hahing at their gleam and sharpness, and there
was more than one cut paw from careless enthusiasm. Ekkthurian came
and looked, and went away silent, and it would not be until the
hydrus returned, hunting for Tebriel, that the dark otter would
speak out again with his usual venom. Something seemed to go out of
Ekkthurian after the stealing of the weapons, something to lay a
hand on his vile manner and silence him. He sulked around Nightpool
with Urikk and Gorkk, and the three otters fished alone, north up
the coast toward Rushmarsh. Sometimes Ekkthurian was not seen for
days, as if he slept the time away in his cave out of boredom and
anger, perhaps. Early winter brought the runs of silverheads and
squarefins. And schools of migrating seals and whales passed beyond
Nightpool, and the sea was brilliant again at night with hidden
flame from millions of tiny phosphorescent creatures. Teb practiced
his swimming and diving, and holding his breath for longer times.
When the water grew too cold to stay in long, he practiced with
sword and spear, and when storms blew he sat in his cave, or with
Mitta or Charkky and Mikk, weaving sometimes, for they always
needed string bags. He ripped out the seams of his leather tunic,
which had grown too small, and laced them with a two-inch gap, with
strands cut from a bridle rein. And he made new flippers for
swimming, for he had well outgrown the first pair.

In these quiet times, he tried to delve
deeper into the dreams that came at night, and into the sense of
growing power that was with him now, heady and mysterious. What
power? What did it mean? Was it linked somehow to the dragon? Or
did he only imagine that? The power he felt was not of the body,
but of the mind. Or, perhaps, of soul. Part of a magical force
that, he thought, could be made to grow, could be used with
astonishing wonder—if only he understood it. If only he had the
courage to learn its source. And yet he could not truly believe
what he guessed at. What was he? Who was he? What secrets had his
parents never told him?

Winter seemed incredibly long and severe,
and twice the island was covered with snow, a rare treat. The
otters spent days sliding down the snowy inner cliffs and never
seemed to tire of the sport. Their heavy tails made fine sleds, and
Teb found a driftwood board for himself and put away all other
thoughts for the joy of days of sledding.

But gales blew, too. And at last everyone
moved into the center of the island again. The otters’ diet, in
winter, ran heavier to eels, which could be dug along the shore
where they had burrowed, and Teb learned to tolerate them roasted.
Then the coming of spring brought fresh shellfish again and a more
varied menu. Teb took to the sea with the rest, eagerly pulling on
his flippers and leaping in to fish and play complicated games of
skill. He learned to dive deeper, thrusting down with the power of
the fins. “It’s all in knowing how,” Mikk said. “Small breath held
in, then larger, then larger, before ever you dive. Until the last
breath goes down into stretched lungs. And then hold that one as
you drop down. Let out a few bubbles at a time until you feel
comfortable—you’ll know when to come up, all right.” A diving rock
helped, too, to weight Teb for deep dives, and he could drop it
before buoying to the surface. He had built a new raft to put the
rocks on, and the swords, and a collecting bag.

He could not see as well underwater as the
otters, or stay under as long, and he was constantly shaking the
water out of his ears. They never did; their ears closed when they
dove, just as did their noses. Teb examined Charkky’s ear to see
how, and found a little flap of furred skin that drew closed when
the water pressed over it. He was growing so tall he had to bend
over to look, and that seemed very strange. All the otters seemed
shorter now, and it made him uncomfortable to be taller than
Thakkur, because he thought of Thakkur as tall. The old otter
looked tall when he stood among the others. Thakkur
held
himself tall.

“You are growing into a young man, Tebriel.
Many human soldiers go into battle no older than you.”

“Do you see me in battle, when you look in
the clamshell?”

“Sometimes. But the visions are vague and
uncertain.”

“What else do you see? I feel
. . . I feel there are things about myself that are still
hidden. As if my memory has not all returned.”

“Or as if, perhaps, those certain things
were never known to you?”

“Perhaps,” Teb said. “What is it you see in
the shell?”

“I see the hydrus returning, Tebriel. I
think perhaps my plan was not a wise one—to use you as bait.”

“If it wants me, if the dark wants me, it
will find me anywhere. Only, why does it? What am I, that the dark
would want me?”

Thakkur paced, staring out at the sunstruck
sea. The water was calm and deep blue under the warm spring sky. A
flock of gulls wheeled close to the cave, then was gone. Out in the
sea along the underwater shelf, a group of otters was fishing,
banking and twisting to snatch at a flashing school of silver
sprats, the otters more playful than hungry. Thakkur stopped pacing
and faced Teb, his back to the open sky, his white whiskered face
in shadow.

“You were alone with the hydrus in my
vision, and I felt a cold fear for you. And I felt a sense of power
grown great, Tebriel, under some terrible stress. Only, I could not
tell whose power—yours, or the hydrus’s.”

Teb sat very still.

Thakkur began to pace again, his paws held
still before him, his broad tail describing a white moon each time
he turned, his dark eyes troubled.

“This time, Tebriel, the vision brings no
certainty. This time I think you must follow your own instinct. You
must leave Nightpool or you must stay, according to what your
deepest inner self tells you.” Thakkur looked at him, frowning.
“There is more here, of power and of meaning, than my poor visions
can sort out.”

‘There is something you are not telling
me.”

Thakkur did not answer.

“Why not? It isn’t fair. If you know
. . .”

Silence. They looked at each other for a
long time, Thakkur’s gaze veiled and secretive, yet very direct, as
if he held back only because he must. As if perhaps this was
something Teb must unravel for himself, without being told—without
help from anyone.

“Because I must discover for myself?”

The white otter nodded.

Teb turned to stare out at the sea. He
wanted to say what he guessed. And yet he was afraid to say it. One
thing was certain, though. He would stay at Nightpool until the
hydrus returned. No inner fear, no deliberation, could make him
turn away now from facing it. For in some way, the hydrus was a
part of the power he felt.

Was it a power that could turn to evil as
well as good? Was the hydrus a part of that evil? He knew he was
drawn to it, to a confrontation impossible to avoid. The hydrus
could make him lose a part of himself, and so he must destroy
it.

But it would be another year, nearly to the
day he spoke with Thakkur of the visions, before they met, and the
hydrus had swum a long way and wreaked great damage along the
coasts of countless continents. Nightpool knew of the wars from the
owl, and that Sivich had settled in well, in the three nations of
Branthen just north of Windthorst. They knew that in the more
northerly countries, other of Quazelzeg’s captains held strong
power. If there was a resistance, it did little more than frustrate
Quazelzeg, and there was no change of rule. Perhaps the heterhuman
folk of the far lands on the other side of Tirror, and pocketed in
colonies on the near continents, were moving in some kind of secret
resistance. There was no way to know, for they were secretive and
mingled little, in these modern times, with human or animal
folk.

The little owls came first and cried to
beware, that the hydrus was near. Then they went away, content with
their warning, lifting and tilting on the wind in close flight,
screaming their hunting cry. Then the hydrus was sensed by
vibration far out in the sea as a band of otters chased silver sea
trout along the edge of the sunken continent.

Thakkur appointed a double watch, two armed
bands always on duty, and the weapons were kept oiled and sharp.
The first time the hydrus came, it raged in from the outer deeps,
driving hard at a band of fishing otters, diving when they dove,
terrifying them until an armed band joined them, sweeping out to
surround the great beast.

They bloodied it and slashed its sides and
tore a wound down one head. They could see the pale, healed scars
where its throat had been cut before, and its eye injured. They had
grown skilled indeed with the heavy weapons, thrusting and slashing
in the water until it backed and fled.

The second attack, four weeks later, brought
it rising suddenly from the shallow landward bay, where it had come
in deep and quietly in the night. It thrust up at the black
sheltering rim of the island so the rock shuddered and the caves
echoed. The defending otters leaped down onto it from the cliff and
bloodied its gaping, reaching faces before it was driven back. One
strong young male, Perkketh, clung to its neck and thrust at its
head with his sword while others cut deep gashes in its leathery
hide. But it killed Perkketh with one thrusting flip of its head as
it heaved him against the cliff.

The Ottra nation mourned Perkketh and made
ceremony for him in the meeting cave and buried him in the cave of
burial close beside the green marsh. They planted his grave with
starflowers. And in his farewell prayer for Perkketh, Thakkur said
words that set Teb to thinking in a new way.

“Not of the sea and not of the land, the
Ottra are wanderers all in that thin world that lies between. Each
to its own place must cling, even in death must cling. And what
comes after death when we rise anew, only a wisdom far greater than
our wisdom can ordain. The Graven Light take Perkketh now and keep
him in joy and in dignity.”

The third attack by the hydrus was close to
the north shore of Nightpool just at Shark Rock, as Teb and Charkky
were coming up at dusk from gathering oysters. It was low tide, and
the oyster beds were exposed far out into the sea. Teb could see
Ekkthurian and his two companions moving along at the far outer
edge of the oyster beds just beside the sea trench, dragging a
string bag of oysters between them. When the hydrus came up
suddenly from the trench, Urikk dropped the bag and ran, but it
snapped up Ekkthurian and Gorkk, then charged Teb and Charkky and
Mikk as the guarding band on the cliff swarmed down. Teb crouched,
his knife ready. The hydrus shook the two otters it held,
bellowing, and reached with its third head for Teb. Teb dodged and
leaped away, slashing at the reaching face, and blood spurted. The
hydrus dropped Ekkthurian, screaming, then dropped Gorkk. The otter
lay writhing and snarling. The hydrus advanced on Teb, all its
attention on him, holding him frozen with the stare of those six
immense eyes; yet it did not reach for him, and knowledge filled
him, in that moment, that it did not want him dead.