I was Kerovan. I clutched tightly at that scrap of identity. Where I was I did not know, but who I was—that I could not forget. My decision held defiance.
The pillars became only shadows I passed at a swift, steady pace. Though I heard nothing audible I was aware of a kind of whispering inside my head—small bodiless things pushed and plucked at some protective covering over my thoughts, striving to win an entrance.
Ahead was an intensifying of the light. The radiance, centered at that spot, began to change color, deepening to blue—then fading to a silver that was like a fire for brilliance.
Though I had no sense of my feet pressing any pavement, I sped along as might a runner intent upon his goal. There was a rising excitement in me as if I were indeed engaged in a race and that the end of it, for good or ill, lay just ahead.
That which was so alight was a dais, a point of which extended toward me. I guessed from what I could see that its full shape was that of a star. On that stood what might be an altar wrought of crystal—an altar—or a tomb—for a form rested within.
I reached the point of the star, there to sway dizzily for a moment—forward with the impulse that had borne me here, back when I encountered resistance from the air itself. Perhaps this formed a protection for the sleeper.
He was neither man nor bird; still a part of both species seemed fused in him. Though, as I looked upon him, this unnatural coupling seemed natural and right. His face was avian—provided with a bill-like extension, which was both nose and mouth; wide, if now closed, bird eyes. On his head rose a crest of feathers, which extended, growing smaller, down to his shoulders, then along the upper parts of his arms. However, his feet were not birdlike—rather broad paws showing the tips of mighty talons, which must have been withdrawn into sheaths. On the contrary, however, his hands were a bird’s claws, laced together about the hilt of a sword, unsheathed, unblemished by time, the blade appearing not steel but a rod of light.
All this and yet he was no monster. Rather the same awe that had filled me since I came here intensified. There, surely, lay one who in his own time had been far greater than any of those who call themselves “men.”
Why I had been summoned to this place I did not know, for summoned I was sure I had been. Those whispers in my head grew stronger, battered harder, with an almost frantic intensity as if they had but a little time in which to deliver some message and feared their mission was in vain.
Still I gazed upon the sleeper. More and more it seemed to me that there was something about him that was of the gryphon—that symbol of my House, which also hung imprisoned in crystal in the ball that Joisan wore. He lacked the beast body, the wings—yet his avian face—crested head—paw feet—claw hands—yes, there was a likeness.
That thought opened the door for an instant to the whisperers, for they became audible at last.
“Landisl, Landisl!”
I turned my head back and forth as one does to dislodge buzzing woodsflies, trying to escape that shrilling. Once before I had heard that name—for name it was—but where and when?
Memory opened—I had called it when I had faced the black sorcery of my mother’s and Rogear’s raving, though then it had been so alien that I had not understood.
“Landisl.” My own lips shaped that once . . .
There followed a moment of dark, a twisting and wrenching, as if my body had been seized and jerked out of one life into another. I opened eyes upon light. But it was not the brilliance of the star dais. I blinked and blinked again, stupidly, be-mused . . . There was a fire, born of wood, real, of this world . . .
Standing over me was the chief of those sent by Imgry. Behind him the other men stirred in the early morning light. I felt a surge of rage—I had been so close to knowing – learning . . . This dolt had broken the dream—the first dream that had meant something, from which I might have learned!
I still found difficulty in seeing trees instead of pillars—fire . . . This time I did not lose the details I dreamed. Rather I carried with me, as we got to horse and rode on through the morning mists, a vivid memory of that other place.
In fact, I became more and more sure that that had been no ordinary dream. Instead, part of me, which thought and could remember, had been drawn into another time—or world—where there still did lie the body of the gryphon-man, sleeping or dead.
“Landisl.” I tried to shape that name waking and found that now it was distorted, sounded so unlike, that I caught my tongue between my teeth. Nor did I exchange any words with my companions. I did not even note when they forged ahead, leaving a gap between us.
Finally I summoned resolution and shut the vision or dream back into memory. I had an odd feeling that if I allowed myself to dwell upon it too long, or too often, I might be lost somewhere, between the world in which I now moved and that other place.
I concentrated with determination on what lay about me—the morning’s warmth of sun, the track along which we rode, even the men of our company. My old scouting instinct returned and I was as alert as if I moved on a foray.
Now I wanted to talk, though heretofore I had held aloof from the others, speaking only when spoken to, which was seldom. That the war in the south was in stalemate I gathered from comments I had heard. Our own fighting had become a smattering of raids made by small squads of men. Imgry and his two fellow-leaders were busied about the foraging of weapons, the rebuilding or building of a closer knit army, under tight leadership.
The invaders, also, appeared less aggressive, willing to hold to what they had seized, but making few attempts to enlarge that territory. Two of the men I traveled with had been talking eagerly of a Sulcar ship, which had made a landing to the far south and been met by a scouting party.
Those hardy merchant adventurers had brought news of a second war overseas, one that hampered the plans of Alizon. The Sulcars, always fighters, had taken with them an invitation to come coast raiding if they could, taking toll of the invaders’ captured seaports. Whether anything might come of this loosely discussed alliance no man knew, but the possibility was heartening.
However, we all knew that the Hounds must be defeated in the Dales, and that we alone must face the struggle for freedom. That was dictated, not only by stiff Dale pride, but the fact that we could claim no other allies—having always been a lone people living much to ourselves.
Or were we alone? I looked to the west as that thought stirred in my mind. In the beginning, generations ago, the Dalesmen had come up from the south. We are a legend-loving people with our songsmiths ever ready to blow up a small encounter into an epic battle. Oddly enough, though, we had no tales of our race that reached farther back than our coming into High Hallack. That our fathers then built well-fortified keeps here suggested they had left behind turmoil and trouble.
What they had fled from we do not know. We are not nomads by nature. Each lord kept his fort-keep snug, trained his sons to war as a matter of course. Yet we had faced no threat, until the coming of Alizon, that was more than a brush with outlaws, a kin feud between one Dale and the next.
Our people had come, however, into a haunted land. The Old Ones (and how many races and kingdoms there had been of them we shall never know) had already withdrawn. They left behind them numerous traces of their own, alien to humankind. There are places where no man dares venture, not only for his life’s sake, but also because of a threat to his spirit. Other places are known to welcome, bring peace and healing. Some of our blood sought out what small secrets they could uncover, but that lore was often baffling.
However, though the Old Ones had left coast and Dales for some compelling reason, we are all certain they had not altogether withdrawn from our world. There was the Waste to the west, a vast buffer between us and even more unknown land, full of signs of Power, potent places. We knew well that there was life there—besides the outlaws—perhaps left to spy upon us, perhaps utterly uncaring, since their affairs and desires might be so far removed from those we understood.