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High on the rocks where the eagles scream,
The Guardian enters the madman’s dream.
Armed with Power in his right hand,
Goes he into the magic land.
Behind he leaves the brown-tressed maid,
Helana the Hill-daughter, unafraid.
Ahead, do danger and death await;
And what will be the Guardian’s fate?
-from ‘The Clearing of the Pass,’
Artir One-eye of the Midland Plain.
The next morning, they went to the Pass. While they were yet some distance away, they rested on a hillock while Helana pointed out certain of the peaks and named them.
She pointed first to one which sloped gently from its bottoms, then more steeply, then leaped suddenly into a sheer pinnacle of snow-blanketed rock. “There is the one we call Kinsetchgrityotch, The White Needle of Rock, and there beside it,” she pointed to one with a large, many-rayed patch of snow on a purple face, “that is Hnigrikskroitotch, The Star in the Rock Above the Darth. Down between them it runs, Harralgriksymba. the Evil Way Through the Rocks.”
They continued on their way, and soon stood before the great mirror, which spanned a significant gap between two sheer cliffs. Hear its base, directly at the point where the old path disappeared beneath the mirror, was an inscription. At first glance, the letters were blurred and illegible; on closer inspection, however, they seemed to leap into brilliant life, reading in this way:
“This way is closed to all,
Until he comes who bears the Power
To face the dangers beyond.”
Rorick looked down at Helana, who was trying to smile through her fear. He leaned down to kiss her, saying, “It would be useless to tell you not to worry, but I will say that you give me an added reason to wish to return.”
Then, drawing the Sword, he lifted his shield and stepped through the mirror. He felt the hilt of the Sword tingle, then he was inside. He stood looking over a wide end desolate Plain, which extended miles in all directions. Before him stood a low stone, stone marker, with words written upon it. When he looked at them, he saw this: ‘You who have dared to pass through the barrier, prepare to meet the first peril.’
Then a circle of flame appeared before him, and through that circle came a man, mounted on a great boar, wearing a breastplate of bronze and a helmet of copper, bearing in his hands three javelins. He looked at the Guardian and cried, “Choose how you shall fight! Either fight myself without your shield, my steed without your sword, or the both of us with sword and shield!”
Rorick looked at the two of them, considered the difficulty of fighting the boar bare-handed, or warding off javelins without a shield, and said, “I shall fight the two of you, With sword and shield.”
With no further word, the man kicked at the boar’s flanks and charged, casting a javelin as he came. Rorick’s shield came up far enough to ward the boar off, but not so far that it blocked his sight. With a leap, he dodged the boar’s slashing tusk, swinging a backhand stroke as he did so.
It was not a particularly solid blow and should rightly have only angered the animal. But the boar stumbled forward onto its knees, flinging its rider free, and suddenly flared into blue flames.
But the rider was up on his feet and whirling like a dancer. Rorick moved in quickly, shield up. The man hurled his second javelin, which the Guardian warded off, and leaped back and sideward, keeping back from the Sword. Now they began a careful dance, the boar-rider seeking to keep back from the Sword, and find an opening sure enough for his javelin, Rorick seeking to close with him.
The battle ended at last, when the man found himself at an angle and cast the javelin with all his strength, a cast which left him bent at an awkward angle. Rorick, bending and twisting his own body, avoided the worst of the blow, though it cut through his armour and gashed his side above the hip. But he was back on balance quickly enough and leaped forward with the Sword outthrust.
His opponent, who had been more off-balance, was just slow enough in moving that the tip of the Sword touched his throat. It ought to have been a wound of the same severity as a man might cause to himself in shaving, but there was a blaze of blue flames, and the helmet and breastplate lay on the ground, with only a touch of discolouration.
After recovering from his astonishment, Rorick set about bandaging his wound to the best of his ability. Because of its location, the wound was difficult to deal with, but he ended by tucking a wad of cloth inside, and arranging his war-shirt to hold the make-shift bandage fast.
This done, he looked around. The desolate waste was still empty, but a path now led from the stone marker off toward the horizon. “And if that was there when first arrived, best I should use my helmet as a beggar-bowl, and sit at the gates for blind,” muttered Rorick.
He thought about the battle he had just fought, and he knew that the power of the Sword had absorbed whatever magic which had produced the boar and its rider, and he wondered what might be the next test? He took a step along the path.
It had been a strange sensation, and he now stood on a different road, a road which seemed to be a lone continuous ribbon of stone. The sun in the sky above was not yellow, but violet, and his eyes required some time to become familiar with the strange colouration. Off to his left rear was a line of towers, towers built of metal bars, stretching out as far as he could see, and crossing the road at an angle before him to reach again to the horizon. There seemed no reason to hesitate here. He stepped forward.
He stood in a clearing in a darkened wood, a low stone marker before him. On the marker he could read the words, which glowed a little in the dimness: “You have passed the first of the tests. Now you must spend the night in this forest, a test of your fears. He who fears nothing may survive.”
Rorick considered this. He smiled grimly, and said, “Yet it does not say that he will not survive who knows fear.”
He was immediately aware of the sound of feet moving in the surrounding woods, paralleling his path, following him, stalking ahead of him. When he stopped, the sounds stopped, save for a steady approach of feet behind him. He hastened on. The movements around him continued. Suddenly, he broke into a run. All around him, the beings, whatever they were, kept pace with him.
The darkness was near complete now, and he darted full-tilt into a low tree-branch. His helmet saved him from more than a stunning blow and a fall, but he regained some sense with it. Rorick could not possibly defend himself properly here on the trail, should they decide to attack him, since they could approach within feet of him without being seen. He went back down the trail to the clearing with the marker. He would have to fight his way past the one behind him, but it would give him a better chance if he were successful.
The things in the surrounding bush kept pace with him, and one had taken to the trail in his rear, but he neither saw nor heard the one he had expected to have to fight. He finally stumbled into the clearing again, and stood by the stone marker, turning slowly to look in all directions, waiting for the first attack.
The attack did not come immediately. He saw no sign of the stalkers, but he heard them gathering ail around, heard them moving and shifting in the brash. Then, with still no attack, he made a fire; it might serve to keep them back at least a little. Carefully, never letting the Sword out of his hand, he gathered dry wood together. Then he had enough. He made some kindling and set up the wood for the fire. He squatted down and said his fire-spell.
At first, nothing came of it; on the second attempt, a burst of flame consumed the wood almost immediately, and only the fact that he flung himself backward saved him from a nasty burn. He got to his feet, looking around; still none of the watchers were in sight. “So magic works strangely here,” he said.
He found a few coals remaining from the wood he had set for the fire, and on this, he built a new one. Still nothing came out of the brash, though the sounds continued. Behind him was always noise as of something preparing to attack, and just when he thought they had burst into the clearing, he turned. There was nothing, and the noise subsided. Again and again this happened, and each time there was no attack.
His nerves were tense, every movement which seemed nearer than the rest brought him nearly leaping around. Suddenly, directly in front of him, a beast came out of the brush. It might have been a lion designed by a madman, for the shape and the man were there, but the beast was a grey dust-colour, and had three pairs of legs, each ending in clawed feet. It charged at him, emitting a noise midway between a growl end a roar, and sprang the last ten feet.
What Rorick did then was more the result of much practice than of considered thought. The shield came up to ward off the front claws and the mouthful of gleaming teeth, and the Sword thrust out for the grey beast’s chest. The force on the shield sent him staggering, and the Sword was wrenched from his hand. He kept his feet and saw the strange blue flames begin to consume the first beast, and saw others slinking forward out of the brush.
His only weapon now was his dagger, for the Sword was in the flaming chest of the first monster. He saw death coming, for the Sword had been barely sufficient for the first strike. Fear overwhelmed him, and the grey pack closed in. Something in his mind whispered:
“Die fighting, you fool!”
He drew his dagger, squared his shoulders, and said:
“Grey pack, fierce pack, many fangs you bear,
But one tooth alone have I, which to rend and tear.
Only death you bring to me, fear I set aside;
Who is first to come to the first to risk his hide?”
There was hesitation in the circle of monsters. Rorick laughed. “No, it was not my best poem, but then are you the judges? Come, I have but one foot of steel here, enough for all of you, too much, perhaps, for one or two”
A chorus of howls rose, howls with a note of frustration. Slowly, all together, they backed off into the brush again. For a time there was the sound of the heavy bodies retreating into the depths of the brush, then silence, save for the crackling of the two fires, his own, and the burning carcass.
The body burned for a long time, and it was some time even after that before he was able to recover the Sword. Yet in all that time, he heard nothing of the beasts. When the Sword was finally cool enough to be touched with his bare hand, he sheathed the sword and sat leaning against the stone marker. A little later, he slept.
In the morning, after a few moments spent stamping some of the stiffness out of his limbs, he set out along the road again. At his first step past the marker, he wondered what was in store for him.
He was on the desolate plain again beneath the purple sun. Off to the right was a collection of what seemed to have once been buildings of magnificent stature, perhaps an entire city. But all seemed to have been smitten in some dreadful way, broken, cloven, half shattered. He wondered, as he stepped along the road, what might have wrought such devastation?
He stood before an immense wall, featureless save for the holes which were mounted in a line before him. Carven into the black rock, at the level of his eyes, were these words:
“Choose now whether you shall take with you the shield proof against all, or attempt the coming tests without it.”
He thought for a moment. Knowing what he had seen already, a shield proof against all ought to be invaluable for the rest of the tests. Yet he doubted the shield was simply there for the taking; the method of claiming the shield would be a test in itself. He climbed the wall, watching warily for any trap, for my sign of some foe waiting above. Unmolested, he came to the top of the wall.
The wall stretched out as far as the eye could see, without break or waver, and was a good ten yards wide. In the center, just ahead of him, a shield was set into the surface of the wall. Rorick approached it and saw that the shield was essentially the same as his, though the upraised Sword in the center of it was brighter and newer than on his. He bent to reach for the shield, but his fingers could not touch it. He straightened and saw a shimmer in the air before him.
The shimmer thickened, darkened, and before he could guess at what it might be, solidified into a man, eight feet tall, well-muscled, wearing what appeared to be a cuirass of leather and a bronze helmet. He bore a rectangular shield on his left arm, and on his right, he held an axe with a short, stout handle. When he spoke, his voice had a strange quality, as though it came from far away.
“I am here to guard the shield. Here in my hand I bear the axe proof against all. Now you have chosen, and now you may go down alive with the shield, or dead without.”
The axe swung up and down. Rorick raised the Sword and brought his shield into position. The axe rent his shield as though it was made of cloth, and he barely managed to save his left arm, missing his return-stroke in doing so. Three more such blows left his shield a useless ragged lump of metal and wood. He dropped his shield, avoided a blow of the axe, and swung the Sword. The other caught it on his shield, and the shield buckled.
Then the dread axe was descending, and Rorick parried with the Sword; Rorick felt the two weapons’ edges jarring together, and was blinded by a brilliant flash. He was lying on his back, looking up at the purple sky, with no idea of how he had come there. He sat up, and his right arm felt dead. The Sword lay in front of him, a small blackened patch on its blade.
The axe, a lump of fused and blackened metal, lay a little further on, and just beyond it was the burned body of the shield’s guardian, slain by the force unleashed at the meeting of the two weapons of Power. Rorick stood. He took up the Sword in his left hand and looked around. He approached the shield, which now seemed to sit loosely on the surface of the wall.
After a moment, there being no sign of any further interference, he clumsily sheathed the Sword, and picked up the shield. Some feeling was slowly returning to his arm now, and he could move it enough to fix the shield on his left arm.
Rorick was on the road through the desolate plain, his right hand still on the shield. He stood still, knowing that each time before, his first step on that road had taken him to the next test, and he did not wish to attempt the next test with his right arm still half dead. Rorick viewed his surroundings.
On a hill, to his left front, was the remains of a single building, its walls standing ragged against the violet sky. The ground around the building was pitted, and in some places melted to a glassy sheen. Strange machines lay all around the building, most of them obviously broken and twisted. Wondering again what could have wrought such devastation, he stepped forward.
He was facing an enormous cliff, extending for miles in either direction. Just in front of him there was a large fissure in the cliff, and within the fissure was a marker, bearing these words:
“Hurry, O hero, for your destination lies through here.”
He would have stepped in, but caution held him back. Further in, on the left-hand side, was a deep cup-like depression, with grooves leading down from it as though water running out of it had worn channels in the rock.
Shrugging, he stepped forward, extending the Sword before him into the fissure. He hesitated a moment, and was just about to move further in when a stream of liquid spurted from a hole in the left-hand side, striking the cup-depression on the right-hand side. He watched as it hissed and crackled, and he could see it dissolving before his eyes.
His imagination told him what would have happened had that liquid touched him, and he now knew why he had taken the shield proof against all. Carefully positioning the shield, he stepped into the fissure. The liquid streamed out, striking the shield, and ran down to drip onto the rock floor of the fissure, crackling and hissing as it did so.
As he reached the other end of the fissure, he breathed a deep sigh of relief. “I wonder how many came here and stepped straight in without hesitation? Even this shield would have failed to protect me had I been carrying it less carefully. Powers Above, what strange place have I fallen into?” He sighed again. “Well, it seems to me that the nature of this place is such that I shall either fight my way through to the end or die. So, I must be upon my way, for if I am to die, it will be as near to the goal as I can possibly manage.”
He stepped forward on the path leading out from the fissure.
Before him, the long flat road led off to the beginning of some rolling hills, disappearing behind a gentle curve. The road, which was made of a single long piece of rock, was cracked and shattered a little further on, great holes gouged in it, chunks of the road lying around, slabs of it lifted and left lying askew. A train of wagons had been travelling and had been destroyed by the same power. Rorick could only shudder. He took the next step.
Before him lay a cave in a grassy hillside. A tall stone stood alone midway between the Guardian and the cave. He approached the tall stone with caution. Upon the stone hung a brass horn, much the size and shape of an ox-horn, and there was a small plaque below it. Upon the plaque he read these words: “With this horn you may summon a dragon from yonder cave; this dragon you must slay, for his longest fangs are keys which you will need, should you survive to the end.”
Rorick extended his hand, and just before he touched the horn, he stopped. “It does not say we must call the drake forth and stand like fools while it overruns me. Let me think.”
He looked around. There was little of any use in the immediate neighbourhood, save some rather twisted branches. He walked up to the cave. There was no sign of the dragon immediately, but he could not see the entire rear of the cave, for the cave was deep. He frowned, then went back outside. The slope around the cave’s mouth was gentle, and he would have no trouble climbing it. But he needed more than that.
He went to a clump of brush, and cut one of the straightest and stoutest poles, about seven feet in length. He had just taken out a length of leather cord from his pack when he looked back at the cave, frowned, and shook his head. “Not enough. It will require a trifle more subtlety.”
He went back to the clump, and cut four more, equal length with the first, then went to another clump and cut some more. At last, with twelve of them ready, he took six down into the mouth of the cave and, by digging into the ground and by piling up stones, set them across the mouth of the cave with the ends, cut to sharp points, directed inward and up at an angle.
He moved out to the point where it was not quite possible to turn aside from the path out of the cave. Here he planted the other poles in a similar manner, save that in the center. He tied his dagger securely to one of them, covering it over with a strip of bark. He surveyed his work, nodded, and went to take down the horn.
Standing just behind the second row of stakes, he set the horn to his mouth and blew. Rorick blew first a long blast, then an improvised call which sounded like pure mockery. He waited, and a moment later heard the noise of dragon-hide scraping on rock as the drake approached. He backed off a little and saw the dragon come up to the first row of stakes.
With a roar, the dragon pushed against the stakes, snapping them off easily with no harm to his hide. He came forward in a rush, careless of the second row, charging full upon Rorick. Wood splintered, the drake flung back his head and gave a hissing scream of pain. Now Rorick moved; running up the slope, just beside the monster, he drew the Sword.
For all the pain of his wound, the dragon was still dangerous; he turned and belched out a gout of flame which Rorick, who had expected something of the sort, caught mostly on his shield. The Guardian leaped, landing astride the long and scaly neck just behind the head, which was about half as long as his own body.
He locked his legs around the neck and hewed with the Sword; the blow did little more than break a scale or two. He cut again, with little better success, then flung aside his shield and took the Sword in both hands. At this point, the dragon’s writhing and bucking became so frenzied that he had to hold himself on with his arms and his legs, or be cast off like a leaf.
For a time, it was all he could do to keep his place. Then, in an instant where the dragon paused infinitesimally, Rorick took the Sword in both hands and struck. He managed two blows before the drake heaved and writhed, sending him flying. The landing jarred him, and though he sought to move quickly to rise and prepare to fight, his limbs would not obey him. But the dragon did not attack; he continued to writhe, scream, and paw at his chest. Suddenly, the drake fell; a moment later he was up again, still screaming, still pawing his chest.
Rorick held back. It was clear that his trap with the dagger was having its effect, and therefore it was no longer necessary to risk all by closing with the beast. The wound on its neck was also making itself felt, and the dragon did not seem interested in avenging itself on the man who had caused its pain.
It took a long while before the dragon was dead, and it took Rorick a little longer to remove the two longest teeth as the instructions on the plaque demanded. At last, with all things ready, he stepped out on the path.
On the road before him was a long line of wagons and other conveyances, most destroyed, with whitened skeletons lying amongst them. There were bundles of implements which had survived the destruction and the time which had elapsed, and these were people fleeing from the Power which was unleashed. Rorick took his next step.
A large grey stone castle stood in the violet light of the sun. It seemed to be hewn from a single block of stone, for there was no join to be seen in its face. The huge double gate was locked with a padlock the size of his head, and above it was a brazen plate, which he could read when he approached:
“Bold hero, prudent hero. Here is the last of the tests. In the central tower is the Power which blocks the pass, but the dead guard the castle. Use your keys, enter, and prepare to fight.”
The padlock had two round holes in it, one above the other. Rorick put one of the dragon’s teeth into one of the holes, heard a click, inserted the other, and when it clicked, opened the lock and pushed the gate.
He drew the Sword and stepped in. All around the courtyard stood or sat several skeletons, armed with shield and sword, spear, or axe. As he stepped inside, they became aware of him; heads turned toward him, and those sitting rose, while those standing drew weapons and moved toward him.
Warily, he watched them. Suddenly, the nearest one leaped at him, sword swinging. He caught the blow on his shield, and his return stroke went through the skeleton’s guard to bite into its bleached ribs. He felt the tingling sensation in his hand again, and the skeleton fell to the courtyard in a heap of disconnected bones.
Rorick realized then that the Sword could counter the magic which animated the skeletons. Rorick knew he need only touch any of them to render them finally dead. He set himself to fighting toward a wall where his back could be protected. He succeeded in this endeavour but was not totally unscathed after he had achieved it. The foe attacked with a silent ferocity and possessed a weapon-skill only slightly hindered by a hint of slowness.
Then, with ten of their number finally downed, the rest fell back into a small watchful semicircle. Rorick, with several light wounds, leaned on The Sword and huffed. Then, still leaning negligently on it, he sang a small mocking song:
“Swiftly swords under violet sun,
Come to me, dead ones, the battle’s not done;
Which bony foe will next be stilled?
For Arvandal’s sons are not easily killed.
Come, now, come, I’ve not the whole day;
Let there be an ending to this play.
Such a little exercise can do no harm,
Though perhaps the sun is a little too warm?”
As though in answer, the castle’s grim guardians moved once more to the attack. Rorick had been considering all things, however, and now changed his own methods. Penned in here against the wall, he would eventually be worn down and slain. He therefore leaped to meet the first of them, crashing into him with his weight behind his shield, bowling that one over into the one behind him, and making a path through them. One or two more blows gave him an empty space through which to go, and he ran for the tower.
He had no expectation of outrunning them all, merely getting a good enough head start to deal with less of them at once. He whirled suddenly; the Sword swinging in a huge backhand which beat the skeleton’s shield back far enough that the edge of the Sword struck the breastbone, which was enough to drop that opponent.
Two others were coming in at once. He thrust the Sword at one, kicked out hard at the other. Whatever power directed them was making them wary of the Sword, for while his kick sent the one stumbling backward, the other flung himself aside from the flickering blade. Then Rorick leaped backward, turned, and ran again for the tower.
Arriving at the door, he raised the Sword and brought it down in a blow that contained all the strength he could muster. The door cracked. He drew back, but the nearest of his foes was almost upon him. He turned to fight. They were strung out again, and he fought with all the skill and every trick he possessed. Twice he leaped away from blows to fall against the door, which cracked under his weight. Then, as he staggered backward against the door under the weight of one of his attackers charging heedlessly upon him, it broke.
He barely regained his balance, and a quick blow dispatched the skeleton who had fallen inside with him and was now trying to rise. He stepped to the door fast enough to prevent the next one from coming in, and at the threshold, he made his stand.
They could come through only one at a time, and he met each as they stepped through. It was difficult, and as the fight went on, he lost the advantage in quickness which he had had at the beginning. His limbs felt like lead, and the piled bones hindered his feet, though he kicked as many of them aside as he could. Three times he was forced to step back far enough from the doorway that the skeleton against which he presently fought could enter and let in the one or two behind, but each time in sheer desperation he drew up the energy to defeat them and hold the door again. On the third time, when he stepped to the door, he found no more opposition.
He leaned against the door-jamb, breathing heavily. “Powers Above, I am in little better case than they.” His chain-mail was rags of metal, his leg was gashed twice, badly, his right arm cut twice, though not quite so badly, his helmet dented, the crest sheared off, and the sight of his right eye was obscured by blood from a cut above it. He had innumerable other lesser lacerations, and his head swam.
He turned and fell on the steps. Rising, he staggered upward, upward upon the circling stair. Faint, sickening, with only the thought of lives thrown away at the Guardian’s Pass keeping him upright, he made his way to the top of the tower. Another wooden door stood before him, and when he pushed, the door opened and he found a room about ten feet square.
Across the room was a window, looking out on the path along which he had approached. In the center was a waist-high block of grey stone, with a large crystal sphere atop it. Within the crystal was a small bright violet spark which seemed to becoming brighter and brighter.
Suddenly the sphere became blue, then an angry red. Its colour changed more swiftly now, and it became a searing white, then expanded to fill the inside of the sphere. Shaking off the weariness that gripped him, Rorick raised the Sword. As he approached, the light became so fierce that he hid his face behind the shield.
As he brought the Sword down, there was a bright blue flash, and he was flung against the wall. Then he felt the building shake, and as he turned toward the door, the building fell.
Suddenly, he was standing upon the gap between the mountains, on green grass, with a proper yellow sun above. There was an encampment of Icarians before him, and he heard the shouts of alarm and surprise just before he collapsed.