The Dreamtrails (35 page)

Next summer festival, when the king came to Herder Isle, the priests bade him forsake the three goddesses worshipped by the Norselanders. The old king laughed and said the priests might worship a male god if they chose, but he preferred the softness of the three goddesses. Being a generous and good-humored man, he granted the priests’ request for more land to extend their cloister, for they had persuaded a shipwright to rebuild their ship and had begun to make trips across the strait, bringing back young boys they claimed were converts to the Faction.

No one thought to question the boys, who had been immediately taken inside the compound for the cleansing period of isolation and silence the priests claimed was needed to prepare them for the Faction. Indeed, the king was often heard to comment that life in the Land across the strait must be harsher than it had been when Norselanders had gone
there to trade, for why else would any lad agree to join this loveless order?

“Eventually,” Lark continued, “by dint of wheedling and begging and demanding, the Faction took over an entire section of Herder Isle. The Norselanders gave little protest because the area included a patch of deadly Blacklands. But there were some rumblings of discontent when the Faction began to build a high wall around the land they had been given. The Herders claimed this was merely to protect the compound and its farmlands from bitter sea winds.”

I guessed that this must have happened about the time the Council had formed an alliance with the Faction, bestowing upon them land to build their cloisters in each province. No doubt they had recognized that an alliance with a terrifying religious order could only strengthen their hold upon the Land. I had not realized that the Herders had first established themselves upon the Norselands, but I had no doubt that the boys who had supposedly wanted to become novices were given no choice. “But you still have not said how they took control,” I prompted.

Lark nodded and went on to explain that the old king had been interested in the order’s apparent vigorous growth and the stern discipline it imposed on its converts. They worked very hard and did not speak, and their silent dedication seemed to him admirable. He thought his own son an overindulged weakling, too much under the sway of his mother, grandmother, and aunts, so when the One of the Faction offered to educate the boy in the austere ways of the cloister, he agreed. By the time the king died, his son was a devout believer in the Herders’ Lud.

Lark went to get some water from a wooden barrel behind a wall panel and to listen awhile at the door. Then he came
back to sit on the bed and continued his tale. “By the time the old king died,” he went on, “there were many more priests, and the Faction all but ruled the Norselands through the old king’s son. He came to be known as the Last King, for when he died, the Herders claimed that he had abdicated in their favor. There was no proof of it, and there was an uprising to oppose it. That was when the cities of Hevon and Fallo were destroyed and Herder Isle divided.”

“But how …?”

“The Faction used Beforetime weapons. My father believes they brought them when they came to Herder Isle, though then it was all named Fallo Isle. In any case, once they had taken over, they sailed to Norseland. Instead of fighting, they released several people who had witnessed the destruction of the cities on Fallo and the Girdle of the Goddess. The Pers—they are our leaders—refused to surrender, for how could the invaders manage to get their dread weapons up onto the land?

“Again the Herders struck, using some terrible weapon that flew like a bird, and the great city of Kingshome and the cliff upon which it stood, broke away and plummeted into the cove. Not one person survived. What else could those who remained on the island do but lay down their arms? The Herders have ruled the Norselands ever since. To begin with, they ruled from Norseland, but after the compound was complete, that became the center of power,” Lark concluded solemnly.

A picture rose in his mind of great black metal gates, set in an impossibly high stone wall, opening slowly to reveal a big black square surrounded by stone buildings similar to cloisters, save that they were formed of black rock instead of the gray of the Land. The compound buildings had the same high
narrow windows and sloping roofs as Land cloisters, but they were roofed in some dark stiff thatch instead of being tiled, as was the custom in the Land. Herders passed back and forth in gray robes, and there were smaller figures in white or black robes. All moved like objects underwater, as if driven not by their own will but by a slow inexorable current. The vision was very dark and loomed oddly and unnaturally, which told me that the memory was distorted by Lark’s emotions. Even so, it was clear that it was not just a large cloister behind the wall but a city. A city of Herders.

I slept on and off through the long slow day that followed. The moon had risen before I was roused by the sound of the horn, which Lark had told me would signal our approach to Hevon Bay. I could see nothing from the porthole in Oma’s cabin but open sea; however, I was able to catch glimpses of the island in Lark’s mind. At my request, he made a careful point of visualizing whatever he thought might interest me. In this way I saw that unlike the Land, there were no high dark cliffs to be surmounted. Like the west coast, the moonlit island was very flat, yet it was impossible to see the channel that now divided the island, or the villages on Fallo, or even the hill that was said to rise from its swampy heart, for an immense stone wall rose up all along the island’s coastline, so high that it obscured everything behind it. It had been built so close to the edge of the island that it looked like a wall rising straight from the sea. Indeed, when the tide rose high or was storm driven, it must crash against the base of the wall. From Lark’s description, I knew that the wall surrounded all the land that had once been Hevon City and that it ran right along the channel that separated it from Fallo Island. The only bit left unwalled was a wide flat spit of land
that curved around the beach that formed Hevon Bay. As we passed along the wall, which surely could not be as high as Lark’s mind showed it, I noted the watch-house overlooking Hevon Bay and remembered that Lark had spoken of another surmounting the corner of the wall facing the channel. No wonder he had said I could not swim it without being seen.

“Why build a wall?” I asked when Lark came down a little later.

“No one knows, but it is said that they were matching a bit of Beforetime wall at the end of the island near the patch of Blacklands,” Lark said. We heard a shout, and the boy stiffened and listened a moment before saying, “We are about to anchor. I had better go up on deck. Remember, stay hidden until the third watch is sounded, and find a place in the rocks to hide as close as possible to where the ship boats will be tethered. You will see the places where pegs have been driven into the stones,” he told me earnestly. Then he muttered a curse and added, “I am a fool. I forgot to tell you that the
Black Ship
is not here.”

“Not here? But it was coming here to report to the Herders.”

“It was here not two hours past, the flagman on the walls signaled. But now it has gone to Norseland. The route passes on the other side of Fallo, which is why we did not see it leaving. You will be pleased to know that Ariel has gone with him.”

I was more than pleased; I was relieved. After Lark had gone, I climbed into the locker and locked the door. I could undo it from inside the cupboard, but we had agreed that it would be safer for me to be locked in since each new watch would make a cursory inspection of the ship when they came aboard. I was trying to find a comfortable position that I could
maintain for some hours, when the ship lurched hard and gave a loud creak. It was coming about, I guessed, and then I heard the rattle of a chain as the anchor was lowered. The noise of disembarking that followed seemed to go on forever, but I distracted myself from the cramped locker by watching it in flashes in Lark’s mind. In the end, I left him because his fear for his father now filled his thoughts and had begun to rouse my own fears. When I tried to reach Lark a little later, I could not contact him, which meant that the Norseland crew had gone ashore, and the boots I could hear now all belonged to Hedra.

It was hot and stuffy in the locker, but I resisted the temptation to unlock the door and get out. Better to be uncomfortable and alive, I told myself. Suddenly, I heard footsteps coming down from the deck. From the sound of the boots, several people were coming along the passage toward the cabin where I was hidden.

“… that is what he told us …,” a man said.

I heard the next cabin door open and then close. Then Oma’s door opened, and I held my breath.

“This is it,” said a man’s voice.

Footsteps and then the locker door rattled. “It’s locked,” said another man’s voice.

“Break it open,” said the first speaker. “She must be there.”

T
HERE WAS A
great crash, and wood splintered under the force of a hard heel. I had a brief glimpse of a group of Herder priests, bald, robed, and demon-banded, peering at me, and then the sundered remnants of the locker door were torn aside and a rough hand reached in to haul me out by the hair. A Hedra captain stared into my face with eyes that burned with a fanatical icy fire above a thin nose and a lipless slash of a mouth.

“A woman!” he said in disgust.

“Not a woman, Bedig,” said the slow quavering voice of an old man.

The Hedra dragged me around to face a tiny wizened priest with coal-black eyes set in a face collapsed into a nest of wrinkles. The thick gold band about his upper arm denoted him a Three and one of the most powerful men in the Faction, save for the mysterious One. Ignoring the younger priest’s half-incoherent bleating, he drew closer to me and peered into my face.

“A female mutant,” he said with a soft, hissing emphasis that brought gooseflesh to my arms.

Another younger priest appeared at the cabin door, panting, “Master, the Norseland shipfolk have already gone across to Fallo, including their master. He was dismissed by the Nine.”

The Three turned to look at the younger priest. “I bade you inform me the moment the
Stormdancer
anchored.”

“Master, the null said the ship was damaged and that it would be near morning before—”

“It is a fool who relies upon the visioning of a single null. Did you confirm the vision, Daska?”

The other seemed to shudder under the old man’s glaring disapproval. “Master, there was only the one null left,” he whispered. “They die so easily.…”

“I know that, you fool. Why do you think I bade you organize a watch?”

“I spoke to the watch—”

“I told you to organize a separate and specific watch for the ships.”

“The
Orizon
 …,” Daska began.

“Ariel told us what happened to the
Orizon
at the same time he informed us of the null’s prediction that another mutant was hidden aboard the
Stormdancer
. But none of that is your concern. Why did you not do as I commanded?”

The other priest cringed. “Master, forgive me.…”

The Three turned to the Hedra holding me. “Bedig, see that Daska is whipped and then confined to a tidal cell for a fourday,” he said indifferently. “Let the crabs teach him obedience.”

“Master,” the Hedra captain intoned.

“Also, I want this ship’s master and his crew brought back for questioning immediately.”

“Their families, Master?” Bedig asked.

The Herder considered it, then shook his head. “Not yet. Let the Norsemen hope that they can prevent us from punishing their families by offering us information. Then when we bring the families in, the pain of learning that they have
been taken will be much greater because it will contain true despair.” He spoke blandly as if he was telling someone how to arrange a vase of flowers or lay a table. “Now let us get this mutant into the compound and see what we can learn about why it boarded this ship, rather than the
Orizon
.”

“Master, is not the interrogation of the mutant to wait until Ariel returns from Norseland with his interrogation machine and the special null?” asked Bedig.

“Ariel left instructions that the creature not be damaged, for the interrogation will be vigorous and requires a subject in good condition. However, despite his undeniable usefulness, Ariel is not one of the inner cadre. Now band the mutant,” snapped the Three.

The demon band was heavier than the one Malik’s armsman had put on me and the taint so strong that it made me feel sick. But it turned my stomach less than the knowledge that Ariel had known I was aboard the
Stormdancer
. Bile rose in my throat, and I leaned forward and vomited.

The Three uttered a disgusted sound and went out, leaving Bedig to drag me after him. Strangely, after that first overwhelming moment of sick terror, I felt no fear as they marched me through the ship and up onto the deck. It was as if I had vomited it out. It was dark enough that lanterns had been lit, for the tide of black clouds I had seen from Oma’s cabin now covered the face of the moon, and even as I was hurried down the ladder and into the ship boat, I heard the rumble of thunder, and it began to rain.