The Ancient One (16 page)

“Then it is no concern of ours,” replied Untla. “The water at your feet will enable you, for a time, to share the Stonehags’ gift of communication. You will understand all that you hear, whatever the tongue, and you will answer back and be understood. It is a gift you already possess in part, as does the one you call Aunt Melanie, for you have already shown that you can walk the bridges of time and place.”

“I only want to walk back,” said Kate quietly as she bent low. Placing her cupped right hand in the water, she drew some out and drank it. The water chilled her teeth, it was so cold. It cascaded down her throat, seeming to linger there for an instant, leaving behind a bracing taste of freshness and purity. She took another drink, then regained her feet.

“You too,” said Untla to Laioni. “And also your dog. Drink.”

Obediently, Laioni knelt beside the spring. One rope of black hair dropped into the water as she bent down to the bracing fountain. Monga, by her side as always, lapped eagerly, swishing his tail as he drank.

Laioni rose. Before she could even straighten her spine, the distant drumbeat echoed again. Faster and louder it grew, until the sound of booming cannons surrounded them. The earth shook so mightily that Kate kept her feet only with the aid of the walking stick.

Abruptly, the tremors ceased. The Stonehags, enormous boulders once again, sat immobile and ageless as fog flowed into the center of their ring. No more voices rumbled; no more spring bubbled. The Circle had returned to stone. All that remained of the great beings were their words of warning, still sounding in Kate’s ears.

XIV:
F
ALLEN
B
RETHREN

Monga kept his head low to the ground as he padded behind Laioni and Kate through the channel between the two great boulders. Mist swept across their surfaces, obscuring all but the deepest cracks. The dog nudged Laioni’s leg, urging her to go faster, his bushy brown tail curled tightly over his back like the mainspring of a clock.

Kate, preoccupied with thoughts of the sinister island, did not pause to study the massive stones as she passed between them. Already she wondered if the Stonehags were right about the Tinnanis. Maybe they didn’t really exist. And even if they did, maybe there was some way to communicate with the Tinnani Chieftain without actually going to the island. Perhaps he or his people came ashore regularly. Surely they must. How else could they have become so deeply ingrained in Halami legend if they didn’t appear from time to time?

“It will not be easy to get there,” Laioni muttered to herself as they neared the other side of the passageway.

Kate spun around. “I was just thinking the same—” She caught herself in mid-sentence. “I understood you,” she said in wonderment. “I mean, you spoke Halami and I understood you.”

The other girl brightened. “And I understood you. It’s the gift of the Stonehags.”

But Kate had no time for celebration. “The Tinnanis—are they real? Have you ever actually seen one?”

Laioni hesitated. “No one has ever seen one, at least no one I know. But we all know what they look like.”

“That’s not too convincing,” replied Kate. “Well, then, tell me about the island. Is there any safe way to get there?”

Laioni lowered her eyes. “It is bad, very bad. People should not go there at all.” She sighed. “The few who have dared to try either have turned up later, wandering aimlessly in the forest with no memory of anything about the island, or have disappeared completely. Some time ago, the son of our eldest, a boy named Toru, dreamed he should go there on a vision quest. I knew him well. We were the same age. We all knew it was too dangerous, and we tried to persuade him to change his mind, but he refused. He left the village—it’s by the coast, a day’s walk from here—and no one has heard from him since.” She pursed her lips angrily. “I think it was the work of Gashra.”

“Gashra?” Kate knew she had heard the name, but she couldn’t remember where.

“The most evil being alive,” replied Laioni venomously. “He lives in the steaming mountain, whose name we never speak lest it increase his power. He can reach into people’s minds and twist their thinking in terrible ways. If they are too good to be useful to him, like my friend Toru, he poisons their dreams to make them chase after death. If they are already evil, he draws them into his service, like he did with Sanbu.”

“Who is Sanbu?”

“One of my people,” Laioni said sadly. “He grew tired of hunting for his food and started stealing from other villages. That was bad enough, but then he joined forces with Gashra and now no one is safe. His band mutilates animals, trees, and people without care. They’ve made the forest outside the crater a dangerous place. That is why I am worried for my father and his hunting party—and for all the Halamis.”

Kate scanned the great gray boulders on either side of them, then turned back to Laioni. “You don’t have to come with me, you know.”

“I know,” she answered in a low voice. “I don’t even know exactly why I followed you here to the Circle, except that something made me feel like—like I was supposed to help you. Monga felt that too, I could tell, from the moment you fell into the hunting pit.” She surveyed the carved handle of the walking stick, barely visible in the dim light between the boulders. “When I was born, it was foretold that I would make a long and perilous journey for the sake of my people. And that in that journey, my guide would be an owl. My name, Laioni, means She Who Follows the Owl.”

Raising the carved handle, Kate asked, “And you think this is the owl?”

“I don’t know,” whispered Laioni, bending to scratch the top of Monga’s head. “I don’t even know the true meaning of my name, for the owl symbolizes two very different things to my people. To some, it is a symbol of the forest world that supports us, something to be cherished. To others, it is a symbol of death, something to be feared.”

Kate glanced uncertainly at the walking stick. “That’s another reason not to come with me.”

“No,” replied Laioni. “By coming with you, I will learn my true fate. I believe that you did not arrive here when you did by accident. There must be a reason.”

Frowning, Kate lowered the stick. “That’s where you’re wrong. It’s just bad luck, that’s all.” She paused, reflecting. “You don’t think I’m some kind of spirit, do you?”

Laioni smiled. “You come through one of the great trees, you heat tea without a fire, you summon the Stonehags, and you carry a stick of power. That’s enough for me.”

“But I’m just a girl, like you.”

“Then you wouldn’t have feet like that,” objected Laioni, pointing to her bright green shoelaces. “They’re as green as new leaves.”

Shaking her head, Kate repeated, “I’m just a girl.”

“Whatever you are, I think you are here to help my people.”

Kate bristled. “What do you mean?”

“These are dangerous times, as the Stonehag said. The power of Gashra grows stronger by the day. His mountain has come alive, rumbles with anger, and spouts burning clouds. Sanbu and his warriors steal and waste whatever they want. Parts of the forest where my people have lived for generations are dying, changing from green to brown, rivers are turning to fire, and our brothers and sisters the creatures of the forest are growing scarcer. Even the fish that once were so plentiful we could walk across the streams on their backs are now hard to find. If I am ever going to make a journey for my people, as the prophecy said, it must be soon.” She swallowed with some difficulty. “There is something else. That boy, Toru, my friend—he was, he was the one I hoped would father my children someday. I have to find out what happened to him.”

“You may be better off looking by yourself.”

“I think we’re both better off staying together.”

“You’re an optimist,” replied Kate. “Like me. And also like someone else I know, who has eyes just like yours.”

“The one you call Aunt Lemony?”

“Aunt Melanie,” corrected Kate. “But I think she’d like your way of saying it.” Her expression clouded again. “I hope I get to tell her someday.”

She turned back to the curling clouds of mist that faced them at the other side of the passageway. The time had come to leave the protection of the boulders, to seek out the Tinnanis, if indeed they existed. She glanced at the smaller boulder to her left that she knew to be Nyla, wishing she could hear again the Stonehag’s rumbling voice. But there was no time for that now. Kate started walking again, disregarding the renewed throbbing on the back of her left hand.

At the instant she passed beyond the boulders, she stopped suddenly in her tracks. She blinked her eyes, certain the fog was playing a trick with her vision. Yet she saw what she saw.

Not five paces in front of her, next to the boiling pool of clear liquid that she knew in later times would bear an evil spell, stood an upright figure. His skin, dark green in color, was covered with rows of reptilian scales that rippled as he breathed. Clad with only a brown leather loincloth, two metallic orange bands around each bicep, and another orange band around his forehead to hold his straight black hair in place, the figure stood no higher than Kate’s waist. In one hand he held a spear, taller than himself, blade up. His eyes, dull yellow in color, scrutinized her with deep suspicion.

Monga, just out of the channel, barked sharply. Laioni gasped and stood immobile by Kate’s side. Just then, the small green figure raised his spear and brought its base down forcefully on the rocks by his feet. The sound reverberated off the cliffs behind the boulders.

At once, Kate was knocked to the ground. Another green warrior, who had leaped onto her back from one of the boulders, tried to pull the walking stick out of her hand. She grappled with him, rolling on the pumice-strewn terrain, amazed to find that his tiny body possessed the strength of someone twice his size.

A new attacker jumped on her back and wrapped his arms around her neck, squeezing hard. She kicked the first attacker in the chest so hard that he released his hold on the stick and fell backward with a thud. But the grip of the second one tightened on her neck and she coughed, sputtering for air.

“Laioni,” she croaked desperately.

But Laioni had also been jumped, and was wrestling with one of the green beings at that very moment. Monga, snarling ferociously, bit him on the leg, making him squeal in pain and start beating the dog brutally with his fists. Monga would not let go, however, sinking his teeth deeper into the scaly flesh and shaking his head fiercely from side to side.

Kate fell over backward, landing on the rocks with such force that the warrior groaned and slipped to the side of her neck, loosening his grip just enough to allow her to pull him around her shoulder. With her bandaged hand, she punched him hard in the stomach several times until he finally released his hold. Before she could roll away, though, he kicked her under the chin and sent her sprawling backward.

The walking stick flew out of her grasp and clattered against the ground. Kate lunged for it, but the attacker who had kicked her got there first. He grabbed the stick and, before Kate could stop him, hurled it up to the warrior with the orange arm bands, who had climbed on top of the boulder directly behind the boiling pool—the boulder that only moments before, as Nyla, had warned her:
Beware . . . your enemies are near.

“The stick!” cried Kate, as she reached for a handhold and started climbing upward. Struggling to ascend, she did not see that the warrior was waiting for her.

Yellow eyes gleaming, he raised his spear above his head. Positioning himself at the extreme edge of the boulder, he prepared to thrust the blade deep into Kate’s back. He paused for the barest instant, spear held high, to savor his moment of triumph.

Just then, the boulder shifted underneath him. Merely a slight slip to the side, it was not a major movement like the jolt of an earthquake. Yet it was just enough to throw the warrior off balance. He struggled to stay on his feet, but tumbled headlong over the edge, whizzing over Kate’s head to land in the boiling pool below.

Hearing the splash and the blood-curdling scream, Kate pulled herself up to the top of the boulder. There, lying on the cracked gray surface, was the walking stick. She closed her hand around the shaft, just as she heard Laioni cry out below.

She leaped to the ground next to the three other attackers, two of whom were rolling on the rocks with Laioni. Another, splattered with black blood, was trying desperately to pry Monga from his leg. With a flying tackle, she landed on one of Laioni’s assailants, pulling him from her side. They rolled to the edge of the boiling pool.

Kate stood and faced the figure vengefully. She could hear the pool bubbling just behind her. His eyes met hers and narrowed to knifelike slits. Then, to her astonishment, he began swiftly to metamorphose. His legs fused together into a single powerful tail covered with green scales, tearing the loincloth to pieces. His arms suddenly shrunk inward and new, stubby legs sprouted from under his hips. Elongating to a point, his head stretched toward his nose, pushing his thin eyes to the sides of his face. The warrior had been transformed into a large green lizard.

Before Kate could move, the creature fell forward onto its belly and began to crawl toward her. She prepared to kick it back, but it swerved around her and crawled to one side. Whirling around, she saw for the first time that the boiling pool had turned green, the same frothing green that had nearly lured her to her death. Her left hand throbbed painfully, but the pool had no power over her. She watched in horror as the giant lizard, captivated by the spell, slithered over the rocks and into the cauldron.

She turned back to the others to see that the two remaining attackers also had changed to reptilian form. They began crawling toward the pool, including one who carried Monga clinging to a torn hind leg. Kate leaped at the dog, grabbed him by the belly, and tore him away from the slithering beast, who continued to crawl undeterred. Holding the dog in one arm, she suddenly saw that Laioni, her eyes wide and entranced, was walking in the direction of the pool.