Spirit Walker

by David Farland

  “You are a great danger to the people here in town,” Phylomon said. “You should be with your sisters in the mountains, tending your trees.”

  And for the first time since reaching Smilodon Bay, words flowed from the Dryad’s mouth. Her voice had a musical quality that reverberated like the song of a flute. “The Mayor keeps me caged,” she said. “He plans to sell me to slavers in Craal.”

  Several people gasped at the startling beauty of her voice, and perhaps also at the accusation of slavery. Phylomon tilted his head like a robin studying a worm. “So,” he said quietly, “first your mayor defies the old laws by bringing a dinosaur to our land, and then he begins selling slaves to boot.”

  With that Mayor Goodman appeared in his doorway, a large man in girth, with more muscle than fat. “I’m not a slaver,” Goodman said. There was only a trace of fear in his voice, and he carried a tone of authority that the blue man did not equal. “The Dryad is in my care.”

  “You mean she’s in your cage.” Phylomon held the mayor’s eye, drew his sword, and sliced at the wooden bars of the Dryad’s cage, cutting it as if it were a potato. The Dryad pushed at her bars and began wriggling out.

  The mayor blustered, “Sir, I meant no harm. Why, I raised that dinosaur from an egg,” he said, nodding toward the stegosaur. “The Pwi bring eggs from Hotland every year—and no one ever knows what sort of beast will hatch from them. Why, every boy in town has had such an egg at least once. It’s great fun to see what will hatch—but the dinosaurs always die come winter. Only a freak of chance let this beast make it through the winters. And, as for the Dryad, why, she’s not human. It’s not as if I were selling a human. She cost me a great deal—And I’ve fed her these past three months hoping to get a decent price from her!”

  Phylomon listened to the mayor’s blustering without watching him, then turned a questioning eye. Wisteria looked at the mayor and tried to imagine him as Phylomon must see him. Goodman was a large man, and strong. Not the kind to be easily withstood. And the lines in the mayor’s face were hard and secretive.

  “I will gladly buy the Dryad,” Phylomon said calmly. He reached down to his belt and pulled out a small bag, loosed the string that bound it, and dumped the bag’s contents into his palm. Diamonds, sapphires and pearls gleamed. The whole town gasped. “Take whichever stone you think fair.”

  The mayor eyed the stones and concentrated. Sweat began to break out on his forehead. Obviously he did not want to appear greedy—for greed is the father of sin. Wisteria knew the girl was not worth even a large sapphire.

  The mayor took a diamond. A medium-large diamond. A diamond that could have bought a ship.

  Greed had overpowered his common sense.

  Phylomon smiled at the mayor, as if pleased with his choice. “What town is this?”

  “Smilodon Bay,” the mayor said, suddenly distant, fearful. He thrust the diamond into his pocket.

  “And if you went to war tomorrow with Thrall pirates, how many men could you muster?”

  Without hesitation, Goodman answered, “Eighty-six men of war. More, if you want old ones or young.”

  “Then have a hundred men of war down at the docks at dusk. Have them bring their weapons,” Phylomon said, “for I will address them.”

  Most of the town stood within hearing range of Phylomon’s words, and the rest of the people seemed to be coming.

  Wisteria watched the mayor intently. Lady Devarre had taught her girls to try to read a competitor’s thoughts just by the way he held his head, the way the nervous lines crinkled near his eyes, the timbre of his voice.

  Mayor Goodman obviously knew that there was no threat from pirates and he feared to gather the town. Phylomon could be plotting to turn the townsmen against him.

  “As you wish,” the mayor conceded with false courage.

  “I have often heard good report of the inn of Scandal the Gourmet,” Phylomon said, “Is this the town where it lies? Could someone tell him that I'd like a room for the night?”

  Scandal’s high, bellowing voice cut through the crowd, “You can tell me yourself!” he said, and the townspeople laughed a false, nervous laugh.

  “I’ve heard you have a bed in one of your rooms—a very special bed, guaranteed free from vermin,” Phylomon said softly as Scandal shoved the crowd aside, making room for his belly to squeeze through. “Is that room available?”

  Ever the showman, Scandal played to the crowd, answering loudly so that everyone could hear. “Well, a bed is only as free of vermin as the man who’s sleeping in it. If you want my special bed, you’ll have to hike up your breechcloth and let me check for fleas, just like every other customer!”

  Phylomon grinned at the game and pulled up his brechcloth, exposing his muscular legs. Scandal grunted and bent over, making a great show of scrutinizing the blue man’s skin.

  “I hereby declare this man to be totally free of vermin!” Scandal announced, laughing. “And therefore worthy of my finest room—free of charge!” Several people cheered, while others just laughed.

  Phylomon said, “Then show me to your inn.” Phylomon took the Dryad’s hand and helped her rise. Together they made their way across town and up the hill.

  The crowd began to disperse.

  Wisteria felt unsure of what to make of the blue man’s appearance, and wanted to ask her father about it, but she didn’t see him in the crowd. She rushed home to the large house on the north end of town.

  Her mother was quietly preparing dinner in the kitchen. Her father sat in a large upholstered chair in his study, reading The Sayings, a book of wise words purportedly spoken by Phylomon over the centuries. Wisteria had never seen her father read the book before.

  So, she thought, he is preparing to meet him.

  Her father, Beremon Altair had graying hair and bright blue eyes. He was a learned man, knowledgeable about arcane mathematics and physical theories that let the Starfarers travel faster than light, a man who’d made a fortune backing shipping ventures in dangerous waters. A man others feared because he, himself, was a rare genetic throwback to the Starfarers—Beremon Altair was a Dicton, one of the few humans left on Anee who carried the extra pair of genetically engineered chromosomes that were the Starfarer’s greatest legacy. Beremon could calculate nearly any mathematical problem instantly, and from birth he had known every word in the ancient, universal trade language of the Starfarers, a language from Earth itself, called English.

  As a Dicton, Beremon was marked from birth to become a man of power, and he’d lived true to his promise.

  Shipping on Anee could be a dangerous gambit. Because of the extreme gravitational pull of the gas giant Thor, Anee’s tides could fluctuate by a hundred feet in a few hours. During raging storms, a strong gravitational wind could send a sailing ship a thousand miles from its destination overnight and leave it smashed against a rocky coast.

  By applying his knowledge of mathematics to calculate the shifting tides, and finding the precise moment when the gravitational winds would surge, Beremon had reduced the risk to his own ships. Over the years he’d expanded his hold on the shipping industry until, by age forty, he’d become the most powerful shipping magnate and financier in the Rough.

  “Father, Phylomon the Starfarer is in town!” Wisteria said loudly. He did not look at her, and showed no surprise.

  Beremon said, “I heard the shouting.”

  “Why would he come here?” Wisteria asked.

  “He often travels from continent to continent, studying animal and plant populations, doing what he can to keep nature regular. If he had skin the color of any other man’s, we’d think him a vagabond. We’d let him stay in town a day or two, watch our clotheslines and gardens to see what he steals, and the mayor would finally sic his mastiffs on him and send him on his way.”

  “That’s not what I mean,” Wisteria said. “I mean, what is he doing here, in this town, now?”

  “He doesn’t visit towns often,” Beremon said. “He tires quickly of us short
-lived people who can never attain a mental caliber equal to his. He is a man of great intelligence, and he lives alone, and when men like him live alone, their thoughts begin to travel in strange, eccentric paths. Who am I to guess what he might be thinking? Perhaps he has heard of Scandal’s quest? The innkeeper has made no secret of it. Or perhaps his visit is coincidental. I’ve heard from sailors that he’s been in Craal the past few years.

  “Down south in Benbow two years ago, he caused quite a stir. It seems that he’s taken aback at how slavery has become a fad in the past century. He’s begun to enforce some of the laws of our ancestors. If you have time, you might persuade a few friends to begin cutting wood for funeral pyres.”

  Wisteria’s stomach tightened. She’d feared as much—he’d come to kill the mayor and the other people she suspected of being slavers. She feared to speak her next words even more. “Will he kill you?”

  Beremon looked up from his book. He smiled weakly. “You think so little of me?”

  “I’m sorry,” Wisteria said. Yet she knew he was a slaver. When she had been a child, her mother had feuded for several months with a neighbor woman named Javan Tech. Javan had accused Wisteria’s mother, Elyssa, of stealing some nails, and no matter what Elyssa or Beremon did to clear their good name, Javan kept trying to prejudice others against them.

  Finally, in desperation, Beremon caught Javan and tied her in their basement for a week until he could persuade the mayor to help stash her in the hold of a departing ship. Wisteria herself had helped feed and water the woman.

  “Sorry?” Beremon asked. “Don’t be sorry. I made one mistake when I was young. Carting that bitch Javan out of town and selling her to Craal seemed a good idea at the time. A fun idea. We got rid of a problem and made some pocket change in the bargain. I still think it was a fun idea. But remember, my Apple, it was only once.”

  Only once that Wisteria knew of, and once was all that it took. She’d never trusted her father after that, despite the fact that she still loved him. She felt as if a snare was tightening around her own foot.

  “I saw Tull today—we talked,” Wisteria said. “We didn’t kiss. We didn’t hug. I wanted to tell you, before you heard it from others.”

  “I’m not surprised that he found you. The Pwi are like dogs that way, always sniffing at the source of joy. You will not see him socially, of course,” Beremon said. “You are the daughter of a Dicton, and if you are lucky you might give birth to a Dicton. Your body is a great asset, and you should marry only into the finest family. I will arrange for a suitable marriage shortly.”

  “I’m sorry,” Wisteria said, backing out of the study. She was not sure if she felt sorry for seeing Tull or sorry because she would be forced to marry a stranger. Talking to her father like this was always unbearable. The look of disgust on his face when he’d learned of her fling with Tull, the guilt she’d felt when she’d fed Javan, the powerful, passionate love she felt for Beremon, her own father, all became so jumbled in her mind that she could not think straight while in his presence.

  “Sorry?” Beremon asked. “Sorrow does no one any good. You will, of course, stay away from Tull?”

  Wisteria remembered her training at Lady Devarre’s School of Merchantry. Her father was offering a good marriage, power. Tull could never give her that. She straightened her back and nodded. “Of course, Father, I will stay away from Tull. I'm sorry.”

  She closed the door behind her and stood outside the room a moment, letting her pounding heart calm. “Oh yes,” she heard Beremon say to himself, “you're always sorry. I fear that you’ll be forever sorry.”

  Chapter 8: Judgement Day

  At dusk, a crowd of perhaps two hundred humans mixed with another three hundred Neanderthals gathered in and around the Moon Dance Inn, each person eager to hear of the blue man’s doings. Phylomon calmly sat inside to dine, the wild Dryad at his side, while the inn filled to overflowing. The townsfolk were amazed to see such a pair sitting on the familiar weathered oak stools of the inn.

  Scandal himself bustled back and forth between the common room and his kitchen, offering Phylomon course after course of his finest fare—honey muffins with salmon berries, lamb ribs barbecued in plum sauce, buttered eel, squash and pine nuts under a blanket of fine white cheese, a baked bread pudding covered in a layer of blackberry tart.

  When he could no longer stand it, one townsman called out to Phylomon, “What are you doing here?”

  “He’s eating pudding!” Scandal said protectively, not wanting the locals to bother his celebrity.

  Phylomon glanced up from his plate. Even from his stool, he could gaze out over the crowd. He measured his words. “I was in Wellen’s Eyes a few weeks ago and heard that the serpent hatch had failed, so I came to investigate.”

  “Ayaah, it failed,” Scandal said, “and it will fail again next year. There’s not a single serpent at the nesting grounds at Haystack Rock. I’ve got some men, and we’re heading for Craal in a week to catch some hatchlings, bring them back here, and stock them in the bay.”

  “Alive?” Phylomon asked. He felt unsure if the idea was brilliant or simply just as ludicrous as it sounded. “You hope to catch them alive?”

  “They wouldn’t be any benefit to us dead,” Scandal answered. “I know it can be done. Why, when I was young, I met a chef out of Greenstone. He had a recipe for serpent—young serpent in chestnuts and red peppers, with an apricot-brandy glaze. The Crawlies catch serpents in the Seven Ogre and transport them by wagon three hundred miles to Greenstone, and send them out by ship all across the Craal.”

  “Yes,” Phylomon said, “many fishermen at Seven Ogre go out for the serpent catch.” He looked down at the table and his eyes became unfocused, remembering those distant lands. “But you plan to haul the serpents much farther. Can they even survive, I wonder….”

  Scandal said, “I figure we can take a few boys over the mountains, fill up my beer keg with serpents, head down to Denai, buy us a small boat, and sail the cargo to Castle Rock. With the serpents nesting, we wouldn’t dare try to get the boat through the Straits of Zerai, but we can ship them overland to Bashevgo, along with our boat, and then put the boat back in the water. We’ll have a three-man crew at Bashevgo building a barge big enough to house the serpents—since they’ll be hitting a growth spurt—and then we can sail the serpents home.”

  Phylomon considered. “That sounds like a fanciful plan on the surface of it, but the serpents do make it to Greenstone. Still, I expect some attrition in the harvest. How many serpents do you think you can catch?”

  “I figure, that if we get there early, we can bring in the little ones—three footers. I could hold a hundred of them in the barrel. By the time we reach Bashevgo ten days later, they’ll be six footers, and by the time we get them on a barge and ship them home, they’ll be fifteen to twenty feet long.”

  “A hundred serpents to patrol this coast is not many,” Phylomon said. “By spring they’ll only be eighty footers. I’d prefer that you brought back a thousand.”

  “What?” Scandal said. “Ten mastodons? Ten wagons?”

  “But even with only one wagon, it will be hard to get in and out of Craal unnoticed,” Phylomon said. “You underestimate the Blade Kin.” Phylomon became silent for a moment, and no one said a word.

  The Blade Kin, cruel warriors culled from the darkest prisons in Craal, were skillful fighters, far more highly trained than the pirate slavers of Bashevgo.

  Phylomon continued, “Over the past few years, they’ve begun to keep a better watch on the Rough than you know. The number of escaped slaves has increased over the past decade, and the escaped slaves make constant war upon the mountain fortresses of the Blade Kin, so the borders are always under watch. It will be difficult to pass them.”

  This was bad news, and Phylomon noted how the mood in the room darkened. Scandal’s plan sounded fanciful, but it might just work.

  “Still,” Phylomon added, “if there are no serpents here in the East, somethin
g must be done, and I must come with you.”

  Scandal clapped his hands in relief, his face lighting up with joy.

  “But first,” Phylomon said, “I have urgent business here. A new college opens in Benbow soon, and they need a printing press to make books. I understand that you have one here in town?”

  “Ayaah,” one of the merchants said, “Sort of. A fellow from the south came up here and tried to sell us one a few years back. He was a crazy youngster with grand ideas. The press was made in Craal, and we wouldn’t be able to get spare parts. He didn’t have the money to ship it elsewhere. No one bought it, so he dumped it into the bay.”

  “Fools!” Phylomon said, standing and looking at the lot of them in shock. Those nearest townsmen backed away, out of sword’s reach, and the entire crowd fell silent. “Why do you hamper me at every turn?” Phylomon scolded. “Surely you realized the value of that press. Could not one of you have spared a steel eagle for it? How do you ever hope to regain the stars when the highest bit of technology you are willing to master is the use of a gun? Damn the lot of you to hell! Isn’t there one among you with any foresight?”

  No one dared answer. They stared at the floor, or into their hands. Phylomon’s gaze whirled to Scandal. The innkeeper here seemed to be the most visionary among them, but even he had not spared a pittance to save the printing press.

  A young farmer barged into the inn, sweat streaming down his face, as if he’d just run the miles to get here. He had frantic blue eyes that were too wide, like the eyes of a simpleton. “Phylomon, Good Sir! Heal my daughter! She's deadly sick.”

  Phylomon looked to the back of the room and shook his head sadly and asked, “Who am I to heal your daughter?” Legends of his wisdom and powers had grown too large, it seemed.

  “I’ve heard,” the young man said, “that if you spread your skin upon a sick person, you can heal her. Heal my daughter, please!” He pushed his way forward through the crowd, fell to his knees.