There was a bench by the end of the great table and there Kemoc had put our food, traveler’s cakes, and fruit from manor trees. But I did not hunger for that, and for my other hunger I had some appeasement.
“It has been a long time,” my brother spoke aloud. “To find a key for such a lock takes searching.”
I did not need to ask had he been successful: his triumph shone in his eyes.
“Tonight the Witches make their move against Karsten.” Kemoc strode back and forth as if he could not sit still, though I dropped upon the bench, the oppression of the air making me feel even more drained.
“And in three days”—he spun around to face me—“they would set the Witch oath on Kaththea!”
My breath came out in a hiss, not unlike the first battle challenge of one of the high snow cats. This was the point of no return. Either she was brought forth from whatever bonds they had laid upon her before that hour, or she would be absorbed into their whole and lost to us.
“You have a plan.” I did not make a question of that.
He shrugged. “As good a one as we shall ever have, or so I think. We shall take her forth from the Place of Wisdom and ride—east!”
Simple words, but the action they evoked was another thing. To get a selected one out of the Place of Wisdom was as great a feat as the walking into Kars to bring out Pagar.
As I thought that, Kemoc smiled. He brought up his hand between us. There was a ridge of scar red and rough across its surface and when he tried to flex his fingers, two of them remained stiff and outthrust.
“This was my key to Lormt; I used it well. Also I have used what lies here—to some purpose.” He tapped those stiffened fingers against his forehead where the black hair we three shared fell in an unruly curling lock. “There was knowledge at Lormt, very old, veiled in much legend, but I scraped it bare. We shall have such a bolt hole for escape as they will not dream we dare use. As for the Place of Wisdom—”
I smiled then, without humor. “Yes? What is your answer to the safeguards set about that? It will not matter who or what we are, if we are taken within a mile of that without authorization. And it is said that the guards employed are not men to be countered with any weapon we know.”
“Do not be too sure of that, brother. The guards may not be men—in that, I believe you speak the truth. But neither are we weaponless. And tomorrow those guards may not be as great as they have been in all other years. You know what will happen in the hours of dark tonight?”
“The Council will move to war—”
“Yes, but how? I tell you, they attempt now the greatest use of the Power that has been tried in generations. They return to what they did once before—in the east!”
“In the east? And that?”
“They will make the mountains to walk, and the land itself answer their will. It is their final throw in the battle against extinction.”
“But—can they do that?” The Power could create illusions; it could further communications; it could kill—within a narrow range. But that it could accomplish what Kemoc suggested, as if he were assured of its success, I did not quite believe.
“They did it once, and they will try again. But to do so they must build up such a reserve of energy as will sap their resources for some time. I would not wonder if some of them die. Perhaps few may live past the in-gathering and channeling of such force. Thus all the guards they have put on their secret places will be drained and we can win past them.”
“You say they did this once in the east?”
“Yes.” He had gone back to his striding. “The Old Race were not born in Estcarp—they came across the mountains, or from that direction, so many lifetimes ago that there is no true reckoning. They fled some danger there, and behind them the Power raised mountains, altered the land, walled them away. Then there was a block in their minds, nurtured for some generations until it became an integral part of the race. Tell me, have you found anyone who can speak of the east?”
I had never dared.
Since Kemoc’s first uncovering of the puzzle, I had never dared press that too strongly among the Borderers, for fear of arousing suspicion. But it was true, no one ever spoke of the east and should I in devious ways lead to that subject they were as blank of thoughts as if that point of the compass had no existence.
“If what they fled was so terrible that they must take such precautions—” I began.
“Dare we face it now? A thousand years or more lies between that time and now. The Old Race are not what they were then. Any fire burns very low and finally to extinction. I know this, that the three of us will be hunted with greater fury than any Karstenian spy or Alizon Rider, more than any Kolder, if any such still live in this time and world. But not one of them will follow us east.”
“We are half of the Old Race—can we break this block to take the trail?”
“That we shall not know until we try. But we can think of it and talk of it, as they cannot. Why, I discovered at Lormt that even the keeper of the old archives did not believe those significant legends which existed. He was not aware of scrolls I consulted, even when I had them spread in plain sight.”
Kemoc was convincing. And reckless as the plan was, it was the only one. But there were miles between us and the Place of Wisdom; we had better be on our way. I said as much.
“I have five mounts of the Torgian breed,” he replied. “Two here and ready, three others hidden for our last lap of the escape.”
He mind-read my astonishment and respect, and laughed. “Oh, it took some doing. They were bought separately over a year’s time under other names.”
“But how could you know this chance would come?”
“I did not. But I believed that we would have some chance, and I was to be ready for it. You are right, brother: it is time to mount and ride—before the lash of the fury the Wise Women raise may snap back at us.”
Torgian horses are from the high moors bordering on the secret marshes of Tor. They are noted for both speed and endurance, a coupling of qualities not always found in the same animal. And they are so highly prized that to gather five of them was a feat I had not thought possible for any individual. For most of them were kept under the control of the Seneschal himself. They were not much to look at, being usually dun colored, with dark manes and coats which did not take a gloss no matter how carefully they were groomed. But for heart, stamina and speed they had no match.
Kemoc had them both saddled with those light saddles used by anti-raider patrols along the seashore. But they were affected by the general eeriness of this night, dancing a little as we swung up, which was not their usual manner. We walked them out across the courtyard and beyond the wall. The sun was almost down, but the sky it bannered held a gathering of purple-black clouds in odd shapes, and these solidified into a threatening band of duskiness . . . while the land beneath lay in the same frightening silence.
My brother had left nothing to chance, which included his having scouted the fastest route. Yet this night even Torgian horses could not keep a swift pace. It was as if we rode through knee deep, ever-shifting sand which sucked each hoof as it was placed, keeping us to a bare trot when every nerve demanded a full gallop. The clouds which had overshadowed the sunset thickened into a cover through which neither star nor moon shone.
And now a weird embellishment was added to the landscape. I had once ridden along the Tor marsh and seen those eerie lights native to that forbidden country glow and dim over its mist-ridden surface. Now such wan gleams began to touch here and there about us—on the tip of a tree branch, the crown of a bush, along a vine wreathing a wall. The very alienness heightened the general apprehension which strove to overwhelm us.
Our sense of anticipation grew moment by moment. And the Torgians reacted to it, snorting and rearing. I called to Kemoc: