“But,” said King Yri, as if in answer to Sindérian’s thoughts, “there are some things we value so highly, we will not sell them at any price, nor yield them under any duress. For that reason Men have called us greedy, a miserly and heartless race. But in this they wrong us. For what we will not sell, we will occasionally bestow as a gift, freely given. She had done better in the beginning merely to have asked.
“And now that you know this,” he concluded, “is there some boon you would ask of me?”
Sindérian took a deep breath. “We have not come here as beggars, or to haggle with you like Ouriána’s messengers. How could that be, when we never guessed we would meet dwarves in the mountains? All that we ask is to be allowed to continue our journey. Unless…” She hesitated. “Unless you know of some way that we might cross the mountains more swiftly. As it seems you are no friend to Phaôrax—”
“Understand this: I have no intention of embroiling my people in your wars,” the King answered with a fierce look. “It is for your kind to end that madness, if it is not too late. I may be willing to assist you in some small way, but I am still considering whether to do even that much. I am, as you say, no friend to Ouriána, but she has never yet carried out those threats she made five years ago. We have not, perhaps, been much in her thoughts since then, and I would prefer that it remain so. Though haste may be to your advantage, it may not be to ours. I will think long and carefully before I decide what is to be done with you.
“In the meantime, rooms have been prepared for your use. It is now night in the world above and you will wish to eat and rest.” He sat back in his dragon-tooth chair, as if he, too, were suddenly weary. “Though we do not regard you as welcome guests, no guest of any kind has ever had cause to complain of our hospitality.”
Time moves differently in the kingdoms of the dwarves, as Sindérian was soon to learn. Without those cycles of dark and light, the phases of a fickle moon, or the revolving seasons by which Men measure their lives—time flows gently. How long she and her friends awaited the King’s decision, if it were one day or many, she could not have said.
Two periods of rest she spent in a closet bed, on a feather mattress under fine woven blankets. Along with the men, she ate several meals in a room where all the furniture was of carven oak, well made and of goodly proportion, though somewhat low to the ground. During the intervals between, they were allowed to roam at will through Yri’s palace.
In the underground kingdom no winds stirred, and the air was heavy with the resinous scent of torches and hearth-fires, yet it was a dim world, for it appeared that the dwarves did not require much light. The presence of strangers had apparently been duly announced, for while they received many curious looks from those who waited on them and those they met in the halls, the dwarves seemed to take the arrival of human visitors in their stride, and treated them with unfailing courtesy.
Much more than courtesy, thought Sindérian. For the palace seamstresses had stitched for her, in what seemed a miraculously short time, an underdress and a loose flowing gown to her exact measure—which the maidservants insisted she put on while they took her own garments away for washing. The cloth was strange to her, with milkweed and thistledown spun into the wool, but very fine and closely woven, and she was not sorry to put aside the dirt of the road.
“King Yri seems to favor you,” commented Prince Ruan when he first saw the gown.
She shook her head. “I think it is only that the ladies here wanted a closer look at my clothes.”
Whether he accepted that explanation or not, the Prince grew increasingly moody.
“We are surprisingly complacent prisoners, are we not?” he asked, as he and his fellow travellers lingered over a meal of venison, pheasant, goat cheese, roast chestnuts, and elderberry wine. “They do not keep us confined; why then do we not even attempt to escape?”
Sindérian eyed him over the rim of a goblet set with cat’s eye and tourmaline. Of them all, he seemed to take their captivity the hardest, being at all times animated by such fierce unrest that it exhausted her just watching him. Was it only his wounded pride, or was there something more serious amiss?
Claustrophobia was inevitable under the circumstances, and she believed they each struggled with it, but there seemed to be something in their situation that goaded him almost past endurance.
“Why shouldn’t we just walk away?” he said when the others remained silent. “The way to the surface is dark, but you could make a light.”
“Even with a light, we would soon be lost in that maze of caverns,” Sindérian replied. “That is, supposing we even had time to lose ourselves before the dwarves overtook us. I think there is little that happens under or over the mountain that King Yri doesn’t know about, and he would certainly know if anyone passed his ward.”
Ruan left his seat and began to pace the room. “We escaped from Saer, despite spells and losing our way.”
Hoping to turn his thoughts in a less reckless direction, she said the first thing that came into her mind.
“King Yri had much to say. Far more than he needed to tell us, all things considered. I think he was watching to see how we responded.”
Ruan stopped pacing, an arrested look on his face. “You believe he was testing us?”
“Yes, I am sure of it. But I think, also, there was greater significance in what he did not say, in things he merely hinted at. What happens in our world affects them, too. They must go above to hunt, to gather food. Yes, and they must keep domestic animals somewhere—goats for cheese, bees for honey. Some of them may spend as much time on the mountain as under it. In the end, they are no more immune to the winds of the world than we are.”
With a thoughtful look Ruan returned to his seat. “They are obviously in communication with the Ni-Féa, and that I do not like.”
“But if he should chance to be a friend to your grandmother…,” Kivik began.
“The Ni-Féa don’t make friends of other races.” Ruan folded his arms across his chest. “If Queen Gäiä ever had friends of any sort, they are long dead. Such friendship as hers could only prove lethal.”
“Then,” said Skerry grimly, “we have no possible claim on King Yri. No reason to expect that he will wish to help us. Moreover, his knowledge seems altogether too vast and comprehensive. Where does it come from?”
Sindérian shook her head. “I don’t know. He is a very powerful seer, that I can tell you. Perhaps the strongest I have ever met. But he may have other ways of learning things, too.”
She pushed away her cup and plate, for her appetite was spoiled. Prince Ruan’s mood was beginning to infect her, and she thought she would explode with frustration if they were forced to wait much longer for the King’s decision.
24
Blinded by the light, shaking with the shock of her suddenly reversed circumstances, Winloki was only dimly aware of the men gathered around her. She crouched on the ground, breathing the clean air, slowly assimilating the fact that she was alive and safe. Finally, she gasped out a single word: “Camhóinhann?”
“Is here, Lady,” said Dyonas’s voice somewhere nearby, and a shadow moved between her and the light. Gradually, that shadow resolved into a pale face with glinting metallic eyes, inside a halo of white hair. “Nor have you any need to fear for his safety.”
“He spoke the truth. He truly was willing to lay down his life for me,” she said wonderingly. She had feared any obligation no matter how slight, and now she owed him her life. She ought to be appalled, not grateful, for gratitude itself was a trap, and yet…
“Did you think he would lie to you? What reason could he possibly have to do so?”