Simon Hawke - The Seeker

“She said that she would rather die,” Ryana said.

“I fear she will,” said Sorak. “She has no strength left. She has come this far on pluck alone. And that is no longer enough. She will be dead by nightfall.”

Ryana looked over her shoulder toward the mountains. “Another three or four days’ ride and we would have reached the end of this wasteland.” She sighed with resignation. “If Torian has not long since turned back, he will find only our corpses.”

“We are not dead yet,” said Sorak.

“It will be night soon,” said Ryana, looking toward the mountains. “Up ’til now, Screech has kept us safe by communing with the creatures that approach us, but Screech cannot make water out of stone. And when our bodies fail us, we shall make a fine meal for some hungry beast. It seems the Sage has merely lured us to our deaths.”

There was no reply from Sorak. She turned and saw him sitting cross-legged on the ground beside the princess, who lay motionless, her chest barely moving as she breathed weakly. She looked as if the pallor of death was already stealing over her. Sorak had his eyes closed. He breathed slowly, deeply, and regularly. Then Ryana began to feel warm.

It was a warmth that did not come from the sun, which was already sinking slowly over the horizon. It did not come from the sun-baked rocks, which still felt hot beneath her feet. It did not come from within her.It came from Sorak.

As she watched, she could see heat waves shimmering around him, and his face took on a completely different expression. It was more than merely an apparent change. His mouth, which usually looked harsh and cruel and sensual, had softened, and his lips appeared more full. His normally dour expression became beatific and serene. And when he opened his eyes and looked at her, she saw that the color of his irises had changed from dark brown to an azure blue.

“Kether,” Ryana said softly.

He reached out his hand to her. She took it and felt revitalizing warmth flowing into her. She closed her eyes as the energy surged through her arms.

Then, still holding her hand, Kether reached out and lightly placed the fingertips of his other hand on Korahna’s forehead. The princess parted her lips and breathed in deeply, uttering a soft moan.

As the princess inhaled deeply, a slight dizziness came over Ryana, and though her eyes were closed, she seemed to

“see” the interior of a library, similar to the one at the villichi temple, only much more ornate, with scrolls stored in rows of cubicles carved from polished obsidian set with hammered silver. It was, she realized, the templar library in the palace compound of the Shadow King, where Korahna had first discovered the preserver writings.

Next, she saw the streets of Nibenay at night, with beggars huddled in the doorways and bedraggled prostitutes lounging in the entrances to darkened alleys. She heard the cries of hungry infants coming from the windows up above, and she saw old women searching through the refuse in the streets for some scrap of food to eat. A profound sadness overwhelmed her, seeing the state to which these people were reduced, and she felt tears start flowing down her cheeks, though she herself was not weeping. Images whirled through her consciousness, faces in taverns as Korahna sought to make contact with the Veiled Alliance, hooded figures accosting her in some darkened room, sneaking out of the palace compound at night to attend clandestine meetings, faster and faster the memories flowed through her, and she experienced Korahna’s life in one kaleidoscopic surge of thoughts, senses, and impressions....

Then, just as abruptly as it had begun, it ended, and Ryana felt Kether’s hand release her own.

She opened her eyes and found herself flushed with perspiration, her entire body tingling. She felt lightheaded, and yet, at the same time, she was no longer tired. She still felt hungry and thirsty, but it was as if a second wind had come upon her and given her new strength. And she saw Korahna’s eyelids flicker open and heard her sharp intake of breath as she sat up and said, “I have had the most amazing dream—”

Sorak’s head was lowered to his chest, and he was breathing heavily. The warmth was gone now, though Ryana still felt its residual effects. The sun, which had started sinking over the horizon what seemed only a moment ago, had long since set. The twin moons, Ral and Guthay, cast their ghostly light upon the barrens—Sorak raised his head, his eyes still closed, and breathed in deeply, then exhaled slowly.

He opened his eyes and said, “I think we can go on now.”

Ryana and the princess were staring at each other. Something incredibly profound had passed between them, and they both knew that somehow a bond had been forged that could never be broken. It suddenly felt as if they had known each other all their lives. They were like sisters, only more than sisters, for through Kether, they had shared an intimacy deeper than even most siblings could achieve.

“I do not understand what just happened,” said Korahna slowly. “It seemed like a curious dream, and yet it was not a dream, was it?”

“No,” Ryana said. “It was not a dream.”

The princess stared at Sorak. “But how . . . ?” Her voice trailed off. She could not think of how to frame the question.

“It is not something we could even begin to understand, Korahna,” Ryana told her. “We can do no more than accept it. Kether gave us strength, and more than that. Much more.”

“Kether?” said Korahna. And then she looked at Sorak and realized she knew, because Ryana had known. For the first time, she understand who and what Sorak truly was. “A tribe of one,” she whispered. It was not something she had even heard of before, but she suddenly knew what it meant.

“Sorak,” said Ryana sharply. “Look!”

A mile or so away, directly to the east, where the ground began to rise, a fire burned.

“Torian!” Korahna said. “He has circled round us!” “No,” said Sorak. “That is not the light of a campfire. There is nothing here to burn, and even if Torian had brought torches or wood to build a fire, it would not give off such light. It burns blue—then green, then blue again.”

“Like the fire of the spell scroll,” said Ryana.

“The Sage?” Korahna said.

“Is it possible that we have found his sanctuary?” asked Ryana.

“Perhaps,” said Sorak. “We shall know when we get there. Come, let us make haste.”

The two women mounted up, and the kank reluctantly rose and moved off to follow Sorak. The creature was tired and weak, and Ryana did not think it would be able to travel much farther. They had only a mile or so to go to reach the place where the flame burned. But what would they find when they got there?

The ground had started to rise, sloping up in stages toward the mountains, still several days’ ride distant The boulders here were larger, and there were more rock outcroppings through which they had to wind their way. Several times, they lost sight of the flame as they made slow progress toward it. Even so, they slowly but steadily drew closer, winding their way through a maze of rocky rills, almost like the walls of a fortress. In the distance, they could hear the sound of some huge creature bellowing as it made a kill... or perhaps was, itself, killed.

As they approached the flame, Ryana could see that it was certainly not a campfire, but a tall pillar of blue-green fire that seemed to sprout from solid rock.

“How can stone burn?” Korahna asked with wonder as she stared at the flame. “By magic,” said Ryana.

When they reached it, they saw it was the same sort of flame that had pointed out their way across the tablelands and the barrens—the magical flame that had been released by the spell scroll. But it could not possibly have been burning all this time, Ryana thought.