Catching the scent of water, the Keplian whickered softly, nostrils flaring. The Adept looked down at the flask, then took a deep breath, awareness returning to his gaze. He shook his head, then handed the water back to Lydryth with the ghost of a courtly flourish in the gesture. “You first, my lady,” he said, in that harsh, barely understandable whisper.
Unable to summon breath or wit to argue with him, she did as he bade, feeling the stale, warm liquid trickle down her throat like the finest of chilled wine from a High Lord’s table. Running her tongue over cracked Ups to catch the last drops, she handed the flask to her companion.
But still Alon did not drink.
-“Here, fellow . ..,” he said, tugging the Keplian’s lead so the stallion stood nearly atop him. “You must be thirsty, too….”
Retrieving his leather jerkin, he spread it over his crossed knees so as to make a hollow. Then the Adept cautiously tipped half of the contents of the flask into the makeshift pail. Monso gulped the scant amount noisily. Only after the stallion had licked up all of the moisture did Alon raise the flask to his lips and drink sparingly.
The Adept shook the last drops from the now-empty flask into the jerkin for the stallion; then he crumbled joumeybread for the Keplian to lip up from the garment’s battered surface. Plainly forcing himself, Alon broke off pieces of joumeybread, trying not to open his cracked and bloodied mouth any wider than necessary to eat. Grimly, he chewed and swallowed the morsels. But when he held out a chunk to the songsmith, she shook her head. “I cannot. The joumeybread is too dry.”
“Some fruit, then,” he said, locating the packet Dahaun had packed for them. “You need the strength, Lydryth.”
Too tired to argue, she mouthed and swallowed the overwhelming sweetness of the dried pulp. Eating did little to restore her blighted spirits, but slowly a measure of strength returned to her weary body.
She watched in dull surprise as Alon unstoppered their second flask and poured another generous measure for the horse. When Lydryth made a small, protesting movement, he shook his head. “I have traveled on short rations before. Rationing too severely does more harm than good, my lady. We are better off drinking now, attempting to keep our strength up while a measure of it still remains, rather than saving most of the water until we are too weak to go on.”
Remembering that her father had once told her something of the same thing, the minstrel nodded, accepted the second flask, then drank. “But only if you take more, too,” she said, handing it to her fellow-traveler. At her insistence, he took several more swallows, then stoppered the remainder carefully.
“How far have we come?” she whispered, trying not to move her parched Ups more than necessary to make her voice heard. “How much farther to the end of this place?”
He shrugged grimly. “We have come farther than Yachne would ever have suspected we could,” he said. “Of that I am sure. The way out should lie just over that hill.” He pointed. Lydryth saw that his hand was shaking, despite his effort to steady it.
“What hill?” she whispered.
“You cannot see it?”
“Of course not.” Old anger made her tone sharper than she had intended. “I see only a thicket of dead bushes laced with thorny vines, all of it so interwoven it might as well be a hanging in the great hall of a keep.”
Alon gazed at her speculatively. “The thicket is illusion.”
“I will take your word for it.” The asperity was still there in her voice, though Lydryth was not sure precisely why she felt so nettled with him. Was it the witch’s spell that was causing her to feel such frustration and hopelessness? Or her anger at Alon for leading them into this trap ofYachne’s? She did not know. At his steady, measuring glance, her mouth tightened defiantly and she looked away, studying the vegetation that Alon insisted was not really there.
“Will we feel the vines and thorns?” she whispered, eyeing the sharp, greyish brambles apprehensively. “Or is this illusion one that confuses only the eye?”
“I fear that it is one of the more tangible ones,” he said. “Monso I can blindfold and lead, but you .. .” He shook his head.
“If I try and make my way through that, I will be flayed alive . . .,” she muttered, staring at the vicious thorns. “Perhaps if my eyes were covered, also …” She trailed off with an inquiring glance.
Grimly, he shook his head again. “For you, the illusion is the reality. Whether you see it or not will make but little difference. As long as the false is real within your own mind, you will feel the results.”
“Can we go around?” she glanced at both sides of the thicket.
“Hardly. There”-he pointed to the left of the thicket-“is a scattering of large boulders, crowded so close that a dog would be hard-pressed to thread a way between them, much less something ofMonso’s size. And there”-he indicated the right-“is one of the steaming pools. Can you not smell it?”
Lydryth’s nostrils twitched, then wrinkled. She could definitely detect the noxious fumes that proclaimed the reality of his assertion.
“Is that the only way we can go?” Panic clutched at her mind. Perhaps if she muffled her face and hands with pieces of blanket, and moved very slowly, she could avoid serious injury. . . .
“That is the only true path,” he said. “See for yourself.” Rising to his feet, he muttered softly, then held out both hands. Purple light slowly outlined his fingers, dripped with painful slowness to the ground, where it gathered and coalesced into one of the sinuous arrow-shapes she had seen earlier. The light writhed forward, toward the center thicket, marking their path. But this time it waned quickly, fading almost before she fixed her eyes on it. Alon staggered, gasping, and had to brace himself against Monso’s shoulder. “The marker . . . ,” he muttered hoarsely. “Did you see it?”
“Yes, I saw where it pointed. I will just have to go slowly, I suppose.”
Alon shook his head, teeth clamping onto his torn lower lip as he pushed himself upright. “No,” he said. “That will not work.”
“But I cannot-”
“Yes, you can!” His eyes held hers with a fierceness he had never shown before. “I have neither time nor strength to allow you to cling to your own comforting illusions, Lady,” he rasped. “What you must needs do is break this Seeming for yourself.”
She stared at him blankly. “But I have no Power! You know that!” she protested finally, her voice shrill.
“I know that you believe that you have no Power,” he countered. “And I know also that that belief is what holds you back.”
“Just as your belief that Yachne’s spell is too powerful for you to break is holding you back?” she demanded coldly. “I never took you for a coward, Alon, until now. How dare you lead us into this trap, then blame me for not having abilities I have never possessed?” Her accusation was filled with venom that made him flinch away as though she had actually struck him.
His mouth tightened, his shoulders that had hunched before her bitter anger slowly straightened. “You possess ‘the Gift,’ as you call it, Lydryth. I have known that since the first night we met. I also saw that the truth was too frightening for you to face, so I let you hold to your mistaken belief. But now you must face the truth!”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Lydryth snarled. “The heat has addled your wits!”
“No, it has not. Only your lack of belief in yourself keeps you from seeing through that illusion. Only your lack of belief in your own Power holds us prisoner. Why do you think the witch of Estcarp pursued you so single-mindedly? You have blinded yourself to the truth from fear-but now it is time to face truth-and use the Power within you!”
“No!” she choked, furious at him. “You lie!”
Blind with rage, she lurched to her feet and struck out at him, flailing, kicking, but he avoided her blows, seizing her shoulders in his hands. Whirling her around, he pulled her back against him, gripping her hard. Hands and arms that could curb Monso’s headlong rushes tightened on her flesh and bone, holding her past any ability others to struggle free. Lydryth gasped with the pain. “Look!” he ordered, his mouth so close to her ear that she could hear him clearly, despite the harsh rasp that served him now for a voice. “That thicket is not there! That thicket is the lie! Look well, songsmith, and see past the falsehood to the truth, which is the hillside!”
Unable to break his grip, she subsided, then stared sullenly at the pale grey vegetation. “I see only the thicket,” she muttered.