I wandered through the village. There were empty houses, small places falling to ruin, empty stables. Of all the people left in the place, Vorge was about the oldest. So, the oldsters had been sent—where? And if not as servants, as what? Around the village stretched the small fields; between the houses were the gardens.
Ill tended. As though the people could not spare attention for them. It had the look of a settlement upon its last breath.
Dolcher still stood at the well. At last he shook his head and went to the house occupied by the Merchant and his group. I slipped back into the lean-to, my ear against the wall.
“Well, fellow, what do you want?”
“May I speak to you, Your Reverence?”
“Thpeak. You are thpeaking. Tho thpeak.”
“Your Reverence, they’ve come from Morp, from the Backless Throne again. They want our young people, sir.”
“Tho?”
“We can’t send our young people, sir. They’re needed for the crops. For raising the zeller. The Throne wants the zeller, too.”
“Let me underthtand thith. You are refuthing to do the Throne’th will?” Silence. I could visualize what was going on. Groveling. Fumbling for words.
“No, sir. Not the Throne, sir. Just Morp. Morp isn’t the Throne, and they don’t understand ...”
“I hope you have not thaid thith to anyone!”
“We did send a message, sir.”
“Fool. Then why are you thtanding here? Get under your roof. Pray you do not all die.” The door slammed. I slipped out to watch Dolcher staggering away from that door, reeling from sorrow and apprehension. Over his head I could see the sky, boiling. It had an unhealthy look. Suddenly I remembered what I had heard about Morp. A charnel town. A town of butchers. Through the wall came exclamations from the group there.
“The idiot hath refuthed the Throne. Yethterday he did it. Morp will have complained to the Throne. Thtorm will come. We will be fortunate to ethcape with our liveth.”
Back outside I went. Yes, storm boiled over the western horizon. Black cloud, drooping at the bottom like great pustulent udders. High-piled, running toward us with the inexorable flow of lava. I got myself back into the lean-to and under the wagon just as the first drops of rain hit.
It was a punishing storm. First rain and wind, tearing at the structures of the place, removing roofs and shutters, sending them flying like pennants into the east. Then hail, piercing what the rain had left.
Then greater wind. And with it all, a screaming sound of fury. Time and another time, dark as night. Howling rage. The roof of the lean-to went, but I remained half-dry beneath the wagon. I had anchored it as best I could with stakes driven in during the first roaring moments.
I lay flat, empty, the storm driving out all thought.
There was no village. There was no life. Only this horror of falling water, this terror of screaming wind.
One might as well die. I knew they were dead, I was dead. No point in being alive in this.
And then, after a forever time had passed, it was over. They had given the best house in the place to the Merchant, and now it stood alone. From inside it I could hear snoring. The Merchant and his guests were asleep. Among the sodden ruins the people of Bleem struggled into the light. There were no fields left, no gardens left. I went out into the woods, took away the hiding spell, and came into the village from the other side. Dolcher was there, standing dazed in the midst of the ruin, staring with empty eyes at the punishing sky.
“Dolcher,” I said. He had been deafened. It was hard to make him aware of me. “Dolcher. Listen to me. Take all your people, now. Right now. What little they can carry, nothing else. No wagons. Nothing else. Go. Go that way, back toward Fangel, around the city, not through it, and then south. You hear me?”
“Who are you?” He looked at me, not really seeing me. “Who are you?”
“It does not matter who I am. I am here with a message for you, to help you. Storm Grower will kill you all. You cannot pacify Storm Grower. Only when you are all dead will she rest. So, you must leave here. Go quickly. Go far. Find caves to protect you from hail. Forests to protect you from sight. Go. And go before those in the house waken.” I used every persuasive trick of voice I could manage, setting several small compliance spells on him meantime.
Not enough to draw interest, just little ones. When I went back toward the lean-to, he was in motion, staggering, bleeding, crying, but in motion.
It did not take them long. The longest time was spent simply in getting their attention. Once they understood, they moved quickly, as quickly as people can who are half-drowned and totally beaten. There were some dead. They laid them out in one of the wrecked houses and set fire to it. It bled smoke into the sky, smoldering. Then they went as I had suggested. Back toward Fangel, a sad, straggling procession. The last of them wended over the hill out of sight sometime before the Merchant woke.
He came to the door, opened it, stared out into the shambles. I had restored the hiding spell and was sitting on the well coping. He did not see me.
“Hey,” he shouted. “We will have our breakfatht now!” Needless to say, there was no response. He cursed for a time, which woke the others, and they came out of the place together.
“Storm Grower?” asked Betand. “Did she not know we were here?”
“I doubt they thought of it,” sulked the Merchant. “We will find no thuthtenance here. Let uth depart.”
“What was all this about?”
“The people objected to the levy from Morp. It ith Morp which provideth provender for Thtorm Grower and Dream Miner.” Provender was one way of putting it.
Huldra came into the light, blinking, snarling.
“How much farther? You have been to That Place before,
