The Great Rift

by Edward W. Robertson

  Mourn followed him through the birches. Upslope, the hill leveled off into breeze-swept grass. Waill stood a hundred yards away, bow in hand. Mourn stopped in the open grass and tested the pull of his long weapon. The clansman removed five arrows from the quiver and stuck them point-down in the dirt.

  He eyed the humans. "Step away. Interfere, and forfeit two things: Your friend's challenge, and your lives."

  Blays snorted. "Well, I don't agree to those terms."

  Dante backed off ten yards, where he stood with Lira and Blays. Across the hill, Waill licked her thumb and raised it to the wind. Downslope, the Clan of the Golden Field watched tight-faced from the knee-high grass. The one-eyed norren looked to Mourn, who nodded, and then to Waill, who did the same.

  Waill raised her bow, arrow pointed straight skyward, then drew back and leveled it at Mourn. She held there for several seconds. Dante willed her shot to fly foul—for her elbow to twitch, for the wind to gust, for the arm of Josun Joh to reach down from the sky and squish Waill into the dirt. She let fly.

  The arrow whipped above the grass. It struck Mourn's chest with a wet smack. He collapsed to the ground.

  Soft groans rose from the watching clan. Dante raced to Mourn. Nether flocked to his fingers. The norren lay on his back, blinking, face white beneath his beard. The arrow jutted from his ribs.

  "Get away," he hissed.

  "You've got a fucking arrow in your chest!"

  "This isn't over." Mourn rolled to his side, eyes widening in pain. He found his knees and reached for the dropped bow. The clan murmured. A hundred yards distant, Waill stood perfectly still. Mourn pulled an arrow from the dirt, but barely began his draw before his string snarled into the arrow twitching from his ribs. Gingerly, he set his bow and arrow in the grass. A far-off look washed across his face. He grabbed the arrow in his chest with both hands and pulled.

  It slurped free. Mourn staggered, blood dripping from his wound. Teeth bared, he picked up his bow and drew it back. His elbows quivered, jogging his aim; he breathed through his nose, jaw clenched, until his arms steadied. He fired.

  He sat down before the arrow landed. The arrow slammed into Waill's chest, spinning her into the grass. She didn't move. Dante sprinted back to Mourn.

  "Help her," Mourn waved.

  Dante goggled. "Shut up and lie down!"

  Mourn lurched halfway to his feet, bloody hand bunching in a fist. "My deal was with her. What happens if she dies?"

  "Lyle's balls!" Dante charged across the slope. The one-eyed norren was already crouched beside Waill along with three other clansmen. The man turned to Dante, reaching for his sword. Dante held up his empty hands. "I'm a healer, gods damn it. Let me see her."

  "You die if she does."

  "Yes, yes. Get out of my way."

  The man frowned, trying not to let hope get the better of him. Dante knelt. The arrow stuck from the left side of Waill's chest. For a moment he feared it had hit her heart, but her chest was rising in shallow jerks. He reached for a knife and cut her clothes from the wound. The shaft had sunk deep between her ribs.

  Dante wiped blood on his pants. "You'll have to push it out the other side."

  The norren glanced between each other, silently conferring. The one-eyed man nodded and rolled Waill onto her side. Dante cleaned his knife on his sleeve and cut open his much-abused left forearm. Beside him, the one-eyed man grabbed the arrowshaft and bore down. Waill snarled, eyes clenched shut. The arrowhead broke through her skin. The one-eyed norren snapped off the fletching and drew the broken remainder from Waill's body. Her blood flowed thickly, pulsing with the cycle of her beating heart.

  Nether roiled from Dante's hands into the hole through Waill's chest. Blood gushed unabated. Dante could feel the impatience of her clansmen, their fear and worry ready to morph into rage and pain. But he could feel the changes in Waill's body, too. Torn vessels sealing shut as nether smoothed rough edges together. Flesh meeting flesh and becoming one flesh. Within a minute, she stopped bleeding. Within two, both holes through her chest were covered in firm black scabs.

  Dante popped to his feet and ran to Mourn. Blays bore down on the bandage he and Lira had wrapped around Mourn's chest, putting pressure to the wound. The cotton sopped with red. Dante delved inside, flooding the norren's veins with hungry nether. Mourn's eyes stayed closed as Dante stabilized the bleeding.

  The one-eyed norren walked up, hands sticky with blood. "We'd like you to stay here until she wakes up."

  Blays cocked his head. "So you can stab us if she doesn't?"

  "She will. Will your friend?"

  "I think so," Dante said.

  He nodded. "Then she will want to speak to him when he does."

  "I think you can trust him," Lira said as he returned to Waill. "He's protective, that's all."

  "So are mother bears," Blays said. "And I wouldn't want to share a den with one after I shot one of her cubs."

  "I'm going to clean up and move the horses." Lira stood and headed for the lake. "Yell if he betrays you."

  By the time she returned, the one-eyed norren, whose name was Skall, had brought Dante and Blays into camp proper and served up pan-fried fish and bread.

  Aroused, perhaps, by the smell, Mourn stirred, blinking through the pain. "Did I not die?"

  "You'll be fine," Dante said. "As your physician, however, I insist you refrain from armed duels for the next three weeks. Ideally, for the rest of your life."

  Gingerly, Mourn touched his bandages. "Has anyone ever told you getting shot by an arrow really, really hurts?"

  "Blays. Repeatedly. And without shame."

  Blays wiped fish-grease from his mouth. "Well, it does."

  No member of the clan spoke to them except Skall, who came by to ask Mourn how he was doing and nod at his fast recovery. Dante woke at dawn, lightly sore. Birds peeped from the birches. Fish rose to suck insects from the surface. Skall came to him while he explored the far side of the lake. Waill was awake.

  Her face was pale, haggard. "I hear you didn't let me die."

  "I'm saintly like that," Dante said. "We needed to make sure you stuck to your promise."

  "Skall would have kept it for me." She turned to Mourn. "You shoot too well."

  "Like I had a choice," Mourn said. "I couldn't let you have a second shot."

  "I couldn't believe it when you got back up. I knocked you on your ass!"

  "I should have stayed there. It was much comfier."

  Waill smiled, then coughed into her hand, which she then checked for blood. "The Clan of the Golden Field will stop our raids. And ensure no one else takes our place. Let the farmers know."

  Mourn nodded. "Then our sollunat is fulfilled."

  "Good." She gazed out on the quiet lake. "If the humans march on the Territories, you know where to find us."

  Dante packed up his bedroll. They made their goodbyes and rode north from the lake. He was tempted to contact Cally via loon then and there, but wanted to confirm their deal with Brant first and then deliver all the news to the old man in one fell swoop. It would be more impressive that way. Really drive home to Cally why he trusted so much to two of the youngest figures in the Sealed Citadel.

  Without the need to hunt for tracks or norren wildsign, they reached the road by nightfall and the town of Shan shortly thereafter. With Mourn looking worn out, Dante bought rooms in an inn and hired a rider to make all haste for Brant's with the message they would return tomorrow—accompanied by an announcement.

  In the morning, Dante checked Mourn's wound, which was crusty and disgusting but showed no signs of excess redness or swelling, followed it up with a brief walk around town to restore his appetite, then returned to the inn for a breakfast of beef, bacon, bread, and green beans topped with crispy onions. After so many cold, hard meals on the trail, it made him never want to stray from the road again.

  At Brant's three-winged manor, the brawny lord met them with an anxious smile. "What's the word?"

  "Hello, for one," Dante
said.

  "Don't play coy. Spill your guts or I'll spill them across the pig troughs."

  Blays yawned. "I hear beer's a peerless interrogation technique."

  Brant's smile was as open as the fields. "Then prepare to be tortured within an inch of your life."

  The kitchen was warm and smelled of rhubarb and cherries. Brant brought up a small barrel of hoppy beer and poured cups for everyone, including Fann, who'd come down from his chambers. Dante and Blays laid out the events of the last few days. Lira watched, sharp-eyed, interjecting any details they'd forgotten. Mourn gazed into his beer. Occasionally, he verged on a smile.

  By the time the story finished, Brant gazed at Mourn with awed horror. "You just stood there? While she shot you?"

  Mourn shrugged. "The risk to the challenger is why so few challenges get made. What would the world be like if you could kill your leader whenever you wanted? It would be a pretty bad world, I'd say."

  "That sounds awful enough as it is!" Fann said.

  Brant considered all this over a long drink. "Do you trust the clan to keep their word?"

  "I do," Dante said. "The norren tend to be honest. On the rare times they're not, they're so devious you won't know you've been tricked until it's too late to matter."

  "You lot are trouble," the farmer grinned. "I'm glad we're on the same side."

  The other baronets filtered in through the evening. Once again, they didn't push for details until after a dinner of pork ribs with mustard seeds and pillowy yellow bread studded with dried cherries. Dante and Blays then told the story again, their words clumsied by beer.

  At the end, the lords laughed, heads shaking. Even gaunt old Raye shook Mourn's hand. "You very stupid or very brave?"

  Mourn shrugged for the hundredth time that day. "If I were very stupid, you couldn't trust my answer either way. So I suppose we must conclude it's bravery. Until the next time I run away."

  Raye laughed gruffly. Brant poured beer. Dante paced himself as best he could under the festive circumstances; he still needed to speak to Cally. He didn't get the opportunity until several hours passed on the clock and several refills passed through his bladder. In the quiet of his upstairs room, Dante clicked his brooch to the old man's setting. Cally answered seconds later.

  "How goes the hunt?"

  "All hunted up," Dante said. "We've got the grain."

  "Stupendous!" Cally said in his ear. "How'd you manage that? Did anyone die?"

  Dante took a long breath, preparing to relate the story for the third time that day, then shook his head. "Too drunk. Just get a bunch of silver in a wagon and steer it this way. I'll tell you more tomorrow. Afternoon."

  "This is nonsense. I fund your trip around the country, and you get so drunk you can't even tell me about it?"

  Dante belched. "You can either hear it told crummy tonight or told well tomorrow."

  "Worthless." Cally sighed. "It better be worth the wait."

  In the morning, of course, Dante was little more articulate than the night before. Fortunately, any early morning updates to Cally were staved off by breakfast and packing and goodbyes to Brant and Jilla, and then, after the ride back to the main road, by concerns they were going the right way (Fann assured him they were) and then by the pressing need to keep both eyes open for bandits, poor footing, and the general lay of the western land. Thin clouds skidded across skies so bright they practically crackled. The wind no longer felt so cold. Snow rested on the southern peaks, but those were fifty miles away or more.

  It felt, at last, like the first days of spring.

  11

  And over the next few days, spring acted like it had it had something to prove. Lukewarm gales battered the high grasses, followed by days-long rains that soaked their cloaks and left the horses steaming and gamey. Most nights they slept under tarps in the fields. Anywhere with an inn, however, Dante shelled out for a night under a roof and a morning next to a kitchen. If there was ever a time to keep spirits and energy high, it was now, when they might not taste success again for many weeks and many leagues.

  Cally was unreservedly pleased to hear about the deal they'd swung in Tantonnen. A caravan had already been dispatched to bring the initial payment to the farmers and pick up whatever reserve grain they could part with before the first harvests. In the meantime, nothing major had emerged from Setteven. The king's men had dispatched a small force from Dollendun to put down riots on the eastern fringes of the Territories, but the matter was expected to resolve quickly, and without a fight. The norren lands had never been wholly peaceful—the clans were too numerous, grudgeful, and splintered to wholly resist the urge to raid and squabble—but they had always melted into the hills and forests at the first sign of Gaskan troops.

  "Don't be afraid to push them on the pass," Cally had concluded, referring to Dante's strategy toward the merchants of Gallador Rift. "They talk quite sweetly about water's ability to overcome, but how long will it take to wear a new way through the mountains? Hmm? How much tea will rot on their shores when the Dunden Pass is shut to all those new markets in Mallon?"

  "I'm not sure how convincing that will be," Dante said. "We don't control the pass and never have."

  "Yes, well, whatever comes of all this, we can all but guarantee a shakeup of the administration of the Norren Territories, can't we? And which city is the largest and closest and thus most likely to wind up with de facto control of the pass? What do you think I'm bending Duke Hullen's ear about right now?"

  "Nothing, I'd hope, or he must be very confused about what his ear has done to deserve it."

  "Oh, enough of your negativity. I'm beginning to think these things might be more curse than blessing." Cally shut down the loon.

  The land sloped upward mile by mile, a rise as gentle as a fog. Blue mountains sat in proud deltas to the northwest. The road bent to meet them. They stopped at a simple town astride a swift and rocky stream. Dante settled them in at the inn, a two-story rectangle with flared eaves and a millwheel splashing in the turbid creek. The bartender's eyes were dark and bright and stayed locked to Dante's brooches, which he hadn't bothered to hide due to the semi-official nature of their trip. Anyway, it was good for the priests of Narashtovik to be seen outside the Citadel. Too many rumors flew about what they did behind their walls. See a man enjoying a beer, and it's much harder to believe he'll be speaking with demons later that night.

  The bartender lingered after delivering Dante his second and final beer, gaze pinned to the ivory carving of The White Tree. "Are you from Narashtovik?"

  Dante nodded, somewhat guarded. "For the last few years, anyway. Mallon-born."

  "There's word you've had a hand in the norren troubles." The man glanced around the room, as if to reassure himself the walls sported no ears. "If the king's army comes to the Territories, do you think Narashtovik will be safe?"

  "Unless the king has a thing for sacking innocent lands. Anyway, Narashtovik is the seat of Arawn. Why are you worried?"

  "My sister lives in the city. I wonder if—" The door opened, welcoming in a cold wind and two sour-looking men. The bartender straightened and left to greet them. He glanced Dante's way more than once before Dante retired for the night, but didn't speak to him again until morning, and only then to say goodbye.

  From the town on the stream, the deeply-rutted dirt road became a highway of travel-worn stones glued together with sandy cement. Here and there, a weed poked from the cracks, but otherwise the road looked younger than Dante himself. Traffic grew more frequent: two-mule farming wagons, peasants on foot, caravans with bright banners and the brighter spears of mercenaries.

  They reached the road into the mountains eight days out from Tantonnen. Three great peaks stood from the mounded hills, their slopes green, their caps white. Shorter mountains ran along a line that extended some thirty miles northeast and southwest. The pass was an easy climb, cold but snowless, the stone road carrying them past grasslands squishy with meltwater. High-peaked homes and warehouses formed a to
wnship just below the crest of the pass. With the shadows of the mountains swallowing the road, Dante stopped for the night.

  Dawn warmed the green lowlands, but hadn't yet reached the top of the pass by the time they crossed to the other side. Below, a great lake twinkled between the misty rims of the valley, miles in length and impenetrably blue, dwarfing the waters Mourn had dueled beside in the wilds of Tantonnen. In spots, the mountains descended in sheer cliffs, the road switchbacking along the face of the grass-tufted rock. Below the cliffs, the land was carved into terraces, giant green steps leading down to the lake. Thick green bushes grew in serpentine rows. Their leaves smelled spicy and sweet and rich. Tea bushes—the product of which was boiled, strained, and served across Gask, Mallon, and every other island, province, and territory the tradesmen of Gallador could reach.

  Without breaking stride, Blays snapped off a tea branch, stripped its leaves, and tucked them into his satchel, scattering the twigs beside the road. Lira watched him steadily.

  Blays rolled his eyes at her. "They won't stink like thievery once we boil them."

  She shook her head. "Bad seeds makes for bitter brew."

  "Oh, what do time-honored proverbs know? I've never met a pure seed in my life."

  "Maybe you need to travel in different circles."

  "Zigzags are more fun." Blays urged his horse forward. "They're more likely to take you places like this."

  A vast city swamped the shore. Masts bristled the piers. Ferries splashed between the banks of the city of Wending and the islands smattering the water. Smoke lingered in the heavy valley air, mingling with the morning mists steaming off the massive lake.

  "I hope you fellows like boats," Fann said. "Because our host lives on one of those islands."

  "Boats." Blays glared at Dante. "You can bring a man back from the dead, but you can't make us fly? Not once?"

  "I can't bring a man back to life," Dante said. "Cally says no one can. Not in this day."

  "Huh. I thought you saw some guy resurrect a dog once."

  "I thought I had, but I'm not sure it was dead to begin with. Or if it was, that what came back was alive."