They had so little current that she had not noticed. There was no perceptible wind. The moon was almost set: it had been be-hind her and still was. There was nothing else to rely on.
She could only go on towards what she must hope were the right woods.
She could not tell how long she had been walking, or how far, but tension and fear had already tired her when suddenly she realized that she had come to the border of the woods--or of some woods, anyway.
There was no fence or ditch, and this surprised her--were the cattle, then, free to wander into the forest?--but the edge of the trees was unexpectedly regular; as far as she could see, a more or less straight fine stretching away into the gloom on either hand. Not far to the river, Zenka had said. If that was right, then perhaps she was now quite close to it. She stopped, listening, but could hear no sound like that of the torrent which she had crossed with the Subans. Not knowing what else to do, she pushed her way in among the trees.
At once she realized why there was no need of any ditch or fence to keep back the cattle. The wood itself was the fence. The Subans, when they cleared the ground for their meadows--however long ago that might have been--must have felled as much as they could of the primitive woodland and simply left the rest. What she found herself in was an almost impenetrable thicket. There was no least glimmer of light. The thin, spindly trees stood close, crowded one against another, their branches interlacing; and below the branches lay a mass of thick undergrowth full of creepers, thorns and briars. There was no telling right from left or, if she were to go any distance into this place, forward from back.
Maia began to weep. She did not sob or whimper: these were not tears of lamentation or protest, but the silent weeping of despair. Despite her terror upon setting out, she had at least possessed resolution: she had been determined not to give up. But there could be no finding a way onward through this.
For what seemed a long time she sat hunched on the ground, so still that the minute, nocturnal sounds of the wood resumed about her. As her weeping abated, she became aware of faint rustlings of roosting birds above. Then, with a clutch of fear, she realized that quite close to her some fairly large creature was moving.
She sat motionless, holding her breath. The animal, whatever it was, passed within a few yards of her, crackling its way among the bushes. Then, with unnatural sudden-ness, the sound vanished. A few moments later it resumed below her, yet somehow altered; in some odd way louder, though more distant than before. After a few moments the explanation came to her. The ground immediately ahead must be sloping downward, and the animal was making its way down some sort of cleft or gully, where such noise as it made would be magnified between the tunneling sides. And surely it could only be towards the river that the wood sloped.
Drawing her dagger, she began to crawl forward on hands and knees, cutting her way foot by foot through the undergrowth. It was desperately slow work, and soon both her hands were bleeding, so that it was all she could do to reach out for another tangle and sever it strand by strand. But she had been right--the ground was indeed falling away in front of her.
She had heard tell of tracts of poisonous growth in forests such as this--ivies and nightshades which inflicted horrible pain and illness upon any creature wandering into them unawares. She could feel and smell leaves and trailing plants all around her as she crawled on, her hands always lower than her knees, her head lower than her body as the descent grew steeper. The whole forest seemed to have fallen silent: her own pain, her own breathing enveloped her. As often as she stopped, she listened with the tension and fear of an animal; and at these moments it seemed as though Shakkarn himself must be following, pit-pat, pit-pat over the fallen leaves.
Now, as though under closed eyelids, she seemed to see, swimming before her, ahead and below, an indistinct, faintly-shining swirl; a glimpse of silvery-gray in ghostly, silent motion, as though the ground itself--or perhaps the air-- were actually sliding away. This, she knew, could only be some kind of illusion. Fear must have affected her eyesight. Yet still she went onward and downward, reaching out her arms and clumsily sliding her bruised knees one before the other.
Suddenly she found herself groping in a thick, muddy pool. On each side of her were others. The trees were fewer, bigger, further apart. Above she could make out faint light--a patch of open sky.
Cautiously, she stood up. With a kind of slow dissolving of unbelief she grasped-- what else could it be?--that she must have reached the swamp bordering the Valderra. The spectral, silvery flow was the river itself, gliding away towards her right.
Sinking at every step into the swampy, rushy ground, she struggled through the trees. As at the ford, there seemed on this side of the river no distinct bank; only the marsh, interspersed, further out, by channels of flowing water. Now it was growing deeper, the water, and there was no longer any firm ground between the pools merging one into another, becoming the river's edge under the faint starlight.
She was up to her knees. If she tried to wade on she would sink in and stick fast: yet if she tried to swim there would be submerged roots and sunken branches to rip an arm or a thigh. Lying down in the water, she thrust warily forward, sometimes braving a few strokes, hands always in front to feel for danger.
At length she reached a little island overgrown with reeds, and crawled across it. On the further side was disclosed the river itself, open to the sky, broader than she could have imagined, revealing itself at last like an enemy ready and waiting. There was no guessing the depth; and peering, she could make out no trace of the opposite bank.
Never a sound it made; very black where the dim light did not strike the surface, and terrifyingly swift, racing down out of darkness and disappearing into darkness again. Suddenly, out of that darkness, like the sneering taunt of a giant--let me just show you, dear!--the river displayed, a few yards out on the current, the body of a goat, swollen and distorted; a sodden, bobbing bundle with bared teeth and pecked-out eyes. Swiftly it was gone, remaining no longer than the river needed to make plain to her what it was.
"Lespa, you sent me here. I've obeyed you, mistress of stars and dreams. Guard and save me now!"
Quickly Maia stripped, retaining only her sandals and the knife-belt round her waist. Her clothes she flung into the water: they floated a moment and were swept away. Then, with a last glance upward towards the clouds covering the stars, she plunged into the Valderra.
52: ORDEAL BY WATER
The moment that Maia had dived into the river she felt certain of her own death. She had never known any water like this. She was powerless in it. This was not water as she had always known and understood it. It was as though she had put a taper to a fire laid on a hearth, to see it instantly leap out and blaze about the room. In panic she tried to struggle back to the bank; but in this current there could be no reaching it. In the moment that she desisted she was spun round, her body vertical in the water, arms flailing as she tried to raise herself sufficiently to breathe, to swim at all, anywhere, in any direction.
She was, she now realized, no more than a fragment in a torrent like a vast mill-race. If only she had been able to see it clearly, by day, she would never have attempted to cross it; would have turned tail and made the best of her way back to Melvda. But now there could be no going back. She was fighting for her life--or for a few more minutes of life-- in a current malignant as a demon. This was a demon's domain: Lespa herself was powerless here.
Always, before, she had thought of water as her own, kindly element. The tutelary spirits moving in water had known and loved her, their infant splashing about the shallows, their pretty lass half a mile from shore, lazing home-ward under a red sky. And yet she had intuitively known-had known three hours ago, when Lespa first spoke in her heart--that to try to swim the lower Valderra would most likely prove her death. If it were not so, Karnat would have found some way to cross it long before this.
The swirling, broken current changed to a strong, steady flow. It seemed now that she
was being carried down a great pool in the dark. The river had not yet succeeded in killing her: she had a respite while it prepared for a second attempt. A particle of courage returned to her. She was Maia of Serrelind, not a drowning goat. If Lespa had lost sight of her, if the water had betrayed her, if the demon was going to kill her, at least she would make it as hard for him as she could. In her first panic she had thought of nothing but keeping afloat. Now, in this breathing space, she was able to recall that however dark and wide the river, the opposite bank must lie somewhere to her left.
She turned on her belly and as best she could began to swim in that direction.
Yet in such a current her strongest efforts were puny and futile. Each stroke with her left hand seemed all-consumingly arduous, like trying to hoist herself up a rope with one arm. Each stroke with her right hand instantly swung her downstream, struggling to turn and commence the whole weary task again.
She felt herself beginning to fail. Already in the forest and the swamp she had been tired, before ever she began this losing fight with the water; and even had she not been tired it would still have been beyond her.
As the force of the current strengthened again she abandoned all attempt to swim steadily across it, merely drifting passively and then suddenly snatching a quick stroke or two, for all the world as though hoping that the demon might not catch sight of her in time. She must be in midstream--now--of that much she felt sure--but still her half-blinded, water-filled eyes could make out no trace of the opposite bank.
Suddenly pain ripped down the length of her right thigh. Something jagged had pierced her, torn her.
Clutching at the place, she was instantly pulled under, mouth and throat full of water, choking; kicking to get her head above the surface. She came up to find herself drifting backwards, and as her eyes cleared saw flash past her in the gloom a glistening, humped, irregular shape, solid amid spatterings of gray foam.
An instant later it was followed by another. She was among rocks. It must have been a sharp rock which had gashed her.
Even as she realized her danger the shape of another rock as big as herself came rushing towards her out of the blackness of the river. There was turbulent noise all around her now--a jagged expanse of broken water, roaring and booming. It was like being among a herd of stampeding beasts.
Thrusting out both hands, she clutched at a pointed, uneven projection of rock and clung to it amid the tumult, seeking no more than to hold herself where she was. Now that the demon had driven her into a trap from which all her strength and skill as a swimmer could not save her, now that her death was certain, her only thought was simply to survive the next moment. Soon she would not have the strength even to retain her hold on the smooth, wet stone. There was no pain along her thigh now, but the water, in the gash, felt very cold: she must be losing blood fast.
It was then, as she hung swaying to and fro at the end of her clenched fingers, that she suddenly glimpsed a glow of fire in the dark. Far off--what did "far off" mean, in this welter where she could move no way but deathward?-- yet it was real, it was not her fancy. It was downstream of her and on her right. It was not a lamp or torch, but the redness of a burning fire; and for an instant--or so it seemed to her--she could hear voices. With all her remaining strength she shouted; listened, then shouted again.
There was no reply. Yet the fire burned on. And if she could reach it she would live and not die.