Lodestone Book One: The Sea of Storms (33 page)

Boxx raised its head at the
mention of its name. “Chandara Friend,” it agreed. Shann wondered
if she ought to warn Ernan that he was liable to end up with a
splitting headache, but decided that it was probably best to allow
him to make that particular voyage of discovery on his
own.

Ernan was
leading the way towards the kitchen while conversing with Lyall.
“So, what does your Chandara eat…?” Shann and Alondo got up and
fell in behind them, followed by Keris and Boxx. However, she found
that she was no longer listening to the conversation. Her physical
hunger had been replaced by a cold feeling in the pit of her
stomach.
The Fire Pits…the Kharthrun
Serpent…the very stuff of nightmares.

Chapter
21

Down
. The way to the Fire Pits lay
open before them. A slim path, a tiny fault of broken rock, led the
way down the immense canyon wall before disappearing beneath clouds
of vapour, beckoning them towards the dangers that lay hidden
below.

The headman had been as good as
his word. He and a group of half a dozen villagers rode with them
to the rim of the immense depression. On the way, Ernan told them
The Legend of Kharthrun. According to the tale, the Pits had been
formed long ago, when the people of the Distrada had displeased The
Three. The Suns had fashioned a fireball and hurled it from the
heavens to serve as a sign of their wrath. The fireball gouged out
a vast burning pit. Then it engulfed a forgar worm, feeding it
until it grew into the Serpent. Shann thought the story outrageous
and even a little blasphemous, but she listened politely and held
her tongue.

At the rim, they halted and
looked out across the fear-inspiring vista. Beneath the steam
clouds Shann glimpsed twisted features amid dark volcanic rocks.
The immense bowl stretched as far as the eye could see, looking for
all the world as if it had been scooped out by a gigantic hand. She
began to wonder whether there might be some truth to the legend
after all.

Ernan could not hide his concern,
as she and the others offered their thanks and expressed their
goodbyes. Lyall made a formal gift of the wagon and the graylesh to
Ernan, and they bowed gravely to one another before the older man
conducted them personally to the point at the lip of the cliff face
where the path began.

Lyall produced a long length of
rope. “Tie the rope around your waist like this.” He knotted the
rope around his middle and handed the end to Shann. She tied it in
the same way and passed it to Alondo. “We stay roped together till
we reach the canyon floor, in case of any mishaps.”

“What about Boxx?” Shann
enquired.

Lyall shook his head. “I think
the rope would only hamper its movements. More importantly, it’s
much lighter than any of us, so if we were to stumble or fall, we
would just drag it down with us. No, I think the Chandara is better
off as it is.” He addressed the little creature directly. “Boxx, be
careful as we descend. Do you understand?”

Boxx raised itself erect on its
hind limbs as if coming to attention. “I Will Be With Keris,” it
declared happily. Keris looked away, but said nothing.

Shann hefted
her pack and manoeuvred her arms between the shoulder straps. They
had slimmed down their possessions to no more than they could
comfortably carry. For Shann that meant just her flying cloak and
her staff; besides food and water, she had nothing else. She
watched as Alondo reached inside his jerkin and pulled out the
emerald he wore around his neck. The jewel sparkled in the early
afternoon light. He bowed his head silently, mouthing a few
words–
a prayer?
–
before tucking the stone back out of sight. Shann was suddenly
struck by the fact that she had no memento, no keepsake, nothing of
her former life and home. If she died here in these Fire Pits,
there would be nothing on her body to indicate to anyone who found
her who she was or where she was from. Had she been a good or a bad
person? Had she loved anyone or been loved? Had her short life
amounted to anything? She felt a wave of sadness wash over her.
Alondo had offered her a place in his home along with Hedda, but
that was a long way off and there was a good chance she would never
live to take him up on it. For now, all she had were the cloak and
the staff. Yet perhaps those things said more about the person she
was now than anything else. From that moment on a rain-soaked night
in Corte, when she had grabbed the staff and ran forward to give it
to the tall fair haired man with the piercing blue eyes, she had
crossed a line. She had taken her life in a new direction.
She had decided to become someone who could make
a difference.

Slowly and
carefully, the party began their descent into the Fire Pits of
Kharthrun. Single file, perched on the narrow rock ledge with their
backs against the cliff wall, edging towards the plumes of rising
steam mingled with smoke and sulphur, Shann felt a growing sense of
peril. What was it Ernan had said?
Too
many ways to die.

~

Shann could
already feel the heat rising from below, creating an updraft of
unsteady air currents. The palms of her hands were pressed against
the rock face as she moved along a ledge not much wider than her
feet.
Don’t look down
.

Alondo seemed to be faring worse
than she was. He was far from sure-footed, and Shann could see the
apprehension in his eyes. He tried cracking jokes in an effort to
raise his spirits. “Lyall?” His voice was like a thin
thread.

“Yes, what is it?”

“You know, out of all of the
things we have done so far, I think this is my least
favourite.”

“I know,” Lyall soothed, “try to
hang in there, my friend.”

The flying cloaks were useless; a
fall from this height would not be stopped by any deposits of
natural lodestone, even assuming there were any directly beneath
them. Looking out over the expanse, it occurred to Shann that there
were no birds flying. The silence was broken only by laboured
breathing and the sounds of boots scraping against rock.

At times, the ledge widened a
little, allowing them to make faster progress. Keris was
stone-faced, her dark eyes betraying no sign of anxiety. She moved
over the thin strip of rock with the grace of a dagan. Boxx
shuffled along with ease. He was forced to stop frequently as the
Kelanni in front of him slowed his progress.

They were a little more than
halfway down. The ledge had widened once again, and Shann was
beginning to think that the nightmare would soon be over, when
Lyall stopped in his tracks and raised a hand. Shann halted and so
did the others. She noticed that Alondo was breathing
heavily.

“What’s the matter?” she called
ahead.

“Look.” Lyall moved aside to
allow her to glimpse the way ahead. She squeezed against him,
craning her neck. The narrow shelf continued for a short way before
coming to an abrupt end, a broken edge falling off into
nothingness–a brutal denial of passage. Her heart sank at the
thought of making the journey all the way back up the cliff side.
The musician had slumped down and was seated with his back to the
rock, hugging his knees. His eyes were shut and he was breathing
through his teeth. She was not at all sure he would make
it.

Keris edged past Alondo and
approached Shann and Lyall. She had untied herself from the rope
and removed her pack.

“Why have we stopped?” she
demanded.

Lyall met her eyes gravely. “The
path is gone.”

~

“Let me see.” Keris sidled past
the other two and crept gingerly to where the path ended
abruptly.

Lyall leaned forward. “Be
careful; it may not be safe.”

Keris did not
answer or look back. She got down on her knees, then lay flat on
her stomach and peered into the abyss below. Her head moved up as
her eyes scoured the rock face.
There
. Ever since that night in the
Gilah Hills when she had faced Mordal for the last time it had
seemed as if a maelstrom were churning within her, a storm of grief
and loss over which she had no control. When she had found herself
kicking down a door in the village of Pinnar, it felt as if she
were another person, yelling at herself from afar, but unable to
make herself stop.

The feelings of grief and loss
were still there, but now, for the first time in many days and
nights, Keris felt a centre, a point of calm. She stood in the eye
of the storm, aware of her feelings, but detached from them
somehow. Here was a problem, an obstacle, but one that could be
overcome by logic and tactical analysis. She was on familiar ground
once more. She was in control.

She got back up and retreated to
where Lyall and Alondo were waiting, indicating behind her with a
flick of her head. “The path continues ahead of and below us. It
begins again at a fault line, where the canyon wall is
split.”

Lyall moved to the end of the
path and checked where she was indicating. He turned back, shaking
his head. “Too far. We could never jump that gap.”

Keris looked straight at him. Her
eyes flashed. “I can do it.”

Shann and Lyall looked at her
with disbelief. “If you’re thinking of using the flying cloak, it
would take a leap of great precision to make it to that far ledge
without falling off,” Lyall argued. “What’s more, there would have
to be a good lodestone deposit on this side and you haven’t even
taken the cloak out to scan for any yet.”

“I won’t be needing any.” Keris
moved back along the narrow shelf. She passed Alondo and went to
the place where she had set down her pack. Carefully she extracted
her flying cloak and fitted it around her shoulders, fixing the
clasps and shaking her head so that her dark tresses settled across
her shoulders, framing her sharp delicate features. She tied the
pack to her belt and made her way back to where Shann and Lyall
were waiting expectantly. She addressed Shann. “Give me your cloak,
please.” Shann looked to Lyall, who nodded at the girl. Obediently,
Shann took off her pack and gave her own cloak to Keris. “Thank
you.” Keris headed for the broken end of the path once more and
knelt down just short of the edge. She laid Shann’s cloak out on
the rock surface and began making adjustments to the control
mechanism.

Lyall walked up behind her. “May
I ask what it is you’re doing?”

Keris continued perfecting her
adjustments without looking up. “I can get us all safely across to
the other side.” Satisfied, she stood up and faced Lyall. “But I
need you to do exactly as I say. Please ask everyone to untie
themselves from the rope.”

Lyall examined her with his
penetrating blue eyes, as if trying to read her mind. “Everyone,
untie yourselves from the rope.” He gathered in the line and handed
it to Keris, who took one end and tied it around her
torso.

She handed the other end to
Lyall. “Keep a firm hold on this.” Then she turned, stepped just
beyond the place where Shann’s cloak lay, took a sighting on the
far ledge and leapt into the void.

There were two parts to this plan
that were going to prove difficult. This was the first. She had
configured Shann’s cloak so as to expose the refined lodestone.
Refined lodestone was stronger than any naturally occurring
deposit, so she was in no doubt that she could traverse the
distance. The problem was that there was nothing at the other end
to put a brake on her momentum. For that reason, she had selected a
trajectory that was as low as possible. The refined lodestone in
Shann’s cloak gave her an unaccustomed jolt and she sailed across
and down the cliff face towards the opposite ledge. Keris angled as
close to the cliff as she dared as the narrow rock shelf rushed up
to meet her. She overshot the edge, and her boots impacted the hard
rock as she came to a running stop. The rope spanned the gap
between both ledges.

Keris removed her cloak and
placed it carefully near the fault line, exposing its lodestone
layer. Then she looked up to the broken path across and above from
her. She could see Lyall and Shann, as well as Alondo and the round
head that was Boxx, driven by curiosity to see what was happening.
“Lyall,” she called out.

“Yes?”

“I want you to tie the rope
securely around yourself and make the jump, just as you saw me do.
I have set my cloak so that you can use its lodestone to slow your
descent.”

Lyall glanced behind him. “But
what about the others?”

“Listen carefully,” Keris yelled.
“In order for this to work, we have to execute a series of actions
in a precise order. Everyone will be fine. I…must ask that you
trust me.”

There was a pause. “Very well.”
Lyall disappeared over the rim and then reappeared wearing his own
cloak. “Ready?”

Keris grabbed the rope and braced
herself in case he should miss his aim. “Come on.”

Lyall set his sights on the
opposite ledge, as he had seen Keris do, and then hurled himself
boldly across the gap. His legs bicycled in the air as he flew in a
somewhat higher arc than she had. Keris saw him adjust his neck
control, partially extending his bronze layer, using Keris’ cloak
to slow his fall. He landed lightly on the other side. “That was
incredible.” He looked back over the distance he had just crossed.
“What now?”