Riverwind the Plainsman

by Paul B. Thompson

  Riverwind wanted only a cool drink of water. His throat was puckered with the stale remnants of the berry juice. But he asked, “What problem?”

  “You mastered your fear of death, but while you were conversing with the gods, our ancestors, you spoke many blasphemies.”

  Riverwind sat up and squared his shoulders. “What blasphemy?”

  “You denied our gods, the forefathers who made us. I have long known that you share your father’s heresy; sons cannot help but bear their fathers’ notions, no matter how false. But I never thought to hear Wanderer’s heresy spouted during a solemn rite,” Arrowthorn said.

  “The punishment for blasphemy is death,” Loreman added. His hands were clenched into fists. He had heard Riverwind talk to his dead son. “The law says the guilty must be stoned at the Grieving Wall.”

  “You go too far,” Far-runner said. “Riverwind was not of his own mind when he said what he did. His father’s spirit influenced him, Loreman.” Stonebreaker and the others echoed Far-runner’s sentiments.

  “What is to be done?” Riverwind asked.

  All through the elders’ wrangle, Arrowthorn had been silent, deep in thought. He had little liking for Riverwind as husband to his beloved daughter, but he had to admire the young man’s performance this day. He couldn’t dismiss Riverwind’s right to quest for Goldmoon’s hand, but perhaps he might teach him a salutary lesson.

  “You shall have your Courting Quest,” Arrowthorn said. “And, in the process, I hope to cure you of your heresy.”

  The disputing elders ringed their chieftain and Riverwind. Far-runner regarded Arrowthorn curiously. “How?” he asked.

  “With no more than a single day’s provision in his bag, Riverwind shall go forth to find proof that the old gods do exist.”

  Loreman smiled. “A wise decision,” he said.

  “How can he do it?” asked Stonebreaker. “You’ve set him an impossible task. The old gods are dead.”

  “He can always return and admit defeat,” Loreman sneered.

  “No honorable warrior—”

  “Enough! As chieftain, I have spoken. We’ve seen that Riverwind has no shortage of courage and strength, but do you want an unbeliever as chieftain? Our gods will bring evil down upon us if we betray them. No, he must learn how great his errors are.” Arrowthorn thrust a finger at Riverwind. “I charge you, upon your sacred oath, that you will take this quest or admit the falsity of your beliefs before all the Que-Shu people. What do you say?”

  Riverwind folded his long arms across his chest. There was only one answer. “I will take the quest,” he said.

  Goldmoon was ecstatic when she learned Riverwind had passed his anointing. When she learned of the quest her father had given her beloved, her joy turned to consternation.

  “Proof of the gods? What proof can there be? I felt the power of the old gods in the Hall of Sleeping Spirits, yet I cannot prove enough to satisfy the doubters!”

  Riverwind stuffed strips of dried deermeat and lumps of pemmican into his shoulderpouch. “I could not refuse. If I had, we would be lost to each other.”

  She grasped his arm. His eyes met hers, and he saw her tears. They embraced.

  “Don’t weep, beautiful one. The quest isn’t impossible. I’ll come back, you’ll see. Then no one can deny us—not your father, nor the elders, nor even the conniving Loreman.”

  Goldmoon choked back her tears. “Where will you go? What will you do?”

  Riverwind drew back enough to study her face. Her brilliant blue eyes were gilded with tears. He brushed a drop of moisture from her cheek with his thumb. “I’ll go where the sun and wind take me. The gods are not bound by mortal barriers. I will seek them in the quiet places—the mountains, deserts, the deep forests. I’ll find them, then come back to you.”

  A smile lightened Goldmoon’s face. Here, in Riverwind’s arms, her doubts dwindled.

  They kissed long enough for Arrowthorn to rap impatiently on the front pole of Riverwind’s tent. Riverwind caressed Goldmoon’s cheek and smoothed her radiant hair. “Time to go,” he said.

  Riverwind’s tent was outside the wall of the village, by the road that led west to the land of the Que-Kiri. Arrowthorn and the elders waited for the young warrior. They made sure he carried only a scant day’s rations. Riverwind was allowed to take his bow and his long-handled saber. In his old but well-oiled leather breastplate and his fringed deerskins, he was ready.

  Goldmoon had dried her tears, but inside, her heart was breaking. In the three centuries since the Cataclysm had rent the land, the old gods had slept. They were so absent from the lives of the people of Krynn that most had forgotten them or had consigned them to the realm of dreams. How could one man, even her stalwart Riverwind, hope to succeed where generations had come to naught?

  Riverwind made polite good-byes to the elders and cast a secret, loving look to Goldmoon. Then, he shouldered his pouch and strode off, his long legs covering the ground quickly.

  “Riverwind!” Goldmoon called. He turned and waved, but never broke his stride. Arrowthorn glared at his daughter for her breach of behavior. Goldmoon missed the look. Her eyes were only for Riverwind as he followed the dirt road south and east until the curving village wall blocked him from sight. She put a hand to her throat and felt the amulet hidden under her tunic, the necklace Riverwind had given her during their journey to the Hall of Sleeping Spirits. It was wrought in steel, rare among the plainsmen, and was shaped like two teardrops touching tip to tip. The amulet had protected them from Hollow-sky’s evil plan. She prayed now it would guide Riverwind to a speedy and successful end to his quest.

  Arrowthorn’s angry glare softened. He was moved by the sorrow in his only child’s face, the face so like her mother’s. But he was chieftain. The tribe’s concerns must come before even his own child’s happiness.

  “Come, daughter,” he said gruffly and stuck out an elbow. Gracefully, Goldmoon entwined her arm in her father’s, and they preceded the elders back into the village.

  Riverwind had no real plan. It was nearly midday, and the heat of late summer was upon the land. Once out of sight of Goldmoon and the Que-Shu elders, he slowed his pace and pondered what to do.

  A rattling sound distracted him. Riverwind looked back at the village wall. Leaning against it was a dilapidated hut, little more than a lean-to, made of bark and mottled pieces of hide. Squatting on the ground in front of the lean-to was a shabby figure, an old man in rags of many colors. His hair was long, tangled, and wild. In a tribe of clean-shaven men, he had a long gray and yellow beard into which beads and tiny brass bells were woven.

  “Catchflea,” Riverwind hailed the strange figure.

  The old man did not look up. His true name was Catchstar, because as a youth he’d hunted far and wide in the hills for bits of the stars that fell from heaven. When the time came for him to display more mature ambitions, Catchstar remained devoted to his odd pursuit. He did not take part in the affairs of the Que-Shu. Ostracized for his eccentricity, treated with open contempt, Catchstar grew more and more distracted. His unmanly habits and slovenly appearance earned him expulsion from the village—just as heretical religious beliefs had earned Riverwind’s family the same fate. Small children christened the old man “Catchflea” as a cruel joke. In time, he would answer to no other name. Their similar standings had made the strange old man and the young warrior natural allies, and Riverwind often defended Catchflea from harassment.

  “Going on a journey, yes?” asked Catchflea, absently shaking a dry gourd. Something rattled within. “A long, long journey?”

  “Very long,” admitted Riverwind. He wondered who would be the old man’s champion once he was gone. “I may not come back for months, perhaps years.” The thought gave him little pleasure.

  “I’ll miss you. No one else brings me rabbits.” When Riverwind had a good hunt, he always shared his bounty with the old star chaser. In some ways, he was like Wanderer, Riverwind’s father. Both men were dreamers in a tri
be that did not esteem deep reflection.

  “If you are going away, Catchflea has a gift, yes.”

  “What is it, my friend?”

  Catchflea scratched his sharp nose. Beads and small bells tinkled in his matted beard. “Something to help you, yes.” He moved the spotted yellow gourd in a wide circle. The top was cut out, and Riverwind could see small brown objects bouncing around inside. Catchflea crooned in a surprisingly tuneful voice:

  “All that comes and all that goes

  Moves in an endless circle.

  Count the days and count the stars

  Starting then and ending now.”

  Riverwind could make little sense of that. When he had finished singing this twice, Catchflea dumped the contents of the gourd out on the hard, dry earth. “Ha!” he exclaimed.

  Three acorns lay in the dirt. They’d fallen in a rough triangle, with one point aimed directly at Riverwind.

  “Here is your journey in a nutshell. Three nutshells!” The old man wheezed a brief laugh, accompanied by the faint tinkle of his beard bells. “This says you will go far away and be gone a long time,” he said, pointing to the nut nearest Riverwind. “This means you will go amidst great darkness.” He tapped a second acorn with one cracked and dirty nail.

  “Evil?” asked Riverwind, sitting down in front of the old man.

  “ ‘Darkness,’ I said, yes?” The last acorn Catchfiea smiled at. “And out of the darkness shall come the seed of the new, which is like the old.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “The new is the old? Natural, yes. That is all I can tell you.” Catchflea scooped up the acorns and slipped them back in the gourd. Round and round went his wrinkled hand, shaking the gourd.

  Riverwind had heard whispers that the old man conversed with spirits who told him the future, and he had a formidable record predicting whether Que-Shu mothers would have boy babies or girls. Riverwind couldn’t dismiss Catchflea’s remarks as idle talk.

  He said, “Which way should I go?”

  “Ha!” This time the nuts fell in a row. “East,” said Catchflea. Riverwind scratched his head. The nuts weren’t obviously pointing east.

  “How do you know what they say?” he asked.

  “How do you know how to breathe? How do you know when it’s time to rise or time to sleep?”

  Riverwind nodded. “I just know. I don’t need to ponder it. The knowledge comes to me, and I know.”

  “That is it exactly, yes,” said Catchflea.

  Riverwind stood slowly, leaving the old man to gather his acorns again. East. Into the Forsaken Mountains. At least at this time of year the high passes would be free of snow—

  The nuts clattered in the gourd. Catchflea dumped them out, crying for the third time, “Ha!”

  Riverwind came out of his reverie. “What do you see, old man?”

  Catchflea squinted up at the tall huntsman. “I am to go with you.” The distracted lilt was gone from his voice.

  Riverwind stiffened. “Perhaps you are reading them wrong,” he suggested.

  Catchflea shook his head. “There is only one meaning, yes. ‘Follow and descend.’ That is what it says.”

  “Descend?”

  The jingle of bells accompanied Catchflea’s bewildered headshaking. “I must do it. Auguries are not given to be ignored.”

  “You can’t come with me,” Riverwind said gently. “I’m going far. I have only enough food for myself for one day. You’re much too old to make such a trek.”

  “I must, yes?” He heaved himself to his feet. Catchflea’s knees and elbows cracked like kindling underfoot. “I won’t be a burden to you, Riverwind. You need only tend to yourself, yes? I can fend for myself.”

  Riverwind grasped the old fellow by his shoulder. “You’re not going.”

  Catchflea’s dark eyes bored into Riverwind’s. “It isn’t only my destiny you tamper with. It is your own. The gods have ordained that we leave Que-Shu together. To flout their will is to invite disaster.”

  Riverwind dropped his hands. “What gods do you serve, my friend?” Catchflea did not answer, but stooped to trace a figure in the dirt. It looked like two teardrops touching tip to tip. Riverwind knew the sign of the goddess Mishakal. That same symbol, wrought in rare steel, he had given Goldmoon to wear secretly around her neck. He narrowed his eyes and stared at the old man.

  “How do you know this sign?” he said suspiciously.

  “Once it was known to all, yes. Now I see it only in the sky, traced in the jewels of the stars.”

  Riverwind wrestled with his dilemma. Catchflea was no ranger, not fit for forest or mountains. Still, his soothsaying was too accurate for Riverwind to discount. Perhaps he could take the old fellow along a short way, then leave him in some comfortable spot.

  “I won’t be a burden,” Catchflea insisted.

  “How long will it take you to prepare?” Riverwind said, resigned.

  The soothsayer bent over with a grunt and picked up his gourd and acorns. “I am ready,” he said. “I have nothing else.”

  The lean-to contained only the mound of moss the old man slept on, some rags, and a rotting waterskin. Catchflea slipped his acorns into a fold of his much-patched shirt and tied the gourd to a loose strip of cloth. “No one in Que-Shu will mourn my leaving, yes?”

  It was sadly true. Riverwind looked away to the mountains. Across the sunny plain, the eastern horizon beckoned, with the Forsaken Mountains only a blue-tinged smudge. Though not steep or especially cold this time of year, the mountains were dry and almost devoid of game. He’d have to hunt daily to ensure a steady supply of food. And now he was hunting for two, as he doubted Catchflea would be of much use in the wild.

  The odds were certainly piled high against him. No horse, little food, and a vague old man to shepherd along—Arrowthorn’s quest would test him severely. Still, he had his wits, his skills, and an unbending determination on his side. The old gods lived. For them, and for Goldmoon, Riverwind would defy any odds.

  Chapter 2

  Thunder Notch

  Cathflea’s aged limbs warmed in the afternoon sun, and he managed to keep up with Riverwind’s long-legged stride. Because they needed food, they could not keep to the main road, the Sageway.

  “There’s a pocket of woods tucked into the shadow of the mountains,” Riverwind said. “If we take that route, there might be deer, or a mountain sheep come down to forage.” He reflected privately that had the old man not come, he could go a day or two on the dried meat and bread packed in his shoulder pouch. In that time he could be deep in the mountains, on his way to meet his destiny …

  “—yield to your knowledge of huntcraft,” Catchflea was saying. “Long are the years since I held a bow, much less a skinner’s knife.”

  They strode across the plain, Catchflea jingling like a peddler’s wagon on its way to market. Riverwind tried to ignore the annoying sound, but after a hundred score yards he halted abruptly and said, “When we get to the forest, you’ll have to find a place and sit still. Those bells will warn away every animal in the country!”

  Catchflea clutched his beard defensively. “I thought the sound pleasing.”

  “It’s very musical, but game will take alarm from it.”

  “I will sit as silent as a stone, yes.” They walked on, the old man holding his beard loosely with one hand to still the bells and beads.

  Trees rose out of the grassy plain like a curtain; there was no gradual change from open land to dense forest. Before plunging into the woods, Riverwind paused long enough to string his bow. To secure his saber so it wouldn’t rattle and frighten his prey, he wound a strip of soft deerhide around the brass hilt, binding it to the brass throat of his scabbard.

  “Speak now, or hold your tongue until there’s meat roasting on our fire,” Riverwind said in a tense whisper.

  “Good hunting,” was all Catchflea had to say.

  Riverwind nocked an arrow and slipped between the trees. With a good deal less stealth, Cat
chflea followed. Though he held his bells quiet, he was not accustomed to moving like a hunter. He blundered along, snapping twigs and almost running into Riverwind’s back. Wordlessly, Riverwind pointed out where Catchflea should place his feet so as not to make as much noise. The old man did better after that, though he was still no match for Riverwind.

  The forest was mostly pine and cedar, so thick that their progress was slow and winding. The forest floor was carpeted with pine needles and cedar berries, which were not edible. Deer, however, esteemed them, and Riverwind found signs where bucks had butted the trees in order to shake down more berries.

  He spied a towering cedar with stout lower limbs and climbed up. Wild creatures were sharp-eyed and keen-nosed. With Catchflea along, the best thing to do was get above their level of sight and smell and wait for the prey to pass by. Riverwind boosted Catchflea up to the lowest branches, climbed past him, and hauled him up higher. With the old fellow safely settled in the main crotch of the tree, Riverwind inched out from the trunk on a stout limb and sat down, his feet dangling and his bow laid across his knees.

  Wind washed through the evergreens, sounding like a far-off waterfall. The pleasant feel of the breeze and the quiet of the forest lulled the soothsayer to sleep. The branch swayed under Riverwind. His thoughts strayed to Goldmoon, as they always did, but still he kept watch for game. His vigil was interrupted, however, by high-pitched snores.

  “Hsst!” he said to Catchflea. The old man never heard him, and went right on snoring. Annoyed, Riverwind plucked the resin bag from his belt. The little leather pouch held the resin and wax he needed to keep his bowstring taut. He threw this at Catchflea. The bag thumped off the old man’s bowed head and landed in his lap. His snores still didn’t waver.

  Riverwind drew up his feet, ready to shake Catchflea awake. It was then he saw the ram. The magnificent beast was poised behind some pine saplings, its huge horns curling down to its wet black nose. Riverwind would have given much to be able to mount those horns over the door of his tent, but he could hardly afford to carry twenty pounds of ramshorn with him now. And a ram that old would be poor eating, too tough.