A Del Key® Book Published by The Eallantine Publishing Group
Copyright © 2002 by R. A. 
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions.
Published in the United States by The Ballantine Publishing Group,
a division of Random House, Inc. New York, and simultaneously in Canada by
Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
Del Rey is a registered trademark and the Del Rey colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.
www. delreydigital. com
Endpaper maps by Laura Maestro
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 0-345-4)041-7
Manufactured in the United States of America
First Edition: May 2002
10987654321
CONTENT
Prelude
PART ONE
TO THE EDGE OF DARKNESS
First Blood	9
The Blood of Centuries	22
Walking with Purpose	32
Details, Details	38
Conflicting Responsibilities	49
The Iron Hand of Yatol	57
Tymwyvenne	65
Trial of Faith  	96
Dark Solitude	106
PART TWO
GRASSES IN THE WIND
Kin and Kind	129
The Sash of All Colors	143
Pragmatism and Patience	150
Never the Horse	155
As Graciously as Possible	165
Expanding His Horizons	173
Her New Family	igQ
The Grim Reality	288
Baiting the Hook	202

PART THREE
ENLIGHTENMENT
The Play’s the Thing	223
Parallel Journeys	236
The Relief of Resignation	245
A Chill Breeze on Leathery Wings	253
What Agradeleous Wants…	260
Ancient Enemies	274
PART FOUR
THE DRAGON OF TO-QAI
The Walkaway	297
Playing to Their Weakness	306
Ghost Town	319
With All the Weapons at Her Disposal	334
Exacting a Promise	346
One Angry Cat, One Clever Mouse	358
Her Winter of Discontent	371
Hit and Run?	378
The Dragon Ruse	385
Sacrilege Revealed	392
Head-On	401
Defensive Position	410
To the Bitter End	417
Epilogue	434
PRELUDE
 
rynn Dharielle looked back over her shoulder repeatedly as she slowly paced her pinto mount, Diredusk, along the descending moun­tain trail. Though she had only been on the road for a half hour be­yond the edge of Andur’Blough Inninness, the enchanted elven valley, the ridges that marked the place were already lost from sight. The mountainous landscape was a natural maze that had been enhanced by the magic of Lady Dasslerond of the Touel’alfar to be unsolvable. Brynn had marked the trail well along her route, but she understood that she would have a hard time finding her way back - even if she were to turn about right then.
This was the first time Brynn had been out of that misty valley in a decade, and she truly felt as if she was leaving her home. The Touel’alfar, the diminutive, translucent-winged elves of Corona, had come to her when she was a child of ten, orphaned and alone on the rugged and unforgiving steppes of To-gai, far to the south. They had taken her in and given her food and shelter. And even more importantly to Brynn, they had given her life purpose. They had trained her and made her a ranger.
And now they were sending her home to find her destiny.
The young brown-skinned woman crinkled her face at that thought, as she continued to stare back along the trail behind her, to the place that she knew to be her real home, the place she would likely never see again. Tears misted in her almond-shaped brown eyes, the sparkling eyes of a child, still, though so much had they seen. Already she missed Aydrian, the fourteen-year-old who had shared some of her training. Many times, Brynn had found the boy to be exasperating, often infuriating. But the truth was, he was the only other human she had seen in these last ten years, and she loved him like a brother.
A brother she would likely never see again.
Brynn shook her head forcefully, her raven hair flying wildly, and point­edly turned back to the trail heading south. Certainly leaving the valley was a sacrifice for Brynn, a dismissal of the trappings and the companionship that had made the place her home. But there was a reason for her depar­ture, she reminded herself, and if the pain of this loss was the greatest sacri­fice she would be expected to make, then her road would be easier by far than anyone, herself included, had ever imagined possible.
Her future was not her own to decide. No, that road had been laid out be­fore her a decade before, when the Behrenese Yatol priests and their armies had tightened their grip on To-gai, had abolished almost completely the last remnants of a culture that had existed for thousands of years. Brynn’s road had been set from the moment Tohen Bardoh, an orange-robed Yatol priest, had lifted his heavy falchion and lopped off her father’s head; from the mo­ment Tohen and his lackeys had dragged off her mother, eventually killing her, as well.
Brynn’s jaw tightened. She hoped that Tohen Bardoh was still alive. That confrontation alone would be worth any sacrifice.
Of course, Brynn understood keenly that this journey, this duty, was about much more than personal gain. She had been trained for a specific reason, a destiny that was bigger than herself. She was to return to the cold ‘~ and wjndy steppe? of harsh To-gai, the land she loved so much, and find those flickersj>fXvhat had once been. She, little Brynn Dharielle, just over five feet tall and barely weighing a hundred pounds, was to fan that flicker into a flame, then feed the flame with the passion that had burned within her since that fateful day a decade ago. She was to find the To-gai spirit, to remind her fierce and proud people of who they truly were, to unite the many divided tribes in the cause against a deserving enemy: the YatoMed Behrenese, the Chezru.
If the plan went as Brynn and the elves hoped, then Brynn would be the harbinger of war and all the land south of the great Belt-and-Buckle Moun­tains would be profoundly changed.
That was the hope of Lady Dasslerond, who rarely involved herself in the affairs of humans, and that was the burning hope of Brynn Dharielle. Lib­eration, freedom, for the To-gai-ru would avenge her parents, would allow them to sleep more comfortably in their graves.
„We will move down to the east, along that open stone to the tree line,“ came a melodic voice from the side and above. Brynn looked up to the top of a boulder lining the rocky trail to see a figure far more diminutive than she. Belli’mar Juraviel of the Touel’alfar, her mentor and companion, looked back at her with his golden eyes. His hair, too, was the color of sun­light, and his features, though angular, with the high cheekbones and pointy ears characteristic of all of the Touel’alfar, somehow exuded gentleness.
Brynn glanced back once again toward the land that had been her home.
„Keep your eyes ahead,“ Juraviel remarked. „Andur’Blough Inninness is no more to you than a dream now.“
„A pleasant dream,“ Brynn replied, and Juraviel grinned.
„They say that memories often leave out the more terrible scenes.“
Brynn looked at him hard for a moment, but when he started laughing, she understood his meaning well. Indeed, there had been many hard times for Brynn in Andur’Blough Inninness, under the tutelage of the often-stern elves, including Belli’mar Juraviel - though he was considered by his kin to be among the most kindhearted of the people. Particularly Brynn’s early years in the valley had been filled with seemingly impossible trials. The elves had pushed her to the very limits of her physical and emotional being, and often beyond those limits - not to break her, but to make her stronger.
And they had succeeded. Indeed they had! Brynn could fight with sword and bow, could ride as well as any of the people of To-gai, who were put on the back of the sturdy ponies before they could even walk. And more im­portantly, the Touel’alfar had given her the mental toughness she would need to hold true to her course and see it through. Yes, she wanted revenge on Tohen Bardoh - indeed she did! - but she understood that such per­sonal desires could not supersede the greater reason for this journey. She would hold fast to the course and the cause.
Juraviel left that part of the discussion right there, and so did Brynn, fol­lowing the elf’s gaze to the sloping stone facing he had indicated. Brynn frowned, not thrilled with the angle.
„Diredusk will have trouble navigating that,“ she stated. She looked back to her pinto pony, who stood calmly munching grass and seemed not to mind the saddlebags he carried, full of foodstuffs and bedrolls for the pair.
Juraviel nodded. „We will get him through. And once we cross under the canopy of the trees, the ground will be softer under his hooves and the trail will slope more gently.“
Brynn looked down to those trees, rows of evergreens neatly defined by elevation, and frowned again. The ground down there didn’t look very level to her.
„We will be out of the mountains soon enough,“ Juraviel said, seeing her thoughts clearly reflected on her pretty face.
„Sooner if we had gone straight to the east, then turned south,“ the iras­cible Brynn had to say, for she and Juraviel had spent the better part of the previous week arguing about this very topic. Considering what Brynn had been told about this mountain range, which ran more north-south than east-west, they certainly could have gotten to flatter ground more quickly by heading to the east.
„Yes, and then poor Diredusk would be running swiftly until he dropped from exhaustion, or until the goblin hordes caught up to us. Or until he mired down in the mud,“ Juraviel said, again with a chuckle. That had been his argument from the beginning, for the lands immediately east of the mountains were far from hospitable, with goblins and swamps and great areas of muddy clay.
„A Touel’alfar and a ranger, afraid of goblins,“ came Brynn’s huffing reply.

„A Touel’alfar wise enough to know that danger is best defeated by avoid­ing it altogether,“ Juraviel corrected. „And a ranger too proud and too stub­born to recognize that her body, though hardened by our training, is not impervious to a goblin spear! You have heard of Mather, uncle of Elbryan, great-uncle of Aydrian. ‘Twere goblins that struck him down.“
Juraviel started to turn away, and so Brynn took the opportunity to stick her tongue out at him. He looked back immediately, catching her in the act, and just sighed and shook his head, hardly surprised. For surely Belli’mar Juraviel was used to such playful behavior from this one, named by many of the Touel’alfar as the most irreverent - and irresistible - of any of the hu­mans they had ever taken in for training. Brynn saw the world differently from most humans, and had done so even before falling under the demand­ing influences of the Touel’alfar. Despite the darkness that had found her at a young age, she-^^mained the one with the brightest and most sincere smile, the one willing to solve any problem thrown her way through cun-ning~andL wit as mucra as through disciplined training.
That wasliie^^harm of Brynn Dharielle, and also, to Juraviel’s thinking, it was the strength that would carry her through this, her ultimate trial, where sadness and guilt loomed large in places unexpected.
If anything could.
PART ONE
TO THE EDGE OF DARKNESS
/ cannot begin to explain the tremendous shift that has come to Caer’alfar since the demon Bestesbulzibar left its stain, its growing rot, upon our fair valley. For centuries, we of the People have lived in relative seclusion, peaceful and content. Only the rangers knew of us, truly, and a select few of Honce-the-Bear’s ruling families. Our concern with the ways of the wider world ended with the potential impact any happenings might have upon us. Thus the rangers, while protectors of the human settlements on the outskirts of human civilization, were also our link to that world, our eyes in the field.
That was enough.
Bestesbulzibar has apparently changed all of that. Curing the time of the DemonWar, I was. assaulted by that demon, while transporting some poor human refugees away from the goblin andpowrie hordes. I would have perished in that battle - perhaps I should have! - except that Lady GaSStefoncTamved and took up my battle. She, too, would have perished, but she used her magical emerald to take us back to the place of her greatest power, back to Andur’Blough Inninness, just outside of Caer’alfar. There, Dasslerond drove the demon away, but not before Bestesbulzibar had left its indelible stain upon our fair land, a mark enduring, and growing.
I believe that if Dasslerond had understood the cost, she never would have brought us all back to the valley, that she and I would have died on the field that day.
For then we would be gone, but Andur’Blough Inninness would live on.
That rotting stain has done more than change the complexion of our fair valley, it has changed the perspective of Lady Dasslerond. The Touel’alfar have existed by remaining on the outskirts, passive observers in a world too frenzied for our tastes. We do not involve ourselves in the affairs of humans - how many times have I been chided by Lady Dasslerond and my peers for my friendship with Elbryan andjilseponie?
Now, though, Lady Dasslerond has assumed a more active role outside of Andur’Blough Inninness. She sends Brynn south to free To-gai from the Behrenese, mostly because the nomads of To-gai will prove much more accommodating and friendly toward our people should the demon stain force us out of our home. In that event, we would go south, through the Belt-and-Buckle and across To-gai, to another of our ancient homelands, Caer’Towellan, where perhaps our brethren still reside.
Still, despite the potential gains should that event occur, I am
surprised that Dasslerond has sent Brynn Dharielle to begin a war, human against human. If we were forced to journey southward, we could do so, I am certain, whether the To-gai-ru or the Yatol Chezru Chieftain ruled the steppes. But Lady Dasslerond insisted upon this, as much so as on anything I have ever witnessed. She is truly fearful of the demon stain.
And so she undertakes her second unusual stance, and this one frightens me even more than the journey she has determined for Brynn. She took }ilseponie’s child, unbeknownst to the mother. She took the child ofElbryan and Jilseponie, right from its mother’s womb! True, her action saved the lives of both Jilseponie andAydrian that dark night on the field outside ofPalmaris, for had not Dasslerond intervened to drive away the demon-possessed Markwart, both humans would surely have perished.
Still, to raise the child as her, as our, own…
And the manner of that upbringing scares me even more - perhaps as much as the reason for the upbringing. Lady Dasslerond has plans for Brynn, but they pale compared to her goals for young Aydrian. He will be the one to deliver Andur’Blough Inninness from the demon stain, at the sacrifice of his own blood and his own life. He will become the epitome of what it is to be a ranger, and then, when that is achieved, he will become Dasslerond’s sacrifice to the earth, that the demon stain be lifted.
She has foreseen this, my Lady has told me, in no uncertain terms. She knows the potential of her plan. All that she must do is bring Aydrian to the required level of power and understanding.
But there’s the rub, I fear. For Aydrian Wyndon, raised without the gentle touch of his mother or the love of his father, raised in near seclusion with harsh treatment and high standards from the moment he was old enough to understand them, will not he complete as a man, let alone as a ranger. There was a side to Elbryan, the Nightbird, beyond his abilities with the sword and his understanding of nature. The greatest gift ofNightbird, the greatest strength of the man Elbryan, was compassion, was a willingness to sacrifice every thing for the greater good. Nightbird’s gift to the world was his death, when he threw his wounded form fully into Jilseponie’s final battle with the demon-possessed Markwart, knowing full well that he could not survive that conflict, that, in aiding Jilseponie, he would be giving his very life.
He did that. He didn’t hesitate, because Nightbird was possessed of so much more than we of the Touel’alfar ever gave to him - because Elbryan the Nigh third was a man of true character and true community.
Will the child raised alone and unloved he as much?
This is my fear.
 - belli’mar juraviel
 
chapter
* 1 *
First Blood
T
hey were out of the mountains now, and the going was smooth and easy. Diredusk most of all seemed to revel in the softer and flatter ground, the powerful pinto pony striding long and eagerly under Brynn’s expert handling. True to his noble To-gai heritage, the pony could trot for many miles before needing a break, and even then, he was quickly ready to be back on the trail, straining against Brynn’s hold to travel faster and faster.
For Brynn, riding along quiet forest trails on a late-spring or early-summer day was about as wonderful as things could get, and would have been perfect - except that with every passing mile the young ranger’s eyes turned back less and looked forward ever more eagerly. She couldn’t enjoy the ride as much when the destination was all-important.
Belli’mar Juraviel rode with the woman at times, Diredusk hardly feeling the extra weight of the diminutive creature. The elf typically sat in front of Brynn, turned to face the woman and lying back along the pony’s powerful neck. He didn’t speak to Brynn much along the trails, though, for he could see that the woman was falling deeper and deeper into thought about the destination awaiting them. That’s what Juraviel wanted from the young woman; that’s what the Touel’alfar demanded of the ranger. The goal was all-important, because Lady Dasslerond had said it was, and nothing else should clutter Brynn Dharielle’s mind - not the fragrance of the summer forest awakening fully, not the sounds of the songbirds, not even the sparkle of the morning sun on the dewy grasses and leaves.
And so they rode quietly, and sometimes Juraviel leaped from Diredusk’s back and fluttered up to the branches of the trees, moving to higher vantage points to scout the road ahead.
Their evenings, too, were for the most part quiet, sitting about a fire, enjoying their evening meal. In this setting, with little stimulation about them, Brynn would sometimes tell Juraviel stories of her homeland, of her parents and their small nomadic tribe, Kayleen Kek. On one such night, with Andur’Blough Inninness a hundred miles behind them, the woman became especially nostalgic.
„We always went to the higher ground in the summer,“ she told her com­panion. „Up the sides of the great mountains in the range you call the Belt-and-Buckle, but that we called Uleshon Twak, the Dragon Spines. We’d camp so high sometimes that it was hard simply to draw in sufficient air. You’d always feel as if you couldn’t catch your breath. Every step seemed to take minutes to execute, and a tent in sight might take you an hour to walk to. I remember that at times blood would run from my nose, for no reason. My mother would fret over me, but my father would just say that the high-sickness could do that and it was nothing to bother about.“
Juraviel watched her as she continued her tale, her head tilted back so that her eyes were staring up at the night canopy. It wasn’t starry that night, with thickening clouds drifting in from the west. The full moon, Sheila, shone behind those clouds, sometimes seeming a pale full light, other times disappearing completely behind a dark and thick blanket.
Brynn wasn’t seeing it, any of it, Juraviel knew. She was looking across the years as much as across the distance. She was seeing the crisp night sky from a camp of deerskin tents fiested among great boulders on the high slopes of the Belt-and-Buckle( She was pearing her mother’s laugh, perhaps, and her father’s stern but loving comrrtands. She was hearing the nickers of the nearby To-gai ponies, so loyal-that they didn’t need to be tethered, as they protested the sparse grasses at the great elevation.
That was good, Juraviel knew. Let per recall the feeling of the old days, of her life before Andur’Blough Inninness. Let her remember clearly how much she had lost, how much To-gai had lost, so that her calls to her people to reclaim their heritage would be even more full of passion and conviction.
„Do they still go to the high passes?“ Juraviel prompted.
Brynn’s expression changed as she lowered her gaze to regard the elf, as if one of the clouds from the sky had dropped down to cross over her fair features. „I know not,“ she admitted somberly. „When I was taken by your people, the Chezru were trying to establish permanent villages.“
„The To-gai-ru must walk the land with the creatures,“ said Juraviel. „That is their way.“
„More than our way. It is our spirit, our path to…“ She paused - unsure, it seemed.
„Your path to what?“ the elf asked. „To heaven?“
Brynn looked at him curiously, and then nodded. „To our heaven,“ she explained. „There on the high plateaus. There in the autumn valleys, full of the golden flowers that bloom to herald the cold winds. There by the sum­mer streams, swollen with melt. There, following the deer.“
„The Chezru do not see the value of such a life,“ Juraviel noted. „They are not a wandering people.“

„Because their deserts are not suited to such a lifestyle,“ said Brynn. „They have their many oases, and their great cities, but to wander through the sea­sons would not show them much beauty beyond those denned enclaves. Behren is not like To-gai, not a land of differing beauties in differing seasons. Thus they do not understand us and thus they try to change us.“
„Perhaps they believe that in giving villages to the To-gai-ru, they will be showing the To-gai-ru the path to a better life.“
„No,“ Brynn was answering before the elf even finished the statement, and Juraviel knew that he would elicit strong disagreement here - indeed, that was his goal. „They want us in villages, even cities, that they might bet­ter control us. In villages, they can watch the clans, but out on the plains, we would be free to practice the old ways and to speak ill of our conquerors.“
„But the gains,“ the elf said dramatically. „The stability of existence.“
„The trap of possession!“ Brynn was quick to argue. „Cities are prisons and nothing more. When they run correctly, they trap you, they make you dependent on the comforts they provide. But they take from you - oh, they take so much!“
„What do they take?“ There was an unintended urgency to Juraviel’s tone. He could tell that he was getting to Brynn, driving her on, which was precisely his duty.
„They take away the summer plateaus, the mountain wind, and the smell…. oh, the scents of the high fields in the summer! They take away the swollen rivers, full of leaping fish. They take away the rides, the ponies charging across the open steppe. Oh, you should hear that sound, Belli’mar! The thunder of the To-gai-ru charge!“
She was breathing hard as she finished, her brown eyes sparkling with energy, as if she were witnessing that charge - as if she was leading that charge. She finally came out of her trance a bit and looked to the elf.
„I will witness it,“ came Belli’mar Juraviel’s soft and assuring answer. „I will.“
Their road remained fairly straight south over the next few days, and Brynn was under the impression that they had but a single goal here: to get to To-gai and begin the process of liberation.
That’s what Juraviel and the others had told her, but the elf knew that he and Brynn had other things to attend to before beginning the long process of placing Brynn at the front of a revolution. Brynn Dharielle had been trained in the rigorous manner that had produced rangers from Andur’Blough In-ninness for centuries, but, as fine as that training might be, Juraviel knew that it had its limitations. Even the most difficult trials - for Brynn, one had involved shooting targets from the saddle and at a gallop - were with­out the greatest of consequences, and hence, without the true understand­ing of the disaster that could be failure. For failing a test in Andur’Blough Inninness could mean humiliation and weeks of intense corrective training, but failing a test out here would likely mean death. Brynn had to learn that, had truly to appreciate all that she had to lose.
And so, on that morning when Belli’mar Juraviel took note of some curi­ous tracks crossing the soft ground in front of them - tracks so subtle that Brynn didn’t even notice them from horseback - he allowed the woman to move obliviously past the spot, then studied the trail more closely. Juraviel knew the tracks, had seen them many, many times during the days of the Demon War, when he had traveled beside Nightbird and Jilseponie battling Bestesbulzibar’s minions. The tracks were like those of a human, a young human, perhaps. But those made by shod feet revealed a poorly crafted boot, and those made by bare feet showed a telltale flatness in the arch and a wide expanse at the toes narrowing almost to a point at the heels.
Goblins. Moving east and in no apparent hurry.
Juraviel looked up and studied the area, even going so far as to sniff the breeze, but then he smiled at himself and shook his head. The tracks were probably a day old, he knew. These goblins were likely long gone.
But he knew the direction.
To Brynn’s surprise, JurayieLannounced that they had to turn to the east for a bit. She didn’t argue/of cobrse, for he was her guide, and so with a shrug, she brought Dirediisk in line behind the moving elf. When that day ended, the pair had put twenty miles behind them, but in truth, they were no closer to the steppes of Tp^ai than they had been the previous day, something that Brynn surely/took note of.
„Are we to travel around the world, then?“ she asked sarcastically after they had eaten their dinner of vegetable stew. „Perhaps that way, we can sneak up on the Chezru from behind.“
„The straight line is always the shortest distance, ‘tis true,“ the elf replied. „But it is not always the swiftest.“
„What does that mean? What have you seen up ahead?“ Brynn got up and looked to the south. „Monsters?“
„There is no barrier looming to the south, but this road is better, I believe.“
Brynn stared hard at the cryptic elf for some time, but Juraviel went back to his eating and didn’t return the look. He wanted to keep the mystery, wanted to have Brynn off-balance and wondering. He didn’t want her to know what was coming, and likely coming the very next day.
Later on, when Brynn was asleep, Juraviel hopped, flew, and climbed up the tallest tree he could find and peered through the dark night to the east.
There was the campfire, as he had expected. It was a long way off, to be sure.
But the goblins, he believed, weren’t in any hurry.
Brynn stared through the tangle of trees, sorting out the distinct and con­fusing lines until she was fully focused on the ugly little creatures beyond.
They were diminutive - not as much so as the Touel’alfar, but smaller than Brynn. Their skin color ranged from gray to sickly yellow to putrid green, and hair grew in splotches about their heads, backs, and shoulders. Elon­gated teeth, misshapen noses, and sloping foreheads only added to the gen­erally wretched mix. Brynn wasn’t close enough to smell the creatures, but she could well imagine that such an experience wouldn’t be pleasant.
She turned and looked up to Juraviel, who was sitting comfortably on a branch. „Goblins?“ she asked, for though she had heard of the creatures during her stay with the elves, she had never actually seen one.
„The vermin are thick about these stretches,“ Juraviel answered, „out­side the borders of the human kingdoms.“
Brynn thought things over carefully, particularly their unexpected change in course of the previous day. „You knew they were here,“ she reasoned. „You brought me here to see them. But why?“
Juraviel spent a long moment looking through the trees to the goblin group. Several of them were visible, and he suspected that more were about, probably out destroying something, a tree or an animal, just for the fun of it. „You do not know that I brought you here to see them,“ he said.
Brynn chuckled at him. „But why?“ she asked again.
Juraviel shrugged. „Perhaps it is merely a fortunate coincidence.“
„Fortunate?“
„It is good that you should view these creatures,“ the elf explained. „A new experience to widen your understanding of a world much larger than you can imagine.“
Brynn’s expression showed that she could accept that, but Juraviel added, „Or perhaps I feel it is my - our - duty to better the world wherever we may.“
Brynn looked at him curiously.
„They are goblins, after all.“
The woman’s expression didn’t change. „Goblins who seem not to be bothering anybody or anything.“
„Perhaps that is because there is no one or nothing about for them to bother at this moment,“ Juraviel replied.
„Am I understanding your intent correctly?“ the young ranger asked, turning back to survey the distant, undeniably peaceful scene of the small goblin camp. „Do you want us to attack this group?“
‘Straight out? No,“ Juraviel answered. „Of course not - there are too many goblins about for that to be wise. No, we must be more stealthy and cunning in our methods.“
When Brynn looked back to him, she wore an expression that combined curiosity, confusion, and outrage. „We could go around them and leave them in peace.“
‘And fear forever after for the mischief they would cause.“
Brynn was shaking her head before Juraviel ever finished, but the elf pressed on dramatically. „For the families who would soon enough grieve for loved ones slain by the evil creatures. For the forests destroyed and dese­crated, the animals senselessly slaughtered - not for food or clothing, but just for entertainment.“
„And if we murder this band, then we are no better than the goblins, by any measure,“ Brynn declared, and she tilted her head back, her expression proud and idealistic. „Is it not our compassion that elevates us? Is it not our willingness to find peace and not battle, that makes us better than creatures such as this?“
„Would you be so generous if those were Yatol priests about that distant encampment?“ the elf slyly asked.
„That is different.“
„Indeed,“ came the obviously sarcastic reply.
„The Yatol priests chose their course - one that invites revenge from To-gai,“ Brynn reasoned. „The goblins did not choose their heritage.“
„Thus you reason that every single Yatol priest took part in the atrocities perpetrated upon your people? Or are they all guilty for the sins of the few?“
„Every Yatol priest, every Chezru, follows a creed that leads to such con­quest,“ Brynn argued. „Thus every Yatol priest is an accomplice to the atroc­ities committed by those followi0|f utieif-^oinrnf>n creed!“
„The goblins have visited more grief upon the world than ever did the Yatol priests.“
„Being a part of that group, gobliris, is not a conscious choice, but merely a consequence of parentage. Surely you of the Touel’alfar, who are so wise, can see the difference.“
Belli’mar Juraviel smiled widely at the compassionate young ranger’s rea­soning, though he knew, from his perspective garnered through centuries of existence, that she was simply wrong. „Goblins are not akin to the other thinking and reasoning races,“ he explained. „Perhaps their heritage is not their choice, but their actions are universally predictable and deplorable. Never have I seen, never have I heard of a single goblin who goes against the creed that is their culture and heritage. Not once in the annals of history has a goblin been known to step forward and deny the atrocities of its wretched kin. No, my innocent young charge, I’ll not suffer a goblin to live, and neither will you.“
Brynn winced at the direct edict, one that obviously did not sit well on her slender shoulders.
„I brought you here because there before us is a stain upon the land, a blight and a danger, and there before us is our duty, clear and obvious.“
Brynn glanced back as she heard the commanding, undebatable tone.
„We will search the forest about the encampment first,“ Juraviel went on. „Thinning the herd as much as possible before going to an open battle.“
„Striking with stealth and from behind?“ Brynn asked with clear sarcas.

But her accusation, for that is what was obviously intended, was lost on uraviel, who replied simply and with ultimate coldness, „Whatever works.“
Less than an hour later, Brynn found herself crawling through the brush south of the goblin camp, for she and Juraviel had worked themselves around the location. The ranger moved with all the stealth the TouePalfar had taught her, easing each part of her - elbow, knee, foot, and hand - down slowly, gradually shifting her weight and feeling keenly the turf be­low, taking care to crunch no old leaves and snap no dried twigs.
A dozen feet before her, a pair of goblins labored noisily, one of them breaking small sticks from the trees and tossing them back to its ugly com­panion, who was hard at work with a small stick and bow, trying to start a fire. Brynn and Juraviel had overheard a pair of the creatures a short way back, and Juraviel understood enough of the guttural language to relay to Brynn that the goblins were planning to set great fires to flush out easy kills.
Brynn paused as she considered that conversation, for she had argued against JuraviePs clear implication that the goblin plans proved his point about the creatures’ temperament. Humans hunted, after all - the To-gai were particularly adept at it. Perhaps this was only a difference in method. Lying there, Brynn understood how weak her argument had been. The amount of kindling that was being piled and the sheer joy on the face of the goblin who intended to set the blaze told her that this was about much more than a simple hunt for food.
Still…
Juraviel had given Brynn his sword for this unpleasant business, though in her hands it was no more than a large and slender dagger. That would work better than her staff or bow for now, though, for this had to be done quickly and quietly. Especially quietly.
She continued forward another couple of feet, then a bit more. She could hear the creatures clearly, could smell them. With mud streaked about her face, and leaves and twigs strapped to her clothing, Brynn understood logi­cally that she was somewhat camouflaged, but still she could hardly believe that the goblins hadn’t taken note of her yet!
The one bent over trying to start the fire yelped suddenly and started to stand. Its companion, closer to Brynn, looked to regard it, smiling stupidly, apparently thinking that the fire was starting to catch.
But there were only wisps of smoke, then the goblin, halfway upright, yelped again, and then again, and its companion’s expression shifted to curiosity.
And then Brynn was behind it, her hand coming around to clamp over its mouth, her dagger, Juraviel’s silverel sword, driving deep into the creature’s back, just to the side of the backbone, sinking deep to reach for the goblin’s heart. Brynn felt that keenly - so very keenly! She felt the flesh tearing, the varying pressures as the dagger slid through, and then felt an almost electri­cal shock, as if she had touched the very essence of the creature’s life force, the point of the weapon acting as a channel to let that life force flow freely from the goblin’s body.
The other goblin yelped again and fell over. Then it yelped - or tried to - yet again, and clutched at its throat.
The goblin in her arms went limp and she eased it to the ground, think­ing that she should go and finish the other. It was a forced thought, though, for all that Brynn wanted to do at that horrible moment was fall to her knees and scream out in protest. She growled those feelings away and steadied herself for the necessary task at hand, pulling free the bloodied sword and considering her next kill. Belli’mar Juraviel was at the other gob­lin before her, though, standing over the creature, his small bow drawn back fully.
He put another arrow into the squirming^gdblin, then another. And then a third, and the creature seemed as if it would not die!
The next arrow drove through the side of its head. It gave a sudden, vi­cious spasm, and the light went out of the goblin’s eyes.
It was all Brynn could manage to keepjteafs flowing from her eyes, to keep from crying out in horror and revulsion, and pain.
So much pain.
Was this why she had trained as a ranger? Or was „ranger“ even the proper word? Was it, perhaps, merely a cover for the true intention of her training, the true title she should drape across her shoulders: assassin?
„Come, and quickly,“ Juraviel said to her, drawing her back from her in­ner conflict. Hardly thinking, she followed the elf along the circuitous route, until they happened upon another goblin, out collecting kindling.
It was dead before it even knew they were there.
The perimeter was secured then, and so the pair focused their attention on the encampment itself, where a band of more than a half dozen of the creatures milled about and sat around the smoldering embers of the previ­ous night’s fire. They had a large, rusty pot sitting atop it, and every once in a while, one went over to it and ladled out some foul-looking stew.
„We could wait to see if others wander out alone,“ Juraviel said to her. „Take them down one or two at a time.“
Brynn winced visibly at the thought, wanting all of this to be over as quickly as possible.
„The time for stealth is ended,“ she said determinedly, and started to rise, intending to charge straight into the band.
Juraviel caught her by the arm and held her fast. „What is a To-gai-ru war­rior’s greatest weapon?“ he asked. „Even beyond courage and the bow?“
Brynn nodded and handed him his small sword, then turned about, understanding. A few minutes later, the goblins in the encampment stood and looked cu­riously to the north, to the crashing and thumping echoing out of the forest.
grynn Dharielle, astride Diredusk, came through the last line of brush with bow drawn. She took the goblin farthest to the right first, dropping it •with hardly a squeak, then got her second arrow away, knocking a goblin away from the cooking pot, a bowlful of stew flying over it as it toppled backward.
A quick and fluid movement had the bow unstrung, and Brynn tucked it under her right arm like a lance as she guided Diredusk to a course right past a third, stunned creature. The goblin’s face exploded in a shower of blood, the sturdy darkfern bow smashing through. Brynn cut Diredusk hard to the left, the pony trampling the next goblin in line, then running down yet another as it tried to flee. Now Brynn swung the staff like a club, whistling it past another goblin’s face, a near miss that had the creature div­ing back to the ground.
By then, though, her momentum had played out. She reached the far end of the encampment, leaving three goblins standing, no longer surprised, and collecting their weapons. Where was Juraviel? Why hadn’t she heard the high-pitched twang of his small bow or the yelps of stuck goblins?
Brynn tugged hard on the reins, bringing her pony to a skidding stop and quick turn. She flanked around to the left, going to a half seat and bending low over Diredusk’s neck as the horse easily leaped a pair of logs set out as benches.
Brynn yanked him hard to the left as he landed, lining up a second run at the center of the camp. The three goblins, though, had wisely retreated to the fringes of the forest, using brush and trees for cover, and the only target she found was the goblin she had narrowly missed on her first pass, the creature stumbling as it tried to rise. Her aim was better this time, the swinging bow smacking it across the back of the head as she thundered past, launching the creature facefirst. It crashed against the cooking pot, knocking it over, then it tumbled down right onto the hot embers. How that goblin howled and thrashed! Its scraggly hair ignited, its skin burned and curled!
With movements so fast and so fluid that they defied the goblins’ com­prehension, Brynn bent and strung her bow as she lifted her leg over the horse’s back, then set an arrow as she dropped from Diredusk into a charge.
She pegged the closest goblin right between the eyes, dropped into a roll to avoid a thrown spear from a second, set an arrow as she rolled, and came up firing.
Then there was one.
A flick of Brynn’s wrist had the bow unstrung as she charged.
The goblin, obviously unsure, obviously terrified, started to run. Then it changed its mind and turned, crude spear presented before it. It thrust out as Brynn came in, but the skilled ranger slapped the awkward attack aside and started forward for what looked like a quick victory.
Started forward, but stopped abpaptry\as the brush to the side parted and a second goblin burst through,/chargingxat the ranger with a small and rusty dagger.
Brynn turned sidelong and started to bring herbow-staff to bear, but the first goblin came back in hard. The ranger adeptly changed the momentum of her weapon, grabbing it up high with her left hand, reversing the grip, then thrusting the staff right back to the side in an underhand movement, guiding it with her right hand, holding on with her left. The charging spear-wielder had its weapon back, trying to gain momentum for its thrust at that moment, and so there was nothing in place to block Brynn s stab before the staff connected with the goblin’s face.
Brynn let her weapon drop then, confident that the goblin was out of the fight for a while at least. She wove her hands furiously before her to set a defense against the goblin with the knife. Her balanced and precise move­ments slowed the goblin just a bit, as it tried to find some hole in the sud­den defense, and that was all Brynn needed. She sent her left hand out wide to the left and lifted her right hand up above her head, giving an apparent opening.
And the goblin dove into that hole, thinking to sink its knife into her chest.
Up snapped Brynn’s right foot, smacking the goblin’s lead arm out wide. She caught the back of the goblin’s wrist in her left hand and yanked it down, twisting to lock the creature’s elbow, its palm and Brynn’s facing up­ward. The ranger turned right inside the hold then, bringing her left arm over and around, then down under the caught arm, turned her back right before the goblin’s torso as she went. Brynn ignored the expected punch from the goblin’s free hand, keeping her momentum, locking her forearm under that trapped elbow, and yanking up, while throwing her weight far­ther out over that trapped hand and tugging down hard.
The goblin yelped in pain, though it still managed to throw a second punch into Brynn’s back.
It couldn’t maintain its hold on the dagger, though, as Brynn’s fingers worked the hand of the pained arm to force it free. As it fell, Brynn pulled straight out with her left hand, keeping the goblin off-balance, and released the arm from her right arm’s hold, stepping forward and snapping out her right hand to catch the dagger before it ever hit the ground. She flipped it over in a sudden reversal and, even as the goblin slugged her again, thrust out straight and hard behind her, planting the dagger deep into the goblin’s chest.
The goblin punched her yet again, but there was no strength in the blow. Brynn pumped her arm once and again, tearing up the goblin’s chest and guts, then turned hard and shoved the dying creature to the ground.

The goblin she had smacked in the face was up by then, but not charg­ing.The creature had seen enough of this fighter, apparently, and started to run off into the forest.
Hardly even thinking of the movement, Brynn launched the dagger, hit­ting it in the back of the leg. The goblin howled and went down hard, then kicked and thrashed, trying to tug the dagger out, but in too much pain even to grasp it.
Now Brynn was thinking again, and watching every terrible movement. As much in horror as in pragmatism, she picked up her staff, rushed over, and smashed the goblin in the head.
It just yelled and thrashed even more.
Brynn hit it again, and again, just wanting this nightmare to be over, just wanting the wretched thing to lie still.
A long while later, after what seemed like many, many minutes to Brynn, the goblin finally stopped its thrashing and its whining.
Brynn slumped to her knees. There were still goblins about, some hurt, others perhaps not so, but she couldn’t think of that right at that moment, couldn’t think of anything except for the dead creatures about her, the gob­lins she had killed, and brutally so. She fought against the tears and against the urge to throw up, trying hard to steady her breathing and her sensibili­ties. She reminded herself that danger was all about her, told herself that a goblin might be creeping up even then, ready to drive a spear into her back.
Brynn glanced over her shoulder at the unsettling thought, but all was quiet behind her. Even in the encampment, nothing seemed to be stirring, though she knew she had not killed all of the creatures back there in her ini­tial charge. She noted Diredusk off to the side, standing calmly, tugging at some low brush, then lifting his head with a great haul of small branches and leaves in his munching mouth.
Brynn took up her bow and strung it, then pulled the dagger out of the dead goblin’s leg and set it into her belt. Fitting an arrow, she crept along a circuitous route, gradually working her way back in sight of the camp.
None of the goblins was moving. Belli’mar Juraviel walked about them, kicking at them, and when any showed signs of life, the elf bent down and slashed open its throat.
Brynn hated him at that moment. Profoundly. Why had he done this to her? Why had he taken her off the straight trail to the south and toward To-gai, only to slaughter these creatures?
It took the young ranger a few moments to realize how tightly she was gripping her bowstring about the set arrow, or the fact that she had inad­vertently begun to pull back, just a bit, on the bow. She eased it to rest, then grabbed it up in one hand, clenching the bow at midshaft and wrapping one finger about the arrow to hold it steady. Then she determinedly, angrily, strode back into the encampment. Juraviel looked up at her. „A bit sloppy,“ he said. „Your first charge through was beautifully executed, efficient and to the point. But you spent far too long with the pair in the brush. Three of these were not dead, and two could have soon enough gathered their witsand strength enough to come in at you. What would you have done if I had not been here to clean up?“
His voice trailed away at the end, his expression showing Brynn that she was correctly conveying her outrage with her steely look.
„Is there a problem?“ the elf asked, his condescending tone alone telling Brynn that he knew well enough what was bothering her.
„Was there a purpose?“
„Need I give you another lecture about the wretchedness of goblins? How many examples should I provide you to settle your guilt, young ranger? Should I tell you about the forests they have burned to the ground, about the human settlements they have raided, slaughtering even the children, and eating more than a few? Should I recount for you again the great De­mon War and point out the hundreds of instances of misery the goblins per­petrated upon the land and upon the humans in that dark time? „
„Raided human settlements,“ Brynn echoed, looking about sarcastically.
„Yes, and took pleasure in every kill.“
„As did you!“ Brynn knew that she was moving over the line even as the words left her mouth.
„Not so,“ Juraviel answered quietly and calmly, seeming to take no of­fense. „I, we, did as we had to do. With expediency and efficiency. Without true malice, and with actions spawned from pragmatism. Did I enjoy the killing? Not really. But I take heart in knowing that our actions here just made the entire world a bit brighter and a bit safer.“
„And seasoned your ranger a bit more.“ There was no mistaking the heavy sarcasm and anger in her tone.
„And that, yes,“ the elf answered, unperturbed.
Brynn quivered on the verge of an explosion. „And do rangers often gain their first battle experience against goblins?“ she asked. „Is that where they draw first blood, where they first can enjoy the sweet smell of death?“
„Goblins or rabid animals, likely,“ the elf was quick to respond, and still he seemed completely unshaken. „Though it could be argued that they are much one and the same.“
His tone as much as his words only brought even more tension into poor Brynn, and she wanted to scream out in protest at that moment more than she ever had since the murder of her parents.
„As worthy an enemy as can be found, if not so worthy as an opponent,“ Juraviel went on.
Brynn turned away and squeezed her eyes shut tightly, then opened them and stared off into the forest. She felt Juraviel’s gentle hand upon the small of her back.
„How steep are the mountains you must climb if you cannot scale this tiny hillock?“

„I did not leave Andur’Blough Inninness to become a murderess,“ Brynn answered through her gritted teeth.
„You left Andur’Blough Inninness to begin a war,“ Juraviel reminded, with even more intensity. „Do you think that your revolution will be bloodless?“
„That is different.“
„Because the Chezru are deserving?“
Brvnn, her eyes narrowed, turned to face him directly, and said with an air of confidence, „Yes.“
„And only the deserving Chezru will die?“
„Many of my people will die, but they will do so willingly, if their sacrifice helps to free To-gai!“
„And many innocents will die,“ the elf pointed out. „Children too young to understand what is happening. The infirm. Women on both sides will be raped and slaughtered.“
Brynn worked hard to hold firm her gaze, but she did wince.
„War is not fought along clear lines, Brynn. The Yatols at war will call upon the fierce Chezhou-Lei warriors, and they, by reputation, will not suf­fer any of the enemy race to live. And will your own people be more gener­ous? How many of the To-gai-ru have suffered horrible tragedies under the press of the Yatols? When you press into Behren, as surely you must if you are to force the people of the sand kingdom truly to allow you your freedom, you will overtake Behrenese villages, full of people who know nothing of To-gai and the plight of the To-gai-ru. But will not some of your own warriors take revenge on those innocents for the wrongs of the Yatol occupation?“
Brynn didn’t relent in her stoic gaze. She could not, at that moment of dark epiphany. But she heard well Belli’mar Juraviel’s every word, and knew in her heart, if her head would not yet admit it, that he was correct.
 
C H A P T E R  *2*

The Blood of Centuries
„ML Z´ akim Douan, Chezru Chieftain of all Behren, opened his eyes on this, the 308,797th day of his life.
^L. The sun looked the same, peeking in his bedroom window. The springtime air, laced with the scents of flowers and spices and pungent camels, felt the same as it always had.
Yakim Douan smiled at that thought, for he liked it this way, too much ever to let it go. He groaned a bit as he rolled off his bed - a hammock, as was customary in the city of Jacintha, where the aggressive and deadly brown-ringed scorpions often crawled into the padded bedding of mat­tresses or straw. Slowly the old man straightened, cursing the sharp pain in both his knees and the way his back always seemed to lock up after a long night’s sleep.
His room was beautifully adorned, with all the trappings one would ex­pect for the most powerful and the richest man south of the Belt-and-Buckle - and arguably north of it, as well. Wondrous tapestries lined the walls, their rich colors capturing the morning light, their intricate designs drawing in Yakim Douan’s gaze and holding it there. How long had he been studying those same images? Depictions of war and of the human form, of beauty and of tragedy? And still, they seemed as fresh and inspir­ing to him as they had when first he had gazed upon them.
Thick woven rugs felt good on his bare feet. He stretched and widened his toes, taking it in fully, then made his creaking way across the large room to the decorated washbasin, all of shining white-and-pink marble, with a golden-framed mirror hanging above it. The Chezru Chieftain splashed cold water onto his old and wrinkled face and stared hard into the mirror, lamenting the way age had ravaged him. He saw his gray eyes and hated them most of all, and wished he had known their color before he had cho­sen this corporeal coil as his own.
Blue eyes next time, he hoped. But, of course, some things were quite be­yond his control.

His current set of orbs was quite telling to him. Never did they seem hite about the pupils anymore, just a dull yellowish hue. His body was •xtv-two years old, and he had hated every minute of the last decade. Oh, of course he could have any luxuries he wanted. He kept a harem of beautiful young women at his beck and call, and should he desire a plaything, he ould bring in any other woman he chose, even if she was already married. He was the Chezru Chieftain, the God-Voice of Behren. With a word he ould have a person burned at the stake, or order one of his subjects to take his own life, and the idiot would unquestioningly comply.
All the world was Yakim Douan’s to take, and so he did, over and over again.
A soft, polite knock on his door turned the old Chezru from the mirror. „Enter,“ he said, knowing full well that it was Merwan Ma, his personal attendant.
„Your pardon, Great One,“ Merwan Ma said, peeking his head around the door. He was a handsome young man in his early twenties, with short, black, tightly curled hair, and large black eyes that seemed all the darker be­cause they were set in pools of white, pure white, with no veins and no yel­low discoloration at all. The eyes of a child, Yakim thought, every time he looked upon them. Merwan Ma’s face was boyish as well, with hardly a shadow of hair, and his nose and lips were somewhat thin, which only made his eyes seem all the larger. „Shall I have your breakfast brought to you up here, or do you prefer a litter to take you to the Room of Morning Sun?“
Yakim Douan suppressed his chuckle. He heard these same words every morning - every single morning! Without fail, without the slightest devia­tion. Exactly as he had ordered them spoken fifty-two years and seven personal attendants ago.
„God-Voice?“ Merwan Ma asked.
A telling question, Yakim Douan realized, for the younger man had spo­ken out of turn, without prompting and without permission. The Chezru Chieftain glared at the attendant, and Merwan Ma shrank back, nearly dis­appearing behind the door.
Yes, Yakim could still keep the overly curious young man in line, and with just a look. That, and the fact that he honestly liked Merwan Ma, was the only reason Yakim kept this one around. While one would normally expect intelligence to be a prized attribute for a personal attendant, Yakim Douan usually went out of his way to avoid that particular strength. The Chezru Chieftain was safer by far if those closest to him were somewhat dim-witted. Unfortunately for Yakim, though, by the time he had realized Merwan Ma’s brightness, he was already enamored of the young man, who had been only sixteen when he had begun to serve. Even after he had come to understand Merwan Ma’s intellect and curiosity, Yakim had kept him on, and now, with ie day of his death approaching, he was glad that he had. Merwan Ma was right and inquisitive, but he was also fiercely loyal and pious, dedicated enough to Yatol to rise into the priesthood. When Merwan Ma called Yakim „God-Voice,“ he honestly believed the title to be literal.
„Come in,“ the Chezru Chieftain bade the attendant.
Merwan Ma came around the door, standing straigta. He was tall, well over six feet, and lean, as were most of the people of Behren, where it was hot all the time and extra pounds and layers of fat did not sit well. He’d seem even taller if he ascended to the priesthood, Yakim realized, for then he’d grow his hair up high, as was the custom for Yatols.
Yakim nearly chuckled again as he considered the fact that his attendant was not a Yatol priest. For centuries, the Chezru Chieftain had been at­tended only by Yatol priests; for centuries, none but Yatol priests were even allowed to speak to the God-Voice. But Yakim Douan had changed that nearly four hundred years before, after one almost disastrous transforma­tion when several of his attending Yatols had decided to make a try for the principal Chezru title themselves, claiming that the new God-Voice could not be found, despite the fact that they had a two-year-old in hand who could fully recite the Codex of the Prophet.
Luck alone had allowed Yakim Douan to continue his reign in that instance, and so when he had risen to Consciousness at the tender age of ten, one of his first edicts was to change the strata at Chom Deiru, the Chezru Palace, putting those whose power was closest to the Chezru Chief­tain out of the loop, removing personal ambition from the formula in times of Transcendence
„The Room of the Morning Sun is prepared for breakfast?“ Yakim asked.
„Yes, God-Voice.“ Merwan Ma was careful to avert his eyes as he spoke. „But you have risen late this day and I fear that the room is already heated beyond comfort.“
„Yes… well, then have my food delivered here.“
„Yes, God-Voice.“ Merwan Ma bowed quickly and turned to leave, but Yakim called out after him.
„Have a second meal delivered, as well. You will dine with me this morn­ing, I think. We have things that we should discuss.“
„Yes, God-Voice.“
Merwan Ma hustled out, and Yakim Douan nodded knowingly at the tremor in his last answer. Merwan Ma had always enjoyed sitting with Yakim - the two had become friends of a sort, a mentor-student relationship - but Mer­wan Ma knew now the reason for the invitation. Yakim wanted to speak with him about Transcendence again, about the Chezru Chieftain’s impend­ing death and the duties that Merwan Ma must carry out perfectly during the time that would follow, the Beheading, it was called, a period when the Yatol Church would be without an official leader, when the Yatol priests would rule by consensus and were bound to make only little changes in standing policy.
Yakim Douan was glad that his talks about the time of Transcendence so unsettled Merwan Ma. That revealed the young attendant’s love for his rhezru master, and that love, Yakim believed, would help to carry them both through the vulnerable few years they must face between Yakim’s death and his subsequent ascension.
jVlerwan Ma returned a short while later, along with several younger at­tendants, all bearing trays of fruits and seasoned cakes, plates and fabulous utensils, and pitchers filled with many different types of juice. They quickly set the table at the northern window in the circular chamber, the one af­fording a spectacular view of the Belt-and-Buckle Mountains, towering black stone and white snowy peaks. The Belt-and-Buckle was the most im­posing range in the known world, with few passes, and even those full of danger, rockslides and avalanches, great bears and cats and other monsters more dangerous by far. The view of the range from Yakim Douan’s palace displayed that awesome power in all its glory. That view, with the sun splayed on the eastern slopes and shining on the white caps, and with the dark shadows looming behind every jag, was considered quite spiritual by most who looked upon it. For the Yatols in particular, it held a reminder that there was a greater power than any they might witness in the domain of humankind. It was a spiritual and humbling view - humbling even to im­mortal Yakim Douan.
When the pair sat down, the attendants hustled all about, pouring juice and serving the food, but Yakim Douan waved them away and ordered them out of the room. A couple of them hesitated, staring at the Chezru Chieftain with confusion, even disbelief, for they customarily served through­out the meal.
„We are capable of pouring our own drinks,“ Yakim Douan assured them. „And of cutting our own fruit. Now be gone.“ He ended by waving his hands at them, and they skittered away.
He looked back to Merwan Ma, smiling, and noted that the young man seemed to want to say something.
„You will speak openly at this meal,“ he instructed, and Merwan Ma shifted uncomfortably.
Yakim went quiet then, but didn’t begin eating. He just sat there staring at his attendant, his expression prompting the young man to speak out.
„You wish to discuss your death again, God-Voice. I am not fond of this topic.“
„Everyone must die, my young friend,“ said Yakim, and he smiled in­wardly at the irony of the statement.
„But you are still a young man,“ Merwan Ma blurted, and he lowered his eyes immediately upon saying the words, as if he believed that, despite Yakim’s claim, he had overstepped the bounds of propriety.
„In my bones, I feel the weight, the wrath, of every year and every morn-mg,“ Yakim replied with a warm smile, and he put his hand on Merwan Ma’s forearm, comforting the younger man.
„But God-Voice, you seem as if you are surrendering to age without a fight.“
„Do you believe in the Revelation of Yatol?“ the Chezru Chieftain said suddenly, sternly, reminding the student of who he was, of his - of their - supposed purpose in life. The Revelation of Yatol wa^ the binding force of the Yatol religion, a promise of eternal life on the Clouo-oLChfez, a place of Paradise. All of the rituals and practices, all of the codes of behavior that governed the Yatol religion were based upon that promise.
„Of course, God-Voice!“ Merwan Ma retorted, blurting the response with surprise and horror.
„I am not accusing you, my son,“ said the Chezru Chieftain. „I am merely reminding you. If we are to believe in the Revelation of Yatol, then we should accept the onset of death with open arms, confident that we have lived a life worthy of the Cloud of Chez. Am I to be sad, then, to think that Paradise is soon to be my home? „
„But we do not ask for death, God-Voice - “
„I know, however, when death begins to ask for me,“ Yakim Douan in­terrupted. „This is part of my station, to understand when death approaches so that those around me - so that you, Merwan Ma - can begin their prepa­rations for the search for the new God-Voice. Do you understand?“
Merwan Ma lowered his eyes. „I am afraid, God-Voice,“ he said.
„You will not fail.“
„But how will I know?“ asked the young attendant, looking up suddenly at the Chezru Chieftain. „How can I be sure that I will select the correct re­placement? It is a terrible burden, God-Voice. I fear that I am not worthy to bear it.“
„You are,“ Yakim Douan said, laughing. „The child will be obvious to you, I assure you. When I was selected, I was reciting the entire Fourth Book of Prophecy.“
„But could not a mother so teach her young child, if she wished him to ascend? „
„I had not yet seen my second birthday!“ said a laughing Yakim. „And I could answer any question put to me by the Yatol Council. Do you doubt that they chose correctly? „
Merwan Ma blanched.
„It is not an accusation, my young friend,“ said Yakim. „It is merely a re­assurance to you that you will know. Your predecessor voiced similar con­cerns… so I have heard,“ the Chezru Chieftain quickly added, for how could he have firsthand knowledge of what Merwan Ma’s predecessor might or might not have said?
„Even so, God-Voice“ the obviously nervous Merwan Ma continued. „Once the child is found -
„Then your duties are clear and with many recorded precedents,“ Yakim Douan interrupted. „And those duties are minimal, do not doubt. You will watch over the child and see that he is well cared for through the early years of his life. Not so difficult a job, I would say.“
„But what of his training? Who will tutor the new God-Voice in the ways
ofYatol?“
Yakim Douan was laughing before Merwan ever finished. „He will tutor you, if y°u so desire! Do you not understand? The child will be born with full consciousness, and full understanding of all that is Yatol.
„Do you doubt?“ the Chezru Chieftain asked into Merwan Ma s scrunched-up face. „Of course you do!“ Yakim added to alleviate the tension before it could ever really begin. „Because you have not witnessed the miracle of Transcendence. I have, firsthand! I remember those early days well, and I needed no tutoring. I needed nothing, just the climb to Consciousness, and by that time, I understood everything about our beloved Chezru, both good and bad, better than any of those around me. Fear not, my young friend. Your time of indenture in the house of the Chezru Chieftain is to end in scarcely more than a decade, it would seem.“
If those words were of any comfort at all to Merwan Ma, he didn’t show it; in fact, his expression revealed just the opposite.
„You know this to be true,“ Yakim prompted.
„As with your anticipated death, it is not a subject I am comfortable dis­cussing, God-Voice.“
„Ah,“ Yakim answered with a great laugh, and again he patted the young attendant’s arm. „You are to serve me, and then to see the next God-Voice to Consciousness, and then you are freed of all responsibility to the Chezru. That is the way it has always been, and the way it must continue to be.“
„All that I love -
„That does not preclude you from joining Chezru more formally,“ Yakim went on. „In truth, I would be sorely disappointed if you do not pursue your calling to piety. You will make a fine Yatol, my friend, and as such, will prove a valuable asset to the next Chezru Chieftain. Why, I have already penned a long letter to my successor and to the Yatol Council expressing my beliefs in your potential.“
That seemed to calm Merwan Ma considerably, and he blushed with em­barrassment and lowered his eyes.
Just the effect Yakim Douan had hoped for. He truly liked the young man, and would indeed miss him when he came to Consciousness in the next incarnation. But on this point of ritual, Yakim had to hold fast. He couldn’t take the chance of keeping one as bright as Merwan Ma around for too long.
Familiarity might bring danger.
Merwan Ma made his way through the great columned hallways of the airy palace. The whole of the place was made of stone, mostly marble, pink and white and the subtle pale yellow of Cosinnida marble from the south. The many columns, ridged and decorated, were of the type that came from the northwest, from the foothills of the Belt-and-Buckle near the border­land of Behren and To-gai. This stone was the brightest white of all, but streaked with red veins throughout, so much so that it appeared to Merwan Ma as if red vines grew all along the columns. He could almost envision large grapes hanging from the vine, ready to pluck and savor.
Merwan Ma’s sandals were leather, and not hard-soled, but his footfalls echoed along the vast chambers of the palace, where every ceiling was deli­cately arched to catch the sound and roll it about. The young attendant often lost himself on walks such as this, wandering the great ways past the inspiring tapestries and the amazing mosaics tiled on the great floors. On such jaunts, he felt alone in the vast universe, and yet at one with it, as well.
He needed that now, that comfort that he was part of something larger than himself, larger than human flesh. His master had done it again, an­other conversation about the God-Voice’s impending death. How could the Chezru Chieftain be so calm about that? How could he speak in such com-monsensical terms about the end of his life?
Merwan Ma gave a great exhale, thoroughly jealous of his master, of any man who could be so at ease with mortality. Merwan Ma was a dedicated and pious Shepherd, a rank above the common Chezru folk but a rank be­low the Yatols. He prayed every day, and followed every ritual and precept of the religion. He believed in an afterlife, in a reward for his good behav­ior. Truly he did. And yet, how pale his convictions seemed next to the supreme calm held by Yakim Douan!
Perhaps he would come to such a place of tranquillity as he aged, Mer­wan Ma hoped. Perhaps he would find a day when he could so easily accept the inevitability of his own death, when he could be so confident that one journey was ending only so that another journey could begin.
„No,“ he said aloud, and he fell to his knees briefly and pressed his palms against his eyes, prostrating himself on the floor, an expression of submis­sion, obedience, and repentance for his last thought. He could never find a place as content as that of the God-Voice! He could never come to under­stand the mysteries of life and death as the Chezru Chieftain, and he alone, obviously understood! Not in this life, at least. Perhaps enlightenment awaited him on the other side of that darkest of doors.
With another deep breath, Merwan Ma pulled himself up from the floor and resumed his journey. He was late, he knew, and the others were likely already gathered about the sacred chalice, the Chezru Goblet, in the Room of Forever. Mado Wadon, the overseeing Yatol, had probably already pre­pared the sacrificial knife, filling its hollowed hilt with the oils of preserva­tion. But certainly, without Merwan Ma there, the others had not begun the bleeding.

 
Yakim Douan continued to enjoy his meal at the northern window, star­ing out at the towering majestic peaks. He knew what was going on in the Room of Forever, and he knew well the ultimate danger to him and to his secrets whenever the seven gathered for the ritual. But the centuries had taken the edge from the Chezru Chieftain concerning this anxiety. He had watched the bleeding closely all those early years, centuries before when he had instituted the ritual.
No, not instituted it, but merely altered it to cover his secret. Since the beginning of Yatol, the selected group had kept the sacred Chezru Goblet filled with their blood, standing in a circle about it and taking turns slicing their wrists until the deep and wide chalice was full to the appointed line. That ritual of blood-brotherhood and the resultant pool of blood had proven to be a wonderful binding force for Yakim Douan, for embedded in the base of that sacred chalice was a single gemstone, a powerful hematite. When Yakim added his own blood to the pool, every week immediately fol­lowing the bleeding ritual, he somehow created a bond to that embedded hematite that he had learned to exploit from a great distance, from the other side of the palace, even. That was important to Yakim, not because he often utilized the hematite, but because he understood that if a sudden tragedy should befall him - the dagger of a rival, perhaps - he would be able to establish enough of a connection to the hematite to free his spirit from his dying corporeal form.
The only real danger to Yakim, then, came during the process of chang­ing the blood pool, for though all of the attending bleeders would be blind­folded and instructed, strictly so, never to glance into the chalice, one look with the blood level low might be enough to arouse great suspicions. For the Yatols were not fond of gemstones, magical or not, and to see one em­bedded in their most-prized religious symbol, the Chezru Goblet itself, would strike a sour note in the heart of any true Yatol. Gemstones were the province of the hated Abellicans to the north, the source of Abellican magi­cal powers, and for centuries, since before Yakim Douan’s first ascension even, the Yatol priests had denounced the enchanted stones as instruments for channeling demon magic.
Seeing a gemstone - and a hematite, a soul stone, at that! - embedded in the base of that deep chalice would bring about questions that Yakim Douan did not want to answer.
But the Chezru Chieftain held all confidence that it would not come to that. In all the nearly eight hundred years he had been secretly using the magical hematite, the blood level in the chalice had only dropped to a re­vealing level once, when a young Yatol priest had inadvertently tripped and spilled the contents.
That unfortunate Yatol, so flustered, so horrified by what he had done, hadn’t even paused long enough to consider the ramifications of what he had seen. He had only stammered apology after apology when Yakim Douan had come upon him, to find him kneeling on the bloody floor and crying, his head in his hands. He had begged forgiveness frorti the God-Voice, even as Yakim’s knife had reached for his unprotected, undefended throat.
That one had died confused.
Yakim Douan shuddered at the memory of that awful day. He had never wanted to kill the man, but so much had been at stake. How could he jeop­ardize his own theoretical immortality, centuries of life, against the few de­cades the poor fool might have remaining?
To Yakim all these years later, it had been pragmatism, and not hatred and not any evil lust for power, that had guided his dagger hand that fate­ful day.
Yakim Douan couldn’t even remember the clumsy Yatol’s name. Nor could anyone else.
Merwan Ma stood perfectly still, chanting softly the intonation of sacri­fice, his voice blending beautifully with the others standing in a circle about the small table that held the Chezru Goblet. The young attendant held his left hand out across his chest and to the right side, ready to take the knife, while his right arm was out before him, his forearm resting on a padded shelf, his wrist dangling above the sacred vessel.
He was blindfolded, as were the others. In fact, Merwan Ma, as principal attendant to the Chezru Chieftain, had been the only one to enter this holy room with his eyes open, guiding the others to their respective positions. Then, with a prayer, Merwan Ma had taken his place and reached below the table and turned the lever. He had watched the red fluid level slowly drop­ping as he had applied his own blindfold.
That lever and release under the table was counterweighted, designed to slow the flow and then close altogether as the blood in the bowl drained. This group would not replace all of the liquid, but only about three-quarters. A bell sounded as the lever closed, the signal for the sacrifice to begin. And so it had, with the chanting. The man immediately to Merwan Ma’s left took up the treated knife, reached forward, and cut his right wrist, then counted out the appropriate time, in cadence with the verse of the common chant, as his lifeblood dribbled down into the chalice. When the verse ended, the man passed the blade to the man on his left and the process was repeated.
And so on, until the knife came full circle, back to Merwan Ma. The at­tendant, his right wrist crisscrossed with lines and lines of scarring, finished his duty stoically and efficiently, then reverently placed the blade back on the table.
As the song finished, Merwan Ma lifted the blindfold off of his head and looked down at their work. Some blood had spattered outside of the great goblet, as usual, and the level wasn’t as high as it should have been, though within the marks of tolerance inside the chalice. Had it not been, Ken the sacrifice would have been declared void and one of the men gathred about the table would have been killed and replaced, with only the tending Yatol and Merwan Ma exempt from that fate.
But the sacrifice was acceptable, the level of red fluid more than suffi-ient to hold the sacred goblet until the month had passed and the next sac­rifice ensued.
Merwan Ma nodded at the handiwork - he’d have to come back in later and clean up the sacred vessel, of course, but other than that, the duty was done. With perfect precision wrought of months and months of practice, he took up the hand of the man on his left and led the group, joined as one line, out of the room.
In the anteroom, as soon as the door was closed, the others pulled off their blindfolds and tightened the bandages on their wrists, congratulating each other on a job well-done.
The exception, as usual, was the one Yatol in attendance. The older man looked to his wrist first, securing the bandage, but then, as he did after every sacrifice, he glanced at Merwan Ma.
The attendant saw little fondness in that look. Many of the Yatols were not fond of him, allowing their own jealousies to overcome their dedication to their religion and their god. He was not a Yatol, after all, not a priest, and yet, when the Chezru Chieftain went to his reward, Merwan Ma would, in all practicality, become the most powerful man in all of the Chezru domain. He would be the initial selector of the new God-Voice, and would have full voice at the ensuing council of confirmation. He would then oversee the early years of the chosen child’s life, and while he would then have no voice in Yatol formal policy, it would be his voice most often heard in the next chosen God-Voice’s ear.
Some of the Yatols were not pleased at this arrangement. Merwan Ma had even overheard a pair of particularly obnoxious priests mumbling that in times long past, a Yatol, the highest ranking of the order below the Chezru Chieftain, had served as attendant, and not a mere Shepherd.
Merwan Ma took it all in stride. He had been selected, for whatever rea­son, and his duty was clear and straightforward. He could not allow petty human frailties and emotions to deter him from his duty. His calling was to God, through the words and edicts of the God-Voice, his beloved Chezru Chieftain. It was not his place to question, nor - he reminded himself then and there - was it his place to accept or internalize the expression the attending Yatol was now sending his way. That look reflected that man’s weakness, and it was not a weakness that Merwan Ma meant to share.
He ushered the group out of the anteroom, then went back into the sacred room, consecrated cloth in hand, and reverently wiped clean the sides of the Chezru Goblet, satisfied that the sacrifice of blood that day would secure the goblet and the health of the church for the next month.
chapter * 3 *
Walking with Purpose
 
rynn and Juraviel rode in virtual silence for many days after their fight with the goblin band. Despite Juraviel’s cutting words and sound reasoning, Brynn could not let go of her anger toward the elf for what he had done to her, for what he had forced from her. For he had made her kill, had taken her out of their way so that she could feel her blade sinking deep into the heart of an enemy, so that she could smell spilled blood and see the stains, so that she could witness death at her own hands, horrible in a way that she had never known. Brynn Dharielle had witnessed much death in her early years in To-gai, after the coming of the Behrenese. She had witnessed the murder of her parents - from afar, but close enough to hear the screams. Nothing could be more terrible than that!
But this last experience was troubling and horrible in a different way. This time she had been forced into the role of assassin, and the smell of blood and the screams had come to her of her own doing, and with a siz­able amount of guilt attached.
Belli’mar Juraviel had done that to her, and his justifications rang hollow in Brynn’s ears as the pair made their way along the southern trails. For more than a week, they went about their duties with hardly a word ex­changed. They each knew what was expected of them, in setting the camp and preparing the meals, and in keeping watch throughout the night. Every now and then, Juraviel would offer a friendly comment, but Brynn usually just deflected it with a grunt or a halfhearted chuckle.
Things began to warm again between them the second week. When Ju­raviel offered a sarcastic or teasing comment Bryn started to give him back one of her own, and by the end of the second week, the pair had even traded exchanges longer than single sentences.
„The Belt-and-Buckle,“ Juraviel said to her near the end of the third week after the goblin fight, when Brynn walked Diredusk up beside him. They stood atop a ridge that had sloped up gradually from the forest, but dropped off dramatically before them. Below, the forest spread wide and thick; and, far to the south, they could see the jagged outline of distant mountains.
Far distant, and Juraviel was quick to dampen the brightened look that arne over the woman. „Do not be deceived. The mountains of that range are more huge than anything you can imagine.“
„I came through them once,“ Brynn reminded. „And I walked their southern slopes.“
„When you were a child, so many years ago that you hardly remember the truth of their scope.“
„I saw them every day when I was a child, and from much closer than this vantage point!“
„Indeed,“ Juraviel replied. „Much, much closer. We can see them, and each day they will seem a little taller. But just a little, and by the time we ac­tually reach them, they will tower so high above us that they will block out the sun itself. Our road is far from finished.“
Brynn looked down at the elf, who stood staring to the south. To her sur­prise, her irritation at JuravieFs words could not take hold. No, Brynn ap­preciated Juraviel at that moment, more so perhaps than she had since their departure from Andur’Blough Inninness. Only then and there, standing with their goal somewhat in sight and yet still so far away, did Brynn truly understand the sacrifice that her mentor, her friend, was making for her. He was giving up months and months, years even, away from his home and kin, and for what? For no personal gain that Brynn could see, however much Lady Dasslerond preferred the To-gai-ru over the Behrenese. When Ju­raviel returned home to Andur’Blough Inninness, if he managed to stay alive throughout the war and return home, the daily routines, the daily joys and sorrows of his existence would not be dependent upon whether or not Brynn had prevailed in To-gai. What did it truly matter to Juraviel and the Touel’alfar whether the To-gai-ru or the Behrenese ruled the windy steppes of that far-distant land?
And yet, here he was, uncomplaining, traveling beside her, leading her to her destiny.
Brynn stooped a bit and draped her arm across Juraviel’s small shoulders. He turned a curious expression toward her, and she smiled in response and kissed him on the cheek, and then, when he returned her smile, she nod­ded, silently conveying her appreciation, silently explaining to him - and she knew that he understood - that she at last understood and appreciated that she could not possibly make this journey without him.
That was the truth that Brynn Dharielle realized, standing there on that varm afternoon, the southern breezes blowing through her dark, silken lair. And as she had grown on that day of her dark epiphany, when she had learned what it was to kill, so she believed that she had grown even more ris day, the day of her second epiphany, the next stage of her maturation along the road to her destiny.

A good leader understood her enemies.
A better leader understood, and appreciated, her allies.
The days blended together, but with each dawn Brynn noted that the mountains did indeed seem taller, if only just a bit. She tried to put it out of her mind, for she was becoming as anxious as if those mountains were not just the landmark that would lead into her land, but marked the very steppes of To-gai itself.
One day on the road, with Brynn leaning forward eagerly, her body lan­guage speaking clearly to the fact that she believed her final goal was al­ready in sight, and almost in hand, Belli’mar Juraviel threw a bit of cold water over her.
„It is good that we make the foothills of the Belt-and-Buckle before mid­summer,“ he said casually. „For then we have a chance, at least, of finding our way through the divide before the winter snows begin.“
Brynn’s expression as she turned to regard him was one of curiosity and confusion.
„For winter will come early up in those high passes,“ Juraviel explained. „Oh, down here, amidst the trees and this far south, I doubt the snows ever pile very deep, or indeed, if it ever snows at all. But note that the caps of the mountains are still encased in snow, though summer nears its midpoint. I suspect that we will not have to climb very high, and not very late into the winter season, before we find the passes fully blocked.
„Of course, that is assuming that we even find a pass,“ he finished grimly.
That last sentence had Brynn’s eyes widening tellingly. „You do not know the way through?“ she asked, almost with a gasp. „But you were there - or your people were - barely a decade ago! When you rescued me from the Chezru! Surely the Touel’alfar have not forgotten the way already!“
„Lady Dasslerond was the one who rescued you,“ Juraviel explained. „She has ways, with her gemstones, to travel great distances quickly. When she had you in tow, though you remember it not, she and her attendants lulled you to sleep, then used the power of the emerald stone to turn a hun­dred miles into a short walk.“
„Then why didn’t Dasslerond do the same thing now?“ Brynn demanded. „We could have saved weeks of travel! And the mountains would be no barrier, while you sit there telling me that we might not even be able to get through them!“
„The road is preparation for the trials at its end.“
Brynn snorted, obviously not impressed with that argument. „And what do we do if we cannot find a way through the mountains? Do we sit in their shadows and share dreams that we know cannot come true? Do we turn back for Caer’alfar and beg Lady Dasslerond to do that which she should have done before?“
That last statement brought a glare of disapproval that reminded the voune ranger that there were boundaries concerning the Touel’alfar she should not cross.
She pressed on anyway, but in more reserved tones, trying to justify her outrage. „My people are enslaved. Every day that we tarry is another day of nisery for the To-gai-ru. The revolution could be taking place by now.“
ge]Ji’mar Juraviel chuckled and shook his head, and Brynn, thinking that she was being mocked, narrowed her brown eyes.
„If Lady Dasslerond had summoned the power of the emerald and placed you within a To-gai-ru village enclave, do you believe that you would have stepped forward and simply taken control?“ the elf asked. „By what declaration would you have been named as hero and leader?“
„By the same declaration I must use, I suppose, when at last we arrive in To-gai,“ came the sarcastic response, and Brynn added under her breath, „If we ever arrive in To-gai.“
„If we find no way over the mountains, then we shall turn east along the foothills, all the way to the coast, to the city of Entel, where we will secure passage to Jacintha easily enough.“
Brynn knew the name of the second city, Jacintha, and understood the extent of the hike.
„Jacintha,“ Juraviel said again. „The seat of Behrenese power. The home of the Chezru Chieftain who rules the Yatols.“
Predictably, Brynn’s expression became one of intense anger.
„You are worldly in many ways,“ Juraviel said to her. „And yet, in many others, you know so little of the wide world. Perhaps that is our fault, but we are, by need, a reclusive people. So, instead of begrudging the delays in returning to To-gai, consider this journey, and the one far to the east that we might well have to make, as a continuation of your training, as preparation for the trials you will soon enough face.“
Brynn stared at Juraviel long and hard, but she had heard the words clearly, and could accept that explanation to some degree. She reminded herself that the Touel’alfar had rescued her from a life of certain slavery, an existence that would never have led to the possibilities spread wide before her. She reminded herself that the Touel’alfar had trained her in the arts she would need to make an attempt to lead her people. In light of all that history and training and friendship, Brynn suddenly felt very foolish indeed for so severely question­ing Belli’mar Juraviel!
She looked down and gave a self-deprecating chuckle, then said, „Perhaps I have spent too much time in the company of Aydrian.“
She glanced back up as she finished and saw that her words had indeed brought a smile to the elf’s fair face.
„Aydrian will find his own way in the world, I doubt not,“ Juraviel re­plied. „But his temperament would never have proven suitable to the task you have at hand. You are a warrior, but foremost you are a diplomat, a leader with words above the sword, an inspiration through courage and…“
The elf paused, raising a finger into the air to signify the importance of his point. „An inspiration through wisdom. Without the second quality, you will lead your people into nothing but disaster. It will take more than force to pry To-gai from the grasp of Behren, my young friend. It will take unpar­alleled courage and cunning, and will take a leader so elevated that her peo­ple will die for her willingly, gratefully. Do you fully appreciate the gravity of that position?“
Brynn suddenly found it hard to draw breath.
„Do you truly understand that you will one day order your warriors into battle, knowing that many of them will die on the field?“
Breathing didn’t get any easier.
„Do you truly understand that you may have to turn your army aside, knowing full well that in doing so you will leave a To-gai-ru village unpro­tected, and that the Behrenese will likely take out their anger against your insurrection on that unprotected village? Perhaps your actions will lead to more children watching their parents die - or even more horrifying, will lead to some parents watching their children die. Are you ready to take that responsibility, Brynn Dharielle? „
She stood there, trembling, unblinking.
„Is the potential cost worth the gain?“
That last question grounded her again, tossed aside the images of poten­tial horror and clarified the potential victory. Victory for To-gai meant only one thing, in truth, but to Brynn Dharielle, that one thing outweighed all the pain and all the deaths.
„Freedom,“ she whispered, her teeth clenched tightly.
Belli’mar Juraviel stared at her for a few moments, then nodded his approval.
She was learning.
Lozan Duk watched the curious couple sitting at the campfire that warm summer night in the rolling foothills of the Belt-and-Buckle, a mountain range that Lozan Duk’s people considered the very end of the world. Lozan Duk was not too concerned with the female, for though her skin was darker and her eyes a bit unusual in shape, she did not seem so much different from the other bumbling humans who every so often wandered into these lands.
But the other one, with his angular features and diminutive form…
At first Lozan Duk and his companion, Cazzira, had thought the second creature a human child, but closer inspection had nullified that viewpoint. He was no child, and indeed spoke in the tones of a leader. And more than that, this one had a set of features that neither of the onlookers could have expected: a pair of nearly translucent wings.
A branch to the side shuddered slightly as Lozan Duk’s companion re­turned, leaping through the boughs as nimbly as any squirrel might. „Denkan „ she said with a nod, confirming their suspicions that the wings Were akin to those of a debankan, a butterfly.
The two hesitated, staring at each other, at a loss. Their histories told of
lv one race of creatures who sported such ornaments, the Tylwyn Tou, the elves of the day.
But those creatures, the Tylwyn Tou, had receded into the oldest memo­ries of the Tylwyn Doc. To many of the younger people, they had become no more than legends.
Was this, then, a legend come to life? For the diminutive creature down by the campfire surely resembled the Tylwyn Doc, with his deceivingly deli­cate stature and his angular features, except that his hair was light, where the Tylwyn Doc had hair almost universally black. And his skin, though creamy, seemed somewhat colored by the sun, where the skin of all the Tyl­wyn Doc, creatures who rarely if ever ventured out from under the nearly solid canopy of their forest home of Tymwyvenne, was milky white.
„Tylwyn Tou?“ Cazzira asked, echoing Lozan Duk’s thoughts exactly.
„And what does that mean?“ Lozan asked with a shrug.
Normally, the procedure for dealing with intruders was fairly straight­forward, and certainly of uniform intent. No reasoning being who wandered into the realm of the Tylwyn Doc, the Doc’alfar, would wander back out.
Intruders were given to the peat bog.
Lozan Duk looked back down at the duo, particularly at the curious crea­ture who seemed in many ways a mirror image of himself, and wondered.
chapter *4*
Details, Details
T
heir bickering was becoming more than an annoyance to Yakim Douan. „The pirates must be handled more delicately!“ yelled Yatol Peridan, the highest-ranking priest of southeastern Behren, the land known as Cosinnida - and a man well-known to be in league with many of the no­torious coast runners. The argument that he was now making in Jacintha - that the crackdown Yatol De Hamman had imposed along his section of the coast, the area north of Peridan’s territory and just south of Jacintha, was unreasonable and dangerous for security - almost had the Chezru Chieftain laughing aloud. How transparent this one was! Yakim always got a good chuckle out of Peridan’s antics; he had only appointed the man as a Yatol because Peridan had done a fine job in getting valuable marble up to the palace in Jacintha for recent improvements.
„The pirates must be handled!“ Yatol De Hamman countered angrily. „Leave it at that. You call for delicate handling because you fear for your own purse!“
Yatol Peridan’s eyes widened at the blunt accusation, but Yakim Douan was paying more attention to the other seven priests, who were sitting back and watching the rising conflict with obvious amusement. The only analogy the Chezru Chieftain could draw upon at that moment was that of a group of youngsters, encircling a pair that had squared off, calling for them to fight.
Yes, this was more than an annoyance. Yakim Douan wanted to begin the time of Transcendence, wanted a new and younger body. But how could he leave the Chezru flock so vulnerable when it was in such disarray, when even the Yatols, the supposed leaders of the Chezru, were bickering amongst themselves? The verbal sparring between Peridan and De Ham­man continued to escalate dangerously, until finally the Chezru Chieftain slammed his fists down on the round whitewood table and rose so force­fully that his chair skidded out behind him.
„Do you use the pirates, Yatol Peridan?“ he asked, the bluntness of his on drawing gasps from all in attendance. It was one thing for a pair of to spar and accuse, but something altogether different for the Chezru Chieftain, the God-Voice of Yatol, to ask a question with such implications. ^ „God-Voice, how can you ask me…“ Yatol Peridan stammered clumsily. „Exactly as I have asked you,“ Yakim Douan replied with all calm and confidence. „Do you use the pirates, for your own gain or for the gain of the
church?“
Peridan continued to squirm, obviously seeking an escape, but Yakim Douan fixed him with a withering glare - a look perfected over the cen­turies, a look that allowed no possibilities of dodge here.
„The pirates have tithed to my church, yes, God-Voice,“ Peridan finally admitted, lowering his eyes. The other priests all looked to each other with concern. Peridan’s admission was not news to them, of course, for everyone there knew the truth of Yatol Peridan’s relationship with some of the most notorious thugs sailing the coastline. But to hear the admission openly, in front of the Chezru Chieftain, was no small thing!
Yatol De Hamman sat back and crossed his arms over his chest, seeming quite pleased with himself.
„And you have used this… tithing, for the betterment of your church and flock?“ the Chezru Chieftain asked, and all eyes looked at him then with continued surprise.
„I have,“ Yatol Peridan answered enthusiastically after the shock of the question had worn off. „And I have spoken with many of the pirates about their activities, God-Voice. I try to alter their behavior. I seek to channel their strengths into the betterment of all.“
„They are killers!“ Yatol De Hamman cried out. „Killers all!“
He started to spout on, but Yakim Douan held up his hand, halting the man. „You speak truly, Yatol De Hamman,“ the Chezru offered. „And I hold little sympathy for those pirates your warships have sent into the depths of the dark waters. But as they are killers, they are also an inevitabil­ity. The pirates have run their catamarans across the coral reefs and away from Behrenese warships for centuries. They have always been there and will always be there. Accept that truth, and you will come to understand that Ya­tol Peridan’s profiting from the pirate activities is beneficial to the Chezru.“
„Bless you, God-Voice,“ Yatol Peridan started to say. But,“ Yakim Douan said sternly, lifting his pointing, accusatory finger Peridan’s way, „do not confuse the issue. You complain that Yatol De Ham-man is sinking pirate ships, and thus sinking your profits, but to do so shows a disregard for the needs of Yatol De Hamman. How is he to rule his nock effectively if they do not believe that he can be trusted to protect them? So come not to Jacintha with complaints that your fellow Yatols are upholding the laws, Yatol Peridan. Come not to Jacintha with complaints that your temple will not be layered in gold.“
Yatol Peridan again lowered his eyes. „Yes, God-Voice.“
„And for the rest of you, find some insight!“ Yakim Douan went on. „There are unpleasant inevitabilities to society, much as we see with the pi­rates off our coastline. We try to diminish these unpleasantries, indeed, b(it we are not wrong to find gain from them. As for you, Yatol Grysh,“ he saicL referring to, and looking to, the Yatol of the northwesternmost reaches of Behren, who presided under the shadows of the great mountains and the plateau along the borderlands of To-gai, in the great Behrenese city of Dharyan. Grysh, a bald, heavyset man with sleepy eyes who noticeably lacked any chin, was, in effect, Yakim Douan’s principal sheriff over the conquered To-gai-ru. The Yatol who had done the conquering, Tohen Bar-doh, had been so brutal in his tactics that Douan had been forced to pull him back from the steppes. There were other Yatol priests in To-gai, of course, but they were either quick-promoted and expendable, eager young men, lifted from the ranks of the Shepherds and sent to the wilderness of the steppes, or they were of To-gai-ru descent, traitors to their own people, who obviously, therefore, could not be trusted by the Chezru Chieftain. That left Grysh, a cunning and often callous man, the perfect liaison to han­dle the savages of To-gai.
„There are many, many bandits running just west of your domain, are there not? „ Yakim Douan asked the large man.
Yatol Grysh blinked sleepily, smiled, and nodded.
„Do you not find a way to tap into their growing resources?“ Yakim Douan asked slyly.
Yatol Grysh, who was easily the most confident and self-assured of all those gathered, excepting of course Yakim Douan himself, merely smiled and nodded again, his demeanor drawing a chuckle or two from the others seated about the table.
„Inevitabilities,“ Yakim Douan said to them all. „We cannot achieve per­fection of our world. This is the teaching of Yatol. Perfection is to be found in an existence beyond this mortal realm. We know of this, and so, while we cannot be publicly tolerant of such behaviors or risk losing our hold, I ap­plaud a Yatol wise enough to turn unpleasantness into gain.“
He finished with a pleading look toward Yatol De Hamman.
„Yes, God-Voice,“ the humbled priest said, and though he offered one disapproving, even angry, look toward Yatol Peridan, he lowered his eyes obediently, giving Yakim Douan at least the hope that this troublesome business had been settled.
And how Douan needed it settled! If the rivalry between De Hamman and Peridan continued to escalate, it would likely come to a head during the time when the Yatol Council, and not Yakim Douan - for he would be in a woman’s womb, or in the body of small child - would be holding power in all the church. De Hamman and Peridan would no doubt be strong voices in that council, as strong as any, and if they went to war with the church Yakim Douan inherited at the age of ten would be in he even was able to inherit the church, for such infighting could de-7 the customs that now allowed for such a transition.
Aweary Yakim Douan walked away from the contentious meeting some-later^ fee] ing satisfied that he had put the beast back into its cage, at for the time being. He would have to reinforce the lessons he had • n to the two troublesome Yatols many times over, he knew. And if he
uld not find a compromise that seemed binding, he would have to hold
i to his earthly coil - would have to suffer the aches in the morning, would have to suffer the uninterested looks the harem girls gave to him when they didn’t think he was looking - for a long time to come.
The tired Chezru Chieftain knew that his day was only going to get busier when he saw Merwan Ma rushing down the long hall toward him, the young man’s face bright with excitement.
„God-Voice,“ Merwan Ma breathed, sliding to a stop before Yakim.
The Chezru managed to straighten his shoulders and eye the young man squarely.
„Master Mackaront of Entel has come to speak with you.“
Mackaront, the personal assistant of Abbot Olin of St. Bondabruce, was an Abellican monk of great power and Yakim Douan’s principal liaison to the northern kingdom. The Chezru Chieftain did well to offer a slight smile and nod in response, did well to hide his trepidation upon hearing the name of the unexpected visitor. If Mackaront had come south with more bad news - that Abbot Olin had died, perhaps - it could put yet another tear in the carefully drawn plans for Transcendence.
„I will meet with him in the Study of Sunset,“ Yakim explained to his as­sistant, and he walked past, turning down the next corridor.
He heard Merwan Ma’s eager footfalls, sandals clapping on mosaic floors, and hoped again that the news from the north would not bode ill.
Master Filladoro Mackaront was surely one of the ugliest men Yakim Douan had ever met. His face was cratered and blotchy, his nose bulbous and seeming almost to glow with painful rawness. His brown eyes drooped and his teeth were all broken and twisted. As if all that wasn’t enough, sev­eral huge warts adorned Mackaront’s head and neck, including one cracked black and brown blemish in the center of his high forehead.
It is good to see you again, God-Voice of the Yatols,“ Mackaront said with a bow. The man spoke perfect Mohdan, the predominant language of eastern Behren.
Yakim Douan motioned for him to sit in a chair to his left, with both seats facing the window, which afforded a wonderful view of sunset over the western-stretching Belt-and-Buckle. Yakim Douan had placed them this Way purposely before Merwan Ma and Mackaront had caught up to him, partly because he enjoyed watching the glorious sunsets, but mostly so that he would not have to sit facing his ugly guest. He liked Mackaront quite a bit, actually, but he didn’t want to look at the man!
„Pray tell me that my friend Abbot Olin fares well.“
„Indeed, God-Voice,“ Mackaront happily replied. „Abbot Olin remains strong and well, his eyes clear.“
„And his mind sharp.“
„Yes, God-Voice!“
Yakim Douan did turn then to regard the ugly master from St. Bonda-bruce, noting how the man’s lips could not sit straight on his face because of the jagged teeth beneath. He wondered, and not for the first time, if that physical ugliness had been the catalyst for Filladoro Mackaront to join the Abellican Church. The Abellicans, after all, frowned upon any relationships between brothers and women - mostly because the powers of the Abellican Church wanted to make certain that no widows or children were left behind to claim any inheritance over Abellican property or wealth! - so it seemed plausible that entering the Church offered Mackaront the excuse for the obvious truth that no woman would ever want to share his bed.
„Why do you call me that?“ Yakim Douan asked the Abellican, quite off the cuff. Behind him, he heard the sharp intake of Merwan Ma’s breath.
Mackaront looked at him curiously.
„In your religion, I am not such a God-Voice, am I?“ the Chezru Chief­tain asked. „We worship different gods, do we not? We assign different meanings to greatness, and yet you address me by the title normally re­served for my personal attendants and visiting Yatol priests. Are you pre­pared to convert to the true religion of Yatol, Abellican Master Mackaront?“
Mackaront’s droopy eyes widened considerably at that remark, and he started shaking his head, his crooked lips moving as if he were trying to find appropriate words with which to respond.
„Or are you merely being polite?“ the Chezru Chieftain asked with a grin that allowed both poor Mackaront and Merwan Ma to sigh with relief.
„God-Voice,“ Mackaront began tentatively, and he quickly corrected it to, „Chezru Douan, I am sent with all humility from my master, Abbot Olin of St. Bondabruce.“
Yakim Douan didn’t even hide his smile. He liked the way lackeys like Mackaront always reverted to the formalities of station when they were backed into a corner.
„I intend no offense to you,“ Mackaront went on. „Never that. I offer you the respect afforded your position, using titles you have earned among your people.“
„Earned?“ Yakim Douan said with a chuckle. „I was born to this posi­tion. There was nothing to ‘earn,’ because this was all decreed by Yatol, by God himself. Do you not understand? „
M ter Mackaront’s expression could not have been more stupefied. He rood the reasoning, of course, for he was well versed in the customs of Y- tols What had him stunned beyond words here, Yakim Douan knew, the Chezru’s tone and insistence, this whole line of questioning - a conation that Yakim Douan knew to be out of bounds.’ „I am not qualified to debate the relative beliefs and strengths of our reli-Chezru Douan,“ Master Mackaront said after a few uncomfortable ^akim Douan ‘s laughter had the man leaning back defensively in his seat.
„Nor should you wish to enter such a debate,“ he said lightheartedly. „Nor do I ever desire such a course. Our worlds are very different, Master Mackaront. Abbot Olin and I have understood that for years, and that un­derstanding has been the cornerstone of my friendship with your abbot for decades. We accept each other’s beliefs, with humility and respect, though I know that he, and you, are wrong.“
Mackaront frowned; Yakim Douan watched his every flinch and move­ment, taking a measure for every step along this tricky road. He wasn’t sure why he had decided to pursue this course this day. It was almost a replay of the conversation he had shared with young Abbot Olin soon after the man had ascended to the leadership of St. Bondabruce, a necessary understand­ing before the two men could pursue an honest friendship.
Yakim Douan came to recognize his own instincts then. When he had heard of Mackaront’s visit, he had at once assumed that Olin might have died. Thus, his instincts had sent him into this unexpected conversation, one that might lead him down a road of friendship with Master Macka­ront, Abbot Olin’s possible successor. Better for Yakim Douan, for the end of this corporeal incarnation and for the early years of the next, if Master Mackaront of St. Bondabruce came to a higher understanding and appre­ciation of the Yatol religion.
„I know you are wrong because I am the God-Voice of Yatol,“ the Chezru Chieftain explained. „As your Father Abbot Agronguerre knows that I… that we,“ he added, sweeping his hand out toward Merwan Ma, „are wrong in our beliefs.“ Yakim Douan gave a shrug, as if it didn’t really matter. ‘Your Abbot Olin understands this. What we, together, have come to know is that, though our beliefs are very different, our goals are not so much so. Pious Abellicans are closer to Yatol than the highwaymen of your lands, as pious Yatols should be far more welcomed into the gates of your heaven than the unlawful pirates running the Behrenese coastline.“
Yakim Douan glanced back at Merwan Ma as he spoke, noting how the man’s eyes widened! Of course they did, and if Yakim Douan had not trusted Merwan Ma implicitly to keep this conversation private, he never would have spoken in such a manner with the man present. For the formal and public declarations of the Yatol religion were quite clear concerning the Abellicans. Their gemstone use alone damned them! To the Yatols, the gemstones were the instruments of the demon dactyls, and by that reason­ing, „pious“ Abellicans should have been placed at the end of the line for those seeking to enter the Paradise promised by Yatol.
While Merwan Ma was obviously confused and stunned, Master Macka-ront seemed to ease back into his seat, a bit more relaxed. Yes, Yakim Douan saw, and was glad: the seeds were being planted well.
„Enough of philosophy,“ the Chezru Chieftain announced. „You did not come here for such a discussion as this, I am sure, and my time is pressing. What news from Abbot Olin?“
Master Mackaront spent a moment collecting himself, clearing his throat and snorting a few very unpleasant sounds. Yakim Douan tried to ignore the man, looking back out to the west and the long line of mountains.
„Abbot Olin bade me come to Jacintha to tell you that Father Abbot Agronguerre’s health has turned for the worse,“ the man from Entel ex­plained. „He is very old and very frail, and a College of Abbots is expected within a year or two.“
„And does Abbot Olin expect to ascend to your highest post at that Col­lege of Abbots?“
„He does. He has rivals, of course…“
„That is why our ascension is placed in the hands of God, and not mortal man,“ Yakim Douan couldn’t resist interjecting.
Mackaront bristled and coughed, but worked past the remark. „There is one master at St.-Mere-Abelle who will strive hard against him. And an­other, perhaps, a younger man, but one who was fortunate enough to find himself beside the disciples of Brother Avelyn, whose miracle rescued the kingdom from the rosy plague. That man is not ready, of course, but the emotions are high and favorable toward deceased Brother Avelyn.“
„Ah yes, the wandering heretic who blew up a mountain and defeated the demon,“ Yakim Douan said with just a hint of sarcasm. „Who raised his dead arm toward the heavens and invoked the miracle you speak of, bring­ing down the power of God to create a mystical cure for the plague that ravaged your land.“ The Chezru Chieftain resisted the temptation to point out that this supposedly God-cured plague should logically be considered a God-sent plague. And if that was the case, then why hadn’t God visited this horror upon Behren and the heathen Yatols?
For mortal men, such questions could bring great distress, but for Yakim Douan, who had lived through the centuries and who planned on living for­ever more, such questions were the stuff of pure amusement.
Not now, the Chezru Chieftain silently told himself. Not here and with this man.
„How much of a threat does Abbot Olin perceive from this young fol­lower of Brother Avelyn?“ he asked.
Master Mackaront shrugged and seemed content with the change of sub-r „Young Abbot Braumin should not pose too great a threat. He is not a „namic man, of himself, and it is only his ties to Avelyn’s disciples - one
rtvred, the other held in the highest regard of all the land, Church and
re alike	that even allows his name to be seriously mentioned. It is more
> other rival, a powerful Master of St.-Mere-Abelle, and thus, sitting at Father Abbot Agronguerre’s right hand, who concerns Abbot Olin, and he will have to wage a strong campaign if he is to defeat the man.“
Wage a strong campaign, Yakim Douan echoed in his mind. The words were telling indeed, and explained much about Master Mackaront’s visit.
Abbot Olin had come begging.
„Abbot Olin is prepared to wage such a battle,“ Mackaront went on with great enthusiasm. „He understands the great gain to both our peoples if he can ascend to the position of Father Abbot while Yakim Douan is hailed as Behren’s Chezru Chieftain. Perhaps then our respective flocks can mend old wounds in a way that kings and ambassadors have never envisioned! Perhaps the bonding, then, of Jacintha to Entel will strengthen the ties to a point where few would ever consider war between our peoples ever again!“
„Entel?“ Yakim Douan asked skeptically. „Why, Master Mackaront, if your Abbot Olin ascends, will he not be forced by custom to move to the north, far from his beloved Entel, to the dark halls of St.-Mere-Abelle?“
„Perhaps,“ Mackaront responded, his momentum a bit deflected. „Ab­bot Olin has spoken of moving the Abellican seat of power to Entel.“
„Old traditions die hard.“
„Or, even if he is forced to move to St.-Mere-Abelle, he will ensure that St. Bondabruce and St. Rontlemore of Entel are headed by men who under­stand the growing relationship between our peoples. Abbot Olin wishes me to assure you that his loyalties to you as his friend will not end -
„Of course not,“ interrupted Yakim Douan, who had heard more than enough. „And please, when you return to Entel, assure your master that I am no less loyal than he. Though I suspect you will not even have to speak the words when Abbot Olin views your cargo.“ As he finished, he stood up and turned for the door, and an elated Master Mackaront was quick to take the cue.
As Mackaront bowed and turned to leave, Merwan Ma rushed ahead of him to open the door.
„Return to me at once,“ Yakim Douan instructed his assistant, and then he turned to Mackaront. „I will instruct good Shepherd Ma on how prop­erly to prepare your wagons.“
You are most generous, God-Voice,“ the overwhelmed Mackaront said with another clumsy bow.
Yakim Douan just smiled and showed him out of the room, nodding to Merwan Ma, a signal for the man to hurry. Then, comfortably alone, the Chezru Chieftain returned to his seat and his wonderful view, awaiting Merwan Ma’s return and taking this quiet moment to reflect on all of the events happening about him, all of those circumstances that would deter­mine when he could at last shed his aching mortal coil.
„I do not understand, God-Voice,“ came Merwan Ma’s voice behind him sometime later, startling Yakim from a pleasant nap. He jumped a bit and turned, and Merwan Ma blanched at the realization that he had just wak­ened the Chezru Chieftain.
„My pardon…“ he stammered, and bowed repeatedly, heading for the door.
„I prefer that my attendants are not blabbering fools,“ Yakim said to him, stopping him cold. „Do not act the part of one, Merwan Ma. It is not becoming.“
„Yes, God-Voice.“
„What did you say when you entered?“

 
„I said that I do not understand,“ Merwan Ma repeated. „Master^ Mackaront left here in fine spirits.“
„As I intended.“
„Of course.“
„Then what is not to understand?“
„All of…“ Merwan Ma started, but he stopped and just shook his head, seeming quite flabbergasted.
„You are surprised that I would help to finance Abbot Olin’s ascension?“
„That is the business of the Abellicans, and something whose effect should end at the mountain range, God-Voice. I do not understand why we would choose to get involved. I know that Abbot Olin is your friend -
„My friend?“ Yakim gave a heartfelt laugh. „No, he is not my friend. Or at least, I would not call him my friend - except, of course, to those who need to hear such assurance, such as Master Mackaront. Abbot Olin and I have an understanding.“
„And a mutual respect?“
„He respects me, as he should. We recognize the gains that may be made from our contact. He has things that benefit Behren, and I have things that benefit Honce-the-Bear. Such as my wealth, you see?“
„Yes, God-Voice,“ Merwan Ma said unconvincingly.
Yakim Douan gave yet another laugh. „Surely you can recognize the benefit to us in having a man such as Abbot Olin seated in power over the Abellican Church. Entel is an important sister city to Jacintha, a way of trading for goods that are hard to secure south of the mountains. Most of the wood within Jacintha, including the great masts for our fleet, was brought here by Entel ships, as were many of the delicacies that we enjoy regularly at our table.“
„I do understand.“ Again, Merwan Ma was not very convincing and seemed to be quite upset.
„But you know, as well, that it is not our place to help the Abellican hea and that is what troubles you,“ the Chezru Chieftain reasoned. Mer-Ma didn’t respond verbally, but his expression showed Yakim Douan hat his guess had been on the mark.
„In friendship and in trade will we infiltrate the kingdom to the north
• h the word of Yatol,“ Yakim Douan explained. „We know that we are ioht We know that our faith is strong and that the Abellicans err in their devotion to gemstones. And we are secure that they, too, will come to see
^e light that is Yatol. The more they see of us, the more our true faith will mock their pitiful religion in the eyes of the Abellican flock.“
Merwan Ma was standing straighter by that point and nodding eagerly, and Yakim Douan understood that he had settled this matter for good. Of course, he didn’t really believe much of what he was preaching. He knew that any who watched the transition from Chezru Chieftain to the next cho­sen child would be stunned, would likely fall on their knees at the sight of the „miracle.“ But he knew, too, that the crafty Abellicans were pretty good at manufacturing miracles of their own, and given all the stir concerning the upraised hand of the dead Avelyn and the way that it „miraculously“ cured the deadly plague, Yakim Douan knew that it would be a long, long time before many Abellicans even thought to change their spiritual course!
But still, he did want Olin to ascend, did want allies within the northern kingdom, men who would not put any pressure on Behren during the time of Transcendence, and men who, through trade and gifts, would make his life a little bit more pleasurable in the next incarnation.
„Our relationship with the Abellicans will prove of utmost importance in the crucial time that will soon be before us,“ Yakim Douan went on, and as Merwan Ma’s eyes widened, just a bit, the Chezru Chieftain recognized that an urgency had crept into his voice.
A burst of laughter from Yakim mocked the attendant’s fearful expres­sion. „All is in place, and you know your duties.“
„Are you not afraid?“
Yakim Douan waved the question away with such confidence that Mer­wan Ma’s shoulders slumped. „We will not travel this circular path again, my young companion, nor will I tolerate your continued lack of faith.“
Merwan Ma stepped back and lowered his eyes, and Yakim Douan was touched by the moisture rimming those brown orbs, touched that the very pious young Shepherd was so concerned about him.
He walked over and draped an arm across Merwan Ma’s shoulders, giv­ing a slight tug to jostle the man from his slumping posture.will be reborn, and you will be there to watch over me, until we are ‘gain united,“ the older priest said. „The word of Yatol is, in this case, lit-I know this because I have been reborn time and time again, and so,  my young friend, I am not afraid. And after you witness the great Tranendence, after you hear the words of consciousness spoken from the mouth of the babe, you will rest easier at night, in full confidence that Yatol is with us, every step.“
He coaxed a smile from Merwan Ma, then hustled the man out of the room. The sun was almost down behind the western-stretching line of the Belt-and-Buckle and Yakim Douan wanted to enjoy the sunset alone.
He was asleep again before darkness engulfed the city.
 
chapter
* 5 *
Conflicting Responsibilities
W hat is it? „ Brynn asked Juraviel, for the elf was up again from his seat before their small fire, pacing the small y \/ clearing they had selected for that evening’s camp.
Juraviel stared out into the dark forest for a moment, then just shook his head. „There is something…“ he tried to explain.
„I feel it, too,“ said Brynn. „A scent in the air… like death.“
Belli’mar Juraviel turned to regard her, considering her words. He could sense something, some feeling about the forest, a bit of a hush, perhaps. Perceptive Brynn had put a proper label to it, though she wasn’t exactly right.
„Not death,“ he corrected. „Decay. There is the smell of decay in the air, like old logs rotting on the ground.“
„There are many dead logs about us.“
Juraviel shook his head again. „No, this is different,“ he explained, but he couldn’t quite find the words. It was as if there was a wetness in the air, heightening the scent of decay, though the week had been dry and there were no streams or swamps or ponds about that could account for the odor.
What might it be?
„It is getting stronger,“ Brynn remarked a few moments later, and she rose and moved near to Juraviel, who still stood on the perimeter of the en­campment, at the edge of the firelight, staring out into the dark woods.
It was indeed getting stronger, Belli’mar Juraviel understood, and since there was no wind, that had to mean that the source of the smell was grow-mg or moving closer. Soon Juraviel had to twitch his nose, so full was it of the scent, and only then did he recognize it for what is was.
Peat,“ he explained, and even as the word got out of his mouth, he choked it off and turned suddenly, his attention caught by a flicker of move­ment out in the forest.
Peat?“ Brynn echoed curiously, scratching her head, and Juraviel real­ized that she didn’t even know the word. No time to explain it to her now, though, for something - or perhaps several somethings - was moving out in the dark.
The elf bent lower and crept out a bit farther from the light, his keen eyes scanning the forest. Another movement caught his attention to the side, then another back the other way. He actually caught a silhouette of this last mover. Too big to be an elf, powrie, or goblin, he realized with a bit of re­lief. It had appeared much the same size as a human man, but stood up very straight and walked stiffly, barely bending torso or legs.
„Go back by the fire,“ he instructed Brynn. The elf’s first instinct was to tell her to put out the fire, but he realized it was far too late for that, that the light of the flames had already shown whoever or whatever was out there the location of the camp. „Stoke it up, and keep your bow ready by your side.“
„What do you see?“
„Go,“ the elf repeated, and as Brynn started away, Juraviel slipped into the cover of the brush. Likely these were humans, frontier huntsmen and trappers. Or perhaps they were outlaws, chased out of civilized l ther way, Brynn and Juraviel would be better off if the elf was out of/sight.
Sitting back by the fire, Brynn Dharielle seemed the picture of calmyanoV indeed, there was little nervousness about the confident young woman. She was a ranger, elven-trained, and whatever Juraviel had seen out there in the darkness, she was confident that she and he could handle it. Her hand closed about the smooth, burnished darkfern wood of her elven-crafted bow, its rich and dark hue crossed by thin lines of the silverel metal that the towering darkferns leached out of the ground.
Yes, Brynn believed, she and Juraviel could handle anything they might expect out there.
But what walked into the light of the encampment a moment later was certainly nothing that either Brynn or Juraviel could have ever expected!
It looked like a man, a Bearman of Honce-the-Bear, but it was covered in a muddy substance that made Brynn think of the rich and rotting mud she had seen under the edge of mossy carpets after a heavy spring rain. Straight and stiff, the intruder was more than a foot taller than Brynn. His clothing, too, was filthy, soaked with the mud, and was torn in several places, and his eyes…
Yes, those eyes! When Brynn looked into them - or rather, at them - a shudder coursed down her spine. She saw the firelight reflected there, but not in any sparkling gleam. No, the eyes of this one showed no life, no inner spark at all.
They were dead eyes.
„What do you want?“ Brynn managed to ask, and she rose fast, bringing her bow across in front of her, an arrow ready in her other hand. „Who are you?“
The man, the zombie, didn’t respond in any way, just kept moving toward her, and now Brynn was backing to keep pace, to keep the distance between them. She heard movement behind her, though, out in the forest, she didn t have far to retreat.
„Stay back!“ she warned, fitting the arrow and lifting the bow before her.
Xhe intruder continued its calm approach.
„Last warning!“ shouted Brynn, drawing back and taking deadly aim.
„It is inhuman,“ came Juraviel’s quiet assurance from above. „Shoot it!“
And as the creature came another step forward, Brynn did exactly that, letting fly, her arrow smacking into the intruder, right between the eyes.
The creature flinched and missed a step, wavering off to the side. But that was just a matter of the weight and momentum of the missile, a horri­fied Brynn realized, for the creature, seemingly uninjured, soon righted its course and calmly came on.
Brynn had another arrow up and away in the blink of an eye, this time aiming lower and putting her shot right through the creature’s heart. Right through it went, and out the other side, drilling a hole through which came a greenish, milky substance.
The intruder passed the fire then, and Brynn scrambled to the side, fit­ting yet another arrow.
„What is it?“ she cried out, but no voice came back in response.
„Who are you?“ she demanded, but the creature just continued to pur­sue her, walking slowly and deliberately.
She let fly again, and again after that, scoring hits that would have dropped any living man, but again, to no apparent effect.
Brynn turned toward Diredusk, thinking to flee.
She gasped in horror and froze at the sight, for the pony was surrounded by more of these foul-smelling intruders, these undead creatures of her nightmares.
But they couldn’t have her horse! Never that! With a snarl and a flick of her wrist, Brynn unstrung her bow, the solid wood straightening into a deadly club. Seeing Diredusk in trouble, whinnying and stomping its hooves, even kicking one of the creatures to launch it back into the brush, washed away Brynn’s fears for herself. Staff spinning and twirling, she charged in, coming up short before one turning zombie. She fell to one knee as the staff came around, transferring all of her running energy into that perfectly aimed swing.
With a sickening thud, the staff smashed against the side of the zombie’s head, leaving a huge and grotesque dent. The creature rocked to the side, skipping on one foot several times. But it did not fall over, showed no sign that it was feeling any pain, and came on again.
Brynn let out a cry and smashed it again, the squishy head flattening a bit more, and then, when that didn’t work, the ranger retracted the weapon, repositioned her hands, and stabbed its end straight out, smashing the crea­ture, which was offering absolutely no defense at all, square in the face. The head snapped back. The zombie moved forward.
Again, Brynn hit it in the face, then lower in the exposed throat. Then she brought the staff back in and turned it over in her hands, spinning and spinning. Around it went, behind her back, coming out into her other hand for another strike, then going back around the other way and coming in hard from the other side, again scoring a square and brutal hit.
The zombie’s head lolled as if without any support. As Brynn leaped aside, the creature continued forward, arms reaching and outstretched, as if it couldn’t see her. She took up her staff in both hands as it passed and, just because she wanted to, took a mighty swing and smashed the passing zom­bie on the back of the skull, sending the head into a bobbing motion.
The zombie started to turn toward her, but just toppled over to the ground.
Brynn didn’t even watch the descent, leaping into the pair of creatures grabbing at Diredusk’s flank. She landed between them, both hands set firmly on her staff, and jabbed it out left and right, and then again, scoring two wicked hits on the zombies’ heads.
Diredusk whinnied and bucked, kicking out with both hind legs, splat­tering the chest of another zombie and launching it into a short flight through the trees. The pony landed and bucked again, throwing its head, spinning and leaping.
Brynn went with that movement, made her way past the pony’s shoulders and head, to the tether, which she quickly undid.
„Go! Go!“ she cried to Diredusk, and the pony, bucking and leaping, dragging two zombies with it, charged off into the forest night.
Tears streaked Brynn’s face, and she was glad, at least, that Diredusk had a chance to get away. For herself, though, there seemed no such escape, walls of zombies were coming at her from every direction. She growled away her fears and charged the nearest group, staff stabbing and swinging might­ily, scoring splattering hit after splattering hit. Twisting and dodging, Brynn somehow got through that line and seemed for a moment to be running free.
But more zombies moved before her, and one of those behind, toppled by her burst of speed, grabbed on to her ankle with a grip inhumanly strong.
Brynn wailed and stumbled, stopped in her tracks, but managing, at least, not to fall over. She spun back on the grabbing zombie and punished it with a series of smacks all about its head, frantically bashing and bashing.
Others closed all about her.
The zombie on the ground lay very still, seemingly back in the realm of death where it belonged, but still it held on stubbornly, its fingers locked about Brynn’s slender ankle. She kicked and twisted, stomping the wrist with her free foot.
But then she had to alter her attacks, as the other zombies descended over her.
In the boughs before the zombies ever entered the encampment, mar Turaviel put his bow to work, the string humming as the elf hed arrow after arrow into the circling mob of intruders. Unlike i Turaviel had understood the nature of this perversion, the undead of the intruders, right away, and so he did not hesitate at all, just set his Bull, but normally effective, bow to its work.
He had half emptied his quiver before he even realized that the arrows were having absolutely no effect.
With a groan of frustration, Juraviel leaped and fluttered down to a lower branch, just above the heads of the zombies. Intent on Brynn and on Dire-dusk the horrid creatures seemed not to notice him, and so the elf waited and quietly moved from limb to limb until he came to one creature rela­tively isolated from its undead companions.
Down slashed the small sword, cutting a deep gash in the zombie’s head.
The zombie stopped and looked around stupidly.
Juraviel slashed it again, and then a third time, in the face, as it at last looked up.
Showing no pain, the zombie reached stiff arms up for the nimble elf. Ju­raviel wasted no time in slashing one hand, then the other, taking off a cou­ple of fingers. Greenish pus flowed from the stumps, and Juraviel could smell the disease. He backed off a few skittering steps and, apparently real­izing that it could not reach him, the zombie clamped both arms about the branch and began pulling itself into the tree.
Juraviel saw his opening and didn’t hesitate, leaping right to the spot on the branch between the zombie’s arms, taking up his sword in both hands and slashing it down with all his might, cleaving the zombie’s head right down the middle. He retracted the blade immediately, brought it back around to his left, then in a circular motion up over his head and back down to the right, driving it in hard against the side of the zombie’s head, creasing all the way to the gash of the great downward cut.
A huge piece of head fell away, but the zombie kept pulling itself up.
Eyes wide with disbelief, Juraviel transferred his horror into power and slashed away with abandon.
The zombie slowly turned and looped one leg over the branch, and Ju­raviel promptly slashed and slashed at that limb until it, too, fell free of the body. Down tumbled the undead monster, holding on with just one hand. Juraviel cut that hand away.
-The creature fell to the ground and tried to rise, but just fell over again and again.
Watching it struggling, but not lying still, Juraviel knew that this fight ould not be won. The creatures were not difficult enemies, one at a time, out the sheer amount of punishment they could take ensured that no fight against the mob would be one against one for any amount of time.
We must flee!“ Juraviel called out to Brynn, as he ran along the branches, trying to find his companion. Diredusk’s frenzy cued him in, and he ran toward it until horse and woman were in sight.
Brynn’s work was nothing short of magnificent, a tribute to the woman and the training of the Touel’alfar. Juraviel watched her bow-staff swinging this way and that, coming in for a sudden clutch and stab, then working back out for a devastating smash. Or at least, it should have been devastat­ing, for it would have felled a living opponent.
He watched Brynn shift her tactics to more effect, watched her drop a zombie with a brilliant combination, watched her free up Diredusk and send him galloping off into the forest night.
That was all-important to her, Juraviel knew, and he managed a slight smile despite the terrible situation. For the To-gai-ru, the bond with their mounts could not be underestimated. A To-gai-ru would risk her life gladly in an effort to save her horse.
Again Brynn worked brilliantly against the closing horde.
Juraviel realized then that he should not simply be standing there in the safety of the boughs, watching her, that he should rush down to her side!
But, despite that realization, the elf did not explode into motion, did not move at all toward his young ranger friend.
Because Belli’mar Juraviel understood the truth of it, understood that he and Brynn could not win out and could not escape. Or at least, that the woman could not get away.
His heart torn, Belli’mar Juraviel chewed his bottom lip, his hand grasp­ing his sword so tightly that his knuckles whitened. He wanted to go to Brynn, wanted to fight beside her and die beside her, if that was the ulti­mate ending. And he would have done that, he knew in his heart, would have willingly given his life for her.
But he could not.
For this horror, this atrocity, held implications beyond the lives of Belli’mar Juraviel and Brynn Dharielle, beyond even the failure of returning Brynn to To-gai to try to lead her people in revolt against the Behrenese. This horror, a perversion of life itself, held implications that went right to Caer’alfar and Juraviel’s people. His duty was clear to him, though it was a duty that burned his heart. His duty was to his people above Brynn, was to return with all speed to Caer’alfar to report to Lady Dasslerond, to warn the Touel’alfar of the grotesque army that walked the southern night.
The elf watched as Brynn was borne down to the ground by a mob of zombies, the stubborn woman fighting all the way.
Juraviel turned his back and started away, picking a course along the higher boughs that would take him far from the scene of horror and send him running on his way back to the north.
The elf stopped before he had gone three strides.
No, he could not do this. Despite his heritage, despite the Touel’alfar code hated his people to the highest regard and placed all of the other .irlinp humans, including human rangers, far below, Belli’mar Ju could not leave Brynn to her fate. - the woman had done for Diredusk, so Juraviel did for her, turning nd half-flying, half-leaping from limb to limb and then from limb to aCback of one zombie, his small sword thrashing violently.
managed to get that one creature off the woman, then rushed into ,0 of the others, slashing wildly and forcing them back, creating enough - an opening for Brynn, who was still fighting fiercely, somehow to climb
back to her feet.
~~Siie held her staff out horizontally before her, hands widespread on its solid shaft. She punched out, left and right repeatedly, forcing two zombies back then went out with a stab hard to the right, crushing the face of a
third.
„There is no escape! „ she cried out, as Belli’mar Juraviel came up behind her, so that they were back-to-back.
„Then die well,“ the elf calmly replied.
And so they tried to do just that, as the walls of zombies closed upon them, sword and staff flailing wildly, tirelessly, brutally.
They had several of the creatures down soon after and had forced their way back toward the encampment, back toward the fire.
Juraviel found the new weapon first, grabbing up a flaming stick and thrusting it into the nearest zombie’s face. A puff of smoke carried with it a sickening smell, but the torch had much more effect than either sword or staff, igniting the creature. Juraviel worked frantically to keep its burning arms away.
The zombie beside it began to burn as well.
„A torch! A torch! „ Juraviel yelled, hope creeping back into his voice.
Brynn reacted quickly, throwing her staff into the nearest creatures to make them hesitate, then spinning back to the fire and trying desperately to find a torch. She burned her hand as she grabbed up one long stick, but ig­nored the pain and spun about, thrusting the flaming end right into the eye of a zombie.
And so the tide of battle turned, briefly, as zombies fell back from the flames. One toppled, fully ablaze, and then another.
But even so, Juraviel and Brynn knew that they could not win out against o many, for their supply of firebrands was limited indeed, and would fast exhaust itself.
Lut through one line and run away! „ Juraviel instructed.
Brynn nodded and turned to move beside the elf, but then stopped sud­denly, feeling a burning sting in the side of her neck. She reached up, her expression curious.
„Brynn?“ Juraviel cried.

The woman exploded into motion, coming forward again, thrusting her brand into the face of one zombie and driving it back.
But then Juraviel watched as her movements unexpectedly and inexplic­ably slowed, as her arms drooped.
„Brynn!“ he cried again, slapping his torch to the side, then leaping out the other way as the zombie went up in a blaze of fire.
Juraviel turned just in time to see Brynn tumbling down, zombies falling over her, thrashing and punching.
He could not get to her, could do nothing to help her!
Now Juraviel knew that he had to escape, to flee to Caer’alfar with this horrible news. He turned a complete circuit, his outstretched torch forcing the mob back. He ended the turn by throwing the torch into the face of one creature, then leaped straight up, his wings fluttering to carry him to the boughs.
He almost made it, but one zombie caught him by the ankle.
Juraviel fought against it, his little wings flapping frantically. But elven wings were not meant for flight. They were meant for enhancing leaps and breaking falls, and the zombie’s grip was too strong and unrelenting.
Juraviel felt himself spinning down to the side, then swinging about fast.
He saw the tree right before the zombie smacked him into it.
Dazed and on the ground, Juraviel’s thoughts were for Brynn, and for his own failure in coming back to her. He should have flown off immediately for the north. His duty to the Touel’alfar demanded it.
But what of his duty as a friend?
He saw Brynn, then, briefly, lifted from the ground by a zombie and thrown back down hard, while others fell over her limp form, kicking and punch­ing, though she was offering no resistance at all. She appeared to Belli’mar to be dead already.
He kicked and thrashed, trying to break free. He scrambled away as soon as he felt the grip relent, climbing to his feet and taking two quick strides.
But he was tackled, then he was punched, and, finally, half-conscious and helpless against the rain of blows, he saw another creature, this one fully en­gulfed in flames, coming toward him.
In his last flicker of consciousness, Juraviel felt fortunate that one of the other zombies smashed him into blackness before he felt the burning flames.
Belli’mar Juraviel knew no more.
chapter 6
The Iron Hand of Yatol
T
he long-caravan snaked its way across the broken brown clay. It appeared like a giant centipede, its torso a long line of camels and covered coaches, its legs the flanking soldiers riding tall horses. In the middle of that center line, in the largest and most lavish coach, Yatol Grysh sat back in his cushy seat, complaining about the heat constantly, though he had several attendants, all beautiful young women, fanning him and patting his brow with moistened towels.
„I do so hate this,“ the Yatol said repeatedly. „With the To-gai dogs, there is never any rest from my duties.“
The two of his four attendants who were of obvious To-gai-ru descent, with their softer and straighter hair and almond-shaped eyes, didn’t flinch at the remark, having long ago gotten used to Grysh’s demeaning manner.
„It will calm the outposters,“ said Carwan Pestle, Grysh’s advisor Shep­herd, and the sixth and final person in the wide coach. „They fear that the thieves grow bolder by the day.“
The caravan had been barely out of Jacintha, making its way along the southern shadows of the Belt-and-Buckle toward Dharyan, the town con­trolled by Yatol Grysh, the seat of his power in northwestern Behren, when couriers from Temple Yaminos of Dharyan had caught up to them, inform­ing the ruling Yatol that the thieves of the Corcorca region of To-gai, just west and south of Yaminos, always a thorn, had become even more active. That, of course, had unsettled the outposters, the Behrenese emigrants who had begun to settle outside the old Behren-To-gai border.
Yatol Grysh had campaigned for those settlements, to the Behrenese peo­ple and to Chezru Douan, figuring that his job would become all the easier as the Behrenese settlers gradually began to civilize the wild To-gai-ru. But the early transition was proving to be something of a trial for the lazy man.
Thus, Grysh had diverted his caravan to the south and ridden right past Jharyan, determined to enter Corcorca with his two hundred escorting sol­diers, a contingent that included a score of fierce Chezhou-Lei warriors.
He’d teach the dogs. Though there weren’t all that many miles separating Dharyan from the To-gai region, it was a difficult trek, with the wagons bouncing along a narrow, rocky, steeply ascending trail, up to the higher elevations of the To-gai plateau. Yatol Grysh did not enjoy the several days of discomfort.
Grysh leaned back and looked out his window at the wide and barren landscape. In the distance to the north, he could see the towering peaks of the mountain range that had been a backdrop to his home for his entire life. He wanted to be back under their cooling shadow, in the temple that was his palace, full of luxuries and sweet foods, of clean baths and beautiful and dutiful women.
But Yatol Grysh understood that the only way to ensure the continuation and safety of his precious palace was to rule these eastern stretches of To-gai with an iron hand. He hated the To-gai-ru, with their barbaric, nomadic ways. He hardly considered them human.
Grysh looked at his To-gai-ru attendants and smiled lewdly. He did like their women, though.
„The people of Douan Cal near completion of their wall?“ he asked Car-wan. Douan Cal, named after the Chezru Chieftain, was the largest and most important of the Behrenese settlements, and also the one most plagued by the rogue To-gai-ru bandits.
„They work tirelessly, Yatol,“ Carwan replied. „But their life is difficult. Water must be carried far and crops constantly tended. Their hunters have not learned the way of the local game yet, and thus often return without food. They are not many, but still, they work as they can, whenever they can, at cutting the blocks for their encircling wall.“
„Have they not enough To-gai-ru servants to complete the work?“
„Many have left, Yatol. The To-gai-ru traditionally wander to the foothills in the summer season.“
„And many, it seems, have wandered to the nearby desert, to come forth whenever it is convenient to steal from our people.“
Carwan nodded. „Life is difficult,“ he said somberly.
Grysh sat back and stared out the window, considering the new responsi­bilities that had befallen him since Chezru Chieftain Yakim Douan had de­cided that the time had come for Behren to „reclaim“ its ancient province of To-gai. True, the subjugation of the To-gai-ru had provided many slaves for Behren, and a seemingly endless supply of the wonderful and valuable ponies so prized by the men of Honce-the-Bear. But Grysh, who witnessed the hardships of controlling the wild folk of the steppes on a nearly daily basis, still wondered about the wisdom of the conquest, still wondered if the bother was worth the gain.
For Yatol Grysh was wise enough to recognize that his people, the Behre­nese, were not well suited for the trials of the cold wind and grassy steppes of brutal To-gai. How many years would it take the outposters to adapt?
The seasons would it take for them to come to understand the ways - desert animals, the huge hares and spry deer, the giant and powerful that was his charge from Jacintha, to continue to build new settle-tretching farther and farther to the west, a supply line of small s’across the windblown stretch of grassland that separated the heart of „ai from Behren, so that the assimilation of the wild To-gai-ru could be-’ earjiest. Yatol Grysh was more a pragmatic man than a religious one, „t both sides of that conflict saw prudence in following the Chezru Chief­tain’s edicts to the letter
And so he had turned south and continued west, to the call or his people. I ate that afternoon, as the summer sun began its descent behind the line of mountains, the call came back that the eastern wall of Douan Cal had been spotted by the point scouts.
„Continue on through the darkness, then,“ Yatol Grysh instructed. „Have a rider go ahead fast to instruct the outposters to light guiding signal fires atop the highest point of their eastern wall.“
„It may be dangerous to travel after dark,“ Carwan pointed out, but Grysh silenced him with a stern look.
„Then tighten the line and move the wagons into three side-by-side columns,“ he instructed. He turned to his military commander, Chezhou-Lei Wan Atenn, who had personally delivered the news of the sighting. „You will protect us from the fierce To-gai-ru bandits, will you not?“
The Chezhou-Lei, proud and loyal, sat up very straight on his tall horse, staring at his Yatol with a frozen and determined expression.
„I thought so,“ Yatol Grysh said, and he closed the window’s shutter, for the sun was descending, and on the steppes, even in summertime, it was amazing to Grysh how fast the air cooled, the scorching daytime heat dissi­pating to an uncomfortable chill.
Grysh slapped away the fanning ladies then, and motioned for them to huddle about his large form, using them as living blankets.
He wanted to be home, true, but Yatol Grysh was a man who knew how to take his comforts as he found them. Surely the ride that night was not so unpleasant. The stories Yatol Grysh heard within the compound of Douan Cal were predictable. Bands of To-gai raiders had struck at the town repeatedly, taking their livestock, hurling curses and hurling missiles. None of the Behren settlers had been killed as yet, but several had been injured, including the sane old woman who had been hit in the head with a rock.
What is your assessment of our enemy?“ Yatol Grysh asked Carwan ter on when they were alone - alone concerning anyone who mattered, atol Grysh did not think enough of his serving wenches to bother watching his words around them.
oung men,“ Carwan answered after giving the question a bit of thought.

„Teenagers, perhaps. The older To-gai-ru would have been more straight­forward and more brutal in their attacks.“
„Because the older To-gai-ru would be righting for more than livestock,“ Yatol Grysh said, and Carwan nodded eagerly.
„The older ones once caused trouble throughout To-gai, fighting fanati­cally,“ Carwan said. „They slaughtered entire villages without regard for the women or children.“
„Because the older outlaws - and praise Yatol that few remain alive - -fought with the names of their gods on their lips,“ Yatol Grysh explained, „they believed that their fighting and murdering was paving their road to whatever they envision as their heaven. Men who do battle in such a man­ner are always the worst enemies, my young student.“
„Like our own Chezhou-Lei?“ Carwan dared to remark.
„And always the best allies,“ Yatol Grysh finished with a sly smile. „And tell me, what are we to do about these raiders? Do you believe that we will find them in the open desert?“
Carwan leaned back and considered the problem. The outposters had be­come fairly competent at navigating this area of desert, by their own boasts, but none knew the region as did the To-gai-ru. There in Corcorca’s rugged landscape, valleys opened up unexpectedly at one’s feet and huge and tow­ering mesas formed dizzying arrays of interlocking channels. Chasing the raiders about in that, their home ground, seemed a fool’s errand indeed.
„We’ll not catch up to them if we spend the rest of the season in pursuit,“ Yatol Grysh went on, for Carwan’s expression made his feelings on the mat­ter quite clear. „And likely, they’ll strike behind us at every opportunity, to embarrass us more than to cause any serious mischief. But in that inevitable embarrassment lies a danger, my student. Do you see it?
„We will turn a band of young thieves into a band of legends,“ Yatol Grysh answered after only a brief pause. „And that legend will give the To-gai-ru of the region great hope that the veil of Behren will be lifted from their land.“
„Then what are we to do, Yatol?“
„The nomads’ latest encampment is not far from here,“ Yatol Grysh ex­plained. „We will pay them a visit on the morrow, I think, and see what we may learn.“
Something about the manner in which he said the words had the hairs on the back of Carwan’s neck standing up. Something about the set of his ex­pression at that moment, a bit of a grin, perhaps, but more a smug and de­termined look, told Carwan that his master meant to see to this thorny problem with all efficiency.
Whatever the cost.
Most of the caravan remained behind at Douan Cal the next day, with Grysh’s coach the only wagon riding out. Surrounding the Yatol, though, the whole of his military escort, along with a few men from Douan Cal knew some of the nearby To-gai-ru.
„. rwan Pestle rode with Grysh. He tried to start a few conversations at but it became obvious to him that his master was agitated and wanted be left to his own thoughts. Carwan could guess what that foretold, for had seen Grysh in similar moods, always before issuing a most unpleas-
e£ order. As Yatol of Dharyan, Grysh also served as principal magistrate,
d so he was the one who ordered the executions of convicted criminals. It was not a duty that he seemed to enjoy, but neither was it one from which he ever shied.
Soon after midday, Carwan was leaning out of the coach window, peering ahead intently, for the call had come back that the To-gai-ru encampment was iirsight. Carwan Pestle had never seen a To-gai-ru settlement, and he held a healthy curiosity toward these strange nomadic savages.
The wagon came over a ridge, the ground falling away gradually beyond, down to a wide and shallow river that meandered across the clay, the ever-eager flora of the desert springing to life about its inevitably temporary banks. A cluster of tents was set near one bend, the thin gray smoke of cooking fires lazily snaking into the pale blue sky. No horses were tethered within the camp that Carwan could see, but there was a fair-sized herd milling about. Above all else, the To-gai-ru were famous for their ways with horses,
d Carwan could well imagine that this seemingly wild herd was far from untamed.
At least to the commands of a To-gai-ru rider.
The lead riders fanned out left and right, forming a semicircle about the camp, the only open route leading right into the river. With perfect disci­pline, the second line of twenty warriors, led by Wan Atenn, kicked their mounts into a thundering run, galloping right to the edge of the camp and forming a tighter, threatening perimeter.
Many cries of alarm came out to Carwan Pestle’s ears, and he noted that all of them were in the voices of women or young children.
A moment later, Wan Atenn signaled that the village was secure, and the driver cracked the whip on the draft horses and Yatol Grysh’s coach ram­bled down to the encampment.
Carwan Pestle peered intently all the way, as the small forms took on more definitive shapes, and he knew that his reasoning upon hearing the cries was correct. There seemed to be no adult men in the encampment.
Wan Atenn rode up beside the window. „It is safe, Yatol,“ he reported.
„No weapons shown?“
‘Only the young and the old and the women,“ Wan Atenn explained.
Carwan Pestle turned a curious expression on Grysh. „Perhaps the men are out on a hunt.“
„Indeed,“ the Yatol replied slyly. „But it is well-known that the To-gai-ru hunt early in the morning. Only early in the morning.“

„But - “
„So if they are indeed out on the hunt, then what, my young friend, might they be hunting?“
Carwan sat back and stared at the Yatol. He was beginning to get a very bad feeling about all of this, his stomach turning over and over. The coach came to an abrupt stop and Carwan was quick to the door, throwing it open and leaping out, then turning about and rolling out the retracting stairs for his Yatol.
Grysh came out slowly, allowing Wan Atenn to set his warriors in defen­sive posture about the small stairway. The Yatol paused on each step, his heavy head swiveling to take in all the sights: the many tents, the many small children peeking out from under the shadows of the folds.
„These people breed like hares,“ he snickered, and he sighed. „Find out who is in charge of this wretched camp.“
Wan Atenn snapped to attention, then spun off, motioning for one of the Douan Cal men to come with him. Together, they went tent to tent, Wan Atenn saying something to the outposter, and the man translating it to the To-gai-ru.
Always, a shake of the head came back in response, followed by a more insistent bark from Wan Atenn and a more insistent reiteration from the outposter.
When that, too, brought no apparent acceptable response, Wan Atenn stepped forward and, with a simple and balanced twist and push move­ment, shoved the To-gai-ru to the ground, and the pair moved along.
„They are afraid,“ Yatol Grysh explained to Carwan. „They do not an­swer because they know not what to say.“
„Your man, Atenn, inspires fear.“
„No,“ Yatol Grysh replied. „They know not what to answer because the truth would damn them. The fools have not properly rehearsed their lies because they did not expect that such a force would come against them. Their hesitance is telling, do you see?“
„Yes, Yatol.“
„Do you?“ Grysh asked again, more emphatically, turning to face Carwan. „Why are they afraid?“ he asked when Carwan gave him his full attention.
Carwan knew the answer, but he chewed on it for a few seconds, not even wanting to speak it aloud, fearing the consequences. „Because they are guilty,“ he said at last, and Yatol Grysh nodded slowly and deliberately, turning his head as he did, his eyes narrowing, to face the gathered To-gai-ru.
Carwan could not deny the logic of his claim, for it seemed obvious to him that this village was at least aware of, if not in league with, the bandits. But as he looked around at the gathering, frightened women and children, and a few old men staring out from the shadows, the word „guilty“ just did not seem appropriate.
A commotion to the side caught his attention, and he turned that way to a Behrenese warrior emerging from a tent, a young To-gai-ru man held
fore him, arm wrapped painfully and effectively behind his back.
„They say that their men are all out hunting, Yatol,“ Wan Atenn said at i same moment, for the Cheznou-Lei warrior and the translator had con­tinued the conversation to the side.
„All but one, it would seem.“
The soldier with the prisoner moved before Wan Atenn and threw the man at his leader’s feet. „A tunnel concealed within the tent,“ he explained.
Wan Atenn nodded to a pair of soldiers and they ran off to the tent, dis­appearing within its folds without hesitation.
„Who is this?’V¥atoTtkysh said to Wan Atenn and the interpreter, and the outposter immediately turned to the To-gai-ru woman with whom he had been speaking^and barked out a series of questions. The woman was slow to answer at first, but! the outposter began screaming at her, the same question over and over.
She started screaming back, answering with such enthusiasm that her lie was easy for all to see, even for those who didn’t understand the To-gai-ru language.
Then it stopped, suddenly, the outposter and the defiant woman staring hard at each other.
„Where are the others?“ Yatol Grysh calmly asked, and his translator echoed the question in the same tone.
„No others,“ the woman answered, and both Carwan and Grysh under­stood the simple phrase before their man turned to explain.
„Where are the others?“ Grysh asked again, in the same calm tones, and again, it was properly translated.
The woman responded exactly the same way, and as the outposter turned to Grysh, the Yatol held up his hand and turned to Wan Atenn.
„No trees to hang the prisoner properly,“ he said. „Stake him.“
Carwan’s eyes widened with shock. „Yatol…“ he started to say, but the look Grysh shot him clearly said that he was out of bounds.
Wan Atenn began barking orders, and in short order, the prisoner had been dragged to the side of the encampment and laid out, spread-eagled, staked down by his wrists and ankles. Every time he tried to struggle, a Behrenese soldier kicked him in the ribs.
The gathering of To-gai-ru screamed and jostled, but Grysh’s escorting contingent was more than able to hold them at bay.
At the next moment of calm, Grysh again nodded to Wan Atenn, and the fierce warrior, no novice to these techniques, fetched a torch from the fire his companions were preparing. Another soldier dutifully ran to intercept Wan Atenn, handing him a bulging waterskin.
A waterskin of lamp oil, Carwan knew. Carwan was at a loss, hardly able to draw breath, let alone speak a word of protest. A word that his unques­tionable master did not want to hear, in any case.
He watched, fighting hard to hide his revulsion, as Wan Atenn stuck the torch into the ground between the man’s knees.
„Ask her again where the others might be,“ Grysh instructed his out-poster interpreter.
The woman, her eyes wide and unblinking, hesitated for a long, long time, then answered with the same words, though in a much more subdued tone.
Grysh nodded to his fierce Chezhou-Lei warrior, who immediately began splashing the lamp oil all over the staked man.
Then the Yatol turned to the woman, a wide smile on his face. „One last time,“ he said, somewhat flippantly.
The woman looked away, and Carwan wanted to as well, but found that he could not, mesmerized by the sight of his master calmly nodding to Wan Atenn, by the sight of Wan Atenn, showing no emotion at all, as he grabbed up the torch and touched it to the oiled prisoner.
Carwan knew that the man was screaming, knew that the gathered To-gai-ru were screaming, but he didn’t really hear any of it. He was trapped by the vision before him, locked by horror and sheer amazement.
„Now,“ he at last heard from the side, and realized that Yatol Grysh, who was motioning for him to follow to the coach, had likely called to him sev­eral times.
Carwan spun away and sprinted to the stairs, guiding his master up, then retracting the stairs and leaping into the coach, eager to close the door on the gruesome scene.
„Do as you will,“ Yatol Grysh said to Wan Atenn, then ordered his driver to be off.
They all left then, except for the twenty warriors and their fierce Chezhou-Lei leader. For a long, long time, Carwan Pestle sat in the quiet coach, determined not to look back. Eventually, though, he did peek out.
The encampment was not in view, lost behind the sloping ridgeline, but several lines of smoke rose into the pale air. Not thin gray smoke, as from the campfires, but evil black snaking lines.
Carwan shuddered and fell back into his seat, trying hard not to throw up.
chapter* 7 *
Tymwyvenne
 
B
elli’mar Juraviel was surprised indeed when he opened his eyes to look upon a strange, almost preternatural scene. A thick fog blan­keted the ground, with dark patches of moss and muddy mounds showing sporadically. He was in a copse of trees, but they were all dead, black-armed, empty things, their crooked limbs snaking out like the last desperate limb-waving pleas of a doomed man. At first the elf saw no signs of life, but then he heard a groan, and managed with great effort to roll over.
Brynn stood there, or at least, hung there, her arms up high above her head, tied at the wrists to a thick, dead branch. Her head lolled about her shoulders and she kept trying to stand up straight - to take the painful pressure off of her arms, Belli’mar reasoned. Her legs would not support her, though, and she kept sagging, often uttering a groan as her arms straightened.
„Brynn,“ Juraviel whispered. „Waken, ranger.“
She didn’t answer, so Juraviel repeated his words, more loudly and insistently.
Still no answer.
Not from Brynn. However, at the second call, forms rose up out of the fog. Hulking, stiff-limbed forms, rising silently and moving deliberately toward the pair.
Shaken by the gruesome image, Juraviel tried to stand, only to find that he was strapped down tightly to his makeshift cot, another dead limb, by a series of looped cords.
„Brynn!“ he cried out. „Wake up, girl!“
The zombies moved methodically about the woman. One grabbed her about the ribs, and with seemingly no effort at all, lifted her into the air. A second zombie grabbed the woman’s arms and hoisted them back up straight, lifting the loop of the rope over the peg that was holding it.
Brynn started, suddenly awake, and her initial thrash broke her free of the zombies. But again, her legs would not support her, and she tumbled down into the mist, and as she tried to scramble away, the zombies fell over her, grabbing her, punching her.
Belli’mar Juraviel cried out to her repeatedly and thrashed about, to no avail. A few moments later, one of the zombies lifted the limp form of the young ranger into its arms, cradling her under the knees and shoulders, and started away on its stiff legs.
Juraviel continued to thrash, thinking that the undead creatures would come for him next. But to his surprise, they all continued away, a solemn and gruesome procession.
Juraviel fought hard to suppress his revulsion and collect his wits. What was going on here? As he settled, he realized that there had to be a higher intelligence about other than the zombies; they seemed unthinking creatures. But why, then, had both Juraviel and Brynn been tied up? Why hadn’t the creatures simply battered them both into the realm of death?
It made no sense to Juraviel, but how could it, after all? He had never seen an animated corpse before, had never even heard of such a thing!
The zombies and their captive disappeared into the fog, and Juraviel heard Brynn utter a plaintive cry, helpless and hopeless.
The elf sagged back, staring up into the dark sky. He noted only then, and curiously, that his perch had been made somewhat comfortable. A thick blanket was under him, between him and the gnarly branch. He craned his neck, trying to find some clues, but he could only see the edge of a wayward flap, nothing that offered him any information. Why had he been treated with some consideration, while Brynn had been mercilessly hung up by her wrists? And why was he still lying there, while his friend had been dragged away to some unknown horror?
Juraviel figured that he was about to get some answers - and likely none that he wanted to hear! - when a hulking form came up beside him, down by his legs, stiff arms reaching out to him!
Panic welled in Juraviel, but was soon overwhelmed by anger - anger at himself, mostly, for the elf knew then that he had done wrong in standing beside Brynn. He should have run off to report this atrocity to Lady Dasslerond; all of his people might be threatened now because of his mis­erable failure.
„Hefle!“ came a shout, a word that sounded vaguely familiar to Juraviel. When the zombie halted and lowered its arms, the elf understood the word more clearly, for it sounded like an offshoot of the elven word „hefele,“ which meant, „desist.“
Juraviel craned his neck again, straining to get a look at the speaker, and when he did, his eyes went wide indeed! For there, standing beside him, were a pair of creatures, a male and female, of similar stature to his own. Their hair was dark, black like a raven’s wing, and the eyes of the male seemed like an inky black pool, while the other’s were the lightest shade of blue a stark and startling contrast to her black hair. They had no wings, as lid the Touel’alfar, but their features were similarly angular and pro-ounced. Juraviel’s own skin had been tanned under the sun, but these two looked as if they had never seen the sunlight, their skin chalky white, almost luminescent in the gray fog.
The female starred hurling words Juraviel’s way. Questions, he supposed, or threats, but the creature was speaking too fast for him to catch up to the meaning^ thelnterrt-
But then he did catch a word, „intruder,“ and another, „thief,“ and he was surprised indeed when he paused long enough to recognize that the creature was speaking to him in his own tongue! Or in a tongue that resem­bled that of the Touel’alfar, both in specific wording and in the various in­flections that could be placed on any word.
The female continued to ramble, with Juraviel’s ears keeping pace with the flow of the words now, and the elf truly understood that the danger was far from past, that these two, and their kinfolk, apparently, were not pleased that he and Brynn had stumbled onto their land. The creature spoke of „the severest of penalties“ for the human woman and mentioned that they might kill Juraviel instead of that worst of fates if he cooperated appropriately.
Finally, Juraviel had recovered his wits enough for him to look the ram­bling and outraged creature in the eye, and say, „We meant no harm.“
Both creatures fell back, their eyes going wide. The female stammered over a few syllables, while she trembled, with nerves, with rage, with… something.
„Who are you, who know my language?“ Juraviel said, trying to use in­flections similar to those the creatures had used, though his tone was obvi­ously far less confrontational.
The pair looked at each other curiously, as if trying to sort through the question. They each repeated the last word, „language,“ several times, shaking their heads and wearing confused expressions.
Juraviel rattled off several synonyms and tried to explain what he meant, and the thought came clear to the pair.
„Who are you who know our… language?“ the one with the dark eyes asked.
„Who are you?“
„Who are you?“ the two demanded in unison.
Belli’mar Juraviel lay back on his branch and closed his eyes, trying to sort out the web of confusion and surprise. Could it be? the elf wondered. Was it possible? He took a deep breath, and answered, knowing full well that he was taking a great chance here, „Touel’alfar. I am Touel’alfar.“
„Tylwyn Tou!“ the female cried, her bright eyes going wide, and her tone made it sound like an accusation.
Belli’mar Juraviel looked at her directly. If this was what he now suspected, then he certainly understood that tone. In times long past, the Touel’alfar and these creatures, the Doc’alfar, had lived together as one race. But the primary difference in the elves, the fact that some were adorned with wings while others were not, had caused strife among the people. Add to that a devastating disease that had afflicted the elves with­out wings for some reason, but not their cousins, and the elven peoples of Corona had been split apart, Touel and Doc.
Juraviel didn’t blink, but neither did he frown or show any intentions of intimidation. He was walking a fine line, he knew, balancing on a perch where a fall would cost him his life - and cost him any chance at all to save Brynn, if she was even still alive.
„Doc’alfar,“ Juraviel said quietly, and as the elf mouthed the word, he be­came even more certain that he should have abandoned Brynn in the initial fight.
„Tylwyn Doc,“ the male corrected, calmly, though his companion seemed as if she was about to leap forward and throttle Juraviel.
„Tylwyn Doc,“ Juraviel conceded.
„And you are Tylwyn Tou,“ said the elf with the bright eyes.
„We name ourselves Touel’alfar, but I accept Tylwyn Tou.“
„You accept?“ the female said with a snort. „Have you a choice?“
Juraviel merely shrugged, or tried to, for his bindings were too tight for such movement.
„What is your name?“ the male demanded.
„Belli’mar Juraviel,“ he answered without hesitation.
„Where have you come from?“ the female snapped.
Juraviel tightened his lips. „I am Belli’mar Juraviel,“ he said again, aim­ing the words at the male, who seemed the more reasonable of the two.
The male Tylwyn Doc stared at him hard for a short while, then said, „I am Lozan Duk.“ he paused and looked to his companion, as did Juraviel.
The Tylwyn Doc with the remarkable light eyes didn’t look at her com­panion, but continued to stare ominously at Juraviel. „Cazzira,“ she said at length. „Know that your doom is named Cazzira, Belli’mar Juraviel.“
The elf’s question came out simply, „Why?“
Cazzira narrowed her bright eyes, her face tightening with anger.
„You have intruded where you do not belong,“ Lozan Duk explained. „The Tylwyn Doc make no exceptions.“
Juraviel pondered that for a bit. „You routinely execute any who wander onto your land, though you have no warning markers to ward intruders away? „
„Warning markers would tell the world where we are, would they not?“ Cazzira asked with biting sarcasm. „Perhaps we do not want the world to know.“
Juraviel lay back again, considering the words, trying to figure out what going on, and what steps he might take, what words he might say to try calm the situation.
„° „Where is my companion?“ he asked. „Brynn Dharielle is her name. A trained by the Touel’alfar and returning to her home beyond the Stains. She poses no threat to the Tylwyn Doc.“ „She is being prepared for the bog,“ Lozan Duk answered matter-of-
aC“All humans are given to the bog,“ Cazzira eagerly added. „We throw them in, and then^our priests return them to us as slaves.“
A shudder coursVd Juraviel’s spine. He pictured Brynn as one of those „slaves,“ an undead monstrosity under the complete control of these
creatures.
„We have not taken much of the land as our own,“ Lozan Duk ex­plained. „But that which is ours, we guard with all diligence.“
Those words rang true to Belli’mar Juraviel, for his own people held be­liefs not so different. The Touel’alfar guarded Andur’Blough Inninness fanatically. They didn’t often kill intruders, because their elven magic, along with Lady Dasslerond’s emerald gemstone, could make those who wan­dered onto their lands forget the way. But if there was any doubt - if the in­truder learned too much about the Touel’alfar, if a ranger, perhaps, failed in his training - then Juraviel knew that Dasslerond would not hesitate to kill the human.
Juraviel thought of Aydrian at that moment, for the young ranger had been walking a fine line for some time. Another shudder coursed through him.
„You cannot do this,“ Juraviel said suddenly, hardly thinking before he blurted the words. He craned his head up again, staring at the two intently. He read Lozan Duk’s expression as one of sympathy, though Cazzira’s tightened features showed little understanding.
„There is a possibility here,“ Juraviel went on. „How many centuries have passed since our peoples were torn asunder?“
„Since the Tylwyn Tou expelled the Tylwyn Doc from their lands, you mean,“ Cazzira remarked.
„Who can know the truth of that distant past?“ Juraviel replied. „Per­haps you are right - there was a plague, by all accounts. But whatever the truth, are we two peoples to be held prisoner by it?“
Cazzira started to respond, but Lozan Duk held his hand up before her. This is not our decision to make,“ he said. „King Eltiraaz will have much to say concerning your fate, Belli’mar Juraviel.“
„And what of Brynn?“ She is for the bog,“ Cazzira was quick to answer.
Juraviel shook his head defiantly. „Then that will be your error. And one the Touel’alfar will not soon forgive.“
You threaten us?“ asked the angry female.
„I speak honestly, and in the hope that this meeting need not be a tragedy. Brynn Dharielle - “
„Is a human, and we do not suffer humans who wander onto our lands to live!“
„Brynn Dharielle is a ranger,“ Juraviel calmly went on. „She is not like others of her race. She has been trained for many years within the home of
the Touel’alfar. She has been given an understanding of my - of our people that elevates her above her sorry kin. My people have placed much faith and responsibility in her. I tell you this now so that there will be no mistaking the implications if you proceed. I want you to hold no miscon­ceptions on this point. Brynn Dharielle is Touel’alfar in all but heritage, and we protect our own as fiercely as do the Doc’alfar.“
Cazzira was tightening her angular features throughout his speech, and she winced visibly when Juraviel referred to her people using the title of his people and not hers.
„Are we to learn from each other, or are you to sever all possibilities of friendship and alliance before they are ever explored?“
Lozan Duk looked at his companion, holding the stare until Cazzira tore her glare away from Juraviel and returned the look. Then, with a glance at Juraviel, Lozan Duk motioned for Cazzira to follow him a short distance away, that they could speak in private.
Belli’mar Juraviel lay back and tried to sort through the amazing turn of events that night, trying to discern his responsibilities. Had he erred in so forcefully protecting Brynn? Perhaps his duty to his people demanded that he try to save himself, whatever the cost to Brynn, that he could flee back to the north and inform Lady Dasslerond that the Doc’alfar were very much real and alive.
No, Juraviel decided. He would not sacrifice Brynn. Not for himself, not for anyone. He intended to get out of this, and intended to have Brynn right beside him when he did.
Lying there, cocooned by an unyielding rope on a tree branch and with a powerful zombie hovering over him, Juraviel had to admit that intentions were a far cry from reality.
„Tell the priests to await the judgment of King Eltiraaz,“ Lozan Duk in­structed Cazzira when they had moved away from their prisoner.
„His judgment concerning humans was rendered centuries ago,“ Cazzira protested.
Lozan Duk looked to Juraviel, then back to Cazzira. „He must speak with this one before rendering his judgment over the ranger.“
Cazzira stared at him hard.
„You know that I am correct in this,“ Lozan Duk replied. „King Eltiraaz would not be pleased if we proceeded after what this one has told us.“
He looked back at their prisoner, her hard look softening, and finally a helpless chuckle. „This is amazing,“ she admitted. „A legend walks our midst. Who can tell what that will portend for the Tylwyn Doc?“ 111 „Or the Tylwyn Tou?“ Lozan Duk added, nodding, and when he turned Cazzira, he saw that she was nodding, too. So many possibilities.
It hurt to move at all, but Brynn turned her head to the side and opened
She was lying on\her stomach, on soft and smelly ground. It was a cave, she realized, as she turned her head more to regard the light hanging on the earthen wait Her gaze lingered there, for this was like no lantern the woman had ever seen. It had a short wooden handle and was capped by a slowing, blue-white globe, with no flames anywhere that Brynn could see.
She continued her scan as far as her aching neck and back would allow. Many, many small roots hung out of the walls and the ceiling, and it seemed to Brynn as if this whole place, however large it might be, had simply been torn out of the ground.
Brynn coughed, and her ribs felt as if they would break apart under the pressure!
Too weary and battered even to cry, the young ranger turned her face back toward the earth and slowly lowered her head back in place. She closed her eyes, wishing it was all just a nightmare, but knowing better. Knowing that she had failed, that she would not be the savior of her en­slaved people.
Fitful dreams awaited her.
When the woman next opened her eyes, she was lying on her back, still bathed in the same bluish white light, and still in the small earthen cave.
„I thought that you would be more comfortable this way,“ came a sud­den voice, and Brynn started, then groaned from the pain. Her panic was gone by the time she winced through the agony, for she surely recognized the voice of Belli’mar Juraviel. Slowly and with great effort, the young ranger managed to turn enough to glimpse her mentor, who sat at the side of the room, not bound, apparently.
‘They can animate the dead, but they have little in the way of healing magic,“ Juraviel mused, and it seemed to Brynn that he was talking more to himself than to her.
Hey?“ she managed to say, and her lips were so dry and parched that they hurt to move.
JJoc’alfar,“ Juraviel explained, coming over to her and putting a small waterskin to her lips. He poured, and Brynn tried to gulp the fresh water, but Juraviel quickly pulled it back.
Not too fast,“ he warned, bringing it forward and giving her another sip. „You have been asleep for a long time. If you drink too quickly, you will shock your body, to no good end.“
„How long?“
Juraviel looked around and shrugged. „Three days at least, I would guess, though time is not easy to measure in here.“
Three days, Brynn thought. But how had she and Juraviel escaped? And where was the pursuit, for how far might the diminutive elf have traveled with an unconscious woman to drag along?
Those questions swirled about in her thoughts for a short while, gradu­ally blending in with the more general gray that seemed to permeate her thoughts, guiding her back to the realm of slumber.
She knew before Juraviel even told her that another day had slipped past. Biynn turned to the side, to where Juraviel had been - and still was - . sitting.
„Ah, Brynn, you have returned to me.“ As he spoke, Juraviel lifted the waterskin and came back to her, putting it to her parched lips.
„Help me to sit up,“ the young ranger said after taking a few sips and then a few deep breaths - breaths that showed her that her ribs were far from healed.
Juraviel was beside her in a moment, easing her into a sitting position, then helping her to turn so that she could put her back against the wall.
„I remember getting hit,“ she said after a lengthy pause. „I tried to fight back, but they were all about me. I tried…“
„You fought well, but the numbers were too great, and the creatures seemed nearly immune to our weapons.“
„How did we get out?“
Juraviel’s expression corrected her even before she had finished speaking the words. They had not gotten out of anything, and were obviously prisoners.
„What do they want of us? And what are they?“
„They - the ones who attacked us - were unthinking animations,“ the elf explained. „Zombies raised as an army by the Doc’alfar.“
„Doc’alfar,“ Brynn echoed, thinking that there was a familiar ring to the word, though she couldn’t place it.
„We have been through this all before,“ Juraviel said to her. „Though I would not expect you to remember it.“
„Doc’alfar?“ Brynn said yet again, for she understood the word to mean „the dark people,“ as Touel’alfar meant „the fair people,“ or simply, „the People.“
„In a time long past the longest memories of the eldest elves, there was but one race,“ Juraviel explained somberly, his eyes staring to the side, as if looking across the miles and the centuries. „Touel’alfar, or Tylwyn Tou. Some had wings, some not, and most of those who had wings had hair of gold and light eyes, while most of those who did not had dark hair and dark eyes.“
„These are your cousins, then,“ Brynn reasoned. She glanced all around. - And this is the home of…?“
„This is a prison, and nothing more.
„Rut they are of the People. You are kin and kind. Why would they treat

“Did I mention the banishment?“ Juraviel remarked, somewhat flippantly. „They’re going to kill us, aren’t they?“
Turaviel looked at her directly. „You, likely,“ he confirmed. „They are not overly fond of humans, it seems.“
Brynn considered the undead force that had come against them, human
zombies all.
„Though theyTnay keep me alive, Juraviel went on, tor information or for bartef, if evef\they should venture to find Lady Dasslerond and Andur’Blough InninnesV’
„Then we have to find a way to fight our way out of here.“
Turaviel shrugged and motioned to the side, to a dark hole in the floor, seeming barely wide enough to crawl into. „One tunnel, through which we’ll have to crawl, blocked at the one exit by a boulder and a host of zom­bies, to say nothing of any Doc’alfar who might be about. And I trust that my kin have not lost their proficiency in battle.“
Brynn’s shoulders slumped and her gaze fell to the floor. „I cannot die here,“ she said. „Not now. My people are in need and I will not forsake them!“ She finished with a snarl, but it was one, she knew, more of frustra­tion than determination. For what could she and Belli’mar Juraviel do? They were overmatched, plain and simple, and so much so that there were no apparent options.
She wanted to punch the wall, and turned, meaning to do just that. But a thought came to her suddenly and her face brightened, and her hand un­clenched and tore at the soft wall instead, pulling away a sizable chunk of root-filled earth. Brynn spun right about, ignoring the pain in her shoulder and ribs, determined to tear a tunnel out of the soft soil.
„Do not!“ came Juraviel’s emphatic cry, and the woman stopped and turned back to regard him.
„The cave is not solid enough,“ Juraviel explained. „Our captors under­stood how to build a prison properly here, and if we weaken the integrity of the walls, it will all fall in on us.“
Brynn closed her eyes, her ribs aching as she gasped in deep breaths, re­considering her exertion.
„We are very deep,“ Juraviel grimly added.
Brynn fell back over to a sitting position, her back against the cool, smelly mud. „What are we to do? To sit and wait, and pray for the benefi­cence of our captors?“
„How I wish I had an answer.“
And so they did just that, sitting and waiting, Juraviel’s mind whirling as he tried to come up with some manner of negotiation that he might use, should he get the chance, to get both of them out of there. Brynn sat think­ing of her failure, of the loss to To-gai and the enslaved To-gai-ru. She would not be their savior, apparently.
Inevitably, the woman’s thoughts turned to her own mortality. What did it mean to die? Would her murdered parents be there at the end of the dark tunnel, as the shamans of To-gai claimed, ready to welcome her to the Great Hunt? Or would there be nothing at all, just an empty blackness, a cessa­tion of existence?
Many times, the woman tried to bring her thoughts back to the situation at hand, tried to fathom some solution to the terrible dilemma. But she was dragged back over and over to the unavoidable contemplations of that greatest of mysteries.
Time slipped past; Brynn knew not if it was minutes or hours or days. She wasn’t hungry, and figured that trying to eat would pain her greatly, anyway. She just sat there and waited, and every so often, she glanced across the way to Juraviel, who sat cross-legged, his elbows propped on his legs, his chin in his cupped hands.
Time slipped past.
The sound of movement in the tunnel shook Brynn from a trancelike slumber some long hours later. The young ranger instinctively started to move, and quickly, to a defensive position, but a sudden stabbing pain in her side forced her back to her sitting posture, gasping for breath.
Juraviel didn’t move very much at all, just turned his head to regard the approaching sound. It wasn’t from weakness or pain, though, Brynn under­stood, but from simple resignation. They were beaten, and Juraviel had fully accepted that. If their captors walked Juraviel to the edge of a cliff, clipped his wings, and told him to jump, Brynn believed that he just might do it, and without complaint!
A covered pot was the first thing that came through the dark hole at the base of the wall across from Brynn, ushered forward by a pair of peat-covered, stiff-fingered hands. The zombie continued to crawl its way into the room, moving more like a worm than a bipedal creature. It set the pot down, then began to recede into the hole, moving slowly backward down the tunnel.
The perfect delivery system, Brynn realized, for the zombie would not panic in the tight tunnel and could take its time in leaving, inch by inch.
„What is it?“ Brynn asked after the gruesome zombie was finally gone from sight.
„Food and water,“ Juraviel explained. „You go first and take as much as you require. It has been far too long since your last meal.“
Brynn stared at the pot for a long moment, considering the pain it had created in her stomach. She didn’t want food, but needed it, she knew. did she? What was the point, if she was just to be executed anyway?
She dismissed those dark thoughts before they could ever gain a hold, pressed forward and pushed the cover from the pot. In the dim light, she couldn´t  make out much within the shadows beneath the lip, but her nose bled her that it was merely bread - stale bread, she determined as she lifted  - and a small flask of water. It was her first meal in four days, and it ‘„too much for her to enjoy a single bite or sip of it. But Brynn forced  illv half of the bread and-water down, treating each bite as a small victory her resistance against her captors, her determination to win out and‘ Turaviel finishedVhe food and drink with the same resigned manner as he had welcomed the zombie waiter.
Brynn just stared at him, trying to impart some fighting spirit. It occurred to her, only briefly, that Juraviel was taking such a passive attitude so that his chances of getting out alive would be heightened, even if his apparent determination not to fight back doomed his companion.
No, Brynn told herself forcefully. Juraviel was resigned because he be­lieved that they had no chance of any substantive resistance.
She would have to show him differently!
The zombie returned after what Brynn estimated to be the turn of a full day. It put the new pot down and grabbed the old one, now serving as a commode, and started backing down the hole.
Brynn started to move, thinking to kill the undead creature while it was vulnerable in the tight passageway, but her expression betrayed her to her companion.
„Do not!“ Juraviel commanded, and Brynn stopped and stared at him, then looked back to the zombie, which continued to back away mindlessly, oblivious to the threat.
„If you kill it, then it will lie stinking in the hole,“ the elf explained, his tone flat and even. „Then we will have to tolerate the added smell of rot, and that I do not desire.“
Brynn sank back against the wall and gave a great sigh. „Are we to do nothing?“
We are to eat,“ replied Juraviel. „And more slowly this day, for they do not always replace the pot they take away on their rounds.“
The cycle continued day after day, and while Brynn’s ribs began to hurt as  she was weakening, not getting stronger, she knew. Their captors were apparently not novices at this business, for they kept the food and drink to absolute minimum, gradually breaking down the strength and will of the prisoners. rynn knew not how many days had passed, and hardly took note when movement sounded in the tunnel. Even after the Doc’alfar emerged from the tunnel, it took the woman a few seconds to realize that this was not their usual zombie waiter!
„ Belli’mar Juraviel,“ the Doc’alfar greeted.
„Hail, Lozan Duk,“ Juraviel replied, and Brynn’s eyes went wide with surprise.
„King Eltiraaz awaits you.“
Juraviel nodded and rolled up to his knees, and it took him a long while to steady himself. Brynn, too, started to move, but Juraviel fixed her with a stare and motioned for her to sit back, and Lozan Duk turned a threatening glare at her.
„You will have your chance to explain yourself to my king,“ the Doc’alfar said to Juraviel. „This is your trial.“
„And am I to have my say to your King Eltiraaz?“ Brynn boldly asked.
Lozan Duk slowly turned to regard her. „You have nothing to say, n’Tyl-wyn Doc.“
N’Tylwyn Doc. The word played over and over in Brynn’s mind, for she had heard a similar word many times during her tenure with the Touel’alfar, particularly in the beginning, when her training in the ways of the ranger, in the ways of the elves, was in its infancy. Many times, the Touel’alfar had called her n’Touel’alfar, a derisive term that meant, simply, that she was not of the People, of the important people, of the only ones who truly counted. There was some hope to be garnered here, in the fact that the Doc’alfar had not similarly referred to Juraviel. By pointedly using the phrase in regard to Brynn as the reason she would not be allowed to go along, he had, in effect, somewhat included Juraviel in his clan.
That hope was lost on Brynn as she slumped back against the wall, though, for the derisive title, n’Tylwyn Doc, sounded to her like the call of the executioner.
The two elves moved out of the room with far more ease and grace than had the zombie waiter. Brynn again considered moving, not to follow, but to attack their jailor, though she realized that she would likely have no chance against an elf in her weakened state. The only thing that held her back were the implications for Belli’mar Juraviel. Brynn was likely doomed, as Juraviel had admitted, but perhaps her friend would find some way to get out of this.
So she sat back against the cool wall and let the minutes slip into un­eventful hours.
Juraviel followed Lozan Duk into a smaller chamber down near the exit of the earthen tunnel - which was still blocked, as far as he could tell - where Cazzira was waiting. Without a word from the female, and without a word of protest from Juraviel, the Doc’alfar moved and slipped a thick belt Turaviel’s waist, tightening it down and pinning his wings, then buck-“h’e front with some locking mechanism.
1O“V will not fly away, little bird,“ Cazzira remarked as she fastened the nd luraviel noted that the Doc’alfar word for „bird“ was exactly the „ ‘ gS the word in his own tongue: marrawee.
53 „Do you believe that I wish to fly away?“ he answered. „Perhaps this is a j-overdue meeting between the alfar, and fate has guided me to you for a reason.’
„Perhaps, Lozan Uuk said.
„Or perhaps it was simply bad fortune on your part,“ Cazzira was quick to add luraviel maintained a nonchalant visage until the female added, „And even worse fortune for your n’Tylwyn Doc companion.“
„Come,“ Lozan Duk instructed, seeming as eager to be done with this particular line of conversation as was Juraviel. The Doc’alfar crawled into the ascending tunnel then, Juraviel right behind, and Cazzira following a short distance back.
Soon after, Juraviel crawled out of the tunnel, but not into the light, though he was outside and the sun was up.
But not there. The fog was even thicker than it had been in the graveyard of trees by the peat bog, casting the place in a moist and perpetual gloom.
„King Eltiraaz has accepted your request to speak with him,“ Lozan Duk explained. „You should be honored.“
„Indeed I am,“ Juraviel replied with all sincerity. A twinge of guilt struck him as he responded, as he thought of Brynn and her likely fate. Still, Ju­raviel had to admit his excitement in seeing his white-skinned and wingless cousins. For the Touel’alfar, this was monumental news, at least as impor­tant as anything Brynn might accomplish in To-gai, and though Juraviel was surely torn and upset about the possibilities of Brynn ‘s lack of future, he couldn’t deny his excitement, his thrill, at the opportunity to represent his people to the king of the Doc’alfar!
„Though I fear that I am hardly properly attired for an audience with your king,“ Juraviel added.
„Your clothing will do,“ Cazzira remarked. „The road-worn, weathered outfit of a traveler, of a thief, perhaps.“
Juraviel took the comment in stride and thought he detected a bit of soft­ening in Cazzira ‘s tone, if not her actual words.
Lozan Duk motioned for Juraviel to follow, leading him down a winding trail to a large, hollowed tree stump. Juraviel found two depressions within, one with soapy oil and the other with clear rainwater.
The washing felt good indeed! He turned when he was done, just in time to catch a towel Cazzira threw away, then they were off again, walking the winding, fog-enshrouded trails, through skeletal black trees that all looked the same. Juraviel doubted he would be able to retrace his steps on his own, and he suspected that his two guards were tracking all about on purpose, to obscure the true path even more. They seemed a lot like the Touel’alfar, he mused.
Almost without warning, Juraviel found himself on a narrow trail amidst towering mountain walls, a narrow gorge trail that led to a huge cave. The two Doc’alfar each picked up one of those strange-glowing lanterns right inside the cave and paused, turning to their prisoner.
Juraviel looked all about, though the other walls of the cavern were far beyond the limit of the light. When his gaze at last settled on Lozan Duk and Cazzira, he found Lozan Duk coming toward him, a black hood in hand.
Juraviel didn’t protest at all as they popped it over his head, pulling a drawstring set about its opening to somewhat close it. Lozan Duk took him by the arm and led him off, and they walked for a long and winding way, down corridors that closed in on Juraviel and through chambers that he sensed were very vast indeed.
A long while later, they stopped again, and Juraviel was surprised when Cazzira pulled off his hood, staring at him intently with her icy blue eyes. They were in a large chamber, and it seemed to Juraviel that he was actually out of doors again, in some secret mountain hole.
His eyes scanned up, up, eagerly, but as he turned, he quickly forgot all about the chamber itself, for there before him towered the magnificent gates of the Doc’alfar city.
„Tymwyvenne,“ Lozan Duk explained. „You are the first who is not Doc’alfar to look upon the gates of Tymwyvenne in many centuries.“
„I am honored,“ Juraviel said, again with all sincerity and more than a bit of awe, for the entrance to Tymwyvenne was what he would expect of any cousins of the Touel’alfar - and more! The doors, huge doors, as thick as ten elves side by side, were of some golden-hued wood. They hung open, flanked by two huge round pillars of the same material, which were set against a wall of gray-and-black stone. Across the top of the pillars was a third, lying horizontally above the doorway, and made of the same wood, with thousands of designs carved into it, many of them shining of various colors. Juraviel looked more closely and noted that many, many gemstones were set in that beam, a king’s treasure, and he was glad to see that there was an appreciation of beauty there, as in Caer’alfar - though his own peo­ple’s ideal of beauty was evidenced in the perfection of nature itself. Juraviel understood that such appreciation often signaled an understanding of the higher orders and stations of life, including mercy.
Through the doors, the trio came into an immense cavern, a place of quiet, but steady, light, where the fog was not so thick. Structures loomed all about them, made of burnished wood of varying hues and textures. There was no one singular dominant design, but each house, for that is what they obviously were, was its own free-flowing work of art. Other Doc’alfar milled about, making Juraviel’s path a veritable pa-ite All wanted to catch a glimpse of the captured Tylwyn Tou, obvi-nd he noted many expressions there, from curiosity to some almost
The place had a somber tone about it, to Juraviel s thinking, gloomy but dark It wasn’t hard for him to figure out his escorts’ intended destinations they crossed a large central open area. Ahead of them, a crisscross of  lconies lined the back wall, climbing up above the city. There, on a higher  that sat the grandest house of all, which he knew without doubt was the pice of King Eltiraazr,
Belli’mar Juraviel fixed:his gaze on that house and the many surrounding ]andings~aniornate railings and balusters, trying to get a feeling for the oc-upants througlTtfeei^choice of design. The alfar could do this more easily than could humans because elven houses were rarely handed down - were, ultimately, a product of centuries of choices and intuitions and creativity from a single driving heart and mind.
This house looked inviting enough, very much like a place expecting many guests and revelers.
Of course, a pair of Doc’alfar guards darkened that notion. They were dressed in strange skin and wooden armor and held thin and nasty-looking hooked clubs, their full-faced helms showing only their dark eyes, and those eyes revealing nothing of their feelings toward this strange newcomer to their land.
The trio entered a wide foyer, then turned down a side passage and around a series of bends, at last coming into another wide room, set with two rows of decorated columns, with a thick green carpet running the length of the room between them. The only piece of furniture in the room was a large golden-wood throne near the far wall, behind which a fire blazed in a great hearth, and upon which sat a Doc’alfar with long black hair and large dark eyes. Like that of the rest of his kin, his skin was creamy white. His clothing, though, was far more remarkable. Thus far, most of the Doc’alfar Juraviel had seen were either in that curious armor or in rather plain garb. Lozan Duk and Cazzira both wore dark brown outfits - suitable for hunting the foggy bogs, Juraviel figured.
I his one - King Eltiraaz, Juraviel knew before the formal introduction - wore light-colored breeches, embroidered with many gemstones, and a rich Jurple shirt. A cape that seemed a combination of the two hung back off nis shoulders, bunching on the chair behind him. His vest was full of sewn rnages, in a thread that seemed almost metallic to Juraviel. He wore a crown leafy vines wrapped about a silvery band, metal that the Touel’alfar recognnized as silverel. That was very telling to Juraviel, for no race other than Touel’alfar knew how to farm the exotic metal from the ground, as far knew; that crown proved to him that either the Doc’alfar had held secret during the centuries of separation, or that this particular crown was a relic left over from the days when the races were one. Likely the second, he surmised, for he had seen no darkferns about, and no other sil-verel. If the Doc’alfar had the knowledge and the means to farm the won­drous silverel, they surely would not have their soldiers carrying wooden clubs!
Unless, of course, the wood of those clubs, a variety that Juraviel did not know, carried a few special properties of its own.
Flanked by Lozan Duk and Cazzira, Juraviel walked along the carpet to stand before Eltiraaz.
The King of Tymwyvenne sat very straight on his throne, staring hard at Juraviel, his expression stern and regal, his shoulders perfectly squared. He had his hands on his lap, holding a gem-capped scepter fashioned out of that same strange wood.
„You will tell King Eltiraaz your tale, Belli’mar Juraviel of the Touel’alfar, from the very beginning of the road that brought you to our lands,“ Lozan Duk explained. „And of why you walk the trails with a living human beside you.“
Juraviel winced a bit at that last statement, further confirmation that the Doc’alfar’s contempt for humans was nearly absolute. He pushed past his emotions, though, and did as instructed, relating his tale from the battle with the goblins south and east of Andur’Blough Inninness - whose where­abouts he had no intention of disclosing - to the night of his and Brynn’s capture.
King Eltiraaz listened intently to his every word, sometimes tilting his head to the side, as if he wanted to ask a question. But he remained silent and patient throughout the tale.
„Long have we known that our kin, the Tylwyn Tou, remained in the northland,“ Eltiraaz said after Juraviel had finished. His voice was both re­gal and melodic, a great baritone that seemed strange to Juraviel, coming out of so diminutive a creature. „Yet no less is our surprise in seeing one, in seeing you, walk into our lands. Know that you are the very first of our lost brethren to look upon Tymwyvenne.“
„I am truly honored, King Eltiraaz.“ Juraviel thought it appropriate to bow at that solemn moment.
The King of the Doc’alfar nodded, then looked to Lozan Duk.
„King Eltiraaz wishes to know why you were in the company of a human,“ Lozan Duk asked.
Juraviel looked from the king to the other male, curious as to why Elti­raaz had not simply asked him himself. „Brynn Dharielle is a ranger,“ he ex­plained. „Trained by the Touel’alfar. It is a practice that we have employed for centuries - taking in human orphans who show promise and training them in the ways of the Touel’alfar, that they might serve as eyes and ears for my Lady Dasslerond in the wider human world.“
„Why not just kill every human who wanders into your domain?“ Caz-j Juraviel noted, in all seriousness. „They are lesser creatures,
ireat, should be eliminated.“
«W view them more highly than do you, perhaps,“ the Touel’alfar
id trying to remain civil, knowing that Brynn’s life might be on the line
!C“\X’e have come to see the humans as valuable allies at times, if often a
bit troublesome.“	^
„More than troublesome, said Lazzira.
„Rangers are not like other humans,“ Juraviel stated clearly, aiming the ds at King Eltiraaz. „They understand much more about the world than their clumsy kin. They are expert warriors, and with the temperament and instilled discipline to use their fighting prowess wisely. They are friends to the natural world, friends to jthe Touel’alfar, and surely no ranger would be a threat or enemy to the Doc’alfar.“ x
„How do you know?“ asked Eltiraak
Turaviel started to echo the question, but caught himself, understanding it and replied, „Rangers who do not show the proper temperament and judgment are not allowed back out into the wide world.“
„And your companion has passed these tests?“ Eltiraaz asked.
„Brynn is as fine a ranger as has ever walked out of Andur’Blough Innin-ness and Caer’alfar.“
„Then why does she need the company of Belli’mar Juraviel?“
The Touel’alfar took a deep breath and considered the question, and considered how much he should reveal to Eltiraaz and the others. He had already spoken the name of his valley, his Lady, and his city, and sensed that he should trust these kin somewhat, but how might they feel about a human heading through their lands on her way to begin a war?
„Brynn Dharielle was selected among the To-gai-ru of the wild steppes south of the great mountains,“ he explained.
„We know of the To-gai-ru,“ Eltiraaz replied.
„Then you know that they are not like their kinfolk,“ Juraviel said. „They are more attuned to the land and to - “
„A few of our soldiers are of To-gai-ru descent,“ Cazzira said, and her grim tone reminded Juraviel of the type of „soldier“ to which she was refer­ring. He looked at her, wondering how deep her enmity truly ran, and was taken in again by those exotic eyes of hers, shining icy orbs layered in emo­tion and thought.
e shook off his revulsion and focused on an interesting question: how had ^any To-gai-ru come to the land of the Doc’alfar? And how did the
c alfar know of Brynn’s people? True, the To-gai-ru settled the land only lundred miles or so south of this region, but on the other side of suppos-c% impassable mountains. Or perhaps, not so impassable?
t how to bring the conversation to that point, to where he could even i to hope that these captors would allow him and Brynn to go free at  alone tell them of a possible way through the mountains?
„Have you found no redeeming qualities in the To-gai-ru?“ he dared to ask. „Are they no more than the other humans to you?“
„Should we look, Belli’mar Juraviel?“ King Eltiraaz asked. „Is it your word to us that the To-gai-ru can be better trusted by our people? Do you believe, perhaps, that we have erred in judging them so harshly?“
Juraviel saw the potential trap, particularly in that last question, but he knew that he had to hold fast to his principles, both for his own heart and for any chance that he might find in getting past those fierce people. „I be­lieve that you should look, if that is what you desire,“ he said. „It is my word to you that the To-gai-ru are more attuned to the ways of both the Tyl-wyn Tou and Tylwyn Doc, if the Tylwyn Doc hold at all to the old ways of our people.“
„More, perhaps, than the Tylwyn Tou, Belli’mar Juraviel,“ King Eltiraaz replied, „if the Tylwyn Tou have come to befriend the humans.“
Juraviel conceded the point without any countering statement at all, for indeed, during the old times when the races of elves were united, they had no contact with anyone who was not of the People.
„I would not say that you have erred, King Eltiraaz. That is not a judg­ment for me to make. In my own land, we preserve our secrecy with equal ferocity; a human who cannot be trusted is treated in the same manner in which we would deal with a goblin who wandered onto our land. Well, per­haps not as harshly as that - we would kill the human more quickly and mercifully.
„But not a To-gai-ru,“ he quickly added, though he had no idea if he was speaking the truth or not, since no To-gai-ru had ever wandered anywhere near to Andur’Blough Inninness, except for those taken in as rangers-in-training, of course. He felt that his reasoning was sound, though, and so he continued. „My Lady Dasslerond would hold back on the killing blow against a To-gai-ru until the intruder’s intent could be discerned.“
„By then, it is often too late,“ Cazzira remarked.
„Too late for what? We fear no threat from anything short of an invading army.“
That set all three of the Doc’alfar back on their heels a bit, Juraviel noted.
„Perhaps your clan is more numerous than our own,“ King Eltiraaz said after a short pause and a glance at his two kinfolk. „We are not numerous, and thus we take threats against our land more seriously.“
„Or you are more quick to judge intrusion as threat,“ Juraviel dared to say, and Cazzira at his side sucked in her breath sharply. Juraviel started to mod­ify the statement, to make it seem less an accusation, but he stopped himself short, letting King Eltiraaz weigh the words.
„Perhaps we must be,“ the king said a short while later. „And I doubt not that we will hold on to our ways, Belli’mar Juraviel. They have served us well through these centuries, have kept Tymwyvenne alive. I care not enough for the clumsy and bumbling humans to risk a single Tylwyn Doc to destroy the entire human race to safeguard my people, ‘ Twould do so, without hesitation.“ kat of a Tylwyn Tou who inadvertently wandered onto your land, ltiraaz? Would such an unfortunate - or perhaps fortunate - Cousin be similarly executed, or would the King of the Doc’alfar that preserving the life of a relative was worth the risk to his people?“ Eltiraaz stood up out of his throne, his gaze set grimly and sternly
onjuraviel. „Is there a threat to my people, Belli’mar Juraviel?“ uraviel squared his shoulders and matched the king’s unblinking gaze in
^A long, long silence ensued, the two/standing there, Eltiraaz a step higher than Turaviel, and thus, looking dowri at hirn\ But in truth, that height dif­ference did nothing to diminish Juraviel in th;s contest of wills.
Finally, after several minutes of the loclted stares, Eltiraaz turned to each of the others, left and right, then declared, „There is no threat.“
Turaviel held firm his gaze and/determined posture, though in truth, he wanted to blow a long and deep sigh. So he was not to die there, it seemed. But that wasn’t enough.
„And what of Brynn Dharielle?“ he asked. „She is To-gai-ru, and even more than that, much more than that, she is a ranger, trained by my people in the ways of the Tylwyn Tou. She sees the world as a Tylwyn Tou sees the world, and is more kin and friend to my people than to her own.“ „So you say,“ Lozan Duk put in.
Juraviel looked at him, and he only shrugged in reply, as if his words were spoken in all simplicity and honesty.
„I do say,“ Juraviel answered, and he turned again to face Eltiraaz di­rectly. „Brynn Dharielle is no threat to you or your people. Indeed, she is, or would be, a friend to Tymwyvenne, if you choose to allow it.“ „I need no humans for friends, Belli’mar Juraviel.“
Juraviel nodded and conceded the point. „She is my friend,“ he said then, and somberly. „I ask of you, King Eltiraaz, to allow my friend to leave with me. On my word, she is no threat.“
1 have not yet said that you could leave,“ the King of the Tylwyn Doc reminded.
Juraviel did blow that sigh, and he nodded.
Soon after, he was back in the small room of peat with Brynn, sitting there silently in the soft light of the glowing torch. Brynn had immediately started to ask him about his visit with the king when he had first returned, Juraviel had waved the question away, not wanting to discuss any of For the first time in his long life, Belli’mar Juraviel felt perfectly help­less m determining his fate, and he did not like the feeling at all.
- rest of that day passed, and the next, and the only contact came from *e zombie waiter delivering their food.
 the second day after his visit with Eltiraaz, though, Juraviel was
summoned again from the peat cave, escorted again by Lozan Duk and Cazzira to the same throne room, where King Eltiraaz sat waiting.
„I have considered your words, Belli’mar Juraviel,“ the king greeted „And I find that I believe you.“
Juraviel did not reply or make any sign at all, not sure exactly what that meant.
„I will have your word that, once you have left here, you will not disclose the location of Tymwyvenne.“
„I will not.“
„And I will have, from you, the location of Caer’alfar,“ King Eltiraaz went on.
Juraviel rocked back on his heels, chewing his lip as he considered the re­quest. „King Eltiraaz, I am similarly sworn to secrecy by Lady Dasslerond,“ he answered.
Beside him, Cazzira and Lozan Duk bristled.
„But this is not equal footing,“ King Eltiraaz replied. „Now you, a member of Tylwyn Tou, know of Tymwyvenne, but none of us know of Caer’alfar.“
„King Eltiraaz, if one of your people wandered to our lands and was cap­tured, you would not expect, nor accept, that your subject would betray the location of Tymwyvenne, even at the cost of his or her own life.“
„And do you accept similar consequences for yourself and for Brynn?“ the king came back without hesitation, his voice rising more than Juraviel had previously heard.
„I do, if that is your judgment,“ Juraviel answered just as quickly. „If that is your decision, then I damn the fates, and not King Eltiraaz and his peo­ple, in bringing me here. But I do argue against such a course. Perhaps there will come of this a rejoining of our peoples, or at least a growing un­derstanding of each other. A distant alliance, long overdue.“
King Eltiraaz stared at him sternly for some time, then broke into a sudden, tension-breaking burst of laughter. „You would willingly die, and without judgment, I believe.“
„I would!“
„And that sincerity makes me believe you even more, Belli’mar Juraviel, friend of Tymwyvenne. Nay, we will not kill you, or hold you any longer as our prisoner. Though I would be pleased if you would remain for some time as my guest.“
„And I would be pleased to do so, King Eltiraaz of Tymwyvenne,“ Ju­raviel answered formally, and with a bow. „But not alone, and not while my companion, my friend, sits in a prison of peat. You say that you believe me, and well you should. But I’ll not accept anything from you - not my own freedom, not your invitation - without a free Brynn Dharielle at my side.“
„And if we kill her? Are we then enemies?“
Juraviel took a deep breath. „We are,“ he declared, and he couldn’t be­lieve the words as they came out of his own mouth! How could he take when so much might be at stake for the TouePalfar? Surely, j friendship could blossom into something wonderful for his „‘ ‘en that, was he acting in the best interest of Caer’alfar - and did ‘r’e the right to act in any other way? - by so protecting Brynn? ^rl’dn’t honestly know, and he found that he didn’t honestly care. and bring the human woman,“ King Eltiraaz instructed Cazzira and f°Duk „Allow her to bathe and feed her well. It seems that perhaps have made two new friends this day.“
T took all the willpower Belli’mar Juraviel could muster to remain up­right at that wonderful moment.
„You are not the first human permitted to/fraik through our lands,“ King Eltiraaz said to Brynn when she - fresh frota her bath and with her clothes wonderfully cleaned - and Juraviel met with the Kmg of Tymwyvenne later
on that day.
„Before you continue, I demand to know vAiat happened to Diredusk!“ the young ranger demanded.
King Eltiraaz sat back, his expression turning stern, his eyes narrowing and focusing on Brynn. Juraviel put his hand on her arm, squeezing tightly in an attempt to silence her.
„Her horse, good King Eltiraaz,“ he explained. „When we were taken, Brynn had her horse with her, a beautiful creature.“
Eltiraaz relaxed visibly, and so did Juraviel.
„What happened to him?“ the stubborn Brynn demanded, and Juraviel squeezed even more tightly, thinking that his companion might be throwing it all away, pushing too hard when they were obviously in no position to de­mand anything.
But again, King Eltiraaz’s expression only softened. „You have enough concern for that creature - Diredusk, you name him - to speak in this man­ner to me?“
‘I do.“ There wasn’t a hint of anything other than grim determination in Brynn’s voice.
‘And if your insolence costs you my patience?“
„If you have harmed Diredusk, then I want not your patience, King Elti­raaz. If you have harmed Diredusk, then - “
Itiraaz held up his hand, but it was his smile that stopped her more than my hand gesture. „We of the Tylwyn Doc do no harm to our fellow crea­tes of Ga’na’Tyl. Your horse, Diredusk, is running free in the fields to the ast, among his own kind. Free, I say, and where he belongs.“
Brynn breathed a huge sigh of relief, and so did Juraviel.
You do not wish him recaptured?“ Eltiraaz asked. rynn looked up at him, and it was obvious that the king was testing her „My concern was for Diredusk, not for myself,“ she answered. „If he running free and safe, then I am satisfied.“

King Eltiraaz smiled, warmly. „Once, many years ago, a man crossed through our lands, coming from the north, and it was the decision of King Tez’nezin that he not be hindered,“ he went on with the tale he had been relating when Brynn had interrupted. „King Tez’nezin, my predecessor to the throne, was rumored to have gone out to the man for a secret meet
ing, though what he discerned that allowed him to change his policies	
long-standing policies of the Tylwyn Doc against humans - I cannot say.
„That human was To-gai-ru, like Brynn Dharielle, seeking a way home over the mountains or under them. Whether or not he succeeded in return­ing to the land south of the mountains, I cannot say.“
„What was his name?“ a ve^y curious Belli’mar Juraviel asked. „And when was this? A century ago?“
„His name I do not know, and it was much longer in the past. Three cen­turies, at least, perhaps four. The years, the decades, do all seem the same.“
Juraviel sat back and considered the words. A To-gai-ru coming through this region from the north would be a rare thing indeed, especially centuries before, when Honce-the-Bear and Behren were avowed enemies, and To-gai was not even known to the humans north of the mountains. But there had been other To-gai-ru rangers, several over the centuries, and none be­fore Brynn had left Andur’Blough Inninness with an elvish escort, though all of them had been assigned back in their ancient homeland. Was it possi­ble that the human Eltiraaz now spoke of had been one of the To-gai-ru rangers? Emhem Dal, perhaps? Or Salman Anick Zo?
Intrigued, Juraviel rubbed a hand over his chin.
„Did he find a way over the mountains, at least?“ Brynn asked. „Or did he start on a path that he hoped would take him home?“
„No,“ King Eltiraaz replied, and Brynn’s hopeful smile disappeared, though it brightened again as the King of Tymwyvenne continued. „Not over the mountains. That human was guided to a way known to the Tylwyn Doc as the Path of Starless Night.“
„Under the mountains,“ Juraviel reasoned, and King Eltiraaz nodded.
„And will you take me and Juraviel to the entrance to this Path of Star­less Night?“ Brynn asked eagerly, seeming oblivious to the frown worn by the Doc’alfar King.
Juraviel caught that look, though, and he understood that this ominously named underground passageway likely lived up to some grim reputation!
„What say you, Belli’mar Juraviel?“ King Eltiraaz asked. „Do you wish to head to this path, a dark road indeed?“
Juraviel looked to Brynn, and her eagerness prodded him into agreeing to a choice that he feared he would later regret. „We do. If this Path of Star­less Night can save us a journey all the way to the sea to the east, then per­haps it is worth the try.“
King Eltiraaz sat back and nodded, his expression grave. „Perhaps, then, all have to worry less that you will betray us to the Tylwyn looked to Brynn again, but she held her determined expression. Juravie ^ Belli’mar Juraviel tell his Lady Dasslerond about us?“ Fl ‘ aaz went on. „When finally you walk the ways of your homeland what will you say?“
3g“T Vill say that I have found a legend come to life,“ Juraviel answered. -O I will say nothing at all. The choice is yours, King of Tymwyvenne, A by your mercy and graciousness. I owe you this, at least, for my own d for Brynn’s. If you wish this entire episode to retreat into the realm ‘fVeUi’mar Juraviel’s hopeful dreams, then so it shall.“ 3 Eltiraaz spent a long while mulling that over. He looked to his Doc’alfar •ompanions, Lozan Duk, Cazzira, and several others he had invited to the meeting that day, gauging their silent answers.

 
„No „ he said at length. „You will tell your Lady Dasslerond that you
have looked upon Tymwyvenne and met your long-lost kin. You will tell her
that she, upon the invitation of King Eltiraaz, is most welcome to visit us,
that we might both learn if our peoples, Doc and Tou, should find theirlvay
together again.“	\
Juraviel could hardly believe what he was hearing, and in truth, he terribly torn at that moment. His immediate duty was to Brynn and their journey to To-gai-ru. Or was it? Was this potential reunification more im­portant? Should he abandon Brynn here and now and head back to the north with all speed? Or perhaps he could take Brynn back with him and delay her mission to her homeland. There was no pressing issue there, after all, nothing more than had been going on since before Brynn had been taken in by the Touel’alfar.
But then Eltiraaz settled it for him. „But that is in the future,“ the king said. „For now, your road is, and must be, to the south. We will show you the Path of Starless Night and tell you more of what we know of the dan­gers that lie within the deep mountains. You may choose to enter, or choose to turn to the east. But not to the north, not now. My people are not ready for this meeting, and I’ll not force it upon them.“ Juraviel nodded his agreement.
And what if Belli’mar Juraviel does not return from the southland?“ ozan Duk interjected. „What if Belli’mar Juraviel does not emerge again the sunlight from the Path of Starless Night? Is this hope that we have lust shared of reunion to die with him, then?“
As he finished, Lozan Duk looked to King Eltiraaz, and Juraviel recog-Hzed then that the question was not likely spontaneous.
would speak with you privately,“ Juraviel bade the king, and with a wave: of his hand, Eltiraaz cleared the room of all but himself and Juraviel. you desire the meeting, and I cannot return, then send a trusted courier or two to the north, staying west of the human lands, to the moun­tain region three weeks’ journey from here. Once there, call out the name of Lady Dasslerond to the night wind, every hour every night. She will find your couriers, do not doubt, and the Touel’alfar will speak with them before passing swift judgment. Have them relay the tale of Belli’mar Ju. raviel and Brynn Dharielle, and tell of how they came to the lands of the Touel’alfar.“
„And they will not be harmed? „
Juraviel took a deep breath, „I cannot commit to anything,“ he admitted „My people are no less reclusive than are your own - it is part of our shared heritage, it would seem. The Lady of Caer’alfar is stern and strong, but she is blessed with the wisdom of the centuries. I trust she will choose correctly.“
„Though you have less to lose.“
„There is that,“ Juraviel admitted. „It is the best I can offer, King Eltiraaz of Tymwyvenne, and more, I fear, than I should have said.“
„And nothing more than we could have discerned, in any case,“ Eltiraaz answered with a chuckle, and he offered his hand to Juraviel, and the Touel’alfar took it in a firm shake.
„Stay with us a few weeks more,“ Eltiraaz offered. „Enjoy the customs of my people, walking freely about Tymwyvenne.“
„And Brynn?“
„Likewise! Let her be the most blessed of humankind, to have looked upon both Caer’alfar and Tymwyvenne! When you are ready, we will take you to the Path of Starless Night, and you may choose your course. We will provide you with ever-burning light and with all the supplies you can carry.“ He paused and assumed a pensive posture, his look quizzical. „And perhaps with more.“
Juraviel understood that he should not press for more than that cryptic statement at that time. Already he had been offered far more than he could ever have hoped for, far more than he ever would have dared to ask for!
„The season means little in the Path of Starless Night,“ Eltiraaz went on. „In truth, the closer you wait toward winter, the more passable will be the dark tunnels, for the spring melt will have flowed from them by then, and the new snows atop the mountains will be locked frozen in the days it will take you to cross under.“
It was an invitation that Belli’mar Juraviel could not refuse, and - given that last bit of logic, one that he knew would calm Brynn’s eagerness - he believed that his companion would readily agree. Perhaps if they stayed in Tymwyvenne, their trip to the south would prove no less time-consuming than the long journey around the mountains, but in truth, it was more than the loss of time that had Juraviel trying to avoid that circuitous route. He had little desire to cross the human lands of Honce-the-Bear, and even less to try to find his way through hostile Behren. There Brynn would be can´t 
no more than a pig looking for a slave owner and he, if his true as a Touel’alfar was ever discovered, would likely be put to a swift , a sacrifice to Yatol. this would be a most-welcomed rest, not for weeks, perhaps, but for “Do you believe him?“ Brynn asked Juraviel that same night, the two
, nding some quiet time trying to sort through the momentous events of
jay How swiftly their fate had changed! And how unexpectedly! 1 „If King Eltiraaz meant us harm, then why would he go to all this trou-ul?“ the elf replied. „He had garnered all of the information he will get
m me from us, concerning Andur’Blough Inninness, and he knows that. No he is sincere.“ As he finished, smiling, he noted that Brynn’s sour ex­pression had not changed. He looked at her curiously, silently prompting her to elaborate.
„I meant about Diredusk.“
„They said he was running free with other horses.“
„But did they say that merely to calm me?“ the young woman asked. „Are they merely telling us what we need to hear? „
Belli’mar Juraviel settled back. „No,“ he answered with the calm of com­plete confidence. „Have you noticed the tables they set? The meals they have brought to us? „
Brynn tilted her head, staring at him intently, needing to find the same conclusions as he obviously already had.
„They eat the produce of the earth, the gifts of Ga’na’Tynne. They eat the fruits and vegetables, the fungi of the tunnels. But not the animals. King Eltiraaz spoke truly of his people when he said that they hold the creatures of Ga’na’Tyl in the highest reverence and would not harm them. Diredusk is running free and unharmed, I am sure.“
„They harm no creatures of Ga’na’Tyl,“ Brynn echoed with a sarcastic chuckle. „Except for humans.“
„Whom they believe deserving of their wrath,“ Juraviel was quick to point out. „Consider those of your race with whom they have had contact. Trappers and hunters, loggers and rogues who have been chased from their own lands. Humans who clear-cut the trees and slaughter the animals, often merely for a pelt to sell in the east. Humans who set traps that cause excru­ciating pain to their prey, without regard for the animal. If the Doc’alfar feel kinship to the living animals, then how could they not feel anger at some or the tactics that trappers and hunters of your race employ?“
Brynn merely shrugged and shook her head, hardly seeming convinced
the argument that the Doc’alfar were, in some way, justified in the hor-We executions they routinely practiced on humans inadvertently walking onto their lands. Juraviel didn’t try to convince her otherwise, didn’t believe that she would ever truly understand. For she was human, if Touel’alfar trained and To-gai-ru, and she understood there to be a redeeming side to her race. Ju-raviel recognized that as well, but, seeing the world as a Touel’alfar, he was much more sympathetic to the Doc’alfar view of things. In many ways, he saw these distant cousins as even more honorable than his own people, who hunted the deer, pigs, fowl, and rabbits of Andur’Blough Inninness. The Doc’alfar only did harm to living creatures they believed deserving of their wrath. It wouldn’t occur to Eltiraaz to have a great deer slaughtered to fill his own table with venison steaks. It wouldn’t occur to any of the Doc’alfar to kill foraging creatures that happened onto their gardens. No, but hu­mans were not like the animals, for they were possessed of reason.
To the Doc’alfar way of thinking, then, that reason condemned them for actions against the precepts of Doc’alfar life.
When he thought of the horrid zombies, Juraviel shuddered and could not totally agree with the Doc’alfar ways. But neither could he deny that there was a consistent simplicity to that philosophy, and one that had more than a little justification.
He looked over at Brynn, who had settled back and seemed ready to sleep, and he did not press the point any further.
The pair felt the looks, most merely curious, but some truly suspicious, on them at all times as they walked the ways of Tymwyvenne over the next week. They were allowed practically free rein, except that they could not leave the city - King Eltiraaz didn’t want to give away too much of the exact location, after all - and could not enter anything other than public struc­tures unless invited, which they were not.
It was pleasant enough, though, and surely interesting. For Brynn, this was yet another new world, widening her already wide horizons; and for Belli’mar Juraviel, this was a glimpse into a different branch of his own history. Many of the Doc’alfar customs were familiar to him, the notes of their communal songs so similar to those of Caer’alfar that at times he was able to join in. But so much else was different, and strangely fascinating! His own people worked with the living, with great trees and flowers, blend­ing into the harmony of the flora and fauna of Andur’Blough Inninness. The Doc’alfar, though, worked with the dead, with cut logs and zombie slaves. Their artisans carved masterwork pieces on the walls of every struc­ture. Their armorers turned slabs of wood into fantastic shields and body pieces, backing them with thick mosslike blankets the gatherers brought in. Their culture seemed somewhat coarser to Juraviel, as much a matter of de­struction as creation, but in truth, it seemed strangely beautiful to him, and equally harmonious with the ways of nature, if in a more severe manner.
Their guides through all of those days were again Lozan Duk and, sur­prisingly, Cazzira. The female Doc’alfar seemed much different to Juraviel and Brynn after the proclamation of King Eltiraaz, almost as if she now wanted to learn all that she could of the strangers, though whether that was of any desire for friendship, or for the information to give her the edge ver an enemy, neither Juraviel nor Brynn could tell. While Cazzira con-•tantly peppered the pair with questions, Lozan Duk took the lead in point-’ out landmarks and particularly interesting artworks. But it was Cazzira, nd not Lozan Duk, who called Brynn aside into a building where the fe-nales of Tymwyvenne used paints and oils to highlight their beauty, to style
their hair.
By the end of the week, Cazzira and Brynn were spending much time together, with Cazzira listening to Brynn’s tale over and over again, leaning forward eagerly as the young ranger recounted it each time. Juraviel watched the pair curiously and closely, fearing that Cazzira was trying to pry valuable information from Brynn, but he did nothing to warn Brynn away from speaking too openly. The Doc’alfar were in complete command, and Ju­raviel and Brynn had no choice but to trust them and simply go along.
Still, Belli’mar Juraviel had a feeling, or perhaps it was just a desperate hope, that something good would come of the unexpected encounter.
„Belli’mar Juraviel was correct in telling us that this ranger is not akin to humans,“ Cazzira reported to King Eltiraaz one evening after hearing Brynn’s tale yet again, from beginning to end. „If humans have such/poten\ rial, then perhaps we should not be so quick -
Eltiraaz held up his hand, stopping the uncomfortable thought shorj/ „Our ways were created for prudence and survival,“ he explatnectTThey will not change quickly, whatever exception we might make for this unusual pair.“
Cazzira sat back and considered the grim reality of Eltiraaz’s words. She could be among the most hardened and callous of the Tylwyn Doc, but only through putting up an emotional wall, a barricade against guilt. Cazzira, however tough she might talk, did not enjoy the killings, even of inferior beings such as humans, though she surely held no love for the big and bum­bling creatures.
„It may be time for some of our ways and tenets to change,“ King Elti­raaz admitted, catching his subject by surprise.
Cazzira looked at him curiously, blinking her blue eyes repeatedly. It may be time for us to explore beyond the boundaries of Tymwyvenne,“ the king went on after Cazzira had recovered.
To the north or south?“ Cazzira asked, her blue eyes narrowing as she scrutinized Eltiraaz, trying to discern his meaning. Did he want someone to head out to the north in search of Caer’alfar? Or was he suggesting that one of the Tylwyn Doc accompany the two strangers to the south, through the 1 ath of Starless Night and onto the southern steppes?
I think we would be ill-advised to approach this land, Andur’Blough In-ninness, that Belli’mar Juraviel has told us about, without Belli’mar Juraviel to serve as our guide,“ Eltiraaz clarified. „Or to offer a formal introduction to his Lady Dasslerond, that she will take the time and effort to better learn of us before making any rash judgments.“
„Are you asking me to walk the Path of Starless Night?“
„I am suggesting that perhaps one of the Tylwyn Doc should accompany Belli’mar Juraviel and Brynn Dharielle,“ Eltiraaz replied, somewhat defen­sively, sitting back in his throne and holding his hands up as if to fend off the legendary explosive wrath of Cazzira. „Am I asking you? No, not ask­ing, Cazzira, not if you mean that I am somehow imploring you or com­manding you to go. I am asking only in the sense that I am offering it to you first, as the first to make contact with these intriguing strangers.“
Cazzira sat back, trying to hide the surprise from her fair features. It wasn’t often that King Eltiraaz asked, truly asked, instead of commanded for that was his place in Tylwyn Doc society. He was the king, bound to make those decisions that he thought most beneficial to the Tylwyn Doc people as a whole, whatever sacrifices any individual might have to make. Yet, here he was, offering the duty of accompanying Juraviel and Brynn to Cazzira. That told Cazzira exactly how important, and dangerous, that duty might prove to be. They were going to walk the Path of Starless Night, after all, and while Tylwyn Doc individuals and parties had sometimes ventured through the lightless tunnels, and To-gai-ru humans had exited them on the northern side of the mountains, most who entered those dark ways had never been heard from again.
„Do you think it wise that one of us accompany them?“ King Eltiraaz asked, again surprising Cazzira.
„I do,“ she blurted before she could even sort through a more thorough and informative response.
Eltiraaz settled back, allowing her to collect her thoughts.
„This is an opportunity that we must explore,“ Cazzira went on after a while. „I did not wish to believe Belli’mar Juraviel when first I encountered and spoke with him. I thought him even worse, even more dangerous, than the human intruders who sometimes cross our lands. Here was a creature above those humans, a kin of ours, who perhaps held the power to destroy us utterly. We cannot let him walk away unobserved.“
„And yet, I have come to understand that there is no such malice in Belli’mar Juraviel’s heart, and if the rest of his people are of similar feelings toward the Doc’alfar“ - King Eltiraaz stumbled over that Touel’alfar word, mimicking JuraviePs voice inflections as closely as possible - “then I believe we would be wise to make contact with our lost kin.“
„It may be no more than wishful thinking.“
King Eltiraaz gave a great sigh. „Perhaps. I feel that there is sincerity in Belli’mar Juraviel’s words of friendship, but I am afraid,“ King Eltiraaz ad­mitted. „In making such a choice to let him and Brynn Dharielle go, I am putting all of Tymwyvenne in danger.“
„In allowing Belli’mar Juraviel and Brynn Dharielle to live, you are doing 
Cazzira replied. „Yet I do not, nor does anyone else, suggest that you Ikhem now. Indeed, if you chose to give Brynn to the bog and execute or Turaviel, you would find opposition to that course, silent if not overt.“  „From your „No.“
King Eltiraaz laughed at the honesty of those words. Cazzira was speak^	and it seemed to Eltiraaz that she, too, preferred their present  urse toward the strangers. But fierce Cazzira never let compassion get in
e way of prudence. „Yet I am not ready boldly to approach Lady Das-Jerond,“ he admitted. „I am not ready to confront the past of Tylwyn Doc and Tylwyn Tou. I know my intuition toward Belli ‘mar Juraviel and his ranger companion, but it is just that, intuition. I will need more than that to attempt to bring the alfar together again.“
Cazzira nodded with every word, understanding completely. „Then you need not ask me,“ she said. „It is right that one of us accompany Belli’mar Turaviel, to the south and then back again, if this way he comes. And it is right that I am the one. I first saw the pair.“
„But it was Lozan Duk who suggested that Belli’mar Juraviel ancL-Bfynn Dharielle be captured and not killed,“ Eltiraaz reasoned.
„Qui’mielle Duk is with child,“ Cazzira replied without the slightest hesi­tation, referring to Lozan Duk’s wife, who was indeed pregnant - the first pregnancy in Tymwyvenne in nearly forty years. „Lozan-T>uk^shouTa not leave. „
King Eltiraaz stared long and hard into Cazzira’s icy blue eyes, measuring her resolve.
Juraviel and Brynn removed their hoods on Cazzira’s command, blink­ing their eyes against the brilliant late-summer sunlight. Despite Juraviel’s original decision against a long delay, they had spent several weeks in Tym­wyvenne, where the sun did not shine, and now the brilliant warmth felt good indeed!
So good that it took Juraviel a long while to realize that he and Cazzira and Brynn were apparently alone, with no sign of the contingent of more than a dozen other Doc’alfar who had accompanied them out of the city. They were in the foothills of the giant mountains, so close that Juraviel derstood that this area just north of the divide would be bathed in shadow at this time of day in a few weeks, when the sun lowered in the sky Wither to the south.
„Where are we?“ Brynn asked. „And where are your kinfolk?“
We are where you said you wanted to be,“ Cazzira answered. „Close to - at least. And why would the Tylwyn Doc wish to accompany you to the J-L Starless Night, a place where we do not often choose to go?“ Then why are you here?“
Juraviel was sharing a stare with Cazzira as Brynn asked the question reading her thoughts. „You intend to come with us,“ he reasoned, and when there came no immediate argument, he went on, „This is our road, one cho­sen by fate and by need. There is no reason -
„My king believes that there is a reason,“ Cazzira interrupted. „You have wandered onto our lands, Belli’mar Juraviel. Do not pretend that your pres­ence in Tymwyvenne means nothing to Tylwyn Doc, or to Tylwyn Tou. Per­haps it means nothing immediately significant, but now the races know of each other once more, and that is a door that, once opened, cannot be closed, for good or for ill.“
„Unless I die in the southland, or on my way to the southland.“
„Yet we still know of you, of Caer’alfar and Andur’Blough Inninness And so King Eltiraaz would learn more. Slowly and in proper time. He would like to keep you in Tymwyvenne for many months, years perhaps, that he might truly learn your heart and your thoughts. But he cannot in good conscience, of course - and despite my counsel - because of your need to be away to the south.“
„We are grateful for King Eltiraaz’s understanding of our situation.“
„And he wishes your response to be the gratitude of a friend,“ Cazzira said. „He hopes that more will come of our chance meeting - much more. Thus, he must continue his exploration of Belli’mar Juraviel’s heart, through Cazzira, who serves as his eyes and ears.“
„And what of me?“ Brynn asked, her tone showing that she felt a bit left out.
„You are still alive, and on your way,“ Cazzira replied, never taking her stare from Juraviel. „Be pleased, Brynn Dharielle, for that is more than most humans who wander onto the land of Tylwyn Doc can ever say!“
Brynn sighed and did not press the point.
„And so you will serve as King Eltiraaz’s eyes and ears all the way to the entrance to the Path of Starless Night?“ Juraviel asked.
Cazzira gave a little laugh and swept around, waving her arm out toward a dark shadow at the base of a nearby jag of stone. „We are at the en­trance,“ she explained, pulling off her pack as she spoke. She untied and opened the pack, producing three of the blue-white glowing torches, toss­ing one to each of her companions while keeping the third for herself. „The continuation of your road, the beginning of my own.“
Cazzira started toward the shadowy opening, but Juraviel grabbed her arm to stop her. She turned about and the two locked stares again.
„This is not your business,“ Juraviel said.
„Is it yours?“
„It is because Lady Dasslerond decided that it was.“
„As it is mine because King Eltiraaz decided that it was,“ Cazzira an­swered. „Perhaps the Tylwyn Doc have no place in the affairs of the Tylwyn Tou, or in the affairs of the To-gai-ru or any humans at all. Or perhaps we not trust you enough to let you walk out freely. That is what we discover. Consider my company the price of your freedom, if you -• a return favor from Belli’mar Juraviel and Brynn Dharielle.“ raviel continued to stare at Cazzira for a long, long while, and then he  d and gave a helpless, defeated laugh. How could he refuse her com-chip after the amazing trust the Doc’alfar had placed in him and in  At other part of Belli’mar Juraviel wondered why he would want to e her as well. Would it not be more pleasant for him to have another along who understood his perspective of the world, the elven viewpoint? He was a fine companion, but she was a human, and would soon be among her own kind, heavily involved in their politics and ways, and during that transition, Juraviel knew that he would be little more than a distant observer. Perhaps those days would be brighter indeed with the companionship of one more akin to him.
Besides, there was something about Cazzira that Juraviel found quite ap­pealing, despite her stern face - or possibly, because of it. Her often fiery and volatile remarks reminded him of another he had once known, a Touel’alfar named Tuntun who had been his dearest friend. Cazzira even looked a bit like Tuntun.
„Lead on,“ he said, and so she did, and so Cazzira and Juraviel and Brynn entered a narrow tunnel that widened into a large and airy cave. Tw exits ran off the back of the cave, deeper into the mountains, and Cazzira considered each for a few moments, then nodded and went into the one to the left.
Soon all daylight was left behind, the trio entering a darkness so pro­found that, without the strange torches, they would not have been able to see a hand flapping an inch from their faces.
C H A P T E R * 8 *
Trial of Faith
The child will be of full consciousness,“ Yakim Douan said to his newest gathering of Yatols, most of them from the region -UL just interior to Jacintha. The Chezru Chieftain had chosen the invitation lists to his meetings very carefully, pulling together disparate, often feuding, priests. He didn’t want any secret alliances building, to fester dur­ing the time when he would be most vulnerable. Thus, in the small gather­ings during which he would give the traditional Transcendence speech, Yakim drew together opposing Yatols, such as Peridan and De Hamman, who would never trust each other enough to form any destructive alliances.
„What does that truly mean, God-Voice?“ asked Yatol Bohl, who led a flock at the great Dahdah Oasis, nine days’ journey west of Jacintha. „Will the child be able to speak? Words or sentences?“
Yakim studied Bohl carefully. At thirty, he was among the youngest of the Yatol priests, and he was certainly among the most fit. He ruled Dahdah with an iron hand, Yakim knew, collecting outrageous fees for shelter and supplies from any caravan coming in from the west toward Jacintha, or heading out to the west from the main city. No doubt, Yatol Grysh had been forced to reach deep into his pockets for a needed stop at Dahdah on his way back to Dharyan.
„Full consciousness,“ Yakim replied. „The child, of no more than a year, will be able to speak as fluently as you or I. The child will know of our ways, will know of me, his predecessor, and will know of his destiny.“
„Surely a peasant mother seeking to elevate her family could teach -
„The child will know more of Yatol and the Chezru religion than any peasant could possibly guess,“ Yakim interrupted the ever-petulant Bohl. „You will see, you will understand, and you will believe.“
„God-Voice, please do not believe that I am a doubter,“ Yatol Bohl said, holding his hands out wide, assuming a posture of perfect innocence.
Yakim Douan just smiled at the pose. He knew exactly that, of course,
All the others, except for those most pious, like the poor fool Ma held grave doubts about the Transcendence, the mystical Menvan  went to the next Chezru Chieftain. Of course they did - wouId they not? For someone to believe that a baby, an infant, would caking fluently and knowing all the secrets of their culture’s wisest was a stretch, certainly, a test of faith against logic, of belief against well Yakim Douan could sympathize with those doubts! He rebered that time, so many hundreds of years before, when he had first learned of the Transcendence. Things were done very differently back ien for it was not the Chezru Chieftain delivering a speech such as this. No, the Chezru Chieftain would die, often unexpectedly, and then the leaders of the Chezru religion would initiate the search.

 
Yakim Douan, a young Yatol, had been just a bit older than Bohl was now when he had participated in that search those centuries ago. He re­membered how full of eagerness, full of great joy he had been at the thought that he was about to witness a miracle, a confirmation of his faith that every man so desires, whether he admits it or not. They had discovered the blessed infant soon after, and full of anticipation and the expectation of extreme joy, Yakim Douan had gone in to witness the miracle child.
And he had found a baby. Not a blessed baby, not a miracle child spe ing the words of Yatol, but a normal baby.
The leaders of Chezru, their names lost to him now, had told him and the other Yatols of the „miracles“ they had witnessed the child perform, of the words they had heard this goo-gooing infant speaking. Many of the other Yatols had taken those proclamations as proof enough that this was indeed the miracle child, the new God-Voice of Yatol.
But Yakim Douan had known better. He had understood instinctively that this baby was nothing more than a pawn, through which the leaders of the Yatol priests could spend the rest of their days in control of the religion, and thus, of all Behren.
He knew.
And so he understood the doubts and the fears that Yatols such as Bohl must now be feeling in this time of approaching crisis. If Yakim could only hand them enough teasing to hold them in check until after the birth, until they saw proof positive that their faith was not misplaced, that the selected child was indeed the God-Voice, then men like Bohl could become very valuable allies to the next incarnation.
When I was chosen, I knew as much about the truth of Yatol as I do ‘ he told them all. „I could recite the Verses of Propriety as well as I bow…“ He gave a little laugh. „No, better, for then my physical body not begun to fail me, my memory did not lapse as it sometimes does now.
The gathering of ten Yatols all chuckled at the Chezru Chieftain’s un­characteristic comedy - all except for Yatol Bohl, who sat staring hard at Douan, obviously taking a careful measure of the man.
Yakim resisted the temptation to call him on that look, and merely smiled disarmingly in response.
„You are human, reasoning beings, and so you hold your doubts,“ he said, and there came a chorus of denials, to which Yakim merely looked away and held up his hands. „It is the expected response, my children, for you cannot make logical sense of faith. Who here has seen the paradise of the afterlife?“ He paused and let the gathered Yatols all look to each other questioningly. „Nay, you cannot see the spirit or hear the spirit. For you in your current state of existence, only the empty and lifeless corpse remains and logic would tell you, then, that death is the end of consciousness.
„I know better, and I tell you that this Transcendence will show you, too, that there is more to this existence than what our physical senses can show us. When you look upon the reincarnated God-Voice, when you hear him speak the words of Truth, you will know and you will be content.
„Fear not for those doubts you now harbor,“ Yakim went on, trying to hold that fierce edge of passion in his voice, trying not to lapse into the simple recitation of this, a speech he had spoken many times over the cen­turies. „Fear not that you will be disappointed, and fear not that your doubts somehow mark you as less than true to Yatol. You are supposed to question and supposed to doubt! Else, how will you be certain that you have selected the correct child? Question and doubt everything! When you find the new God-Voice, your questions will catch in your throats and your doubts will vanish so completely that you will be befuddled as to how you ever held them. And then you will know true peace, my children, for then you will understand the truth of your faith. To witness a miracle is to ease the fear of dying itself. Look upon those few living Yatols who remem­ber the last Transcendence! See the contentment in their old eyes, my chil­dren, and take heart that you, too, will know that supreme comfort.“
It was true enough. Only three Yatols remained alive who remembered the last Transcendence, when Yakim Douan had been identified as the next God-Voice of Yatol, and those three were considered among the happiest of all the Yatol priests. Happy because they had seen a miracle and knew that heaven awaited them. Happy because they understood the value of their lives in service to Yatol.
Happy because Yakim Douan had ultimately deceived them.
When the gathering dispersed a short while later, most of the Yatols left the audience chamber grinning and speaking excitedly about the coming Transcendence. Two notable exceptions caught Yakim Douan’s eye and attention as he watched the departing flock. Merwan Ma sat at the side of the stage, in the shadows, staring at him with a long look upon his face. The man was deeply troubled by Yakim’s expected and hoped-for death, the
Chieftain knew, and was deeply troubled by his own inability to ac-reality, to brush aside his logical fears of mortality and logical sad-
at losing a man he considered as mentor and friend. nosture and his fears did not bother Yakim Douan, though, for he hat Merwan Ma would rejoice when the God-Voice was discovered.
Chezru Chieftain decided then and there that when they found him, of his first spoken revelations would be to tell poor Merwan Ma that on Douan was still with him, looking over him and taking pride that his udent was performing his ultimately important duties so very well. The second exception to the common joy troubled Yakim Douan much ore though, for Yatol Bohl left the chamber neither smiling nor chatting itedly. His face was stern and locked into an expression of deepest reflection.
That one could prove to be dangerous, Yakim Douan knew. He was young and strong and eager and impatient. And he was ambitious - too much so, perhaps, to sublimate himself to a mere child. The one true concern that had followed Yakim Douan through his centuries of power was the weak­ness of true spirituality in the face of human emotions. A Yatol priest, for all of his piousness, even heroics, in the eyes of the church, could only ascend so far, could never be greater than the second rank of the hierarchy. Cer­tainly if Bohl witnessed the selected child, the God-Voice who could tell him of the Yatol tenets and codes as well as any scholar priest, then he would be convinced and would put aside his earthly ambitions-and human weaknesses.
But would Yatol Bohl show enough patience? Would he wait the nearly two years it would take after Yakim Douan s death to even finer the new Chezru? Or was he plotting a more direct route to instalL-anew leader of Yatol?
Yakim Douan smiled knowingly. The same magic that allowed the decep­tion of Transcendence would soon provide him with practical information.
We are to wait years to be disappointed?“ Yatol Bohl asked his guest, Yatol Thei’a’hu, incredulously. „Surely you cannot believe this chatter of a speaking infant!“
Lhezru Chieftain Douan has asked us to trust in our faith, and what is with without trust?“ replied the other Yatol, older than Bohl by more than ecade and seeming worn and thin, with sleepy eyes and a badly balding I and a jaw that constantly trembled from a disease he had contracted years before. „Are we to believe in the miracle of Paradise if we can in this relativlely minor miracle?“
Imor?“ Bohl echoed with the same unyielding skepticism. „An infant recite the tenets of Yatol? An infant? Have you even known an in-3 speak in a complete sentence, Yatol, let alone in any manner that makes sense?“
„Minor,“ Yatol Thei’a’hu insisted. „If Yatol can fashion Paradise, if Yatol can transcend death, then how can you doubt this?“
Bohl settled back on his comfortable seat, a relatively shapeless stuffed bag, and took a deep draw on the hose extending from a watery tube beside him. „And yet, you doubt it, too, for all of your reasoning now. Else, friend why are you here?“
Yatol Thei’a’hu similarly sat back on his shapeless chair, staring at his counterpart. Bohl’s words were true enough, he had to admit to himself His feelings toward this impending Transcendence were not positive at all and his expression and posture showed that clearly. In truth, Thei’a’hu had never been overly fond of Yakim Douan, and had often privately disagreed with the man. While he accepted the Chezru Chieftain’s unchallenged lead­ership and obeyed Douan’s commands to the letter, Douan had made sev­eral very damaging decisions concerning Yatol Thei’a’hu’s province of Eh’thu, located two weeks to the south and west of Jacintha. Ten years be­fore, Douan had clipped off the northernmost stretch of Thei’a’hu’s prov­ince and given it to Yatol Presh, who rode with the nomads of Tossionas Desert, in an effort to settle the often-troublesome nomadic warriors. That ploy had hardly worked, for the Tossionas nomads were causing as much grief as ever, and yet, that redrawing of province lines had cost Thei’a’hu an important oasis. For all of his faith, Yatol Thei’a’hu could hardly believe that Douan’s decision had been god-inspired - how could Yatol have made such an obvious mistake? That was the most grievous example, but there were others, always gnawing at the reasonable Thei’a’hu’s logic.
„For centuries, we have followed the Transcendence of Yatol,“ Thei’a’hu said. „When the Chezru dies, the search begins for the next God-Voice, and that God-Voice will be identified through the miracle of premature knowledge and voice. That is our way, and so Chezru Douan prepares us now for the next Transcendence. What would you have us do, Yatol Bohl? Are we to seize the title for ourselves? Do you believe that the other two hundred Yatols of Behren will accept a religious coup?“
„I have suggested no such thing!“ Bohl sputtered in reply.
„Then what?“
„We must be aware and alert,“ the fiery young Yatol insisted. „We must insinuate ourselves into the process of the search, to find a child who will be sympathetic to our needs.“
„You believe that you can know such a thing about an infant? You be­lieve that you can find a child who will be acceptable to the other Yatols, if this child is not speaking as Chezru Douan has told us?“
„Do you believe that there will be such a child, a clear-cut God-Voice speaking the tenets as fluently as our present Chezru Chieftain?“
Thei’a’hu settled back even farther at the continuing blunt, bordering on heretical, declarations of Yatol Bohl. That was it, was it not? Either they be­lieved that such a creature would be born into their midst, literally as
Douan had said, or they did not. And if they did not, then perhaps uld do well to find a child whose mother would favor Bohl and friend, if such a child is found, then perhaps we should abandon selection and fall in line with the others,“ Bohl went on. „And if not, hen what have we lost?“ If we find a bright child to elevate, there remains the problem of Chezru an’s choice of Shepherd Merwan Ma as tutor and mentor the „ Yatol Thei’a’hu reminded. „Merwan Ma above all others will help shape the next Chezru, and he is likely of similar mind and heart as Douan, else he would not have been chosen. That heart is not sympathetic for Eh’thu, I am sure.“
„Merwan Ma is insignificant,“ Yatol Bohl insisted. „He will be a minor player in the future of Yatol.“
„Not according to Chezru Douan.“ „Who will be dead and buried,“ the other reminded. Yatol Thei’a’hu narrowed his sleepy eyes at the obvious threat, for Bohl’s tone made it quite clear that he believed he could have Merwan Ma elimi­nated, if the need arose, and that he would not hesitate to do so.
Yakim Douan watched it all with a considerable amount of amusement - for he, too, was in that quiet room in the luxurious northern quarter of Jacintha. Not physically. Physically, Yakim Douan was in Chom Deiru, the Chezru palace in Jacintha, in his meditation room, where none would dare disturb his private communion with Yatol. Little did they know/that^his true communion on that day, as on many, was with a certain hematite, \ magical soul stone. Using that magic, Yakim walked out of his body, his spirit silently making its way along the streets, following troublesome Yatol Bohl to his temporary quarters in the city.
How convenient that Bohl had chosen that very day, the same d^y as the speech of Transcendence, to further his nefarious plotting with Yatol Thei’a’hu.
It saddened Yakim Douan to learn that Thei’a’hu was in on Bohl’s grow­ing conspiracy. He had always been rather fond of the man, and though he knew that Thei’a’hu harbored some resentment about the loss of his north­ern reaches, Yakim hadn’t imagined that his decision had put the man so far into Bohl’s dangerous court.
Bohl’s last statement, though, hinting at eliminating Merwan Ma, had not surprised Yakim Douan in the least. He understood Bohl well, had over the centuries seen many men of similar impatience and weakened faith. Indeed, Yakim Douan was one of them!
How could he not sympathize with Bohl? The man, who obviously isn t sold on the specific concept of Yatol Paradise, was merely being ‘ragmatic, much as the disillusioned Yakim Douan had acted pragmatically those centuries before when he had discovered his own secret to immortal­ity, one that made logical sense to him.
If he had a body about him at that moment, Yakim Douan would have is-sued a revealing sigh. In looking at Bohl, so much a younger version of his own first incarnation, Yakim Douan considered, and not for the first time not even for the hundredth time, that he had the power to offer true im­mortality to others, a select few, perhaps, friends and lovers who could coast through the centuries beside him. His was not necessarily a lonely ex­istence, for in each incarnation as God-Voice, he was able to surround him­self with friends, and certainly the Chezru Chieftain had little trouble in finding the carnal companionship of many, many women.
But what might it be like to walk the centuries with another? With Bohl perhaps, or Merwan Ma?
It was a passing thought, as always. For taking such a course would surely invite great risk. A companion who knew the truth of the hematite and Transcendence might speak out to a friend, or might allow himself to fall in love and wish to take yet another on the century-walking journey. Or even worse, a companion might harbor ambitions to become the God-Voice, threatening a position that Yakim Douan did not wish to relinquish.
For who but a pragmatic, not overly spiritual man might Yakim Douan convince to follow him on his eternal journey. Only a man like young Yakim, or like Bohl, a man who harbored innermost doubts about Yatol, would desire this journey, and a man such as that, Yakim Douan knew first­hand, could not truly be trusted. A man without the true belief in Paradise, and thus, without the true fear of Yatol, was a man who desired to make Paradise his own in this life.
Whatever the cost.
His body would have sighed again had it been there, as Yakim Douan realized what he now had to do to eliminate this latest threat, to eliminate Yatol Bohl.
And yes, he realized, Yatol Thei’a’hu, as well.
How might he do that without causing a major disruption in all the church, a ripple that would shake the groundwork he had struggled so hard to put in place? If it was but one man, one caravan, he could order his Chezhou-Lei warriors out, disguised as bandits. Even if the great warriors were recognized by any survivors of that caravan for who they were, no one would believe mere escorts. But two Yatol priests and two caravans?
It would have to be orchestrated carefully and over time.
Over time. Yakim Douan was biting his lip in frustration even as he re-entered his corporeal form back in the palace. He did not want to delay the resolution to this newest problem, did not want to spend the next weeks - even months, perhaps - in executing the deserving Yatols, then waiting for the results to shake out. I might…“ he started to say, but he stopped short, his lips curl ‘ent right back out in spiritual form, leaping through the hematal then soaring across the city to the house occupied by Yatol „If he found the man lying in a bath, surrounded by pretty, scantily ung attendants, both male and female. Yakim considered the scene h pity and amusement. It was common knowledge that Thei’a’hu he´d lost his ability to perform sexually, and so it had been rumored that the man took his pleasures vicariously.
Pitiful wretch.
Ignoring those standing about the Yatol, Yakim Douan’s spirit soared right to the reclining man, and right into the reclining man.
Yatol Thei’a’hu’s eyes popped open wide and he let out a shriek that turned all heads in the room his way. Some of those onlookers started to ap­proach him, but then they all backed off, eyes wide with shock, as Thei’a’hu thrashed about in his tub, splashing soapy water all about the room.
His mouth opened and twisted as if he was trying to spout out some words, some cry for help, and indeed he was.
But he had no control. For Yakim Douan was in there with him, two spirits, two wills, fighting for control over one body. Muscles knotted and twisted from contrasting signals. Eyes bulged and Thei’a’hu’s mouth con­tinued to twist and snap, biting into his lip and tongue.
Do you know me, Yatol Thei’a’hu? Yakim Douan’s spirit telepathically demanded.
The body stopped thrashing, lying very still in what remained of the bathwater.
Look upon me! Yakim Douan went on. Let your heart tell you who has come to visit!
Chezm Chieftain Douan? Thei’a’hu’s mind silently asked.
That is one incarnation, came the teasing, cryptic response.
The onlookers in the room, some of them just gathering the nerve to approach the man once again, leaped back as Thei’a’hu’s body jerked in surprise.
Jtol! Yatol! Yatol! Thei’a’hu’s spirit screamed.
You are a nonbeliever! Yakim Douan accused. You disappoint me, Yatol Ibei’a’hu.
No!
You con sort with heretics who deny the truth of Yatol!
ei a hu’s call, both telepathic and physieaL, held the inflections of -
mper then, as he repeated over and ove% „Mdrcy.“ U >rrect your sacrilege, YatotTk^a^hu/This niJht! Now! You have but one f-o again walk the path to Para&eT^akjplDouan ended by imparting - specific visual instructions, and then he departed Thei’a’hu’s physical body, his spirit drifting up to the ceiling to observe, and though he was in visible and silent, those others in the room sensed that spirit, or something Yakim Douan was amused again to watch the looks of confusion and fear upon their faces, to see the hairs standing up on the back of their necks, to see the women hugging themselves as if suddenly chilled. The Chezru Chieftain even went back down among them, a cold ghost brushing close heightening the fear. More than one of those attendants ran out of the room, screaming.
But the show hadn’t even yet begun, Yakim Douan knew, and so he con­tinued to watch, taking great pleasure as Yatol Thei’a’hu climbed out of the tub, pushing past any attendants who moved to help him, or to try to put a robe about his naked shoulders.
Thei’a’hu did have a blanket wrapped about him as he exited the house more to ward the chill than out of any modesty, for it was obvious to all looking upon him, Yakim Douan’s spirit included, that the man was sud­denly obsessed and single-minded.
That blanket also conveniently hid the tool Thei’a’hu would need to find his way back to Paradise.
The visiting Yatols had all been quartered in the same area, and so Thei’a’hu did not have far to walk to get to the house of Yatol Bohl, push­ing right through the two soldiers standing guard at the door and banging on it loudly. When it was opened, by yet another soldier, Yatol Thei’a’hu did not wait to offer an explanation, but just forced his way through, screaming for Yatol Bohl.
The man came down the sweeping staircase at the back of the foyer a moment later, dressed exactly as he had been when Yatol Thei’a’hu had left him three hours earlier.
„Thei’a’hu,“ he said, obviously stunned at the man’s appearance. „What is wrong?“
Thei’a’hu stormed up to him, Bohl holding his arms wide, his expression incredulous.
That look grew even more incredulous when Thei’a’hu’s knife jabbed into his belly.
„Heretic! Unbeliever!“ Thei’a’hu cried, pumping his arm repeatedly, and with the strength of a man possessed and with the determination of a man who truly believed that his own salvation was at stake.
By the time Bohl’s stunned soldiers could restrain the intruding Yatol, Yatol Bohl lay curled on the floor, his lifeblood pouring out into a widening puddle that already took in more than half of the foyer.
Hovering above the entryway, the spirit of Yakim Douan watched it all, with a bit of regret, but in truth, thoroughly enjoying the spectacle. He con­sidered his voyeurism there and felt a twang of guilt, wondering if he was no better than Thei’a’hu, taking his pleasure vicariously. tiered not, he decided, and he retreated back to his waiting corpo-eparing himself, for he knew that Yatol Thei’a’hu would soon „ before him to answer for the crime of murder. ^Douan decided to play this delicately, and with ultimate contempt se around him. He would hear Thei’a’hu’s story, then would retreat >S k with Yatol, then would return and proclaim Thei’a’hu a hero of
The old Chezru Chieftain was still chuckling at the beautiful irony of it 11 vhen Merwan Ma rushed into his meditation room to tell him that he was*needed in the audience chamber immediately 

chapter *9*
Dark Solitude
he Path of Starless Night offered a darkness beyond anything that Brynn had ever known, deeper even than the blackness of the peat
JJL cave. Walking the tunnels, descending under the mountains beside Juraviel and Cazzira, Brynn began to understand a second element to the darkness, a profound sense of brooding, a quiet so intense that it numbed the ears and made her retreat within herself. She tried to consider the goal ahead, tried to find strength and determination in the realization that this dark path marked the end of her journey home. When they exited the Path of Starless Night, they would look upon To-gai, the grassy steppes of her homeland.
Brynn couldn’t hold the thought against the pounding silence, stifling and seeming almost hungry.
They had lamps, those curious glass-and-wood creations of the Doc’alfar, all glowing bluish white. But even the light seemed uncomfortable there, di­minished and out of place. Given the limited range of the glow, it occurred to Brynn that their lamps served to highlight them to predators more than they revealed any predators to them.
The air was warm and still - so still that it settled about them like a heavy blanket, weighing down their steps. The tunnel was broken and uneven, so that even they, two elves and an elven-trained ranger, had to take care with every step not to stub their toes or trip and fall. Similarly, the walls were broken, with jags of stone all about, casting ominous shadows in the dim light.
„How much worse are these shadows in the flickering light of a flaming torch,“ Cazzira said suddenly, her voice breaking the stillness so starkly that both Juraviel and Brynn jumped. „With each flicker, the shadows come to life,“ Cazzira went on. „Many died in here in times long past, before we learned the secrets of the fazl pods. Those who traveled these paths became so numbed to any danger from the repeated dancing of the shadows that when real danger presented itself, they were caught unawares.“ R nn regarded her glowing scepter, its carved wood handle and the d class ball set at its top. The light was fairly constant, but in looking 1 * the ranger did note that there were some things moving about rtthin the frosted sphere.
„Fazl pods?“ Juraviel asked, as if reading Brynn’s mind.
„Small centipedes of the deep peat,“ Cazzira explained. „They make the though it normally dissipates into the air like a glowing mist. Encased  airless globe, they glow for many weeks. Without them, we would , a chance of crossing under the mountains, for we could not carry enough wood and I doubt we’ll find any down here! „
The conversation died at that, and the trio went on. They came to many forks in the trail, and intersections, and crossed a few wider chambers, some -hat had many exits. But Cazzira went on in seeming confidence that she knew the way, and it took Brynn a long while to catch on to the secret: all choices in the path had been marked, subtly, in flowing elven script deli­cately carved upon the walls.
„Your people come down here often,“ she said, and she winced, for her words sounded as an accusation.
Cazzira looked at her hard, as did Juraviel, the Touel’alfar silently signal­ing for Brynn to tread cautiously.
„You know the way, because the passages have been marked by Tylwyn Doc, I mean,“ Brynn stuttered, trying hard to keep her tone nonconfronta-tional. „Your people are not strangers to the Path of Starless Night, I would assume. „
„We used to come in here quite often,“ Cazzira answered after a long pause. „Once, many centuries ago, Tymwyvenne was comprised of two settle­ments, the one you have walked and one in here.“
„Why was the second abandoned?“ Juraviel asked before Brynn could, the elf apparently past his trepidation at broaching the subject.
„The reasons are many, but in truth, this is not our place. Dark things crawl along these corridors, and after a few more days in here, you will understand why we prefer the open air.“
„I understand it already,“ Brynn remarked, and Juraviel laughed in agreement.
They walked through the rest of the day - to the best of their estimation - and set a camp in a small side chamber, placing their glowing lamps strate­gically in the corridor outside, so that whoever was on watch would see the approach of a threat before it saw them.
Ihe next day went the same way, with brief conversations punctuating the silent blackness. The second day, Cazzira showed them some moss and rang! that they could eat, and some other mushrooms that they would be wise to avoid. On and on they^wallted, and oftentimes crawled in corridors too low for even the two elwes, and th«n set a similar camp.
ihe next day was much the same^and the next after that, and the next after that, where the only highlight was the discovery of a small stream where they could refill their waterskins, and even bathe a bit. Brynn was glad of that, very glad, but despite the clear water, every day they got a bit dirtier and a bit smellier.
On and on they walked, and the paths were so winding, left and right that they had to wonder how much progress they were really making to the south. At times, the trail before them ascended at such an angle that they had to climb hand over hand, struggling for finger- and toeholds. At other times, the path dropped so dramatically that they had to take out the fine silken ropes Cazzira’s kin had provided, and slide down.
None of them complained; they just kept putting one foot in front of the other.
So many wondrous things did Brynn, Juraviel, and Cazzira see in the days to come: a wide underground lake, its water gently lapping at the shore, dis­turbed somewhere out in the darkness by something unseen and unknown; an underground waterfall, tumbling noisily, echoing like tumultuous music in all of the caverns and corridors about; strange and beautiful formations of crystals squeezed from the rocks, twisting and turning into exotic, shin­ing shapes as they became pushed out over the eons.
The trio were walking through another wondrous place, a three-tiered plateau of gigantic mushrooms, thicker of trunk than a large oak and thrice Brynn’s height, when they came to know, for the first time, that they were not alone.
It came as a flicker of movement, a subtle brushing of darker shadows at the edge of Brynn’s consciousness. The woman couldn’t react defensively, couldn’t get her staff up to intercept the rushing creature as it ran past her, but she did let out an alarmed yelp.
His muscles toned to their finest warrior edge, Belli’mar Juraviel dove immediately to the side, launching himself into a somersault. As he came around, easily finding his feet again, he noted the shiny line of a thick blade, slashing through the air where he had just been. He started to call out to Cazzira, but saw that the Doc’alfar was already exploding into motion.
She came around on her tiptoes, her arms out wide, her small, golden-wood club flying at the end of one extended limb. She whipped it past the dark attacker, too far away for a strike, but with enough of a whipping sound to freeze the creature in place for an instant.
That was all Brynn needed. As the creature jerked upright, the woman dashed forward, slipping her bow between its widespread legs. She caught the leading edge of her bow with her now free hand and continued on, low­ering her shoulder as she lifted with both hands, slamming into the crea­ture, which was somewhat smaller than she, while her lifting bow took away its balance.
Down it went, crashing to the floor.
Before Brynn could pursue, she noted other movement, all about, and ,amst a sec- came up just in time to set herself in a defensive posture !“ Juraviel yelled, as a pair of the creatures rushed through a t area, their ugly features showing clearly. The elf leaped toward then fell into another roll to avoid the thrust of a pair of spears. ‘Ijrynn shifted her bow out toward him, and Juraviel grabbed on, wel­ding the momentum assist as Brynn pulled him right past her, to dive yet another roll that brought him up between Brynn and Cazzira, and
1 ser to the Doc’alfar. He started toward her, alarmed, but realized almost t once that Cazzira needed no help at that time.
Her movements were every bit as fluid, graceful, and beautiful as bi’nelle dasada, the elven sword dance. She twirled about, spinning on a pointed toe leaping and kicking, and all the while shifting her small club from hand to hand, letting it flow out from her, an extension of her perfectly con­trolled body.
She seemed to leave an opening, and a goblin rushed in at her back, spear leading.
But Cazzira spun and the spear went past her turning back, and the gob­lin got too close, inside the reach of her club.
The crack was so pronounced that Juraviel and Brynn figured the Doc’-alfar’s club must have split apart, but when the strike was finished, Cazzira continued her dance, intact weapon in hand, and the goblin skidded down and lay very still, the side of its head caved in.
Cazzira’s club swiped past another goblin, which hunched back out of range, then came on, for it seemed clear that the diminutive Cazzira had overbalanced.
Nothing could have been further from the truth. The club went sliding harmlessly past, but the Doc’alfar flipped it over to her other hand, her left hand, weaving against the flow of her body as she turned right to left. Her left turned under and handed the club back to her right, reversing the weapon so that Cazzira took its thick end.
Out snapped that right hand, stabbing the thinner, handle end of the club into the face of the attacker, whose own momentum worked against it.
Two goblins down and the dance went on.
Belli mar Juraviel’s fascination with the tantalizing dance of Cazzira nearly cost him dearly, for the goblins coming at him paid no heed to any­thing other than their intended prey.
Lne elf got his sword out in front to parry one spear and force the welder of the second to hold back its thrust. Then Breynn was there right behind the/attacking pair, her bow-staff mentally before her with widespread hands. She punched out, left right, smacking both goblins hard./toe on the back of the head, on the shoulder, and both stumbled forw/rd.
Where JuravieJ’s fine-tipped sword stabbed them, one-two, one-two.
The elf spun about, and Brynn leaped up beside him, but the remaining goblins on the flank ran off screaming and shouting, shadowy forms blend­ing into the darkness.
Both Brynn and Juraviel spun about to regard Cazzira, who seemed stuck in place, like a statue fashioned after a dancer caught in a pose, one arm ex­tended above her head, her weapon held perpendicularly to it, back over and across her head, and her other arm out before her like some targeting instrument. She was up on one foot - on one toe, actually - with her other leg looped about the supporting limb, lending to her perfect balance.
No goblins approached; no goblins, save those on the ground about her, were to be seen.
„We must move from this place,“ Juraviel said. „To tighter tunnels where goblins cannot throw spears at us from the shadows!“
„Some are wounded,“ Brynn remarked, but if that meant anything to the two elves, they did not reveal it.
„Away! Away!“ Juraviel demanded, and on the trio ran, past the tower­ing mushrooms and out of the wide chamber, rushing down one narrow corridor.
Around the first bend, Juraviel, in the lead, came face-to-face with yet an­other goblin, its sickly eyes wide with surprise.
A fine sword slid into its belly; a club came past Juraviel’s shoulder to smash it in the face.
The three ran over it as it fell back, stomping it flat to the stone.
They heard the loud flapping of wide goblin feet in pursuit sometime later.
Brynn handed her lamp to Juraviel, then strung her bow as they ran, and when the sound closed in at their backs, she turned suddenly and let fly, her arrow disappearing into the darkness. She knew not if she hit anything, or if her arrow skipped harmlessly across the stones, but the sound of pursuit stopped for a bit, and the three ran on.
They crossed a large chamber, keeping near to the wall, then turned into the first opening, only to hear goblins, many goblins!
They passed that, and the second opening and the third, as well. Then, using nothing more than a simple guess, they charged down the next. In the dim light of her glowing lamp, Cazzira in the lead nearly stumbled over the edge of a precipice. She fell to her knees, watching in horror as a few loose stones fell before her, dropping out of sight.
Seconds later, the three heard the echoes of the stones bouncing along the deeper rocks.
„Back!“ Juraviel yelled. „Quickly, before the goblins cut us off!“
„They already have!“ cried Brynn.
„There is a way!“ said Cazzira, pointing to the right, past the precipice.
Peering into the gloom, just at the edge of the lights, Brynn noted a rocky ding trail that seemed full of loose stones. She was about to point out ‘ h rious danger there, but Juraviel and Cazzira weren’t waiting, with the far leaping out and beginning her controlled slide, and Juraviel hop-it behind her, his wings flapping furiously so that he put as little Sit on the unstable slope as possible.
Brvnn turned and let fly another couple of arrows, wanting the other two
be far below before she tried the slope with her greater mass. Then she went out gingerly, and lay out on her side, using her bow like a guiding oar she slid down, down, into the deeper blackness.
She caught up to Juraviel and Cazzira at an apparent dead end: a lip overlooking a deep, deep drop.
The two were working furiously - to set up some defense, Brynn figured at first, but she looked on curiously as they unpacked the fine silken rope, Cazzira taking one end and handing the bulk of it to Juraviel.
With a shared nod, the Touel’alfar leaped out into the blackness, wings beating furiously. He disappeared from sight, but the fact that the rope didn’t seem to be tugging at all gave Brynn hope that his descent was controlled, at least.
„He has found footing,“ Cazzira told Brynn a few seconds later.
Brynn glanced back to see Cazzira tying off the rope around the stub of a stalagmite with one of her patented slipknots. Holding the rope in both hands, the Doc’alfar set her feet against the mound and pulled with all her strength, tightening the slack as much as possible.
„Use your belt,“ she said to Brynn, then she looped her own belt over the rope and swung out, sliding away into the darkness.
Leaving Brynn, who had given her lamp to Juraviel, in absolute darkness, and with the sounds of goblins approaching.
The woman worked furiously, pulling off her belt and falling down to her knees, groping her way to the stalagmite mound and the taut rope. She had no time to pause and consider what she was about to do, no time to yell out and make sure that Cazzira was clear and she could come on, no time even to shout and ask how far she would have to slide. She just looped her belt over the rope, grabbed up her precious bow, and slipped out, tucking her feet defensively as she blindly slid over the rim of a deep chasm.
Juraviel and Cazzira put up lamps to guide her in on the other end, the pair standing on a landing, with a dark tunnel behind them. As soon as Brynn touched down, Cazzira grabbed up the rope and gave a deft twist and tug that detached it across the way.
If  hey pulled it in and ran on, and this time, with a gorge blocking the way behind them, they did not hear the flapping feet of goblin pursuit. Tthey went on for a long, long time, until sheer/exhaustion stopped iem. They made their camp in as defensible a position as they could find, set their order of watch, and, despite their nervousness  each of them slept soundly.
They moved off with all speed the next day, along the only tunnel available to them, though Cazzira admitted that she had little idea of where they were
„In Tymwyvenne, we have a saying that most who perish in the Path of Starless Might do so of old age,“ she told them with a half-hearted chuckle If she was trying to be humorous, neither of the other two caught it.
They seemed to be going generally in the right direction, south, as far as their instincts could tell, but more troubling, they were going down more than up. And the air grew warmer and more stifling with each passing hour
The next change came so gradually that it took them all many, many steps to even notice.
Juraviel stopped, and the other two glanced at him and were held by the curious expression on his face. „The tunnels are not natural,“ he explained „They have been worked.“
Both Cazzira and Brynn moved to the side of the tunnel, holding aloft their respective lights to study both wall and flooring. Sure enough, they found crafted supports along walls and ceiling, and worked blocks flooring the somewhat even slope beneath their feet.
Brynn and Juraviel inevitably turned to Cazzira for some explanation, but the Doc’alfar had none to offer. „There are no cities down here, no settle­ments at all, that the Tylwyn Doc know of,“ she explained. „Unless these are goblin tunnels.“
Juraviel was shaking his head before she ever finished that last, ominous thought. „No goblins made these,“ he said with some confidence. „Goblins tear down, they do not create.“
„The world is a wide place, Belli’mar Juraviel,“ Cazzira reminded. „By your own words, not all humans are alike - the men of the kingdom north of the mountains are not so closely akin to the To-gai-ru. Perhaps the same can be said of goblins.“
Juraviel considered the words briefly, but shook his head again. Not goblins.
„We should know soon enough,“ Brynn put in, and she started away, the other two falling into step beside her.
The worked tunnel went on for more than a hour of walking, opening fi­nally into a wide chamber sectioned by walls of mortared stone, each run­ning out from a wall, left and right, and with a narrow doorway set in the middle. Gingerly, ready for fight or flight, the trio moved up to the door, to find that it was not fully closed, and was swinging unevenly on its old and rusty hinges.
Juraviel took the lead, gently pushing it open, studying the stonework im­mediately beyond, then rushing ahead, glancing left and then spinning around to the right, looking past the door.
Then he looked back to his companions and shrugged.
The trio went left, moving along a corridor of stonework walls, six to feet high, all the way to the wall, and finding only a dead end, with no ‘her doors or openings apparent. ‘ raviel looked at his companions, shrugged again, then hopped, beating jmss to lift him to the top of the wall. Then he leaped higher, a short gave him an overview of the wide chamber for as far as his light would illuminate. Knowing that he would make quite a fine target there, the elf came down almost immediately.
A maze of walls,“ he explained. „There seem to be openings, but at op-osite ends of each successive corridor. „
„A defensive design,“ Cazzira noted. „To force enemies to battle along hundreds of feet of narrow corridors merely to cross this one chamber.“
„Then let us hope it is not now defended,“ said Juraviel, and he started along the corridor the other way, all the way to the far wall, where they found an opening that turned back into the second corridor. All the way back to the other end, they found the entrance to the third.
Entering that third corridor, Brynn jumped up, caught the top of the wall, and pulled herself into a sitting position atop it. „My feet ache from the walking,“ she explained, reaching back toward Cazzira. The Doc’alfar took her hand, and Brynn easily pulled her over the wall, while Juraviel flut­tered up and over to join them.
And so they crossed, wall by wall, gradually working their way back toward the center of the room, and finally they came over the last of the thirty barriers, to find a series of carved steps leading between four fabu­lously decorated columns, and with a great iron door set in the chamber’s back wall.
The carvings on those columns told them much.
„Powries,“ Juraviel said breathlessly as he inspected the worn reliefs. He looked to Cazzira, who seemed not to understand. „Bloody caps. Dwarves.“ The Doc’alfar shrugged and shook her head, even after moving beside Juraviel to see the fairly accurate depiction of one of the fierce powries sculpted into the column. Fittingly, that relief showed the powrie in threat­ening pose, hooked sword at the ready and in full battle gear.
If we go through that door to find a city of powries awaiting us, then we are surely doomed,“ Juraviel remarked.
Cazzira looked up at him, a knowing grin on her face. „Yet you wish to °pen it as much as I do.“
A strange feeling washed over Brynn as she watched the two elves exchange smiles, a sudden intuition that some deeper connection was forming between them. She didn’t say anything about it, just followed, her bow ‘ hand and ready, as Juraviel and Cazzira walked up to the large iron , studied it for a few moments, then pushed it open, its/ rusted hinges creaking.
A thin, glowing fog awaited them.
„Fazl pods,“ Cazzira noted, moving forward. Just inside the doors \va landing, a balcony overlooking a wide chamber with a series of platea stepping down into the bowels of the mountains. Hundreds of structur houses and larger c