Even as Alamar set the empty bottle down, “Drimma!” exclaimed Aravan.
Arandor cocked an eyebrow. “Drimma? What would the Drimma do?”
“They cannot lose their feet. Once through the crossing rite and it will be with them forever.”
“Has this been done ere now?” asked the captain.
Aravan nodded. “Aye, Bekki did learn from Phais and Loric the rite during the Great War.”
The captain held up a hand. “Yet crossing the Planes requires more than just knowing the steps. One must also be at an in-between at the right time, as well as become lost in the rite.”
Aravan frowned and then said, “As for reaching the proper state of mind, I am certain the Drimma might do so whenever they celebrate Elwydd at the changing of the seasons. If so, ’tis a small matter to have them repeat that rite to go in-between.”
“I agree with my chier,” said Aylis. “The paean to Elwydd will put the Dwarves in the proper state to make the crossing.”
Alamar nodded. “My daughter is right, I think. And besides, Dwarves are the proper ones to teach.”
“I concur,” said Aravan.
“Thy meaning?” asked Arandor.
“Just this, Captain,” said Aravan. “I think we do not want Humankind learning the way to pass from Plane to Plane. As I once told Lady Faeril, look at how Humans despoil the land. Although Humankind can do little more to ruin Neddra than the Rucks and such haven’t already done, to let them loose in the High Plane, well. .”
“I understand,” said Arandor, nodding.
“This, then, I propose,” said Aravan. “If the Drimma do agree, we teach them the necessary steps, and can they get into the needed frame of mind to make the crossing, they will be the ones to ferry supplies from Mithgar to here. Besides, if this works, some might even agree to help staff the fortress, and as I have oft said and seen as well, they are mighty warriors.”
Arandor nodded. “Ah, then, Humans staff the garrison on the Mithgarian side, there in the vale north of Inge, but Drimma bear supplies across.”
“Just so,” said Aravan.
Arandor thought a moment and then said, “Kachar is the deeve of the Drimma nearest to that crossing; who is DelfLord there?”
“Borak,” said Aravan.
“Good, then,” said the captain. “I will send an emissary to DelfLord Borak.”
Aravan turned to Alamar. “Wouldst thou ask one of the Seers to go with the envoy? Together they should be able to convince Borak to agree. I mean, after all, it is a great boon we offer.”
Arandor frowned. “Great boon?”
“Why, the manner of the crossing of the Planes,” said Alamar.
“Ah, yes,” replied Arandor.
Alamar glanced at Aylis. “Now, as to a Seer to send on that mission-”
“I will go, Father,” said Aylis.
“No, daughter. I can see that you and that young sprout of a ship’s captain are eager to rejoin the Eroean and set off to who knows where. Instead, I will ask Delen to go. He’s eager to visit Mithgar.”
“As you wish, Father,” said Aylis, her gaze downcast, though she squeezed Aravan’s hand in delight.
Arandor said, “Then we are in accord: if High King Ryon and DelfLord Borak also agree, it seems we have a framework for the upkeep of the black fortress, as well as the plans to assure the ways into Mithgar and Adonar and Vadaria are warded against Spawn escaping from Neddra.”
Alamar looked at the empty bottle before him and said, “We’d drink a toast to that had we a bottle of good brandy.” Then he laughed and added, “Or even a bottle of swill.”
11
NEXUS
MID WINTER, 6E1
Asevenday later, as the dull red sun stood at the zenith-neither morning nor afternoon, but the in-between time necessary for beings to cross out from Neddra and unto Vadaria-Aravan and Aylis began the chant that would take them over to the Mageworld. They were going to collect some of Aylis’s belongings-auguring cards, a viewing bowl and dark dye, a finding needle, a small crystal globe, and other such Seer’s gear-for she and Aravan were on the first leg of their journey to Mithgar, to Merchants Crossing in Jugo, where the Elvenship Eroean was moored and her crew patiently waited for their captain to return.
As the pair emerged on the plateau in Vadaria, the clanking sounds of a hammer against a chisel against stone split the air, along with some venting of oaths. Aravan frowned and looked up and about, and on the heights cupping the flat he saw several Mages standing ward. Aylis waved up at them, and one sketched a salute while the others nodded or raised hands in greeting. Then she and Aravan moved onward. As they rounded the shoulder of the bluff hemming in the table, they saw the reason for the cursing: by pulley and rope, Mages were hoisting a large block of stone up to a scaffold above. Down below, others worked with hammers and chisels, dressing the next block. Still others led horses drawing wains up the slopes below, and bringing more stone to the site. Magekind was at work building a tower, a bastion to ward the in-between.
Aravan glanced up at the barely begun fortification and laughed. “I thought I would see stones floating free through the air to be precisely maneuvered into place. But instead I see high-rising platforms and ropes and pulleys and mortar-filled hods and trowels and hammers and chisels and sweating and straining people.”
Aylis grinned and said, “It would take much ‹fire› to erect it by castings. The loss would not justify the gain.”
Aravan frowned and said, “Methinks ye Mages should have asked the Drimma to build the tower.”
Aylis turned up a hand, a rueful grin on her face. “You are right, Chier. I ween none thought of it.”
“ ’Tis all the more reason for Durek’s line to learn to go in-between.”
Aylis looked at Aravan and said, “I suppose across the nexus from Neddra to Adonar whatever fortification is being raised there also is not being built by Dwarves.”
Aravan chuckled and shook his head. “I suspect that none thought of asking the Drimma to erect that bastion, either.”
Aylis then said, “Let us suggest to whoever is in charge here that he ask the Dwarves to come.”
As they started across the slope, Aravan smiled and said, “Knowing the Drimma, they will tear down whatever they find as being shoddy and start from the bedrock below and make the structure Drim-solid to the very top.”
Aylis and Aravan spent the next two fortnights in her cottage, talking, making love, laughing, making love, cooking, making love, sleeping, making love, making plans, and making love. It was as if they were, in part, trying to make up for the many millennia they were separated-from the destruction of Rwn to the time when Aravan and Bair crossed into Vadaria right after recovering the Silver Sword, a total of seventy-two hundred and twenty-nine years.
On the day before departing Vadaria, Aravan and Aylis sat at the table out in the open air. Aravan gazed at the scintillant glitter of the stream tumbling past and said, “ ’Tis an altogether impossible task.”
Aylis looked at her black-haired lover and asked, “Impossible task?”
“Trying to catch up to what we missed.”
Aylis smiled. “As the old adage goes: you can never catch up and get even, and certainly not ever get ahead. Still, I enjoy every moment we strive to do so.” Even as she said it, Aylis blushed furiously.
Aravan laughed and looked at her, a gleam in his eye, and then he stood and offered her his hand and asked, “Shall we, my demure maiden, put that eld saying to another test?”
At the end of those two fortnights, Aylis took up her small bundle and Aravan took up his spear, and as the bright moon of Vadaria stood at the zenith-an in-between time, neither yesterday nor tomorrow, yet the easiest time to make the crossing-the pair canted the chant and paced the steps, and within moments they stood beneath the black moon of Neddra, sailing above through the dark broken clouds.