“Tell her about th’ horses,” Fian urged.
Jakoby nodded and smiled again. “Dameon will have told you that he taught us what he could of the fingerspeech, but being blind, he could not tell us how to understand beasts. That was Fian’s task, though he warned us he was not very good. Nevertheless, we were able for the first time to communicate with beasts. We had thought them less than humans, but quickly we understood that most are easily equal to humans in intelligence. Our previous treatment of beasts seemed base and terrible in the light of this, and our community changed almost overnight. Ownership of animals is now called slavery in Sador, and I am sure Dameon has told you enough of our past for you to understand our hatred of that trade. Henceforth, horses and their riders are comrades and allies, as equal as man and woman.”
“What about horses who don’t want to be ridden?”
“They need not. But life is difficult in Sador for human and beast alike, and we survive only by our unity. Seeing this, most horses are content to remain among us, as long as they are free to come and go as they please. Even so, some do not choose a rider and have formed a wild pack to defend themselves from the giant cats that prowl the desert.”
“Do they regard the tame horses as traitors?”
Jakoby shrugged. “I do not know enough animal speech to ask such a question, but the wild herd leader has just proposed that all horses run with the herd as foals, then submit themselves to a period of learning with humans, after which they may either choose a rider or return to the herd. We decided we would no longer buy horses from the Land, but the herd leader has asked that, in repayment for the occasional labor of horses, a certain number of enslaved beasts be brought from the greenlands and freed in Sador each season.
“Next year, we will make a treaty of honor with the herd leader. This makes it imperative for us to learn more of the fingerspeech so that there will be no misunderstandings between our kinds.”
“What about other beasts?” Gevan asked.
“We hope to use the fingerspeech with them, too, in time. The kamuli are as wise as horses, but although they prefer to remain among us, they have no wish for closeness and ask only that we use no rein or whip on them and that we do not take their calves from them. We still hunt wild beasts for meat and for leather, but it has been decided that the tribe will hunt only those that are hunters of men and eaters of meat. Of course, we will not hunt beasts that are pregnant or with young. Some beasts are less wise—chickens are nearly brainless, and snakes reject all approaches. There is a sort of desert dog that is completely insane, and the big desert cats refuse to respond.”
There was a clatter at the door, and Kella entered with Katlyn, both bearing laden trays. Gevan made space on a sideboard and helped them lay out bread and cheese, a vegetable slice, and pots of butter and mustard. There were also little pancakes dripping with mountain-clover honey, fruit dumplings dusted with sugar, one of Katlyn’s famous preserved berry pies, and a jug of cream.
Jakoby gazed at the food appreciatively, as Katlyn drew a pottery urn and some mugs from her voluminous apron pockets and poured a measure for the tribeswoman, saying, “ ’Tis a fement brewed by my bondmate, Grufyyd.”
Jakoby studied her so intently that Katlyn’s smile faded. “What is the matter?”
“Nothing is amiss, good woman. I merely saw in your face a flash of another’s. It is my guess that you are the mother of Brydda Llewellyn.”
Katlyn beamed and agreed that she was. She began to press food on the tribeswoman and her silent daughter, telling them how this or that was cooked or baked. She left only after being assured there was enough for twenty people.
After Katlyn had gone, Kella said, “I went to tell the futuretellers we needed some beds made up, but they had them ready. They foresaw—” Without warning, something flew in the open window and crashed into the wall beside her. With an exclamation, she hurried over and picked up the small owl I had seen earlier on her shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” Kella said, tucking the dazed bird into her pocket. “It will follow me in the most exasperating way.”
“You speak to birds?” Bruna asked.
“No,” Kella laughed. “A nest full of these fell out of a tree, and I fed them until they could fend for themselves. The others have all flown away now, but this one will not go.”
“You cannot beastspeak it?” Jakoby asked.
Kella shook her head. “Birds are almost impossible to reach, and in any case, I am not a beastspeaker. I can merely empathise to them a little.”
After everyone had eaten their fill, Kella and Fian took the trays away. Jakoby sat back with a groan and belched loudly. “That was a true feast. These greenlands offer a richer harvest than the deserts.”
Gevan refilled our mugs and insisted on drinking a toast to Sador. Jakoby responded by drinking one to Obernewtyn. They would happily have gone on, but the jug ran out. We talked a little more of beasts in Sador, and Jakoby told me the Battlegames had been modified to ensure animals were not harmed. If they participated, it was of their choosing, and for this service they might ask a boon or payment. Then she spoke of Dameon. “I think he saw the true beauty of the desert more quickly than those whose eyes see only barren white dunes shimmering in the heat. Dwelling among us, he lived with the desert, and that is a powerful thing. Maybe he will not find it easy to leave.”
“We have need of him,” I said.
“I do not doubt it. I have never known anyone so strong and yet so gentle.”
“I don’t look forward to telling everyone that he has not come, truly,” I sighed. “The Empath guild has spent many hours preparing special performances to honor him at our moon fair.”
“Moon fair …” Jakoby frowned. “A celebration of the new moon?”
“No, it is a celebration like the bazaar week after the annual Battlegames,” Bruna said, stifling a yawn. “There is feasting and competitions.…”
“Since we cannot easily or safely attend fairs, we have our own,” I said. “Of course, there are no outside traders or jacks, and competitions are more displays than anything else. But there is feasting and dancing and music and a couple of our own ceremonies.”
“Is it permitted that we remain?”
“We would be glad if you would,” Gevan said, and I could see he was pleased to think of showing his magi to the Sadorian.
“The moon fair will not take place for a few days,” I said. “If Brydda is expecting you …”
“I am in no particular haste,” Jakoby said easily, but her eyes flicked to her daughter. Bruna was fast asleep, curled like a long, thin cat into the side of a deep armchair. All of the haughtiness had gone out of her, and she looked vulnerable and little more than a child with her fingers curled under her cheek.
“I cannot say as much for my daughter,” Jakoby sighed. “It was her suggestion that I should travel in person both here and to Sutrium. She then asked if she could accompany me, to ‘learn more of the barbarian customs of Landfolk.’ She also professed to be curious to see Obernewtyn with her own eyes, and well she might be, for Dameon has told us much that is fascinating about this valley.
“But underneath all of these fine-sounding reasons, Bruna hungers to see Bodera’s son, Dardelan. When they first met, she called him a pale, soft boy more like to a woman than a man, but I think her harsh talk against him hid a sweet barb that he had set in her the first time she beheld him. She would like to tear it out of her, my little wildcat, but such a barb is not easily removed. I think she comes to the Land to show herself Dardelan is unworthy of her, but under that she longs to see him. But if he can love her, what then? Her spirit belongs to the desert, but he must take his father’s place in the Land. No matter what comes of this journey, I fear Bruna will suffer … and perhaps Dardelan, too.”
She sighed again, and I thought that for all she was an accomplished warrior and tribal leader, she was also a worried mother.
She rose then and asked where they were to sleep.
/> I took her cue and said I would show her. Gevan rose, too, and bid the Sadorian farewell. When Gevan had gone, Jakoby bent to touch Bruna’s cheek. The girl woke instantly, reaching instinctively for her knife.
“Come, child,” Jakoby said firmly. “We have yet to bathe before we can sleep.”
I conducted them to the chamber that had been prepared for them and showed them where the nearby bathing room was. The barrels of water steamed, and Jakoby sighed in pleasure at the sight.
“So much water!”
I had barely taken off my boots in my own chamber when Ceirwan arrived. “I sensed ye were awake, an’ I had to tell ye.”
“What?”
He grinned, his eyes alight. “One of those two Sadorian men with Jakoby says he is betrothed to Miryum.”
“Oh dear,” I said, remembering Miryum knocking a Sadorian warrior to the ground because she thought he was making fun of her when he had actually been proposing. The tribesman had later presented her with two horses, and Jakoby had broken the news to us that, by accepting them, the stocky coercer had unknowingly accepted an offer of bonding.
Ceirwan giggled. “I can’t wait to see her face.”
I was less amused. “Did he bring the horses he gifted her?”
“Zidon an’ Faraf. Yes. They both asked to see Innle, an’ Alad started tellin’ them ye were nowt th’ Innle out of beastlegend, but they seemed to ken ye in reality.”
I nodded and quickly changed the subject by asking Ceirwan to announce the news of Dameon’s delay at midmeal.
Ceirwan sighed. “I might have guessed I would end up havin’ to break th’ news. Ye ken that in th’ Beforetime, they killed messengers bringin’ unwelcome tidings.”
“That sounds very shortsighted,” I said.
The guilden yawned widely. “Well, it is late, an’ I am weary.”
On the verge of sleep once he had gone, I heard a scratching at my door and Maruman’s mental demand to be let in. He was indignant because as he’d slept on Dragon’s bed, Kella’s owlet had landed on his tail and had tried to carry it off, apparently thinking it was some variety of furry worm.
Suppressing laughter, I patted the bed invitingly. “I missed you today.”
That was the nearest I dared come to questioning him about his visits to the Healer hall, but he made no attempt to explain himself. I had known him too long to try asking again and merely shifted over to give him room. The old cat leapt up and coiled himself into the curve of my hip; at the same time, his mind cuddled to mine, ignoring my mindshield.
I lay listening to him snore until I, too, slept.
I was walking through the maze, but it was different—made from some bitter-smelling hedge mounted up on a frame. The mountains in the distance were too steep and jagged to be the mountains ranged about Obernewtyn. Nevertheless, I was trying to get through the maze, because I wanted to look at the doors of Obernewtyn, although a part of me knew they had been destroyed.
Maruman appeared beside me, swishing his tail and yawning to show off his fangs. Muscles rippled along his flank, and the saber markings on his tawny coat gleamed. “You can see the doors if you want,” he sent languidly. “They exist still on the dreamtrails.”
“Shhh,” I hissed, for now I could hear a woman’s voice beyond the hedge wall.
Maruman gave an offended growl and faded.
“… can’t explain why,” the woman said, her words strangely accented. “I just feel as if we should go. Something is going to happen here. Something bad.”
“As bad as in Turka?” The voice belonged to a man, and it was sharp with anxiety.
“No. Not that … but something. We need to go somewhere else.”
Suddenly, a nightmarish beast appeared before me, massive and red, tearing through the shrubbery and screaming in fury. Its raking claws barely missed my face as it slashed at me in a swooping pass.
“Beware!” Maruman sent urgently. “It comes again. Wake!”
Instead, I sank and found myself brushing against a memory of walking in the woods with Rushton. It was so pleasant that I allowed myself to be absorbed.
“I love you,” he said, and kissed me long and softly on the lips. Then he drew back and looked at me so intently that I felt shy. “Are you sure you do not mind that I am unable to use my Talent?”
I took his face between my hands and kissed him. “I would not reshape you in another mold, else you would be another person.”
His green eyes glinted. “I hope you will always feel that way.”
Always, I thought, wondering dreamily what it meant for mortal creatures to use such a word.
There was a screaming cry, and the great taloned beast dropped suddenly from the clear sky and plunged toward us.
“Wake!” Maruman sent.
“Look out!” I screamed at Rushton. I threw myself to the ground, but Rushton did not, and the thing lashed out at him before flying away.
I stared up in horror at his bloodied arm. Rushton swayed and fell to the ground. I had started toward him when Maruman leapt between us in his tyger form.
“Let me go to him!” I screamed.
“He is a dream, but the beast is not. Wake!”
The beast uttered its chilling cry, then plunged, claws outstretched.
Again I sank instinctively, only to find myself drifting in darkness.
I heard a roaring sound and the unearthly singing that told me I was deep enough inside my own mind to hear the mindstream and to feel its pull. I waited passively for its magnetism to equalize with the desire of my mind to rise to consciousness, knowing that I would then not go up or down without exerting will. I did not fear the beast would follow, for it could not do so without risking its own destruction. Perilous safety, though, for the mindstream’s lure was so powerful as to tempt me to succumb to its call.
Below, I could now see its silvery flicker. Abubble detached itself from the roiling surface and floated up toward me.
I had no hope of avoiding the memory it contained, and all at once I was in a strange, noisy machine speeding above the earth. There was a young girl in it and beside her a man. I had done enough reading to recognize that they wore Beforetime garb, even if the flying machine they rode in had not made it clear that I was seeing into the past. In front of them was a third man with a strange contraption on his head. He was peering intently out of the bubble that separated us from the air, touching this dial or button. I guessed he was directing the course of the machine. Outside, the sky was very blue and clear, and the sun shone down on a mountainous terrain.
“You can’t afford to get mixed up with Tiban fanatics,” the man said.
The girl responded hotly. “The Chinon Empire—”
“Have closed themselves off, and they are no concern of ours. That is their choice.”
“It wasn’t the choice of Tiba to be swallowed up by them. But you don’t care about that, do you? You’re like everyone else who doesn’t care what atrocities the Chinon Empire commits, as long as you don’t have to witness them,” the girl said with cold fury.
“I’m afraid I’m not a schoolgirl with the leisure to go on peace marches. I can’t do anything about what happened hundreds of years ago in Chinon. I am simply doing what I can in practical terms to stop the world from destroying itself.”
“Helping to stabilize the balance of terror?” the girl muttered scathingly. “What sort of solution is that? The weapons industry must be beside itself with joy.”
“The weapons industry has nothing to do with it. A balance of terror crosses all ideological and religious boundaries. It is the only thing no one can argue with.”
“What about these accidents that everyone knows are not accidents?”
The man’s face developed a closed look. “You know perfectly well my people have been asked to prepare a program that will eradicate the possibility of such accidents. The Guardian program will have access to all world information sources, and it will be able to evaluate danger swiftly and without bias
. If it deems that one country has aggressed on another, it will activate the Balance of Terror unit, and BOT will retaliate, targeting the perpetrators without any country having to make the decision.”
“Eye for an eye? What if your precious Guardian makes a mistake?”
“It is far less likely to make a mistake than a human being.”
“That’s not an answer. And if the Uropan government is designing the computer, it will think as a Uropan would, so it will still be biased.”
“The program developers are of all nations, including Gadfia and Chinon, and it has been designed to evaluate and take into account the varying cultural differences. In a sense, the Guardian program will be the very first world citizen. Not only that, but it is also capable of learning, and as time goes on, it will continue to grow and mature. It will be the most sophisticated program ever created, and it will be a buffer between humans and the BOT retaliation unit.”
“I suppose it will walk on water as well.”
The man gave her an exasperated look. “The World Council believes that Guardian and BOT will protect us from human greed and stupidity.”
“Nothing can save us from that.…” There was a note of sorrow in the girl’s voice, and the older man seemed taken aback.
“Cassy, is it so bad to spend the summer at the institute? The mountains in Old Scotia are very beautiful once you are accustomed to the bareness of them. We can spend some time together hiking, and you can do some sketching.…”
“Sure thing,” the girl broke in bitterly. “Only you’ll be too busy directing your precious projects. What is it you’re researching there, anyway? It’s not just this Guardian thing. What’s with those weird red birds?”
A shutter closed over his eyes. “Forget the birds. You shouldn’t have seen them.”
“I suppose you’re doing some sort of disgusting experiments, dissecting the poor things or spraying perfume in their eyes.”
“Don’t be absurd. The institute is not a cosmetic laboratory. As far as I know, the birds are part of a genetic research program.”
The girl crossed her arms. “Why can’t I go to Mericanda with my friends?”