Once it left the pit the green shielding melted away. The creature within emerged. Lucky me, I was a bird. Lucky Uncle, he was old. Else both of us would have drowned in our own drool. This was one gorgeous woman and she was not wearing a stitch.
Soulcatcher.
Even in a birdly state I did appreciate how long it had been since I had seen my wife.
Catcher began to shimmer, not putting on another shield but taking another face. The effort distracted her from her surroundings. She did not spot Uncle Doj, who had become one with the night as deftly as a Deceiver. I recognized form and face just as Uncle, from behind Catcher, brought Ash Wand whining down in a stroke that should have sliced her to her breastbone.
She was fast. She tried to dodge and throw up some sort of sorcerous defense. The air groaned. She cried out and plunged forward, not killed but certainly cut badly. Uncle jumped in to finish her off. Ash Wand flashed. Blood flew. Catcher bounced around. So did Uncle. Chance interceded. A bamboo pole in the holocaust began popping off. Two fireballs clipped Uncle good. Catcher bounced him around some while he was distracted but did not have the strength to finish him. Anyway, people were responding to the noise, though it would be hours before Doj was found.
Catcher dragged herself away, used her enfeebled power to control her bleeding and change her shape. By the time she reached her hidden clothing she had become Sleepy. Which explained why Sleepy was so useless. As long as he passed for insane he was less likely to endure a scrutiny close enough to reveal the fact that he was not my prodigal assistant.
I was angry in a major way. Where was the real kid?
I flapped down and landed on Uncle’s chest. He was drowning in his own blood. I pecked and pulled and forced him to turn his head to the side. Then I went after Soulcatcher.
She had disappeared.
I did not find a trace. But I knew where she was headed. Sleepy would be inside my bunker, never having been missed, when I got up in the morning thinking I had suffered through a sleepless night.
Now I knew what had happened to Smoke, too. That twitch of cheek I had glimpsed on Sleepy had been Catcher realizing she could be found out if anybody took Smoke cruising along her backtrail.
I knew her secret now, anyway, though. Maybe Kina was a more powerful enemy than Catcher suspected. The goddess might even have a sense of irony, using a crow to stalk the mistress of crows.
I settled onto the roof of my bunker. Beneath me Thai Dei snorted and snored as badly as he had the night we decimated One-Eye’s trove. Someone else down there was making a racket, too. Since Sleepy was out I figured it had to be me, which meant Sahra was right when she accused me of roaring like a starving bear.
I never believed her before.
Hard to believe we had gone to sleep after watching all the excitement across the way. Catcher must have sent a spell ahead or left a doozie behind.
I had a feeling I would not be comfortable looking at myself from outside so overcame the temptation to flap down and peek through the doorway.
Sleepy came out of the darkness.
For somebody who had been mauled and cut up Soulcatcher could move like a gazelle. No healthy, normal human could run that well. Maybe a little sorcery?
I had wondered how I would get out of the white crow. Catcher’s swift approach was the key. The crow took off. I stayed behind. I floated and watched. And as Catcher slowed and had to begin to acknowledge her wounds I floated up and away and in a direction that could only be described as tomorrow. Catcher did not sense my presence even though it was she who had made it easy for me to slip the moorings of my flesh. Then it was the night I had left. And everybody, including me, was snoring away inside the bunker. And I was still free to wander the ghostworld.
98
Sahra was sleeping restlessly. Tobo lay beside her, one little paw on her bare breast, occasionally sucking at her nipple. I watched for a while. My tension slipped away as I did.
What kind of lunatic was I? This was what I wanted and where I wanted to be but in a few hours I was going to hoist my weary body up and climb the mountain again. And I would keep climbing the mountain even though it might kill me.
Why?
I would. I knew I would. But I did not know what compelled me to do so.
I extended a ghostly hand to Tobo. For a moment it seemed I actually felt his warmth. He stirred as though having a bad dream. I withdrew, tried to stroke Sarie’s hair instead.
She smiled.
“Mur. I thought I felt you. It’s been so long.” She chattered softly. I basked in it, wishing I could talk to her, too. She peeled Tobo off her breast and stood up, bare to the waist, doing a little dance that reminded me just how long it had been. She was recovering her figure already. She flashed me a mocking smile, looking right at me. Maybe she was a witch. “Tobo is strong enough to travel. The Water Dragon Festival is coming soon. I will leave then, in the confusion. My preparations are all made.”
My wife, the smart, confident, competent woman. I wondered what I had done to deserve so much, other than to tickle her grandmother’s fancy.
Sarie danced. I drooled. Tobo began to fuss. I think he sensed my presence easier than Sarie did. I frightened him.
“If you were here...” Sarie sighed, stared me in the invisible eye as she offered me an even more lascivious look. “But you aren’t.” She shrugged. “But it won’t be that long.” She cradled our son in her arms. He took a nipple immediately, donning a look of smug satisfaction.
I know what you mean, kid.
Tobo’s eyes popped open. The one I could see stared right at me where I watched over Sarie’s shoulder. He let go, took a deep breath, let out a whopper of a howl. The kid had lungs.
A priest invited himself in almost instantly. “What’s going on?” he demanded. “Why is the child screaming? Who were you whispering to?”
“Get out,” Sahra told him. “You have no right to come in here.”
The priest had trouble dragging his gaze away from her breasts. He began to apologize with not entirely credible sincerity.
Sahra snapped, “The baby has gas tonight. He’s having trouble with his digestion. I talk to him. That allows me a chance to have a sensible conversation occasionally.”
That’s the girl. Get the poor kid dosed with shark’s-liver oil or some nasty-tasting powder. That will teach him to yell when his old man comes around.
I drifted in and did my best to plant a kiss on the small of Sarie’s neck before I left. I went away as happy as a man could be in my circumstances. I knew my wife and child were well and still loved me. There are plenty of men in today’s Company who do not have a clue about their families although, in truth, not many care. Were they the sort who did care they would have left when the Taglian loyalists were allowed to go home.
The rest of the swamp was a silent, dark place. Which was to be expected at that time of night. I found my way to Taglios though there was no moon and the sky was overcast.
It would not be long before the rainy season began.
I spent hours roaming the Palace and the more important temples but learned very little. Without Smoke I was constrained by real time and it was too late for anybody but the priests of the Night Gods to be stirring and scheming. And those people were not plotting, they were preparing for some minor feast night.
Maybe, if I planned to do much useful ghostwalking, I would have to get to bed early in the evening, while the world was still awake and conspiring. I found no news anywhere unless you count the overwhelming evidence that persecution of friends of the Company had spread throughout most of the territories our efforts had brought under Taglian suzerainty. It did not seem a persecution as vicious as had been ours of the Stranglers. Our friends were surviving it. Mostly they were just losing their appointments. In a few cases where there were personality conflicts some people ended up inside cells. Murder did not appear to be a tool the Radisha cared to employ.
All my assumptions were based on spare, postmidnigh
t evidence.
I could not find Mogaba. I could not find either of our prodigal wizards. No surprise. I did not invest much effort in the hunt. I did put some into trying to locale Croaker’s kid.
Wherever she was she would be alone. There might be an opportunity in that.
While I searched I also kept an eye out for some evidence of what had become of the real Sleepy.
I had no luck with those quests, either. But I did stumble on evidence that my blindness might not be entirely accidental.
I was drifting over a slope I knew to be in the mountains not many miles from Catcher’s former cave. I was sure Catcher would not have gone far when she moved, despite having Howler’s carpet at her disposal. I wandered into an area of small, deep and dark canyons. I flitted up and down those, letting their walls guide me, figuring the kid, or anyone else, would be detectable by the heat or light of a fire. I doubted she could do without.
I found no fire. I did find my horse. I think. I whipped past the beast, catching only a glimpse, an impression that it was confined inescapably, another that it sensed my passage and tried to respond. But when I stopped and turned back I could find nothing. In fact, it seemed that in just a moment that entire corner of the world became a sensory desert.
I had run with Kina once already this trip. I might not be alone now, especially if I was anywhere near the Daughter of Night.
I knew the general area. I would tell Croaker. He could send soldiers out if he wanted.
Catcher would not be getting in our way.
My last action was to check on Uncle Doj where the Nyueng Bao bodyguards were keeping vigil. He was unconscious but alive. I gathered that they were keeping him drugged for his own good, giving him time to heal. Whatever his mission, he did not need to complete it immediately.
I went home to my comfortable flesh and uncomfortable bed.
The guys let me sleep in like it was a holiday. The sun was already up when I crawled out of my bunker, past the vacant eyed Sleepy doppelganger sprawled beside the doorway.
99
Croaker arrived soon after I finished my breakfast mush. He had not slept in. “You went in yesterday? How was it?”
“Just a few yards. Thai Dei, too. He insisted. We had ropes tied to our butts. Sit down here and check out the view across the way.” I had my back to Sleepy. I did not want my lips read. I made gestures like I was talking about something else while I whispered my news.
Croaker chuckled. “Now isn’t that interesting. We’ll just play along for now. I won’t even tell Lady. Though I got to tell you, everybody but you already suspected.”
“Shit. That’s why you were such a bunch of assholes. You didn’t trust me not to give it away. What’s the plan for today?”
“Try the road all the way to the top. I’ll go with you. Save the talk till we get on the other side.”
“Good idea.” I let everything wait till later. “You eaten?”
He glanced at my battered tin bowl. “You live like kings over here, don’t you?”
“Absolutely. Only the best for the cream of the legion.”
“I’ll pass. This time.” He looked up the mountain and sighed. “One-Eye had the right idea. I’m too old for this shit.”
“It’s not that bad.” It was not. When I call the slope a mountain I mean it metaphorically. The road could be made usable by wagons with very little work and the rim of the plateau could not have been more than a thousand feet higher than the Shadowgate. And probably not that far.
“Let me know when you’re ready.” The Old Man massaged his right knee. He noticed me noticing. “Little rheumatiz. But it only hurts when I walk on it.”
Buy a horse, I thought but did not say. “How old are you really?”
“You’re as young as you think you are,” he replied, his expression branding that one a load of old manure. “Lady keeps me young.”
I wondered if there might not be a touch of truth in that one. She did a great job of keeping herself slim, sleek and fresh.
“Grab the standard and let’s go.”
“You want to take a couple guys along? Just in case?”
“Your guy will follow us. Want him or not. Grab a couple others. Rudy and Bucket will do.”
“You going to ride?” He had ridden over on his big stallion. “I always figured you’d go whole hog when you went up there. The full Widowmaker rig and whatnot.”
“Next time. Let’s go.” He was nervous.
I hollered for Rudy and Bucket. They showed up quickly, like maybe they had been lurking nearby, expecting a summons. Their Nyueng Bao shadows drifted along behind them. The whole bunch were ready to travel.
I said, “Looks like it’ll be me holding up the parade.” I was pleased the guys had shown some initiative.
I crawled back into my bunker, noting as I went that Thai Dei too was ready to climb the mountain.
I needed only a moment to collect some jerky, roasted oats and a canteen. On my way out I told Sleepy, “Don’t go away, pal. I’ll be back in time for supper.” Gods and devils of the earth willing.
I grabbed the standard. We crossed over the boundary a man at a time. The vibration seemed less dramatic this time. Thai Dei too seemed less touched. But the others turned pale and became very jumpy. The chill was no less strong. I shivered.
In a moment the road was clear before me, the polished jet thread wandering up the slope. “You see the way?” I lowered the head of the standard till the iron head touched that thread. I do not know why I did that.
A vibration went through me that was a dozen times stronger than that coming through the Shadowgate. I gasped. I shuddered. Maybe I sputtered and foamed at the mouth.
“What’s wrong with you?” Croaker demanded.
I pushed the standard into his hand. “You just do what I did.” I stepped away. Looking up the slope I realized I was seeing it in a different way. I saw the same old dirty, barren slope with its glistening black thread but also saw a ghost of what it must have been like in an age long gone, when the road was new and the slope, while nearly as barren, had not had such a godsforsaken look.
Human ghosts moved there, too, though they were even more insubstantial than the road and slope and unfallen fortifications around us.
Croaker reacted exactly the way I had. But he must have had a clue or two more. As soon as he regained control he passed the standard to Bucket and told him to repeat the process.
The standard passed from Bucket to Rudy and from Rudy to Thai Dei. Thai Dei thought about it for more than a minute before he went ahead. He did so only when the Old Man told him, “You don’t follow through, you don’t go up the hill.” Thai Dei did not want to do that either but had no choice. He was trapped by his own character as well as, I suspected, the task Uncle Doj had laid upon him.
Once Thai Dei made his move the other Nyueng Bao followed. Croaker told them, “It doesn’t mean you’re committed to the Company, boys.”
A moment later I observed, “Now that we’ve got that out of the way what say we climb the mountain?” Good Standardbearer me, I took up the Lance and started trudging.
It felt good to be headed home.
What?
I looked at the others. Nobody appeared to be having trouble keeping touch with reality. Maybe it was another aspect of the dreaming and falling into nightmares.
Thai Dei hung close to my back. He was not comfortable at all this morning. He had his sword out and ready.
The black ribbon widened as it climbed the slope. It also seemed to take on depth. Its surface, though flat, assumed an appearance of concavity. If you touched it, it felt hard and cold yet seemed almost soft underfoot.
The slope steepened a bit. I huffed and puffed. Then the going became easier, the road less timeworn. The horizon line stopped retreating as fast as I chased it.
“Stop!” Croaker yelled.
I stopped. I looked back. The Old Man was a hundred yards behind me. Even Thai Dei was having trouble keeping up.
Croaker was puffing badly when he caught up. “Man, I’m really out of shape.”
“You’re the one wants to take this walk. It’ll suck that belly right off you.” He was not fat. Yet. But he had not been missing any meals lately. “You see the road clearly?” Just to make sure I was not suffering some vision with my eyes open. I am no longer ever quite sure of my place in reality, never unsuspicious that there might not be an objective reality at all. Everything could be dreams inside of dreams, the illusions of souls rolling forever in a Swegah where now and then a few collided and joined in an almost common fantasy.
You notice, nobody ever sees things exactly the same?
“The black path? I don’t remember reading anything about that in the Annals.”
“We never read anything by anybody who ever actually saw any of this. We’ve never read anything by anybody who was closer than two generations to this place. By then the Company had a different set of concerns.”
Croaker grunted.
To make sure we held this illusion in common I polled everybody. Even the Nyueng Bao agreed we were following a ribbon of blackness. They did not like that. They were frightened by it but accepted it. The entire world, outside Man’s natural swamp realm, was a frightening place.
“Everybody got their breath? Let’s trudge on.” I really wanted to get to that plain. I tried to remember what it looked like at night, from up high and far away, but the view had been pretty obscure. I wondered why I never tried to go exploring. I wondered what Kina had to do with the plain. Could this be the plain where she fought the great battle of her legend? I wondered if we would find out why no Taglian would talk about the place, why, when it was mentioned, most walked off shaking their heads and muttering, “Glittering stone.” I wondered how that phrase could have found its way into a language as an idiom for “madness.” Especially inasmuch as we were now certain that the Taglian terror of the Company and the Year of the Skulls had been artificially induced.
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