The Sage Seed Chronicles: The Unraveling (12 page)

Bast stood up and brushed the crumbs off of
his pants. “We need to bed down. We are getting up just before
dawn. I understand that our passengers will be back at that time.”
He looked at Erin and she nodded. “As soon as we eat tomorrow we
will be moving out. I think you understand the urgency now. Another
note on your keep-it-to-yourself list: where Bure has influence the
skunks are also in danger. After the crossroads the two wagons of
skunks won’t be with us but one very important one will.”

“My security team,” and he nodded to the nine
strong men who wore the security guild patch sewn on their shirts,
“all know each other and know Kennet, who is driving our supply
wagon. Most of us know Olm,” he gestured to the black haired young
man who drove one of the passenger wagons, “who is the son of
Omin,” he nodded to a black haired man with a broken nose and a
sunny smile. “Our other driver is Bran who is a younger brother to
Byan of our team.” He nodded to the two men, respectively that had
a definite familial similarity with their curly brown hair and hawk
shaped noses.

“The other two members of our party have been
helping Gyan on this complex project of saving our realm. They are
very important to him, and to us, and are to be protected. Some of
you may have met Drune. He has been in and out of Kunscap over the
years and is of the miner’s guild. He has been doing undercover
work for Gyan over the past few months and was in on the capture of
Bure, as was Kennet.” He gave Drune a smile and a nod.

“Erin lost her parents to Bure early on. She
was on his list of people to kill and disguised herself as a boy,
taking care of the horses in the guild train. Erin was extremely
important in building the case against Bure, Targ and Wras. She set
herself up as a target and it is because of her plan that Bure was
finally captured. Erin has a way with animals and it because of
that ability that we are able to transport thirty skunks to the
prairies. She has a companion who is a skunk. He will be traveling
with us the entire way. He is a right handy animal I understand, as
he will eat the vesi who hide in your boots and has a terrific
ability to let us know of an imminent quake.” He gave her a nod
that was more like a small bow of respect.

“Now to the bedrolls, lads. Morning comes
early.” Everyone left the fire to their respective small camps.
Erin put her bedroll out between Kennet’s wagon and the first
passenger wagon. It didn’t take her long to fall asleep as it had
been an eventful day. She didn’t feel Tempo come and curl up
against her a couple of hours later when Luna and Cear were both up
high in the sky. After Erin was asleep Gyan was still up,
contacting Lazin, Bas and Ree to expect and watch for the
messengers, Nuit and Keir.

The camp started stirring just as there was a
glimmer of grey on the horizon. Tempo jumped to his feet and did
the vesi rounds as people shook out their boots then he stood by
the gang planks of the wagons to greet and count the returning
skunks, crunching on his breakfast. When breakfasts were eaten and
all passengers accounted for they were on the road.

Tempo has been dozing on Erin’s lap as she
rode by Kennet’s team, when he woke up with a start and gave a
growl. At the same time a really eerie sound came from the last two
wagons. Heads turned back in their direction. Erin caught a snatch
of a message from Tempo and yelled, “QUAKE!” She wheeled her horse
around and rode for the two back wagons. “Rein in your teams.
Quake!” She repeated the message again and again as she skidded to
a stop. Erin scooped Tempo up off of her saddle and dismounted in a
leap. Setting him down, she tied the reins to the back of a wagon
as the quake hit. She reached out her mind to communicate soothing
thoughts to the teams. She saw that the three wagon drivers where
trying to stop. Kennet was more successful as he had caught on as
soon Erin had opened her mouth to yell, having been a veteran of
several quakes on the guild caravan, when Erin traveled with them.
The ground quivered and there was an audible rumble. She worked her
way through the teams rapidly, focusing on those animals that had
their ears back and showing the whites of their eyes. Verbally and
mentally she spoke soothingly to them and stroked their hides
reassuringly. As one team settled she moved to the next until they
were still. Their hides may be rippling a little with their
nervousness but they were settled. The ground still shivered a
little but as far as quakes went it wasn’t bad. At least the ground
hadn’t been rolling.

Erin was standing by the last wagon team as
Gyan and Bast rode back. She looked up at them as they stopped
beside her. Gyan looked down at her for a moment. “Young woman you
are one impressive person. By the ancients, I am glad you are on
our team!”

Bast looked at Gyan and gave a bark of a
laugh. “Gyan, sometimes you are given to understatement!” He
laughed again then he turned toward Erin. “Thank the skunks for me.
Their early warning system is impressive. I assume that the teams
are alright.” She nodded.

Then Bast nodded over his shoulder toward the
mountain range. Erin looked the way he indicated and saw an angry
looking grey plume rising from a peak in the back of the range. Her
head whipped around and she mentally scanned the passengers for
panic or pain. There was none. She ran for her horse’s reins as she
called for Tempo, scooped him up and mounted. She turned the horse
toward Gyan and Bast and said with urgency. “Is it alright to
leave? I think we need to get some distance between us and that
cloud. There was a story passed down in my family of clouds like
that being filled with ash and choking noxious air. Can we leave,
please?”

Bast and Gyan kicked their horses into
motion. “Let’s move!”

The Great One’s expedition left the area with
all haste. There wasn’t much of a wind, which Erin considered a
good thing. She didn’t know how long ago the event happened, but
her father’s story of the volcano and the air being filled with
suffocating ash and deadly gas was scary enough to have made an
impression.

They rode at a brisk pace for a couple of
hours until they were out of the mountainous area and into the
rolling hills. Everyone was coated with a light dusting of ash but
a wind from the southwest had come up and had moved the worst of it
over the back lands and into the uninhabited area of the realm. The
cavalcade gradually slowed to a pace that was easier on the horses.
Looking back, the ominous plume had spread over the mountains in
the area, but in the upper levels of air the cloud was definitely
leaning due to the wind.

Erin dropped back and opened her ‘door’ to
listen for any distress from their skunk passengers. She was
relieved to not hear any pain or grumbling. Tempo, who was before
her in the saddle, asked the inhabitants of the wagon how they were
doing. They had burrowed down in the hay and had weathered the wild
ride. As she slowly rode forward through the convoy she mentally
reached out to the wagon teams and asked how they were. They were
the ones that had been pulling the weight and she was a little
concerned about them running full out for such a long time. They
were tired but weren’t sore. She assured them that though the Great
One wanted to travel swiftly, he didn’t intend to gallop all around
the realm. She made her way forward to Gyan and Bast.

“Our passengers and the teams are all fine.”
She gave them a big smile, “Everyone took it in stride. I assured
them that you didn’t intend to travel the whole realm at that pace.
I am grateful that the upper level winds are blowing that cloud
where no one lives.” Bast barked out a laugh at the beginning of
her statement but both men nodded agreement concerning the volcanic
cloud.

“We will keep to this gentler lope for
awhile. We didn’t intend to eat up ground this way but I am happy
that we have left that volcano behind us. We will be making the
crossroads by supper time if we can keep up this pace.” commented
Bast.

“I can’t tell if the clouds back there are
storm or are from the eruption. It looks ominous either way. When
we stop we had better set up tents just in case.” said Gyan.

Erin dropped back and joined Drune. He, like
everyone else, had a grey patina. On him it wasn’t even relieved by
his eye color as they were also grey. Erin gave him a big white
smile. “We all look like nightmare creatures. I sure would love to
be able to bathe.”

He returned the grin. “The only color you
have is your blue eyes and where you wiped your mouth off. Nasty
stuff but I guess we got off easy. It could have been so much
worse. Which brings me to an observation. The quake was small. Does
that mean that the volcano is just letting off pressure and could
really get serious and erupt at a later time? If that is true we
might not be so lucky with our wind direction next time.”

Erin looked at him for a moment. “That is a
sobering thought. I don’t know. Perhaps Gyan knows or someone back
in Kunscap might. Either way we don’t have any control over it. All
we can do is get the items in place, then locate and activate the
latents.”

Drune winced. “I have never tried to do
things at such a tiny level. The thought that I must to be able to
do it is definitely intimidating.”

Erin nodded. “We can have a healer standing
by checking the person’s pulse and such. The ancient’s description
was fairly clear. Have you tried to just look into the blood like
they suggested? If you could do that without manipulating anything
and do no harm, you would be part way there. That might give you
more confidence.”

“I’ll give it some thought. I need to work on
this. I appreciate the ancient’s pendant as an aid. To think that
we had people who could do such fine things with their gifts and
that Bure’s kin killed them.” he shook his head, “It is such a
terrible loss.” They rode in silence for awhile and as the day
stretched on toward sundown they could see the glimmer of the river
in the distance.

Because they had made good time Gyan decided
to camp just beyond the crossroads. That way they could have easy
access to water for washing up. They made camp just as the sun was
setting. The first order of business for Gyan was to have a
conference with Bran, Olm and the skunks. Wagons were parked and
the gang planks were in place. As the skunks emptied out of the
wagons they clustered around Tempo who was going to act as
interpreter. He would be able to understand what was said through
Erin’s mind and would pass it on to his fellow skunks. Gyan got out
a map and sat down with the drivers but was also speaking toward
the small animals which were crowded closely around him because of
their near sightedness. He used gestures so the striped mammals
could follow along.

“Bran, your wagon will unload in the Duluse
Province. There will be five stops and at each stop three skunks
will get off to establish their new home territory. You will stop
here, here and here.” he said pointing to the road map, midway from
where they were to Wellyn, then at Wellyn, and near the crossroad
leading to the pass. “Each time you stop put down the gang plank
and hold up three fingers. That means that three can leave the
group to find a home. I suggest,” and he looked at the assembled
skunks, “that you move away from the towns to find your burrow.
Since you hunt at night you can get closer then and eat those
things that are plaguing the people of the town. But you are all
valuable and I wouldn’t want people reacting badly to the sight of
you. Discretion, particularly at this time, would be the better
course. We need to go into Sawblen first but we will be talking to
people wherever we go and will be telling them about how you are
helping us. We just don’t have time to do that before you
settle.”

He turned back to Bran. “So when you hold up
three fingers and three have separated themselves from the rest,
then point in the direction of the eastern mountains so they are
clear about the best direction for them to travel to put them on
the prairies where the most food is. Next go just past the
crossroads on the pass road and drop off three more. The last three
will be here.” he said indicating a spot between the crossroads and
the Pastarham Bridge. “I suggest you point north, north east toward
the Cascade River. Once every passenger is off to find a new life
on the Duluse prairie then you return home the way you came. The
pass is too dangerous right now.”

He turned to Olm. “When Bran makes his first
stop I want you to pass him and continue to your destination. Your
wagon of skunks are destined for Pastarham Province. Stop first
here.” He indicated midway on the road from the bridge to the three
way road junction. “Three will go north in the plains in front and
around Osily and three will go south into the wider prairie.” He
clearly made the hand gesture of three going one way and three the
opposite direction. So the skunks could see. Tempo was keeping up,
communicating what the Great One was saying and the skunks were
riveted in their attention. “Drop off three more near the Bridge to
Arbreton. They can stay between the road and the river. The last
six skunks are to be dropped off here.” pointing to a spot two
thirds of the way to Terresville. “Two need to travel east and four
skunks should move into the larger prairie south east of there.”
Gyan again made the hand signals of two going that way and four for
the other direction. “Does everybody understand?” The two drivers
nodded.