“It was my brother—well, half brother. I kept dreaming that he was creeping up on me with a knife—trying to kill me, as he tried once before.” D’arvan swallowed hard. He was still in thrall to the dregs of his dreams, feeling a tension between his shoulder blades and dry tightness in his throat—the lurking, all-pervasive terror of the stalking assassin, of the hidden knife in the dark.
“Well, I’m not surprised, considering—” Maya stopped in mid-stride and turned to him, her eyes very wide. “D’arvan, you don’t think it could be true, do you? I mean, the two of you were so closely linked. You don’t think he has found out where you are, and he’s coming to—”
D’arvan gasped at the truth to which his own fear had blinded him. Her instincts were always much surer than his own. “Dear Gods—Eilin!” he shouted. “He’ll come to the tower! Quick!” Snatching Maya’s own sharp blade from her scabbard, he plunged away through the trees, leaving the warrior, with her shorter stride, straining to catch up.
“D’arvan, you fool, wait!” she called after him. “You can’t—” But he had already left her far behind.
D’arvan had almost reached the border of €lte trees that hemmed the grassy sward beside the lake, when Eilin’s mental shriek for help rocked him back on his heels. Panting, he redoubled his pace, forcing his way through branches that sliced, whiplike, across his chest and face, tripping over roots that seemed to rise and reach out for him, twining about his ankles nd knees. He was too preoccupied with thoughts of his brother > wonder why the forest seemed to be so much denser, his way tirough it far longer than it had been before. Davorshan! How had he managed to pass the wolves that guarded the valley? What sorcery had he used to creep up on them like this? The Mage gasped out a curse. If only he had paid more attention to his dreams!
When D’arvan reached the lakeside he stopped dead, confused and dismayed. The border of trees now ended right by the hore, digging in with writhing roots to churn and obliterate the smooth, grassy slope that had been there before. That was not the only change. The island tower had been transfigured beyond all recognition. Huge vines snaked up round the once smooth walls, scratching the stonework and tapping at the hardened crystal of the windowed rooms. Thickets of thorny bramble and sloe choked the wooden bridge and the ground before the tower door.
Round the mainland end of the bridge, the apple trees from Eilin’s orchard had gathered in a tight knot. D’arvan watched in amazement as unseasonal fruit swelled on each bough with uncanny speed—but the reason failed to occur to him until a branch whipped back with snakelike speed and hurled an apple like a stone from a slingshot. He dodged, but the hard fruit drove with bruising force into his shoulder, missing his face by inches. A fusillade of apples followed it, forcing him to duck behind a tree for his own protection. But its roots began to tug themselves out of the ground in a shower of soil as it moved to give the orchard trees a clear shot at their target, The entire Valley was in turmoil; every growing thing was moving to protect Eilin, Mistress of Earth-magic. And mistaking him for another intruder, they were blocking him from going to her aid! Taking a firm grip with both hands on Maya’s sword, D’arvan began to hack at the surrounding branches, frantic and unthinking in his haste.
A sinister rustle passed through the ranks of the assembled trees. A crimson mist began to loop and roil among the reaching branches—the rage of the forest. A sound like the whistling howl of a gale filled D’arvan’s ears as the boughs began to toss and sway, their twigs tike bony fingers grasping at his hair and tearing at his eyes and clothing. His knuckles dripped blood as the branches clutched and smote at his hands, trying to knock the sword away. Far away, it seemed, beneath the snarling, raging din of the forest’s fury, he heard Maya, crying for help. Torn, D’arvan tried to turn back to her, but his way was blocked by a thicket of holly trees that bristled with glossy, dagger-pointed leaves. Taking advantage of his hesitation, the forest flung roots like earth-encrusted tentacles around his ankles. One sharp jerk and he was down. The roots began to tug him away, farther back into the deep heart of the forest. Briars looped round his hands, which still clutched the hilt of the sword, and dug clusters of sharp thorns into the tender skin of his wrists and the backs of his hands. Dust devils swirled across the ground, flinging dead leaves, earth, and pebbles stingingly into his eyes.
“Help me . . .” Once again Eilin’s cry seared D’arvan’s mind; it was weak now, and despairing.
“I can’t!” he gasped aloud, tears of pain and frustration running down his face. Already the knees and elbows of his clothing had been torn to ribbons on the rough ground, and the skin beneath was scraped raw. Already his hands were becoming numb, their circulation cut off by the ever tightening loops of vine. Soon he would lose his grip on the sword, then “he would be helpless to go to his teacher’s aid ...
Of course! Fool! What he been thinking of? He was an Earth-Mage, too! No wonder the forest had taken him for an enemy, hacking at it like some stupid, untutored Mortal! Straining to focus his whirling thoughts, to remember what the Lady Eilin had taught him over the past weeks, D’arvan gathered his power and reached out with his mind, trying to contact the heart—the very soul—of the forest.
It beat back at him furiously, its intelligence obscured behind a mist of seething red rage. But D’arvan persisted. “I’m a friend! A friend! I’ll help you to help the Lady! See, I’m an Earth-Mage, her own pupil. See?” Beseechingly, he held his powers out, as Eilin had shown him, open to the scrutiny of the forest. He summoned the moist, heady scents of spring’s burgeoning and the ancient musk of the mother soil that cradled the seed; the dapple of sunlight in the beech tree’s shade and the diamond-dance of the lively stream; the silver of moonlight and the silk of morning mist; the stark white shfoud of winter’s mourning and the poignant exuberance of autumn’s fire.
And something changed. Like the snick of a key unlocking a door, like the falling away of chains, like the relaxing of winter’s claws upon the land with the coming of spring, the forest accepted him. The howling died away to a muted murmur, and D’arvan felt relief like the lifting of a massive weight as the ire of the trees ceased to hammer at him. The roots and vines loosed their grip and fell away, and a clear avenue opened before him, across the churned ground and over the bridge, leading right to the door of the tower! Scrambling to his feet, D’arvan ran, a single errant branch poking him hard in the back to hasten him on his way.
The vines across the door fell back with a slithering rattle as D’arvan approached, sword in hand. As he jumped past them into the kitchen, he wondered if they would come after him, but some force seemed to be preventing them from entering the building. When he reached the bottom of the spiral staircase, the young Mage discovered the reason. He staggered back, gagging on the reek of evil magic. Choking, with streaming eyes, he pulled himself upright using the smoothly curving stair rail and began to haul himself, step by step, up the metal stairs.
The upper rooms that led off the staircase were utterly devastated. D’arvan flinched at the destruction, as he peered into room after room. The windows were cracked, the wooden benches overturned and splintered, the tender young seedlings torn and trampled underfoot. Now that he had opened his mind to the use of his powers, the Mage could feel their distress acutely, their tiny, soundless cries of pain piercing his mind and wringing at his heart. But each room was empty of people, and reach though he might, he could no longer touch Eilin’s mind. Chamber after deserted chamber he passed during his ascent, and found the same appalling destruction. Then, rounding the final curve of the staircase, he stopped. At the top of the stairs was a figure that bore in its left hand a sword that was dripping with blood. Davorshan. At the sight of D’arvan, his face contorted into an evil, leering grin. “Hail and well met, brother,” he said. “It took longer than I had thought to find you—but the weeks of wandering lost on those blasted moors will be well repaid by your death!” Raising the blade, he stepped forward, murder in his eyes.