Caliphestros nodded in grateful relief. “I shall be pleased to—as we work. But work we must, and quickly. As it is, we shall not have time to so arm all of your warriors — Yantek Ashkatar must choose his very best troops, and even at that, it will be a close-run affair.”
The foragers and Caliphestros began to rise, Keera helping the old man to remove his walking equipment, so that he was able pull himself onto the white panther’s powerful shoulders as she dipped her neck to receive him.
“It seems to me,” the Priestess of the Moon declared, “that we are being asked to put faith that would better suit a god than a man in ‘Lord’ Caliphestros.”
Veloc bravely stepped forward, a trace of uncertainty nonetheless present in his words. “We ask you only to believe the words of a man who has made as much of a study of these matters as you have all made of the power and workings of the Moon.” There was no member of the Groba who was able to protest to this, and Veloc was encouraged to press on: “And now, I would ask your most honored and revered persons to allow us to withdraw and to host Lord Caliphestros at our family’s home. Keera has had but a few minutes’ reunion with her children, and my lord Caliphestros has had a most arduous journey to Okot—”
“A fact to which I can attest,” Yantek Ashkatar said, nodding certainly. “The journey of Keera’s party has been an arduous one, indeed — why, even Heldo-Bah—”
But Ashkatar was interrupted, and further explanation was made unnecessary, when the loud sound of Heldo-Bah’s snoring came from the direction of the hearth of the enormous cavity that was the Den of Stone’s fireplace. The moment might have been cause for still more argument and insult, and the Priestess of the Moon looked ready for both; but the Groba Father quickly stepped in to offer Veloc a moment to go and kick his friend awake, and to let the troublesome forager gather himself for departure, as the man who occupied the chair surmounted by Moon horns inquired:
“Are you certain there are no more splendid quarters we can offer you, Lord Caliphestros? Keera and Veloc come from good, honest stock, who were generous enough even to have taken so troubling a boy as Heldo-Bah into their home, for many years; yet they are humble people, as is their home, and we can certainly arrange—”
“It shall not seem humble, to me, Father,” Caliphestros replied. “For it has been ten years since I knew such surroundings, and longer still since I knew such company. Besides, Stasi and I will sleep out of doors, as is our custom during these months, and therefore we shall not frighten the children too much, nor keep the others awake with the strange hours we keep.” He glanced at Keera quickly. “Better Stasi feel safe among such a family than that she feel excessively honored. And I might say the same for myself—”
At which Heldo-Bah’s tired voice growled, “I am awake, damn you, Veloc, and ready to leave this place, I assure you — so stop kicking me!”
“Perhaps a quick departure for a night’s rest, Father,” Keera suggested, “would be best after all.”
“As you say, as you say,” the Father replied, with a wave of his hand.
As the party turned to go, Caliphestros paused to mention only one thing more to the Priestess of the Moon: “And, Priestess, such remove from the great activity of the center of Okot will give me further chance to consider a problem with which, I believe, yourself, the Fathers, and all of the Lunar Sisterhood have been struggling.”
“Oh?” the Priestess said doubtfully. “And what might that be?”
Caliphestros paused, studying this remarkably prideful young woman, and determining that had he, like Veloc, been summoned to her bed, he, too, would certainly have refused. “You have, unless I am mistaken, been casting the runes in connection with this crisis.”
The Priestess scoffed. “There is no great revelation in that — it is our way to cast the runes, to assist in any troubles that face our people.”
“Indeed,” Caliphestros replied carelessly, turning Stasi toward the exit to the Den. “Then perhaps I am wrong — perhaps you have determined just what ‘the Riddle of Water, Fire, and Stone’ is, and are aware of how its solution may very soon aid in the struggle against Broken.”
For the last time during this audience, the faces of all at the Groba table reflected utter confusion. “How—?” the Priestess managed to express in alarm; and then the Father asked, in a more coherent expression of concern:
“My Lord Caliphestros — how can you know of the Riddle of Water, Fire, and Stone? And what can you tell us of its meaning and use?”
“Little more than you yourselves can — just yet,” Caliphestros called over his shoulder, raising a hand as he departed. “But it is good to know that we are all indeed concerned with the same problems, is it not?” Caliphestros and Stasi, without any encouragement, continued on their way out of the Den, seeming weary with the place. “I bid you good night. Tomorrow begins our great work, and we must be rested and ready …”
Keera and Veloc turned to issue more formal and acceptable words of departure to the Groba, while Heldo-Bah, like Stasi herself, simply wandered toward the long stone hallway that led out of the Den, scratching at his head and various other parts of his body.
“If you do not mind, Lord Caliphestros,” he could be heard to say in the stone hallway, “I shall sleep with you and your friend under the trees and stars, tonight. They are good people, Keera and Veloc’s family, but I would rather be in the place that suits me best, and worries me least …”
“And you are welcome, Heldo-Bah,” Caliphestros answered, his voice now fading altogether. “But do not keep Stasi awake with your snoring, for it is one of many human sounds she detests …”
Back in the Den of Stone, the Groba Father looked up and down the great table at his fellows. “Well — what say we: sorcery or science?” Then he gazed at the stone hall once more, as he answered his own question with another: “Or does it really matter at all, when we consider the forces that are even now bearing down upon our people …?”
And to that query, not even the Priestess of the Moon had an answer.
3:{v:}
Upon the mountains south of Okot, Caliphestros and his surprising new
order of acolytes create an inferno as fearsome as Muspelheim;
while Keera, for the first time, begins to wonder if the old man’s passion
holds danger for her people …
The three Bane foragers had long since learned that both Caliphestros and Stasi had the capacity to almost instantly distinguish between persons of quality and compassion and those more common humans, ungenerous and cruel in nature. And among the most reliable and generous of people to be found in Okot (or anywhere else) were certainly Keera’s family — not only her own and Veloc’s parents, Selke and Egenrich, but the tracker’s children: the still-recovering boys, Herwin and Baza, as well as the storm of energy, curiosity, and youthful wisdom that was the youngest, Effi, so like her mother in many ways, although more circumspect, and now having been exposed to the kind of tragedy and sadness, brief but scarring, that teaches wise children not to be bitter or selfish.
The morning after Caliphestros, Stasi, and Heldo-Bah slept outside the welcoming family’s home, Keera followed Caliphestros’s instruction to assemble every miner, ironmonger, and smith that lived in the central and outlying settlements of Okot so that they could listen to the requirements of a plan that, in a matter of days, would so arm the central corps of Yantek Ashkatar’s troops that they could hope not only to defeat even the soldiers of Broken, but to do so at a point far north of Okot, thus keeping the exact location of the long-hidden community safe.