People of the River(57)

Tharon forced a swallow down his dry throat. The army of ghosts that had protected his back earlier had vanished. Now the shadows of Kettle, Thrushsong, and Shagbark loomed over his own shadow like gigantic Underworld beasts.

"All of you. You're—^you're trying to kill me!"

The tangles of their hair protruded from their shadows like claws, flexing open and closed as they reached for Tharon. Shagbark took a step, and her shadow lunged for him.

He stumbled in horror, screaming "No!" as he whirled and drove the point of his handspike into Shagbark's chest.

When she staggered face-first into him, her forehead slamming against his shoulder, Tharon wrenched his handspike free and shoved her away. Kettle let out a choking scream. Shagbark crumpled to the floor with the quiet of a feather alighting on a bed of tawny grass. Blood gushed rhythmically from her chest while she writhed weakly under the veil of death that descended like a black curtain.

Tharon could see the curtain coming down, down. He backed up until he collided with the raised altar and sat down.

Odd. His nausea had vanished.

Calmly, he said, "You think I don't know that you Starbom imbeciles are trying to Dream my death? Well, every time you have a Dream about me, you had better remember that I know."

Kettle closed her eyes and stood with her mouth puckered against sobs. Tharon sucked in a deep, soothing breath, rose, and crossed the room.

"Clean up this mess. Kettle," he ordered as he passed. A new spring had entered his step as he headed to his bed chamber. I should sleep well tonight.





Ten


Starlight glistened on the yellow wall spiders over Meadow Vole's head. She lay in her robes, watching the light, listening to the broken words Lichen spoke to Wanderer in her sleep. Lichen's voice sounded so breathy and tearful that it made Vole's soul wither. She rolled to her side to study her daughter. Only the top of Lichen's head showed over the edge of the buffalo hide. Her long braid snaked across the sleeping mat like a fuzzy lasso of summer ermine fur.

Lichen whimpered and turned over onto her stomach, her little hands digging frantically into the cattail mat as if she were trying to flee some terror.

Vole threw off her blankets and went to kneel by her. She put a tender hand on her daughter's cheek. "Lichen?" she called softly. "Lichen, wake up. It's all right. Lichen?"

"Mother?" Lichen whispered, her voice muzzy.

"I'm here. You're safe."

Lichen reeled sleepily to her feet and stumbled into Vole's arms. "Oh, Mother, I had a terrible Dream. There's a girl who keeps calling me, and I—I don't know who she is. And I saw this man, a terrible man ..."

She buried her face in the shroud of Vole's dark hair. Vole stroked Lichen's back gently and made soft shushing sounds in her ear. "What else did you see in your Dream?"

Lichen took a breath as if to speak, then shook her head. "I . . . it . , . never mind. I'm sorry I woke you."

Vole propped her chin tiredly on Lichen's head; her heart sank. Lichen didn't want to tell her, and she knew why. Vole feared real Dreams. She had never learned how to control them. So on the few occasions when they came to her, they controlled her—with such terrifying Power that she often wondered whether the Dreams hadn't ripped her soul from her body. Vole had spent half of her life fighting to obliterate her own Powers and the other half trying desperately to protect Lichen from her inheritance by shepherding her away from anything remotely to do with E)reaming.

Lichen disentangled herself from Vole's arms and quietly sank back into her bed and tugged the robe up over her shoulders. She squeezed her eyes closed, a clear signal that she didn't want to talk any more. "Thank you. Mother, but you can go back to sleep now. I'm all right, really."

Vole let out a tense sigh. She touched the frizzy end of Lichen's long braid. "Lichen? Do you want to go live with Wanderer?"

A pause.

"Do you want me to?"

"Not really," Vole admitted. "But he could teach you a great deal, and maybe . . . well, maybe I've been wrong in thinking that if I tried hard enough, I could kill the Power in you. It seems, my poor daughter, that First Woman has condenmed you to be a Dreamer. I pray she has mercy on your soul."

Lichen's eyes shot open. The two stared at each other for a long time before Vole gathered her daughter into her arms and held her close. From the wall niche across the room, Vole thought she heard the Stone Wolf call out for the first time in cycles—as if in approval.

"Sleep now. Lichen. Tomorrow we'll pack your things and I'll take you to him."



Wanderer balanced on his navel on a spire of rock that jutted from the ledge above his house. The rock curved out over the cliff face so that he could see two hundred feet straight down. What a feeling of freedom! Wearing only a deerskin breechclout, he spread his arms and legs out over thin air to imitate the movements of the flock of ravens soaring above him. The birds squawked and floated on the warm air currents that swept up the side of the bluff. Wanderer inhaled deep breaths of the grass-scented air and squawked, too. The sound resonated a bit too high until he began to draw it from the very back of his throat. He squawked again, bolstering his concentration by focusing on the silver ribbon of the Father Water that slithered across the treeless bottomland in the distance.