He slogged on because he had no choice in the matter, but it was working at him, gnawing at his sanity and eroding his emotional and psychological balance. He could feel it happening and he had no defense against it.
The day wore on, and their journey across miles of barren emptiness continued. They were moving in a mostly northerly direction, trying to get to a hole in the wall of the Forbidding that would bring them out much farther north of where they had started and presumably closer to where Redden and Oriantha both thought they should be when they reentered the Four Lands.
When they finally stopped for a rest, Oriantha waited until Tesla Dart was chittering away with Lada before kneeling beside a dejected Redden.
“How are you holding up?” she asked quietly.
Redden shook his head, his wild red hair falling over his eyes. “Not well.”
“Can you keep walking?”
“Probably. But I feel like I’m coming apart inside. I can’t seem to stop it from happening.”
She put her hands on his shoulders. “Remember what I said. I won’t leave you, no matter what.”
“I know that.”
“I will stay with you, and I will find a way to get us both safely back into the Four Lands and to Arborlon and to your brother. I know these are only words, but they are a promise. You will not be returned to Tael Riverine while I am still alive.”
He was crying again, and he brushed at his tears angrily. “It just feels like there’s no end to any this. I keep thinking about all the others. All of the dead. I feel as if I’m being drawn to them. I can feel their hands closing on me. I can’t make myself believe I won’t end up like them.”
“Listen to me,” she said. Her lean, smooth face was so close to his own, he could feel her breath on his face. “By the end of this day, we will be outside the Forbidding and back in the Four Lands. I will make Tesla Dart promise this. There won’t be another day inside this world. Then maybe you can start putting what you’re feeling right now behind you.”
He nodded without looking at her. “I can’t do anything before then, I can tell you that much.”
“Just concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other,” she said. “Just stay with that for the rest of today. You’ll be fine.”
They set out again shortly afterward. They had finished the little food and water Oriantha had brought with her from the camp. Tesla Dart seemed to be able to go for long periods with no food or water at all, and she said nothing of the supplies situation, insisting they press on.
“I want us out of here by nightfall,” Oriantha insisted.
“I want us out of here forever!” the Ulk Bog snapped in reply.
It was midafternoon when they reached the rim of a crater-shaped valley that dropped away in a huge, sweeping bowl, its slopes rock-strewn and chopped apart by twisting defiles. The valley floor stretched away for perhaps a mile, all of it riven with jagged cracks and littered with boulders and clumps of thick scrub. It was a stark, desolate landscape, an arena poorly carved by ancient cataclysms and the passing of time, rough-hewn but immediately reminiscent of the place where Redden had watched Khyber Elessedil do battle with Tael Riverine. When he made the connection, a deep shudder went all through him, and he wrenched his gaze away and concentrated on the ground in front of him.
“What is that?” Oriantha asked Tesla Dart.
The Ulk Bog glanced over and shook her head. “Kroat Abyss. Very bad. You don’t go there. Dangerous things.”
They kept walking, glancing over now and then to the valley. “Who was Kroat?” the shape-shifter pressed.
“Straken Lord, very early. One of first. Drilled down for place to keep the bad things collected.”
“The bad things. What sort of bad things?”
“Elf magic, talismans and sorceries used against the Jarka Ruus in ancient wars. Locked away with us, these ones, when we were imprisoned. But no one knows their power, no one knows how to use, afraid to try.” She gave them a sly look. “Weka touched them and no harm came to him, he told. But Straken Lords keep such for themselves, not let others come close. Weka not like others. Weka knows all the secrets of the lands, all the hiding places, all the treasure chambers and tombs and keeps. So he visits and looks.”
She gestured at the valley. “Takes me there, once. Long ago. So long. I was still learning. Just a girl. Takes me down into darkness and shows me what is there. Things of the Old World. Of when Jarka Ruus were one with Faerie. Long since gone.”
Redden, who had been only half listening before, suddenly realized what he was hearing. He stopped where he was. “What did you say?” he asked sharply. “Things of the Old World?”
The other two stopped and turned back to him. “No, Redden,” Oriantha said in warning. She was already sensing what was coming.
“Were there pretty stones?” he asked, ignoring her. “Did Weka show you colored stones?”
“Some,” said the Ulk Bog. “In a box, locked up. Pretty stones. Different colors.”
“Were they in sets of three?” he pressed, moving over excitedly.
“Redden, stop it!” Oriantha snapped.
Tesla Dart glanced over at her, and then looked back at the boy. “Sets of three. Red. Green. Another two. Yellow, maybe?”
“Four sets, four colors? You saw these stones? They were down there?”
“Saw them like I see you. Took them out of case and held them in my hands. Pretty in the light. Glittered and shined. But they were only stones, not magic. Nothing happened. I put them back.”
“Shades!” Redden breathed, turning to Oriantha. “Do you believe it? We’ve found the missing Elfstones!” He held up his hands as she started to object, giddy with excitement. “No, listen to me. This is a miracle. We had the chance to find them all along; we just didn’t know it. Tesla Dart knew where they were. She knew! But she didn’t know we were looking for them because we didn’t say anything about it. We just told her we were trying to find friends that had been carried off by a dragon. We didn’t tell her why we were inside the Forbidding in the first place. We didn’t say what we had really come looking for!”
“Redden, what difference does it make now? That search is ended!”
“Only because, until this moment, we had no place to look. We didn’t know where to go. Only Khyber knew anything, and she took that knowledge with her when she died. But think about it! Tesla Dart knows this information, too. She can take us down there into that pit. We can still find the Elfstones and bring them back out again!”
Oriantha stared at him. “Listen to yourself. How many are dead already because they thought they could find the missing Stones? How many, Redden? Now you want to risk our lives, as well? You want to forget about getting out of here, about finding a way back to your brother? You want to go hunting for the Elfstones, too? You must be out of your mind!”
Redden stepped forward so that he was right in front of her.
“I need to do this. Do you understand me? I need to. I’ve watched everyone die—and most of them right in front of me. I watched Carrick die. I watched the Ard Rhys die at the hands of Tael Riverine. All of this happened because of the search for the Elfstones—I understand that. But if we now have a chance to find the Stones and bring them back into the Four Lands—to finally do what we set out to do—don’t we have an obligation to try? It would provide some small vindication for what’s been sacrificed. It would prove that those who are gone didn’t die for nothing!”
Oriantha shook her head. “No. It was madness before, and it is madness now.”