Of Truth and Beasts

Tracking Wynn by the staff’s sun crystal was limited, for he gained only a sense of her general direction and distance. But she was coming south from the Lhoin’na. By a map copied from the ship captain’s records, Ghassan guessed she was nearing the end of the Slip-Tooth Pass. She would soon enter the range from the northern side, but he was not concerned. He had ample time, and she had a long, hard trek ahead of her.

With his copy of the poem fragment translated for her and the clues that it bore, Ghassan was certain he would find the seatt well before she did—if it existed.

He still wore his midnight blue robe with its cowl to protect him from the bright sun and the freezing nights. But he hadn’t found ample firewood for the past eight days. All he had left to eat was dried flatbread. Water was not so much an issue.

Ghassan had grown up near the desert before joining the guild. Interaction with tribal people who still ranged the dunes taught him the ways to find water where others would see none. Even weary as he was, ever since translating that poem fragment, Ghassan often lingered in memories of his youth.

Allowed to sit “silently” at the evening fire with his grandfather when tribal elders came to visit, he heard many an entertaining though frightening tale—including one about a headless mountain. It was said that for any who found it, the last thing they heard in this world were whispered rumblings in the dark. Then the head of the mountain took form again, but as fire instead of stone. All there were consumed, leaving only ash that blew away in the next dawn’s wind, and the mountain remained headless once again.

That tale had not been so entertaining or frightening to eight-year-old Ghassan. If such noises were the last thing one heard before the peak’s missing head reappeared as fire, then ... ?

“How could anyone have lived to tell of it?” he had whispered to his grandfather, not daring to speak openly, impolitely, before the hosted tribal elders.

Grandfather had smiled brightly. With a wink and pat on Ghassan’s hand, he placed a finger over his wrinkled lips.

Ghassan had not thought of that tale again until after he met Wynn Hygeorht. Now he looked up the base slope of a headless—or “fallen”—mountain beyond, hidden from the desert below by the jagged hills and lower crags.

It must have once been as immense as any other peak in the range. He could almost not see from one side of its base to the other. About halfway up, the entire top half seemed to have caved in. He wondered, if he climbed all the way up, would he find a flat plateau, crumbled hillocks of boulders, or a crater?

“I am here, Wynn,” Ghassan whispered in the cold evening breeze. “I have found it first.”

He rushed downward through the depression to the mountain’s base.

If this was where Bäalâle Seatt had once existed, climbing to its top would avail him nothing. Any higher entrance would have collapsed if the mountain-top had indeed fallen. But if the tales of the “headless mountain” were based on fact, anyone who had come here and lived had never mentioned anything below it. Lower entrances, if they existed, surely would have been found. So did they even exist?

Yes, he was here. He believed he had found the location of the lost seatt.

“But how do I get inside?” Ghassan whispered again on the wind.

Chapter 19

A few nights later, Chane was out foraging on his own. He took relief in being off by himself for a while.

In his mortal days, he had needed a share of solitude. That penchant had increased since the night he rose from death. Though he cherished Wynn’s company, the last two moons in close quarters with others had begun to take its toll.

He still had some acquired life in one bottle, so he was not concerned for himself, but he strode the pass’s western slope, looking for firewood or anything edible for his companions.

They had made good time in the last few nights, and mountains loomed close ahead. But even in darkness, the landscape was bleak, a rocky terrain spare of trees.

He wandered into an open area at the base of a shorn slope where no trees grew among the scattered, loose stones. Only the sharp angles of embedded boulders showed in the dark. He headed toward the straggly trees at the far side, for no game would linger here.

Chane’s boot toe caught on something.

Stumbling forward before righting himself, he looked down at a square edge protruding from hardened ground. He found himself standing on a flat area, and an exposed patch of smooth stone showed where his boot had scuffed away the dirt. He bent over, studying it.

It was smooth—too smooth—and level versus the surrounding slope of dirt. Crouching, he began brushing away more dirt, and soon exposed an edge.