The Black Beast Page 5

  “Death!” Tirell said, and I winced. His voice sounded terribly harsh in this still place. But the maiden’s face did not change.

  “Death?” she said politely. “To be sure, there is death to be had here aplenty. Look around you!”

  Tirell did not look around; he stared at the shimmering maiden. She walked up to him. “There are the trees,” she explained to him, “very tall, easy to climb and jump from. And then there is the lake. Indeed, the lake is a very font of death. Take some!”

  I certainly must have gaped then; she was taunting him! Yet her voice sounded liquid and sweet, and I saw no malice in her look. She faced him scarcely a foot away, meeting his hard, glittering blue eyes with hers that were the color of sparkling water.

  “Death!” she mused more quietly. “You have ridden past death all the way here! What could be easier than to go over a precipice? No, my lord, death is too puny a foe. Have you no worthier adversary?”

  Tirell stirred as if coming out of a trance. “Abas!” he muttered.

  “Vengeance,” said the lady softly, her voice like the summons of a distant trumpet call.

  “Vengeance on him who slew my lady!” Tirell said hoarsely. “What have I been thinking of, to let him live after me!” Blindly he turned and started out of the verdant castle, but the lady touched his arm and he stopped where he stood.

  “You are a prince,” she exhorted him. “Plan, bide your time, make sure your stroke. And before you plan, eat and sleep. I will show you where.”

  Tirell let out a long breath. “Even so, Lady,” he mumbled. “I follow.”

  She led us into her pavilion and welcomed us as honored guests. Within the tent of golden cloth we found every comfort, luxury even, that we could ever desire. Richly patterned cushions covered most of the floor, and a woolen carpet showed beneath. Basins of warm water awaited us, for washing, and fine linen towels. Candles stood burning clearly on tiny carved tables. Braziers glowed, each heating a different delicacy. It should have taken many servants to prepare all that met us, but besides Shamarra I did not see a being in the place.

  Tirell sat down in a weary daze, lost to all courtesy as the lady served him fine white bread and amber liquor. She gave me the same, and my hand trembled as I took the cup for fear lest my fingers brush against hers and I lose all composure. I was on fire inside. I could eat only a little. Tirell did the same, then lay back against his cushions and slept. My face burned at his uncouthness.

  “He is worn out with sorrow.” I spoke at last to excuse him.

  The lady was looking at Tirell, and she scarcely glanced at me when I spoke, though she answered gently enough. “I know it. Never fear—I am not angry. Have you eaten well?”

  “Marvelously well.” I chewed on some strange red-gold fruit, hoping to please her by eating. Presently I spoke again, hesitantly. “My lady—”

  “Yes?”

  “You’ll think me bold—but is it wise, this baiting of him against Abas?”

  She met my eyes then, though briefly, and her glance was not unkind. “It gives him reason to live,” she said. She turned her gaze back to Tirell’s sleeping form. “Perhaps it will not be too long before better reason comes to him.”

  She watched Tirell sleep, as I had sometimes watched him when chance offered; it was a rare sight, had she but known it. When Tirell sleeps, his proud, mettlesome face smooths out into the likeness of a young immortal, fair and free, unfettered by bitterness or scorn. Such an aspect was on him in Shamarra’s pavilion, and she sat and gazed at him in long silence, seeming quite unaware or unconcerned that I gazed at her in like wise. I wanted never to stop looking at her, and I don’t know when I did. I believe I fell asleep with her image in my eyes.

  In the morning I awoke early, before Tirell, feeling as fresh as if I had rested for a week. Eagerly I made my way out of the pavilion and out of the leafy castle to look around me. Though the sun was up, everything still lay in shadow, for high ramparts of rock rose all around the lake and its grassy margin. Shamarra was bathing in the lake, her golden hair floating out behind her. She lifted her arm lazily in greeting and walked toward me, pulling her glistening garment about her. I watched her until courtesy compelled me to shift my eyes. When she neared me I was looking at the willows.

  “Did you sleep well?” she asked politely.

  “Indeed, yes, very well.” My mind floundered foolishly for something to say to her. “Might I also bathe in the lake?” I blurted. I, who had never bathed in anything except tubs of lifeless water brought from wells by slaves! I have never had much sense where Shamarra was concerned.

  “I don’t know,” she answered soberly. “Go and look.”

  So I went and knelt by the verge, expecting something strange. The black lotus of Vieyra grew at the very edge, its four-petaled reflection wavering in the lucent water, white. But only my own freckled face stared back at me. A secretive thing water is, all surface and shimmer, hiding mysterious depths for all that it seems as clear as air. I turned to Shamarra, questioning.

  “You are an innocent,” she said. “Nothing in the lake can harm you.”

  I grew oddly angry, though there had been no mockery in her voice. “Then I can bathe,” I said.

  “To be sure.… But there will be a price to pay.” She walked away.

  Her warning rang in me. But I felt suddenly absolutely determined to bathe. It was not just obstinacy—though I admit to some obstinacy—it was … I sensed, however vaguely, that the lake was a key, a magical means that might make me more like her. I loved her already; I wanted to bathe where she had bathed.

  I stripped and stepped in at once. Nothing untoward happened, and nothing marvelous either. I liked the feel of the water on my skin—smooth, tingling, moving over me like a thousand cool fingers. By the time I was done, the sunlight had worked its way down the rocky western mountains that towered just beyond Shamarra’s domain. I stood on the grass, dripping and admiring those glowing heights. I gazed until footsteps sounded and Tirell walked up to me.

  “All hail, handsome prince!” I greeted him lightly. “Did you sleep well?”

  “Yes,” he said. Then, with his customary cynicism, he added, “Why? Did she drug the mead?”

  “No. In the land of death perhaps all men sleep like the dead.” I spoke thoughtlessly, then stiffened and glanced at my brother. But he merely shrugged.

  “It is foolishness, all this talk of dying,” he remarked. “The lady spoke truth. I could have thrown myself off a cliff almost any step of the way here.”

  “I was miserably aware of that,” I said.

  “Would you care?” he asked morosely.

  “Of course.”

  “Why?” His voice was toneless.

  I could not tell what he wanted. And a little demon of anger stirred in me; I was annoyed at the dance he had been leading me. If I had known how rare such speech from him was to become, I would have answered him more gently.

  “If you go,” I stated, “then the altar awaits me.”

  I don’t know if he was hurt; my eyes were on the mountaintops. I heard him snort.

  “What would you do?”

  “Flee beyond those peaks yonder,” I answered promptly. “Look at them! Aren’t they splendid?”

  Tirell looked up at the mighty crags and shrugged. “Our way lies toward Melior,” he said. “Forthwith.”

  I took that as the command that was intended and ambled back to the lakeside to get my things. “Look into the water,” I called to Tirell, just as a random thought. But he shuddered and vehemently shook his head.

  “Thank you, but no! That lake is the strangest thing in this strange place, and I for one will be glad to leave it. You’re mad to let it touch you. There is our hostess.”

  Shamarra sat on the grassy verge in front of her palace of greenery. Even in the bright sunlight that now reached it, the lakeside seemed dim and gray, and Shamarra’s islet dimmest of all. At rest she seemed soft and still as the grass at her bare feet. But as we
approached and she stood to greet us she shimmered and shone. The movement changed her.

  Tirell bowed to her. “Lady, I come to take leave of your kindness. My heart burns to be on with the task you have pointed out to me.”

  “Vengeance?” Shamarra raised her delicate brows. “But for that task I think you will need a sword, is it not so?”

  Tirell felt that he was being mocked; I saw the muscles of his neck harden. “I can find a sword, Lady,” he stated.

  “Not such a sword as I will give you. Wait but a moment.”

  We waited for more than a moment as she walked through the grassy courtyard and disappeared into the leafy keep. We were bound only by courtesy, and Tirell stirred restlessly under the restraint, but he was well rewarded. Shamarra returned with our horses loaded down with food and gear, and even Tirell stared when she handed him a three-foot sword of iron.

  Weapons in Vale were usually made of bronze. We had iron, of course, but it was heavenly metal, scarce and almost as precious as gold. Abas hoarded it in his treasure room and drank from fine cups that Fabron the smith had hammered from the stuff, cups little larger than a baby’s fist. A sword of iron was a weapon men would shy from in as much awe as fear. It was a plain, dangerous-looking thing with a somber glint. Shamarra buckled it onto Tirell without comment.

  “There is a king’s ransom in that,” Tirell remarked softly.

  “Use it well,” the lady told him. “It will cut through any bronze. Guard it from thieves, for there is no other like it. Here is the helm.”

  The helm and shield were of iron also. I really lost my breath then. They were both bordered in a knotwork design that made my eyes ache with its intricacy. In the center of Tirell’s shield, half entangled in reaching twigs, stood the pawing form of a winged horse with a single sharp horn.

  “The beast has lived long,” Shamarra said.

  My weapons and arms were of bronze, fine bronze embellished with scrollwork, to be sure. The lady handed me a little dagger that was made of iron. Tirell was eager to be off. He mounted the black, and Shamarra frowned gravely up at him.

  “Why do you not ride the white,” she asked, “as befits the bridegroom of the goddess?”

  Tirell’s face hardened and he shook his head. “As long as sorrow for my slain love lives in my heart,” he vowed, “I will wear black and ride a black, and let the black beast follow me if it will! Nor will I ever wed any maiden by name of the goddess, however fair.”

  “All things carry the seeds of change,” Shamarra said. “Look yonder.”

  She pointed across the lake, past the lone swan that floated white over its twin of black. There on the farther shore stood the black beast looking back at us, its head held high, horn pointing toward the sky. In the still water just below wavered a reflection—an image of white! Fair white were the folded wings and shining flanks, and purest white the horn.

  “Remember that,” Shamarra said quietly. “It may yet be of use to you.”

  She stood back, and Tirell started away. I came out of a stupor and scrambled onto my horse. “Perhaps we shall meet again?” I asked Shamarra—begging, rather.

  She laughed, a rippling sound. “I think we will,” she answered. “Look for me by watery ways.” I urged the white mare after Tirell, and when I had caught up to him I looked back. The black beast was already pacing at my heels. The lady stood by her lake, watching us go. I waved, and she lifted a hand in answer, but already I knew which of us it was that held her gaze, and my heart was sore.

  Chapter Five

  Tirell was the one who found courage to embrace the beast. Though at the time I did not think of it as courage, but as folly, terrifying folly, maybe madness. I had not yet learned that valiant madness braves the dark and comes through it—that is how Abas failed; he was afraid. And I was afraid of the beast and therefore despised it as somehow misshapen, unclean, in spite of the lady’s words and the fair image in the water. The real enemy was myself. I was a far worse fool than Tirell, those first few days, and I was of no help to him.

  He rode out of Acheron with a hard, straight back, and now and then he laughed a laugh I did not like. Sunk in my own gloom, I felt little inclined to speak to him. The black beast paced behind me, once again content to bring up the rear—to my dismay. Soon I had other cause for dismay. Tirell rode far too fast for safety on the treacherous slopes, and more than once I closed my eyes.

  We spent the night on a ledge scarcely wide enough for the horses, and we slept little. Tirell stirred and muttered on his narrow space of stone. Once or twice I asked what ailed him. He gave no reply, so I asked no more. He rode through the next day in a tense, rigid daze, almost as if he were in pain. I learned much later that Abas had been calling him, tormenting him with the inner voice. I did not know that at the time, and I didn’t understand—I still don’t understand. I am no visionary, and I cannot imagine what those days were like for him.

  By nightfall we found easier footing, praise be, and we camped beneath knobby, gray-fringed trees. I distrusted those trees from our earlier meeting, and I resolved to sleep lightly. Still, I was so exhausted and heartsore that I expect I would have been lost in deepest slumber had it not been for the racket Tirell put up. All night long he thrashed and moaned and whispered and whimpered in his sleep. Any other time I would have gone to him, awakened him, soothed him and talked to him until it passed, whatever mood or dark dream it was. But, whether due to the moss or to my own vexation and weariness, I could not or would not move. I lay dozing and listening to him. “Get away,” he would whimper. “Let me alone.” Finally, just at first light, he seemed to wrench himself out of it and staggered up. I lay drowsily watching him through a veil of eyelash. He looked wild and all asweat, like a frightened colt. Come here, my brother, I thought in my half sleep. I dreamed that I embraced him. Come here, let me comfort you. But he did not so much as glance my way.

  The beast lay not far away, at ease in the gray moss. It lifted its head and looked at Tirell out of cloudy eyes, but it did not move or seem to threaten him; the look was flat. Tirell stood returning that gaze, his head up and his lips drawn back in fear or disgust. I thought surely he would move away. Instead, swaying, step by slow step, he walked toward that fell black thing, as if against his will, as if drawn. I willed myself to jump up and save him from that unseen tug, but still I did not move! Then I saw there was no immediate danger. As he approached it, the black beast inclined its dagger horn, sheathed it in earth, a gesture of peace. All the time it kept fixed on him its white-rimmed gaze. Tirell reached it, sank down beside it, and laid his head wearily against its arched and muscular neck.

  “Great Eala!” I blurted out loud, startled fully awake at last.

  Tirell paid no attention to me; perhaps he had not heard me. His grimace was gone, and I think he sighed. He sat beside the beast through daybreak into sunrise, stroking its neck and sleek black body, even patting its bony head, scratching around its ears and daggerlike horn. That weapon was raised now, but Tirell seemed to have forgotten fear of it. He stroked the folded wings…

  His head snapped up. “Frain!” he called to me in peremptory command. “Come here!”

  I got up and went at once, automatically, like a well-trained servant. But as I neared the beast reluctance slowed me. Tirell beckoned impatiently. He patted the beast again, then took the left wing in both hands and spread it like the wing of a captive bird. His voice came oddly gentle out of his hard white face. “The creature is crippled,” he said. “Look.”

  At the curve of the wing was a great knot where the bone had snapped and crookedly healed. It was easy to see, once I had dared to look, that the wing was useless, except perhaps for frightening peasants and fledgling princes.

  “He can never fly on that,” said Tirell in tones of pity.

  I stared at the beast, jealous that my brother had turned to the animal for comfort when he would not turn to me, angry at myself for feeling that way. “Come closer,” Tirell urged. “Touch it.” But
I still loathed the beast.

  “No, thank you,” I retorted, even more sharply than I had expected. “You pat the outlandish thing. Stay there all day if you like.”

  Tirell’s face went stony, and he dropped the wing. “I don’t have all day. Come on.” He rose and went to his horse.

  “Why, where do you expect to go?” I cried, still angry. “Will Grandfather tumble Melior for you as he did the Wall?”

  He returned no answer, only glared and started away. He set a hard pace that morning, and I stubbornly drove my white to stay close to his heels. Down and down we traveled, down to the lowest slopes of Acheron. By midday we could glimpse the breached Wall through the thinning stand of trees. And there, still within the sheltering wood, we had to halt. An army confronted us!

  Facing the forest with the stones of the ruin at their backs stood archers and men-at-arms and the Boda themselves in their scarlet tunics, all ranked three deep and stiffly alert. Beyond them, within their line, I could see tents and chariots and horses and strutting warriors, all the signs of a good-sized encampment. Tirell and I left our horses, crept to the last cover, and gaped.

  “But our kingly father must be afraid!” I exclaimed. “Is it you he dreads? Or is it these whispering trees?”

  Tirell smiled grimly and gave no reply, staring with narrowed, glittering eyes toward Melior. I continued to survey the soldiers. Some men moved, and beyond them I saw something that bent me like an unexpected buffet.

  “Look,” I said. “Grandfather’s hut. It’s all destroyed.”

  The place was shattered like the Wall. Tirell gave no sign of having heard me. But the beast bounded past us and leaped into the open space beyond the sheltering forest, screaming defiance and hatred at Abas’s army. Its voice was hoarse and gibbering and wailing all at once, like that of a man whose tongue is taken away; it was an ugly, hurtful sound. I was frozen by that cry, and for their part the warriors only stood and shuddered. They stared stupidly at widespread beating wings, rearing underbelly, and hooves and daggerlike horn. I think every man of them would have run if it had not been for the restraint of their own ranks pressed around them. Moments passed before they remembered their weapons. One by one they reached for their bows, and arrows started to fly.