Then I saw Kyllan using the point of his sword, dug into the shifting earth, to pull himself along. I followed his example, trying to reach the confusion marking our campsite.
“Ha—to me!” called Godgar. About him whirled other things, small flitting figures ringing him in, in a frenzy of attack. I cut and slashed, felt steel meet flesh and was not sure of what flesh. Then I saw Godgar stumble and go down, and things scurried to leap upon him as he fought to regain his feet. At those things I aimed strokes which sent them flying. Points of angry red sparked about us and I knew them for eyes. But in what faces those eyes were set, I could not see.
Godgar clawed at me and I used my maimed hand to draw him up.
“The pool—break the pool—drown them out—” He lurched from my hold toward the basin, fell there again, fumbling at the stones set in the break. Then I heard a sharp hammering even above the squealing of the things through which I waded to join him. There were sharp pains in my legs and thighs. I shook off a small body which leaped to plaster itself against my back and tried to over-topple me. But I reached Godgar and bent to pry at the stones.
Though we worked in the dark, fighting off the foul smelling rabble which poured out of the earth, yet by some stroke of fortune one of us loosed the main stone of that barrier. There boiled out a flood which surprised me, since I had thought that not so much force would come from a pool fed by such a quiet and sluggish stream.
The squealing of our half-seen enemies rose to screams, as if they looked upon water as a danger even greater than that steel and fire we used against them. They fled, uttering their piercing cries, while the water dashed around us with the force of a strong river current. Surely more poured from there than had ever been pent in the basin.
Godgar cried out and tried to drag me to one side. I looked over my shoulder. Visible, glowing with some of the blue light of the stones, a tall pillar of water rose even higher, its plume crest dashing down in the flood faster and faster. This fountaining had no relation now to the gurgling, puffing bubble which earlier fed the basin.
I saw small shaggy things caught in that overflow, whirled back and down, rammed by the water into the hole from which they must have emerged. For the flood sought the stone Godgar had earlier marked, or rather the dark pit that stone had capped, and now it poured hungrily into that cavity with the activity of a falls feeding a river.
We stumbled yet further back. The torrent of rushing water was now between us and the fire. The noise of its passing drowned all other sound. Something whirled along in it clutched at my leg, nearly toppling me. In instinctive reaction I struck down to free myself from that hold, but not before swift, sharp pain struck into my thigh and brought a cry out of me.
I could not rest my weight upon that wounded leg, but fell back against one of the blue stones, trying to feel in the dark the extent of the damage. But so tender was my flesh, that I could not bear the touch of my own fumbling examination. I could only hold to the rock, Godgar gasping and choking beside me, while the water continued to run from what seemed an inexhaustible source.
There were no more of the squealing things on our side of the stream. Now across the flood the fire flared again so we had a better measure of light. I could see men there and the gleam of swords. On the very edge of the flood, the water licking eagerly at it, lay a body, face turned up and eyes staring sightlessly straight at me.
I heard a cry from Godgar and would have echoed that had I not needed all my strength to cling to consciousness. For the pain from my thigh had become red torment such as no other wound I had ever taken.
The thing was small and twisted, its arms and legs, if those four limbs could be dignified by such human applications, were thin, covered with coarse bristles which made them resemble roots with a matting of finer fibers. In contrast the body was thick and bloated and of a white-gray which grew rapidly paler while we looked upon it. This, too, was covered with hair in shaggy patches, not like any hair I had ever seen on man or beast, but very coarse and upstanding from the hide.
It had very little neck; its skull seemed supported directly by wide bowed shoulders. The jaw and chin, and very little chin there was, jutted forward to a sharp point; the nose was a ridge joined to that vee of jaw, with two openings just above the lips. The eyes were deep sunk on either side of that ridge. It wore no clothing, nor was there any sign it was more than animal . . . yet I knew that it was.
“What is it?” Godgar asked.
“I do not know.” Except, all my instincts told me, that it was one of the servants of evil, as were the Gray Ones and the Rasti.
“Look!” Godgar pointed. “The water—”
That fountain, which had stood so tall and poured forth such a volume of water, was dropping lower and lower as it continued to play. The flood which had cut us from the fire was growing narrower by the moment. I watched the dwindling dully, knowing that if I loosed my hold upon the rock which supported me I would fall. I doubted greatly that I could then rise once again. The river became a runnel; the runnel, a trickle.
“Kemoc!” I heard a cry raised from the fireside and tried to answer. It was Godgar’s shout which brought them to us. With Kyllan’s arm about me I fell forward, not only into his ward, but also into darkness in which pain was lost.
I roused, only too soon, to find Dahaun and my brother in counsel over me. It would seem, I understood with a kind of dreamy unconcern, that the wounds of the Thas—for it was those underground dwellers who had sprung the attack—were poisoned and that, though Dahaun could apply certain temporary measures to alleviate my pain, the healing must take place elsewhere.
I was not the only wounded. There were broken bones from the falling rocks, and several more poisoned cuts among the defenders. But mine was the deepest hurt and the one which might slow our retreat.
Kyllan spoke quickly—saying that he would stay with me until help could be sent. But, catching the look in Dahaun’s eyes, I knew our peril, and, in this dreamy state where her remedies had placed me, I did not fear riding. This much I did foresee: that although the Thas attack had failed, mainly by reason of that extraordinary flood, it would not be the last. To be trapped away from the Valley meant defeat.
“Tie me on Shil.” I managed to get out the words, though those sounded faint and far away in my own hearing. “We ride—or we die—as well we all know.”
Dahaun looked deep into my eyes. “This is your will, Kemoc?”
“This is my will.”
So at dawn we did ride, I bound to Shil as I had said. Dahaun had given me leaves to chew. The sour juices in my mouth were bitter, but they kept that barrier between me and pain, leaving me aware of it yet not subject to its tearing.
We traveled under clouds, still heavy with the storm which did not break. I went as a man might go in a dream, seeing here a bit sharply, there a fraction with a clear mind, then sliding once more into a haze.
It was when we came to the river that I awakened out of that state. Or was awakened—by a mind thrust, so keen, so inimical, that I gasped and tried to right myself on Shil’s back. The Renthan gave a great trumpeting cry, whirled, to race away from our party, down the bank. I could do nothing to control our going. Behind sounded shouts, cries, the pounding of hooves in our wake.
As if he would escape any pursuit, Shil leaped from the bank into the river. Water closed over me as I struggled against the ties which kept me on the back of the plunging Renthan who seemed utterly mad.
Something gave and I was free, gasping and choking.
I had been well taught to swim by Otkell, the crippled Sulcar warrior our father had sent to lesson us. But my wound had made of my left leg a part which would not answer the orders of my mind. Still gasping, choking, I came against a boulder and held to it despairingly. All mist had gone from my mind, and the fierce pain of my wound left me too weak to keep that grasp against the pull of the current.