That afternoon, Harta-ak took a deep, shuddering breath and opened his eyes. He cried out in terror and Versa-eh rushed to his side. She stroked his hair, smiled, and laughed through tears. “It is about time you woke up. You are so lazy!”
The next morning, Alex did the same. His eyelids fluttered, then flew open and he gasped for breath.
“You were far away,” Senta-eh observed.
“I did not think I was ever coming back,” Alex agreed.
They spent another week in Rinta-ah. Initially, Alex and Harta-ak puttered around like ancient men, barely able to walk. A few days later, they were upright, and a few days after that both men had regained much of their vitality.
Rinka-ak, the young prince, visited them. “I thought you were foolish to try to beat godat-ta. I didn’t know it would be the wasta-ta that nearly killed you.”
Alex glanced at Senta-eh. “We’ve banished godat-ta twice now. I hope to never have to see another wasta-ta.” A sudden thought occurred to Alex. “Where are our horses?”
Rinka-ak waved the concern away. “They are safe on the other side of the river. I stationed a contingent of men there to care for them. When you are strong enough, they will be waiting for you.” He paused thoughtfully. “In fact, I’m thinking of building a small settlement on the other side of the river. Over time, we could improve the bridge, so we could move more and bigger items from one side to the other.”
Harta-ak and Versa-eh lit up. “We have an idea.”
Alex sat back and looked at the three young people. They were all less than twenty years old. They were the new generation of Kragdon-ah.
Maybe progress is not so easy to stop.
“The difficulty,” Rinka-ak mused, “is how to make a small settlement defensible, both from man and beast.”
“That’s exactly our idea. We’d be happy to work with you on it.”
“Tell me!” Rinka-ak said, a glint of excitement in his eye.
“Have you been to the salt deposit?”
Rinka-ak put two fingers to his forehead. “My father took me several times.”
Harta-ak formed his hands into a bowl. “So you know it is a round bowl, with a single entrance that doesn’t involve climbing to the top.” He waggled his pointer fingers to indicate the opening. “Our idea is that we could build a gate that would block that entrance. Then, we could put dwellings for a few people inside. It wouldn’t take many people to defend it then. A few guard houses on the ridges would be all it would take.”
Alex wandered away, still trying to work strength back into his limbs. Senta-eh joined him as he walked to the bottom of the amphitheater that held Rinta-ah. “Are you not interested in Harta-ak’s plans? You went to great lengths to make this happen for him.” She didn’t say You almost died for it, but those words hung between them anyway.
“I went to great lengths to give them the opportunity. That’s all they ever needed. Now they have that. Our young friends are all bright and ambitious. They will figure out how to make things work without this old soldier.”
“You are not so old. You still look good to me. For one who is so small, that is.” She added the last with a smile.
Alex turned and looked up into Senta-eh’s beautiful face. “You know how I feel about you.”
“Do I? You have said I am a good person. There are many good people among the Winten-ah.”
As usual, Alex found himself tongue-tied at the onset of a conversation that dealt with issues beyond his ability to express.
“Let me tell you, then. I want to spend every day with you. Every minute.”
“We already do,” she pointed out.
“You are not making this easy. You are frustrating.”
“So people have told me since I was a young girl.”
“Here it is, then. I want to be with you. In every way. I want to bind our lives together. You are more than the best person I know. You are my first thought in the morning and my last at night.” He hesitated, thought of a Tom Cruise movie from his youth and considered saying You complete me, but that wasn’t right. “I want to commit my life to you.”
“Then why haven’t you?”
“Because I cannot until I know it is impossible for me to return home. To my daughter.”
“I thought we knew that when we took you to where your door had once been and it was gone.”
Alex put two fingers to his forehead. “I have seen one other door.”
“Ah,” she said, the light dawning. “Denta-ah. There was a door in Denta-ah that the slug-man used.”
“Yes,” Alex confirmed.
“Come then. Let’s tell our host and our friends we are leaving. We are going to Denta-ah.”
Chapter TenReturn to Denta-ah
Four days later, Alex and Senta-eh saw the first guard on the forest path to Winten-ah.
“Gunta, Manta-ak, Senta-eh.”
“Gunta,” they both returned.
The guard lifted a horn to his lips and announced their coming. He leaned over his platform and said, “We have other company as well.”
“Nothing that will slow us down much, I hope,” Alex said quietly to Senta-eh. Things had changed between them since Alex had finally, if somewhat ham-handedly, told Senta-eh how he felt. There had been times over the years when an electric charge had jumped between them. It was a constant thing now. Alex was anxious to make a final decision.
They kicked their heels into their horses and hurried along the path, greeting each guard in turn.
When they turned east toward the cliffside, it filled Alex with a sense of home, as it had for years now.
His sharp eyes saw a small contingent of people sitting at the edge of the field near the cliff. Three of the people sitting there wore orange robes.
The children of Winten-ah ran out to greet them. They oohed over the scars Alex
