Читать книгу The Three Sisters - Rebecca Locksley - Страница 5

Elena worked hard on the potion all afternoon. She mixed it over the fire and added herbs, heating and reheating it until at last she could feel a strong life spirit in it. Then she stopped. To do more would diminish it and weaken the potion's effectiveness against joint pain. Elena was not especially skilled at healing. She preferred to make things like boats and spears, but she had a special feeling for the life spirit which was useful in making such potions.

She took a long, luxurious stretch and looked around. She was surprised to find that it was almost dark. The light had turned velvety with evening, and people were gathered round their cooking fires. The Mori camp looked cosy. Skin tents were clustered around the tall, thin, finger-like tower of Fleurforet. A group of pipers practiced somewhere on the other side of the camp. Young people of courting age were dressed up in their festival finery and strolling with studied casualness around the base of the tower. Children played a chasing game between the tents. Elena's daughter, Alyx, was running among them.

Elena inhaled the scent of wood smoke and the delicious scent of mangiri trees with a happy sigh. The trees' scent was the scent of home. She had lived with the Mori for seven years. Of her own people, the Tari, she knew little. She did not even remember the holy land of Ermora where she had been born. She had grown up on an isolated island with only her foster parents and two sisters for company. Always she remembered her grandmother's warning that if the Tari found her they would harm her. There was some prophecy involved, but her grandmother had disappeared before she had told them more. Once Elena had been curious about the Tari and had chafed against hiding. Now she did not care. She was happy here. This forest, singing with the life spirit, was her home. These were her people.

The nomadic Mori roamed in small family groups throughout the large forest on the eastern side of the island of Yarmar. They worshiped Labwa, the lord of the forest, and tried to live in harmony with the life spirit. Consequently, the watchtower of Fleurforet was the only permanent building found in their territory. Four times a year they gathered here to meet with each other and to allow their queen to mediate disputes. The shamans, who possessed magical vision, would climb the tower and watch the sea for the merchants who came to the nearby river estuary to trade with the Mori.

When the merchants came, guides would lead them to the Mori camp. The place was hidden by strong magic, and any non-Mori venturing alone into the forest nearby quickly found themself lost.

Elena was just wondering how the afternoon's trading had gone when a pair of arms snaked round her waist and squeezed. She spun around, laughing with delight.

'How do you do that?' she cried, embracing the dark-haired man behind her. 'I never hear you coming.'

'A hunter must take extra care when stalking clever prey,' Eldene said lightly before he kissed her. Eldene often told her how clever she was. She loved his rare and generous spirit. Elena had been veiled when they had met and they came to love each other without him ever seeing her face.

Elena sensed he was troubled. Over seven years of marriage she had become good at reading his moods.

'What is it, my lord?' She guessed at the cause. 'Did the merchant have bad news? Will he not be able to bring the arrowheads?'

Eldene's eyes twinkled. 'Tree and leaf. Now, be honest with me. You read my mind, don't you? It's Tari magic, isn't it?'

Elena laughed. 'Oh, wouldn't you like to know, my lord and master! But don't change the subject. What did the merchant say?'

'He said the Mirayans were stopping and searching ships. I do not understand the Mirayans. They seem to have some idea that they have the right to do these things. Where do they get this idea?'

'They are so strong.'

'Aye. I know. They simply do it because they can. But it is so hard to understand how they justify it.'

Elena hugged him. It was puzzling. How was the life spirit served by this will to dominate? But there were more important matters to consider at the moment.

'So, the arrowheads? Did the merchant refuse?'

'The merchant will bring them. He will even bring them more cheaply this year. He has a grudge against the Mirayans. All the Danians do now. Now, do not be frightened. It seems the Mirayans were behind the attempt to kill their queen.'

Elena gasped. 'Yani!' Her sister Yani was one of the Danian queen's bodyguards.

'Your sister is safe. She's a hero, in fact. Her quick blow killed the assassin and saved the queen's life.'

'She killed? Oh, poor Yani!'

'Poor Yani?' Eldene was surprised. Few outlanders really understood how violence affected the Tari.

'To kill is the greatest crime against the life spirit. It brings the deepest agony to the Tari. I must send her some comfort. What else did the merchant say?'

'He says it is likely that Duke Wolf will break our treaty. He has been gathering his troops in Lamartaine. You were right. Do these people care nothing for balance?' It was a rhetorical question. Everyone in the Archipelago knew that the Mirayans were only interested in the kind of balance that stemmed from their mastery.

Elena and Eldene held each other in silence.

When they had first come to the Archipelago, eighty years before, the Mirayans had simply been traders. But as time went on they began to take control over the ports they traded from. More recently, a civil war in their homeland had bought them to the Archipelago in greater numbers and with a view to settling on the land.

Twenty-three years ago a group of Mirayan mercenaries had sailed into the harbor at Olbia and offered to help the Southern Seagani clear up the chaos left by Demonmaster Asgor's destruction of Olbia. Peace and security had been established but the Southern Seagani had found themselves compelled to offer their Chieftainship to the Mirayan leader Alexus Scarvan, who soon pronounced himself High Chief of all the Seagani. After a series of battles the other Seagani tribes learned to accept his overlordship. One of High Chief Scarvan's vassals, Duke Wolf Madraga, now ruled the Eastern Seagani from his fortress at Lamartaine. This meant his lands bordered on the lands of the Mori. He seemed to be busy perpetuating the old tensions between the Mori and the Eastern Seagani for purposes of his own.

The Mirayans were frighteningly ruthless in their determination to dominate. Seven years ago Duke Wolf had taken Eldene captive and, using him as a hostage, threatened his mother, the queen of the Mori, into trading exclusively with them. Eldene had escaped and Elena had found him, wounded and exhausted, on the beach of their little island. She and her sisters had hidden him from his pursuers.

Now Eldene laughed, a little ruefully. 'It is ironic to think that the Mirayans brought us together. They would curse if they knew they were the reason I have such a clever wife who understands these stupid, evil people and warns me to hoard arrowheads and double patrols.'

Elena felt herself melt. Eldene was the only one who ever treated her as if she had a brain, and every time he did she turned to soft butter in his hands. No one else seemed able to see beyond her looks. She had never ceased to thank the powers of life that she had been able to meet and know such a man without her beauty getting in the way.

She tightened her arms around him. He smiled down at her.

'I am glad I heeded you, clever wife, and had the shamans strengthen the warding at the forest edge and around this place.' He laughed. 'Do you know the merchant could not even hear us until he came into the clearing? At least we are safe here. Only a Mori can get through those wardings.'

Then he sighed. 'What is it, Rowl?'

Elena turned. Eldene's second-in-command was standing behind her. He was a hard-bitten old veteran who, like many of the Mori men, was too shy to look Elena in the eye.

'Montagne has returned from his patrol,' he said to Eldene. 'You said you wanted to see him.'

'Yes, I do. I'd best go.' Eldene took Elena's hand and kissed it with a romantic flourish. 'Until we meet again, my love. I shall count the moments.'

With a half-affectionate, half-mocking smile, he strode away across the clearing. Elena watched him go. He filled her with such joy, yet today she was left with a dark feeling in her breast. Sometimes it felt as if a trap were closing in around them. The Mirayans owned all of the coastal land that bordered the Mori forest, and now it looked as though they were going to try and take the forest as well. It seemed likely that such warlike people wanted to rule the whole island of Yarmar. There was already frequent fighting at the forest edges, where Mirayans kept defying their own treaty and attacking the Mori's revered trees.

She shook herself. Surely the magic of the forest, where the power of the life force was strong, would protect those who honoured it. She checked that her daughter, Alyx, was safe and turned back to her potion. She was so intent on straining off the liquid that at first she did not notice the shouting or the armed men running out of the trees. Like most of the other Mori, she only realised that the camp was under attack when the alarm horns began to sound.

Scooping up Alyx and a couple of her playmates, Elena ran to the safety of the tower. Queen Sonnette Verdey, Elena's mother-in-law, was already there, hustling mothers and children inside. Elena grabbed some weapons in order to fight beside Eldene, but Sonnette barricaded the tower door and refused to let her out. Shortly afterward a wave of Mirayan soldiers slammed against the tower walls.

There followed a long night of fire and blood. The women within the tower kept shooting, sending arrows down into the fray. All night they prevented the Mirayans from taking the tower.

At last, as dawn struggled through the trees, the din of the battle died away. In the early morning stillness the Mirayan mages lit up the sky with flares. By their light, Elena could see the wreckage of the camp: the destroyed and smouldering tents, the broken bodies. Four men were kneeling on the ground, their arms tied behind their backs. Around them stood an implacable wall of Mirayan warriors, the red dragon flag like a splash of blood across their chests.

One of the kneeling men raised his head and looked up at the tower. Elena saw that it was Eldene. He was still alive! The realisation flowed through her like fresh spring water. Her husband, her love, was still alive. Elena pressed closer to the slit window but it was too narrow for her to lean through.

And then a man stepped out beside Eldene with an axe raised in his fist.

'No,' Elena screamed with all her heart and mind. She would have leapt from the window had it been possible. The other women pulled her back just as the axe fell. Eldene's body slumped forward. Dead.

Eldene's executioner killed the other three men - Eldene's second-in-command and two brothers, the youngest only twelve. Thus died all of Sonnette Verdey's sons. When the deed was done, another man stepped forward. He looked up at the tower and spoke, his voice made louder by magic.

'Thus die all enemies of the Mirayan Empire! I am Wolf Madraga, High Chieftain of the Eastern Seagani people. Your leaders are dead. Submit to me and your lives will be spared.'

So now the Mori must face surrender and slavery, or death, thought Elena. And Eldene was dead. She sank down against the wall, her face in her hands. She couldn't believe it! She could still see his face as he had bent to kiss her. He couldn't be dead. She tried to clutch the sweet memory of his kiss to her, to force it to be real. He was dead. He would never kiss her again. She would never forgive herself for not dying there beside him.

'Mumma,' cried a voice in her ear.

Alyx! Her little daughter stood beside her, face anxious and puckered, ready for tears. Elena snatched her to her chest. She must be strong for Alyx. All was not lost yet. Alyx clutched at her, her eyes big with fear but she did not cry. Sweet life! If only she had some way of getting her daughter safely away from here. Elena felt a hard knot of panic settle on her. If only she had magical powers like her sister Marigoth. Or even a strong sword arm like Yani.

Frightened children pressed all around her, their hands clutching at her, their little faces pushing against her sides. Sweet life! All these little ones. This couldn't be real. She couldn't be here; they couldn't be trapped like this. There must be some way out of this nightmare. If only she had not lost Marigoth's stone. If only she could have called for help somehow. She was Tari. Why couldn't she do something? Couldn't the life spirit save them?

An argument was raging on the other side of the room.

'We must surrender,' Sonnette said. 'They say they will not kill the boys.'

Her mother-in-law looked a hundred years old. She had lost two daughters to the Mirayans in earlier fighting and now in one night she had lost her three sons as well. But still she was strong. She had to be. She was the leader of these frightened women and children.

'They lie! They always lie!' someone cried.

'Let them burn us,' screamed someone else. 'Better to die free than live a slave.'

'No!' Sonnette shouted. 'Labwa forbids self-slaughter. It will be bad. I cannot say otherwise. But while we live we are still Mori and we can hate. We can still find some way to strike back at these filthy pigs. If they put us to weave, we can weave poison into the cloth. If they set us to care for their children, we can smother them in their cots.'

There was silence throughout the room.

'Seek death if you wish. There are swords enough here for those who wish to kill themselves,' she said. 'But I will live if I can, for those who live can always fight again.'

Many of the women had begun to weep. The children were wailing. Alyx clung to Elena with a strangling grip. Her trembling hands brought strength back to Elena. She forced herself to stand up.

'We must be brave,' she whispered softly to her daughter. Your father would wish it.

Sonnette came to Elena's side and squeezed her arm so strongly it hurt.

'You must protect Alyx,' she hissed. 'She is the last of the Verdey. My daughter is dead and I may die tonight too. Alyx is the next queen. You must protect her.'

'I will,' Elena said. 'With my life.'

'They will not kill you,' Sonnette said. 'You are too beautiful. You will survive. Buy Alyx's survival too. Do it for Eldene.'

The sun was red through the smoky dawn. Only a thin stone tower and piles of smouldering ruins remained of the Mori settlement.

* * *

Duke Wolf Madraga had delivered his ultimatum to the survivors. Now he stood among the smoking remains of the skin tents and regarded with satisfaction the huddled corpses that littered the ground.

Large numbers of Mori had died this night. Both the men and their strangely warlike women had put up an impressive fight though they had been significantly outnumbered and outmagicked. He had to respect them for that. The duke bore the Mori no particular malice. This punitive expedition had simply been the logical result of the continuing Mori raids on peaceful Mirayan settlements. They needed to be taught a lesson. He hoped that this attack would finally make them learn.

He hoped, too, that the handful of women left guarding the children in the tower would surrender. He had no taste for unnecessary killing, even in the case of Mori women who were quite likely to stab you in the back given half the chance. Unnecessary killing was wasteful.

Wolf was a practical man: cool and efficient. It showed in his appearance. Though he had the leathery face of one who had spent most of his forty years campaigning in all weathers, there was something very neat about him - the way he moved, his expression, his compact body, the cut of his greying hair. He was not tall and not at all an impressive physical figure, yet his soldiers trusted him and followed him with unswerving loyalty.

'How goes it, brother-in-law?' a jovial voice hailed him.

The High Chieftain of Seagan and Wolf Madraga's liege lord, Prince Alexus Scarvan, came limping through the debris toward him. A bad leg wound four years before had put an end to his fighting career, but he was still able to survey the battlefield.

He is not aging well, thought Wolf Madraga. Sad when a man is forced to give up his life's vocation. Scarvan's always large body had softened and spread with inactivity, and his face was red and puffy. He was a lecherous bull of a man, fond of women, food and wine, but he had been a good leader, and had brought his followers from a rout in war-torn Miraya to new lands and honours on the island of Yarmar. Wolf respected his skills even if occasionally he had to distract him from mauling unwilling serving girls.

Wolf had always been a loyal vassal to Scarvan and was happy to be so. He had married Scarvan's sister and, though she was long dead, the bond between the two men was still strong. There had been a time when Wolf had been regarded as Scarvan's logical successor, but due to the ministrations of the very skilled native physicians, Scarvan's sickly son seemed likely to survive after all. This did not bother Wolf. He had only a practical amount of ambition and was content with his large dukedom. It was more than he could have expected back in Miraya.

The only tension that had ever occurred between Wolf and Scarvan was due to the black and white clad priests of Mir who even now followed in Scarvan's wake. In Wolf's opinion, during the last few years they had come to have far more influence over Scarvan than was reasonable.

'Well, you've done a fine night's work here, brother-in-law,' Scarvan said, clapping Wolf on the arm with one of his big paws.

'Aye,' said one of the priests at Scarvan's side. 'Watch them burning in their own sin.'

No wonder these priests had so little luck converting the natives, Wolf thought, chilled by the avid look in their eyes. He turned away, only to be confronted by another avid face.

Giron Mori.

'You promised me Eldene's widow, Lord Wolf. I brought you through their magic so you could take Eldene. You promised me Elena Starchild.'

'Yes, yes,' Wolf said. 'You may have first pick of the female captives, Giron.'

'So you're not going to fireball the tower?'

'We shall if they don't surrender.'

'No!' Giron shouted. 'You promised me!'

'Shut up!' Wolf said. 'I doubt it will come to that. Women seldom have the guts for self-destruction.'

'You promised me Elena Starchild! She's in that tower!' Giron lunged at Wolf. A couple of men-at-arms grabbed him even as he moved.

'For Mir's sake! Just wait, you fool.' Wolf nodded at the men. 'Take him away and cool him down.'

'Lusty fellow!' Scarvan said in amusement. 'These Mori are animals. But I'd put him to death if I were you. I've got no time for traitors.'

'Yes, it's a tempting thought. But if I deal honestly with him others may betray their leaders. Eldene may be dead but there are plenty of other Mori men out there.'

'I'm curious to see this Elena Starchild,' Scarvan said.

'You'd better hope they surrender, then. We'll lose too many men in an assault to make it worth our while to take the tower. Mori woman are good archers, and vicious when they're defending their children.'

'Like bitches with their pups,' Scarvan grinned. 'Are they pretty though?'

No doubt he'd want to sample some of that prettiness tonight.

'You have to watch your back with them,' Wolf said. He never made use of captives, preferring his women to give some semblance of consent even if it was only bought with money. 'They spin and weave like all women and they make fine field slaves.'

'Valuable enough, then,' Scarvan said. 'I'll give you a good price for the woolworkers if you get them out.'

'Done!'

At that moment there was a shout.

A green flag waved out of a window in the tower. The duke turned and moved closer. A single arrow flew out but bounced uselessly off the magical protection barrier that covered him.

'Who's leading them?' Scarvan asked of a nearby man-at-arms. He didn't speak any native languages.

'Sonnette Verdey, Eldene's mother. Like most of these native tribes she's called queen. Her son was only a war leader.'

'Perversion of nature,' Father Gaius muttered.

'Who in their right mind follows a woman?' Scarvan snorted. 'These tribes! No wonder Mir has allowed us to beat them.'

There was a general nodding among the priests.

'She's agreeing to come out if we don't kill the boy children,' said the man. 'The duke's giving his word.'

'She's got no choice,' Scarvan said, who had made many such deals in his time.

'Eldene got any sons?' Scarvan asked when Wolf had come back to his side.

'Just a daughter. This is the end of the direct male line, though no doubt someone will rise up to fill the gap.'

'Just like old times this,' Scarvan said. He clapped Wolf on the shoulder.

Wolf grinned back at him. He'd always been fond of the old devil. They were two men certain of their power and their loyalty to one another. It was to be the last time.

The door of the tower opened.

The mages moved forward to check which of the captives could use magic and disabled them with iron witch manacles. Women and children filed out, defeated. Their heads were bowed and covered. Some of them were sobbing. The Mori were short, dark-haired, olive-skinned people, but there was one among them who was noticeably taller. As she came through the door the child she was leading began to pull back. She leaned with noticeable grace to pick the child up and as she straightened her shawl fell off her head.

Everyone stopped. Every man in the clearing stared. The mages forgot their duties. The mouths of the priests fell open. Even the men stripping the dead bodies felt the silence and looked up to stare at her.

For she was fair as gold with skin like ivory and huge, dark green eyes. Her face! Each feature was so delicate and fine. Her neck was slender, her body shapely. Perfect. Surpassing perfect - astonishing! She was the most beautiful woman they had ever seen.

And by the time the sun had fully risen, Wolf Madraga and Alexus Scarvan were no longer friends.

'You promised me the woolworkers,' Scarvan shouted. 'It is my right as your liege to have the pick of the captives. How dare you oppose me!'

Madraga almost struck his lord. The sight of Scarvan's puffy red hand touching her arm made him desperate. Scarvan's bodyguard stopped him. Giron, the Mori traitor, threw himself at Scarvan and by the time he had been cut down, Scarvan was pulling the woman up the gangplank of his ship. The time for rash action was over and sense had stepped between Madraga and his desires.

All through the arguments, the widow of Eldene Mori had held herself with dignity, her eyes downcast, her child clasped close. She was a paragon of womanhood, like a white swan, like a supple birch tree, a fine jewel… Words could not describe her beauty. No wonder they called her Elena Starchild.

Wolf could tell she was frightened and repelled by Scarvan from the flare of her nostrils and the quick backward glance she had given him as Scarvan had pulled her away. The thought of her fate tormented him. He knew that rutting bastard Scarvan. Wolf strode up and down among the ruins of the Mori village wishing he could have argued better or that he had the spine to have his men attack Scarvan, or even that he had never attacked Fleurforet.

Stop being such a fool, he told himself, she's only a woman. There are many others. He could hear their screams echoing across the clearing even as he paced.

Yet there was no one else who mattered. He clenched his fists and his teeth, trying not to look behind him at the ship, where a rape must now be taking place. Scarvan's puffy red body…

'Brother Wolf,' said a voice. Jark, leader of his Seagani allies, was at his side. 'That woman. You must save her! You must take her from Scarvan.'

Madraga turned on Jark. There was no one else to punish.

'Would you have me attack my liege lord? There is such a thing as honour! Or don't you understand that?'

Jark Seagani's face showed outrage. He was a noble among the Seagani, and he and Wolf had sworn blood brotherhood when the Seagani had voted to give Wolf their chieftain's crown.

'Damn you!' he cried. For a moment he seemed about to strike Wolf. Then he said coldly, 'I will forgive your words for I know that it is lust that makes you speak so. But do not press me too far, blood brother.'

Something in his voice calmed Wolf. He realised what he had almost done and regained control.

'Do not think the woman is for you,' Jark continued. 'She is Tari - a man might as well lust for a goddess. She is not to be owned by such as us. And definitely not to be owned by such as Scarvan. We must rescue her, lest the anger of the Tari fall on us and they destroy us as they destroyed the cursed ones of Olbia. They will hate for one of their women to be thus used.'

Wolf was astonished by Jark's words. 'What are you talking about? This is superstition! Twenty years I've been in this archipelago and I've heard Tari this and Tari that, but I've never seen one of these creatures. They don't exist.'

'You Mirayans,' said the Seagani's senior shaman, who was standing behind Jark. 'Just because you don't see something, you won't believe in it.'

'Don't try me, shaman!' Wolf snarled. He was usually very polite to shamans. Native religious leaders made bad enemies, as that shitbag Scarvan had found. But shamans were purveyors of superstition, and he disliked them even more than he disliked priests.

'Wolf! Brother!' Jark said, catching his arm. 'The good Father is right! Did you ever before see a native woman who looked like that? The golden hair, the green eyes - these are marks of the Tari. Believe me brother: they are real. I saw them as a child. And they are dangerous, mighty mages. They threw Olbia into the sea to avenge their dead and it was easy for them.'

'She is some Mirayan half-breed,' Wolf snapped. 'And I am not going to destroy my honour for her sake. She's only a woman, by Mir's blood.'

He shook himself. He had to get control. Jark was right in one thing. This was lust - just a stupid animal feeling. He had to get the better of it and try to think clearly.

'Do not speak to me more, blood brother,' he said, managing with difficulty to speak calmly. 'I am angered and fear to be unmannerly.'

He strode away.

* * *

'We must do something!' cried the shaman, Arak, looking out at the ship disappearing down the river.

'What?' Jark shouted. The thought of Alexus Scarvan touching that woman horrified him even more than it had horrified Wolf Madraga.. 'What can be done? Look, the ship is already out in the bay. Shall we take to boats? There are no boats! Curse that man!'

He threw his sword on the ground and turned away, covering his face with his hands.

Arak tried to calm his own shock and horror so that he could comfort Jark as a spiritual leader must. He put a hand on his arm.

'Good Father!' Jark said in a broken voice. 'I am a man, and I feel now as any good Seagani must, but I'm not so bewitched that I would attack Alexus Scarvan. It would endanger our people to do so.'

'I know,' said the shaman, who understood. 'But what of the Tari? What of their just anger?'

'The Tari have not been seen these past twenty years. Perhaps they are sleeping. Or dead.'

'Never think it!'

'What can we do?' Jark asked. 'Surely their wrath will rightly fall on Alexus Scarvan. Think, good Father. What if they destroy him like they destroyed the Seagani of Olbia? Perhaps… ' A savage look came onto his face. 'Think if that despoiler of the sacred groves should be washed into the sea. Think of it!'

'Yes,' Arak said. The thought soothed him a little, but not enough. The Tari could see beyond immediate cause and effect, and the Seagani had been instrumental in causing the woman to be captured.

The thought stayed with Arak through the rest of the day, as it stayed with all the Seagani. What should have been a triumphant victory over their enemies had became a kind of defeat, all because of this Tari woman.

Elena Starchild did not seem to be a mage or they would never have been able to take Fleurforet. Nonetheless she was valuable simply because she was Tari, a conduit of the life spirit and a member of a powerful and unpredictable race. The fact that Eldene Mori had a Tari wife could only mean that the Mori had Tari favour. In order to avoid possible repercussions Arak instructed the Seagani to refuse their fair share of the Mori loot and not to touch the Mori women. His orders were willingly obeyed. After the disaster at Olbia, no one wanted to anger the Tari.

There was another consideration that preyed on the shaman's mind: Elena Starchild was dangerous in and of herself. The legends had talked about a power some of the Tari had called fatal beauty. He had always thought it a myth but his own senses had been enchanted by her, as had Jark's and those of every man who beheld her. Giron Mori had betrayed his lord to own her. And as for their godless Mirayan lords - they had fallen out over her. The shaman had never seen the pragmatic Wolf Madraga in such a state before. This fatal beauty was truly a power and, like all powers and the Tari themselves, it was able to unbalance the whole world.

The shamans of the Eastern Seagani recognised that in Wolf Madraga they had a lord who would not interfere with their beliefs. But if he were to fall out of favour with his own liege, or if he were to be killed and replaced by another - Great Stallion, forbid it - another Mirayan might not be so light-handed. And such a replacement would set disastrous events in motion. Many of the clan leaders still cherished the illusion that they had had some choice in electing a Mirayan chief. They would not accept another man without a fight, and they would lose that fight, as native people always lost against the Mirayans. Arak had always seen Alexus Scarvan as a kind of punishment to the Seagani for the impiety of killing the three Tari mages. A precarious, precious balance was in great danger and all because of that woman. It would be a good thing if her people came and took her away so that she was no longer a focus for chaos.

And if her people decided to punish those who captured her as well? The Mirayans with their godless, life-destroying ways were entirely worthy objects for their anger. But how to be certain that their anger was directed the right way? As the day went on Arak became more and more certain that action was needed.

So it was that a few days later, after consulting with other elders of the Shamanic Brotherhood, Arak found himself travelling toward Ermora, the holy land of the Tari.

Three groups of people had traditionally shared the island of Yarmar: on the western side were the Seagani, who were herders and farmers; on the eastern side in the great forest were the Mori, who lived as hunters and gatherers; in the centre of the island, as they had once been at the centre of Yarmarian life, lived the Tari. Their hidden land, Ermora, lay high up in the Gen Mountains. The mountains were so tall that clouds were often caught on the peaks and shrouded them from view.

Arak travelled toward the centre of Yarmar until he left the borders of Eastern Seagani. Here, among the tumbled foothills of the Gen Mountains, lived the Red Seagani: shy, secretive sheep herders who had had little to do with the Mirayans. They were not a dangerous people, but they were odd and it took all Arak's courage to deal with the way they would come and peer into his face while he was sleeping, and yet run and hide from him during the day. Some of their faces showed signs of Tari blood - the dark green, almond-shaped eyes, and the pale skin and hair. Perhaps this was what made them so fey.

As Arak approached the foothills and Gen Gateway, a large cluster of roughly hewn wooden and thatch buildings scattered among the mysterious ruins of much larger stone buildings, he could see how truly sheer and craggy the Gen Mountains were.

Here the Red Seagani were not so shy. Arak found lodgings and hired a guide. That evening two shamans of the village came to sup with him and to ask him of his business with the Tari. He told them of the captive Tari woman and of the Mirayan brutality toward her. It seemed wise to be honest in this place.

The following morning Arak and his guide set out to climb the mountains. They were not far out of the village when a hawk with rich, red-brown plumage flew past them and up the mountain.

'Is it a messenger?' Arak asked of his guide, but the lad, whose red manhood tattoos were so new on his cheeks that they were still raised, merely grunted.

For three long days they climbed the mountains. Just as Arak was beginning to think the hard climb would never end, they suddenly topped a rise and found themselves on a lushly forested plateau.

'Penterong,' the guide grunted, pointing to a path that led away into the forest. He left the path and sat down on soft green grass beneath the trees. Arak understood that he meant to go no farther.

The Tari were regarded as a gentle, kindly race by ordinary people, and Arak himself was old enough to have fond memories of their travelling folk. Yet he could not help remembering how easily they had thrown the city of Olbia into the sea. A wise man always approaches the powerful warily, he thought. Yet as he walked through the forest of Penterong that fear left him. His sight gorged on the beauty of the forest as a hungry man gorges on food. Its beauty satisfied and delighted him as nothing had ever done before. He felt young and free again: full of energy and twice as strong as he had ever been.

Though he sensed that there were watchers among the trees, he was not afraid. He felt completely a part of this landscape, as if he were a piece of a perfect pattern that included rocks, trees and sky; or as if he were a dancer in a complicated dance, performing his part while all around him the world sang in joyous harmony. The world was him and moved through him and he belonged to it. At the same time he saw how tiny his part was and how much more there was to understand. The world was a mystery of richness and beauty which could never be entirely known and would never sour.

Arak had not had such feelings since the day he had taken the sacred passage to shamanhood. Unlike that day, when the feeling had been brought on by drugs and his senses had been dazed, here he saw everything with great clarity. A part of him, the part that had assessed the effect of the Tari woman on the Mirayans so coldly, saw with a fearful wariness that he was falling into a religious ecstasy, but even that did not really trouble him.

At last Arak came into view of the great rose-covered rock wall that was the healing hall of Penterong. As he stood open-mouthed and staring, there was a rustling in the trees nearby. A great cloud of small birds burst through the foliage and flew past him, twittering brightly. Suddenly a woman stood before him. She was dressed in grey, and her pale gold hair was interwoven with red feathers. She reminded him of the tall, stately herons that lived on the margins of the sea. Perched on her arm was the hawk he had seen earlier. She stroked it with her finger and regarded him out of the corner of her eye.

'You are the one with the message for the Tari?' she asked. Her eyes seemed as wild and predatory as those of the hawk.

'I am, lady,' the shaman said, beginning to feel afraid again.

'Then come with me,' she said and led him away into the forest.

In a clearing sat two Tari: a man and a woman. They were tall and fair as Tari always are, but there was a coldness about them that Arak did not remember from the Tari he had met as a child. The woman wore the clean white robes of a healer and her hair was gracefully braided with gold thread and green beads, but her dark eyes were full of cool mockery. The shaman thought he would have had to be at the very door of death before he would have asked her for healing.

Neither of them gave their names, though the woman called the man Jagamar. He gave her a severe look when she did so, however, and she hardly spoke after that.

The man was handsome, with a fine-boned face and smooth, elegant silver hair. His eyes were not cold but fiery and, as Arak spoke, they became increasingly full of excitement.

Arak told them of the battle for the Mori stronghold of Fleurforet, emphasising the Mirayans' guilt as much and as subtly as he could. This was easy, for the Tari was far more interested in the Mirayans than in the Seagani.

Jagamar called the Mirayans the people of the dragon and asked the shaman much of how they did things and what they believed in. He asked particularly about High Chief Scarvan and Duke Wolf. He did not seem to have any special fondness for the Mori, but he asked a great many questions about Elena Starchild.

After a long period of questions and answers, the Tari man thanked the shaman. It was only when Arak was on his way home that it occurred to him that it was almost as if the Tari man had never seen Elena Starchild. It puzzled him, though he could make nothing of it.

'You have done well and shown us great friendship in coming here,' the Tari man said.

'It is an honour to serve the Tari,' Arak said. 'Their presence is much missed in the lands of the archipelago.'

'Yes, yes,' the man said dismissively. 'We thank you. If you wish to continue to serve us, you will not speak of this matter too widely. Now one of the attendants will return you to your guide.'

Arak found the bird lady at his side and followed her without further ado. He was disappointed that he was not going to see more of Penterong but somehow relieved to be going. The Tari were more frightening than he remembered them to be.