by Candy Rae
She shook her shaggy head. “No, not yet. They know neither when it was stolen nor who did the stealing. They may be tendays or even months ahead of us. Whatever trail there was is more than likely cold. It will be up to us, with help, to work it out and run them to the ground beneath our paws.”
“I still think your people should send out a general alert,” he said.
“That is not possible,” was her enigmatic response as she turned her head away.
Daniel frowned.
Why not?
Thalia busied herself settling Josei’s harness on to Vya. It had to fit just right she explained to Daniel so that the straps, made of supple zarova leather, did not rub or constrict her movement.
Vya was vocal in her instructions, informing Thalia what parts were loose and what were tight (she was thinner in the body than Josei), stretching frequently, testing the fit.
It was a novel experience for Daniel, accustomed as he was to saddling and bridling his restless but silent Firefly back home. At last though, Vya pronounced herself satisfied and Thalia explained to Daniel how he should sit on Vya’s back and more important to an increasingly nervous Daniel, just how he could hold on.
“I’ve added stirrups,” she added, “we don’t use them unless we’re fighting.”
“I’ll certainly feel more secure with them,” he agreed, “how do I mount?”
“I’ll demonstrate,” she answered with a grin, picking up her knapsack and settling it on her shoulders. Daniel had already donned his. He noticed that she had her sword belted round her waist.
Thalia took a short run at Josei who stood like a rock and to Daniel what he saw was almost like magic. One moment Thalia was on the ground, the next she was astride Josei and looking at him.
“Wow!”
Well, if a strip of a girl like Thalia could do it, so could he. He was after all quite a bit taller than she was.
“Right,” he said with a gulp and ran towards Vya. She stood braced, like Josei, although unlike him she appeared tense. Unlike Josei she was not accustomed to carrying a rider. He took a flying leap. He managed it first time for a wonder and although Vya staggered she recovered almost immediately.
“Oof,” was all she said.
Daniel snuck a glance over at Thalia. Did he detect a look of respect in her eyes? “Didn’t think I could do it?”
She ignored the question.
“Let’s move out,” she ordered, “and remember my southern friend, you don’t even try to attempt to direct Vya. She’s in charge. Hold on to the straps and grip with your thighs and knees, not with your lower legs, that’ll restrict her breathing and movement.”
“You may also wrap your hands in my neck ruff,” Vya offered, “it will help you to stay on.”
“Thanks,” a surprised Daniel answered and did so, wondering at the softness of her hair, so unalike the rough mane of a horse.
“Let’s go.” ordered Vya.
The four set out, initially at a walk then at an unspoken command Vya picked up the pace, first to a trot (Daniel had to remember to sit in the saddle pad and not to rise and fall) then into a gentle lope that was to Daniel most preferable to the joggly trot,
Josei and Vya ran faster. Daniel was aware of the increase in speed but he was concentrating on staying on. The countryside flashed past. The trees appeared and disappeared, whipping past his face. The sun rose high in the sky and they did not slow. Daniel realised that his horse would have been badly winded by now and he wondered at the stamina of the Lind. How did they do it?
“Supply Station ahead,” Thalia shouted over, but he didn’t hear her. He nodded as if he understood and at last Vya and Josei began to slow. He let out an explosive breath.
“Enjoying yourself?” laughed Thalia.
“It was exhilarating,” he laughed back, “muscles are feeling it though.” They felt numb.
“We’ll ask Holad for some liniment,” Thalia promised. “They know we’re coming.”
Of course, they’re telepathic, they’ll have sent word on ahead. Useful.
“Where is the Supply Station?”
“Round the next bend,” Thalia answered, “want to run some more? We’ll get there quicker.”
“I’m game if you are,” Daniel answered, gritting his teeth.
* * * * *
INLAND FROM THE WESTERN COAST - THE NORTHERN CONTINENT
Thalia laughed and they sped on once more, running into the Supply Station a short while later. To Daniels’s amazement Vya didn’t seem to be breathing heavily.
“How long can a Lind run?” he asked as he helped Thalia remove the borrowed harness.
“All day if they have to,” she answered, “and fight at the end of it.”
Daniel’s eyebrows rose.
“Josei’d need to rest before a big battle though at least that’s what I’ve been told. Their stamina is good but not infinite.”
“I’ll remember that,” he promised.
“See that you do, now rub her down, get the sweat off her, where the harness was mostly.”
Grooming Vya was, Daniel decided a quarter bell later, one of those times he was sure he would never forget. Vya leant into him as he brushed the sweat and journey burrs from her coat. She was clearly enjoying the sensation of being brushed, perhaps for the first time in her life.
Daniel found himself envying the mind and life-bond Thalia had with Josei. What was it like to have what they shared? He found himself murmuring words to Vya as he brushed. Thalia was grooming Josei, she wasn’t talking, she didn’t need to, Daniel knew that as their innermost thoughts were joined so too were unspoken words.
An unnatural alliance his tutors had described the bond between human and Lind but Daniel knew now that there was nothing unnatural about the phenomenon but that it was something to be cherished.
I wish Vya could hear me, he thought wistfully.
: What makes you think I cannot? :
Daniel stopped brushing, his mouth a huge ‘o’ of astonishment, his head swivelled but there was no indication that she had said anything. She stood there, seemingly quite unconcerned that he had stopped his ministrations. Her eyes were half shut and her ears were flickering as she reacted to the sounds within the Supply Station.
Just my imagination running away with me. Self-consciously, he started to brush again and Vya sighed with contentment.
Grooming over, he and Thalia departed for the kitchens and some much needed food. Daniel’s stomach was growling, the porridge had been a long time ago.
Vya caught Josei’s eye and winked.
His lips crinkled in what to the Lind was a smile.
As they walked to the kitchens Daniel asked a further question that had been intriguing him.
“Why is Vya sort of browny-all-over while Josei is mostly bluey strips? That Lind of the Holad back at the shore was stripy too.”
“All the rtaths, that’s Lindish for packs, have different stripe colour patterns,” she explained as they entered the swing doors at one end of a long, low building from which the most delectable smells imaginable were emanating. “The rtaths here in the west of the continent still retain their patterns, one colour, one rtath, the further east you go the more mixed they are. Humans caused it, or mostly. When we arrived most Lind took their mates from the same general area, often from their own rtath, especially if it was a large one but when the vadeln-pairings started many found themselves living and taking mates from elsewhere. The four home rtaths in Vadath are virtually indistinguishable these days, at least in part. Josei’s ancestry is a mixture although as you can see blue is predominant.”
“But Vya has no bright colours at all.”
“I believe she comes from a rtath that has its home in Dagan, I managed to get that much out of Josei.”
“She’s a bit of a mystery then?”
Thalia nodded, “yes, a bit of a mystery.”
“So what is she doing here?” asked Daniel.
Thalia shrugged, “I didn’t ask, not
polite. She might have been visiting the Gtrathlin.”
“What is this Gtrathlin Lind. Their king?”
“I don’t think the Lind fully understand the concept of kingship.”
“If she comes from Dagan,” he said with rising excitement, “she will know the Lai! I’ve always wanted to see one.”
Be careful what you wish for,” Thalia advised, “wishes have a habit of coming to pass sooner or later here in the north.”
“Have your wishes been granted?” he teased.
Thalia bestowed on him a level gaze, “some of them, yes, yes, they have, but they might have happened anyway.”
The cook was beckoning them over. He knew Thalia of old.
“I'm afraid it’s plain old stew today Vadeln Thalia,” he apologised, “but it is hot and is made to my special recipe.”
“Then it will taste good,” Thalia replied sitting on the bench which was placed down one side of a long refractory table. Sit Daniel.”
Cook placed bowls of steaming stew in front of them both. The cutlery was placed in large non-handled mugs in the middle.
“The boy will bring drinks over in a mo.”
“Water please,” insisted Thalia in a firm voice, “we’ve still got a long way to travel today and don’t want our brains fuddled with that wonderful cider you served last time.”
“I’ve got some of last year’s press left,” Drew suggested, trying to persuade her. He was very proud of his cider.
“Still no, but thanks for the offer.”
They began to eat and after a while Daniel realised why there was a bench on only on side of the table when both Vya and Josei entered and took up positions opposite them. Two large bowls of stew were placed in front of them and they began to eat.
As Drew started to leave in order to tend to his stove once more Thalia stopped him.
“Drew, may I ask, have any strangers been through here recently?”
He sat down on the bench beside Thalia.
“How recent?”
“Perhaps the last four months of so?”
He shook his head. “Nary a one Vadeln Thalia. They mostly stay on the trade route see and this station is way off the beaten track.”
“Why’s that?” asked Daniel through a mouthful of stew. It was delicious.
“This Supply Station is a Holad Centre too,” Thalia explained. “It lies at the intersection of three different rtathlians. The Holad tend the members of all three so it made sense to build the Station in the middle.”
She turned again to Drew, “so no strangers at all? No lost travellers and the like?”
“Not this last half year and more. Last summer though, there was one. A strange sort of fellow, harmless though I’m sure. Not very bright. Said he was some sort of lawyer and had got lost. I don’t like lawyers. Strange thing was, he looked more like a prospector than anything else. We get them dropping in here from time to time.”
“What’s a prospector?” whispered Daniel to Thalia.
“Someone who wanders where he shouldn’t be, looking for precious metals in the ground. They’ve always been a few in the rtathlians. The Lind mostly ignore them.”
“Ask Drew if he passed through only the once,” said Daniel.
“Only the once,” agreed Drew, “said he was travelling back east, homesick for the sights of home. Shabby sort of bloke and not quite right in the head.”
That’s our spy, Daniel was thinking and Thalia was thinking the same.
: No point looking for him : she telepathed to Josei : he’ll be long gone. I’ll bet my last florin though that we’ll find that he passed through the Gtrathlin’s domta, spying out the land and that he came from the west. Back home east to see the sights of home indeed! :
: Ask Drew to describe him. I’ll ask around :
Drew, when asked, remembered the man rather well but even better from Thalia’s point of view was that some Lind ordinarily resident at the Station remembered him too. They were able to supply Josei with an image of the man which Josei passed on to Vya.
“He’s probably not even still on the continent,” Thalia whispered to Daniel.
“Every little helps,” he countered.
“Thanks Drew,” said Thalia, “and this stew of yours is even better than last time. Josei agrees too.”
Drew looked pleased.
“I’d best be getting back to my stove. Come say goodbye before you go, pick up some titbits for the journey.”
“I will and our thanks.”
“For the food or the information? No, don’t answer that,” he grinned.
“You think it is our man?” asked Daniel as Drew wandered away.
“Might be, might not but I’m thinking, if it is the King of Leithe who is behind all this, he would have had to know where exactly this artefact was. He probably sent out a good many people to look for it, some of whom have never been remembered. The only reason this one was is the fact that this Station is so isolated.”
“True,” admitted Daniel.
“And, call me idiotic, but my gut feeling says that we’ve stumbled upon something here, something important, a clue.”
“That’s a bit far fetched. He probably was exactly who he said he was.”
“I don’t think so.”
“So what now? East to the Gtrathlin? I wish we knew what this person or persons unknown has stolen and why we’re being sent to recover it. I mean, why the great secrecy?”
He was looking at Vya as he said this and she returned his look. Daniel got the impression that she knew exactly what the artefact was.
“I think we’ll find that the prospector person Drew was talking about did go to the Gtrathlin’s domta,” said Thalia, “he was a spy looking for the artefact and he found it.”
“Hunt the spy to catch the thief?”
“Got it in one. Of course he might have taken ship back to Leithe once he’d found what he was looking for but I think not, timeframe’s too short. I think he went from here to the domta then east to tell the thief where it was. We know what he looks like and once we’ve questioned the Lind at Gtratha we’ll know what the thief looks like too. Then we find them.”
“You make it sound so easy,” Daniel complained. “But I wish we knew what has been stolen, Artefact sounds too vague, I mean, is it large or is it small?”
“I’ve got my suspicions,” she answered, “want to hear them?”
“I think I do.”
“I have a sinking feeling that the artefact is almost the most important and dangerous object in existence. It’s not just some ancient thing that some king or important person wants to add to a collection. There’s too much thought, time and planning gone into all this.”
“Some collectors I have met are obsessive.”
“You think? Not this obsessive. Think of how much all this must have cost!”
“So what is it then?”
“The other power core.”
“The what?” This was the first Daniel had ever heard of a power core.
“Don’t you learn history in the south? What did Tala Talansdochter and the Lai Chizu use to destroy the Dglai spaceship?”
“Some sort of weapon I suppose. I know that it almost completely destroyed the land around it. My father said that some of the vegetation is just now only beginning to grow back.”
“The weapon that destroyed the Ammokko was the power core of the Electra, the other spaceship. The Argyll and the Electra were the survivors of the cosmic storm. Tala and Chizu, well it wasn’t them exactly but let’s keep it simple. They found the Electra’s power core, modified it somehow then Chizu and Tala flew to the Ammokko and dropped it right on top of it. They both died.”
“I know that. I’m not a complete ignoramus.”
“Well, afterwards, they dug out the hulk of the Argyll and the wetlands near Settlement and excavated it. The power core was removed. I’ve always believed it was taken to Dagan for safe-keeping.”
“You think the spy person went to Dagan t
o find out?”
“And he found out that it wasn’t there. It had been moved to what our ancestors probably thought was a safer place, to the Gtrathlin of the Lind. Men and women were moving to Talastown in Dagan. Merchant ships were beginning to visit there. Very few humans ever visit the Gtrathlin and they are usually vadeln-paired. I think I read somewhere that there is a cave in the domta and the only one who enters the cave is the Gtrathlin. It’s where the Lind keep what is precious to them. Tara Sullivan-Crawford’s writings are kept there, that’s where Niaill and Taraya found the means to defeat the Lai. The cave is sort of sacred.”
“But surely the Gtrathlin wouldn’t have let him rootle around in the cave? And they’d have been suspicious of him surely. I’ve heard the Lind can tell if a person is lying.”
“Not necessarily, some people have very good, what you might describe as shields which the Lind cannot penetrate and the spy wouldn’t have needed to actually enter the cave. He just had to find out exactly where it is, after all it would have been the only place the power core would have been taken to.”
“So we just travel east asking questions?”
“Approximately, yes.”
“I still don’t understand, if the power core, if that is what has been stolen, I mean, why don’t the Lind send out a general call and go get it?”
Vya cleared her throat.
“My compliments. You have worked it out. Unfortunately Daniel, we cannot broadcast the fact that the power core has been stolen. It is not just the King of Leithe who has ambitions, territorial or otherwise. Some of your dukes, for instance, might think possession of the core would be advantageous. Pirates and brigands too come to mind and Argyll, well, there are no doubt some men and women there as well.” She sighed. “The Avuzdel will be looking and others. They have been looking and have found nothing. I think though that we are definitely on to something here and should follow it through.”
“Why exactly am I here?” asked Daniel, who had been still wondering about it, “I mean, I’m not Avuzdel, not even Vada.”
“We think you can help,” Vya answered, “and I know that you can be trusted.”
“I suppose that’s a compliment of sorts.”