“Farshaun?” he whispered, as if not certain the old man was still there.
Farshaun rose and moved over to him, sitting once more, but much closer now. “I’m here.”
“Tell me what I said.”
The old man repeated most of it, Khyber listening from across the way, ready to add anything that might be left out or misstated, but staying put, not wanting to do anything to frighten the seer. That he had seen things, perhaps heard them, too, was undeniable. But she also knew he might not remember any of it. He had been deep under a spell of his own making when he spoke. It was like that sometimes with seers. What mattered was whether he could make any sense of it now.
When Farshaun had finished, the Speakman nodded slowly, and then said, “I know the landmarks. I have seen them in my travels. Save for the waterfall, as I have already said. There is no waterfall in that country. No water of any kind. I can tell you how to get to where it might be. But it is very dangerous. Too dangerous.”
“Can you take us there?” Khyber asked him suddenly. “Can you guide us through the worst of it?”
The Speakman looked at her for the first time. His features were drawn and haggard, everything stretched out of shape and pinched by weather and age. He looked to be neither young nor old, but from some indeterminate middle region. He shook his head. “I travel alone.”
“This one time?” she asked. “Can you make an exception? We need your eyes to help us find the landmarks I described and avoid the dangers you know.” She hesitated. “It is important.”
“She speaks the truth,” Farshaun added. “You need go only as far as you want. But anything would help.”
The Speakman looked back at him. His eyes were bright and depthless and filled with secrets. He gave them a half smile, one that reflected an irony they did not understand.
“If I go with you,” he answered, “I won’t be coming back.”
The old man and the Ard Rhys exchanged a quick glance. “Why would you say that?” she asked.
He climbed to his feet, his tall, bony form hunched over in the gloom, his shadow crooked and skeletal.
“Because none of us will.”
22
Aphenglow Elessedil was walking the upper hallways of the Druid’s Keep, forcing herself to ignore the ache in her broken leg, summoning her magic to buttress her efforts. She used her staff to support herself, burdened by a pronounced limp and a frustration that led her to curse her infirmity in a variety of imaginative ways. The pain told her she was stretching herself farther than she probably should. Still, if she wanted to get stronger, that was what she needed to do. It was a fine line between going just far enough and too far, but she trusted her instincts to tell her when the first began to edge into the second. So far, she wasn’t there yet.
She had just reached the end of the hallway and was turning around to go back again, grimly satisfied with her momentary progress if not with her overall situation, when Arlingfant hurtled through a doorway at the far end of the passageway and came running toward her.
It was easy enough to see that something was amiss, but Aphenglow stayed where she was and waited for her sister to reach her. Trying to do anything more physical would be a mistake.
“Aphen!” Arling stumbled to a halt in front of her, breathing hard. “Federation warships—a fleet of them! They’ve just crested the Forbidden Forest and are sailing right for Paranor!”
A jumble of thoughts crowded into Aphenglow’s mind, but she dismissed them all as foolish. The Federation would never dare to attack Paranor. Not only would such an effort fail; it would also risk substantial repercussions from the governments of other lands. The Druids were a neutral power. It was understood by all that they were to be left alone. This must be something else.
“Up these stairs,” she directed her sister, limping into the stairwell to the observation tower on her right.
They climbed as swiftly as they could, winding their way up the ancient stone steps.
“Who spied them?” Aphen asked, the strain of the climb more than she had expected. She gritted her teeth and quickened her pace.
“One of the Trolls on watch. He didn’t know who they were at first, not until he put the spyglass on them and saw the Federation flag.” Arling moved a few steps closer. “Are you all right? We have plenty of time.”
That remained to be determined, Aphen thought. “I need the exercise,” she responded instead. “How many ships?”
“Two warships, a light cruiser, a transport, and one that’s quite a bit smaller. A command vessel or a scout, I think.”
Too many to have good intentions. What did they want with the Druids? There hadn’t been any communications between Paranor and Arishaig in months. Why now? Had the men on these airships come to see the Ard Rhys on business?
Or, she wondered suddenly, had they come because they knew Khyber Elessedil and the other Druids were away and believed the Keep and its remaining occupants were vulnerable?
They reached the top of the stairs and stepped onto the floor of the observation tower. Windows opened in all four directions, a series of two-foot-wide openings spaced evenly all around the circular room. In the center, a large permanently affixed telescope rested in its iron cradle atop a platform. Levers, gears, and wheels attested to its maneuverability. With Arling’s assistance, Aphen climbed onto the platform, unlocked the mechanism, and swung the scope into position facing south.
She found the Federation fleet right away, advancing through a wash of sunlight and late-morning haze directly toward the Keep. She took a minute to study each ship, trying to intuit as much as she could from the look and feel of it, counting mounted weapons and armored heads.
“I don’t like the look of this,” she muttered.
The tower’s outer door burst open and Bombax appeared, wrapped in his robes and carrying his heavy staff. He was healed well enough by now that he had regained his normal healthy pallor and most of the weight he had lost during his captivity, and he moved swiftly and easily as he mounted the platform and came up to her. “What do you make of it?”
They had patched things up sufficiently between them over the past few days that they were back to talking like normal people. Aphenglow still wasn’t happy with the lack of common sense that Bombax had demonstrated in letting himself be made a prisoner of the Mwellrets, but they were trying to work their way through their differences of opinion on the matter.
“Dozens of armed men on deck,” she said. “I’d guess a lot more are hidden belowdecks in that transport. Lots of rail slings, fire launchers, and something else mounted forward on the starboard and port bows of both warships.”
“Let me see,” he said.
She stepped aside for him, letting him peer through the scope. He needed only a moment. “Flash rips,” he announced.
Strictly forbidden everywhere—something everyone in the Four Lands knew. Her uneasiness increased. Flash rips were big, dangerous weapons—cannons equipped with specially crafted diapson crystals that could burn an entire airship and everyone aboard it to ash if they locked on their target from close enough. Showing weapons of this sort made it clear the Federation meant business. At the very least, it was attempting to intimidate the Druids with a show of firepower. At worst, it intended to put that firepower to use.
“The warship on the right is the Arishaig—the Federation fleet’s flagship,” Bombax added a moment later.
“Is this Drust Chazhul’s doing, do you think?”
He shook his head. “It’s possible.”
She locked her fingers on his arm tightly. “They know the Ard Rhys and the others are gone. I can feel it. Are the defenses up?”
He turned to her, his smile broad and relaxed. “Always. We’re safe enough if they’ve come to play games. But let’s see what they want before jumping to conclusions.”