51: MAIA ALONE

At first the way, though rough and awkward, was clear enough. Her eyes adapted quickly to the half-darkness and she was able to keep a more-or-less straight course, looking up every minute or so at the black line of the trees against the night sky. As in the camps that afternoon, she continually came upon little streams and ditches, but now there were no bridges across them, makeshift or otherwise.

Stubbornly she clambered down and up, down and up, wading and scrambling until she was coated with mud from head to foot. Twice she passed through herds of cattle, the beasts looming suddenly out of the night, gathering about her inquisitively, breathing hard, plodding after her until at the next dyke she left them behind. Lonely sheds, too, she passed, and a ruined hovel, its bare rafters a lattice of blue-black squares against the night sky, with here and there a dim star twinkling through.

Were those the same woods in front of her, or had she unknowingly altered direction? She stood still, trying to hit upon something—anything—which might help her. Which way had the ditches been flowing?

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.