Her gaze followed the traces of the two paths down into the foothills to the fore, where the knolls shielded the trailheads from her sight. The ways seem to be coming together, mayhap even to join.
Sighing, Liaze took a bearing on where she thought the routes might begin, and then she trudged back down to the horses below.
As dusk came upon this bleak land, Liaze made camp in a narrow canyon and well out of the wind. Just ahead, the canyon branched, one way leading up and to the right, the other unto the left.
That night she slept well, for only faint traces of the constant blow reached down into the rift.
The next morning, Liaze walked away from her campsite and took the cleft to the right. She searched for traces of what might have been a rider passing this way. The trail itself was fairly smooth, yet the well-packed pathway showed no sign of hoofprints: there were no dimples, no impressions, no pocks whatsoever.
Liaze returned to the split and walked the left-hand way. Here the trail was even more hard-packed, and stones littered the way, and Liaze despaired of finding Wait!
Liaze stooped and looked at one of the fist-sized rocks. Its color was darker than that of the stones nearby. She turned it over. It’s lighter on what was its down side.
She turned over a nearby rock of nearly the same size. And this one is darker on its bottom. Mayhap…
Liaze continued onward, and she found several more stones that looked as if they had been turned over. Perhaps the hooves of a horse kicked these loose as a rider rode this way.
Liaze looked up the twisting path and beyond to the col on high and sighed. Just my luck: he picked the harder way, and the sinister one at that. Then she smiled. Though if it were Luc on his way to the Autumnwood, going opposite would have been dextral for him.
Liaze walked back to the animals and saddled Pied Agile and Deadly Nightshade and tied on their gear, and then she laded the packhorses with the goods. Mounting up, she said to the steeds, “Brace yourselves, mes amis, we’ve a long climb ahead.”
Liaze heeled Pied Agile in the flanks, and up the canyon and into the left-hand slot she rode, the horses on tethers behind, all the animals calmer today-even the stallion-for they had spent a night out of the wind.
Up the twisting way they went, at times in the lee of the broad shoulders of the slopes, at other times exposed to the hurtling blow, which became fiercer the higher they went. And the climb was rugged and stony, the way quite difficult in places, especially at twisting turns, where the rocks seemed to have piled up in the corners.
At times, Liaze switched off from Pied Agile to Nightshade. At other times she walked and led the animals, the packhorses limiting the pace, for they were never relieved of their burdens, as were the stallion and mare.
Often, Liaze stopped to give them all a breather, and she watered them and fed them some grain-especially the pack animals-to keep up their flagging energy. And then she would continue.
As the sun neared the zenith, Liaze afoot entered a long slot leading to the crest of the col. “Ah, my friends, we are nearly over the top. But I think walking downslope will not be much easier, for making a long descent is almost as difficult as the opposite.”
And out of the fierce wind, on upward toward the summit of the way they went. And just as they reached the crest The ground trembled, and there came a great loud grinding of stone on stone, and a massive slab slid out across the way, and rock clattered down the slope beyond, while at the same time, from arear there came another heavy grinding, and a rattle of stone cascading down the pathway behind.
Even as the horses skitted and shied, Liaze quickly set an arrow to string and looked about for the foe who had sprung this trap. Yet she saw none whatsoever, only two giant blocks barring the way, just as would immense stone gates. And then she gasped in surprise, for these weren’t truly great rough slabs of granite, but had the look of giant hands.
And then to the right a huge stony eye opened in the massif, and, grating and rumbling like an enormous wedge of rock sliding on rock, a deep voice said, “Urrum, hmmm, another one disturbs.” And a second eye opened in the mountainside.
18
Her gaze scanning the precipitous rise, Liaze looked for the one who had spoken, yet the only things she saw were the two great stony eyes and, directly below them, a slender, deep crack running horizontally across the sheer rock for some six feet or so.
Even as she looked on, again came the grinding and gravelly voice, its words ponderous: “I have you now… and you will not pass as easily as the other one did.”
Liaze’s eyes narrowed, and she looked into the shadows of the cleft, for it seemed as if that were the place the voice had come from, yet she could see no one within-no tiny Sprite, no Twig Man, no one. Is it possible that the mountain itself is “What other one?” she asked.
There was a long pause, as if whoever the speaker was, he was mulling over his answer. At last came the reply: “The one with the stone.”
Indeed, the voice is coming from that cleft.
Liaze relaxed her draw. “What stone?”
Another long pause, then, “The one he bore.”
“Who is it you speak of?” asked Liaze.
There came a low grumble, like that of a distant slippage of heavy stones. It went on for a while, but finally, “I know not his name,” came the slow reply, “but he had one of those things that you have six of. What do you call them?”
“Six things?” Liaze looked about.
The mountainside creaked, and a scatter of pebbles rattled down into the path. The great flinty eyes slowly turned somewhat leftward.
“There with you. About the size of minor boulders.”
“Oh.” Liaze waved at the animals. “The horses?”
Another distant rumble sounded for a while. “That is as good a name as any. He, too, had a black, um, horse… much like the one you have.”
Liaze’s heart jumped. “Did he wear a metal shirt and a metal cap and carry a metal horn like this one?” She held up Luc’s silver trump.
Slowly, grinding, the eyes turned toward Liaze, the flinty gaze to at last come to rest upon her. “Yes… It was but a short pebble cascade ago when he came across.”
“Oh, Lord Montagne, it was my Luc,” said Liaze. “It must have been when he was on his way to my realm… back whence I came. Did he recently return this way? Oh, I must find him, and I could use your help, Lord Montagne, if you have any to give.”
As she waited for the answer, she returned her arrow to its quiver and her bow to its saddle sheath.
At length, the being said, “Many things spill out of you all at once, as if in avalanche… Indeed… avalanche…”
Liaze waited, and just as she feared there would be no answer to her questions, the stone being said, “Yes, he went down the way you came… No, he has not yet come back this way.”
At these words, Liaze’s heart fell. Even so, she knew that only by wild chance would the witch in her flight have flown through this pass, dragging the shadowy hand after, Luc in its grip.
Again there came a rumble, and she realized that the mountain was yet responding to her questions. “Rrr… I have seen him but once, and though I tried, I could not stop him, for he bore the stone… He passed through without giving me my due.”
“He bore what stone?”