team.
Even Lady was little more than a hodcarrier on this job. But hodcarriers are needed, too.
“Thanks for the compliment,” Tobo said after I tried out my similes. “But I’m mostly doing embroidery and plain old-fashioned knot tying on broken threads. Parts of this tapestry were plain outright crippled. It’ll never be completely right, even if it’s stronger than when it started.”
“But you can weasel Longshadow’s booby trap out of there?”
“It’s kind of like lancing a boil and cleaning it out, but yes. He actually made a pretty crude job of it. Obviously, he didn’t know much about shadowgates. He did know that there was no one in our world who knew more. What he didn’t understand was that there were more keys.”
“Of course he knew,” I said. “That’s why he sent Ashutosh Yaksha, his apprentice, to infiltrate the Nyueng Bao priests at the temple of Ghanghesha.”
Tobo looked puzzled, like he did not recall that story.
“He knew they had a key there and he wanted it. So he could get back to Hsien. If you don’t know that story you’d better corner your uncle. Because that’s what he told Sleepy.”
Tobo smiled weakly. “Well, maybe. I suppose.”
“What do you mean, you suppose?”
Lady paused what she was doing. “Don’t play Doj’s games, Tobo. You won’t be fooling anybody. I was there. Inside the white crow. I know what the man said.”
“That’s probably it. Doj told Sleepy a bunch of stories. Some were probably true but some he probably made up. Stuff he thought might be true because it sounded plausible based on what he did know. Master Santaraksita spent years searching the records at Khang Phi. The history of our world’s Nyueng Bao isn’t much like what Doj might’ve wanted you to believe.”
“Which was it?” I mused aloud. “Was he lying or making it up?” I have known plenty of people who would not admit ignorance even in the most obvious circumstance.
Tobo said, “Master Santaraksita says our ancestors left Hsien as fugitives, sneaking out like snakes using a secretly manufactured key. They were trying to get away from the Shadowmasters. There was supposed to be a regular, gradual evacuation across the plain. Because they were persecuted followers of Khadi they did favor the organizational structure we’ve seen in other bands of believers but those people weren’t mercenaries and they weren’t missionaries. They weren’t a Free Company. They weren’t a band of Stranglers. They were just running away because the Shadowmasters insisted they had to give up their religion. Master Santaraksita says their priests probably made up a more dramatic history after they’d been settled in the river delta for a while. After several generations spent wandering. Before they arrived the only people in the swamp were Taglian fugitives and criminals and a few remote descendants of the Deceivers Rhaydreynek tried to wipe out. Maybe the Nyueng Bao wanted to impress them.”
Tobo’s hands never stopped moving while he talked. But their movements had nothing to do with what he was saying. He was mending things that I could not see.
“How much did Doj lie?” I was determined to pin that on him. I never did trust that old man.
“That’s the intriguing part. I don’t know. I don’t think he really knows. He did tell me that a lot of what he told Sleepy originally he said just because it sounded believable and like something she wanted to hear. When you get right down to it, except for his skill with Ash Wand, Uncle Doj is a bigger fraud than most priests. Most priests actually believe what they preach.”
Lady said, “Sounds like he’s spent time hanging around with Blade.”
Tobo continued, “The key my ancestors used to cross the plain was created secretly in Khang Phi. It went back to Hsien so the next group of fugitives could use it. They never got the chance.”
“But they had the golden pick.” Which was the key that Sleepy eventually found and used to get onto the plain so she could release us Captured from underneath Shivetya’s fortress.
“That must have been the key that belonged to the Deceivers who hid the Books of the Dead back in Rhaydreynek’s time. They must’ve hidden the pickax under the temple of Ghanghesha. The temple has a long history. It started out as a Janaka shrine. The Gunni took over and used it as a retreat. Then the survivors of Rhaydreynek’s pogrom chased the Gunni out. But they faded away. Nyueng Bao folklore talks about bitter fighting over doctrine in the early days. A century later Gunni holy men from the cult of Ghanghesha began to come back to the swamp. Eventually most Nyueng Bao forgot Khadi and adopted Ghanghesha. A few generations back the pick turned up when the temple was being repaired. Somebody realized that it had to be an important relic. It wasn’t till more recent times, when Longshadow, and later Soulcatcher, found out about it, that anyone realized how important it had to be.”
“What about the pilgrimages?”
“Originally people from Hsien were supposed to meet our people at the shadowgate with news from home and more refugees. But the Shadowmasters found out. Plus on this side my ancestors lost touch with the past. Contrary to legend, and unlike the way things are now, there wasn’t that much pressure from outside. Hanging on to old ways and old ideas wasn’t that important a way to maintain the identity of the Nyueng Bao.”
“Whatever Doj says, most Nyueng Bao aren’t devoted to tradition and keeping the old ways. Most don’t remember anything anymore. You saw that while we were in Hsien. The Nyueng Bao aren’t anything like those people over there.”
Lady and I exchanged looks. Neither of us assumed Tobo was telling any more of the truth than Doj ever had. Though the boy was not necessarily lying consciously. I glanced at Thai Dei. He gave nothing away.
I said, “I’ve been wondering why Doj never found any Path of the Sword guys over there.”
“That’s easy. The Shadowmasters wiped them out. They were the warrior caste. They kept fighting till there weren’t any of them left.”
I had, for years, wondered why a sword-worshipping cult would be part of a people descended from a band of worshippers of Kina, who, in my world, did not believe in shedding blood. I still did not know. But now I knew that nobody else was likely to know, either.
I told Lady, “I’m surprised Sleepy never picked up on the fact that the supposed priest of this Nyueng Bao band went around carving people into steaks.”
“Deceiver people at that,” she added. “He slaughtered them by the score at Charandaprash.”
Tobo is a clever young man. He understood that we did not find his version of history more convincing than Doj’s.
I still was not sure whether he believed what he was saying.
It did not matter.
Lady poked me. She whispered, “Murgen and Willow Swan have drawn my attention to an interesting phenomenon. You’ll want to see for yourself. Tobo, drop doing what you’re doing and look at this, too.”
By then I knew it would be something I did not want to see. Thai Dei, Murgen and the others were debating the best places to take cover already.
I turned. Lady pointed. A trio of Voroshk flyers, appearing only slightly larger than dots, hovered above the rim of the plain. They were way up high and a long way away, motionless.
I asked, “Anybody want to guess how well they can see us?”
Lady said, “They can tell we’re here but that’s it. Unless they have a farseeing device.”
“What’re they doing?”
“Scouting around, I imagine. Now that their gate is gone they can get onto the plain whenever they want. During the day they’re safe as long as they stay off the ground. And they probably won’t have much trouble with shadows even at night if they stay high up. We’ve never seen shadows go higher than ten or fifteen feet above the surface of the shielding.”
“Think they’re looking for us? Or are they just looking?”
“Both, probably. They’ll want revenge. And maybe even a safe new world.”
The Voroshk did not move while we were talking. I pictured similar trios ranging to all points of the plain, perhaps hoping they could open the way without us. “Tobo, can they get off of the plain?”
“I don’t know. They won’t be able to here. Not without one of my keys. I’ll install something that’ll kill them if they try.”
I admired his confidence. “Suppose they have somebody as slick as you are? What’s to keep him from undoing your spells the way you’re undoing Longshadow’s?”
