Tanaros shook his head. "There is no game here."
Ushahin, still clutching the case containing the Helm of Shadows to his belly, shrugged his crooked shoulders. "As you say. Were the choice mine, I would waste no time in killing her."
"The choice is his Lordship's." Tanaros' voice hardened. "Would you strip all honor from him?"
"In favor of survival?" Ushahin looked bleak. "Aye, I would."
Tanaros reached over to touch his crippled hand where it rested on the case. "Forgive me, cousin," he said. "The Grey Dam of the Were is due all honor. She spent her life as she chose and died with her eye-teeth seeking her enemy's throat."
"Aye." Ushahin drew a deep breath. "I know it." In the torchlit tunnel, his mismatched eyes glittered. "Do you know, cousin, my dam afforded you a gift? Even as she died. You will know it ere the end."
"As you say, cousin." Tanaros withdrew his hand, frowning in perplexity. Perhaps, after all, the Dreamspinner's grief had worsened his madness. "Her life was gift enough."
Ushahin bared his teeth in a grimace. "It was for me."
THE SIX CLANS OF THE Yarru-yami, the Charred Ones, Children of Haomane's Wrath, debated the matter for two days. In the cool hours of the early morning and the blue hours of dusk they debated, each member given his or her allotted length of time to speak in the center of the Stone Grove, atop the rocks that marked the Well of the World.
The debate hinged on a single Yarru, the one who must choose.
He was young, the Bearer, still a youth. Of average height for one of his folk, his head scarce reached the Counselor's shoulder, with coarse black hair falling to his shoulders and liquid-dark eyes in an open, trusting face, struggling manfully to listen and weigh all that was said. He was quick and agile, as the Yarru were, with bare feet calloused by the desert floor, and brown-black skin. It was the mark of his people, the Charred Ones, unwitting victims of Haomane's wrath—save his palms, that were pinkish tan, creased with deep-etched lines.
And when he pressed them together and made a cup of his hands, those lines met at the precise base of the hollow to form a radiant star, for such was the sign of the Bearer.
He was seventeen years old and his name was Dani.
"Can he hoist the bucket?" Blaise Caveros had asked bluntly.
"Yes, Guardian." The old man Ngurra had shifted a wad of gamal into the pocket of his cheek, regarding the Altorian. "He is the Bearer. It is what he was born to do, to carry the water of Birru-Uru-Alat, that weighs as heavy as life. But whether or not he does is his choosing."
And so there was debate.
It began with Malthus the Counselor. "Dani of the Yarru," he said, leaning upon his staff. "You have seen the red star, the signal of war. In the west, the Sunderer's army grows, legion upon legion of Fjeltroll streaming to join him. Soon he will move against us like a mighty tide, for it is his will to lay claim to the whole of Urulat and challenge his brother, Haomane First-Born, Lord-of-Thought, the Will of Uru-Alat." The Counselor scowled, his bushy eyebrows fierce. "We can fight, and die, we who are loyal to Haomane and the light of the Souma, who would see Urulat made whole. We will fight, and die. But in the end, only one thing can halt Satoris Banewreaker."
With his staff he pointed to the rock-pile in the center of the Stone Grove. "Therein," he said, "lies the Water of Life. It alone can quench the marrow-fire that wards the dagger Godslayer. And you alone can draw it, Dani of the Yarru. You alone can carry it. You are the vessel, a part of the Prophecy of Haomane, the Unknown made Known." The Counselor opened his arms. The Soumanie gleamed red upon his breast, nestled amid his beard. "It is a grave matter," he said. "To bear the Water of Life into the Vale of Gorgantum, inside the walls of Dark-haven itself, and extinguish the marrow-fire. We who stand here before you, the Company of Malthus, are pledged to aid you in every step of the way. Yet in the end, the fate of Urulat rests in your hands, Bearer. Choose."
Such was the beginning.
Many others spoke, and among the Company of Malthus, only the Counselor understood the tongue of the Yarru; for many years had he studied it in his quest to unravel the Prophecy. And what he understood, he kept to himself over the days that followed.
When all was said, Dani the Bearer chose.
* * *
EIGHT
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"YES?" LILIAS RECLINED ON SILK cushions, raising her brows at the page.
"My lady," he said and gulped, glancing sidelong at pretty Sarika in her scanty attire, kneeling at her mistress' side and wafting a fan against the unseasonal heat of a late Pelmaran spring. "My lady… there is an ambassador to see you. From the Were."