Luap felt acutely aware of that loss. Gird’s death had ended what he might learn from Gird, but there were still many peasants living in vills much like his, plowing fields, making tools, tending sheep and cattle. Arranha—what had been Arranha’s vision, that died here with him? What had he thought, as a young man, would shape his life? What had really shaped it?
He stared at Arranha’s quiet face, already as remote as a stone carving, and wished he could shake it to life and speech again. Now he knew the questions he should have asked—now, when it was too late. Now he knew what he did not know—would never know. Elders died, he thought. Elders died, and with them their personal visions died. If Gird had died at Greenfields, as he had said he should have, Gird’s vision would have died there too. It had lived on because Gird lived on, and when he died it began to fray. . . .
Luap shied away from that thought, forced his mind from the thought that different people—himself included—had striven to engrave their own visions on what was left of Gird’s. Instead, he thought of himself as an old man for the first time. He would be old soon, the elder on whom the others depended, as he had depended on Arranha. Here, in this stronghold and the land around it, lay his vision. When he died, what would happen to the stronghold? To his people?
I did not seek command, he cried in his heart. It is not my fault that it was thrust on me. In that familiar echoing space, a comfortable warmth rose. He might have come to it by accident, against advice, but he had nonetheless done well. His people prospered, and praised him. Perhaps he had not been fit for command in Gird’s day—he would admit that—but now? Who else could have done what he had done? He hugged that to him, comfort for his genuine grief, as they carried Arranha’s slight body to its resting place on the mountaintop, where the first sun each day could find it.
He must not die until it was safe, he thought on the way back down. He must shape it now, while he could, with all his strength, and be sure he did not die too soon. He felt the weight of responsibility settle onto him . . . his people had no one else to depend on, now.
He spoke of this concern to no one. He might have discussed it with Arranha, in the old days, but Arranha was dead; in the days after the funeral rites, Luap found himself worrying the problem of his own mortality whenever the pace of work allowed. He was not afraid of death itself—he had proven that, he thought, in the old days, on the battlefields of Gird’s war—but he wanted to accomplish something before he died. Gird would have approved, he thought. Gird, too, had dreamed of establishing a people in peace and prosperity—and that was all Luap wanted.
Always and ever, in the depths of his mind, the question tickled him: was it really not possible to hold back aging with magery? Could he not at least try? It couldn’t hurt, surely . . . not if he took care. Even the appearance of youth or agelessness might help impress the Khartazh, and the Rosemage had agreed that anything harmless which had that effect was good.
“And how is the prince, after the death of his priest?” the black-cloaked leader asked his spy.
“He has recently thought of trying his magery—his ‘royal’ magery, as he calls it—against aging,” the spy said. “They have told him it will not work, but he is not convinced. And now, of course, he worries more than ever about the fate of his people if he should age too soon.”
“I believe he will find his magery strong enough for that,” the leader said “He deserves a long and healthy life.” The black-cloaked assembly laughed, their voices harsh as jangling iron.
A few days after Arranha’s funeral, Luap called Seri and Aris into his office to look at the maps the ambassador had left him. Seri’s eyes lit up.
“Imagine the effect of these in Marshals’ training,” Luap said.
“Do they have any of the old caravan route?” she asked.
“You remember I asked the ambassador that, and he said he would find out. But I have another idea. If we could find a practicable route from the upper valley down to the plain, it might be shorter and safer for caravans to come through there—and then through our canyon to Dirgizh. Then we would have someone to trade with, and a way for those who won’t use the mageroad to visit.”
Seri frowned. “Do we need that? It’s a long way for anyone to come, and I doubt Girdsmen would . . .”
“I think they will,” Luap said. “That trade used to prosper; as Fintha recovers from the war, Finthans will have more to trade. You know yourself the spice merchants do well. We could be trading now, if the Marshal-General weren’t so opposed to frequent use of the mageroad . . . imagine how easily we could sell the gifts the ambassador brought. An overland route should be acceptable to the Marshal-General.”
“He’s right, Seri,” Aris said. “He’s not opposed to trade; he’s encouraged the trade south into Aarenis—” Luap had not known that; he wondered how Aris knew.
“And you want us to find a way through these canyons to the old eastern route?” Seri said.
“Yes . . . and I don’t know whether you should begin by finding it from outside—from Dirgizh—or from the upper valley. But you’re our most experienced explorers so far.”
“We’ll have to start now if we’re to be done by winter,” Aris pointed out.
“I hadn’t thought you’d start this season,” Luap said. “Until we have others who can speak the Khartazh language as well, I can’t spare you more than a few days at a time.”
“Then we’ll start there,” Seri said. “Aris can teach his prentices, and I’ll teach the militia—”
“And me,” Luap said, smiling. “I should learn Khartazh.”
“And you,” she said. “But you learn faster than most.”
Even so, Aris and Seri managed a short trip into the upper valley. Deciding just where to start the climb out of the main canyon was hard enough. Two approaches ended in sheer cliffs they could not climb. Finally Seri climbed partway up one of the north-running canyons across from what they thought should be the best way.
“We didn’t use our heads,” she said when she came back down.
“Again?” Aris grinned at the expression on her face.
“It’s not funny,” she said. “We don’t have much time and we’ve wasted too much. What we need to do is follow that game trail—” She pointed. “It disappears over that knob—”
“Which is too far to the right; the valley has to be right up over that fallen block.”
“And we can’t climb it. Think, Aris: the animals go everywhere. We follow the game trail and keep choosing the ones that go higher.”
The game trail angled sharply up the steep slope; Aris found himself grabbing for rocks and bushes to help himself climb. By the time they were above the trees, he could see far down the canyon, and back up the one Seri had come out of. Above him, Seri’s boots went steadily on, occasionally giving him a faceful of dirt.
“This is a lot worse than the trail to the mountain top,” he said, gasping, when they stopped for a rest.
“We have more to climb.” Seri tipped her head back to look. “Gird’s toes: look at that. We should be goats to get up there—and how could anyone bring a caravan down?”
Aris looked down and wished he hadn’t . . . the broken rock and loose soil below looked unclimbable. “We have to find another way out: I don’t want to break both legs going down this!”