The Rivers of Zadaa tpa-6 Page 3

  We were four-and-one, but it wasn’t as simple as that. We may have turned Saint Dane back on those other territories, but victory often came at a steep price. I can’t help but have the sick feeling that in order to win the battles, Saint Dane has gradually chipped away at our strength. What’s that old saying about winning the battle but losing the war? As important as every territory is, this wasn’t about any one battle. There’s no question that we aren’t as strong as we used to be, and the war is still very much on. My uncle Press is dead. So is Vo Spader’s father. Osa and Seegen were killed too. Writing it all down like this makes me realize just how many people have made the ultimate sacrifice to stop Saint Dane. I don’t know if the feeling I have is sadness, or anger. Probably a little of both. Throw in a little fear for good measure. Never forget the fear.

  But that’s not all. Spader and Gunny were trapped on Eelong when the flume collapsed. (I don’t mean to bring up a sore subject, but if I’m going to do a recap here, I’ve got to include it all. Sorry.) On Eelong we learned our lesson the hard way that the territories cannot be mixed, and only the Travelers can use the flumes. Not only are two Travelers stuck there, but the collapsing flume killed Kasha, Eelong’s Traveler. She was the first Traveler of our generation to die. I hope she was the last. As I’m writing this, I’m looking at the small silver urn that holds Kasha’s ashes. One day, I swear, I will return her to Eelong. I’m holding out hope that somehow the flume can be repaired, or another one will be discovered. Not just so I can return the ashes, but to spring Gunny and Spader. I need them. Bad. But we have no control over the flumes. The best I can do is hope.

  Each of the Travelers I have met so far have been incredible people. We were each chosen from our home territory to stop Saint Dane and his mad quest. Uncle Press told me that Saint Dane is a Traveler too. If that’s so, I wonder what territory he is from? Is it a territory consumed by evil? Is being a violent, murdering, sadist normal for Saint Dane’s home? Who knows? Maybe compared to the other people of his territory, he’s a good guy. How’s that for a gruesome thought?

  I’m not exactly sure why I’m writing this to you guys. You already know it all. I guess as I’m sitting here, getting ready to begin a new chapter of my life, it helps to look back and take stock. Sometimes I think I’ve done pretty well. For somebody who still has no idea why he was chosen to be a Traveler, let alone the lead Traveler, I can be proud of the way I’ve helped mess up Saint Dane’s evil plans. But there are other times, usually late at night when I can’t sleep, that I feel like I’m in way over my head. I’ve had to make some tough decisions, and they haven’t always been the right ones. I’ve been lucky enough that the other Travelers have picked up the slack when I’ve messed up. Still, I can’t help but fear that one day I’ll make a move so wrong, it will blow up in our faces, and we will lose it all to Saint Dane.

  It makes for a lot of sleepless nights.

  There’s so much at stake, it’s hard to even imagine. Saint Dane is trying to control the destiny of everything that ever existed, or will exist. Everything. I can’t even get my mind around the concept of Halla, let alone the idea that someone as evil as Saint Dane wants to bring it all down. Before Uncle Press took me away from home on Second Earth, the biggest responsibility I had was to get my homework done and take out the garbage. Half the time I didn’t even get to the garbage. Now I’ve found myself leading a group of people who are the only force standing in the way of the destruction of all living things. And I’m only sixteen! I think. I’ve lost all track of time. I guess it goes without saying that I’d rather be home, taking out the garbage.

  But that’s not the way it was meant to be, or so I’ve been told. The only way I can keep my head on straight is to not worry about the way I’d like things to be, and deal with the way they are. As overwhelming as it all feels, I have to look forward. But that’s tough. I can’t help but think about home. And you guys. And wonder what happened to my family. And my dog, Marley. And wish none of this ever happened. But it did. I’m here. Chances are good Saint Dane is too.

  And so we go.

  “Enough,” Loor said sharply to Saangi. “It will heal.” Saangi put down the needle and thread, then slathered a sticky, clear ointment on the stitches. “This will protect the wound and keep it dry,” Saangi explained.

  “I know what it does,” Loor said sharply. I got the feeling that she had been stitched up before. She slid a golden-colored cloth strap around her arm to cover the stitches, and just like that, she was good to go. “Thank you, Saangi,” she said sincerely.

  “May I speak honestly?” Saangi asked. “Of course,” Loor said.

  “Battle lines are being drawn,” Saangi said. “But you do not accept them. By trying to understand all sides, you have put yourself in a dangerous position. When the battle begins, by aligning yourself with everyone, you may find you are protected by no one.”

  Loor nodded thoughtfully. “My loyalty lies with the royal family of Zinj,” she said. “I believe they are the best hope for restoring peace. But there is a larger concern, and that is Saint Dane. There is no doubt that he is out there, working to push Zadaa closer to war. Unless we find out how, it won’t matter whose side anyone is on, for all of Zadaa will be laid waste.”

  “But every Ghee is choosing their allegiance-“

  “It does not matter,” Loor interrupted. “If we are to find Saint Dane, we must be able to speak with all sides. That is why Pendragon and I must leave now.”

  “I would like to join you,” Saangi said.

  Loor stood up and stretched her long legs. It was hard to believe she had just been through a ferocious battle and been nearly killed about four times over. For her it was all in a day’s work. It was already ancient history. Unbelievable.

  “No, stay here,” Loor ordered. “We will not be long. Pendragon, come with me.”

  “You got it,” I said, and got to my feet.

  “What if you need help?” Saangi complained.

  Loor picked up the long, wooden staff that I’d seen her use so effectively as a weapon, and jammed it into the leather harness on her back.

  “You are beginning to sound like a worrisome old woman, Saangi,” Loor said. “Pendragon and I are capable of taking care of ourselves.”

  To be honest, I was kind of hoping Saangi would come along. The more the merrier. But this was Loor’s show, so I didn’t say anything. Loor walked toward her door, with Saangi right on her heels.

  “Pendragon is not a warrior,” Saangi protested. “He cannot protect you as I can.”

  Loor stopped short, and Saangi nearly ran into her.

  “Do not make the mistake of underestimating Pendragon,” she said firmly. “You do not know him as I do.”

  I was kind of thinking Saangi was right. I wasn’t a warrior. If anybody was expecting me to go all “warrior” and protect Loor if things got nasty, they were counting on the wrong guy. When things got rough, it was usually Loor who pulledmybutt out of the fire. Saangi whirled and shot me an icy look. She may have only been fourteen, but she was definitely not lacking in the self-confidence department.

  “It is my job to serve Loor, as her aide and as her acolyte,” Saangi said with authority. “I respect your mission. Please respect mine as well.”

  “Saangi!” Loor shouted angrily. “Do you realize who you are speaking to?”

  “It’s okay,” I said to Loor. I looked to Saangi and smiled. “I can’t tell you not to worry, Saangi, but we’re all on the same side here.”

  Saangi didn’t back down. She stared at me a moment more, then stepped out of the way to let me pass.

  “I will expect you both back here by nightfall,” she said.

  I walked past her to join Loor at the door and said, “Yes, ma’am.” I then said to Loor, “Yikes, she’s bossier than you are.”

  Loor didn’t think that was funny. She held out the heavy, dark cloak I had worn to the zhou battle. “Put this on,” she said sharply. I think she was trying to prov
e that nobody could beat her in the “bossy” department.

  “You’re killing me with this, you know?” I said, taking the cloak. I was already wearing the soft, white clothes of the Rokador-a lightweight jacket that crossed over at the waist and tied with a sash, along with simple white pants. And sandals. I hate sandals. To me sandals are for old guys who still think they’re hippies, or girls who wear plaid flannel shirts. But I didn’t have a choice. As bad as it would have been for a Batu to see a light-skinned guy like me hanging around the city, it would have been worse if I had been wearing Batu clothing. Then they could have accused me of being a spy or something. And for the record, I had my Second Earth boxer shorts on. After I had to go boxerless while wearing the disgusting, rotten rags of Eelong, it felt all sorts of good to be back in boxers and wearing the soft cotton clothing of the Rokador. I would have been nice and comfy… if I hadn’t had to wear the heavy, hot cloak as disguise.

  Did I mention how hot it was on Zadaa?

  “Where are we going?” I asked.

  “To see what we are up against,” Loor answered.

  We left Saangi looking teed off, and walked out of the apartment and across the large, central courtyard of the Ghee-warrior compound.

  “She’s tough,” I said.

  “She takes her duties seriously,” Loor said. “She wishes to be a warrior, but I fear she is too impulsive.”

  “She had pretty good impulses when she bailed you out of that zhou fight,” I teased.

  Loor didn’t even acknowledge this with a look. All she said was, “I told you. I would have found another way to defeat the zhou.”

  “Right,” I said.

  “You doubt me?” Loor asked.

  “Me? Never!” I said with a chuckle. I liked needling Loor, but the truth was, I didn’t doubt for a second that she would have found a way to beat that beastie without Saangi’s help.

  Loor led me across the compound, where we passed several Ghee warriors. Some were exercising, others were in small groups in deep conversation. Though the Ghee were divided, they all still lived in this same compound. I wondered how long this could last. If the conflict got worse, having all these macho types living together could get tense. Or violent. I kept hidden in the cloak. I must have looked like an idiot, walking around in this heat dressed like an Eskimo. But nobody stopped us. I guess nobody wanted to mess with Loor. Or an Eskimo.

  She brought me to a horse stable that held some of the most beautiful, powerful horses I had ever seen. These were regular old horses, not like the zenzens of Eelong with their extra leg joint. Loor saddled up two with heavy, leather saddles that were very much like Western saddles at home. We both mounted up and were soon trotting through the streets of Xhaxhu. I was becoming pretty comfortable on horseback. Uncle Press taught me to ride when I was younger back on Second Earth, and I’d had many chances to ride on various territories. I really liked it. Somewhere in the back of my head I felt that when this was all over, if I had the chance to go home, I would get myself a horse.

  “You’ve seen Xhaxhu at its finest,” Loor said as we rode side by side. “Now you are seeing the horror of what it has become.”

  As I mentioned before, the city was dry. But man, “dry” didn’t cover it. Some water troughs still had a trickle of precious water running through, but it wasn’t near enough to quench the thirst of the hundreds of Batu citizens who knelt by the stone troughs, desperate for the slightest bit of moisture. Some even had their entire bodies inside the troughs to lick at the pathetic trickle. It was pretty sad.

  The people of Xhaxhu wore simple, one-piece, short outfits in vibrant colors. There were pinks and bright blues, yellows and oranges, with fancy beadwork around the neck and sleeves. On my first trip here, everything had appeared bright and lively. But now that they didn’t have enough water to wash themselves, let alone their clothes, the bright colors had become muted and dingy. That pretty much described the city itself. Dingy. The lush, green palm trees that lined the streets now looked like a fence of dead poles. No music played. There was little conversation or socializing of any kind. The whole city, including its people, seemed as if it was drying up and turning into sand.

  “What’s the deal?” I asked Loor. “Has it totally stopped raining?”

  “That is part of it,” she answered. “But we do not rely on rain here in Xhaxhu. We are nourished by the underground rivers of Zadaa. That is where the true problem lies.”

  “What’s happened to them?” I asked.

  “That is the question.” Loor answered. “The only question that matters. The answer will determine the future of Xhaxhu, and of Zadaa.”

  “And Halla?” I asked.

  Loor shrugged. There still was no proof that Saint Dane had anything to do with any of this, but when you found a territory in trouble, with people suffering and ready for war, chances are Saint Dane was lurking around somewhere.

  “So then why did this happen?” I asked. “I do not know,” Loor said. “That is what we must find out.”

  We trotted to the outer border of Xhaxhu, where there was an immense, stone wall that circled the entire city. I’m talking huge. This wall must have been five or six stories high and made out of giant, truck-size boulders. I didn’t want to imagine how much backbreaking work had gone into building it.

  “The wall is for protection against invasion,” Loor said, reading my mind. “The Batu and Rokador are not the only tribes of Zadaa, but we are the most civilized. There are many tribes in the desert who live like animals and feed on one another.”

  “You mean they steal stuff from each other to survive?” I asked.

  “No, I mean they feed on one another. Many of the tribes of Zadaa…are cannibals.” Oh. Nice.

  “The Ghee are trained to protect Xhaxhu, which in turn protects the underground of the Rokador. This wall is our first line of defense. It is also protection against the elements. A windstorm could rise up with no warning and pelt the city with sand for hours.”

  As we trotted through a break in the wall-there was no door-I saw that there were giant sand drifts rising up against the outside of the wall.

  “How often does a storm come up?” I asked.

  “Often enough,” Loor answered. “It can be devastating. I hate to think of how Xhaxhu would handle a storm now, when we are so weak.”

  I briefly wondered if Saint Dane could possibly cook up a storm, but decided that as powerful as this guy was, he did have his limits. I didn’t think he could change the weather. At least, I hoped he couldn’t.

  Loor led us a few hundred yards away from the walled city to another, smaller wall. It wasn’t as tall as the protective wall around Xhaxhu, but it was long. We were at a corner. The wall stretched out for what might have been a mile on either side.

  “This is what I want to show you,” Loor said. “This is one of the farms where food is grown for the people of Xhaxhu.”

  A minute later we trotted through an opening in the wall. What I saw inside made my heart sink. Xhaxhu was a big city, with a lot of mouths to feed. I expected to see rows of crops, like on the agriculture barge of Grallion on the territory of Cloral. Well, I didn’t. All I saw was sand. Lots of it. We walked our horses toward the middle of the field, their hooves kicking it up. The place looked more like an archeo-logical ruin in Egypt than a farm. The emptiness was eerie.

  Loor must have been reading my thoughts, because she said, “The farmers have given up. Without water to irrigate the crops, there is no need to plant, or fertilize, or even to keep back the sand.”

  “Okay, dumb question,” I said. “How important is this farm?”

  “There are seven that feed Xhaxhu. The farmers have diverted what little water is still available to three of them. But the food grown on three farms is not even close to being enough. We are dipping deeply into grain reserves. We do not expect they will last long. Reality is that soon, very soon, we will starve.”

  “I guess that counts as pretty important.”

 
; That’s when something caught my attention. Several feet in front of us, the sand began to shift. Something was moving beneath it, hidden from sight. A moment later I saw more movement a few feet away. Whatever it was, there were two of them. I glanced at Loor. She didn’t look worried, but Loor never looked worried.

  “What kind of beasties hang out here in the desert?” I asked nervously.

  “You saw the quig-snakes at the gate?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” I said, not liking where this was going.

  “The desert is full of snakes,” she said calmly.

  Snakes. Snakes are the worst. I was about to kick my horse into gear and get the heck out of there, when I heard something behind us. It sounded like a muffled thump. Innocent enough, but since a second ago there was nothing within a hundred yards of us, any sound could mean trouble…especially if there were snakes sneaking around beneath the sand. I whipped a look around, expecting to see a couple of slithering sand snakes about to strike. I was surprised to see that we were no longer alone.

  Standing behind us were two white-robed figures. Their heads were completely covered, as if to protect them from the harsh desert sun. Both stood facing us, with their legs apart, each holding a short metal bar that was no doubt, a weapon. I shot a quick look in front again, to see if the snakes were getting any closer.

  There were no snakes there, either. Instead I saw two more of these robed figures coming up out of the sand like swimmers rising from the water. These guys looked pretty much like the first two. They got to their feet and held out their weapons, ready.

  “Uh,” I said to Loor. “Those aren’t snakes.”

  “No,” Loor said. “They are Rokador.”

  Rokador. The enemy of the Batu. Not good.