The Anvil of Ice (41 page)

The dark peaks of the trees seemed to thrust up at them from below. The travelers came level with them long before they had reached the valley floor, marveling at their great height, and the thickness of the roof of foliage they spread across the valley. "You could almost walk over that!" exclaimed Ils.

"It would be hardly less safe," said Kermorvan drily. By then, though it was yet early afternoon, the sun was dipping behind the steep valley walls, and an ancient gloom seemed to drape itself like a shadow-veil around the forest. To the bare lower tree trunks it clung, muffling sound, baffling the sight. Only at the margins did the trees glow light green in the sunlight; the bulk of the forest reared behind them like a wall of darkness. But as they stopped to eat under the shade of the outmost trees, rows of leaning alders along the riverside, it appeared quiet and peaceful enough. "And it cannot be very far through, at this point!" said Elof encouragingly, as they finished their scanty meal. He stooped to fill their leather waterbottles from the river as it came tumbling down the slope beside them, clear and shallow, to fall rumbling into its own deep-cut channel between the roots of tall firs like gateposts. Kermorvan, chewing an end of smoked meat, said nothing. "A few miles at most," Elof added. "And beyond that an easy way through the hills, by the look of it. We should be out by nightfall."

"If our way is straight," said Kermorvan, and rose. "Well, we have naught to gain by delay. Are we all prepared? Very well then. But Kerys! If it were not the only way…" And turning, he plunged between the alders into the gloom of the forest as a diver into deep water, and to the others, only a little way behind, he was as swiftly swallowed up.

Hastily they scrambled after him, and found the undergrowth tangling thick about them, sword ferns, wood ferns, five-finger ferns, tall horsetails gaudily ringed red and brown and green, tangled bushes of huckleberry, clumps of iris and many others they did not recognize. Low branches of hazel, maple and mountain lilac swept at their faces. But Kermorvan, only a few steps ahead, was gliding between them with the ease of great woodcraft, and by following him they found the clearer ways. Ils had least trouble of all, being the shortest, but Elof, wiping pollen from streaming eyes, tugged at his sword, yearning to hack his way clear; he remembered, though, the woodcraft he had learned from Kermorvan, and forbore. No need to make his trail any easier to follow, if followers there might be. He became acutely aware that the ground was sloping away beneath them, the walls of the dale turning steeply downward once more, and when he looked back the forest edge was high above his head, the afternoon light shining through it as over a high wall, split into smoky beams among the tree trunks. "There must be deep places in here where the sun never reaches, where no light ever shines!" He spoke softly, and shivered a little. Even the wind among the leaves seemed high overhead, and below here it was strangely still.

"Indeed there must!" laughed Ils. "And what would you do if you had not got one of the duergar with you, then? Eh? My eyes feel eased as they have not done since I was carried off by you squint-eyed men! In this fine shade I can see patterns on plant and stone that you cannot. I can see the small things as they stir among the leaves. The very fungi on the rotting wood glow with light for me to see by! Now say, have I not the better of you strong swordsmen?"

"You always had!" chuckled Elof. He was suddenly almost achingly glad she was here, with her sardonic good cheer and stonelike steadiness. In a rush of sudden affection he reached out and hugged her. She drove a bunched fist into his diaphragm, not especially hard.

"Hands off, you smelly young human! At least till you've had a bath in something better than seawater!"

He laughed, unoffended. They had been friends since their first day together in Ansker's forge. He had always found it easy to like Ils, to forget she was of a different, alien kind, one that held men in no great esteem, and that she was undoubtedly far older in years than he. Now, though, she had reminded him of that, in a roundabout, half-joking way. He did not mind, but nor, then, did he stop to think she might have been reminding herself.

Kermorvan's harsh whisper broke in on them. "Cease, you two! Are you on a country stroll?" They knew he was right, and fell silent. There were sounds in the forest they should be paying attention to, the hollow music of tumbling water, the rush of swaying branches, the rustle of leaf mold and snap of twigs on the forest floor, the patter and scurry of small things among them, the cries of birds. It was in these, in their sudden change or cessation, that they might find their only warnings of trouble, if trouble there came.

Elof listened then, and as he listened he became more and more aware of the size of the forest. The sounds of it seemed to stretch away into infinity, to drown any faint murmur from the world outside. A difficult patch of bush brought him breathless among a stand of redwood trunks; he leaned for a moment on a wide bole, looked upward and stood rigid with amazement. Up they soared over him, those ragged trunks, to an immense height, as if they were pillars supporting the sky. They were even taller, growing from this steep slope, than they had looked from the hillside. The smallest of them was as large as the largest in the northern forests he knew, and they grew closer together. The thick branches bristled out from the upper trunks to link and mesh into a roof so thick that only a shifting dapple of light fell to the damp floor beneath, and in some places less than that. Elof understood the tangle of growth he saw around him, plant climbing upon plant, all clustering like frantic children around the boles of the high trees, redwoods chiefly, but with firs and cypresses among them almost as tall. It was all a struggle toward the sun, a slow fierce war of jostling growth whose intensity, once perceived, was almost alarming. It was like walking among statues in attitudes of battle, and seeing blood flow. The forest seemed suddenly a less peaceful place, full of jealous, malign vitality, and he scurried on to keep up with the others, feeling he understood Ker-morvan a little better now.

More time passed, another half-hour perhaps, and they were still going downhill. The light overhead seemed dimmer and grayer, the trees if anything even taller and more overpowering. Ils glared into the dimness. "How far down does this dale go? I cannot even see the further slope yet!"

Kermorvan nodded. "We will not be through before nightfall, I fear, Elof-"

But Elof gestured him to silence, and they stood very still. The birds had fallen almost silent. The sound of rushing water was louder now below them, but there was another very similar note above it, a new sound of rushing and pattering and splashing. Kermorvan looked up, and water dripped down upon his face. "Rain!" he said. "Well, we have shelter of a kind down here, no one place better than another. As well to press on." So they donned their cloaks, pulled their hoods out to shield their faces and walked on. The wind rocked the treetops and drove last autumn's skeletal leaves dancing across the forest floor, but the mighty branches above them scarcely stirred. The smell of the mold grew richer, stronger, heavier, almost stupefying. The ceiling of foliage did indeed stop the rain, but only to pass it on as slower, heavier drops, or a haze of spray which worked its way in everywhere. They were soaked in minutes, and deaf to everything save the sharp relentless pattering, a sound which lulled the mind and numbed it. Then it came upon them.

Elof heard only a sudden windrush, moaning like a great horn, and a creak of branches above him before something seemed to smash down onto his shoulders. He twisted, tried to reach his sword and instead found himself grappling with a tall figure, clawing at smooth bare skin, slick with rain. Then abruptly he was sprawling winded on the ground, a weight on his back and hard rod or staff pinioning his arms and head, driving his gasping mouth down into the mold. Beside him he could hear Ils thrashing and cursing; frantically he heaved upward, caught a glimpse of Kermorvan still on his feet, sword drawn, standing off a ring of indistinct shapes. A blow rang on his scalp, and he sank down stunned. Dimly he heard a rush, clanging, shouts and a thud as something heavy toppled down on the ground. Then he was hauled roughly to his feet and hurried stumbling to one side, unseen arms pinioning his hands behind him.

Through blurred eyes he made out Ils, disheveled and furious-looking but otherwise unharmed, similarly held in front of him. "Don't struggle!" she hissed. "Deadly danger! Tapiau's Children!"

Only then did he notice clearly the strange figures who held her. They were not a comforting sight. They looked human, but they were inhumanly tall and slender, nearly twice Ils's height and very long-limbed, with skin the color of light honey. It showed, for they wore little, and looked to him more savage than the Ekwesh. That much he had time to notice before the furious struggle around Kermorvan spilled over. A body slammed against him, the grip on his arms broke and he tumbled forward into the path of another running figure, who leaped over him without stopping and vanished into the bushes. Shouts rang out, a scream; he sprang up, swept the black sword from its scabbard with a cold whistle, and fell upon the figures holding Ils. They dropped her arms and danced back; one flung a javelin, he swung his sword at it and it exploded in flinders. Then, quite suddenly, they were gone. There was no trampling in the thick undergrowth, not a sound of flight; it was as if earth and tree-shadow had swallowed them up.

Us bounced to her feet and pointed. Elof spun round and saw Kermorvan, breathing hard, with a great splash of blood across his cloak, and more along his blade. And at his feet, twisting, lay one of the strange creatures. Elof stepped closer, and gaped with astonishment. Under its dusty harness of metal-studded leather, it was unmistakably a woman.

"What forest demons have we here?" panted Kermorvan. He looked deeply troubled. The woman's long arm was deeply gashed, and a puddle of blood was soaking into the mold around the shattered fragments of what had been a vicious-looking hooked pike. He and Elof looked at each other in momentary helplessness; this was an enemy, but could they let her bleed to death in front of them? They themselves had only been held, not stabbed as they could have been. And she could be some surety for them. Suddenly, without a word spoken, Kermorvan was on his knees, pinching the wound shut with his wiry fingers, and Elof and Ils were rummaging in their packs for bandages and salves.

"This should be sewn up," growled Kermorvan, "but we cannot take time for that. A bandage is only a minute's work and will bar the blood enough for now; let us hope her friends have the skill. Elof, do you stop her twisting her arm, thus. Ils, do you keep a watch. What are these half-men, anyway?"

Elof took the long arm in his lap, and barely managed not to drop it as he saw the hand. It was half again as long as his own, and weirdly unlike it. It was as if an ordinary hand had been taken and stretched, but without growing any thinner. The four main bones and the fingers beyond them were all far longer, and in repose they curled inward like a hook, meeting the palm. The thumb, by contrast, was little larger than his own, and set more to the side of the hand. But the muscles and tendons stood out around it as they did around the fingers, with an impression of wiry strength/He imagined trying to do fine smithying with such a hand, and shook his head. No wonder they were so primitive! But something jarred within his mind, and he looked again at the harness, and wondered. It was not the crude breechclout he had first thought at her thighs, but a shaped strip of soft leather bound round her hips with a broad belt of the same stuff. Not a bad garment, if all its wearer cared about was protection, not modesty, and there seemed to be patterns worked on the leather. There definitely were on the broad studded strips that ran from the belt to cover her breasts, restraining them and acting as light armor. Protection again, but no undue concealment. It looked like fighting gear for a scout or fast skirmisher, cut down to the absolute minimum. But she would still need boots. He looked down at her feet, and felt cold. They were bare, and they were shaped as weirdly as the hand. But there, somehow, it looked even worse. What then of her face? It was hidden by a tangled mat of brownish hair; hesitantly he brushed it aside and this time did jump. The eyes were a glitter of icy green, wide, wild, slanted like an animal's, the face around them drawn back in taut snarling lines, lips stretched transparent over grinding teeth. It looked so like an animal, he expected her to fly at him, but then he knew it for a grimace of terror on features that were essentially as human as his own. He opened his hand reassuringly, drew it back and saw her relax. Kermorvan finished his bandaging, reached up and swiftly bound the bent arm to her body. "That will stop the wound opening again, for now. We had best be on our way now, and her with us."

"Is that wise?" asked Ils drily. "Is taking hostages honorable?"

Kermorvan winced. "It is necessary. Helping her was right, but it has cost us the minutes we gained putting them to flight. Anyway, she is no hostage, I will not harm her. But they are not to know that. Come!"

Another windrush moaned among the trees, and a sud-den spattering of rain fell about them. There was a loud rustle of leaves. "Too late!" said Elof through clenched teeth, and he cursed himself. It was obvious now how the other creatures had vanished so quickly. He of all of them should have seen it: that hand had been ideally shaped for tree-climbing as he would shape his forge-tools. Now they had come back, with others, moving with the wind so they would not be heard, and swung down from all sides. They stood now in a wide ring, alert and menacing. They had bows now, and more spears poised to hurl, and even Kermorvan made no attempt to move.