The Forest of Peldain

Chapter Seven

In his dream Lord Vorduthe found himself drifting, a breeze-driven ghost, through the limpid greenness of the forest. Cage tigers and man-grab trees snapped about him, shoot tubes lunged toward him. But none of them could touch him. He was dead, and insubstantial like sea mist.

So dead that he rose smoke-like through the forest’s roof, temporarily losing himself in a close tangle of leaf, branch, bud and every kind of surprising growth, before gaining the clear air to go drifting over the dazzling ocean. And suddenly he was in the Hundred Islands.

That was when death turned into a nightmare. Happenings at home were just as Lord Korbar had warned and he had secretly feared. An army of cruel primitives rampaged through Arcaiss, a horde of brown-skinned Orwanians, always the least civilized of the peoples of the Hundred Islands, ever half-eager to revert to the savage practices of their forebears. For the Orwanians had been ardent cannibals until restrained by Arelian conquest, and they still worshipped their traditional god Krax, who ate the flesh of men.

Flame and smoke billowed over sundrenched Arcaiss. In the royal palace the dreaming Vorduthe beheld a terrible sight: the Monarch of the Hundred Islands, King Krassos himself, spread-eagled over a brazier, face contorted, his skin crackling. And in the streets were fires and cooking grids, and the buildings echoed to the dreadful cries of men, women and children who were being roasted alive for the pleasure of the brown savages.

Vorduthe looked up to the headland where his own home was situated. Against his will his spirit was drawn there, passing through the cool rooms to the interior courtyard. He saw a band of grinning savages, their teeth filed, carrying the paralyzed form of his wife to the fire they had prepared.

One primitive could not wait to see her flesh cooked. Taking a knife of black flint from the waistband of twisted grass that was all he wore, he cut off her nose and stuffed it into his mouth.

Vorduthe’s ghost fled, recoiling into the sky among the wheeling wide-winged seabirds, calling out in agonized protest to Irkwele, the great sky god who had thrown down clods of earth into Thelessa’s perfect oceans so that man might have islands on which to live. But Irkwele did not reply. Instead a gigantic figure rose cumbersomely out of the ocean. Vast seaweeds draped it. Water streamed down the angles of its face. Sea beasts the size of ships tumbled from its hair.

It was Ukulkele, ruler-god of the ocean who had opposed Irkwele in the beginning. Vorduthe recognized him easily: his image, made of wood and coral and dyed with the inks of various marine creatures, faced Irkwele’s across the sacred grove that lay in the exact center of Arelia. Towering over the island, over Vorduthe, the god glared angrily down at him. The iron-like mouth opened; Ukulkele began to speak, in a voice like the sound of the summer typhoons that beset equatorial regions. He had never forgiven Irkwele, he said, for spoiling his unbroken world ocean. He would create great waves to throw against all these scraps of land, washing them away as if they were mounds of silt.

The roaring voices receded; the face of Ukulkele blurred, framed by the blue sky. When it solidified once more it had altered, was smaller, staring down at him with enigmatic sternness.

“He’s coming round, my lord,” a voice said.

He knew that face. It was troop leader Ankar, a member of Lord Korbar’s group. “Where are your troops?” Vorduthe croaked. “Where are they, troop leader?”

“All gone, my lord. Shoot tubes took the last two.” The words brought Vorduthe completely to his senses. He was alive. And, he realized with wonderment, there was still blue sky framing the face that stared down at him.

He raised his head. He lay on soft bracken. From somewhere nearby came the gentle sound of flowing water, suggesting that they were camped by the bank of a river. Lord Korbar came into his range of vision, walking toward him. More men were farther off.

Were they out of the forest at last? The spot was hemmed in by trees which included types he had become familiar with in the past three days, but no dense canopy blotted out the sky. Overhead, green and blue were mixed.

Lord Korbar knelt by his side, his face grave. “I am glad to see you may be recovering, my lord. Are you able to rise? Do you still feel ill?”

“Korbar, I have had a dream,” Vorduthe muttered. “A dreadful dream. Pray to the gods that is all it was.”

He shook his head to shake off the memory. Best say nothing of it, he thought. Some men believed in dreams.

“What happened?” he demanded. “Why am I still alive?”

“You have the Peldainian to thank, my lord,” Korbar replied. “It was he who brushed the thorns from your body before they became embedded; they were of the burrowing type. Their contact introduced poisons to your body, but not enough to prove fatal.”

“What is this place? How did I get here?”

“We carried you here on a litter, my lord. You have been unconscious for a good part of the day.”

“That was against express orders, Korbar!” Vorduthe was angry. “No injured men are carried!”

“It was at Octrago’s insistence, my lord,” Korbar said apologetically. “He advised us you would likely recover, and that we needed you. I agreed. There were no dissenting voices.”

Vorduthe grunted in displeasure, even shame. He struggled to a sitting position. “Tell me everything that happened.”

The young troop leader dropped his eyes as Korbar told the tale, as if not wanting to be reminded of it. “Most fell either in the slime bed or in the thorn bushes,” Korbar said. “A hideous time! The few of us who were left managed to retrieve a few tools and some of the mountaineering equipment we will need, but all the wagons had to be left behind. So, without the protection of fire, we made the remaining journey here, and of the few who remained fewer still have arrived. Luckily we had not too far to go, though only Octrago knew it. We are not actually out of the forest, my lord. This is a sort of sterile spot in it, known to the Peldainian—yes, I grant he is a Peldainian, though none the better for that.” Korbar made a wry face. “He tells us the main danger is over. We now take to the water.”

“Where is Octrago?”

“Up the river a short way, seeing to the construction of boats.”

“And how many men have we left?”

“Counting the Peldainian, fifty-three, my lord.” Korbar’s tone became one of deep disgust. “Roughly the number he claims to have set out with.”

After resting a while longer Lord Vorduthe was recovered sufficiently to get to his feet and examine his surroundings more closely. All that was left of the effects of the poison was a slight aching in his joints.

As Korbar had said, this was an infertile spot as far as the forest was concerned, though why this was when water was plentiful nearby he did not know. Perhaps the soil was unsuitable, he thought. Many trees had died and consisted of husks. Others were withered, their foliage yellow.

One type of plant, of somewhat sinister appearance, he had not seen before. This was an expansive tree with soft trailing fronds, almost inviting one to enter its enclosing shade. But among the fronds were what looked like huge seed-pods, gaping wide open, two or three times the size of a man. From the open lips of the pods fringes of slim tentacles reached out, no thicker than a finger but extending well beyond the shade of the trees themselves. Plainly they could sense the presence of men, for they followed their movements yearningly, waving and rippling like strands of seaweed in an underwater current.

“Those are coffin trees,” Korbar informed him. “Stay away from them, needless to say, though they do not seem a particularly effective form of predator by the general standard of the forest. You can guess from their name what kind of a trap those pods are.”

Vorduthe nodded. For the moment he refrained from speaking to the tattered remnant of his army. No more than a score of men were in sight; the remainder, he assumed, were up-river with Octrago.

As the afternoon turned to evening Octrago’s party returned, carrying with difficulty three boats of canoe-like shape. Briefly their iron-like color prevented Vorduthe from realizing that they were, in fact, larger versions of the green pods grown by the coffin-trees. Each looked capable of carrying fifteen to twenty men.

Thankful to be relieved of their exertions, the warriors laid the boats on the ground. An unaccustomed look of pleasure came over Octrago’s face when he spotted Vorduthe on his feet.

He came over immediately. “Congratulations, my lord,” he said in his dry voice. “I am glad to see that you have survived your ordeal.”

For his part Vorduthe displayed no hint of displeasure. “I owe you my life, apparently, but I am not inclined to thank you for it when so many others have perished,” he said. “If anything you have done me a disservice. You have brought shame on me, for I too should have perished.”

He paused. “Neither do I understand why you should be so concerned for my welfare.”

“It is simple enough, is it not? You are my protector, my lord. Without you, how long will these fine warriors keep themselves from my throat?”

“At the rate they have been disappearing you should very shortly have nothing to fear,” Vorduthe rasped.

They were speaking alone; Korbar had departed to inspect the canoes. “What have you to say for yourself now, King Askon?” Vorduthe persisted. “We have no army with which to conquer Peldain. What are your plans?”

“On the face of it, my mission would appear to have failed,” Octrago agreed, though with less of the glumness that Vorduthe might have expected. “As for the future, that is decided for us. We can only go on, into the inhabited region of the island, and see what opportunities for advantage there are. Don’t despair—fifty of King Krassos’ seaborne warriors is a body of men to reckon with as matters go in Peldain.”

Vorduthe was inclined to question that in view of Octrago’s proven expertise with a sword, but he let it pass.

Octrago pointed toward the riverbank where the boats lay. “Has Lord Korbar explained our situation? Those are the dead husks of coffin pods—big ones. They make perfectly adequate river craft, if trimmed of a few excess parts. We have but to fashion paddles for steering. The current will carry us most of the way, and when we leave the river the depths of the forest will be behind us. There will only be a scattering of trees and plants to avoid.”

“Indeed?” Vorduthe looked doubtful. “And what prevents the forest from picking us off as we float along?”

A light chuckle escaped Octrago’s lips. “We shall be safe. You will see.”

A thought occurred to Vorduthe. “How many men could be transported this way? Are dead pods of that size plentiful?”

Though the smile faded from the Peldainian’s face, he kept his composure. “Quite plentiful. Any number could be carried down-river, I dare say.”

With that, the conversation ended. Every man was told to make himself a paddle as best he could with whatever materials came to hand, using what tools there were or even the edge of his sword. Although darkness would soon descend Octrago advised they should set out straight away. No one had eaten since early morning; none of the food in the stricken wagons had been recovered and he had warned from the beginning that nothing in the forest was safely edible. It could be days before they found food.

Octrago demonstrated how to twist dry leaves together with reeds from the riverbank to improvise a store of makeshift firebrands. Then, before embarking, Vorduthe addressed some brief words to his remaining troops.

“Our experiences,” he said, standing before the haggard-faced men, “have been so terrible that few would believe them. What we have come through has never been endured by any Arelian before. But those of us who stand here have come through it, and while we remember our fallen comrades, we can take pride in our achievement. Our thoughts now must be for the future. We are promised that the worst is over, and that from now on there will be only human foes to fight, if any.”

He paused, looking over the group of warriors, no more than troop-sized. In the eyes of nearly all he saw the same silent question. We were supposed to be an invasion force. How do we conquer now, being so few?

“After such disasters there can be no guarantee that any of us will see home again,” he continued. “New adventures await us, in a land none of our kin has ever seen. Put your trust in Irkwele, and behave, as you have behaved, like warriors of King Krassos!”

One by one the four pods were lowered into the water and held fast while the men clambered aboard, Vorduthe, Korbar and Octrago taking their places in the leading pod. Then they were cast off together and maneuvered to the middle of the fairly fast-moving, but rather narrow river.

Vorduthe marveled at how well the pods performed as boats, standing upright in the current by virtue of their heavy spines and proving easy to control by the ship-wise Arelians. The rim of the pod in which he sat had been cut back to make the structure more open. Some interior excrescences had also been cut away, leaving the inner surface dotted with knots and lumps, some of them serviceable as seats. There were also signs of what could have been dead veins and slit-like lips—the remains, perhaps, of the knot’s original purpose as both mouth and stomach.

Swiftly the current bore the boats on; there was no need to do much more than hold them steady. The little flotilla was swept beyond the oasis of infertility and past overgrown banks, past surrounding jungle that grew ever more lush. To begin with the men shrank behind the protection of the pods’ sides, afraid of the towering trees which soon completely overhung the stream. Occasionally there would be a flurry of branches nearby, a lunge of lance or wriggle of danglecup, but the boats moved too fast to make an easy target for the vegetable predators and Octrago, sitting upright in the prow of the leading craft, paid them absolutely no heed.

Vorduthe peered into the water, curious to know what fish or other creatures might dwell there. The water was very clear; he saw a bottom of sand and pebble across which strands of light green weed ran. There were no fish; only some lizard-like things with vertical knife-edge tails and long toothed jaws. They were about the size of Vorduthe’s forearm.

“Don’t put your hand in the water,” Octrago said with a smile, noticing his interest. “They’ll have the flesh off it in moments.”

The Arelian commander settled back in his place. The trees had joined far overhead, blotting out the darkening sky. Then it became evident that the riverside bushes were growing closer together, forming a continuous hedge which reached ever taller. Peering ahead, Vorduthe saw that the river entered what appeared to be a tunnel.

The tunnel was, in fact, formed of the bushes, which finally overreached the stream to form a curved, matted roof. This, probably was the protection Octrago had spoken of. In gray gloom the boats plunged into the winding corridor, whose coolness and silence, apart from the rippling of the water, created a soothingly enclosed feeling. Sometimes one could glimpse shadowy shapes through the thicket and tangle that roofed the waterway, but mostly it grew ever denser. The forest began to seem a distant threat.

For what Vorduthe guessed might be three to five leevers they wound their quiet way. The sun went down. Of Thelessa’s bright starlight little filtered through the forest’s foliage and less still through the matted vegetation that made up the natural tube through which the boats rode. Vorduthe was asked for permission to light brands, but Octrago held up a staying hand. “Not yet,” he said. “We are not completely blind. We shall need them for later.”

Gradually their eyes grew accustomed to the near-darkness. Vorduthe could see those around him as vague shapes.

“The current is becoming sluggish, my lord,” a serpent harrier said suddenly.

It was true. The boat had drifted near the left bank and had slowed down. Soon it veered crosswise to the direction of the river and scarcely moved at all.

Octrago took a firebrand from the pile in the bottom of the canoe and after several tries it lit with the flint he carried. He held the slowly crackling flame aloft.

The flickering light revealed the four boats drifting in brackish, barely moving water, close to one another and swinging this way and that. The river had broadened, overflowing its banks. The covering tangle pressed low, barely above their heads. A short distance farther on it merged into the water, blocking the way.

“The bushes have choked the stream,” Octrago announced. “We shall have to clear it. Stay in the boats for the time being—there might be water lizards about.”

At his bidding they paddled the canoes up against the damming tangle and began hacking with swords and axes. Vorduthe tried not to think about how far the blockage might extend, but shortly it became clear that the bed of the stream was logged with flotsam and completely silted up. They were able to step out of the boats and continue the work while standing on the spongy matting.

At first they thought to cut a path through the bush and drag the canoes over the detritus, to what they hoped was clear water beyond. In the event it proved easier to dig out a narrow channel through which to half-float, half-haul the boats, crawling meanwhile beneath the thorny mass overhead. They labored in darkness, relieved intermittently by the light of a firebrand; until at last there was a sudden rush of water as the final bar of silt was shucked away and the channel made contact with the continuing riverbed.

The water level here, fed only by what had seeped through the blockage, was lower than on the other side, but now it began to rise and the current to quicken. Pausing only to splash some of the mud off themselves, the Arelians clambered back into their boats to follow the current once more.

To Vorduthe’s surprise the prow of his boat suddenly dipped sharply. He heard the scrape of Octrago’s flint. Sputtering flames gave sight of new surroundings.

The vegetation was gone. They floated now through a tunnel whose walls were of bare rock. The stream had probably entered a hillside, Vorduthe thought. But at the same time the boats were quickening their pace; they were on a downward slope, descending deep underground.

The river swirled and boiled as it swept through the winding cave. In places the roof was so low that the boats barely scraped through and the passengers were obliged to press themselves below the rough-carved rims of the timber-like pods.

They made their way by the poor light of the briefly burning brands. If the torches happened to die together there was total darkness for a while and the boats bumped against the rough walls of the tunnel and even into one another, but generally it was not too difficult to hold them steady. Soon the stream leveled somewhat. The path which the river had over the ages carved out of solid rock became less irregular, so that Octrago deemed that brands should be lit only now and then. For a lengthy period they proceeded in this fashion, learning by feel how to keep the prows turned forward and how to prod themselves free of the walls on either side.

Suddenly the natural channel opened into a large cavern, its limits indistinct in the light of the torches. The river splayed out into a broad body of water which moved silently but fairly fast in the subterranean darkness, like a wide river approaching a weir.

Octrago shouted to turn the boats to the left and paddle close to the near overhang. Presently a kind of shore came in sight: a big stone ledge rising out of the waterline.

“Beach here,” Octrago called.

Stepping deftly from the leading pod as it careened on the rock, he stood holding aloft a blazing brand, facing the, others as their sandals trod the damp stone. His words echoed dully as he spoke.

“I have called a short halt here to explain that a tricky pass lies ahead,” he told them. “At the far end of this cavern the water divides in two. One part, the greater, falls into a deep fissure and after that its course is unknown to any man—perhaps it plunges endlessly into the depths of the world. The other, the one we must take, leads to our goal.”

He paused to transfer fire to a fresh brand before continuing, tossing the expired one into the water where it hissed briefly. “The current will do its best to carry us into the fissure so we must paddle with a will to find the exit. It is essential to keep as close as possible to the left-hand wall. If you lose sight of it then you will know you are being swept toward the chasm and from then on nothing can save you.

“Also, do not lag. I will locate the mouth of the exit and guide you to it, but I shall not be able to linger. If you are not in sight of the boat ahead of you then you will be lost.”

There was shifting of feet. “How near is the exit to this fissure?” someone asked.

“Very near—that is the difficulty. You must approach the tunnel mouth with all speed and resist the current for all you are worth.”

“It might be easier if the boats were roped together. We could help one another,” someone else suggested.

“No, because one endangered boat could drag the others over the edge with it. Each boat crew must rely on its own strength. Is all understood, my lord?” Octrago raised his eyebrows to look sternly at Vorduthe, and then at all the others. “Good. Then we proceed.”

The water looked thick and black and it tugged at the pods as they were pushed free of the ledge and probed forward under the close-pressing rock. At first this was no problem as the current was all in one direction toward the far end of the cavern. But after some minutes the lake’s surface under the overhang became plagued with eddies and unpredictable cross-currents. Something seemed to be trying to drag the boats away from the edge of the cavern, not toward its center but somewhere to one side.

Again and again the pods were swung round, as if attached to underwater ropes and had to be returned to their course by determined concerted paddling. Octrago, using a succession of torches, leaned as far over the prow as he could, peering anxiously into the darkness. From ahead there began to come a steady rippling sound.

“Make ready!” he called at last. “The flow now becomes swift!”

And so it did. Octrago’s brand was blown out by the breeze as they were swept forward. Cursing, he spent valuable seconds kindling another with his flint. When the flame strengthened, Vorduthe saw the expanse of water racing away from them to the right, surging aslant, and beyond it a great black hole over whose lip it streamed.

There was a big waterfall in the hills of Arelia. Vorduthe had visited it often. The falling stream plunged with a continuous roaring noise, and it filled the air with spray which sparkled in the sunlight. How different was this! The dark water was sinister in its quiet. There was no roaring: only the subdued rippling. No spray: just the cavern’s usual dampness in the air.

Did the stream fall to such a depth that its eventual crashing into whatever lay below could not be heard? Vorduthe suspected that the underground lake was fed by more rivers than the one they had come by, which he did not think could supply such a mass of perpetually falling water. Octrago gave a shout of encouragement: he had spotted the mouth of their escape route. But the current was strong and at its flood.

Such a hurrying onrush would have been impossible to resist had not the water begun to whirlpool, swinging into a curve on its approach to the chasm. The periphery of the vortex never reached the gaping hole, however; instead it split off, drawn through the tunnel mouth opposite. Keeping to this narrow band of water was the only way to avoid being dragged over the edge.

All oars were plied on the right-hand side of the boat in the desperate effort to stay under the overhang. The far end of the cavern loomed up. Vorduthe was unable to make out the tunnel entrance, but Octrago presumably knew where it was for he called to direct the boat a little to the right—a frightening instruction for it seemed to mean turning into the vortex.

Vorduthe looked aft to check the progress of the following two boats. He was dismayed to see only a flickering light some distance off, which while he watched disappeared.

He nudged Octrago. “I can’t see the others!” he hissed.

Octrago swung his head round. He frowned, the flickering flames making his face grotesque. “We can’t wait for them! If we slow down we’re finished!”

He turned his attention back to the rock wall. By now Vorduthe could make out a black shadow there. Then, visible on the surface of the water, the current parted.

“To the left!” Octrago shouted. “Take us to the left!” The men in the body of the pod responded with a final attempt to extract yet more leverage from their paddles. Then the boat suddenly shot forward and was carried into the hole in the wall.

No sooner were they safely inside than Octrago grabbed a paddle and frantically turned the boat athwart the current, trying to jam it in the tunnel. “Light brands—as many as you can!” he urged. “And call to your comrades—shout for all you’re worth!”

There was a thunk as the stern struck the tunnel wall, then the long pod swung round until it lay close alongside and was held there by hands clinging to any unevenness they could find in the rock. As the torches blazed the symmetrical outlines of the tunnel were picked out in sharp relief. Hoarse bellows echoed up and down it. “This way, lads! Over here!”

Answering calls came from over the water. Vorduthe feared that the other boats were hopelessly lost and that he was hearing the last doomed cries of men about to be turned over the lip of the chasm, but soon the shouts came louder and flickery light showed itself at the mouth of the passageway, and first one boat and then the other floated downstream toward them.

He breathed a deep sigh. “Thank the gods!”

Octrago was smiling, clearly pleased with the outcome of the operation. The newcomers checked their progress as they approached, pressing their paddles against the walls.

“Excellent!” he declared. “Well, let’s get going. We should be through by morning.”

They cast off, allowing the stream to carry them. The tunnel stretched ahead, a straight, continuous bore. Unlike the route from the forest to the cavern, it was clearly the work of man.

On and on the three boats moved, gliding gently through the darkness, for here there were no hazards and therefore little need of light. If a boat bumped into the wall of the canal it was easily pushed off before it jammed itself. Vorduthe arranged for the men to get some sleep, resting in shifts. And he even slept an hour or two himself.

At one point they encountered an obstacle. Light from a brand revealed a rockfall that partially blocked the way. A spell of work was required to clear the obstruction sufficiently to allow the boats to pass. They continued, until Octrago who had spent the whole time peering eagerly into the blackness, announced he could see light. In the minutes that followed the illumination grew, streaming in from the glowing circle ahead.

They had come through.