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"Nor do I," Harjeedian replied with heartfelt sincerity. "I assure you, nor do I."
XXXV
SOME DAYS LATER, Truth padded up to Firekeeper where she stood on the hilltop upon which the majority of
the gates were built. The jaguar's charcoal-black tail with its strange flame-colored spots lashed with such agitation
that Firekeeper expected sparks to trail after. "Are you stronger, wolfling?" the jaguar asked with a trace of her former
arrogance.
"I can bend a bow again, and run from this cottage to the hilltop without losing my breath," Firekeeper said with
some pride. It had taken hard and painful labor to achieve these goals. "But I am not what I was." "And Blind Seer?"
"He is stronger as well, though less than pleased with having to wear a coat other than his own."
This last was an understatement. To the eye, Blind Seer was not much changed from what he had been before. If
he were a bit leaner, well, that only made him look all the more fierce. Appearances, however, lied.
In battling querinalo's fever - an ordeal of which the wolf still would not speak except to say that he had learned
things about himself no one should know - Blind Seer's body had sought to cool itself by shedding all of the thick
undercoat that normally insulated the wolf from extreme cold. Blind Seer, once able to sleep within a drift of snow,
now found himself unable to tolerate a passing breeze. He shivered uncontrollably, and grew quite short-tempered as a
result.
Derian suggested the solution, an artificial coat crafted from a thick wool blanket.
"We make these for foals born too early in the spring," he said, "and I can make one for you that won't restrict
your movements in the least."
Blind Seer growled, "I will look the fool - and worse, weak, here where there are many wolves who may wish to
challenge me."
Firekeeper faithfully translated, wondering how Derian would respond, for the young man was still sensitive about
his appearance. Derian surprised her.
Derian reached up and touched his horse's ears. "I think I know more than you ever will about looking a fool.
Didn't I once dress up as a carrot? Stop whining and come over here and let me fit you."
Blind Seer slunk over, shamed by his insensitivity to his friend's distress. Now he wore a skillfully cut coat in a
shade of grey not unlike his own fur. None of the yarimaimalom had challenged him, perhaps scenting the blue-eyed
wolf's buried fury, perhaps from gratitude for what Blind Seer had done for them, certainly from respect for his
prowess.
"I am glad that you both are stronger," Truth went on. "I fear we have overlooked something, and only hope that
we are not too late to deal with it."
Blind Seer had padded over to join them in time to ear the jaguar's words. Now he looked about uneasily, head
back as if he could catch some sense in Truth's words on the wind.
"As I have grown stronger," Truth continued, "I have resumed my prowling. It is interesting what these eyes see."
She deliberately blinked those white eyes with their blue slit pupils. Oddly, they did not at all give the impression
of blindness, but rather of seeing too much, so that Firekeeper shifted uneasily despite herself. Blind Seer as less
impressed.
"I smell your tension, cat, though you try to hide it. Speak. Or is this matter not as urgent as your glands believe?"
"It is urgent," the jaguar said, "but I am not certain we can deal with it until darkness has fallen and the humans
grow quiet."
"'Then it has to do with our prisoners?" Firekeeper prompted. "What have those white eyes seen?"
"Great activity where there should be little," Truth replied. "Two missing who should be more visible.
Anticipation and anger warring in the same breasts. I think that those we think are our captives have come up with
some plan to turn against us, to transform the hunters into the hunted."
Firekeeper frowned. "Two missing?"
"Ynamynet and Lachen - not missing as such. They are seen at the evening meal and occasionally elsewhere.
However, when I began my prowling, I realized I could not find them. I asked the yarimaimalom, and they assured me
the two Once Dead were about, but admitted upon being pressed that there were long chunks of the day that one or the
other of that pair were missing."
"And no one wondered about this?" Blind Seer growled. "No one felt concern that the Ones of this strange pack
vanish?"
"Not all creatures are wolves," Truth said stiffly, "to think in such a fashion. Most of the watchers were winged
folk, and although they flock, the flocks rarely have leaders as such."
Firekeeper evaded a budding argument by raising another question. "The humans have been watched continuously
since we have taken them. Their actions have been restricted to the counsel building alone. Only those few who must
go elsewhere to perform their duties have done so - and those under escort. How could they act against us?"
"Our error," Truth said obliquely, "was in forgetting that although these southwestern yarimaimalom are indeed
yarimaimalom, they know little of humans. Moreover, these humans speak languages we do not, so that they could talk
to each other. As long as they hid the emotional sense of what they said beneath bland faces our watchers could not
understand what was being said. Even so, when I questioned them, a few of the more nose-oriented watchers admitted
being troubled by a strange odor of triumph they scented from a few of the humans."
Firekeeper nodded. "Eshinarvash is too large to have been among the watchers, and the ravens spent their waking
hours watching over you. You are right. The yarimaimalom from the southwestern forests could easily be fooled. But
what could the humans do, confined as they are in one building? We inspected that building before it was turned into a
prison. I thought that we had removed everything that could be turned into a weapon."
"I do not know what they are doing," Truth said, "but the omens are clear. If we do not investigate this soon - and
without our investigation being known of - events will turn against us."
"I know little of divination," Blind Seer said, "but enough to draw some conclusions from what you have said.
This need for secrecy and speed would seem to indicate that whatever the humans have been preparing, it is nearly
done - close enough that were our purpose to be detected they might spring their trap early."
Truth's tail began lashing again. "I fear you are correct, wolf. My first impulse was to make my way inside and
inspect immediately, but the smoothly flowing river of the immediate future broke into foaming white water."
"Then for now the future flows smooth?" Firekeeper asked.
"Fairly," Truth said. "Few things move from now to then unquestioned."
They waited until nightfall, but not without making preparations. Their allies were briefed, and the yarimaimalom [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]