Robert Redick - The River of Shadows

The other dlomic soldiers nodded. “The Otter speaks for us all,” said one.

“Otter?” said Hercol.

The dlomic woman looked slightly embarrassed. “I am Lunja, a sergeant of the Masalym Watch. My name means ‘Otter’ in the old tongue of Chaldryl. So to my men I am the Otter.”

Hercol nodded to her. “I thank you for your trust, Sergeant Lunja.” He looked at the remaining faces, one by one. His gaze fell last on Alyash, who was something of an apparition. His hair had burned off completely; his shirt was torn open, revealing his old, extensive scars, and blisters like embedded pearls graced his ears and forehead.

“What are you staring at?” said the bosun. “Yes, I’ll blary follow you. Not as if anyone here’s going to take orders from me.”

“Then prepare to march,” said Hercol, strapping Ildraquin over his shoulder. “Fulbreech is still moving away. We will rest at dusk, whether he pauses or not. But since we have crossed the Black Tongue by daylight, let us at least do as Vadu wished and use these hours well.”

He set off at an unforgiving pace, and the others, in their burned boots (and in Vispek’s case, no boots at all) struggled to keep up. They walked under the trees, out of the dense underbrush at the margin of the forest, but near enough its edge to keep the river in sight. Thasha, who carried nothing except her sword, began to help Pazel hobble along on his wounded leg. After a few minutes she gave the task to Neeps. “You’re the right height,” she said, sliding Pazel’s arm over his shoulder. Neeps flashed her an awkward smile, and so did Pazel. But when he smelled lemons he turned away, pretending that his leg hurt him awfully, so that neither would see the truth on his face.

An hour later Pazel felt stronger, and told Neeps he could manage on his own. The forest began to thin by midafternoon, and in time they marched out of it altogether, onto a narrow plain of low, feathery grasses, bounded on the right by jagged cliffs and the scree of old landslides, and on the left by the crumbling banks of the Ansyndra, along which grew scattered pines and cedars and the occasional oak. It was strange country, very warm and windless, and yet enclosed on all sides by those enfortressed mountains, looming over them with vast shoulders of snow. The Ansyndra became deeper, narrower, more violent and swift. They had no other guide but Ildraquin’s whispers to Hercol, but he drove them on, nearly running, saying that their quarry lay ahead, always downriver and ahead.

So the day ended, and at dusk as promised Hercol let them rest. They chose a spot with many cedars near the river. The mountain’s shadow brought swift darkness, but they had good luck with the matches and soon a fire was burning. It cheered them some and dried their boots, but its heat made their burns ache. Alyash disassembled Ott’s pistol, drying the components on a stone. Pazel gazed blearily at the little wood-and-steel mechanism. Hard to believe that it could kill a man.

Famished, the twenty-one travelers and three dogs shared half their stock of mul, which came to about a teaspoon each. Pazel was battling sleep even as he chewed. He drifted off with Thasha once more examining his leg, and a dog licking his mul-sticky fingers with equal concentration.

At dawn they were chilled and soaked with dew. Hercol had them up and marching before they were properly awake, and certainly before they could commiserate about their injuries, their fallen comrades, the lack of food, the impossibility of return. The plain widened as the river (unreachable now, sunk deep in its rocky gorge) cut longer serpentines. Hercol maintained his savage pace, cutting off any protests with a lancing stare. When they crossed a stream he ordered them to bend and drink deep, and while they did so he wrenched off his own boots and handed them without a word to Cayer Vispek. In the heat of the afternoon the scalded dog began to limp and drop behind, calling after them with a mournful yelp. Hercol turned back and lifted it over his shoulders, and carried it that way like a sack of grain. “If its foot does not improve by morning we will eat it,” he declared.

They ate the last of the mul that night, and Bolutu extracted a long thorn from the dog’s paw. Hercol would not permit a fire. “We have closed the gap,” he said. “I think the sorcerer is within five miles, and I would not lose him now.”

Just beyond their camp the land rose in a stony bluff, leaning out over the river gorge. While the others prepared to sleep, Hercol climbed the bluff with Ensyl on his shoulder. They crouched among rocks at the summit, hidden from the sight of anyone beyond, staring through small gaps. They remained there a long time, motionless.

“What are they looking at?” said Neeps finally.

Thasha got to her feet. “Let’s go find out,” she said. She and Neeps climbed the bluff and stood beside Hercol. At once they grew still, gazing beyond the rocks, transfixed.

When Neda too noticed their fascination, Pazel held out his hand. “Help me up,” he said. “We’ll go and see for ourselves.”

At that Jalantri leaped to his feet and caught Neda by the arm. “You’re not thinking, sister! You’re badly bruised and there is fighting ahead. Let him waste his strength if he will. We know better, Phoenix-Flame.”

Neda seemed at a loss for words. She looked at Jalantri’s hand on her arm until he dropped it, chastened. Then she glanced quickly at Pazel and started up the hill.

They walked in silence (so weirdly normal, climbing a hill beside his sister; they might have been back in Ormael) until Neda said, “The way of the sfvantskor is perfection.”

“Okay,” said Pazel.

“If you are distracted by the personal,” she said, “you will fail when your people most need their champion. That is certain, proven. That is why we are chaste. We turn our passions to the needs of the people, to the Grand Family. That is the Mzithrin way, and the sfvantskor must be the example.”

Pazel looked back: Jalantri was still watching them. “You don’t have to explain, Neda,” he said.

She smiled, as though amused that Pazel thought he understood. Then she said, “The dogs keep sniffing at Neeps. They look at him strangely, too.”

Pazel glanced at her, aghast. He could have kicked himself for not noticing. They’re hunting dogs, he thought. Were they trained to hunt tol-chenni? Is that what Neeps smells like to them? Fear for Neeps surged through him once more. But when they reached the hilltop, where the others were still crouched and staring, what he saw drove everything else from his mind.

A gargantuan lake spread before them, far greater than Ilvaspar, almost as large as the Gulf of Masal itself. Or was it a lake? It was almost perfectly round, and its shores were sheer, rocky cliffs. But there was no water that he could see. Instead, across the whole expanse, some twenty or thirty feet below the rim, spread a layer of dark, murky green. A flat surface, but not entirely smooth. It appeared to be composed of one round patch atop another, like overlapping lily pads choking a pond, except that these pads were all fused at the edges into one solid mass. Pazel could see no gaps at all, except very close to them, where the Ansyndra tumbled into the crater.

“Hercol says Fulbreech is down there,” said Thasha. “Inside it. Moving around.”

“But what is it?” said Neda. “A lake, covered in water-weed?”

“I think,” said Hercol, “that we are looking at the Infernal Forest.”

“That’s no forest,” said Pazel. “I mean… could it be?”

“We have seen many strange things on this side of the Nelluroq,” said Ensyl, “but that is the strangest. I do not like it. I fear it will not go well for us there.”

“Then let us rest,” said Hercol, “for Fulbreech is there below, somewhere. And Arunis must surely be with him, for who would enter such a place if not compelled?”