Snake Heart (6 page)

There was too much brush to see the ground approaching, so the landing startled him. It was surprisingly soft. Despite the distractions, he had managed to slow himself down.

Water trickled past nearby, and mud lay beneath his feet. He had the sense of the ravine only being ten or twenty feet wide at the bottom.

Though moderately pleased that he hadn’t broken any bones, Yanko couldn’t waste time patting himself on the back if he wanted to catch up. He hurried in the direction Dak had gone. He had barely taken five steps when a dark shaped loomed up in front of him. Right away, he sensed that it was Dak, but he still blurted a startled gasp and stumbled back.

“I thought you were farther away,” Yanko said, embarrassed by his reaction.

“I heard you fall.”

“It wasn’t so much a fall as a rapid descent,” Yanko said, not wanting Dak to think he had been so inept as to stumble into the hole after him.

“In Turgonia, we call that a fall.”

Yanko shrugged. “I thought you might need help getting out.”

Dak grunted and turned back the way he had been heading. Clearly, he was overwhelmed by Yanko’s concern.

They headed up the ravine in the opposite direction from which Lakeo had gone. Yanko was tempted to share that Kei had shown him a better way, but reminded himself that he
wanted
Lakeo to arrive first, even if it meant extra trekking in his abused sandals.

He did not intentionally walk slowly—he wasn’t sure why it mattered, but he had a hard time making himself appear more inept than usual in front of Dak—but he also did not point out the spots where the ravine walls were less steep and they might have climbed out. The foliage made it hard to see those walls, or even the creek meandering past beside their feet, but his senses could detect the rough contours of the terrain around them. He created a blue mage light to send ahead of Dak, but he did not make it overly bright.

Now and then, Dak paused, looking upward and listening.

“Where did you send Lakeo?” he asked after one such stop.

You send?
Yanko wasn’t sure if that implied that Dak knew they had been up there whispering about something. Why hadn’t he asked,
where did Lakeo go?

“She’s trying to find a way around the ravine,” Yanko said.

Dak continued on without questioning him. Using his sword, he hacked at foliage choking the way. He hadn’t done that up above, but maybe he wasn’t worried about anyone tracking them through this. Who else would be foolish enough to fall—or rapidly descend—to the bottom of a ravine?

“Looks like we can climb up here.” Dak pointed his sword up a slope that wasn’t as steep as most of them. Numerous roots and branches offered handholds.

With some alarm, Yanko realized that by pushing inland, they should now be in a straight line with the waterfall. He had sent Lakeo on a path that would be easier to navigate, but it was also more roundabout. Dak wiped off his sword, sheathed it, and reached for the first handhold.

“Dak?” Yanko asked, making him pause. “Are you worried about what we’ll do if Minark doesn’t come back?”

“No.” Dak started climbing. Did he know Yanko was trying to delay him, or was he just being his usual, terse Turgonian self?

“Because you think Arayevo will talk him into returning? Or because you think his greed for treasure will prompt him to check and see if we found it?”

Dak was already disappearing up the slope, passing out of the influence of the mage light. Yanko sighed and started climbing too.

“The Kyattese are out here too,” Dak said, his voice drifting down from above, along with dirt that smacked Yanko on the top of his head.

“Your backup plan is to get a ride home with them? Are you sure they would have you?” Even as Yanko asked the questions, he wondered if that truly
was
Dak’s backup plan. What if sailing home with the Kyattese was his primary plan? He hadn’t seemed surprised by the underwater boat’s appearance. Maybe he had instructed the Kyattese to follow the
Falcon’s Flight
.

“Why wouldn’t they have me?” Dak asked.

“Uhm, you’re tall and big. Do you even fit in an underwater boat?”

Dak was too far above him for Yanko to see the look he probably shot down, but he could imagine it.

“Do they not care that you’re Turgonian and from a warrior culture?” Yanko asked, attempting a more serious question. “They seem very... Well, they claim to be pacifists, don’t they?”

“They prefer peace. They’ll fight if you try to take over their islands.” More dirt trickled down. “I see the top.”

Yanko climbed the rest of the way without asking further questions. He would assume that Dak had a way to get home if he found the lodestone. Yanko wished he could assume
he
did.

By the time he reached the top, sweat trickled down Yanko’s spine. He flopped onto a boulder.

“Can we rest for a second?” he asked.

Dak had already started into the trees, but he paused. His face was masked as he gazed back, the mage light just illuminating him. Yanko looked down, trying not to feel like a wimp. He could have continued on, but more than ever, he felt it might be best if Lakeo got there first. What if that underwater boat could go right up the river to the pool and pick up Dak and his shiny new lodestone at the waterfall?

“It’s hard work communicating with tortoises,” Yanko said, feeling the need to make an excuse for his supposed weariness.

“Is it?”

Yanko wasn’t sure whether that question indicated skepticism or if Dak honestly wondered.

“Using the sciences for any extended period of time is, yes.” Yanko dragged his sleeve across his brow, wiping the sweat away. It did not cool off much here at night, not like in his mountain homeland.

Dak kept looking to the west, clearly agitated by the delay.

“What honor do you seek, Dak?” Yanko asked.

“What?”

“When I asked why you wanted to go on this treasure hunt, you told me, ‘You are not the only one who seeks honor.’”

“You have a good memory.”

“Should you sound so gruff and displeased when you give a compliment like that?”

Dak snorted. “Probably not. Nobody’s ever accused me of being tactful.”

“Do you have a father or someone who expects a great deal from you? A father who you’ve never been able to please?” It seemed strange asking someone with gray sprinkled in his hair if his parents’ good opinions still mattered, but Yanko couldn’t imagine that it ever stopped mattering. Maybe one eventually learned not to base one’s life around those opinions. He didn’t know yet.

“My father sits in a rocking chair with his gun, looking out over the orchard and shooting coyotes that come too close to the chicken coop. Sometimes, he shoots people who come too close to
him
. All he expects is to be left alone. He’s not overly concerned about my career anymore.”

“So... you inherited his grumpiness?”

Dak gave him a flat look.

Yanko probably deserved it. “Anymore, you said. Was there a time when he put pressure on you to be something other than what you wished to be?”

“He wanted me to be a soldier. It was all I wanted too.”

“And that’s what you are?”

“Yes.”

Prince Zirabo had implied that Dak was more than that, that he had some political or diplomatic significance. Yanko didn’t disbelieve Dak necessarily, but he doubted he was
only
a soldier. Turgonians had a warrior caste rather than honored families—it was their version of an aristocracy—and their military officers came out of it. At the least, Yanko suspected Dak was one of those people.

“A soldier who seeks honor,” Yanko said, realizing Dak hadn’t answered his original question.

“Yes.”

“I want honor returned to my family, not just because it’s what my father wants, but because over many generations, we earned a place of trust with the government leaders and had a say in major decisions. It’s not right that my mother—that one person destroyed that for us. But I also... Dak, my people are in trouble. If this lodestone could lead us to a new fertile land... I
have
to recover it.” He wasn’t sure why he was still talking, except that he would prefer it if Dak did not fight him over the lodestone. Maybe somehow, he could persuade Dak to look the other way when Yanko took it.

“I’m aware of the trouble of which you speak, but Nuria has been the predominant military power in the world for longer than my people have even had a homeland. I am skeptical that there truly is a lost continent—perhaps there is an island shrouded by magic somewhere—but if there is... Yanko, no other nation wants to see Nuria with more land that could be used to birth more armies, more mages. Turgonia isn’t the only nation that would fight to make sure that doesn’t come to pass.”

Yanko clenched his jaw. He should have valued Dak’s honesty over secrecy and lies, but it was hard to accept the blunt words. “The rest of the world wants to see us starve and for our nation to collapse into civil war?”

“My people would like to see Nuria cease to be a threat. How that happens doesn’t matter, just that it happens.”

“But preferably with great violence and upheaval?” Yanko couldn’t keep the bitterness out of his voice. He remembered being a boy, out in the woods with Great Uncle Lao Zun, and questioning why some loggers targeted the largest and oldest trees in the forest when lesser trunks could just as easily provide timber. His uncle had said that it was human nature to enjoy seeing the mighty fall. At the time, Yanko hadn’t applied it to more than trees.

“It needn’t be,” Dak said, “though powerful nations rarely break up without violence. There’s too much of value that people will fight over.” After a moment’s pause, he added, “It’s unfortunate that you’re caught in the middle. No matter what your father says, this isn’t your war. Generations’ worth of self-centered human beings created the problems in the world that you were born into. Your elders owe you a debt, not the other way around.”

Yanko shook his head. “Sometimes, you’re born with obligations and don’t have a choice—that’s what it means to be
moksu
. It’s not—in my culture, you respect your elders and acknowledge the wisdom that comes from living many years. You don’t get the option to... condemn them. You do what your family needs you to do. There’s no other choice.”

“You always have a choice, Yanko. To pretend you don’t is to make yourself a victim.”

Yanko rubbed the back of his neck, weary from the long day and from the conversation. Perhaps it was time to end it. He didn’t need a Turgonian whispering insidious words in his ear, planting dangerous thoughts.

“You have a choice, Dak? You’re here, dealing with a whiny Nurian kid, entirely because you want to be?”

“Shocking, isn’t it?” Dak offered his hand. “Ready to continue? Someone else was here a week ago, remember. Delays may not work in our favor.”

“Good point.” Yanko shouldn’t be worrying about Dak as competition until they were in the room—or secret waterfall cave—with what they sought. Until then, they had external competition to consider, others who could keep them both from their goal.

Yanko did not need assistance to rise, but he accepted Dak’s hand. They headed into the brush, Dak again leading. Yanko did not try to delay him further, not after that reminder that Sun Dragon might be out there, and that, thanks to his tortoise friend, Yanko now knew that Pey Lu was in the area. What if she also sought the lodestone? If she did, she’d had a week longer to search the island.

After twenty minutes of maneuvering through the rainforest, Dak halted, holding up his hand. Once Yanko stopped, he caught the sound of voices in the distance. Male voices. That meant it wasn’t Lakeo or Arayevo.

“They’re on the beach to the south.” Dak veered from his course, heading toward a rocky summit that rose above the trees.

Yanko hesitated, tempted to veer in the other direction, toward where he believed the pool lay. He wished Kei had stuck with him, but couldn’t blame the bird for avoiding the fall into the ravine. Besides, parrots were supposed to sleep at night. Kei might not reappear until dawn.

Dak moved quickly, almost running, and Yanko decided to follow. He wanted to know who those voices belonged to. Besides, he had Lakeo looking for the pool.

As they scrambled up a black rock slope, the vegetation thinned. The voices disappeared, replaced by the sound of the ocean. They climbed above the treetops, and Dak hunkered low. Feeling exposed, Yanko did the same thing, banging his knees and his sword scabbard on the harsh lava rocks.

The sound of the ocean grew louder, seeming to come from both sides of him now. Dropping to all fours, Dak headed for a cliff. Yanko paused before following, reaching out with his mind to try and get a better feeling for what lay below their peak. The sound of water off to his right wasn’t from the ocean at all, but from a waterfall. The
tortoise’s
waterfall. Yanko could see the pool with his mind, perhaps six hundred feet to the side and a hundred feet below their position.

He bit his lip and looked at Dak’s back. Might he sneak away and look behind the waterfall before Dak caught up?

The sound of voices drifted up again, just audible above the ocean’s roar. Yanko had to know who was out there. He didn’t sense anyone by the pool yet, so there should still be time to investigate it. A quick peek at the beach wouldn’t hurt.

Yanko crawled up to Dak, who now lay flat on his belly as he looked over the cliff. Following his example, Yanko pulled himself up to the edge on his elbows, the rock jabbing into his hipbones.

They had reached the opposite end of the island. A ship was anchored beyond the reef, braving choppier waves. It had a dark hull, and Yanko could barely make it out against the black water. If not for a few lanterns along the railing, he would not have spotted it at all.

Several rowboats had entered a lagoon and were pulled up on the beach. One held a crate or chest with something lumpy leaning against it under a tarp. It was too dark out to see what the cargo was.

There was light farther up on the beach—
mage
light. Yellow and orange orbs floated in the air, highlighting weathered faces. Armed men and women were gathering around a man speaking and gesturing, giving orders. The pale-skinned, red-haired man wore travel clothing with numerous pockets, and he was waving something about. A map? The onlookers had a variety of hair and skin colors and wore a mixed collection of garments that represented the styles of numerous nations. Two of the men wore the orange robes of fire mages, but most looked like they had borrowed their clothes from friends—or enemies. The people reminded Yanko of those in the tortoise’s vision, and he shifted uncomfortably, rocks digging into his belly.