“Hai, calmly, good beast, calmly,” I suddenly heard from over near the seetarr, Dallan’s voice struggling to be soothing. The pack animal he was working on had rumbled warningly with a good deal of anger, and even l’lendaa walked carefully in the presence of an angry seetar. I headed over there to see what was going on, but was stopped before I could reach Dallan.
“Come no closer, wenda,” he warned me, giving the angry seetar all his attention, but nevertheless knowing I was there. “I have not the faintest notion what ails this beast, therefore are you to remain well away from him.”
“I have no need to approach the nearer,” I told Dallan, having stopped beside the barbarian’s giant black mount to put a hand to his sleek neck while he nuzzled at my hair. “The seetar is in discomfort from the last pack strap tightened, and wishes to be eased. I will soothe him, and then you may adjust the strap.”
I touched the angry animal with my mind, letting him feel more clearly the concern being put out by the man holding his lead so carefully, and he seemed to calm down almost immediately. His previous anger began puzzling him then, knowing as he did that the man he served would have adjusted the strap at the least sign of discomfort on his part, just as he had already done any number of times before. Dallan hesitated very briefly, his mind almost as puzzled as the seetar’s, then he immediately fixed the strap while the beast stood quietly and allowed it. As soon as that was done, he left the seetar to stop in front of me.
“What occurs here?” he demanded, dubiously eyeing the way the head of Tammad’s mount rose above mine with a soft rumble of warning meant to tell him to watch himself. “That seetar is one I have used as a pack beast ever since it was fully grown. For what reason would it come so near to being enraged with me, and for what reason does Tammad’s beast believe I would mean you harm? Why are the seetarr suddenly so strange?”
“The seetarr are not alone in being strange,” I said, automatically calming the big black standing over me as first Cinnan and then Tammad came to join our discussion. They’d seen what went on and had heard Dallan’s question, and were wearing frowns almost identical to his.
“What disturbs you, hama?” Tammad asked, looking down at me with real concern. “I am able to feel your disturbance, yet cannot make out the nature of it.”
“What disturbs me is that the depression I struggled beneath all of yesterday has again returned,” I told him, putting one hand to my head. “That there is no reason for such a feeling is more disturbing still, and I find myself growing angered at the same time. Perhaps what I feel is in some manner being passed to the seetarr.”
“That may perhaps be so,” he mused, looking down at me thoughtfully. “Shield your mind completely, so that we may see what, if any, results there are.”
“An excellent thought,” I said at once, and as soon as the decision was made my shield was there, cutting me off from the minds around me. Immediately, all six of the seetarr seemed to settle down, that indefinable air of tension draining away like water in dry sand. The big black standing over me like a giant guardsman sighed and lowered his head, then snorted a greeting to the man who usually meant so much to him. Immediately, the depression and anger I’d been feeling began easing off, obviously about to disappear altogether. I looked up at the barbarian ruefully, feeling like an idiot for not having thought of that myself, but there was no accusation in the grin he showed me, only a sort of wryness.
“It seems I am no longer the possessor of the facility with wendaa which once was mine,” he said, putting a gentle hand to my face. “Was this not so, your disturbance would have long since been replaced with pleasure.”
“Your clumsiness and ineptitude in the furs are well known among all wendaa who have been used by you,” I agreed soberly, remembering how wild he had gotten me the night before. “The fact remains, however, that with my shield in place, I am as undisturbed as the seetarr. It would please me to know what occurs here.”
“You, too, are no longer disturbed?” Dallan asked, rescuing me from the look I was getting from Tammad over my jocular reference to his abilities. “Then the seetarr were indeed unsettled through your mind. For what reason was your mind so unsettled?”
“I know not,” I told him honestly, then thought of one possibility. “Perhaps my misgivings over this journey have now magnified to the point of affecting me and those around me without my being aware of it. I certainly continue to feel them strongly enough.”
“Despite my assurances that your fears are unfounded?” Tammad asked, his expression its usual calm, but his eyes faintly annoyed. “Perhaps you had cause to feel so before we spoke, yet now . . . . ”
“The woman feared to accompany us?” Cinnan interrupted, his expression disturbed. “Had I known this when I requested her presence, Tammad, I would willingly have withdrawn the request. There was little need to . . .”
“Fears must be faced if they are to be conquered, Cinnan,” the barbarian interrupted in turn, trying to soothe the other man. “The wenda is now as well aware of this as we, and also must it be remembered that we may require her assistance in locating Aesnil. She does not accompany us on a whim. ”
“This entire matter continues to seem strange,” Dallan said, staring at the barely rising sun without seeing it. “Of what did the woman’s fears consist?”
“She feared that if she accompanied us there would be difficulty for us to face,” the barbarian answered, now definitely annoyed. “Likely the thought of a dark-haired, green-eyed wenda being taken among so many strange l’lendaa with none save three beside her disturbed her, yet is she no more than vaguely aware of the skill possessed by the three she so easily dismisses. Are you also of the opinion that there will be those who are able to take her from my side?”
“Certainly not,” Dallan said with a snort and a gesture of dismissal; then he moved his eyes back to me. “Is this the sole content of your fears, Terril? That there will be difficulty brought about by your presence?”
“Indeed, yet not for the proposed reason,” I said, sending the barbarian a glance filled with my own annoyance. “Had I remained behind the difficulty would not have touched youyet would you also not have found Aesnil. Damn!”
The last word, spoken in Centran, startled them all, but I was too furiously frustrated to care. I hadn’t known I was going to say that about Aesnil until the words were out, but now that I’d said it I could feel the truth of it. If I didn’t go they’d never find Aesnil, and that despite the fact that I’d never had any intention of helping them. If I kept getting these flashes of bits and pieces it would eventually drive me crazy-even if I survived whatever was ahead of me. I hugged the furs I was holding with a strength fierce enough to strangle whatever was doing that to me, then became aware of the stares from three pairs of eyes.
“And what leads you to believe, wenda, that my Aesnil will never be found should you not accompany us?” Cinnan asked, looking at me oddly. “She is Chama of Grelana, and well aware of the position. Do you believe she would forsake her people—and the man whose bands she wears-forever?”
“I-feel that she would eventually return, yet not in a manner you would wish,” I said, groping for the right words. “I do not mean to upset you, Cinnan, yet what comes to me comes by itself, at its own pace and in its own time. I know of it in the same manner I know that Aesnil rides to Vediaster, yet beyond that?”
My shrug really annoyed him, his expression making me glad that my shield was tightly closed, but there was nothing any of us could do to change things. All three of the men were dissatisfied with what I’d said, and that made four of us. Standing around discussing it any more would have been a waste of time, though, so we quickly broke camp and moved on.