Maldred thrust his fingers in his ears and stumbled to the canyon wall, leaning against it and drawing breath deep into his lungs. He concentrated on his heart, feeling it beating. He desperately searched for the spark within him.
“It’s too loud,” he told himself. “Can’t…”
Dhamon was lost to the voices. Riki, Varek, and Ragh had dropped out of sight—lost to the screams, too. Maldred watched as Dhamon shuffled toward the muddy river.
“Stay with us forever,” Maldred faintly heard through the wails. “Breathe the river. Stay with us forever.”
“No!” Maldred shouted. He threw all his effort into finding the spark, coaxing it to glow. “So hard,” he muttered. “Can’t think.” Somehow he managed, his mind wrapping around the magical essence inside him, blowing on it as a man would blow on a small flame, pleading with it, willing it to grow.
“Must think.”
Maldred felt the warmth and focused on it, shoving the screaming to the back of his mind. He thrust his hands at the canyon wall and felt the energy rise from his chest and into his arms, pass down and into his fingers and into the wall. The canyon wall rumbled, and the vibrations increased in the stony ground.
“Stop!” Maldred bellowed. He heard the word above the wails, felt his energy pound into the canyon wall. Cracks appeared around his fingers. He concentrated and forced more energy into the stone. The cracks widened. “Stop! Or I will slay all of you!”
Instantly the wails ceased. The only sound was Maldred’s labored breathing and the soft whistling of the wind that whipped across the walls.
“Stop, and allow us to pass.”
“What?” Dhamon shook his head, mud flying from his hair. “Madness.” He stared across the river to see the faces. All of them now had their mouths closed. Their eyes, narrowed in anger, were dark crevices.
“Not madness,” Maldred gasped. “You’re not mad, Dhamon. They are.”
Dhamon shuffled next to Maldred. The big man’s fingers were dug into the stone, and hairline cracks sprouted around them. Dhamon looked up. There were more faces on this side, above him.
“Galeb duhr,” Maldred said. “Creatures of stone, as old as Krynn perhaps. They predate the Cataclysm for certain. They’re the mad ones.”
“They tried to lure me into the river.”
Maldred nodded. “Maybe they did the same to Riki and the others. Go back. See to them, I’ll follow shortly.”
Dhamon didn’t hesitate, turning back to look. His head was still muddled, pounding, his ears ringing with the remembered sound of the screams. The canyon curved, and he hurried as fast as he could along the wall, finding the others at the edge of the muddy river. Varek was in it up to his waist. Rikali was shaking her head, mud flying from her hair, and tugging at Varek. The sivak leaned forward, clawed hands on its knees, great shoulders hunched, head bent into its chest.
“Move!” Dhamon bellowed as he neared. The word sounded like a whisper. He gestured to the far end of the cavern, where he saw an opening.
“Follow him,” Ragh gasped. The sivak saw the opening, too, a narrow gap next to a near vertical spire, and followed Dhamon, heavy feet pounding across the stone floor of the Screaming Valley.
* * * * *
It was nearly sunset by the time they found a stream. All of them sank down next to it and cleaned the muck from their aching bodies.
They hadn’t talked much since emerging from the valley, mostly because they had a hard time hearing anything. Their ears were still ringing.
“I threatened to bring the valley down,” Maldred told Dhamon later that night, “threatened to kill them all. I couldn’t have done it, of course.”
“They didn’t know that,” Dhamon supplied.
Maldred nodded. “Fortunately for me they were mad.” After a moment, he added: “Pity. Galeb duhr are impressive creatures, and most of them are reasonably benevolent.”
“If they’re as ancient as you say, my friend, perhaps living through the Cataclysm drove them mad.”
Maldred leaned back on his elbows.
“Maybe we’re mad, too, after all,” Dhamon continued. “Slogging through mud rivers to look for long-buried treasure. Me thinking there’s a cure for my scales.”
“The treasure and the cure exist,” Maldred said. He lay on his back and was instantly asleep.
Chapter Fifteen
Broken Nests
Morning found them on a sloping field where sheep and a handful of young goats were grazing. Varek pointed to a far rise where a small farmhouse and a precariously tilting old barn sat.
“We’re close,” Maldred said. “Very close now. The pirate treasure is somewhere beneath us.”
“For all the good it’ll do us,” Varek grumbled. “We’ve got no shovels, and I dare say borrowing some from that farm would be a bad idea.”
“We won’t need shovels,” Maldred replied. For the rest of the day he lay on his stomach in various areas of the pasture, fingers dug into the earth, jaw working, occasionally humming. Varek hovered nearby, sometimes fascinated, most of the time bored.
“Beastie, why haven’t you run off?” Rikali had settled herself on the ground, an arm’s length from the draconian. “I know you can’t up and fly away, but you’ve had chances—ain’t none of us been watchin’ you close. Dhamon ain’t even here now.”
The creature let out a deep breath, hissing like a snake.
“Beastie?”
“My name is Ragh.” The whispery voice sent a shiver down the half-elf’s spine. “Perhaps I’ve nothing better to do. Perhaps I simply find your little band… interesting.”
The half-elf raised an eyebrow. “Or perhaps you want some of the pirate loot. And that ain’t gonna happen.”
The sivak closed his eyes. “Coins and baubles mean nothing to me.”
“Then what? What…?” The half-elf’s eyes widened as she leaned closer. “Beastie… Ragh… are you here ’cause you think you owe us some kind of debt? ’Cause we rescued you from that village?”
The sivak glanced at her, then looked away.
“An honorable draconian?” she pressed. “That’s it, isn’t it? Well, don’t you worry. I’ll keep your little secret. Everyone’s got a secret, don’t they?”
* * * * *
Dhamon made himself scarce, using the excuse he was scouting the area to make sure there were no Legion of Steel Knights around. He knew there was nothing he could do to help Maldred, as the big man was using magic, and magic took its own time. He used the time to run. His strides were long and easy, and he concentrated on his pacing and speed. The exercise kept his mind off everything but the act of motion. At times he would study the landscape in front of him, then close his eyes and run blindly from memory, letting the air wash over his face. When he opened his eyes he would pick up the tempo, feet pounding against the earth, legs pumping until he couldn’t go any faster. He kept the pace up for some time, feeling his heart thundering wildly in his chest and sweat beading on his skin, then reluctantly slowed to a quick walk, dragging great gulps of air into his lungs before starting to run again. The exertion felt good, and rather than tire him, it seemed to give him more energy.
He covered considerable ground, noting the remains of a tiny village that had been beset by fire long months ago and a single standing farmhouse with a large field. The far quarter of the field was filled with corn and showed some evidence of being harvested. He saw thin, twisting roads in the distance, which he suspected led to a few of the small towns he’d noted on the map, and he saw great expanses of grass, dead from the lack of rain.
Wild animals were few in the open. He spooked a grazing deer, and a dog spotted him at the end of a small ravine and gave a merry chase, but it had no hope of catching him. At the edge of a large pond, he spied wolf tracks, but they were not particularly fresh. He stared at his reflection in the water.