Andre Norton - Witch World - Lore of the Witch World

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Lore of the Witch World by

Andre Norton

Introduction

by C. J. Cherryh

Writing an introduction for one of Andre Norton's books is rather like

applying gilt to a lily, superfluity to be sure. When I was offered the chance

to do it, I first thought it was impossible and then sat down to try, and

then began to think of thousands of readers who would love to get a line

in… to say some things that want saying; things I don't think can be said

too often, ever.

About the Witch World stories: For all of us who've ever created a

world to dream about, for those of us who write and for those who keep

theirs in their hearts...the Witch World stories hold a special place. It's a

land, a world, a place of dark shadows and alien powers and human beings

touched with strangeness, a place where men and women find

extraordinary things within them, and match themselves against an

environment at once marvelously detailed and full of mysteries. The Witch

World is never explored. The smallest valley holds strange happenings and

a past which reaches into things stranger still. The traveler finds the

unexpected, the ancient, the bizarre at every turn. Nature is powerful here

and those who open their hearts to it and to living things find themselves

capable of marvels and involved in an old, old warfare. One meets old

friends here, and hears of them; finds remnants of eldritch powers and

visitants; finds… if one looks… ancient truths about courage and honesty

and duty that involve the highborn and the ordinary, the young and the

old, humans and the four-footed kind all in one fabric of magic and

mystery.

The Witch World both lies within a tradition and generates a tradition

of its own. It comes of that mythic tradition out of which comes Homer's

wine-dark and fantastically mapped Mediterranean, peopled with gods

and strange powers, which other heroes went on to sail in their turn,

because it was a Place and a Time which had to exist; and which made

heroes out of men and women of unlikely sort, because they met the

unknown with why? and what if? and why not? The Witch World is one

of those places a reader lives in, and some of those readers have.become

writers, and writers who never quite forget their journey in that

ever-surprising and yet strangely familiar terrain. A lot of us who create

worlds, whether we write them or dream them secretly, owe a great deal to

this place, for its completeness, its way of underlaying daily life with the

fantastical, its way of seeing vast forces implicit in the smallest and

humblest things.

If the Witch World had never been written, so many other worlds would

be the poorer.

And that brings me to Andre Norton herself.

There's been a great deal of fuss about women entering the science

fiction field lately. Oh, no. Not lately. Andre Norton has been there, long

before, doing things her way. I did some checking on publication dates

and I was stunned to realize that Andre was publishing in this field the

year this writer was a knobby-kneed kid in the third grade, struggling to

get a bicycle home in what (to that third-grader) was the blizzard of the

century… and I was too young to read the stories then, myself not one of

the youngest of this crop who keeps getting asked about "women breaking

into the field."… Andre's been there, writing her stories.

That skinned-knee kid with the pigtails didn't meet Andre Norton until

1977, although we'd corresponded a bit, because Andre out of the

goodness of her heart did the introduction for my first book, which is one

reason why I'd fight tigers to get the chance at this introduction. She

asked me, me, the stranger from Oklahoma, to drop in on her to visit after

Worldcon; and when that occasion turned into the chance for me to bring

her the Gandalf Award she'd won from the World Convention for Life's

Achievement in Fantasy—oh, I was delighted! For one thing, I figured that

had to at least win me a welcome at the door. When I showed up at

Andre's door and had a time to catch my breath I found myself with one of

those people who do kindnesses as if it were nature's most logical process,

who is on the side of good books and living things, who has the kind of

definite ideas about what's right and what's just that might be expected of

the creator of worlds where people stand by each other.

I like Andre Norton. I knew that from the start.

And when people sit down and start talking about how they got into

this field in the first place, what writers were responsible for leading them

deeper and deeper into that attitude we call sense of wonder, and which

has to do with being really alive to this universe and all the possibilities of

it—that most precious gift of learning how to see what we look at— Andre

Norton's name is one that always comes to the front.

What has Andre Norton done for this field? She's written for all ages;

she's been the gateway through which so, so many of us have come into

this field in the first place. She created women who did things, such as

Jaelithe, and she sparked imagination in a host of young minds who had

rarely seen such a thing; she created heroes who were more than strong,

and touched the hearts of countless young people who could never be quite

the same afterward. There's a special look that comes into the eyes of

these folk when they talk about Andre Norton, and you know full well that

she has a very special place in their hearts, forever; that Andre's books are

the ones they're going to put into the hands of their own sons and

daughters and say with that special, waited-for hope: "I think you might

like this. It's good." There's hardly a gift one can give another so precious

as something that wakes us to what we call sense of wonder. That's what

Andre's work has done for so very many of us. She's special. She's one of

those talents without which this field would be inestimably the poorer.

She reminds me curiously enough of John Wayne: a quiet person with

strong convictions, who never much goes with fads but does things her

way, whose style is her own, and who has shot straight and told the truth

and given a lot of readers, young and old, a marvelous sense of heroism

possible in their own lives, because it's right there pointed out to us what

great possibilities there are, what great hearts in unlikely frames, what

grand adventures likely for those who see their world with sense of

wonder!

She writes. And the thing she does for this field has woven itself

through so many lives that that influence keeps traveling. She's vexingly

modest and deprecates such notions, but they're true, Andre! And I'm glad

to have gotten the chance to say them. Thank you. Andre, for being there,

for making worlds, for opening up so much of wonder to us… I get to say

it; but I say it for so many others. Thank you.

SPIDER SILK

1

The Big Storm in the Year of the Kobold came late, long past the month

when such fury was to be expected. This was all part of that evil which the

Guardians had drawn upon Estcarp when they summoned up their

greatest power to blast and twist the mountain lands, seal off passes

through which had come the invasion from Karsten.

Rannock lay open to that storm. Only the warning dream-sending to

the Wise Woman, Ingvarna, drew a portion of the women and children to

the higher lands, there to watch with fear and trembling the sea's fierce

assault upon the coast So high dashed those waves that water covered and

boiled about the Serpent Teeth of the upper ledges. Only here, in pockets

among the Tor rocks, could a fugitive crouch in almost mindless terror,

awaiting the end.

Of the fishing fleet which had set out yesterday morn, who had any

hopes now of its return save perhaps a scattering of wreckage, playthings

of the storm waves?

There were left only a handful of old men and boys, and one or two such

as Herdrek, the Twist-Leg, the village smith. For Rannock was as poor in

men as it was in all else since the war years had ravaged Estcarp. To the

north perched Alizon, a hawk ready to be unleashed upon its neighbor;

from the south Karsten boiled and bubbled, if aught was still left alive

beyond the wrecked mountain passages.

Men who had marched with the Borderers under Lord Simon Tregarth

or served beneath the Banners of the Witch Women of Es—where were

they? Long since, their kin had given up any hope of their return. There

had been no true peace in this land since old Nabor (who could count his

years at more than a hundred) had been in his green youth.

It was Nabor now who battled the strength of the wind to the Tor,

dragged himself up to stand, hunched shoulder to shoulder, with

Ingvarna. As she, he looked to the sea uneasily. That she expected still

their own fleet he could not believe, foresighted as all knew her to be.

Waves mounted, to pound giant fists against the rock. Nabor caught

sight of a ship rising and falling near the Serpent's dread fangs. Then a

huge swell whirled it over those sharp threats into the comparative calm

beyond. Nabor sighed with the relief of a seaman who had witnessed a

miracle, life won from the very teeth of rock death. Also, Rannock had the

right of storm wrack. If that ship survived so far, its cargo was forfeit now

to any who could bring it to shore. He half-turned to seek the shelter of the

Tor hollows, rouse Herdrek and the others with this promise of fortune.

However, Ingvarna turned her head. Through the drifts of rain her eyes

held his. There was a warning in her steady gaze. "One comes—" He saw

her lips shape the words but did not hear her voice them above the roar of

wind and wave.

At the same moment, there was such a crash as equaled the drum of

thunder, the lash of lightning. The strange ship might have beaten the

menace of the reefs fangs, but now had been driven halfway up the beach,

where it was fast breaking up under the hammer blows of the surf.

Herdrek stumped out to join them. "It is a raider," he commented

during a lull of the wind. "Perhaps one of the Sea Wolves of Alizon." He

spat at the wreck below.

Ingvarna was already scrambling over the rocks toward the shore, as if

what lay there were of vast importance. Herdrek shouted after her a

warning, but she did not even turn her head. With a curse at the folly of

females, which a second later he devoutly hoped the Wise Woman had not

been able to pick out of the air, the smith followed her, two of the lads

venturing in his wake.

At least when they reached the shore level, the worst of the storm was

spent. Waves drew a torn seaweed veil around the broken vessel. Herdrek

made fast a rope about his waist, gave dire warnings to his followers to

keep a tight hold upon it. Then he ventured into the surf, using that

cordage from wind-rent sails, hanging in loops down the shattered sides,

to climb aboard.

There was a hatch well tamped down, roped shut. He drew belt knife to

slash the fastening.

"Ho!" His voice rolled hollowly into the dark beneath him. "Anyone

below?"

A thin cry answered, one which might issue from the throat of a

seabird such as already coasted over the subsiding surface of the sea on

hunt for the bounty of the storm. Yet he thought not. Gingerly, favoring

his stiff leg, the smith lowered himself into the stinking hold. What he

found there made him retch, and then heated in him dull anger against

those who had mastered this vessel. She had been a slaver, such as

Rannock's men had heard tell of—dealing in live cargo.

Of that cargo, only one survived. Her, Herdrek carried gently from the

horror of that prison. A little maid, her small arms no more than skin

slipped glovelike on bones, her eyes great, gray and blankly open. Ingvarna

took the strange child from the smith as one who had the authority of clan

and home hearth, wrapping the little one's thin, shivering body in her own

warm cloak.

From whence Dairine came those of Rannock never learned. That

slavers raided far was no secret Also, the villagers soon discovered the

child was blind. Ingvarna, though she was a Wise One, greatly learned in

herbs and spells, the setting of bones, the curing of wounds, shook her

head sadly over that discovery, saying that the child's blindness came from

no hurt of body. Rather, she must have looked upon some things so

horrible that thereafter her mind closed and refused all sight.

Though she might have been six or seven winters old, yet speech also

seemed riven from her, and only fear was left to be her portion. The

women of Rannock would have tried to comfort her, but secretly in their

hearts they were willing that she bide with Ingvarna, who treated her

oddly, they thought For the Wise Woman did not strive to make life easier

in any way for the child. Rather, from the first, Ingvarna treated the sea

waif not as one maimed in body, and perhaps in mind, but rather as she

might some daughter of the village whom she had chosen to be her

apprentice in the harsh school of her own learning.

These years were bleak for Rannock. Full half the fleet did not return

from out of the maw of that storm. Nor did any of the coastwise traders

come. The following winter was a lean one. But in those dark days, Dairine

showed first her skill. Her eyes might not see what her fingers wrought yet

she could mend fishing nets with such cleverness that even the

experienced women marveled.

And in the following spring, when the villagers husked the loquth balls

to free their seeds for new plantings, Dairine busied herself with the silken

inner fibers, twisting and turning those. Ingvarna had Herdrek make a

small spindle and showed the child how this tool might be best put to

work.

Good use did Dairine make of it, too. Her small, birdclaw fingers drew

out finer thread than any had achieved before, freer from knotting than

any the villagers had seen. Yet never seemed she satisfied, but strove ever

to make her spinning still finer, more smooth.

The Wise Woman continued her fosterling's education in other ways,

teaching her to use her fingers, her nose, in the herb garden. Dairine

learnt easily the spelling which was part of a Wise Woman's knowledge.

She absorbed that very quickly, yet always there was about her an

impatience. When she made mistakes, then her anger against herself was

great The greatest when she tried to explain some tool or need which she

seemed unable to describe but for which she evinced a need.

Ingvarna spoke to Herdrek (who was now village elder), saying that

perhaps the craft of the Wise Woman might aid in regaining a portion of

Dairine's lost memory. When he demanded why she had not voiced such a

matter before, Ingvarna answered gravely: "This child is not blood of our

blood, and she was captive to the sea wolves. Have we the right to recall to

her past horrors? Perhaps Gunnore, who watches over all womankind, has

taken away her memory of the past in pity. If so—"

He bit his thumb, watching Dairine as she paced back and forth before

the loom which he had caused to be set up for her, now and then halting

to slap her hand upon the frame in frustration. It seemed as if she longed

to force the heavy wood into another pattern which would serve her better.

"I think that she grows more and more unhappy," he agreed slowly. "At

first she seemed content. Now there are times when she acts as a snow cat

encaged against her will. I do not like to see her so.

The Wise Woman nodded. "Well enough. In my mind this is a right

choice."

Ingvarna went to the girl, taking both her hands, drawing her around

so that she might look directly into those blind eyes. At Ingvarna's touch,

Dairine stood still. "Leave us!" the Wise Woman commanded the smith.

Early that evening as Herdrek stood at his forge Dairine walked into the

light of his fire. She came to him unhesitatingly. So acute was her hearing

that she often startled the villagers by her recognition of another presence.

Now she held out her hands to him as she might to a father she loved. And

he knew all was well.

By midsummer, when the loquths had flowered and their blossoms

dropped, Dairine went often into the fields, fingering the swelling bolls.

Sometimes she sang, queer, foreign-tongued words, as if the plants were

children (now knee height, and then shoulder height) who must be

amused and cherished.

Herdrek had changed her loom as the girl suggested might be done.

From Ingvarna she learned the mysteries of dyes, experimenting on her

own. She had no real friend among the few children of the dying village.

Firstly, because she did not range much afield, save with Ingvarna, of

whom most were in awe. Secondly, because her actions were strange and

she seemed serious and more adult than the years they believed to be hers.

In the sixth year after her coming, a Sulcar ship put in at Rannock, the

first strange vessel sighted since the wreck of the slaver. Its captain

brought news that the long war was at last over.

The defeat of the Karsten invaders, who so drained the powers of the

rulers of Estcarp, had been complete. Koris of Gorm was now Commander

of Estcarp, since so many of the Guardians had perished when they turned

the full extent of their power upon the enemy. Yet the land was hardly at

peace. The sea wolves of the coast had been augmented by ships of the

broken and defeated navy of Karsten. As in times of chaos, other

wolfheads, without any true lands or allegiance, now ravaged the land

wherever they might Though the forces under Captain General Koris

sought to protect the boundaries, yet to defeat such hit-and-run raids was

well beyond the ability of any defending force.

The Sulcar Captain was impressed by the latest length of Dairine's

weaving, offering for it, when he bargained with Ingvarna, a much better

price than he had thought to pay out in this forgotten village. He was

much interested also in the girl, speaking to her slowly in several tongues.

However, she answered him only in the language of Estcarp, saying she

knew no other.

Still, he remarked privately to Ingvarna that somewhere in the past he

had seen those like unto her, though where and when during his travels he

could not bring to mind. Still, he thought that she was not of common

stock.

It was a year later that the Wise Woman wrought the best she could for

her sea-gift foundling.

No one knew how old Ingvarna was, for the Wise Woman showed no

advance of age, as did those less learned in the many uses of herbs and

medicants. But it was true that she walked more slowly, and that she no

longer went alone when she sought out certain places of Power, taking

Dairine ever with her. What the two did there no one knew, for who would

spy on any woman with the Witch Talent?

On this day, the few fishing boats had taken to sea before dawn. At

moonrise the night before the Wise Woman and her fosterling had gone

inland to visit a certain very ancient place. There Ingvarna kindled a fire

which burned not naturally red but rather blue. Into those flames she

tossed small, tightly bound bundles of dried herbs so that the smoke which

arose was heavily scented. But she watched not that fire. Rather, a slab of

stone set behind its flowering. That stone had a surface like glass, the color

of a fine sword blade.

Dairine stood a little behind the Wise Woman. Though Ingvarna had

taught her over the years to make her other senses serve her in place of her

missing sight, so that her fingers were ten eyes, her nostrils, her ears could

catch scent and sound to an extent far outreaching the skill of ordinary

mankind, yet at moments such as this the longing to be as others awoke in

her a sense of loss so dire that to her eyes came tears, flowing silently

down her cheeks. Much Ingvarna had given her. Still, she was not as the

others of Rannock. And ofttimes loneliness settled upon her as a

burdensome cloak. Now the girl sensed that Ingvarna planned for her

some change. That it would make her see as others saw—that she could

not hope for.

She heard clearly the chanting of the Wise Woman. The odor of the

burning herbs filled her nose, now and then made her gasp for a less heavy

lungful of air. Then came a command, not given in words, nor by some

light touch against her arm and shoulder. But into her mind burst an

order and Dairine walked ahead, her hands outstretched, until her ten

fingers flattened against a throbbing surface. Warm it was, near to a point

which would sear her flesh, while its throb was in twin beat to her own

heart. Still, Dairine stood firm, while the chant of the Wise Woman came

more faintly, as if the girl had been shifted farther away in space from her

foster mother.

Then she felt an inward flow from the surface she touched, a warmth

which spread along her hands, her wrists, up her arms. Fainter still came

the voice of Ingvarna petitioning on her behalf, strange and half-forgotten

powers.

Slowly the warmth receded. But how long Dairine had stood so wedded

to that surface she could not see, the girl never knew. Except that there

came a moment when her hands fell, as if too heavily burdened for her to

raise.

"What is done, is done." Ingvarna's voice at the girl's left sounded as

weighted as Dairine's hands felt. "All I have to give, this I have freely

shared with you. Though being blind as men see blindness, yet you have

sight such as few can own to. Use it well, my fosterling."

From that day it became known that Dairine did indeed have strange

powers of "seeing" through her hands. She could take up a thing which

had been made and tell of the maker, of how long since it had been

wrought. A shred of fleece from one of the thin-flanked hill sheep put into

her fingers would enable her to guide an anxious owner to where the lost

flock member had strayed.

There was one foretelling which she would not do, after she came upon

its secret by chance only. For she had taken the hand of little Hulde during

the Harvest Homing dance. Straightway thereafter, Dairine dropped her

grasp upon the child's small fingers, crying out and shrinking away from

the villagers, to seek out Ingvarna's house and therein hide herself. Within

the month, Hulde had died of a fever. Thereafter, the girl used her new

sight sparingly, and always with a fear plain to be seen haunting her.

In the Year of the Weldworm, when Dairine passed into young

womanhood, Ingvarna died swiftly. As if foreseeing another possible end,

she summoned death as one summons a servant to do one's bidding.

Andre Norton - Witch World - Lore of the Witch World

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