Part 41 (1/2)

Hawklan neither moved or replied, Dan-Tor's words and his awful presence belied each other so starkly.

Dan-Tor's smile broadened rea.s.suringly. 'I'm unfamiliar with the ways of Orthlund, but if you've been any time in Fyorlund, then you must know by now that it's our way to talk. To talk endlessly, in fact. It's an old and trusted way.'

Hawklan's uncertainty grew. To stand there silent would serve no purpose. To bandy words with the man in public would be hazardous. But to enter his lair . . .?

There was a slight disturbance behind him. 'It's only the horses,' whispered Isloman, and Hawklan turned as Serian and Isloman's horse walked through the surprised crowd. Dan-Tor quailed as he saw the sword and bow hanging from Serian's saddle. Casually, Hawklan lifted down the sword and fastened it about his waist.

Dan-Tor's smile did not fade, but the aura around him s.h.i.+fted restlessly. 'Lord Hawklan,' he said, 'I offer you speech, in the manner of the Fyordyn, and you arm for violence.'

Hawklan was about to speak when Serian breathed softly to him. 'Take care. The people don't have your sight. They see only his smile and your sword and stony face.'

With difficulty, Hawklan bent his mouth into a smile. 'Isn't it the way of the Fyordyn to be armed forbattle when speaking in the Geadrol?'

Dan-Tor bowed slightly but did not answer.

The smile on Hawklan's face faded. It was no use. He couldn't maintain any pretence in the presence of this abomination. He felt himself being overwhelmed by forces he did not understand, and it was taking all his conscious will to restrain them. Like distant thunder, drums and trumpets sounded in his mind, as if presaging a terrible battle.

Dan-Tor felt himself similarly a.s.sailed, though he knew too well the nature of the forces he was dealing with. Around Hawklan was an aura such as he had not seen since the time of the First Coming. Every fibre of him strained to leap out and destroy this obscenity; this distortion and obstacle to His plans. But the danger . . .

Two great and opposite forces lowered over one another like black storm clouds, held back by who knew what restraints until some tiny stirring would unleash their lightning. Each grew with the other.

Serian whinnied nervously and stepped back.

Hawklan watched, impotent, as the vague ill-formed hopes he had carried with him died at the sight of the pitiless reality he was facing. Visions of ills cured, problems solved, wrongs righted through debate and reason, laughed at him distantly for his naivety, scorned him for a fool.

The few words that he and Dan-Tor had exchanged lay between them like dead leaves: a pitiful rustling futility echoing in the awesome silence. Both pondered the featureless terrain of doubt. Neither could leave the object of his long search. Neither could seize it. The people watched, silent and uncomprehending.

Then from high above came a raucous cry. A cry that had sounded over the Mandrocs as they marched on the High Guards in Orthlund. Dan-Tor started violently. His smile vanished and he looked up at the circling Gavor. Hawklan felt the spirit around the man darken and writhe. Then abruptly he was gazing into Dan-Tor's hate-filled eyes.

'I'll not be mocked by your death bird, Orthlundyn,' came a grim and terrible voice, that seemed to fill the very sky, and Hawklan felt a great blow being gathered for the destruction of his friend.

His vision cleared. He had been drawn from Orthlund on a search for the source of a great evil. Now it lay before him, strong, vigorous and purposeful. The world would crumble before it if it were not struck down.

The healer in him urged, 'Excise this diseased tissue.' The warrior roared, 'Kill it before it kills you.'

And all the living things about Vakloss cried out for release and vengeance. Words would avail nothing here. The first stroke must now be his, no matter how it seemed in the eyes of the watchers.

With a movement as natural as the swaying of rushes in the wind, Hawklan swung round and lifted the Black Bow and a single arrow from his waiting horse. Dan-Tor's blow for Gavor gathered in strength then faltered, distracted by this sinister harmony at the edge of his vision. As he turned, Hawklan nocked the arrow and drew back Ethriss's Black Bow. It creaked like the mast of a tall s.h.i.+p then, without pause, Hawklan released Loman's arrow towards the very heart of the terrible creation that stood before him.

Dan-Tor heard its ancient song but, for all he despised humanity, it was his human frame that saved him,not his vaunted Power. Reflexes that were ancient even before he was born turned him from the path of the approaching doom, and though the arrow tore through flesh and smashed bones before it tore out through flesh again, it struck no vital organ.

The impact drove him backwards and he stumbled on the steps. Both crowd and Mathidrin stood paralysed by the suddenness of the a.s.sault and, seeing its failure, Hawklan reached for a second arrow.

But the wound to Dan-Tor was to more than his mortal form. Loman had not the skills of the craftsmen of the Great Alliance, but he was a fine apprentice to them, and the arrow was as perfect in its making as any could be in that time.

Delivered from the Black Bow of Ethriss by a great warrior-healer, it rent not only Dan-Tor's flesh, but his black spirit also. His eyes widened and blazed a baleful red, and his mouth cracked open, his brown face like the crater of an angry volcano. From its depths, rising interminably from the faintest whisper was unleashed a sound that became so loud it seemed solid in the air, and so inhuman that all who heard it, save Hawklan, staggered and fell to the ground in terror.

Far to the north, a dark and brooding form heard the cry of His servant, and in cold anger reached out over the mountains and plains to deny its will.

Unnoticed, an enfeebled form slipped from His thrall.

Hawklan recognized now the creature that writhed on Loman's arrow and stood paralysed with horror.

He felt no stirring within him. No resurrection of the Guardian Ethriss or any other spirit to save him from the fate that was to be his he who had released Oklar, the earth corrupter, First among the Uhriel of Sumeral.

Images of desolated, war-sacked lands, of Tirilen, Loman, Gulda and countless others rose up to reproach him for his failure. Then in the uttermost darkness of his fear a faint familiar voice spoke to him.

'The sword, Hawklan. Ethriss's sword.' The voice was Andawyr's pained, weak, and distant.

Unthinking, Hawklan drew the sword and held it in front of himself with trembling hands as Oklar unleashed the Old Power at him.

The ground at his feet started to rage and heave as if it were a wind-lashed ocean. Great fissures opened and closed about him like the mouths of predatory animals. A terrible rumbling seemed to fill the very universe and a million tiny barbs entered his body as if to rend and tear his every cell. Somewhere in the distance was the faint noise of falling masonry and a screaming crowd crus.h.i.+ng itself in panic.

Hawklan knew only the sword. He poured out his spirit into its perfection and strength, hoping in some way to save those around him. But even as he did so, he knew he could not use the sword as it should be used and he felt his own strength ebbing as the tumult grew louder and louder.

Slowly he sank to his knees and, as his mind slid into oblivion, he felt a cold presence pa.s.sing near him.

Sweetly spoken words, faint but filled with appalling malevolence formed like ice burns in his heart: '. . .

Keeper . . . Ethriss's lair . . . Mine . . .'

Then it was gone, and darkness took him.

Chapter 56.

The King sat motionless and stunned as the awesome rumbling and shaking faded and gave way to themore identifiable sounds of panic and disorder spreading through the Palace. The torches which had flared up and filled the Throne Room with a dazzling brightness, as if to protect him from some terrible a.s.sault, now returned to normal, and Rgoric found himself tremblingly aware that some great evil was near.

Dilrap staggered into the room, wide-eyed and bewildered.

'What's happened?' the King demanded. 'That noise. And the whole Palace shaking?'

Dilrap gesticulated aimlessly. 'I don't know, Majesty,' he said fearfully. 'I was helping the Lord Eldric and his son. People are running everywhere in panic. I came straight back here.'

The King put his hand to his head in despair, then almost angrily, 'And what are you doing here anyway?

You were to leave with the Lord Eldric.'

Dilrap looked at the King with unexpected resolution. 'I'm no rider, Majesty,' he said. 'Still less a warrior. It's my duty as your Secretary to stay by your side. A duty determined by the Law . . .'

'Never mind the Law,' shouted the King, his eyes widening in disbelief. 'Do as I order you get after them.'

Dilrap looked apologetic. 'Majesty, you're not above the Law. You're at once sustained and constrained by it. You can't break it without due penalty.'

Rgoric clenched his fists, but Dilrap moved forward urgently. 'Majesty, if you kill Dan-Tor, then punish me as you see fit. But if he kills you, then I'll be the only person close to Dan-Tor and loyal to the old way. I'll corrode his New Order as he corroded the old one. It may be precious little that I can do, but it's more than I can do anywhere else, and I intend to do it.'

Before the King could recover from the shock of Dilrap's unequivocal statement, a grim procession made a noisy entrance into the hall, bearing the injured Dan-Tor in a chair.