Circle at center

4
The Hour of Darken

Even though it meant leaving the College an hour early, Belynda decided to make her way to the Mercury Terrace on foot rather than float through the air in her ambassador’s chair. She hadn’t gotten any work done all day-not since yesterday afternoon, as a matter of fact, when she had learned that Caranor was dead. Since then the sage-ambassador had been dazed and listless, numb even to any sensation of grief.

How long had it been since she had known anyone who died? A hundred years, perhaps… that had been Waynekar, an elder teacher. He had taught her the ways of elvenkind as a child-and had taught her parents nine centuries before! At the time of his passing, and still now, the memory of Waynekar brought only a sense of fulfillment, as the cycle of his life had been rich and, ultimately, complete.

But Caranor had died untimely, and by fire. Belynda could not imagine a more horrible circumstance. Why, then, was she not distraught by sorrow, tormented by grief and confusion?

Or perhaps she was. Certainly she was not herself, she realized, as she found herself walking aimlessly through a small market. How had she wandered off the Avenue of Metal, which would have taken her directly to her destination? Shaking her head, she consulted her small compass. The needle pointed unerringly in the direction of metal, and thus she knew she had not drifted far from her course. There was the great Gallery of Light, with its myriad crystals and prisms whirling gently under the brightness of the sun. And just beyond was the Museum of Black Rock, where the ubiquitous group of goblins slouched about on the long, shiny porch.

The road from the market curved around until it rejoined the main avenue, and she hurried along that wide street until she reached a hilltop from which she could see the Mercury Terrace and the dazzling waters of the lake beyond. A quick glance showed her that the sun had not yet begun to recede, so she paused for a moment to catch her breath.

It amazed her that after living in this city for centuries, she still found it possible to get lost. Yet when she looked across Circle at Center she understood how. Walking through this great metropolis, the sprawling city that surrounded the Center of Everything, was more like walking through a forest than a community of buildings. Most of the homes belonged to elves, and every elf surrounded his dwelling-be it mansion or cottage-with a surfeit of greenery and blossoms. Trees lined streets which, with the exception of the Avenues of Metal and Wood, tended to wind and curve. Furthermore, this was a hilly island, and clustered in many groves and vales were neighborhoods of faeries and gnomes that no self-respecting elf would ever visit.

The two causeways, of course, gave solid bearings. Too, the center of the island, a ring of hills higher than any others, was visible from any good vantage in the city. From here she could see the columned facade of the Senate, ringing nearly a third of the Center of Everything. And from beyond the great edifice jutted the long, silver spire of the Worldweaver’s Loom. She had been too distracted to notice the casting of the threads today, but she took comfort as always in the lofty tower and its symbolic protection.

Conscious now of time passing, she made her way to the terrace. The streets were crowded, as they always were just before the Hour of Darken, but the crowds gave way readily at the sight of her sage’s robe. She found Tamarwind waiting before the terrace, leaning on a railing above the lake with his back to her. Touching his arm as she joined him, Belynda suddenly felt comfort in the physical contact with another person. Her fingers lingered for a moment as he turned around and smiled broadly.

“No prettier sight in Nayve than twilight across the lake,” he proclaimed, putting his own hand over hers.

“Indeed.” Belynda tried to relish the beauty, saw the fringe of darkness cresting the mountainous horizon as the sun began to recede. Highest of all the summits was the Anvil, with its flat, gray-black top and the narrowed neck of cliff below the broad summit. Now the fading of daylight had rimmed that massif in purple and vermillion, a combination that should have been breathtaking.

Instead, she felt only that pervasive numbness.

“Shall we get a table?” the sage-ambassador asked, trying to sound bright.

“I’ve reserved one-though I think it was your name that got us the location,” Tamarwind said with a smile.

She kept her hand on his arm, and he seemed to welcome the contact as the black-robed host-a tall elf with an expression of utmost serenity-glided across the plaza to give them a small table at the very edge of the terrace. The lake, now a brilliant lavender, sparkled and lapped below them.

Several officious gnomes brought glasses of iced water and presented each of them with a loaf of warm bread and dish of sweet butter. Tamarwind gawked at the splendor of the surroundings, permitting himself a smile of pleasure as he inhaled the aroma of the fresh bread. He took great pride in ordering an Argentian wine from an elven steward, and informed Belynda that it was a vintage regarded as one of the finest in Nayve. “Though of course each vineyard in the Fourth Circle has different strengths and weaknesses,” he allowed.

“Hmm… I’m sorry.” Belynda was embarrassed. “What did you say?”

“It’s not important,” Tam replied seriously. “But something is, I can see. What is it that’s bothering you?”

She drew a breath, collecting her thoughts even as she tried to answer the question. “I learned that Caranor died… by fire.”

“Caranor the sage-enchantress?” Tamarwind’s eyes widened. “How could that happen?”

“No one knows… she was mistress of fire, of all the elements. And yet she and her house were burned to ashes.” Even as she described the news, Belynda couldn’t bring herself to believe that it was real.

Tamarwind thoughtfully chewed on a piece of bread. He turned to look at a nearby table as a ripple of laughter wafted through the soft air on the terrace. Belynda looked too. The eight diners there were dressed as elves, in robes of green and white, but there were distinctive differences: These people were slightly larger than elves, and had as many different hues of hair color as there were individuals at the table. A woman at the end had tresses of flowing red, while near her sat a stout maid with short brown hair. Two men and another woman had hair with various shades of lightness, but none approached the gilded blondness of elven locks. Another man and two women had hair that ranged from chocolate brown to the purest black but was tightly kinked, complemented by a rich dark skin color.

“Druids, aren’t they?” Tamarwind said, politely averting his eyes from the strangers even as he asked the question.

“Yes… they live in the Grove, that great network of trees beyond the Senate.”

“They’re beautiful, in a rough sort of way.”

“Most of them are,” Belynda agreed. “Somehow humans seem more solid than do we elves… and many of our people, especially the males, find them appealing.”

“A sight you won’t see elsewhere in Nayve,” Tam noted. “Eight humans together. It must be ten years since even a single druid visited Argentian.”

“They rarely leave Circle at Center, or at least these lands around the lakeshore. They have everything they need here.”

“Do you know any druids?”

Belynda nodded. “I have become friends with several-one, in particular, called Miradel. The Goddess brought her here perhaps two hundred years ago.”

“From the Seventh Circle?” Tamarwind seemed very interested, and Belynda was relieved to have something to talk about, to take her mind off Caranor.

“Yes… the place they call Earth, where all humans come from.”

“Are they all so beautiful, so tall and proud?”

Belynda shook her head ruefully. “Hardly. The druids are only the most splendid examples of the race… they are brought here by the Goddess only after they have lived many lives in their world, and through them demonstrate goodness and virtue. They are very tame and wise examples of humankind.”

“Why do you say ‘tame’?”

“Humans are a dangerous breed, for the most part,” explained the sage-ambassador. “In many ways violent-not to mention prone to disease, and to incredibly rapid aging. Of course, here in Nayve they are not faced with those curses.”

“It sounds like a good thing that the Goddess is selective… and that other humans stay on their own circle!” Tam declared with feeling.

Belynda felt she had to explain further. “There is another way that a human can come to Nayve… without the will of the Goddess. Fortunately, it is a costly procedure… very rarely used.” Already she regretted opening this avenue of conversation. Though she herself had learned of the major druid spells during her centuries at the College, it was clearly not the sort of thing that ordinary elves needed to know, or should be encouraged to talk about.

“How?”

She felt herself blushing. She knew the particulars of the magic involved, but it was not anything she cared to discuss. “A druid can use her own power to summon a different kind of human… one who has made himself into a supreme warrior over the course of many lifetimes. These can be men of violence and impulse… If the druids are ‘tame’ humans, you might say that warriors are the opposite.”

“Sounds frightening-but rare, you said?”

“Yes.” Belynda felt uneasy. “The spell involved is costly… in a sense, it means doom for the druid who casts it.” She hoped that Tamarwind wouldn’t ask any more questions about that particular kind of magic.

Fortunately, at that moment the server approached with the dinners they had ordered-a roasted lake trout for Tamarwind, and a pepper stuffed with cheese for Belynda. She was relieved at the good timing, and amused by the smile of frank anticipation that curled her companion’s lips.

Abruptly Belynda felt a lurch that roiled her stomach and rocked her on her bench. The server stumbled, fish and stuffed pepper cascading across the table. Glasses shattered-not just here, but across the terrace. The sage-ambassador seized the edge of the table, wanting to hold onto something, and was shocked as the heavy slab twitched and tilted in her grasp. Tam’s face had gone white, and she heard screams and sobs coming from across the plaza, cries of alarm from throughout the city. As she looked into the night, she saw pitching waves roil the surface of the lake. Still Belynda could not accept the truth, not until Tamarwind shouted the unthinkable words:

“The world is moving!”

T he tremor rocked the floor beneath his feet, but Natac merely flexed his knees and waited for the earthquake to pass. It was not a violent temblor, though he knew that it might presage more significant jolts-perhaps in the very near future. He looked around the terrace, saw water splashing out of the bowl of the fountain, the leafy treetops swaying back and forth through the night air. In a sense the movement was almost a relief-it distracted him from the solitary brooding that had occupied him since twilight.

He heard a scream inside the villa. The sound was followed by a loud crash, and then the warrior was racing into the hall without further thought. The old woman screamed again, the sound coming from the kitchen, and he ran in to find her grasping the heavy wooden cooking bench, her eyes wide with horror.

Natac lifted her up in his arms and she clung to him, sobbing. Mindful of the chance of a subsequent tremor, he carried her carefully through the hall and under the open sky of the garden. There he found Fallon, who stared at them wide-eyed, trembling. “What’s happening?” demanded the gardener.

“It was a small earthquake. Don’t be frightened,” Natac replied, wondering again at this childish display of fear.

He looked across the valley to see waves rippling and churning the lake, while from nearby ravines landslides tumbled down the steep slopes. He watched until the debris rattled and rumbled to rest at the bottom of the incline, much of it spilling into the lake.

Only then did he notice that the old woman was still crying, clinging to his arms and shoulders with her head buried against his chest.

“We’re safe here,” he said. “You only have to get out of the building-the real danger is having the roof fall on your head.”

She drew a deep breath, and though her sobs softened, she still clutched him, obviously terrified.

“See,” he said, trying to calm her-and mystified as to why she was acting like such a child. “It’s gone now-and anyway, that wasn’t even a bad one.” He remembered at least a dozen earthquakes notably more violent, several of which had brought houses and temples crashing down in ruins.

“Nayve-the world moved!” said the woman with a moan.

“It hasn’t happened before?”

She pulled her face back to stare into his eyes, still holding him by the shoulders. “Circle at Center is the foundation of everything. It cannot become unbalanced!”

“The foundation of everything-even Mexico and Mictlan?” Natac was still mystified, but her terror at the quake had served to restore much of his confidence. Oddly, he felt as though he now stood upon firmer ground, while her own beliefs had been shown to be somewhat tentative.

She looked at him sharply. “Of Mexico and all Earth, yes-in a way that you will come to understand. As to Mictlan, I told you-there is no such place!”

“And the world of Nayve cannot be shaken!” he retorted, with a sense of triumph that suddenly flashed into guilt when he saw the fear in her dark eyes-eyes that were alive, and so beautiful-such a deep and perfect violet.

The truth hit him like a blow, so much that he staggered back, gaping like a fool and then shaking his head, angry and disbelieving. But those eyes moistened, glistening with sadness, and he understood.

“Miradel?” The word came out like a croak, and that sound lingered alone in the air, for the old woman just nodded mutely in reply.

T hey sat in the garden while Nayve’s night drew a curtain around them. In some back quarter of his mind, Natac remained alert for a subsequent earthquake, though the land had remained stable since that abrupt shock. Aside from this cautious awareness, his thoughts were chaotic, a jumble of questions, connections, and utter disbelief.

He looked at the old woman again-of course she was Miradel. How could it have taken him so long to recognize her? Her face had the same shape, a perfect oval with the three-petaled flower of cheeks and chin. Furthermore, those violet eyes were unique, he felt certain, in all the cosmos. True, the bronzed skin had darkened, and patterns of wrinkles webbed across her temples and her cheeks-and the musical voice had a harder edge to it, a sound that had been lacking in her soft, welcoming tones of the night before. Or had it been so recently, after all?

“How long was I asleep?” he asked, breaking the long silence. “Years? That you became an old woman in that time?”

“No-one night. Just one night.”

“A night-” He leaned back, bracing himself with arms propped on the stone bench. Overhead was the night sky of Nayve-and the sight jarred him every time he’d looked up since sunset-that is, since the Hour of Darken.

The sun had receded to a bright point at the zenith of the heavens. Brighter than any star he had ever seen, even than the comet that had wandered across the skies of Mexico just before his death, it was still just a star, surrounded by the blackness of the beyond. On Nayve, as on Earth, the vault of the night was speckled with stars. But here the stars shifted position before his eyes, slowly evolving through a dance as chillingly unnatural as it was beautiful.

“How long is a night in Nayve? Will I be old with tomorrow’s dawn?”

Miradel smiled wistfully and gently shook her head. “The Lighten Hour, we call it. And no, you will not. Our nights are much the same as nights in your own world. Just long enough for a thorough rest-though I sense, Warrior Natac, that you are not ready for sleep.”

He stood up, feeling his confusion push as anguish into his limbs, his voice. “You said you brought me here with magic? What kind of magic-and which is the real Miradel? The maiden last night, or-you?”

She straightened, lifted her chin with pride as she glared at him again. “Both are really me-or the other was me, in precise truth. It is the cost of the spell… I aged from the casting.” Her eyes flashed something-anger, or pride, he couldn’t tell. “In the end, I will die.”

Natac knelt before her, staring into her eyes. “We all die!”

Now Miradel smiled again, the sad smile that had changed not at all from the young woman to the old. “Not in Nayve… in the Fourth Circle humans-those lucky few who are called here-live forever. You will have centuries of youthful vigor before you-freedom from disease, or any infirmity.”

“You-you would have had such a life, if not for the casting of this spell?”

“Yes.”

“Why?” He stood and walked away from her, then whirled back. He was filled with awe, and a terrible sense of guilt. “Why did you do it?” he asked in a hoarse whisper.

“Because Nayve needs you-and because your world, your part of Earth, has so little time left.”

“What’s going to happen to my world?” he asked. He was surprised to find that, despite his resentment and suspicion, he believed her.

“Your warriors will meet warriors from a different land-invaders who, in a few short years, will destroy the nations, the places you have known.”

“My sons-their children, their wives-killed?” Natac asked.

“I cannot say yet… the threads have not yet been woven into the Worldweaver’s Tapestry. Still, the pattern is set-the result is inescapable, as it applies to nations. When you ask about individuals, we cannot say until the pictures are before us.”

“Who will invade Tlaxcala? Even the Aztecs have failed, every time they tried.”

“These new enemies will destroy the Aztecs even more thoroughly than they will your own realm-again, it is inevitable.”

“Are they gods?”

“No-they are humans from another part of Earth. People of white skin and hairy faces-larger than your own people, and bearers of deadly tools.”

“Humans-of Earth. But where do they come from?”

“Perhaps it will help you to meet some of them-here, in Nayve.”

“Other warriors-like me?”

Miradel nodded. “There are two of them near here, both brought years, in fact centuries, ago. They, like you, were summoned by druid magic, a spell cast by one who sacrificed her youth to weave the spell. I will take you to meet them some time after the Lighten Hour-they have developed the habit of sleeping very late.”

Natac found that he didn’t have that trait, at least not yet. He slept alone on the fur-lined bed, and awakened refreshed to feast on a breakfast of eggs, rice, and the beverage called “milk.” The druid promised to describe to him the source of that nectar, but the explanation had been put off by other matters. Fallon was there, too. After the meal he took the dishes, cast a few droplets of water across them, and made the same puffing gesture with which he had watered the garden. This time water sprayed vigorously across the dirty plates, and moments later they were clean.

Miradel taught him more about Nayve during the morning, showing him the beautiful lake with its verdant island. She told him that the valley in the middle of the island, and specifically the silver spire rising high into the sky and visible even from the villa, was the exact center of all existence. This was a concept that remained unclear to him, but he nodded and let her keep speaking.

Late in the morning he had a chance to view a spectacle she called “the casting of the threads.” Miradel directed Natac’s attention to the distant silver tower. He watched in awe as a sparkling ring of brightness rose into view, apparently starting from the base of the tower-though that foundation was concealed from his view. The light rose higher and faster until it reached the summit of the spire. From there it crackled into the air in bolts of white brilliance, flashing like lightning upward into the sky until the bursts dissipated in the distance.

He had many questions, but the druid informed him that he would have to wait for those explanations. For now, Miradel prepared a midday meal that they enjoyed in the garden, dining on succulent meat and beans spiced with familiar peppers and other exotic flavors unlike any Natac had ever tasted. Only then did they start out from the villa, walking along a mountain trail that gradually curved around a tall summit and then descended toward a forested valley that sheltered a string of sparkling lakes.

“Our timing is chosen on purpose,” she explained. “This way you’ll be able to meet Fionn and Owen after they’re awake-but, if we’re lucky, they won’t be drunk, yet.”

“Drunk?” Natac knew the word, at least in the context of his native tongue, but he couldn’t understand why it would be relevant here. Then he had a thought: “Is this some ritual day of celebration? A festival that they begin with the noon, perhaps?”

Miradel smiled sadly and shook her head. “For the most part, Owen and Fionn get drunk every day-they keep six or eight druids busy, just making wine for them.”

“These warriors have druids serve them-are they slaves, like Fallon is for you?”

“No… they do so out of choice.” She looked at him frankly. “And you should know that Fallon is no slave-he, too, does the work that he chooses to do. You will find no slaves in Nayve. Some druids, it seems, enjoy the… company of warriors. And these men have persuaded them to do their work.”

By then they had come around the shoulder of the mountain. The pathway overlooked a green meadow, and in the center of the clearing was the strangest house Natac had ever seen. It was made of wooden timbers-he could see that much by the ends of logs jutting from the corners. But the walls had been overlaid with large animal pelts to make a large, apparently weatherproof enclosure. Smoke billowed from a wide stone chimney, and the yard nearby had been divided into sections by pole fences. Several bizarre animals grazed or lolled within these separate sections.

Natac was about to ask about those creatures, when he was startled by a booming voice emerging from the woods at the clearing’s edge.

“Fionn! You sheep-buggering Irishman! Come out and defend yourself!”

“That’s Owen-and it seems that we’re too late.” Miradel sighed. “Or else they’re still drunk from the night before.”

“That’s a human?” asked Natac. The man who swaggered into view was huge, easily head and shoulders taller than the Tlaxcalan. His face was obscured by a thick, shaggy pelt of yellow hair, which darkened to brown as it extended across his torso and well down onto his legs. Some kind of armored shell covered the top of his head, an inverted bowl that was the same dark color as the iron Natac had seen in the villa. Owen bore a staff that was taller than himself, and as stout around as a man’s wrist.

“I said come out, Fionn-you cow-loving son of a mare!”

“Owen?” The one called an Irishman emerged from the house. He was as big as the other warrior, and similarly shaggy-though his hair was like the red of tarnished copper. He wore a cap of leather, and carried a thick cudgel. “You faerie Viking! Why are you back-did you run out of little boys down at the fjord?”

Fionn was trailed by a pair of females who wore diaphanous gowns and clung to the big man’s arms as if to hold him back. Natac saw that Owen, too, had brought women with him, a trio of maidens who now ran out to follow him across the field.

“Those are druids?” asked the Tlaxcalan.

“Yes-as I said, some of my Order enjoy warriors.” Miradel looked at him through narrowed eyes. “No doubt you, too, will eventually have your pick.”

He looked away, unwilling even to consider her words.

“We’d better wait here for a while,” Miradel said. “But watch-you might find it interesting.”

“Those are both men?” Natac pressed.

She nodded. “They are humans from a different part of Earth than Mexico-but yes, they are of a people who are cousins to you and your own.”

He shook his head in disbelief, half expecting to feel the ground shake as the two warriors approached each other. Owen had his staff raised, while Fionn swung his club back and forth, holding the narrow end in both hands.

“Liar!”

“Bastard!”

“Faggot!”

“Blackguard!”

The insults flew thick and loud, and Natac lost track of who was hurling the epithets. And in another moment it didn’t matter as the pair flew at each other, wooden weapons whistling through the air. Fionn’s club smashed Owen’s iron hat with a loud clang, while the staff landed with stunning force on the Irishman’s knee. A fist flew, bloodying a nose, and then came the loud crack of wood landing against a skull.

It was Fionn who went down, and Owen straddled him, ready to drive the staff into his foe’s belly. But somehow the supine warrior found the leverage to flip the Viking over, and by the time Owen landed, Fionn was on top of him, twisting the Viking’s massive leg around. Natac winced as he imagined the pressure, the pain-and then there came a loud snap of bone. He gasped, knowing that such a break, even if it did not result in a fatal infection, must cripple a man for life.

The Viking, his leg jutting at an unnatural angle, shrieked as Fionn rolled off him and stood. “Do you yield?” he asked, snatching up his club and raising it.

“Yes, by Thor-I yield!” snarled Owen through clenched teeth.

Immediately the druidesses gathered around the injured man. One woman stood with her arms spread, spilling something like water over the wounded man. Two more knelt at each side, stroking the mangled limb. By the time Natac and Miradel had reached the bottom of the slope, the Viking’s leg had been straightened. The astonished Tlaxcalan watched as Owen lurched to his feet and stood on the limb with no apparent limp. “That was a good twist, there, at the end,” he admitted grudgingly to Fionn, who beamed in triumph.

“What? Who’s this?” asked the Irishman at the sight of the two new arrivals.

The druidesses gasped in unison, and one of them advanced hesitantly. She was staring at the old woman, and finally asked: “Miradel?”

“Yes, Nachol, it is I.”

Immediately the woman called Nachol, who was a tall female with long hair the color of spun gold, blanched, then came forward and wrapped the older druid in a tearful embrace. Natac stood by awkwardly, conscious of the two warriors looking him over and at the same time wanting to ask Miradel a thousand questions.

“You went against the will of the council,” Nachol was saying. “Why?”

“I had no choice,” Miradel answered. “The threads of the Tapestry showed me that.”

“When?” The golden-haired druidess relaxed her embrace and was joined by several other women who looked at Miradel with expressions mingling awe, pity, and sadness. A few cast appraising, accusing, or suspicious glances at Natac.

“Two nights past.”

“And the spell worked,” said a dark-haired, diminutive druidess, inspecting Natac archly. “You have brought Nayve another warrior?”

“Warrior?” The word was a hoot of amusement, uttered by Fionn. “More like a boy, I should say. Owen, maybe she brought him here for you!”

“Watch your tongue, you Celtic fool!”

Fionn threw his head back and laughed heartily. Owen’s burly fist flew, smashing the open mouth. Natac saw teeth fly and watched the druidesses scamper out of the way as the two men were at it again, crashing to the ground, rolling back and forth with a barrage of smashing fists and jabbing knees. Miradel sighed, the younger women stood around wringing their hands, and blood spilled from both men.

“Druids brought them here, as well?” Natac asked. Miradel nodded. “For this?” he pressed.

“No-you will learn soon enough that we have no control over these men, once they are brought here. We tried to reason with them, but they have learned to do as they wish to.” She looked at him strangely, and he knew she was wondering if he would prove to be as intractable as the two burly men still rolling around on the ground.

In that instant he was embarrassed for his race, for his whole world. He would not give her cause for regret.

He picked up the staff that Owen had dropped in the first bout. “Warriors of Earth!” he cried out as the two rolled close. Plunging the end of the shaft between them, he used his knee as a fulcrum and pulled, easily levering the men apart. “Why are you fighting?” he asked.

“Why?” Owen blinked, speaking through puffed and bleeding lips. “Because-because it’s what we do! As well ask why we breathe, why we eat!”

“We figh’ ’cause his ances’ors s’ole the women of my ’ribe,” growled Fionn, his words mushing through the mouthful of broken teeth.

“Stole your women-and your land, too!” Owen retorted with a laugh. “Not that you Irish would know what to do with good land if you had it!”

‘Women and land-my people have fought for those things, as well,” Natac said conversationally. “But here-this place they call Nayve-it would seem that there are women and land enough for all warriors.”

Owen scowled, and squinted at Miradel. “She told you that ‘Nayve’ poppycock, eh? Don’t listen, boy-this is the warrior’s paradise, called Valhalla, and I’ve been here long enough to know that!” He turned to the short, dark-haired druidess. “Fetch us some wine, Fernie-I’m working up a thirst here.”

The woman quickly ran into the house as Natac settled himself on the ground, squatting sociably with the two hairy men.

“I know it’s Valhalla,” Owen continued, “because it’s what the priests told me to expect. I went straight from the battlefield, my blood and my guts running across the dirt, and into the arms of a beautiful woman. If that’s not a warrior’s reward, then I’m a Frenchman!”

“My priests had it wrong,” Fionn said. “They spoke of a journey to a place of darkness, eternal chill.”

“As I learned of Mictlan,” Natac agreed. He looked at Owen. “So you must have had very wise priests?”

“Lucky, more than wise, I’d say,” snorted the Viking. “They were wrong about plenty-my comrades and my enemies should have been here, but there was only me. And this red-haired Celt.”

“I was here for two hundred years before Owen showed up,” Fionn explained. Natac realized that one of the druids had done something to the Irishman’s mouth-he no longer bled, and in fact had a full set of clean, whole teeth. “How long ago, now?”

“Last count we were five hundred years together,” Owen said proudly. “And the sheep-buggering fool has still never learned to fight!”

“Why, you-”

“The pretty girls who greeted you here,” Natac said quickly, interrupting the budding contest. “Where are they now?”

Both men shrugged and looked at each other, somewhat sheepishly.

“I don’t know,” the Viking admitted.

“The druid who was there to welcome me-I never saw her again,” Fionn said.

“Do you know why?”

“Never asked,” shrugged Owen. “There were plenty of others to take her place.”

Natac sat back, thinking. His mind fixed on a picture of Yellow Hummingbird, of a young girl going to her death at the hands of false priests, to feed the will of nonexistent gods. Then he thought of another sacrifice, that made by Miradel when she had brought him here.

The two bearded warriors were busy sucking on the wineskins that Fernie had brought. Natac caught Miradel’s eye, and asked her the question again.

“Why?” he wondered, trying to see the answer in her eyes.

“Because I think there are things you can teach us,” she said, taking his young hand in her old fingers. “And these will be things that the people of Nayve have to learn.”