Forgive me when I digress, but writing of my feelings helps me to comprehend them.
This hstgodlhave acquired as a companion is—according to my teacher, Brother Horse—a more typical shaman's helper than the other two. This one I call Swan, because that is how she appeared to me. I found her in a lonely valley of ghosts, guarding their tombs. How long ago she was set there to ward them, I cannot say, and she had little sense of passing time; but all of the ghosts had departed, and Swan had nothing left to do—and yet could not herself depart. In this case there was no battle, no danger, and no desperation—only a lonely god. I offered her a place in my mansion, explaining what sort of service I would expect from her, and she agreed more than readily. After the capture of the bull, it was a great relief, and though the swan is not a powerful or ferocious helper, she comforts me in a way the others do not.
Tsem became a warrior three days ago; he is very proud. Perkar and the others have fashioned him an enormous wooden mace and a shield with a wooden frame covered in elkhide. We were set upon by creatures Perkar names Lemeyi, which are half god and half something else. These three had the appearance of long-legged wolves. They paced us for a day before attacking, shouting with Human speech. I could have taken one—as I did the bull—but the thought repelled me. Instead I sent out the mare to attack, and she dispensed with one. Perkar dispatched a second, but it was Tsem who broke the spine of the third. It writhed and cursed at him in Nholish, scored deep claw marks into his shield, but he hit it again and again, until it did not move.
I protested when Perkar began teaching Tsem to fight with weapons, but now I admit that he was right to do so. The Lemeyi was trying to reach me, and Tsem would have interposed himself in any case, armed or not. These creatures had claws like sickles and fangs like daggers. He would have died. As it is, he came to my rescue. He knows it, too, and walks more proudly, makes jokes readily for the first time since leaving Nhol.
The encounter with the Lemeyi affected Perkar more than the rest of us. He has brooded almost without words since that fight. Ngangata says that Perkar was once tricked by the Blackgod in the guise of a Lemeyi. This is yet another instance that makes me wonder how much I can trust either Perkar or the Blackgod whom he names Karak.
We began this journey in the southern Mang country, a place where only the skeletons of mountains remain. Now we are in places where mountains are in the prime of life, mountains such as I never dreamed could be. It astonishes me that a peak more magnificent than those I have seen can exist, and yet I know that it can, for ahead of us, in a forest Perkar calls Balat, She'leng awaits. I have seen it before, in the otherworld of the lake, but the memory of that place fades like a dream; the colors and shapes are difficult to remember—exactly like a dream, in fact, since Brother Horse calls dreaming “floating on the surface of the lake. ” We shamans do not merely float—we dive—but those deeper dreams are often as nonsensical as the ones at the water's edge.
My fourteenth birthday is four moons away, and I wonder often if I shall ever see it. I think that I won't. Just as my blood moved the River to pull Perkar and me together, something is moving us all again. It seems as if instead of a mountain, She'leng must be a vast pit—an ant-lion trap. For months we liave been skittering down the widest, least sloping part of that funnel, digging in our heels sometimes, now rushing down in great leaps. The Blackgod told Perkar that what awaits us at that bottom place is the death of the River, the end of a war. Perkar believes that the war which will end will be that of his fathers people against the Mang. That may be. But it seems to me that a larger conflict rages, and neither side much cares about us save in how we might be used.
I wish you were here. An enemy lately taunted me with the possibility of your presence. It was the only thing he offered that held temptation for me. It may be that he was telling the truth about you, and in that case lam sorry, for you have been drawn into this deepening pit with us. Perhaps we will have a chance to meet again and talk, before we reach the bottom.
PART THREE
THE GODS OF SHE'LENG
XXVIII The Drum Scout
A few ravens took to the air as Ngangata led the way into the field, but most remained where they were, glutting themselves on the corpses that lay broken on the rough ground.
“Harka?” Perkar murmured.
“All dead. No one hiding in the woods. ”
Nevertheless, Perkar joined the others in scanning the far tree line. It kept his gaze from touching the hollow regard of the dead, and, in any event, survivors of the battle could not be far distant, for the ruins of two yekts still smoldered nearby.
Brother Horse and Yuu'han rode out impatiently, studying the dead and muttering to one another the names of their clans.
Two bodies belonged to no Mang clan at all. They were clad in hauberk and helms like his own folk, and from beneath their steel caps bushed hair the color of wheatstraw. Perkar sighed heavily and dismounted.
Studying their ruined faces, he felt a selfish relief in not knowing either of the men, though the bloodied embroidery on their shirts identified them as being of the Kar Herita or some closely affiliated clan.
How often had he imagined this moment, when he would first see one of his own people again? From before the start of the journey home, of course, but in the last few days his every waking moment seemed plagued by visions of this first encounter. In his dreams—sleeping and waking—it was the broken body of his father or his younger brother he found first. For once, at least, his imaginings were more painful than the reality.
“Six dead in all,” Ngangata told him, after making a circuit of the meadow.
“The rest Mang?”
“Yes.” Ngangata nodded. “Four Mang and two Cattle People.”
“This is much deeper into Mang territory than I thought my people would ever come,” Perkar muttered, kicking at a stone. “This is such poor pasture for men to fight and die over.” He glanced up at the half man. “How are Brother Horse and Yu-u'han taking this?”
The two Mang were riding over to inspect the ravaged yekts. Ngangata followed them with his gaze. “We all knew that it would come to this eventually.”
“I've tried to talk them into turning back.”
“Yes. But this war concerns them, too. They wish to see it ended as much as we.”
“What if we come upon a battle in progress, Ngangata? I won't be able to watch my people fight without helping them, and neither will they.”
“Then we must avoid any such battles.”
“How?” Perkar asked irritably, aware that Hezhi and Tsem were approaching. Tsem's eyes were watchful, darting here and there, and his massive club was cocked back on one shoulder, ready.