“Is your leader who he says he is, truly?” Talmir asked as he met the youth’s eyes. It was only just dawning on him how young most of them were.
The young man glanced at his own, none of whom looked back, before meeting Talmir’s eyes. He did not look defiant.
“He is whatever he told you,” he said, and his voice held only the slightest accent that Talmir half-recognized.
Talmir looked to his right, catching the eyes of Iyana and Creyath across the traders and mules. He raised his brows, and while Iyana was too concerned for Karin on his canvas bed to do more than shake her head, Creyath gave him the smile he wanted.
Glancing behind, he saw similar looks of amusement and took heart. Disappointed and lost as he might feel at the present turn of events, Talmir could not let his mood overtake the company. He forced a smile and addressed the youth, who had refocused on the path ahead.
“He told us he was the Sage of the Red Waste,” Talmir said, expectant. The response was not long in coming.
“Then that is what he is.”
Talmir frowned. “You speak as if you don’t know.”
The youth shrugged and Talmir caught the glint of cold obsidian at his waist. This one was a fighter. He supposed they all were, after a fashion and given what they’d seen. Given the savages that had tried to make a mess of Karin and had then been unmade by Ceth. That stoic guardian was the only one in the company who did look back, his dispassionate features coloring for the first time in what Talmir could only presume was annoyance.
“What is his power?” Talmir asked, making a show of it. “He hasn’t told us. Sounds like he hasn’t shown you.” Now a frown. “Does he control foxes?”
“No.”
The speaker was female and had a lilting tone that Talmir found surprising. He let loose some slack in his horse’s reins and stepped ahead of her to get a better look. In the place of the raven-haired girl he had expected, one of the lighter nomads who matched the old man’s guardian examined him as she walked, gray-blue eyes aloof. She was stern and beautiful, and her hair bordered on golden where the others were silver-white like Iyana’s.
“Do tell,” Talmir said, seeing that she did not mean to.
“They are the guardians of this land and its people,” she said as if reciting from a text committed to memory. “They will be here when nothing else remains.”
“Even the people they protect?”
Talmir could not see her over the wall of sun-baked horses’ hair, but he knew the voice and was glad she had taken her attention away from Karin for the moment.
“Yes,” the woman said, sounding melancholy. “Even then.”
Iyana did not respond and though Talmir wanted to, he found the words lacking. He looked at the foxes that stuck closest to the old man—who kept a better pace than the rest—and thought they looked suddenly ghostly in the shimmering curtain of the day’s changing. He shook his head and blinked.
“You could have the nicety to ask me about my power rather than bothering the children,” the old man called back.
“They don’t look like children to me,” Talmir said, meaning to build some bridge to them, some commonality. He only received a frown from the red-sash and nothing at all from the gray with her thin, yellow-white features.
“You’re all children to me,” the old man answered.
“Fine, then,” Talmir said. “What is your power?”
There was a pause and Talmir thought the old man was playing another game with him.
“Given enough time,” the old man said, “plenty.”
It could have been a joke at his expense, but Talmir didn’t think so. The tone the Sage—or whatever he was—had used was at once the same and slightly less than his previous exchanges, as if he knew but feared to tell. It sounded like regret, all told, and for whatever reason, it had the effect of making Talmir trust him more, or at least distrust him less.
They spoke no more and Talmir was glad for it, though he had been the one prodding. As the sun sank lower, parting the high dunes that were far enough to look like anthills, the sand underfoot radiated a warmth that was inviting in the place of its previous oppression.
Now, Talmir could see why Iyana stared this way at this time of dusk, and had done ever since they’d crossed the cracked plains. While Talmir had busied himself with preparations for camp, scheduled watches and rationed firewood, Iyana watched the sun melt into the yellow-brown sea of stillness. More than that, she watched the second glow that rose to replace it.
Now that they were close—or now that he was looking—Talmir could see it too. It was like a purple shroud with a red heart, and it made the sky farther north the color of blood and lilacs. To the south, the colors of the sunset took the sky, the red-gold hue beautiful in its earthly way, but not alien. This other light was different. It was sacred, Talmir knew without knowing. It was a harbinger, though of what, he was uncertain and afraid.
He suppressed a shiver and felt a tingle go up his right side, settling at the temple. He turned to see Iyana staring. She nodded, her face grave and serious, and he did not know how to respond, so he looked beyond her.
The north was now as much rock as sand, the black spurs changing from jagged to smooth. They were lit golden in the dying rays of the sun, and their tops shone like mirrors to the stars that were only now peeking out from the blue-black canopy above. Talmir had never seen anything like them, and as he stared in wonder he saw darker patches that might have been caves and tunnels. He began to take heart in their course, and to think that perhaps they had not been misled after all. His mind worked to recall the tales the elders told of the black caverns beneath the northwest dunes and the heroes that had been born and raised there.
Talmir did not feel the land change until he nearly fell, tripping only to catch himself on the sturdy arm of the light-haired woman he’d spoken with earlier.
“I am Martah,” she said as she lifted him.
“Talmir.” He nodded, steadying himself. She betrayed the ghost of a smirk as he righted himself and then she moved off, leaving him to look ahead.
The plateau had finally ended, with the slow slope making for an easy descent into a bowl that stretched beneath the black shelves and their hidden pathways. For leagues around, the land was carved with great swaths of softness broken up by hard, elongated valleys of sifting sand crafted at the whims and fancies of the winds sweeping down from the north, where he looked next. And there, far past the black shelves and below the winking stars that were growing bolder, he saw the hints of outlines too tall to be anything but mountains, and knew that they made up the desert’s ending.
He wondered what lay beyond.
“You’ll be left behind.”
Talmir blinked and looked ahead. The old man stared at him from the bottom of the rise and Talmir craned around to see that both companies had moved into the curved crescent between the black rocks that now appeared as melted stone in the softer, white light of the moon and stars. One of the foxes—the only one left, Talmir noticed—sat patiently at the old man’s side.
Talmir led his horse up to the pair and waved for Creyath to continue without him. The Ember blinked, his amber eyes glowing like warding torches, and started back up the easy wave behind the rest.
The old man, looking less tired than any—including the young and sturdy of his own twin tribes—took up his wake, while the fox passed under the painted horse and left them, disappearing on the other side of the slope, where it sent up the beginnings of the nighttime song Talmir was starting to think of as a lullaby even as a thought struck him that it might be something else entirely.
He examined the old man, who now walked beside him, and thought he was wrong for thinking him such, though he clearly was. Up close, he seemed more sturdy, more solid than he had at a distance. His strides were long and uninterrupted, and though he looked like one who might carry a walking stick for appearance, he did not. His eyes possessed a sharpness and clarity that would have given Sister
Piell a run in her younger years, and his chin was strong and cutting. The chin of a warrior, Talmir thought.
“You never asked us why we came,” Talmir said as he watched the nomads assist Iyana and the other Faeykin in lifting Karin up onto the black shelf that stretched out beneath a darker arch he hadn’t noticed before.
“I know why you came.”
There was no judgment in his words and none of the teasing playfulness Talmir had experienced before. If his face and body displayed none of the wariness he might expect, his tone betrayed its first hints.
“You came seeking power. You came seeking the same thing everyone else does. Power, and with it, the hope for change.”
Talmir thought to defend himself and then realized it was folly. The Red Waste spoke the truth, even if he couched it in generalities. He did not seem to mean it as an accusation.
A pair waited for them at the place where the black rock met the sand like a prow. Ket and Ceth, the former looking distinctly uncomfortable in the stoic presence of the latter.
The old man took Talmir by the crook of the elbow and eased him lightly ahead, motioning in the direction of the overhang and the cavern beneath it where the rest had gone. Now that Talmir looked, he saw just how deep it went. Rather, he could not see, which was all the same. Ket moved closer to him, glancing back suspiciously at the other pair as they spoke in hushed whispers. It was largely the old man doing the talking while Ceth listened with the rapt attention of the converted.
“Don’t worry on it now,” Talmir whispered. “Go. Join the others. Take this one with you. I’ll be along.” He passed the reins to the young soldier, who hesitated only briefly before doing as instructed. Ceth followed and soon passed man and beast by, his pace deliberate.
“Trouble?” Talmir asked as the old man came to stand beside him. He said it distractedly, suddenly struck by the brightness of the stars in their ethereal canvas. The sky seemed rounded out here, as if it were blown glass.
“Never too far,” the old man said. “Come. Let’s find you lot the rest you’re too stubborn to ask for.”
He tried to tug Talmir along, but Talmir stayed rooted and the old man flicked his eyes up to consider him. Seeing them was enough to know he was who he said he was. Talmir would worry on the questions—the implications—of that on the morrow.
“What should I call you?” Talmir asked, and the face before him broke into a smile as wide as it was true.
“Pevah,” he said. “That is what the children call me. I prefer it to the rest, and I recently stopped caring whether or not it was earned.”
It was simple enough to make Talmir laugh. He did, and found that it was as genuine as the smile Pevah had just shown. Together, they walked beneath the arch, the desert songs mixing with the wind they left behind.
The cave mouth was difficult to see until they were nearly upon it, and then it opened wide like the maw of one of Bali Swell’s lake monsters to swallow the company whole. Iyana suppressed a shudder as she walked through the high overhang, the cool air of the desert night giving way to a soft warmth that must have been baked into the rock in the heat of the day.
None of the desert foxes that had been their constant companions throughout the trek joined them, but already she heard their strange and haunting melodies out among the half-covered spurs and sheltered ridges. The sounds carried on the breeze and followed them into the enclosing black.
They left the soft white light of the moon and stars behind, and Iyana considered dipping into the Between to light her private way with the bright tethers of her companions. She saw Sen and the other Faeykin walking in the center and close to the front and knew they already were, their steps confident in the gloom.
Soon enough, the obsidian walls began to give off their own sort of light—the orange glow of a fire banked and burning deeper and farther down the winding throat. At first, the black rock had reminded Iyana of the northern peaks of the Valley. Now that she saw by the light they reflected rather than held, she knew this rock to be living. As she examined the curved walls with their crescents and sharp turns, she saw them as waves caught beneath black skies and frozen in time. She brushed her hand against them and delighted in the smooth sensation and the pleasant shock the heat sent into her palm as she walked.
“This way. Bring the horses. The way below is too steep for them.”
The speaker was one of the darker nomads, and now that she was reminded of the circumstances, the questions that had dogged Iyana throughout the day were recalled. She wanted to know who these people were. She wanted to know where they had come from. Most of all, she wanted to know what they wanted, and why they wanted it.
But the best answers often came of questions that went unasked, or asked at the right time. Another of the Faey Mother’s teachings, and something Iyana hoped those in her company would heed.
The way split, and Iyana saw Ket and Mial help their hosts lead the animals to the left. She thought they might be frightened in the dark, but as they passed the offshoot, she saw that the tunnel only traveled a bit farther before opening into a larger chamber lit by the night sky overhead. There must have been a hole carved or weathered into the top, and beneath the milling steeds, she heard the splash and saw the glimmer of water in a curved basin. She heard Captain Talmir speaking to the old man behind her, but was too caught up in the sights and sounds of newness to look back.
There was a violence to the way ahead, and she heard slow intakes as the company soaked it in, a few sharper ones as a pair of soldiers navigated Karin’s stretcher over the tiny hills. They were closer to the fire, now, and the waves of frozen black were now tinted a deep red. The cavernous tunnel slanted steadily downward and sharply to the right, and the crescents that marred its surface were split and bordered by crests between the eddies that were sharper and more sudden than those above. It smelled slightly of ash and ozone, but that pleasant tang of salt on the desert breeze followed them in, and she could still feel the wind that must have found its way into the network from chutes and natural chimneys.
The company was largely silent, her companions due to a mix of awe and exhaustion while the nomads both light and dark wore it like a comforting shawl. Perhaps this was a land where speaking wasted energy best kept in, or perhaps their hosts did not trust the Valleyfolk come unannounced into lands that were never theirs.
Now the ground sloped down more sharply, and Iyana saw the broad-shouldered man known as Ceth standing just ahead and to the right. Behind him, the cave walls were awash in the reflected amber light, and just behind his heels was open air and a drop she never would have noticed had he not stood just before it, light hair moving in the subterranean currents.
“Take care,” he said without warmth as the soldiers gave him and the chasm as wide a berth as possible. The path was like a spiral stair bordering a chute that could have seen one of the wagons fall into without ever scraping the edges. It was wide enough for three to walk abreast, but the most Iyana saw was pairs. She saw Jes clutch her bandaged arm to her chest and lean her head over the edge—there was no rail—and recoil.
“Far,” Iyana heard her whisper, and she could not suppress the curiosity that welled up and had her peering over the edge as well.
Below, what at first looked to be a bright orange desert flower resolved into a fire that raged more than flickered. Though it was far below, she could feel its heat from here. The walls were baked with it, and the carved chimney around which they walked shone like a cylinder inlaid with jewels. It was mesmerizing, and Iyana only noticed she had been leaning far enough to slip when a steady hand clutched her by the arm and pulled her sharply back.
“Ow!” she said, causing the soldiers in front and a few from behind to pause and look in her direction.
“Sorry.”
She had expected Sen to be the culprit and nearly recoiled in surprise when Ceth released her and moved on without a backward glance, the caravan’s collective eyes tracking his progress.
“It i
s a new place, Iyana. Do not let it lull you into complacency.”
Now it was Sen who spoke. His hand was out, as if he had meant to pull her back before Ceth had beaten him to it. The others passed by as Iyana eyed the other Faeykin steadily and dispassionately. She recalled the desert flower they had found and the sorry fate it had met at his hands, and though a part of her knew it was wrong to judge him so fully for such a banal act, a deeper part of her knew she was right to fear him.
Judging by the way his green eyes sparkled in the ruddy glow, she thought he caught it and could not tell how he felt about it.
“Are you okay, Iyana?”
“Fine,” she said, smiling up at Creyath as he came down from the upper level. Talmir and the old man who might be a Sage followed behind, and Sen took up the rear as she fell into step beside the Second Keeper of Hearth. She did not peer over the edge again, but rather looked across the chasm and watched Ceth as he rounded the stair and reached the bottom, her own mind working even as his face betrayed nothing, his gray-blue eyes focused ahead.
There was a sweetness to the air as they neared the bottom, and Iyana nearly stuck her tongue out to taste it. Though she could now hear the crackle of logs in the pit and feel the hot kiss of the flames that quested up, she felt the air lighten and take on a pleasant caress. It smelled like water, to her. Or like the shore of Last Lake, and she saw other members of the caravan looking up as they felt the same faint, phantom spray touch their bare arms and necks.
In place of the stoic quiet the desert nomads had affected throughout their journey, the land they entered now was full of the sounds of life. As she reached the bottom of the stair behind the others, Iyana recognized them as the mingled voices of children reunited with the parents that had been sent out to fetch her and hers.
She smiled as the company parted to reveal the myriad reunions, and that smile only widened when she saw the looks of joy and relief plastered across the stern and stoic faces of the nomads who were not nomads at all, their embraces warmer even than the fire in the pit that lit them.
The Midnight Dunes (The Landkist Saga Book 3) Page 10