Exiles Gate

She passed the bowl on to the man at her right, and so it went on.

The murmur grew.

'Is there something remarkable in it?' Morgaine asked then, civilly.

'There is fen-wort in it,' Arunden said. 'And neverfade.'

'To loosen tongues,' Chei said in a small voice, at Vanye's left, 'and to bring out truth.'

'Liyo —' Vanye said, for there was of a sudden too much warmth on his tongue for one sip of honey-mead. She glanced his direction.

'It is harmless—' Chei said. The cup was finishing its course. A young woman brought a skin and filled it, and it began a second passing.

The crowd-murmur grew. 'Another bowl!' the priest objected. 'It is unclean, unclean—'

But the bowl went to him. 'Drink,' Arunden bade him, and clenched his hand in the priest's hair and compelled him, at which there was rough laughter, at which Vanye took in his breath and stared in horror, not knowing what to do, not knowing what the priest might do, or some man who respected him.

But no one did anything.

'Liyo, ' he said, wishing them out of this.

'Is thee all right?' she whispered back, past the laughter and the noise.

'I am all right,' he said, and it was true, as the moments passed and the cup went round and the priest wiped his mouth and frowned. He felt Chei take his arm and press it—'—no harm,' Chei was assuring him. 'No harm in it—'

He reached that conclusion in his own reckoning, that it was very strong, that his stomach had been empty, but it was well enough: he thought that he would not fall if he rose, nor sleep if he sat, but that if he sat still a little while his head might not spin and his judgment might come back.

Chei's hand rested on his shoulder then, heavily, a friendly gesture, offering him the cup in the next round. Every detail seemed to stand out with unnatural clarity—like the effects of akil, very like that, but milder. There were more and more cups offered about, bowls passed hand to hand, drink poured from skins, blurred voices murmuring words indistinct to him. More than one bowl came his way. He drank only a little and passed them on.

It was mad. There seemed no hostility in it, but it was all balanced on the knife's edge, a peculiar sort of intimacy in this passing of drink round and round. Yet another bowl came his way, and he only pretended to drink now, and gave it on to Morgaine, who likewise feigned drinking, and passed it on again.

'Say on now,' Arunden said, whose mustache glistened with beads of liquid in the firelight. 'Now we talk. My lady qhal, fine lady, who shares my drink and shares my fire—what is it you want in my land?'

'Passage through.'

'Through, through, where through? To what—to Mante?'

'It is the gates,' Chei said unbidden. 'My lady—tell him.'

'Chei means to say,' Morgaine said quietly, in a silence that had grown so sudden and so hushed there was only the wind in the leaves about them, among a hundred, perhaps a hundred fifty men, and words rang in the air like a hammer on iron: 'that Vanye and I came through the southern gate and we are going out the northern one, against the interests of the qhal in this world. We will pass it, we will seal it, and there will be no more taking of men and changing them, there will be no more coming and going out the southern gate, with Gault bringing whatever he likes at your backs while the north brings war against you. There will be no more gate-force. Once I am done with them, they cannot bring them back to life.'

A great murmuring grew in the silence she left. 'Ha,' Arunden cried, and gestured to one of the women, who filled a bowl. He drank deeply, and wiped his mouth. 'Who will do this?'

'No great band of men will do it,' Morgaine said. 'No force of arms. A Gate is far too dangerous to assault head-on.'

'Aye, there you say!' He took another deep draft. 'So who will do it?'

'I am enough.'

'Ha!' He waved his hand. 'Drink for our guests! You are enough! Woman, m'lady qhal, how do you propose to do that? Seduce Skarrin?'

'Liyo,' Vanye said, but her hand rested on his arm, and she slid her hand to his and pressed it hard.

'Gate-force,' she said. 'I am qhal—am I not? The most they have to fear—is one of their own with hostile intent.'

'Who says there has never been? Qhal feud and fight. And what has it ever done? You are lying or you are mad, woman.'

'Feud and fight they may. But they will not go that far. I will. They have no chance against you then. Do you see? I will give you the only chance you will ever have.'

'And the fires—the fires—in the valley!'

'The only chance,' Morgaine repeated, 'you will ever have. Else Gault will widen his territory and yours will grow less and less. I set that fire—else Gault would be warned and warn his lord, and after that, my lord, you would see a hunt through these hills you would not wish to see. I will advise you: shelter me and mine tonight, and pass us through these woods in the morning as quietly and quickly as you can. Beyond that I can assure you the qhal will have other concerns; and beyond that you can do what you have never, I would surmise, been able to do: to come at Gault from the wooded south. That gate south of Morund will cease to be active. There will be no power there. Begin to think in those terms. Places you have not dared to go. Enemies you will not have when these present shapes age and fade—it is that which can make a qhalur enemy a most deadly threat, do you understand? It is the experience of a half a score lifespans fighting in the same land, against human folk who know only what they can learn in twenty years. That will cease. You will see them die. You will find their successors fewer and fewer. They do not bear half so frequently. That is what I offer you.'

Arunden wiped a hand across his mouth. The bowl tilted perilously in his hand. From time to time as Morgaine spoke the gathering murmured almost enough to drown her voice, but it was quiet now.

Arunden was entirely drunk, Vanye thought. He was drunk and half numb and the visitor he had tried to ply with drink and drug had spun a spell enough to muddle a man's mind—that was the witchery Morgaine practiced. He had seen her work it on more than one man with his wits about him; and he watched now a desperate and inebriate man trying to break the strands of that web, with sweating face and glittering eyes and quickened breath.

'Lies,' Arunden said.

'Wherein?'

'Because you will never do it! Because no one can get through.'

'That is my worry. I have said: shelter for the night. Safe passage through to the road. That is all.'

'That is easy done,' Arunden said, wiping his mouth again. He held out the bowl which had come to him. 'It is empty!'

A woman hastened to fill it. There were a great number of bowls filled, and a general and rising commotion among the onlookers. Chei's hand a second time rested on Vanye's shoulder.

'Quiet!' Arunden shouted, and took another deep draft of the bowl. 'Quiet!'

There was a slow ebb of noise. Wind sighed in the leaves, and bodies shifted anxiously.

'Gault will move against us,' Arunden said, and motioned violently toward her with the bowl, spilling the liquor. 'That is what you have done!'

'He may,' Morgaine said.

'What does a woman know about strategy?' Arunden cried then, and seized by the shoulder one of the women who rested near with the skin of drink, and shook at her. 'Eleis here—a fair shot and a fair cook, till she comes to bearing, eh, pretty?—a good many of our girls come down to the marches for a few years, but lead? Carry a sword? This arm here and mine—d'you want to go a pass with me, Eleis?'

There was rude laughter.

'What do you say?' Arunden asked then, and jutted his chin and waved the bowl