The Burning City (61 page)

Was this thing any faster than a bison team?

Traveling above the Hemp Road made landmarks hard to find… but
that
, already behind them, was Chief Farthest Land's high peak and lookout point, as the caravan first saw it coming home. Landscape drifted by much faster than it ever would at a bison's pace. Behemoth was
fast.

Morth asked Green Stone, “Have you any idea where we might find gold? There must be rivers all along…”

Green Stone was shaking his head.

“I know a hillside covered with virgin gold,” Whandall said, “if we can find it, if it hasn't been mined out. I went up it in the dark. Came down with Coyote in my head. But it's south of First Pines. Now you tell me, will we pass close enough to First Pines to know this place? Stone, you've actually seen First Pines more often than I have.”

“I'll ask Behemoth.” Morth crawled forward to speak into the beast's ear.

Green Stone waved to the south. “Those are the pines, there where the land starts to dip. It looks like Behemoth wants to go above them.”

Morth returned. He said, “Behemoth believes that he goes where he will, but he's wrong. He can't
see
places low in manna. They're holes in his map. He won't go near towns.”

“Just as well.”

Green Stone said, “So when we run out of pines we just walk on down and get the gold, yes, Father? We've covered a daywalk already, two wagon-days. Morth, were you going to travel at night?”

“Better not.”

They camped on the crest. Pines ran from the frost line right down into the canyon, hiding the canyon and the Hemp Road.

Morth summoned a yearling deer to roast. The bird hunted his own dinner. Behemoth ate the tops of young trees and pushed down older ones to get at their top foliage.

Next afternoon they ran out of pines. Now they could see down into the canyon. A beige trace was the Hemp Road, running almost parallel to a stream's blue thread, but higher. The ragged slope of the far hill, and the stream that ran down the gorge, were familiar. The caravan passed twice a year, but Whandall had never been impelled to climb that hill again.

Huddled up against the forest was the town of First Pines.

Morth and Whandall were lowering cargo from the mammoth's back. Green Stone looked from the chaparral-covered hillside across from them, down into the canyon, then at Morth's bags of bottles. He said, “You want
all
of these filled with
gold?”

“Yes.”

His son hadn't quite imagined the size of this job! Whandall grinned. “We're far enough from town, locals won't bother us. Bandits might. We've been attacked here more than once. We can take a first pass this afternoon. Camp tonight at the caravan campground, watch for bandits—”

“No! Come back up. Sleep here,” Morth said. “Bandits won't bother Behemoth.”

Sleep with Behemoth—sure, that sounds safe. “Couple of days, then, if there's any gold. Twisted Cloud has known about this place all along. She might have told anyone.”

“How do I know gold?” Green Stone asked. “How do I know wild from refined?”

Whandall wasn't sure he would either. Gold ore wasn't always bright smooth yellow. He said, “You coming, Morth?”

Morth was torn. “You've seen what I'm like when I've touched wild gold. Do you really need me?” Hopefully. Resisting.

Whandall said, “I can't sense it, you know.”

“Don't I just.
Ah!
Take the bird,” Morth said. “Watch Seshmarls.”

Stone and Whandall set out with the bird wheeling above them. They'd half filled their packs with empty bottles. Those didn't weigh much, but they'd be heavy coming back.

The rising wind was to Seshmarls' taste. The rainbow crow flew with motionless wings, pretending to be a hawk. He had to flap more often than a hawk would.

Without that bird they might have come and gone unnoticed.

They reached the floor of the canyon in a ring of older children all chasing around under the bird, demanding to know whose it was, or swearing it must belong to Whandall Feathersnake.

Whandall introduced himself and his son and the bird. When he asked where they were from, they pointed up the valley toward First Pines.

They crossed the valley floor, and the stream, in a circle of children and a flood of questions. While they climbed, Whandall told tales of the bandit attack and of Coyote's possession.

A few of the smallest couldn't keep up and dropped out. An older girl went with them, complaining bitterly of the excitement she would miss. Green Stone apologized. “We can't stop. We have to finish before dark.”

Now ten remained of the original fifteen.

He just couldn't tell. These might be from First Pines, the children of customers and friends. They might be bandits' children, or First Pines might include part-time bandits. Then again, it was a fine day for walking uphill in a gaggle of babbling tens and twelves, with bright noon light to
guide them around malevolent plants that had ripped half his skin off one black night.

“Oh, look!” cried a black-haired boy, and he pointed up.

The bird was arguing territory with a hawk. What had the hawk so confused, what had excited the boy, was the brighter-than-rainbow colors flashing across Seshmarls' feathers. It hurt the eyes to look.

“Wild magic,” Whandall murmured, and Green Stone nodded. They took note of where they were and continued to climb.

The stream ran to their right. The children's chattering had dwindled, but one boy—thirteen or so, with straight black hair and red skin and an eagle's nose—urged them on. Whandall spun them a tale about an Atlantis magician in flight from a magical terror. He did not speak of gold. He let the bird's display guide him up the hill.

Gold would not be found where Seshmarls kept his accustomed colors. Where colors rippled across the bird in vibrating bands and whorls, hurting the eyes… well, it seemed they were tracking a flood that might recur once or twice in a man's lifetime. Gold followed the flooding.

“Oh, look now!”

The bird sank toward the stream, darkening as he fell. The children ran.

Greenery thickened, blocking passage. Stone and Whandall forced their way through. And there in the water, with eight children all around it, sat the skeleton of a man. Seshmarls perched on his skull, jet black.

Whandall said to them, “Here rests Hickamore, shaman to Bison Clan, lost these many years.”

“Gold,” Green Stone said, and picked up two yellow lumps as big as finger joints. He put one in his pouch and gave the other to the oldest boy. “Here,” he said, and pointed out more dully glowing bits of gold for the children to collect, until every child had a bit of gold and they were scattered all up and down the streambed. Green Stone and Whandall tried to find gold in places a child would miss, and thus filled their belt pouches.

Day was dimming. Whandall gave a tiny black glass bottle to the oldest girl. “Wait three days,” he said, “then show it to your folk and tell them where to find Piebald Behemoth the shaman.”

They all trooped down to the valley floor and parted there.

Whandall and Green Stone followed the last sunset light up toward the crest and Behemoth. “That was clever,” Whandall said.

“Thank you, Father. I wasn't sure.”

“No, it was brilliant! This isn't what Morth needs; it's refined. Valuable, of course, but Coyote used up all the manna in it. But it'll draw them.”

Morth heard their tale, then asked, “Will the children wait?”

“Don't know. We still don't know if those are First Pines children or bandits. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if they tell their parents or go themselves. The way to get the refined gold around the shaman's skeleton is to go up the river. We'll cross lower down tomorrow and get the wild gold on the slopes. We know where it is now.”

The bird settled on Morth's arm. “Reminds me,” Green Stone said. “Keep the bird with you tomorrow, Morth. He attracts too much attention… oh, that'll do,” as the bird on Morth's forearm turned glossy black.

They crossed the valley at dawn. A lone black crow wheeled above them. They saw no children.

They filled some bottles with water. Water going up, gold coming down. They panned a little gold in the stream. It was only a powder here. They stopped again at the bottom of the ancient mud flow. Whandall thought he saw color in the mud, not yellow, but the odd tints of gold salts.

And he felt the pressure of a lurk's eyes.

They kept climbing. Whandall looked about him, taking it all in, letting his mind find patterns. He didn't look for a face among weeds. That was not how you spotted a lurk.

The bird wheeled above them… and suddenly blazed with colors.

Vegetation was low and sparse, leaving little cover to hide a man. Flooding had left whole river bottoms sprawled across this slope; then years of rain had washed away the lightest particles of silt, leaving what was heaviest; and that must have happened over and over. Gold was everywhere.

Following the firebird's path, Whandall began collecting nuggets. Green Stone couldn't perceive gold until they'd been at it awhile, but then he caught the knack.

Seshmarls flapped uphill in a wide spiral. He was black again. Was he seeking the mad magic in gold, or just his dinner? The bird dwindled until they almost lost him. Then they saw his rainbow flare and followed.

Now Whandall had no thought for watching eyes, nor for anything but gold. When their belt pouches were full they emptied the gold into their packs. By sunset every muscle was screaming. Their empty bellies cried for food.

A half-moon gave them little light. It was good they'd brought water, but that was gone now. Unable to see to collect more gold, they began sifting the gold sand into bottles in the dark.

By moonset most of the bottles were full. There was no gold left in the packs, and no light at all.

Green Stone hefted his pack. “That's heavy!”

“Put it down. We can't walk in the dark.”

“It'll still be heavy tomorrow. I'm cold, hungry. Father, what are we doing here?”

“Gold fever. We should have been on our way hours ago. Now we'll be here the night.” With their gold sealed in cold iron, Whandall was having second thoughts. He thought his sanity had returned.

Green Stone said, “I wish Morth were here. He'd summon something to eat.”

“Gold drives Morth crazy! We don't dare build a cook fire anyway.”

“Well, we got his gold for him.”

“Why does Morth want it?”

“I'm not supposed to tell.”

“Not Morth's plans, no, but do
you
have a plan? Or did you come just to ride Behemoth?”

“Maybe I can find my fortune in Tep's Town, or earn it. Maybe it's my blood calling to me.”

“Let me tell you about your blood,” Whandall Feathersnake said, “and about
Morth.”