CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Akhrasut Neth The belkagen led the way, threading a winding path up Akhrasut Neth through ravines filled with thousands of years of shattered stone and sand. Low trees with thick, twisted roots clung to the rocks, and even this late in the year their small, waxy leaves were thick and vibrant. Amira followed the belkagen, staying close, for neither of them carried a torch, and with the canopy of cloud hiding the moon and stars, the night was dark. She knew Lendri and Gyaidun were following-the big man carrying the deer-but she heard them more than she saw them. In the almost total darkness, her surroundings were little more than varying shades of murk. She stumbled several times and would have fallen once had she not had her staff to steady her.
She cursed herself, knowing what a terrible racket she was making, though the others moved with little more noise than the breeze through the brush. Amira knew elves could see like owls in the dark, and even Gyaidun seemed to be having little trouble. Now and then she heard others following as well-the turning of a stone, gravel sliding under stealthy feet, a branch sliding over a passing body-but she never saw who was trailing them. The belkagen seemed unconcerned, so she followed his lead. About halfway up, they walked out of the fog. Amira could still see no better, but the darkness didn't seem as thick, and the air that came to her lungs had a dry bite. By the cold, she knew there'd be a thick coating of frost by morning, and if those clouds chose to release their burden, they'd have snow. The ground grew steeper, the trees smaller and farther between, and Amira soon found herself climbing more than walking, pulling herself over jagged boulders and up shelves of rock. Though she was quite warm in the clothes the belkagen had given her, climbing the rocks made her fingers stiff and cold. She was about to swallow her pride and call for a rest when their trail entered another ravine, and this time there were jagged steps cut into the rock. Though they were cracked and weathered with age, Amira knew they were far too straight and regular to be natural. Someone had carved these. The stairway doubled back on itself three times, and then the land flattened out. Before Amira's eyes, the darkness bled away into bright contrasts of shadow, gray, and silver, and she looked up. A jagged tear had opened in the clouds, and the edge of the moon shone down on them. Leaning on her staff and breathing hard, Amira looked back. Akhrasut Neth sat on a sea of fog, unbroken to the farthest horizon. Gyaidun and Lendri climbed the last of the steps, and Amira saw others behind them, the nearest just rounding the last twist of the stairs. She could not make out details in the moonlight, only pale shadows, but there were many of them, dozens at least. Some walked upright while some padded upward on all fours. Amira turned to the belkagen, who stood watching the sky not far away. "The Vil Adanrath are coming?" she asked. "The omah nin's pack and a few others, yes." "Why?" "They come to honor Akhrasut Neth. It is tradition." "What about…?" Amira looked to Gyaidun, the deer carcass still draped over his shoulders. "They will keep an honorable distance," said the belkagen. "Haerul knows what you do here this night. He may watch from afar, but he will not approach the exiles." Amira looked back down. The nearest of the Vil Adanrath had seen them and stopped on the stairway. Even as she watched, the rent in the clouds passed over the moon, and the world plunged into darkness again. "We must go," said the belkagen. "Midnight is not far off." They set off, Amira following the belkagen. Again she had to follow him more by sound than sight. The trail wound through more trees, some of which stood beside the trail itself so they had to duck through branches to pass. After stumbling over the third root, Amira stopped and said, "Belkagen, is there some taboo against torches?"
"Taboo?" said the belkagen. "I am sorry, Lady. I do not know this word." "Why am I stumbling around in the dark? My toes are bruised and my shins feel scraped raw. Is it forbidden to carry light on the Mother's Bed?" There was a short silence, then Amira heard the old elf chuckling. "My apologies, Lady Amira. There is no… taboo. I merely forgot the limits of your eyes. Forgive my discourtesy." The belkagen spoke a short incantation, and green flames began to lick up the top quarter length of his staff. They were not the pale sickly green of fire magic she'd sometimes seen dark wizards use, but a vibrant, living flame, like spring sunshine filtered through a canopy of newly sprouted leaves. Amira thought she even caught the scent of blossoms. The light they cast was meager, but in the near-total dark to which her eyes had become accustomed it seemed like a beacon. They set off again, and Amira looked over her shoulder to Gyaidun. "How do you see so well in the dark? You're human." "I am athkaraye.
Elf-friend. Even though I am now an exile, the blessings remain."
Amira remembered him speaking of this once before, of the "blessings" he'd gained in becoming Lendri's blood brother and elf-friend to the Vil Adanrath. She knew of similar rites among elves to the west, though she'd never met one of the so-called "elf-friends." But it would go a long way toward explaining how Gyaidun moved with such grace and stealth in the wild, how he ran seemingly tirelessly for scores of miles… and how he could see on such a dark night. The group walked on a bit more, and soon the trees thinned as the ground rose. In the clearing, the belkagen stopped, and by the light cast from his staff, Amira saw a large fang of rock breaking through the ground. A great fissure split the stone from the ground to half its height, forming a door into darkness. "This is it?" said Amira, her voice hushed to a reverent whisper. Even after hearing the belkagen's history of this place, she hadn't put too much weight in it. Every people from the crudest barbarians to the most cultured societies had their own traditions, histories, and legends. She didn't discount any of them, but neither did she accept them without question. She had sifted through the old shaman's tale, hoping that this might be one of Faer?n's sites of power, that she might find some aid in rescuing Jalan. But standing there in a thick darkness broken only by the shimmering light cast from the belkagen's staff, far from her home with shapeshifters at her back and a fell sorcerer somewhere out there, for that moment she believed. Something in her deepest heart, some buried race memory, perhaps, of a time when all men walked in fear of the ancient powers of the world… something inside Amira woke up and hummed with life at the sight of the yawning darkness in the rock. "This is Hro'nyewachu," said the belkagen. Amira heard a rustling in the grass behind her, and she turned. Gyaidun had placed the deer in the grass before him, and both he and Lendri knelt with their heads bowed. Behind them, among the trees, Amira saw silver shadows keeping a respectful distance. They too knelt, and even those that walked on four legs through the trees stopped and lowered their heads. "From here," said the belkagen, and Amira turned back to face him, "we go alone, you and I." Amira tried to swallow but found her throat dry. "Lead on," she rasped. The belkagen knelt beside the deer carcass. "If you would, Yastehanye…" Gyaidun lifted the deer and placed it over the elf's shoulders. He moved with a reverence that only deepened Amira's trepidation. The belkagen stood, holding the deer secure with one hand and his staff in the other. If the carcass was a great burden to him, he didn't show it. "If we are not back by sunrise," said the belkagen, his voice raised for everyone to hear,
"do not tarry. Go to the aid of Jalan, son of Amira of Cormyr, and bring the vengeance of the Vil Adanrath upon those who took him." The belkagen turned and proceeded into the cave. Amira followed. Behind them, the howling of wolves rode the autumn dark. She hoped their song was a salute, but to her the mournful howls sounded more like a dirge.
Their path descended almost at once, the ground beneath Amira's feet ranging from steps hewn out of the rock to gravel-strewn sand.