Барб Хенди - Of Truth and Beasts

Sau’ilahk remained hidden behind an outcrop near the bottom of the pass as he watched all three elves begin to climb. It felt too long before he heard Hannâschi’s voice echo down the slope.

“Look, Domin! A path.”

He longed to blink up beside them, but there was little cover where they stood. Soon they started off again, snaking and curving up the mountain until he lost sight of them.

Sau’ilahk allowed himself to fall slightly dormant, to dematerialize and blink up the mountain. At first, he could not see them, but he heard voices again. He drifted ever so cautiously around the sharp slant of a sheer cliff face.

The last of the three elves was disappearing into the brush at the base of the cliff wall.

When they did not come out, anxiety began to trickle through Sau’ilahk. Rather than blink into the unknown, he drifted nearer, slowly following where he had seen the elves vanish. Within moments, he found himself looking out of a tunnel into a vast cavern with dead crystals lining the upper walls.

The elves were crossing the cavern, looking about in wonder. A large, open archway filled a good section of the far wall. The three were debating something, but Sau’ilahk had missed the first part.

“We cannot leave the horses saddled down there,” Hannâschi said. “And we need what is left of our supplies.”

“Go quickly,” Chuillyon answered. “We cannot let the journeyor get too far ahead.”

“I will go,” Shâodh said.

Before the slender elf came straight toward Sau’ilahk, he blinked out, focusing on the archway at the vast cavern’s far side. He was not at all surprised when he rematerialized and hurried onward to find a tram platform.

His anxiety changed to hope. Wynn had found an ancient tram station on this side of the range, but did it lead to the seatt? He dared not believe it yet. He had been disappointed too many times.

Drifting past the tram, he spotted an old metal pump cart out on the tracks, and he stilled his mind to listen. Far ahead, he could hear the rhythmic creak of heavy wheels in the tunnel’s stone grooves for tracks. Wynn was already well ahead, leaving the elves behind.

Sau’ilahk glanced back, hearing Chuillyon’s muffled voice in the tunnel leading to the tram station. He no longer needed these elves, and Shâodh was outside. Could he risk attacking the girl and the old elf to replenish himself before going after Wynn?

He remembered how Chuillyon alone had almost bested him once in Dhredze Seatt. He might spend more energy than he gained, and even in hunger, it was not wise to take such risks when he was so close to victory.

Sau’ilahk turned back toward the tracks in one last instant of indecision. Then he blinked down the tunnel after the sound of those wheels in the deep stone tracks.

Ghassan il’Sänke was not a man easily disheartened. But day after day, night after night, of searching this fallen mountain for an entrance had left him questioning his abilities. In addition, he’d been tracking Wynn’s rough position. By her distance from him, she had to be inside the range. Although she had a long way to go before reaching this side of the mountains, she was moving more rapidly than he thought possible. How was the question he could not answer.

Tonight he searched the upper regions of the mountain’s northern base, stopping once for a supper of flatbread—which was almost gone. He should have been glad for anything to eat out here, but when closing his eyes, all he saw were lamb kebabs, honeyed yams, and herbed rice. He had been away from home for so long now.

Ghassan was also not a man given to any kind of sentiment, but he could not help missing his rooms at the Suman guild, eating properly prepared food, and partaking of the companionship of his peers there. He had been too long among the Numans, with their tasteless vegetable stews and open, unguarded chatter.

And now he was alone, sitting on a fallen mountain, and looking for a way inside.

He shook his head, admonishing himself. His task to intercept Wynn, to learn what she was doing, took precedence over everything.

When Ghassan opened his eyes, he started slightly.

The sparks of two unblinking eyes looked back at him from around the side of a rock. Thoughts of self-defense flooded his mind first, but the eyes were small and curious. He focused in the darkness and made out the shape of a ground-dwelling creature remembered from his youth.

A geufèr, with light brown fur, round ears, and rotund body, was a harmless small animal that lived on grubs and insects.

Ghassan remained still, careful not to frighten it off, while his mind turned inward. He had rarely seen a geufèr above ground. Something about the sight of it here felt like a sign. Closing his eyes again, he raised the image of the small creature in his thoughts. Over this, he drew the shapes, lines, and marks of blazing symbols stroked from deep in his memory, and he chanted silently.

Once again, he drove a sense of fear into the animal. He focused hard on the need for the creature to go deep, deep down. When he opened his eyes, it was gone. There had been no chance to lock its presence in his awareness.

Ghassan scrambled up the slope, looking about for the geufèr. He glimpsed a light brown form as it shot between two boulders taller than him. He rushed up to the boulders but saw no way to get between them, and he stifled a cry of anguish.

He quickly rounded the left boulder, trying to see if it had shot out the narrow gap on the other side. What he found instead was a broader space between the bases of the two boulders.

Ghassan pulled out his cold lamp crystal and crouched down. Within the gap, he saw a pile of rubble and a pure darkness beyond it so deep that the crystal’s light did not illumate the back of the space. Drawing a sharp breath, he wriggled inside. As the top half of his body passed into that darkness, he reached out, holding his crystal as far into the space as possible.

He saw a smooth surface above him.

He dared not hope too much, for this could simply be a shallow cave long filled with rubble. He crawled forward, and the rubble beneath him began to decrease as the space grew larger. He held his crystal up to the wall and ceiling, which were smooth, and knew then that he was inside what must have been a passage that had not caved in when the mountain collapsed. Still crawling, he reached a side passage on his left that was nearly clear. He scrambled over the last bits of broken stone and stood up, holding his crystal high.

There was no sign of the geufèr, but Ghassan still whispered his thanks. The tunnel he stood in stretched far beyond his light, leading straight into the mountain. Remnants of long-dead dwarven crystals were still embedded in the walls.

He had found the seatt.

Wynn leaned against her pack aboard the cart, listening to the never-ending creak as Ore-Locks pumped them farther down the tracks. He and Chane had spelled each other for seven days and nights. She almost couldn’t remember the scent of fresh air or the sun on her face.

Shade loped along the track beside the cart. Much as Wynn wanted her to stay onboard, after three nights, the dog had fallen into a depression and begun passing Wynn forlorn memories of open forests and fields. The only option was to let her run for a while until her spirits lifted.

Chane sat beside Wynn, leaning against the outside of the back of the metal box. He’d been watching Ore-Locks ever since he’d awoken. Even down here, he fell dormant, which was the only way they knew of dusk and dawn. When the sun presumably set in the outside world above, he was instantly awake. Not once did Wynn have trouble rousing him midday if they had to stop to clear debris from the tracks. It was strange, for he’d never come out of dormancy so easily during their time under the mountain of Ore-Locks’s people.