Inheritance (42 page)

“How worse?”

The Chert grinned at Lynan. “It could be me walking instead of you.”

It was late at night, and Rendle, tired and fed up from hours arguing with Charion’s quartermaster about supplies for his company, was not in a good mood when Eder opened the flap to his tent and just walked in.

“This had better be good.”

“You have a visitor,” Eder said shortly and moved aside. At first Rendle did not recognize the lumpen shape that entered, even when Eder lit another candle.

“Who…” But then something about the mouth and crooked nose sparked a memory. “Prado?”

“The same,” Jes Prado answered, and without invitation sat himself down on Rendle’s bunk. He was cradling his arm, and his clothes were bloody and torn.

Rendle poured wine into a mug and passed it to Prado. “What happened to you? I wasn’t expecting you for another day, at least. Did you find the prize?”

Prado swallowed the wine in two gulps and held out the mug for more. Rendle obliged.

“We found the prince, all right,” Prado said, his voice rough with exhaustion, “and got him as far as the Barda River. Then we lost him.”

Rendle’s face went as hard as stone, but his voice remained level. “Lost him?”

Prado drunk some more wine, then started retching. Rendle took the mug away from him until he had finished, then handed it back. Prado met his gaze, but turned away when he saw the look in Rendle’s eyes.

“But I know where he’s going,” he said quickly. “We were chased by Kumul and two companions—”

“The crookback and the girl?”

“Aye. We made it to the river just in time and took a barge. The pilot played along for a while, then drove the barge into a clump of jaizru nests.”

Eder blanched; Rendle did not even blink. “And then?”

“The eels killed my two best men and two of my horses. I saw Lynan pushed over the side by the pilot, then the pilot mounted one of the horses and forced it into the river. I saw them being attacked as they made for the bank. More jaizru were flying at the barge. I jumped over the other side, thinking the eels would be too busy with the pilot and the horse. I was mostly right.” He held up his arm to show the wounds he had received. “I have more on my back and neck.”

“And then?” Rendle prodded without a trace of sympathy.

“I reached the bank and collapsed. I don’t know how long I was out for. When I came to, I saw Lynan carrying the pilot away from the river, heading west.”

“What about the horse?”

“I didn’t see its carcass in the river. I think it must have gotten away.”

“And where do you think Lynan is going?”

“The pilot was a Chett,” Prado said. “I think they’ll head for the Oceans of Grass. Where else can the prince go?”

“How did you reach Daavis?”

“I caught another barge upriver. I had to give the pilot the last of my coins.” He finished the wine, but did not dare hold out the mug again.

Rendle and Eder exchanged glances. Eder nodded and left the tent. “Do you think you can ride?” Rendle asked.

“Give me a night’s rest and I’ll—”

“Now,” Rendle said. “We must ride tonight if we’re to make the Algonka Pass in time to intercept the prince. If you are right about Lynan heading for the Oceans of Grass, that is the only way through.”

“How many men will you take?”

“I will take my company, Prado. I’m not going anywhere near the Chetts without plenty of swords to back me up.”

Eder returned. “I’ve sent out the marshals. The company will leave Daavis in small groups and meet four leagues north of the city.”

“Get our tents down,” Rendle ordered. “We won’t be coming back here.” He turned to Prado. “And you come with us. If we capture Lynan, I may forgive you for what you have done. If not…” He poured more wine into Prado’s mug. “… I may sell you to the Chetts.”

The next morning Gudon’s knee seemed no better to Lynan, but the pilot insisted the pain was less. Lynan applied more haethu to both their wounds. They ate a handful of berries they had found nearby and then they set off once more, traversing steep slopes made slippery with loose stones. Lynan discovered the hardest part was not climbing but descending; he had to use all his strength to keep his footing and at the same time concentrate on leading the horse along the firmest ground. The muscles and joints in his legs felt as if they had been so overused he would never walk normally again; and as far as he could see, for all his efforts they were making barely any progress at all. The terrain seemed the same no matter which way he looked. But Gudon, with gentle humor and confidence, continued to give directions and encouragement.

The sky was covered in high clouds which made Lynan feel dreary, and though it made the air cooler, it also made it more humid. They stopped regularly to let both Lynan and the horse rest, and near midday they were lucky to find a gully with trees for extra shade and a brook with water so cold and fresh it helped invigorate them. Gudon actually tried standing without support and managed to walk three paces before Lynan had to help him sit down. “You see, little master, I told you it was healing.”

“I wish it had healed enough for you to lead the horse for a while. It does not like these slopes.”

“Any more than you,” Gudon pointed out.

“How far to the Algonka Pass?”

“We will reach it tomorrow, probably in the morning. The descent to the road will be hard, but once there it is easy going all the way to the Strangers’ Sooq.”

“And how far from the pass to the sooq?”

“Another day.”

Gudon started suddenly and began digging at the base of a tree Lynan had not seen before. “It is rare to find these on this side of the Ufero Mountains,” the Chett said excitedly. He dug until he had exposed enough of the tree’s roots to get a hand around one of them. He pulled twice and the root lifted into the air, then used a small knife he retrieved from a sheath at the back of his shirt to sever it from the main stock. The outer layer peeled off easily, revealing a milky-white core. Gudon cut it in two and passed one half to Lynan.

“We call these gods’ roots,” Gudon said, and bit off a mouthful. “We use it to spice our food.”

Lynan copied him. The flesh was softer than he thought it would be, but very fibrous. At first, he thought its taste seemed sweet, but then he felt the mild tingling along his tongue and down his throat that told him worse was to come. A moment later, he was spitting it out and gulping water from the brook.

“What do you use it to spice? Leather?” Lynan’s tongue and throat felt as if someone had stuck a burning branch down his gullet.

“The Chett use it widely in cooking. If you leave it in the sun for several days, then pound it into a dust and add water to it, you get haethu. If you add a handful of the dust to a pond or river, the fish come belly-up to the surface and are easy to catch. If you rub the juice into your skin, flies and mosquitoes stay away.”

“I’m not surprised.”

“It is the most wondrous of all plants.”

Lynan felt his stomach rumble. He hoped they would soon have more to eat than the occasional handful of nuts and berries.

The clouds disappeared during the afternoon and the heat became another burden for Lynan to bear. Although the slope became less treacherous, the ground was now made up of large rocks rounded by weathering. The horse became increasingly skittish and difficult to handle. Gudon sang to it, which calmed it for a while but also brought a warm wind blowing up and over the mountains from the Lesser Desert.

“One must be careful with the songs,” Gudon said. “There is always a price to pay for using any magic.”

“Apparently,” Lynan said wryly, blinking furiously to keep the sweat out of his eyes. He could feel the skin on his ears and nose starting to burn. “So why did your princess send you to the Barda?”

Gudon did not seem surprised by the question, and he answered without hesitation. “Because it was the mercenaries working out of Hume and Haxus who were the center of the cursed slave trade, and my people were its main victims. They used the Barda River to take us down to Daavis for selling.”

“But that was many years ago.”

“We have a long memory. We keep watch, we listen, we smell the air. We will not let the Slavers arise again and take us as they did before.”

“But the Chetts are famous warriors. Why didn’t you stop them back then?”

“For many centuries the Chetts lived in small tribes of a hundred or so. It doesn’t matter how brave you are if your enemy is three or four times your strength and you have children and cattle to protect. We finally started coming together to make larger tribes, but there were many arguments among the chiefs about who should be in charge. We fought each other as much as we fought the Slavers. In the end the father of my princess won a great battle against other Chetts near a waterhole called the High Sooq, and we started planning to hit back against the enemy.”

“Your army was big enough to take them on?”

“Not in one battle, little master. The Oceans of Grass are very wide and hold more people than any in the east suspect, but not so many to take on the rich lands of Hume or Haxus. But we could raid and harry. In the end, it never came to be.”

“Why?”

Gudon leaned over and tapped Lynan on the shoulder. “Because of your mother and because of your father. She ordered the destruction of the Slavers, and he carried out her command in a great war.”

Lynan blushed. For as long as he could remember, he had been proud of his father’s record as a general, but it had always been a private thing, without real understanding of what Elynd Chisal’s efforts had meant for other people. Lynan blinked with a sudden thought.

“Prado was one of the mercenary captains who worked for the Slavers?”

“Oh, yes. I have never seen him before, but all Chetts know what he looks like, and know his name. I hope the jaizru fed off him.”

“So do I,” Lynan said, touching the wound on his jaw. “So do I.”

“Here!” Ager cried. “Over here!”

Kumul and Jenrosa stopped their search of the ground and joined Ager at the edge of a gully. Ager held up a white misshapen lump.

“Congratulations,” Kumul said. “What is it and what are you going to do with it?”

Ager threw it to Kumul, who caught it and looked at it. “See the tooth marks?”

“They could be from anything—”

“And how the root is cut neatly at one end?”

Kumul looked more closely. “Yes, you’re right.”

“And here,” Ager said pointing to the ground. “They’re hard to see because the ground is so hard, but hoofprints, for sure.”

Jenrosa breathed a sigh of relief. “So Lynan did come this way.”

“Afraid your magic had failed you?” Kumul teased.

“I told you which direction they were traveling,” she said reproachfully.

“Well, now we can be sure where they’re heading,” Ager said quickly, throwing warning glances at them both. The two of them had become short-tempered since losing the tracks they had been following the previous night.

Kumul nodded. “The Algonka Pass.”

“It makes sense. We had always planned to make for the Oceans of Grass, and from here that’s the only route.”

“At least he’s not trying to cross the Lesser Desert.”

“He might have if the pilot he rescued did not know the way,” Ager said.

“Common sense would tell him not to go through the desert,” Kumul scoffed.

“But not how to move along the Ufero Mountains, and not which direction to travel.”

“How long ago were they here?” Jenrosa asked.

“Five hours ago, maybe more.”

“They are pulling ahead of us, despite the injured pilot.”

“That’s because we had to rediscover their trail. Now we know for sure that they are heading for the Algonka Pass, we can make for it directly. We should get there soon after they do.”

“Why not try and get there before them?” Kumul asked. “We could walk through the night.”

“Along this route? I don’t think so, at least not if you want to keep the horses. It’s bad enough in daylight.”

Kumul did not argue the point. “All right, but let’s get moving. The more ground we make up before the sun goes down, the less anxious I’ll be.”

Prado was beginning to wish the jaizru had eaten him. It took the last vestiges of his strength to remain seated on the horse Rendle had given him. The company rode for four hours until the first signs of dawn lit the sky, then rested for half an hour. Rendle sent a surgeon to look at Prado’s wounds and the man applied some foul-smelling ointment that took away some of the pain but none of his exhaustion. They rode all that morning, always keeping the Barda in sight, heading northwest toward the Ufero Mountains and the Algonka Pass. Farmers threatened them when they rode over their fields, and Eder would disdainfully throw each of them a handful of coins. Merchants leading long lines of pack horses and mules would swear at them as the passing column upset their animals and sent huge clouds of dust sweeping into their faces; these Eder ignored.

Rendle ordered a halt again before midday. They ate cold rations of dried-beef-and-yogurt strips. Rendle sent his fastest outriders ahead with orders to locate Lynan and if possible detain him until the main force caught up, or, if they encountered Chetts in any numbers, to ride back with a warning.

The company rode during the worst heat of the day. Eder asked him to ease up, but Rendle ignored him. When horses fell away—blown, lame, dropping from thirst—their riders were left behind to fend as best they could. When the road bent west and came right alongside the Barda, Rendle let the company rest for another half hour while the horses were watered. And then they were off again, the mountains slowly growing in size, their shadows stretching far across the land.

Prado twisted the reins around his hands and somehow hung on. There seemed to be dust everywhere and he wished he could breathe clear air. The reins started to cut into the skin around his fingers, but the pain was nothing to that he was already suffering.

Rendle kept them going until it was too dark to ride. When he called a halt, men fell off their saddles and horses stood shaking and sweating. Rendle went around, not resting himself until he had spoken at least a single word to all his men, encouraging them, bribing them, warning them. When he had finished, campfires were already alight and the horses watered and brushed down. He then stood alone at the end of the camp, staring out toward the mountains as if by sheer will he could make them come to him. Eder joined him after a while with a mug of hot stew. Rendle gulped it down and handed back the mug.