The Riddle - Alison Croggon [181]
She squared her shoulders, trying to will away her tiredness, and walked slowly toward the black arch.
MAERAD was not entirely surprised to see the wolf standing on the slope beyond the arch, its form frosted by the waning moon. It was standing very still, staring straight at her despite her charm. A terrible doubt rose inside her, constricting her throat: had her charms been unsuccessful? Was the Winterking, even now, laughing as she walked into an elaborate trap?
She bit down her doubts and stopped an arm’s length away from the arch, looking through it to the road beyond. It ran on about twenty paces before it met the snow-covered mountain road, which glimmered slightly as it wound around the mountain wall and disappeared. She deliberately didn’t look at the wolf. Unwillingly she dragged her eyes back to the arch and pondered her next step. She could feel the power invested in the stone from where she stood: it seemed to bear down on her with a malevolent vigilance. Its message could not have been clearer if it had been written in letters of fire: You shall not pass.
I have to pass, thought Maerad. But it will take everything I have left, and it will probably be for nothing.
As she took a deep breath, gathering herself for one last exertion, she heard a voice in her mind.
Do not speak until you pass the Arch, it said.
Maerad nodded.
You cannot pass the Arch, it went on. It will reveal you. You must become wolf.
Maerad looked at the wolf in bewilderment, and silenced the questions that rushed into her mind. Wolf?
The wolf sat down on its haunches, still looking at her. The starlight sparked cold off its eyes.
Become wolf, it said again. It settled down casually and put its head on its paws, looking for all the world like a domestic dog lying down in front of a fire. Maerad stared at it in exasperation, thinking it could at least have given her a clue. After a few moments, the wolf pricked up its ears and looked at her.
You do not have long, it said. The stars will soon begin to fade.
Maerad gave the sky a swift glance and saw the wolf was right. It would not be long before daylight, and she would need to be well away from Arkan-da by then if she was to have any hope of escape.
She tiredly put down her pack, sat down on a rock, and put her face in her hands. The cold pierced her clothes, and she was shivering. Inside her a voice said, You can’t do this. You’re mad to try. You can still go back to your chamber and undo the semblance and make everything as it was, and the Winterking will never know. And underneath this voice there was another, which whispered, And you will then see the Winterking tomorrow.
Maerad miserably let the implications of this rise in her mind. Leaving here would mean that she would never see Arkan again. Despite everything — despite the wrongs he had done her, despite his tyranny, despite his cruelty during their last meeting — something in her cried out in protest. She could remember only his face in repose, his cruel, sensual mouth. My enemy, she thought bitterly: my own heart. It calls me back into prison, even as the gate opens. But how can I leave my heart behind me? It would be a maiming deeper than the loss of my fingers. Then even my heart would be songless.
Maerad didn’t know how long she sat, shrouded in her unhappiness, forgetting the wolf, forgetting that she sat at Arkan’s very door, insensible even to her present peril. She felt as if she were being very slowly torn in two. At last, the wolf called her back to herself.
Become wolf, it said again. Or you will be a tame dog forever. Maerad looked up, startled, and realized that the sky was beginning to lighten. She was almost frozen, her hair iced and her feet numb. The wolf was standing up again, and it seemed to be looking at her with something like scorn.
Maerad closed her eyes.
I choose to leave, she said steadily to herself. She felt as