Black Jade Read online

  As we made camp at day's end, I sensed that none of my friends felt the pull of this place - at least not yet. They set to work drawing water and building our rudimentary fortifications out of wet logs with good cheer. This diminished somewhat when Maram yet again failed to make a fire. But the rain finally stopped, and the patch of blue that broke from the clouds just before dusk promised better weather for travel the next morning, and we all hoped, drier wood.

  For all the next day, we journeyed as straight a course west as I could guide us. We encountered no people - only some rabbits, deer and chittering birds - and that was to our purpose. A few low hills rose up to block our way, and we had no trouble skirting them. The sun, pouring down through the numerous breaks in the trees, warmed us. It dried out the woods, as well. That night Maram finally succeeded in striking up a fire: a good, hot, crackling one. But when Liljana unpacked the leg of lamb to roast it she wrinkled up her face as she sniffed at it and said, 'Whew - it's gone bad!'

  Kane came over to test it with his nose, and said, 'It's a little off, it's true. But I've eaten worse. Why don't you roast it, anyway?'

  'And poison the children?' she asked him as she rested her arm across Estrella's shoulder. 'Will you care for them if they fall ill?'

  She told him that he could roast the lamb if he wished, and eat it himself as well. But as none of the rest of us was eager to put tooth or tongue to this tainted flesh, Kane picked up the lamb's leg and flung it far out into the woods. He said, 'I'll not feast in front of the rest of you. Let the foxes or racoons have a good meal. They, at least, aren't particular.'

  Liljana, undeterred, set to preparing us what she called a good meal' anyway: fried eggs and rashers of bacon, wheat cakes spread with apple butter and some freshly picked newberries for desert. We went to bed warm that night and with full bellies. Even the howling of wolves from somewhere deeper in the woods did not disturb our sleep.

  Just after daybreak we set out again toward the west Atara, bow in hand, determined to take one of the woods' wild sheep for our dinner, or perhaps a deer. But all that morning, strangely, we saw no game larger than a skunk. The wind through the trees reminded me of the faroff whispering that I had first sensed upon entering Acadu. It carried as well a faint reck of rotting flesh. Altaru smelled this stench before I did; the twitching of his great, black nostrils and a nervous nicker from within his throat alerted me to it. We walked on two more miles beneath the maple and hack-berry trees, and it grew stronger, nearly choking us. And then, a hundred yards farther along, we came out into a grassy clearing littered with the carcasses of sheep. They lay in twisted heaps. There were thirty-three of them, as I quickly counted. All had been killed with black arrows fired through their bloodstained white wool.

  'Oh, Lord!' Maram called out in a muffled voice. He held his scarf over his mouth and nose. 'The poor little lambs! Who would slaughter so many and leave them here to rot?'

  It was a question that almost needed no answer. The black arrows, as Kane quickly determined, were Sakai-made and stamped with the mark of the Red Dragon.

  'Hmmph,' Atara said, walking around the edge of the massacred herd. 'Morjin's men must have arrows in abundance, to waste so many leaving them this way.'

  'It's not waste at all,' I said, suddenly understanding the purpose behind this dreadful deed. 'At least, not waste as Morjin's men would count it. Surely they left the arrows as an advertisement.'

  'A warning, you mean,' Maram said. 'And it's all the warning I need to flee this district.'

  Kane, sniffing at one of the sheep and testing the rigidity of its limbs, said to him, 'These beasts are three days dead. Whoever did this is likely long gone.'

  'So you say,' Maram grumbled.

  'What is strange,' Master Juwain said, 'is that none of the scavengers have gone to work here.'

  No, no, I thought. I reeled before the fire that sucked in through my nose and burned through my blood. It is not strange at all.

  Liljana, as well as Kane, dared to uncover her face in order to take in the stench of the rotting sheep. And she said, 'I think these arrows were poisoned with kirax. It taints the flesh so that when it turns, it gives off an odor like burning hair. If I can smell it, so can the badgers and bears.'

  On the lips of many of the sheep, I saw, black blood drew swarms of buzzing flies. I guessed that the sheep had gnashed their jaws together in a maddened frenzy that severed tongues and broke teeth, so great was the agony of the kirax.

  'Lets leave here,' I said, 'as quickly as we can.'

  'Very well,' Master Juwain said to me. 'But we'll have a difficult choice to make, and soon. How far into Acadu do you think we've

  come?'

  'Forty miles,' I said. 'Perhaps forty-five. If your map is right, we should find the Tir River in another five miles or so.'

  'And how do you propose we cross it?'

  'Come,' I said to him. and to the others as I remounted my horse. 'Let's go on to this river, and then well see about crossing it.'

  As we rode through a patch of oaks, the soft wind in our faces drove away the stench of the murdered sheep. Despite Kane's assurances to Maram, Kane scanned the woods about us with his sharp black eyes, looking for the sheep's killers, and I did, too. After about four miles, the air grew more humid, and we heard the rushing of water through the trees. We pushed through some dense undergrowth to find the Tir River raging through the forest in full flood.

  'Abrasax said that the snows had been deep this past winter,' Master Juwain sighed out. 'We must be at the peak of the spring melt.'

  I gazed at this torrent of churning brown water, which sloshed and spilled over the Tir's muddy banks. The river would sweep even the horses away if we tried crossing here.

  And so we set out along the band of denser vegetation close to the river. Every quarter mile or so, we would force our way back through the bracken and trees to look for a place where we might ford the river. But the Tir, it seemed, swelled swift and deep all along its course. And so instead we set our hopes on finding a ferry.

  At last, after a few more miles, we came upon a clearing planted with new barley. A farmhouse, built of stout logs, sat near the center of it. In the yard outside the house, a few chickens squawked and pecked at pellets of grain. I saw no barn to shelter cows or draft horses; the sty by the side of the house was empty of pigs. I thought it strange to see no one about doing chores or working in the fields on such a fine spring day.

  'Perhaps they've fled this district as I've proposed we do,' Maram grumbled. We stood by our horses at the edge of the clearing, looking at the house. 'Perhaps we should go inside and see if they've left behind any stores that we might ah, appropriate.'

  'Don't you think,' Atara said to him coldly, 'that we might at least knock at the door before plundering these poor people?'

  It seemed the wisest course. But then Kane cast his piercing gaze across the clearing, and pointed at the house. He said to me, 'Do you see those crosses cut into the walls and the door?'

  I strained my eyes to peer at these darkenings of the house's wood that looked like black, painted crosses. I knew suddenly, however, that they must be arrow ports. When I remarked upon this, Kane smiled grimly.

  'So, it would be wisest if only one of us knocks at the door,' he said. Then he looked at Maram and smiled again.

  And Maram looked right back at him as if he had fallen mad. 'You can't think I'm just going to walk up to that house under the aim of arrows, can you?'

  'It was your idea to enter it,' Kane reminded him.

  'Ah, well, perhaps we should ride on, then.'

  'At least,' Kane said to him, 'call out to whomever might be holing up inside the house. Of all of us, you have the loudest voice, eh?'

  And so Maram cupped his hands around his mouth and bellowed out a greeting that fairly shook the trees above us. Through the silence that befell upon this blast of Maram's breath, a woman's voice, shrill and faint behind the dark cross of one of the arrow ports, called back to us: 'Go a
way! We don't talk to strangers here!'

  'But we're only poor pilgrims!' Maram shouted back to her. 'And we would only ask a little of your hospitality!'

  'Go away!' this unseen woman shouted again. 'The Crucifiers have already taken everything, and we've no hospitality to give!'

  'But at least tell us if we might find a ferry nearby to take us across the river!'

  'Go away! Go away! Would you kill me, too? Please, go away!'

  The anguish in the woman's voice told of great loss, perhaps of a husband killed trying to protect this little homestead or a daughter carried off. I placed my hand on Maram's shoulder and said to him, 'For mercy's sake, let's do as she says and not torment her!'

  Maram nodded his head at this as a watery sadness crept into his eyes. I heard him mutter, 'Oh, these poor people - too bad, too bad!'

  We turned to skirt the house and its fields, into the forest along the river. From the darkness through the trees, crows cried out their raucous caws that seemed a warning. Soon we came to another farm where a ragged man stood hoeing his field; when he saw us approach, he dropped his hoe and ran inside his house. He, too, shouted out that we should go away, and told us to return to whatever land we called home. We came upon two more farms whose houses and fields had been burnt to the ground, and then another where the bodies of a young girl and boy lay on top of splinters by a woodpile. Their homespun tunics were bloodstained and torn. An axe, encrusted with black blood, had been dropped on top of a tree stump nearby. Their father, or so I guessed he was, remained close to them: for planted into the loamy, black earth in front of the house was a roughhewn cross onto which a man had been nailed. I thought this man had been young, like myself, but it was hard to tell, as both the cross and the body attached to it had been burnt to a black char. It was a hideous thing to see, and I pulled Estrella closer to me to cover her face with my hand; I held her slender body next to mine as shudders of sorrow tore through her and she wept without restraint.

  'Oh, Lord!' Maram called out, nearly weeping, too. 'Oh, Lord, oh Lord!'

  But Daj, who couldn't have been more than eleven years old, stood dry-eyed staring at this terrible sight as if he wanted to burn the memory of it into his brain.

  Then Liljana covered his face, too, for she would not suffer him to look upon such sights: he who had already seen too many terrible things in Argattha. And she said, 'I would like to know how many Red Priests Morjin has sent into this accursed forest.'

  'So, not many,' Kane growled out. 'Surely the Crucifier could not afford to send very many to subdue such an out-of-the-way land.'

  'His men might be few in numbers,' Master Juwain said, gesturing at the trees around us, 'but they have no lack of wood with which to work their abominations. The terror they've unleashed, I think, is something that takes no count of numbers.'

  I nodded my head at this as I swallowed against the knot of pain choking up my throat. I forced out, 'Let us bury them, then.'

  Of all my companions, only Kane thought to gainsay me. But then his eyes met mine as he looked deep inside me. He finally said, 'All right, then, but let's be quick about it.'

  The rich bottomland here was soft from the spring rains. We had no trouble digging in it, though it took us longer than Kane would have liked to excavate three rather deep graves. When we had laid the three murdered Acadians beneath three neat mounds, I said a requiem for the dead, praying their souls up to the stars. And then it was time to go.

  But Kane, standing guard with his bow in hand, motioned me closer to him. He murmured, 'Look off past that elm to the south of the fields. There's a man standing in the woods there who has been watching us.'

  Through the trees perhaps a hundred yards away, I saw the cloaked figure of a man. He stood facing us and appeared to bear no weapon more fearsome than a staff; neither did he move to arm himself or flee when it became obvious that we had espied him.

  'Surely he can't mean us any harm,' Maram panted out as he hurried up with his bow. 'Else he would have attacked us while we were engaged digging the graves.'

  The mystery of this man's identity was soon to be solved, for he began walking straight toward us. He seemed utterly unconcerned to stride right into the bow-range of three strange archers. He pushed through the charred shoots of barley, using a long, unstrung bow as a sort of staff. He was an old man, I saw, with straggles of gray-white hair hanging down from his square, blocklike head. His unkempt beard was colored likewise and spread out across a florid face that looked as strong and weathered as a piece of granite. Though not tall, he was thick in the arms and chest. His old eyes were grayish-green and care-worn, like the homespun cloak that covered his sturdy body.

  'Thank the stars!' Maram said to me as the man approached us. 'His eyes are as human as yours, and so he can't be one of the Grays!'

  And then the man stepped closer and held out his open hand to us as he called out in a rough voice, 'My name is Tarmond. And whom do I have the pleasure of making acquaintance?'

  'My name is Mirustral,' I said, giving him the Ardik form of my name, which meant 'Morning Star'. I nodded at Kane, and then told the man one of Kane's many names, saying, 'And this is Rowan Madas.'

  In turn, I presented each of my other companions, telling Tarmond the names that we had settled upon for our journey. This slight deception pained me, but there was no help for it. We could not simply march right into the heart of the Dragon Kingdoms giving out our true names to all whom we encountered.

  'From what lands do you hail?' Tarmond asked as he gazed «t Atara's long blonde hair. Then he looked from Estrella to Maram, and then back at me as if trying to solve a puzzle. 'Few strangers other than the Crucifiers journey through our forest these days, and none in such a strange Company as yours.'

  'And yet you were willing to walk straight up to us "strangers" under the aim of our arrows. Is that not a strange thing?'

  Tarmond looked Kane up and down as if he didn't like very much of what he saw.

  And then Tarmond thumped his hand across his chest and told him: 'I do not fear your arrows. To a man such as I, whose sons the Red Priests have murdered, whose daughters have been taken as concubines, an arrow through the heart would be a blessing.'

  So great was the sorrow that poured out of him that I had to harden my own heart against it lest I begin howling out in anguish.

  'We have heard,' I said to him, 'that the Red Dragon has sent priests into your land.'

  'They are everywhere,' Tarmond told us. 'And yet they are nowhere, as well, for they go about in secret or in disguise, and turn even good Acadians to their cause. Some say the Red Dragon himself has given his priests cloaks that render them invisible.'

  And with these words, he looked at the burnt cross rising up above us as if one of these secret priests might be standing wraithlike beside it.

  Liljana stepped up to Tarmond and grasped his hand. She said, 'Do you not fear that one of us might be a priest in disguise?'

  A slow, grim smile broke upon Tarmond's lips. 'The Red Priests do not bury those they murder or crucify. And they do not weep for the dead.'

  Here he looked at Estrella and then at me.

  'You might be priests, or their acolytes,' he said, 'but that would be a deception greater than any I have seen.'

  'Then you have not seen all of the Lord of Lies' deceptions,' Kane growled out as he continued to eye Tarmond suspiciously.

  A shadow of doubt darkened Tarmond's face as he looked at Kane. 'You seem to know more of the Crucifier than is good for a man.'

  'So, perhaps I do. As you say, his priests are everywhere, and they have no sympathy for a company of pilgrims such as us.'

  Tarmond gazed at the scarred and nicked crossguard of Kane's sheathed sword. He said, 'Pilgrims, then, who are well-armed.'

  Liljana, who was better at dissembling than I was, said to Tarmond, 'I am of Tria, and so is Master Javas. The boy and girl are my nephew and niece. Rowan and Mirustral are knights who guard us, as is Basir. Mathena is one of the
warrior women of Thalu - you may have heard of them. We seek the Well of Restoration, said to lie in the Red Desert. It is also said to bestow wisdom along with healing.'

  She went on to tell of Master 'Javas' and his quest for knowledge, and of Estrella's desire to be healed of her mutenes; Atara's blindness, of course, was evident, though it obviously puzzled Tarmond that she should be able to move about so freely and bear a bow aa if she could actually aim arrows at any target. I thought that the story that we had concocted to explain our company was a poor one. Although it contained elements of the truth - for surely the Maitreya could gather a healing radiance within the well of the Lightstone - I knew that people could always sense a lie.

  'I've never heard of this Well of Restoration,' Tarmond said. 'But if you're bound for the Red Desert, then you've a long journey ahead of you, and a hard one.'

  'It would be less hard,' Liljana said to him, 'if we could find a way across the river. Surely there must be a ferry nearby.'

  'Indeed there is,' Tarmond said, motioning with his thumb over his shoulder. 'Four leagues back down the river. But the ferryman, Redmond, is friends with the Crucifiers, and you can expect no confidentiality from him, if it's confidentiality you seek.'

  And with that, his eyes fell upon the hilt of my sword. To cover its bright diamond pommel and the seven diamonds set into its black jade, I had fashioned a crude jacket of buckskin, as of a good leather grip.

  'I do, however,' Tarmond said to me, 'know a fisherman who used to run a ferry. He might be willing to take you across the river. His name is Gorson, and he is of my village.'

  He told us that his village lay only another league and a half farther on upriver. He was returning home to it, he said, after a journey some twenty leagues to the south.