Artemis Awakening (21 page)

“But Lynn couldn’t come to you,” Adara said, “because she didn’t know if you could be trusted.”

“She still doesn’t know,” Bruin said, his voice breaking. “She told me anyhow.”

“She told you because of that Ring,” Griffin said. “I’m guessing that Ring assured her that if you came after the ‘fish’ that meant you could be trusted. She puts a lot of faith in that Ring’s visions.”

“Ring makes my skin crawl,” Terrell said. “All of this makes my skin crawl, but I don’t see how we can turn back. As Helena might say, if we start balking at jumps, pretty soon we’ll be good for nothing but quiet trail rides. I’m not ready for that.”

Adara grinned at him, then grew somber. “And I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t try to find out more. Griffin is our excuse for going in, for staying on, for poking around. He can act all seegnur and imperious, insist on seeing the facility. If the Old One is as determined to unravel the old mysteries as we’ve always thought, then he’s going to be welcoming.”

“Winnie said,” Terrell reminded them, “that she didn’t know where she spent all that time, but Lynn must know. We’ll need to find out if the two places are the same.”

“Going to the Old One won’t be safe,” Bruin warned them. “It will be terribly dangerous—and I would be sending you on without me. I owe Kipper the safety of my home. My students are arriving even now. Moreover … The Old One has a sway over me I don’t think he has over any of you. He was my first teacher and kept an interest in me even after I began to learn a hunter’s craft. When my years of wandering ended, he convinced me to think of myself as a teacher. I already knew how to read, but he loaned me books, encouraged me to continue growing at a time when many men settle into ruts. I fear myself near him.”

Adara flung an arm around Bruin. “You are my teacher, old bear, not him. Honestly, the Old One’s charm failed to win me. I wonder now…”

I wonder if he met me, considered whether I could serve as one of his brood mares, saw my budding claws and reconsidered. It’s possible to disarm a poor creature like that Winnie, but me? That would be a challenge. So I was dismissed to Bruin’s care.

“Then we go on as planned,” Terrell said. “Bruin will return to Shepherd’s Call with Kipper. Adara and I will take Griffin to Spirit Bay and snoop around.”

“It seems like the best thing to do,” Adara agreed. “It’s not much of a plan, but at this point, trying to come up with something more detailed would simply be a waste of energy.”

*   *   *

They rode out a few days later. Lynn provided maps, drawn with the sensitivity for the land of one who had been both hunter and gamekeeper, but even as she shaded lines indicating not only location but elevation, augmenting her pictures with little notes regarding quirks of the terrain, she warned them that what she was giving them was likely to be of little use.

“Whatever I think of his morals and ethics, the Old One is no fool. He knows that place is no longer the secret it once was. Although we have not made any fresh attempts after his captives, he doesn’t know if or when we might try again. I’m guessing that even if you find this place it will either be abandoned or adapted to some completely innocent purpose.”

No one disagreed. Griffin noticed that Adara made a careful copy of the map, entrusting the copy to Terrell before tucking the original away inside the front cover of a leatherbound notebook that occupied its own pride of place in a special pocket in her pack.

He’d been surprised to see the notebook and wondered at his own surprise. When the answer came to him, it embarrassed him to the depths of his soul.

You’ve been thinking of Adara as some sort of noble savage,
his inner voice chided him.
Close to nature, as lovely and as free of thought as any wild animal. Now you’re shocked to realize she reads the written word with as much ease as she interprets the tracks of the beasts along the trail. You’ve been fancying yourself half in love with her, haven’t you, Griffin Dane? But how can you love her if you don’t know her?

Griffin had no answer for that. He had no answer for a lot of things. Knowing that he’d be of little use preparing for the next stage of their journey, he assigned himself the task of talking to Ring. Ring, after all, was the closest they had to a clue as to what the Old One was hoping to achieve. However, other than confirming his initial impression that Ring was inflicted with some form of precognition, Griffin learned little.

“Because, you see,” he explained to Adara and Terrell once they had left the fort, “we can’t know whether the Old One considered Ring a success or a failure—or something in between.”

“It’s hard to believe,” Adara said, “that such a tormented creature could in any way be considered a success.”

Terrell, who was riding in front, glanced back over his shoulder. “I wish I could agree, Adara, but from what Winnie told us—from what was done to Mabel—I’m not certain that the Old One particularly cares whether or not his subjects are tormented, not as long as he gets what he wants.”

Adara nodded. “I knew you were going to say that. Let me put it another way. How useful to anyone would someone like Ring be? The man can’t walk across the room without checking to make sure the floor is still in front of him. He speaks in riddles that make perfect sense if you already know most of the answer. If the Old One wanted an oracle of some sort, surely he wanted better than that.”

“Point,” Terrell agreed, “a definite point. As Griffin said, we won’t know until we learn if the Old One considered Ring a success or not.”

“And that’s not,” Griffin added, “exactly a question we can ask.”

“No,” Terrell admitted. “We can’t. That’s why it’s going to be your job to keep the Old One busy so that Adara and I can look around without arousing his suspicion.”

Griffin didn’t much like the possessive way in which Terrell spoke of Adara, the way the factotum assumed they were a team. Griffin had looked for evidence that Adara shared Terrell’s feelings, but, other than the fact that she’d given Terrell—rather than Griffin—the spare copy of the map, he couldn’t find any indication of favoritism. She was equally polite to them both. As far as Griffin could tell, she wasn’t favoring either of them with her attentions …

Or rather,
his inner voice corrected,
you know for certain she isn’t favoring you and you don’t think she’s favoring him. On the other hand, there are times you sleep or they’re both off …

“Oh, just shut up,” Griffin muttered aloud, then flushed to his collar. Terrell didn’t appear to have heard. If Adara had done so, her only response was the tiny smile that quirked the corner of her mouth.

There was a great deal that was not commented on during that journey. Neither Griffin nor Terrell commented about how they felt regarding their lovely female companion—although Griffin would have bet any or all of his meager possessions that he was not alone in lavishing a great deal of thought on her.

They did not talk about where Griffin was from. Griffin wondered how much of this was politeness—a desire that he not feel too acutely homesick—and how much might be some leftover bit of etiquette from the days of the seegnur. After all, those long-ago tourists would not have wanted to be questioned by those they would have viewed, at best, as some sort of servants.

Most of all, they did not talk about what they would do when they got to Spirit Bay. Griffin—always one to speculate—tried to introduce the matter a few times, but found that both of his companions were more practical in their mindset.

“We’ve settled what we can, based upon what we know,” Adara said, her gentle words not completely concealing a certain tension. “Think, Griffin, if we had not met up with Lynn by chance…”

“Or by Ring,” Terrell cut in.

Adara nodded curtly. “If not for that, we would be going on to Spirit Bay with one set of facts. Perhaps these would have served us well. Perhaps not. Now we have what Lynn and the others have told us. Is there a third set of facts or a fourth or a fifth?”

Despite everything that wasn’t being discussed and the underlying tension this created, in retrospect, the journey to Spirit Bay was pleasant. If bandits were abroad, they took the measure of Adara, Terrell, and, most especially, Sand Shadow, and decided the risk was not worth the gain, especially since that gain would seemingly include little other than three distinctive horses and a very ornery mule.

Griffin did not number himself among the threats, for although he carried Adara’s spare bow and quiver, and he also had a long hunting knife belted at his waist, he had a distinct impression that to those skilled in reading the indefinable signs that mark a fighting man from one trained to fight, he—Griffin—would not show as much of a threat.

Everything Griffin saw when they chanced upon the area’s inhabitants confirmed his feeling that in matters such as the Old One, local authorities would be of no help. The route Adara and Terrell had chosen had largely avoided population centers—both because Sand Shadow would not be welcome in many and to avoid questions about Griffin.

“There’s an added advantage,” Adara said cheerfully. “We won’t need to pay as many tolls. Bruin gave us some coin, but I’d prefer to save as much as we can.”

“Tolls?” Griffin asked.

Terrell nodded. “This region is basically a league of associated towns, a heritage from the days of the seegnur. Cities such as you have described would not have fit their image for Artemis.”

“I can see that,” Griffin agreed, “but five hundred years have passed. Surely some ambitious person or group would have tried to dominate their neighbors.”

Terrell shrugged. “There have been kingdoms in the past, but usually they don’t last more than two generations: the conqueror and the conqueror’s immediate heir. The lore is strong in this region. In the end, the people revert to the traditional pattern.”

“So who is collecting the tolls Adara mentioned?”

“Local government or someone who has been granted a concession for providing some service—like maintaining the roads or a bridge.”

“And what happens to people—well, like us, who avoid paying?” Griffin tried not to sound nervous. “Would we end up locked up somewhere?”

Terrell laughed. “Only if we couldn’t pay—either in coin or goods or labor. There would be a penalty, of course, but as long as you’re willing to pay, there aren’t hard feelings. After all, it’s not as if we are using the roads, right?”

Griffin, accustomed as he was to a world where tracking devices were routine, found the idea fascinating—and more alien than a young woman with claws and eyes like a cat’s.

No wonder the Old One can get away with the kidnapping and the other things of which Lynn accused him.

Of course, while it was happening, the journey didn’t always seem pleasant. When there are no convenient inns, as there rarely were on the route Adara and Terrell had chosen, every downpour that promises a cold meal and a damp bed is an event—especially for one such as Griffin Dane, who had rarely slept either cold or wet. If it hadn’t been for Sand Shadow and Adara, they would have eaten far worse. And if it had not been for the curious conglomeration of tricks and gimmicks that made up a factotum’s training, they would have been a great deal less comfortable.

Fighting against a sense of uselessness—and against his frustration with a journey measured in miles rather than minutes—Griffin threw himself into those tasks he could perform. He gathered deadwood for the fire, groomed the horses (despite Griffin’s best efforts, Sam the Mule would tolerate only Terrell), stirred pots and turned spits. In this way he asserted himself as part of the team rather than patron being escorted—or worse, a package being delivered.

Griffin wasn’t certain how either Adara or Terrell viewed him. Adara’s attitude had never been quite as relaxed since the attack by the metal spider. Also, he never had any time alone with her. Their days of sharing a tent were over. He shared one with Terrell. The other man didn’t snore, but he did murmur in his sleep. When Griffin mentioned this, Terrell shook his head.

“I don’t or, if I do, you’re the first to mention it. Sure you’re not hearing yourself? I’ve woken a few times to hear you carrying on, though not in any words I can understand.”

“No one has ever told me I talked in my sleep, either,” Griffin retorted.

Terrell gave him an impish grin. “I suppose we must have some special affinity, then.”

Griffin snorted, but the fact was that much as he had resisted it—for he couldn’t help but see the other man as his romantic rival—he was coming to sincerely like Terrell the Factotum. The other man was self-confident to a point that might be seen as cocky, brash in a manner that made Griffin feel his own tendency to second-guess as even more of a handicap than usual. But there was a kindness to Terrell as well, an automatic courtesy that made the long hours they spent in each other’s company tolerable.

Often, when they were camped, Adara took herself off. She didn’t go far but, when she climbed a tree to a height where none of the men could easily follow, busying herself with taking notes in her little book, the message was not hard to interpret. Terrell explained this need for solitude as part of a hunter’s nature, but sometimes Griffin wondered.

Is she avoiding me? Is she avoiding him? Is she frightened about the Old One? Worried about Bruin? I wish she’d talk to me—or even to Terrell. I suppose she can talk to Sand Shadow …

Sand Shadow was a constant source of wonder and delight for Griffin—and the feeling seemed to be mutual. The puma was quite willing to accept Griffin as a new and fascinating toy. She was always eager for the opportunity to practice refining her use of her curious hand/paws. One of her tasks was practicing tying knots. She already knew the basics, but Griffin taught her a few clever twists that Gaius, his most nautical-minded brother, had shown him.

The puma knew a few simple variations of the string games called “fisher’s mesh” on Griffin’s homeworld, but known on Artemis by the curious name “cat’s cradle.” Griffin showed Sand Shadow a complicated pattern called “Sea’s Eye,” then regretted it, for the demiurge became obsessed with getting it right, butting him with her very solid head or lashing him with her thick, heavy tail until she had every step down to perfection.