stars winked into view against the deep blue of the sky, lighting the way for the five as they hiked upward onto the rock. It was a still, peaceful night, filled with sweet smells carried from the forest on a gentle south wind. A pathway was found, broad, well–trodden, twisting its way through clumps of boulders and past craggy drops, winding steadily upward into the shadow of the mountain. Behind them, the forestland began to drop away, revealing the dark vista of the Brakes as they spread northward below them toward the thin line of the Rill Song.
It was nearing midnight when the Elven fortress at last came into view. The great stronghold sat back within a deep crevice, a twisting maze of parapets, towers, and bulwarks rising up darkly against the moonlit stone of the cliffs. A long, winding stairway ran up the slope to a gaping entry in the castle’s outer wall. Ironbound wooden doors, weathered and split with age, their hinges rusted fast, stood open against the night. Watchtowers perched like squat beasts of prey atop massive stone– block walls, their narrow windows black and vacant. Spikes protruded from the crest of the parapets; high within the cluster of peaked turrets, chains that had once carried the standards of the Elven Kings clanged sharply against iron poles. From somewhere above the fortress, deep within the mountain’s crags, sounded the piercing cry of a night bird, its shriek rising until it matched the shrill pitch of the wind, hanging momentarily, then fading into echo.
The five who remained of the little company from Arborlon climbed the steps to the entrance of the abandoned fortress and stepped cautiously through. A high, tightly enclosed walkway ran back to a second wall. Weeds and scrub had grown through the stone block that formed the walk. The five started forward, boots echoing hollowly in the stillness of the passage. Bats flew from chinks and cracks, their leathery wings flapping wildly. Small rodents scurried across the broken stone in flashes of sudden movement. Cobwebs hung like sheets of thin, fine linen, clinging in streamers to the company’s clothing as they passed.
At the end of the walkway, an entry opened into a huge courtyard littered with debris and filled with the whine of the wind. To either side of an encircling battlement, a broad stairway wound upward toward a balcony that fronted the main tower of the ancient fortress, a monstrous walled citadel that rose hundreds of feet into the night sky, its rugged stone curving back into the shadow of the mountain. Windows marked the rising floors of the tower, overlooking the tangled blackness of the Matted Brakes. At the center of the balcony, a deep alcove sheltered a single wooden door. Below, leading directly from the courtyard into the tower, was a second door. Both stood closed.
Wil glanced about uneasily at the walls and battlements that loomed over him, dark and sinister and crumbling with age. The wind howled in his ears and blew dirt in his eyes, and he tightened the cowl of his cloak about his face for protection. He did not like this place. It frightened him. It was a haven for the ghosts of dead men, a haven in which the living were intruders. He looked at Amberle and saw the same uneasiness reflected in her face.
Crispin had dispatched Dilph to explore the balcony. With Katsin in tow, the Elf Captain moved now to the tower entry before him. He worked the latch unsuccessfully, then put his weight against the door. It held firm. Katsin tried with no better luck. The door was blocked solidly. Wil watched their struggles to free it with growing apprehension. The fortress shut them in like a prison, and he was anxious to be free of it.
Dilph reappeared from the balcony, his words nearly lost in the shriek of the wind. The upper door was open. Crispin nodded. Gathering up several loose sticks of wood that could serve as torches once they had gained access to the tower, he led the company up the balcony stairs and into the shelter of the alcove. The door stood ajar. Stepping just inside, the Elf Captain used tinder to catch fire to one of the brands he carried, lit a second to give to Dilph, then motioned them all inside, pushing the door closed against the wind.
They found themselves in a small anteroom that branched off into a series of darkened hallways. A stairwell cut into the far wall, winding out of the stone–block floor and upward into the gloom. Dust, hung heavily in the wind–stirred air, and the rock of the tower was permeated with the smell of musty dampness. Holding out his torch, Crispin paced across the room and back again, tested the heavy iron latch that secured the anteroom door, then turned back to the others. They would rest here until dawn. Katsin and Dilph would stand watch in the courtyard while Wil and Amberle slept. Crispin would go in search of the passageway that would take them through the mountain to the banks of the Mermidon.
Dilph handed his torch to Wil. With Katsin following, he slipped out into the night. Crispin bolted the door behind them, cautioned Wil and Amberle to keep the latch down, and then disappeared into the darkness of one of the hallways. The Valeman and the Elven girl watched until the light from his torch had faded into the gloom. Then Wil moved over to the entry, set his torch into an iron rack fixed in the stone and hunched down with his back against the door. Amberle wrapped herself in her blanket and lay down next to him. Through chinks in the fastenings that held the door, the, howl of the wind sounded its eerie call down the tunnel–like halls of the tower.
It was a long time before either of them fell asleep.
Wil was never certain that he did sleep. He seemed to doze more than sleep, a light drifting rest that left him groping uncertainly between wakefulness and slumber. Almost at once, he began to dream, moving through the tangle of half–steep that hung like a fog across his subconscious. Darkness and mist enfolded him in a forest of imaginings, and he wandered lost. Yet he had been here before, it seemed. It was familiar to him, this darkness and the haze that drifted through it, the mass of jumbled landscapes through which he passed. It was a dream, yet not a dream, that he had had before…
Then he felt the terrible presence of the creature as it crouched somewhere in the dark about him and abruptly he remembered. Havenstead — he had dreamed this dream at Havenstead. The creature had come for him and he had fled, but fled in vain, for there had been no escape. He had come awake finally But could he do so now? Panic surged through him. It was out there, the thing, the monster. It was coming for him again. He could not run from it, could not escape it unless he could wake. But he could not find the way out of the dark and this mist.
He heard himself scream as it reached for him.
Instantly, he was awake. In the pocket of his tunic, the Elfstones burned like fire against his body. Lurching up wildly from his blanket, he peered into the smoky haze of the torchlight as it flickered redly from the tower’s stone walls. Amberle crouched beside him, sleep clouding her vision; her face pale and frightened. Wil touched the small bulk of the Elfstones uncertainly. Had it been his scream that had wakened them, he wondered? But the Elven girl was not looking at him. She was looking fixedly at the door.
«Out there,” she whispered.
Hurriedly, the Valeman rose, drawing the girl up with him. He listened but heard nothing.
«It might have been the wind,” he said finally, his voice hushed and filled with doubt. He put his hand on her arm. «I had better have a look. Lock the door after me. Do not open it unless you hear my voice.»
He rose, pulled back the heavy bar, and slipped out into the night. Wind whistled sharply through the door as it closed behind him. Amberle pushed the latch securely in place and waited.
Wil crouched for a moment in the shadow of the alcove, staring out into the dark beyond. Moonlight fell across the length of the deserted balcony and across walls and battlements that rose all about. Cautiously, he crossed to the parapet and peered downward into the courtyard. It was empty. There was no sign of Katsin of Dilph. He hesitated, uncertain as to what he should do next. A moment later he started along the length of the balcony. At the top of the stairway, he stopped again to scan the courtyard. Still nothing. He started down.
Tumbleweeds and dust balls blew randomly across the debris–littered court, scattering wildly with each new gust of wind. Wil slipped down the stairs soundlessly. He was almost to the bottom when he saw Katsin. At least he saw what was left of Katsin, his body twisted grotesquely as it slumped against the tower wall beneath the balcony. A few feet beyond lay Dilph, barely visible under what remained of the heavy tower door that earlier had been solidly blocked.
Wil felt himself go cold. The Reaper! It had found them. And it was inside the tower.
In the next instant he was scrambling back up the stairs toward the balcony entry, praying that he was not already too late.
Alone in the tower anteroom, Amberle thought she heard a noise rise out of the gloom of the stairwell behind her, a noise that came from somewhere deep within the structure. Uneasily she glanced about, then listened. She was still listening when a pounding on the tower door startled her so that she jumped away in surprise, crying out.
«Amberle! Open the door!»
It was Wil’s voice, so muffled by the wind that it was barely recognizable. Hurriedly she threw back the heavy
