Gate of Ivrel

“Come,” said Roh. “One of my men is holding your horses a little distance down the road. We knew them. It was they that brought us to help you, when we saw them bolt from this direction.”

Morgaine looked at him, as if doubtful whether she would trust this man, though she had slept lately in his hall. Then she nodded and set out, unneedful now of Vanye’s arm. He paused to clean his sword upon the grass before he overtook her: her blade needed no such attention.

It was indeed some distance. Men other than Roh walked with them all the same: there were rustlings in the forest about them, shadows whose nature they could not determine in the gathering dusk, but it was sure that they were Chya, or Roh would have been alarmed.

And there stood the horses, being tended and rubbed with dry grasses: the Chya were not riders, but they took tender care of the beasts, and Vanye for his part thanked the men when they took their animals back in hand. Then Morgaine thanked them too. He had thought her in such a mood she would not.

“May we camp with you?” Vanye asked of Roh, for the night was gathering fast about them and he was himself so weary he felt like to die.

“No,” Morgaine interrupted him with finality. She slipped the strap of Changeling, and hung the weapon on her saddle, then gathered the reins about Siptah’s neck.

“ Liyo.” Vanye seldom laid hands on her. Now he caught her arm and tried to plead with her, but the coldness in her eyes froze the words in his throat.

“I will come,” he said quietly.

“Vanye.”

“ Liyo?”

“Why did Ryn choose to die?”

Vanye’s lips trembled. “I do not think he knew he would. He thought he could stop you. He was not ilin, not under ilin law. One of the men was his lord, my brother. Another was Paren, his own father. Ryn was not ilin. He should have gone from us.”

He thought then that Morgaine would show some sign of grief, of remorse, if it was in her. She did not. Her face stayed hard, and he turned from her lest he shame himself from anger, no less than grief. Half-blind, he sought his horse’s rein and flung himself to its back. Morgaine had mounted: she laid heels to Siptah and sped him down the road.

Roh held his rein a moment, looked up at him. “Chya Vanye, where does she go?”

‘That is her concern, Chya Roh.”

“We of Chya have both eyes and ears in Morija, well-placed. We knew how you must come if you came from Kursh into Andur. We waited, expected a fight. Not– that.”

“I am falling behind, Roh. Let go my rein.”

“ Ilin–oath is more than blood,” said Roh. “But, Chya Vanye, they were kin to you.”

“Let go, I say.”

Roh’s face drew taut with some weight of thought. Then he held the rein yet tightly, a hand within the bridle. “Take me up,” he said. “I will see you to the edge of my lands, and I know you will not stay for a man afoot. I want no more mischances with Morgaine. You stirred us up Leth, and they are still aprowl; you brought us Nhi and Myya, and Hjemur at once; and now all Baien is astir. This woman brings wars like winter brings storms. I will see you safely through. My presence with you will be enough for any men of Chya you meet, and I will not have their lives taken as she took those of Nhi.”

“Up, then,” said Vanye, moving his foot from the stirrup. Roh was a slender man; his weight was still cruelty to the hard-ridden horse, but it was all that could be done. He feared to lose Morgaine if he were delayed more.

Roh landed behind him, caught hold, and Vanye set heels to the black. The horse tried a quick gait, could not hold it, settled at once to a slower pace when Vanye reined back in mercy.

Morgaine would not kill Siptah. He knew that when her fury had passed, she would slow. And after a time of riding he saw her, where the road became a mere trail through an arch of trees, a pale glimmering of Siptah’s rump and her white cloak in the dark.

Then he put the black to a quicker pace, and she paused and waited when she heard his coming. The black weapon was in her hand as they rode up, but she put it away.

“Roh,” she said.

There was moisture on her cheeks. Vanye saw it and was glad. He nodded courtesy to her, which she returned, and then she bit her lip and leaned both hands upon the saddlebow.

“We will camp,” she said, sensible and calm, the manner Vanye knew in her, “in whatever place you can find secure.”

CHAPTER IX

IVREL WAS ALL the horizon now, snow-crowned and perfect amid the jagged rubble of the Kath Vrej range, anomaly among mountains. The sky was blue and still stained with sunrise in the east, as much as they could see of the sky in that direction. A single star still remained high and to the left of Ivrel’s cone.

It was beautiful, this place upon the north rim of Irien. It was hard to remember the evil of it.

“Another day,” said Morgaine, “perhaps yet one more camp, will set us there.” And when Vanye looked at her he saw no yearning in her eyes such as he had thought to see, only weariness and misery.

“Is it then Ivrel you seek?” Roh asked.