Exiles Gate

'You were fortunate,' Morgaine said. 'Did I not just say how I abhor good fortune?'

Bron looked anxiously at Chei, last at Vanye, a worried look, a pleading look.

'It is truth,' Bron said. 'That is all I know.'

Vanye shifted position, having found his arm cold from the wind gusting through the woven-work. He found his heart beating uncomfortably hard. 'Arunden was an ally of your lord's?'

'We were ambushed on our way to join with him. The qhal may have known he was there—' The thought seemed to come to Bron then. His mouth stayed open a moment. His eyes darted and locked.

'And withdrew,' Morgaine said.

Bron had nothing to say. He darted a look of his own Eoghar's way and back again. Chei's breath was rapid.

'No one would—' Bron said.

'You say yourself, changelings are not uncommon. A man too close to qhalur lands, a scout, a hunter—'

'We are not that careless!'

Heaven save us, Vanye thought. And aloud: 'Is your enemy without guile? Or luck?'

Both the brothers were silent. At their own fire, Eoghar and his cousins talked among themselves, voices that did not carry over the water sound.

'It would be easy, then,' Morgaine said, 'for messengers of all sorts to come and go. From the camp, for instance.'

'We do not know it is so!' Chei said.

'No,' Morgaine said. 'It might be coincidence. Everything might be coincidence.'

Bron exhaled a long slow breath. 'A treaty with Gault?'

'Possibly,' Morgaine said, 'you were only fortunate. There is chance in the world. It is only very rare—where profit is concerned.'

Bron ran his fingers back through his hair and rested, his hands clenching his braids. Then he looked at Vanye and at Morgaine. 'Are you, after all, from Mante? Is this something you know? Are you having games with us?'

'We are strangers,' Morgaine said. 'We are not from Gault and not from Skarrin. We do not know this land. But of treachery and of greed we have seen altogether too much. Perhaps it has occurred to you—that there is profit to be had. We do not withhold it. Anything, you can gain from us, take. We will have no need of power in this world. Do you want Gault's place? Or any other—take it.'

Bron caught a breath. 'Everything,' he said in a faint voice, 'that Chei has told me about you I believe. I never—in all my life—In all my life, I never—never knew I would—come to—to owe—'

'A qhal?' Morgaine asked.

Bron swallowed the rest of that speech. His face was bone-white, his pain-bruised eyes set on her as if he could not find a way to move. 'But,' he said after, 'it is you I will follow. I do not think we will live long. I do not think we will live to see Mante. But for what you did for my brother I will go with you; for what you did for both of us, I will do everything I can for you. I do not deny I am afraid of you. There is a cost—to serving qhal—and I do not know what you would choose, between us and others. But what you say you will do—if you seal the Gates—is a chance for every man alive; and we never had one till this. It is worth a life. And mine is spun out longer than I expected, since Gyllin-brook. Chei's, too. Where else shall we find a place for us?'

Morgaine looked at him long; and turned then and began to pack away their belongings. 'I do not know. But I would you could find one.' She looked up at them. 'When we reach the road, turn back. Go somewhere far, and safe. Two more humans will be a hazard to me—only that much more likelihood that someone will know me for a stranger.'

Chei had opened his mouth to protest. He shut it as she spoke and he caught a breath. 'But,' he said then, 'they would take us for the Changed, that is all. There is no reason not.'

'It is that common.'

'Half the qhal in Morund—have human shape.'

'So,' she said softly, and her frown deepened and darkened. She put a last packet into the saddlebags and wrapped the ties tight. 'They are using the gates that often.'

'I do not know,' Bron said, looking as bewildered as his brother. 'I do not know how often they come and go.'

'No one knows,' Chei said. 'None of us go south. When they want to come and go—they use Morund-gate. They do not need to ride through our land.'

'Frequently?'

'Maybe—several times a year. I do not know. No one—'

'So a message has already gone to Mante.'

'I think that it would have,' Chei said. 'When the woods burned. I think they would send for that. Gault is not friendly with Mante. With his lord. So they say.'

'Rumor says,' Bron amended. 'Men who come and go off Gault's land. Some do, still.'

'Too much here is tangled,' Morgaine said; and Vanye shifted his mailed and weary shoulders back against the rock and picked up the thongs that depended from his belt, beginning to braid three of them.

'As to changelings,' Vanye said, 'we do not do that, with friend or enemy. You are safe with us, as safe, at least, as we are. And we intend to reach Mante, and go beyond it. But that—that, has no return. You should understand that. My lady advises you turn back. There is reason. You should listen to her.'

There was silence after, except a discordant muttering from Eoghar and his cousins, about their separate fire. A little laughter drifted from them, about their own business. Doubtless Chei and Bron were distressed. He did not look up.

'Lady,' Chei said.

'For your sake and ours,' Morgaine said firmly.

Again there was silence, long silence, with only the noise from the other fire where, Vanye saw with a shift of his eye, the three clansmen had unstopped what he reckoned was not a waterskin, and began to pass it about. He did not like it. He did not want the quarrel now, either, with unhappiness enough in their camp. 'Liyo,' he said in a low voice and when he had her attention, shifted his eyes to indicate the matter.

She frowned, but she said nothing. They were not boisterous at the other fire, only men taking their ease of the dark and the rain in a way as old as men on any earth.

And finally: 'I do not understand you,' Chei said.

Vanye jerked the braiding loose and looked up at him, frowning. 'There is Hell between the gates, Chei, and we will ride through it. There is a new earth the other side, but fairer or fouler than this one, neither of us knows. Heaven knows how the worlds are ordered, but the gates bind them together in ways dangerous for all life. When we are gone it will not be the same sun that rises over us. That is all I understand of it. But that is where we will be—as if we were dead, Chei, and the other side of Hell, and you cannot go back or change your minds then, and nothing you knew will be true. That is what will become of you. This land is your home. And fair or foul, it is what you understand. Think on that. And you still will not know the extent of what will happen to you. Nothing you know will be true.'

'But you go. And you are a Man. Are you not?'

Vanye shrugged. The question went deep, troubling him. 'It will not matter,' he said. 'I cannot even reckon how old I am. The stars are not the same. I do not know where I am. I do not know how long ago my cousin died. And it was only a handful of days ago I left him. Now only my liege speaks my language. All the rest are gone.' He looked up at two bewildered, sobered faces. 'That is the plainest I know to tell you. There is nowhere we come from. There is nowhere we are going. We only go. Come with us if you will. Leave us, the other side of the gate. It may be you will find peace there. It may be we will fall straight into Hell, and die there. We have no way to know. If it is to glory you hope to follow us—or wealth—there is none to offer you. And whether we are right or wrong in anything we do, I do not know. I cannot offer you that either. My liege cannot. So you would be wisest to stay here. Truly you would.'

'I do not understand you,' Chei said.

'I know. But I am telling you the truth. Go with us as far as Tejhos, that is all. Then ride west. Lose