Considerably relieved, he started again down the trail and soon came to a narrow gorge where high rock walls loomed close on either side of the trail. He could not see them in the blackness, but a sudden coolness in the still air around him told him of their presence as surely as if his eyes had confirmed it. In a few minutes, he had passed through the gorge and entered the dead forest again. He noted that the path was more level here, as though it had finally emerged from the foothills and entered the vale proper. The stench of rotten plant life assailed him even more intently, and he thought sadly of the pain Robyn would feel as she entered this bleak region.
Daryth's temper had calmed, and he began to think of returning to the camp. The others would be asleep, and in the morning he would be able to face them both and still retain his composure. Indeed, this was a plan that offered him some hope, and even promised the chance to get some rest.
And then a low growl emerged from the darkness. Instantly Daryth dropped into a catlike crouch as his blade sprang into his hand. He held the scimitar before him, horizontal to the ground so that the keen blade was ready to slice into an unseen attacker. The faint glow of the enchanted weapon barely penetrated the thick darkness.
Every sense of his body grew taut as he strained to see and hear. He tried to reconstruct the sound he had heard. It had been faint, but not because of distance. Fear thrummed through him梖ear such as he had never known. It became a dread panic that rooted his feet to the ground and clouded the already hazy senses of his eyes and ears. The pounding of his heart echoed through his brain and seemed to reverberate into the forest itself.
Whatever was out there growled again, and Daryth could
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sense il feeding upon his fear. The growl had been soft and deep, not like a bear梚ndeed not like anything he had ever heard! Swiveling, still catlike, on the balls of his feet, he tried to look around.
Suddenly he knew that the thing out there was some kind of cat. It had aspects of a great feline in its growl, and Dar-yth began to picture a massive cat-body crouched to spring. But it was more than this, he knew as well. This threat was not just a cat, but a cat-creature of great, all-encompassing evil that defied all laws of animal creation.
Slowly, forcefully, Daryth struggled to gain control of his frayed nerves. He recalled the basic lessons he had learned, many years ago, in the Academy of Stealth: fear is a state of mind. As such, it can be conquered by a stronger state of mind.
The Calishite suspected that the teacher of this lesson had never felt fear such as he now felt. Nonetheless, he concentrated on the discipline of that lesson and others that had helped him to master his body's more primitive urges. Slowly he felt the pounding of his heart subside. His hands, mercifully, did not shake. And most important of all, his mind began to free itself from the paralysis of terror.
The thing would attack him, Daryth sensed, but it seemed to be in no hurry. Perhaps he could improve the odds by the time the assault came. The first order of business was to choose the ground for the fight.
Daryth felt the presence of open woods on all sides, naught but gaunt, barren trunks to protect his back. Slowly, carefully, he sheathed his weapon and reversed his direction, remembering the rocky walls that had loomed on either side of the trail. The narrow gorge lay close behind him.
For several minutes, he glided through the night as quickly as caution would allow, until he felt the cool reflection that told him he had entered the narrow gorge. He stopped for a second, and although he heard no sound of pursuit-he had not expected to梩he presence of the unseen menace still lurked out there in the blackness.
Daryth backed against the wall, taking care to move in
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complete silence. He forced his breathing into a slow, rhythmic pattern and tried to relax when he at last leaned weakly against the cold granite.
Something stroked across his shoulder and he gasped out loud, whirling instantly and drawing his weapon in the same motion. The blade cast a faint glow across the rocky wall, and he saw that it was a trailing tendril of dead moss that had startled him. Cursing silently, he again turned his back to the wall and stared at the small circle of light around him.
Though he knew that the light made him more visible to anything lurking in the darkness, he did not sheath the blade. It would take too long to regain his night vision, he assured himself. In reality, the dim circle was the only comfort he had in the terrifying night, and he could not bring himself to relinquish it.
Calmer now, he tried to take stock of his assets. Besides his blade, he had a coil of sturdy rope around his waist and a small pouch containing various picks, wires, and probes. He wore the smooth gloves he had discovered in Caer Allisynn, which contained wire picks of their own. He knew that lockpicks would be of little use to him now.
And he had his belt, a pouch of drinking water, a small box of tinder, a flint, and a short, sharp dagger. Most of these items rested in a compact pack in the small of his back, though the dagger was concealed in the back of his right boot.
Of them all, only the scimitar seemed to offer immediate help. He still held the weapon before him, the blade across the height of his body. The magical light of its enchantment gave him a sense, inflated perhaps, of power. The weapon had been crafted of hardened steel, ensorcelled by some forgotten weaponsmith so that its edge remained keen, its point sharp, and its strength unfailing.
He had always intended to name it, Daryth recalled now?something grand and heroic. The proper name had never really occurred to him, and he had decided to wait until it did. Now he saw the weapon gleam and curve before him, and he saw it as a larger version of an animal's claw or
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fang梐 weapon he found himself facing, or suspecting that he faced, now.
"Cats-Claw," he whispered. The blade seemed to glow with a warmer light, as if the cold steel had been warmed by the naming. Daryth sliced the air in a back-and-forth motion, and Cat's-Claw floated like a feather in his hand.
Then he saw the eyes.
Two great yellow orbs stared at him from the darkness, beyond the protective glow of Cat's-Claw. Each seemed as large as a melon, slitted with a long, evil pupil. They remained upon Daryth, unblinking, as the Calishite leaned back against the wall. He imagined the fetid breath of the creature on his face, and it seemed to suck his very spirit away.
For a second, Daryth felt his knees grow weak and he began to sink to the ground, but as quickly as it began, the impulse passed and he stood firm again. He would not kneel before this vision from hell!
The eyes continued to bore into him, and he felt the cold bile of terror rising in his throat. Again the growl came from the darkness, pushing him against the cliff with an almost physical force. Still holding Cat's-Claw before him, Daryth groped at the cracked face of granite with his left hand, discovering several wide ledges. He studied each of these with his fingers, not daring to turn away from the staring eyes until he had completed his exploration.
Then he spun sideways and leaped onto the stone wall. By memory, each of his feet and his free hand found purchase in a narrow irregularity in the rock face. The force of his spring lifted him several feet above the ground and allowed him to brandish the scimitar outward with his free hand.
Carefully he raised one leg, then the other, until he could lift himself another foot. Still he held the blade at the ready, while his left hand stretched upward to grab another firm hold. Then, pulling himself up, he repeated the process.
The yellow eyes still stared from the darkness, but the creature moved no closer. Once Daryth saw the eyes disappear, and he gasped in panic, but they instantly returned, and he realized that the thing had merely blinked. Again
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and again, he pulled himself higher on the wall. Finally he reached a ledge he guessed to be about fifteen feet from the ground, and here he paused to rest.
He stood with his back to the cliff, staring outward and down. The predator had disappeared again, whether because it had moved or because he had carried the light source farther away, Daryth couldn't tell. He derived little comfort from the fact that he couldn't see it anymore.
After his heart ceased its pounding, once again Daryth turned to climb. He began to wonder if he might not avoid the creature by scaling this granite face to the top, where the four-footed predator would be unable to pursue. He felt with his fingers to find a handhold above his head while he stood on the wide ledge. At last he found a grip, and he quickly pulled himself upward. Once again he held the scimitar away from the rock, ready to strike in the event of any surprise attack.
Now came another growl from the darkness, this time deep and heavy. It rumbled off the rock and echoed through the silence with a sinister resonance. Daryth could see nothing below, but he sensed the thing slinking toward the bottom of the cliff. With a detached sense of wonder, he thought it uncanny that the creature always seemed to move in perfect stealth, never giving even a whisper of sound at its passage.
TUrning back to his task, Daryth pulled himself up the rock wall with practiced skill. He concentrated less on silence than on speed, for he sensed safety in the unseen heights above him. Pulling on tiny cracks in the rock, forcing his boots into impossibly narrow wedges, he made steady progress up the wall.
And then the awful approach came from behind him, and his heart failed for a moment. With a soft moan of terror, he clung to the rock as he felt the presence, immediately below him, of death. The creature sprang to the ledge the Calishite had just left, landing soundlessly on the narrow shelf of rock. Daryth couldn't hear or see the leap, but he knew that the thing once again crouched very near.
He forced himself free from the paralysis of his terror and
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stared below, holding Cat's-Claw out from the rock so that the blade shed as much light as possible. Those great yellow eyes, slanted up at the corners in oriental fashion, gazed hungrily at him from just a few feet below the level of his boot.
The light from the scimitar spilled over the ledge where the creature perched, but though the Calishite could see the rock and patches of fungus and the huge eyes of the thing, he could see nothing else. A black shadow blocked his view of some of the rock, and from this he discerned a long, feline shape. He had to guess the creature's shape more from what he couldn't see than what he could.
Heavy lids drooped over those terrible eyes in a slow blink, and immediately Daryth hurtled himself up the face. Perhaps, with luck, the ledge below would prove too narrow for the monster to gain footing to spring.
His left hand forced into a wedge, while his right still held the blade. Daryth kicked and scraped at the rock with his boots, looking for a foothold. One boot caught on a rough spur, and he hoisted himself up with growing desperation. In a frenzy, he probed with his other foot, seeking any support that would hold his weight.
A hot wound slashed through the leather heel of his boot, into the sole of his right foot. He cried out in pain as he felt a tug. Instinctively Daryth slashed downward with Cat's-Claw into the black space below his foot. His other hand began to slip from its hold, but then the keen blade bit into something that twisted angrily beneath the impact and the tugging ceased.
Gasping, he pulled himself up another few feet and wedged himself into a narrow, chimneylike crack that stretched vertically above him. Turning his back to the cliff, he held the blade across his lap and stared, wide-eyed, into the blackness.
Even as he struck the thing, he realized, the creature had made no sound. Where was it now? Had it fallen back to the ground or to the ledge below? Or was it even now creeping up the cliff toward his tiny shelter? Was this where he was destined to die?
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Cursing silently, Daryth attempted to cast off these morbid thoughts. He realized that his hands梙is whole body, really梬ere shaking from the close call. Oddly, the first biting pain in his foot had given way to numbness. He twisted his leg awkwardly to try to get a look at the wound. Resting Cat's-Claw on his lap, he used both hands to pull his foot around, ignoring the pain that again flared with the movement.
His eyes widened in shock, and the world began to spin around him. With a moan, he leaned back into the crack, afraid he would faint. Mercifully, after several seconds of dizziness, his senses calmed somewhat. He felt terribly weak, but he forced himself again to look at the wound.
His foot was gone梠r at least half of it. Numb with disbelief, he saw that some horribly sharp thing had ripped through the bottom of his boot and torn off the forepart of his foot. Nausea rose in his throat at the sight of the white bone, its red mass of flesh glistening, and the blood that dripped freely from the gaping wound.
He leaned forward and vomited over the side of the rock, heaving until his stomach was empty. Weakly he leaned again into the crack, not sparing a hand even to wipe his mouth. Then he forced himself again to look at the wound.
Though the heel and ankle remained intact, Daryth sensed that the wound had crippled him for life梙owever long that life might be. The Calishite decided he would gladly settle for one more sunrise at this point. He would make it to the dawn!
With that determination, his thoughts once again focused on his enemy. Where was the creature? The camp seemed very near now.... Wasn't that Robyn stroking his forehead? How gentle . . .
Startled, he snapped to wakefulness. The cold rock poked into his back, and his cramped muscles tormented him. He had lost consciousness. For how long? he wondered. Curiously, the knowledge terrified him more than had any of the events of the night. Death did not cause him great fear, as long as he could die fighting. But to grow weak, to lose consciousness so that death could creep up silently and claim
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him while he remained unknowing . . . this he could not allow!
He looked down again, and again he saw nothing but vast blackness. Whether he had dozed for seconds or an hour, he couldn't know. How long could it be before dawn? He felt with sickening certainty that night's cloak would last for many more hours.
Grunting in pain, he wrapped the wound crudely, using cloth torn from his tunic. The binding quickly soaked through with blood, but it would serve as minimal protection. Next he tried to lift himself from his awkward seat. Only with great exertion did he finally pull himself free from the crack. His muscles shrieked in protest. Once his wounded foot thudded into the rock, and the resulting explosion of agony threatened to drive him mad. Gasping and choking, he clung desperately to the rock until the pain subsided.
