From Across the Clouded Range (54 page)

“
Now, gentlemen,” a soft
voice said from the cowl of the black robes, “must we fight each
other. Enough blood will be spilt in the battles to
come.”

Recovering from the shock of the
spectacle, Ipid realized that this new entrant was the leader of
the te-am’ eiruh, Belab. He was also a te-ashüte, though he was
certainly not a Darthur. From what Ipid had seen, he was quiet,
reclusive, and always hid his face beneath the deep cowl of his
robes, which seemed the custom of all his people, who were
universally treated with fear and reverence by the
Darthur.

“
Great Uhram, the Ashüt
patiently awaits your presence?” Belab’s voice was soft but clearly
audible to everyone and held no malice. He looked at the gathered
warriors like a disappointed parent, and the warriors cringed back
like children. “The others sent me to find you.” Another thing that
was odd about Belab was the strange language he used. It was not
Darthur, it was not the Imperial tongue, yet Ipid could understand
it as if he had used it his entire life. And so could the Darthur.
It was a strange phenomenon that he could not explain, but it made
him wonder why Arin needed him as a translator.

Arin looked to the east. The sky was
pink with the dawn. Ipid had not realized how much time had passed
and neither, obviously, had Arin, who looked back at Belab in
surprise. He looked at the lightening sky again then sighed. “My
apologies. We will accompany you to the Ashüt at once. Perhaps the
representative from the Tavuh Clan will join us when he has caught
his breath.” Arin spoke the last as he stepped over the still
sputtering body of his cousin. The other warriors laughed and began
to disperse, leaving Üluth on the ground, disgraced.

With Belab’s departure, Thorold
recovered from his daze. He looked down at his nephew with scorn as
he fell in behind Arin. Ipid was not so quick, and Arin was forced
to turn before he came out of his paralysis. “Come, te-adeate Ipid.
You are needed.”

Ipid made a wide circle around Üluth
and said a silent prayer of thanks to the Holy Order. Arin was a
savvy strategist, but it was clear that he was not as well versed
in politics. Ipid knew that heavy-handed tactics like those used
today only widened rifts and increased an opponent’s resolve. It
was just such rifts that Ipid had to foster. Now was not the time,
but eventually the time would come, and when it did, he would be
ready.

#

Ipid ran to catch Arin and fell into
his shadow as they made their way to the Fork in the Road. Already
word of Üluth’s humiliation was spreading through the camp.
Warriors in loose clumps discussed the incident with a mixture of
laughs, disapproving frowns, and outrage. Ipid furtively watched
those reactions in hope of better understanding the political
dynamic of the Darthur, but he could not be sure if the reactions
marked one-off curiosities or a shift in broader
perceptions.

He did notice that the men fell
universally silent when Üluth appeared, staggering well behind Arin
and Thorold. They diverted their eyes and mumbled to themselves or
walked back to their tents. No one dared draw the huge warrior’s
attention or ire. It did not bode well for Üluth, yet the other
clansmen obviously still feared him enough to remain quite. He had
lost their respect, but not their admiration. Ipid knew that as
long as he had the one, the other was never completely
gone.

The door of the Fork in the Road was
already open when they arrived. Two hulking guards flanked it. They
nodded in unison when Arin strode past them. Thorold spoke a few
words to the guards – something about not allowing any disturbances
– and followed. After what he had just seen, Ipid stayed as close
as humanly possible to Arin.

Inside the inn, the tables had been
pushed back so that only one remained in the middle of the room.
The chairs from the merchants’ room had been arrayed around the
table and were occupied by the members of the Ashüt. Arin took an
open seat at the center of the table facing the door with Thorold
immediately to his right. Surrounding him were the eleven Darthur
representatives on the council – one from each clan with a seat
remaining open for Üluth, the representative of Arin’s own Tavuh
Clan. The Darthur were all grizzled warriors in their middle years
who, by Ipid’s estimation, had been selected more because of their
prowess in battle than their deftness of mind. Though Ipid could
not tell any differences in their dress, Arin had told him that the
cut of their vests clearly denoted their clans.

Gathered at the other end of the table
were the four non-Darthur members of the council. They spoke
together in a tight group that showed their wariness of the
warriors surrounding them. The final two seats at the table were
taken by Belab, who sat at a corner of the table as far as possible
from the other Ashüt members, and Üluth, who angrily pulled back a
chair and sullenly sat halfway down the table.

By that time, Ipid had already found
his small stool behind Arin’s seat and had his notebook out and
ready. At that same moment, Thorold jostled past him with a long
sheaf of parchment. He spread the map out on the table in front of
Arin and placed stones on each of the corners to keep it from
curling. There was a collective murmur from the te-ashüte at the
appearance of the map, and many of them stood from their seats to
get a better view.

“
May our ancestors guide
us to honor through their wisdom and example,” Arin intoned to
start the meeting. “May we mark their stories and use them to guide
this council.”

“
Uhhrr ruhhmp!” A
collective roar from the now standing te-ashüte answered Arin
little prayer. The te-ashüte nodded to each other and found their
seats but most of their eyes remained on the map.

“
To give you perspective,”
Arin casually spoke to his fellows, “we are here.” He stepped to
the end of the table and planted his knife in the table through the
end of the map where Gurney Bluff was depicted by a red dot that
had been added by the former innkeeper.

There was a collective “Ah!” from the
men at the table as they crowded around the map with renewed
interest.

“
If you will permit me, I
will now explain what I have learned about this world and present
my plan for conquering it.” Arin swept his hand across the map for
emphasis and then basked in the murmurs of approval that followed
his bold words.

Chapter 25

Dasen screamed. His eyes flew open and
searched wildly for the creatures that had been on top of him a
moment before. His heart pounded. His breaths were ragged
pants.

There was no creature.

It was a dream,
he repeated to himself then let out a sigh of
relief and put his hand over his chest to calm his thundering
heart.

Teth’s hand over his mouth sent his
heart racing as soon as it has slowed. “What happened?” she
whispered from above him. She crouched next to him, her head a few
inches from his and upside down. She glanced at him then searched
the branches hanging around them. “Are you alright? Did something
happen?” She seemed to realize only then that he could not answer
while her hand was covering his mouth.

“
It was just a dream,”
Dasen explained when her hand came away. “I dreamed that the
creatures had caught me. That they . . .”

“
By the Order!” Teth
whispered with the force of a scream. “You realize we’re trying to
hide, don’t you? You realize that part of hiding is being quiet?”
She turned her baleful eyes from him to the branches around them.
Her face was streaked grey with mud, hair matted with pine needles
and twigs, lips chapped, one cheek marked by a long scrape, clothes
torn, stained, and caked with the remnant salt of her sweat. She
smelled, musk and tin. Her laced shirt and canvas pants hid every
scrap of femininity remaining in her wiry, hard form. But her eyes
were bright. A few freckles peaked out from under the dirt. And she
was still alive. It was not much, but for now, that was enough.
Dasen tried to suppress a smile as he accepted Teth’s barely
audible rant. “. . . if there are any around, it’ll only be a few
minutes before your dreams come true. You might as well track them
down and introduce yourself.”

“
I’m sorry, Teth,” Dasen
tried to be sincere, but even the derision seemed welcome after
last night. “It was a dream. I can’t control what I do in my
sleep.”

“
Well, perhaps you should
try.” Teth sighed and made an effort to calm herself. “It doesn’t
matter now. If they were out there, they’d be on us by now.”
Another sigh. “I think we lost them for now, but they could always
pick up our trail, and we’ve already been stopped too long.” She
searched the branches again then reached down and helped him to
sit.

Dasen suppressed a groan as he came
up. He felt like he had been run over by a team of draft horses.
Every corner of his body ached with a stiffness well beyond what he
had felt after the first day. His head throbbed. His tongue was dry
and swollen. His stomach stabbed at him between rumbles. Spikes of
pain shot through his neck and back. His eyelids drooped and yawns
racked his body. He almost wished the creatures had captured him.
Surely nothing they could have done would be worse than
this.

Last night had been the longest, most
grueling experience of his life, far outpacing even the day of
their joining. Just getting to and crossing the bridge had been
almost more than he could handle, and the night had not ended
there. They had continued running, hiding, crawling throughout the
night, driven by the flying creatures that remained swooping
overhead and the possibility that the others would somehow find a
way across the gorge. They had abandoned what remained of the pack,
but that had been little consolation. To avoid the creatures, they
had left the trail, fighting their way instead through the
thickest, most overgrown sections of forest that Teth could find.
At times they had literally squirmed like worms through the
pitch-black branches of wild plum bushes. They had crawled against
a stream that would not have reached above their knees so that they
could remain hidden beneath the undercut bank. They had run up
hills so steep they had to use their hands as much as their feet
then slid on their bottoms down the other side. When, finally, he
had collapsed in exhaustion and even Teth had crumpled down beside
him, panting, they had found this spruce, pulled themselves under
it, and fallen instantly asleep.

With another groan, Dasen leaned back
against the trunk of the tree. The first branches started a few
inches above his head then reached out more than six feet to where
they brushed the ground with their stubby needles. He could not see
even a shimmer of the outside world through the layers of
greenish-grey; he could not imagine what Teth was searching for so
intently. Finally, with obvious effort, she lay on her belly and,
with much grunting, crawled to the edge of the tree. She lay there
for a long time, head moving slowly back and forth, long knife
clutched in her hand, until she rolled to her back and repeated the
process. Satisfied, she pulled herself cautiously from under the
tree and stood, moaning all the way up.

“
I think we’re safe for
now,” she called in hushed tones a moment later. “I can’t see any
signs of pursuit, and the sky is clear, but we should keep moving.
If they still want us, it’s only a matter of time before they get
across the river and pick up our trail. I did what I could last
night, but it was too dark and we were too desperate not to leave a
pretty obvious set of signs.”

“
Ugh” was the only
response Dasen could manage. His eyes had drifted shut, and he had
to pull himself back out of sleep.

“
Come on, Dasen,” Teth
seethed a moment later. “I don’t feel any better than you, but we
need to get moving.”

“
Okay,” Dasen roused
himself again, shook his head, and slowly, painfully bent onto his
hands and knees. Every corner of his body protested, but he forced
himself to crawl out from under the protection of the branches.
When he was clear, he flopped onto his back and covered his eyes.
The sun felt impossibly bright after the gloom of the tree’s umbra,
its rays like spikes being driven into his head. “Am I remembering
wrong? Did we actually drink a barrel of bad wine last night before
running through the forest? On top of everything else, I feel hung
over like you can’t believe.”

“
It’s the plant you were
chewing. The loggers used to chew it to keep their strength up, but
your father banned it on his crews because this is what happens
when you stop.”

“
Thanks for warning me. By
the Order, I think my head is going to burst.”

“
We didn’t really have any
choice. If I hadn’t given you those leaves, you’d have never made
it to the bridge, much less beyond it. Come on, I’ll help you up.
Some water will help. And maybe I can find a grove of higg trees as
we walk.” Teth held a hand out. Dasen removed an arm from over his
eyes and peeked up at the glowing outline of his wife. With a moan,
he accepted her hand and allowed her to pull him to his feet. When
he was there, his stomach revolted. He bent and heaved onto the
ground, but his stomach was too empty to produce anything beyond
bile. He spit onto the dirt and felt the acid eating at his
bone-dry tongue.