Maja tugged at his sleeve.
“What about Benayu?” she whispered. “Zara said her powers were weaker over the sea.”
“Good point. Better not risk it,” he said, and explained to the man.
It was midmorning before they were able to move off with six of the guard to accompany them as they skirted Zara’s ward. A handsome barge took them across the river, and on the further shore there were several hundred citizens and groups of schoolchildren lined up to cheer them as they disembarked and a flute-and-drum band to lead them to another feast laid out under a vast scarlet and gold pavilion.
As they were being shown to their places one of the Provosts stopped them.
“One moment,” he said. “There’ll be a few speeches afterward, and it would be appreciated if one of you would reply.”
“Not me,” said Saranja instantly.
“All right, I’ll give it a go,” said Ribek.
“It needn’t be more than a few words,” said the Provost, clearly doubting this stranger’s ability to produce an oration up to the high standards of Larg. “And after that you would be well advised to rest. We are arranging with one of the desert tribes to guide you to the Highway, and they prefer to travel by night, when the snakes and scorpions are less active.”
“We won’t have much trouble getting to sleep after we’ve had a share of that lot,” said Ribek, with a nod at the loaded tables.
That was true. Maja, in fact, couldn’t wait, and fell asleep during the speeches. She was woken by the sound of laughter. Ribek was on his feet obviously enjoying himself, with his audience in the palm of his hand. He waited for the laughter to die.
“One last thing,” he said, still in his usual light tone. “We—Maja and I—met and talked to the Sleeper. It’s something we’ll remember as long as we live. None of you have been so lucky, but you know she’s there, asleep. She always has been, and as far as you’re concerned, she always will be. But she won’t. She’s very old, and tired and lonely, and longing to be released from her task and go. It must be terrible to die alone, far from the people you most love. At least she isn’t that. She’s right here, among them, among you. And the best thing you can do for her is to love her back. I am sure you admire and respect and honor her no end, but that isn’t the same thing. Love her. Show your love for her. Plant a rose in your garden for her sake. Teach your children to love her—don’t use her to frighten them when they don’t behave. That sort of thing. I’m sure you’ll think of ways. Whatever it is, she’ll know. Even in her dreams, she’ll know.”
He sat down. The first speech, before Maja had nodded off, had been followed by polite applause. This time there was silence. Everyone looked a bit stunned. Somebody started to clap dubiously. Slowly the rest joined in. There was nothing as crude as outright cheering, but it seemed to Maja that the clapping had a different feel about, more than polite. Meant, natural. It stopped only when the President rose smiling to thank Ribek and declare the feast over.
A tent had been got ready for the travelers to rest in for the few hours before their guides arrived. Benayu slept unstirring on one of the beds with Sponge curled up at his feet. There was a well-licked dish and a bowl of water beside the bed. Maja flopped onto hers fully clothed and was asleep before she had drawn three breaths. The next she knew she was on a horse somewhere—Levanter, her extra sense told her—with her right cheek numb from pressing against his mane and neck. The air was cold and dry. The sound of the horses’ hooves was no more than a soft pad, pad. She opened her eyes, and immediately screwed them shut against the glare of moonlight. In that glimpse she had seen a ghost, black against the glare, swathed from head to foot in a hooded cloak, its only visible feature one spidery arm holding Pogo’s bridle. Then she was asleep again.
Next time she stirred enough for Ribek, riding in the saddle behind her, to realize she had woken and steady her as she sat groaningly up.
“High time,” he said. “It’s past midnight. Best try to stay awake now, or you won’t sleep during the day. Stay there a moment.”
He slid himself down, helped her back onto the pillion and remounted. She stared around as they rode on. In every direction the desert stretched away, seeming almost featureless under the big moon. A little way ahead of the party two shadows danced along over the dusty earth. She could barely see the guides who cast them. Saranja and Rocky were on her right, with another guide beyond them. Pogo was still there on her left, led by a guide. For a moment Maja thought he was carrying some kind of sack on his back, but then she realized it was another of the tribespeople facing away, hunched down, riding sidesaddle. Benayu’s litter followed, with another guide leading each pony.
A quiet, throbbing vibration, not like anything she’d felt before, was coming from behind her. Craning round, she saw two more of the guides bringing up the rear, walking with a peculiar gliding pace and carrying short branches. As she was looking at them they halted, turned and waved their branches in the air. A breeze sprang up out of nowhere, picking up little flurries of dust and depositing them over the stretch that the party had just crossed.
Now she realized that the same sort of thing was happening ahead of them. The two tribespeople leading the way weren’t merely there as guides—they were using the same sort of magic to do something else. Drive something away, she thought—yes, of course, snakes and scorpions. She shuddered. There’d been only one kind of snake in the Valley, and it wasn’t poisonous, but still she had a horror of the creatures. She didn’t know much about scorpions, and she didn’t want to.
The night seemed endless, the desert all the same, the moon moving oh so slowly westward, the constellation of the Fisherman in the northern sky circling around the Axle-pin, invisible below the horizon, at the same slow pace as the earth turned over. She felt herself falling asleep again.
“Pinch me,” she said.
“No fun. Why don’t you sing to me? What about ‘Cherry Pits’?”
“‘Cherry Pits’?” she whispered.
“Cherry Pits” was an old, old song which mothers sang over cradles and children used for counting games. The words, when they meant anything at all, were about two lovers sharing a bowl of cherries and making some absurd promise and sealing it with a kiss for every one they ate.
“What’s so awful about ‘Cherry Pits’?” he asked.
“Nothing…Nothing…”
“Tell me.”
“I…I can’t.”
She knew perfectly well what was wrong with “Cherry Pits,” but it was a place in her mind she didn’t go. It had a door like the one in the corner of the Council Chamber at Larg, a door which she had magically caused to disappear. She had made a gap in time. On one side of the gap she had let the chickens out and scattered their grain for them and collected the eggs and brought them back into the kitchen, and on the other side of the gap, two evenings later, she had put the chickens away for the night and was coming back into the kitchen with the eggs they had laid in their secret nests during the day.
And in that gap Saranja had gone away.
Ribek was silent for a while, then said, “Well, if you can’t, you can’t. How about something else? ‘The Gooseboy’?”
“All right.”
She was astonished to find that Ribek, who could do everything so gracefully, couldn’t sing in tune. Never mind. It was still a lot more fun than being pinched. They sang on for the rest of the night, all the songs they could remember. Songs and stories were almost the only thing Maja’s mother had managed to give her. Dawn came much sooner than she’d expected, and then, almost at once, it was day.
The tribespeople halted and gathered around. Some of them threw back their hoods to reveal dark, beaky faces, their cheeks patterned with tattoos. By daylight she saw that several of them were carrying stout staffs, pointed at one end. Three of them were only shoulder high to the others—women, Maja knew through her extra sense, but without that it would have been hard to tell. The sack-like figure from Pogo’s back was also a woman, but very old. The men lifted her down, set her on her feet, handed her a staff and waited.