The Castle Of Hape. Caves Of Fire And Ice. The Joining Of The Stone

Soon she could make out something painted on the walls. She held the lamp up. Scenes of farms and villages, of battles, scenes shifting between shadows, then changing as she moved on. Who had painted such images so deep in the caves? Her lamp sputtered and grew dim.

Then the scenes came clearer and seemed larger suddenly, crowding toward her between the chasms of darkness. Scenes of war and violence leaped out at her; men opened their mouths in silent screams as swords flashed. She heard the din of war faintly, then it rose in volume until it deafened her. She smelled blood and death. Had she moved into Time suddenly? Clouds raced across dark skies. All was movement and shouting, a dozen places in a dozen times. She was caught like a fly at the center, suddenly mad with desire to thrust herself into those scenes. She searched for Ram’s face among infinite battles, searched for a flash of his red hair. Once she reached out her naked hand toward a battle, then snatched it back and pressed it to her mouth to stifle the cry that rose: for the shadows had changed to form themselves into a twisting tree. The battles faded. The tree filled the cave, huge and pulsing with life. It pushed gnarled branches against the cave walls, forcing up, bending against the dirt roof. Its bark was rough and dark, its roots humped like twisted, naked legs across the cave floor. Its trunk was wrinkled into seams and angles that formed the face of an old, old man. His eyes watched her from some terrible depth. Eyes cold and knowing, eyes like windows into Time. His voice was like the rasp of winter wind.

“I watched you come. I watched you search. I know what you seek here. You will find it, young woman. You will move through Time unending, and you will suffer for that. Time cares nothing for your suffering. And you care nothing for reason if you plunge into Time’s reaches”.

“I do what I must. I can do nothing else.” She held her shaking hands still with effort. “Who are you? What—sort of creature are you?”

“I am Cadach. 1 have dwelt in this tree since my death. Fear of him flickered in her eyes despite her bold stance. My soul dwells here. I have no strength to move toward what you call joy and fulfillment. I have no stomach for atonement. Traitor in my life, traitor to Ere and eager slave to evil, I am left filled only with the dark and twisted, I hunger only for the dark. I do not choose joy, I have no use for joy, it is too bright, I do not choose to be born anew.

“My children wander Time endlessly. My children atone for me. His sense of agony filled Skeelie. My children know not that I exist here. They know only that their need is to reach out, to hold a light to the darkness that comes again and again upon Ere. For they, each one, carry within them the higher spirit that I would have become, that I denied with my evil. They carry that spirit which I will never carry, my five white-haired children.”

His voice went silent. His face seemed carven once more, then collapsed as it began to recede back into the bark. Skeelie stood staring, shaken, wanting stupidly to cry out for him not to leave her. His eyes, dull and lifeless now, disappeared last. She backed away from the trunk. His fading voice breathed out once more, hollow now, hardly a whisper. “Follow through the maze of this cave as your mind bids you, Seer.” She strained to hear. “Follow you the path of the starfires. Find the Cutter of Stones who made them, for he will give you strength. Follow to the source of Ramad’s beginnings, touch the place of his childhood and his strength. And know you that Ramad must search through Time for more than his lost love, know you that he must search for the lost shards of the runestone of Eresu if he be true to himself.” She could hardly make out his words, leaned closer to the hoary bark; and one question burned in her.

“How do I know I can move into Time? I do not carry starfires. I do not touch Time’s secrets, nor have I found a rune.”

“You are one of the few born to weave a new pattern into the fabric of the world. Those so born are not anchored to a single point in Time.”

“I do not understand.”

But he was gone. The ancient tree slept, retreating into a million years of repose whence its core had risen. Skeelie moved past it into the darker shadows, wondering, trying to make sense of his words. How could the old man know of Ram, of the starfires? Surely he was a Seer. A Seer trapped, his immortal soul taken. A Seer of evil? A traitor as had been BroogArl, and HarThass before him? A traitor trapped so, never to be born again? She shivered. And his white-haired children . . .

Could Anchorstar be one of Cadach’s children? Anchorstar—my white-haired children . . .

Anchorstar had carried the starfires, had given one to Telien, had given three to Ram. Follow you the path of the starfires . . .