underestimated Chamdar by more than a little.
In the years following what happened at Annath, father, my uncles
and I have pieced together Chamdar’s movements during the fourth
decade of the fifty-fourth century. Father in particular became almost
obsessed with the project and he was the one who finally verified
Chamdar’s involvement in what happened to Darral. He happened
across a talkative old fellow in one of those rowdy taverns in Muros
who, after some prodding, dredged up an incident out of a nearly
dormant memory. He recalled that a Murgo matching Chamdar’s
description had been asking for directions to Annath in 5349 ~ ‘On
accounta that wuz th’ same year my old ox, Butter, died. Calt him
Butter ‘cuz he wuz alluz buttin’ his head aginst me.’
At some point in his shady past my father had developed the
knack of winnowing not only thoughts, but also images, out of
other men’s minds, and so when the somewhat tipsy old fellow
remembered the incident, father was able to recognize Chamdar
from his informant’s rather blurred recollection. Chamdar had
passed through Muros in 5349, and he had been looking for Annath
just before Darral had been killed. I wouldn’t want to have to pursue
our case against Chamdar in a court of law, but it had never been
our intention to take him before a magistrate. We had quicker, more
certain ways to obtain justice.
Anyway, after I’d confirmed Ildera’s pregnancy, we talked things
over with Geran, and we decided not to try to keep it a secret from
Alara. As it turned out, the news that she was about to become a
grandmother made Alara very happy, and if things had turned out
differently, it might even have restored her to sanity.
It was quiet in Annath that spring and summer. The menfolk
went to work in the quarry every morning, and the women cooked,
cleaned, washed clothes, and gossiped. Ildera bloomed – slowly of
course – and she frequently gave vent to the pregnant woman’s
universal complaint, ‘Why does this have to take so long?’ All in
all, it was a fairly normal pregnancy.
I thought things over frequently during the late spring and early
summer, and I decided that after the baby was born, our family
should probably move again. We’d been in Annath for twenty years
now, and even though Annath was isolated, I felt that it wouldn’t
be a good idea for us to remain there much longer. I ran through
My mental catalogue of all the towns and villages in Sendaria,
crossing out all the places where I’d previously lived, since local folklore
will cling to incidents that took place generations ago. I definitely
didn’t want to run across someone who might be able to dredge
certain memories out of the long gone past. All it takes sometimes
is for some idler to say to his friends, ‘Have you noticed how much
she looks like that lady they say lived over on Shadylane about
three hundred years ago?’ and my secret’s out. Ultimately, I settled
on the town of Wala, some miles to the south of the main road
between Muros and Camaar. I hadn’t lived in southern Sendaria for
centuries, and Wala was a fairly new town, founded less than two
hundred years ago.
To avoid any possible discovery, the twins and I relied rather
heavily on the members of Ildera’s clan to carry messages back and
forth to each other. When there are unfriendly ears about, it’s not
a good idea to shout – figuratively speaking – back and forth. It
was late summer when a horsehide clad Algar brought me a letter
from them advising me that they’d finally located my father.
Actually, I believe it was Mandorallen who tracked him down and gave
him the message that ‘a certain kinswoman of thine is with child’.
Mandorallen’s the perfect one to carry a message like that, since he
wouldn’t even think of trying to puzzle out what it meant.
Father immediately returned to the Vale, but – wisely, I thought
– decided not to come to Annath. We didn’t know where Chamdar
was, and father didn’t want to lead him right to me and my family.
Instead, father went off to central Sendaria and started thrashing
around in order to attract Chamdar’s attention.
It was late autumn when Alara’s condition took a turn for the
worse. All during the spring and summer, she’d been so caught up
in the progress of Ildera’s pregnancy that she’d seemed at times
almost normal. Then as the leaves began to turn, she quite suddenly
developed a fixation that Darral was lost somewhere in the
surrounding mountains. I know now who it was who’d implanted that
fixation, but at the time it totally baffled me. I simply couldn’t let
her out of my sight for a moment. The minute I turned my back,
she was gone. I frequently – after hours of searching – found her
wandering aimlessly in the surrounding forest, plaintively calling
out her husband’s name. Those pitiful cries tore at my heart, and I
couldn’t bring myself to scold her.
In retrospect, I’ll concede that Chamdar was no ordinary Grolim.
He was extraordinarily skilled at concealing himself. I never once
caught any sense of his presence nor any hint of what he was doing
to Alara’s mind. Moreover, he knew me far better than I was prepared
to admit. He knew, for example, that all it took to send me
off into the surrounding forest was Alara’s absence. Most Grolims
wouldn’t have had any conception of my love for the members of
my family, since love’s an alien concept to the Grolims. Chamdar
not only understood it, but he also used it to skillfully pull me out
of Annath at the critical moment.
Winter came early that year. The first heavy snowfall swept across
the mountains before the aspen trees had even finished shedding
their leaves, and that combination always makes for a very cluttered
forest. When a thick, wet snow piles up on unshed leaves, its weight
breaks branches, and it’s very difficult to wade your way through
the resulting brush-pile. After Alara had escaped me a few times, I
gave some thought to throwing caution to the winds and conducting
my searches for her from the air. I firmly set that idea aside, however.
There was no point in announcing my location to Chamdar just to
keep my feet dry.
I’m sure the irony of that didn’t escape you. In essence, I was trying
to hide from somebody who already knew exactly where I was.
Chamdar was playing me like a lute. Every time I think of it, my
blood starts to boil. If I knew how to do it, I’d resurrect him so that
Garion could set fire to him again.
Then about sunset on Erastide eve, Ildera went into false labor. I’m
certain now that Chamdar arranged that as well. A village lady
brought Geran’s urgent summons to me, and I quickly looked in
on Alara. She appeared to be sound asleep, so I carefully reached
into her dozing mind and reinforced that sleep. Then I gathered up
my instruments and went on down to the other end of town to
deliver the newest member of my family.
Ildera’s false labor continued for several hours, and then her
contractions and labor pains diminished.
‘What’s wrong, Aunt Pol?’ Geran demanded, his voice a little
shrill.
‘Nothing’s wrong, Geran,’ I assured him. ‘This happens all the
time. Ildera’s just not quite ready yet, that’s all.’
‘You mean she’s practicing?’
I’d never heard it put quite that way before, and it struck me as
enormously funny.
Geran was a bit offended by my laughter, however.
‘She’s just fine, Geran,’ I assured him. ‘This is what midwives call
“false labor”. It happens so often that there’s even a name for it.
The real thing will come along in the next day or so. She’ll sleep
now, and you might as well do the same thing. Nothing’s going to
happen for a while.’
Then I closed up my bag and trudged back up through the snow
to my own house.
And Alara wasn’t there when I returned.
I should have realized at that point that Chamdar had broken my
grip on Alara’s mind. Nobody wakes up after I tell him to sleep until
I’m ready for him to wake up.
It had been quite cold for a week or more, but there hadn’t been
any fresh snow, so the village itself and all the surrounding area
was criss-crossed with footprints that went off in all directions. I
concentrated my search to the north, the direction Alara had usually
taken on those futile quests of hers, but once again, Chamdar was
ahead of me. This time, she went south. Although it was dangerous,
I sent out brief spurts of searching thought, but I still couldn’t find
her. That seemed very odd to me. I kept ranging back and forth in