Eloise Read online

  The weight was too much. He felt the room begin to spin as he struggled against the inert mass, a roaring begin to fill his ears. In his mouth there was the taste of blood.

  Like a crippled spider, Arbush inched himself over the floor.

  "Hold it, Earl," he gasped. "Let it go now and it'll snap my spine."

  "Hurry!"

  Dumarest grunted as he felt the weight begin to slip from his hands. With a final effort he threw it to one side, away from the crawling figure. With a crash it slammed to the floor.

  "Arbush?"

  "I'm all right." The man was standing, wincing as he flexed his legs. "The damned thing must have hit a nerve when it fell. Paralyzed me for a while and then held me fast. It was a bad time, Earl. All I could do was to lie there, not knowing if anyone else was alive; waiting to starve, to die of thirst and cold." He shivered. "A hell of a way to go."

  "There are worse."

  "Maybe, but if so, I don't want to hear about them." Arbush pursed his lips as he studied his companion. "You look in a hell of a state."

  Dumarest caught at the console to steady himself. The final effort had robbed him of strength and the plump figure of the minstrel seemed to swell and shrink before his eyes.

  He said, "My ribs could be broken. Get drugs from the medical cabinet and something to bind my chest. You'd better hurry; we've a lot to do."

  * * * * *

  There was food, some basics which had escaped spilling, and other things. Sitting in the salon they ate; sipping the sickly compound, heavy with glucose, laced with vitamins and flavored with citrus, a cup of which provided energy enough for a day. Eglantine's cabin had held succulent dainties; soft meats and spiced fillets of fish, compounds of nuts and honey, fruits steeped in spirits. They ate regardless of choice, using the food as essential fuel; a means to combat the cold.

  They had chosen the practical clothing they wore, thick layers of assorted garments tightly bound with straps and thongs.

  Raking the final fragment of meat from a tin, Arbush threw it aside and gave a gusting sigh.

  "I've eaten worse and I've eaten better, a dozen courses served with wine by a smiling wanton; but never have I enjoyed a meal more."

  Dumarest made no comment. He was stiff, his torso tightly bound with dressings, his blood thick with drugs. He had washed the blood from his face, neck and hands and treated superficial abrasions; but a little of the ache remained despite the medications. And nothing could ease the situation.

  "We were lucky," said the minstrel somberly. "We had more luck than anyone could deserve. To be trapped in a warp and escape from it-"

  He broke off, shaking his head, thinking; remembering the time of madness when all familiarity had vanished and nightmare reigned. The chaos as the ship had traveled into the warp, riding a tide of fury to the very node itself; protected only by the Erhaft field, the whine of the laboring generators.

  There was no way to tell how long it had lasted. A second, a year; both could have been the same. And then to be spat out like a pip between closing fingers; to be thrown into a region of normal space at incredible velocity so that, abruptly, a world had loomed before them.

  He said, again, "We were lucky."

  Luck which hadn't lasted. The generators had failed as they neared the ice, the ship falling, to be sent hurtling down an icy wall, to hit a crevasse; to be ripped and torn apart as, within, soft flesh met unyielding metal.

  An impact which Dumarest had been unable to avoid.

  He said, dryly, "Maybe the others were the lucky ones."

  "No, Earl, you know better than that. For them it is over, true; in the gamble we made they lost as we won. Had Shalout been at the controls, none would have survived. As I told you, Earl, you have more luck than most. I read it in your palm."

  "Is that why you sided with me?"

  "Did I?" Arbush raised his eyebrows. "Well, maybe I did. A hint to an intelligent man is better than a book to a fool. And maybe I have old-fashioned ideas about the keeping of bargains. Well, now we have other problems to face. On the way down, did you see anything? A city?"

  "No." There had been no time for that. All Dumarest could remember was the world, the whine of atmosphere, the shocking advance of the ice, his own struggles with the controls; the final, sickening moment when the field had collapsed and they had fallen like a stone. "I saw nothing. And we don't even know which part of space this world could be in. The warp could have thrown us anywhere. Not that it matters. First, we have to survive."

  "To escape this damned cold," agreed Arbush. Ho pounded gloved hands together. "Any ideas, Earl?"

  "We must wait until dawn and then head towards the sun. Move south and hope to get out of this ice. For that we'll need food, ropes, and the means to make a fire. Ice axes too."

  "What are they?"

  "Things like picks with sharpened ends. Or one end sharp and one shaped like an axe. The Styast wouldn't have carried them; they'll have to be made."

  "Tell me what you want and I'll make it," said Arbush. "I worked in metal once, years ago now, but some of the old skill remains. Anything else?"

  "Pitons. Long spikes with eyes at the end to hold a rope. Hammers to bury them in the ice. More spikes to fit on our boots. Braided wire strong enough to carry seven times our combined weights. Packs in which to carry supplies." Dumarest rose. "We'd better get on with it."

  The ship held all the material they needed. Dumarest stripped wire from the conduits while the minstrel busied himself with tools and a jury-rigged lastorch. Packs were fashioned from coverings stripped from the bunks, stiffened with fiber and sewn with wire. By the time they were finished, Arbush had made the ice axes. He held one out for inspection.

  "These do. Earl?"

  Rough blades had been welded to lengths of pipe, bound with cable at the ends to provide a grip. Dumarest hefted one, sent the point slamming into a scrap of metal.

  "They'll do. Make a ring at the end so they can be carried on the wrist with a loop."

  "I've made four." Arbush gestured towards them, then looked keenly at Dumarest. "You look bad. Those ribs hurting you?"

  Drugs had eased the pain, but there could be internal bleeding which sapped his strength. Dumarest coughed, touched his lips, looked at a smear of blood on his hand.

  "I'll be all right. You?"

  "Bruised all to hell," said Arbush. "And my legs still seem numb. I got beaten up once and this feels the same. Well, I got over it then and I guess I'll get over it now." Pausing he added, quietly, "Do you think we've got a chance, Earl?"

  "There's always a chance."

  "Yes; and if there is, you'll take it. That's something else I read in your palm. Guts and luck both. I'm willing to ride with them." Arbush shivered. "Damn this cold! What we need is a drink. Maybe Beint had a secret bottle stashed somewhere."

  He found it in a loop under the console; a metal flask of brandy disguised as a container of oil. After the first drink Dumarest replaced the cap.

  "We'll need this later," he said. "Now let's get back to work."

  At dawn they were ready; packs loaded, pitons heavy in pouches, coils of braided wire, hammers, axes hanging from roughly fashioned harnesses. Dumarest stood, thinking, mentally rechecking what they carried. A single item could mean their lives; once they had started, there would be no turning back.

  Arbush came bustling from within the body of the wreck. He carried two lasers, and a bag which made small metallic clinkings.

  "Here." He handed one of the guns to Dumarest. "A good thought, Earl. I'd forgotten."

  "What's in the bag?"

  "Money. Your ten thousand ermils." Arbush handed them over. "Some other things."

  "Such as?" He watched as the minstrel tilted the bag. Rings showed, heavy bands set with precious gems, adornments wrenched from the fingers of the dead captain. A few octagonal coins, some others. The entire portable wealth of the Styast.

  "There's no point in leaving it. Earl. A city can be as deadly as a jungle f
or a man who can't pay his way."

  A hard-learned truth. Dumarest said, "Keep the rings and well split the money. Ready now?"

  * * * * *

  They climbed from the ship into a scintillating fairyland; the ice glowing with red and orange, green, blue, yellow, all the colors of the spectrum fired by the light of the sun. It was small, a blue-white orb which seared the vision, a compact patch of brightness in the sky. It hung low; against it they could only squint behind protectors of tinted plastic, goggles hastily improvised from the filters of broken scanners.

  For a while they studied the terrain, grotesque figures muffled and shapeless; the minstrel's gilyre, miraculously preserved, hanging by a string from his pack.

  "It's cold," said Arbush, gesturing towards the sun. "It looks hot, but it's cold. Radiating high in the ultra-violet and we must be a long way from it. The entire planet could be ice-bound, Earl."

  A possibility, Dumarest had been on stranger worlds; but life existed in the most unexpected places. And if this planet held wealth of any kind it would have attracted exploiters; men who would build cities, visitors in ships.

  If men were close. If the world was a habitated region. If the warp hadn't flung them into another space.

  He said, "I'll take the lead. We'll be roped together. Keep back, but not too far. If I slip, dig in and take the strain."

  "You've done this before," said Arbush. "Traveled over ice, I mean. How bad is it, Earl?"

  Bad enough. Dumarest narrowed his eyes against the glare, catching deeper pools of color; shadows which revealed crevasses, mounds and distant peaks which would have to be climbed. Ahead rolled an undulating surface, scored and traced with gullys of unknown depth; yet one which could be traversed without too much trouble during the day.

  Relatively easy for men in good condition with proper equipment and clothing. Far from that, in their present condition.

  "Well head towards those peaks," he said, deciding. "Due south as far as I can gather. Aim for the pass between them. When we reach it, we'll take another sighting. Now, remember, keep the rope taut and stay alert."

  There was no wind; for that he was grateful. No cloud and no flurry of frozen particles; but even so the going was hard. The surface was deceptive, perspective distorted, a multitude of snares hidden by the glare. Twice he stepped over the unseen edge of a crevasse, relying on the rope which jerked him to a halt and drew him back to safety. The third time a thin layer shattered beneath his boots and he fell further down than before, feeling the savage jerk at his harness as the life-line snapped taut.

  Arbush's face was anxious as he drew him to safety.

  "Your mouth, Earl, it's got blood on it. Do that again and you could shred your lungs. Why not let me take the lead?"

  "You're too heavy." Dumarest wiped at the blood, already frozen. "If you slipped, I couldn't hold you, I'd follow you down." He looked at the sun. "We moved too soon. Later, if the sun rises higher, we can get a better view."

  "Do we wait until then?"

  "No. We can't be sure the sun will rise higher than it has. We'll just have to take more care."

  He moved on, cautiously, testing every step of the way. The ice was crusted in places with frozen snow, patches which had hardened to hide what lay beneath. Like snails they crawled around them, crossing them only when there was no choice, anchoring the rope to axes driven deep as each man traversed the areas in turn.

  Later the going improved; the ice which had been scored with cracks as if some mammoth hand had shattered the surface, growing more solid, less treacherous.

  At noon they reached the pass and looked down into nightmare.

  "Well never be able to do it." Arbush, breathing heavily, slumped with his back against a hummock. The gilyre, swinging loose, rapped against the ice and made a soft, thrumming sound. "Earl, we'll have to find some other way. There has to be simpler route."

  There probably was; finding it was something else. Dumarest looked at the sun; it was still low, even at the center of its swing. Lowering his eyes he took a sight; a jagged peak which rose like a rotten tooth, another beside it which seemed to bear a crenelated castle. From both summits smoke seemed to drift in thinning plumes, trapped snow carried by high-altitude winds.

  Between where they sat and the distant peaks lay a mass of cracks and fissures, mounds, escarpments, gullys, shimmering cliffs; the whole area torn and jagged as if a giant fork had stirred the surface. To reach it they would first have to descend a sheer wall which stretched as far as he could see on either side.

  "We'll never do it," said Arbush again. "We've got to drop five hundred feet and then cross that mess out there. Climbing, descending, up and down-and then what? More ice."

  "Well do it," said Dumarest. "We have to. Hold my legs while I take a look."

  He eased forward as Arbush gripped his ankles, thrusting the upper part of his body over the edge. The ice was rough, cracked in places, ledged at spots on the way down. He studied them, impressing their position on his memory. Back up in his original position he said, "It won't be all that difficult. Pitons will hold the ropes and we can use the axes."

  "Just like that?"

  "There's no other way." Dumarest freed the coil of braided wire from his harness. "Join this to yours and make sure the knot is tight and smooth. It has to pass through the eyelet of a piton. We'll let ourselves down as far as we can go and then take it in stages."

  At the edge Dumarest searched for a firm place and hammered one of the pitons in it, up to the eyelet. Through it he fed the joined rope, testing the knot with a jerk, making certain that it would slip through. Checking the end attached to his harness, he threw the remainder over the edge, then, gripping the length below the eyelet, slipped over the edge of the cliff.

  A simple manoeuvre for a fit man, to let himself down a sheer drop while supporting his own weight on a trailing rope. But he wasn't fit, the braided wire was thin, cutting into his gloved palms, hard to grip; only the spikes on his boots enabled him to ease his way down towards a ledge he had spotted.

  It lay a little towards the right, too far to reach; a narrow extension from the face, the edges frayed and weak. He dropped below it, kicked at the face and began to swing like the bob on a pendulum. Another kick, a third and his boots rasped on the ledge. Before he could swing away he slammed the point of an axe into the ice and hung on, breathing deeply.

  "Earl! Are you all right?" Arbush's face was a blur, his voice a thin echo.

  "Yes." Dumarest hammered home another piton. Through it he fed the free end of the rope, then released it from his harness. "Draw it up and do what I did. Hurry!"

  It was easier for the minstrel; his weight taken up by the rope which Dumarest eased through the piton, the metal taking the strain. Gasping he clutched at holds, looking up then down, his mouth crusted with a rim of ice.

  "Seventy feet," he said. "Maybe more. What do we do now?"

  Dumarest pulled the rope, freeing it from above. "The same as before. And we do it as many times as we need to, until we reach the bottom."

  "And if there are no ledges?"

  "We'll use the axes to make holds, pitons to support our weight."

  "And when they run out?"

  "Then we start worrying." Dumarest handed the man the length of trailing rope. "Hang on to it. Help me take the strain."

  They reached the bottom of the cliff as shadows thickened in the gullies, and the summits of the peaks flared with the dying light of the sun. Night caught them in the labyrinth and they found a narrow crevasse into which they huddled, as they ate rations warmed over a tiny fire.

  "How long. Earl?" Arbush leaned forward a little as he sat, his face limned by the dying embers. "How far have we traveled today? Twenty miles? Ten? How long before we find a city?"

  "As long as it takes."

  "Until the food runs out. The fuel. Until one of us falls and kills himself. Until the cold gets us both. Well, no one promised that it would be easy." Arbush stirred, the gilyre f
alling from where he had placed it, to boom a little as it fell. "And, at least we can have a song."

  It was a plaintive thing; a hopeless yearning carried on the pulse of strings, the whisper of ghost-drums born beneath the tapping of gloved fingers, the notes blurred and fuzzed yet skillfully blended. It faded to rise in a sudden crescendo; hard, brittle, this time seeming to shout defiance, the organ-notes of the minstrel's voice rising to send echoes rolling across the ice. Voice and music ended abruptly on a thin keening, which seemed to hang suspended in the air.

  "Goodnight, Earl."

  "Goodnight."

  It was a time for sleep and yet Dumarest found it impossible to rest. Overstrained muscles joined with older injuries, accentuating their aches so that he turned and twisted, dozing to wake and turning to doze again. Drugs would have brought oblivion, would have at least ended the discomfort; but they, like everything else, were in limited supply.

  Later, when they were essential, they would be used.

  But time need not be wasted.

  Sitting upright, Dumarest leaned his back against the ice. Facing him Arbush was asleep, his face covered, his gross frame jerking as if he dreamed. One hand was lying in the long-dead embers of the fire, the other clutched his gilyre. Above the stars blazed with fading glory, their light diffused by a thin skein of cloud, a gossamer veil carried on an unseen wind. A wind which could lower, cloud which could thicken; a storm could fill the air with a raging blizzard.

  If so, they were as good as dead.

  Was this where it was all going to end? The long search over. The path he had followed since a boy; the hard, bitter, blood-stained path among the scattered worlds to end here on this unknown planet, beneath a nameless sun?

  The stars seemed to swirl, to take on other configurations, to become a mane of silver hair. Derai whom he had known, who had promised so much, who had left him to dream in endless, subjective sleep. As others had left him; too many others. Kalin, Lallia, Mayenne-all now dead. Dust and fragments of the past.

  The wind gusted lower, sighing, holding the wail of a Ghenka song. The metal plate on which they had built the fire rasped over the ice as he fell against it. Sleep finally came with a host of memories, faces which loomed close to fall away, to be replaced by others distorted in the fabric of nightmare.