Elsmere: A city and port on the north coast of the Bay of Elsmere. Known for its fisheries and for ocean trade. It is protected from the strife often found in the north by its remoteness from other large population centers.
Merhaven: A duchy to the east of Elsmere, small, self-contained, consisting largely of fishing villages and farms. Genieve is Duchess of Merhaven, though she never uses the title.
The Highlands of Ghastain: A huge mesa thrust up when the skystone fell, surrounded by precipitous cliffs, drained through the King’s Cut and the Eastern Valley by the river Wells and to the south through various rivers flowing into the Big Mud. The northwest quadrant of the highlands is known as the King’s Highlands.
Map
Contents
Dedication
Cast of Characters
Map
Chapter 1
The Woman Upstairs
Chapter 2
The Journey
Chapter 3
Pursued by a Witch
Chapter 4
Becoming Xulai
Chapter 5
An Awakening
Chapter 6
The Dragdown Swamps
Chapter 7
The Old Dark House
Chapter 8
Merhaven and the Sea
Chapter 9
The Sea King
Chapter 10
The Last Monster
Chapter 11
The Sea Child
About the Author
Also by Sheri S. Tepper
Credits
Copyright
About the Publisher
Chapter 1
The Woman Upstairs
“If you look over your left shoulder,” said the horse, “you can see the towers of King Gahls’s castle on the highlands.”
The wagon driver replied, speaking very softly, “Blue, if you look over your right shoulder, across the water, you might catch a glimpse of a dozen or so of Hulix’s archers with arrows nocked.”
“Ahhhh,” murmured the horse, plodding resolutely forward. “That would be Hulix, Duke of Kamfels, son of Queen Mirami.”
Abasio, the driver, resolutely keeping his eyes forward, yawned and stretched, giving no indication he had seen the archers. Among Abasio’s former friends and companions it was generally supposed that archers who had taken the trouble to paint their hands and faces to match their leafy surroundings were less likely to shoot a passerby if the passerby didn’t notice them. Being noticed could be considered an insult. “He is indeed the son of Queen Mirami.” Abasio yawned again, loosening his jaw, which had been tightly clenched. “In order to allay suspicion, I am about to sing something pastoral and suggestive of bucolic innocence.”
“Something half-witted and full of tra-la-las,” sneered the horse, sotto voce, “and hey-nonny-nonnies.”
“Very probably,” said Abasio, clearing his throat.
Hey—oh, the wagon pulls the horse,
Or else the horse the wagon,
And no one really knows what force
By which the which is draggin’.
For time can run from front to back
And sometimes even sidewise,
And oceans have the liquid knack
Of often running tidewise. . .
“Neigh, neigh,” offered the horse, “ti-i-idewise.”
The singer continued:
Though who does what and what was where
Are matters that can lure us,
With riddles so arcane and rare
That none know how to cure us,
Let’s not waste life deciphering,
Let lore and logic scatter,
Let love and beauty rapture bring,
And meaning will not matter!
His voice, a pleasant baritone, after engaging in a number of fal-de-lals and triddle-de-dals, faded into a silence that did not so much fall as insinuate itself.
“Are they gone?” the horse whispered.
“Seemingly,” replied Abasio, throwing a surreptitious glance across his shoulder where the water-filled gap had widened considerably between them and the archers. “Either they or we have gone, yes.”
“It was all those neighs that did it,” the horse said, approaching a curve in the road. “They decided we were not dangerous because I kept de-neighing it. Whaagh?” Blue snorted in astonishment, stopped dead, glaring ahead in dismay. What had been a road was, for a considerable distance, underwater.
Abasio heaved a sigh and leapt from the wagon seat. Once level with the horse he could see that small stones emerged from the water’s surface here and there. Fallen branches at the edges lay partly submerged but not afloat. “It’s shallow,” he said, leaning away from the wagon to look ahead. “The road comes out of it just at the end of the curve.”
“I suggest you wade,” the horse remarked. “Let’s keep as much weight off the wheels as possible.” He put his shoulders into the collar and heaved, moving briskly through the swale, the wheels making ripples that sloshed against Abasio’s boots as he moved alongside, ready to push if necessary. They came out of the water onto an uphill road freshly cut from the forest. Rounds of new wood, sawed off flush with the ground and scarred with wheel and hoof tracks, showed where trees had been. Branches, some still with leaves attached, were piled in the forest on the uphill side, though the large timber had been hauled away. Downward to their right—where the old road had been—water rippled softly under the stroke of the wind, its shivering surface flecking the valley with darting glints of sun gold.
“It’s the waters rising. So they say,” Abasio commented resentfully.
“We should have gone down the other side of the fjord.”
“Where we’d definitely have encountered the inimical duke himself. If we’d survived the encounter, we’d have had to take the ferry to get to Krakenholm,” said Abasio. “You may recall what happened the last time we put you on a ferry.”
“It was windy. There were waves.”
“You were seasick,” said Abasio. “I was only thinking of your welfare.” He tugged very slightly on the reins to signal a momentary halt and did a few knee bends to give the appearance of a man stiffened by hours of driving, though he had been asleep inside the wagon until recently. Big Blue had slept the previous night while Abasio had kept watch, so today the horse had followed the road while the man slept. The lands of both King Gahls and the duke of Kamfels were reputedly unfriendly to travelers, but there had been no alternative to trespassing on one or the other.
“How much farther to Woldsgard?” the horse asked.
“Not far. You can see a couple of fingers of the Hand of Wold just over the rise, a little
