by Allan Cole
The warrior's body lay broken across a large, flat stone. His corpse could be clearly seen in the light of Cassini's purifying fire. Janos muttered something and although I couldn't make out his words, I knew he was reacting to the shape of the armor and helm the corpse was wearing. It was exactly as he had described the horsemen of his childhood. The warrior had been a large man, taller even than Janos, with wide shoulders and thick chest. He had a beaked face, like a bird of prey, with deep-set still-open eyes that seemed permanently set to peer into vast distances. There was a sword strapped to his waist and a broken spear lay to one side. His body shone a deep, earthen brown, as if he had been daubed with many layers of paint.
Cassini pointed upward and we saw a thick drop of heavy liquid form on a rock that hung above the corpse. It gathered into a bead and splashed down on the warrior. As it broke, the sweet odor rose again and we watched in fascination as the drop spread across the warrior, leaving brown trail like heavy oil. Janos motioned us closer and we could see the body had been covered and preserved by the liquid falling over many generations. The man grimaced up at us, his look as painfully fresh as the moment he'd died.
"I've seen insects preserved like this," Janos said, "but only in old forests. The local people said they were trapped in the sap running from the trees; they sell them as talismans when the liquid dries. It's called amber, I believe." Janos touched the preserved body, curious. "A warrior in amber," he mused.
"I don't see any trees here," I said. "Only stone."
"It is obviously a spell his companions cast," Cassini said, "to preserve their comrade from the elements. Since he could not be properly laid to rest, they did what they could to comfort his ghost."
Cassini filled a gourd with coals from his purifying fire and shook it over the corpse. Sparks and smoke showered as Cassini moved around the stone, chanting soothing words to placate the warrior's ghost. He promised a handsome shrine, with many gifts from the Shore People to honor him. In the shadows I heard a long sigh. The warrior's eyes seemed to glitter, then went blank. We took this as acceptance and the three of us lifted the corpse free of the killing stone. He came up so easily I nearly fell. The body was lighter than a child's; empty of all the fluids and flesh that give a living thing weight. As we laid the warrior on the canyon floor a purse fell and shattered, spilling its contents. There were a few old coins, pierced for trading stock; a whetstone for the sword; and what appeared to be a roll of writing linen. My hand reflexed for it. "Wait," Janos warned. But one finger touched before I could snatch my hand back. A corner of the linen crumpled into dust. "I'm sorry," I said. No one heard me.
"It looks like some type of map," Cassini said.
Janos's eyes lit with excitement. "Can you reconstruct it?"
Cassini didn't answer, but excitement gripped him as well. He fished in his pack for a small vial of black fluid and an herbalist's knife. He shook a few drops of the liquid in the blade's measuring trough, then sprinkled a pinch of the linen dust over it. I couldn't hear the words of his enchantment; he said them so quickly and smoothly you could see he had long practice at this sort of task. I remembered all young Evocators were put to work in the library, turning scraps of scrolls or manuscripts into dozens of duplicates each day.
While he worked I glanced at the pouch the map had fallen from, marveling that the leather it had been cut from had also been preserved by the amber. I saw something on its face I took at first to be discoloration, then realized it was too regular. I leaned closer, but did not touch the pouch, having learnt my lesson. Worked into the leather was an emblem: A serpent coiled across a tooled star. I saw bits of pigment clinging to the emblem, blue on the serpent's coils and yellow on the star, which I realized was actually a sunburst. I pointed it out to Janos, and he scrutinized it as carefully as I had.
"A family crest," I hazarded.
He shook his head. "Not likely for a soldier serving in an organized formation. I would guess it is the crest of those he Watched for. Perhaps a prince, perhaps a sorcerer, perhaps a king. Perhaps that is the emblem of the Far Kingdoms themselves."
I was about to wonder as to the certainty of his words when Cassini announced the spell had begun to work. He breathed over the mixture. A speck of goo congealed to another, and that small lump bonded to its brother as well. In a moment we could see a sliver of linen begin to grow and Cassini quickly dumped the knife's contents onto the mother roll. There came a crackle and a hiss as if a fire were being fed, and the roll of linen began to move. In a blink, all traces of antiquity fell away and the linen spread out before us as fresh and white as the day it was made. The quill scribblings had turned into deep lines of black ink, glistening as if just dipped up from a bottle.
Cassini lifted the light beads and the three of leaned forward to see. It was a map, as he had guessed. But it was a most unusual map, for where a human mapmaker would mark perils such as swamps, canyons or thick jungle, the linen was blank. What was marked were mountain peaks, each crag carefully delineated; rivers that could be seen from the air; and certain high points where a Watcher might have his post. "A map," I murmured, "meant for birds."
"Or," Janos said, "men who can fly, or at least transport themselves from peak to peak with magick."
There was the outline of the Pepper Coast as if this marked the limits of the Watcher's area of concern, then the map sprawled east. At the easternmost edge of the map was a great lump of a mountain range; a big, black fist knuckling up from the linen.
We heard a sigh and we spun to see the warrior's eyes all a-glitter again. He seemed to be looking at me. I'm sure the others felt the same, but for a moment I believed that long dead warrior was trying to speak to me. Then I heard a terrible rattle from his throat, as if he had been clinging to life all these years and was only now being released. The eyes went blank again; but now his rictus grimace was more like a smile.
Janos spoke, voice rough: "Is that omen enough for you, Cassini? What more do you need?"
Cassini was silent, but I could feel the tension building, and saw great emotion twitching at the muscles in his face.
"Well?" Janos prodded. "Do we still return home? Or do we go?"
Four days later we marched east. We left L'ur and his crew in the company of Black Shark's people, who had vowed eternal gratitude for our releasing them from that ancient curse. He even sold us small asses to help carry our burdens, and assigned some of his people to go along as hostlers and guides "until the ends of the world, if you so wish." Furthermore, after the Shore People built the promised shrine for the Warrior in Amber, they promised to help L'ur construct a new ship to take us homeward when we returned.
L'ur himself was now a firm friend of the Antero family. If we met disaster and did not return within six months, L'ur held a note to my father with a pledge of payment for all the time he would have waited, as well as for a replacement of the Kittiwake. I had no doubt L'ur would wait and it wasn't just because of the small fortune I had pledged. He had become as gripped by the fever as any of us when I unrolled the map to the Far Kingdoms.
"For the first time in my life," the old sailor said, "I wish to the gods I had been born a walking man."
* * *
CHAPTER NINE
NOMADS AT WORLD'S END
The river led inland through rolling countryside, that the eye sought hard to fill with farms and villages and people; but there was little of sign of humanity in that wilderness. We passed close to a few hamlets; their ragged settlers watched us pass without smiles, without gestures. Our soldiers grew rapidly tired of shouting ribaldry at the few nubile women we saw, for the bawdiness was treated as if it had never occurred.
"All the people," Janos observed, have the same look as some of the poorer folk in the hills near where I grew up. They see any man with a sword, no matter how that tightly it's sheathed, as their enemy. You may recollect what I said once before," he continued, lifting his voice to Cassini, who was walking not far from us, "about what war is like on this
side of the Narrow Seas? The look in those people's eyes says more than I can about their lives."
Cassini shrugged. "The strong have always battened on the weak, and always shall. Nature and the gods dictate, man follows."
After a time, we saw no more inhabited villages. Once or twice Janos identified an overgrown weedy patch of secondary growth as where a village, or a farm estate, might have stood years earlier. The climate was a bit warmer than Orissa, perhaps, and it rained more frequently. But the rain drifted softly, like a mist, and came as welcome relief to the heat of the day. We held to an easterly direction, by compass and, from time to time, the sorcerous "map" Cassini had fashioned from the Watcher's talisman. Even though it showed but peaks and occasional features of the landscape, it was still valuable, and we were able to keep our journey on its proper course.
There were many things of interest to me; and it was not just because I was with the first civilized men - civilized Orissan men, I should say - to see this land, but also because this is when I really began to view things through the eyes of my own people. Although honesty directs me to admit that as a merchant's son, I also saw much gold being heaped into the Antero vaults. Here there was a fish whose delicate white flesh could be smoked. There was a fruit of glowing green/purple, whose taste exploded in your mouth. A minor spell against decay and corruption, and those could become the latest savory in Orissa. A seed that was as fiery as any ground and dried pepper any of us had tasted.
After a march of five days, the worst problem we had encountered was a persistent fit of sneezing that seemed to set upon all of us just at dusk. We were traveling as if strolling through a park - a park set aside for our private enjoyment. Then, after about a week more, things began to change. I was walking beside Cassini, and thinking idly of how easy the way had been for the past hour, as our route wound over low hills, following a series of shallow ravines. He halted, abruptly, and Sergeant Maeen, walking just behind us, had to double-step to avoid running into him. Cassini paid no mind; his eyes were blank and staring... looking far into nothingness. I pulled Cassini out of the line of march, and beckoned for Janos, who quickly was beside us. I feared our Evocator had become suddenly sorcelled in an unknown manner. But such was not the case, for Cassini soon brought himself back to full awareness; he peered around, realizing that the entire party had stopped and was looking at him.
"This land," he said, without preamble, "was as the shaman of the Shore People said. I felt the souls of thousands of people, some who lived on these hills, and some who traveled this way, traveled on this very road whose ruins we are pacing." I nodded, involuntarily, realizing why our path had been so easy. Of course we were on a long-forgotten ruined road. "In that vale just beyond," Cassini said, "which you cannot see from here, there was a famous inn... at a crossroads. Many stayed there. It was a happy place."
"What happened," Janos asked.
"Death," Cassini said. "death and blood. So much blood, for so many years, that those who lived fled, fled or gave up their spirits in hopelessness."
"Who brought the death? Where did it come from? What was it? Steel... or sorcery?"
"I think... both," Cassini said slowly. "Sorcery is what I feel most strongly, echoing from these hills. Who brought it? I do not know. Where did it come from? I do not know that, either."
Then he returned fully to normal. "Enough," he said. "I do not do Seeings as if I were some witch putting unwashed peasants to awe at a Planting Time fest. You. Soldier. Bring me some wine. And check the ties on my boot when you return. I fear I am developing a blister." Cassini was a cold man, even for an Evocator.
An hour later one of the asses brayed, and reared, his pack spilling across the ground. The pack was small, but quite heavy, since it contained the thick canvas bag with half of our gold. The pack thudded to the ground and ripped, coins rolling away into the greensward. Maeen shouted at the animal's master, but he shook his head - vowing he'd done nothing to spook the creature - and pointing out that he had been more nowhere near the animal when the pack fell. The other Shore People chimed in that he was telling the truth.
"Then you are doubly to blame," Maeen roared. "For you tied your hitches so poorly this morning when you packed the animal that the rope must have worn and broken. You are doubly an ass, and your animal should be leading you, rather than the opposite." The Shore Man stammered that the rope must have been old, but Maeen would have none of that.
I walked to where the pack and its cargo were scattered, and picked up the rope. It was quite new... L'ur had taken it from the wreck of the Kittiwake to make up our packframes. I examined the end of the rope: it had been cut; cut cleanly, in fact, as if a very strong man with a very big, very sharp knife, had slashed it. I took the rope to Janos, who also showed it to Cassini. Janos told Sergeant Maeen that was enough. Have the ass repacked, and continue the march. None of us said anything, but our thoughts were clear. I was remembering that tiny golden scythe that Janos had secured back in Lycanth, that now rode in his pack. I knew it could be used not only in the cutting and preparation of magickal herbs and such, but to work spells from afar. Certainly there were other golden scythes like it, and wizards to wield them. I thought again of the Choosing in Lycanth, and how close that creature had come to me. Then I thought of the Archons Tempest; that thought made me look back over my shoulder, and although I saw nothing to warrant it, I shivered.
Minor annoyances increased as we traveled: we were attacked by swarms of black mites whose bites stung like fire; an increase in minor accidents made it seem that all of us were suddenly in the throes of boyhood gangliness; and a dusk, the mysterious fits of sneezing returned.
The problems came to the fore the night we found the ruins. A low pass had made it easier for us to follow close along the river. The river suddenly shallowed and spread out for two spearcasts over visible shoals. It did not seem logical since I could see in the distance that the river returned to its normal, gently flowing character. As a child of a river city, I thought I knew what I might find, and sharpened my gaze. I surmised that eons ago this river had been channeled. I called for a halt while I wandered through the brush looking for more evidence. Without much trouble, I found what I was looking for: the river "banks" were carefully-mortared stone walls; and those walls were nearly thirty feet apart. Janos was beside me, evidently puzzling at the U-shaped construct.
"Built by man," he said. "But for what end?"
"A set of locks," I explained. "At each end there would have been wooden gates - allowing a boat to enter and either rise up, or be lowered to a new level to continue its course. Over there..." and I pointed to the shallows "... would most likely have been the over-run when the locks were not in use. When it was abandoned, time would have passed, and the river, impatient with its bonds, would have burst through the over-run to find a new bed."
All of us were silent, imagining these locks filled with boats laden with trade goods, waiting for passage along river. The width of the lock showed that the country had once been fully as prosperous as Cassini's vision had told us.
Janos had Maeen send out scouts, and they returned quickly with more signs of civilization. Further up the river, one man found a winding path. It would have been a tow path, I guessed, so boats heading up river were not dependent on muscle, wind, or the energy-draining spells necessary to move heavy-laden craft. A few feet away, hidden by a screen of vines, was a building with thick stone walls and narrow-slitted windows. The great beams that held the roof were still in place, though black with age. In front of the building was a smaller, circular structure.
Now it was Janos' turn to be the expert. "A barracks," he said. "The small building would have been for customs and the on-watch guards. We can take shelter here," he said. "The canvas from the packs will stretch over the old beams for our ceiling." He ordered a halt for the night, even though it was two hours before dusk, and detailed two of the Shore People who'd claimed great experience with nets, poisons and piscatorial spells to catch
something fresh for dinner.
I stood in the middle of the bustle, lost in thought. I was not then, and certainly not now one of those fools who believe man has a right to throw up his houses and businesses where ever he pleased; but I recognized then, and have felt the same since, there is something sad and frightening about ruins. Here man was once, and then he vanished: by choice or by threat, who could know?
Then another, even stranger thought struck. I mentioned this quietly to Janos: "In which direction do you think the soldiers were guarding? Were their enemies ahead of us, to the east? Or was this to prevent some threat from behind?" Janos shrugged, and did not bother to guess.
We heard a cry of pain, then angry voices, and the sudden CLANG of a sword against a shield. We ran into the center of the ruins. A scattered fire... an overturned cookpot... two soldiers with swords ready. Janos shouted, but the two men circling each other - eyes probing for an opening, paid no heed. His hand blurred in that violently quick motion I remembered from outside the tavern in Orissa, and his broadsword flashed, knocking away both blades of the soldiers. They came back to their senses, and there was a babble of "...bastard knocked over..." "...laughed..." "...clumsy ape..." and a bellow for silence.
