Blind Seer snorted. "I remember. It is the emblem of the new Kingdom of the Isles."
"How?" Firekeeper looked at Plik, accusation in her dark eyes. "How did this come here? I thought the Liglimom knew as little of the northern lands as the north did of this place. How did this come here?"
Plik swallowed an involuntary surge of fear. "I don't know. You say you know this woman. She is a contemporary then, not a historical figure?"
"She is alive," Firekeeper said. "Or was, last I heard. Not only does she live, these emblems speak of recent knowledge of her. First Valora was queen of Bright Bay. About three years ago she lost her right to rule. Since then she has been queen only of the Isles."
"Queen," Plik said, making sure he understood the foreign term. "First Female."
"First Human," Firekeeper corrected. "The One of her pack. After the way of the northern humans, Valora's ruling came to her from having been born to the right parents, not from any deed of her own."
Plik wanted to ask any number of questions about this peculiar concept of government, but a feverish brightness in Firekeeper's eyes stayed him. The wolf-woman was now turning over the other figures.
"This one I do not know - the costume is again foreign. This one here. See, again the dress is northern. A woman again, to judge from the skirts. Her head is missing."
"I think," Blind Seer said, "we should find that head if we can. Would you be willing to check beneath the waters again?"
Firekeeper nodded. Her lips were set so tightly that Plik wondered if she had suspicions as to who that broken figure might represent. Without another word, she exited the room of the silver block. A moment later, they heard faint splashing as she felt around in the water.
Blind Seer had laid down alongside the figurines, his ears cocked to listen. "Plik, do you recognize any depicted in these figurines?" "No," Plik replied. "Until Firekeeper came to misheemnekuru, I had only glimpsed humans at a distance, out on the waters in their boats. My kind does not ingle with humanity - and mingles very little with the beasts."
"Ah ..." Blind Seer said. "Well, the ravens may be of sip there."
The Royal Wolf might have elucidated more of his thoughts, but at that moment Firekeeper re-entered the am. She had shed her loincloth. Water streamed from her naked body and wet hair. She was strapping her leather knife belt back around her waist, the blade in her hand, held away from any chance contact with damp.
Apparently, merely groping around with her hands in the water had not been sufficient. She had gone diving, and, judging from what she held wrapped in the discarded loincloth, her efforts had not been without reward.
"Look at these," the wolf-woman said, dropping the bundled loincloth beside the figurines. It fell open to reveal few more carved pieces of stone. "I need to dry off."
Plik reached for the first thing that came to hand. A male figure, clad in dress like, but not like that of the Liglimom. He began to dry the stone against his coat, but stopped when his grey and brown hairs stuck to the stone. Instead he reached for a piece of fabric.
Firekeeper returned almost as quickly as she had left, now wrapped in some of the unknown occupant's bedding. Her hair, hastily toweled off to stop the worst of the dripping, stood out at odd, spiky angles. Plik thought for the first time how odd it was that humans, alone among almost all the beasts, had hair that grew without limit. It certainly did not seem to be a useful trait, and he was glad for his own shaggy coat.
Squatting, Firekeeper picked a small bit of broken stone from the wet heap she had just brought in. "I think this is the head that goes with the other northern body. It is chipped but..."
She fitted head to body, and held the reassembled whole before Blind Seer. The blue-eyed wolf studied it with thoughtful calm. Then, almost as an afterthought, Firekeeper handed the two pieces to Plik.
"A woman in northern attire," Plik said. "Do either of you know this woman as you did the other?"
Blind Seer replied, "I cannot say I see any resemblance to any we know in that face. The nose is gone for one. But once again there are symbols etched into the base. One is that of House Gyrfalcon, the other that of the land of New Kelvin. There is only one woman I know to whom that pairing would apply."
"Melina." Firekeeper's voice held a flat anger that sealed Plik's questions behind his teeth. "So I thought. Blind Seer, I do not like this."
"Nor I," Blind Seer nosed the heap of stones. "Take these outside and ask Bitter and Lovable if they see anyone they know among those sculpted here."
Firekeeper glanced at him. "You suspect?"
"I do, but I prefer not to say."
Firekeeper dropped the sheet where she stood. Apparently, she was dry enough for her comfort.
"I will go," she said. "Will you stay?"
"Someone should guard Plik."
Firekeeper nodded. "Well enough. Do not remain in here too long. More and more, I fear this is a place wherein we should not linger."
Left alone with Blind Seer, Plik asked the questions he had held back until Firekeeper had taken her anger and agitation away with her.
"This Melina ... Another northerner you know?"
"Yes. A woman who loved magic too much. She is dead now."
Plik waited, but no further details were forthcoming. He remembered how the one figure had been broken, the other not.
"But this Queen Valora, she lives?"
"She lives. As far as we know, she lives."
Plik waited for more, and when nothing came set himself to work. He had bagged almost all the books. With their northern aversion to magic, Firekeeper and Blind Seer had resisted his taking the brazier. The bedding was interesting. He couldn't see a use for the basin in the water chamber. Neither the silver block, nor the light panels would come free without damage. Then he remembered the chandelier in the entryway. rely they would not care if he took a stone or two from , Over a century had passed since magic had been practiced, but Plik knew that sometimes an item could retain the signature of the one who had made or used it. A light crystal was a long shot, but better than nothing. Blind Seer dragged one of the bags of books forward. Pausing and running his tongue around his teeth, he watched as Plik moved a chair over to beneath the chandelier.
"What are you doing?"
"I was going to ..." Plik then stopped, realizing something. He removed one of the crystals and held it where the wolf could inspect it. "See anything here?"
Blind Seer sniffed, his ears laying back against his skull, his lips wrinkling back from some very impressive fangs.
"I think I might. These are the same type of stone from which the figurines were made. These pieces are larger,: then they would be."
Plik was inspecting the fixture. "There are a dozen or so crystals missing, mostly from the upper tier. Firekeeper found, what? Five figurines? Six?"
"About that," the wolf agreed. "Either there are others, or not all the stonecutter's hunts came to good ends."
"I'd bet the latter," Plik said. "We've seen no cutting tools, so he may have had to use what was left to him."
Given his company, Plik did not say "magic," but from how Blind Seer's ears pressed even flatter, the wolf understood.
"We need to take a sample," Plik said firmly, "and, I we cannot leave the brazier or the bowl. Those wiser than me in the ways magic was practiced may learn something from them." They had both forgotten Powerful Tenderness and Truth, for the pair had waited silently in the exterior darkness. Now Truth spoke.
"There are no omens indicating harm will come to you for doing this," she said, "but I will be the first to admit that my sight is not what it once was."
Blind Seer gave a shuddering sigh. "Very well. You will have your way, Plik, but be quick about your collecting. "
Plik was, and when they had taken all away, even Firekeeper's abandoned loincloth, even the wet bedding, Powerful Tenderness stood out of the doorway. No one was surprised when it closed of its own accord, nor when pale white light rippled across its surface, leaving the silver seamlessl
y melded into place once again.
"I felt that," Powerful Tenderness said, stooping to lift Truth. "Old magic, like in an amulet, but this was made to renew itself."
"A great expenditure of power must have gone into that making," Plik agreed. "I wish I understood better what this place is."
Truth, passive as a huge toy in Powerful Tenderness's arms, said softly, "A place for keeping in. A place for keeping out. A place where the worlds meet - worlds that perhaps should not meet."
But when questioned, the jaguar claimed to have no idea what she had said. With this the thoroughly unsettled band had to be content.
FIREKEEPER RETURNED shortly after the door had been sealed, young Rascal romping at her heels. She bore the figurines in a bundle at her waist, balancing the weight of her knife.
"I found Bitter and Precious," she said without preamble. "Our host pack had been hunting, and the ravens stayed to dine. They took time from their meal to examine our finds, though."
She looked at Blind Seer. "Your suspicions. Were they about the other broken figure?"
Blind Seer huffed breath out through his nose in a huff of agreement. "You were right then. Bitter swore the figure was a perfect miniature of Dantarahma. The emblem on his base is of the junjaldisdu."
Plik bleated in astonishment. "Dantarahma? But he died but a year ago... He was the junjaldisdu who ..."
"Loved magic too much?" Blind Seer's hackles rose, but there was humor in the cant of his ears. "As did Melina - who also is shown without a head. Queen Valora too, had doings with magic, but she trusted unwisely and lost her prizes. Trails cross most often when you near the deer yard. What trail is this?"
Firekeeper shuddered. She removed the bundle from her waist and spread out the figurines, lining them up, matching head to shoulders. Two were broken. Three remained entire. Of these, one was Valora. The other, man and woman, wore a style of clothing like, but, as Plik had said, not the same as that of the Liglimom.
"Bitter and Lovable did not know these two," she said, tapping the two with the unfamiliar dress. "Moreover, though they have emblems scratched on them, the ravens did not recognize the emblems either. Perhaps I should say 'emblem.' It looks much the same on both figures."
"We could copy the emblem," Blind Seer suggested. "Plik has a steady hand. If the maimalodalum do not know the symbol, then perhaps one of the Liglimom on the mainland does. We could send a message to Derian."
Firekeeper emitted a soft inaudible sigh, a mere kiss of breath against her lower lip. Blind Seer was always harrying her to learn to read and write. Indeed, she knew he read better than she did, though neither of them were fluent. However, the wolf had rapidly realized that humans used their written symbols as trail markers, as most of the beasts used scent and more personal signs. "You would not ignore where a bear has sharpened his laws on a tree trunk," Blind Seer had chided her. "Why do you ignore these signs?"
And Firekeeper had refused to reply, for the entire issue awoke uncomfortable stirrings within her. Although she now knew more of her human kin than she ever had before, in a contrary fashion, she still fled from that heritage.
"I have one more figure," Firekeeper said. "I found it when I went diving, but I kept it back from the others... I needed to think."
She reached beneath her knife belt and drew forth an uncomfortable lump from where it had pressed against her flesh. She laid it where the firelight would illuminate both its form and its markings.
This sixth figurine was of a jaguar, and from the cant of the head, something in how the figure stood, even in the rosettes of spots so carefully placed, it was clearly not just any jaguar.
It was Truth.
LONG AFTER THE OTHERS HAD STOPPED TALKING and gone to sleep, long after the fires had been banked to coals, Truth sat thinking about everything that had happened these last few hours.
They had told her she had talked to them, had told them how to find her, but she had no memory of this. They had told her how she had moved her body out of the harness, but she had no memory of this either.
Indeed, her body felt strange to her. After perceiving infinity, it seemed limiting to rely on one pair of eyes, one nose, one set of ears, one mouth. Limiting, but comfortable, too. She could trust those impressions, as she could never trust the others. It was a feeling akin to fullness after starvation.
There had been much speculation about what the presence of those six figurines might mean. If the evidence of the four known figurines could be applied to the two unknowns, then clearly they must be images of contemporary people. How they could have been found in an apartment that had apparently been sealed since before the coming of Divine Retribution had been something no one could explain.
That hadn't kept Powerful Tenderness and Plik in particular from speculating, and Truth had taken some amusement in watching Firekeeper fidget. That the figurines had been used to focus on individuals seemed evident. Two of those individuals were dead. Though the immediate causes of death were vastly different, the greater cause was frighteningly similar. Both Melina and Dantarahma had investigated the magical arts with more enthusiasm than had been the wont of either of heir widely differing peoples. Each had discarded the varying prohibitions of their peoples. Had they been helped to slip the bonds of convention? Had they been prompted to do so? Was the prompter the same as the advice that had guided Truth?
It seemed all too likely, and Truth was aware that the tiers held her in some suspicion because of this. Worse, tie held herself in suspicion. It was not a good feeling.
Plik had promised he would copy the symbols from the two unknown figurines the next morning. When Firekeeper had protested at the delay, the beast-souled had pointed out that he could not do his best work by firelight the wolf-woman had subsided. Soon afterward, she and her wolves had gone to ran off some of their contained energy.
Truth had heard them singing to the setting moon, their voices mingling with those of the island's resident pack. She wished she had such easy relief for her worries, but jaguars were solitary creatures. With such solitude she must be content.
PLIK AWOKE TO THE SCENT OF FRYING FISH mingled with that of wet bear. He rose from where he had curled in the long grasses and picked his way to the camp. Powerful Tenderness, still showing traces of having been swimming, was frying fish. A Wise Bear and Wise Sea Otter had joined him. The bear was waiting for the cooking to finish. The otter was eating his share raw.
"These," Powerful Tenderness said with a toss of his head toward the two yarimaimalom, "along with the local wolves will arrange to refill the trench in front of the silver door."
"Good," Plik said, not envying the Wise Beasts their labor - nor their own, should they decide they needed to look into that apartment again. "Even with the silver door resealed, I think that place is not a good thing to leave easy to find."
"The Wise Beasts agree," the bear said. "Not only would younglings fall into the trench, but we all fear what might come out."
"Or what might be drawn here," the otter agreed. "Magic's pull is not to be taken lightly. Deep beneath the waves there are said to be fish who lure others into their very maws with false lights. So it is with Magic's arts. Unlike the northerners, we do not think Magic intrinsically evil - but she is certainly to be avoided by those who cannot understand what they find."
Plik wondered what the northern wolves would think of this philosophy, but there was no trace of the three wolves. Truth was lolling by the fire. The jaguar, like the otter, had preferred her fish raw, and was eating with messy enthusiasm.
"Taste," the jaguar said by way of greeting. "That I do enjoy having back again. I had almost forgotten how good it is to taste."
"I'm glad you have found something to enjoy," Plik said. He rummaged in the packs until he found his drawing materials. "Where are the figurines?"
"Firekeeper has them," Truth said, "all but the two. Those she left for you to copy."
She tossed her head, spraying the area with little bits of torn fish and
glittering scale, indicating a small bundle neatly tied to a tree limb.
Plik wondered if Firekeeper didn't trust them with the test of the figurines, or if she was merely possessive. Probably a little of both. After all, she was human, and there was no race ever - not even squirrels and ravens - who so enjoyed collecting useless things.
And she has only scant reason to trust us, Plik thought, forcing himself to be fair. She is an outsider wherever she goes. I thought I knew something of that state, but compared to Firekeeper...
He let the thought drift, and ambled over to a sapling whose succulent young growth promised a good meal. Between bites, he sketched the emblems etched onto the bases of the figurines. They were essentially the same: roughly triangular, with another triangle set within. The edges of both triangles were repeatedly broken into curving lines that rose upward to new points. Somehow they suggested flame.
Plik shivered. Among the five elements, the most unpredictable - even more so than Magic - was Fire.
The flameItriangle within a flameItriangle did not seem in the least familiar to Plik. He wondered if this was because it was very old - or perhaps very new. The wolves arrived soon after Plik had finished his drawings, making the raccoon-man suspect that Firekeeper had convinced Lovable, who was easily bribed with trinkets, to stand watch. Blind Seer and Rascal could be of little help, but Firekeeper applied herself with unwonted eagerness to assisting Plik and Powerful Tenderness assemble their gear. She even helped Powerful Tenderness hoist the heavy pack to his shoulders - not that he needed her assistance.
The drawings were sent ahead, carried by Bitter, then tie travelers took their leave of the house that was no longer a house. Behind them was the scent of fresh dirt as tie bear set about filling the trench. Plik knew that before lie night fell there would be little trace of their hard labor - but of their discovery there was much evidence, some of it carried in his own, small pack. Bearing mystery - and perhaps Magic - Plik hurried on the trail back to Center Island.
HOPE SHOOK HER HEAD. "We have spent the last several days since Bitter brought your message researching those two symbols, and although there are ones like them in our archives, we can find none that are the same."
Wolf Hunting Page 8
