And if something was beckoning, we were responding. We were in a steep land now, heavily wooded, where the hills were of a grayish-white stone deeply pockmarked by caves, and though the path was difficult, we made our way up the ever more rugged incline with such frantic zeal that we outstripped our own strength, and from time to time had to halt and drop to the ground, laughing and gasping, until we could catch our breath. And then we were onward again, furiously slashing through brambles, scrambling over boulders, clawing our way upward, upward, upward, moving faster than we would have thought possible. The higher we went, the more urgent became the call. Come to me! Come! Come!
Traiben spoke to me and expressed his concern. I shared it. “We’re starting to lose control of ourselves,” I said uneasily to Thrance. “You said that you would guard us against the Kavnalla’s song.”
“And so I will.”
“Shouldn’t we be taking some precautions by this time, then?”
“Soon. Soon. There’s no need at this point.” Nor would he say more than that, however hard I pressed him.
And upward we sped, willy-nilly. We were all but running up the slope now. The thought came to me once again that despite his protestations Thrance might indeed be the creature of the Kavnalla, and was merrily leading us toward our doom.
Others now were beginning to wonder, not just Traiben. Our ever-swifter pace was taking its toll on their bodies and stirring troublesome questions in their minds. Where were we going in such a hurry? they asked. What is this thing that speaks in our heads? Is there danger? Tell us, tell us, tell us, Poilar!
But there was nothing I could say. I knew no more than they did.
I felt that it was my responsibility to take some action. But what? Thrance was elusive. Often he walked ahead, moving with remarkable swiftness for one whose body was so transformed into twistedness and deformity. Watching him striding so swiftly, I was reminded again of the shining young Thrance of years ago, bursting from Pilgrim Lodge and running ahead of all his Forty up the road that led to Kosa Saag. So there is still some of Thrance within that ruined body, I thought. I pushed myself to catch up with him. He moved serenely, his breathing utterly normal, as though this pace were nothing for him.
I said, “We can’t go on like this. The voice grows louder and louder, and people are speaking out. We have to know what we’re getting into, Thrance.”
“Wait. There’s time yet for you to learn.”
“No. Now.”
“No, not now. The time will come.” And with a new burst of speed he streaked ahead. I followed him, but it was hard for me to match his pace, and my bad leg began to ache. How did he do it? There had to be a demon in him. Again I caught up with him, and again I pressed him, and again he eluded me with grinning evasions, putting me off, telling me the time was not yet.
I felt a burst of rage. I should kill him, I thought. And take us all away from this place. Unless he is killed he will never let us alone, and ultimately he will destroy us. For he is a demon, or else he has one in him.
But the thought of killing Thrance appalled me. I tried to sweep it from my mind. Another day, I told myself, or two or three, and then I would confront him once again, and this time I wouldn’t let him wriggle from my grasp. It was a weak decision, and I had no illusions about that. But Thrance baffled me. I had never had to deal with anyone like him before.
My companions were growing even more restless now. After dark one night a delegation came to me, troubled and angry, when we had halted after a day of wild climbing that left us all exhausted: Galli, and Naxa, and Talbol, and Jaif. The pull was so strong now that we were climbing virtually from dawn to dusk; but finally we had stopped from sheer weariness, despite the insistent booming in our minds, and were camped in a place of little shallow caverns against the pitted and eroded Wall.
Hendy was with me in the small dank cavern I had chosen. Galli said, very brusquely, “Send her out.”
“What is this?” I asked. “Am I to be murdered?”
“We want to speak with you. What we have to say is between you and the four of us, and no one else.”
“Hendy shares my sleeping-place, and much else of mine besides. Whatever you have to say you can say in front of her.”
“It makes no difference to me,” said Hendy softly, and began to get up to go.
“Stay,” I said, catching her by the wrist.
“No,” Galli said. She seemed gigantic, standing there in the mouth of my shallow little cave. Her face was fierce. I had never seen her with such a look as she had now. “Send her outside, Poilar.”
I was eager for sleep, and I suppose I had the doing of the Changes on my mind also, and the voice of the Kavnalla was louder than ever, like the beating of a drum in my brain. Come, come, come, making me short-tempered and impatient. I turned my back and said, “Let me be, will you? I’m in no mood for discussing anything with any of you now. Talk to me about it in the morning, Galli.”
“We’ll talk now,” Galli replied.
Then Talbol said to her, “What difference does it make if Hendy hears this or not? Let her stay while we speak.”
Galli grunted and shrugged, but offered no objection.
“Will you hear us?” Talbol asked.
“Go ahead,” I said grudgingly.
Talbol swung around toward me. I remembered that he had been Muurmut’s man. Just as well Muurmut was gone, I thought: I could imagine how much difficulty Muurmut would be making for me if he had been a member of this delegation too. I studied Talbol’s broad flat face, brown as the leather that is the trade of his House. This was a strange alliance, I thought, my friends Galli and Jaif with Talbol and Naxa, who never had had much love for me.
He said, “What we want to know is simply this, Poilar: Why are we rushing forward in this lunatic way, when we don’t know where we’re going or what we’re heading toward?”
“We’re going into the Kingdom of the Kavnalla,” I replied. “And through it, and beyond.”
“Into it, yes,” said Naxa, stepping forward to stand at Talbol’s side. “But beyond it? How do you know? What if Thrance means only to deliver us up to this unknown thing that we hear speaking in our minds?”
“Not so,” I said, looking away from Naxa in discomfort, for the fear that Naxa had voiced was of course one that I shared. But I couldn’t say that to him. “He has a way of protecting us against it.”
“Ah, and what may that be?” Galli asked.
“I don’t know.”
“But he intends to teach it to us, sooner or later?”
“When the time comes, is what he told me.”
“And when is that?” she asked me. “What is he waiting for? It seems to us that the time is very close. He protected his own Forty so well that of them all he’s the only one who still survives. My brother was a member of his Forty, Poilar. And now we fly toward your Kavnalla day by day, and its voice grows stronger and stronger within us, and Thrance tells us nothing.”
“He will. I know he will.”
“You know? You think? You believe? You hope? Which is it, Poilar?” Great heavy-set Galli rose up before me like a tower, her eyes ablaze in the dimness of the little cave. “Why don’t you demand that he tell you right now? Are you our leader, or is he? When will he teach us what we need to know in order to defend ourselves?”