"I know." I stroked his hair. "That's why it's important to remember. But the stories are important, too."

And we can bear to hear it now, I thought; not the whole truth, no, but Kaneka's truth, the one she will carry to sustain her, that she will weave into legend and one day her grandchildren will tell to their children, holding up an ancient Drujani war-axe and saying, this was hers, and this was her story.

If it is so, mayhap we can learn to endure our own.

This was her land, and these were her people. I envied her that. Her story was done, and I prayed for her sake it was so. Of a surety, she had earned it. Still, mine continued. A sacrifice had been made, and I had allowed another to take my place. I had promised to walk the Lungo Drom, the longest road, for Hyacinthe's sake. The end of his story was yet unwritten. I prayed it would find an ending half as meet, in debts forgiven and joyous reunion.

I prayed it would end in love. I prayed we could come home, all of us. In the morning, we departed for Saba. Kaneka held me hard and I returned her embrace, feeling her warm and solid presence. "Take care of yourself, little one," she whispered. "Take care of them all. May your strange gods watch over your every step."

I nodded and swallowed. She had been a good friend, and I was sorry to be leaving her. "And you, Fedabin. I think, after last night, you have a long life as the storyteller of Debeho ahead of you."

"It may be so." Kaneka released me and grinned. "It may be so!"

Onward we rode, turning back in the saddle to wave a half-dozen final farewells. At length, the village faded into the landscape, the mud huts indistinguishable from the tawny plains. Once again, we were on our way.

On the second day, we reentered the mountains, climbing treacherously narrow trails in single file, ascending to dizzying heights with the valley spread below us like a green carpet, deceptively smooth.

Our guides Tifari Amu and Bizan relaxed in the mountains, chatting amicably back and forth as they rode.

Joscelin too was at his ease, at home in the highlands of Jebe-Barkal as in his own Siovale, and Imriel-I had forgotten that he had been reared in the heights. I watched him scrambling about the crags in the evenings, gathering deadfalls for the fire, agile as a mountain goat.

A lost prince raised in secret by the priesthood of Elua, innocent of his origins. That had been his mother's plan. Watching him in the mountains, I nearly wished it had been so. Too late, now. The goatherd prince was not to be.

Once, a party of Tigrati tribesmen came upon us. For a few minutes, our welcome was uncertain.

Hands hovered over swords, and all of us eyed one another. I held my arm out, extended as Tifari had taught us, revealing the Ras' passage-token, and Imriel did the same. Joscelin was tense, his hands crossed low over his daggers; he had not fought since his injury. Then one of the men grinned and made a jest, and Bizan replied in kind, and all was well. Give every courtesy, and never reveal fear. We made camp together that evening and shared our goods in a common pot.

I heard the "mountain-talkers" for the first time that night, the speaking drums that Audine Davul's father had studied. The hunters carried a smaller version, a short length of log hollowed and polished, which their percussionist beat on with mallets. It made a sharp, staccato sound, carrying over the highlands in a series of complex rhythms. After a time, we heard the great drums of their distant village boom in answer.

"We will pass undisturbed," Tifari Amu said in satisfaction. "The news has been spread." And it must have been so, for we encountered no one else in the highlands.

After a week, we began to descend once more, following a series of plateaus to rejoin the river.

Wildlife abounded in these regions. I cannot even begin to count the species we saw. Antelope and gazelles were plentiful, graceful creatures with russet hides and spiraling, pronged horns. They had a trick of springing straight into the air with all four feet off the ground when startled. Bizan and Tifari Amu hunted them on horseback, with spears. It was an astonishing thing to see the swift Umaiyyati horses keep pace with the fleet beasts, swerving and doubling.

There were camelopards, too, which is another beast I would not have credited without seeing it. They are immensely tall and angular, with legs like knobbled stilts and necks that stretch to the treetops, pale hides covered with a crazed pattern of darker blotches. For all their size, they are gentle creatures and merely watched us pass, wondering. Of a surety, there were other, less benign inhabitants. At night we heard the roar of lions, a fearsome sound. When we could, we would cut acacia branches, dense with sharp, hooked thorns, and assemble a makeshift stockade around our campsite, for beasts of prey would come for our horses if they dared.

There were sharp-faced jackals like great black foxes, and hyenas, the carrion-eaters, with their ungainly bodies and spotted hides. After a successful hunt, one could always hear them, the eerie barking laughter ringing out in the night as they fought over the bones, which they cracked in their strong jaws.

There were scavenger birds, too; the sky would darken with them when Bizan and Tifari made a kill . . .

buzzards, and vultures with their vast wingspans and bare necks, and strangest of all, great storks that flew with their long legs trailing and landed to pick their way through the throng of bird-life with long, pointed beaks.

'Twas a beautiful land, that much I will own. I could understand why Audine Davul's father had loved it.

I could understand, too, why she longed for home. For all the wonders of Jebe-Barkal-and I am glad, to this day, that I have seen a herd of oliphaunts bathing in the river at sundown-I could not help but think that the lavender must be in full bloom in Terre d'Ange, perfuming the air, grapes beginning to ripen on the vine.

Still, there were far worse places we could be.

I knew. We had been there.

And whether it had been madness to bring him or no, Imriel thrived on the journey. Although the loose Jebean burnoose kept off the worst intensity of the sun, the pallor of the zenana had given way to healthy color. He had lost the skulking wariness I had first known, and the shadows under his eyes were gone.

Although he was far from sturdy, his bones no longer seemed quite so frail and vulnerable beneath his skin, and I swear, he'd grown a full inch since we left Daranga.

"He must be eleven, you know," Joscelin remarked one evening, watching Imriel lay tinder and branches for the campfire in accordance with Bizan's careful instruction.

"Eleven!" It startled me somehow; his age was fixed, in my mind, at ten.

"Do you remember, he was born in the spring? Six months old, when he vanished in fall." From the Little Court of La Serenissima, he meant; he'd been part of that search. "Somewhere between Drujan and here, he would have turned eleven."

"You're right," I said.

Joscelin watched him without speaking for a time. "He'll hate it at court," he said eventually. "They'll watch him like a hawk, every minute of every day, waiting for him to turn into his mother."

"Ysandre won't allow it," I protested.

He gave me a deep look. "Her own cousin tried to have him killed. Elua knows whether or not Barquiel was behind it. What's Ysandre going to do? Bring back the Cassiline Brothers, assign him as someone's ward?"

"If she has to."

"She won't like it." He shook his head. "Not after La Serenissima. And that won't stop the talk. Nothingcan stop the talk. He's already pulled one of Melisande's own tricks, eluding Lord Amaury like that."

"He didn't know," I said softly.

"You think that will matter where gossip is concerned?"

I looked away. "No."

"It will make him hard," Joscelin murmured. "I hate to see it, that's all."

"I know." I watched Imriel crouch beside the firepit, coaxing a spark from Bizan's flint striker and blowing softly on a nest of dried grasses at the heart of his arrangement. "Well, we've a long way to go yet, and a longer way back."

"Not as long as it was," Joscelin said. "Not nearly so long as it was."

And I was not sure, then, if we spoke of the journey or somewhat else.

SEVENTY.

WE OWED our respite to the rhinoceros.

'Tis passing strange, to owe so much to such a monstrous beast; and yet it is true. We were yet in sight of the river when the creature burst through the dense underbrush of the acacias, the hooked thorns troubling its thick hide not at all. I sat my horse stock-still, feeling it tremble beneath me, staring at the looming head like the prow of a warship, small, maddened eyes set on either side of that great central horn. All I could think of was the Black Boar of the Cullach Gorrym, and how it had emerged from the wood to lead Drustan's troops to victory in Alba. I'd thought that was big.

Then Tifari Amu shouted, and Bizan, and both of them wheeled their horses in opposite directions, seeking to draw the beast off. Having none of it, it lowered its head and charged, swerving at the last minute to miss me, scattering our bearers and our donkey-train, scattering all of us. It was fast, faster than one would imagine, and its passage shook the very earth. I heard cries of dismay and a yell of pain as someone was entangled in the thorns.

"Joscelin!"

Like in Daranga, Imriel's voice, high and true, rose above the shouting and the drumming of mighty hooves. I saw, and breathed a curse. Joscelin had dismounted and stood between me and the beast as it made its turn, rounding. His sword gleamed, angled in his two-handed grip, and he stood light on his feet, waiting.

The rhinoceros charged.

I did not see, in truth, exactly what happened, for in that instant I dug my heels into my mount's flanks and fought him as he flung up his head in terror, sawing at the reins and wrestling him into a sideways dancing step. I know only that Joscelin whirled out of the way, turning like an Eisandine tauriere, botharms extended and the tip of his sword scoring a long gash down the length of the creature's leathern hide.

I will do it, I thought, still fighting my mount and seeing the rhinoceros gather itself, lowering its head, shoulders rising like a hummock on the sea, seeking its opponent. Joscelin moved to intercept it, graceful and sure, Tifari and Bizan returning at full tilt, too far away, the wind snatching their cries from their open mouths. Elua help me, but I will do it, I will ride between him and that monster, if I have to kill my horse and myself.

Why it did, I'll never know, but the rhinoceros thought better of it. It shook itself, for all the world like a massive dog, and turned, trotting toward the river, plowing through the thornbushes and leaving us.

"You idiot!" I shouted at Joscelin, finding my voice. "You could have been killed! What in Elua's name were you thinking?"

He laughed out loud, spinning in a giddy circle, his blade carving a silver line in the air. "I struck true, Phedre! Did you see? I can still do it. I can still do it!"

I opened my mouth and closed it. "You could have been killed," I repeated with more restraint.

"Joscelin, if you need to test your skills, pick something that's not nearly the size of an oliphaunt, with hide like cured leather. You can't kill such a beast on foot, with a naked blade."

"You can if you cut their hamstrings." In a calmer humor, he sheathed his sword behind his back. "Tifari Amu told me; it's how they hunt oliphaunt. It takes precision, that's all. I'm sorry if I frightened you."

I gave him a look and had no time for aught else, for by then, Tifari and Bizan returned, with Bizan's horse pulling up lame, having strained a foreleg, and our bearer Nkuku had to be extricated from the thorns. He was badly scratched and shaken, and two of the donkeys entangled as well, having been scattered by the rhinoceros' charge. Those acacia thorns are like nothing I have ever seen; finger-length and sharper than a fishhook. There were wounds to be tended, human and animal alike, and a pair of water-skins slashed to shreds, good for naught but patch-leather. Tifari Amu opined that the beast must have been ill, and sought only to gain the river. Mayhap it was so, but it wrought a fair amount of damage! 'Twas a mercy Imriel had thought to grab the reins of Joscelin's mount, else we'd have had a job chasing it down, too.

Nonetheless, we needed to regroup, and so it was that Tifari scouted upriver, finding us a pleasant site.

Here we would make our camp, until we were fit to travel.

The site was situated at a bend of the river, which flowed smooth over a pebbled bed, swirling and eddying as it turned. At one point a natural spring gave rise to a deep, secluded pool, emptying in a rivulet which meandered off on its own, burbling over rocks to feed the Tabara River. It was a perfect place to bathe or wash clothing without fear of crocodiles or hippopotami intruding, and for that alone I was grateful. We pitched our tents on the grass near the river's bend, lush as greensward and ample fodder for horses and donkeys alike, and Yedo, another of the bearers, carved out a passage through the underbrush to the bathing-pool.

We spent four days there, all told, letting strains and thorn-gouges heal, while Tifari and Bizan hunted gazelle-not only to replenish our supply of meat, but to replace our water-skins, for they used the hides scraped clean and laid to cure, burying them in hot sand and shale away from the green swathe cut by the river. When it was done, the hides would be tied by the four legs and laced tight with leather thong woven from the remnants of the old water-skins, and these, Tifari assured us, would serve us well in thelast portion of our journey, where we must depart from the river and again traverse the highlands.

After that, we would reach the Great Falls, and enter Sabaean lands.

I did not know, until we had it, how much we needed that respite.

Thanks to the generosity of the Lugal of Khebbel-im-Akkad and Ras Lijasu of Meroe, while we did not travel in state, we travelled in comfort, as much as one might attain in the wilds of Jebe-Barkal. Millet we had in plenty, for cooking the flat, spongy bread of the Jebeans, and spices as well, and dried dates and figs. Our tents were well made and spacious, and we had all of us adopted the Jebean custom of sleeping on hide cots, stretchers that disassembled easily and raised one off the ground, where scorpions and other insects were wont to be found.

I even had a three-legged stool slung with a leathern seat, and an ample supply of ink and parchment to record our journey. And that I did, sitting before our tent and musing over the activities of our encampment, setting in writing the stories that Shoanete of Debeho had told me; yes, and our own travels as well, and the hunting-songs of Tifari Amu and Bizan, and the workmen's chants of our bearers, that no one had ever recorded. Would that I'd had such luxury in Skaldia! Near as it was, it was a culture no less exotic to those of D'Angeline blood. For a long time, I had wished only to forget it. Now, I thought of the hearth-songs I'd sung to poor Erich in the zenana, and wished I remembered more, and had them written down.

To think, I'd sung the Master of the Straits to calm with such a song.

His mortal mother had sung him songs.

I pondered our neat campsite, the dark skins and exotic features of our comrades, Joscelin and Imriel clad in Jebean attire, the splendid vista of the lowlands flanked by green mountains, the vast blue sky that arched over it all. We were a long way from the grey waters of the Straits, from that rocky, lonely isle.

Hyacinthe. I never forgot.

It was on the third day of our respite that Joscelin caught his fish, although that was not how I would remember that day. To be sure, he'd caught fish before, and a fair number of them, some weighing ten to fifteen pounds. I do not know what species they were-cowfish, the Jebeans called them-but they were a salmon hue, with many-rayed dorsal fins and small heads. When cooked, the flesh resembled trout and was quite agreeable.

Joscelin was after bigger game.

He pointed them out to me, he and Imriel; vast shadows lurking in the pebbled depths of the river. I nodded, listening politely as Imriel explained how they meant to use smaller fish as bait, showing me how the treble hooks were strung. And then I retreated to sit upon my stool and pore over my journal, watching the river's edge with half an eye and thinking about how I was to convince the Sabaeans-the Mele-hakim, Shoanete had called them-that they should reveal to me the Name of God that they had hidden from Adonai Himself.

It was the shouting that caught my ear, and at that I had to go and see.

Joscelin stood knee-deep in the rushing waters, clad only in a pair of white Jebean breeches. Sunlight gleamed on his loose, damp hair, the muscles working in his arms as he played out the line, hand overhand. Downstream, the mighty fish he'd hooked fought him, bucking and leaping, its sides flashing silver. I will own, I gasped when I saw the size of it.

And on a sandbar in the middle of the river, Imriel jumped up and down with excitement, shouting instructions, clutching a stout branch in one hand. His black hair was plastered to his cheeks in coils and he had stripped to his sodden breeches.

I laughed. I couldn't help it. 'Twas an epic battle in its own way, though unfit for any poet's tale. When the line was played, Joscelin began drawing it back in, fighting the fish for every inch of it. And how that fish fought! I saw it when it broke the water, silver-sided with a green back shading to black, fierce and vigorous, a true giant of the river. Imriel floundered into the depths, beating ineffectually at the waters with his club, and Joscelin shouted him back, still hauling on the line. I'd have worried about crocodiles, if I wasn't laughing so hard.

And somewhere, in the midst of it, my heart swelled to aching with love.

Somehow, by main strength, Joscelin hauled the thrashing fish onto the sandbar and Imriel landed it, striking it hard with his club and falling on it, struggling to hook his fingers in its gills. It heaved wildly under him, and boy and fish wrestled in the shallow waters, skin and scales wet and shining. He succeeded, too, though the fish was nearly as large as he was. Once it was subdued, Joscelin had to wade into the river to retrieve it, carrying the massive thing overhanging his arms. It must have weighed fifty pounds. He sloshed ashore, Imriel splashing alongside him, alight with glee.

"What do you think?" Joscelin asked laughing, tossing the fish at my feet where it landed with an audible thud, wriggling and twitching on the greensward.

I took two steps forward, grabbed his hair and kissed him.

For a moment, I think, he was too startled to react, and then- Elua! His arms came hard around me and he returned my kiss, hard, hands sliding along my back, following the path of my marque. It was like the torch igniting the Sacred Fires in the festal hall.

We parted breathless and staring at one another.

"I think," I said unsteadily, "you should bring me fish more often."

"I think I will," Joscelin replied, sounding bemused. He glanced down. "What are you looking at?"

"Nothing." Imriel was hugging himself, grinning fit to split his face, shifting from foot to foot. "You should take a bath, Joscelin; you're all over fish."

"So are you," he said to Imriel, then blinked at me. "And so are you, now. I should ... I should clean the fish, first."

"I can do it." Imriel wedged his fingers under the gills and dragged the fish a foot, rolling it onto its back to expose the pale belly. "See?" He traced a line with one damp forefinger. "I cut here to begin. You said I made a good job of it, remember? It's bigger than the others, that's all. Yedo can help me."

Joscelin raised his eyebrows at me.

"Well?" I said. "Imri's right, you're all over fish. Go take a bath, Joscelin." He went, gathering dry clothing, a lump of precious soap and a reasonably clean towel of Menekhetan cotton.

Imriel gloated over his fish, and looked at me sidelong. "I will tell Yedo not to let anyone use the bathing-pool," he said, all innocence. "If you want to go, and wash your gown."

"You think I should?" I touched his river-damp hair. Imriel looked down and nodded fiercely, the matter suddenly too great for words. I wondered why it meant so much to him. "All right," I said. "I'll go."

The passage to the bathing-pool was like a green tunnel, mimosa bushes crowding inward to filter the light, pungent sap weeping from the new-cut branches. Clusters of small yellow flowers brushed my gown as I passed, dusting the fabric with pollen. I felt strange in my own skin, sensitive to every breath of air, my heart beating too fast with uncertainty.

And aching, still.