This was an observation as cold as the water under our feet, and for a moment I felt numbed by the sombre truth of his words. But life was not a sum of apples or potatoes to be added up so easily. If all that had been wanted from me was mindless faith and obedience, Cassy would never have left such cryptic clues and messages. That she had done so told me that she had expected me to think and make decisions. As with the obfuscations and evasions of the futuretellers, I knew there must be a reason for the secrecy that surrounded my quest, but perhaps that reason had something to do with free will and choice. For no matter what, I felt sure those things would be required of me, ere the end.
But I kept these thoughts to myself.
The rift cut east and west and east again before moving decisively north-west. It widened enough for me to walk beside Gahltha, but Maruman bade me ride so that we could move more quickly. Once mounted, I looked up at the crack of sky visible high above. The only time sun would strike down through it would be for a brief period in the middle of the day. I hoped we would not still be in the rift then. I dug out my hat and gloves, took off the sandals and hung them down to let them drip dry, but still I was cold. Gahltha suggested I put my feet on his bare back to warm them, adding drily that the sound of my teeth chattering was making him nervous. I was glad to obey and clung to the webbing loops to keep my balance.
The rift continued to zig and zag, but now I noticed that the cuts east were always longer. I wondered if it was yet another legacy of the tremors that had occurred during the Great White – the result, so the Teknoguilders said, of the potency of the weapons that had been used by the Beforetimers, which had roused terrifying forces locked inside the earth. I had no idea what we would find at the end of the rift, but given how steeply and closely the mountains rose up beside one another, it seemed unlikely that we would find a convenient canyon or valley waiting for us. Certainly I had seen few canyons when the Agyllians had brought me to the ken. On the other hand, I had really seen only the western side of the mountain range, since the birds dwelt on that side of the great spine of mountains that ran along the centre of it. The high jagged giants would have blocked any clear view of the eastern side of the range. Suddenly I found myself remembering that Jacob had scribed of mountain paths or roads forged in the Beforetime. That I had seen none of these likely meant that, if they existed still, they were on the eastern side of the range. I made up my mind to re-read the journal more attentively as soon as I had the chance, but one thing was certain: whether or not there were ancient roads he might have used for his vehicle, Jacob could not have travelled into the mountains through the rift because the vehicle he had drawn in his journal would not have fitted through it.
And something else was beginning to nag at me.
If Dragon and I were not to travel together with the expedition to the Red Land, and if I had not been mistaken in my reading of Cassy’s clue, which referred to those things, then something had happened to prevent the future Cassy had seen from coming to pass. In which case the final clue might be in the Red Land even if I had been unable to accompany the expedition because of the need to find Cassandra’s key. And what of the visions Maryon and Dell had experienced of Dragon and me in the Red Land, which had occurred long after Jacob had left Obernewtyn with Cassandra’s key? One mistaken vision that put me in the Red Land I could accept, but that the two most powerful futuretellers in the Land should have made a mistake, and that it should be the same mistake, simply did not seem possible.
Suddenly a shadow fell over me. I looked up, thinking instantly of the malevolent spirit-form that had overflown me on the dreamtrails. But it was only that the rift had closed up overhead. Gahltha plodded on unperturbed, though I could feel he was weary of trudging through the icy stream. I tried to make myself equally patient, but it was hard to travel without a clear idea of where I was going.
‘Why do the funaga have to know where they are to go?’ Maruman asked. To my surprise, his tone lacked the ire that usually accompanied such a question.
‘I am the Seeker,’ I sent. ‘How am I to seek without thinking of what is ahead of me?’
‘ElspethInnle is Innle who alone can seek what is to be sought. Marumanyelloweyes is the Moonwatcher, sent to guide ElspethInnle where she must go,’ the old cat sent imperturbably, and to my annoyance he sank back to sleep.
I cast a longing glance at the strip of vanishing sky behind me, before resolutely turning my eyes to the pitchy darkness ahead, wondering why it was that whenever I was pursuing my quest, the way ahead always seemed darker and colder than the way behind me. I wished as I had done many times before that I might live in the moment as beasts did, instead of thinking and worrying about the future, which was so infinitely changeable as to defy even the power of a strongly Talented futureteller. After all, if one could not ever truly know what the future would hold, what use was there in making plans? But the only time I had ever found it easy to live in the moment was when there was great danger threatening. When the danger passed, the transcendent revelation of the moment faded, as if the mind could not hold such a thing for long.
I cleared my thoughts and made myself listen attentively to the slapping of water against the stone walls, the muted thud and splash of Gahltha’s hoofs in the stream, but almost at once I was distracted by light ahead. It was too soft and yellow to be daylight, unless it came from some oblique and filtered source. Then ahead I saw a glimmering patch of brightness on the wall of the rift. I was almost upon it before I realised that it was a cluster of the little taint-devouring creatures that dwelt in damp highland caves and crannies.
There was another patch of them on the opposite wall, and further along the rift they were on both walls. Still further there was such a multitude of the creatures that they lined both walls. I had never seen such a huge colony of them before. It must be the moisture attracting them, for the walls of the rift now glistened with water, trickling down from a hundred tiny cracks to join the stream running along the rift.
Passing through them, I could not help but feel that Jak’s ambition to enable the little creatures to adapt so that they could tolerate a brighter, warmer habitat and thereby be able to be relocated so they could consume and transform tainted matter in drier terrain, while understandable, stemmed from the same belief that had led humans to bring the world to the brink of destruction in the first place: the notion that we had the right to change the world and anything in it to suit our needs. Perhaps this belief was connected to the fact that although animals could live completely in the moment, we humans seemed to live almost entirely in our imaginings of the future or our regrets over the past. For if one dwelt completely in a moment, there was no room for thinking about changing it. There was only acceptance.
The gleaming colony came to an end as the base of the rift began to slope steeply upward, and only then did I realise we were no longer walking through water.
The darkness became complete the next time the rift changed direction, but I did not worry about Gahltha stumbling. Aside from the fact that he and all of the other beasts had far keener eyesight than me, he had an awareness of his surroundings that far surpassed mine, another advantage of living fully in the moment perhaps. It struck me that Dameon also possessed an uncanny awareness of his surroundings, and I wondered if the empath had developed the same ability as beasts because his blindness required him to pay attention more profoundly to the things around him.
Suddenly my stomach rumbled loudly, and I could not help but grin at the thought that a humble bodily appetite could also bring you into the present. I turned and dug out another of Javo’s food packages and this time when I offered it, both Maruman and Darga accepted several morsels. I apologised to Gahltha, who gave the equine equivalent of a shrug, saying that he had grazed well that morning.
Tilting my head to drink some of the water from my gourd, I saw light ahead again, but it was too pale and bright to be coming from more of the taint-devouring creatures. We had not gone much further before
I saw that the rift had again opened to the sky. Then Gahltha broke into a trot. I stoppered the gourd hastily, thrusting it into my vest, and caught hold of Gahltha’s mane. Seeing that the ground ahead sloped steeply up, it occurred to me with a thrill of excitement that the crack overhead was not merely an opening, but the way out.
At that moment, Gahltha broke into a canter that seemed horribly dangerous in the confined space, but I knew he was trying to build up momentum enough to reach the opening. I only wished he had warned me so I could have climbed down before he began his ascent but it was too late now.
Feeling the horse strain under me, I began to fear that, despite his great strength, Gahltha would falter. I truly could not imagine what would happen if he began slipping backwards, since it would be impossible for him to turn around. It was with relief that I spotted a narrow shelf of stone jutting out from the wall ahead. I just had time to warn Gahltha and Maruman of what I meant to do before we came level with it and I leapt from the horse’s back to land hard and awkwardly on the shelf. The light was blotted out briefly a moment later and when daylight shone down into the rift again I knew Gahltha had got clear. I dropped to the sloping floor and looked back expecting to see Darga. When he did not appear, I realised the dog must have moved ahead of Gahltha in the rift without my noticing.
I climbed the rest of the way up the slope without difficulty and emerged onto a shallow, sunlit plateau jutting out from low down on the eastern side of the mountain. It was remarkably level, as if it had been chiselled and sanded, though a thick spiky grass grew over it. I could not see far in any direction, for the way was blocked on all sides by the rising slopes of mountains, and in the gaps between them were more mountains. Where the sun fell, the steep inhospitable slopes were brown and green with stubble grass, low scrub and a few small trees that had managed to gain a foothold, but where the sun did not fall, the mountain faces were black and forbidding. I saw no obviously tainted ground but nor did I see any sign of road or path or indeed any level ground at all, save the plateau I stood upon. For a moment, I felt utterly daunted, but then it struck me that Jacob Obernewtyn had been far older than I when he came into the mountains, and in his time, the poisons that tainted them would have been far more virulent than now. I had a momentary vision of an old man, stooped and appalled, gazing at mountains that glowed green and poisonous on all sides, and shuddered, telling myself that it was unlikely he had got very far, even with his Beforetime vessel, and so perhaps I would not have to go far to find Cassandra’s key. Indeed, perhaps once I had done so, Atthis would send her fliers to carry me to the ken. The hope shamed me, for while the birds might also carry Darga and Maruman, Gahltha would have to make his own way. Unless the fliers would simply return me to my companions after my audience with Atthis.
Some impulse made me get to my feet and follow the narrowing plateau back around to the east, wondering if I would be able to catch a final glimpse of Obernewtyn. It narrowed and then ended abruptly, but I had come far enough to be able to see back down the valley. Yet all was hidden by a thick, low blanket of mist that lapped against the encircling mountains like milk in a stony bowl.
‘Better not to look back,’ I muttered aloud and was struck by the thin sound of my voice in the profound silence of the mountains.
I sensed a movement behind me and turned to see Maruman watching me accusingly.
‘Where now?’ I asked, feeling obscurely guilty.
‘It is time to eat and rest,’ the cat sent.
I sighed and followed him back to the rift opening. I removed the web and its burdens from Gahltha so that he could graze and then unfastened the gourd bottle I wore at my belt and offered water to the beasts. Darga refused, saying that he could smell a source of clean running water close by. He padded around to the north where the plateau diminished to little more than a ledge and vanished out of sight. I had just got out some food when he returned, muzzle dripping, to say he had found a pool of clean water fed by a spring.
Gahltha and Maruman went to drink but I went to the edge of the plateau to look down. The slope fell almost perpendicular from the rim of the plateau to murky shadows far below. There would be no climbing down even if I could see clearly what lay below.
‘Better not to look down or back,’ Darga advised, reminding me that he was no less privy to my unshielded thoughts than Maruman and Gahltha. This was what it was like to be a beast among beasts, I thought, kneeling to set out a portion of food for Maruman, and giving another to Darga, who accepted it solemnly. I ate my own share as I pulled my blanket from my pack and spread it on the grass, wondering how it was that humans alone were deaf to the communications of other creatures, save those of us who had the Talent to beastspeak, and even then we heard only what we chose to hear.
Once I had finished eating, I stretched out on the blanket, marvelling again at the flatness of the plateau. I had not been conscious of weariness, but I felt it when I relaxed. The sky overhead was very blue and the touch of the sun on my skin after the chilly darkness of the rift was pleasant, for all there was little real heat in it. It was not yet winter but in the mountains winter came earlier and it would be cold higher up. Indeed, if I had to pass through the high mountains that ran along the centre of the range, I was like to encounter snow and even a brief blizzard would not be out of the question. Was that why Maryon had included a thick hat and woollen gloves?
Darga came to lie along one side of the blanket, and Gahltha returned and went back to grazing. Neither of them appeared to be the least bit concerned about where we were to go next, and I envied them. Try as I might to be content in the moment, my mind strove blindly and furiously backwards and forwards.
There was no sign of Maruman and I wondered if he was hunting. Until the last few years, when his limbs had grown stiff and painful, I knew he had furtively hunted mice and rats and birds at Obernewtyn, despite this being forbidden within its walls, so I had no doubt he would relish hunting in his renewed state. Certainly there was life in the mountains for all its impassive stillness. Even now I could hear the chirruping and scolding of birds higher up the slope above the plateau, and there was the soft whirr of insects in the grass. There would be larger animals dwelling in cracks and niches, birds and mice and lizards, and perhaps rabbits or even foxes and martens. But once we came to tainted ground, there would be little life and what there was of it was likely to be mutated.
In the Land, until recent times, mutated beasts had been slain outright, considered to be marked by Lud’s displeasure, for in those days the Herders had preached that the Great White and all of its afflictions were a punishment imposed on humans by an angry and disappointed Lud. In the early days humans who were mutated had been slain as well, but later they had been seen as a source of slave labour and had been put to work out their lives on Councilfarms. Children with Talents – which had also been considered mutations – were sent to Councilfarms or to institutions where they could work and live out their lives, but they were prevented from breeding.
Even in this age, when it was known that Misfit Talents had existed before the Great White and that such abilities occurred spontaneously for no known reason, there were many who still secretly believed we were abominations who ought to be burned. That attitude would change, Dardelan had once said, when Misfits began to breed children, for those truly afflicted by holocaust poisons could seldom bring forth live babes, and if they did, the children would be terribly deformed. But I doubted that any proof would ever alter the attitudes of those who hated and feared us, though I did believe that in generations to come, that hate would lessen. Or perhaps it was better to say that I hoped so.
I drowsed until the sun shifted and the plateau fell into shadow, then Maruman returned to rouse us. I was puzzled when he set off along the plateau to the north, until I realised he was likely bringing me to the spring to replenish my water, yet to my surprise it did not end, but narrowed into a ledge that ran away around the mountain flank. Aside from the outer edge, which was
broken and uneven as if part of it had fallen away, it was remarkably smooth and level and easily wide enough for us to go along it single file.
We had not gone far along it before we came to a pool of water caught in a natural cupola of stone at knee height in the side of the mountain. The spring that fed it must have been within the cupola, for water was constantly trickling from its lip and running across the ledge giving rise to a bright swathe of slippery green moss. After drinking and filling the gourd bottles, I crossed the slick wet section of the ledge warily, and hurried to join the others. There was a great shadowy gulf between the rank of the mountains that capped the valley of Obernewtyn and the next rank, but where the sun fell on the upper southern slopes, I could see grass and stunted bushes. There were barren stony places, but I saw no sign of the dead black or paste white swathes that would indicate tainted ground. It struck me that for all that the mountains this side of the range were steeper and stonier than in the west, they were less tainted. Certainly Gahltha had not allowed me to drink from any of the streams I had seen when he brought me down from the mountains following Atthis’s directions. If this side of the mountains had been less affected by Beforetime poisons, it might very well be that Jacob’s instruments had led him east, no matter where he had entered the mountains.
The ledge continued around the mountain until we were effectively moving west. It remained flat and smooth, though the mountainside itself grew ever more steep until it seemed that I was walking along the side of a cliff. It was dark and somewhat slippery, too, for being north facing, no direct sunlight would ever reach it, yet it was a far easier passage than I had expected. When the mountain curved around so the sun warmed us briefly, I was startled by the difference between walking in sunlight and in shadow and called a brief halt. Maruman did not object, though he would not let us stop for long. As we set off again, I wished we might cross to the southern slopes, where the sun fell in broad bright stripes, lighting up great stretches of yellow needlegrass or brown-tinged moss. But aside from the fact that there was no ledge to serve as a path, there was no way to get across the great dark chasm between the first rank of mountains and the second. As if to mock our stolid, careful progress, two wide-winged birds swooped into the chasm, dropping down like stones into the darkness and rising again into the sunlight to soar high overhead. Seeing Maruman watching them, his tail lashing, I was reminded of the first time I had communicated with him at Kinraide. He had been stalking a bird then, too, and I had impulsively shouted out a warning to the bird. Maruman had responded by calling me a stupid funaga. That I had heard him had shocked us both. The memory of his outrage made me smile, but I made no comment to him.
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