Her foremost officer, the man who would have died trying to hold the Karmians back, if she and Yannul had allowed it, frowned in the fragrant, mild winter air, and asked her why she must continue, and how she was sure the city existed.
“I know it does,” she said. “I know I must be there.”
“But why, lady?” He indicated the men standing around gazing at her. “You brought us out of Lan. You invoked the goddess and She rose up before us—” This cry was smothered in a burst of acknowledgment.
Safca flushed darkly, her eyes bright. She loved to be loved, having formerly been left short of love. When she could be heard, she said, “It’s the goddess who informs me I must go on.”
Silence, then. This was indisputable. The officer said, “We’ll follow you.”
“No,” she said, “I invite those who feel the need to reach the city, as I do. Others would be useless to the goddess. She wants only those who respond to her design.”
“What is this design?”
She spread her hands. The wind tossed her hair. In such moments, she began to look beautiful, not as a woman could be beautiful, but like the spires of the mountains, the stands of proud trees.
“I don’t know. But I am part of it. Ashni made me part of it.”
They had been told of Ashni, the child-goddess who had lived among them, unrecognized, at Olm.
The meeting broke up. Next day Safca had her transport, wagons from the town, very light and peculiarly carved, with covers of dyed, waxed linen. There were no zeebas in the valley, let alone horses. The Zorians used the gelded rams from their flocks, and Safca’s party would do the same. When she left, crossing one of the tilting plank bridges over the river, less than twenty persons were moved to go with her.
“Why are we doing this?” asked Yannul.
Medaci said, “Because I’m drawn, as she said, toward the city.”
She tried to explain this drawing to him. He could not grasp it or did not want to, but she wished to follow Safca northeast, and he went with her. Their boy was happy at last. He had struck up a friendship with a Lannic lad of the same age who was also part of the expedition. They rode together on a cart drawn, this time, by two stout but willing pigs.
It still rained days and nights at a stretch.
Yannul, the damp in his bones, cursed the enterprise. He did not believe in the city, yet it assumed vast metaphysical proportions.
He lay on his back now, thinking of him, his sword-arm aching and complaining, remembering how the Karmians had not been hurt, only sent packing, too tired to decide any more if he was angry or excited or afraid or bored. When the riot started outside, he plunged from the rugs, dragging his knife up with him, charging out of the wagon and dropping almost on top of his younger son, who was standing there calling him.
“It’s all right, father. It isn’t war.”
Yannul shook himself. He had been half-asleep after all. He lowered the knife, noting his son found him lovable and heroic and funny all at once, and wanting to cuff him or hug him for it.
“What, then?”
“Come and look.”
So Yannul let himself be conducted a quarter of a mile, and once there, looked.
The woods they had traversed all yesterday opened to the east on a burgeoning sunrise, soft-colored and hazy. At the foot of the sunrise spread another river, a band of water with the sky in it. And there above the river and just below the dawn was the arcane city of the Zor.
A ruined city. A broken sword. . . .
Before they got there, before they crossed the second river, they came on a chain of villages, spread all along the near bank, separated by yards, or a mile from each other, as far as the eye could see. People, it seemed, resided in the proximity of the ruin, if not within it. An odd arrangement. They had to pass between two of the villages, going to the water, and then by or through others as they rode the bank looking for a bridge or ford. Men and women, children, some sheep, wandered out and stared at them. Yannul and a handful of the other Lans attempted speech, but they had no interpreter now. It was useless. Groups vehemently pointed, however, that way—which was upstream. They knew the strangers wanted to go over to the city and were aiding them, without involvement.
Finally there was a large oared boat, in decent repair, tied to a tree. This was the method for getting over.
Four of the Lans rowed the first installment across, and kept at the work until relieved. Although the passage was brief the endeavor took a long time. Not only had human beings to be ferried, but bleating and disgruntled beasts, and necessities from the wagons, which they had had to abandon by the tree.
That the nearest pair of the numerous villages would rob them was probable.
Then the disparaging chatter died down. Deposited under the walls of the Zorish city of Zor, something swept their minds of trivia. It became silent, except for the cawing of the wind around the angles of the stone above.
From outside, the city was a dark bulk, a high bulwark of black stone, infrequently topped by the black tip of a tower.
From the distance, the city had looked whole, though they knew it could not be. Nor was it whole. The walls were cracked, faulted, in spots they had come down, but tumbling against each other had formed new walls, jumbles that remained impenetrable.
They walked, the little troupe of people, along the walls searching for a way in.
Yannul put his hand on the back of Medaci’s neck. “I’m here with you.”
She smiled at him and he saw she was not frightened. Despite the knowledge that this was the Lowland city in replica—for that was precisely what it was; not now but as it had been, centuries ago.
One of the children running ahead found a gateway. There might have been others. There was no gate, just the echoing arch.
Broad terraced steps went down beyond. Streets folded away. Towers ascended. There stood a pillared building on a rise. A long window burned, clasped in the stone. They gestured to it, for the colored glass was not all smashed.
“Safca,” Yannul said.
Medaci shook her head. Their Olmish lady was far off, tuned to some voiceless song of the city.
She walked before them.
They went after.
Overhead, the towers, unleveled if broken, made shadows without shadows on the sky.
“Am I afraid?” Safca asked of herself. “No,” the other element of Safca answered gently, the element which was mother and teacher to the lesser element; her solely human self. “No, not afraid. The power of this place is very strong. But you’re here for a purpose. You can feel that. The purpose is also the Power.”
Something led her, it was no trouble to give in to it.
How long had she been walking in the city? Perhaps several hours. The others must be exhausted. She was not.
Suddenly, she was aware of having reached a destination. Safca glanced about her, in some fashion, she had been anticipating some mighty thing, a colossal statue, maybe, or an edifice that was unearthly and fearful. But no. It was a small carved door in the side of a wall. She touched it, and it gave at her touch. Safca was surprised after all.
She looked down into the eye of a great pool. There seemed to be a cave beneath the ancient street, conceivably some entrance into an under-channel of the river. Then she heard the murmuring exclamation around her. She looked again and saw why. Catching embers from the daylight, she beheld jewels and metal, a hoard such as legends spoke of—