The nether flowed away from the woman's hands. "What are you doing here?"
"We came to—" Dante snapped his mouth shut. In a rush, he understood. "We came to discover why Pocket Cove has never been invaded. But I suppose we can leave now."
The woman's red wrap fluttered around her wrist. "Do you find our world hostile?"
"Yes. And I've just figured out how you keep it that way."
"Unfortunate," she said. "Now that you know, you cannot leave."
"That's downright uncivilized," Blays called across the gap. "I feel so unwelcome, I think I might just turn around and go home!"
"Please come with me. What happens next is not for me to decide."
Blays dropped his voice. "Alternately, we kill her and run away before her friends come out to find what happened."
Lira gave him a dark look. "The People don't kill as indiscriminately as you. We should go with her."
Dante stared through the mist. It would be easy enough to turn back; the woman's hold on the nether was strong, but not strong enough to save her from what he could command. Still, though he knew how they protected their land, it wasn't the type of knowledge that would allow him to use their methods himself. He needed to know more.
"We'll come with you as friends," he said. "The kind of friends who don't try to kill each other."
The woman nodded and climbed off the edge of her ridge. Dante followed suit. The descent was much trickier than his terror-aided climb up, and he nearly slipped three times, banging his knee hard enough to draw blood. At the bottom, he lowered himself to the thick layer of mud. His boots sunk to the ankles, but he could walk.
The woman introducer herself as Asher and squelched west across the mud. Dante followed absently, lost in his second-sight, keen for any telltale glimmers of nether around her hands. Hard stone once again thumped beneath his boots.
"When have you met our people?" Asher asked Lira some time later. "Who taught you that sign?"
Lira didn't take her eyes from the misty horizon. "I grew up in the Carlon Islands. When I was old enough, I began hiring on ships as a swordsman. This lasted a few years. My final assignment was with the Shadow. It did a lot of business with your people."
"I know of the Shadow," Asher said. "I saw it just last fall."
"Good to know it survives. My last voyage with it was three years ago. It was the summer. We were meeting one of your vessels at Harl Island to buy all the barnwhelks it could carry."
"Barnwhelks?" Blays said.
Lira nodded. "Snails."
"Snails?"
"When fresh, or properly dried, they can be used to treat the venom of most other creatures of the sea," Asher said. "In most parts of your country, a handful of barnwhelks will buy you a household."
"New idea," Blays said. "We forget all this slave business and become snail-hunters instead."
"This is enough about snails," Asher said. "You were saying?"
Lira stepped around a knee-high swell of slick black rock. "We were on the piers finishing the exchange when the pirates struck. The Eyeteeth Gang. We were outnumbered—grossly. Those of us with blades went to the docks to hold them off while the Shadow and the People of the Pocket shoved off. We managed to hold them off just long enough. Most of my fellows fell. I tried to fight to the death, but the Eyeteeth took me instead.
"They wanted to know where the Shadow had gone, as well as the vessel of the People of the Pocket. I didn't tell them."
Asher's expression darkened. "What did it cost you?"
Lira pulled back her lips and pointed at the gaps where her eyeteeth had been. Dante looked away. He'd assumed they'd been lost to simple rot.
"Those," she said, "as well as two of my toes, and all my toenails."
"But you didn't speak."
Lira shook her head. "I was sworn to protect the Shadow."
Asher cocked her head. "But not the people they did business with."
"Revealing the People of the Pocket's destination could have compromised the Shadow's location. In any event, it would have compromised the Shadow's interests, and would have been a violation of the spirit if not the letter of my vow. After a few days, the Eyeteeth knew my cause was lost. They readied to kill me.
"But a few days was all the time the People of the Pocket needed to return. The Eyeteeth had taken several of their crew as well. The People's nethermancers wiped them out. They would have killed me, too, for what I had seen, but a woman named Istvell had seen me keep my tongue throughout it all. She gave her name for me. I was saved."
Asher held her hands out palm-down and rolled her wrists until her palms pointed at the fog-matted skies. "And she showed you worlds within worlds."
"She showed me worlds within worlds," Lira nodded.
"That is why you're here with me and not back there beneath one hundred feet of mud."
"I don't think that's the only reason," Dante muttered.
Asher smiled as coldly as the mist. For the next two hours, they walked in silence through the sweating stones. The sun waned, its fog-blocked glare drifting toward the horizon. The mist thinned abruptly. They stood on black cliffs above light blue seas, rhythmic waves hissing over a beach of black sand. Asher crossed to a doorway carved into the side of a rocky mound. White light blossomed in her hand. She led them down another long, enclosed stairwell, emerging from the bottom into the pink rays of sunset.
Lira took a long breath of salty air through her nose. "Have outsiders ever seen this?"
"Sometimes." Asher walked south across the stand. "Then they are given the choice to stop being outsiders or stop being alive."
To the north, a spectral call of oot oot oot floated down the shore. Asher's feet whispered on the sand. Down the beach, a proper door opened into the cliffside. Asher opened it, revealing a high tunnel lit with the unblinking white glare of torchstones. Their feet echoed in the closed space. Laughter rang down the halls. Asher turned down two side passages, stopping in front of a door made from something papery and semi-translucent.
"Please don't leave this spot." She opened the door, revealing mounds of blankets and white light, then closed it with a whisper. Low voices seeped through the thin door. She returned a minute later and gestured them inside.
On the far side of the stone room, a woman sat on a pile of blankets, her black hair shot through with gray. She wore snug, featureless black clothes and a red scarf on her wrist, which fluttered as she gestured to the blanket across from her. Dante sat, trying not to gape. Nether rolled from her like heat from a stove. She did nothing with it—in fact, she didn't even appear to have summoned it—but he could feel it nonetheless, a dark ocean he'd never felt from anyone besides Cally himself.
"Please tell me what you know," she said. "Please don't try to lie."
Dante forced himself to meet her eyes. "All I have are guesses."
"Then kindly tell me what you guess."
"The cliffs keep most out. I don't know whether you shaped them or simply found them useful. When armies came, you buried the soldiers in mud or sand until they stopped coming at all. If even that doesn't work, you seal off your caves and leave the invaders to wonder where you've gone."
She gave him a look as sturdy as the walls. As stony, too. "Where are you from?"
"Narashtovik."
"Is Narashtovik still a possession of Gask?"
He risked a short laugh. "Not for long, though our independence might be as short-lived as a dayfly. The king will march on us soon. I came here to learn how you've resisted every army that's come your way—in the hopes we might do the same."
She nodded, gazing toward the ceiling. "I see. Every people should rule themselves, if ruling themselves is what they want to do."
Dante leaned forward. "Then you'll teach me how to move the earth?"
"Of course not," she laughed. "I'm afraid we don't give a shit. Why do you think we're behind these great black walls?"
Dante blinked. "But we have a common enemy. If you help us, you help y
ourself."
Her brows lifted as slowly as a sunrise. "They're not my enemies. Enemies can only be enemies if they have the ability to hurt you."
"I'll swear on anything never to tell. Never to use it against you. Why are you the only ones with the right to defend yourselves?"
"We don't. But we are the only ones with the right to our secrets, if you please." She leaned back, folding her hands in her lap so her fingers overlapped at a right angle.
Helpless fury rose in Dante's throat. He wanted to shake her until the knowledge popped right out her throat. What she knew could change the world. Could forge him into a weapon every bit as strong as the Quivering Bow. To deny him that felt not just heartless, but monstrous.
"This isn't just for my sake." He fought to control his voice. "This is for the entire norren people. King Moddegan will cross their lands before he gets to us. And he doesn't consider them human."
"I sympathize. That's why I'm letting you leave. Which I urge you to please do now." She shut her eyes.
Asher detached from the wall. "I will take you back to your land, please."
"It's time for us to go," Lira said softly.
Dante wanted to scream. Instead, he stood. Asher took a torchstone on her way out. It lit their way across the twilit beach, up the stairs, and across the miles of misty plateau. They crossed the last hour under full cover of night, their path through the rocks and mud lit only by an unseen moon and the lunarly glow of the torchstone. Dante stayed silent all the way to the staircase back down to the plains.
Asher halted there atop the carpet of broken rocks. "Please don't come back."
"But you've been so helpful," Dante said.
"Worlds within worlds," Lira waved.
Asher nodded. "Worlds within worlds."
She disappeared up the staircase. Mourn's fire flickered in the grass. Dante didn't speak on the way there. As Mourn rose to greet them, a crackling, banging rumble rolled from the cliffs.
Dante whirled. Rocks and dust sprayed from the black wall. The remains of the staircase crumbled to the plains in a pile of rough shards.
13
The plains rolled away, the same empty miles they'd crossed just days before. Dante let Blays and Lira fill Mourn in on what had happened in the Pocket. He pushed his horse until it sweated and heaved. The return to Wending and the lakes of Gallador was their last chance to stave off the coming strife. He resolved not to fail.
A day's ride from the western peaks of the rift, he pulsed Cally's loon. The old man answered at once. Dante related the details of their trip to the cove, expecting Cally to respond with derision and complaints, but he turned thoughtful instead.
"So they make the land do their dirty work for them," Cally mused. "Wish I'd thought of that one."
"Can you move the earth?"
"If I kick it hard enough."
Dante sighed. "Do you have any idea how it's done?"
"Oh, I have ideas," Cally said. "You could plant a rock beneath a stick holding up a giant vat of mud, and then use the nether to crack the rock. But it sounds like the People of the Pocket are a smidge more sophisticated than that."
"I get the feeling they could carve a statue of you without lifting a finger."
"Interesting that you put it in those terms. For the most part, we think of the nether as a brute force, a thing that roughly grabs or bludgeons. An extension of our arm, perhaps, if our arms were made of large hammers. Yet they seem to have precise command of the ground. Are they using finer tools? Or are they employing a different approach altogether? Maybe they're literally convincing the earth to move!"
"I know this much," Dante said. "They're skilled. Highly. I'd love to see a fight between their leader and you."
"I don't get in fights. I have far too much dignity for that." Cally coughed up something wet and substantial. "Speaking of squabbles, the norren haven't been quick to leap into one. None of the clans, towns, or individuals of interest have officially defied the treaty."
"Oh? And how many of them have officially fied it?"
"Few," he admitted. "Still, it's reason for hope, if hope is something you find useful."
It was, as much as Dante might like to deny it. The following morning, he took to the road with something like a smile. White caps rested on the green mountains. A light haze softened the world, muting the early morning light. His horse stepped lightly. They climbed into the pass where a forest of bamboo sliced the sunlight into a thousand yellow wedges. The snows had retreated to isolated patches of blue-white shade, leaving the ground sodden and soft. The haze burned away by the time they crested the pass. Below, the lake of Gallador glittered like the land's most precious gem.
A warm spring wind followed them into Wending. They stabled beside the docks and rowed to Lolligan's. The old man answered the door himself. He smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes.
"And how are the People of the Pocket?" he said. "Do their eyes really glow red? Is the lightning that shoots from their ass lethal, or just part of the show?"
"They're creepy," Blays said. "If the rest of the world dropped dead, their only complaint would be the stink."
"Wait, you actually met them?"
Dante rolled his eyes. "And gained nothing from it. What about here? Has anyone's mind budged an inch?"
Lolligan's tanned brow wrinkled. "Been a lot of talk. Even by the standards of people who do nothing but talk."
"Good talk?"
"Not by your standards." Lolligan glanced from his doorway, as if expecting to spot men in black masks lurking in the bushes. "I get the idea the Association isn't as unified as Jocubs wants you to think."
Dante locked eyes with the mustached man. "What gives you that idea?"
"The king's treaty proved that if they want to move against it, they need to do it now. Yet they haven't. I think there are some war-hawks in the TAGVOG, and their strategy is to do nothing but stall until there's nothing that can be done."
"Then we'll have to force the issue," Dante said. "Do you have any paper? I think it's time to send Jocubs a letter."
Blays gasped. "Are you sure you want to be that bold? What will people say?"
Inside, Dante penned a brief letter in his finest hand, blotted the ink, and sealed it with a dab of black wax. Lolligan's boatman rowed away to Jocubs' isle. He returned in less than an hour with a letter of his own. An invitation to another dinner two days later.
Dante sent out his clothes to be washed. Went into town for a haircut and shave. Had his boots resoled and relaced. He spent the remaining time hanging around tea houses in the fancier districts, trolling for gossip and insight. The former was torrential; the latter, a dribble. One rumor stated that Jocubs would marry his first daughter and the fortune that came with her to Moddegan's second son if only the king revoked the treaty in favor of peace. Simultaneously, another claimed Jocubs would raise the army himself if Moddegan didn't lead his country to battle. Others claimed Moddegan was coming to town in person to rally support for his cause. The one thing they all agreed on was that the future looked uncertain, and that uncertainty was bad for anyone currently doing well.
The night and morning before the dinner, Dante sequestered himself in his room at Lolligan's, drafting speeches to hit this point home. By definition, every one of the merchants at the event would be a successful man or woman. A few of them might secretly hope to benefit from the upheaval. Most, however, would suffer. A few might lose it all. Wars were costly things. If Moddegan's silver started to dwindle, no one knew who he might turn to for aid—and what threats he'd make to ensure he got it.
Dante finished with hours to spare. He spent them bathing away the salt and grime of the trail. At the pier, he was surprised to see Blays had done the same. Their boat pushed off, Jocubs-bound. At the chairman's island, rowboats and sailboats clustered around the docks, which creaked with men and women in bright skirts and fur coats. They milled into the banquet hall, where servants stood ready with platters and crystal glasses.
Jocubs' avuncular laughter rolled across the room. Dante could barely see him behind the swarm of men and women vying for his word. Dante slid along the picture windows, maneuvering closer, accepting a servant's offer of wine and a pastry smeared with farmer's cheese and baked trout. He recognized many of the men and women from the prior event, and he smiled and chatted with them while he waited for a break in Jocubs' admirers. The room smelled of tea and woodsmoke and charred pepper-pike.
Dante caught his break an hour later. Beside Jocubs, a merchant's young wife tipped back her head, laughing without reserve, her cleavage soaring. Heads turned. Dante wedged himself next to Jocubs, whose winglike eyebrows were raised in amusement. Seeing Dante, he smiled warmly.
"I'm glad to see you made it back from the west with no loss of limbs or sanity."
Dante smiled back. "There was nothing there but grass and cliffs. The only risk was being winded to death."
"Ah, is it windy there? It's been unseasonably warm here. Good seasons ahead, I think." Jocubs scuffed his feet left, right, left, smiling apologetically at his own superstition.
"And how did the time treat Gallador? Does this dinner mean you've reached a decision?"
Jocubs turned to the window, smiling at some distant peak. "After we eat, good man. We wouldn't want to put anyone off their meal."
Dante found himself subtly replaced by a whip-thin man with a triangular mustache and a hungry eye. He let himself be pried away, and was soon engaged by a man he'd met at the last quorum, the youngish one with the widow's peak and knowing smile, who reintroduced himself as Ewell.
"Ever figure out the cost?" Ewell said.
Dante cocked his head. "The cost?"
"Of striking this bargain."
"Besides precious days of my life?" Dante gazed at the burbling crowd. "I think they're still figuring the price out for themselves."
"How strange," Ewell said. "You don't tease a hungry fish. You just drop your hook."
"Have you heard—?" Dante's breath left him in a groaning whoosh as Blays drove his elbow into his side. In the same instant, the crowd went silent as a fog. Several glanced Dante's way with looks as if he'd farted in their soup.
The Great Rift Page 31
