Spellbreakers by Katherine Wyvern Read Free Book Online

forked out to the right and up, and she was soon
hanging on to mere hand-and-footholds, which she had to find by touch on the damp,
overgrown cliff-face. Sometimes water dripped in and around them, or in her
eyes, as she searched the next step. When she came her slanting way to the fern
trunk she was still a long way down from the arching fronds overhead. She
looked down.
    It was a mistake.
    At this point the bottom of the gorge was seven or
eight yards down. It was not a sheer drop, since even here the cliff was not
quite vertical, but falling would definitely be definitely unpleasant.   She swallowed, considered the fern’s trunk,
which was leaning almost two yards away from the wall .
    Bloody Ancients! They might have built a ladder, or
used a rope . She knew it was no use complaining
and that no ladder or rope would have lasted for such a long stretch of time in
this lush damp atmosphere, but even so, it was a damn impractical way to get
into a tree top.
    Come on, she
thought, Daria would not hang here like a bloody spider on a wall. She would
look at the tree, gauge the distance and jump. Oh, I wish I was half as crazy
as she is.
    She gauged the distance.
    She took a breath.
    She jumped.
    She jumped way too hard, in an awkward convulsive
jerk, and landed heavily against the spiky trunk. The blow almost made her
fall, but somehow she clung on. The mighty trunk barely shivered, but she heard
a strange slithering sound from overhead, like of uncoiling snakes, and for a
long moment she froze in panic.
    “Do you wish for a pillow and blanket to be sent up
there, princess?” came Dee’s voice from below, and
Leal sighed, bit back a sharp retort, and climbed up. This was easy, since the stiff,
thick stumps of old leaves stuck up in every direction from the core of the
trunk, but it was a scratchy job. By the time she reached the spreading head of
the tree the front of her jerkin was scraped and ripped in half a dozen places.
Finally, she writhed among the enormous spreading midribs of the palm-like
lofty nest of the fern’s heart.
    And here she stared, lost in wonder.
    Like all ferns’, the dragon-fern’s new leaves were
coiled in tight spirals, rising from the center of the tree. But unlike other
ferns, these were very obviously alive in a sentient, animal way, and waved
this way and that, quivering, curling, whispering .
Could the fern be alarmed by her presence? She thought of what Dee had said. Do
not hurt the tree, whatever you do .
    “I don’t mean you any harm, my dear,” she said in a
soft whisper. She reached gently to the nearest coil, and barely stroked it
with the back of her fingers. The tree stood very still, all the leaves and
curls poised. She slowly stretched her hand to the next coil and caressed it
more fully. Slowly, very slowly, more tight curling shoots rose from the center
of the tree, and there, among the slithering scaly greenery, hung a single
glistening fruit, like a pale blue-grey apricot, silky, and damp with dew.
    “I need to take this, now. Please do not be angry with
me. I need it so badly. Will you let me take it, now?” She spoke softly,
somewhat at random, merely minding her tone, like one speaks to a shy horse.
    The tree slowly relaxed . Its scaly heart opened
to her. She gradually reached for the fruit. Her hand closed on it. She gently
twisted, and pulled.
    The fern shook all over, like a tree in a gale wind,
and the spirals sprung back into a scaly knot as she fell backwards into the
void.
    She landed miraculously on her feet, on centuries of
rotting faded leaves, piled deep over the sloping foot of the cliff. She slid
down, tumbled over the fern-grown path and fell into the stream.
    “Ow!” she said, kneeling on all fours in the shallow
water.
    “All in one piece there?” asked Dee scrambling down
the stony bank and striding in the stream to help her up.
    “I think,” said Leal.
    “You have the fruit?”
    “Yeah, I have the bloody fruit. Miracle I did not drop
it in