But if his cry had shocked me out of a half-drawn spell, it also caused a change in the weaving mist. That thickened into concrete shapes.
“Bartare!” For the first time since we had left the place of ringing rocks, I saw her. In her, too, there were changes.
Her hair was much longer, covering her to the waist like a cloak, until she swept it back. Her face was thinner, making her eyes appear larger. She stood with hand to chin, her fingers tugging at her lower lip, watching us as one who must make an important decision. And there was a daunting air of assurance about her.
She smiled as if she could read my mind and knew my growing uncertainty, for this was no longer a child over whom I could assert that small shadow of authority I once had.
“So you have come, despite all warnings, Kilda c’ Rhyn,” she said. Her voice was still high and light, that of a child, yet she was no human child now. “And what have you come to do, Kilda? Wrest us back into that small, small world where I was nobody, nothing? Do you think I will go – or Oomark – now that he has known what it is to be of the Folk? Has he not asked his freedom? We have broken out of the shells your kind made for us. This body was of your world, yes – ” She ran one hand from her breast to her thigh. “But the spirit it houses has come home! And now the body becomes the proper casing for it. We cannot return – nor shall we!”
She had moved out from the center of the platform and now stood close to us, looking down, playing with the long ends of her hair. Still there was in her a portion of the human she had been, even as it came now and then to the surface in Oomark, and I saw that she was enjoying the belief that she was in control here and now.
”We are free!” she repeated. “And you cannot make us unfree, Kilda.”
Bartare was the center. If we were ever to return to the same world, it must be through her.
“Are you free, Bartare?” I chose my words with care. “Who stands behind you – there?” I pointed to the dense pillar of curling mist still occupying the center of the platform.
She lost her half smile and came closer. “Do not call me ‘Bartare’! I am not Bartare. I am who I was meant to be. You cannot, control me by naming that name.”
“And if you are not Bartare, then who are you?” I noted that she eluded my question concerning the other occupant of the platform.
Now she laughed. “Not so will you catch me, Kilda. My name cannot be named by you. I am free of any bonds. You understand, Kilda – I am free!”
“I do not believe it,” I returned flatly and boldly.
She stared at me, then for the first time glanced back at the mist. When she returned her attention to me, she laughed once more, but not quite so confidently. Perhaps the use of the notus had heightened my sense of intuition, so I was able to know her unease.
“Ask of her” – I pointed to the mist – “if you are free.”
It seemed to me that Bartare’s Lady must be here. And my words brought about a change in the mist It thickened and darkened. Finally it was a form, taller than any human, yet humanoid in shape – a woman, as I had guessed, and one who was majestic, awe-inspiring. Her black hair rippled down to her feet, and it was tossed free over her shoulders as Bartare wore hers, though a band of silver set with white stones was about her head. More silver and white stones formed a collar wide and deep across her green gown, a point of which extended in a narrow line between her breasts to unite with a belt at her waist. The green of her robe was that same green Bartare, even in our own world, had favored, and it flowed about her as if she was not clothed in fabric but in some living substance that caressed her body. As with Bartare her black brows formed a bar above her eyes, and her features were clean-carven in a cold beauty that repelled.
I saw her so for an instant, long enough to engrave her in my memory for all time. Then, as with Kosgro, she shimmered and was changed into something else and else and else. So quickly were those alterations that nausea gripped me, yet I could not look away.
Once more Kosgro saved me from the snare of illusion, if illusion it was. He called my name sharply. I started and was able to break the hold her eyes had fastened on mine, to look back to Bartare.
“Ask it of her,” I said. “Let her say you are free.”
“I do not need to ask.” Bartare’s voice was heavy with pride. “I am of her kind – her spirit daughter! I am a changeling. Do you know what that means, Kilda? Once your species did know well. I am one of those planted among human kind to learn their ways and draw with me into this world some of their stock. She has given me now the right to show myself truly of the Folk – proving to you also that I am not one to be lightly used. You think me a child, Kilda, to do this and do that as you say. I played that game while I must, to reach the gate. But a child in this world, one of the Folk, is not such as you can lay any command upon.
“Because you – because you – ” She hesitated, repeating herself. Once more she glanced at that thing behind her, though I resolutely kept my eyes from following the direction of hers. Whatever she would have said she decided against. Instead, she waved her hand.
“Look you – the Folk and those who are one with them. They are coming to see me prove my right to stand here thus-with this!”
From where she had gotten it, I could not tell, but suddenly she was holding a narrow-bladed sword, not of any metal, but fashioned of wood so newly cut that it had a clean whiteness to it. Using that as a pointer, she flashed it from side to side, calling to our attention the fact that we were no longer alone at the platform. Others had come to stand quietly watching.
Indeed, that was a strange gathering. There were those like Oomark, perhaps of the very group that had trailed us. There were women, slender, with thick green hair waving back and forth on their heads, their skin shining brown, wearing scant coverings of leaves. There were men and women humanoid in appearance, more so than these, and all had black hair and wore green. And there were others, some beautiful, some ugly, with now and then a head or face so grotesque as to seem out of a nightmare. They gathered around three sides of the platform, but facing Bar-tare there remained only the three of us.
“You have stayed Between, Kilda, as has this sniffing monster who shuffled hither at your bidding. And Oomark.” Her eyes turned to her brother, now crouched at my feet. One of his hands held to my breeches, but his head was bent, and he did not raise his eyes.
“Yes, Oomark. I owe him something, for he helped to Open the gate – though he did that because I willed and not because he wished to aid me. But it would seem that now he clings to you, Kilda.”
I dropped my hand to rest upon the short curled hair now covering the boy’s head.
I found words I had not consciously planned to say. “Because he is not yet entirely lost to what he once was.”
“So? If he has chosen, then shall he abide by that choice. Now I shall bind you three to our purposes, and then you shall serve as tribute this time to the Outer Dark. You shall be a lock on that other gate through which have been swept far too many of the true blood. By the power in me – ”
“Kilda!” That was Kosgro. “Give me your hand! Give, but do not look at me. Look rather – there!”
As if his words had been a pointing finger to aim my right, I looked. What he had cast upon the ground were two of the three blossoms of the notus I had given him. They were yellow and limp, but very noticeable.
His hand closed on mine so tightly that it might have brought a cry of pain from me had I not been too aware of something else, for there was a strength in him that was not only of the flesh, but also of the spirit. Something in roe answered to that strength and was drawn to it. Had I wished now, I could not have raised my eyes from those two blooms. Oomark crowded against me, clutching at my legs, hiding his face.