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Daine looked at the water image in front of her, and shivered. It showed Corus, the Tortallan capital, with its crowds, rich marketplaces, and temples. A giant, ghostly rat crept through the streets, thrusting his nose into windows and doorways. He licked a man who was making a speech in front of the stocks: The man began to cough. A woman brought him a dipper of water; he could barely drink it. Two men helped him to sit. The ghosts of tiny rats flowed from his mouth, landing on those who had gathered around him.
“Slaughter has been out since May,” Broad Foot said. “Malady, though, and Starvation—what you heard were the gates to their dwellings being opened.”
“The Three Sorrows,” whispered Numair, making the Sign against evil on his chest.
Daine copied him in the Sign; her skin prickled. Leaf curled around her neck to see. Now it rubbed its tiny head, with its green hat, against her cheek. Jelly had vanished into Daine’s pocket when the three images had appeared in the water.
“They are the siblings of the gods,” the duckmole explained. “Their appearance causes great changes, many for the good—”
“I doubt the ones they kill think so,” murmured Daine. She looked at the duckmole, thinking hard. It was one thing to ask the badger for help, another to ask the duckmole. Broad Foot had nothing to do with her, really, or with humankind—there were no two-leggers in the lands where his mortal children lived.
“You know,” said the mage casually, “the more disorder that is created in the mortal realms, the more power that Uusoae will have to use. Or so it appears to me.”
Daine took her cue from the man. “I bet that Chaos will feed on this. How can she not, when all three Sorrows are wandering loose?”
The duckmole sighed. “So that’s it. You want me to halt the Sorrows.” He scratched himself. “I can’t stop them all,” he warned them. “They are strong. They ought to be, with humans feeding them for centuries. I can only hold one, and I’ll have to remain in the mortal realms to keep it from breaking loose. The Great Gods themselves could do no better. Some powers cannot be ruled, even by the mightiest.”
Daine and Numair traded worried looks. Choose between Slaughter, Malady, and Starvation?
“Who are we to say which roams free?” whispered the girl. “If we ask to hold Slaughter, Malady and Starvation will kill hoards of folk—but if we hold Starvation, which kills slow, the other two will wipe out large numbers. . . .” Her throat closed.
“Armed humans can defend themselves,” Numair said, thinking aloud. “Hopefully Starvation can be held at bay through food imports. But Malady. . . .” He shuddered. “Malady doesn’t care who it takes, or how many. Malady can wipe out armies and leave no one in the Yamani Islands or Carthak to farm the land.”
“And it’s just out,” added the duckmole. “It’s weak still.”
Daine shivered and tried not to think of friends killed in battle, or dying slowly of hunger. “Malady,” she whispered. “If it can be only one, let it be that.”
Broad Foot rocked from side to side, muttering. At last he stopped. “Stay on the path,” he ordered. “It is a fixed thing, even on the Sea of Sand. It will lead you to the Dragonlands. Getting in, of course, is your affair.”
“Of course,” murmured Numair.
Daine knelt to face him. “I’ll owe you for this, Broad Foot.”
“So will I,” added the man.
“It is only fair. If you can force Uusoae to reveal herself, and save the divine and mortal realms, we ought to do some things for you. Be careful, then.” Silver fire gathered around his small body, and he vanished.
“What will we do if the dragons refuse?” Daine asked Numair.
“Fret about them later,” he said, gathering their things as she quickly finished her lunch. “I’m worried about crossing the Sea of Sand, if Rikash doesn’t help us.”
Daine stowed her pack and quiver on her back. “What’s wrong with the Sea of Sand?”
“I keep forgetting that we haven’t both made a study of myths and legends,” remarked Numair, shrugging into his own pack. “The Sea of Sand is more than a desert. It’s said the Great Gods take mortal heroes there—though Alanna the Champion never mentioned such an experience. If the hero survives, it is a sign that his—or her—mortal impurities have been seared away.”
Daine winced. “Please, Goddess,” she said, looking up. “Send Rikash with help.” She led the way to the path. “I’m fair confused,” she told Numair. “If I’m in the Divine Realms, why do I look up to pray to the gods? Shouldn’t I be looking somewhere else?”
“Thinking about things like that will give us both headaches,” he replied. “Although I believe that Shuiliya Chiman had visions of the dead praying by looking down. Now, in the lost books of Ekallatum . . .”
Daine smiled. As long as he could talk of learning, Numair would forget anything else, including future dangers. At her belt and on her shoulder, two heads craned toward the mage: The darkings were fascinated.
The path ahead climbed; they stopped often both to rest and to get out of the sun. To the east, the ground fell to a broad river with a sea of grass on its far bank. To the west, the thinning forest gave way bit by bit to scrub and short grasses. Finally, as the afternoon sun beat down without mercy, they stopped near a spring tucked in a rocky cleft. First they ate a meal of bread and fruit, then curled up to sleep until the sun went down.
“What do you mean, ‘no reports’?” The voice was young, male, with the accent of the Copper Isles. “All through this campaign you have been able to say exactly where the enemy is! Now, suddenly, you have no information from your spies? There is a Yamani fleet north of us—what if it is coming here?”
“I have but two spies there, as you know! If there is some way that they have been detected— Put your own idle mages to the task!” Ozorne’s voice was twisted by fury. “You want everything handed you as a gift. But for me, you would have neither courage nor allies to take on Tortall, for all your vows of death to King Jonathan’s line! If you want news, scry for it!”
A hoarse voice added, “General Valmar—if you think perhaps to take your fleet and slip away tonight, or tomorrow, or ever, know this.” From a childhood spent too close to that harsh land for comfort, Daine recognized a Scanran voice. “Every skin of liquid fire that you possess will burn, should I touch it with my Gift. If you throw them overboard, our allies among the merfolk will fasten those skins to your hulls, and I will burn them then. We will not have the Copper Islanders act as they have so often, and forget their vows of allegiance.”
Footsteps—hurried ones—receded. Daine heard metal claws digging into wood.
“The centaurs, too, grow restless,” the Scanran remarked.
“I have hairs from every tail among them, to bind them to me. They’ll sing a very different tune, should I scorch even one.” Ozorne’s voice was sullen.
“Sometime you must tell me how you first had information so detailed that one might think you perched on the shoulders of the northern defenders, and now you have nothing. I look forward to hearing.”
Daine opened her eyes and smiled. The badger and Gold-streak had visited the darkings in northern Tortall, then, and talked them into breaking contact with their creator.
Wanting Numair to sleep a bit more, she wandered over to the spring. On its glittering surface, she looked for news of home. An image formed immediately. In it, Broad Foot clung to one of Malady’s feet. The rat-Sorrow tried to shake him off; the duckmole jammed venomous spurs into Malady’s transparent flesh. Malady stiffened; his reddened eyes went blank. He froze.
Daine blinked. Now she was over Port Legann, so high that men and the ships that blockaded the harbor looked like toys. In the distance to the southwest—the direction of the Copper Isles—she saw the bright flare of torches. The image moved closer and brightened, so that even though it was night, she saw the shapes of ten ships. With the strange, clear sight granted by the water image, she easily read the flags that crowned the masts.
/> Numair asked softly, “Daine?” He was sitting up, frowning.
She began to stuff things into her pack. “The Copper Isles is sending ten ships—they’re flying battle flags—north. I think they’re making for Legann.”
The sun had set. Quickly they packed; before they set out, Jelly changed its seat from Daine’s pocket to Numair’s shoulder.
The land was changing, turning to desert in the west. The path headed that way, gleaming silver under war light and the light of the newly risen moon, sloping down through huge clusters of rock. In the distance a bird leaped from a pinnacle, flying as if it meant to reach the moon. When it pulled in its wings and tail, Daine grabbed Numair’s arm and pointed.
The bird opened itself, spinning on its tail. Lances of silver, blue, and gold light shot from its feathers, an explosion of color over the desert. Within seconds, more dark forms took wing. Each opened itself to the light in a shimmering dance of colors. Unlike the sunbirds, these did not drop back to earth. They spiraled around one another, winding like a river across the scrublands, more of their kind falling in behind them.
“Beau-ti-full,” whispered Leaf beside Daine’s ear. She had been holding her breath. Releasing it, she sighed. “Beautiful,” she agreed, stealing a look at Numair.
Petting Jelly with a finger, he watched the spectacle, eyes glowing with awe. “I wish I could stay, or come back,” he whispered. “So many wonders.”
The way grew steep. Lizards that glowed pale blue or yellow darted across the path, or crouched in stone hollows, tongues flicking out to taste the air as the two mortals went by. The path led among stone formations that looked like cracked and broken pillars tightly jammed together. Wind and grit had cut the soft rock into laddered, fantastic shapes. They made Daine nervous: She had an odd feeling that some hollows in the columns were eyes that tracked her.
