CHAPTER SIXTEEN

As soon as Kheda stepped up onto the far bank, he had his sword and hacking blade ready.

What horrors are lurking on this side of the river?

'Where are we going?' Risala scrambled up to stand close beside him.

Kheda saw that all the savages were looking at Naldeth, who was negotiating the awkward climb up the crumbling bank. 'It looks as if we're all waiting on your convenience, Master Mage.'

'All right,' the wizard said uncertainly.

'Just start walking,' Kheda said curtly. 'Let's hope they show you where to go.'

To his relief, he was proved right. As Naldeth took a few hesitant steps, three eager savages who weren't burdened with fish or fowl flesh hurried ahead, half-turning to draw the wizard onward with beckoning hands and anxiously ingratiating smiles.

Kheda saw they were following the path he had cut through the vicious grasses the night before.

Was it only last night? It seems like an age ago.

He glanced at Risala and saw her face tight with tension. 'I think it'll be all right,' he said softly.

'Do you?' She stared at him. 'I'd feel better if we'd seen some sign that suggested as much.'

'I think we can trust the way these people are behaving towards us,' Kheda retorted.

I'll trust that and my own instincts before I rely on

some omen of the sky or earthly compass. Can't you accept that?

Risala didn't answer. As Kheda walked on, he concentrated on scouring the clumps of grass for any sign of danger. Clouds of tiny black flies were drawn to the fish and bird meat but nothing bigger had shown itself by the time they reached the steep barren slope leading up to the plateau where the bulbous barrel-like trees stood.

The fissures Naldeth and Velindre had opened up in the ground still gaped, the sandy earth deep within still dark where the dew's dampness lurked beyond the increasing strength of the sun. Several of the trees leaned drunkenly askew, their roots flailing impotently in the empty air. One had toppled over completely, an ugly gash in the sustaining earth cutting its feet from under it. Those mighty trees that had burned had been reduced to ragged black shells, the soil all around them grey and lifeless.

Naldeth clicked his tongue in exasperation and waved a hand at the ruined expanse. Sand began flowing like water to fill up the crevices. The wild men picking their way cautiously across the broken ground halted, their murmurs half-appreciative, half-apprehensive. Naldeth turned his attention to the fallen tree. Its exposed roots writhed and the stunted branches thrashed as it strove to stand upright again. Those savages closest to it sprang away with cries of alarm. The rest halted, some kneeling and others cringing as they all turned to the mage.

'Leave it.' Velindre gave Naldeth a discreet shove in the small of his back. 'Save your strength.'

Naldeth sighed and let the tree crash back to the ground. The savages hurried onwards with visible relief. Once they had left the barren expanse of the mighty barrel trees, they found themselves toiling up an apparently endless shallow slope dotted with thistly plants and the

strange scaly fingers of thorny green spikes. The sun was beating down strongly now and Kheda was sweating.

Where are we going to find water in this desert, so far from the river?

As he slowed to mop his brow, savages hurried past him. The foremost began shouting and Kheda saw movement ahead. A gap opened up in the indistinct green as men and women appeared, using sticks and spears to drag aside a woven barrier of thorns and spines.

Kheda took a moment to look around. Behind the tangle of vegetation, the land rose bare and brown, the earth washed away to leave scars of broken rock. Looking inland, he saw that this whole expanse of higher land fell away sharply into deep gullies choked with twisted nut trees and tangled thistly plants. On the seaward side, as best he could judge, the spiny forest sprawled all the way to the cliffs.

So these people at least have the wits to claim land with natural defences on two sides and reasonably open scrub on the other two.

'What do I do now?' Naldeth hovered at Kheda's elbow.

'You look calm and in control.' He pushed the younger man forward. 'And we'll be following you, looking equally confident. Just remember how hounds can rip the throat out of a foe who cowers too low.'

Risala was stony-faced. Velindre still looked drained, though her eyes were brightening with anticipation and a hint of discreet menace. Kheda looked to the old woman, who was still dogging his footsteps, in case her expression might give him some clue as to what to expect. Unfortunately her expression was as impenetrable as Risala's.

Naldeth walked slowly through the rough opening in the spiky barricade. Yellow-green sprawls of the fleshy spiny plants grew along the inside. The wild men separated to

pick their way through this low maze. Those who had appeared to greet them waited, spears ready.

As Risala and Velindre fell into step behind him, Kheda used his hacking blade to knock away the more threatening of the fat spiny leaves. A murmur of awe made him look up. Those who had not seen his steel before were gaping at it. Kheda paused and swung at one of the taller paddle-shaped leaves. It fell to the ground with a soggy thud, cleanly sliced in two. He looked around, his face impassive as he held the gaze of any who caught his eye.

Do you understand this? That if you attack me, you '11 be cut down?

As the wild men and women within the barrier stood still, suitably cowed, a small child naked but for a string of crude beads knotted around his hips ran forward. Squatting down, he thrust a stick deep into the pulpy interior of the severed leaf and lifted it up, wary of the spines. Licking at the juice trickling down to paint dark shining lines on his dusty forearms, he hurried away with his prize.

Naldeth chuckled. 'I don't think he's in awe of you, my lord of Chazen.'

'I don't suppose that matters.' Kheda was satisfied that all the adults' attention was still fixed on his blade as they walked on, leaving the thorny barrier and the sprawling plants behind.

'Do you suppose this is what they call home?' Velindre wondered wryly.

There was something approximating a village in the midst of the area encircled by the tangled barricade. Low huts spread in an irregular fashion around a trampled expanse of bare earth with a fire pit dug in the centre. The walls of the crude dwellings seemed to have been made from lattices of the nut trees' gnarled branches. As best Kheda could tell, a layer of the razor-edged grass had then

been threaded in among the twigs before a haphazard coating of muddy clods was slapped on top. Some had roofs made in the same fashion; others were merely enclosures with an awning of animal hide stretched over one corner.

'Do you suppose that's where the mage lived?' Naldeth looked askance at the largest building in the makeshift village. Where the other huts were irregular in height and shape, this was a precise circle. The wall was made from stakes cut from the twisted trees and planted with care to minimise the inevitable gaps between each one. The roof was considerably more substantial, thickly thatched with grasses and resting on sturdy timbers that must have been hewn from taller, straighter trees akin to the ones in the dry valley back on the other side of the river.

'They didn't run away.' Risala pointed at the two women lurking in the substantial hut's open doorway. 'What do you suppose they are going to do?'

Kheda could see no clue in their expressions beneath their coronets of plumes, gold and scarlet and orange. Closer to, he saw that their hair was caked solid with some shining red substance, vivid among the ebony heads of the rest of the savages.