Warlock by Andre Norton

Was Turan a pilot? Vintra had no such knowledge. As Ziantha probed she received the impression that such a skill was difficult to learn and required long tutorage. Or was Wamage to serve them so, accompany them on what might be a vain search? Did Turan plan to take the other fully into his confidence? Or did he propose to put a mind-lock on the alien and so bend him to their aid? That she did not believe could be held for any length of time.

Wamage drove on. The lights were fewer. They now passed a line of flyers. He circled at the end of this and stopped by one much smaller craft.

What might have been a torch flashed in the night. Wamage turned off the lights of the ground car and leaned out of the window to call softly:

“Doramus Su Ganthel?”

“To answer, Commander!” came swift answer.

“You have done well.” Turan spoke for the first time since they had left the palace. “My thanks to you, battle comrade.”

“It is in my mind that perhaps I have done ill,” Wamage replied, a tired, heavy note in his voice. “I do not know why you must do this thing—” He had half hitched about in his seat. “Lord Commander, this woman is your deadliest enemy. She is Vintra who swore before the Host of Bengaril to have your head on the tri-pole of rebel victory. Yet now—”

“Now, by the will of Vut, she serves me as no other can. Think you of where I have just come from, Wamage. If she wanted me dead would I not have remained there?”

“The High Consort speaks of sorcery—”

“For her own ends, and that you also know, Wamage. Was it not you who warned me of her, not once, but twice and more? I tell you that when I return all which puzzles you now will be resolved. But if I do not go—then between the High Consort and the priests I will indeed be returned to whence I came and that with haste.”

Wamage sighed so heavily Ziantha could hear him. “That I cannot doubt, Lord Commander, having heard what I have heard. But if there is a third choice—”

“For my safety, Wamage, in this hour there is not! And above all what I must do now must be speedily done. The longer I waste here—the more chances there are for failure—”

He stepped out of the vehicle, and Ziantha made speed to follow him. The waiting armsman came to them.

“At your service, Lord Commander. What is your will?”

“To fly to the south coast where there is a place we may not be seen. This is of high importance, and it must be done with speed. You are a pilot?”

“Of my father’s personal craft, Lord Commander. But a scout—I have not flown one—” He was beginning when Turan interrupted him.

“Then you shall gather air time in one tonight. Battle comrade”—he turned now to Wamage—”for what you have done this night I can never give thanks enough. You have indeed saved my life, or at least lengthened it. Let that always be remembered between us.”

“Let me go with you—” Wamage put out a hand as if to clutch Turan’s arm.

“I leave you for a rear guard, one to cover me. It is a hard thing I ask of you—”

“But nothing that I will not do. Guard your back, Lord Commander!”

Ziantha was aware he watched her as he delivered that warning.

“Be sure I do,” Turan answered.

They climbed aboard the strange flyer, and with the armsman for pilot the machine came to vibrating life, swung around, and ran along the field, until Ziantha was sure there was trouble and it would not lift.

With a bounce it did, and she felt queasy as she never had in a flitter. In the cramped cabin she could feel the vibration through her body. And it seemed to her that flying in this Forerunner world was a more rigorous experience than she had been accustomed to.

“It is fortunate, Lord Commander,” their pilot said, “that these scouts have instant clearance from the field with no questioning by the control tower. Else—”

“Else we would have had a story for them,” Turan said. “Now we can rather plan on landing. Listen well, for much depends upon this. You must set us down in a place as near to the sea as you can take this flyer. And it must be done with as little chance of discovery as possible. We are seeking a source of power, something which lies on an island and to which we have a single pointer. With this—with this—” Turan had hesitated and then began again, “I can promise the future will be changed.”

But he did not say whose future. Ziantha smiled in the dark. Turan’s—the real Turan’s influence must be great—or had been great that he could bind these two men to his purposes. Though Wamage had had his doubts. Perhaps a sensitive in this civilization where the power was apparently so little known could apply pressure without even realizing it. Though she knew that if there was need she could control the armsman for a short time as she had Wamage.

“There is the Plateau of Xuth, Lord Commander. It—it has such an evil reputation that not many seek it out, not since the days of Lord Commander Rolphri, though that is all countryman’s talk—”

Countryman’s talk, maybe—Ziantha caught a hint or two of what lay in his mind as he spoke—but he believes it holds a threat. I pick up fear which is not of other men but of something strange. If Turan caught that also he would seem to discount it, for he replied promptly:

“Xuth is to our purpose. You can pilot us there?”

“I believe so, Lord Commander.”

“Well enough.” Turan had edged a little forward in his place. He was intent upon what the armsman was doing, and Ziantha knew that he was striving to pick up from the other the art of flying this ancient machine.

Had the alien mind-patterns been easier to contact he would have had no difficulty. But having to make allowances for constant disruption of mind-touch, his concentration must be forced to a higher level. Without his asking she began to feed him power, give him extra energy. Nor did she cease to marvel at his great endurance.

They did not speak again. Perhaps their pilot thought they slept. Once or twice they saw the riding lights of what must be other aircraft, but none came near, nor did there appear to be any pursuit. However, doubt nibbled at Ziantha’s confidence. Surely they could not have got away from Singakok and the High Consort as easily as this!

The night sky grayed; they were coming into day. Dawn and then the full sunrise caught them. For the first time in hours the armsman spoke:

“The sea, Lord Commander. We turn south now to Xuth.”

Turan was half collapsed in his seat. Ziantha regarded him with rising concern. His look of fatal illness was heightened by the sunlight. Could he last? And this was so faint a hope they followed— She fought the fear that uncoiled within her, began to seep coldly through her body.

“Xuth, Lord Commander. I can set down, I think, along this line.”

In spite of her resolution Ziantha closed her eyes as the nose of the flyer tilted downward and the machine began a descent. It seemed so vulnerable, so dangerous, compared to the flitters that she could only hope the pilot knew what he was doing and they were not about to crash against some unyielding stretch of rock.

The machine touched ground, bounced, touched again with a jar that nearly shook Ziantha from her seat. She heard a gasp from Turan and looked to him. The gray cast on his face was more pronounced; his mouth was open as if he were gasping for breath. Although the flyer ran forward, the pilot’s tension suggested he was fearing some further peril.

They stopped and the pilot exhaled so loudly she could hear him. “Fortune has favored us, Lord Commander.”

Ziantha looked out. Ahead was only emptiness, as if they were close to the edge of some cliff, a deduction which proved true as they climbed out into a brisk, whipping breeze and the full sun of midmorning.

Beyond, Ziantha could hear the wash of sea surf, though there was more distance between the shore and the flyer than she had earlier believed. The pilot had landed on what was an amazingly level stretch of rock running like an avenue between tall monoliths and crags of rock.

There was no vegetation to be seen, and those standing stones were of an unrelieved black, though the surface on which they stood was of a red-veined gray rock. A sudden sobbing wail brought an answering cry from her, as she whirled about to face the direction from which that had come.