J.C. & Barb Hendee D 5 Rebel Fay (v1.3)

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bundles that Leesil had scavenged. Her frown deepened.
"Where is my pack?"
Magiere knew the answer. She'd been the one to pack the horses the previous
morning.
"It must've been on Port," Leesil answered. "Everything I could find& this is
all we have left."
The little sage's eyes widened further, then narrowed at Leesil. "What? All
my journals were in that pack, my quills and parchments& Chap's talking hide!"
Leesil turned away and wouldn't look at her.
"You sent most of your journals to Domin Tilswith," Magiere said, anxious to
calm Wynn. "Before we left Soladran. You can rewrite anything of importance,
and there's been nothing worth noting since we left the Warlands. The elven
Territories are still ahead, and that's what you've been waiting for most.
We'll find parchment or paper and I've seen you make ink."
"Of course," Leesil put in. "Soon as we're through these mountains& and a
feather to cut a new "
"If we get through!" Wynn shouted at him, and her words echoed about the high
cavern. "If Chap finds a way. If we do not starve. If we do not die of
exposure or walk blindly over a cliff into a chasm& because you could not wait
for winter to pass!"
Any defense Magiere might have offered for Leesil was smothered in her own
rising guilt.
They all knew from the beginning that if Leesil's mother still lived, she was
imprisoned by her people. The elves wouldn't kill her, it seemed, so she would
still be there no matter how long it took to find her. But from the moment
Leesil discovered the skulls of his father and grandmother, he'd stopped
listening to reason.
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Magiere had argued with him, time and again, over waiting out winter. In the
end, she always relented, and he pushed them onward. Now here they were
without horses or adequate food, and beaten down with fatigue and injury.
Wynn's words were aimed at Leesil, but they struck Magiere into silence.
"What about Chap's talking hide?" Wynn continued. "How is he to talk
efficiently with me, now that it is gone?"
The talking hide was a large square of tanned leather upon which Wynn had
inked rows of Elvish symbols, words, and phrases. Both she and Chap could read
it, and Chap pawed out responses beyond his one, two, or three barks.
Chap shook himself and barked once for "yes," then poked his nose into Wynn's
shoulder.
"He can still talk with us a bit," Magiere offered.
Wynn didn't answer. She took another berry, fumbling to peel its skin with
her thumbnail.
Magiere was about to stop her, for Leesil's suspicion was half-right. They
had no idea where this gift of food had come from or why. She glanced at Chap,
ready to ask if the berries smelled safe. He huffed a "yes" before she spoke
and headed off across the cavern floor.
With a sigh, Magiere set the crystal aside and took up a bisselberry of her
own, pulling back the fruit's skin.
Leesil wandered off to the cave's far side and crouched to gaze blankly down
into the hole Chap had found. He was so driven to keep moving, to reach the
elven Territories and find his mother. But Magiere knew they'd be lucky to
even find their way back out of the range. She looked toward the hole he
inspected and saw a flash of silver fur.
"Leesil, where is Chap?"
Magiere snatched up the crystal and her falchion as the tip of Chap's tail
disappeared down the hole.
"Get back here, you misguided mutt!"
Chap crawled over the hole's lip and hopped down into a sloped tunnel,
heading deeper inside the mountain. In the darkness he barely made out the
passage, but scent guided him more than sight. He smelled something familiar.
As much as that made his instincts cry a warning, he had to be certain of what
he suspected.
The passage was rough and its ceiling so low that his ears scraped if he
raised them. A few sliding paces downward, it dropped again a short way to the
floor of a wider tunnel. The scent was strong, and Chap jumped down. His nose
bumped a pile of plump fruits that tumbled apart, rolling off their platter of
fresh leaves.
Bisselberries, Wynn had called them. What the elves of this continent
calledr�icheach sghiahean bitter shields for their edible skin was as
unpleasant as the inside was sweet.
He pushed on down the tunnel, and when it seemed he had gone too far without
encountering another pile, he paused and sniffed the air. It took a moment to
separate the scent behind him from anything ahead, but they were there,
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somewhere down in the dark.
More bisselberries.
Someone& something& had laid a trail for them into the belly of the mountain.
This was too mundane to be the working of his kin. He could not determine the
direction in which the passage ran forward or back or even to the side through
the so-called Broken Range. Where would they end up, even if the trail led out
of the mountain at all?
Entombed in stone, a manifestation of the element of Earth, Chap called out
through his Spirit one last time.
In this dark place, the silence of his kin made him sag. He stiffened and
rumbled with outrage.
They would not come to him, and the survival of his companions his
charges now depended on skulkers who would not reveal themselves. Behind the
scent of fresh fruit and their green leaves, behind grime and dust kicked up
by his own paws, was the other scent he had smelled upon first entering this
place.
Like a bird and yet not. Faint but everywhere in the dark beneath the
mountain.
Chap turned back, stopping long enough to pick up several bisselberries in
his mouth to show the others. Hopefully it would not take long to make them
understand. There was only one path to take, if they were to avoid starving or
succumbing to winter.
Someone was trying to lead them through the inside of this mountain. Someone
had called them in from the storm to find shelter.
Chap headed back toward his companions. He had to convince them to follow him
into this passage& to trust his judgment once more.
Chapter Two
Aoishenis-Ah�re a title, a heritage, and an obligation. "Most Aged Father"
waited within the massive oak at Crijhe�iche Origin-Heart. As the centermost
community of what humans called the elven Territories, it was also home to the
Anmagl�hk, a caste apart from the clans of his people. He had lived so long
that even the elders of the twenty-seven clans no longer remembered scant [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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