"I think we have not yet found all that we require." Magnus clasped his brother round the shoulder—and helped hold him up. "I, too, am worn not only with marching, but also with striving to understand."
"Riddle-me-ree, riddle-me-rune!" Cordelia sighed. "And I am wearied with seeking to riddle it out."
" 'Tis the bizarre folk we've seen, in a bazaar of sound," Magnus protested.
"And with a rack of bizarre behaviors." Geoffrey shook his head. "I ken it not."
Gregory plodded ahead, fighting to keep his eyes open. "Wherefore doth the music change so oft? Is not one form enough?"
"Or doth it truly change?" Magnus countered. " 'Tis not so great a transformation, when all's said and done. Is it truly so, or is it only as we hear it?"
"Oh, be done!" Geoffrey said, exasperated. "Dost thou say all life's but a dream?"
"Nay, then, do not wake me!" Cordelia stopped, gazing ahead. "For yonder lies a web of gossamer that no daylight mortal could sustain!"
The river widened into a small lake, overhung by willows. The rest of the forest drew back, leaving a little meadow between the bank and the forest, and the current slowed, leaving room for a great abundance of water plants. The evening mist blended outlines, and the gathering dusk made the landscape indeed appear to be something out of a dream.
"Let us rest now, I prithee." Cordelia sank into the soft meadow grass.
"Yes—this location would be appropriate," Fess said. "Boys, gather wood."
"Aye—directly, Fess." But Gregory was near to collapse, leaning back against Big Brother's knee.
"He is done," Magnus said gently.
"Nay!" Gregory struggled back upright, forcing himself to stay awake. "I am as able as any!" He looked up at the lake. "What are these flowers, Fess?"
"Some are water lilies, Gregory, but most are lotuses."
"Lotuses?" Magnus repeated. "I have ne'er seen their like before."
"We have never been so far to the west, brother, either," Cordelia reminded.
Magnus felt a weight against his leg, and looked down to see that Gregory had succumbed to sleepiness after all. He stretched his little brother out in the soft grass, with a smile of gentle amusement. "I shall gather wood, Fess. Sister, do thou…" He stopped, seeing Cordelia's lifted head. "What do you see?"
"Naught," she said, "yet I do hear yet another sort of music."
Magnus cocked his head, listening. After a few minutes, he said, "I can make out some hint of it."
"And I." Geoffrey wrinkled his nose. "Wherefore must it ever transform?"
"I too hear it," Fess said, and of course that decided the issue.
Around the curve of the river, lights came into view, seeming to float on the water. One single light drifted up higher.
"What manner of thing is this?" Cordelia wondered.
As the music came closer, they could see that the lights were campfires, with young people grouped around them, talking and laughing—and growing more intimate. Cordelia gaped in surprise, then glanced anxiously at her little brother, but he was sound asleep.
"How now!" Geoffrey said in wonder. "Do they float upon the water?"
"No, Geoffrey," Fess assured him, "they have rafts."
And rafts there were, a half-dozen or more, each with a handful of young men and women. Above each raft, a single lantern hung on a pole.
"How can they have fires on rafts without burning the logs?" Cordelia wondered.
"Mayhap they brought hearthstones," Geoffrey suggested.
One of the rafts bumped the shore near them, and a soft voice called, "Wherefore dost thou stay lonely?"
"Join us!" invited a bulky young man, beckoning to them with a smile. "Pass a happy hour, and…"
"Join us!" called a young woman's voice. "Leave thy cares to glower, and…"
"Join us!" called a dark-haired young beauty. "In our river bower, and…"
"Join us!" they called all together.
"I misdoubt me…" Magnus began, but Cordelia had no hesitation. "Up, sleepyhead!" She nudged Gregory awake. "Here are they who will spare us a long day's march on the morrow!"
"Nay," Geoffrey protested, "for we know not their intentions…"
But Cordelia had already set foot on the raft, and what could he do but follow?
"I beg you, young friends, do not!" Fess's voice said inside their heads. "You must not put yourself at the mercy of people who may be your enemies!"
"Pooh! An we cannot defend ourselves against the likes of these, we are poor fighters indeed," Geoffrey said scornfully. "And if all else fails, we may fly."
Magnus stepped onto the raft. "Come, brother. If there's a trap of some sort, each of us must clasp our sister by an arm and loft her high." He turned to swing Gregory aboard.
"I shall parallel your course on the riverbank," Fess assured them. "Be careful."
"We shall," Magnus subvocalized.
A wiry young man pushed with a pole, and the raft floated out into the stream.
"Come, sit by me!" A handsome young man stretched out a hand toward Cordelia. "I am Johann, and there's room a-plenty 'gainst my pillow of fragrant boughs. Come nestle with me in idle dalliance!"
"I thank thee." Cordelia sat primly, tucking her skirt about her shoes. "I've need of rest."
Johann smiled, accepting the implied refusal with equanimity. "You do seem wearied."
"Aye," Cordelia admitted, "for we have come far, and have seen much."
"And heard much," Geoffrey added. "A cacophony of sound, and seen strange ways a-plenty."
"Tis horribly confusing," Gregory sighed, "and most dreadfully ravelled."
"Then let it be." The dark-haired girl smiled up at Magnus. "I am Wenna. Unknit thy brow, and rest with me." She leaned back, hands behind her head, stretching.
Magnus's breath hissed in, his gaze fast upon her, and Geoffrey stared, spellbound.
Cordelia looked up, frowning at the sound, but Johann asked, "Is't so great a coil, then, that doth confound thee?"
"Aye." She turned back, relieved at being able to speak of it to a stranger. "We have found stones that make music, and in following them we have found strange creatures and seen folk who behave in senseless fashions. 'Tis a web proof 'gainst all unravelling."
"Ravelled indeed," said the girl behind Johann. "What confusion it is, seeking to discover why mothers and fathers do as they do, not to us alone, but to one another also."
Johann nodded. " 'Tis even as Yhrene saith."
"Aye," the wiry young man agreed. "Wherefore do they kneel to the priest, and bow to the knight? There is no sense in it."
"None, Alno," Yhrene agreed.
But Gregory objected. "They kneel to Our Lord, not to the priest! And the knight's of a higher station than they."
"Even so," a lumpish young man growled, nodding. "It all seemed so simple, when I was ten. But when I came to the brink of manhood, and did begin to act as I thought a man should, I was rebuked. When I protested that I did but as they had bade me, they told me that they had not meant it that way."
"Aye, Orin, I know the way of it," Johann said, with sympathy. "Long and long did I seek, till at last I riddled it out."
"Thou hast?" Gregory roused up, suddenly no longer at all sleepy. "How didst thou make sense of it?"
"Why, by seeing that there was no need to," Johann returned, with a beatific smile. "This was my great insight. "
Alno nodded. "And mine."
"And mine," Yhrene said, "and all of ours. What great peace it brought us!"
"What?" Gregory asked, incredulously. "Did all of you see the same answer at the same moment?"
"And all the same idea," Geoffrey murmured.
"We did, in truth." Johann smiled, quite pleased with himself. "Of a sudden, we saw there was no need to puzzle it out—only to embark upon the flood, and be happy."
"We needed but to build rafts," said Orin, "and take ourselves aboard—ourselves, and the stones that made our music."