“I just came to see our Traveler here,” the woman said, staring into Wataru’s eyes so intently that he became embarrassed. “Tell me, how is Wayfinder Lau?”
Wataru was taken aback. “Huh? What? You know him?”
“For nigh well eight hundred years now. That one couldn’t call a bolt of lightning to save his life back in the day. I do hope his spellcraft has improved?”
Wataru smiled. “Sorry, I can’t say I saw him cast any spells.”
“So you’ve come to see the Goddess, eh?” Granny continued. “But have you thought of what you’ll do if you can’t see her?”
“Well…” Wataru looked at Kee Keema, who was also squirming uncomfortably. “I guess I never considered the possibility.”
It was an honest answer. The old woman snorted. “Then I’ve nothing else to ask you.”
And with that, she left the tent. Wataru blinked, and Bubuho smiled wryly. “My apologies. You’d be a bit cranky too if you were her age.” He turned back to Wataru. “I’ve heard the Traveler’s journey is a difficult one. Now, as you know, Meena is a girl with a special past and a unique destiny of her own. Take her along with you, and your journey may become more difficult still. She told you of Sigdora, yes?”
“Yes, she did.”
“And still you will take her?”
“I will,” Wataru said, nodding firmly. “I don’t know if traveling with me will help Meena find her parents again, but I think we will be able to help each other on our travels, at least.”
“Then I have nothing else to say.” Bubuho smiled gently. “Please, rest until rehearsal begins. The other members want to meet you, I’m sure. You’re free to go about as you wish.”
Wataru and Kee Keema took the opportunity to look around and talk to various circus members. In total there were about fifty people in the circus, and they learned several things: that the Elenora in the circus’s full name was the troupe leader’s deceased wife, and that their show on the lakeshore had been delayed on account of the wildfire.
“The hot winds blew even up here, and the waves on the lake were so bad we could barely go out in a boat, let alone set up our stage.”
Kee Keema had already become fast friends with the waterkin in the circus, and he spent his time practicing their staff-tricks. While they ran about hooting and hollering, waving wooden swords shaped like spears, Wataru continued walking through the camp, asking if anyone had seen, by the lake or in the woods, a little sorcerer in black robes. No one had noticed a thing.
The sun had set when rehearsals finally began. The stage was lit and stars were twinkling in the sky. Music started and dancers appeared, singing the song heard earlier in the day. Wataru was enchanted. It was a show just for two, and he loved every moment of it.
Though she must have been out of practice, Meena was the headliner of the show. In bright-colored clothes she leapt from swing to swing, high above the stage, flitting with light grace, twisting in midair, catching herself just when you thought she was going to fall, and striking a pose for the crowd. Wataru’s palms were sweating as he watched the performance. But when Meena landed safely in the spotlight, he clapped until his hands were sore.
Wataru began to wonder if Meena wouldn’t really be more happy here with the circus than traveling with him.
Still, her past must drive her to find out the truth. Wataru wondered how he would feel in her position. He turned the question over in his mind as he lay down in his tent, still excited from the show. Finally, with stars watching over him, Wataru fell asleep.
About that time, Bubuho returned to his tent to find Granny waiting for him. “Something the matter?” he asked.
The old woman stood staring up at the night sky. Then she raised her arm, and pointed. “See that, Bubuho?”
Bubuho looked up. The starry sky was beautiful, like fragments of jewels scattered on lacquer-black silk.
“Which star do you mean, Granny?”
She looked up again and sighed. “So you can’t see it.”
Bubuho walked over and stood next to her.
“Then it’s the Fellstar of the North, for sure. I can see it. It’s not a trick of my aging eyes.” She sounded somehow sad. “That Traveler is the Half. The Fellstar has come to tell us this.”
“Ah,” Bubuho said quietly. “Then I hope no harm will come to Meena.”
Granny made no reply. She merely stood, staring up at the northern sky.
Chapter 15
The Camp
The road to Lyris wove its way through thick woods, across mountain passes, and over jumbled rocky ravines. It seemed that every hour brought them into new terrain. The Vision landscape was beautiful, severe, and a bit unfriendly to travelers, Wataru thought. Just like it is in my world.
Often they would come upon small villages that didn’t provide lodging. On those nights they were forced to pitch a tent and camp outdoors. Kee Keema taught Wataru how to do everything: pick a campsite, make a fire, fish for food in the rivers and ponds, and gather edible berries and mushrooms from the forest. Tagging along, Meena was also curious about learning these things. But when it came time to cook, the kitkin didn’t need any schooling. She was a hundred times better at preparing meals than Kee Keema.
In his travels across the southern continent, Kee Keema had walked many lands, and knew many of the towns and villages they came to. But Wataru was surprised to hear that he had not yet made the trip to Lyris.
“Lyris has a shipping guild of its own, so they have little business with us darbaba drivers. They need specially made carts and containers for importing and exporting goods and services. Plus, they have their own specific way of doing things. I’ve passed by the area many a time, but never had a chance to visit.”
It was, he learned, a village of craftsmen. They trafficked in metal, stone, wood, and leather to make all sorts of things. The design and quality of their craftsmanship was legend—and all of it made not by magic but by hardworking hands.
Their wares were known even in the north thanks to sailship merchants. In faraway lands, the necklaces and rings they made fetched ten times the local price. For the past several years, the most coveted of these items were a series of baubles called Heaven, made by a master craftsman known as Toni Fanlon.
“Seems it’s sparked a bit of a craze up north. A sailship merchant friend of mine asked me to drop in on Fanlon’s workshop should I ever go near the place. Apparently, he crafts ’em all by hand, so that means there’s only ten or so made a year. You have to be very lucky to get your hands on one of those.”
“Can’t you reserve one in advance?” Meena asked, gently swaying back and forth in the cart behind them. She seemed quite interested in them herself.
“Out of the question. Apparently, this Fanlon fellow’s not much for customer service.”
He sold his works only to people he had met, and liked, Kee Keema explained. “You can bring all the money you want, and if he doesn’t like you, he won’t sell you a thing. Of course, if he gets along with you well, he’ll charge you only the cost of materials. They say he even sometimes gives stuff away for free.”
“Odd fellow,” Meena said, sniffing.
While the two talked, Wataru was thinking. If Lyris traded in beautiful crafts, they would need lots of rare metals and jewels. Maybe someone there would know something of the second gemstone Wataru needed to find. It made even more sense, when he considered that Mitsuru was said to have gone to Lyris ahead of him.
Was Mitsuru on a quest to find the gemstones too? But didn’t he already have a gem—the one on the end of his black staff—with enough power to quench the wildfire in Maquiba?
When they were no more than a day’s journey distant from Lyris, they encountered their first accident on the road. A large cart drawn by two darbabas had tipped over, spilling a great load of rock salt. The mess would have to be removed by hand, then the cart would have to be moved out of the way before anyone could pass. The men there couldn’t say how long it would take,
and until it was done, no one could go farther.
A short distance ahead was the border for both Sasaya and Bog. At the checkpoint gate, officials observed travelers as they passed from one land to the other. The United Southern Nations valued the independence of each of its lands, but times were peaceful, and there was little hassle involved with passing between any of the four countries. This policy was what made it possible for drivers and merchants like Kee Keema to travel all through the south. The gates’ only duties were to record the number of people who passed, and make sure that the contents of each cart matched the writ the driver carried.
They decided that rather than wander aimlessly around while they waited for the road to clear, they might as well help with the cleanup. As such, they were all working and sweating in the noontime sun, when two officials flew down from the gate. They set up a desk in a small teahouse to the side of the road, and announced that they would proceed with the gate-passing formalities to help expedite congestion after the road was clear. It was such a reasonable suggestion that Wataru was rather surprised.
“I can’t imagine any official in the real world being this thoughtful.”
The officials had actually flown down. They were both karulakin. Wataru immediately remembered being saved by a kindly karulakin during his first visit to Vision.
“What? What are you looking at?” asked the karulakin who was wearing eyeglasses.
“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to stare. I met one of your kind before—that is, one of your people saved me once.”
“Well now, that’s fine, just fine.”
“Ah! Quite good, quite good.”
The two gate officials flapped their wings enthusiastically. They looked pleased. “We always seek to serve the public good, you see. Tell me, what was the nature of your predicament?”
“Ah, um, well, I was attacked by these gimblewolves…”
“Aaah!” the officials shouted. “Gimblewolves!”
“I’ve not had one of those in a long time!”
“Can barely remember the taste!”
“Ach, we should go home more often!”
“No, no, it’s our duty to serve the people!”
“Then we should at least write home and have them send us some gimble-wolf jerky.” The karulakin smacked his lips.
When they walked away from the desk, Kee Keema put a hand to his chest and made a faint gagging noise. “I’d heard the karulakin liked that foul-smelling flesh, but I never imagined it was really true. Makes me ill just to think about it.”
“So the homeland of the karulakin is near the desert where the gimblewolves live?”
“Aye. Up on a rise, at the top of a cliff over the gulch. But many, like these two, leave to become officials. Bird-men have good heads for figures.”
“Say,” Wataru asked. “If I ask you something, would you promise not to get angry?”
“What’s that?”
“What would happen if these karulakin took up transportation, like your kind? Wouldn’t they be pretty stiff competition? I mean, they could fly things anywhere!”
Kee Keema threw back his head and laughed. “Not a worry there. Not even a little. They haven’t the strength to lift much more than a crate. It would take one the whole day to load a cart.”
Kee Keema put a hand to his jaw and struck a pose of exaggerated thought. “The day our livelihood is threatened will be the day a creature shows up that’s faster than a darbaba, doesn’t need care and feeding, and can go just where you tell it to go without you yanking on the reins the whole time. But I’m not worried. The Goddess looks out for her own. She wouldn’t leave us waterkin out in the sun to dry and shrivel up. Everything exists according to her plan. She didn’t make a creature so convenient as that, and I don’t see why she would in the future.”
Wataru nodded and said he was probably right, not voicing the doubt that flashed briefly through his mind.
—But, Kee Keema, there’s something in my world that’s just like the creature you imagined. Except it’s not living. It’s called a machine. Not just machines, but power in general. That was what made Wataru’s world move.
—I wonder what would happen if someone invented machines here in Vision? Or brought them back from my world? The thought didn’t sit well with Wataru for some reason. He shook his head and went back to clearing rock salt off the road.
By evening, a small campground had sprung up by the teahouse. Wataru’s group pitched their tent and traded supplies with their neighbors. They all sat around a common fire, ate, and talked merrily.
The night was growing deep, and just as Wataru began thinking about lying down in his tent, he saw lights from several torches coming down the mountain road from Maquiba toward their makeshift camp.
“Look…” Meena said, stifling a yawn. Everyone turned and peered out into the night. “It’s the Knights of Stengel.”
Pretty soon everyone in the campground joined her in craning their necks, trying to get a better look at the approaching lights. Soon they saw not only the lights, but silvery reflections in breastplates and helms.
“What’re they doing all the way out here?” a merchant next to Wataru muttered. “Looks like their great captain is leading them, no less.”
“What? Captain Ronmel? Here?” said one of the gate officials coming out of the teahouse, flapping his wings. “We must greet him properly!”
“If you’re going to greet anyone properly, shouldn’t you call the master of the teahouse?” the merchant said leisurely, hands in his pockets. “Those bird eyes of yours don’t see well enough to make tea in the dark.”
“Indeed, just as you say!”
There were five Knights in all, one riding up ahead of the others. Their helms covered their faces, but the darbaba upon which they rode wore cloth banners hanging over their foreheads, with five-petal flower designs upon them. Trone had taught him that mark back in Gasara—these were indeed the Knights of Stengel.
The master of the teahouse came running out so fast it appeared he might stumble and roll out into the road. Composing himself, he went to greet the Knights while they were still some distance from the campground. They spoke briefly, and the Knight in the lead and the one sitting directly to his rear left got off their darbabas and approached the camp with the master.
“That one in front, is he Captain Ronmel?” Wataru asked the merchant.
“Aye, that’s right.”
“How can you tell if you can’t see his face?”
“The shape of his helm says enough. Take a closer look. You see how it is formed like a dragon’s head? That’s the helm worn only by the warriors of House Ronmel.”
“You know your stuff.”
The merchant snorted. “I may be a down-on-my-luck merchant now, but a long time ago, I was studying to become a starseer. I even studied in Sasaya for a while, I did. You have to learn your history to study the future, you know.”
Before they came in range of the campfire, the two Knights had taken off their helms. They were both quite tall, each standing at least two heads above the stocky teahouse master.
“We’re the first Lancer Company of the Knights of Stengel,” the one walking in front announced in a loud, clear voice. “I am Captain Ronmel, and this is my lieutenant, Vais. This evening, while we were stopped at the Grandera River crossing house, we heard of the darbaba cart accident here, and how passage along the road was stopped. We came to survey the damage. I know you must all be tired from your day’s work, but we ask a moment of your time to assist in our investigation. We will erect a tent for this purpose—but if there are any injured, tell us now.”
Wataru had expected a stern, authoritative proclamation, but the man was rather polite. Wataru wasn’t the only one surprised. Many of the others around him seemed startled as well. Ordinary people didn’t often have the opportunity to meet a Knight of Stengel, Wataru realized.
Everyone was quick to comply with the request. When the investigation began, the Knights remo
ved not only their helms, but all their armor. This gave them a much more casual look, but they still maintained their stiff posture and spoke with utmost formality.
Wataru’s tent was right next to the tent set up by the Knights. But for some reason, he wasn’t summoned immediately. Those who were interviewed first said they hadn’t been asked anything really difficult. Yet, at the same time, they seemed relieved as they walked back to their own tents.
“Don’t see why Captain Ronmel has to come all the way out here over a darbaba cart flipping,” Kee Keema wondered aloud. Half of his mind was not on the Knights at all but on their team of darbabas. He looked like he was ready to drool as he talked about their fine manes, and wondered how far they could run or whether they were good on the rocks. He would have gone over to examine their hooves if he hadn’t thought it inappropriate.
While they waited, the night slowly passed. Meena was having trouble staying awake and started leaning against Wataru. She looked so comfortable that Wataru soon found himself drifting off too. Suddenly a voice called out, “You three! You’re next.”
It was Lieutenant Vais. Wataru leapt to his feet, but Meena actually leapt through the air, almost reaching the doorway. The lieutenant quickly stepped back, raising his hands.
“I’m so sorry, sir,” Meena hurriedly apologized, blushing. “I didn’t mean to startle you!”
The three obediently followed the lieutenant. They noticed his shoulders shaking slightly, as though he were trying with all his might to keep from laughing.
The Knights’ tent was a small affair, with a folding table set directly in the center. Captain Ronmel was patiently waiting for them. Next to him sat the shortest of the five Knights, holding a pen poised over a large booklet bound on one side. The open page was covered with writing.
“Having a laugh, Vais?” Captain Ronmel asked as the three sat across the table from him. “What sort of spell did you weave to achieve this?” he asked them. “It’s not anyone who can make old stoneheart here crack a smile.”