The Woad to Wuin Page 13

  “Help me!” I screamed, wanting nothing more than to forget that I had ever entered the infernal place called Ba’da’boom.

  I twisted, shrieked as the shadows sliced through me yet again, this time calling in icy tones, Fuggedaboudit!

  My inner voice, which had steered me right (and wrong) on so many occasions, tried to tell me, You’re imagining it! There’s nothing there! It’s all in your mind! But those sensible thoughts were drowned out by the overwhelming frenzy of fear that drove me, deeper and farther. I ran headlong, bounced off walls, stumbled again and again until I thought I no longer had any capacity for feeling left in any of my extremities, and still I kept moving.

  And that was when I saw the light.

  At the far end of the passage, ever so slightly, ever so little, the darkness looked a bit lighter than where I was. I was able to discern different surroundings, although I could not see for sure what they were.

  The boom grew even louder then, and the shadows seemed as if they were becoming more substantial, pulling at me, trying to slow me down. Or it might have been the fatigue of my own limbs serving to impede me, but my mind was far too frenzied at that point to be able to distinguish. It seemed as if the boom had become so vast a thing that it was developing a physicality all its own. That it was manifesting as yet another obstruction which I literally had to force my way through. I cried out deep in my throat even as I shoved myself forward, feeling as if my body weight had tripled, and the rocky floor was angling upward. I stumbled again, hauled myself up, and the shadows cried out in infuriated unison as I propelled myself into some sort of large chamber.

  It was an intersection of stony corridors, but far larger than any other that I’d encountered. It was as if a number of different paths had converged upon this one place, and yes, yes, there was light. It was meager, but it was there. It was sunlight, tiny, delicate rays of sunlight, penetrating through some sort of holes in a ceiling so high that I couldn’t even begin to discern it.

  The boom was now so overpowering, thudding so in the floor and walls and in my own head, that I no longer had the will to stand. Only my staff was keeping me up, and the shadows were coming together. In the minuscule light of the chamber, they had greater form now, or at least they did to me. They howled at me, berated me, leaped upon me, and blamed me for their hideous state of affairs, for their deaths, for the great evil that had been done to the creatures they were in life, and I have never, ever been as terrified as I was at that moment. I tried to turn away from them, to shield myself from them, but they were everywhere, just everywhere.

  Instinctively I endeavored to get to the lighted areas, as pathetic illumination as that provided, but they strove mightily to keep me away, blocking me, pounding me down, seeping into me as killer frost gets into the bones to destroy someone by freezing them to death.

  And something occurred to me at that moment.

  I had no idea what put the notion into my head; desperation, most likely. With the boom overwhelming me, with the shadows of reality or of my mind threatening to leave me a gibbering wreck, I found enough strength to lunge toward the meager light and—as I did so—I yanked the glittering diamond from the place on my person where I’d secreted it. My arm was outstretched as far as it could go, and it was just enough as the gem caught the light that was coming from on high like the eye of one of the gods staring down at me.

  I wasn’t entirely sure what I was expecting to happen at that moment, but I could never have anticipated what did occur. The diamond—already a source of inner fire by its very nature—seemed to become scalding in my hand as the light suffused it. It reacted to the daylight in the way that flame reacts to air stoking it. It gobbled the light eagerly, like a starving child, and then sent it in all directions. A rainbow played against the far walls, and I heard something howling within my head. There is nothing quite as daunting as the death screams of those who are already dead.

  I moved the diamond, tilted it this way and that, casting light everywhere I could within my field of vision, and the shadows seemed to fall back. There was angry hissing, and even though I could still feel the soul-numbing chill within me, there was the distinct sense that I had narrowly avoided an even more terrifying fate. “Get back! Get back, you bastards! Soul suckers! I wasn’t responsible for what happened to you, but by the gods, I’ll take you down now, you hand servants of hell! Back! Back, I said! Back!” Over and over I shouted these overwrought commands and many more.

  And suddenly, from one of the passageways, something huge came at me, more solid than anything else, more terrifying than anything that I had seen. “BACK!” I bellowed.

  It spoke to me then, in a confused female voice, and it said, “Apropos?! Gods, what’s happened! Look at you!”

  “Sharee?” I could barely get her name out. My tongue felt thick in my head. I was so overwhelmed by my fear that I totally forgot to preserve my detachment and disdainful air. Instead I lurched toward her and threw my arms around her, sobbing out my terror and what I’d gone through. What an idiot I must have sounded like to her at that moment. “The shadows! The shadows wanted to kill me! They were coming off the walls! Keep them away! Keep them away!”

  It was dim enough that I couldn’t see her face, which was fortunate, since I’m sure the mixture of contempt and pity she must have felt at that moment would be a sight I would have carried with me for the rest of my life. She didn’t address my delusions or cries of what I had seen, but instead simply said, “Come with me. I found a way out.”

  “You did?!”

  “Yes, I did. But give me the gem back …”

  “Here! Here!” I thrust it into her hands, and she took it and shoved it into a pouch in her cloak. “Take it! You’ve earned it! I don’t want it! It’s yours! It’s yours!”

  She led me out of the caverns of Ba’da’boom then, out into the daylight and safety from the shadows.

  Within two minutes I’d managed to light-finger the gem off her and tuck it back into my pack.

  Gratitude is fine as far as it goes, but riches go further still.

  Chapter 6

  Fate’s Finger

  Sharee was as good as her word. She had indeed stumbled upon a way out of the catacombs of Ba’da’boom, and when we first emerged from the place, I alternated between squinting against the now-blinding daylight and sobbing in piteous joy that we were out. (This was, of course, before I snatched back the diamond.)

  In retrospect, I should have realized while still within, fighting the shadows that I was convinced had come to life to haunt and harass me, that we were getting nearer to the surface. It had been difficult to tell with the gradations of the subterranean paths we’d been following whether we were going down or up or staying level. But the holes that permitted some lifesaving rays of the sun to filter through should have been enough to make me realize that we were getting close to salvation.

  We emerged from a hole in what appeared to be a solid rock wall. “It was the water,” she told me. “I heard it. I heard the waves.”

  Waves indeed. We had come out onto a shoreline, and I recognized it instantly even though I had only seen it from a distance, while riding along one of the outer roads that circumvented the Elderwoods some years back. I was stunned that we were there. I mean I absolutely could not believe it. We had crossed, underground, on a diagonal, virtually the entire state of Isteria. I knew that time had lost all meaning while we were under there, but still … the notion that we had been traveling for so long was just shocking to me. “How many days were we down there?” I croaked out.

  Sharee shook her head. She had no idea, either, and I could tell from the dazed expression on her face that she had been doing the same mental mathematics as I had been and was coming up with the same appalling conclusions.

  A large beach stretched out before us. It was not sandy, but instead hardened and almost claylike in its composition. The sea that washed up against it was perfect and clear and azure blue, with nary so much as a whit
ecap in sight. The sea might have had a name attributed it to it by mariners, but we simple land-folk had always referred to it merely as the Nameless Sea.

  The cliffside from which we had emerged stretched hundreds of feet into the air. There was probably a path that led down to the beach where we were standing, but I had no idea where it might be, and the cliff itself seem fairly unscalable. At least I knew that I wasn’t going to be scaling it anytime soon. Even an experienced rock climber might have been daunted by the challenge, and I with my lame leg would simply not be remotely up to the task.

  For that matter, even if we did manage to climb the cliff … where would we go? I was coming to the realization that such matters had to be considered. During our subterranean sojourn, I had been driven by only one concern: getting out. Now that we were out … where were we to head? We had given Beliquose the slip, obviously, but there was no Bugger Hall for me to return to. I was without employment or resources or anything beyond the pack on my back and some coins in my purse … enough to last a while, provided we stayed in Isteria … which no longer seemed possible. The only other thing I had going for me was …

  I turned to Sharee. “Take me there,” I said abruptly.

  She looked at me in confusion for a moment, and then her face cleared. “Ah. There. You mean …”

  “The mountain you told me about that had more of those diamonds. Hundreds of them, you said.” I’m sure that my basic avarice was quite naked in the way that I asked. “You said you’d bring me there if I helped you. Well, I helped you. Bring me.”

  “We just got out from subterranea,” she reminded me. “You can’t be so anxious to find another place to spelunk around, can you?”

  I couldn’t answer the question immediately … mostly because I had no idea what spelunk meant, other than possibly the sound a pebble makes when dropped into a thick mug of ale.

  Sharee, meantime, appeared to have lost interest in me. Instead she was padding across the beach, her face tilted up toward the sun, her arms outstretched, and she actually pirouetted in place if you can believe that. It was the most relaxed, the most joyous that I had ever seen her. It was as if she had forgotten that I was there … or, for that matter, had made the conscious decision to set aside her dour attitude for a brief time and celebrate the fact that we were both still alive and reasonably whole.

  She made her way to the edge of the beach, and that was where the sand was. She removed her boots and let the sand sift between her toes. Then she suddenly started peeling off the rest of her clothes. She turned and saw my hesitation, and the annoyed frown returned.

  “Like it or not, neither of us has anything the other hasn’t seen,” she said with grudging acknowledgment. “And I am anxious to wash off the last vestiges of that place. Do as you see fit.” And without another word she shrugged off the last of her vestments and plunged naked into the water.

  Well, a metaphorical gauntlet had been thrown down, and so naturally I had to follow suit. I stripped down and dashed into the water, and promptly started screaming. Paddling about, she turned in the water and looked at me quizzically. I, in the meantime, was madly backpedaling out and—the moment I had emerged—threw my cloak around me to cover my trembling nakedness.

  “Gods, woman, do you have ice water in your veins?!” I cried out. “That water is freezing!”

  “Well, it is winter,” she reminded me. “Being a weatherweaver, extremes of temperature don’t affect me as dramatically as they do you.”

  “And you could not have mentioned that earlier?”

  She shrugged and backstroked around as I sat on the sand, wrapped up in my cloak. It had been my intention to wash out my clothes, but the thought of wearing such cold, sodden things was not particularly attractive. I only wished I had something clean to change into. But when I had hastily tossed together provisions, alternate clothing was not something I thought about. I made a mental note to remember that for the very next time I had to go on the run. And considering the way my life went, that could be just about any time.

  I watched her paddle around, and she noticed me smiling at her. She halted, and I couldn’t tell if she was treading water or whether her feet had found purchase beneath. “What is it?” she asked, head cocked.

  “You just look … at peace.”

  “So?”

  “So …” I shifted beneath the cloak. “So … what’s that like? To be at peace?”

  “What an odd question,” she said, brushing back her hair which had fallen in her face. “You’ve never been at peace?”

  “No.”

  “No?” She sounded skeptical. “What about the two years you spent running that tavern? You made it sound like you were fairly happy.”

  “That’s not the same.”

  “How is it different?”

  I wasn’t entirely certain I could articulate it. “I suppose … because for one to be at peace, one has to be able to confine one’s perceptions entirely to the moment. I never can. No matter what I’m doing, no matter how well things are going … I will always be thinking of it as transient and waiting for it all to be snatched away from me. And damn it, Sharee, don’t look at me in that pitying manner! I will not be an object of pity!”

  “Then don’t say pitiful things.”

  “It’s not pitiful!” I shifted in the sand and started digging small holes in it with my toes. I tried not to sound as if I was feeling sorry for myself, and was only partly successful. “Everything in my life, every time I’ve had anything of any substance, it’s been snatched away from me. Never has there been a creature who was more aptly named than I: Apropos of Nothing.”

  “Now you truly are being self-pitying,” she said disdainfully. “Everyone has suffered loss in their lives, Apropos. And yet they’ve managed not to be soured on life itself.”

  “They’re not me.”

  “That much is certain.” She appeared to give it thought, and then she said, “Try to take just this moment … what we’re experiencing right here, right now. We’ve escaped from the caverns of Ba’da’boom. We’ve left Beliquose and his bloodhound far behind. We’re alive, and perhaps you’re a little cold …”

  “A little?” I was trying not to let my teeth chatter.

  “The point is … enjoy the peace of this moment. Go ahead,” she said with a slight tone of challenge to her voice. “Just relax. Be at peace. Don’t think of strife. Don’t think of anything except pure peace.”

  “You’re being ridiculous, but if it will quiet you …” I shrugged, then closed my eyes and considered all the blessings of fortune that had, at least, allowed us to survive to run away another day.

  I thought of all the luck I’d had … not the bad luck, but the breaks that had allowed me to survive. After all, the fact that I was still alive was, in some respects, nothing short of miraculous considering all that I had experienced with nothing save my questionable wits and mild fighting abilities to defend me. Perhaps, I thought, Sharee was right. Perhaps if, rather than dwelling upon injuries and unhappiness of the past, I considered only the possibilities of the future in a positive light, why … peace could indeed be mine.

  Suddenly an earsplitting howling tore the air. A single wolf, I thought, which might not be a problem, except the sound was more deep throated, and even more human in tone than a mere wolf. It was the “human” aspect that made me realize, even before I heard a depressingly familiar voice.

  “THERE THEY ARE, THE THIEVING BASTARDS! AFTER THEM!”

  The fact that he was such a great distance away did nothing to disguise the sudden presence of Lord Beliquose. Still covered by my cloak, I twisted around and looked in utter astonishment at the tops of the cliffs. Sure enough, there they were: Beliquose, and his beloved lapdog, Bicce, and his men … who, now that I could see them, appeared to be numbered about a dozen or so. A dozen sellswords and cutthroats no doubt, but their trade was less important than the fact that several of them had longbows and seemed to be sizing up the distance and the possibilitie
s of making the shot. Beliquose and several of the others were on horseback. Bicce pitched back her head and uncorked another howl even more soulful, and frankly frightening, than the first.

  “FIVE MINUTES!” Beliquose bellowed to his men. “FIVE MINUTES TO FIND A ROAD DOWN, AND IF NOT THAT, THEN WE CLIMB DOWN HAND OVER HAND!”

  I would actually have paid serious sovs to watch them clinging batlike to the cliff’s surface, except I had the sickening feeling they would be just inconsiderate enough to survive the descent.

  I staggered to my feet, but, because I wasn’t carrying my staff, I stumbled and fell into the pile of clothes Sharee had left behind. Sharee, meantime, was splashing out of the water, running for her clothes. By that point I had managed to stand and was in the process of pulling on my breeches. I also took the opportunity to shove the diamond into the inner pouch of my belt, having just lifted the gem off Sharee’s clothes when I’d become entangled in them.

  If Sharee noticed, which she might well have, she said nothing, for she was too busy getting dressed herself and probably reasoned she could just grab it back from me when the mood suited her. She might not have been entirely wrong on that score, either. Battles of wits with wizards are always ill-advised engagements. I was suited to it, having led an ill-advised life, but I do not recommend it for anyone who values their sanity.

  “How the hell did they find us?” I snarled as I yanked my tunic over my head and grabbed for my cloak. “Don’t tell me that damnable bloodhound was able to track us while we were underground?”

  “That’s exactly right,” she said, adjusting her cloak.

  “How? It’s not as if she could have detected our scent!”

  “Creatures such as that one have tracking abilities that go far beyond something as mundane as aromas. They track your very essence.”