Exile's Challenge (37 page)

“Not Grannach,” the Dreamer said, “but some other.” Across the anxious circle he saw Kahteney staring at him, the Lakanti wakanisha's eyes narrowed as he caught the drift of Morrhyn's thoughts. “Our dreams were clouded, no?”

Kahteney nodded silently.

“And there were Davyd's dreams,” Morrhyn continued.

“I'd no dreams of this,” Davyd said. Then gasped as he, in turn, understood where Morrhyn's thoughts went. “You say the Breakers guide him?”

Almost, he wished he'd not spoken aloud as he saw Arrhyna's face pale, and heard Lhyn's strangled cry, saw Rannach's hands clench tight. But he had dreamed of the invaders, and of soldiers, and of meetings between the People and the Evanderans—and surely, did Taza look to take Debo beyond the mountains, it was a tangible step toward the realization of his dreams. He felt a strange excitement, as if matters
moved toward conclusion, leaving no further room for doubt, but only action; and at the same time he felt very cold and afraid. He looked at Rannach and said, “Must you go into Salvation, you'll need a guide.”

“I go!” Arcole stepped forward. “I know the forests of Salvation as well as Davyd.”

“But you cannot dream of danger, eh?” Davyd smiled forlornly: the Maker knew, but he'd no wish at all to return to Salvation. “And we both bear the exile's brand, so must we go beyond the forests.…” He shrugged. It should be ironic were they to fall back into the hands of the Autarchy.

“You're hurt,” Flysse reminded him. “Your wounds are not full-healed.”

“And it shall be a hard, fast chase,” Arcole echoed. “Can you stay in the saddle? Can you not, then best you remain here.”

Davyd said again what he did not wish to say: “Does this chase continue into Salvation, then shall you not need my guidance?”

Arcole looked to Morrhyn for support, thinking Davyd in poor shape for a desperate pursuit, but the Commacht Dreamer only sighed and shrugged, and said, “Must you go across the mountains, you'll surely need such help as Davyd can give.”

“And do his wounds open,” Arcole demanded, “and he begin to bleed?”

“Then he must turn back,” Morrhyn said. He looked Davyd square in the eyes. “Does that happen, I'd have your word you'll halt.”

Rannach said, impatient, “I'll send men back with him.”

Morrhyn said again, still looking at Davyd, “I'd have your word.”

Davyd had never thought to argue with Morrhyn, but now he said, “And do I not give it?”

A tight smile thinned the wakanisha's lips, perhaps in approval of his protégé's determination. “Then I'll not give you those herbs and medicines that shall sustain you.”

Davyd chuckled bitterly. “Then you've my word.”

“Good,” Morrhyn said, and grasped the young man's wrist. “Listen, I think perhaps it's the Maker's will you go—but
not to your death! Do what you can, but no more, eh? Do those wounds open, then you return here.”

Davyd nodded slowly. “I gave my word, no?”

“Yes, you did,” Morrhyn answered, “and when you come back, we'll conduct those ceremonies that shall make you a true Dreamer.”

“Perhaps.” Davyd met the pale blue gaze unfaltering. “But do I fight? What if I become a warrior?”

“I don't know,” Morrhyn answered honestly. “Had we the time to dream, we might find the answer to that.”

Rannach interrupted. “But we've no time, eh? Davyd, do you come with us, then let's ride. Are all these fears aright, then I'd take Taza before he reaches the mountains.”

“He'll not pass the tunnels,” Colun insisted. “Even does he enter, how shall he escape my Grannach?”

“Is he guided by the Breakers …” Morrhyn shrugged. “… who knows their power?”

“How could they find us?” Kahteney's voice was hoarse, harsh as the planes of his horrified face.

“Perhaps they've not yet; not in Ket-Ta-Thanne, but …” Morrhyn hesitated, looking toward the mountains, a vast, dark bulk against the still-dull sky. “But Chakthi's folk dwell there, and was it the Breakers turned the Tachyn mad, then perhaps there's some communication between them now.”

“Surely not even Chakthi …” Fat Yazte shook a bearlike head. “Surely not even Hadduth …”

“Whether or not, it means nothing!” Rannach turned his head, glowering at each in turn, his patience all run out. “My son is taken and I ride after him.”

Beyond the western egress of the Meeting Ground the terrain rose in a series of thickly wooded ridges and sweeping mountain meadows. None were difficult to negotiate—the hard part would come later, when the true mountains were reached—and Taza made good time, even must he wind his horse. He had three others, after all, and for now it was imperative he stay ahead of the search parties Rannach would doubtless send after him. He sneered at the thought—even did the Matawaye catch him, still he had Debo as a shield,
and all the promises of the voice inside his head. The child gurgled now, settled in a pannier behind Taza's saddle. His initial outrage on waking to find himself carried off on horseback was replaced with pleasure at this unusual turn of events, and he napped and woke and settled down to watch the countryside go by. Taza—guided by the voice—had brought food and drink for the child, and when Debo complained he'd pass him juicy buffalo meat and let the youngling suck on the waterskin he'd filled with milk. It seemed enough, and he was able to feed the boy from the saddle, without stopping: he dared not halt, not with Rannach doubtless blood-raged behind him.

And so, when the paint horse foundered on the rim of a meadow where a steep trail climbed up winding through stands of new-leafed aspen, and stumbled as it reached the grass, its head downhung and lather white all down its chest and legs, he dismounted. Took off his saddle and the pannier holding Debo, and slung them on a white pony taken from Tekah's string. Then he set off again, at the same desperate pace, trusting in the voice to bring him safely through and show him the way past the hills ahead. He had no other choice now.

The paint horse watched him go and made no move to follow.

All the warriors would have gone out with Rannach had he not forbade it, but he elected only fifteen to that pursuit. The rest he urged to patrol the Meeting Ground a day's ride out, and did they find Taza's trail, to bring both Taza and Debo—most definitely Debo—back alive.

Morrhyn was proud of him, for the constraint he showed and the calm he forced on himself as he organized both the hunt and the running of the camp in his absence, more when he counseled Yazte to remain, charged with holding the People in order and to prepare against the possibility of the Breakers.

That word had spread fast, and Morrhyn was largely occupied with assuring the Matawaye that he'd not dreamed of attack, nor was any likely, as Rannach prepared to leave.

Davyd and Arcole rode with him—the assumption tacit between them all that they must perhaps return into Salvation.

“The Maker grant it not be so,” Flysse whispered into Arcole's chest, “but must you—take care, eh?”

“I've you to come back to.” He stroked her hair, wishing he'd no need to go. “So, yes: I'll take care. I'd not lose you, my love.”

Davyd watched as they embraced, and could not help wondering how it should feel to have Flysse's lips on his, to see that look in her eyes. And then she was looking at him, and hugging him, and admonishing him to caution, and he felt only embarrassment and was grateful when Rannach shouted for them to mount and be gone. He climbed limber astride his horse, gritting his teeth as the stitches in his wounds tugged, promising himself he would not succumb, but ignore the pain and go on to whatever lay ahead.

They rode out at a gallop, each man leading two extra mounts. They went as if on a raiding party, save they wore no paint, kitted for hard travel with little food to weigh them down and only their blankets to sleep in. The Matawaye carried bows, knives, and hatchets; Arcole and Davyd brought with them their muskets and a pistol apiece, all the powder and shot they had left. Colun and his Grannach would have come with them, had Morrhyn not pointed out that even the Stone Folk's pace could not match that of a running horse, nor horses easily carry both a warrior's and a Grannach's weight. So the creddan promised to abide awhile on the Meeting Ground and only when all seemed secure return to his mountains.

“But he'll not pass through,” he shouted after them. “Not past my Grannach.”

None heard him: all were intent on the chase.

Night fell, colder on the high ground than in the valley, and Debo set to wailing. Taza halted long enough to wrap a blanket about the child and feed him—chew on a strip of jerky himself—but still the boy complained as they pressed on. The novelty of the ride was gone and he longed now for his
mother, his father, and familiar surroundings. It was a great temptation to abandon him: his cries split the darkness like the howling of a hungry wolf, but the voice had made Taza understand his importance, and so the crippled youth endeavored to block his ears to the screaming and continued his ascent of the foothills.

It seemed he no longer needed to sleep, as if some vast and undeniable energy filled him and drove him on, or he were a chip of metal drawn to a lodestone. He could not—would not!—deny it, but only go where the voice told him, which was onward and upward to his just ascension. He felt no cold as the night grew older and a wind came down off the peaks, but only heated by his ambition, his desire, warmed and comforted by the promises. Neither did he wonder why he no longer heard the voice. He supposed it came in sleep—for which he had no time or need—and would come again when he achieved his goal. He entertained no doubts, but only certainty, and forced his stolen horses on through the darkness and the chill, uncaring.

The searchers found the paint horse around the midpoint of the day. The animal watched them with weary eyes, torn between curiosity and the temptation of the grass. It followed them a little way as they rode off, but then gave up and returned to its cropping.

“He came this way.” Rannach pointed at the tracks. “And he's only three horses now.”

“And killing them,” Dohnse said. “Can he hope to reach the mountains?”

Rannach looked at the crags, bright in the noonday sun, light sparking off granite and snow, and set to transferring his saddle from the wearied black to a fresher roan. “Does he kill them, likely he can.”

“And then go where?” Dohnse asked. “Surely it must be as Colun says—the Grannach shall halt him and hold him.”

“Save it's as Morrhyn fears,” Rannach answered, his voice bleak.

“Think you so? Truly?” Dohnse shaped a sign of warding. “The Breakers come again?”

Rannach sighed. “I'm no Dreamer, brother; and all I know now is that my son is taken—and I'd have him safe back.”

He swung astride the roan and cantered off. The black stallion snorted its protest at the interruption of its grazing and tugged awhile on the rope, then fell into pace behind, drawing a piebald gelding with it.

“Shall we catch him?” Arcole held his musket cradled across his hips. “Have we a chance?”

Davyd answered honestly: “I don't know.”

“But your dreams …” It was difficult to talk, the pace Rannach set, climbing swift as horses and men were able up steep and winding trails that seemed mostly bare stone, galloping wild when the plateaus came, ducking under branches as they charged through stands of timber.

“They told me nothing of this,” Davyd called back. “Only what I've said.”

He was grateful that a dense swath of pine fronted their path and they must fall into single file and duck low to avoid the overhanging branches: Arcole's questions were too hard to answer, too heavy with obligation. He had dreamed, yes—but not of this, nor of where it might lead. He feared all Morrhyn's wonderings were true—surely they appeared commensurate with his dreams—and that Taza
was
somehow in communication with the Breakers, or at the least with the Tachyn beyond the hills.

Save, he thought, the Tachyn could not own such power, and so—he forced himself to contemplate the likelihood of it—it
was
the Breakers' hand in this, somehow reaching out across the worlds to guide Taza.

But to what purpose? That he bring Debo to Chakthi, present the Tachyn akaman with the fruit of his son's assault? Why?

He cursed as a branch struck his face and he swung in the saddle, almost losing his musket. He was not so good a rider as he'd thought, and he was afraid.

The Maker knew, but he was afraid.

There grew in him the certainty that Taza
was
guided, and would find a way through the Grannach tunnels, and would take Debo to Chakthi. And then he—his branded cheek seemed to burn at the prospect—must go back into Salvation,
back into that land of indentured folk and the Autarchy. For a moment fire flashed before his eyes, like the flames consuming a condemned Dreamer. Then he saw it was only the ending of the pine wood, where the trail came out onto a rising slope of green grass struck vivid by the sun, and he laughed for sheer relief.

“You're cheerful.” Arcole came up alongside. Their pace did not slow—neither Rannach nor any others there would allow that. “So tell me, what of your dreams?”

Davyd did not feel cheerful, but he put on a smile and said, “I think the Maker moves us. I think that perhaps all this is somehow a part of my dreaming. To what end, though …”

Arcole saw his comrade's face grow solemn and felt somewhat of that dread Davyd experienced. “To Salvation?” he asked. And when Davyd nodded: “Then it shall be the Maker's will, no? And He'll protect us. God knows, I've already promised Rannach I'll go back.”

“Yes, and I,” Davyd returned, and voiced a silent prayer to the Maker that it not be so, that they catch Taza—at least, rescue Debo—before the mountains.