“He chose for Z’Nelia’s consort a man who was also a great Mover. It was a political marriage, uniting his daughter with the only Mover with the power to be a threat to the royal family. Desak died soon after Z’Nelia bore a son, and her husband in effect ruled the Zionae for some years-until she approached the peak of her powers. Then came the attack of the Savishnon, and her defeat of them, as you have Seen.”
“Z’Nelia’s family,” Wulfston prompted. “Did she kill them?”
“She meant to kill them. In fact, when she returned from Mount Manjuro to Johara she thought she had.
For they betrayed her. Matu-”
“Norgu’s father? Norgu is Z’Nelia’s son?” Wulfston demanded in astonishment.
Tadisha gasped. “Shangonu protect us! If they should ever unite against us-!”
“Unlikely,” said Barak. “Z’Nelia will never trust Norgu again after he turned against her at Mount Manjuro. You see, Matu betrayed Z’Nelia with her own sister. Z’Nelia had grown more powerful than Matu, and he resented it. Their son, Norgu, showed exceptional powers for so young a child. Her sister had no powers of her own, but saw in Matu’s child the chance to gain someone with powers whom she could control. So when he was quarreling with Z’Nelia over who ruled in Johara, she seduced Matu, and became pregnant.
“In the face of the Savishnon threat, Z’Nelia pretended to forgive them, claiming that she would welcome the child her sister carried-her own husband’s child. But when they went to Mount Manjuro, she used her Mover’s powers to topple the faithless couple into the volcano.”
“This was four years ago,” said Wulfston. “Z’Nelia’s sister-can it be Chulaika?”
“That was her name, although it is no longer to be spoken in Z’Nelia’s lands.”
Wulfston looked to Ashuru, Tadisha, and Kamas. “So that is what this is all about! Did you know?”
“No,” said Ashuru. “How could we?”
“They could not,” Barak affirmed. “It was not to be Told. Not only Z’Nelia-Norgu will kill me if he finds out I have told you.”
“Then, since you have told this much,” said Wulfston, “you might as well finish the story. Z’Nelia tried to kill Matu and Chulaika at the volcano.”
“Nbrgu loved his father,” Barak continued. “When Z’Nelia tried to kill him, Norgu turned against his mother, and she pushed him into the volcano with the others. Norgu and Matu together had the power to save themselves and Chulaika, but Z’Nelia returned to Johara thinking them dead. Matu, Norgu, and Chulaika fled west, and found lands for themselves.”
“Chulaika bore Chaiku, and after Matu died she decided to return from the dead to depose her sister,”
Wulfston finished. “Probably Norgu’s growing power made her move now-and drag me into it because she needed someone with strong powers to stand a chance against either Norgu or Z’Nelia. ” He shook his head, all that he had learned too much to assimilate at once. “Before anything else can happen, I am going to Norgu’s castle for Lenardo.”
“I will follow as soon as I can ride,” the Grioka replied. “That is a tale I will have to know.”
“You may ride with me,” said Ashuru. “We will be only a day or two behind you, Lord of the Black Wolf.”
Ashuru followed their progress on the three-day journey to Ketu, either Kamas or Tadisha reporting to her each evening. Wulfston worried that enemy Seers might listen in, but the messages were only of their own journey, no mention of Ashuru’s plan to keep the Savishnon to the north.
There was no further contact from Lenardo. With Norgu back at his castle, the Master Reader was more closely observed, but the lack of contact was another worry.
Letting the army continue toward Norgu’s lands, Wulfston accompanied Tadisha and Kamas on the road to Ketu. He let his Karili friends do the Seeing, only occasionally Reading through them. For all he knew, he could be broadcasting “Come and get me!” to Z’Nelia every time he damped his Adept powers to Read something.
As nothing happened-no attacks, nothing either Kamas or Tadisha could See that seemed suspicious-he was feeling rather self-congratulatory as they topped a hill and came in sight of the trade city.
Traylo and Arlus suddenly stopped, their hackles rising, as they snarled at a patch of brush at the side of the road.
“Lord Wulfston, for Hesta’s sake, will you call off your dogs?”
He recognized the voice. “Zanos!”
A tall figure came out of the brush, a man dressed in a deep-hooded robe, with long sleeves that covered his hands. The fabric trailed the ground, covering every bit of Zanos’ white skin, the hood hiding his head.
But when he faced Wulfston he threw the hood back, revealing the familiar freckled face under the thatch of flaming hair.
But the blue eyes were haunted, and there were lines in Zanos’ face that told of a man driven.
“Where is Astra?” Wulfston had to ask, although he knew that if Zanos’ wife were alive she would be at his side.
“Drowned,” was the curt reply. “Old Huber, too. We both tried to reach her when the ship sank. He was closer. The whirlpool that dragged her under took him along.”
Wulfston instinctively reached out a han’d in attempted comfort. “I’m sorry-” he began.
Zanos shook him off. “I will avenge her,” he replied flatly. Then he eyed Tadisha, Kamas, and their retinue. “You’ve come to get the Night Queen crewmen out of the slavers’ pens?”
“Yes,” said Wulfston, “and then to rescue Lenardo. He’s just two days’ journey from here. Come and meet my friends, and we will tell you our plans.”
They went off the road to where a clear brook meandered through the meadow, and sat and talked as they ate their midday meal. Zanos had been living off the land. He looked gaunt, but Wulfston was not certain how much of that was grief, and how much deprivation. His fair skin was red with sun-and windburn. Under the robe he wore his Aventine tunic, now torn and threadbare. His sandals were also his own, stained with seawater and repaired with rawhide.
“Where did you find a robe long enough for you?” Wulfston asked.
“Haven’t you noticed? The people in this land are very tall, like Sukuru.”
“The Warimu,” Tadisha supplied.
“Yes, of course. Zanos, have you seen or Read any sign of Sukuru or Chulaika? I haven’t.”
“Read?” asked Zanos. He had been braced to use Adept powers ever since they had encountered him.
Now Wulfston felt him drop his defenses to Read him.
“Yes, Read,” he admitted. “Probably at about your level, although I haven’t had the opportunity for training or testing yet.”
“Congratulations,” Zanos told him, but there was no joy in the perfunctory courtesy.
“Zanos…?”
The man’s haunted blue eyes fixed on Wulfston’s. “It was a joy to Read with Astra while she lived. But it became a curse when I suffered her death. She died calling out to me-reaching out to me-and I could not reach her!”
The gladiator’s thoughts cut off abruptly. “I will avenge her death, ” he repeated. “But first I will help you free the Night Queen crew. I’ve been into town. The eight white men reported for sale are definitely Captain Laren’s men, but I didn’t know how I was going to break them out of there alone.”
“Zanos,” said Wulfston, “we are going to buy them.”
“You will contribute to the slave trade!”
“We need our strength for another battle,” said Kamas.
“But slaving is wrong!” Zanos protested. “Bah! You people probably profit by it-but Lord Wulfston, surely you want to destroy the slave pens!”
“Zanos, I do not approve of slavery,” Wulfston replied, keeping his temper by recalling that this man had been a slave and would never forget the experience. “But you have to understand that if we call that kind of attention to ourselves in Ketu, we will give ourselves away.”
“You’ve thrown in with them!” Zanos gasped. ‘That’s why they wanted you in Africa-to help them fight this Z’Nelia.”