“You are cold,” Garth said. “You should get some sleep, and so must I.”
He heaved himself to his feet with a grunt, threw the piece of wood he had been using as a bolster onto the fire, and bid everyone good night.
I considered a walk to see how the horses fared, but a brief probe revealed that they were all asleep, so I said good night, too, and climbed into my bedding. I missed Maruman coiled onto my stomach and hoped he was not annoyed with me for leaving without saying goodbye.
My last sight before drifting to sleep was of the flames licking the night sky between me and the teknoguilders, still deep in their conversations.
I woke with a faint start to broad daylight, surprised to realize I had not dreamed for the first time in many days. I sat up and found I was alone except for Miryum, who was squatting by the fire, feeding it twigs with a faraway expression on her wide, flat face. I yawned aloud to let her know I was awake.
“Garth told me not to wake you,” she said, as if expecting me to reproach her.
I stretched languorously. “I have not slept so soundly in ages.”
“It is always easier to sleep away from Obernewtyn,” Miryum murmured, hanging a pot above the flames. “Here, on the rare nights you dream, the dreams are comfortably dull.”
I stared at her. “Are you saying the dreams you have here are different from those at Obernewtyn?”
“Of course. And it’s getting worse. I think dreams are grown vivid and strange at Obernewtyn, because so many Misfits dwell there.”
I thought of what Maryon had said about her guild finding it hard to futuretell clearly and wondered if there could be a connection between this and what Miryum was saying. Then there were my own dreams. I had never experienced so many dream-memories from the distant past. I had put it down to my dwelling on the past in my waking hours, but what if it was more than that?
I made up my mind to speak to Maryon as soon as I returned. Perhaps her guild’s dreamscapes would give us some clue as to what was going on. Very likely she had no idea there was a difference in the way people dreamed away from Obernewtyn, since she and those of her guild seldom traveled.
“Do you want some food?” Miryum asked.
I groaned and pressed my stomach. “I ate too much last night to feel hungry now. But if there is choca …”
She nodded at the pot swaying languidly over the flames. “It is brewed already. I did not think you would say no to that.” She poured a mug of the frothy brown mixture, and I sat up, wrapped in my blankets, to drink it. The grass sparkled with dew, and the day seemed to glisten. Gahltha and the other horses were grazing peacefully by the water’s edge, and I had a brief, vivid memory of the day we had gone on rafts into the mountains to escape Henry Druid’s armsmen. Gahltha’s fear of water had forced us to leave him, and he had fled into the highest mountains to escape what he perceived as his shame and perhaps to seek his death. Instead, he had met the Agyllians.
“I will stay on here until the teknoguilders return for the moon fair,” Miryum said abruptly. “The other coercer-knights will escort you back to Obernewtyn.”
I sighed inwardly. I would have been glad to ride with just Faraf and Gahltha for company, but to say so would have offended the coercer-knight’s very substantial sense of dignity, so I merely thanked her. She set about washing up the few firstmeal pots and dishes, and I drained my cup, saying I would have a quick bath before going into the caves.
Carrying a towel and fresh clothes, I went to relieve myself in the refuse pit that had been dug some way from the campsite. After shoveling fresh earth over the pit, I ran to the water’s edge. Throwing off my night shift, I immersed myself in the icy river water, gasping at the chill and taking care not to go deep enough for the current to catch hold of me. I splashed about lazily, enjoying the sparkle of sun on water and wishing somewhat wickedly that Rushton was with me and naked, too.
That thought was so pleasant, I daydreamed of it, and imagined pressing myself against him and feeling his hard hands on my hips.
A concerned call from Miryum recalled me to myself. Hastily, I got out, dried, and dressed, and returned to the campsite.
“I thought you had drowned,” Miryum said repressively.
I ignored her disapproval as we went together into the mountain, but my lightheartedness dimmed as shadow swallowed daylight.
The Teknoguildmaster greeted our approach with an echoing shout of welcome and helped me from the raft. “Come and see how it works, Elspeth. Zadia and Yokan are down already, but Qwinn is just about to dive.”
Fian was watching the two teknoguilders monitoring the hoses. They paid no heed to us at all. Qwinn was being helped into his suit.
“Give me the glows,” he said to his aide.
The younger teknoguilder handed him two small bulbs. Qwinn clipped them deftly to his weight belt, drew on gloves and goggles, and sheathed a knife in a knee pouch.
“Be careful,” the Teknoguildmaster said, passing him a breathing tube. There was a loop of rope around it, which Qwinn slipped over his head. After a brief general nod, he backed down the mound, pulling the tube after him. As he vanished into the water, I seemed to feel myself sinking into that chill depth.
“How did you learn that the building had shifted?” I asked.
“Some of my people dug down after we learned of the basement storage and found the bottom was broken away. We knew the building could not have shifted too far from the base, since it was still intact. But it will be no easy matter to locate the base, even though we know pretty much where it must be. It is such a mess down there, and add to that the pitchy darkness and the forest of water weed, grown to fantastic heights.…”
“Surely th’ basement would have been crushed when the buildin’ tore apart?” Fian said.
“Since the upper levels are intact, it is very likely that the base is as well,” Garth explained. “It was buried in the ground before the city was flooded, and it will have been heavily reinforced to bear the weight of its upper levels. The chambers themselves may even be dry if they were sealed and secured. The real problem will be getting in.”
“How long has this diving been going on?” I asked.
Garth tilted his head and gave me a faintly challenging look. “We began preparing the apparatus over a year ago. We have been diving since thaw, mostly to test the equipment. Our initial intention was casual exploration, but then we learned about the Reichler Clinic’s basement storage.”
“All this preparation, and you never spoke of it to guildmerge?” I asked with only a tinge of mockery. “What if something had gone wrong?”
“All life is danger, and you cannot be judging every action by that alone,” he responded, a trifle brusquely.
“You can make that point at the next guildmerge.”
Garth heaved a long-suffering sigh. “I would have made a report in time; I hope you know that.”
I said nothing to that, aware that he would have done so only when he had something valuable enough to prove that the end justified the dangerous means.
“I will let Rushton know that you will present a report to guildmerge once you find this cellar, before you do anything,” I said pointedly. He nodded with obvious reluctance. Having forced this concession, I left to return to Obernewtyn.
Though I thought nothing would drag Fian from the dive site, he wanted to come back with me. Miryum had coercively summoned the coercer-knights, and under cover of their preparations for departure, she begged me to find some way of dealing with the Sadorian that would not drive him to suicide.
“You want to refuse him, then?” I asked, still sensing an ambivalence in her.
She flushed. “I was … charmed, I admit, by the idea of a man coming so far for me. But my life is given to Obernewtyn and our cause here.”
I wanted to say what I had learned—that happiness must be taken when it is offered. But some wisdoms can only be recognized if they are come upon after a hard climb. I promised I would do my best to hav
e a solution when she returned to Obernewtyn.
As we mounted, Faraf came over. She was still limping slightly, and it had been decided that she must rest and return when the others did. “We have not had much chance for thinktalk,” she sent regretfully.
“Very soon we will walk into the high valleys and think/run together, little sistermind,” I promised, stroking her mentally and physically.
She nuzzled my knee and sent shyly that this would please her very much.
“She is sweethearted as Avra,” Gahltha sent privately as we turned our backs on Tor. I waved to the little pony and Miryum until the trees blocked them from us, wondering to the black horse if Avra had foaled yet.
“Not yet,” Gahltha sent with such certainty that I asked how he could be sure. He answered that heartmates could always sense how the other felt if they wished. This made me ache anew for Rushton. The bird-borne missive from him had eased my anxieties, but it was a long way from Sutrium to Obernewtyn.
No one was in sight when we rejoined the main road. A smudge of smoke from Guanette was the sole reminder that we were not all alone in the world.
The air was very clear, and as we turned our noses to the high mountains there were rank upon rank of them visible for once, and behind them, what appeared to be banks of clouds were in fact more mountains.
Gahltha dragged my thoughts down to earth, sending that the horses wanted to stretch their legs. We rode at an exhilarating pace for some time, trotted a bit, and then galloped again. It was only early afternoon when we stopped to rest at a public spring just before the turnoff to Darthnor. The horses were thirsty, and there would be no more drinkable water until we had got through the pass. Technically, we were on public property, but boundaries had a way of shifting when gypsies negotiated them, and the memory of Bergold and his sister prompted me to set a watch. Half the coercer-knights posted themselves in trees, perching in branches that gave them a good view of both the road and the turnoff.
Leaning against a mossy fallen log, I realized I was weary.
“I had forgotten,” Fian groaned. He flung himself flat on the ground not far from me.
“Forgotten what?”
“How much I hate to ride. Every bone in my body aches, an’ I know it will be worse tomorrow.”
Smiling, I advised him not to think of riding, since more of it lay ahead. “Fian, do you know why the Sadorians do not speak gadi?”
A true teknoguilder, Fian’s fidgets ceased as soon as his mind was engaged. “They do speak it, but they have chosen to communicate in urolish. A lot of Gadfians actually learned urolish back in Gadfia, and they simply taught the others after their exodus.”
“Why didn’t they just go on speaking gadi?”
“Partly because they wanted no one they encountered to know where they had come from, in case they were followed. But also I think rejectin’ gadi were part of rejectin’ their country an’ their heritage in a broader sense,” Fian said. “But they still teach gadi to their children, an’ they use it for ceremonies an’ in songs.” He rolled onto his side. “Ye know, when I first figured out that them codes I was findin’ was actually ancient languages, I remember wonderin’ why dinna th’ Beforetimers choose one language an’ all of them speak it? But when I was learnin’ th’ jerman code, I found there were things I could say in that language that there were no words for in our language. I realized a different language is nowt just different words fer th’ same things, it’s a different way of thinkin’.…” He shook his head. “I’m nowt bein’ very clear.”
I thought I understood. “You’re saying that you think the Sadorians want to remember gadi because it lets them say things that our language doesn’t?”
He nodded eagerly. “Exactly. I think there is a part of th’ Sadorians that can only be expressed in gadi, an’ that bit of them would die if they let their language gan. Of course, there’s a lot th’ Sadorians feel is bad about their Gadfian heritage, so they only use it in poetry an’ songs. There is some sort of rule they have about never usin’ it in anger. But still, some of th’ Sadorians say gadi ought to be let die, because although it is a language of poetry an’ passion, it can also express perfectly th’ rage of th’ Gadfian fanatics.”
One of the coercer-knights interrupted to report that she had detected a group of miners traveling from Darthnor to Guanette. Their leader planned to bring them to the spring.
“I could coerce him to change his mind, but then we’d have to stay hidden for ages until they have gone out of sight down the road,” the coercer said. “It’s better if we go now.”
I told Fian, who sighed and struggled to his feet. “Let’s gan, then. Sooner begun’s soonest ended.”
We arrived at Obernewtyn late in the afternoon. The coercers dismounted by the main gate, thanking their mounts, and Fian took himself off, too, when we came to the grassy track leading to the Teknoguild cave network. His horse offered to carry him there, but he said wryly that he had better walk the remainder of the way or he might never walk again.
I continued on the outer trail running along the wall to the farm gate. I jumped down from Gahltha outside the barns, and he rubbed his head on my chest, then went in search of Avra. I did an attuned scan of Obernewtyn seeking Rushton, but to my disappointment it did not locate.
I was halfway across the furrowed field on the other side of the orchard before Alad spotted me and left his team of planters to greet me. His shirt clung damply to his shoulders and back, and his face gleamed with sweat.
“I see you are exercising the guildmaster’s privilege to watch others carry out your orders,” I said dryly.
He grinned and said he could use a drink and a bit of shade. He led me to where a spreading eben tree grew in one corner of the field. Here, in shadow, a bucket of water and a dipper were half buried in a vanishing snowdrift. He poured himself a drink and asked how the trip to Tor had gone.
I told him about the diving project, and he shook his head and advised me to leave scolding Garth to Rushton.
“I had decided that already,” I admitted. “Have you heard anything more from Rushton, by the way? I had half hoped he would be here by now.”
“He would be riding easy, as traveling jacks do. I’d not be looking for him before tomorrow morning.”
I repressed a sigh. “How are preparations for the moon fair going anyway?” He beamed. “I think this will be the best we’ve had yet, what with all the displays and Gevan’s magi. You must see the wagons. Grufyyd has crafted them.…”
As he talked, my mind drifted back to Miryum’s assertion that people slept unquietly in the mountains. When Alad gave me a quizzical look, I did not pretend I had been listening to him. Instead, I asked if he slept better when he was away from Obernewtyn.
He blinked at the change of subject. “I leave Obernewtyn too seldom to know if I would sleep better away.”
“Do you sleep well in general?” I persisted.
Alad looked puzzled. “What are you getting at, Elspeth? No, I don’t sleep well. I toss and turn and can’t switch my mind off for thinking of planting this seed, or pruning this row, or cutting down on tubers.”
“Do you dream much?”
He snorted. “Now you sound like the novice we have nagging me to fill our dream journal. The thing’s a damn nuisance.” His exasperation dissipated in resignation. “All right, I do dream, if you can call them dreams. I’d call them distorted memories. Last night, for instance, I dreamed that Domick, Roland, Louis, and I were racing to the Teknoguild cave network to rescue you and Rushton from Alexi. That was pure remembering, but then it turned into a nightmare.” He shook his head.
“A nightmare? What do you mean?”
“One minute we were running through the trees just as we did in reality, and the next this giant dragonish beast flew at me. I screamed, and then I was awake and covered in a muck sweat.” He noticed the expression on my face. “What is the matter? You look as if you just had a nightmare.”
My lips felt n
umb. “The … the monster that came at you. You called it dragonish?”
“Oh, well, I meant no offense to our poor wee Dragon,” Alad said. “It’s just that the beast looked so much like those visions she conjures.”
I was flabbergasted at the sudden realization that it was not a critical mass of Talent distorting dreams and making sleep difficult at Obernewtyn. It was one Talent in particular.
“Things wear different shapes on the dreamtrails,” Maruman had sent to me so many times.
Different shapes.
9
“HOW HAVE YOU all been sleeping lately?” I asked.
“Are you joking?” Gevan demanded bluntly. “You called me in the middle of a vital rehearsal of the magi to answer questions about my sleeping habits?”
“I was mixing a difficult preparation,” Roland growled.
“And I am Mistress of Obernewtyn in Rushton’s absence,” I responded coldly.
There was a startled silence.
“Well, then, if it matters so much, I slept badly,” Gevan said. “Last night and for as many nights past as I can remember. But no doubt it is because of the moon fair preparations. I was up until—”
“Dreams?” I interrupted.
His irritation faded, and he nodded. “Now that you ask, I dreamed of Ariel and his wolves going after Selmar all those years ago. I dreamed I could hear her screaming. I seem to be dreaming a lot of the past lately.”
“Roland?”
The healer nodded. “I sleep little, and I toss and turn and can’t seem to settle. It is the same with all my people. Last night, I dreamed of trying to heal people with the plague. Hundreds of them, and as quickly as they were healed, they were ill again.”
“Angina?”
The young empath said softly, “I dreamed of Hannay climbing up the cliff during the Battlegames in Sador. I dreamed of how scared he was of falling.”
I looked at Maryon, who did not answer but spread out what appeared to be a large, beautifully dyed, woven map.
“What land is this?” Gevan asked, striding across to peer over her shoulder.