'If you can help Olio, I would be forever in your debt,' she said.
'I will help Olio,' Edaytor said simply.
Orkid stepped forward. 'And you, your Majesty, will you now help your Kingdom?'
She took a deep breath and said: 'For all my life.' Then she smiled wearily at him. 'As you already knew.'
The mountains around Pila were hidden behind a heavy grey sky. Marin, king of Aman, stood alone in the old watchtower that was the oldest part of his royal castle.
Gusting wind lashed at his hair and blew away his tears. In his right hand he held the small slip of paper that had come by carrier pigeon only an hour before. The message was from his brother, Orkid, and told him of the events of three days ago. He had read with disbelief of the terrible death of his granddaughter in miscarriage. And then he had read of the death of Sendarus, his only child. He had felt the whole universe hold still. He had tried to read the words a second time, but had been unable to make sense of them.
Then the universe had started again.
His courtiers, sensing that something was awry, had asked him what the message contained. He told them, his voice low and cold, and they had joined him in uncomprehending shock. Then he had left his throne, ordered no one to follow him, not even his bodyguard, and climbed the watchtower from where his grief poured from him like a torrent.
He cried for his son, for his unknown granddaughter, for his long-dead wife and the love they had shared for Sendarus, and finally he cried for himself, his self-pity overwhelming him. It was this that finally brought him back from the black sea he had fallen in. He hated himself for it, he hated himself for being alive when his beloved son was dead. And there was more. Where before he had never thought of Lynan as anything but another tool in his ambition to make Aman great, the outlaw prince was now the murderer of Sendarus, and he hated him with a white rage that settled in his chest like a second heart, pumping new life into him.
He descended the tower, already planning what he must do to destroy Lynan. He realised with grim satisfaction that part of it was already being put in place by Amemun. The thought stopped him in his tracks.
Amemun loved Sendarus almost as much as Marin, and he would have to be told. Grief suddenly rose in him again, but he held onto his new hate and his mind cleared like a dry old forest swept with a summer fire.
The old Amanite gave his most polite smile and graciously accepted the small morsel of food in his left hand. He blessed it in the name of the god of the desert, placed it into his right hand and put the morsel in his mouth. He pretended to chew and enjoy the food, then swallowed it whole, forcing down the bile that surged up his gullet. The heat inside the tent was oppressive, and he was feeling nauseous.
'Good!' Amemun declared, and his host, the headman of the Southern Chett tribe he found himself with, smiled appreciatively.
'As our honoured guest, you must by tradition have the best portion of the feast.'
'It was delicious,' Amemun said. Please, Lord of the Mountain, let me hold down my heaving stomach.
'As headman I would normally have it,' the host said, his tone suggesting another meaning.
It was Amemun's turn to smile appreciatively; he was on firmer ground now. After spending gruelling weeks on the hot, arid plains that filled the south of the continent of Theare he had finally found his way to this man, rumoured by shepherds living on the border lands between Aman and the desert to be one of the grand chiefs of the Southern Chetts. His name was Dekelon, and he looked to be a hundred years old. His head was bald, his skin the colour of sun-baked mud, and his eyes brown, rheumy circles.
'Your hospitality will have its rewards,' Amemun said.
'That is the way of things,' Dekelon said. He motioned for his son and whispered something in his ear. The son nodded and left the tent, taking with him the rest of his father's relations and retainers. 'Now we can talk. You have come a long way to see me.'
'Is that so strange? Your reputation as the strongest and wisest of all the Southern Chetts is known even as far as Pila.'
'There are two things you should know, Amemun of Aman,' Dekelon said, his voice changing from the singsong tone he had used in greeting to something colder and flatter. 'The first is that when we are alone there is no need for flattery; it does not help your cause, whatever that cause may be.'
'Ah. And the second?'
'We do not call ourselves the Southern Chetts as if we were nothing but a twig off a nobler and greater tree.'
'I understand. By what name should I call your people?'
'We call ourselves the Saranah.'
'Saranah? I do not know that word.'
'It is from an ancient tongue, and is the name of a bird that soars above the oceans, rarely touching the ground,' Dekelon said. 'Just as my people touch the ground here very lightly. We live on an old country, and poor, so we protect it and nurture it where we can, and scratch what living we are able from our goats and sheep and scattered plots of land.'
'What ancient tongue?' Amemun asked, curious.
'Very few of our people know it any more, and none at all in the east.'
'Is it a tongue we all spoke once?'
Dekelon shrugged. 'Perhaps.' His tone suggested they were here to discuss matters more weighty than a dead and largely forgotten language.
Amemun sighed deeply. He had travelled long and far to deliver this message. 'As you say, the Saranah live on an old and poor land. Perhaps it is time you found richer pasture?'
Dekelon glanced sharply at him. 'Are you suggesting we move east, into Aman?'
Amemun blinked. He had not expected discussions to be so direct. 'No.'
'Then what are you suggesting?'
'That you move north.'
For a moment Dekelon did not understand, but when he realised what Amemun was in fact suggesting he wheezed in laughter. 'Oh, that is a fine joke. We Saranah are scattered all over this land in our small tribes, and you want us to march north and occupy the Oceans of Grass. Our distant cousins, the hated Chetts, live there in huge clans. What will they say about it, do you think?'
'They are currently occupied with another matter,' Amemun said lightly. 'And who knows what is possible for the Saranah if they have rich friends behind them?'
Dekelon's face broke into a wide grin. 'How rich?'
Amemun grinned in return. 'Very,' he said.
CHAPTER 3
Salokan, king of Haxus, rode low over the saddle. His own panting was drowned out by the panting of his horse. He peered into the dark, searching for any sign of the enemy, but all he could see was a blur of single trees and low bushes that seemed to reach out for him. His face was scratched in a hundred places, and he could taste blood trickling between his lips. He heard an arrow whistle over him and he cried out, dug his heels even deeper into the horse's flanks. It whinnied and put on an extra burst of speed. A group of infantry loomed in front of him, and for a strange second he could not tell if they were standing or lying down; then he saw the barbed shafts sticking out of their bodies and he rode over them.
Up above, the moon kept pace with him and he prayed for it to go away, prayed for its revealing light to be shut off. He passed low under a tree. A branch snagged his cloak and tore it off, almost unhorsing him. The muscles in his thighs and back were aching so badly the pain became a single mass. Another group of infantry, spearmen, and this time alive. They called to him desperately as he thundered past, but he ignored them.
And then the moon started to blink. Salokan risked looking up and saw that his horse was following a trail through a grove of thorn trees. The canopy became more and more dense and eventually the moon disappeared altogether. Salokan reined in and looked around desperately for any sign of pursuit; when he did not see any he dismounted and led the horse away from the trail until he was sure no one would see him unless they were virtually on top of him. As he caught his breath he absently checked the horse's girth straps then allowed himself a few mouthfuls of weak red wine from a leather bottle in one of his saddlebags. The horse fidgeted, and he calmed it down by stroking its muzzle.