Salt View had to be their destination, then. Was it possible this king they sought to raise was residing in Salt View, so close to Nibenay? Valsavis frowned. He disliked the thought of the game ending so quickly.
But surely, he thought, if there were a powerful wizard in the village of Salt View, the Shadow King would have been made aware of it. The people of Salt View would sell their own mothers for a profit. No, thought Valsavis, it seemed unlikely. What then?
There was, apparently, some connection between the elfling and the Veiled Alliance. Was there a chapter of the Veiled Alliance in Salt View? If so, he had never heard any mention of it. The members of the Veiled Alliance were all preservers in active opposition to defilers, and there were no defilers in Salt View. Magic-users were unwelcome there, whether preservers or defilers. So the probability was that the elfling and the priestess were seeking someone or something else. Valsavis could not imagine who or what that could be.
It was a puzzle. Valsavis was intrigued by puzzles, especially when they were posed by those he stalked. He mounted his kank as the dark sun began to set on the horizon. He checked his waterskins to make certain they were full. It was going to be a long, hard journey, but he was sure to find something of interest at its end. An elfling Master of the Way with a priceless magic sword, assuming it really was the legendary blade called Galdra. A beautiful, young villichi priestess well schooled in the arts of combat and survival. And a mysterious wizard king to be, powerful enough to excite the caution of Nibenay himself.
Yes, worthy adversaries, all.
Valsavis urged the kank forward, down the slope to the Great Ivory Plain. And so the chase begins, he thought with satisfaction.
2
Sorak knew the marauders had their base on the western slopes of the Mekillot Mountains. Those foothills were near the caravan route from Altaruk to Gulg so, to give the marauders a wide berth, he headed on a diagonal, southeasterly course, rather than going straight south. It added at least another day to their journey across the Great Ivory Plain, which was not an attractive proposition, but on the other hand, it reduced their chances of encountering marauder scouts.
It also brought them closer to the village of Salt View, which was located just beyond the mountains, near the eastern tip of the range. According to The Wanderer’s Journal, there was a pass roughly at the middle of the range, which was the normal route that one would take to reach Salt View, but Sorak intended to give that a wide berth, as well. It would be a logical place for the marauders to post lookouts. What better place to ambush unwary travelers than in a desolate mountain pass?
They reached the northern slopes of the foothills just before daybreak on the seventh day of their journey. According to the rough map in The Wanderer’s Journal, the distance across the Great Ivory Plain from Nibenay to the mountains was approximately forty or fifty miles. The actual distance they had traveled had been easily twice that. In his days as the Wanderer, thought Sorak, the Sage was obviously not a very accurate cartographer. Either that, or errors had crept in over the years as the journal had been copied numerous times for distribution. Sorak hoped the former was the case, for if errors had crept into the journal, then he had no way of knowing how far he could trust its contents. It was an unsettling notion, especially since the journal was supposed to contain clues that would guide them on their quest.
They had been as sparing with their water as possible, but they had still run out. For Sorak, with his elfling powers of endurance, going without water was not as much a hardship as for Ryana, whose human constitution had greater need of it, especially on the Great Ivory Plain. It was much cooler traveling at night, but when they stopped to rest during the day, the heat was so intense that moisture had to be replaced. Ryana’s lips were parched and cracked, and it had been all she could do to put one foot before the other. Sorak had offered to carry her, but she refused to burden him. Exhausted and at the utter limit of her resources, she still had her stubborn pride.
As soon as they had reached the foothills, they stopped to rest, and Sorak dug a shallow depression in the ground. He used a druid spell to draw water up out of the sandy soil. Ryana could have done it, but she lacked the strength. It took a while for the liquid to percolate up through the soil, because the water table was far below the surface. Once it did, he watched to make sure that Ryana took only small sips.
She crouched on hands and knees to drink, then sat up and sighed, wearily and gratefully. “I never thought that dirty water could taste this good,” she said. “It was still a little salty, though.”
“We should be able to find better water once we get up into the mountains,” Sorak said.
“I think I could sleep for at least a week,” Ryana said, stretching out on her back and shading her eyes with her arm.
“Do not fall asleep yet,” Sorak told her. “We are still out in the open here. I will feel safer once we find some cover.”
She groaned. “Can’t we rest here for just a little while?”
“Of course,” he said, relenting. “But we must be moving on soon. We will make camp among those rocks up there, where we should find both shade and shelter.”
She looked in the direction that he indicated and sighed once more. “Sometimes I wish I were an elf,” she said.
Sorak smiled. “Elves are carnivorous, remember. And they have great, big, pointed ears.”
“Well, an elfling, then,” she said. “Then I could be like you, resist my flesh-eating impulses, and have ears with only little points.”
“On you, they would look most attractive,” Sorak said.
“That’s right, flatter me when I’m weak and have no strength to respond,” she said. “It is safer that way,” he replied. “Ouch,” she said. “It hurts to smile. My face is so dried out it may crack.”
“I will find some cactus and pulp it so that you may spread it on your skin.”
“Ohhh, that would feel wonderful. Now if only we could find a small stream that I could wash in!”
“I shall do my best,” said Sorak.
“You remember that stream that ran down from the spring by the convent?” she said.
He smiled. “Yes, I remember. We all used to bathe there every day, after our weapons training sessions.”
“I remember the bracing, cold water of the pool, and the way the stream ran down over the rocks below,” she said. “I can almost feel it now. I took it all for granted. The stream, the forest, the cool and refreshing mountain breezes. ... I had never truly realized how dry and desolate our world is.”
“You miss the Ringing Mountains, don’t you?” he said.
“I shall always think of them as home,” she replied. And then she added, quickly, “But I am not sorry I came.”
Sorak remained silent.
“Do you wish I had remained there?” she asked softly after a moment.
Sorak did not reply at once, and she felt a sharp pang of anxiety. Finally, he said, “A part of me does, I suppose. And I am not referring to any of the tribe. I mean that part of me wishes you could have been spared all this.”
“I made the choice to follow you of my own free will,” she said.
“Yes, I know. And I cannot begin to tell you how glad I am to have you with me. But I also cannot help thinking sometimes of the life you could have led had it not been for me.”