pause and caused me to recall another, similar place.
«What…?» asked my charge, turning. Then, «Why, you moved much more quickly than I had guessed. That is our destination, the Keep of Ganelon.»
I thought then about a Ganelon. I did not want to, but I did. He had been a traitorous assassin and I had exiled him from Avalon centuries before. I had actually cast him through Shadow into another time and place, as my brother Eric had later done to me. I hoped it was not to this place that I had sent him. While not very likely, it was possible. Though he was a mortal man with his allotted span, and I had exiled him from that place perhaps six hundred years ago, it was possible that it was only a few years past in terms of this world. Time, too, is a function of Shadow, and even Dworkin did not know all of its ins and outs. Or perhaps he did. Maybe that is what drove him mad. The most difficult thing about Time, I have learned, is doing it. In any case, I felt that this could not be my old enemy and former trusted aide, for he would certainly not be resisting any wave of iniquity that was sweeping across the land. He would be right in there pitching for the loathsome beasts, I felt sure.
A thing that caused me difficulty was the man that I carried. His counterpart had been alive in Avalon at the time of the exiling, meaning that the time lag could be just about right.
I did not care to encounter the Ganelon I had known and be recognized by him. He knew nothing of Shadow. He would only know that I had worked some dark magic on him, as an alternative to killing him, and while he had survived that alternative it might have been the rougher of the two.
But the man in my arms needed a place of rest and shelter, so I trudged forward.
I wondered, though…
There did seem to be something about me that lent itself to recognition by this man. If there were some memories of a shadow of myself in this place that was like yet not like Avalon, what form did they take? How would they condition a reception of the actual me should I be discovered?
The sun was beginning to sink. A cool breeze began, hinting of a chilly night to come. My ward was snoring once more, so I decided to sprint most of the remaining distance. I did not like the feeling that this forest after dark might become a place crawling with unclean denizens of some damned Circle that I knew nothing about, but who seemed to be on the make when it came to this particular piece of real estate.
So I ran through lengthening shadows, dismissing rising notions of pursuit, ambush, surveillance, until I could do so no longer. They had achieved the strength of a premonition, and then I heard the noises at my back: a soft pat-pat-pat, as of footfalls.
I set the stretcher down, and I drew my blade as I turned.
There were two of them, cats.
Their markings were precisely those of Siamese cats, only these were the size of tigers. Their eyes were of a solid, sun-bright yellow, pupilless. They seated themselves on their haunches as I turned, and they stared at me and did not blink.
They were about thirty paces away. I stood sideways between them and the stretcher, my blade raised.
Then the one to the left opened its mouth. I did not know whether to expect a purr or a roar. Instead, it spoke. It said, «Man, most mortal.» The voice was not human-sounding. It was too high-pitched.
«Yet still it lives,» said the second, sounding much like the first.
«Slay it here,» said the first.
«What of the one who guards it with the blade I like not at all?»
«Mortal man?»
«Come find out,» I said, softly.
«It is thin, and perhaps it is old.»
«Yet it bore the other from the cairn to this place, rapidly and without rest. Let us flank it.»
I sprang forward as they moved, and the one to my right leaped toward me.
My blade split its skull and continued on into the shoulder. As I turned, yanking it free, the other swept past me, heading toward the stretcher. I swung wildly.
My blade fell upon its back and passed completely through its body. It emitted a shriek that grated like chalk on a blackboard as it fell in two pieces and began to burun. The other was burning also.
But the one I had halved was not yet dead. Its head turned toward me and those blazing eyes met my own and held them.
«I die the final death,» it said, «and so I know you, Opener. Why do you slay us?» And then the flames consumed its head.
I turned, cleaned my blade and sheathed it, picked up the stretcher, ignored all questions, and continued on.
A small knowledge had begun within me, as to what the thing was, what it had meant.
And I still sometimes see that burning cat head in dreams, and then I awaken, wet and shivering, and the night seems darker, and filled with shapes I cannot define.
The Keep of Ganelon had a moat about it, and a drawbridge, which was raised. There was a tower at each of the four corners where its high walls met. From within those walls many other towers reached even higher, tickling the bellies of low, dark clouds, occluding the early stars, casting shadows of jet down the high hill the place occupied. Several of the towers were already lighted, and the wind bore me the faint sound of voices.
I stood before the drawbridge, lowered my charge to the ground, cupped my hands about my mouth, and called out:
«Hola! Ganelon! Two travelers are stranded in the night!»
I heard the clink of metal on stone. I felt that I was being studied from somewhere above. I squinted upward, but my eyes were still far from normal.
«Who is there?» the voice came down, big and booming.
«Lance, who is wounded, and I, Corey of Cabra, who bore him here.»
I waited as he called this information to another sentry, and I heard more voices raised as the message was passed along the line.
After a pause of several minutes, a reply came back in the same manner.
Then the guard called down:
«Stay clear! We're going to lower the drawbridge! You may enter!»
The creaking began as he spoke, and in a brief time the thing banged to earth on our side of the moat. I raised my charge once more and walked across it.
Thus did I bear Sir Lancelot du Lac to the Keep of Ganelon, whom I trusted like a brother. That is to say, not at all.
There was a rush of people about me, and I found myself ringed by armed men. There was no hostility present, however, only concern. I had entered a large, cobbled courtyard, lit by torches and filled with bedrolls. I could smell sweat, smoke, horses, and the odors of cooking. A small army was bivouacked there.
Many had approached me and stood staring and murmuring, but then there came up two who were fully arrayed, as for battle, and one of them touched my shoulder.
«Come this way,» he said.
I followed and they flanked me. The ring of people parted as we passed. The drawbridge was already creaking back into place. We moved toward the main complex of dark stone.
lnside, we walked along a hallway and passed what appeared to be a reception chamber. Then we came upon a stairway. The man to my right indicated that I should mount it. On the second floor, we stopped before a heavy wooden door and the guard knocked upon it.
«Come in,» called out a voice which unfortunately seemed very familiar. We entered.
He sat at a heavy wooden table near a wide window overlooking the courtyard. He wore a brown leather jacket over a black shirt, and his trousers were also black. They were bloused over the tops of his dark boots. He had about his waist a wide belt which held a hoof-hilted dagger. A short sword lay on the table before him. His hair and beard were red, with a sprinkling of white. His eyes were dark as ebony.
He looked at me, then turned his attention to a pair of guards who entered with the stretcher.
«Put him on my bed,» he said. Then, «Roderick, tend to him.»
His physician, Roderick, was an old guy who didn't look as if he would do much harm, which relieved me somewhat. I had not fetched Lance all that distance to have him bled.
