She shook her head. “No, not if I can avoid it.”
He looked at her sternly. “Well, I’m glad to have a little longer with you, but if it means you might not get home safely then I’m afraid I have to insist you leave right now.”
She laughed, then her smile faded rapidly. Moving close, she kissed him firmly. “You take care as well. You’re not quite out of the mountains yet.”
“I will,” he told her. “Kyralia has snow and hilly parts too, you know.”
Her eyebrows rose.
“Which you’ve never been to, except on the way to Sachaka, at a time of year when there was no snow.”
“Darn. I shouldn’t have told you that.”
She shook her head and pulled away, moving to the sledges. “Do you need me to run through the directions on how to get back to Arvice?” she asked, packing away the sleeping mats and utensils from the previous night’s meal.
“Take the sledge down the valley to the hunter’s shack. Leave it there and walk to the road. Slaves will be waiting to take me to the local estate and arrange transport from there.”
“That’s right. If you don’t encounter them for some reason, it’s the estate with four big trees either side of the entrance road. You shouldn’t encounter any Ashaki. They don’t tend to travel at this time of year. If you do, tell them who you are and request to be taken back to the Guild House. They’ll be politically obliged to help you.”
While she sounded confident, there was a worried look in her eyes. What’s the worst that could happen? he asked himself. The Ashaki might toss political obligation aside, reason that I’m a Traitor now and not protected by any diplomatic rules, and try to kill me. But they probably wouldn’t without first trying to read my mind. He rubbed the base of his thumb, where the mind-read-blocking stone lay beneath the muscle. It still itched a little, though he’d healed the cut. Tyvara had recommended the pos ition for it, since a newly inserted stone did tend to itch, and a slave rubbing at sore hands wasn’t unusual.
He’d not had much time to learn how to feed fake thoughts to a mind-reader. Even with Tyvara’s magic, I doubt I could fend off an Ashaki attack for long. If the Ashaki then senses that his mind-reading is failing, he might try to torture information out of me. I don’t know if I could withstand that at all, or for long. Better to get to the Guild House and into Ambassador Dannyl’s protection unseen.
“I’ll do what I can to stay out of sight,” he assured her. “And this time I won’t have half the Traitor spies trying to find us and turn us over.”
She nodded. “Be careful who you trust, even so. Kalia’s faction may be weakened, but there are still Traitors who hate you for what your father did. They won’t do anything to endanger Sanctuary, but they may make your life uncomfortable.”
He shrugged. “I’ve slept in a hole in the ground. I can cope with a little discomfort.” Then he frowned. “I’ve been thinking … is it wise that Kalia is the only one who knows how to Heal with magic?”
Tyvara’s eyebrows rose. “I’m sure the queen would rather Kalia wasn’t the only one, but we don’t have any choice about that.”
“Well … you could have another choice … if I teach you Healing before you go.”
Her eyes widened a little, then she smiled and shook her head. “No, Lorkin. We don’t have time for that.”
“We could stay another night.”
Her smile widened. “As much as that appeals, I still must go now. There are other reasons I need to get back quickly. The fact that Kalia has that one little advantage over us is the only thing keeping her faction happy.”
“Nobody has to know.”
She chuckled. “Zarala said you might offer this.”
“Really?” He felt strangely affronted. Was he that predictable?
“Yes. She told me to refuse.” Picking up the tow ropes of the sledges, Tyvara handed one to him. “Let’s go.”
They moved to the entrance of the cave and stepped out into a landscape coated with fresh, undisturbed snow. Bright morning light made everything dazzlingly white. The walls of the valley were steep and close, but widened as they reached eastwards. He could make out the line of the path they’d taken to descend into the valley, and another narrow one continuing down to the valley floor and a frozen river.
They turned to each other. They stared at each other. Neither spoke.
Then a distant rumble drew both to look at the sky. They were too deep in the valley to see the coming weather. Tyvara cursed under her breath.
“I’ll go first, so that I don’t toss snow down onto you,” she said. “Try to get to the hunter’s shack before the next storm.”
He nodded. She strode away, pushing snow off the path with magic. He watched her go, feeling that every step she took stretched some invisible bond between them. She did not look back, and he could not decide if he was disappointed or relieved.
When she finally reached the top of the wall, she did stop. Looking down, she lifted an arm and waved. It was less a gesture of farewell as one of impatience. His imagination conjured her voice and expression. “What are you waiting for? Get going!” He chuckled and set off into the valley, like her shoving snow off the path with magic as he went. When he reached the bottom he looked up.
She was gone. He felt strangely empty.
Then his eyes were drawn to the wall of ice that had covered one side of the cave they’d spent the last day and night in, and he gasped. It was a curtain of water, frozen in place.
A waterfall, he thought. It’s beautiful.
He wished Tyvara had been with him to see it. But then, she had probably travelled this path before, and seen it already. Still, it would have been nice to share such a sight with her.
He sighed. There was no point wishing things were otherwise, and he must put all romantic notions aside and concentrate on getting back to Kyralia. There would be rough and dangerous times ahead, and important meetings and negotiations to arrange if all went well.
He turned away and hauled his sledge toward home.
The journey down the path into the canyon seemed far more precarious than the journey up. It was much harder to ignore the dizzying drop to one side, and instead of facing into the wall when making one of the sharp turns, travellers were forced to face outward over the valley.
Achati was even more silent and tight-lipped than before. Tayend was uncharacteristically quiet. Nobody wanted to turn in their saddle to look at others in case the movement unbalanced the horses and they swayed closer to the edge.
This left Dannyl with many hours to think about what he had learned from the Duna.
It had been late when he’d rejoined Achati and Tayend the previous night, having spent many hours listening to and writing down the Keeper’s legends and stories. He’d told them what he’d learned of storestones, and shared his relief that they were so difficult and dangerous to make and that stones capable of holding so much power were very rare.
He hadn’t mentioned that the Traitors had stones that could block a mind-read and present a mind-reader with the thoughts he might expect. Concealing such information from Achati gave him twinges of guilt, but he knew he’d feel much worse if he passed it on and brought about the slaughter of thousands of slaves and rebels. Though Dannyl resented the Traitors for taking Lorkin away, they hadn’t killed the young man and certainly didn’t deserve to be hunted down and murdered for it.
There were plenty of strategic reasons for protecting the knowledge of how to make magical stones, too. If the Ashaki took such secrets from the Traitors, Kyralia’s former enemy would be even stronger, and less inclined to change its ways in order to join the Allied Lands. The Duna had trusted him with the information in the hope that they could form friendly links with the latter. Perhaps they would exchange stone-making knowledge in return for something.