“But we cannot—”
“This is about your future more than mine.” Richard gestured off in the direction of the goddess and her followers. “You heard what that spy said. The goddess intends to slaughter and eat all of you for disrespecting her. What if I die in the attempt to kill her? Then what? What will you do then? Just let them kill you all?
“Brutal leaders like the Golden Goddess cannot long tolerate those who don’t believe, follow, and do as they are told. She views all of you as a disease that could spread to her followers if she does not cut you out before she loses any of her followers and then her power. She cannot allow you to live. She will send her followers for you and they will kill every one of you, along with your females and your offspring. You don’t need to believe me. You all heard what that spy said.
“I have fought wars before, and this one is really not all that different. Such brutal leaders always seek to eliminate any who don’t believe in their cause.
“You all are a bigger threat to her than I am. If I am killed, she continues to rule. But if you are not eliminated, you all pose a continual threat that could make her followers turn on her. Leaders need the support of those they lead. All of you threaten to cause her to lose her support. For that reason, she must kill all of you.
“It is not up to me to do it for you. You all must be a part of your own futures if you want to protect not only your own lives, but the lives of your offspring. If you do not help me, your offspring will have no future.”
One of the Glee in front gestured to be heard. “You told that spy that you are a war wizard, the bringer of death. You said that war fighting is what you were born to do. We are not war fighters. We were not born to do this. This is something you alone must do. We cannot fight.”
Richard fought back his urge to yell some sense into them.
“I realize that,” he told them, trying to maintain his patient, reasoning tone, “but you all need to listen to me. You are a gentle race. You are peaceful. You love your young. You do not wish to harm others.
“I understand all of that because I was once very much like you. I did not want to fight. I learned hard lessons that if I stand aside, then those I love lose everything. They lose their lives. I have seen many good friends die.
“I learned that to save those I love, and even others who believe in peace as I do, as you do, I had to fight even though I did not wish to fight. I am telling you this from my harsh experience. If you wish to survive, you must fight for your own lives. I can help a great deal, but I can’t do everything for you. This is about your lives, and the lives of your kind. If you don’t take your world back from the goddess, she will take everything from you.
“She already has plans to come and kill you all, so, in a way, you all are already dead. Your only choice now is to decide to live.”
57
Sang looked around at the silent Glee watching them. They seemed to be shaken by Richard’s words as they looked at one another, but Richard didn’t hear their voices. At least they weren’t running away. He wondered if they were talking among themselves or voicing their objections to Sang alone, or maybe even arguing among themselves and they didn’t want him to hear.
It was even possible that they were all about to decide that they couldn’t, or wouldn’t, fight and in the end they would all walk away, leaving it to him. He couldn’t do this alone with only Vika to help him. He feared that they were so shaken by all they had heard that they would end up saying no. He knew that once the Glee had made that switch to hunting and killing, they lost all reluctance, but these Glee had not made that transition to being killers.
He knew that he might be able to kill the goddess, but that would not by itself stop the beliefs that she and her followers held. If these Glee would not fight for their own lives, then in the end, the most realistic thing he could do would be to save the people in his own world by destroying the device that allowed them to go to different worlds to hunt people. That might be enough to save his world, but it would not save this one, and he and Vika were going to have to live out their lives in this world.
Finally Sang turned back to Richard, as if having heard what the others had all had to say. “Lord Rahl, we understand and appreciate the very meaningful sacrifice you have made to save your kind, and your world, as well as to help save our world and preserve our way of life. We have helped you in coming here so that you might stop the goddess and save your world. We also understand the threat the goddess poses to our lives.
“But even if we agreed to do this, you must understand that we would die out there in those barren, dry, empty lands. It is too far for us to travel away from here, away from the water where we gather our food and live. We could not survive out there. We would die.”
“And what you need to understand is that I know about fighting wars. I’m telling you, if the goddess believes there is only one way in, then that is the only place she will guard and the only place they will stand ready to fight. If we could instead go in behind where they least expect us, and surprise them—”
“I am telling you, we could not do it,” Sang said, lifting his arms in frustration. “We would die out there.”
“Not necessarily,” Richard said.
Sang shook his head in apparent exasperation. “We cannot go that way and hope to live to fight them.”
Richard smiled. “That’s what the goddess believes. That is why it would give us the element of surprise on our side, and surprise is one of the best weapons you could have in a fight. Surprise will help all of you prevail even though you are not experienced at fighting. It would be even better if we could come in at night. When does it get dark here?”
Sang hissed his frustration that Richard just didn’t seem to get the point. He gestured to the sky. “There is always at least some light in the sky. When the sun goes down, there are moons that provide light.”
“Moons?” Richard asked. “How many moons are there?”
“Two. It does get darker when the sun goes down, but with the light of the twin moons it never gets to be such a dark night like it sometimes does in your world.”
“Is that when they sleep? When the sun goes down and it’s darker?”
“Yes. When the sun goes down and day grows still, we all sleep then. When night comes, we sleep partly in the water to stay wet, and also to be safe. The wild boars like the mud, but they are afraid of water, so they won’t come right up to the banks to attack us.”
“How much longer until then?” he asked. “Until they sleep?”
Sang looked to the sky, shielding his eyes with one claw. With such thick, continually heaving and rolling clouds, it was hard to tell where the sun was, but apparently the Glee had learned how to judge it. Sang thought a moment, trying to think of a way to explain it. Finally he did.
“You know how long it took us to come here from the device on the mountain? It will be the quiet time when the Glee sleep in probably three of those journeys. That long. We have never crossed the drylands, but it would be at least two days and nights. We could not survive that long there.”
Richard pinched his bottom lip as he considered. It was a problem that it wasn’t darker at night. Still, if the goddess and her followers were asleep, that helped. He consulted the map Sang had drawn on the ground, and again looked at the sky.