The Well of Darkness Read online

  “How many?” I asked, rather sharply. Keeshah’s silence was omnipresent, a weight on my spirit. I had to struggle to control the panic that swelled within me—I couldn’t tell whether it was Keeshah’s feeling, or merely my own reaction to his oddness. “How far away are they?”

  Tarani slipped into communication with the beautiful bird, using a mindlink that was only barely similar to what I shared with Keeshah. Tarani had told me that theirs was primarily an exchange of images. The bird could hold images of where to go or who to find, and remember what she saw, so that she had been useful more than once as a messenger and scout. She had also, under Tarani’s direction, saved my life in Dyskornis and helped us fight off wild vineh on our trip toward Eddarta. The few seconds Tarani communed with Lonna seemed an eternity.

  “Only two men,” she said at last. “But there are six dralda with them, and they are barely two days behind us.”

  “Dralda?” I repeated, groping through Markasset’s memory for the meaning of the word. I discovered that, to the young Gandalaran, it really was little more than a word. But if Markasset had never seen the creature it named, Ricardo had some association for its vague image. Dogs, I thought. Wild dogs. Tarani said she formed her bond with Lonna by saving the bird from a dralda. But I’ve heard the word since then … “Zefra!”

  “What about Zefra?” Tarani asked.

  “I was just remembering,” I said. “The night I met Zefra in the garden, she mentioned ‘Pylomel’s dralda’.” I smiled a little shakily, the strange unrest making it seem as if my nerve ends were remote and hard to control. “Your mother threatened to feed them my heart, if you came to harm.”

  She smiled back, and I could see that the thought of her mother’s concern made her feel sad and tender. Then she shook her shoulders a bit—a gesture I had learned to associate with moving away from memory—and said: “Yes, she mentioned to me that the High Lord had managed to have some dralda trained for hunting. What puzzles me is—there are two men among the dralda, setting the pace for their travel, and yet they are amazingly close. How can that be?”

  I puzzled over that for a moment, too. Keeshah could travel three times as fast as a man—that is, the Gandalaran standard of distance was a “day”, referring to the distance a man could travel in one day. Keeshah could travel a “day” in only a few hours. The measurement was based on an average, of course, but by that standard, any man-speed pursuit should be at least three days behind us, maybe four.

  “If there are only two of them,” I said, “that, in itself, would give them a little extra speed. Indomel must have sent them out right after we left.” I didn’t want to mention the prerequisite to that action. When we had left Lord Hall, Zefra had laid a compulsion on Indomel, her son and——thanks to Thymas’s dagger in Pylomel’s heart——the new High Lord. For Indomel to have acted so quickly, he’d have had to throw off Zefra’s control. What had he done to Zefra then? “That still doesn’t account for their closeness,” I said. “Indomel must have picked the fastest …”

  Oh, no, I thought.

  “Tarani, the men—is one of them a little guy, with almost a reddish tone to his headfur?”

  She nodded. “You know him?”

  “Obilin,” I said grimly. She looked blank for a second, then realization crossed her face.

  “The High Guardsman whom Pylomel sent to claim Rassa,” she said, and shuddered. “Not a pleasant man.”

  That‘s an understatement, I thought grimly.

  “He’s the High Guardsman,” I said. “I had to fight him to get that place in the guard, and you can bet he’s put me together with Pylomel’s death. He probably begged Indomel to let him come after me.”

  “I see that he might be faster than other men,” Tarani said, “and spurred on by his pride. But the other man—”

  “Wouldn’t dare not keep up, if you see what I mean.”

  She nodded thoughtfully.

  “Still,” I said, with a reassurance not entirely sincere, “we have a good lead, and Keeshah’s speed will increase it quickly …”

  Tarani stared at me as my voice trailed off, but I turned my head away from her to stare, in turn, at Keeshah.

  *Must go now,* Keeshah had announced to me through our mindlink.

  I refused to understand what he meant.

  *We are ready to travel,* I assured him hurriedly.

  *Must go alone,* he said. *To the Valley. Now.*

  Keeshah took a few steps away from me, his head lowered, the powerful muscles of his shoulders tense to the point of stiffness.

  “Rikardon?” Tarani’s voice was far away, unimportant.

  The Valley of the Sha’um—Keeshah’s birthplace. Fear crawled in my groin, coated my tongue with bitterness. Markasset had always known that Keeshah would need to return to the Valley one day. The only sha’um who left the Valley were males. They were required, for the sake of the species, to go back and mate. Sometimes they were gone for a year or so. Sometimes—my heart stopped at the thought—sometimes they never came back from the Valley.

  *Let me come with you,* I begged.

  Keeshah whirled and stalked back toward me, impatience growling in his throat. His mane rippled up around his neck; his tail whipped up a frenzy of dust behind him. The block between his mind and mine dissolved as Keeshah reached out to me, trying to make me understand. Then it was clear that he had been hiding from me only to spare me.

  I caught my breath and flinched physically at the onslaught of emotion and need. I wasn’t aware of Tarani’s hand on my shoulder, her voice urging and questioning. I was in the grip of an obsession, a need far stronger than anything I had ever felt before. It was more than desire—much more.

  The female who hovered, faceless, odorless, at the far range of the image which called to me was only part of the need. I longed for the cool sweetness of the forest where I had been born, for freedom from the unnatural bond to the man, for communion with my own kind, and, yes, for the challenge and the passion of the female. It was all one, and calling sweetly, imperiously, irresistably—I had to be free of the man!

  I staggered as the contact broke. For a moment I rested, rubbing my hands over my eyes to shake off the lingering touch of Keeshah’s rage. Then I stepped forward, my heart aching when the big cat backed away. But I had to touch him once more. I couldn’t let him go without saving one memory of his fur against my face, his muscles smooth and hard under my hand. He suffered my approach, and endured my arms around his neck for a moment, then shook himself and sidestepped.

  Through the overwhelming tangle of emotions, I caught a light, flickering thought from him: *Can’t help it. Sorry.*

  *I know, Keeshah,* I told him hurting all through my body and mind. *Come back to me, if you can.*

  *Yes.* His mindvoice was faint, fading. *Try.*

  He stood only a few feet away from me, but Keeshah was already gone, his consciousness totally absorbed in the need that had claimed him.

  It was a stranger I watched, a beautiful, dangerous animal, as Keeshah laid back his ears, tested the air, and ran westward—without looking back.

  I was alone.

  It didn’t matter that Tarani was near me, speaking across the vast gulf of physical space. I saw her, felt her touch, occasionally answered her questions—though usually I didn’t bother. I had a memory that she was important to me, that I cared for her. But the memory had the disreality of hallucination, the detached feeling of a dream.

  It was almost as though I had been cast back to my first few hours in Gandalara, before Keeshah had touched my mind with his. Once more was I lost, confused, and alone, in the middle of a salty desert moving under a pale, heat-soaked sky.

  In that earlier time, my fuddled mind had focused on the Great Wall as the only reasonable hope for survival, and I had put all my effort into moving toward it. The high escarpment behind Raithskar had been no more than a blue line on the horizon, probably indistinguishable from the southern “wall” of impassable mountains. Some remna
nt of Markasset—or his inner awareness, unrecognized then—had fixed Ricardo’s attention on the important target.

  In somewhat the same way, I was now getting messages from the thinking Rikardon, who seemed so separate an individual that I felt a fierce envy toward him. He had been Keeshah’s friend. He had been able to think clearly, make plans, carry them out.

  By contrast, I was able only to cling to what he said was important. Yet I grasped at his advice gratefully, relieved that I was spared the enormous effort of making a decision.

  This time, too, I had an all-absorbing focus for my energies: the Ra’ira.

  The blue jewel, enclosed in my leather belt pouch, burned in my awareness with an almost physical warmth. I couldn’t distinguish the discreet elements of its importance to me, or recall the history which had brought me to this point.

  I didn’t remember that I had pursued the Ra’ira as if it were an ordinary, if symbolically significant, gemstone. I didn’t have any conscious awareness of having discovered that it could amplify ordinary mindpower and permit direct telepathy, otherwise unknown between people. Its ancient significance, both in the benevolent formation of the Kingdom and in the malevolent abuse of the gem’s power that had brought Kä into ruin, was only a vague fact.

  All these were part of a single, rock-solid piece of emotional information: the Ra’ira was dangerous, and it was my job to take it back to Raithskar, where it would be safe from misuse.

  I translated that directive into absolute concentration on two physical actions. One—keep the Ra’ira safe. I actually held the pouch in my hand, so that I could continually confirm my possession of the oddly shaped jewel. Two—keep moving.

  I followed those directives totally. Some part of me saw that featureless sand I marched across. I was aware of a raging thirst, but it never became enough of a need to distract me from those other imperatives. I just kept walking through the heat and fine, salty dust.

  It seemed obvious to me which way to go—the same way Keeshah had gone.

  It could have been my loneliness pulling me in the big cat’s wake. It could have been my awareness that the way to Raithskar lay through the narrow and treacherous Chizan Passages, and that the sha’um would be taking the quickest approach to Chizan. It didn’t occur to me to consider that Keeshah’s speed was three times mine, and that he had less need for food and water, more tolerance in general for the desert crossing.

  It was part of the directive: follow Keeshah.

  Tarani didn’t agree. She pulled at me periodically, shouting words it was too much trouble to try to understand. I recognized Obilin’s name, heard a word that was only vaguely familiar: dralda. Once Tarani tripped me, grabbed one of my feet, and dragged. Lonna was there, too, clutching at the loose fabric of my desert trousers and lifting.

  I kicked out, caught Tarani in the stomach, sent her sprawling. I helped her up, said something harsh, and staggered away. I had thought that all feeling had left me, but when Tarani followed after me then, a small gladness crept into the void where emotion had been.

  Darkness. It was only slightly cooler, but it brought relief from the eye-hurting vista of pale sand.

  We rested. Tarani’s humming woke me. I lay quietly for a time, listening to the melody, becoming aware of physical discomfort—hunger, thirst, a trembling weakness. Tarani’s hypnotic voice promised relief, if I would yield to it. But it was nearly dawn, and the drive to be moving was on me again. Only weakness kept me still, as I summoned the energy to stand and walk.

  I lay idle for so long that Tarani must have believed her mindspell had worked. She began to pry gently at the fingers that enclosed the leather pouch—and the Ra’ira.

  The remote gladness I had felt in Tarani’s company the day before vanished in a wave of rage. I lashed out with the hand that held the pouch; my fist caught the left side of her jaw. Tarani fell over, rolled, jumped to her feet as I staggered up. I saw, but barely noticed that she, too, was moving unsteadily, that her face looked as parched and puffy as mine felt.

  “Traitor!” I thought I was yelling, but the sound I heard was a hoarse whisper. “Is this why you’ve stayed with me—to steal the Ra’ira for yourself?”

  “Fool!” she spat back, caressing her darkening jaw with the back of her hand. “Obilin is almost on us! Can you not hear the dralda?”

  Dralda. Pylomel’s dralda. Only the barest link existed between the remembered, meaningless words and the sound I heard. The mournful coughing, drifting closer as we listened, lifted the fur along the back of my neck.

  “Escape is impossible now,” Tarani said. “Do you want Indomel to have the Ra’ira? Throw it away, Rikardon!” she gasped, commanding and pleading in the same breath. “Bury it in the sand!”

  I struggled with confusion, watching Tarani warily as she stepped a little closer to me.

  “We’d never find it again,” I protested.

  “It is better lost than in service to Indomel’s power,” she grated, and lunged to grab the pouch.

  I snatched my hand back, tottering in reaction to the sudden movement. “There are no dralda,” I snarled. “The sound is one of your illusions, a trick to get the Ra’ira for yourself!” I moved off, waving her away. “Stay back,” I warned her.

  “It is not an illusion,” Tarani said, with such a tone of hopelessness that I found myself swept up in a new confusion.

  “We got away from Eddarta,” I said. “We brought the Ra’ira away from Gharlas and Pylomel and Indomel. We escaped. The Ra’ira is safe now,” I said, with the fierceness of a child who hopes that saying a thing will make it true.

  I heard the sound again, blood-stopping in its strangeness and its eagerness.

  It‘s true, I thought, we‘re still in danger. But I—I have to get the Ra‘ira to Raithskar. I‘ve been doing my best, without Keeshah. It wasn‘t fair that Keeshah had to leave. I‘ve been doing all I could. Haven‘t I?

  They‘re almost here, I realized in a panic. We‘ll be killed and Indomel will get the Ra‘ira. I—I‘ve failed. But it isn‘t my fault, it‘s Keeshah‘s. No, that‘s wrong, Keeshah couldn‘t help it. It‘s not Keeshah‘s fault. It‘s …

  “It’s your fault!” I cried to Tarani, turning fear and despair into a seething rage. “You think I don’t remember, but I do. We were two days ahead of them when Keeshah left, two days. You’ve been pulling at me, dragging on me, holding us back. If it weren’t for you, we’d still be far ahead of them. It’s your fault!“

  I stepped up to her, my right arm poised for a swing.

  She stepped back, and her sword appeared in her hand.

  “The next time you strike me,” she said, “will be the last time.”

  I stopped, stunned and surprised by the savage menace in her voice and posture.

  “You have resisted everything I tried to do to save us,” she said, shouting now to be heard over the noise of pursuit. “The dralda have to be following Keeshah’s scent, and I’ve been trying to move us away from Keeshah’s track. It may be too late for us,” she said, “but I refuse to let your foolishness cost us the final prize.

  “Now, Lonna!”

  A streak of white flashed by me. The bird’s claws raked my left hand; the pain startled me into dropping the pouch. Lonna banked a sharp turn and dipped close to the ground to grab up the piece of leather and its contents.

  “No!” I shouted and dived. My hands closed around the pouch just as Lonna grabbed it. “Protecting the Ra’ira is my job!”

  The bird screeched; Tarani shouted; the eerie call of the dralda drew nearer. I clung desperately to the piece of leather while the bird’s wings beat blindingly against my face and her claws pulled at pouch and hands indiscriminately. I ignored the pain of the scratches, the sting as my bloody hands were pressed into the salty sand.

  “Enough, Lonna,” Tarani said at last, and there was silence. The beating wings stilled as Lonna paused and looked questioningly at the girl. The bird’s full weight rested on my outstretched hands, clenched toge
ther around the scarred pouch. Lonna rested with her wings folded, but not quite relaxed, her beak parted. She was panting from the effort of our struggle. Tarani knelt by us and smoothed the feathers on the bird’s breast.

  “Why is it so quiet?” I panted.

  Tarani merely looked at me, then coaxed the bird to a perch on her outstretched arm. She stood up. “There is nothing more you can do, Lonna,” she said. “Go quickly, and be safe.”

  The bird launched herself, circled us once screeching her frustration, then flew straight up, her white body disappearing against the clouds.

  “Why is it so quiet?” I asked again, sitting up.

  All of the desert area of Gandalara seemed flat. Its hilly contours made themselves noticed in two ways—first, by the strain in your legs as you walked up and down the mounded sand; and second, when something or someone, hidden by the gentle hills, appeared as if from out of nowhere.

  The dralda appeared now, too excited over the end of the hunt even to howl.

  3

  The dralda were dog-like in the same sense that the sha’um were cat-like—they shared qualities I identified with dogs, but there were differences from the animals Ricardo had known. As with every other mammalian creature in Gandalara, the canine teeth of the dralda were longer and wider than those of their counterparts in Ricardo’s world—sharp tusks rather than teeth. This, and a swift impression of the high-shouldered shape of a hyena combined with the size of a great dane, were all I could tell about the animals before one slammed into me, knocking me backward with breath-killing force.

  I threw up my arms to protect my face, but I needn’t have bothered. The dog merely stood with its forepaws pressing into my chest. I could clearly feel each of eight sharp claws pricking into my skin. Its head loomed over my face, its lips drawn back. A soft growl vibrated through its paws.

  I turned my head cautiously. Tarani was pinned underneath the massive body of another dralda. The remaining animals circled us, seemingly frustrated that their prey had already been claimed. Then, from beyond Tarani, one lowered its nose to the sand and snuffled. It lifted its head and howled; the other uncommitted dralda echoed the cry, and the whole pack of them started off running.