Instead of holding her breath or fretting, she counted her heartbeats until she heard the Voice of the Masters say her name. Then she met his flat gaze like a woman who had already departed, leaving her doubts and even her capacity for uncertainty with him.
“It is as the Manethrall proposed,” Handir announced. “This test of truth also has been satisfied. The Ranyhyn have answered. They await your will beyond the gates.”
For an instant, he appeared to hesitate. Then he admitted. “Their number is ten.”
Ten. Oh, God, ten. Seven for Linden and her friends: three for the Masters.
“Thus,” Handir continued, “the great horses acknowledge both your intent and your capacity for desecration.”
In effect, he had given his permission.
Linden meant to offer him a parting bow. In her relief, she might have thanked him. The Masters were Haruchai and deserved as much. But she could not stop herself: she was already running toward the tunnel under the watchtower as if the sheer force of her yearning would compel the gates at the end of the lightless passage to set her free.
Chapter Six: Sons
In sunrise, the Ramen and the Haruchai- the Humbled and their gathered kinsmen as well as Stave-gave homage to the Ranyhyn while Linden greeted Hyn gladly. Although she was impatient to be on her way, she did not chafe at the delay as Manethrall Mahrtiir named each of the great horses to the Masters: the seven who had borne Linden’s company as well as Mhornym, Bhanoryl, and Naybahn, who would be ridden by the Humbled. And she was not surprised that Handir had selected Branl, Galt, and Clyme to accompany her. Doubtless the Humbled had insisted on assuming that duty. They may have wanted another opportunity to prove themselves.
Still she mounted Hyn quickly when the Ramen and the Haruchai had completed their ceremonies of respect. As soon as Stave and Mahrtiir indicated that her companions were ready, she turned her back on Revelstone and rode away as if her path toward Andelain held fewer perils than the defended Keep.
Foes like Kastenessen and Roger, the Harrow and Lord Foul, merely wished to break her so that she might surrender or misuse her powers. The Masters believed that she could not be trusted.
Mahrtiir sent his Cords scouting ahead. The Manethrall and Stave rode on either side of Linden. Liand accompanied Anele behind her. The Humbled ranged around the company. In that formation, the Ranyhyn cantered easily into the southeast, angling across the light of the new sun.
From the vicinity of the fields that fed Lord’s Keep, the riders travelled down the bare plain which had been the battlefield for the Despiser’s final war against the Lords; his last attempt to achieve his ends through sheer force. But the swift gait of the Ranyhyn soon carried the company past the plain into a region of tumbled hills that stretched for leagues.
The hills permitted easy passage. Their slopes were gentle, worn down by ages of time and weather. Still they constricted the horizons on all sides. For safety’s sake, Mahrtiir joined his Cords searching the terrain while the Haruchai rode closely around Linden, Liand, and Anele. And the ground was clad in the tough, raw-edged grass that Linden feared for the old man’s sake. Throughout the first day of their journey, whenever the riders paused for food and water, or to scavenge a few treasure-berries, they remained on horseback.
As she rode, Linden watched for villages-for any habitations-but she saw none. Surely the Land’s people did not avoid living in the vicinity of Revelstone? She assumed, therefore, that the Ramen chose a path which would allow them to pass unseen. Perhaps Mahrtiir’s keenness to leave Lord’s Keep behind urged him to avoid encounters that might slow the company. Or perhaps he understood that the Humbled would oppose exposing villagers to the dangerous knowledge and magicks of Linden and her friends.
She also scanned the hillsides for some sign of the Harrow. But the Insequent did not appear. If he travelled somewhere nearby, neither the Ramen nor the Haruchai could discern him.
After Linden’s first rush of excitement, the day seemed to pass slowly. Yet Hyn’s comfortable strength supported her. And she was encouraged by the sensation that she had finally begun to take charge of her own fate; that she had wrested the initiative away from her enemies. For too long, she had simply reacted to their various gambits. Now they would be compelled to react to hers.
With luck and courage, and the inestimable aid of her friends, she might be able to surprise the Despiser’s allies.
That night, however, she and her companions made their camp on a swath of rubble which had spilled down over centuries or millennia from a rugged escarpment among the hills. A bed of tumbled and weathered stones protected Anele, but granted her no more than a little fitful sleep. As the night wore on, her anticipation became a restless anxiety.
An attack was likely. Kastenessen and Roger would surely try to stop her. Other foes-less predictable ones-would do the same. She had been warned away from Andelain by friends as well as enemies. And while she lay awake, she felt the constant bale of Kevin’s Dirt etiolating her resolve. Beyond question the Falls are a great evil, Liand had once said to her. Yet I deem them a little wrong beside the deprivation imposed by Kevin’s Dirt. In darkness, the impending weight of imminent blindness had the power to erode her judgment and conviction as well as her senses.
Under the circumstances, she was both comforted and disturbed by the fact that the Haruchai did not appear to sleep. Perhaps Stave, Galt, Branl, and Clyme dozed with their eyes open while they rode, or snatched naps when they were certain that their companions were safe.
In addition, they appeared to eat little, although they did not refuse treasure-berries. It was instinctive with them, Linden supposed, to keep private anything that resembled ordinary mortal needs and vulnerabilities. Thousands of years after the Vow of the Bloodguard had been broken, Stave and the Masters continued to emulate the Haruchai who had once served the Lords.
She could rely on their stringent inflexibility. But it was also their gravest weakness.
Fortunately Liand had spent a considerable time during the days ride, and in the evening, poring over his orcrest. The next morning, he demonstrated that Sunstone could indeed counteract Kevin’s Dirt. With quiet exultation, he restored health-sense to the Ramen, Linden, and himself, sparing her the exertion of her Staff. After that, she felt less alone; reassured to know that hers were no longer the company’s only instruments of power.
During the day, she was soothed by Hyn’s steady gait, as secure as a throne. And the hills opened into a billowing grassland that seemed to expand the possibilities of the world. Like the relief provided by Liand’s orcrest, being able to see farther eased some of her trepidation.
Near sunset, the company stopped for the night in an arroyo with a brisk stream rushing down its centre and a bed composed primarily of broken shingle and slate: enough stone to protect Anele from possession, but free of the deep rock which would expose him to his worst memories. The water was runoff from seasonal showers and mountain snows. Among its liquid secrets, it carried the faint flavours of rainfall and blizzards, new warmth and older ice. In summer, the watercourse would be turbulent to its rims, a small river hastening generally southward. Now, however, the littered bottom of the arroyo was the safest place that the scouting Ramen had found for Anele to spend the night.