Aurian

18 Leviathan

She was swimming. What the blazes was going on? This couldn’t be death—not another dark, freezing ocean! Some inner sense of time told Aurian that only a few seconds had passed since she’d lost consciousness—in fact, it was little longer than that since she had fallen into the sea. Then, to her utter astonishment, she realized that she was breathing easily. Breathing underwater! Aurian laughed aloud, the sound muffled and distorted as her lungs forced water through her mouth. So the legends were true, that you couldn’t drown a Mage! Her body must have made the change instinctively, adapting her lungs to deal with the new medium. I’ll wager Miathan doesn’t know about this, she thought triumphantly. He’ll think I’m dead, and I’ve given him too much to worry about, for him to suspect otherwise. Gods, I hope he’s in agony!

Then the Mage remembered Anvar and Sara. Their lungs would not adapt. They would be drowning! Heading back to the mass of floating wreckage from the stricken ship, she dived, trying to ignore the insidious thought that it would probably be useless. But she had promised Vannor that she would take care of Sara, and it was she herself who had brought Anvar to this fate. She had to try. But Aurian^bund it impossible to see anything beneath the dark waves. Even her Mage’s night vision could not cope with that. She wished she could be like the whales, with their extra sense that enabled them to recognize shapes in the blackest depths . . . Of course! Beneath the water, she sang—a song that she had only learned today but seemed to have known all her life . . . Aurian sang, calling the Leviathans in her mind, to beg for their aid. And to her relief, they answered.

They were with her in an amazingly short time, combing the wreckage-strewn waters to find what she sought. One of them was soon beside her, his immense bulk dwarfing her as she swam. She recognized his thought patterns as those of the father of the whale-cfeikl she had saved. His deep, kindly voice echoed in her mind. “I have the man. My mate seeks the other. Can you climb onto my back, Little One? The man needs help.”

Aurian thanked him and headed for the surface, where the whale rested with his broad back just out of the water. The Mage scrambled up with some difficulty, hoping that she wouldn’t hurt him. She only had time for an instant’s surprise at the warmth of his sleek skin beneath her hands, before she found herself gasping and choking, unable to breathe. She was drowning—drowning in air!

This time Aurian did not lose consciousness, though the panic-filled moments while her lungs adjusted seemed to last a lifetime. She tried to stay aware of what was happening, knowing that someday the knowledge might stand her in good stead. “Have you considered the implications of this thing?” The words she had once said to Finbarr came back with startling clarity as she choked and wheezed.

Aurian looked around dazedly. She felt cold and exhausted, but was relieved to be breathing normally once more. She lay on the whale’s broad, barnacle-encrusted back, rocking gently with a sea that was already growing calm. And there was Anvar, lying limp and motionless a few feet away. Balancing carefully, she crawled over to his side. He felt cold—very cold—and he was not breathing. A chill passed through Aurian. Was she too late?

The Mage tried to reach out with her HeaVer’s senses—and found, to her horror, that she could not. Cold and exhaustion had taken their toll, arid she had thrown every shred of her power into her attack on Miathan. The effort of contacting the Leviathan had completed the drain. Aurian cursed, hammering a fist into her thigh in frustration. Now, at the time of her greatest need, her body had betrayed her! Until food and rest had restored her, she would be unable to summon the intense energies used in Healing.

Fighting panic, Aurian racked her brains. Surely there wa an alternative? Remembering Meiriel’s instructions for such an emergency, she turned Anvar over and pressed hard and repeatedly on his back. Water trickled from his mouth, but he did not breathe. Aurian pushed harder, the exertion warming her despite the icy wind. “Breathe, blast you!” She was tiring quickly; cold sweat trickled down her face.

At last, as Aurian was on the verge of despair, Anvar’s chest heaved once, then again. He coughed and retched, spitting out seawater and taking great, gasping breaths. His eyes stared wide at the calming sea and the vast, curving back of the whale. He struggled in the Mage’s arms and tried to speak, but could only splutter and choke.

“Steady, Anvar—you’ll be better soon.” With sympathy, Aurian remembered her own terrifying struggle on the whale’s back, before her lungs had adapted back to breathing air. “Rest for a minute, and get your breath back while I tell you what happened. The whales, Anvar—they aren’t just beasts, they’re intelligent. I can talk to them, in my mind, and this one saved your life . . .” As she was explaining her part in his rescue, Anvar interrupted her.

“Sara?” he asked, in a faint, hoarse voice.

Aurian shook her head. “I don’t know, Anvar. Wait, and I’ll—”

“Why didn’t they save her?” Harsh and accusing, his voice cut across her own. “Did you ask them to try?”

Aurian recoiled in indignant rage. Why, the miserable, ungrateful— He had no thought of how close she had come to losing her own life, or thanks for saving his! For an instant her mind went back to that dreadful night on the river, when she had lashed out at him in her grief over Forral. Maybe Anvar was doing the same thing—but no. He had called her a murderess, and the memory still burned. Goaded beyond bearing by this new proof of his lack of trust in her^he could only react with anger. That does it, she thought. When we get to land, I’m finished with him!

“Anger, Little One?” The whale’s warm tones echoed chid-ingly through her mind.

“The other member of our party has been lost, Mighty One,” Aurian explained. “The man blames me.”

“He blames you?” Wry humor bubbled beneath the thoughts of the giant. “He must think a great deal of you, to believe you capable of shouldering such awesome responsibilities!”

Aurian, once she was over her surprise at the notion, was quick to deny it. “I fear not, Mighty One. Where I am concerned, his mind seems filled with doubt.”

The Leviathan laughed. “Little One, when we doubt our own selves greatly, we often find it more comfortable to transfer that doubt to another. The man will learn, in time. As for his lost friend, you may tell him to put aside his fears. My sister has her safe, and she will reach land before we will. For this, he has you to thank.”

As Aurian had expected, Anvar’s face lit up at the tidings. But when he reached out in an excess of joy to hug her, she moved angrily away from him. “Stay away from me!” she snapped. “You’ve already made it clear what you really think of me. Once we reach land, you and that selfish little featherhead are on your own—and I wish you joy of her, Anvar, for one day she’ll betray you as she’s already betrayed poor Vannor!”

Anvar’s face darkened. “How dare you talk about Sara like that!” he shouted. “You’ve been unfair to her from the start. You have no idea what she’s suffered—”

“No, and I couldn’t care less! I can see what she’s become, and that’s enough for me. She’ll use you, you fool, and drop you as soon as it’s expedient—but at least I won’t be around to see it this time. I’m finished with both of you, and I hope I never see you again!”

Furious as she was, the expression on Anvar’s face gave Aurian pause. She had never seen him look so angry. “That suits me!” he retorted hotly. “I noticed that you had no objections to using me over the last year or so. Well, let me tell you this, Lady—I’m done with slaving for the bloody Magefolk. After today, Sara and I will make our own way in the world— without your interference”

At this point the whale intervened, saying that the anger emanating from their minds was causing him great distress. Aurian, instantly contrite, apologized to the massive creature. She moved as far away from Anvar as the Leviathan’s broad back would permit, and for the first time in days, settled herself for a good sleep. Surprisingly, it was long in coming. She had lost Forral’s thick cloak in the shipwreck, and her wet clothes clunj; to her like a sheath of ice. The Mage gave in to a passing wish that she could curl up with Anvar, so that at least they could share what paltry heat remained to them. A surreptitious glance showed him huddled tight in his own lonely place, visibh shivering, but refusing to make a move toward her. Well, I’m not going to ask him! Aurian thought. If he wants to get warm, have to come over here. So she stayed where she was, with nothing to sustain her but empty, stubborn Magefolk pride, until finally her exhaustion claimed her.

Dawn found them approaching land. The sky had cleared to the palest blue. The sea was flat calm, and the air surprisingly warm. Aurian awakened, bleary-eyed and unrested, to see a beach of fine silvery sand broken by clumps of jagged rock. A lush, dense strip of unfamiliar forest lay behind it, and beyond that towered cliffs of convoluted gray stone that soared to a staggering height. The silky, perfumed air was alive with the shrill calls of unknown creatures beneath the forest canopy. Shock ran through Aurian. This was no northern shore! The violent storm had blown them right to the fabled Southern Lands!

The whale halted an arrow’s flight from the shore, where the water was deep enough to float his massive bulk. Aurian turned to Anvar. “This is where you get off,” she said tersely. “He says that his sister left Sara here, so she should be about somewhere.”

Anvar hx>ked astonished. “You really can talk to that thing, can’t you?” he said.

“Thing? He’s as intelligent a creature as you, Anvar, and I find his conversation infinitely preferable to yours, so go away.” Aurian set her jaw, averting her eyes from Anvar’s injured expression. It’s a bit late now, to be looking hurt, she thought grimly.

Anvar looked down into the water, which was crystal clear in this sheltered bay. Following his ga^e, Aurian saw myriads of bright fish darting through the lapis-blue depths. “Aurian, it’s too deep here! I can’t—”

The Mage could see the panic in Anvar’s eyes, and belatedly remembered his inability to swim. She remembered her terror the previous night, when the choking water had surged into her tortured lungs, and shuddered. Anvar was shaking, and she fought in vain against a surge of pity for him. “All right,” she sighed. “I’ll help you.”

Keeping her voice calm and reassuring, she said, “This is what we’ll do. I’ll go first—” Suiting word to deed, she slid off the whale’s sloping back and into the water. After the bitingly cold seas of the northern climes, its warmth came as a pleasant shock. After a brief consjaltation with the whale, she turned to Anvar. “Now, I want you to slide down here. His fluke’s just—”

“His what?”

“His fin, then, if you like. It’s just under the water, so you can stand on it, and you won’t go under.”

Anvar hesitated, biting his lip.

“Go on—he says it doesn’t bother him,” Aurian urged.

“Maybe—but it bothers me!” Anvar muttered through clenched teeth.

“Look, it’s perfectly safe. I won’t let your head go under, I promise. Trust me, Anvar—for once.” She couldn’t keep the edge out of her voice.

Finally Aurian managed to coax Anvar onto the fluke that the patient whale was holding steady. The water came up to his chin. Thank goodness he’s tall, Aurian thought as she swam to his side. “Don’t grab me!” she warned, realizing what he was about to do. She righted herself and stood beside him on the fluke—and discovered his problem. It was difficult to stand upright in the buoyant, salty water. The body wanted to tilt itself and float.

Aurian placed her hand on the back of Anvar’s head.

“What are you doing?” he gasped.

“Don’t panic. I’m holding your head out of the water. All you have to do is take a deep breath and lean back—just relax and your feet will come up naturally. You’ll float, I promise, and you won’t go under. I’ll have you safe.”

After a time, An vaf plucked up enough courage to do as she said. Aurian was swamped by a flurry of foam as he panicked, floundering and thrashing and clutching at her. At the expense of a ducking, she managed to keep him from swallowing too much water and got him right side up, back on the fluke. Pushing the heavy, clinging curtain of hair out of her face, she found an indignant Anvar glaring at her with red, salt-stung eyes.

“You said I’d float\”

“I said relax, you double-dyed dimwit, then you’d float!” “I can’t relax! I’m bloody terrified!

It took a while, but finally they managed to get the float ing part of the operation sorted out. Anvar lay back, his fat breaking into an astonished smile.

“Anvar, don’t forget to breathe!”

More floundering. But eventually they managed it, and after that, towing him to shore was a comparatively simple matter. Within minutes they found themselves standing knee-deep in a gay lacework of surf that tumbled and danced up the beach.

“Well,” Aurian said. “If you ever get into deep water again, at least you’ll be able to float.” On an impulse, she reached down and pulled a long, lethal dagger from her boot top, handing it to him without looking him in the eye. “Take this,” she told him. “At least you won’t be unarmed.”

It struck them both at the same time that this was the moment of their parting. There was a sudden, tense silence as they stood, up to their knees in water, and looked at one another. Suddenly, Aurian was tempted to reconsider. This was insane! How could she leave Anvar? She found herself unable to turn away from him, and he too seemed unhappy and undecided, biting his lip while he fidgeted with her dagger. Oh, drat this, Aurian thought. We’re behaving like children! An apology was out of the question—after all, he was in the wrong —but she was about to open her mouth to tell him that they ought to stay together when—

The spell was shattered as Sara erupted from the forest and dashed down the beach toward them, calling Anvar’s name. “Oh, Anvar—I was so afraid! Those beastly sea monsters—I thought I’d be eaten for sure!” She .gave a sudden shriek. “Oh! Look out—there’s one right behind you! Quick, get out of the water!”

“Sara—thank the Gods you’re safe!” Forgetting the Mage, Anvar left the water in a flurry of foam, and ran to her. Aurian cursed, and turned away in disgust. Breasting the warm waves, she swam out to the Leviathan and climbed onto his back, her heart weighing her down more than her wet clothes. When she looked back, Sara was in Anvar’s arms.

Sara’s shrill voice carried clearly across the water. “Well, who cares if she goes! We don’t want her with us anyway!”

The Mage gritted her teeth and braced herself against the warm body of the whale. “Let’s go,” she said. She never heard Anvar’s frantic voice, calling her back.

Anvar was furious. “Be quiet! She’ll hear you!” He still could not believe that Aurian was actually leaving. He felt somehow lost, anchorless. He called to her, begging her to wait, but the whale was sounding, exhaling deeply in a roaring geyser of water and air. She could never have heard him. Sara’s arms twined persuasively round his neck as she kissed him, turning his face from the ocean, effectively stopping him from calling again. “Never mind her,” she murmured. “Think of your freedom, Anvar. Think of us.”

The Leviathan could move very fast when he wanted to. Anvar broke away from the kiss, but the Mage was already out of earshot. “What in the name of the Gods do you think you’re doing?” he snapped at Sara. “It’s not a question of freedom, you idiot! Not just now. We should be sticking together!” In his heart he knew, with a sickening sense of shame, that it was he himself who had driven the Mage away.

“How dare you speak to me like that!” Sara flared. “How is it supposed to be my fault? It wasn’t I who called her a murderer! I thought you wanted us to be together, just the two of us.” Her face crumpled, and tears spilled from her guileless violet eyes. “I thought you loved me, but it was her you wanted all along . . .” Picking up her tattered skirts, she ran away from him, along the beach.

Gods, what else could go wrong? With a groan, Anvar hastened to follow her.-The early sun blazed down from a vibrant, cloudless sky. Its silky heat was already enough to dry the clothes on Anvar’s body, but the chill of last night’s stormy waters seemed to have settled immovably into his bones. The drying salt and sand made his skin feel stiff and gritty, his eyes smarted, and he ached all over. Panting in the heat, he caught up with Sara, and put an arm around her. “I’m sorry,” he told her. “Truly I am—and I do want to be with you.”

After a while, Sara allowed herself to be mollified, but there was a certain hard look in her eye that made Anvar feel as though he would be treading on thin ice for a while. Bloody women! he thought sourly. He looked out to sea, but Aurian had vanished. They were alone. “Come on,” he said resignedly. “Let’s go and find some water.”

Luckily, fresh water was plentiful in the forest. It drained down from the cliffs behind, forming many streams that passed through the lush fringe of forest on their way down to the sea. Anvar and Sara only had to walk a little way along the beach before they stumbled on the first of these streamlets where it entered the ocean. They followed it up into the shadowed forest, where the air was cool and moist, the broad-leaved trees and tangle of thick vegetation overhead cutting off most of the sunlight.

The air was filled with a zithering chorus of insect noises, interspersed with strident animal shrieks and birdcalls from the canopy overhead. Sara shrank fearfully against Anvar, unnerved by the strange sounds. “It’s all right,” he reassured her hopefully. “They’re only animals and birds.” But he used Aurian’s dagger to cut them two stout staves from a nearby tree, thinking as he did so how annoyed she would be at this abuse of her good blade.

The waters of the brook gathered in a hollow to create a small, deepish pool. Around its sides the vegetation had been nibbled back by animals, leaving a strip of earth and leaf litter. The mud at the brink was cross-stitched with the tracks of animals who had come down to drink. Anvar stopped to examine them. Small rodent prints, the slots of tiny deer, sinister S-tracks of snakes—and what were these? They looked like prints of hands—tiny human hands! Anvar felt a prickle in the back of his neck. Suddenly the forest seemed full of unseen eyes. He hastily scuffed the tracks away~wirii his boot before Sara could see them.

Parched by the heat and the seawater he had swallowed, Anvar flung himself down to drink, splashing cool, fresh water on his salt-tightened face. Once his first, urgent thirst had been quenched he looked around, fearful of losing his way in the forest—until he remembered, sheepishly, that he only had to follow the stream. He felt relieved. If Aurian should change her mind . . . But she would not—not after the way he had treated her. How he regretted his harsh words of the previous night. If he had only kept his temper, instead of flying to the attack because she had made him feel guilty. Surely she would have understood . . .

Gods, but he wasjmpgry! Desperate to ease the gnawing emptiness inside him, Anvar pondered the possibilities of finding food in this alien place.

Sara must have been thinking the same thing. “Anvar, I need something to eat!”

It was little short of a command, and Anvar felt a stab of irritation. Aurian had never spoken to him like that, and he had been her servant! Striving to keep his voice calm, he said: “So do I. Shush, let me think a minute.”

“But I’m hungry. 1 want something to eat now!”

Luckily, Anvar’s long-departed grandpa came to the rescue. He had filled the young boy’s childhood with tales of his own youth in the country. By the time he was nine, Anvar had been fully conversant with the skills of trout-tickling—in theory, at any rate. And not far away was an ocean teeming with fish. “Come on,” he said to Sara. “We’ll catch some fish for dinner.”

In practice, it proved to be a lot more difficult than it had sounded. Out in the open sea, the fish seemed to have developed some magic of their own. Again and again, as Anvar’s careful hand almost closed on their sleek, shining bodies, the fish suddenly vanished, leaving the exasperated fisherman with a handful of empty ocean. Anvar stood waist-deep in the sea, growing more irritated by the second. Why wouldn’t the bloody things stay still? His eyes ached from peering into the dazzling waters, and the sun beat fiercely on his unprotected head and back. He seemed to have been doing this for hours. Try as he would, he could not shake off the “fiction that the damned fish were mocking his bumbling efforts. As he lifted his hands out of the water, he saw that the skin on his fingers was white and wrinkled.

“Anvar? Anvar!” Sara’s voice rang out from the shore. What did the wretched girl want? He was vaguely aware that she’d been calling for some time. He turned—and there she stood, laughing, holding up a bag made from a white square of linen torn from one of her petticoats. It was bulging and squirming in her grasp. “Look! I’ve caught some!”

For a split second he could cheerfully have strangled her Then the import of her words sunk in, and Anvar was both astonished and relieved. Moving as quickly as he could against the clinging pressure of the water, he waded back to her through the shallows. “How in the world did you manage that?” he said, trying not to sound as indignant as he felt.

Sara dumped her writhing bundle down on the white sands and put her arms around his sunburned neck, making him wince. “Easy.” She smirked. “Aren’t you proud of me?”

“Of course!” he snapped, glaring at her, and Sara relented.

“Did you not notice?” she said. “The tide’s turned, Anvar.” She gestured to a reef, now exposed, that pointed out like a finger into the ocean. “There are lots of fish over there, trapped in the rock pools,”

“The tide?” Anvar felt stupid. He knew about tides, but not having been to the sea before, he had never understood their import.

The realization hit Sara at once. “Oh,” she said. “You’ve never been to the sea before, have you?”

“How could I?” Anvar snapped. “The Magefolk don’t give their servants outings to the coast, you know! How do you know so much about it, anyway?”

Sara looked away for a moment. “Vannor used to take me in the summer.” Seeing the look on Anvar’s face, she hastily changed the subject. She couldn’t afford to alienate him. “Anyway,” she said brightly, “I’m useless. I may have caught them —-I couldn’t help but do that—but I can’t kill them. And as for dealing with the horrid bits, well, it always makes me sick.”

She had obviously said the fighf thing, because Anvar smiled. “I’ll do that. I learned how to do it in the kitchens at the Academy.”

Sara shuddered. She wished he wouldn’t keep reminding her that he was a servant. Living with Vannor, she had grown used to having servants around, and had ceased to think of them as human beings. They were just, well, there—polite, anonymous, and at her beck and call. It made her feel unclean, somehow, to be making love to one of them. Still, for expediency’s sake, she could put up with it. Turning to Anvar, she gave him her brightest smile, which had always worked with Vannor. “It’s a good thing there’s somebody practical around,” she told Anvar, “I’m afraid I’m just hopeless. Do you know how to get this fire starte4£l’%

Before his ill-fated fishing attempt, Anvar had left his tinder and flint with his discarded shirt on a sunbaked rock to dry out. There was plenty of wood between the forest’s edge and the high-tide mark, and Anvar soon had a fire going. He used Aurian’s dagger to gut the fish, feeling guilty again, for he knew she had given him the weapon for more important reasons than this. He baked the fish on flat rocks at the fire’s edge, and they feasted in the shade of the forest’s eaves, by the stream, where the lush foliage protected them from the midday sun.

Anvar awakened in the cool, fragrant dusk. The last blush of sunset glowed behind the tall cliffs, and bats swooped over the beach, hunting insects lured by the glow of the fire. Now-the sun had gone, hordes of tiny scuttling crabs were makin| off with the remains of the fish. Anvar shuddered, and scrambled hastily to his feet, wincing at the fiery stiffness of v sunburned back, and trying to clear the fuzz of sleep from brain. All that staying awake with Aurian had finally caught with him, he supposed. He must have fallen asleep before had even finished eating.

Then he realized, with a start, that Sara was missing! Ar iously, Anvar scanned the beach. Surely she wouldn’t be stupid as to wander off alone? Taking a branch from their fit wood pile, he kindled one end at the fire, and examined the spot where she had been sitting. There was no sign of a stm( gle, so no beast from thr=forest had seized her. Then he saw footprints, leading to the stream, then away into the jungl With a curse, Anvar plunged into the shadowed forest, following the course of the water.

The forest at night was far more eerie than the glowii emerald jungle of the daytime. Roots writhed up to trip him, vines (snakes?) brushed his face, almost startling him into dr ping the torch. Branches grasped at his clothing. Faces le out from trees, seeming to grimace in the flickering torchligl The mold underfoot was slick with the evening’s dew, a1 sickly glowing growths sprung from rotting logs, reminding him horribly of the chalice from which Miathan had released his Wraiths. Anvar’s heart hammered; his breath came si and gasping. What was that light ahead? A strange, flickering ghost-light. Anvar slowed his pace, creeping carefully up to the clearing that cradled the little pool—and stopped, enchanted. A nymph was bathing in the still, dark water. She was pale-skinned and golden-haired: surrounded and waited upon by a court of fallen stars that danced above the water, crowning her with silver. Anvar held his breath. An errant star danced close to him, and he saw that it was a flying insect whose body glowed with cool, white fire. Then the nymph turned to face him, standing naked in the enchanted pool, her golden hair streaming across her shoulders. Sara.

Anvar was enraptured, helpless in the face of such otherworldly beauty. He had meant to chide her for venturing alone into the forest at night, to rebuke her for her lack of common jnse. Instead he found himself moving inexorably toward her, a sleepwalker drawn by the lure of an elusive dream. Throwing his guttering torch and casting aside his clothes, he joined Sara in the pool.

She stiffened, a protest half articulated on her lips. Then with a shrug, she lifted her face to his kisses, her arms to return embrace. They made love on the brink of the pool. Anvar afire, carried away on the wings of love, of passion, by the auty of Sara and the lambent night that combined to form a igle transcendent whole. So carried away was he that it was in the instant of climax that he felt an uneasy hint of ibt that Sara was not with him. Oh, her body, yes. Su-emely responsive, making all the right moves, the appropri-sounds. But in that explosive instant her eyes flew open, and >king into them, he realized that Sara herself was elsewhere, away.

Anvar let his body relax, his heart thudding rapidly against breast. Sara smiled, and ran her fingers idly through his jr. You imagined it, he thought. Trick of the light with those ined fireflies. But his joy had fled, and his heart’s ease was slaced by a desperate awareness of how much he needed her. am his childhood she had been his—and now, at last, he had to himself. The idea of losing her was unthinkable. But for first time, he felt an insidious touch of doubt, like an icy ;er. Had Aurian been right? Had Sara been callously using inor for her own ends? And now, was she using A/w? “I’m cold,” Sara aersplained. “Cold and muddy.” She grimaced, and tried to wriggle out from beneath him. “Now I’ll have to bathe again!”

With a sigh, Anvar let her go, joining her in the pool to bathe. The unexpected coldness of the water, now that he was in a state to notice such things, sent the last remnants of the night’s magic fleeing as quickly as it had come.

Without speaking, they walked back to the beach, where Anvar rekindled a huge blaze.

“I’m hungry again,” Sara whined. But the last of the fish had been carried away by the crabs, and Anvar knew they had no chance of finding food in the dark. “Try to sleep,” he said. “We’ll find something in the morning.”

“And then what?” she demanded. “We can’t mess around in this dreadful wilderness forever, you know.”

To Anvar this place was a paradise, if he didn’t count the sunburn, but he supposed she was right. “I don’t know,” he said. “If we climb the cliffs tomorrow—”

“What? Climb up there? You must be joking!” Anvar sighed. “Well, we can make our way along the shore, then, camping as we go. The cliffs can’t go on forever.” “And which direction do we take?” Sara countered. “Why, you don’t even know what lands we’re in!”

“Neither do you,” Anvar retorted, nettled, “and you’ve traveled farther than I have, or so you say. Why don’t you make a suggestion?”

“You’re absolutely useless, Anvar! You don’t know anything! I wish I’d never-^1” Sara bit the words off abruptly.

“You wish you’d never what?” Anvar felt an ominous chill at her words. But Sara turned away from him, refusing to say more, and he was reluctant to press her. Within a matter of minutes she was asleep, or at least pretending to be.

Anvar stared miserably at the night sky. The stars seemed closer here, mellow lamps set in a velvet canopy. It was a far cry from the glittering star-crazed sky of his northern home, and suddenly he felt lost, and, despite Sara’s sleeping form huddled next to him, very much alone. He wondered where Aurian was, and was bitterly sorry for his hurtful words. She’d have known what to do. Forral had taught her well. Even when she found herself at a loss, her courage made up for the lack. In truth, he admitted ruefully, it was the near arrogance of her certainty that sometimes annoyed him so. That and the fact that she was a Mage, one of the race that had robbed him of his place in the world. He toyed with the dagger she had given him, its clean, sharp, businesslike lines reminding him of its owner. Where was she now? he wondered. How would she manage—pregnant, alone, and grieving, with Miathan in close pursuit. He began to worry about her, feeling that he had failed in his responsibility. But despite his troubles, the days of terror and flight had taken a greater toll than Anvar realized. Long before he could awaken Sara to take a watch, he fell asleep in the midst of his reverie.

Had they known to what lands they had come, and what race inhabited them, Anvar and Sara would never have built a great fire, like a beacon on the beach. Had they been aware of the danger, they would have hidden in the forest and been more careful about setting watches. As it was, they slept innocently on, their fire visible for miles from the open sea. When the long black galley glided up to the beach they were unaware of it, and even the light crunch of boots on the sand and the hiss of drawn steel failed to wake them.

Anvar was awakened by the clutch of hands on his body, and the sound of Sara’s scream ripping through the night. He struggled violently, gaining his feet for a moment and groping for Aurian’s dagger. But the blade had fallen from his hand while he slept, and was lost in the sand. He had time for a glimpse of flickering torches, swartbjr faces, and white, grinning teeth before a heavy blow on the back of his head knocked him unconscious.