“That you freed me? What were they taking you back for—judgment?”
“No, I had already been judged, even though I was not there to answer. I think they meant to give me in place of you.”
“Your own people!”
She was communicating more strongly now, with some of her old, firm flow. “Fear is a great governor of minds, Kemoc. I do not know what arguments the enemy may have used. There are very bad things which can be done by them.”
“If the Krogan meant to give you up, then why—”
“Why were Orfons and Obbo attacked? I do not know. Mayhap the Sarn Riders are not of the same mind as those with whom Orias treated. This has always been so, Kemoc; such alliances do not hold long among those of the Shadow. An ally one day is a rival the next.”
“These Sarn Riders, who are they?”
“A force which holds these hills. It is said they follow one of the Great Ones who has not altogether withdrawn from this world, and that their captains take orders from a strange mouth. Wait . . ..”
Now it was she who ordered, and I who lay silent. I could breathe through my tiny root niche, but I was still blind. I could feel her body against mine and it was rigid with sudden tension.
* * *
* * *
X
To WAIT BLIND the coming of danger is to await the fall of a war ax when one stands a captive with bound hands. Orsya’s mind touch was shut off. I thought she used that skill elsewhere, questing for danger, but of that I was not sure. It was all I could do to lie there.
Water splashed, washing me dangerously back and forth in my shallow hiding place. I gasped and choked as it filled my nose unexpectedly. This was no normal rippling of the river. How soon would their steel stab to spit us?
Orsya’s hands fastened on my forearm. Her nails bit into my flesh. I read it as a warning. But still she did not use mind touch. Minutes drew hour long; those threatening waves subsided.
Tentatively my companion made contact: “They are gone, for now. But they will not give up the search.”
“Dare we move?” I did not know how she could be so sure, but that she was, I accepted.
“You cannot take to the river deeps.”
“But you can! Go, then. I am a scout and can easily throw off these bush-beaters.” I tried to make my answer as certain as hers.
“The deeps lie downriver, they know that, and will be waiting.”
“The Thas have left a half-dam above. There are no deeps to hide in there,” I counterwarned. “Will you not have a better chance down than up?”
“You forget—my people also hunt me. Safety only lies where they do not go, where I was heading when they caught me.”
“Where?”
“The river is shallow for a space, where the Thas and the Sarn forced us to a stand, but higher still it narrows and deepens again. Then it takes to underground ways. Wherever waters run the Krogan may go. I do not think the Sarn will follow that way, and while Thas lurk in burrows, still there are places they do not like.” She hesitated. “I have found an old, old way, one made by those before us. There is a spell-laying there, but thin and tattered by the years, so if one is of strong will, one may penetrate it. But to sniff such will send a Thas squealing in flight, for it is a man spell, not one laid in their earth magic, but sealed with fire and air. Nor will the Sarn come, even if they find the gate, because it is guarded by one of the words of power. Of all that lies within I have no knowledge, save that such as we are not forbidden entrance. It will shelter us for a space.”
“Yet upstream and past shallows,” I reminded her. Though she offered me this shelter freely, yet I had Kaththea to think about now.
“It lies in the direction of the Dark Tower.” Her simple answer to my thoughts at first did not make sense. Then I flinched.
“Why do you fear that?” Orsya’s curiosity was as plain to me as my flare of fear must have been to her.
I told her, then, of Loskeetha and her sand reading, and of the three fates she had seen for the ending of my quest.
“Yet I believe that you cannot take any other path,” Orsya replied. “The Dark Tower draws you as if it is a pull-spell. For it is not in you to turn your back upon her whom you seek, not even if you believe such a desertion may save you both. You are too close-knit, one to the other. You shall see the Dark Tower, but thereafter the fate may not lie in Loskeetha’s reading at all. I have heard of her Garden of Stone and whispers concerning her sorcery. But in this land nothing is fixed and certain. For long ago all balances were set swinging this way and that. We can live but one day from dawn to sunset, one night from twilight to first dawn, and what lies ahead can change many times before we reach it.”
“But Loskeetha said—decisions—the smallest decisions—”
“One has to make choices and abide by them. I know this much; any road to the Dark Tower is guarded, not only by things seen, but those unseen. I can offer you one path I believe that Dinzil and his men do not know.”
There was logic in her saying. If that were the heart of Dinzil’s holding, he would treat it to every defense. I could do much worse than accept her offer and go with the river. There would be trouble enough along that watery road to make a man keep his wits sharp, his eyes ever on watch.
We pulled out from under the drift refuge and, for as long as we could, we swam. If the enemy hunted, it was downstream. Orsya took the lead, using each promising overhang of bank, each large boulder or half submerged piece of drift for concealment from which to spy out clear passage beyond. We saw pronghorns come to the water to drink, and that was heartening. For those timid grazers would not seek the open if any men were about.
Finally the water grew too shallow and we must wade instead of swim. It was then that we came to the blood-stained place where Orsya’s people had been attacked. Now it was twilight, gloom thickening into night. I was glad that she could not see, or did not seem to see, those stains and the carcass of the animal.
Night brought no halt as far as my companion was concerned. I was amazed at her energy, for I had thought that her hard usage at the hands of her captors would have left her weakened and not able to keep to such a steady pace.
We were well past the half-dam that the Thas had made, and thereafter I tried to make my ears serve me, since my eyes could not penetrate the shadows. Now we went hand in hand to keep in touch. I heard sounds in plenty and some of them made me tense, since I could not believe they were of the normal night. But they drew no closer to where we crouched listening, and then we would venture on.
Orsya’s prediction was right; the stream began to narrow and the waters arose to our middles. Here and there trails of phosphorescence in the form of bubbles spun in lines.
My companion might be tireless, but I was not. Though I did not like to admit my weakness, I began to believe there was a limit to the number of steps I could continue to take. Perhaps she read my mind; perhaps she was willing to admit that she was also not a thing forged from metal, such as the machines the Kolder used to do their bidding in the old days, but knew the fatigues and aches of flesh and bone.
Her grasp upon my hand brought us into a burrow, such as the one in which we had sheltered on our way back to the Valley. It had not been recently used, for there was no animal taint in it. It was barely large enough for both of us to crowd in very close together.
“Rest now,” she told me. “There is still a long way upstream and I cannot mark my guide points in the night.”
I had not thought I could sleep, but I did. Unlike the night before, my dreams were not haunted, nor could I remember dreaming at all. But I awoke hungry and thirsty. The last of my supplies had gone with the bag I had used as a weapon, and since that happening, now a day away, we had been so constantly on the move, I had forgotten food. Dahaun’s warning would have to be disregarded now.