Another Doom
Doom arrived,
Carried to our door in strong arms.
Yet worse
Was the rot within, the danger
I did not see.
—The Heavy-hand’s Saga, attributed to Valis Swift-harp
Hold,” Floringaeld mouthed, and his gauntlet glimmered as he raised it again. We had been going uphill for a long while, the dark before us thick as cold batter. A volva’s eyes are sharp and so are a shieldmaid’s, but we were both near-blind once far enough from the glow of a burning city. Elaedie held my arm, limping as I swayed with exhaustion, but between us we managed well enough; Arn’s helper was a slim Elder girl, her dark hair sheared raggedly at her shoulders and her clothes full of smoke. She held my shieldmaid’s left elbow; one woman led, the other followed, and I could not say who was more thankful for being given a task to concentrate upon.
Elder men stayed at the edges of the group, bearing staves, daggers, or whatever else might serve as a weapon; the captain of Laeliquaende led us and Gaeran took the rearguard, grim-silent, his eyes glittering blue.
I had no idea where we were, or what we aimed for. We walked, and walked. The gloom seemed endless, and though not truly cold—soft spring night, the breeze faint and the grass dew-heavy—I shivered often. Ash kept falling, sparse flakes whirling like hesitant snow in autumn, the kind which melts the next day but still warns of frozen, impending hunger.
We halted. Elaedie’s fingers tensed upon my arm, pale against the shadowy cloth. Before us, the child in her father’s arms did not cry, but her breath came quick and light. I tried to think of something fit for soothing a little one, but a lullaby would make too much noise and I was drained of seidhr. A few stars struggled through the blackness that was not cloud; the Moon was up, but waning and rotten-cheese yellow, a worm-eaten scytheblade leached of all beauty.
Every time we halted that night, I sought not to think about what might happen. We had not encountered any more orukhar, but that did not make the frequent halts and waiting less terrible. Battle is awful but anticipation… well, it is not entirely worse, since avoiding further chaos and bloodshed is preferable to almost anything else I can imagine, even now.
And yet.
The sounds of carnage and flame, bellsong and metal meeting metal, were also extinct. Only the ruffling of the breeze and the faint, numb echoes of distant cries broke the night’s silence. The world held its breath, and even the faint sigh of the tired Elder child as she wavered upon the edge of sleep seemed loud.
“Lirielle, Lirielle,” someone whispered nearby. “Whither dost thou wander?”
It had to be from a song, for the accents were most pleasingly arranged, if somewhat archaic. Elaedie let out a soft, ragged gasp, but it was Floringaeld who replied.
“Do not look for the star, she has left us.”The captain half-turned, the sword in his right hand giving a dull gleam. “Who goes there?”
“Noorukhar would speak so, my friend.” A shadow melded from the darkness, another in its wake. They were Elder, of course, and I thought I recognized the voice.
No. It cannot be.“Aeredh?” The iron casket’s corners pressed even harder through the shadow-cloak; I swallowed the rest of my disbelief.
“Solveig?” A different voice, not Elder, but I found I could recognize it as well. “Is Naciel with you?”
It was indeed the Crownless, Tjorin beside him as well as a group of other Elder, mostly warriors in battered armor, their blades bare. They surrounded our group with alacrity, having shepherded a few others to points of escape; I gathered, from the murmured conference, that we were the last.
Tjorin moved closer, eager for news of the princess. I could not think of what to say, but I had to produce some manner of news. “She… she drew them away.” I sounded numb and breathless. “The orukhar. So we could… so we could escape.”
“Ah.” Tjorin’s face was shadowed, and he paused. “We heard a voice upon the wind, and saw a light. Some trick of the Enemy’s, Daerith thought, but Aeredh said nothing of his would use the name of the Hunter. So.” He shook his head, and hurriedly resheathed his sword with a soft sound. “Who needs aid? I have some sitheviel, and managed to gather some healwell too.”
I wished for my own embroidered seidhr-bag, but it was in the palace along with everything we had brought from Dun Rithell. Only a bee-end torc remained, resting comforting and warm against my collarbones—that, and the red coral in my hair.
Arneior had her spear, too. But everything we wore was of Elder make, and a sudden sharp pain speared me. I had to swallow, hard. “Elaedie—she was wounded in the leg. And there is a child; she may be sleeping now, but…”
“Say no more.” Tjorin produced a small silver flask gemmed with bright blue slivers, and there were grateful murmurs as the most grievously wounded or exhausted were granted a sip of sitheviel or a bit of poultice-pungent herb pressed against their wounds. We set off again amid his ministrations; the son of Hrasimir spoke soft encouragement to all and even pressed a mouthful of cordial upon Arneior.
Elaedie’s limping eased. I wondered what it cost Tjorin to sound so cheerful while his beloved risked herself, and was once again ashamed of my own weakness.
“There you are.” Aeredh had dropped back; Floringaeld consulted with another of the new arrivals in an undertone, and our pace improved. I still could see almost nothing but the gleams of the Crownless’s gaze were familiar, and he touched my shoulder. An almost weightless brush of fingertips, yet a bolt went through me, not seidhr but almost as intense as the sharing of vital energy at the edge of the Glass while I sought to remove a killing shard from Eol’s shoulder. “I feared the worst,” he continued, the words mere shadows to match their bearer. “Are you injured?”
I could not have said. I felt nothing save savage exhaustion, and fear. And the thing in the iron coffer, thrumming like birdwings. “I do not think so. Here.” I thrust the box at him, but again he would not take it.
Instead, his hand found the back of mine, a gentle palm-touch, and he pushed my cargo to my chest once more. “’Tis yours to bear, my lady alkuine.” So softly even the Elder around us might not hear, he spoke. And he moved closer, as if we were in the Wild again, though he did not put his arm over my shoulders. “I am relieved to find you safe.”
“Hush,” someone whispered. “We are not in safety yet.”
Indeed we were not. But the darkness did not seem so deep, and I could hear Arneior breathing just past Elaedie, who no longer leaned so much upon me. My own steps seemed more certain, though the ground was rocky and I felt every dip and rise through thin slippers.
I could not hear Aeredh, but the warmth beside me was familiar and I was even grateful for his presence, as a fisherman tossed from his boat could be glad of any flotsam nearby. We were now steadily climbing, if the ache in my calves was any indication.
Some while later—I could not say how long, for I might have slept while walking, my subtle selves burrowing inward to escape fear and fatigue—I blinked, and realized a faint thin greyish line was rising to our left. It described a high sharp tooth, and another more indistinct stone fang rose upon our right.
I realized the line was incipient dawn, and the teeth were the folds of a mountain.
We had escaped the valley.
Almost.
The Elder woman next to me was no longer a mere shadow but the soft suggestion of a tall form, dark hair falling down her back, her face a pale oval. Beyond her was a brighter glimmer—Arn’s spearblade, rising and falling as she walked, the young girl between them bearing some faint resemblance to Astrid as she walked with my mother and shieldmaid, perhaps eager to visit a riverside fair.
I turned my chin slightly; to my left was a shape that could only be Aeredh. A blue glimmer was his glance, and his hand curled around my elbow as if I had stumbled, warm even through shadow-cloak and dress-sleeve.
The light strengthened. Soon I realized I could see the Elder before us as well. We were in loose file, threading between two high walls of rock. The wind was chill, and ruffled ragged fabric; the greens and silvers of their cloth melded with the grey almost as natural vegetation. Even the warriors’ armor seemed less gleaming, as if it understood the need for camouflage.
My own mantle moved uneasily on the stiffening breeze. I could not decide if the cloth was still solid shadow or merely a deeper grey, and looking down at it—even at my own sleeve—made my stomach uneasy. Perhaps I had torn the hem after all, for it did not drag and ’twas silly of me to think seidhr could be used for mere alteration of a garment, even an Elder one.
As soon as it was light enough the girl at Arn’s side took Elaedie’s arm instead; they moved before us, and my shieldmaid fell into step beside me as if she had never left. It was a relief, but Aeredh still held my left elbow. Perhaps he wanted to make certain I did not drop the iron box.
The Crownless’s cloth was singed and chunks of his dark hair crisped to nothing; the swordhilt at his shoulder bobbed as he walked and his cheek bore a dark, slowly-healing weal that did not look like lichburn. My throat was dry, and though I longed for some sustenance more mortal than Elder draughts I would not have turned one away at that moment.
“Eol,” I finally whispered. “Did you see him? Soren, and the others?”
Aeredh glanced at me, a blue flicker before his gaze returned to the ground before his scarred boots. He steered me around a clump of stone, and I realized he and Elaedie had been herding me all night. I had not stepped upon a single twig, much less a toe-bruising stone among many littering the defile.
They were careful shepherds, the Elder guiding night-blind Secondborn.
“I did not see him, but keep heart.” His fingers tightened briefly upon my elbow. “’Tis not easy to trap a wolf of Naras, my lady.”
Arn slowed, her chin tipping up as she studied the line of Elder before us. “Hidden pass.” Her voice was a mere husk of itself. “I think we go just over the mountain’s shoulder, see there? Well-nigh invisible from below, but we shall feel the cold soon.”
“And outside the valley?” Suddenly I could think again, though each consideration struggled through a thick blanket of resistance. “Still winter, I wager. The melt cannot be fully underway just yet—Floringaeld said so, at the council.”
“Ice, or mud.” She glanced past me. “Well? What say you, Elder?”
“We shall make for Dorael.” Aeredh sounded just the same as he ever had, though quiet enough his voice would not carry to our other companions. “Once there…”
“Another Elder city to destroy.” I hunched over the casket in my arms, wishing I could drop it. A group of my kind fleeing catastrophe might well leave a trail of broken or too-heavy implements, but the Elder did not—from discipline, I thought, or perhaps they had nothing else to lose. “Taeron said I was doom.”
He made no answer, nor did Arn. What could they say?
My shieldmaid was correct; we were very near the snowline. There was little foliage, merely scrub between great knife-edged boulders and greyish lichen upon black rock. The faint colorless light in the east turned golden and rosy by degrees, then orange.
I looked back once, craning over my shoulder as Aeredh’s grip tightened upon my left arm.
I could see a few Elder behind us, though I knew the line stretched farther. Their garb blended with the mountainside; every one bore some mark of battle or escape, and ash starred their flowing, silken hair. The valley lay below, full of boiling mist randomly scarred with the very crowns of the tallest evergreens in certain groves. A venomously orange smear in the distance showed Laeliquaende yet burned, and a column of dark greasy smoke lifted from it. For a moment the rising vapor was full of contorted faces, mouths open in silent agony.
“Careful.” The Crownless set me right as I faltered. “Do not look, Solveig. It is not of your making; you did not come here willingly.”
I did.There was no use in explaining. I turned away from the wrack of yet another beautiful Elder city, and it was just as well my throat and the rest of me were so dry, for it meant I could not weep. Still, my eyes stung. Arn walked beside me haggard and ash-starred as the Elder, the woad upon her face flaking. The look upon my shieldmaid was that of a woman in a nightmare, determined to endure the worst.