The travelers began to sit down, bowing under the rush of the wind. Even the Abascar survivors were looking defeated. The hungrier they became, the more their dreamlike delirium faded and their attention became affixed to the urgent, practical work of staying alive.
Batey stood rubbing his mustache with his knuckles and looking down at the ivy leaf. “Some of these leaves are big as bedsheets. They’d make good tents. Or …” He walked down to the shore, then flung the leaf out like a flag over the water. Wind whipped it violently, sucking the length of it toward the tunnel.
He pulled it back, grinning. “Let’s put a raft in the water.”
Three of the Bel Amicans pushed the foremost float out and then climbed aboard while two others held it fast to keep it from floating back across the space they’d covered. Batey climbed onto the raft and gave an edge of the leaf to another passenger. “Hold it tight. Lift it upright. I’ve built enough boats in Bel Amica to know—all you need for a sailboat is water, wind, a raft, and a canvas. Now …” He turned to the waders who held the edge of the raft. “Climb on.”
When the raft began to move against the current, the wind filling the leaf-sail, Batey looked back, eyes flashing bright white and wild. “And that is today’s lesson,” he shouted.
Petch, who had watched all of this with arms crossed, suddenly dropped his skeptical pose, snatched up a glowstone, splashed anxiously into the water, and climbed on the raft with Batey and his five helpers.
The raft picked up speed, and a few moments later it was gone, Petch’s glowstone fading like a spark.
After a stunned silence, the other travelers rushed to the wall to tear at the large ivy leaves.
The ale boy was the last to climb aboard one of the sail-borne rafts. In the tunnel as he lost sight of the gold-lit cavern, he thought he saw something splashing against the current—something like a large hand, its fingers striking the water and paddling hard in pursuit.
The tunnel roared with wind, with the spray of water against the rafts’ leading edges, and with the excited cries of the passengers.
But after the initial thrill of swift progress, there came the fear of what might happen next. Occasionally the ceiling dipped so low that it ripped at their sails.
They sailed for what seemed like several hours, right on through what they assumed was a night. In time they found themselves scudding between banks of terraced earth, where shining eyes watched them, thick as fields of stars.
Irimus Rain saw Kar-balter reach for an arrow. “I wouldn’t do that. If you hit one, the others might be angry. And we don’t know what they’ll do.”
The boy scooped up a handful of water, examining it in his glowstone’s light. “Water’s clearer here. Still too gritty to drink, but better.”
“Look.” Kar-balter folded the sail and handed it to Em-emyt, so the float slowed. “The rafts ahead are moving in to shore.”
Among the crowd on the bank, they faced a sobering realization. “We’ve hit a spot that’s too tight,” said Alysa, a Bel Amican woman who had proven so resilient with an oar that she’d taken turns steering several rafts. “We can’t sail on. The ceiling’s low ahead, and the river’s narrow. But it’s shallow. We can walk.”
“We’re not all here,” said Irimus. “Where are the first and second rafts?”
“They’ve gone on,” said Alysa.
And so the procession moved on, most of them striding forward against the slow and tepid flow. But the weariness proved too much for some, and they lay on the rafts that the line pushed upstream.
The ale boy, too small to walk upright in the current, lay on the foremost raft with all their collected glowstones so he could illuminate their path.
In this stifling vein, they labored on, the sounds of their gasps and groans echoing all around them, loud and close. In time it seemed they were imprisoned in an everlasting travail, and one by one they would stumble, catch one another, and carry each other along. But the Abascar survivors, feeble as they were, began to sing the songs of the night hours. Their harmonies seemed to strengthen them, propelling them like a march-chant for a troop of soldiers.
The songs faded twice at a sound like distant thunder. Dust wafted from the trembling ceiling.
“What was that?” asked Nella Bye. “Earthquake?”
No one had an answer. But each time the flow of the river changed—the first time it quickened and the level rose slightly, and the second it slowed and grew shallower, as if somewhere a great wheel had turned.
“Eat,” whispered Nella Bye.
The ale boy woke to something bitter on his tongue and a circle of blurred faces around his raft, looking at him.
“It’s just some bits of a fish that Cormyk caught.”
“No,” he breathed, closing his eyes. He felt waves of heat wafting through his head and shoulders. “Not yet. Wait.” He tried to call up a face for the name Cormyk. How far had they traveled together without even knowing one another’s names?
“Ale boy.” Irimus Rain’s silver beard wagged over him. “We admire your discernment. And if there were good fish from clean water in front of you, you would be a fool to eat this tasteless meat. But this is what we have. Cormyk was a fisherman in Bel Amica, so he should know if it’s likely to make you sick.”
The fisherman. The ale boy remembered him now. An aging, quiet man whose face still wore the horror he’d suffered in captivity.
“Are there fish for everybody?”
“No,” said Irimus. “We’re passing around the two he caught. Feeding the weakest first.”
The ale boy tried to refuse, but his body worked against him, taking the piece that Nella Bye pushed into his mouth with her thumb. He chewed it, then swallowed and choked. She lifted her cupped hand to his lips. “I strained this through a clean stretch of cloth on my cloak. You need it.”
He swallowed. The water tasted like grass tea at first and then the ferment of an orange peel. He gagged and coughed.
As he came to his senses, he saw that they were moving into a more spacious passage. The exhausted walkers clambered back onto the rafts and argued over who would take up the rowing. But the debates quieted as they looked up in amazement.
Torchlight revealed that the ceiling was thickly webbed, and there was movement in the silvery mesh.
An enormous cavespider slipped out through the milky weave and hung suspended in the space behind the last raft. Its slender, glassy legs twitched as if it were counting the bodies. Then it sprang away out of sight.
When Irimus whispered the news to Nella Bye, her unseeing eyes widened. “Please don’t say any more,” she whispered.
The spider reappeared, scuttling across the water’s surface on the fibrous pincers of its feet. As it did, it drew a thin, almost invisible taut line, just above the water.
“What is it doing?” whispered Irimus. “It almost looks like it’s setting a trap for us.”
“But it’s behind us,” said the boy. Nella Bye shrieked, and they turned.
A smaller spider, this one about the size of a rain canopy, had alighted on the front of their raft. Its body was as big as the ale bottle that the boy had stashed in the travelers’ cargo and just as green and glassy. The glowstones’ light filled its form, highlighting delicate organs that pulsed and twitched. Its eyes were like clusters of purple fish eggs, and its teeth were like little knives that sharpened one another.
Three of its feet were fastened on Nella Bye’s head.
“Don’t move,” the ale boy told her.
Irimus drew out a dagger.
Nella Bye clenched her eyes shut, baring her teeth, and emitted a faint squeal as the spider stroked her brow with the edge of a fibrous foot.
“Is it hurting you?” Irimus asked.
“No,” she squeaked. “It’s … prickly like a thistle.”
The spider made no aggressive moves. It just kept its foot against Nella Bye’s forehead, then prodded lightly at the ragged fabric over her left shoulder.
S
uddenly it released her and skittered around to perch on the back of the raft.
“They’re … they’re not after us,” said the ale boy. “They’re after something else.”
No sooner had he said it than something came swimming aggressively upstream behind them, running right into the low-slung line. It looked like a living tree branch, but it thrashed like a bearcat caught in a trap.
“Another big bug?” asked Kar-balter.
“I don’t think so,” said Irimus.
The travelers watched, horror-stricken, as the captured pursuer became tangled in the line. Its limbs twitched fitfully, and it kicked and fought the web. The more it struggled, the more of its wooden, nine-legged body became glued. Meanwhile, the spiders went to work. Standing on the surface of the water, they spun their thrashing prey, wrapping it in a thick cocoon.
Other cavespiders descended from the ceiling, casting lines across the water behind the rafts.
“More sensible spiders I never have seen,” said Irimus.
“That thing,” said the ale boy, “it’s not welcome on their river.”
“And they’re expecting more,” whispered Irimus. “Let’s go. I’d rather meet more of these spiders than any more of … that.”
Behind them, the spiders left their catch suspended like a trophy.
Weary as he was, the ale boy could not sleep. The spiders and the wooden claw had reminded them all that they were vulnerable and that they had no idea what to expect ahead.
They did not wait long for the next surprise.
“That’s … ice,” gasped Aronakt, pointing to the stream ahead.
“How can there be ice on the river?” asked Irimus Rain. “It isn’t cold enough.”
“It certainly is ice,” said Kar-balter. “An island of ice floating downstream.” The ale boy wanted to rise, but he could not.
He heard a sharp crunch. “I’ve got it with the oar,” Kar-balter shouted.
“Look,” said someone else. “Snow flowers!”
“Those only grow on mountain ice,” said Irimus. “Must have come from far away.”
A moment later Nella Bye held a cupped hand to the ale boy again. “Here you are. Try this.”
He touched his tongue to an ice crystal. The fierce clarity of it shocked him. He took in a mouthful and held it there. His teeth ached, and then his head ached. But the melt that trickled down his throat was immediately invigorating. It was as though wires pulled taut throughout his body relaxed.
“That’s good,” he said. “That’s very good.” He closed his eyes, recognizing a faint scent from Nella Bye’s frosted hands. “We have to keep going.”
17
HOMELESS DREAMERS
ood thing your patrols never found my highwatches.” Cal-raven’s voice came from the darkling branches above. Then he landed hard, his boots stamping deep impressions in soft, loose soil. “Without them, we’d go hungry.”
Ryllion woke, jittery, the evening around him a blur. “Food?”
Cal-raven tossed him a leather pouch. He sat up and leaned against a boulder, dizzy with hunger and punished for lack of something that only the Seers could give him—but what? He feared that he knew the answer.
He loosened the sack’s drawstring, and with a claw he teased out some green nuts and shelled seeds. “How’d you keep pests out of the stash?”
“Made the pouches from gorrel hide.” Cal-raven laughed as Ryllion choked.
While Cal-raven arranged kindling, whispering as if to give the fire an invitation, Ryllion watched him, bewildered. Cal-raven looked more like a merchant fallen on hard times than a king. His red hair had grown long and ragged. His beard was long too, but uneven, revealing deep scars on his face.
What is this man made of? he wondered. He laughs so easily with one who recently plotted to kill him.
He caught a few words, and he knew that Cal-raven was building that new house in his imagination. The thought made him anxious. What chances would he have among stragglers he had mocked and abused? Would they respect their king’s orders? Would Cal-raven keep his promise and give him a chance to make amends? What would happen when House Bel Amica found out?
They won’t shrug and say, ‘Oh, when Ryllion killed Deuneroi, it was just the Seers’ influence.’ They’ll demand justice.
Cal-raven struck a sparkstone, and a yellow flame slithered through the kindling, revealing the low, mossy trunks of the trees.
A brascle called from above. Both men tensed. Any other bird call would have been welcome in this lifeless forest. But brascles meant beastmen. This one was close.
“Where are we?” asked Ryllion. Sick as he was, their days of slow travel in search of the Abascar company’s trail were blurring in his memory.
“Edge of Fraughtenwood, a journey west of the Throanscall.” Cal-raven shook his head. “The last time I was this far north, I was driving beastmen from the site of my father’s folly. He tried to dig a channel from the Throanscall.”
“Why?”
“He wanted streams to flow through Abascar, water to bless my mother’s gardens. But then she ran away. He was humiliated. The dig became something else. A demonstration of control.”
“Is that why your father rejected the Seers’ help? Fear of losing control?”
“He wanted Abascar to provide for itself—food, water, everything—so no one would have to go outside. He once loved the wild, just as he loved my mother. But then the wild took my mother. Losing them both, I think his heart broke twice.”
Ryllion finished the last of the small, stale meal. “You speak as if you cared for them.”
Cal-raven scowled, staring into the flames as moths fluttered about his head like troubling memories. “I think I understand my mother. I cannot put a wall between myself and the wild unless I wish to cut myself in half. I’m also my father’s son. I want to build a house that will shelter my people from harm. I must not repeat their mistakes. I want my people to enjoy all the gifts the Expanse still has to offer, all the things my father and mother denied them for fear or jealousy.”
“There were stories in Bel Amica. I heard your father cast out the teacher you loved.”
“Scharr ben Fray told me tales of the Keeper. How it would crush Cent Regus hordes. How it would carry injured travelers across the Expanse to healing waters. How it would hide from those who sought it but take the most determined believers to a great city of many towers. Bell towers. I would dream of making that journey. I would wake hearing that music. Fourteen shining notes. I’d go out into the forest searching.”
Cal-raven turned to face him, a silhouette against the fire, sparks rushing up behind his head. “You really don’t remember the dreams?”
Ryllion doubled over, groaning with the sense that jaws were grinding up his guts. He seethed until the pain passed, then spoke through clenched teeth. “At the shipyard where my father worked, I fell from a boat’s prow. I seized a piece of driftwood and stayed afloat. I carried it for days after that. It looked like a winged horse with a dragon’s tail. It was only an accident of wood and weather, but it seemed so familiar.” Ryllion felt as if he were setting down his armor in the presence of an enemy. “I gave it a name. Don’t all children name their toys? Decided I would build a boat and place it on the prow. Like a protector. But the foreman of my father’s ship saw it and mocked me. My father stepped between us. And that night he returned from the shipyard with cuts on his face. So he beat me.”
“For that toy?”
“No. With that toy.” A snarl slithered into his voice. “The foreman had punished him for failing to rid me of such childish dreams. The foreman was a man of certainties.” He paused. “It’s strange. The foreman knew my toy looked like the Keeper even though I never said anything.”
“He recognized it.”
“Men make right what’s wrong through strength, my father said. So I pursued strength. And I caught the Seers’ attention. They told me that they could help me become stronger and that my ambition was given t
o me by my moon-spirit. It was my responsibility to fulfill it. So as I grew, I followed their counsel.”
Cal-raven stared intently into the dark. “It isn’t easy to discover that faith has made you a fool. It’s hard to know what to …” He stopped and stood up. “Did you hear something?” He snatched up a piece of kindling and carried its flame to the clearing’s edge.
Ryllion listened. The forest was restless, as if a wind were rising. But there was no wind.
“On a few occasions,” he said, “I’ve seen a shadow in my dreams. It’s a terrible feeling. I wake sensing that the Keeper is angry. Angry that I cast it aside.”
“Then let me quiet your fears.” Cal-raven returned to the fire, drew a second burning brand from the flames, and brought it to Ryllion. “I’ve seen the Keeper. The beast that inspires these dreams and stories is an animal. A beast of bone and blood. It’s magnificent. But it does not grant your wishes. It does not heal wounds. It’s as likely to destroy what you love as it is to tear down what’s in your way. And yet …”
The brascle cried out again, a shrill and angry call, and wheeled away southward.
“And yet the dreams go on,” Cal-raven said softly. “I don’t understand this. But perhaps I’ve been wrong to think that the Keeper is what I’ve been looking for. Perhaps the Keeper was just a lure. A guide. A piece of a greater mystery. Auralia said that the Keeper sent her to Abascar. But what did it send her to do? Show us colors we’d never seen. A glimpse of another world. When I saw them, I felt such longing. I knew I had to find their source. When I find it … that will be Abascar’s new home.”
The fire crackled, one of the wedges of cottonbeard crumbling into ash.
“You’re a fool; it’s true,” whispered Ryllion. “You’ve gambled everything on a dream. And it’s all fallen to pieces. You’re like me. Except that you have something I do not. You have hope. I have none, but if you think you can find help for me … I will go with you.”