Part 31 (1/2)

42 Success for the Sorcerer.

Panic swept the rock. The resting Noaidis tried to help those still lost to the power of the drums and chanting. Some woke easily, others not at all and had to be left to death as their brothers sought what little protection the bare island provided.

Lieaibolmmai found himself flat on his face concealed in the dark of the cave entrance, digging in his furs for his little knife. There was a squelching noise like a man walking through a swamp, and he saw the monster put its back paws through the chest of the Noaidi in the bird mask.

The gigantic creature was hideous. Its black wolf's head with eyes of s.h.i.+ning emerald sat on a body that was a twisted stand-off between man and wolf, though three times the size of the biggest man Lieaibolmmai had ever seen. The creature loped on all fours, its back limbs and front left those of a wolf, while its front right, which it used to tear and smash the Noaidis, to pull them into its crus.h.i.+ng jaws, was the arm of a freakishly big human.

The sorcerers had been taken completely by surprise. Some were slas.h.i.+ng at the creature with their knives, some were throwing rocks, a few were shooting arrows from squat bows, but most were scrambling for the boats that would take them off the island.

Lieaibolmmai cleared his mind. Hadn't he bound the wolf? He had gone to it in its dreams, called it with his drums, commanded it into the cave and done all the magic as the runes had revealed. He had also heard the girl with the wolf and it was certain they were known and important to each other. And hadn't the wolf appeared in exactly the form he had seen in his visions? So what was this thing?

He felt himself p.i.s.sing where he lay. He had to control himself, to think clearly.

Then he understood that he had been deceived. Somehow the G.o.ddess had tricked him. He had snared a wolf but not the one he was looking for. And yet he had touched its mind, run with it in the wide dark of the mountains, breathed its joy in the kill. He could not understand it.

Lieaibolmmai was an honest man. He had no delight in the dark magics he had been shown and looked for power only to defend himself rather than for its own sake. He knew what he had to do - to give the girl he had uprooted and the wolfman he had enchanted and d.a.m.ned a chance. He went further into the cave and threw down the ropes.

'The wolf is here,' he said into the darkness. 'Stay until it has finished killing. I will do my best to control it. I will-'

He never finished his sentence. A primordial sense told him that something was behind him, something worse than a neck-break fall. He stepped forward into the darkness.

At the bottom of the shaft Feileg and Adisla heard Lieaibolmmai crash to the ground beside them and then his scream. He had torn his arm from its socket and couldn't stifle his agony.

Then something else dropped softly down the shaft, some sort of creature.

In the blackness there were retching and coughing noises. The creature hacked, growled and snapped again and again. She heard it snuffle forward, its snout testing the darkness. Adisla was close to collapse. She could concentrate on nothing, think of nothing but the awful sc.r.a.ping sounds coming from the creature's throat, within which she seemed to hear some words.

'My love,' it said. 'I have found you.'

43 A Sacrifice.

Vali. That name still described what faced Adisla in the black of the pit.

How much change must you go through before you are no longer you? How many planks can you replace on a s.h.i.+p before you have to say that you have a new boat?

Vali's jaws dripped with the blood of the sorcerers, his mind was full of the scent of their panic, and yet, now that he had found Adisla, a glimpse of who he was came to him, indistinctly, hardly discernible, as a distant sh.o.r.e might appear through haze. This was the girl he had loved since the instant he met her. He fought down his other perceptions - the delicious aroma of anxiety that clung to her, the succulence of her flesh, even her threat. She was not him, and every living thing that was not him now seemed hostile and dangerous.

'No,' said Adisla. 'No.' She could see nothing in the darkness, nothing at all, but that made the creature more terrible - its rasping voice, the heat of its breath.

'I have found you, as I vowed,' said Vali. 'Come from this place.'

Adisla s.h.i.+ed back, reaching for Feileg's hand.

'What are you?' she said.

'Your love. Vali.'

The Noaidi was trying to bite back his pain but his suffering escaped him in suppressed groans. Vali felt the attraction of the holy man's agony, calling him to feed. His skin felt alive, his muscles drawing power from his questing hunger.

'Keep away from me,' said Adisla. Her body convulsed as she clung to Feileg in the dark. Vali could see them clearly and felt his lips draw back from his teeth, his legs prepare to spring. He willed himself to be still.

Feileg spoke. 'It is him. I saw the beginning of this change. It is the prince.'

Adisla was shaking her head.

'Let me take you from here,' said the wolf.

Adisla drew in her breath and backed further away. 'I will not go.'

'Better that than the damp and dark,' said Feileg. 'Go. If it is your turn to die then you will die.'

'I do not fear death, only him.'

'He is as the Norns wish him to be. Now go.'

Still she did not go. Feileg pushed her forward. Then fear killed all her thoughts, and she did not resist as Vali gathered her up. Her weight was nothing to him and he lifted her to the top of the shaft and then pulled himself up using his human arm. Three Noaidis stood at the mouth of the cave. The sun had risen behind them, turning the rocks inside to burning gold and revealing Vali and his burden to the sorcerers. They let fly with their bows. Vali turned his back to them to s.h.i.+eld Adisla. The arrows. .h.i.t him hard but didn't even break his skin. Vali put the girl down, turned again and made a stuttering, snarling run towards them. They fell back and scattered. Vali returned to Adisla.

She tried to summon her strength, not for herself but for him.

'Do you remember what you were?'

'I remember the betony you gave me when I first went out to fight. I remember you at the river, the sun on the water and you racing your brothers from bank to bank. I remember how you kissed me when we last saw each other. I remember you, Adisla, so I remember me.'

Adisla looked at him. Somewhere in his expression, in the inclination of his head, she could see her Vali. It was him, so how could she be afraid?

'Do you know what you have become?' said Adisla.

The creature bowed its head. It stammered, 'I am a b-better thing.'

'No, Vali, you are not. You must come back to me,' said Adisla. 'We must break this curse.' Feileg was beside her. He had climbed one of the ropes Lieaibolmmai had thrown down the shaft.

The wolf spoke: 'It feels like a blessing. I am so strong and the world is so beautiful.'

'We have had only one blessing in life, and one curse,' said Adisla. 'Each other. You have found me and I will find you. There are sorcerers who will help you, and we will take them the gifts they ask to save you.'

To Vali, Adisla's body sparkled with scents, sang with her fear. And there was another sensation too, something even more persuasive. They would be together for ever if he ate her. They would be the same person. What closer love than that is possible? No! Her connection to him was stronger than hunger. Her love burst over him like cool water on hot iron and made a blade of his will.

'What would you have me do, Adisla?'