Treasured One Read online

  I’m of two minds about caves. I love mine, but I hate theirs.

  Anyway, the servants of the Vlagh had encountered other creatures in the caves and mountains, and evidently the overmind had realized that some of those creatures had characteristics which might prove to be very useful, and it had begun to experiment—or tamper—producing peculiar and highly unnatural variations.

  I rather ruefully conceded that the experiment which had produced what Sorgan Hook-Beak of the Land of Maag colorfully called “the snake-men” had been extremely successful, though I can’t for the life of me understand exactly how the Vlagh had produced a creature that was part bug, part reptile, and part warm-blooded mammal that closely resembled a human being.

  Biological impossibilities irritate me to no end.

  I will admit, though, that had it not been for the near genius of the shaman One-Who-Heals, the creatures of the Wasteland would probably have won the war in my sister’s Domain.

  Ashad made a peculiar little sound, and I got up from my chair and crossed in the dim light of our cavern to the stone bench that served as his bed to make sure that he was all right. He was nestled down under his fur robe with his eyes closed, though, so I was sure that he wasn’t having any problems. Our discovery that our Dreamer-children weren’t able to live on light alone had made us all a little jumpy. It wasn’t the sort of thing we wanted to gamble with. Then we came face-to-face with the question of breathing. Veltan’s ten eons on the face of the moon had been a clear demonstration of the fact that we didn’t really need to breathe. Many of our pet people were fisher-men, though, and drowning happens quite often. Even though our Dreamer-children were actually gods, their present condition strongly suggested that they needed air to breathe and food to eat, and none of us was in the mood to take any chances.

  Ashad was still breathing in and out, though, so I went on back to my chair. I let my mind drift back to Ashad’s first few hours here in my cave. If anybody with a cruel mind would like to see a god in a state of pure panic, I think he missed his chance. Panic had run rampant in my family that day. As soon as Ashad started screaming at me, I went all to pieces. Eventually, though, I remembered a peculiarity of the bears which share my Domain with deer, people, and wild cows. She-bears give birth to their cubs during their yearly hibernation cycle, and their cubs attend to the business of nursing all on their own. Then I remembered that a she-bear called Broken-Tooth customarily hibernated in a cave that was no more than a mile away.

  Still caught up in sheer panic, I grabbed up my howling Dreamer and ran to Mama Broken-Tooth’s cave. She’d already given birth to the cub Long-Claw, and he was contentedly nursing when I entered the cave. Fortunately, I didn’t have to argue with him. He was nice enough to move aside just a bit, and I introduced Ashad to bear’s milk.

  His crying stopped immediately.

  Peculiarly—or maybe not— Ashad and Long-Claw were absolutely positive that they were brothers, and after they’d both nursed their fill of Mama Broken-Tooth’s milk, they began to play with each other.

  I remained in the cave until Mama Broken-Tooth awakened. She sniffed briefly at her two cubs—totally ignoring the fact that one of them didn’t look at all like a bear—and then she gently nestled them against her bearish bosom as if there was nothing at all peculiar taking place. Of course, bears don’t really see very well, so they rely instead on their sense of smell, and after two weeks of rolling around on the dirt floor of the cave, Ashad had most definitely had a bearish fragrance about him.

  Ashad slept until almost noon, but my flaxen-haired little boy still seemed exhausted when he rose, pulled on his tan leather smock, and joined me at our table. “Good morning, uncle,” he greeted me as he sank wearily into his chair. Almost absently, he pulled the large bowl full of red berries he’d brought home the previous evening in front of him and began to eat them one at a time. His appetite didn’t seem quite normal, for some reason.

  “Is something bothering you, Ashad?” I asked him.

  “I had a nightmare last night, uncle,” the boy replied, absently fondling a shiny black stone that was about twice the size of an eagle’s egg. “It seemed that I was standing on nothing but air, and I was way up in the sky looking down at the Domain of Vash. The country down there in the South doesn’t look at all like our country up here, does it?”

  There it was again. Ashad obviously knew Yaltar’s true name, even as Eleria did. “The people of the South are farmers, Ashad,” I explained. “They grow much of their food in the ground instead of concentrating on hunting the way our people do. They had to cut down the trees to give themselves open ground for planting, so the land down there doesn’t look at all like the land up here. What else happened in your dream?”

  Ashad pushed his yellow hair out of his eyes. “Well,” he continued, “it seemed that there were a whole lot of those nasty things coming into the Domain of Vash—sort of like the things that crawled down into Balacenia’s Domain a little while ago.” The boy put the shiny black stone down on the table and ate more of the red berries.

  There it was again. It was obvious now that the Dreamers were, perhaps unconsciously, stepping over the barrier I’d so carefully set up between them and their past.

  “Anyway,” Ashad continued, “there were outlanders there, and they were fighting the nasty things just like they did in Balacenia’s Domain, but then things got very confusing. A whole lot of other outlanders came up across Mother Sea from the South, but it didn’t seem like they were interested in the war very much, because they spent all their time talking to the farmers about somebody called Amar. The ones who were doing all the talking were wearing black robes, but there were some others who wore red clothes, and they were pushing the farmers around and making them listen while the ones in black talked. That went on for quite a while, and then the outlanders in the south got all excited, and they started to run north toward a great big waterfall, and the other outlanders—the ones who got there first—sort of got out of their way for while, and then when everybody got to that waterfall, it looked to me like everybody was trying to kill everybody else, and no matter how much I tried, I couldn’t understand exactly what was going on.”

  “I’ve heard that dreams are like that, Ashad. I don’t need to sleep, so I don’t really know what dreams are all about.” I hesitated. “Where did you find that shiny black rock?” I asked, more to change the subject than out of any real curiosity.

  “It was in the back of the cave where Mama Broken-Tooth sleeps in the winter,” Ashad replied. “She had three cubs while she was sleeping this past winter, and while you were busy helping your sister Zelana, I went to her cave to see them. They’re sort of the brothers of me and Long-Claw, aren’t they? I mean, Mama Broken-Tooth nursed me and Long-Claw when we were just cubs, and now she’s nursing the three new ones. That sort of makes us relatives of some kind, doesn’t it?”

  “I suppose so, yes.”

  “Anyway, the three new cubs were making those funny little sounds bear-cubs always make when they’re nursing, and Mama Broken-Tooth was cuddling them like she used to cuddle Long-Claw and me when we were just cubs.” He picked up the shiny stone. “This is an agate, isn’t it?” he asked, holding it out to me.

  I took the stone, but almost dropped it when I sensed the enormous power emanating from it. “I think you’re right, Ashad. Black agates are very rare, though.”

  “It’s pretty, and I really liked it when I first saw it. I asked Mama Broken-Tooth if I could have it, and she told me to go ahead and take it. I used to carry it with me wherever I went, but then I mislaid it, I guess, but when I woke up this morning, there it was right in my bed with me. Isn’t that odd?”

  I laughed. “I think this might just be the year of ‘odd,’ Ashad,” I said. “It seems like every time I turn around there are piles and piles of ‘odd’ staring me in the face. How did the rest of your bears come through this past winter?”

  “Just fine, uncle,” Ashad replied. “Ther
e are lots and lots of new cubs.” He suddenly grinned broadly, shaking off his gloomy expression. “Baby bears are so much fun. They do all sorts of funny things that make their mothers terribly grouchy. Just last week Mama Broken-Tooth was scooping fish out of a stream—you know, throwing them up on the riverbank the way bears always do—but her three cubs thought she was playing, so they were swatting the fish back into the stream. When she saw what they were doing, she came running out of the water, gave them a few swats, and then chased them up a tree and made them stay up there for the rest of the day. I laughed, but she growled at me. She didn’t seem to think it was funny at all.”

  “Will you be all right here by yourself for a few days, Ashad? I need to go talk with my brother and my sisters. There are some things they need to know about.”

  “I’ll be fine, uncle. I was over in the village of Asmie the other day, and Tlingar promised to teach me how to use a spear-thrower—that long, limber stick the man-things around here use to whip their spears out there a long, long way. Tlingar’s just about the best there is with the spear-thrower, isn’t he?”

  “He keeps the people of Asmie eating regularly, that much is certain,” I agreed. “I shouldn’t be too long, Ashad. If you get tired of throwing spears, you might want to go play with Mama Broken-Tooth’s three cubs. If they’re as frisky as you suggested, poor Mama Broken-Tooth’s probably exhausted by now. Give her a little time to rest up. Like they always say, ‘Be nice to the neighbors, and they’ll be nice to you.’ I’d better get started. I’d like to talk with Aracia before her priests get her involved in all those silly ceremonies.”

  “Say hello to Enalla for me, uncle.”

  There it was again. Ashad had just used Aracia’s Dreamer Lillabeth’s real name. Despite all my careful manipulation, the Dreamers kept pulling bits and pieces of reality up through the barriers I’d put between them and the past. I shuddered to think of what might happen if the Dreamers stumbled across some things far more significant than just their names.

  I told my tiny, glowing sun to stay behind, and then I went to the long, twisting passageway that led out to the open air.

  The morning light of early summer was golden as I came up out of my cave under Mount Shrak. I summoned my thunderbolt and rode on down toward the southeast to the Domain of my elder sister Aracia.

  Aracia’s Domain is much like the Domain of our baby brother Veltan, with vast wheat-fields stretching from horizon to horizon like some enormous green carpet in the early summer sun. I hate to admit it, but the introduction of wheat farming and bread has brought much more stability to the Domains of Aracia and Veltan than the sometimes catch-as-catch-can quality of life in my Domain and Zelana’s, where the land is primarily devoted to hunting and fishing. There has to be more to life than just munching on a piece of half-moldy bread, though. I’m fairly sure that Aracia and Veltan view me as some sort of primitive antique, but I know better. The people of their Domains are little more than cattle. They move around in herds, and I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised to discover that “moo” crops up in their dialect quite frequently.

  The people of my Domain—and of Zelana’s—are fiercely independent. Nobody—not even me or Zelana—tells them what they must do. To my way of looking at things, those farmers more closely resemble the mindless servants of the Vlagh than they do real people.

  You don’t necessarily need to tell Aracia or Veltan that I just said that.

  Where was I? Oh, yes, now I remember. I’m fairly certain that it was farming that ultimately led to religion in Aracia’s Domain. Once the spring planting is finished, a farmer really has nothing significant to do until harvest time in the autumn, and that gives him far too much time for speculation. As long as people concentrate on such things as what they are going to eat tomorrow or how they’re going to avoid freezing to death when winter rolls around again, there’s a certain practicality in their lives. It’s when the people have enough free time to begin asking such questions as “Who am I?” or “How did I get here?” that things start getting wormy.

  I’ve periodically ranged out beyond the Land of Dhrall to observe the progress of the outlanders, and I’ve noticed that the more intelligent ones spent a lot of their time brooding about mysterious gods. That isn’t necessary here in the Land of Dhrall, of course, since it’s very likely that the god of any particular region lives just over the hill or down the street.

  Some of the people of Aracia’s Domain saw a glorious opportunity there. Aracia could tamper with the weather, if she chose to, and that produced abundant crops, and the displays of gratitude of her subject people were usually grossly overdone. Had one of my people gone to such extremes, I’d have laughed in the fool’s face.

  Aracia, however, really enjoyed all the groveling and excessive displays of gratitude. Deep down, Aracia adores being adored. I’d been the first of our family to awaken during this cycle, so I was nominally in charge of things this time. Aracia had been the second to awaken, but deep in her heart she yearns to be first, so she encourages her people to continue their overdone displays of gratitude, and the more clever among them, sensing that need, exaggerate their thanks to the level of absurdity, erecting temples and altars, and prostrating themselves each time she passes.

  Aracia thinks that’s awfully nice of them.

  Aracia’s need for adoration had attracted many of the less industrious men of her domain, and over the years this has produced a sizeable town, and that in turn has brought assorted tradesmen to the place. I’m sure that Aracia’s temple-town is the closest thing to a city in the entire Land of Dhrall. The large stone buildings are covered with a white plaster and their roofs are made of red tile. The narrow streets have been paved over with large flagstones, and the town is at least a mile wide.

  At the very center, of course, is Aracia’s enormous temple with gleaming white spires reaching up toward the sky. To be perfectly honest, the whole place seems just a little silly to me.

  When my thunderbolt deposited me in Aracia’s marble- pillared throne-room, her overfed sycophants either fainted dead away or fled in terror. I smiled faintly. Nothing in the world seems to get everybody’s immediate attention more quickly than a thunderbolt.

  Aracia’s golden throne stood on a marble pedestal, and there were red drapes behind it. “Have you ever considered letting me know when you’re coming, Dahlaine?” my splendidly dressed sister demanded in an icy tone of voice.

  “I just did,” I replied bluntly. “Are your ears starting to fail, Aracia? Any time you hear thunder, it’s probably me.” I looked around my sister’s throne-room and saw a fair number of wide-eyed clergymen trying to conceal themselves behind the marble pillars at the sides of the vast chamber. “Let’s go find someplace private, dear sister. There are some things you should know about, and I don’t have all that much time.”

  “You’re very rude, Dahlaine. Did you know that?”

  “It’s a failing of mine. Over the years, I’ve found that ‘polite’ is a waste of time, and I’m just a bit busy right now. Shall we go?” I’ve long since discovered that abruptness was the best way to get Aracia’s immediate attention. Any time I give her the least bit of slack, she’ll lapse into “ceremonial,” and that usually takes at least half a day.

  Aracia looked more than a little offended, but she did rise from her golden throne and step down off the pedestal to lead the way out of her ornate throne-room.

  “What’s got you so stirred up today, big brother?” Aracia asked as we proceeded down a long, deserted hallway.

  “Let’s hold off until we get to some private place,” I suggested. “There’s trouble in the wind, and I don’t think we should alarm the people of your Domain just yet.”

  Aracia led the way into a rather plain room and closed the door behind us. We sat down in large wooden chairs on opposite sides of an ornately carved table.

  “Are you sure that none of your people can hear us here?”

  “Of course they can’t, Dahlai
ne,” she replied. “This room’s one of those ‘special’ places. Nobody’ll be able to hear us, because the room isn’t really here.”

  “How did you manage that?”

  She shrugged. “A slight adjustment of time is all it takes. This room is two days older than the rest of the temple, so we’re talking to each other two days ago.”

  “Clever,” I said admiringly.

  “I’m glad you like it. What’s happening that’s got you so stirred up, Dahlaine?”

  “Ashad had one of those dreams last night, dear sister. Evidently the Vlagh didn’t learn too much in Zelana’s Domain, so it’s sending its servants south toward Veltan’s Domain—or it will before much longer. Ashad’s dream was a bit more complicated than Yaltar’s was when he saw the invasion of Zelana’s Domain, though, and some things were cropping up that I didn’t quite understand. He told me about two separate—and evidently unrelated—invasions and a very complex war near the Falls of Vash. That’s another thing that kept cropping up as well. Ashad referred to Yaltar by his real name—in much the same way that Yaltar kept referring to Eleria as ‘Balacenia.’ I almost choked the first time Ashad said ‘Vash’ when he spoke of Yaltar.”

  “I told you that bringing in our alternates was a mistake, Dahlaine. If our Dreamers wake up and come to their senses, the whole world might collapse in on itself.”

  “They do seem to be stepping around some of the barriers I put in place, Aracia,” I admitted, “but it’s too late to do anything about it now. The Vlagh’s evidently going to keep trying to overrun us, and we don’t have time to raise a new group of Dreamers. Has Lillabeth had any of those dreams yet?”

  “Not that she’s told me about,” Aracia replied. “I’ve been a bit busy here lately, though.”