The Dreamtrails (29 page)

“Even so, it seems strange to me that, despite the new ships he has purchased, he continues to master the
Black Ship
,” said the younger priest.

The older man shrugged. “The
Black Ship
is unique, both in its ability to attack other ships at sea and its capacity to carry men. It is because he agreed to take part in this invasion that we were able to bring as many Hedra as we have. His
Black Ship
alone took double the number of the other two ships.”

Crouched precariously upon the high stone ledge, I frowned. Surely far more men than I had seen marching along the tunnel would have fit on three ships, especially if one of them was Salamander’s
Black Ship
. But if that was so, then where were they?

“… his price was the rebels and their supporters alive and saleable,” the younger priest was pointing out. “Which is why he desires as few deaths as possible.”

“He will have slaves aplenty after this day’s work, regardless of how many are killed in the invasion,” the older priest said indifferently.

The pair was silent for a time, and the younger priest said, “I am told that those who rule the Red Land are heathens who do not believe in Lud. I have wondered sometimes whether it can please Lud that we enable Salamander to send them so many slaves.”

“The purifying flame will sear the Red Land someday. Lud will suffer no unbelievers. But Ariel has been to the Red Land, and he assures the One that his influence is strong there. When the time is right and Lud wills it, Ariel will open the way for the Faction.”

“What do you suppose motivates him? Ariel, I mean,” the younger priest asked, now adding wood to the fire. “There are times when his words make me doubt his faith.”

“That had troubled me on occasion, as it has others among our brethren. But though he is high-handed and arrogant, Ariel has served us well. He, after all, proposed allowing the
rebels to overtake the Council in this part of the Land in order to lessen the power of the Councilmen. And he suggested that this Malik would be willing to open a way for our invasion. Even these were his ideas and his invention,” added the priest, tapping at the demon band about his neck with a grimace. “I wish he would find some way to protect us from the taint, but at least we need wear them only on land.”

“Is it true that he also suggested building a force of our own warriors who would be pure in mind and body? Who would fight not for glory or gain, but for Lud?”

“Yes, the creation of the Hedra was his idea, and it so pleased the One that he agreed to let Ariel build his own dwelling on Norseland. It is a pity he won such decisive favor with the One.”

The younger priest frowned. “I do not understand.”

“Well, Ariel has great influence with the One, and there are times when we have been glad of it. But there are also times when Ariel makes speeches to the One about Lud and retribution and the Herders being chosen to rule the world, which render the One … very excitable. And when the One is excitable, there is almost always blood. Sometimes the bloodletting is less than convenient. More than once, good informants have been rent limb from limb because the One required them to be purified immediately.”

“I heard that the One wanted every single man, woman, and child in the Land slain,” said the younger priest, lowering his voice as if the words shocked even him.

“The One is very pure. How should he not be when he is so dear to Lud and knows his grief at the waywardness of his children? But on this occasion, Lud, in his infinite wisdom, prompted Ariel to offer words to the One that stayed his hand.”

“Are you saying that Ariel influenced the One?” asked the younger priest, sounding shocked.

“Of course not,” snapped the older. “Naturally, being the chosen first of Lud, the One is incapable of being influenced by lesser beings. Say rather that Ariel is the instrument of Lud, and for this reason, you must take care never to speak against him. Even some of the questions you have asked me might be cause enough for the One to become … excitable. Remember what happened to the last priest who questioned Ariel’s motives? They say he died screaming, driven mad by Lud for his blasphemy.”

“All who displease Lud die screaming and raving,” the younger priest said piously.

“It is one thing for slaves and novices to be put to death,” the older man said querulously, “and quite another for inner-circle priests to suffer the same rough end. The priest who died was as I am, an inner-circle Nine, for Lud’s sake! And his death meant a host of others had to be put to death, because they had sworn loyalty to him. It was an unnecessary violence.…”

“It is rumored that the One offered to make Ariel a Nine, and he refused. He told the One that Lud desired him to serve the Faction as an outsider, until such time as the Herders had dominion over the world.”

The older priest said nothing, and the younger priest glanced at him, then leaned forward to gaze moodily into the fire. I sat back on my heels. The exchange between the priests was fascinating, but I could not sit up here forever like a roosting pigeon when anything might be transpiring above us.

I readied myself to climb back down, but a movement caught my eye. It had come from the shadowed end of the
cavern, and I gaped to see a man emerge from the darkness. He was tall and lean and swatched in a hooded black cloak that made it impossible to tell if he was a warrior priest or an ordinary priest. But when he reached the two by the fire, he pushed the hood back. I saw that, instead of being shaven, his head was entirely covered in a loose black cloth similar to that worn by the nomadic Sadorians when they travel across the blazing white heart of their desert land, only he also wore black bandages about his face, concealing all but fierce yellow eyes.

Salamander
.

If I had not been holding my breath, I would surely have gasped aloud, so great was my surprise, for seldom did anyone see the infamous slaver so close, let alone so far from the sea and his
Black Ship
. I wondered what he hid so carefully under all those layers of black, since a simple mask would have disguised his identity well enough. It took only a moment to confirm that he wore a demon band.

“Where is Malik?” Salamander asked. His voice was deep and smooth, but the words were distinct despite being slightly muffled by the cloth over his face.

“He has not come. I think we must assume that something has gone wrong,” the older priest said.

“It matters not,” said Salamander. “If he has been exposed, Ariel has made sure the rebels will get nothing out of him. When one of the freaks attempts to read Malik’s mind, it will collapse, taking the intruder’s mind with it.”

“And if they torture him physically?” the younger priest inquired.

“He will not be tortured,” said the other priest with a sneering laugh. “The boy chieftain does not approve of torturing prisoners.”

“Then we proceed with the next stage of the invasion?” Salamander asked.

“Yes,” the older priest said. “The Hedra will soon be in place in the cloister.”

“We must leave at once,” Salamander said decisively.

The priests gathered up their cloaks and slung cloth bags over their shoulders while Salamander took up a resin torch, lit it, and then kicked the fire apart. When the priests announced themselves ready, he turned without hesitation and began to walk back the way he had come.

They disappeared into the shadows at the far end of the cavern, taking the lantern light with them, and I realized that I had been right. There was a way to the surface from this end of the tunnel! Fortunately, there was a faint glow from the embers of the fire, and I climbed down from my ledge and hurried after the three men, picking my way around bedrolls and other obstacles.

Thinking of what I had overheard, I realized that if Rushton and the others had
not
ridden into Saithwold when they had, I would have coerced Malik and died. Was that why Maryon had sent the others after me? Instead, another coercer would die trying to probe him. Surely that would make Dardelan realize something was wrong and send a force of fighters to Saithwold.

I had reached the shadows now and saw another tunnel leading off the chamber. It was dark and had a dank smell that made me gag, but there was light ahead. I went toward it carefully, because I did not want to stumble into Salamander and the priests. Gradually, the drumming of the waves grew louder and the briny reek of the sea stronger.

At the end of the tunnel, I peeped out. What I saw took my breath away.

Before me was a cavern many times larger than the one where the priests had sat, but instead of being floored in stone, there was a vast pool of water that reflected a great opening in the side of the cavern. Daylight flowed through it, and I could see the sea washing against the stony spikes that edged the opening. But I could not see the sky, only a long, sun-streaked stretch of cliff wall, which told me that I was looking into one of the narrows. But the truly astonishing thing—the
impossible
thing—was that three greatships were floating on the cavern lake, one of them as large as the giant Sadorian spicewood vessels. Its black hull told me it was the infamous
Black Ship
mastered by Salamander.

He and the two priests had reached the edge of the lake, where a ship boat had been pulled onto the steeply sloping stone shore. As I watched the three men climb into it, my head rang with the strangeness of what I was seeing, for how had the ships got into the cavern? Obviously the sea would flow into the cavern at high tide, but a ship could not possibly pass through the stone spikes.

But then I saw that this was not quite true. There was one section where there were no stone spikes, but it was barely the width of the
Black Ship
.

The ship boat had almost reached the
Black Ship
, and I was struck again by its similarity to Sadorian ships. But there were many additional constructions on the
Black Ship
’s deck, not to mention the great ugly bulb of wood and metal spikes protruding from the prow, which must be used as a battering ram.

So absorbed was I in my examination of the ship, I did not immediately notice how many people stood on its deck, and when I did, I looked at the other ships and saw that it was the same. At least as many gray-clad warriors stood upon the
three ships as I had seen marching up the tunnel. Doubtless the rest were to be set down on the beach where Malik had received the crates from the Herders, or divided among all three beach accesses to the Land in Saithwold province. The Faction had left nothing to chance.

I tried to think what to do. Obviously, the only way to reach the surface was to climb back up the tunnel, but if I did that, I would walk straight into the hands of the Herder warriors in the cloister.

My eyes fell upon the ship boat, now tethered to the
Black Ship
, and I saw with mounting excitement that the other two greatships also towed ship boats. Those aboard the
Black Ship
were now weighing anchor, and as I watched, long oars came out and the ship began to turn its misshapen prow toward the gap in the stone spikes.

I licked my lips and looked at the two remaining ships. The nearest was not so far away, and its ship boat tugged and bobbed on the waves in my direction. It was not dark, of course, but I doubted anyone would be looking back into the cavern. All attention would be fixed on the
Black Ship
, which edged toward the gap in the spikes.

I thought of the inner-cadre priest in the other cavern, fingering his demon band and saying he was glad they had only to wear the devices when they were on land. If he spoke true, and I could board a ship, then I could take it over by coercing first its shipmaster and ultimately everyone aboard. I could learn all the invasion plans and even use the ship and those aboard to help me stop the other ships from escaping.

Heart pounding, I worked my way around the side of the cavern, keeping low. Then I crawled down to the water’s edge behind a rib of stone and put my hand into water that was so icy I shuddered. But I dared not dither, because I
would be seen more easily out of the water than in. Gasping at the cold, I entered the sea and struck out for the ship boat. I was delighted to find that the tide flowing toward the cavern’s opening was carrying me straight toward the ship. But it was so strong and swift that delight turned to horror as I found myself being swept inexorably
past
the ship boat.

The tide was ferocious. I could not stop myself.

I was dimly aware that the
Black Ship
had left the cavern and that the second ship had turned to approach the gap. It hit me that if I made it past the stone spikes into the narrow, my only chance of survival would be to board one of the ship boats. I glanced back to see the second ship moving rapidly into place. I gave up struggling against the pull of the waves and arrowed forward, steering myself between the stone fangs. For one terrifying moment, I seemed about to smash into a looming pillar, but I shot past it into the inlet’s violent waters, which immediately dragged me under.

I kicked hard to reach the surface and managed to suck in a breath of air, but then I was dragged under again. By the time I fought my way back to the surface, I saw the second ship leaving the cavern. Dragged under again, this time I swam hard toward the middle of the inlet. I surfaced in calmer waters, but two ships had already gone down the inlet toward the open sea.

I had just readied myself for the last ship when a wave crashed over me again, pulling me under the water. It was like being eaten by a whirlwind. I tumbled and turned, and water forced its way up my nose and down my throat. My chest began to hurt with the need to breathe. I remembered the shipmaster Powyrs telling me that the sea was unforgiving to those who tried to fight it and forced myself to go limp.

Incredibly, as if it had only been waiting for me to
surrender, the sea spat me to the surface. I had time to gasp a breath of air and to see a few streaked purplish clouds in the blue slice of sky before a green shadow reared up and struck me down again. I went under three more times before I managed to reach less savage waters, but my relief was shortlived, for the third ship was emerging from the sea cavern. Even as I watched, I could see that the ship was not approaching the gap at the right angle to pass through. The shipmaster had miscalculated, and I heard a terrible grinding sound as the ship hull was ground against the side of one of the stone spikes. After a long moment, the tide turned the ship enough that it passed through the gap and turned to sail after the others!