Song Of The Aura: Grym Prophet Part 2

"Hmmm," Captain Berne said, obviously surprised and reasonably put-out. It was a serious problem, for sure. "Wella" he began, then lapsed into silence again.

"I wonder if the Aura thought of that, when they put all this into motion," Gribly thought aloud.

"'Course they did," grunted the nymph Captain gruffly, "T' Aura thinks of everythinga if they rightly even need to think at all, the way we mean when we say the worda Hmmma This is a puzzle an' no mistake."

"Is it really that dry in the Grymclaw?" Elia asked, "I don't need very much water to keep my Second Form, just enough to bathe most of my skin, and even then I can last a week at most between wettings."

"Ah," said Berne, nodding, "That makes it a mite easier, for sure. Let me put m'thinkin' cap on fer a few more hours an' I'll have this *un out in no time."

"You think you can?"

"Oh, most a.s.suredly. This's a captain's job, y'know, mistress Wave Stridera to figure out the hard-to-chew things before they're even in *is crew's moutha"

"That's bizarre," Gribly commented, but neither nymph seemed to hear him.

"Well then," Berne continued, "I'd best be into m'cabin t'puzzle this'n out. You two can *ave all the time y'need to put yer own heads t'wards it, but don't be too knotted up if'n y'can't decide. I'll do the heavy thinkin' this time around."

"Many thanks," Elia told him before he headed below. Sighing, she turned to Gribly, some of the l.u.s.ter in her eyes gone. "I never thought I'd be a burden like thisa No matter what the captain decides, I'll slow you down in your hunt. Maybea maybe I'll stay behind."

"No!" Gribly interjected, then, quieter, "Noa I don't think that'll be necessary. We'll find a way, and this is as much your quest as mine, now. With any luck we'll all find the answers we need, once we reach the Aura."

"Yes, I hope soa" she stepped a little closer to him, and he touched her hand rea.s.suringly. "What was his name? I don't remember anymore. Byorne might have told us, back beforea" Before their ranger-guide had been murdered by the same beasts that had ma.s.sacred her tribe. Yes. He had, now that Gribly thought about it.

"Wanderwillow. Soundsa oh, tree-ish, don't you think?"

She smiled. "Yes, it does."

They stood there silently for a minute, hands touching but not exactly intertwined. Gribly could barely have been happier, until he noticed the stare of the ponytailed wheelman being drawn in his direction. Elia's hand was gone suddenly, as she twisted around to face the open water behind them. He followed her example and began to watch the undulating waves, one hand over his brow to shade his eyes from the sun.

Elia had stretched her hand out now, and was moving it in leisurely S-shapes, like a swimming fish. For a moment nothing out of the ordinary happened, and Gribly's gaze dropped to the foamy water below. Then, like an apparition, the water directly under the Treele girl's hand, yards below, began to imitate her movement, defying gravity and the swell of the sea. It looked like a little blue-green river amid the white foam, slos.h.i.+ng and swimming almost directly perpendicular to the current left in the s.h.i.+p's wake. Gribly smiled.

"Nice trick," he told her. She smiled back, and lifted her hand.

"I've only started," she said, and the water obeyed her command, rising up straight out of the waves, a wormy, jiggling ma.s.s of liquid that seemed to be pouring over and over itself in a never-ending cascade. No matter how quickly the water flowed, it never let a single drop fall back into the foam. As Elia brought her hand higher, the water followed, until she was almost pointing at the sky, and the seawater worm was wriggling and slos.h.i.+ng not more than two feet from her face.

"I'm impressed," Gribly said, wriggling his own way just a little closer to Elia and stealthily slipping an arm in hers.

She threw the water-worm right at him.

As the Suthway Cath plowed through the Inkwell faster than an eagle in flight, the dark bulk of the Grymclaw grew closer and closer. Soon it was a high wall of looming gray cliffs not far in the distance. Down in Captain Berne's cabin, Elia talked to him earnestly about the possibilities that could help her survive in the dry expanse of the Grymclaw. Once Gribly had dried himself off, he joined them.

"Why couldn't you dry me with that trick of yours, that you used on Lauro and me back on the iceberg?" he asked, shaking his wet hair at Elia like a dog.

"Oha I didn't think of it," she answered, leaning away with a too-innocent smile.

"All right, calm yerselves," Berne interceded, tapping the edge of his map table with a heavy metal device used for navigation. "I've consulted what few charts o' the Grymclaw are avail'ble with th' Zain, an' I think I may've come up with an answer to yer problem, mis'tress Elia."

"Oh?" she said, turning her attention to the yellowed papyrus sheets laid out in front of the captain. Soon the two nymphs were deep in a discussion about water and carrying capacity, distances and available water sources. Gribly tried as hard as he genuinely could to stay interested, but his attention soon wandered and he found himself looking around at the interior of Berne's cabin.

A large but mostly unadorned mattress-bed stood in one corner, a curious suit of armor in another. There was a carved hearth in the wall nearest to the navigation table, with several chairs pushed up against the wall on either side. Odda He hadn't thought to find anything like that on a s.h.i.+p. On each wall were various trophies and maps of past voyages, along with one strangely realistic painting above the hearth. When it seemed as if his absence wouldn't be noticed, Gribly slipped away from the table to examine it. Elia and Berne soon drifted into the nymphtongue behind him.

In the background of the painting was a s.h.i.+p much like the Suthway, beached on a sandy sh.o.r.e with green trees in the background. The foreground was a jagged cliff and series of small pools, where a ragged group of nymphs he a.s.sumed to be the s.h.i.+p's crew were gathered, staring and pointing. The object of their attention was a strange, womanlike creature made of green-blue scales, rising from depths of the largest pool. What in Vast it was, Gribly couldn't tell, but the malicious expression written across the fish-woman's face made him cringe. He looked away, and something above the picture caught his eye.

"Like the looks o' that, do you?" Berne's voice came from behind him, where he had apparently finished his conversation with Elia.

"What is it?" Gribly inquired, frowning. "A weapon?"

"*Tis indeed," the nymph captain confirmed, taking the device down from its hooks. It appeared to be a silver anchor, smaller than usual, with sharpened edges that glinted in the sunlight that streamed through a portal in the cabin wall. It was attached to a leather-bound handle, which ended in a polished chain several feet long. "It's my own blade, scavenged from the first s.h.i.+p I e'er wrecked; a li'l punt I stole from th' old Zainarch's own dock."

"Impressive. I don't think I could wield it." Gribly declined to comment on the theft.

"Aye, it's been many a time since I wielded it meself. Been sittin' in a chest aways back at *ome, it *as. But, seein' as trouble's brewin' on the horizon fer me an' all me mates, I've brought it out again."

Loud shouting in the nymphtongue broke the silence that followed, addressed again and again to Captain Bernarl.

"We're comin' into range," Berne told the two young Striders, hurriedly replacing the anchor-blade and straightening his longcoat. "I must be off t'manage th' crew. Get yerselves outta the way *til we're ready t' lower th' boats. I'll be seein' ye both off safely, that I'll be."

In a trice he was gone.

"Interesting fellow," Gribly observed.

"Good. You'll fit right in with him," Elia remarked as she brushed past.

"Very funny. Oh, wait a moment." She did. "What did you find out abouta about the Grymclaw?" He wasn't sure how to phrase the question about her Second Form.

"Oh." She paused, c.o.c.king her head to one side thoughtfully. "It ought to work. There's a river running parallel to our planned path that I should be able to return to whenever I feel the need to replenish my Inner Watera Also, he'll give us waterskins Cleric Lithric has made to hold much more water than usually possible."

"Oh. That soundsa like it'll work. Alright."

She just shrugged. "Let's hope so. No matter what, I'm still in this hunt." She turned and left in a whirl of blue.

"I wouldn't dream of stopping you," Gribly smirked. Then he followed her up on deck.

Chapter Four: Smoke Rises.

It didn't take long: just a short boat-ride to the cliffs of the forbidding land, then a shorter march up one of the steep paths that led to the top.

Berne saw them off, but he didn't like it. There was trouble ahead for those two, he just knew ita and worse than the madmen and sorcerers riding demon-horses they'd already encountered, if he was right. War was coming. He was sure of it. He'd told them what they needed to know to stay alive, of coursea but that hadn't been everything, by a long shot; especially about Gram, the self-styled Thief Lord of the South. His old, piratical traits were hard to snuff out, and trust didn't come easy to a pirate. Ah, well, it was too late now. He might as well let them go their own way. Aura protect them, especially if the Aura was truly alive and interested in them.

Berne finally turned his back on the sh.o.r.e and let his mates row him back to the Suthway. By the time he arrived, his mind was made up.

He would return to Mythigrad and confer with Varstis. Raitharch, indeed! That wily Reethe had always been a patient one, and now it'd paid off more than anyone could have foretold. His failure to report his success to the Alliance was troubling. But then, who didn't like to get ahead once in a while? Wasn't that what being a brigand was all about?

But Varstis had power now. If he was no longer part of the brotherhood, then fine. Berne had united the Zain- perhaps Varstis would help him control them. In any case, they would have to unite the tribes in order to withstand the conflicts that were likely to come. Vastion coming to pieces in the south, rangers appearing and being slain by h.e.l.lish creatures from bedside fairy-talesa Aye, trouble was brewing. It could only be a matter of time.

Berne spent most of the return journey pouring over old maps and mementoes in his cabin, fingering the chain of his long-disused anchor-blade. If he planned his way right, perhaps he could profit from a wara and cheat the Alliance out of their share, too, if Varstis was willing to cooperate, and no b.l.o.o.d.y rangers showed their face. Rangers. They had always been a thorn in the Alliance's side, and especially Lord Gram's.

Hours later, shouts sounded outside his cabin, but Berne ignored them. His back hunched as he sat at the navigation table, the captain clenched and unclenched his fists in frustration. Then a thought hit him. Could rangers be the answer to his troubles? Could he use them to break free from the grip of Gram and the Alliance? Of course, he'd have to find them firsta and they were said to have lairs in the Grymclawa "Captain! Smoke!" an urgent call in the nymphtongue sounded outside his door. It was Yan, the wheel-nymph.

The Grymclawa Hadn't Gribly and Elia met a strider on their way there? Weren't they there now? This could be quite- "Captain! Mythigrad is burning!" Blast. No rest for a weary soul.

Berne leaped to his feet, upsetting his chair and causing the cutla.s.s at his side to rattle in its sheath. Slinging the anchor-blade carefully across his back, he made for the door. A twist of the rusted latch and it was open, Yan's worry-creased face staring back at him. Hardening his features, he nodded curtly to the nymph and stomped up onto the deck.

In the distance, smoke was rising from the t.i.tanic iceberg which housed the Reethe capital of Mythigrad. Pulling a spygla.s.s from his coat pocket, he put it to his eye and scanned the opening of the inlet.

s.h.i.+ps. s.h.i.+ps of metal like he had never seen, glinting golden-red in the dying sun. Flashes of fire as they a.s.saulted Mythigrad.

Replacing the spygla.s.s, he roared orders to his crew, gesturing animatedly and calling for more than the possible speed. Honor out of the question, they had to save the city!

"Full speed ahead! Show your courage, Fire of the South! To Mythigrad!"

Berne was a pirate only secondly. Today he was Captain Bernarl of the Zain, first and foremost, danger be forgotten, loyal to the end!

The anchor-blade would swing again, before this day was done.

Oblivious to the eventual fate of the Suthway Cath, Gribly and Elia watched the s.h.i.+p fade into the distance.

"It scares me to see him go," Elia said, meaning Captain Berne. As she spoke, she donned the hood on the white robe and fur-lined cloak the Reethe had given her.

"And the Grymclaw doesn't faze you?" Gribly joked half-heartedly. "Because I'm a little more worried for us than him."

The girl just shrugged. "I'm used to it, after traveling with you for so long."

"Thanks."

"Any time."

After a silence of several minutes, Gribly took Elia's hand. She didn't stop him, and he squeezed it comfortingly. "Let's go. We've got a lot of ground to cover, and we're not even sure what to look for."

Without answering, she let him lead her away.

By the time the sun was beginning to set, they had walked until their feet were raw and sore through their boots. The Grymclaw was not so much frightening as dreary; a land of flat gray plateaus and mounds of rock that jutted up from the earth like domes of long-buried cathedrals. The sky was full of wispy clouds, and the sun's light seemed to weaken as they neared the center of the enchanted land that was said to cause the wintery curse that held the Inkwell in its grip.

It's not so different from Blast, Gribly thought, just darkera and not as sandy. Whatever else it was, the Grymclaw was certainly dusty.

As they walked, the sky grew darker and darker as the clouds thickened. After an inestimable time, the sun began to peek through in the West, sending scattered beams of bright red that smote the land and sent up little gusts of flame in the distance.

"Well that's disturbing," Gribly muttered. Elia just kept a little closer to his side. "What's that?" he wondered, seeing something of interest not far from them. To their left there seemed to be a band of lighter gray in the dusty lead-color of the land.

It turned out to be a road, wide and flat, that seemed to have been abandoned long ago. There were little or no footprints, and a fine layer of dust lay upon it. The travelers started down it, and the day turned to night long after they had ceased to feel anything but the dryness of the air and the aching in their bodies.

The night was pa.s.sed in uneasy rest. The Reethe had provided as well as they could for the two, but it was hardly enough to keep the stones out of one's back while one slept. A quick, cheerless meal and the ensuing colder-than-death night were more than enough to make Gribly wonder at the madcap quest and ill-fated adventure that seemed likely to be the death of him.

The next day pa.s.sed much as the first had. The light gray of morning was accompanied by a painful, forced march as the cramped muscles of both travelers re-acclimated to the ordeal. Later in the day, as the heatless sun found breaks in the clouds to light up patches of the land in yellow flames that died out almost as soon as they had begun, another cold meal was had, and the two Striders continued on their journey.

Just as the sun began to set in the cloudy sky above on their second day in the Grymclaw, the road they had been traveling on ended quite abruptly. It was an event of only seconds: Gribly climbed a hill only to discover that it ended in a cliff, dropping off into a chasm that opened up in front of them without warning. As he neared the edge, Gribly's foot dislodged a pile of pebbles that went streaking down into the blackness below.

"What in the-!" he exclaimed, swaying backward. Elia pulled him away from the edge with a little yelp.

"That was too close," she hissed in his ear, gasping for breath from the shock.

"Yesa far too closea" He sat down for a minute to think, and she sat beside him. "The land must have gone through some horrible upheaval years ago. Look around."

In the light of the dying sun, the two Striders took in the surrounding country. It seemed to have changed in an instant.

The cliff where they sat dropped off hundreds of feet to the ground, but it was not part of a canyon, as Gribly had first supposed. There were lumpy formations of rock a hundred feet or more out from the cliff, but that was all. They were looking out over a whole new world concealed by the cliffs that ringed the real realm of the Grymclaw: miles and miles of gray gra.s.s and rocky hills poking up at random in the plains. Fires lit up the darkening evening, glimmering like fireflies in the farthest points of the Sand Strider's vision.

People.

"Lightsa a towna look, Gribly, there's a whole country hidden down therea" Elia's voice was soft with wonderment. "They're fighting to survive, you can bet. How does anyone live here?"

"Well," he answered, "I guess there's only one way to find out. We need to get down this cliff somehow."

"Yesa but there isn't much chance of finding a path, like we did back on the sea's edge. I think that's why so few reports of this place come back with the people who've come herea there's no way down."

"Ah, but they didn't have a Sand Strider with them then, did they?"

"There's no sand here, Gribly."

"But I can Stride rock, too, remember?"

"Oh." It seemed she had forgotten, which annoyed the thief, though he couldn't think why. They stood together, and he looked high and low for some idea as to how his powers with the earthy elements could help them get down. The sunbeams s.h.i.+ning through the heavy clouds winked out, one by one, and in minutes it was almost completely dark.

"I think we should sleep on the problem," he announced. Elia agreed.

"Just not here, so close to the cliff. Let's move backa a long waya and see if there's a more sheltered place to sleep."

"Sounds good enough. Let's go." As he turned, a new thought struck him. "I wonder if Lauro had any trouble finding this place and getting down. We never did find his stolen Wave Chariot on the coast."

"If he lived to make it this far, I doubt it gave him a problem," Elia said softly, her musical voice m.u.f.fled by the oppressive darkness that was descending all around the pair. "He can fly, remember?"

In a sort of natural overhang tucked away at the base of a rocky hill, the two young travelers made their meager camp. After setting out their bedrolls in opposite corners of the hollow, Elia set about preparing some of the rations of dried fish and pilgrim's bread the Reethe had given them for the journey. Not tasty in the least, but enough to fill them and keep them on their feet, along with some water blessed by Cleric Lithric.