All during the Age of the Dragon, the various Brotherhoods had dwindled or were destroyed by Morjin's assassin-priests. The closing of the Silver Brotherhood's school in Surrapam that Master Juwain had lamented over dinner was among the last of these. Now, only the original Brotherhood remained to spread the light of truth throughout Ea. Although its Brothers had been the first to make vows to preserve the wisdom of the stars and raise up humanity to its birthright, they called themselves the Last Brotherhood.
'All of the Brotherhoods have been destroyed' I said to Master Juwain. 'All except one.'
'Hmmm, have they indeed?' Master luwain said, 'What do you know of the Black Brotherhood?'
'Only that they were once strongest in Sakai. And that when the Kallimun priests established their fortress in Argattha, they hunted down the Brothers and razed every one of their schools to the ground. The Black Brotherhood was completely destroyed early in the Age of the Dragon.'
Maram, taking an interest in our conversation, nudged his horse forward to hear better what we were saying.
Master Juwain turned about in his saddle, left and right, scanning the empty hills around us. And then, in a much-lowered voice, he said, 'No, the Black Brotherhood was never destroyed. The Kallimun only drove them out of Sakai into Alonia.'
He went on to tell us that the Black Brotherhood, seeking to under-stand the fire-negating properties of the black gelstei and the source of all darkness, had always been different from the other Brotherhoods. Early in the Age of Law, when the Brotherhoods had renounced war, the Black Brothers had rebelled against the new rule of non-violence. Believing that there would always be darkness in the world, they began taking up knives and other weapons to fight against it. And they fought quite fiercely, for thousands of years. As the other Brotherhoods - the-Blue and the Red, the Gold and the Green - closed their schools all through the Age of the Dragon, the Black Brotherhood opened schools in secret in almost every land.
When Master Juwain had finished speaking, Maram sat very erect on his horse and said, 'I've never heard anyone speak of that.'
'We don't speak of it' Master Juwain said. 'Certainly not to novices. And not usually to any Brother before he has attained his mastership.'
At this, Maram, who was no more likely to attain a mastership than I was to become a king, slowly nodded his head as if proud to be taken into Master Juwain's confidence. And then he said, 'I didn't know there were any black gelstei left in the world for anyone to study.'
'There may not be,' Master Juwain said. 'But the Black Brothers gave up the pursuit of such knowledge long ago.' 'They have? But what is their purpose, then?'
'Their purpose,' Master Juwain said, 'is to hunt the Kallimun priests who once hunted them. And ultimately, to slay the Red Dragon.' .
Here he turned toward me and said, 'And that brings us back to Kane. I'm afraid that he might be of the Black Brotherhood. From what I've read about the Black Brothers, he has their look Certainly he has their hate.'
I looked off at the soft green hills and the purplish Aakash Mountains just beyond them. The sun poured down its warmth upon the earth, and a sweet wind rippled the acres of grass. On such a lovely day, it seemed strange to speak of dark things such as the Black Brotherhood. Almost as strange as Kane himself.
'And so you asked Kane to ride with us,' I said to Master Juwain. 'Why, sir?
Because you thought he might scare away any of the Red Dragon's men who might be hunting us? Or because you want to know more about the Black Brotherhood?'
Master Juwain laughed softly as he looked at me with his deep eyes. And then he said, 'I think you know me too well, Val. Kane was right about me, after all. I do seek knowledge, sometimes even in dark places. It's my curse.'
I looked up at the sun then as I thought about my own curse; I thought about the way that Kane's eyes had nearly sucked me down into the dark whirlpool of his soul.
Would I, I wondered, ever find that which would heal me of my terrible gift of experiencing the sufferings of others?
'If Kane is of the Black Brotherhood,' I finally said to Master Juwain, 'why would he press to accompany us?'
But Master Juwain who knew so much about so many things, only looked at me in silence as he slowly shook his head.
For the rest of the morning, as we journeyed north along the Aakash range, we talked about the Brotherhoods' role in the study and fabrica-tion of the seven greater gelstei stones. The fine day opened into the long hours of the afternoon even as the valley through which We rode opened toward the plains of Anjo. The hills about us gradually lessened in elevation and began to flatten out. Maram wanted to pause on the top of one of these to eat our midday meal and take a nap. But despite the soreness of my side, I was eager to press on, and so we did. Late in the day, with the sun arching down toward the jagged Shoshan Mountains to the west, we crossed into Daksh. No river or border stones marked off this dukedom. We knew that we had entered Duke Gorador's domain only because a shepherd whom we passed told us that we had. He also told us that we would find the Duke's castle some five miles farther up the valley at the mouth of one of the canyons leading through the Aakash Mountains. And so we did. It was almost full night as we rode up to the castle's main gate and presented ourselves to the Duke.
Duke Gorador proved to be a heavy man with a long face like a horse and long lower lip, at which he pulled with his steely fingers as we told him our story. He seemed glad to hear that I had made enemies of Lord Salmelu and the Ishkans; apparently he regarded the enemy of his enemy as his friend, for he immediately offered us his hospitality, and ordered that we be feted. But before we sat down to take dinner with him, he insisted on looking at Altaru and taking his measure. He well remembered sending him to my father, and was astonished to see me astride him.
'I never thought anyone would ride this horse,' he said to me just inside his castle's gate. Unlike my father, he had the good sense to keep well away from him. 'Now come dine with me and tell me how you managed to win his friendship. It seems that we have many stories to tell tonight.'
That evening, over a meal of roasted lamb and mint jelly, we spoke of many things: of the warlords who terrorized the wild lands to the north of Daksh and the warriors of Duke Barwan who patrolled the passes of the mountains to the east. As it happened, Duke Gorador, too, had a son who had gone off to the great gathering in Tria. He gave us his blessings and told us to look for a Sar Avador, who would be riding a black gelding that might have been Altaru's cousin. Of Kane, whom he had met, he had nothing to say. For as he told us, his father had taught him that if he couldn't speak well of a man, he shouldn't speak at all. He did, however, have words of praise for Thaman and his cause. He surprised everyone by announcing that the Valari must someday unite under a single king. But it surprised no one that he thought this king should be of Anjo: perhaps even Lord Shurador, his eldest son.
We slept well that night to the musk of the wolves howling in the hills. That is, Master Juwain and I slept well, Maram insisted on staying up until the dark hours writing a poem by candlelight. He intended to give Lord Shurador's wife his adoring words the next day since he couldn't manage to give her his love that night. But when the dawn broke its first light over the castle, both Master Juwain and I dissuaded him from this potentially disastrous act. We told him that if his verses were well-made and true, his passions would be preserved for all the ages. He could work on his poem as we journeyed north, and if he so desired, he could read it to the nobles and princes in Tria.
We said goodbye to the Duke near the gate where we had met him. Then we rode into the soft, swelling hills around his castle. The sky was as blue as cobalt glass; the soft wind smelled of dandelions and other wildflowers that grew on the grassy slopes, in the east, the sun burned with a golden fire.
It was a fine day for traveling, I thought, perhaps our finest yet. I determined that we should leave Daksh far behind us and cross well into Jathay before evening came.
Perhaps some thirty miles of rolli
ng country lay before us. We began our journey through it to the sound of Maram bellowing out the verses of his new poem. It was a measure of the safety that Duke Gorador provided his domain that we could ride without fear of Maram's noise provoking any enemy to attack us.
As the noon hour approached, the mountains to our east grew lower and lower like great granite steps leading down into the plains of Anjo. Their forested slopes gradually gave way to grassier terrain. At the border between Daksh and Jathay, they stopped altogether. Here, where one of the feeder streams of the Havosh led northeast toward Yarvanu and Vishal, we paused to eat a meal of lamb sandwiches and take our bearings.
'Ah, Val, listen to this,' Maram said between bites of his sandwich. Which line do you think is better? "Her eyes are pools of sacred fire?" Or, "Her eyes are fire feeding fire"?'
We sat on top of a hill above the west bank of the Havosh River. The day was still clear, and we could see many miles in any direction. To the east, just across the sparkling trickle of the river, the plains of Jathay glistened like a sea of green. Only some fifteen miles from us lay the city of Sauvo and the court intrigues that Duke Rezu had spoken of. To the northeast, along the line of the Havosh, were the fields of Vishal and Yarvanu, and some miles beyond their domains, the distant blue haze of the Alonian Sea. The Shoshan Range still rose like a vast wall of rock and ice to the west, but I knew that their jagged peaks gave way to a great gap some seventy-five miles to the northwest. Forty miles due north of our hill, the raging Santosh River flowed down from these mountains into the Alonian Sea. It formed the border between Alonia and Anjo's wild lands that both Duke Rezu and Duke Gorador had warned us against. From our vantage above them, they didn't seem so wild. Long stretches of swaying grass and shrubs were cut by stands of trees in an irregular patchwork of vegetation. The ground undulated with soft swells of earth, as of the contours of a snake, but nowhere did it appear hilly or difficult to cross.
'Perhaps you don't like either line,' Maram said as I suddenly stood to gaze down at the thin, blue ribbon of the Havosh. 'How about, "Her eyes are windows to the stars"? Val, are you listening to me? What's wrong?'
I was barely listening to him. A sudden coldness struck into me as of something serpentine wrapping itself around my spine. It seemed to contract rhythmically, grinding my back-bones together even as it ate its way into my skull. Despite the dreadful chill I felt spreading through my limbs, I began to sweat. My belly tightened with a sickness that made me want to surrender up my lunch.
Now Master Juwain stood up, too, and laid his hand on my shoulder. He touched my head to see if my fever had returned. And then he asked, 'Are you ill, Val?'
'No,' 1 told him. 'It's not that'
'What is it then?'
I saw great concern on both my friends' faces. And I was concerned not to alarm either of them, especially Maram. But they had to know, so as gently as I could, 1
told them, 'Someone is following me.'
At this news, Maram leaped to his feet and began scanning the world in every direction. And so, more slowly, did Master Juwain. But the only moving things they detected were a few hawks in the sky and a rabbit startled out of the grass by Maram's darting back and forth across the top of the hill.
'We can't see anything,' Master Juwain said. 'Are you sure we're being followed?'
'Yes,' I said. 'At least someone or something is seeking me and knows where I am.
It's like they can scent out my blood.'
'Do you think it's Kane?' Maram asked. He turned south to peer more closely through the valley leading back to Duke Rezu's castle.
'It could be Kane,' I said. 'Or it could be someone waiting for us to ride into a trap.'
'Waiting where?' Maram asked. 'And who is it who's after you? The Ishkans? No, no
- they wouldn't dare ride this far into Anjo. Would they? Do you think it's your assassin who has tracked you down?'
But I had no answers for him, nor for myself. All I could do was to smile bravely so that the flames of Maram's disquiet didn't spread into a raging panic.
Master Juwain, who had an intimation of my gift nodded his head as if he trusted what I had told him. He asked, 'What should we do, Val?'
'We could try to set a trap of our own,' I said, touching the hilt of my sword.
'No, there's been enough of that already,' Master Juwain said. 'Besides, we have no idea how many might be pursuing us, do we?'
Maram nodded his head at the good sense of this, and said, 'Please, Val, let's leave this land as soon as we can,'
'All right,' I said. I pointed down at the Havosh River where it formed the border of Jathay and led toward Yarvanu and Vishal. 'If it is Kane who is after us, then he knows that Duke Rezu advised us to go in this direction. If it's someone else, then likely they'll be waiting for us along the Nar Road where it crosses through Yarvanu.'
'Of course they would,' Maram muttered. 'That's the only way over the Santosh into Alonia.'
'Perhaps not the only way,' I said.
'What do you mean?' Maram asked in alarm.
I pointed down into the wild lands that began at the base of our hill. I said, 'We could journey north, straight for the Santosh. And then into Alonia. If we keep northwest toward the Shoshan Range and then strike out north again, we should intercept the Nar Road in the Gap far from any of our pursuers.'
Maram looked at me as if I had suggested crossing the Alonian Sea on a log. Then he called out, 'But what of the wild lands we were warned against? The robbers and outlaws? Ah, perhaps the bears, too? And how will we cross the Santosh if there's no bridge? And if by some miracle we do cross it without drowning, how will we find our way through Alonia? I've heard there's nothing there but trackless forest.'
Some men are born to fear the familiar dangers that they see before their eyes; some take their greatest terror in the unknown. Maram was cursed with a sensibility that found threat everywhere in the world, from a boulder poised on the side of a hill to roll down upon him to his most wild imaginings. I knew that nothing I could say would assuage the dread rising like a flood inside him. Dangers lay before us in every direction. All we could do was to choose one way or another to go.
Even so, I grasped his hand in mine to reassure him. It was one of the times in my life that I wished my gift worked in reverse, so that some of my great hope for the future might pass into him. I fancied that some of it did.
We held council on top of that barren hill. All of us agreed that when facing an opponent, it was best to do the unexpected. And so in the end we decided on the course that I had suggested.
After packing up our food, we rode down into the wild lands with a new haste communicating into our horses. We moved at a bone-jolting trot over fields overgrown with shrubs and weeds; but upon entering the various woods that lay upon our line of travel, we had to pick our way more slowly. The country through which we rode had once been rich farmland, some of the richest in the Morning Mountains..But now all that remained of civilization were the ruins of low stone walls or an occasional house, rotting or fallen in upon itself. We saw no other sign of human beings all that long afternoon. When evening came, we made camp in a copse of stout oaks. We risked no fire that night. We ate a cold meal of cheese and bread, and then agreed to take our sleep in turns so that one of us might always remain awake to listen for our pursuers. I took the first watch, followed by Maram. When it came time for me to rest, 1 fell asleep to the sound of wolves howling far out on the plain before us.
I was awakened just before dawn by a dreadful sensation that one of these wolves was licking my throat. I sprang up from the dark, damp earth with my sword in my hand; I believe I lunged at the gray shapes of these beasts lurking in the shadows of the trees. And then, as I came truly awake and my eyes cleared, I saw nothing more threatening than a few rotting logs among the towering oaks. 'Are you all right?'
Master Juwain whispered. 'Was it a dream?' 'Yes, a dream,' I told him. 'But perhaps it's time we were off.' We roused Maram then and
quickly broke camp. Upon emerging from the woods, we rode straight toward the north star over a dark and silent land. But soon the sun reddened the sky in the east and drove away the darkness. With every yard of dew-dampened ground that we covered, it seemed that the world grew a little brighter. I took courage from this golden light. By the time full day came, I could no longer feel the serpent writhing along my spine.
Even so, I pressed Altaru to cross this forsaken country as quickly as we could. The ground fell gradually before us; in places, it grew damp and almost boggy - though nothing like the Black Bog that guarded the way into Rajak. The horses found their footing surely enough, and began to quicken their pace, urged on by clouds of biting, black flies. By noon we had covered nearly fifteen miles, and by late afternoon, another ten. And in all those miles, we saw nothing more threatening than a couple of foxes and the prints of a bear by the muddy bank of a stream.
And then, as we drew nearer the Santosh and entered a broad swathe of woods, we came upon a band of ragged-looking men whom Maram immediately took to be robbers. But they proved to be only outlaws exiled from Vishal for protesting the ruthless war that Baron Yashur was prosecuting against Onkar. With their matted hair and filthy tunics, they seemed scarcely Vaiari. But Valari they were, and they offered us no hindrance, only the roasted haunch of a deer that they had just killed.
And more, when they heard that we were journeying to Tria, they offered to show us a way over the Santosh.
Meeting these 'wild' men that Maram had so feared was a great stroke of fortune.
After we had eaten the gamy-tasting venison, they led us west along a track through the woods. A few miles of tramping along the black, hard-packed earth brought us dose to the river. We heard this great surge of water through the trees before we could see it: the oaks and willows grew like a curtain right down to the bank. But then the track straightened and rose toward the causeway leading to an old bridge spanning the river. At the foot of this rickety structure, we paused to look down into the river's raging brown waters. There was no way, I knew, that we could have swum across them.
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