Circle of Dreams Trilogy

by Linda McNabb

  Zaine swallowed a lump in his throat as he nodded. “I will wake Davyn and tell him.”

  “No,” Aldren said firmly. “Go now and tell nobody, or they will try to stop you. They are obsessed with making a new crown, which will not do anything to help them. If you do not reach Guyan, your quest will fail and the storm dragons will destroy this world.”

  CHAPTER FOUR - ON THE RUN

  Zaine glanced at Maata and saw her nod briefly. They helped the old weaver back down the hill to the novice hall and settled him into a bed.

  A quick glance around the room told him that his mother was guarding the crown. Her arm was through the circlet and she was clutching it to her chest as she slept. Zaine tiptoed across the room and gently prised the crown from his mother’s grasp. He held his breath as she stirred slightly – then she turned on her side and relaxed with a deep sigh. Zaine backed away, grabbed an empty pack from under one of the beds, and pushed the crown inside.

  “Go now, and hurry,” Aldren urged. “Avoid any place where people live, as the storm will follow your path when it comes after you, and it will destroy anything it comes across.”

  Zaine gulped at the thought of the storm chasing him. It didn’t feel right to be sneaking out in the middle of the night without even telling Davyn, but it seemed he had little choice. He nodded goodbye to the old runeweaver and left.

  Maata was outside, holding the reins of two horses. Zaine eyed the saddle a little nervously – he had ridden before, but that was on an old mare back on the Taitem farm and it had not had a saddle. This horse was young, huge and gleaming white, and looked far livelier than the old nag back at the farm.

  “The storm sounds louder,” Maata told him as she mounted.

  “That’s not a good sign,” Zaine said, slipping the pack onto his back. He stepped into the stirrup and swung himself onto his horse, trying to look like he had done it a thousand times before. “How far is it to Land’s End?”

  “About a two-day ride – if we hurry,” Maata replied.

  Two days in a saddle didn’t sound appealing, but then again neither did staying around to face the storm dragons. The sound of howling and smashing sent a shiver of fear down Zaine’s spine, and he turned the horse back up the hill towards the castle. He knew he should be heading away from the storm, but something compelled him to gaze at the storm once more. The horse protested, but Zaine urged it on until the castle came into sight.

  The sight that greeted them sent his heart racing and his mouth went dry. The storm was doing more than just making noise as it sped around Willow Castle. It was tearing off parts of the roof, blowing out windows and sending debris flying into the air. There would be nothing left of Willow Castle in a very short time – and then the storm dragons would come after him!

  “Time we were off, I think,” Zaine mumbled as he turned the frightened horse back down towards the main gates and nudged it forward. It needed very little encouragement to run from the storm, and they galloped out the gate and into the darkness.

  Maata led the way, and the two white horses raced on through the darkness. With a two-day ride ahead, however, they knew that the horses could not keep up such a pace, so grudgingly they kept the horses going at a calmer, steadier pace. Maata and Zaine had hardly spoken since they left Willow Castle; each was deep within their own thoughts. Zaine was worrying about what would happen if he couldn’t find this mysterious Guyan before the storm dragons found him.

  As the sun began to creep over the horizon, Maata reined in her horse and stopped. Zaine stopped beside her and patted his horse to calm it down. It could sense the danger wanted to keep moving, and Zaine didn’t blame it – he felt the same way.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked, as Maata stared off ahead of them with a concerned expression.

  “We can’t stay on this road,” she replied a little distantly.

  “Why not?” It looked like a perfectly good road to him, even if it had become a dirt track.

  “There is a village not far ahead, and Aldren said we were not to go near people,” Maata reminded him.

  “The horses will need to be fed and rested soon,” Zaine said, feeling cross with himself for not thinking of that problem before now. “They can’t keep this speed up for two days without rest and food – and neither can we.

  “We’ll have to go around the village,” Maata insisted, turning her horse off the track. “The horses can rest later.”

  They travelled across the countryside at a steady pace for much of the day, stopping only to water the horses at a stream and to pick the last of the season’s berries to stave off the pangs of hunger. By the time the sun was about to set, Zaine was almost nodding off in the saddle and the horses were only trotting slowly along. Zaine knew they would have to stop for the night soon.

  Something seemed oddly familiar to Zaine as the horses picked their way through the small bushes. It wasn’t until they had reached the crest of a hill that he realised where he was.

  “The Taitem farm,” Zaine said with a wooden, shocked voice. “I didn’t even realise we were going in that direction.”

  He reined in his horse and stared down the hill at the small farmhouse in the valley. A light evening mist hung around the fields, and small tendrils of smoke drifted out of the single chimney of the farmhouse. A lone figure could be seen on horseback riding through the fields, and Zaine knew instantly that it was Pretor.

  “Is this where you grew up?” Maata asked. Zaine just nodded. A flood of memories from a childhood spent working on the Taitem farm came rushing back as he stared at the only home he had known until a few weeks ago.

  Zaine had never expected to be back this way or to ever get a chance to say goodbye to the farmer, and he regretted his sudden departure of a few weeks ago. He had no desire to see the farmer’s wife, Tilly, who had never showed him any affection and who had been happy to sell him for a jar of silver like one of the sheep they farmed. Pretor, however, had always done his best to stand up for Zaine, even though the little man was no match for his demanding and cruel wife

  “I need to go down and see Pretor,” Zaine said, gathering up the reins and pulling the horse’s head in the direction of the man who had raised him.

  “And when the storm comes through here it will destroy him,” Maata reminded him with a quiet voice. “Remember, it will follow you or the crown, so neither one can be near anyone you wish to remain safe.”

  The farmer stopped and seemed to be staring right up at them, but from this distance it was impossible to tell what the dark-skinned farmer was really looking at. Zaine knew Maata was right. Going down there would mean an end to the farm, and Pretor did not deserve that.

  Zaine lifted one hand in a gesture of farewell, paused briefly to see if Pretor responded, then turned his horse away from the farm when he got no response. The farmer was perhaps out looking for lost stock and hadn’t seen them at all.

  “I know where we can rest for a while,” Zaine told Maata. He was suddenly very weary and doubted he could ride for much longer. “Nobody lives there anymore.”

  Zaine led her around the village and through the forest on the far side. They had to dismount and lead the horses as the trees grew closer together.

  “Where are we heading?” Maata asked in the quickly gathering darkness.

  “Davyn’s cottage,” Zaine answered. He didn’t want the storm dragons to destroy it, but they needed somewhere to get some rest for just a few hours at least. It would spare the villagers the wrath of the angry storm that followed.

  When it finally came into view, the small, round cottage seemed much smaller than Zaine remembered. The sun had all but sunk from the sky and the forest had taken on the grey hues of night. It seemed like a lifetime since the last time he had been to the herbmaster’s cottage, instead of just a few weeks. That was before he knew what a runeweaver was or that Davyn was really his father.

  They tied the horses to a tree and Zaine fetched them some water from a rain barrel at the back of
the cottage. The horses munched happily on the plants growing at the back of the cottage. Now that they had stopped, Zaine realised just how cold it was. The horses’ breath was coming out in clouds of steam, and Zaine could feel goose bumps on his arms.

  “We need to keep them warm,” Maata said, also looking concerned for the horses.

  “There should still be some old blankets in the cottage,” Zaine replied. He pushed open the door that he had gone through so many times in the past and paused as he stepped inside. It was dark and cold inside, nothing like the warm, welcoming cottage he remembered. He lit a candle stub from a shard of flint on the shelf and searched the cottage. Sure enough, he found a pile of blankets under the bed at the far end of the cottage, and he took two of them out to where Maata had stayed with the horses.

  “Next we need to get ourselves warm and fed,” Zaine said after they had settled the horses. “There’s a food safe in the cottage and I doubt Davyn had time to empty it before he left.”

  Maata looked very pleased at the idea of food and warmth, and they went back into the cottage just as the sky darkened enough to be considered night-time. Maata lit as many candles as she could find, while Zaine stacked the fireplace and lit it. His fingers were numb and painful by the time he had prodded and blown the fire into life. The cheery flame lit the room and restored some of the happy memories that Zaine had of the herbmaster’s cottage.

  Zaine warmed his hands by the fire for a minute and then went to the wooden trapdoor in the dirt floor where he knew the herbmaster stored his food for the winter months. He breathed a sigh of relief to see it was well stocked. While Maata sorted through the provisions for something quick and filling, Zaine walked over to the old wooden worktable. This was where Davyn, pretending to be a herbmaster, had sorted his herbs. Zaine had helped him many times, and it brought back some happy memories. He found his attention drawn to the small shelf at the bottom of the worktable. It was only a short way off the floor and was barely big enough to fit a foot under.

  “What are you looking for?” Maata asked as she brought some food over to the table and began to divide it onto two old wooden plates.

  “This is where I found the green runebook when I was five years old,” Zaine replied, bending down and looking under the shelf. “I should have known that Davyn had hidden it for a good reason, but I didn’t tell him that I had found it. I should have never looked at it – then none of this would have happened.”

  “Of course it would,” Maata replied with a reassuring smile. “It would have happened one way or another, whatever you did or didn’t do. Now forget all that should-have, could-have nonsense. You know what your life-reading said. There was no way you could have done anything differently.”

  Zaine took the slim silver book from his pocket and laid it on the bench. The cover was slightly damp, but most of it had been protected by his cloak. He flicked open the cover of his life-reading and turned to the page which laid out his entire life in just a few words. He read them out slowly – trying for the hundredth time to find a new meaning in the words that didn’t mean he was going to destroy everything.

  Let this child know the runes and he will come to great power.

  He will shatter a world with one finger.

  His anger will bring down the sky and his feet will split the ground.

  The royal line will hang in the balance … and Zaine will decide its fate.

  Within him rests the power to free the masters of the books.

  “Put it away and have something to eat,” Maata insisted, gently closing the book and pressing a plate of food into Zaine’s hand.

  Zaine reluctantly put the book away and sat down at the small table to eat. A short time later they were fed and warm – and very tired.

  “I don’t know how long that storm will take to catch up, but I think we’re going to have to get some sleep,” Zaine slurred his words slightly as he swayed with tiredness.

  “The horses need rest anyway,” Maata agreed, attempting to cover a yawn with her hand.

  Zaine dragged a couple of cushions onto the floor by the fire and Maata took the small, narrow bed by the wall. Zaine banked the fire to last the night and lay down on the cushions. The ground was hard, but he didn’t notice. They covered themselves with their cloaks and within a few heartbeats both of them were fast asleep – dreaming of being chased by angry clouds.

  Comfortingly familiar sounds of birds and wind in the trees woke Zaine the next morning. The fire had burned down to a bed of embers, but the cottage was still warm. The weak winter sun was shining through a small gap in the black curtains and it was clearly well past sunrise. He sat up slowly and stretched, feeling stiff from the unyielding floor he had slept on. He put a pot of water onto the embers and made a hot drink of herbal tea before gently shaking Maata awake.

  “I didn’t mean to sleep so long,” she said, sitting upright and rubbing her eyes. “We should have left hours ago.”

  “We’ll get going as soon as we’ve had a bite to eat,” Zaine said, handing her a cup of the hot tea. “We can’t ride all day on an empty stomach.”

  They ate quickly and then Zaine doused the fire while Maata packed some provisions from the herbmaster’s food stores. As they rode off through the forest, Zaine wondered if the cottage would survive the wrath of the storm dragons when they came this way. They had folded up the blankets and tidied the cottage before leaving, even though they knew it was likely to be destroyed soon.

  They made good time and reached the edge of the forest in an hour. Their progress was much faster as they followed an old track that led up through the hills. Up ahead, Zaine recognised Widow’s Peak, where Davyn often went to collect herbs.

  “How do you know we’re going the right way?” Zaine asked Maata a short time after they had passed by the base of Widow’s Peak. “Surely you didn’t come past this way on your trip there last time?”

  “I know it is east,” Maata explained and pointed to the sun that was peeping between grey and dismal clouds. It looked like it might rain anytime soon, but Zaine was no longer bothered by a simple rainstorm. “If we keep going in this direction we’ll eventually come to the main road through to Land’s End.”

  They rode for hours in almost total silence. Energy wasted on talking might be needed later, and neither could think of much to chat about anyway. When the sun was just past its zenith, the hairs on Zaine’s neck rose and a shiver ran down his back. Without even needing to turn around, he knew what was behind them.

  “Zaine, we’ve got a problem.” Maata’s voice was tense. She had stopped her horse and was looking back the way they had come. Zaine turned as well, and his breath caught as he saw angry clouds approaching very fast. There was no way they were going to reach Land’s End in time.

  “We have to do something – and fast,” Maata said needlessly. The black clouds were getting closer and Zaine imagined he could already make out the shapes of the storm dragons. He blinked and looked away, forcing himself to think of a way to defeat the storm.

  “I don’t think I can fight the storm. We’ll have to make a run for it,” he said quietly.

  “Maybe we could hide?” Maata asked, looking around for somewhere to hide from the storm.

  “How far is it to Land’s End?” Zaine asked. He looked in the direction they had been heading, but already he knew what her answer would be – ahead, plains stretched out to the horizon.

  “Too far,” Maata confirmed. “At least another hour or two of hard riding.”

  “I guess we shouldn’t have slept in after all,” Zaine muttered, knowing there was no point in regretting something that was already done.

  “Can you hide us with a rune circle like you did back in the gardens at the castle?” Maata asked, getting off and patting her horse to soothe it. The horses could sense the impending storm and were getting skittish.

  “I can,” Zaine said, also dismounting. He frowned as he considered what to do. “But I think the storm dragons will be able to t
ell that the trail suddenly stops. I don’t think it will fool them for long.”

  He stared at the storm, and then grinned at Maata as a solution suddenly sprang to mind. “Since we don’t want them to see where the trail ends, I’ll just make sure the dragons have a trail to follow.”

  “How?” Maata asked as she kept one eye on the advancing storm.

  “Give me your shoes,” Zaine instructed. She slipped them off and handed them over with a curious look. Zaine handed her the reins to his horse and took off his own shoes, then placed both pairs on the ground. He took out a stick of grey chalk that Davyn had given him and drew quickly on the top of each shoe. He placed them back on the ground and stood back. “Watch this!”

  Maata watched as the shoes began to glow and then to move up and down. Zaine took a step forward and gave them a quick kick and the shoes shot off across the grassy plain, well away from the direction of Land’s End. The shoes vanished into the long grass in seconds. Maata’s eyebrows rose as she grinned.

  “Now can you hide us?” Maata asked. Zaine nodded and quickly drew a circle of runes around both them and the horses. Maata was struggling to keep the horses calm as the storm raced towards them at an incredible pace. It would be upon them in a matter of seconds.

  Just as Zaine put the final stroke on the circle and enclosed them in a circle of invisibility, the storm descended on them. The wind did not seem to be affected by the circle and it whipped at them cruelly. Zaine grabbed the reins of both horses to help Maata keep them from bolting out of the circle. The horses’ eyes were wide with fright and they had drawn back their mouths to show their large teeth.

  Zaine held his breath as the storm passed right overhead. He could see the storm dragons, swirling and writhing within the storm. They looked to be driven by an anger that chilled him to the bone.

  The storm seemed to pause as the trail turned, then the storm dragons sped away following the path made by the shoes.