He neared a second small stream.
“See the yellow clover,” Binnesman said as they passed. Averan nodded. “It’s called melilot. If you roll the golden leaves between your fingers and apply them to varicose veins, you can heal them in moments. It can also relieve swelling from bruises, and can be added to a compress of lamb’s ear to stop bleeding wounds.”
The horse leapt the stream, and Binnesman said, “As for the willows, you may not want a staff made of one, but you can steep the leaves to make a tea that will cure most pains, including those of a weakened heart. I find that if you pick them at midsummer it is best. Some old women prefer to strip the bark from the willow and use it, but the plant dies.”
Averan knew about willow bark, of course. The wizard drew rein and climbed down from his mount.
He picked the leaves from a flower with purple petals on the tip, light yellow in the center. “This is heartsease,” he said. “Silly girls not much older than you use it for love potions. Personally, I think that clean hair and an inviting smile do as much good. But if you chew the fresh leaves for a few minutes, you’ll find that your mood brightens, and cares weigh less heavily on your mind.”
Averan put the leaves in her mouth. They had a pungent odor that seemed to open her chest, allow the air in easier. She chewed them thoughtfully as Binnesman remounted and rode along.
“If someone is following you, tie morning glory in a loop and cast it on the trail behind,” Binnesman said. “Your enemies will get tangled in the brush.”
For long minutes he extolled the virtues of goosegrass and feverfew, elder flowers and smallage. As he did, his horse climbed the foothills until they reached the forest. There he stopped in the shade of some alders. In the higher hills Averan could see the red leaves of maples, tan leaves of beech, the greens and blues of pine and spruce.
Averan looked out over the fields to the south. Mangan’s Rock was miles away. She cried out, “From here you can’t see the reavers at all!”
“It helps put the problem in perspective, doesn’t it?” Binnesman said. “Up close they’re monsters, towering over you with dripping fangs. But from here...the Earth swallows them.”
Averan stared off. She didn’t know what to say. The falling sun cast its slanting shadows. She could see the folds and undulations of the ground that she hadn’t noticed in the full sunlight. The air had begun to cool.
“Gaborn wants me to come to the Underworld with him. Was I wrong to say yes?”
“What does your heart tell you?” Binnesman asked.
Averan felt inside. She hadn’t noticed it, but all of her concerns, all the fears that had paralyzed her today, were suddenly gone, lifted by the heartsease. For the first time she felt as if she could really look at her problems.
“I’m not afraid. Not now.”
“Good,” Binnesman said. “You’re not a child going into the Underworld: you’re an Earth Warden. The Earth can hide you. The Earth will heal you. The Earth will make you its own. You must understand that. You’re not a child any longer. You’re a powerful wizard. And I’m coming with you, of course, as is Spring.”
“Good.” Averan felt genuinely relieved.
“But you must promise me something,” Binnesman said. “You must promise to remember what you are.”
“A wizard?” she asked.
“An Earth Warden. You are here to protect the small things of the world.”
“Yes?” She could tell by his tone that she had done something wrong.
“Don’t let Gaborn mislead you. You are not here to fight reavers—that much I can assure you.”
“I’m protecting people,” Averan objected.
“It’s only natural to want to protect your own kind,” Binnesman said. “But mankind is not your domain. You aren’t called to serve it.”
“How can you know?” Averan asked.
“Because it is my domain,” Binnesman said forcefully. “There is only one Earth Warden to a species. It is my duty to watch over and heal mankind. You—I don’t know what you’re here for.”
“You’re getting old,” Averan said. “What happens when you die? Won’t you need a replacement?” She liked the idea of carrying on in his stead.
“When the Earth no longer needs my services,” Binnesman said, “then I’ll be released. Not before.”
“I won’t take over your charge?”
“No,” Binnesman said. “When I am gone, mankind will either be saved or destroyed. But in either case, the danger will have run its course.”
Averan looked up and, despite the heartsease, his words filled her with sadness. She could not comprehend how he must feel, knowing that he bore such a weight on his shoulders.
“How can you even talk about it?” she wondered.
“If mankind is swept away,” Binnesman said with a wise nod, “I will grieve. But in time a new kind of men will arise to take their place. They may be as different from us as we are from the Toth. But life will go on.”
Binnesman stared off toward Gaborn’s army at Mangan’s Rock for a long moment. His blue eyes seemed unnaturally clear in the fading sun, and shadows filled every crease in his face.
“Now, girl, to work.”
For a long hour he schooled her. He pulled seven small white agates from his pocket, and laid them out on the ground. “I apologize that these are all I have. Such small stones are of limited use, but they may come in handy.”
He drew runes about them in the dirt, and then called forth images in the stones. At first it was simply mountain ridges as seen from the ground—blue in the distance with a dusting of snow. Averan could look uphill and see the same ridges, overhead.
But then Binnesman began to move the stones about. Each time he set a stone down, the viewpoint changed. She saw the roads that they had traveled this morning as they followed the reavers’ trail—all as if she were standing on some high escarpment, looking down. The sound of wind rushing over the hills issued from the pebbles, and she could smell the twisted pines there among the rocks.
The stones are showing me what stones see, she realized. She saw more than just roads. She saw lakes and hills, a bear running over a ridge, huffing and grunting. She saw carters driving wains south from Carris, their wheels squeaking and horses whinnying, and a long line of people fleeing that city.
Binnesman dabbled with his stones, as if searching for something in particular. At last she witnessed movement in one valley. Binnesman adjusted his stones, twisting one. The scene changed to a much closer view. She saw Skalbairn’s knights in the mountains, flushing a scarlet sorceress from the pines on a ridge. It was growing dark now. Thirty men had her surrounded, and the monster was digging in the sod, desperately trying to escape by burying herself.
Just downhill, eight blade-bearers lay dead.
“That’s what I was looking for,” Binnesman whispered. “Gaborn sent his riders to hunt for any reavers that might have escaped. It looks as if they’ve found some.”
“A throng of nines,” Averan corrected. Reavers often traveled in threes or multiples of threes. For an important mission, nine was a minimum number.
Several men charged into the trees, rode the sorceress down, lancing her from behind. Averan could not merely see the men, she could hear their shouts, the jangle of armor, the pounding of horses’ hooves, the wing beats of a startled grouse, and the rasping breath of the reaver.
When he finished, Binnesman waved his hands over the agates, and the image dissipated. He seemed thoughtful. “So, Gaborn was right. The reavers down on Mangan’s Rock were trying to divert his forces while they sent a warning.”
Averan knew that the danger was far from over. Perhaps he’d won a small round, but there were still nearly sixty thousand reavers down on Mangan’s Rock, and they would not wait for long.