10
Tariel and the others waited all day and night outside the entrance, but to their great frustration, no one came out. They had expected someone to come out at some point to relieve the other guards, but no one emerged from the narrow pass, even well after they had finally made camp for thenight.
“Could it be this is not the main entrance?” Yarim asked the next morning, as they breakfasted on what was left of the bread and cheese they had packed. “Perhaps there is another way into the valley that is more heavilyguarded.”
“Or perhaps the bandits are lying low for some reason,” Calrain pointed out. “The guards we found were a dead giveaway to the entrance, after all. If someone is hunting them, they may have pulled all their menback.”
“Blast it,” Tariel said. “I hope that doesn’t mean the entrance has been sealed off.” She tossed the remnants of the hard crust into the ashes as she rose, then walked over to the entrance. Pushing her hand through the illusion of the wall, she sent out a tendril of magic. The illusion flickered, allowing her to see the passagebeyond.
“It looks clear,” she said, pulling back. The sun had nearly finished cresting the horizon, and she squinted against it as she turned to look at Yarim and Calrain. “We can’t afford to keep waiting out here. I have to goin.”
Yarim and Calrain exchanged pained looks. “If you must,” Calrain said, pulling his dagger from his belt as he walked toward her. He pressed the hilt into her hand. “Take this withyou.”
“Oh no, I couldn’t.” Tariel tried to hand the dagger back. She knew that dagger was precious to Calrain—it had belonged to the monk who had raised him before he had been sent off to Castle Tyrook to apprentice under BrotherTersen.
“Please.” Calrain curled her fingers around the scabbard. “I would feel better knowing you have a piece of me withyou.”
Tariel smiled, pressing her free hand against his heart. “I always have a piece of you with me.” But she strapped the dagger around her waistanyway.
“That weapon is a good size for you,” Yarim said as he joined them. He gave her a lopsided smile. “But perhaps you should avoid using it with yourmagic.”
Tariel stuck her tongue out at him. “I will get better at it. Just nottoday.”
Yarim laughed and embraced her. “I doubt there is anything you cannot master, with a will likethat.”
She tilted her face toward him and kissed him sweetly, savoring his dark, spicy scent and the feel of his strong arms aroundher.
“Come back to me,” he murmured against herlips.
“I will,” she promised. She turned to kiss Calrain too, and traced the lines of his lean face as she pressed her mouth against his. He stroked her spine as he kissed her back, and the sensation soothed some of hernerves.
“If you do not return in twelve hours, we will follow you in,” Calrain said as he released her. “Try not to take toolong.”
“I’ll be in and out as quickly as I can manage,” Tariel promised. She closed her eyes, pulling her magic around her, and spun up the illusion of the hunting dogagain.
“I’m not sure I will ever get used to that,” Yarim muttered when shefinished.
Tariel laughed. Turning away, she pushed through the illusion and entered the mountainpass.
Utter silence descended upon her as she took those first few steps inside, and her skin prickled with awareness. The walls of the pass rose on either side of her, so tall she could barely see the top, and little light filtered in. It was barely wide enough for a horse to pass, and Tariel imagined the bandits’ beasts must be well-trained not to spook in such a tight, eerie-feelingspace.
The pass went on like this for some time before she came to a fork. Tariel thought about it for a minute before choosing the one on the right, and after a few minutes, the path widened enough for two horses to walkabreast.
“Well, that’s better,” she said, her mood rising a little. She breathed easier, until she found herself standing before a deep chasm. Peering over the edge, she could not find the bottom, and when she chucked a rock over the edge, it took a long time before it hitanything.
“All right,” she said, sucking in a deep breath as she eyed the stone bridge that stretched over the chasm. She gingerly stepped one foot onto it, then jerked back when the ground started to give. Her heart pounded as she stared at the bridge, expecting it to crumble, but to her surprise, it heldsteady.
Biting her lip, she set her foot on the path again, but this time, chose the left side. This section of the path did not give, but held firm, and she placed her other foot in front, her entire body trembling. She held her breath the entire time as she continued this way, placing one foot in front of the other as she stuck to the left side, refusing to entertain the idea of looking down until she’d made itacross.
“That was the scariest thing I’ve ever done in my life,” she gasped, placing her hands on her upper thighs as she leaned forward a good distance away from the edge. Her heart pounded, and she sat for a moment to get her breath back, leaning her head against the cool stone. The patches of moss that clung to the ground felt good against her hand, and she stroked it the way one might pet a dog’s fur, seekingcomfort.
Speaking of dog’s fur,she thought, remembering the illusion. She looked down at herself, horrified that it had lapsed. Her fear had completely overcome her, and she’d dropped the illusion without thinking. Frantically, she spun it back up, cloaking herself in the dog’s formagain.
I have to pay more attention,she scolded herself as she continued along the path. Out here, at least there was no one to see her lapse of concentration, but once she was on the other side, she could not afford to let her guarddown.
Tariel made her way through the rest of the path on high alert, and her sharpened senses helped her evade a few more pitfalls, including a rope trap that would have strung her up by the ankle, and a string tied over the path that, if tripped, would have released an avalanche of rocks on top of her. Shaking her head as she hopped over the string, which was thin and so close to the color of the ground that she nearly did not see it, she wondered if the other fork had been the easier path. She couldn’t imagine the bandits navigating all these traps onhorseback.
Finally, some three hours after she had entered the pass, the high walls opened up, and Tariel sighed in relief as she beheld the valley. It was a wide, verdant landscape dotted with trees, with the mountains rising all around, and a brook snaking through the valley. Smack dab in the center was a castle built of dark stone that had likely once been quite fine to look upon, but whose walls now crumbled in several places. Still, there were pennants flying from the towers, and as Tariel looked closer, she spotted the intertwined snake and sword against the green and blackbackground.
