The True Game by Sheri S. Tepper part one

“We were fools, Gamesman, fools. Young and inexperienced and without the sense to save our necks. The chart was false and the salve for my eye was false, and when we had done with both I was blind and we were lost in the Dorbor Range somewhere, so lost we thought we’d never come out again. They’d been Gifters, you see.”

“Gifters?” I murmured.

“Aye. Gifters. Devils in the guise of humankind, generous with gifts which lead only to destruction. Well, we didn’t want to die, not even me, blind as a cave newt. So we worked our way south as best we could. There was stuff to eat enough. We killed mountain zeller and ate berries, and the cliffs were full of springs and streams, so it wasn’t that we hungered. Then we came upon a sizable river running away south. We built ourselves a raft and let the few horses go—poor beasts, they might be living there yet if the pombis didn’t get them—and floated away south.

“Then it was hell, Gamesman, sheer hell for days on end. There were rocks in the river, and falls, and taking the raft apart and hauling it around obstacles and putting it together again. Once or twice my companions spotted smoke off in the woods, but we didn’t dare see who was there for fear it might be Gifters again. We just went on and went on until we came to a long, placid stretch of river, and then we curled up on the raft and slept. I think we may have slept for some days, because when we came to ourselves we were coming to the town of Zebit, some ways south of here.”

“South of here,” I said, puzzled. “Bannerwell is south of here.”

“No, no, Gamesman. Bannerwell is south and a little east. If you go down the west side of the mountains, you’ll come to Zebit, and it is south of here, right enough. The river makes a long curve, so we had floated by Betand in the darkness. The river I speak of flows just west of the city, here, over a low swell of hills.

“Well, they had all had enough exploring to last them a time, and I wanted only to have a Healer do something with my eyes. Those in Zebit said there was nothing they could do, but they recommended a Healer here in Betand who was said to be very powerful. So I bought a small pawnish boy to be my guide, and we crossed the river there at Zebit and found the trail into the mountains and then north to Betand. It was all nonsense about the Healer. She could do no more than the others. So, here I’ve stayed since, evoking small visions in return for a place to sleep or a bite to eat. The end of my great adventure, the only one I am ever to have.”

I shook my head, musing, as he nodded, lost in memory and the flow of his own voice. “So,” I said at last, “you came here from the south.” That didn’t help me at all.

“Oh, you might say so, Gamesman. But I came from the east, you know, and from the north as well. Twas my whole adventure brought me to Betand, and it was in all directions from here.”

“Save west,” I said, suddenly enlightened.”

“True,” he murmured, saddened. “I slept in the west, but I did not see it. Oh, I’ve seen it in visions, the sounds of metal, the green lights, the great defenders.”

Would I had paid him more attention, but I did not. My question had been answered, and I was on fire to be away. So I pressed coins into his hands and left him without hearing what he was going on about. He had come to Betand from every direction except the west, therefore west was the direction I should go. I wondered briefly what guise Mavin had taken to hear the old man’s tale. She may have sat in the same place, buying beer as I had done and listening to him tell the well-rehearsed story. Well. Enough of that and time to be off. I did not even really listen to his tale of the perfidious Gifters. I left the city through the northern gate and would have ridden on at speed save for a voice hailing me from among tents and wains at the side of the road.