Again I touched each of them, pulled in the power, and lifted us, sending us down the road as fast as I dared take us, considering I had to make sharp corners and steep hills.
This time I lasted ten minutes before I had to stop. Water and a quick rest got me going again, just as the sun started to set. From what I could tell, we were a long way yet from Baker. It was getting noticeably cooler, which was also helping me.
“Can you keep going?” Tanda asked as I stopped for a second time and sat down on a rock beside the road.
“We’re making good speed,” Aahz said, clearly satisfied with our progress.
“We are,” Tanda said, “but this is hard on Skeeve.”
“I can keep going,” I said, taking one more drink and then standing. “I just need to rest every ten minutes or so.”
“Understandable,” Aahz said. “For someone of your level of skill.”
“For someone of any level,” Tanda said, stepping to my defense. “There’s not much power in this area. He’s having to pull from a ways off.”
“That true?” Aahz asked me.
“It is,” I said. “But I said I can keep going and I can.”
“Then we go when you’re ready,” Aahz said. “We don’t have much light left and we won’t be able to make the speed we are making now at night.”
It was clear we were going to spend a night outside on Kowtow and face what an entire population was afraid to face.
Aahz didn’t seem to be worried.
Tanda had said nothing.
I was just the apprentice. What place was it for me to say anything?
In the west the sun was slowly setting. In the east an almost full moon was starting to come up over the horizon. In a few days the full moon would signal another fear in the people who lived here: the round-up.