Horn Crown

18

Thus they fronted each other—Light and Dark. Though Iynne and I were not part of this meeting, I understood, through that path to the past which had opened within my mind, that this was no new struggle. In this haunted land there had long been a swing of the balance, favoring now the Light, again the Dark; and I knew that the coming of my own people might well set it once more atilt and so bring forth such warfare as man of the kin could not conceive.

Gunnora—her spell held for me; I would ever, I realized, cleave to that which she ruled—for she had brought part of me alive. Part of me—the rest—that was liege to Kurnous, the Horn-Crowned Lord. I was sworn to him by my own desire, and did not regret that choice. In him there appeared that quality which I had seen in the Bard Ouse, opener of gates, and in the Sword Brothers. At that moment I began to wonder if all our journey had honestly been a matter of choice, or had we, in some manner, been summoned into this world, that we might supply the opportunity to rebalance again the immortal scales.

How did the gifts and talents of these who confronted each other appear? Did they indeed need others, outside their own kin and kind, outside their knowledge, to bring about the proper time and place, the action for rebalancing? This was largely a forsaken land; had the numbers of the Old Ones become so few that now they would struggle against each other for possession of those of our own blood?

As I thought this there was speech between them. I put my arm about Iynne, for she had half fallen against me as if her legs could no longer support her; her strength might have been sucked away to feed the greedy need for power that abided here. Raidhan’s bony arms dropped to her sides, hidden in the black sleeves of her robe. The winged woman’s grimace became more pronounced. She spat and the spittle landed close to the feet of the shining figure who was her opposite—whose brilliance was too much for mortal eyes to pierce.

“It is again the hour—”

Did that ring in my ears or, rather, did the words marshal within my head? Kurnous spoke as he moved a pace toward the beast-man. “You have challenged, Cuntif—so I answer. Your gate is not about to open again!”

His opponent snarled. “But you have opened gates in plenty, wearer of horns. Now you bring others into the game—was that not forbidden of old?” He pointed directly at me. “Because the blood has grown thin, the heroes have all died, you summon these lesser ones and strive to fashion new liegemen. That is against the Oath—”

“Against the oath? When you would have made use of him—or your companion would have. Who summoned him with the cup—to put that to a foul purpose? We shall have no devil child born in Arvon!” It was Gunnora who spoke before her tall companion. “And you, Raidhan— your trap is sprung, your victim has been brought forth out of that bondage of deceit you wove. She is still a maid, in spite of your enchantments, and no vessel for evil.”

From the shining one came lilting notes, like the clear song of a bird—a wondrous trilling which made the heart glad to her. She, who was the gross parody of that presence, hunched her shoulders, allowed the tips of her wings to trail among the tall growing grass.

“Yes, the gates have opened,” the Horn-Crowned Lord said calmly. “When there comes a time for the shifting of forces, then we must summon those who can be aroused. From these so called there may be a new beginning. We have been long alone in a deserted land. Not all can we deal with—but there is always fertile ground waiting for the right seed. They shall be given their choice, and that shall be freely made, as is the right of all living things.”

“That girl has chosen!” Raidhan pointed a bone-thin finger at Iynne.

I tightened my grip more on Garn’s daughter. She was not going to that infamous three.

“Not freely, not with true understanding,” countered Gunnora. “Do you think I do not know how you entrapped her? She has not within her that spark which should have flared of itself for a real choice. Look you, is that not so?” She turned a little toward the two of us and held out her hand.

I felt such a hot desire that I thought I might sway as I stood. But Iynne cried out as one stricken by a sharp blow, slipped about in my hold, to press her face against my shoulder. She might be turning from a sight she could not bear to look upon.

“You would have used her—not by her true choice!” There was pity in Gunnora’s eyes. “You would have brought about the Great Secret coupling between your evil forces and an empty one—debased that which is of the Light!”

Once more she looked to the crone. “Three we are, nothing in the Lore binding can make it otherwise. But also we are pledged, you, I, Dians, to keep the faith—or there will be a reckoning.”

“Once before,” Kurnous took up that attack of words, “there was the strife of Light and Dark—there followed death, in spite of deeds for good. Harm and destruction rent wide this land and we were near spent—near banished because of it. Freedom of choice must remain.”

“I have my place, my power, you cannot deny me!” flared the beast-man.

“Have I denied that? Freedom of choice. Those you can openly win—they shall be your liegemen, for there shall be that within them which can only answer to your call. These two have chosen—”

“She has not! You yourself have said it!” Raidhan snarled at Gunnora.

“In her way she has. She is not of those who can be touched because their minds closed to us. Ensorcellment is forbidden; those who come wish it more than their other lives. Call her now without those spells!” ordered Gunnora.

The crone’s expression was as thunderous as the heaviest of storms. I saw her sleeves flutter as if her arms moved, but she made no ritual gesture. Perhaps she was forced to accept the truth of what my amber lady said.

“You see?” There was an odd note in Gunnora’s voice—could it have been a tinge of pity? Did she feel a little warmth for this twisted, wasted, ugly female creature? “What was done, must now be undone— Now!”

There was a force about her, a deepening of the warm gold light which I saw outline her figure. A point of this swept out like a well-aimed dart. I saw the crone stumble back a step. Her face was truly venomous. Her mouth twisted as if she wished to spit poison in return.

Then her shoulders drooped. If she could have taken on a heavier burden of years, she would have done so at that moment. Her hands arose, jerkily. I could sense her own will fighting a stronger force she could not withstand. This was not Gunnora’s doing—the division lay within herself, bringing her back into balance against all her Rival for more power of her own.

She spoke, four words—those rumbled, thundered. I fell as if both earth and sky answered with a shifting, as if two worlds overlapped for the space of a breath. Then we were once more in a single time and place.

I held—nothing! Iynne was gone, leaving empty space between my arm and my body. Then I cried out and Gunnora looked to me quickly.

“Have no fear for her, she has been returned to her own people. Nor will she remember. That she does not carry within her a dread child which would have been a bane for all of us—that is because you stood firm. Be glad!”

“You have not won!” The beast-man roared, his voice promising blood and savage death. “This is not the end—”

Kurnous shook his crowned head. “Neither of us can ever win. You will continue to try through the years to gain your will, but there will, in turn, always be one to stand against you—the balance will remain.”

“Not forever!” The beast-man swung his arm across his body in a furious gesture of repudiation.

He was gone!

The crone showed a straggle of yellow teeth in a sneer. “Not forever,” she repeated in turn. Her black sleeves whipped about her body as if there were a wind blowing, though I did not feel it, and it did not even ruffle the grass where she stood. Enwrapped in the blackness which covered her spare body, she dwindled until she was like a sere leaf which that wind carried away with it into nothingness.

Now the winged woman gave a harsh cry, unfurled her pinions, and leaped high into the air. Then she too sped away across the sky, the shining one flying after her.

The other two turned to face me fully. Enough remained in me of the earlier, more youthful, unfinished Elron so that I asked:

“The Dark is then loosed to work its way here? What then, will be the fate of the clansmen?”

“No land is all light without dark. For if there is no dark how could the light be judged and desired?” Kurnous asked in turn. “As it has been said—this is a near-empty land. There will be born among those who came with you some who are open to us—light and dark. Choices will be fully theirs. Others shall remain unknowing, for they will be of another kind and not seekers—”

I thought now of the presence in the Black Tower and it seemed to me that good might well be termed evil if such was allowed to have its way with its foul lures—without hindrance of those who might help.

“Not without hindrance—”

I began to believe that there was no need of speech between us. This was the lord I had chosen indeed and by that choice I would live from this hour on. Still there might come times when I would be troubled, when it would seem that good could do much and yet did not.

“Power—it rests upon the balance of power,” Kurnous continued. “Do you not understand that whoever gathers too much power, be it of the Light or the Dark, tips the scales and only chaos will fill the land? We learned that lesson long ago—and found it hard learning. This land was once great and strong until the balance was upset. Rebuilding will take very long—and many times that will seem beyond the strength of those who attempt it. They will try—for in your people lie the seeds. You will grow beyond your own belief that such can be achieved.”

Some part of me knew the truth of his speech. Yet human impatience remained.

“My lady Iynne is truly safe?”

“She will awake in the same place from which she was taken. Raidhan laid there a snare at the coming of your people. But her purpose was defeated because when she summoned the cup, you, who had set your mark already upon it, came also. For this lifetime it is yours,” Gunnora said. There was a difference about her. That overwhelming impact which she had on me appeared to have ebbed. I could look upon her and feel content, happy in a way I had not known before, but that fiery longing no longer moved me. I saw her smile.

“Not now—that is a hunger you shall know, yes, but in the proper time and with the proper one who will share it.”

“Gathea—and Gruu?”

There was no smile on Kurnous’s face. Rather he looked at me as if surveying a liegeman about to go into battle, to make sure that his man was properly armed, well prepared.

“The cup is yours, the rest must lie with you. Again free choices—for you both. Do you choose to face a trial knowing that may be denied? Or do you accept what will come—good or ill.”

I did not understand what he would tell me. But I had an answer for what I wanted most myself.

“Gathea—Gruu—they may need me. I would go to them.”

“Very well, so you have chosen. Go then and do what your heart tells you to do!”

It was no whirlwind which bore me away, nor any wings set on my shoulders. Rather there came a moment of dark when I believed I was back with the Presence—in that place where no light ever reached. Then came light—moonlight once more, as if the day were left behind.

Before me was a Moon Shrine. Not that of the dales, nor that sinister place in which Raidhan an had tried to muster her helpers for foul witchery. This had a brightness of pure light—perhaps another part of the balance—standing to equal that other shrine where Iynne had waited defoulment and death of spirit.

She whom I sought was before the altar stone, and her body was silver white, for she had thrown aside all clothing, bathing in the radiance, drawing to her the power alive in this place. In the air above the altar stone hung a column of brilliance, veiling a figure I could hardly see.

Arms upheld, Gathea worshipped, her eyes closed, yearning open and avid in her face. My fingers went to buckles, to latchings. I put from me, first the trappings of war and death, and then all else so that I, too, had only the light, the light and the cup, and with it, as memory stirred and impulse ordered, that leaf of the forest woman.

As I moved to the shrine the light gathered thick before me. I felt it resist me, that resistance also attacking my mind—offering a sharp protest, a denial of what I carried, of what I would do. There arose out of the light, where he had been lying across the space between the two pillars before me, the silver body of Gruu. His lips wrinkled back in a soundless snarl of warning.

Then his eyes, as brilliant as any gems in that strong light, rested on the cup, before again meeting mine. Out of what had awakened in me I spoke to him mind to mind, reassuring that cat, who was more than cat, his place in my life which would be ours for the future.

“This is my right—and her choice.”

So Gruu moved aside and I entered into the Moon Shrine.

So much power! It beat against me, I could feel the cool pressure of it against my skin. My flesh prickled as if tormented by thorns. I felt an urge to hurl myself forth, but I took one step and then the next. The cup I held at the height of my heart, the leaf warm in my other hand.

Gathea turned suddenly, as if some warning or uneasiness had struck through the serene sorcery which filled this place. I saw her eyes widen. She raised a hand to ward me off.

But I knew what was to be done, I had made my choice—hers lay yet before her. I dropped the leaf into the hollow of the cup. It lay solid for only a second or two, then it melted, swirling down and then up, to near fill the cup—the bounty of nature herself summoned to bless this hour.

As a liegeman might do in high ceremony before his lady I went down on one knee. Was there a slight feeling of pressure on my head? Light indeed—yet I was ready for the crown—though that would not be of my summoning.

Gathea pointed a finger at me.

“Go!” There was force, was it also colored by a faint fear. That command heightened the pressure on me. If she held firm I could well be swept from this place, and neither of us would ever be whole. Always we would know a lack to keep us hungered until we passed through the last Gate of all.

“Dians!” When I had not obeyed, Gathea turned again to the altar, to that pillar of light above it.

I could see, but not clearly (I do not think any man would ever see that presence as she was). But there was the shadow of a slender maiden there. The face she wore, misty as it was, had a kinship to Gathea’s—closed, proud, keeping to vows which held against the fullness of life.

“Dians!” the girl cried again.

The face grew colder, showing a ghost of enmity. I remembered out of my newfound knowledge that Dians could kill a man who tempted or forced one of her maidens against that maiden’s will.

I called upon nothing, no one. This struggle I must win for myself.

“Dians!” Was there a questioning rather than a foreboding in Gathea’s voice now?

There formed above the cup, spiraling upward from the leaf’s bounty, a golden mist—the color of Gunnora’s harvest robe. Then that became amber and there was a heady fragrance to fill the space between us.

“Dians—” Gathea did not call; she murmured. Now she half turned from that silver figure to look at me. I spoke and my words came from a ritual older than a time any of my race could reckon:

“The field awaits the seed, the Power of the Lady opens the field to the seed. There comes the other to whom is given the duty of awakening—that the harvest may follow—that it may be for the nourishment of body, mind and spirit.”

Gathea came to me, one reluctant step and then another. The struggle was plain to read in her face. I held the cup, waiting. Choice, the choice was hers—I would not bring it to her, she must come to me—willingly.

For a long moment she stood so close that I might have stretched out my hand to touch her soft flesh. Only that was not the way. Yes, the power passed from man to maid—from new-made woman back to man. Only when the pattern was done so would the whole be greater than the parts. Still, the choice was Gathea’s.

“Dians—” a fleeting whisper. Around us the silver light pulsed, now hot, now cold, as if the struggle which was within Gathea was measured thus.

She was looking deeply into my eyes. Nothing passed between us. I do not know what she sought to see, or if she could indeed find it. Slowly her hands arose from where they hung by her sides, and—Would she dash the cup from me? Or was her choice otherwise?

Above mine her fingers curled around the bowl of the goblet, curled and held. Then she lifted it out of my grasp. As she took it, I stooped a little more and touched her white feet, the old words ready on my tongue:

“Those who seek shall also find, and rich shall be the treasure found. In the Maiden lies the Queen, and in the Lady’s name do I salute her, even as I salute thee.”

I raised my hands and laid them to where her slender thighs joined her body:

“In the Maiden awaits the fulfillment of the harvest. In the Lady’s name so I salute thee.”

Rising to my feet, I touched her small, firm breasts.

“In the Maiden stands another who cometh forth when the time is ripe. In the Lady’s name do I salute thee.”

Gathea held the cup level now between my lips and hers. In her eyes there was an awakening wonder—a change.

I drank from the cup she proffered, and then she drank also. Between us the cup was empty and she tossed it from her. It did not fall to the pavement, rather was carried through the air to stand upon the altar. That pillar of silver light there was deepening, changing, into rich gold. I took Gathea into my arms and the kiss I gave her, even as Gunnora had promised, was to seal my fate and open the last barrier.

The golden light—the warmth—we forgot all else. What remained was priestess and Lady, man and HornCrowned Lord. From their union would come power with which much could be wrought. As I took one who no longer would follow the sterile path of Dians, I felt that weight settle upon my head—the crown. Liegeman I had been, in this hour was I Lord.

Kinless—clanless—and crowned!