And now Noranda was likewise lying unconscious, just like Bethany. She was somewhere nearby. Alec took a determined step away from the window, entered the hall, and walked aimlessly until he found a maid, who gave him directions to the infirmary. Alec soon found the door and stepped inside, where he saw Brandeis standing next to the only occupied cot in the room.
Alec looked at Noranda, pale like all the others who had fallen, her face in a slight grimace. He watched with sympathy as Brandeis stroked her hair. “You need to make sure you drip a strong broth in her mouth. Boil vegetables as well as the meats, so she gets as much nutrition as possible,” Alec said. He and Brandeis both lingered by her bedside, thinking of her, for several minutes, until Brandeis emerged from his reverie. “We need to get you down to dinner. Helma will insist that we be there on time, if not early, after all she’s had to do!” The two of them returned to the guest quarters, where they gathered all the other travelers, and together they trouped down to an elegant dining room whose windows looked over a small courtyard.
“You’ve outdone yourself!” Brandeis congratulated Helma as she stood in a small doorway, observing the wait staff setting the dishes on the table. Delle was waiting, along with Durer and Johanna and Circh. Alec greeted them all warmly, and in turn they treated him like a lost member of their tribe.
Over dinner Alec learned about the young leaders’ progress in working with the leaders of Stronghold and running their family’s trading business. “Your cleansing water is making a big improvement in our trade. As long as we keep making profits from it we’ll keep the aunts and uncles satisfied with our methods,” Durer gratefully told Alec as they conversed.
Eventually dessert was served and the meal drew to a close. “We’ll need extra horses and water skins to cross the prairie,” Alec told Durer as the last plates were removed from the table.
“You can take as many as you need,” Durer said easily. “How many riders do you want?”
Alec looked at him momentarily. “We’re traveling as fast and light as possible. I don’t plan to take a fighting force.”
“We’ll take him,” Armilla spoke for the first time. She pointed at Delle. “If he wants to come. I’ve traveled with him before. I know he can keep up a good pace.”
“If you’re taking Delle, you have to take me too,” Brandeis spoke abruptly. “I won’t slow you down. You’ve got two from Goldenfields and two from Oyster Bay, so you need two from Stronghold.”
“Rander wanted to come too,” Alec replied slowly. “I told him he needed to stay to take care of Rief, to make sure he was with her.”
“I’ve done this before Alec,” Brandeis said pleadingly. “I waited for months the last time Norrie was in her tomb, and it drove me crazy. If I stay here and stew with no way to help the situation, I’ll go crazy again.”
“You know this is not a well-planned journey. We only know we are going to go in search of the lacertii in the mountains. I don’t want to sound negative, but it may not be a simple journey that will make you feel like you’re accomplishing something. But if you want to join us, I understand. You’re welcome to be a part of our trip,” Alec relented. He turned his head slightly, and saw Johanna give a slight nod of her head, a sign of her approval of his decision.
“We’ll leave first thing in the morning. I’d like to go down to your stables tonight and select some horses, if that’s alright. And I’d like to take a brace of pigeons, if you have some you can lend us,” Alec added. “If Brandeis starts to act up, we’ll send a pigeon back telling you where to pick him up!”
“That was uncalled for!” Brandeis protested. “They’ll know where to find me; they’ll just need to visit the nearest tavern!”
Everyone turned in for the night shortly thereafter, and slept soundly. For Alec’s small band, it was the most comfortable night’s rest they had enjoyed in weeks, and all were refreshed as they joined Alec early the next morning and proceeded to resume the long, perilous journey.
Chapter 9 – Reaching the Pale Mountains
Two weeks later the eight riders were far out into the great eastern plains between Sandyforks and the Pale Mountains. They had left streams and ponds behind, and were carefully rationing their water supplies. Alec expected them to safely make it across the plains, but until they reached the mountains and their next source of water, he wanted to maintain discipline and conserve the water they had for their horses and themselves.
The summer evening had been short, and as morning broke, Delle motioned to Alec to join him as he stared eastward at the sunrise. “I think I see smoke rising out there. Do you see it?” he asked as his hand shaded his eyes from the blinding red sun.
“I do,” Alec confirmed. “There is a family of settlers out here -- Abram and Sara and their children. There used to be more families, but most of them left after Riverside was destroyed. That smoke may be from Abram’s chimney. At least, let’s hope so. Their place is practically in the foothills of the mountains.”
The whole contingent began riding and within an hour was near the farmstead whose chimney was indeed belching the smoke Delle had spotted earlier. The sun was already warming the plain, and Alec knew they would soon see a shimmering blanket of heat distorting the distant view. This was his third time to cross the empty lands, and all of them had been during the long hot days of summer, he remembered. Sara was smart to do her cooking now in the relative cool of the morning, Alec realized.
Abram, Sandy and young Tomas, all holding implements or clubs, stood on the porch of the house as the eight riders rode up to the farmstead. Alec could see Sara inside through one of the windows, the head of a small child visible against her apron. They weren’t used to visitors, and weren’t trusting any group of such a size that rode up. It was a prudent approach, Alec considered, knowing that there was no one else to help the family in the event of trouble.
“Sandy! How is that leg doing?” Alec shouted from a safe distance. “Not every healer will come back to give you a check up.”
“Alec? Is that you?” Sara bolted out onto the porch. “Abram! Get out there and welcome Alec and his friends,” she scolded. “Tomas, go to the well and draw some water for their horses.”
Alec dismounted and motioned for his companions to climb down also.
“Let me get you a bite to eat,” Sara said as she started down the porch to greet Alec. Sandy though, moved faster than either of his parents, and vigorously shook hands with the man who had healed his lame leg a year earlier. “It’s like it was always perfect. There’s never been a problem since you healed it.”
Abram arrived and grabbed Alec’s other hand. “It’s good to see you. What brings you and your friends all the way out here? Come inside and have a seat – all of you. Sara, bring a jar of juice up from the cellar.” All the younger children came out of the house, some excited and others shy at the sight of so many strangers.
“No, don’t waste your good juice on a lot like us,” Alec called insistently. “We’re passing through on our way to the mountains. We just stopped in to say hello and make sure everything is going okay.”
“We have a long journey ahead of us,” he added.
“Why are you taking a handful of warriors into the mountains?” Abram asked, looking at the dismounted riders who were milling about the yard.
“Our ingenairii have fallen ill, and we are looking for a cure for them. It’s in the mountains, somewhere,” Alec answered.
“We have new neighbors,” blurted one of the younger children, hanging onto her father’s shirttail.
“We have seen a couple move out here again. They came from Stronghold. It’s the first new settler we’ve seen since the troubles in Riverside a few years ago,” Abram agreed. “But as for you, there’s a lot of mountain range out there,” he gestured east. “What kind of cure are you looking for?”
“We are going to look for a forgotten holy place,” Alec said. “There is something there that will cure this problem, so the ingenairii can live and ser
ve the Dominion.”
“I don’t know if it would give a cure, but one of the neighbors who moved away told me once that an old trapper told him about finding a great big old church up in the mountains way up north in the river valley,” Abram said. “It must have made quite an impression on the trapper, from what Domune told me.”
“Did he give you any directions on where it was?” Alec asked, interested in the prospect of the first tangible clue to his destination in the mountains.
“The trapper said it was up north, in the river valley. I never heard anyone else talk about it, so it must have been farther north than most of the trappers and miners went,” Abram answered. “He said the valley around it was haunted.”
Alec examined Abram, Sara and the children to the best of his abilities without using his healer energies, while the rest of the squad helped pump water, watered the horses and prepared to move on. By mid-morning all were in the saddle and moving out, leaving the bemused family of farmers to settle back into their routine lives.
As they rode eastward Alec pondered Abram’s claims. He had been clueless about where to go within the mountains, and wondered if his conversation was a sign telling him where to go. That night they rode until past sundown, and enjoyed a loaf of bread Sara had given them, a luxury compared to the food they’d eaten on the trail. Alec took first watch, staring east at the stars that rose over the mountains that now dominated the horizon.
“The young one worships you,” Brandeis said, sitting down beside him. “Patrick, the young Goldenfields soldier; I listened to him talk for a while during the ride today. He was recounting the stories Berlisle told him about you going to Bondell.”
“I haven’t spoken to him much so far,” Alec replied, surprised by the revelation.
“Have you spoken to any of them? Or are you too wrapped up in this quest to think about them?” Brandeis asked. “I know what I was like when we first received Noranda’s body. I didn’t talk to anyone for a long time, and then of course I went in the other direction.
“Take it easy, Alec. Wake me when it’s my shift,” he stood and patted Alec on the shoulder then walked back to the circle around the fire and crawled into his blankets.
Chapter 10—At the Ruins
“We’ll have rough going for a while now,” Alec told the group two days later as they faced the section of road wiped out by the earthquake that had stranded Richard’s carnival years ago.
“You mean it hasn’t been rough so far?” Brandeis asked, breathing heavily from the climb to that point.
Alec grinned at him as he dismounted and started to lead his horse down a steep slope. Thomis brought up the rear as they spent the morning going down and then climbing back up to where the road resumed.
“I was standing right here when the earthquake hit,” Alec told Patrick, pointing at a spot in the road. “We’d been working to widen and improve the road so our carnival wagons could visit Riverside.”
“Were you one of the armed guards?” Patrick asked him.
Alec grinned. “I was a stable hand, and apprentice bottle washer,” Alec replied with another grin. He climbed back on his horse. “We should get pretty close to Riverside today, and then we’ll pass through it tomorrow and keep going.”
“Do you know where we’re going?” Delle asked.
“Abram told me about a place he heard about up north. I think that’s the place to try first,” he answered. “I was just going to follow the old road east until we found the lacertii, but let’s try this instead.”
“I’m all for that,” Armilla muttered loudly, as a couple of others murmured agreement.
Alec understood their distrust of the lacertii, but said nothing to voice his faith that they would be safe among the lacertii. He turned his horse and led them on, over the road that he was now traveling for a third time. It was beginning to feel comfortable to him.
They camped that night on the mountain top that Alec knew overlooked Riverside’s ruins. The next morning, he called Brandeis up to the front with him as they rode into the empty ghost town. “In that building right there, your beloved killed a lacerta,” Alec pointed out as they rode through the narrow opening in the street. “She saved my life.”
The group quickly reached the bridge, and as they crossed above the river, Alec looked to the south. Not far down there was the way to the cave of John Mark. Maybe he should go back there, he pondered. It had proven to be a sanctuary and a refuge so many times. But now was not the time to return there. Ahead the road climbed gently up a valley, heading east into the lands controlled by the lacertii. He and Noranda had hidden in the underbrush, and watched a patrol of lacertii soldiers arrive from that road and cross the bridge into Riverside. It had been a terrifying time, stranded in the wilderness among the murderous lacertii soldiers.
Along one road were memories of safety and hope. Along another were memories of fear. Yet now, he was going to go in the direction of the unknown. And he hoped it would be the right direction.
The horses strung out in single file as they followed a narrow trail that headed north along the east bank of the river. It was only mid-morning, and Alec led his group of riders at a careful pace north along the river trail. Alec halted the squad at dusk. “There’s plenty of game around here,” he noted. “Armilla, you and Berlisle go out and bring back some meat. Patrick and Delle, come with me to find some greens, and the rest of you set up the camp site and fire.”
“How long are we going to be in the mountains, Alec?” Delle asked minutes later as he watched Alec pile plants on Patrick’s arms.
“I wish I knew, Delle,” Alec answered. “I don’t even know if these ruins up north are real, or where we’re supposed to be. I know we’ve spent a lot of time getting here, and we don’t really have a lot of time left while the ingenairii are lying unconscious back home.”
“Alec, how was Kinsey? Did you see her?” Delle asked.
Alec looked at Delle, and recollected the long trip up and down the river those two had made with Armilla. “I did see her in Oyster Bay. She’s getting the best care possible up on Ingenairii Hill.
“And as soon as we find this cure, she’ll be back on her feet, just like Noranda and Rief and Bethany and everyone else,” he added.
The next morning the travelers set out early, and the next day, and the day after that as well. By afternoon of the fifth day of their trip on the east bank, the character of the river valley began to change. The trail began to climb higher in the valley, which was growing narrower and steeper. The river was growing narrower, and the water flowed turbulently in a rocky bed.
“There’s something up ahead,” Armilla announced as she held up a hand to stop the riders. “Listen,” she held a hand to her ear. They all paused, and realized there was a dull roar in the far distance. “Patrick, you and Joahn go forward and scout the trail. Find out what that noise is. Berlisle, you go up the hill into the forest to make sure no one’s coming down at us. Thomis, you go back down the trail behind us.”
Within seconds Alec, Brandeis and Armilla were alone on the trail, as their squad members went to their positions. Brandeis dismounted and pulled his bow from behind his horse, then shouldered a quiver of arrows, and walked out in front of the other two. “I wish I had my powers,” Alec said tensely, unsheathing his sword.
They stood silently for minutes. The sounds of the forest had died away, and Alec felt his nerves growing taut. The three of them head a faint sound of hoofs approaching. The sound grew louder, and Alec felt prepared for battle.
The tree branches parted in front of them and Joahn and Patrick emerged, unscathed. “There’s a monstrous waterfall up ahead. The river must drop hundreds of feet! That’s the roar we heard,” Patrick announced. Armilla looked at Alec with both relief and disgust, then gave a long, piercing whistle to call the other members in from the woods. When all were assembled, they resumed their journey.
As the trail rounded a turn behind a screen of dense cedar trees, Alec abruptly sa
w the waterfall, magnificent in its noise and height and colorful display of rainbows. All the riders paused. “It’s nearly as big as the falls at Stronghold!” Delle shouted. After a long moment to appreciate the beauty of the scene, they resumed riding. Their trail came to the cliff side, and began to steeply climb, switching back and forth. Halfway up, they all dismounted to relieve the horses, and led them up to the top. During the time they had taken to climb, the sun had nearly reached the horizon, and Alec picked a campsite for them to spend the night.
When they awoke the next morning, Alec noticed a different feel to the river valley at the higher elevation. “There are more pine trees now, and I don’t see any oaks or maples,” he observed to Joahn.
“The air seems clearer, too. It doesn’t feel like the middle of summer,” Joahn replied.
For three more days they rode along the path, continuing to climb higher, although higher mountains remained in front of them, capped with snow. Soon after mid-day, Brandeis called from the front of the group, “Alec, I see something above the trees ahead.”
“What is it, the sky?” Delle replied.
“Leave the jokes to me,” Brandeis answered. “It looks like the top of a building.”
As the rest of the squad joined Brandeis, they all could see a distant stone structure, gray above the green trees, beyond the next small ridge. The appearance of the tower was only a deceptive glimpse though, and they rode on for hours before they saw it again.
“How extraordinary is that?” Berlisle asked rhetorically as they sat atop a knoll that overlooked a broad valley in the mountains. Majestic ruins of a tremendous cathedral rose in the center of the valley, rising above the trees that grew around it.
“Let’s set up camp down there,” Armilla suggested, and they rode down the trail slope towards the limestone husk.
Preserving the Ingenairii Page 6
