Читать книгу Pilgrim - Sara Douglass - Страница 15

StarLaughter stood and stared. She could hardly believe the beauty of the crystal forest. She lifted one hand and stroked the trunk of the tree nearest her. It was cool and solid, but somehow vibrant.

“Exquisite,” she said.

The Demons were grouped two or three trees beyond her. StarLaughter could see their dark and distorted forms through the transparent trunks.

“Dangerous,” Barzula said. He had his arms wrapped about himself, and his golden eyes flickered uncertainly at the trees.

StarLaughter walked up to them, slipping a little on the glassy footing, and noting that the golden leaves of the trees — and how smooth and silky they felt! — were exactly the same shade as Barzula’s eyes.

“Dangerous?” she said. “How so?”

Mot rounded on her, baring sharp teeth, but he pulled himself up at the look of surprise on StarLaughter’s face.

“A trap,” he said, and waved his hand about. A thousand hands reflected back at him from a myriad of trunks and branches. “This is a trap designed by the Enemy.”

StarLaughter frowned, and tightened her hold on her son. “You must not let it harm him.”

“Fear not, Queen of Heaven.” Sheol slipped an arm about StarLaughter’s shoulders and gave her a brief hug. “No harm shall come to your son. Now …”

Her tone suddenly brisk, Sheol turned to Rox. “How do we proceed? Which way?”

Rox shrugged. “Down. Everything slopes down. The Enemy’s craft is down. What we need is down.”

“Then why do we still stand here?” StarLaughter asked, raising one eyebrow. She shifted her son to a more comfortable position, and took a step forward. “Can’t you use your power to scry out the … the place?”

Rox looked at the others. “Shall I? It is my time — my power grows each minute as terror feeds off this pitiful land.”

“We need to move,” Raspu agreed. “If we stand about and wait the trap will only snap shut.”

But will it snap shut the instant we move? Sheol shared her thought with her companion Demons, but not with StarLaughter.

Rox looked her in the eye. There is only one way to find out.

Sheol nodded. “We must risk it. Let loose your terror, Rox. Shatter these trees, and find the hiding place for us.”

Rox smiled. He shifted so that he stood with his feet wide apart, and tipped back his head. His grin widened, became more feral, then he spread his arms out wide, his fingers trembling slightly … and screamed.

Terror raged through the trees. Every nightmare possible, every fear imaginable, every horror that was ever conceived, flooded rampant through the crystal forest.

Far away, hidden at the edge of the crystal trees at the point where it joined the waterways, WolfStar cried out and sagged to the floor. His breath cramped in his chest, his eyes bulged, and his limbs trembled.

His hands convulsed, and tightened about the tiny, cold corpse he carried.

“No!” he whispered, and then gagged.

In yet a different part of the crystal forest, the Survivor leaned against a tree, and grinned. His brown eyes danced with merriment.

“Predictable,” he whispered. “But foolish. Very, very foolish.”

Terror raged through the crystal forest. It bounced and jangled through the trees — and then it reflected, reflected back toward its source a thousand times stronger than it had been born.

Straight back to the Demons and StarLaughter.

It hit them with unimaginable force.

Every one of them, StarLaughter included, fell to the crystal floor, bruising flesh and jarring joints, their mouths opening for screams that never came because of the sheer weight of the terror that consumed them.

The baby slid out of StarLaughter’s arms, rolling downhill until he slammed against a tree and lay still.

Completely still, his eyes wide open and blank, unaffected by the terror that assailed those who cared for him.

As quickly as the terror had hit the group, it dissipated. Rox had withdrawn his power in the extremity of his own fright, and once the source was shut off, so the terror dimmed until there were only faint shadows left to chase each other through the forest.

Mot was the first of the Demons to recover. He struggled to his feet, his pallid flesh quivering.

“I had always wondered how the Enemy had trapped Qeteb,” he said hoarsely. “Now I know. They must have used his own power against him. They must have reflected it back at him!”

Sheol bared her teeth, arched her neck, and then howled, letting the sound echo through the forest a full minute before she shut her mouth with a snap.

“Then, knowing, we are the stronger,” she said. “No-one can ever use that trap against us again. Come, rise, and we shall set off on foot to find our stolen treasure.”

StarLaughter came out her fugue with a start, and suddenly realised that her child was missing. She cried out, then spotted him some paces away. She scrambled over on her hands and knees, ripping the hem of her robe where it caught under one knee, and gathered him into her arms, crooning softly.

“Was he hurt?” Raspu asked.

StarLaughter shook her head. “He is well, see how well!”

The five Demons were now gathered about her in a circle. They stared down at the unmoving infant, then lifted their eyes and stared at each other.

And smiled.

The Survivor ran one hand back through his silvered hair.

Then he straightened his black leather jacket with a tug at its hem.

“Good,” he said. “Good girl.” He patted the tree affectionately. “That scared them! Now, we may as well let them have what they want, and let them leave. No use holding them up any more than we have already.”

The Survivor smiled slowly to himself. “But that was fun to watch.”

Then he tensed, his eyes on a far distant form moving stealthily from tree to tree. He caught a brief glimpse of golden wings, and coppery hair.

WolfStar!

Noah swore. He hoped the Enchanter wasn’t going to make a nuisance of himself.

He stilled, watching the distant form carefully. Noah suddenly realised that WolfStar had outlived his usefulness by many, many years.

“Something should have been done about you a long time ago,” he murmured.

Then suddenly Noah’s face blanched, and his right hand clutched at his chest, and he forgot all about WolfStar as the craft wreaked their deadly havoc within him.

In the end, it wasn’t the Demons that Noah had to fear at all.

Sheol stood talking quietly to Rox, making sure he hadn’t been harmed too greatly by the sudden reflection of his power, then turned and gestured to StarLaughter and the other Demons.

“Come. Let us waste no more time here than we must.”

She turned and walked deeper into the forest, her feet slipping and sliding on the treacherous floor.

After an instant’s hesitation, the others followed her.

They found the going difficult and nerve-wracking. Feet constantly slid out from underneath them, and their hips and knees were continually jarred and bruised by sudden heart-lurching tumbles.

StarLaughter, her arms so tightly wrapped about her unliving son that they sunk into his flesh, had to spread her wings in order to maintain even the semblance of balance.

But even that worked against her, because the feathers invariably got caught in low-slung branches. Sharp crystal twigs dug into her feathers until blood speckled the path behind her, and she was constantly being spun about as a wing was securely lodged between branches.

StarLaughter gritted her teeth against the pain, and struggled forward. Damn all the Stars into eternal darkness that she no longer had her power!

And why didn’t she? Hadn’t the Demons promised that her power would be returned to her when she came back through the Star Gate?

Raspu caught her thought and paused, leaning a hand against a tree trunk to maintain his balance.

The ground was now sloping alarmingly, and yet the slopes below showed more tangled crystal branches and golden leaves for as far as the eye could see.

As StarLaughter drew level, Raspu slipped an arm about her waist and drew her tight and hard against him.

StarLaughter, her breath momentarily jerked from her body, looked into his eyes in fright — and then relaxed, feeling the power and warmth of his body against hers.

“Be still, Queen of Heaven,” Raspu whispered, his breath warm against her cheek, his arm still warmer about her waist. “Power shall be yours, but you must wait a little longer for it. Once our own power has been strengthened by this Lake, then we will have some to share with you. A different power than what you once commanded, but still power.”

“Of course,” StarLaughter said, accepting. “The Star Dance is no more, is it?”

“No,” Raspu whispered, and leaned down to softly brush her lips with his. “No more.”

The Demons struggled lower and lower. No more tricks leapt out at them, but their tempers grew progressively shorter as they went deeper, until they lashed out as they stumbled, their arms and hands striking twigs and leaves from branches, leaving a scattering of crushed crystal and trampled leaves in their path.

“Where?” snapped Sheol.

“Where?” snarled Rox.

“What is wrong?” StarLaughter whispered, now walking close to Raspu.

“It must be here somewhere!” he said, then jerked to a halt. “Wait!”

“What?” Sheol asked, turning to look at him.

Raspu stilled, sending his awareness slinking out between the trees. There was something … something …

“Something is out there!” Mot said.

“What we are looking for?” StarLaughter asked, her eyes bright.

Raspu shook his head slowly.

“Something … else. Something … watches.”

Noah stilled in his efforts to get back to his craft. Pain still arced through his chest and arm, but it wasn’t as fierce as it had been previously.

Or maybe he was simply getting used to it.

He raised his head slightly and peered about. Could the Demons see him? Sense him somehow? He tried very hard not to even breathe. No doubt the pain they would visit on him should they catch him would be even worse than this he currently endured.

Noah remembered the horror that had been wreaked on his own world, the frightfulness of the campaign to trap Qeteb, and he shivered.

“Drago,” he mouthed soundlessly, and looked up through the crystal-clogged slopes rising above him. Drago!

And agony such as he could not have even imagined knifed through his body.

“It feels almost like the Enemy,” Sheol said, a deep frown twisting her face. “I remember how they felt, how they tasted. And this tastes so familiar.”

Rox shook his head. “It could not be. They were mortal, they could not still live.”

“But still,” Raspu said, and looked about. “Still … there is something out there.”

“But it is not a danger,” Mot said briskly. “Come.”

And he set off again.

The other Demons looked at each other, shrugged, and followed him, Raspu holding StarLaughter’s hand.

But still they kept their awareness sensing out about them.

They found what they where looking for eventually, when they were so tired and impatient that they were at the point of sinking their teeth into each other.

It sat before them, bubbling quietly.

“Warmth!” Sheol whispered, and sank to her bruised knees.

StarLaughter stood, staring, unable to believe that after so long, the first of the jewels of the Grail stood before them.

A large, spreading pool of blood in the very pit of the crystal forest, gently steaming and bubbling.

“Yes!” Raspu screamed … and then lunged at StarLaughter.

She pulled back instinctively, her arms tight about her son, but Raspu was far too quick and far too strong for her, and he yanked the baby from her arms.

“Yes!” he cried again, and tossed the baby towards the pool of blood.

The child arced through the air — and then fell, hitting the pool with a sickening heavy-wet splash.

Blood splattered out in a great circle where he had hit the pool, covering both the Demons and the nearest crystal trees.

StarLaughter cried out in horror, her hands to her face. Her child had gone! Disappeared!

“Wait,” Raspu said, his voice now calm. “Wait.”

Every one of the Demons was now still, tense.

Waiting.

Suddenly there was an agitation within the pool of blood, as if it were being stirred by an unseen hand, and then something floated to the surface.

A child.

But an infant no longer. A toddler of perhaps three or four. A boy, his hair thickened and clotted by the blood in which he floated, his eyes closed under gelatinous clumps of the stuff, his pale skin made rosy by the blood running off him.

“DragonStar!” StarLaughter cried, and waded into the pool.

She sank to her thighs almost immediately, but she struggled on, the blood rising up through her pale blue gown and soaking her breasts and wings. She lunged for the boy, missed, lunged again, and grabbed him by the hair, pulling him to her.

“DragonStar,” she whispered this time, and drew the boy to her, offering him her slimy, crimson breast.

The nipple plopped out of his unresponsive mouth, but there was a difference in him — and the difference was not only his size.

StarLaughter looked up to the Demons anxiously standing at the edge of the pool.

“He is warm,” she said, tears slipping down her cheeks. “He is warm!“

WolfStar watched from his hiding place twenty paces distant. He lay flat along the forest floor, his head raised only enough so that he could see through the transparent roots before him.

This was his first sight of the Demons — and of his wife, StarLaughter.

He was shocked that after four thousand years she could still rouse emotions in him. There she stood, so dark and beautiful, her coagulating robe clinging to the body he still remembered, could still feel.

And in her arms, their son.

DragonStar.

No, he thought, trying to drive down his feelings for StarLaughter —

— remember the nights they had shared? Remember the love and the laughter?

And remember also that she plotted to take your place on the throne, and conspired with our unborn son to that purpose.

— no, not DragonStar. Qeteb. Born and yet unborn.

StarLaughter was willing to let a Demon inhabit the body of their son.

WolfStar’s lips drew back in a silent snarl. No wonder he loathed her. She had deserved her death, and he wished she’d been made to suffer more than she had.

Perhaps he could still arrange it.

The Demons grouped about StarLaughter, drenched in clotted blood and now standing out of the pool. As their hands patted at the boy, and their faces bent to kiss him, WolfStar slithered carefully forward, one hand dragging the tiny corpse behind him.

There. Again! Raspu thought, sharing it only with the other Demons.

Who?

What?

Where?

WOLFSTAR!

Yes, Raspu nodded to the others. WolfStar.

StarLaughter, unaware of what was going on about her, crooned and laughed at her child, one hand trying to wipe the clots of blood from his body.

What should we do? What is he doing?

They considered, their jewel-like eyes sharp.

Watch, Sheol thought, and the others silently agreed. Watch — and learn what it was that WolfStar did here.

Raspu laid a hand on StarLaughter’s arm and pulled her gently back up the slope.

“It is time to leave, Queen of Heaven,” he said. “Time to move to the next site.”

“Yes.” StarLaughter had a great smile of happiness on her face. “Yes.”

As they moved off, Barzula lagged behind, concealing himself with power and keeping his senses focused on the blood pool.

Thus he was aware when WolfStar furtively ran forward to the pool, now considerably smaller in circumference than previously, and threw in his own still corpse.

A tiny girl bubbled back to the surface, as still as the male-child had been, but just as warm.

Barzula frowned, only barely repressing the urge to confront WolfStar — how dare he use the pool! — when he stopped himself, and smiled.

They could use this. Indeed they could.

And so he hurried after the other Demons, formulating his plan as he ran.

Drago pulled Faraday back down to the ground when the Demons emerged, sheltering her with his body.

Both drew in shocked breaths at the appalling sight of the bloodied StarLaughter carrying a toddler.

“Look!” Faraday whispered. “Look!”

Drago nodded, his face composed but thoughtful. “Their first goal is achieved. Qeteb now warms.”

“And they? The Demons?”

“Will be stronger now. More confident. They have braved and won the first of the obstacles. They will know they can win through the others, as well.”

StarLaughter sat, the child in her lap, completely absorbed in him. Her eyes shone soft and happy.

A few paces away the Demons stood huddled, talking urgently.

“WolfStar?”

“He had an infant that he threw in?”

Barzula nodded. “The corpse of a girl-child. I do not know what she means or is to him that he so dares.”

“And she …?”

“She was … warmed.”

“How dare he?” Rox seethed. “How dare he —”

“Wait,” Barzula said, and laid a hand on Rox’s arm. “We can use this.”

“Use? How?”

And Barzula spoke.

After a few minutes all the Demons nodded, their eyes glowing with satisfaction.

“And StarLaughter?” Sheol asked.

“She will not like it at first,” Barzula said, “for she aches for revenge. But she will accept, and then she will approve. Think how much sweeter the revenge will be!”

Sheol gurgled with merriment, startling StarLaughter into looking up.

All the Demons were laughing, and clapping their hands. They must be pleased for her son, she thought, and smiled at them.

Sheol quietened as she watched StarLaughter. She turned to her companions. “Is it time?” she asked. “Should we?”

They considered the possibilities, finally nodding.

“A little,” Raspu said. “Not too much.”

“Just enough,” Sheol agreed. “Enough so she can be useful —”

“— but not a threat,” Mot said.

StarLaughter, her head once more bent to her son, looked up as she heard the TimeKeepers approaching. Their faces were gentle, their jewel-bright eyes loving.

“When you originally came to us,” Sheol began softly, “we promised you power for your help.”

Her eyes shifted to the boy-child in StarLaughter’s lap. “Now we are on the final path, our goal is in sight, and we have come to fulfil our promise. Stand.”

StarLaughter obeyed, her eyes hungry. Rox stepped forward, and took her shoulder in his hands. “Beautiful woman,” he whispered, and kissed her full on the mouth.

Power flooded through StarLaughter. Her mouth gobbled at his, desperate for more of the sweet stuff, but Rox pulled away, laughing.

Barzula stepped forth, and offered StarLaughter his mouth. She clung to him, drinking in as much power as he was willing to give her, and then almost fell when he pushed her back.

StarLaughter regained her balance, and clung to each of the other Demons in turn as they let her feed from their mouths.

As Sheol, the last, pushed her away, StarLaughter tried to understand the power that now flooded her. It was not Icarii power, and not tied to the now-silent Star Dance, but something far different — and far, far more exhilarating.

“I thank you,” she whispered. “Now I shall be a true mother to my son.”

The Demons smiled.

Faraday swallowed her revulsion as the Demons gathered StarLaughter to them. Once they had done, they mounted their dark horses, moving back through the Silent Woman Woods.

“Drago,” she said, “it is time we went. Noah told me that we could find a way down through the Keep —”

“No.” Drago laid a hand on her shoulder and pushed her gently back down. “You stay here. I want to do this by myself. Please.”

“But how will you —”

Faraday never finished. With a low cry the feathered lizard stuck its head out of the neckline of Drago’s tunic, looked about, then scrambled forth.

Drago almost fell over with the strength of its exertions, and grabbed at the nearest tree for support.

The lizard scuttled for the border between the Woods and the crystal forest, and then jumped between the first two of the crystal trees, its feet scrabbling on the slippery surface.

Drago looked at the lizard, looked at Faraday, then shrugged helplessly. “It looks like I will have some company after all.”

“Be careful,” Faraday said.

Drago stood looking down at her, very still. Her face was upturned to him, her eyes bright with concern.

Hesitantly Drago reached out a hand, then stopped it before his fingers touched her face.

“Wait for me,” he said, then turned and walked between the first trees of the crystal forest, one hand now on his sack, the other hefting his staff.