The Unforsaken Hiero

EPILOGUE

UNDER HER, LUCHARE FELT THE EXHAUSTED HOPPER stumble and come to a halt, unable to continue. For a moment, she sat there numbly, before forcing herself to dismount. Her legs were shaking with fatigue, and she; had to lean against the heaving sides of the beast for support. Vaguely, she was aware that one of the three men of her guard was offering help. She shook him off and stood there, trying to gather her energy to survey her surroundings.

Three men—only three now! How long had it been since the count took the others and turned back to protect her rear? Time was a jumble of confusion in her head. How long since they had turned into the forest, trying to lose themselves in its vastness? And to what end? What had all the weeks of endless flight gained them?

She forced her mind back to the present and looked about. Before her, the little trail they had been following came to an end, and the colossal trees of the forest gave way to a moss-floored clearing. The day must be ending, with the sun already far down in the west; but after the dimness under the great trees, the light from the open sky seemed glaringly bright. She stared about her, suddenly conscious of a curious sense of familiarity. It was as if she had been here before in some other, far happier life.

She saw that the weary men were trying to make camp for the night, gathering moss for their beds and wood to build a fire. Supper, she knew, would be what remained of yesterday’s kill. One man was working with flint and steel to kindle a small mound of twigs. Under him, the ground was blackened with evidence of some previous campfire. Again, familiarity tugged at her mind.

As she stood there, a feeling of something wrong grew in her. Then she realized that the forest had become strangely silent. Even the cries and chattering of the birds were stilled. She strained her ears to listen and her senses to reach out…

Luchare!

Faintly, at the very edge of her awareness, the call came through to her, demanding the answer that welled up in her mind. Then it was gone.

Night had fallen hours before, but torchlight showed a bustle of activity around the dock where the warship lay. Inside the captain’s cabin, a single candle revealed two white-bearded men sitting at a small table. They looked up as the door opened to admit a younger man.

“They said I’d find you here, Father Abbot,” Hiero began. Then he stopped, and a surprised smile crossed his face as Brother Aldo rose to greet him.

“I’ve been hearing about your winning the battle,” the Elevener said. “Too bad I was just too late to witness it. Hiero, you look as if you need a week of sleep!”

“Later. I don’t have time now,” Hiero told him.

Demero indicated a third chair. “Sit down, my boy. Aldo has returned with news from the South—terrible news, but I swore you should have the truth. D’alwah City is lost, the army has been totally beaten. Luchare and the king fled, nobody knows where. And no one knows whether she lives …”

“She’s alive,” Hiero stated. “And I’m pretty sure I know where.”

“She is near enough for you to contact?” Aldo’s voice was filled with doubt.

Hiero shook his head slowly. “No, she’s impossibly far away. Yet for one instant, I know I made contact with her mind. That’s why I’ve come here to find you, Father Demero—to ask your permission to leave and go south to find her. Klootz, Gorm, and the cat people will come with me. And a few others have volunteered. They also ask permission.”

“How far south will you go?” Aldo asked, before Demero had a chance to reply. “After you find your Luchare—if you do, as I pray you will—are you willing to go on to where only a man of your proven ability to defy the Unclean can go? Will you go far south of D’alwah into the reeking jungles where Amibale’s accursed witch of a mother took that young traitor and Unclean ally to learn his evil? Because it is there, from the slender bits of evidence we have, that my Brotherhood and I believe the evil source of the Unclean may lie.”

Hiero considered, remembering that Solitaire had also warned of a great and evil mind far to the south. But there was only one possible decision. “If I have permission, I will go.”

“Very well.” Abbot Demero stood up, as if the meeting were ended. “You shall have permission—but only after I see you tucked firmly in bed and about to get the sleep you need.”

“There isn’t time!” Hiero protested. “The trip around the Inland Sea may take too long, even if we have nothing but good luck—which seems improbable. We should leave at once.”

Aldo began, chuckling, and the abbot was smiling as he laid one around Hiero’s shoulder.

“My boy,” Demero asked, “did you really think I wouldn’t know what was going on when you went around making preparations? Or did you think it an idle whim of mine to refuel this ship and load it with supplies for you?” He snorted with mock indignation. “Hiero, ships can be used for better purposes than destruction. Now give me the names of your volunteers, in case I missed one. Then well put you to bed in a cabin here. When you awake, you and your band will already be well on the way to your princess.”

The princess was lying on a bed of moss, far to the southeast, but she was not asleep. There was too much on her mind.

Hiero was alive and well and free! All the doubts that had come to haunt her were gone, erased by the certainty of her brief contact with his mind. He would come for her. And she would be here, waiting for him.

She let her eyes rove about the clearing, now lighted by the nearly full moon above. She knew it now—this place where they had all camped on the long road south, just before they met the strange women who lived in these giant trees. She listened to the silence of the forest, remembering that the same silence had first heralded the coming of Vilah-ree and the others. They would remember her and provide a haven of safety for her and for the three men—most certainly for the men!—in their tree nests.

She turned on her side, smiling. And finally, she slept.