The Black Star (Book 3) (72 page)

Ten minutes later, an animal rustled the branches the opposite direction Cee had gone. Dante went still, ducking his head. Two norren walked through the trees, a man and a woman.

"Oh hell." Dante stood and forced his way through the brambles, screening his eyes against the thorns. He emerged to the sight of two drawn bows. He sighed. The two norren lowered their weapons, looking sheepish. "How long have you been following us, Fenn?"

The woman shouldered her bow. "A couple of days."

"Where are the others?"

She was silent a moment. "Following behind us."

"So you wouldn't ever see us," the male added, confirming what Fenn had implied; Dante had met him before, but couldn't recall his name offhand.

Dante cupped his hands to his mouth. "Hey, Cee! They fell for it!" He turned to Fenn. "Well, come on and let's go see Mourn."

Cee rode back grinning in triumph. She shook the leaves from Dante's clothes and handed them over. He walked his horse behind the two Nine Pines scouts. Mourn and the others were encamped in tents in the woods a couple miles away, on ground Dante and Cee had covered earlier that day.

As soon as they arrived, Mourn walked out to meet them, massive shoulders rolling. "Oh. There you are."

"Why do I feel like you already know why I'm here?" Dante said.

"Because you're reasonably intelligent." Mourn shook his head. "This sounds like madness."

Dante's face fell. "You won't help us."

The norren lifted his eyes. "I didn't say anything about whether I or the Nine Pines would help. All I said was this sounded like madness. As mad as trying to swallow your own bones."

"But your bones are already inside you."

"Exactly."

"If you didn't say you won't help us, does that mean you will?"

"I still haven't said anything about that, have I?" Mourn's shoulders slumped. "Of course I'll say yes."

"What? Then why hide from me?"

"So I wouldn't have to say yes."

Dante bent with laughter. "I don't know if I've ever heard you more miserable in all my life."

"Me neither. As long as you're here spoiling my day, you may as well take some of my stew, too."

He led Dante and Cee to a blanket on the grass. Someone had started a fire beside it and a handful of norren were poking at the kindling and setting up racks and pots above it. The air filled with the smell of roasting potatoes and melting fat. While they waited for it to cook through, Dante related the full story; Mourn had the broad strokes, presumably from Hopp or one of the others Nak had spoken to, but was missing many of the fine touches.

"Blays is back?" Mourn said. "Somehow, that's more surprising than anything else."

Dante eyed the simmering stew. He hadn't had a hot meal in days. "He feels guilty about handing Cellen over to the Minister. But getting it back will likely mean violence, and then he'll feel guilty about
that
, and run off again."

"A person who feels guilty about hurting others? He sickens me."

"It isn't the guilt that's the problem. We all feel it. But he lets it rule him. Even when we had no other choice. When our actions made the world a better place."

Someone handed Mourn a bowl of stew. He held on to it, ignoring the steam curling from its thick surface. "And you can set it down like I can set down this bowl?"

"In time? Of course."

Mourn honked with laughter. "You don't know how lucky you are."

Dante had nothing to say to this. "You still haven't told me what you think of the plan."

"I think that if I die, I'll be able to quit pretending I know how to lead this clan."

"Is it really that bad?"

"Don't tell me you like being in charge of Narashtovik. Because, now that I think about it, I know you do. So telling me that would be redundant." Mourn gazed across his people as they ate and worked and talked. "The only thing that I have learned as a leader is that I'm not fit to lead. And neither is anyone else."

Someone delivered Dante a bowl of stew and conversation ceased for a while. After he finished, he sat back, comfortably stuffed, lips slick with grease.

Without warning, Mourn stood. He stared into the twilight and raised his voice to his clan. "I'm about to ask you if you want to do something very foolish. Foolish in the sense it will be dangerous to your physical well-being. Some of those who go with us may not make it back. Because we won't be able to carry the bodies back with us."

He paused. Possibly it was a dramatic choice, letting his people conjure up wild scenarios in their heads, but Dante thought he was doing just what he appeared to be doing: fighting to find the best way to express what he felt inside.

"But perhaps it would be foolish
not
to go. Because our goal is to avert a war against Narashtovik. They are being attacked because of a crime committed so long ago that no one in these lands remembers that it happened. They have no choice in the matter. But we do, and here is our question: do you value Narashtovik's existence enough to risk your own?"

Pale things moved in the firelight: hands being raised. Not all of them, not even a third, but it was as many as Dante could have hoped for. Yet as he sat beside Mourn, watching as people with no ties of blood or power to Narashtovik pledged to fight for it, sadness coiled in his chest.

Because Mourn was right. Some of these people would die. And Dante was the one who had brought that death to them.

36

A thick cloud of powdered stone gushed from the wall. Blays turned and pulled his cloak over his face. The dust whispered over him, layering the damp grass. Minn stood undaunted, face caked with it; she flipped back her cloak, knocking it off with a flourish.

"You will listen to me, Ro! Cellen has returned—and it has been taken."

Ro remained standing at the edge of the cliffs. She was an intimidating leader and knew the best time for an exit is after a dramatic moment like pulverizing a staircase. The fact she was listening made Blays think Minn might have a chance.

"So what?" Ro said.

"The man who took it is from Weslee. He still blames Narashtovik for the devastation of his homeland. He's going to use Cellen to destroy them."

"I say again: So what?"

"It's a crime they had no true part in! If anyone deserves to be punished,
we
do. It's our responsibility to save them. Hiding here is wrong."

"We washed our hands of Narashtovik and all it represents an age ago," Ro said. "It was their decision to stay."

Minn lowered her eyes and glared at the dark cliffs; Blays could see her willing herself to calm down. "Ro, you don't even know what you're refusing. We could save thousands of lives at no risk to ourselves. If you'll let me up to talk to you for five minutes—"

Blays touched her arm. "She's gone."

Minn lifted her gaze back to the cliffs. The three women were nowhere to be seen. "
Ro!
"

The wind answered, shuffling through the grass. Blays folded his arms. "Should we go, then?"

Minn turned on him. "Should we
go
? Your whole city is depending on us."

"That's true. Which is unfortunate for them, given that we can't force Ro and all your friends to march eight hundred miles across the continent and then burrow their way through another hundred miles of mountains."

"All we have to do is get inside Pocket Cove. If I can make Ro hold a real conversation with me, I know she'll see reason."

"'Reasonable' isn't the word I'd use for Ro. More like 'intractable.'"

"I don't believe you'd come up with a plan this good, spend the next six days dashing across the country to see it through, then turn around at the first hint of resistance."

"Hint?" Blays laughed. "You call destroying our only path into your home a 'hint'? If you tried to rebuild the stairs at this point, what do you think they'd do?"

"The same thing they would have done to you if you hadn't gone away: bury us in a rockslide."

"Is that a subtle way of reminding me how much I owe you?" Blays put his hands on his hips and shot a nasty look at the beetle trundling over the tip of his boot. "Well, if we can't get in by going over, we'll have to go around."

"By boat?"

"Why not? I mean, besides the fact we don't have one."

"It wouldn't have to be much," Minn said slowly, working this through. "At the north end of the bay, the sea flows from the north between Fo-o Island and the mainland. From there, it sweeps around the curve of the cove. All we'd have to do is build a raft. The tides will take care of the rest."

It was growing dark, but Blays didn't waste a minute. They untied the horses and followed the cliffs north, slowing as the light faded. The rock wall curled west to meet the sea.

"You're sure we can't just build some stairs right here?" Blays jerked his chin at the walls to their left. "We must be fifteen miles away from our last encounter. Surely they're not watching every foot of their turf."

"No, but they're in tune with it. They have to be. If Gask ever tried another invasion, we have to be able to sense it before the king's army would be able to scale the cliffs."

Blays found it hard to believe they could keep tabs on so much space, but he kept his trap shut. They'd built this place, after all. Maybe that gave them a special connection to it. Anyway, he and Minn had another plan.

They set up camp beside the northern cliffs. Surf rolled through the darkness, but the noise was thin, and Blays knew sound traveled far on the seaside air. When morning came around, he saw that he was right—they couldn't even see the ocean—but after a quick ride, they were upon it by early morning. To their left, which was now the south, the cliffs extended into the water and stopped cold. An island hung a few miles off the coast. All they had to do was put together a vessel, then hop into the channel.

And do a hell of a lot of praying, because there were no villages in sight and Blays hadn't exactly come laden with his shipwright's tools. He had an axe, but it was a hatchet for whacking twine and twigs. It would barely be able to dent the rugged trees along the shore.

He did, however, have a length of thin rope, the sort of thing you carried whenever you rode out into the wilds. And a whole bunch of blankets and canvas. While Minn cut these into strips, Blays lugged driftwood from the beach and gathered fallen logs from the patchy forest. It didn't have to be pretty. It didn't even have to last all that long; frankly, they could probably make it by clinging to a loose pile of branches.

He didn't love the idea of dangling in the water across five-plus miles, however. Not only because of the horrible cold, but also the infinitely more horrible sharks. Now that the ocean had had all winter to cool down, maybe it was too frigid for sharks, but chilly waters hadn't stopped the one at Ko-o from spoiling their day.

They spent the early morning lashing together a platform of mismatched logs. It wasn't the sort of thing they'd be able to sell, but it looked like it would do the trick. They dragged it down to the sand.

"Are there any wolves or other large predators around here?" Blays asked. "I mean, besides Ro?"

"Not this close to the sea. Why?"

"Just curious."

Leaving the horses tied up seemed cruel—probably because it was—but it was either that or bid them farewell. That, in turn, would mean running on their own legs to Gallador and picking up horses from Lolligan. The return trip would take twice as long.

He made a silent vow to come back for them. If anything happened in the meantime, they'd have to be another sacrifice to the greater good. Blays shelved the thought and pushed the raft into the surf. The water was testicle-withdrawingly cold, but the waves weren't too bad. After a couple exhausting minutes, they were out in the strait.

Just as Minn predicted, the current swept them along the curl of the cove, drawing them along at a couple hundred yards from shore. Blays had found flat pieces of driftwood to use as oars, but they proved useless against the waves and tides. They continued in the desired direction, however, the raft twirling slowly, just large enough to keep its surface above water except during the roughest waves. They had to kneel to avoid losing their footing, and the shins and knees of their pants grew sodden.

His loon pulsed. Blays winced. He'd forgotten to check in with Nak last night. He could ignore it, but that would only raise more questions later. He got Minn's attention and pointed to his ear, then said, "What's up?"

"Nothing special," Nak said. "Just checking to make sure you hadn't fallen off the end of the earth. Run into anything unusual?"

Blays curled his arms over his head to try to block out the sound of the waves slopping over the raft. "Nope. Still dead quiet on this front."

"Oh? You sound preoccupied."

"We're riding, that's all. Very fast. Should probably pay attention to that, in fact. How about I tell you about it later?"

He closed down the loon. The smell of salt was dense in the air. A few gulls floated on the winds, cawing forlornly. The raft came around the top curve of the C-shaped bay and swept down the long north-south beach. Blays thought he could see a canoe far to the south, checking the traps or the nets. A couple people might have been standing on the sand across from the canoe, but they were too far away to be certain.

Not for long, though. Traversing the bay in this fashion reminded him how achingly small it had felt during his brief time there. From one tip of the C to the other, the bay was about twelve miles across, fifteen tops. He still didn't understand how the People could stand to spend their whole lives in such a limited space.

Seeing it all at once, though, even from the less-than-sweeping perspective of a waterlogged raft less than a quarter mile from shore, it made a little more sense. You could spend years exploring its beaches, its tides, its flourishing pools. Not to mention the Fingers. The mist alone would make each visit feel like coming to a different place. It was its own little world. Its people were, too. He'd hardly scratched their surface. Perhaps they were happier to be able to know their corner of things inside and out.