Swordmistress of Chaos by Robert Holdstock, Angus Wells Page A

are to find Donwayne, we must first find the skull of Quez. Can these sea-wolves help us?’
    Spellbinder smiled, a slow, secret grin. ‘Perhaps they can. Much will depend on the outcome of your combat. Win Gondar’s favour, and he might well lend us a wolf-boat or two to aid our search. I’ll do what I can to influence the outcome, though I’ve heard talk of some tame Sorcerer who works for Kragg, seeking the downfall of Kharwhan.’
    Again Raven pressed him about the Ghost Isle, and again he refused to answer. It seemed as though he spun a web of words around her mind, tangling her thinking so that she was diverted from her original purpose, steered off into sidetracks leading away from her questions. It was impossible to argue with Spellbinder when he chose not to pursue the matter: as though he worked his strange powers upon her to avoid revealing his true background.
    They reached Kragg before she could press the point to a conclusion.
    They were on deck when the island showed, high and hulking through a grey miasma of sea-wrack. A wind blew cold and cutting from the north, and prisoners, like the crew, drew cloaks tight around against the biting chill. Kragg was a stone dropped into the Worldheart Sea, wind-washed pinnacles of granite rising up into cloud that hung like smoke above the tips of its ridges. Dark breaks showed in the lower rock, raging foam beating in futile anger against the eternal stone. It was a hard, hostile place, and Raven could understand how it might breed a hard, ferocious people. The wolf-ship turned its head directly between two proud-jutting points that left no more than a double boat’s-width between them, and Gondar himself called the stroke as they rushed madcap towards the cleft.
    The oars dipped furiously, driving the wolf-boat at certain destruction, and Raven poised to leap outboard when they hit. But the snarling prow passed arrow-straight between the rocks, the oars lifting at the last possible moment to sneak narrowly between the guardians of the bay beyond. Once through the gap, they were in calmer water, and the oars dipped again to take them gentle-swift to a wide beach of black sand.
    Men and women came running to meet them, and Gondar climbed the wolf-prow to raise his axe in greeting. As the vessel grounded on the sand, he sprang ashore, landing with a great shout that was quickly drowned by the babble of voices. Then, through the crowd, came a tiny man, dressed all in white, his shining pate yellow in the cold sun, his straggling beard a grubby blot against his tunic.
    Raven and Spellbinder jumped to the shore in time to hear what he said.
    ‘How went it, Gondar? Is Kharwhan thrown down?’
    ‘No, Belthis.’ Gondar Lifebane shook his great head, staring into the black eyes of the mage. ‘The storm came up as you promised. It dispersed the mind-mist as you promised. Then it turned and blew against us, so that Crog’s boat went down under the fury of it and the rest of us ran like frightened sea-cows. Still,’ he turned, smiling, gesturing at Raven, ‘it brought me a prize I’d not otherwise have found. Even though I must yet win it.’
    Belthis stared, but his gaze was not on Raven. His eyes, black coals in a pallid face, were fixed on Spellbinder, as though he saw a mortal enemy boasting before him.
    ‘That one!’ His voice was a sibilant malignancy, envenomed as any serpent’s. ‘He is destruction for us all. Kill him!’
    ‘It was ever the way of ageing magicians to destroy their rivals,’ said Spellbinder quickly, loudly, so that all should hear. ‘Age envies youth as weakness envies strength.’
    ‘Kill him!’ Belthis screamed, spittle flecking his withered lips. ‘Kill him now, before he damns us all!’
    Gondar Lifebane stepped between them, his massive body a barrier through which the old magician’s eyes sought to burn.
    ‘What is this talk of death and danger? Why kill him?’
    ‘Spawn of the Ghost Isle, he!’ Belthis howled. ‘He carries