“It’s choosing where the path goes,” she said.
They halted and looked at each other. Ribek shrugged.
“If Maja’s right, it doesn’t make much difference what we do, does it?” he said. “Suppose we try to turn round, whoever’s doing this can still choose where the path goes, and we’ll finish up where we would have done anyway. So we might as well push on and get it over with. If it’s a trap, it’s a trap.”
“I don’t think it’s a trap, exactly,” said Maja. “It’s just…interested in us.”
“The horses don’t seem to be bothered by it,” said Saranja. “On we go, then.”
The sun was almost on the horizon when they came to a place like any other they’d seen all afternoon, a shallow fold in the ground, the near side scrub and boulders, a dismal little stream dribbling along the bottom, and scree-strewn slope beyond. Sponge trotted ahead, tail high, ears pricked, alert and interested. He splashed through the stream, started up the slope on the other side, halted, crouched a moment, turned and slunk whimpering back. Benayu dismounted and knelt to comfort him. Sponge huddled into his arms like a frightened puppy.
Again the others looked at Maja. She shook her head.
“I didn’t feel anything,” she said. “Only—I don’t know—perhaps the ward or whatever it is is hiding something stronger now.”
“Well, there’s one way to find out,” said Ribek, dismounting.
They watched him cross the stream and start confidently up the other slope, only to stagger suddenly, as if he’d been struck by an invisible fist, duck down, covering his head with his arms, turn and rush back toward the stream. Almost at once he caught his foot on a boulder and fell sprawling but crawled frantically on.
Saranja ran to help him to his feet and bring him shuddering and sweating back to the others. They waited while the shudders died away. At length he straightened and shook himself.
“Pure nightmare,” he said. “Nothing there, no monsters, nothing like that, just—just the thing itself. Anyway, I can’t face it again, and nor can you. Looks like we’re going to have to go back after all.”
“There’s a stone in Zald, isn’t there, Benayu?” said Saranja, starting to pull the jewel out from under her blouse. “Why don’t I give it a try?”
“It’s that one there,” said Benayu. “Ready? Now, touch it with the middle finger of your left hand—no, keep it there, and circle the fingertip over it, three times to the left and then three to the right. You won’t feel anything yourself—you’ll just have to hope. I don’t know if it’s strong enough, mind you. That’s really powerful stuff making this happen, and a really powerful ward stopping us feeling it.”
“No harm in trying,” said Saranja.
They watched her cross the stream and start up the slope. About where Ribek had crumpled she slowed—not, apparently, because there was anything slowing her but out of natural caution. Nothing visible happened, but Maja sensed a surge of complex energies moving with her on up the slope. After a little while she turned and came back.
“Didn’t feel a thing,” she said. “Perhaps it’s stopped, or perhaps it just doesn’t like men. It wouldn’t be the only one.”
“It was trying to get at you,” said Maja, and explained.
“Perhaps I’d better lend you Zald,” said Saranja. “Then you could go and see if you can tell where it’s coming from.”
Inwardly Maja cringed. Even protected by Zald-im-Zald, to face what Ribek had faced! And alone!
“Wouldn’t work,” said Benayu. “Zald is yours, Saranja. Apart from the woundsain, it imprinted on you, since you almost sacrificed your life to it. I’ll see if I can get it to release the stone, and then you can go together, holding it between you. Do you think you can cope with that, Maja?”
“I’ll be all right, with Saranja there,” she muttered.
But what about Jex? “Better not start shielding me again, Jex, or perhaps the stone won’t work. It may be too much for you anyway.”
Hand in hand, the two of them crossed the stream and started up the slope. The little stone lay comfortingly against Maja’s palm. She could sense the quiet flow of magic streaming up her arm, spreading through her body and radiating out a little way beyond. There was an almost musical chiming, a complex pattern of interwoven threads of power, as they passed through some kind of magical barrier, and then the wave of terror surged round them. Innumerable talons of power clawed at their protecting aura. Answering power flowed from the stone and stood firm. With an effort Maja ignored the storm around her and concentrated on the source of the attack. There seemed to be nothing hiding it from her now.
“There,” she said, and led Saranja up and to the left.
They reached a shallow basin a few paces across, lined with almost identical round smooth stones, each about the size of a man’s head. All but one of them, halfway up the further side of the basin, seemed inert, but the whole attack flowed from that one.
Amazed at its power, Maja led Saranja toward it and pointed. Saranja gazed at it, shrugged, stooped and touched it tentatively with the fingertips of her free hand. The surface of the stone trembled, seemed to melt and flow, and became a face, both childish and ageless, soft, smooth, the color halfway between flesh and stone. The full lips parted and a narrow, tubular, dark purple tongue slid out and extended until its tip could probe into nostrils and ears, and delicately pick the sleepy-dust out of the corners of the golden eyes, and then withdrew. Without the fear-defying stone against her palm, Maja would have found the whole process too horrifying to watch.
“Yes?” whispered the sweet lips.
“Will you let us through, please?” said Saranja.
“Who are you and what is your purpose?”
“We’re Saranja and Maja Urlasdaughter. The others are Ribek Ortahlson and Benayu. I don’t know his parents’ names, but his uncle was called Fodaro. We’re on our way to Tarshu.”
“Fodaro we know of. You say ‘was.’ He is dead?”
“The Watchers killed him. They’re looking for us. We don’t want them to find us. That’s why we came this way. Will you let us through?”
“Go back a little. Watch.”
They climbed to the rim of the basin and turned. Maja clung to Saranja’s hand to steady herself against the whirlwind of magic that formed as the rocks that lined it began to flow and change shape. They became mason-hewn stone that piled itself rapidly into a building. The basin widened and filled with water, and now she was looking at a squat gray tower rising from the middle of a circular lake. The keystone of its arch was the face that had spoken to them from the boulder, carved in stone.
The doors opened and a woman stood under the arch. She was dressed in a plain brown cloak, and apart from the blue jewel suspended from her neck she looked like some farmwife who has just brought a load of produce to a country market, middle-aged, short, plump, round-faced but small-featured, smiling. She would not, Maja thought, have looked out of place in the Valley, where no magic had ever been known.
A bridge appeared at her feet and she stretched out both arms in greeting but made no move to cross it.
“Welcome, cousins,” she said. “There was a woman once called Tilja Urlasdaughter. I am her remote descendant. My name is Chanad. I will call your friends.”
Her voice was soft and level, the words very precisely spoken, as if every syllable was precious. They turned and saw Ribek and Benayu look suddenly toward them, and then start to lead the horses confidently up the slope.
They ate in a comfortable room with a steady fire glowing in the grate. Chanad carried in plates, mugs and cutlery on a tray. Maja was puzzled. Even with Saranja holding her steady she had barely withstood the swirling blasts of magic that had accompanied the appearance of Chanad’s tower and continued with increasing force as they had crossed the bridge toward it. But once in under the arch all that was gone. All she could feel was the faint background buzz that told her that outside the tower it was still there. The answer, when it came to her, was so unexpected that she blurted it out.