Swan grumbled, "You need to make up your mind, darling. You want me to look out for the Radisha or—"
"Never mind. I don't have time. I'm cold and I'm cranky and I want to change that. Look at this crack. Is this the way it was before? Because even though it's pretty impressive, it's nowhere as huge as Murgen made me think it would be. Everybody but Iqbal's baby can skip across this."
Swan studied the gap in the plain.
Immediately evident to any eye was the fact that there were no sharp edges. The stone seemed to have softened and oozed like taffy.
"No. It wasn't like this at all. It looks like it's been healing, it's not a quarter as wide as it was. I bet in another generation there won't even be a scar."
"So the plain can heal itself. But not so things that were added later." I indicated the fortress. "Except for the spells protecting the roads."
"Apparently."
"Start moving across. Swan, stick with Tobo and Gota. Nobody else has any idea where to go from here. There you are," I answered an impatient caw! from above. If I kind of squinted and looked sideways, I could make out the white crow perphed on the battlements, looking down.
Still muttering to himself, though somewhat good naturedly, Swan stepped across the crack, slipped, fell, skidded, got up exercising a string of out-of-shape northern expletives. Everyone else laughed.
I summoned Runmust and Riverwalker. "I want you two to figure out how to get the animals and carts across. Draft Suvrin if you want. He claims he's had some minor experience in practical engineering. And keep reminding everyone that if they remain calm and cooperative, we'll all get to sleep in a warm, dry place tonight." Well, maybe dry. Warm was probably too much to expect.
Uncle Doj and Tobo helped Mother Gota across. Sahra followed. Several other Nyueng Bao followed her. That made an awful lot of Nyueng Bao concentrated in one place suddenly. My paranoia began to quiver and narrow its eyes suspiciously.
I said, "Goblin. One-Eye. Come along. Slink? Where are you? Come with us." Slink I could count on to be quick and deadly and as morally reluctant as a spear when I pointed and said, "Kill!"
Uncle Doj did not fail to note the fact that even now I trusted him only incompletely. He seemed both irked and amused. He told me, "There isn't anything for our people here, Annalist. This is all for Tobo's benefit."
"That's good. That's good. I wouldn't want the future of the Company to be placed in the slightest risk."
Doj frowned, disappointed by my sarcasm. "I have not won your heart yet, Stone Soldier?"
"How could you? You keep calling me names and won't even explain."
"All will become clear. I fear."
"Of course. Once we reach the Land of Unknown Shadows. Right? You'd better hope there aren't any half-truths or outright cover-ups in your doctrine. ‘All Evil Dies There an Endless Death.' It could still be true."
Doj responded with a baleful look but it seemed neither angry nor calculating.
I said, "Swan. Show us the way."
81
I think this's as far as I can take you," Swan told me. He spoke slowly, as though having trouble sorting out his thoughts. "I don't get it. Stuff keeps going away. I know I was farther inside than this. I know all the things we did. But when I try to remember anything specific, I lose everything between the time I got to this point until sometime during the gallop back. Stuff comes to me all the time when I'm not trying. I do remember that. Maybe Catcher messed up my brain somehow."
"There's an all-time understatement," Goblin muttered.
Swan ignored Goblin. He complained, "We were actually off the plain before I realized that we were the only ones who would be coming out."
I was not sure I believed that but it did not matter now. I grunted, suggested, "How about you make a guess? Maybe your soul will remember what your brain can't."
"First you need to get some light in here."
"What do I have wizards for?" I asked the gloom. "Certainly not anything useful or practical like providing a light. They wouldn't need one. They can see in the dark."
Goblin muttered something unflattering about the sort of woman who indulges in sarcasm. He told Swan, "Sit down and let me look at your head."
"Let me!" Tobo enthused at the same time. "Let me try to make a light. I can do this one." He did not wait for permission. Filaments of lemon and silver light crawled over his upraised hands, swift and eager. The darkness surrounding us retreated, I thought reluctantly.
"Wow!" I said. "Look at him."
"He has the strength and enthusiasm of youth," One-Eye conceded. I glanced back. He was still astride the black stallion, wearing a smug look but obviously exhausted. The white crow was perched in front of him. It studied Tobo with one eye while considering our surroundings with the other. It seemed amused. Then One-Eye began to chuckle.
Tobo squealed in surprise. "Wait! Stop! Goblin! What's happening?"
The worms of light were snaking up his arms. They would not respond to his insistence that they desist. He started slapping himself. One-Eye and Goblin began to laugh.
Meantime, the two of them had done something to Swan to clarify his mind. The man looked like he had just sucked down a tall, frosty mug of self-confident recollection.
Sahra saw nothing funny in Tobo's situation. She screamed at the wizards to do something. She was almost incoherent. Which betrayed how much stress she inflicted upon herself.
Doj told her, "He isn't in any danger, Sahra. He just let himself get distracted. It happens. It's part of learning," or words to that effect, several times, before Sahra calmed down and began to look defiant and sheepish at the same time.
Goblin told Tobo, "I'll take it till you get your concentration back." And in a moment there was light enough to see the walls of the huge chamber. Someone who is skilled at something always makes it look easy. The little bald wizard was no exception. He told One-Eye, "Help Swan keep his head clear."
I thought the place looked like a nice change from sleeping out in the weather. I wished there was fuel we could burn to heat it.
"Whither now?" I asked Swan. For some time I had been silently regretting not having caught Murgen while I was dreaming so I could have gotten reliable directions.
The white crow squawked and launched itself, leaving One-Eye cursing because it had swatted him in the face with its wings.
I was starting to understand the beast. "Somebody see where it goes. One of you sorcerer geniuses want to send a light with it?" Tobo had received control of his light again and had it working in good form but it took all his attention to manage it. I hoped he outgrew this more-confidence-than-sense stage before he took a really big bite of disaster.
Uncle Doj trailed the crow at a dignified pace. I supposed I ought to contribute something more than executive decisions, so I followed him. A ball of leprous green light from behind overtook me and made a nest in my tangled hair. My scalp began to itch. I had a suspicion One-Eye might be sneering at my personal hygiene, which, I confess, sometimes became the victim of a negligent attitude. Sort of. "This'll teach me to take my darn helmet off," I grumbled. I refused to allow him to flash me his smug, toothless grin by not looking back.
I had not been wearing an actual helmet. God save me, that would have been cold. I had been wearing a leather helmet liner, which had kept my ears from getting frostbitten. Barely. Winter. It was one of those things the planning team had not foreseen.
I hurried past Doj, who was startled when he saw my hair. Then he grinned as big as ever I had seen him do. I tossed him a bloodthirsty scowl. Unfortunately, to do so I had to turn around far enough to see One-Eye and Goblin suddenly stop exchanging handslaps and snickers. Even Sahra turned slightly sideways to conceal her amusement. All right. So suddenly I am the clown princess of the Company, eh? We would see. Those two would...