But still he could not move. He did not trust his senses. The ghost of Althak loomed beside him, it asked him questions with Althak’s voice but he refused to listen. With the solidity of the rocks that had tried to kill him, Althak’s ghost pushed him forward towards the door. Ghosts that leered at him from their transparency guarded the door. Then he saw the woman.
She stood apart from the cluster of villagers near the door, a strange little figure among these giants. A loose blue robe hung from her shoulders and fluttered in the wind. She stared at him vacantly, just another curious villager.
But she was different. She was solid. No, more than solid. The others were wavering ghosts blown in the wind, but the buildings were solid; he, himself, was solid. She was like a blinding pillar of light, solid as massive granite in the darkness. He felt himself fading in comparison, paling away to nothingness.
When he looked back at Althak’s ghost his eyes had to adjust before he could find him. He seemed less threatening now, an insubstantial, ineffective thing against the solidity of the woman. But it had been Althak, and Althak had been kind to him. He pointed to her. It was impossible that they had not seen her.
“Look!”
“Azkun, this is no time for wenching.”
Althak’s ghost nudged him towards the doorway, but he twisted away from its paradoxically solid grasp. A sharp pain ran the length his injured arm and he thought he had made it worse. But the woman was all that mattered. He crossed the space between them and reached out to her. He had to touch her.
Suddenly another of the ghosts stood between them. An old woman, he could hardy see her insubstantial form against the first woman, barred his way. She wavered and floated in the wind, but wrath was etched in her face as she said something in the Vorthenki tongue that was unmistakably a rebuke. Then both were gone, the old woman and the young, they disappeared into the night.
Althak’s hand grasped him by the shoulder and he turned.
He blinked. The world was normal again. Althak was no longer a ghost, none of them was. The others looked at him curiously, as if they had not noticed the change. The light spilling from the doorway looked friendly, as did the faces of the villagers nearby.
Drinagish had already gone inside and Menish was about to follow, but he was troubled by something. For some reason Azkun could not fathom he was suddenly deeply upset.
“That was ill done,” said Althak as he herded him towards the doorway. “One does not take women in the road as one fancies, whatever you may have heard of my people.”
“I do not know what you mean,” replied Azkun. “Could you not see her?”
“She was comely enough, I suppose, though I've seen better. But that's not the way these things are done.”
“But she was real!”
They stepped through the doorway into a large room with faded frescoes on the walls and heavy wooden rafters. The walls were made of stone and the floor was strewn with rushes. In the centre of the room a great cauldron hung from one of the rafters and a fire below it filled the room with the smell of smoke, which mingled with the other smells of ale, fish and sweat. Lamps hung from the rafters, shedding a smoky light. There were benches and tables scattered around the floor, occupied by big, yellow-haired Vorthenki seamen. Along one wall lay a series of wooden barrels.
An unusually short Vorthenki, who made up for his lack of height by an enormous girth, beamed broadly and bowed incessantly at each and all of the company, speaking quickly in the Vorthenki tongue as he did so, and giggling nervously at the strangers. Althak was the most richly dressed so he received most of the bows. Menish seemed barely interested.
“Have him roast some of our meat, Althak, I don't like the smell of that cauldron. We'll sleep here tonight. Ask him if he can organise a bath.”
Althak nodded and passed Menish’s message to the proprietor who bowed again and beamed even more broadly.
The fat man indicated that they should sit at one of the benches while he scuttled off to another room and began shouting orders. Although Azkun understood nothing of the Vorthenki language it was obvious enough what was happening. Besides he caught hints and snatches of thoughts from everyone in the room. But to Azkun they were dominated by the boiling thoughts of Menish. His mind was racing with confusion and anxiety. Azkun’s own confusion was largely replaced by relief, but Menish’s suddenly troubled thoughts mingled with his own. They were so intense that Azkun began to see what was bothering him.
Menish despised the Vorthenki. As they rode past the first of the houses he had remembered their foul, barbaric ways. Their long houses were a symbol of their brutal society where a strong man would murder his brothers and set himself up with his wives and slaves.
He hoped Azkun had not noticed the dragon post outside the inn, but Menish had seen it. Across the road it stood, streaked with old blood. Sometimes they used animals, Menish knew, but Kopth preferred human flesh. Children or slaves were often killed to adorn the dragon post.
Menish had expected no less, in fact he had not really expected such a fine building as this in which to spend the night. It was obviously an old Relanese structure, for the Vorthenki never built of stone. The frescoes on the walls were illustrations of tales from the Mish-Tal. Of course it had seen better days. The smelly cauldron of fish stew in the centre of the room was a Vorthenki alteration.
But all this was incidental. He had expected to find Vorthenki in a Vorthenki village. The thing that troubled him had sprung from the incident outside when Azkun had approached that woman. Why he had done so did not really concern Menish. If his story was true he had never seen a woman before so it was not unreasonable that he should approach the first one he noticed. It was not the young woman Menish was thinking about anyway. It was the old one.
She had stepped out of the shadows and thrust herself between Azkun and the woman he was reaching out to and told him with all the vehemence of the Vorthenki tongue to leave her daughter alone. Then she had looked beyond Azkun and her eyes had lighted on Menish.
Thalissa.
For a moment his heart had stopped beating. In that moment she had turned and whisked the young woman away into the night. But he had seen her.
Her face was lined with age, as was his own now, and her once golden hair was grey, but even though he could not see the colour of her eyes in the dim light he knew her features only too well.
Inside the inn, in the cheerful light of the lamps, he wondered if it really was her. It was all so long ago. Perhaps he was mistaken. Perhaps he was not mistaken. He needed to know. He did not know what, if anything, he should do if she was still alive. Nevertheless, he had to know.
The fat man returned. His name, he had said, was Astae and he had spoken enthusiastically of his premises as if they rivalled the palace of Atonir. Menish could speak Vorthenki well enough, but he disliked that tongue. He would rather leave Althak to organise things with the man. Now Astae herded several dirty looking women before him, each carrying carved drinking horns.
“This is the best ale north of Deenar, M’Lords. Folk come from as far away as Athim for a mere sip of the ale of Lianar. And our women are said to be the delight of the Dragonseed…” Menish glared at him so ferociously that he trailed off nervously. If there had been an Anthorian woman in their company Astae would not have survived that sentence. Grath loosened his sword overtly and Bolythak’s dagger, which had been cleaning his fingernails, moved in a subtle but menacing way. A bawdy song in the wilderness was one thing, open talk of the Dragonseed festival was quite another.
“We require food, drink and rest,” said Althak, breaking the tense silence. “Your hospitality need extend no further.”
Astae grinned nervously. He had obviously not met Anthorians before or he would know better than to offer his women to them. It was only a mistake, thought Menish, the Vorthenki honoured their guests this way. The women stood in an awkward knot beside their master, wondering what to do with the drinking horns, not quite daring to offer them to these strange folk, though one of them was surreptitiously making eyes at Althak.