From his belt he drew the talon knife which was both an honor badge of his people and, most times, his only weapon. He caught the tip between the two fingers and tossed it out to clatter down the ramp towards the ground.
What followed was like being caught near the tail of a ship taking off. There was an explosion of searing light which again left Farree blinded. Then– Something which he had sensed—a compulsion, a stern will—vanished. He pawed at his eyes with one hand—they were still watering. However, that spear of light from the north was gone. The weapon of fire might have failed; he was sure it had not willingly been withdrawn. There remained—like a whisper in his head– unease—counter-fear—astonishment—all. Then that, too, vanished and there was nothing but dark and silence.
Those candles on the mounds had snapped out of existence as quickly as had the weapon of light. There was only thick dark outside now, dark and a rising wind which beat with an icy lash against Farree as he staggered a step or two forward to look out into the valley. At first he had a fraction of terror, the belief that he had been blinded by that last shattering of flame. Then, as he turned his head frantically from side to side, he saw that each of the mounds was still sending into the cold of the night thin trails of faint luminescence—it might be the breath of unseen monsters turned visible by the icy air.
There was no crown, no candle flame. Farree leaned against the side of the door opening and he looked beyond– toward the north from whence that spear had come. His teeth caught hard upon his lower lip—there—and there—and there—!
Not as bright as the mound candles, in fact tenuous enough to be only ghosts of those flames, there were pale lights. As his eyes adjusted he could count them—nine– They were too faint in color to be camp fires, and from each streamed a thread of grey unnatural mist. Outward to the south they were reaching over the valley, waving as might banners. The first of these now dipped down, as if to lap them out of their refuge, but it came no farther than the foot of the ramp. There it wavered and clung, sweeping back and forth, joined and fed by those other traces of vapor, which made it more visible.
It was trying hard to get to them but it was walled away. Farree heard an exclamation from behind him. A stunner clicked, aimed at that wavering tongue of mist. It did not vanish, no, instead it appeared to draw energy from the power sent against it, so that the tongue of mist spread wider, its movements becoming more energetic and threatening, though it still did not reach beyond the foot of the ramp.
"No—!" He heard Zoror's voice. "Cold iron—your boot knife—let that feel iron!"
His cry might have been for Vorlund but it was Farree who heeded the order first. He grabbed at his own boot top, caught the hilt of the weapon which Vorlund had taught him to use, though he had never done so except in practice. The hilt was warm in his hand, the warmth growing into real heat as he raised it. Then, as the Zacanthan had done before him, Farree threw, aiming at the tongue of mist. He saw the black spot that was the speeding knife, and then the whip back of the mist. It broke into tatters which waved wildly in the air. A moment later he was aware that Vorlund had joined him loosing the infighting weapon of the spacers.
That mist fluttered, a thing now of ragged, dissolving wisps. It drew back to the mound which had been crowned, but no farther than that, changing the direction of its advance, pointing rather to the ground than to the ship beyond. Once more it was rebuilding in shape and strength.
"Cold iron! That is truth then!" Zoror's hand fell upon Farree's right shoulder. The Zacanthan may have yielded to the strike of the original beam but now his voice was full and deep again. He was, to all appearances, his old self as he leaned past Farree to blink out into the night.
"Cold iron?" Vorlund demanded. "What do you mean?"
"Mean?" Zoror's voice carried all the force of one who has chanced upon a long-hunted treasure. "That once more there is a kernel of truth lying snug within legend, brother. It was said many times of the Little People that the one weapon they could not circumvent nor withstand was iron itself—iron which made man the master of the worlds where, one after another, they disputed his lordship."
There was a moan which was closer to a sigh. Farree swung around. Vorlund was down on his knees now, supporting Maelen. By the ship's lights her face was pale and drawn. She might have lain for long in the hold of some illness. Then her eyes opened and she looked up at the Zacanthan.
"They have power—such as even a Singer cannot summon—"
Zoror nodded. "It was always said of them that they were not to be easily overcome. There is something here, though, which we do not know—why should they attack without warning when we mean no harm?"
"Because of me!" Farree said bitterly. "And I do not have the knowledge to be able to discover the why of that either." Once more that ache in his head strengthened. There was something—something to be done—and the need for doing it gnawed within him; only he knew not what it was or why he must do that unknown act.
"We are safe within here," Zoror glanced around at them, his gaze lingering a moment on each as if he measured their strength and abilities. "Let us rest the night in iron-governed safety and see what the morning will bring."
Farree, half blind again from the pain in his head, lurched obediently into the corridor beyond the port. Somehow he got down to the level of his own cabin and there collapsed into his hammock, aware of nothing more than that his body rested and perhaps his head might follow. One hand moved restlessly. His palm felt sticky and not knowing nor caring what he was doing he brought up his hand and licked at it, so gathering into his mouth what was left of the bruised leaves and berries of ill-bane. He chewed and swallowed that harvest. The pain which had been a tight band about his head eased. He slid, as he might have on the ramp had he lost his footing, down into darkness.
There was a great hall, and panels in its walls were a-glitter with light, cold light, in spite of the fact that some of the colors were the red and yellow of flames. The pavement underfoot was silver, perhaps even true blocks of that metal. He did not tread there so much as waft above it, yet he did not feel any expansion of his wings.
Between the glittering panels were others of the same silver as was underfoot. Those were wrought with patterns in high relief. Some depicted strange creatures such as the fire-breathing snake which had hunted him back to the valley. Others were humanoid in form, yet differed one from the other. There were bodies like his own, winged and plainly traveling aloft. But there were also other things, grotesque, some monstrously so, and more merely strange, exuding no menace, as did a few.
There were no torches or lamps within the room—the radiance seemed to flow from the flooring beneath. Then he became aware of swirls of a milky mist which was coiling and recoiling, reaching every time farther out into the middle of the chamber. From somewhere there sounded a single trilling note. Two of the pictured wall blocks vanished sidewise into the flanking wall and there entered two whose wings were furled about them like colorful capes, even as he himself went where he trod the earth.
One was slightly taller than the other; since the wings sprang from the shoulders, they concealed most of the body, and were of a deep crimson shading into a silver as glinting as the pavement. His head (for the features on that calm and nearly expressionless face were ruggedly masculine, with a seam of scar across one cheek) was held high and there seemed to be flickers of fire in his large eyes.
His companion was just as plainly female. Her enclosing wings were the delicate ivory of the ill-bane flower, but they were also touched with silver which glinted gem-bright as she moved. Her long hair was braided about her head and woven in among the pale yellow of those coils were gem-set threads. Once in the room she loosed the tight covering of her wings to show that she wore a short, form-clinging robe of pure silver, girded by a wide belt of gold and brown gems. To the first glance she might look like a girl only on the verge of womanhood, but when one saw more closely, especially her eyes, there were signs of years of knowledge.