13 KOLDER NEST
TIME WAS hard to measure in this ship’s cell. Simon lay relaxed on a narrow shelf bunk, but still he held to that ribbon of communication which included not only Jaelithe, but now Loyse in a lesser degree. Though the girl no longer shared his quarters, she was present in his mind.
Simon had seen none of his captors since, shortly after this voyage had begun, Aldis appeared and took charge of Loyse, leaving him alone. A second inspection of the narrow cabin had provided some amenities: a bunk which could be pulled out and down from the wall, a sliding shelf on which, from time to time, a tray of food appeared—coming from the wall behind.
The food was emergency rations, he thought, thin wafers without much taste, a small can of liquid. Not appetizing but enough to keep hunger and thirst under control. Otherwise there was no break in the long, silent hours. He did sleep a little while Loyse took over, holding the tie. Simon gathered that she now shared Aldis’ cabin, but that the Kolder agent was leaving her alone, content that she was passive.
Seven, now eight mealtimes. Simon counted them off. But that gave him no reasonable idea of the number of hours or days he had been here under the unchanging glow of the walls. They could be feeding him twice daily, or even once; he could not be sure. This was a period of waiting, and to any man who had depended most of his life upon the stimulation of action, waiting was a harsh ordeal. Only once before had it been so—during a year in jail. Waiting then, warped by the bitterness of knowing that he had been duped into taking punishment for those he hated, he had spent that time striving to work out schemes for repayment.
Now he was facing a blind future without even a good knowledge of the nature of the enemy. All he had was that mental picture from the past of the Kolder leader dying in Gorm, a narrow valley down which strange vehicles dashed while those in them fired back at pursuers. There had been another world for the Kolders and something had gone wrong there.
Somehow they had discovered a “gate” and come through—into this time and place, where the civilization of the Estcarpian Old Race was on the wane, a slow slip into the age-old dust which already rose about Es and the villages and cities of their kind. Along the coast—in Alizon and Karsten—a more barbaric upswing was rooted, newer nations, elbowing aside the Old Race, yet so much in awe of their legendary witches that they dared not quite challenge them—not until the Kolder began to meddle.
And if Kolder was not uprooted, Alizon and Karsten would go the way of Gorm: ingested into the horror of the possessed. Yet Kolder played upon this older enmity and fear to make their future victims their present allies.
The nature of Kolder. Simon began to concentrate upon that. Their native civilization was a mechanical, science-based one—that fact had been amply proven by what they had found in Gorm. The Estcarpian command had always believed that the Kolder themselves must be few in number, that it was necessary for them to have the possessed captives in order to keep their forces in the field. And now that Gorm was gone and Yle evacuated—
Yle evacuated! Simon’s eyes came open, he stared at the ceiling of the cabin. How had he known that? Why was he so very sure that the Kolder’s only stronghold on the coast was now an empty shell? Yet certain he was.
Were the Kolder now drawing in all their forces to protect their base? Kolder manpower—there had been five left dead in Gorm, the majority in their own apartments—not killed by any sword or dart, but as if they had willed their own dying—or some animating spark, common to all, had failed. But five! Could the death of only five so weaken the Kolder cadre that they would have to pull in all their garrisons?
Hundreds of the possessed had died in Gorm. And then there were their agents in Karsten—Fulk—and the others such as Aldis who were still alive and about their business. Not true Kolder, but natives who had come to serve the enemy—not as mindless possessed, but with wit and awareness. Not one of the Old Race could be so bent to Kolder use; that was why the Old Race must go!
Again Simon wondered at whence that emphatic assertion had come. They had known that the Kolder wanted no Old Race captives for their ranks of possessed. They had suspected that this was the reason, but now it was as clear in his mind as if he had had it from Kolder lips.
Heard it? Did the Kolder have their form of communication such as that he now held with Jaelithe and Loyse? That thought shook him. Quickly Simon sent a warning to she who followed and caught her unease in return.
“We are sure of the course now,” she told him.
“Break. Do not send again unless there is great need.”
“Great need . . .” That echoed in his mind, and then Simon became aware that the vibration which had been so steady in the walls about him was muted, humming down scale as if the speed they had maintained was being cut. Had they reached their port?
Simon sat up on the bunk, faced the door. Would they lock him with the same stiff control which had kept him prisoner before? He had no weapons, though some skill in unarmed combat. But he hardly thought that the Kolder would try a scuffle man to man.
He was right, even as the door to the cabin opened, the freeze was on him. He could move—by another’s will—and he did, out into the narrow corridor.
Men there, two of them. But looking into their eyes Simon controlled a shudder only because he could not move save on order. These were possessed, the dead-alive of the Kolder labor horde. One was Sulcar by his fair head, his height; the other of the same yellow-brown skinned race as the officer who had brought Simon on board.
They did not touch him, merely waited, their soulless gaze on him. One turned and started along the passage, the other flattened back against the wall to allow Simon by, and then fell in behind him. Thus, between the two, he climbed the ladder, came out on the surface of the submarine.
Above was an arch of rock. The water lapped sullenly against a waiting quay and Simon saw here a likeness to the hidden port beneath Sippar, evidently a familiar pattern for the enemy. Still moved by remote control he walked ashore on the narrow gangway. There was activity there. Gangs of almost-naked possessed shifted boxes, cleared spaces. They worked steadily, as if each man knew just what was to be done, and the quickest way of doing it.
No voices raised, no talk among the work gang. Simon stalked stiffly behind his guide, the Sulcar bringing up the rear, and no one looked at them. The quay was long and two other subs nosed against it. Being unloaded, Simon noted. Signs of withdrawal from other posts?
Before them were two exits, a tunnel and a flight of stairs to the left. His guide took that way. Five steps and then a waiting cubby. Once they were inside the door closed and they arose in an elevator such as had been in Sippar.
The ride was not long, the door slid open upon a corridor. Sleek gray walls with a metallic luster to their surfaces, outlines of doors, all closed. They passed six, three to a side, before they came to the end of the hall and a door which was open.
Simon had been in the heart center of Sippar and he half expected to see here again the seated Kolder, the capped master at a cross table, all the controls those men had run to hold their defenses tight.
But this was a much smaller room than that. Light, a harsh burst of it, came from bars set in the ceiling in a complicated geometric pattern Simon had no desire to examine closely. The floor had no discernible carpeting, yet it yielded to cushion their steps. There were three chairs, curved back and seat in one piece. And in the center one a true Kolder.
Simon’s guards had not entered with him, but that compulsion which had brought him out of the submarine now marched him forward a step or two to face the Kolder officer. The alien’s smock-like over garment was the same gray as the chair in which he sat, as the walls and the flooring. Only his skin, pallid, bleached to a paper white, broke that general monotone of color. Most of his head was covered by a skullcap, and as far as Simon could see, he had no hair.
“You are here at last.” The mumble of an alien tongue and yet Simon somehow understood the words. Their meaning surprised him a little, one could almost believe that they were not captor and prisoner but two who had some bargain in prospect and needed only to come to a final agreement. Caution kept Simon silent—the Kolder must reveal his game first.
“Did Thurhu send you?” The Kolder continued to study Simon and now the other thought that there was a spark of doubt in that question. “But you are not an outer one!” The doubt flared into hostility. “Who are you?”
“Simon Tregarth.”
The Kolder continued to hold him with a narrowed stare.
“You are not one of these natives.” No question but an assured statement.
“I am not.”
“Therefore you have come from beyond. But you are not an outer one, and certainly not of the true breed. I ask you now—what are you?”
“A man from another world, or perhaps another time,” Simon saw no reason not to tell the truth. Perhaps the fact that he was a puzzle for the Kolder was to his advantage.
“What world? What time?” Those shot at him harshly.
Simon could neither shake his head nor shrug. But he put his own ignorance into words.
“My own world and time. Its relation to this one I do not know. There was a way opened and I came through.”
“And why did you journey so?”
“To escape enemies.” Even as you and yours did, Simon added in his mind.
“There was a war?”
“There had been a war,” Simon corrected. “I was a soldier, but in peace I was not necessary. I had private enemies—”
“A soldier,” the Kolder officer repeated, still appraising him with that unchanging stare. “And now you fight for these witches?”
“Fighting is my trade. I took service with them, yes.”
“Yet these natives are barbarians, and you are a civilized man. Oh, show no surprise at my guess, does not like always recognize like? We, too, are soldiers and our war brought us defeat. Only it has also brought us victory in the end since we are here and we hold that which shall make this world ours! Think you on that, outsider. A whole world to lie thus—” He stretched forth his hand, palm up, and then closed his fingers slowly as if he balled something tangible within his fist. “To serve as you will it! These natives cannot stand against what we have to back us. And—” he paused and then added with slow and telling emphasis, “we can use such a man as you.”
“Is that why I am a prisoner here?” Simon countered.
“Yes. But not to remain a prisoner—unless you will it. Simon Tregarth, March Warder of the south. Ah, we know you all—the mighty of Estcarp.” His expression did not change, but there was a sneer in his voice.
“Where is your witch wife now, March Warder—back with those other she-devils? It did not take her long to learn that you had nothing she cared to possess, did it? Oh, all that passes in Estcarp, Karsten and Alizon is known to us, to the minutest detail it is known. We can possess you if we wish. But we shall give you a choice, Simon Tregarth. You owe nothing to those she-devils of Estcarp, to the wandering-witted barbarians they control with their magic. Has not that witch of yours proved to you that there can be no loyalty with them? So we say—come with us, work in our grand plan. Then Estcarp will lie open for your plucking, your terms—or strike any other bargain you wish. Be March Warder again, do as Estcarp wishes, until the word comes to do otherwise.”
“And if I do not accept?”
“It would be a pity to waste one of your potential. But he who is not with us is against us, and we can always use a strong back, legs, arms to labor here. You have already tasted what we can do—your muscles do not obey you now, and you cannot take a step unless we will it so. This can be used otherwise. Would you care to breathe only by our favor?”
There was a sudden constriction about Simon’s chest. He gasped under that squeezing pressure and panic awoke in him. Less than a second, but the fear did not leave him when he was released. He did not in the least doubt that the Kolder could do as was threatened—keep the air from his lungs, if they chose.
“Why. . . bargain?” he gasped.
“Because the agents we wish cannot be forced. Under such controls you must be constantly checked and watched, you would not so serve our purpose. Accept freely and you will be free—”
“Within your limits,” Simon returned.
“Just so. Within our limits, and that will remain so. Do not believe that you can give assent with your lips and keep to your own purpose thereafter. There will be a change in you, but you will retain your mind, your personality, such of your desires and wishes as fit within the framework of our overall plan. You will not be only flesh to carry out orders as those you term possessed and you will not be dead.”
“And I must choose now?”
The Kolder did not answer at once. Again his expression was blank, but Simon caught a faint tinge of meaning in his voice—threat, uncertainty, maybe one and the same.
“No—not yet.”
He made no signal which Simon could distinguish but the control brought him about, set him walking. No guards this time, but they were not needed. There was no possible way for Simon to break free, and the threat of constriction about his chest was with him still, so that every time he thought of that he had the need to breathe deeply.
Down the corridor, into the elevator again. Up, an open door; the order to move, another hall and another door. Simon went into the room beyond and the control was gone. He turned quickly, but the door was closed and he did not need to try it to know that it would not open.
The harsh, artificial light of the lower room was gone. Two slit windows were open to the day and Simon went to the nearest. He was in a position of some height above a rocky coastline with a sheer descent to water. By side glimpses he got an idea of the building; it must resemble Yle. Not only was the window slit too narrow to climb through, but there was no way down, save that drop straight to the sea-washed rocks.
Simon crossed to the other window. Bare rocks again, not the slightest sign of vegetation—rocks in wind-worn pinnacles, in table mesas, slashed into sharp-walled canyons and drops. It was the most forbidding stretch of natural territory he had ever seen.
Movement. Simon pushed forward as far as he could in the window slit to see what moved in that tormented wilderness of broken rock. A land machine of some sort, not unlike a truck of his own world, though it progressed on caterpillar tracks, which crunched and flattened the surface at a pace, Simon judged, hardly faster than a brisk walk. There were marks on that surface which the machine followed. This was not the first truck which had gone that way, or perhaps not the first trip this one had made in the same direction.
It had a full cargo, and clinging to that lashed-on gear were four men, their ragged scraps of clothing labeling them slave laborers. The machine lurched and jerked so that they held with both hands and feet. That slow crawl inland with a cargo on board. Simon continued to watch until the truck disappeared behind a mesa. It was only then that he turned to examine his new prison.
Monotone color and a bed which was merely a shelf opening from the wall and covered by a puffed, foamy substance. Closed doors of cupboards—a whole row of them. One upon his investigating turned down into a table, another gave him sanitary arrangements as there had been on the submarine. The rest remained tightly closed. It was a room to induce boredom, Simon thought. Perhaps its very monotony was a piece of careful contrivance.
But there was one thing he was sure of: this was the Kolder base. And there was a good chance that they might have him under some form of observation. The fact that he had been released from control might even be because they wished to see how he would use his freedom. Could they suspect the tie? Was he bait in a trap to bring in Jaelithe?
What would the Kolder give to have one of the witches in their hands? Simon thought that under the circumstances they would give a great deal. Suppose that everything—everything—which had happened to him since the awakening in Tormarsh when he had found Jaelithe again had really been of their engineering! He could not be sure it was not.
Yet the Kolder depended upon their machines. They affected to despise the power. So had they any way of detecting what Simon, Jaelithe and Loyse had woven? To contact Jaelithe now . . . would it be right or wrong?
Betrayal or report? He had promised to let her know when he reached the base, give her the news which would eventually summon Estcarp. But how long would it take to bring in that armada? And what could darts and swords or even the power do against the weapons the Kolder must mount here—things which had not perhaps been in Gorm or Yle? Should he call or stay silent?
More movement. A truck crawling back. Was it the same vehicle he had watched depart? But that hardly would have time to unload and this was empty.
Call—or be silent? Simon could no longer use this useless survey of the land as an excuse for not making up his mind. He went to the bed, lay down upon it. A chance—but everything was a chance now, and if this was not betrayal, then he dared not delay.
14 WITCH WEAPON
JAELITHE HAD journeyed on Sulcar ships before, but never into the void of mid-ocean. There was a vast impersonality about the sea which undercut her confidence in herself in a way she had never known before. Only the knowledge that her witchdom had not been swept away was her support. The witches had the reputation of being able to control natural forces. Perhaps on land they could summon up a storm, a mist or weave hallucinations to control the mind. But the sea was a power in itself and the farther the Wave Cleaver sailed the less sure Jaelithe was.
Simon’s fear that they might have awakened the suspicions of the Kolder, oddly enough, steadied her. Men—even the Kolder, alien as they were—she could face better than this rolling immensity of wind-driven wave.
“There is no land reckoned hereby on any chart.”
Captain Stymir had out his rolls of sea maps.
“Have none of your exploring ships ever reached in this direction before?” Jaelithe asked, seeing in his very bewilderment something strange.
Stymir continued to study the top chart, tracing markings with his finger. Then he called over his shoulder, “Pass the word for Jokul!”
The crewman who came in answer to that hail was a small man, bent by the years, his brown face seamed and salt-dried. He walked with a lurch and go and Jaelithe saw his right leg was stiff and a little shorter than the left.
“Jokul,” Stymir flattened the chart with a broad hand, “where are we?”
The smaller man’s head came up. He pulled off a knitted cap so that the wind lay over his tight braids of faded hair, his somewhat large nose pointed into that breeze.
“On the lost trace, Cap’n.”
Stymir’s frown grew the deeper. He studied the filled sails above them as if their billowing had taken on a sinister meaning. Jokul still sniffed that wind, advancing a step or two down the deck. Then he pointed to the sea itself.
“The weed—”
A thread of red-brown on the green, whipped up and down with the rise and fall of the swell, trailed on near to another patch. Jaelithe’s gaze, following that, saw that closer to the horizon there was an all red-brown patch. And the change in the captain’s expression made her break silence.
“What is it?”
He brought his fist down with a thumping blow. “That must be it!” His frown was gone. “This is why—the weed and the lost trace!” Then he turned to her. “If your course leads there, lady, then—” His hands were up and out in a gesture of bafflement.
“What is it?” she demanded for the second time.
“The weed, it is an ocean thing, living on the surface of the waves in these warmer waters. We have known it long and it is common. One may find bits of it washed ashore after any storm. But there is this about the weed—it has been increasing and now the patches have that on them which kills—”
“Kills how?”
Stymir shook his head. “We do not know, lady. A man touches it and it is as if his hands are burned in a fire. The burns spread upon his skin, his body, and afterwards, he dies. It is some poison in the weed—and wherever it floats we no longer go.”
“But if it is in the water and you are on board ship, do you need to fear the touch?” she countered.
“Let a ship touch it and it clings, clings and grows—aboard!” Jokul broke in. “It has not always been so, lady, only for some years now. So the ocean paths it takes we must now avoid.”
“Only lately,” Jaelithe repeated. “Since the Kolder have grown so bold?”
“Kolder?” Stymir stared at the floating weed in open bewilderment. “Kolder—weed—why?”
“The Kolder ships go under the surface of the sea,” Jaelithe pointed out. “How better could they protect their trail than to sow trouble above where any enemy must follow?”
The captain turned to Jokul. “The lost trace—where did it lead?”
“Nowhere that we wished to go,” the crewman answered promptly. “A few barren islands which have nothing. Water, food, people, even the sea birds are scarce there.”
“Barren islands? Are they not on your chart, Captain?”
He flattened out the top one again. “Not so, my lady. But if this is the lost trace, then it may be that we cannot follow it farther. For the nature of the weed is such that first it appears in such strings as yonder, then in patches, as you see farther beyond. These patches thicken, not only in number but in depth, so that they make small islets borne on the sea, and then larger islets, and at last, if anyone has the folly to push in, they are a solid mass. This, too, was not always so. The weed made islands, aye, but not so solid—nor was it death to hunt there. I have harvested crabs for the eating. But now no man goes near that ocean stain. Does it not seem as blood washing from a gaping wound? The very sign of the death it is!”
“If one cannot penetrate so far how does one know of these isles?”
“At first we did not know the danger. A floating ship with dying men on her deck drifted out of the weed. And of those who chanced upon that vessel and went to their rescue five more died because the weed had fastened to her hull and they had brushed against it. So did we learn, lady. If the Kolders have indeed set this defense about their hold, it is one we cannot face unless we work out some plan against the weed.”
The floating weed—Jaelithe had to accept their word upon its danger. The Sulcar kind knew the sea and all its concerns—that was their mystery. The weed . . . But she no longer saw that trail like blood on the sea. Her hands went to her head and she swayed at an imperative summons. Simon!
Simon in the Kolder base—that way—beyond the floating death. They must head into—through—that.
“Simon,” her reply sought him urgently, “there is danger between us.”
“Stay off! Do not risk it.”
Curtain between them now. She could not penetrate that despite frantic efforts. Kolder curtain. Did they know, or was that only usual precautions? Simon!
Jaelithe felt as if she had screamed that name, it was a tearing pain in her throat. But when she opened her eyes Stymir showed no alarm.
“What we seek lies beyond there,” she said dully, pointing to the horizon where rode the weed. “Perhaps they also know that we come—”
“Captain! The weed!” Not a warning from Jokul, but a cry from the mainmast lookout.
One trail—one patch. No! A dozen trails now, all reaching out deadly tendrils for them. Stymir roared orders to bring the ship about, send it backtracking. Jaelithe sped for the cage on mid-deck.
The great white falcon welcomed her with a scream as she clicked open the latch of the cage. She stiffened her arm to support its weight as it hooked its heavy claws about her flesh and bone, sidled out to freedom. Fastened to one of those strong legs was what she sought, a tiny mechanism in a rod which the bird could carry with ease. Jaelithe drew a deep breath, to steady her nerves and quiet the racing of her heart. This was a delicate business and she dared make no mistakes. Her finger nail found the tiny indentation in the rod, and she pressed that in code pattern. The bird in flight would automatically register, on this triumph of the Falconers’ devices, the course and distance. But the tale of the weed was another matter which she must record for the Falconers to decode. That done she carried the bird to the afterdeck, speaking to it softly meanwhile. Falconers’ secrets remained secrets as far as their allies were concerned. How much the bird actually understood Jaelithe could not tell. Whether it was training or bred intelligence which made this falcon superior was a matter for argument. But that it was their only chance to warn the fleet following she knew.
“Fly straight, fly fast, winged one.” She drew a finger down the head as those fierce eyes met hers. “This is your time!”
With a scream the falcon tore skyward, circled the ship once, and then shot as a dart back towards the long-vanished land. Jaelithe turned to the sea. The tendrils of weed advanced, a swelling web of them reaching for the ship. Surely, surely their rapid drawing in upon the vessel was not natural. How could floating weed move so swiftly and with a purpose, as she was sure was happening now. Oh, if she only had her jewel! There was more than hallucinations to be controlled through that. At times of great emergency it could pull upon a central store of energy, common to all the witchdom of Estcarp, and so accomplish tangible results.
But she had no jewel, and what she could use was not the power she had known before. Jaelithe watched the fingers of the weed and tried to think. It lay upon the surface—and so far there were no thick islands such as Stymir had feared. Under the water was safe, but the Wave Cleaver could not go below as did a Kolder ship.
Water gave the stuff support and life. Her fingers moved in a studied pattern on the rail before her. Jaelithe found herself reciting one of the first and earliest of the spells she had ever learned: one to impress upon a child’s mind the base for all “changing.”
“Air and earth, water and fire—”
Fire—the eternal opposition to water. Fire could dry water, water could quench fire. Fire—the word lingered with a small beat in her mind. And Jaelithe knew that beat of old, the sign every witch waited for, the sign-post of a spell ready to work. Fire! But how could fire be the answer on the ocean—a weapon against drifting weed which was poison to what it touched?
“Captain!” She turned to Stymir. He scowled at her as if she was only a distraction in his battle to save his ship.
“Sea oil—you have sea oil?”
His expression changed to one of a man facing a hysterical woman, but she was already continuing.
“The weed, will it burn?”
“Burn—on the water?” His protest was halted as if a thought struck home. “Sea oil—fire!” He connected those with the rapidity of a man who had improvised before in the face of danger. “No, lady, I do not know whether it will burn—but one can try!” He shouted an order.
“Alavin, Jokul, get up three skins of oil!”
The skins of thick oil, skimmed from the boil off langmar stems, kept for use in storms, were brought to the deck and Stymir himself made the small cuts on their upper surfaces before they were lowered on lines to drag behind the Wave Cleaver. The oil began to ooze forth some distance from the ship.
It showed as a distinct stain on the waves, spreading as the leaking bags were rolled and mauled by the force of the waves. When that dark shadow made a goodly streak, one of the marines went aloft. His dart gun had been checked by Stymir and a round dozen in the clip load were the burst-fire type, used to set aflame an enemy’s rigging and sails.
They watched the patch eagerly. The strings of weed had reached it, had pushed on so that weed was discolored. There was a burst of eye-searing white fire on one of those soggy tendrils. Soaring flames licked along the oil slick—from more than one place now as the marksman placed his darts.
Smoke rose in a haze and the wind drove to them a stench to set them coughing. Flames roared higher and higher. Stymir laughed.
“More than oil feeds that! The weed burns.”
But would more than just the oil-soaked tendrils burn? That was the important question now. Unless those branches of weed ignited and the fire spread to the other patches, they had not gained more than a small measure of time, a very small measure.
If she only had the jewel! Jaelithe tensed, strained against the bond of impotence. Her lips moved, her hands cupped as if she did hold that weapon. She began to sing. No one had ever understood why the gems worked to focus the magic wrought by will and mind.
If their secret had once been known to her people, it lay so far back in the dim corridor of their too-long history as to be buried in the dust of ages. The making of the jewel itself, the tuning of it to the personality of she who was to wear it, probably for the rest of her life, that they could do. And the training of how to use it properly, that was also a matter of lessoning. But why it worked so and who first discovered this means . . .
The archaic words of her chant meant nothing now either. Jaelithe only knew that they had to be used to raise the power within her, make it flood her body, and then flow outward. And, though she had no jewel, she was doing now what she would have done had it lain on her palm, pulsating with her song.
She was no longer aware of the captain, of the crew, even visual and tactile contact with the ship was gone. Although no mist born of magical herbs and gums wreathed her in as it must for the difficult raisings, Jaelithe was as blind as if she was so enfolded. And all the will which seethed within her body, had been bottled in her since she laid aside the witch gem, was thrust at the fire, as if she held a spear within her two hands and aimed it at the centermost point of the flames.