It was unsigned, but obviously it came from the trading captain of Jagd's caravan. It was just enough news to be aggravating. How was the dragon unstable? What was the beast doing? And why hadn't he heard from the caravan leader himself? Surely he had arrived in Lamath by this time. Obviously the bird had been delayed by the captain's inability to give good guidance to Flayh's estate, but where was the man himself? Flayh wanted hard facts, not tantalizing tidbits! He paced his airy cell, pausing every other moment to gaze out the window, watching for some action on the road south to Dragonsgate, or the road to the southeast, where the Lamathian estates of Uda were clustered. Nothing.
There was another sudden flutter of wings, and Flayh cursed the stupid bird and reached out to grab the feathered creature. Then he realized there were now two blue flyers on his window ledge, and the latest arrival bore a message tied in the orthodox cylinder around its leg. Flayh tore the message off and shot a mental picture of his aviary at the two birds. They wasted no time leaving his company.
Flayh unrolled the message, and nodded. It was in the large scrawl of Tohn mod Neelis: You will be pleased, to note I have taken your advice. Have left this morning to visit Dorlyth mod Karis with an entourage of six hundred. Will keep you informed by carrier. -Tohn.
"By carrier!" Flayh exploded. Then he sat again before the blue' crystal object on the table, and focused his malevolence into it. "Perhaps you won't talk to me, Tohn mod Neelis, but at least you will be aware that someone is talking to you-and that the words are getting nastier every day!" As they rode deeper into the Great North Fir, Pelman withdrew into himself a little more each day. It was barely noticeable at first, for the two young people were giving progressively more attention to one another. But it soon began to register with them that oftentimes now he would go for hours without speaking, and that he occasionally appeared to forget they were with him.
Other than the slight sense of insecurity this odd behavior birthed in them, the forest journey proved nothing short of idyllic for the boy and girl. At the southern edge of the great tangle of trees and shrubs, the powerful firs mixed with trees of other kinds. But the deeper they pushed, the more the evergreens took control, until at last they rode on a floor of needles alone, surrounded only by giant firs. Bronwynn had never seen trees so big, or forest glades so dark. They had spent the first day ducking low limbs and avoiding brambled bushes. Now they rode freely where they willed, for the nearest branches interlocked twenty feet above their heads. They spoke of the Fir as a vast green temple, with thousands of columns rising into an emerald ceiling, frescoed by light and shadow. They laughed at the antics of nervous squirrels, and compared their childhoods at length. Rosha taught Bronwynn what little he knew of falconry, and they freed Sharki to give him exercise as they rode. Swooping between the massive trunks, the bird looked less like a falcon than it did like a bat darting through subterranean caverns. The girl attempted to describe for Rosha the ocean and the beach, but succeeded only in making him angry.
"You t-t-tease me! There is n-n-not so much water in the w-world!" "I'm speaking the truth! Just because you have never trav-" "You think to m-m-make a f-fool of me!" Bronwynn made a face at him. "No one needs to make a fool of you! You do it so well to yourself!" Pelman was riding some distance ahead of them. At this he turned Minaliss around and sat looking back at the young pair. His look wasn't scolding, just curious. He hadn't heard the argument, only the noise.
"Is there s-s-such a thing as a-a-an ocean?" Rosha demanded, frowning fiercely. Bronwynn said nothing. She knew she didn't need to.
"Of course. It bounds the eastern edge of the three lands." "F-f-full of water?" Rosha protested. He didn't look at Bronwynn. He didn't care to view her smug smile.
"And fish, and shells, and salt. You mean Dorlyth never told you of the ocean?" Rosha shook his head angrily. "No-under the circumstances I suppose not. We didn't have joyful experiences there." "What circumstances?" Bronwynn piped up. Pelman's comment had been laden with meaning, and Bronwynn sensed a story hidden within it. Bronwynn loved stories.
"Well," Pelman said after a moment, "Rosha's father told me to teach him. I suppose this is as good a time as any." The powershaper turned his horse back to the north, and his youthful companions reined in beside him. Through the rest of the afternoon he told them stories of adventure, stories of love, stories of failure that made the tales of victory seem more grand. He told them of the days he and Dorlyth had spent as slaves, and how they first encountered a man named Admon Faye.
"Ad-m-mon F-faye? He's the one who c-c-came to see m-my father." Pelman looked sharply at Rosha, surprised by this- then recalled Dorlyth's cryptic statement about being in touch with the man. "Yes, Dorlyth did get on better with him than I did." "Was he captain of the slave raiders that captured you?" Bronwynn asked.
"Oh no, he was just a slave himself then, a helper to the land pirate who stole our freedom from us. Tried to befriend us, even as he helped put the shackles to our wrists." "That ugly thing?" Bronwynn protested.
"He wasn't ugly then. Evil comes to carve a man, Bronwynn. The ugly face he wears today was not inflicted on him. Somewhere along the way, Admon Faye chose evil-and in that choosing, chose the ugly face as well." The conversation wound through different subjects much as they wound their way through the massive trunks. Rosha listened earnestly, his mind a-jumble with facts and concepts that vaulted beyond his poor imagination. As dusk came, they found that the forest had thinned around them, and realized they had been climbing for some time. A break in the branches revealed the peak of a breathtaking mountain towering above them, and Pelman slowed his horse to gaze upward, transfixed by the vision.
"We'll stop here," he muttered. Without a further word, he dismounted and walked to the center of the clearing, eyes still fixed on that crown of snow turned pink by the setting sun. Bronwynn looked at Rosha and shrugged, then hopped off her horse and stretched. She was becoming used to these rugged days of riding, and was proud of herself for it. She began to pick up what wood was lying around, and called to Rosha to do the same.
But Rosha remained seated on his horse. The day's conversation had benumbed his mind, but that was not his concern now. He worried about Pelman.
The powershaper was changing. Dorlyth had warned him it could come, Pelman had warned him it would come; but even so, the young man could not escape the uneasiness this change produced in his heart. He dropped from his horse, drew his greatsword, and vowed that this night he would not sleep.
Bronwynn was puzzled. She dropped the wood in the middle of the clearing and put her hands on her hips. "You would think someone else might help!" she complained, looking back and forth between the two men. Suddenly Pelman began to walk, climbing up the slope and entering the trees.
"P-Pelman!" Rosha called, wanting to run after him but hesitant to do so.
"Where's he going?" Bronwynn cried, aware now that something was happening she didn't understand. Rosha ran to her instead, and put a protective arm around her shoulder.
"I d-don't know that. But I do know he's not p-pprotecting us tonight." "I'm cold," she said quietly, and Rosha felt a shudder scramble through his body. He raced to the packhorse and fetched her coat, then ran back to wrap her in it. He set up the tent while there was still some light, and he bundled Bronwynn in piles of wraps and put her inside it. "No fire?" she asked.
"N-none tonight," Rosha growled. A picture burned in his mind, a picture of his father and Pelman, trussed like bagged bucks and tied across the saddles of slave raiders. It was all the warmth he needed to keep his eyes wide open and his hands clenched on the pommel of his sword.
Pelman spent the night on the mountain.
"Onions!" Pezi exclaimed, and took a long, deep sniff. His companions, other merchants of Ognadzu, looked at one another and snickered. "Well, can't you smell them?" he asked. "Someone has an onion patch along here, and I intend to find it." "Pezi, you are beginning to smell like a vegetable vendor," one mocked him. "You've bought out every g
arden we've passed since we left the desert!" "Don't remind me of the desert! I don't ever want to hear about that desert again!" The Telera Desert stretched across much of the southeastern section of Lamath. One had to cross it to get to the more populated areas in the northern river valleys. The five merchants had been three long days crossing it.
"Come now, cousin, it was good for you," another merchant joked. "I'll wager you dropped forty pounds back there in the form of sweat!" "But he'll replace it with forty pounds of potatoes as soon as we get to Lamath," another man cackled.
"And why shouldn't I?" Pezi blustered. "You have your vices, your recreation. Why shouldn't I have mine?" "It's a pity the games don't include a meat-to-mouth competition. Ognadzu would be assured of at least one first prize every year!" "I warn you, cousin, I'm not to be trifled with!" Pezi threatened the last speaker.
"Yes, be careful, Malchar. Woe betide if Pezi should decide to sit on you!" More laughter greeted this, but it was cut short by the ring of steel scraping steel. The merchant named Faliar, a barely bearded youth who was Pezi's second cousin, sighted down a sword blade that hovered at his nose.
"And should I decide to sit on you, Faliar-woe betide?" Pezi said quietly. A cruel grin spread across his broad face as he watched Faliar ransack his vocabulary for a reply that would get him out of trouble with the least amount of embarrassment. Pezi dropped the tip of his sword and lightly tapped Faliar's chin with it. "These new whiskers. They perhaps make you think yourself a man now, who can scoff at others without threat of injury? Perhaps I should shave them for you?" Faliar gulped involuntarily, and pulled tightly on the reins of his horse. If the beast should become frisky and jerk forward . . .
"My apologies, Pezi," he blurted, choking on the cockiness he was forced to swallow.
Pezi said nothing, but sneered meaningfully. He sheathed his sword. "Now to the onions," he muttered, standing in the stirrups to peer down the rows of crops that lined each side of the King's Road.
"Your uncle may not be pleased with you dallying over foodstuffs while he waits for news," Malchar said coldly.
"And who would be so foolish as to tell my uncle such a thing, Malchar?" Pezi inquired.
"You mustn't think, because my young brother backed away from your drawn sword, that I will, cousin," Malchar said, his hand on the handle of his own blade. Pezi met his gaze.
"Threaten me again sometime when I'm not hot and hungry," Pezi said at length. "We'll see who backs away then." He looked at the others. "Come on, we ride to Lamath." "You've decided your visit with the King is top priority?" Malchar said snidely.
"That is my mission, cousin," Pezi replied with insulting politeness. "But first priority is a saddle-maker I know." "A saddle-maker?" Someone asked. "Since that thief stole my horse, I've had to use one of your skinny little saddles that doesn't amount to anything. It's like riding on a rail, I tell you! It's about to cut me in half." Someone giggled. "What are you laughing at?" "The dragon has one body with two heads. Can't you picture Pezi with one head and two bodies?" "There's certainly enough of him for two!" someone whooped, and they were all cackling again.
Why fight it? Pezi thought. His sword remained in his scabbard, and he sighed for the passed-up onions.
Pelman came back to camp before the sun rose, and was there when Bronwynn awoke. A fire was made, and breakfast cooked and eaten, without a word passing among the three of them.
They bypassed the mountain, skirting its base to the east and then back around to the north. Even after they were well past it, Pelman kept craning his neck to look back at its towering summit.
It was during that afternoon that the dread fell on Bronwynn. She began to believe that things were watching her. The forest had opened up again, and they rode once more in the realm of the big trees. Bronwynn could see long distances in all directions, yet she still felt uncommonly tense. She convinced herself that there were watchers behind every trunk-invisible watchers, who kept hiding behind the trees. She pulled Sharki down off her shoulder and began stroking his feathers. If it annoyed him, the bird didn't show it. She searched the limbs above for squirrels, but saw none. Except for the three of them, the forest was abandoned. We are riding through the land of the dead, she thought, and a tremor swept through her. She swiveled in her saddle, seeking reassurance from the powershaper who rode behind her, but found no help there. She saw that Pelman was turned away too-back to the mountain. What fascinated him so about that pile of rock? Then she saw his face as he turned around again, and her heart quailed. His forehead was furrowed with lines of uncertainty, and his normally vibrant eyes looked lifeless and lost. His lips moved. He's talking to himself, she thought. The powershaper is unsure of his power. She turned to look at Rosha and edged her horse closer to his. The young warrior was fighting to stay awake. The day passed in deathly silence.
And yet when they stopped to make camp that night, Pelman seemed his old self. He called fire out of the air and made it dance to amuse Bronwynn. He slapped Rosha on the shoulder and taunted him for being a sleepy head.
"You are Rosha Pahd-el, that's who you are," Pelman teased. "You've caught the King's disease." Rosha grinned wryly, but said nothing of the cause of his exhaustion. He was profoundly grateful finally to see Pelman kneel in the ritual that would draw a wall of invisibility around them. But his thanksgiving gave way to anxiety again when, more than an hour later, Pelman hadn't budged from that position. Rosha sat by the fire and watched his father's friend, feeling some responsibility to protect the man-and realizing how unequal he was to the task.
"I'll bet you're hungry, aren't you?" Bronwynn asked. Rosha began to reply that indeed he was, but stopped when he saw she wasn't talking to him but to her bird! "Go on, Sharki. Take off!" She tossed the bird up into the air, even as Rosha was crying out.
"Wait!" The cry echoed away.
Rosha stood slowly, shock and disappointment etched on his face. Bronwynn looked at him curiously. "What's wrong with you?" "P-p-Pelman has p-put up the cloak of p-protection! How will Sharki find us in the d-dark?" Now grief tore through Bronwynn, and she cried, "My falcon! I've lost my falcon!" She darted for the edge of the tiny clearing, but Rosha leapt out and caught her by the wrist. "He won't know where to find me! He'll be lost!" she said, tears spilling onto her cheeks as she struggled to get away.
Rosha clung to her, whispering to calm her. "We'll f-f-find him. We'll step outside the c-c-cloak and wait for him to return!" Then he slipped his arm around her shoulders. Glancing back once more at the kneeling figure of Pelman, he guided her through that magic wall of chill they had come to take for granted. The fire winked out behind them, and they sat on a fallen log and looked back at the now darkened meadow. There were no stars tonight, nor did the glow of a moon pierce the heavy cloud cover overhead. Rosha drew his greatsword and propped it on the log beside him.
"We'll be able to see him here?" the girl asked anxiously.
"I g-guess so. I'm no p-p-powershaper, I d-don't know." "I wonder if Pelman is, anymore," Bronwynn said, her eyes searching the sky. "Has he talked to you about last night?" Rosha shook his head. "I m-meant to sp-speak to you about that-" "Slow down," she murmured, laying a hand on his arm. "You get nervous and then you talk fast, and your stutter gets worse." Rosha looked at her, a new appreciation of her dawning in him, then nodded and continued, more slowly now. "I-have-been-watching-him-all day. He is-changing." "Into what?" "Into-whatever-he is-in Lamath." "That makes no sense. He's himself, isn't he?" "Yes. But-my-father-says-his-self-is different there. He d-doesn't-he-doesn't-shape-ppowers in Chaomonous, d-does he?" "Slowly! No. But there aren't any powers in Chaomonous." "No-powers?" "I've never seen any. But, of course, there are things like lightning and wind. Our learned men don't call them powers, though, and they don't try to shape them by magic." "Then-how?" "By-understanding them. Experimenting with them. Mixing things together. You understand, don't you?" Rosha shook his head. "Sounds like m-magic to me." "But Pelman doesn't do that there. Or he didn't, when I knew hi
m." "What- did-he-" "He was a player." Rosha cocked his head in puzzlement. "He put on plays for all the people to come watch. He wrote some himself, I think. They were funny plays, until he began to make fun of my father. That's what caused my father to enslave him." Bronwynn thought for a moment, then said, "Oh no, he's not going to turn into a stupid actor again when we get to Lamath, is he?" Rosha shook his head, and partially smiled. "He's- not what you-think he is." "By that you mean-?" "He's m-more." Now it was Bronwynn's turn to be puzzled, and she waited for Rosha to elaborate. "M-my father-told me, but I d-didn't-believe him. Last n-night-I-left-you-for-a little while. I followed him. He was-kneeling-like he is n-now. Only he was-talking to someone." "Who? Who was there?" Bronwynn asked anxiously, the dread springing again to her mind.
"That's-j-just it. There was n-no one there!" "But there's someone here, laddie-buck!" a voice said behind them, and suddenly Rosha and Bronwynn knew what fishnets looked like to a fish.
The Prophet Of Lamath Page 15