I was awakened by a sense of presence. Or maybe it was a noise and a sense of presence. Whatever, I was awake and I was certain that I was not alone. I tightened my grip on Grayswandir and opened my eyes. Beyond that, I did not move.
A soft light, like moonlight, came in through the cavemouth. There was a figure, possibly human, standing just inside. The lighting was such that I could not tell whether it faced me or faced outward. But then it took a step toward me.
I was on my feet, the point of my blade toward its breast. It halted.
“Peace,” said a man’s voice, in Thari. “I have but taken refuge from the storm. May I share your cave?”
“What storm?” I asked.
As if in answer, there came a roll of thunder followed by a gust of wind with the smell of rain within it.
“Okay, that much is true,” I said. “Make yourself comfortable.”
He sat down, well inside, his back against the righthand wall of the cave. I folded my blanket for a pad and seated myself across from him. About four meters separated us. I located my pipe and filled it, then tried a match which had been with me from the shadow Earth. It lit, saving me a lot of trouble. The tobacco had a good smell, mixed with the damp breeze. I listened to the sounds of the rain and regarded the dark outline of my nameless companion. I thought over some possible dangers, but it had not been Brand’s voice which had addressed me.
“This is no natural storm,” the other said.
“Oh? How so?”
“For one thing, it is coming out of the north. They never come out of the north, here, this time of year.”
“That’s how records are made.”
“For another, I have never seen a storm behave this way. I have been watching it advance all day — just a steady line, moving slowly, front like a sheet of glass. So much lightning, it looks like a monstrous insect with hundreds of shiny legs. Most unnatural. And behind it, things have grown very distorted.”
“That happens in the rain.”
“Not that way. Everything seems to be changing its shape. Flowing. As if it is melting the world — or stamping away its forms.”
I shuddered. I had thought that I was far enough ahead of the dark waves that I could take a little rest. Still, he might be wrong, and it could just be an unusual storm. But I did not want to take the chance. I rose and turned to the rear of the cave. I whistled. No response. I went back and groped around.
“Something the matter?”
“My horse is gone.”
“Could it have wandered off?”
“Must have. I’d have thought Star’d have better sense, though.”
I went to the cavemouth but could see nothing. I was half-drenched in the instant I was there. I returned to my position beside the left wall.
“It seems like an ordinary enough storm to me,” I said. “They sometimes get pretty bad in the mountains.”
“Perhaps you know this country better than I do?”
“No, I am just traveling through — a thing I had better be continuing soon, too.”
I touched the Jewel. I readied into it, then through it, out and up, with my mind. I felt the storm about me and ordered it away, with red pulses of energy corresponding to my heartbeats. Then I leaned back, found another match and relit my pipe. It would still take a while for the forces I had manipulated to do their work, against a stormfront of this size.
“It will not last too long,” I said.
“How can you tell?”
“Privileged information.”
He chuckled.
“According to some versions, this is the way that the world ends — beginning with a strange storm from out of the north.”
“That’s right,” I said, “and this is it. Nothing to worry about, though. It will be all over, one way or the other, before too long.”
“That stone you are wearing… It is giving off light.”
“Yes.”
“You were joking about this being the end, though — were you not?”
“No.”
“You make me think of that line from the Holy Book — The Archangel Corwin shall pass before the storm, lightning upon his breast… You would not be named Corwin, would you?”
“How does the rest of it go?”
“… When asked where he travels, he shall say, ‘To the ends of the Earth,’ where he goes not knowing what enemy will aid him against another enemy, nor whom the Horn will touch.”
“That’s all?”
“All there is about the Archangel Corwin.”
“I have run into this difficulty with Scripture in the past. It tells you enough to get interested, but never enough to be of any immediate use. It is as though the author gets his kicks by tantalizing. One enemy against another? The Horn? Beats me.”
“Where do you travel?”
“Not too far, unless I can find my horse.”
I returned to the cavemouth. It was letting up now, with a glow like a moon behind some clouds to the west, another to the east. I looked both ways along the trail and down the slope to the valley. No horses anywhere in sight. I turned back to the cave. Just as I did, however, I heard Star’s whinny far below me.
I called back to the stranger in the cave, “I have to go. You can have the blanket.”
I do not know whether he replied, for I moved off into the drizzle then, picking my way down the slope. Again, I exerted myself through the Jewel, and the drizzle halted, to be replaced by a mist.
The rocks were slippery, but I made it halfway down without stumbling. I paused then, both to catch my breath and to get my bearings. From that point, I was not certain as to the exact direction from which Star’s whinny had come. The moon’s light was a little stronger, visibility a bit better, but I saw nothing as I studied the prospect before me. I listened for several minutes.
Then I heard the whinny once more — from below, to my left, near a dark boulder, cairn or rocky outcrop. There did seem to be some sort of turmoil in the shadows at its base. Moving as quickly as I dared, I laid my course in that direction.
As I reached level ground and hurried toward the place of the action, I passed pockets of ground mist, stirred slightly by a breeze from out of the west, snaking silvery, about my ankles. I heard a grating, crunching sound, as of something heavy being pushed or rolled over a rocky surface. Then I caught sight of a gleam of light, low on the dark mass I was approaching.
Drawing nearer, I saw small, manlike forms outlined in a rectangle of light, struggling to move a great rocky slab. Faint echoes of a clattering sound and another whinny came from their direction. Then the stone began to move, swinging like the door that it probably was. The lighted area diminished, narrowed to a sliver, vanished with a booming sound, all of the struggling figures having first passed within.
When I finally reached that rocky mass all was silent once again. I pressed my ear to the stone, but heard nothing. But, whoever they were, they had taken my horse. I had never liked horse thieves, and I had killed my share in the past. And right now, I needed Star as I had seldom needed a horse. So I groped about, seeking the edges of that stony gate.
It was not too difficult to describe its outlines with my fingertips. I probably located it sooner than I would have by daylight. When everything would have blended and merged more readily to baffle the eye. Knowing its situation, I sought further then after some handhold by which I might draw it. They had seemed to be little guys, so I looked low.
I finally discovered what might have been the proper place and seized hold of it. I pulled then, but it was stubborn. Either they were disproportionately strong or there was a trick to it that I was missing.
No matter. There is a time for subtlety and a time for brute force. I was both angry and in a hurry, so the decision was made.
I began to draw upon the slab once again, tightening the muscles in my arms, my shoulders, my back, wishing Gerard were nearby. The door creaked. I kept pulling. It moved slightly — an inch, perhaps — and stuck. I did not slacken, but increased my effort. It creaked again.