The Lost Ranger, page 16
“You do. And I’m glad to have you back. I was worried.”
Grellum blinked slowly. “I don’t want you to be worried about me.”
“You’re my friend.”
He watched me and then looked around. “It’s still so dark. I think… I think I’m going to take more rest.” He lay back down, curling onto his side, and his breathing quickly fell into a steady rhythm.
“I guess he wasn’t fully awake yet,” Davond said.
“But hopefully he can be.”
Davond nodded. “Hopefully he can be. And now you can rest.”
“I’m not sure that I can.”
“Asherah is resting. Grellum is resting. You may need your rest, as well. We don’t know what we’re going to find.”
The implication in his tone was clear. If Asherah needed to draw upon the tether connection that had formed between us, then I needed to sleep.
“Will you and Veela be alright?”
Davond snorted. “I think Veela could handle this all herself.”
“I can,” she said from the front of the raft. “And you should get some sleep, Neb. You can take over once you do.”
I wanted to argue, but there was no point in it.
I lay back, resting my head on my arms, and stared up the sky. Within moments, I fell asleep. I had strange dreams of my mother, our home in Bastrop, but familiar things were shifting and swelling and changing. Could my mother have been a tether? She had never given me any reason to think that.
When I came awake, light still filtered through the branches of the cypress trees. I got to my feet and joined Veela. She nodded and handed me the whipstone pole before she lay down.
After a while, Veela roused herself and even Grellum came awake, rubbing his eyes. Asherah sighed, sitting up and looking around. Davond sat on his knees, looking near the rear of the boat.
“What is it?” I asked, looking back at Davond.
“Probably nothing,” he said softly.
I turned, staring, but couldn’t see anything.
Veela joined him, and then she groaned. “There are ripples in the water,” she said. Her voice was soft, as if she had wanted to keep others from hearing, but I did. “It’s too big for dusa.”
“I know,” Davond said.
“Which means…”
“Which means the Sundered have found us.”
Without saying another word, Veela grabbed another whipstone pole and got to her feet, joining me. We looked at each other, sharing a glance, but then fell into a rhythm as we pushed the raft forward. It had a regularity to it, and were we not pursued by the Sundered, I might actually have enjoyed the process. There was something quite relaxing about gliding through the water this way, making our way through the swamp. I had always enjoyed that part.
Up ahead of us, I noticed small bubbling.
“Dusa,” I said.
“I see it,” Davond said.
“It looks to be a large one,” Veela said.
I wondered how she could tell that from where she was standing, and I craned my neck, trying to figure out if she saw something that I could not. I had never liked the fact that she always had Churan’s favor when it came to hunts, but then, she also had known him longer than I had, and had worked for him for far longer, as well.
A head bobbed out of the water.
Dark eyes and five tusks.
It was a big dusa. Not as large as the boar that I had brought back to Bastrop, but it wasn’t that far off.
“They cannot use it,” Asherah said, striding toward the front of the raft and coming to stand next to Davond. “It would grant them too much strength.”
“Well, we don’t have time to hunt it, so unless you have another idea…”
She raised her hands and I felt a soft burning on the back of my neck.
“Oh, no,” I said.
Davond looked over at me. “What is it?”
“I think she’s doing the same thing that she did to the poor swamp rat.”
And the same thing that she had done to me. She had used my strength, borrowing from me so that she could somehow enlarge the swamp rat. If she did that now…
What would happen to the dusa?
As I watched, I saw exactly what would happen to the dusa.
It began to swell.
It continued to swell, and as it did, it became too large to hide beneath the surface of the water. And more than that, more tusks curved up from its jaw, including off its snout. First a sixth tusk, a seventh, before two more sprouted and continued to grow.
“Oh my…” Veela breathed out.
The enormous dusa shook. Water sprayed around us and the raft approached too fast for us to do anything.
Davond brought his pole free of the water, but Asherah shook her head. “Do not intervene.”
He set the pole back down. I realized that the rest of us had sort of frozen in place, propelled by momentum more than anything else. The sight of the enormous dusa had caught all of us off guard.
The only one who could speak was Grellum. “What is that?”
“That one looks a little larger than last one we came across,” I said. “Can you imagine how much meat we could sell?”
“What did she do to it?”
“Tether magic,” I said softly.
We passed by the dusa. I kept waiting for the enormous boar—and it had to be a boar—to turn toward us, but it didn’t. Its head lowered, tipping toward the water, and it snorted. Its entire snout was now out of the water, and it seemed as if it stood taller than any of us. There was nothing that would be able to bring down a creature like that. The dusa with six tusks had impossibly thick skin, but this one, now with nine tusks, and even a tenth now starting to form far back on its snout, would have to have even thicker hide.
The dusa shook its head, and though I could hear the hissing, I could not make out anything else that was taking place. I didn’t know if the Sundered were able to harm a dusa of that size, with a hide that thick.
“The pass is not much farther,” Davond said.
It was a difficult way to navigate. The pass was known by most who were familiar with the swamp, though it was well hidden between several different cypress trees. From there, the pass led into another section of the swamp that was incredibly difficult to navigate. I had to hope that Veela’s raft was stout enough that it could withstand a little jarring.
I saw the first of the cypress trees that marked the pass.
Almost as one, we began to veer toward it. The only person who didn’t notice the pass was Grellum, though he took our lead and followed as we shoved the raft off to the side. We slowed, dragging our poles through the water as we made our way forward.
“Do you think we’ll be able to make the turn with that?” I asked, looking over at Davond before tipping my head back toward the massive dusa.
“Don’t worry about it,” Davond said. “Focus on what’s ahead.”
As we neared the entrance to the pass, I waited. “It’s your raft,” I said to Veela. “What do we need to do?”
“We will take a hard turn, and as soon as we do, I will let you know what you need to do.”
The raft glided forward and none of us said anything. We waited.
The raft drifted closer. Making the turn was going to be a challenge, and I wondered whether we could fully make it. As we neared it, I tried to gauge the space in the pass, trying to eyeball whether we had enough room with a raft of this size to even enter the pass.
And then I felt a buildup of heat.
It began to build behind us. The hissing intensified.
I looked over at Veela, but she shook her head.
In front of me, Asherah stood, twisting so that she could look behind us. I couldn’t see the dusa, and I couldn’t see the Sundered, though there was something taking place back there.
The hissing became even louder.
I raised my pole, knowing that we were going to have to jam it into the ground, make a hard turn, and reach for the entrance to the pass.
“Now!” Veela said.
All of us drove our poles down, and we pushed.
It wasn’t going to be enough.
“It’s not working,” I said.
“I can help,” Asherah said.
She set her hands down to either side, and when she did, I worried that she was going to somehow draw upon me like she had before. I didn’t need to be weaker, especially while we needed to navigate to the pass, but if it let us get into the pass, then maybe it was for the best.
I didn’t feel any fluttering of heat. The only thing that I noticed was the soft rippling of water around the raft on either side, and it was followed by a strange stirring of wind, the stench of the swamp coming with it, and then we glided.
The raft twisted, reaching the entrance to the pass.
It was only wide enough to get through it. The edges of the raft brushed against the trees on either side.
We had to raise our poles, and Veela and Grellum pushed from the back while Davond and I both hurried forward, driving our poles into the front, pushing us forward. There was a soft groaning, and for a moment, I thought that we were going to get hung up, but then the raft started to ease forward, slowly sliding past the trees, and then we were in the pass. The dark canopy arched overhead, no sunlight coming through. Vines hung down, and there was a strange whispering in the air, something that sounded like voices in the distance, a moaning quality that left most who came through the pass thinking that it was haunted. It was just echoes, I knew, but it didn’t make me feel any better.
I continued pushing us forward, working with Davond to help us ease along the pass, and looked back. I kept looking for the massive dusa, but saw nothing.
“Keep going,” Davond said. “We need to stay ahead of them. We need to use the time that it bought us.”
Asherah took a seat, resting her hands on her lap, and she breathed slowly.
She looked tired. Whatever magic she had used had drained her.
We had to hope that she had enough remaining if the Sundered caught us. I had to hope that she would not need to draw upon me for the same reason. As we progressed through the pass, the strange moaning continued around us.
CHAPTER TWENTY
We’d been going through the Gerasl Pass for the better part of an hour with no one talking. There had seemed to be a general agreement to keep quiet as we made our way through the narrowest—and darkest—part of the pass. The air was still, somehow even more still than the rest of the swamp felt, and the soft murmuring of moaning voices continued to carry through here.
Grellum was the first one to break the silence. “Let me just say that I’m very thankful that you’ve never felt the need to come through here before,” he said to me.
Veela snorted. “No one needs to come through the pass. But if you’re looking for hidden hunting grounds, there are places that can only be accessed here.”
“There are plenty of good hunting grounds outside the pass,” I said.
“Only if you know the swamp,” Veela said.
“Which I do.”
I dipped my pole into the water, pushing off. The bottom of the swamp was deeper here, reminding me of when we’d traveled the other channel chasing after the tether. That seemed so long ago, though it couldn’t have been more than hours. So much had happened that I wasn’t even sure how to process it.
Thankfully, it didn’t seem as if Asherah had drawn on the tether connection to me again, though I wasn’t sure if she could do it without me knowing. I suspected there would have to be some way for her to do that, though maybe it didn’t matter. So long as I didn’t get too tired, did I really care?
She had saved us from the Sundered more than once using that magic. In a way, I had been a part of it. I should be thankful for that.
“The boar might not be able to make it through here,” Davond said.
“Just what Bastrop needs. A massive dusa roaming the swamp,” I said.
“Think of how much whoever brings that down will get paid!” Grellum muttered.
“If they can. We faced that six-tusker and nearly died.” I looked over at Asherah, then Davond. “And now you’re telling me that the Sundered used that for something?”
“They would use the creature to increase their power,” Asherah said.
“How is that different than what you would do? Davond said tether would use the tusks for something similar.” Though he’d also said that they would leave the dusa alive. That the boar had been killed suggested that whatever had happened had been different than tether magic.
“There is some power that can be gained through such things, but the real power is in how it can be harnessed and concentrated.” She nodded, and I followed the direction she indicated, realizing that she was looking down at one of the tether swords. “Blades like that allow power to be concentrated. It is what allows the tether to form more effectively. It is why we would use something like that to form a bond, and nothing different.”
“So the dusa head was not tether magic,” I said.
I supposed that made a certain sort of sense. The tether used living things.
“How would they use it?”
“It depends upon the kind of power they need,” she said.
“Well, a dusa head. One larger than most. How would they use that?” Not only a dusa head, but what if they managed to kill the dusa that she had expanded? That massive creature would likely carry significant power within it.
“It depends. I’m not familiar with all aspects of their power, so I can’t tell you what they would do, only to tell you that it would be dangerous for any who were to come into contact with it.”
“Sort of like how it’s dangerous for me to have come into contact with you?” I asked.
She frowned. “What happened was necessary.”
She turned away, staring along the length of the pass, and I decided not to keep pushing.
“She’s interesting,” Grellum said.
I grunted. “Interesting isn’t really the right way to describe it,” I said. “She’s a tether princess or something along those lines, and she uses her power to do all sorts of crazy things.”
“Well, she saved us back there.”
“She saved us from the very thing that she put us into danger from,” I said. “She didn’t really save us from anything.”
Grellum looked back. “It’s all interesting, isn’t it?”
“That’s not exactly how I would describe it,” I said.
“Quiet,” Davond said. He raised a hand and motioned around us.
As he did, I frowned, looking everywhere. What had he detected?
There was the steady moaning that we had been hearing ever since we entered the pass, but other than that, I didn’t pick up on anything else. There was no wind. The soft rippling of the water made a little burbling noise. And there was a strange jittering sound, one that sounded like the vibration of insects off in the distance that I could not see. Other than that, the darkness continued to grow around us.
It was getting late.
The day had grown long—far longer than I had ever expected it to be. So much had happened, and now I couldn’t help but feel amazed at where I was and all that had taken place.
“We should find a place to rest for the night,” I said. “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m worn out.”
“You want us to sleep out here?”
“It’s not what I want, but I think we’re going to need to.”
I looked over at Asherah. I noticed that she was leaning slightly forward, and though she was holding onto the pole, she seemed to be sagging slightly. She was getting tired. At what point would she fall forward? I had no idea what toll the use of her magic took on her, but I suspected that it was significant. Having seen how hard she worked, and having seen the way that she seemed to draw power from things around her, I couldn’t help but feel as if she needed rest more than the rest of us.
“We can take shifts,” Davond said. “We can’t go all that fast through the pass anyway. Those who don’t need rest should take the first shift.” Davond looked over at me. “You’ve been working hard enough today. I think you should get some rest.”
I wanted to argue, but at the same time, I was tired.
“And you,” he said, nodding to Asherah. “You don’t know your way around the swamp, and you have been drawing upon too much of your tether bond. Take this chance to get some rest.” He flicked his gaze over to me. “I fear that a time will come when we will need you rested.”
I wasn’t sure if he was talking to her or me. At this point, he could be talking to either of us.
I set the pole down and settled onto the raft, tucking my legs around me. I was tired, but just sitting was enough at this point.
Asherah joined me, taking a seat across from me. Some of the hardness that had been in her expression before began to fade, softening a little bit. “I want to apologize for what I did.”
“I understand why you did it,” I said. “Though I might’ve appreciated a little warning about what it would mean for me.”
“I assumed you knew.”
“Because I had the sword?”
“And you are with him.” She nodded to Davond.
I let out a long, frustrated sigh. “Well, I didn’t know, and unfortunately, now I have to wonder if perhaps he knew all along.”
And if he had known, and if he was trying to protect me, why would he not have warned me? Because he had wanted me to. And now he was letting her take the blame.
“That bastard,” I muttered.
“What was that?”
I shook my head. “Doesn’t matter. Anyway, I didn’t know. I went to try to help you. That’s all that I did. And I am glad that you survived. And had you not, I’m not sure that I would’ve gotten away.”
“Which is why I need to thank you. I was wrong to be so hard with you. You did come for me.”
“Would they have killed you?”
“Probably,” she said. “We came out here for something that could strengthen my gift. That’s why Eleanor brought me. She thought… it doesn’t matter what she thought anymore. She’s gone. And I don’t know how to find it without her.” She said the last with a whisper.
