He drew breath to answer, and the rookery burst into a flurry of black wings as all the ravens of Darkhaven took flight at once, a circling stormcloud. Without thinking, Tanaros found himself on his feet, the black sword naked in his fist. The Mørkhar Fjel came at a thundering run, bristling with weapons. Speros, unarmed, swore and smashed the Dwarfish wine-jug on the edge of the table, shattering its graceful form to improvise a jagged weapon. Red wine bled in a widening stain on the white linen.
“Greetings, cousin.” Ushahin stood at the edge of the glade; a hunched form, small and composed. Above him, the ravens circled in a tightening gyre, answering to him as if to one of the Were. His uneven gaze shifted to Cerelinde. “Lady.”
“Dreamspinner.” Her voice was cool. She had risen, standing straight as a spear.
“Stand down.” Tanaros nodded to Speros and the Fjel and shoved his sword back into its sheath. His hand stung and his chest felt oddly tight, as though the brand over his heart were a steel band constricting it. “What do you want, Dreamspinner?”
“I come on his Lordship’s orders. ‘Tis time to send the ravens afield again.” Ushahin gave his tight, crooked smile. In Cerelinde’s presence, he looked more malformed than ever. Here was the beauty of the Ellylon rendered into its component parts and poorly rebuilt, cobbled together by unskilled hands. “But there is a matter of which I would speak to you, cousin. One that concerns the safety of Darkhaven.” He paused, and in the silence, Fetch descended, settling on his shoulder. “A matter of corruption.”
He said no more, waiting.
Tanaros inclined his head. A moment had passed; an axis had tipped. Something had changed, something was lost. Something bright had slipped away from him, and something else had settled into place. Its roots were deep and strong. There was a surety, a knowledge of self, and the course he had chosen. Beneath its brand, his aching heart beat, each beat reminding him that he owed his existence to Lord Satoris.
A vast and abiding love.
He touched the pouch at his belt, feeling the contours of Hyrgolf’s rhios through it, letting himself be humbled by the awesome loyalty of the Fjel. The Fjel, to whom it seemed Arahila’s forgiveness did not extend. On the far side of the glade, Ushahin’s eyes glittered as if he knew Tanaros’ thoughts.
Perhaps he did.
“Permit me to escort the Lady Cerelinde to her quarters,” Tanaros said to the half-breed. “Then I am at your disposal.” Turning to Cerelinde, he extended his arm. “Lady?”
Cerelinde took his arm. “Thank you,” she whispered, “for this glimpse of sun.”
“For that, Lady, you are welcome.” Tanaros heard the unsteadiness in his voice and despised it. He crooked his arm, capturing her fair, white fingers against his torso and made his voice harsh. “Now, come with me.”
She went, making no protest.
Behind them came the padding footfalls of the Havenguard, crunching upon the beech-mast. And all the way, Tanaros felt the combined gaze of Ushahin and the ravens of Darkhaven upon him. On his arm, Cerelinde’s touch burned; on the outer edges of his sight, Fetch’s vision burned, a raven’s fitful thoughts, backed by a dragon’s roar, and the gleam in Ushahin’s mismatched eyes.
Somewhere between the two, lay his path.
So be it, Tanaros thought, conscious of the steady throb of his beating heart, and all that he owed, every breath drawn, to Lord Satoris.
A matter of corruption?
No. Never.
SIX
FROM HIS PERCH HIGH ATOP a pine tree, Dani saw the Fjel.
It was the fourth time that day he had clambered up the tree, using it as a vantage point to survey the barren reach. Each time, he whispered a prayer to Uru-Alat, praying to find the landscape empty as it had been the day before, and the day before it.
On the third day, his luck ran out.
Although it was hard to tell from so far away, they appeared to be the same kind he had seen before—lean and predatory, with smooth, grey hides that were blended into the rocky terrain. If he hadn’t been keen-sighted, he might have missed them. But, no, there it was again—a steely flash in the distance, the northern sunlight glinting on armor plate. Clinging to the pine’s trunk with his good right arm, he stared intently at the direction of the Fjel. There were more of them this time, though only one wore armor. Save for the waterskins strapped over their torsos, the rest were unadorned.
They were traveling in a pack and they were traveling swiftly. For a moment, Dani watched, mesmerized by their steady, tireless lope. Even at a distance, an awful grace was in it.
Then fear returned in a rush, the sour taste of it in his mouth. Using both feet and the one hand, Dani descended the pine tree in awkward haste, heedless of the prickling needles and rough bark, and hurried into the hidden cave.
“Fjeltroll?” Uncle Thulu’s voice was faint and thready.
“Aye.” He met his uncle’s feverish gaze. “A dozen at least.”
“Did they see you?”
“No.” Dani shook his head. “They’re pretty far south of us and moving fast, all in a pack. It doesn’t even look like they’re hunting. I think they’ll miss us,” he added hopefully. “Maybe they’re not even looking.”
“No.” Uncle Thulu coughed weakly and wheezed, one hand scrabbling at his chest. In the dim light, his shirt was stained dark with seeping fluids. Despite Dani’s best efforts to clean and tend them, his wounds continued to fester. Yesterday, they had begun to slough dead flesh and the small space stank of it. “Help me sit.”
With alacrity, Dani eased him into a sitting position, propped against the cavern wall. “Better?”
“Aye,” Uncle Thulu whispered, licking his dry, cracked lips.
“Here.” Moving deftly and quietly, Dani made his way to the mouth of the cave. There, in a shallow depression to one side, was a cache of moss he had gathered. It had sustained them during the past three days. Grasping a smooth stone, he ground the spongy moss into a damp paste. Scooping up a handful, he returned to squat beside his uncle. With gentle care, he spread the paste on the elder Yarru’s parched lips. “Try to eat.”
Uncle Thulu’s mouth worked with difficulty, his sluggish tongue taking in the moss paste. Blinking back tears, Dani spread another fingerful on his lips. There was moisture in it, not much, but enough to live on. It was the only thing he had been able to find within half a day’s journey of their hiding place. And if he had not seen a single lost elk grazing on it, he might never have thought to try the moss. It was all that had kept his uncle alive.
And barely, at that.
“Enough.” Uncle Thulu grasped Dani’s wrist with urgent strength and drew in a deep, rattling breath. “Dani, listen to me.”
“Yes, Uncle.” His chest ached with fear and love.
“They’re starting over. That’s why they’re moving in a hurry. They’re going back to pick up our trail from the beginning. And if they’ve added to their numbers, they’re not going to miss us this time.” Thulu’s eyes were overbright in his wasted face. “Dani, you have to go. Now.”
“I won’t.” He refused to hear what Thulu was saying. “Not without you.”
His uncle said it anyway. “I’m dying, Dani.”
“What if we went back?” The thought struck him like an offer of salvation. “We could wait for them to pass, then head south! They wouldn’t hunt for us once we passed out of Fjel territory, and the Staccians … well, they’re just Men, we can hide from Men, Uncle! And get you home, where—”
“Dani.” Uncle Thulu’s grip tightened on his wrist. “I’m not going anywhere,” he said gently. “Do you understand? This is where the journey ends for me. I’m sorry, lad. You’ve got to go on without me.”
“No!” Pulling away, Dani clutched the clay vial around his neck. “For what?” he asked angrily. “For this? It’s not worth it! It’s not fair, uncle!” He yanked at the vial with all his strength. For a moment, the braided cord on which it was strung burned the skin of his neck; then it parted wi
th a faint snap. Dani held the vial in one hand. Hot tears burned his eyes, and his voice trembled. “I didn’t ask to be the Bearer! What’s Satoris ever done to the Yarru-yami, anyway, that we should seek to destroy him? It’s not his fault Haomane’s Wrath scorched the desert, he was just trying to hide from it! And if he hadn’t … if he hadn’t, we wouldn’t have found the Water of Life! We wouldn’t be the keepers of Birru-Uru-Alat. We wouldn’t even be what we are!”
The ghost of a smile moved Thulu’s cracked lips. “These are fitting questions for the Bearer to ask,” he whispered. “But you will have to answer them alone.”
Dani unclenched his hand, staring at the vial. It lay on the starry, radiating lines of his grimy palm; a simple object, fragile and crude. Clay, gathered from a scant deposit at one of the Stone Grove’s water-holes, fired with baari-wood and dung in a pit dug into the desert’s floor.
Inside it was the Water of Life, water he had drawn from the Well of the World and dipped from the bucket, holding it in his cupped palms as old Ngurra had told him to do, filling the vial with care. The lifeblood of Uru-Alat, the World God; the secret the Yarru-yami held in trust. A gift only the Bearer could draw; a burden only the Bearer could carry. A choice in the making.
In the apple orchards of Malumdoorn, while the sun slanted through the trees and the Dwarfs stood watching, a single drop had caused a dead stick to burst into green life; planting roots, sprouting leaves and blossoms.
A dawning certainty grew in him. For the first time, Dani saw clearly the divided path before him and understood that the choice between them was his, and his alone, to make. Not for the sake of Malthus, whose impassioned words had swayed him; not for the sake of Carfax, who had given his life to save him. Not even for his uncle, who would gainsay it. The choice was his, and his alone. This, and not the Water itself, was the Bearer’s true burden.
Dani lifted his head. “No, Uncle. Not just yet.”
“Ah, lad!” There was alarm in Thulu’s weak voice. “The Water of Life is too precious to waste—”
“Am I the Bearer?” Dani interrupted him. “You keep telling me it is my right to choose, Uncle, and yet you give me no guidance, no hint as to which choice is right. Well, I am choosing.” With one thumbnail, he pried at the tight cork, working it loose. The faint scent of water, life giving and mineral-rich, trickled into the small cavern. With his heart hammering in hope and fear, Dani bent over his uncle and smoothed his brow, putting the vial close to his lips. “I choose for you to live.”
Uncle Thulu exhaled one last, long, rattling breath and closed his eyes in surrender. “May it be as Uru-Alat wills,” he whispered.
At close range, the stench of his suppurating wounds vied for dominance with the odor of water. Dani ignored it, concentrating on tilting the flask. Under his breath, he chanted the Song of Being, the story of Uru-Alat and how the World God died to give birth to the world. It was an act of prayer; a Yarru prayer, the oldest prayer, a story learned and told in the deep places of the earth, where the veins of life pulsed and the Yarru had hidden from Haomane’s Wrath. It was an old story; older than the Shapers. It was as old as dragons, who were born in the deep places from the bones of Uru-Alat and carried a spark of marrow-fire in their bellies.
A single drop gathered on the clay lip of the vessel. It gathered and swelled; rounding, bottom-heavy. It shone like a translucent pearl, glimmering in the shadowy cavern, reflecting all the light in the world.
Beneath it were his uncle’s parted lips. Dark flesh, fissured and cracked, smeared with moss-paste. The tip of his tongue, a pink supplicant lying quiescent on the floor of his thirsting mouth.
Dani tilted the vial.
One drop; two, three!
They fell like stars through the dark air into the mortal void of Uncle Thulu’s waiting mouth. And, oh, Uru-Alat! A sweet odor burst forth as they fell, redoubled in strength; a scent like a chime, like the sharp clap of a pair of hands.
It happened almost too quickly for sight to follow. Uncle Thulu’s eyes sprang open, wide and amazed. His chest heaved as he drew in a great, whooping gasp of air. Dani cried aloud in astonishment, scrambling backward and nearly spilling the Water of Life. He shoved the cork into the clay flask, then shoved his knuckles into his mouth, fearful that his outcry would draw the Fjeltroll.
“Ah, Dani, lad!” Uncle Thulu sat upright. The brightness in his eyes owed nothing to fever—it was the brightness of sunlight on clear waters, a promise of life and health. “If this is folly, what a glorious folly it is!” He grinned, showing strong white teeth, and yanked his shirt aside to expose his chest. “Tell me what you see!”
Beneath the foul-crusted wool, Thulu’s skin was smooth and dark, gleaming with health. In the dim light, Dani could barely make out three faint lines, pale threads like long-healed scars. He sighed with relief. “They’re well and truly healed, aren’t they?”
“More than healed!” His uncle’s voice reverberated joyously from the cavern walls. “Ah, lad! I’ve never felt better in my life! Why, I could—”
“Shhh!” Dani laid one hand over Thulu’s lips. “The Fjeltroll.”
“Right.” His uncle nodded. “Aye, of course.”
“I’ll go look.” Without waiting for Thulu to argue, Dani turned to wriggle out of the cavern’s narrow opening. With the vial in one hand and the dirty sling still tied around his left arm, it was awkward going. He inched beneath the concealing pine branches and into the open, crawling on his belly until he had a clear view.
There, to the southeast, a moving smudge on the landscape; a dull glint of steel. He didn’t even need to climb the tree to spot them. The Fjel had already passed them. They were moving fast … and they would be returning fast, too.
“Have they gone?”
Dani winced at the sound of his uncle’s voice. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw Thulu standing in front of the cave. “Aye, barely. Uncle, get down, please!”
“Sorry, lad.” Thulu drew a shuddering breath and dropped to a squat. In the open light of day, he looked even more hale—unnervingly hale. The muscles in his sturdy thighs bunched and twitched with vigor. “It’s just … I don’t know if I can explain, but it’s like a fire in my veins, Dani. I can’t hold still.” He rubbed his face with both hands. “Just as well, isn’t it? We’ve no time to waste.”
“You’ll have to sit for a minute.” Dani sat in a hunched pose and concentrated on splicing the broken thukka-vine thong on which the vial was strung, braiding the strong fibers. “VVe’re not going anywhere until those Fjeltroll are long out of sight.”
“And where shall we go when we do, Bearer?” Despite it all, Uncle Thulu put the question to him gently, remembering the words Dani had spoken in fear and anger. “It seems, against the odds, that I am still here to guide you. Where is it you would go?”
Dani bowed his head, his coarse black hair hiding his expression. “Darkhaven,” he murmured. “We go to Darkhaven, Uncle.”
“You’re sure?”
“Aye.” He stroked the pit-fired clay vessel with one fingertip. “I made a choice, Uncle. I’m responsible for it now. And if there are questions the Bearer should ask …” He shrugged. “Perhaps I should ask them in Darkhaven.”
Uncle Thulu watched him. “It is Darkhaven’s agents who seek your life.”
“I know.” Dani tested the spliced thong’s strength and gauged that it would hold. Raising his good arm, he slipped the vial around his neck, feeling it nestle into place against his chest. “I have given them reason.”
“You know, lad.” Uncle Thulu nodded at Dani’s left arm, bound in its sling. “I know what I said before. But we’ve a long way to go, and Fjeltroll to outrun. Whatever questions you might ask, it’s not going to alter their orders; not here and now. A single drop from that flask—”
“No.” Dani shook his head. Fear had passed from him; in its wake, he felt tired and resigned. “You were right, Uncle. It is too precious to waste. And how terrible might we become if the Bearer chose
to use it thusly? No,” he said again. “It was my choice to use it to save your life. It is enough.” He glanced behind him, surveying the horizon. There was no glint of sunlight on steel; the moving smudge had gone. “Shall we go?”
“Aye, lad.” Uncle Thulu sprang to his feet, then paused. He fumbled at his chest with blunt fingertips, finding no wound, but only the pale ridges of long-healed scars. An expression of perplexity crossed his broad face. “What was I saying? It was a folly of some sort, I fear. Something has changed here, Dani, has it not? I should be dead, and yet I live. And you, you …”
“I am the Bearer,” Dani finished softly. For the first time, he had a glimmering of what the words meant, and it made him feel very, very alone. With an effort, he used his good arm as a lever, clambering upright. Once standing, he touched the clay vial at his throat, aware of his burden. “Will you be my guide, Uncle?”
“I will,” said his uncle. And he bowed, low. “Aye, lad, I will.”
THE WALL WAS LIKE A dragon’s spine, coiled and sinuous. It stretched for league upon league around Darkhaven, clinging with determination to every sinking valley and rising ridge in the Vale that surrounded Lord Satoris’ fortress.
It was taller than the height of three men, and broad enough for four horsemen to ride astride atop it; or four Fjel to run at a trot. Within its confines lay all that Darkhaven encompassed. There, to the north, were the mines where the Fjeltroll labored, digging iron from the earth. There, closer, were the furnaces where it was smelted, the forges where it was beaten into steel. The Gorgantus River made its sluggish way beneath a pall of grey-black smoke, tapped by the cunning of Speros of Haimhault, who had built a waterwheel and made it serve Darkhaven’s purposes.
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