He paused, studying them shrewdly. “I suppose you’re set on this?”
Brin nodded wordlessly, waiting.
The woodsman sighed. “Maybe there’s someone else who can help you then—if you’re sure this is what you want.” He blew sharply through the stem of his pipe to clean it, then folded his arms across his broad chest. “There’s an old man named Cogline. Must be ninety by now if he’s still alive. Haven’t seen him for almost two years, so I can’t be sure if he’s even there anymore. Two years ago, though, he was living up around a rock formation called Hearthstone that sits right in the middle of Darklin Reach—formation that looks just like a big chimney.” He shook his head doubtfully. “I can give you directions, but the trails aren’t much. That’s wild country; hardly anything human living that far east that isn’t Gnome.”
“Do you think he would help us?” Brin pressed anxiously.
The woodsman shrugged. “He knows the country. He’s lived there all his life. Doesn’t bother coming out more than once a year or so—not even that the last two. Stays alive somehow in that jungle.” The heavy brows lifted. “He’s an odd duck, old Cogline. Crazier than a fish swimming through grass. He might be more trouble than help to you.”
“We’ll be all right,” Brin assured him.
“Maybe.” The woodsman looked her over carefully. “You’re a pretty thing to be wandering off into that country, girl—even with your singing to protect you. There’s more than thieves and cowards out there. I’d think on this before you go any further with it.”
“We have thought.” Brin came to her feet. “We’re decided.”
The woodsman nodded. “You’re welcome to take with you all the water you can carry, then. At least you won’t die of thirst.”
He helped them refill their water pouches, carrying a fresh bucket of water from the spring that ran down out of the hills behind his cabin, then took several minutes more to give them the directions they needed to reach Hearthstone, scratching a crude map in the earth before the stoop.
“Look after yourselves,” he admonished, offering each a firm handshake.
With a final word of farewell, Brin and Rone hitched up their provisions across their backs and walked slowly from the little cabin into the trees. Behind them, the woodsman stood watching. It was clear from the look on his bearded face that he did not expect to see them pass that way again.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
They journeyed through that day and the next, following the twists and turns of the Chard Rush as it wound steadily deeper through the forests of the Anar and crossed into Darklin Reach. Rone was gaining in strength, but he had not yet fully recovered, and progress was slow. After a brief meal on the second evening, he went directly to sleep.
Brin sat before the fire, staring into the flames. Her mind was still filled with unhappy memories and dark thoughts. Once, before she felt herself growing sleepy, it seemed that Jair was with her. Unconsciously, she looked up, seeking him. But there was no one there, and logic told her that her brother was far away, indeed. She sighed, banked the fire, and crawled into her blankets.
It was not until well into the afternoon of the third day following their departure from the Rooker Line Trading Center that Brin and Rone caught sight of a singular rock formation that loomed blackly in the distance and knew that they had found Hearthstone.
Hearthstone was a dark, clear silhouette against the changing colors of autumn, its rugged pinnacle dominating the shallow, wooded valley over which it stood watch. Chimneylike in appearance, the formation was a mass of weathered stone carved by nature’s fine hand and shaped with. the passing of the years. Silence hung starkly over its towering shadow. Solitary and enduring, it beckoned compellingly from out of the dark sea of the vast, sprawling forestland of Darklin Reach.
Standing at the crest of a ridge, staring out across the land, Brin felt its unspoken whisper call out through her weariness and her uncertainty and experienced an unexpected sense of peace. Another leg of the long trek east was almost over. The memories of what she had endured to reach this point and the warnings of what yet lay ahead were strangely distant now. She smiled at Rone and the smile clearly caught the highlander by surprise. Then, touching his arm gently, she started downward along the shallow valley slope.
The barely discernible line of a trail snaked down through the wall of the great trees. As the sun moved steadily toward the western horizon, the forest closed about them once more. They picked their way carefully over fallen logs and around jagged rock formations until the thickly grown slope leveled off at its base. Within the forested canopy of the valley, the pathway broadened and then disappeared altogether as the dense scrub brush and fallen timber began to thin. Warm afternoon sunlight flooded softly through the cracks and chinks of the interwoven branches overhead and lighted the whole of the darkened woodland. Dozens of wide, pleasant little clearings pocketed the valley forest and lent a feeling of space and openness. The earth grew soft and loose, free from rock and carpeted with a layer of small twigs and leaves that rustled gently as the Valegirl and the highlander walked across them.
There was a sense of comfort and familiarity to this little valley that was foreign to the wilderness that lay about it, and Brin Ohmsford found herself thinking of Shady Vale. The life sounds, insect and animal, the brief traces of movement through the trees, sudden and furtive, even the warm, fresh smell of the autumn woods—all were similar to that distant Southland village. There was no Rappahalladran, yet there were dozens of tiny streams meandering lazily across their path. The Valegirl breathed deeply. No wonder the woodsman Cogline had chosen this valley for his home.
The travelers passed deeper into the forest, and time slipped slowly from them. Now and again they caught brief glimpses of Hearthstone through the webbing of the dark forest limbs, its towering shadow black against the blue of the sky, and they pointed themselves toward it. They walked in silence, worn and anxious to be done with the day’s long march, their thoughts concentrated on the terrain ahead and the sounds and sights of the forest.
At last Rone Leah came to a stop, one hand fastening guardedly on Brin’s arm as he peered ahead.
“Hear that?” he asked quietly, after listening for a moment.
Brin nodded. It was a voice—thin, almost inaudible, but clearly human. They waited a moment, gauging its direction, then began walking toward it. The voice disappeared for a time, then returned, louder, almost angry. Whoever was speaking was directly, ahead.
“You had better show yourself and right now!” The voice was high and strident. “I’ve no time for games!”
There was some muttering and cursing, and the Valegirl and the highlander looked at each other questioningly.
“Come out, come out, come out!” the voice shrilled, then trailed off in an angry murmur. “Should have left you back on the moor… if it wasn’t for my kind heart…”
There was more cursing, and the sound of someone crashing through the underbrush reached their ears.
“I’ve a few tricks myself, you know! I’ve got powders to blow the ground right out from under you and potions that would tie you in knots! Think you know so much, you… Let’s see you climb a rope! Let’s see you do that! Let’s see you do anything besides cause me trouble! How would you like me to leave you here? How would you like that? Wouldn’t think yourself so smart then, I’ll wager! Now get out here!”
Brin and Rone stepped through the screen of trees and brush blocking their view and found themselves at the edge of a small clearing with a wide, still pond at its center. Across from them, crawling aimlessly about on his hands and knees was an old man. He scrambled to his feet at the sound of their approach.