Of Truth And Beasts Part 41

"This was cut by my people," he confirmed. "Humans do not fit stone like this without mortar, but . . ."

"But what?"

"I see proof of only three dwellings. My people do not live in small villages in the middle of nowhere."

"So what was this doing out here?" she asked.

Wynn twisted in her squat and spotted Chane a few paces off with his arms crossed. For some reason, he'd been resentful about bringing them here. Shade sniffed the ground all around but didn't seem any happier than Chane. Wynn ignored them both.

Ever since finding the broken pylon and Ore-Locks's mention of a ground-level entrance into the mountains, her thoughts hadn't stopped churning.

"What do you think it was?" she asked Ore-Locks.

She couldn't keep the tremor from her voice. When she saw her own hesitant hope mirrored in his face, it made her falter for an instant.

"Perhaps a way station for overland travelers," he said slowly. "My people have constructed a few such north of Dhredze Seatt, along the coast toward the Northlanders' territory. But those were built on a well-traveled route and-"

"Then Vreuvill was right!" Wynn cut in excitedly. "Dwarves once used this pa.s.s to interact with the Lhoin'na ancestors. But we are nowhere near the range's southern side and the seatt itself. Where were the dwarves coming from, going to, that they'd require a layover here?"

No one spoke, but Chane's expression grew darker. What was wrong with him?

Wynn scurried over to join Ore-Locks. "Are you certain your ancestors might be capable of building a pa.s.sage all the way through the range?"

"If you sages believe much was lost in your Forgotten History, then there is no telling.... But I wonder what knowledge and skills my people may have once-"

"No!" Chane nearly snarled.

Wynn stiffened in surprise as Shade's head swung toward him.

"Even if you find such a thing," Chane went on, "we are not wandering down some tunnel beneath mountain after mountain, with little food, nothing to hunt, and only hope of fresh water. If we travel for days and nights and reach only a cave-in, do we walk back out, only to find ourselves worse off than before?"

Chane crossed his arms tighter.

"Pohkavost!" he hissed, anger making him slip into his own language.

Wynn didn't know what to say. He wasn't wrong in calling it "lunacy." Everything he'd said was valid, but he was not in charge here.

To make matters worse, Shade normally growled if Chane took that kind of hostile tone. She hadn't, and instead she got up and sat right in front of Chane, glaring at Wynn.

Ore-Locks remained crouched in silence. Wynn didn't need to glance back to know he was waiting for her to end this rebellion.

She was tired, hungry, filthy, and had no wish to fight with the two companions she trusted-and she certainly had no wish to side with Ore-Locks.

It suddenly occurred to her that while Chane and Shade had both remained at her side, aiding her, the more she gained hope in her purpose, the more reticent they'd become. Did they want her to fail, to abandon this desperate task and just go home-to be the dutiful little sage, finally obeying her superiors?

"If we found a pa.s.sageway on this side," she said calmly, "we would not even have to search for the seatt. It would lead us right there."

Chane took a step forward, his mouth opening to argue, but she stood up in the same moment.

"We have to try," she told him. "We have to at least look. It's better than facing another moon or more wandering in the mountains, trying to find the remnants of a lost seatt on the edge of leagues and leagues of desert."

The words building in Chane never left his parted lips. Maybe now he would finally accept that no matter what, she would still follow her own path.

Shade rumbled at her softly and began walking over. Wynn wasn't about to tolerate a heated argument of chopped memory-words, either.

"No," she said, holding out her hand. "We're doing a search. Maybe I'm wrong and there is no pa.s.sage, but these ruins, this place, existed for a reason."

She turned away, facing south, though it was too dark to see the foothills of the pa.s.s's end, let alone the mountains. Then she looked down at Ore-Locks still crouched at the base of the exposed wall's remains.

It felt wrong to hurt those close to her by turning to him, but whatever his motivations, he was the only one willing to help. If she could find a pa.s.sage built by the ancient dwarves that led directly into the seatt, half this battle would be won.

"Well?" was all she said to him.

Ore-Locks simply nodded.

Gha.s.san il'Snke was no closer to finding a way inside the seatt. He had given up counting days or nights. He searched the lower reaches of the headless mountain until exhaustion took him, and he simply dropped where he was to sleep. When the rising sun, or a sharp wind, or the night's chill woke him, he searched again.

A small voice in his mind began to taunt him. Could he be wrong? Was it not possible that this mountain had eroded on its own?

Perhaps there had once been a high lake up there, and it had simply dried out and filled in. Who was he to claim otherwise? A natural disaster, such as a volcanic eruption ages past, could have collapsed the top once it had cooled. Even that would have fit the legend of the mountain's head returning as fire. And again, nature would have taken care of the rest over centuries.

But Gha.s.san denied his self-doubts.

What natural disaster could collapse an entire mountain from the inside? A volcano would have blown the top outward, leaving sharp, pocked stones, if not hardened paths of cooled lava, in the aftermath. Many small ravines would have formed following the erosion of softer material. But it was not so.

The seatt was in there, beneath the headless mountain. He had only to find his way in before Wynn reached it. But he was no scout or guide, wise to these barren wilds. He needed to start relying on his strengths.

He was a metaologer.

Movement caught his eye where he lay exhausted on a gravel slope. At first he did not bother to look. It would be another tiny dust twister kicked up by wind curling through the peaks. When it came again, he heard gravel tumbling overhead.

Gha.s.san rolled his head, raising a s.h.i.+elding hand, and looked upslope.

It was only a barrel-chested lizard skittering away as a few specks of gravel tumbled down. The creature's scales were mottled brown and gray. Perhaps it had been there all along, blending with the landscape. He lowered his hand, too tired to even hunt it down for food.

But his mind came fully awake.

How or why had this ugly little creature come all the way out-up-here? But for protruding boulders and loose stones, there was little cover in this area, and yet he had not noticed the creature before. In its rush, it had sent gravel downslope. It would have done so whether it had climbed down or up to get to his level.

Gha.s.san rolled onto his hands and knees.

The lizard froze on a boulder beyond the gravel slide's edge; it had noticed him.

His thoughts galvanized as he blinked slowly. In that sliver of darkness behind his eyelids, he raised the lizard's image in his mind. Over this he drew the shapes, lines, and marks of blazing symbols stroked from deep memory. A chant pa.s.sed through his thoughts more quickly than it could have pa.s.sed between his lips.

He felt the lizard's tension, poised in the baser response of fight or flight. He wanted the latter as he opened his eyes and still kept the little beast's presence fixed in his mind. When he hissed at it, feeling the flight response seize it, he fed its instinctual fear with his will.

The lizard bolted.

Gha.s.san scrambled upslope after it, slipping and sliding on loosened gravel. The lizard must have someplace that it holed up; it was too far from the lower reaches to have merely wandered all the way up here.

The lizard was faster, or he was slower, than expected. By the time he reached the boulder, it was gone from sight, but he still felt its presence in his mind. He followed that blindly.

An immense rock protrusion jutted outward just around the slope's bend. Years of erosion had built up above it, creating a dangerous outcrop of loose material. He did his best not to make the slope's material slide as he worked his way toward the outcrop.

The closer he came, the more the presence felt as if it came from below. He did not care for traversing underneath that much ama.s.sed loose gravel and earth. Angling down toward the overhang, he inched along with many upward glances.

A flash of brown-gray darted in under the outcrop, and Gha.s.san froze. He could still feel it in there.

He carefully stepped farther down as he sidled around below the outcrop, watching those tons of dirt and rock atop it for any sign of s.h.i.+fting. Then he saw the hole and dropped on his knees in despair.

The lizard had simply run inside its den, a slit beneath the great stone, barely large enough to reach into. It was certainly no entrance into the mountain. But he had learned one thing.

Gha.s.san did not need to search alone.

He released the connection to its limited instincts, as it did not have the necessary mental function that he would need. A mammal of some kind would be better. He carefully hauled himself up, sidled along the slope, out of the outcrop's path, and then turned downward. Once panicked into running, the lizard may not have dived for a true entrance. But other forms of wildlife existed here.

Some might use other hiding holes here to take cover against high winds, cold, rain, and sleet. And perhaps one of their refuges was not naturally formed, something large enough for a dwarf, or him, to enter.

Chuillyon stood in the remains of what appeared to be some sort of small dwarven settlement too small to even have been a village. Apparently, Wynn and her companions had spent a good deal of time here shortly past dusk, and then had moved on toward the foothills into the range.

"What was it, do you suppose?" Hannschi asked, crouching to finger the edge of a half-buried foundation stone by the light of her cold lamp crystal.

Her face looked too pale, her cheeks slightly sunken, and her gold-brown hair hung dull. Shodh was faring only a little better.

Chuillyon cursed himself for being a fool, and not for the first time in recent nights. If he could find away to go back in time for one moon, he would have managed all of this differently. Upon leaving his homeland, he'd decided they were better off traveling light. He had requisitioned horses instead of a wagon to ensure greater mobility, should they need to bypa.s.s Wynn or shadow her more closely. They had brought water bottles, blankets, crunchy flatbread, dried fruit, and limited grain for the horses.

In his younger days, he and Cinder-Shard had traveled long distances with far less. They'd always managed to forage for themselves, and he had not foreseen why following one small, human journeyor would be any different. But it was different, and in his zeal to discover Wynn's true goal, he had not calculated the possible outcomes carefully enough.

Although he had seen an ancient map showing the Slip-Tooth Pa.s.s, the distance had been difficult to gauge. They had traveled toward the mountains longer than expected, and though he had intellectually known they would enter some barren terrain, he had not fathomed quite how barren. The closer they came to the range, the less there was to forage for themselves or their horses.

He had handpicked Shodh and Hannschi long ago for their skills and quick wits. They were both journeyors, and so of course they had undertaken tasks of their own abroad. But Shodh had gone with two other elven sages to help map sections of the great jungle to the east of their homeland, while Hannschi had spent a year at the Chathburh annex aiding in an exchange of Elven and Numan texts-and to read and account the Numans' newest metaology holdings for comparison.

Both had performed well and returned home with useful information, but neither had ever faced conditions like this. Sleeping on the ground in winter was beginning to take its toll, and though faithful Shodh had believed Chuillyon knew a great deal about Wynn's final goal, this was not exactly true.

If and when Wynn could find Balle Seatt, Chuillyon knew nothing about what she sought there. Shodh was growing more and more aware of this, and it did not sit well with the young journeyor. Worse, Chuillyon may have underestimated Wynn.

In spite of her surprising deeds at Dhredze Seatt, she was still only a small human. It never occurred to him that her physical const.i.tution might outlast that of his own kind. The journey down the Slip-Tooth Pa.s.s had to be longer than she antic.i.p.ated, and her supplies must be dwindling. Yet she showed no sign of giving up or turning back.

Chuillyon should have paid more attention to the fact that she'd trekked all over the eastern continent-even to one of the highest points in the world there. She was hardier and more tenacious than antic.i.p.ated, and that admittance embarra.s.sed him.

Shodh crouched next to Hannschi. "It is dwarven? You are certain?"

"Yes," she answered. "Not a trace of mortar was used."

His brows knitted. "So, they examined these remains and then headed straight south?"

Hannschi merely nodded.

"Did you hear them say anything?"

"No, this area is too exposed. I could not get close enough, even by bending light and shadow."

Through all of this, Chuillyon remained silent. Shodh looked up at him, a slight touch of disgust in his usually stoic expression.

Shodh's demeanor was becoming an issue-not that Chuillyon entirely blamed him. The young one was loyal to the Order of Chrmun and to the guild. When given a clear mission, he would do anything to succeed. But they had no clear mission here except to tag along in secret without a known destination or ultimate purpose.

Only Chuillyon could feel the desperate importance of following Wynn, of finding out what she sought. That blind purpose had sunk into the core of his old bones. His fears of failing were not something he cared to verbalize for Shodh. For now, he required a.s.sistance and obedience, and nothing less.

Hannschi stood up. Back home, she often chided him for his methods. Out here, she never complained or tried to get him to explain their current purpose. But she was exhausted, and he knew it.

"On to the foothills?" she asked. "Once they are forced to go on foot, I might be able to get closer."

Chuillyon nodded once, and Shodh looked away.

CHAPTER 20.

With little choice, Chane spent the entire night helping Wynn search for some hidden entrance to a pa.s.sage beneath the mountains.

To his silent relief, they found nothing.

He preferred that she head into the open range, aboveground, where he could better protect her. Let her look for the "fallen mountain" among hundreds of other peaks until she finally gave up and let him take her back into civilization.

Less than an eighth night before dawn, Wynn called a halt for the night, and they returned to their camp. After a meal of boiled oats, she sat near the fire and began repeating a ritual Chane had observed her doing more and more in her scant spare moments along this journey.

She and Shade would sit by the fire, and Wynn would open two or three worn, shabby journals. She placed them on the ground, and then opened a newer one directly in front of her. She would glance at pages of the old ones, write in the new one, and then close her eyes and touch Shade.

Once, he had summoned the courage to ask what she was doing. She had s.h.i.+fted uncomfortably and told him she was simply reorganizing her notes. His feelings toward her journals were so mixed that he did not press the point.

In nights past, Chane had recognized several of the shabby journals she copied from . . . because he had read them. In essence, these were also copies. Wynn told him she had recreated some journals from memory after a number of them were lost in a snowstorm during her journeys with Magiere, Leesil, and Chap. One of their packhorses had been dragged over a cliff by a snowslide.

Of course, upon returning to Calm Seatt, she had lost all her journals, recreated or otherwise, to her superiors for the better part of a year. Now that she had them back again, she seemed to be using spare moments to recopy them yet again. Chane wondered why.

Tonight, Wynn had two journals that seemed even older lying on the ground. Their covers were faded blue. He had seen them in Wynn's small stack but had not read these. She also had a faded brown one lying open that he had read. It was the one that covered her encounter with Vordana in Pudrlatsat, when Chane had saved her from the undead sorcerer. The omission of his name in that particular journal still hurt him.

Chane moved toward her, as if to walk past. Wynn instantly took her hand off Shade, picked up the aged blue journals, and closed them.

"What are those?" he asked casually, as if they did not matter.

"Some older notes. When I was in Stravina with Magiere and Leesil, I managed to send Domin Tilswith a few journals before the rest were lost. He returned them to me later. I'm just copying and reorganizing."