They rode in silence for what seemed like many hours, though it was difficult to tell the duration with any precision. As they rode, the scenery beyond the shifting place moved with a bizarre rapidity, as though they were traveling much faster than Mauritane's other senses told him. The sun, however, barely moved in the sky overhead. The time that passed for them, whether ten hours or twelve, could not have been more than an hour or two in the outside world, for the sun was barely at its zenith when Mauritane's internal clock told him it should be night.
They stopped for a brief dinner. Only necessary words were spoken. It was obvious to Mauritane that the others were still thinking about the sight of Satterly's horse and how easily it could have been one of them. The meal was a grim one.
They mounted and rode again for another seemingly endless stretch. From beyond the shifting place, the sounds of the world were slow and eerie, muffled as though the entire world were buried beneath a pile of blankets.
They stopped again. As the hours wore on and became first one full day, then another, then perhaps a third, the silence among them became overwhelming, as though it were mandated. Each of them seemed lost in thought, pondering the world outside the shifting place as it caromed by in a hazy blur. When they stopped, they watched leaves fall from the trees in slow motion, examined with rapt expressions the fascinating properties of a stream whose waters intersected the shifting place, how it created a bizarre waterfall, the current flowing over some invisible obstacle which, Satterly pointed out in muttered tones, appeared to be the stream's own water.
Mauritane looked into the sky and at some point the sun had moved past its apex and was now nearing the horizon. He felt as though he could not stand another moment in that timeless space. Just ahead in the real world, for so Mauritane had begun to think of it, was a flat, grassy clearing between two dense stands of pine, suitable for a campsite.
"That's enough," he said. "Silverdun, get us out of here."
The relief was evident on every face. "Come along," said Silverdun quietly. "Getting out should be much easier than getting in. Just ride at a quick, steady pace." He pointed to the left. "That way."
Mauritane led Streak out of the shifting place and the world sped up again, taking on its usual sights and sounds. The others followed him out and the shift in their overall mood was palpable. Satterly breathed an audible sigh of release.
"Congratulations," said Mauritane, consulting his charts. "We covered four days' worth of ground in a single day."
"I, for one, felt all four of those days," said Silverdun wearily.
"We'll be in Sylvan ahead of schedule," said Mauritane, attempting to leaven the overall mood.
Only Gray Mave managed a smile. "Well, that's good, isn't it?"
Silverdun slung his tent from behind his saddle and stumbled around it. "It might sound that way after about ten hours of sleep. If anyone asks me to take the first watch, I'll cut his throat."
"I'll take first watch," said Raieve. "Then I plan to sleep for a very, very long time."
"Let's all get some rest," said Mauritane. "Once we've all rested, I want to speak to you. I believe a Hegest is long overdue."
Silverdun nodded soberly. "Yes, Mauritane. You're right. A Hegest would do us all some good."
"What's a Hegest?" said Satterly, his voice slow and tired.
"Wait until tomorrow," said Raieve. "You'll find out."
Mauritane watched her crawl into her tent. She looked back at him for a moment, pursed her lips, then turned and went inside.
Chapter 23
hegest
Raieve knelt by the ice-covered poplar and dug her hands into the snow at its base. The previous night's freezing rain had left a clear sheen over everything: the tents, the trees, even the snowy ground. The ice bit into her skin, its jagged edges scoring her already-red hands with white lines. The ground had an empty, wintry smell.
Her hands began to sting. She dug around the base of the poplar's trunk, creating a narrow trench. Just as the needles of cold reached beneath her skin more than she could stand, she found what she was looking for.
The mushrooms were tiny, lavender in color, with wide, flat heads and narrow stems. Icthula. She collected them in her aching palm and brushed them into a jar. The icthula was the final ingredient, joining the spittle, bitter herbs, and radish seed already inside. She scooped a handful of snow into the jar and covered it with a lid, placing it gently on a tiny brazier she'd secreted away from camp.
Above her, at the top of the slope, she could hear Silverdun complaining about his food. She tried to ignore him.
She watched the jar intently until it boiled, holding her hands over the brazier to warm them. As the fire worked the frost from her fingers, they began to sting in a different way, like sharp pinpricks all over her flesh.
She stirred the jar's contents with a stick, watching it bubble, until the mixture turned a purplish color. She lifted the jar using the hem of her cloak and poured it out into another jar with a strip of cloth over the top as a strainer. She let the solid ingredients fall away.
The filtered icthula mixture stank horribly. With a grimace, she lifted it to her lips and drank the whole thing, wincing as the hot liquid scalded her tongue and the roof of her mouth. Almost immediately the drug began to take hold of her, drawing her out of herself until her awareness perched just outside her body, ready to leap out and explore its surroundings.
She stood up, her stomach turning at the dizzying perspective. She climbed the slope awkwardly, cursing herself for her own stupidity. It would have been a lot easier if she had returned to camp first.
The climb seemed to last hours but could not have, because when she returned to camp no one appeared to notice that she'd left.
"It's time," said Mauritane, as she appeared at the crest of the slope. "Have a seat."
Raieve took her place around a new fire, built upon the ashes of the fire from the night before. The flames wriggled and twisted like braids of light.
Mauritane let his eyes rest on her for a moment. The icthula drew her toward him and she held back, forcing herself to remain still for now. She gave him a silent nod and he turned away. The icthula had been her idea; the Hegest his. She'd seen the tiny mushrooms a few nights before and had told Mauritane about them during their ride through the shifting place. It was her mother's recipe she was using.
"Let's begin," said Mauritane.
"Before we start, can someone please tell me what we're doing?" said Satterly, his voice petulant.
Mauritane sighed. "The Hegest is a sharing of stories, but it is not simply words that we share. We speak of our history, our past, our vision for the future. These things bind us, each to the other. They remind us who we are and why we press forward, why we think and act as we do. The Hegest is a Self in words."
Raieve became lost in Mauritane's speech, remembering how he'd whispered into her ear as they made love, remembering the touch of his hand on her thighs and around her waist. The icthula painted the memories as bright as day, depositing her within the circle of his arms by a stream somewhere in the past. She had to shake her head to make the vision vanish.
"So, what do we, uh, do?" said Satterly.
"Watch," said Silverdun. "You'll get the idea."
Mauritane began. He took a handful of some cheap incense Silverdun had bought in Estacana and threw it into the fire.
"I am Mauritane, son of Ticumaura, son of Bael-La, son of Bael, son of Rumorgan, a child of the ancient Thule. On the day of my birth, an egret landed on my father's rooftop. I enlisted in Her Majesty's Royal Guard at the age of twelve. I saw the sun rise over the Plum Mountains on the longest day of the year. I killed an ogre with my bare hands when I was nineteen. I was made an officer in the Guard at the age of thirty, after leading my company to victory against the Unseelie at Midalel. I loved a woman, the Lady Anne, was married in the City Emerald. I was promoted to Captain of the Royal Guard after the death of Secon'anas."
Mauritane took
a deep breath. "Now I am again in the Queen's service. That is an achievement I thought impossible only weeks ago. I am honored."
Raieve forced herself to remain calm, while all around her, Mauritane's words tried to draw her back to the stream's edge. She closed her eyes against them.
Silverdun's turn was next. Relying on the icthula to conceal her presence, she moved her awareness forward and into him.
"I am Perrin Alt, Lord Silverdun," he said, and the words were doubled in her mind as she heard them both from her own ears and within Silverdun's head. As he rattled off a list of ancestors that led backward through time toward the very first Lord Silverdun, she let herself ease into the stream of his mind and opened wide her awareness.
Silverdun's eyes were closed; she could see only blackness and splotches of red, tiny tracers of blue. It served as a soft screen against which Silverdun projected the images of his mind's theater, a cast of old, dusty portraits in a hallway, a single face in all of them, perhaps Silverdun's father. In the background of his mind played a repeating string motif that rose and fell in volume, repeating the same few measures over and over. Sometimes the violin was emphasized; sometimes there was a viola next to it, a cello. She recognized the tune as one he'd been whistling all morning.
As he spoke, she concentrated on the pictures displayed on his internal projection screen, like the silhouettes of puppets she'd seen in the markets of her youth. They were changing. Here was a woman holding Silverdun's hand, a mother.
"My mother converted to Arcadianism after I was born," she heard him say. "I was very young, and I remember only the singing."
The violin was silenced and a chorus of singers appeared, chanting a complex aria of love and faith.
"She attempted to raise me in her belief, but my father would have none of it. He feared that Mother's religious predilection would interfere with his popularity at court, and it did. His influence began to wane as stories spread of her evangelism at our country estates."
A hazy vision appeared, Silverdun's mother dressed in court finery, on her knees in a country town square, washing the feet of beggars. Then, Silverdun in his cell at Crete Sulace on his own knees, praying.
"During my last year at the Academy, my father was thrown by his horse and killed. I was the only son, and I was forced to return home to attend to my father's estate and appoint an overseer, for I was still too young to manage everything."
Another sensation, this one of touch, cool hands on Silverdun's shoulders and hair, the sweet, light touch of a mother's love.
"My mother came to me after the funeral and asked me to give all of our family's possessions to the church. I was overwhelmed by my father's death. I thought perhaps I heard Aba's voice in my head telling me it was the correct thing."
Raieve felt Silverdun's anger flow in his veins. "I was now Lord Silverdun and it was my choice to make. Unfortunately, however, my father had two brothers, neither of whom saw me as anything more than an obstacle between themselves and the Lordship. When they heard of my mother's plan, they ran to their friends at court. Some constables and court officials were bribed; a member of the polity gave a judge some friendly advice. I don't know exactly how they did it, but they had me convicted of treason, for what I'm not exactly sure. Only my title saved my life. With me out of the way, they could run the lands as they wished."
The flow of mental images came to a stop. Silverdun breathed deeply. "For years I pretended that I did not care. Lately, though, as I peer at my reflection in my tiny looking glass, I realize that I have allowed my uncles' hatred to make me ugly. Perhaps my mother was simple for believing what she believed. Or perhaps I really did hear the voice of Aba that day. Either way, if I make it out of here alive I'm going to see to it that the Arcadians have my family lands, if for no other reason than to chill the hearts of those thieving bastards." He smiled ruefully. "That is not the story I meant to tell, but I am glad I told it. I am honored."
Raieve pulled herself out of his mind, reeling from the overload of sensations. His thoughts were rapid and overwhelming, full of colors and details, sights and sounds. Her own thoughts were simple and direct by comparison. She took a few deep breaths within her own skin, trying to fight the sensations of the icthula for a moment of clear thought. She found herself unable to ward off the sensory glut and for a moment began to panic, nearly vomiting into the fire.
It was her turn next. She spoke carefully, trying to appear if not calm, then at least sane. "I am Raieve, daughter of Raelin. I am a daughter of the Heavy Sky Clan of Avalon. Our clan is one of the few remaining matriarchal clans on the steppes. I've been called a mongrel and half-breed all my life and shamed for it. I've done everything I can to prove myself a pure-hearted Avalona, if not pure in blood. Was it my mother's fault that an Unseelie soldier wrested her innocence from her when she was merely a girl? Was she any less of a woman for that? Am I?"
She realized she was getting carried away, the force of the icthula dragging her emotions upward and outward, like a cloud of anger. She told the rest of her story through gritted teeth, of the Unseelie invasion and the chaos of their withdrawal. She told of her failed voyage to the Seelie Kingdom to recruit men and purchase supplies for her clan's bid for peace. And she told of her murder of the Seelie official and her arrest.
When she was finished, she heard Satterly whisper, "This is supposed to make us feel better?" She almost laughed.
It was Gray Mave's turn next. She sent out her awareness and nestled around him, searching for a path inward to his mind's core. She found her way in through his eyes and as soon as she was inside, she could tell something was very wrong.
Inside Mave's mind there was a single word repeating over and over, like the sound of a windmill or waterwheel. The word was "Why?" It tumbled through every thought. "Why, why, why, why, why?"
As he leaned forward to begin his story, he clutched at his chest. Raieve could feel the burning soreness of the wound, the deep hot ache of it. The buggane's sword had been poisoned. Gray Mave was dying and he knew it. "I deserve this," he thought to himself.
A memory appeared in his mind, growing slowly from the blankness of his empty stare. Superimposed over the blurred image of the fire there came a creature, a hideous snaking thing that was translucent, nearly transparent, with pale leathery wings and sharp teeth. It called itself Bacamar.
"Look down," said Bacamar in the memory. Mave's internal viewpoint tilted downward and he stared into the mouth of something beyond death. It was the size of a world, the mouth, with lips like continents, red and burning. It had teeth, millions of them, and the teeth had eyes. The eyes were thick with mucous, scaly and green. They peered longingly toward Gray Mave.
"Do something for me," said Bacamar, "and I will let you live again."
Gray Mave swam toward Bacamar in the ice-cold ether of death and nodded. "Yes, anything, only do not let me fall into the mouth."
In the miasma of memory, Raieve could not hear the words that Bacamar spoke as the creature led Mave back down to the world of familiar things, back into himself, where he regained consciousness. He was lying on the floor of his home in Hawthorne with a terrible pain in his throat and Mauritane standing over him with a noose in his hands.
Raieve cried out, and it sounded strange to hear her own voice from across a campfire. Gray Mave's eyes turned to meet hers and she found herself suddenly back in her own body, staring back at him.
His eyes widened. He clutched at his head, clawing at his hair, then stood. She could see him wince from the pain in his chest.
"I'm sorry," he said. Then he ran.
Raieve said something to Mauritane, she was not sure what. But it resulted in Mauritane and Silverdun leaping to their feet and drawing their swords. So it made sense, whatever she'd said. They hurried after Mave, down the steep slope beyond which she'd found the icthula.
"What happened?" said Satterly.
Raieve ignored him. She leaned backward and looked at the sky, fascinated by the shapes of
clouds and the brightness of the sun. They all seemed to be saying something to her, but their words were just beyond her vocabulary.
Chapter 24
gray mave
Mauritane rushed after Mave, Silverdun at his side, down the snowclad slope to the north where a wide river bowed across the valley below. Gray Mave ran ahead of them, clutching his chest either from lack of breath or from the sting of the buggane's wound. He stumbled on the root of a giant oak, fell to his knees, then pitched face forward into the snow. The morning sun glinted from the blade of his sword, the weapon lying useless at his feet.
"Is it a trick?" said Silverdun as they sidestepped down the slope.
"I don't know," said Mauritane. "Keep your weapon drawn anyway."
Gray Mave lay on his wide chest, huffing miserably, his face buried in the snow. "I'm sorry," he whimpered. When he lifted his face, a line of mucous dribbled from his nose onto the ground. He was sobbing.
Silverdun, his cloak wrapped around his head like a shawl, prodded the man with his sword. "Hold, Mave. Mauritane, what is the meaning of all this?"
Mauritane took one of the empty message jars from the pocket of his cloak and held it out to Silverdun. "Someone's been stealing these from my saddlebags at night. Raieve and I came up with a plan to catch him during our ride through the shifting place yesterday."
Silverdun eyed the jar suspiciously. "Who's been receiving these messages and to what end?"
"That's what we're about to find out. Sit up, Mave." Mauritane grabbed Mave's shoulder and tugged. Gray Mave winced at the pain in his chest and stood slowly, resting his hands on his knees halfway up.
"The wound from the buggane's sword," he chuffed, out of breath. "I think it's done me in. It's what I deserve, at least."
"Come back to camp, Mave," said Mauritane, without inflection. "We'll talk there."
Silverdun scowled behind his hood. "Why did you and Raieve not include me in your spy hunt?"
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