"Is he still in your head?" Llesho asked. He thought he ought to be more worried about the intelligence Master Markko might be collecting through her eyes, but he found that mattered less to him than the creeping horror of the magician's hold on her mind.

But she shook her head. "I felt him go when the witch-finder died," she said, never taking her eyes off Hmishi. "I don't think he can maintain a hold on a mind he's taken from so far-not without a willing intermediary working with him. And Tsu-tan was more than willing."

"But he's gone. You're safe." He stopped her fingers from their restless wandering over the hand she held in her lap. You can't be broken, You can't be broken, he thought. he thought. Hmishi's not the only one who needs you. Hmishi's not the only one who needs you. He didn't add that to her burden, but reminded her of the only duty that seemed to matter to her now. "Hmishi will need you when he wakes up-the real you, the one he loves-right here, and not hiding away safe inside your head." He didn't add that to her burden, but reminded her of the only duty that seemed to matter to her now. "Hmishi will need you when he wakes up-the real you, the one he loves-right here, and not hiding away safe inside your head."

"Do you think I'm really safer inside my head?" she asked, her voice rising to a keening wail, "when all I can think about is the breaking of his bones?"

"I need you whole." It spilled out, selfish as it was. He He needed her, needed her, he he couldn't lose them now, when Master Markko's armies stood ahead of them, so close to the final battle. couldn't lose them now, when Master Markko's armies stood ahead of them, so close to the final battle.

"You need too much."

Llesho had said the same of his quest to the gods and ghosts who moved him. They hadn't released him, and he couldn't let Lling go either. "Who else can I depend on to do murder for me?" he asked, and it was the right thing to say. She was no less mad, but he knew that, just as the magician had, he could pull her strings. Only, instead of magic, he would use her hatred to control her. It made him ill to think it, but he couldn't let her go.

"He doesn't have your brother."

"What?" Llesho pulled back from the brink of his thoughts to focus on what she was saying.

"When the magician was in my mind, he took what I knew, but I sensed his thoughts as well." She shuddered at a memory. Coward though it made him, Llesho was glad she didn't share it with him. "He was looking for Menar, the poet, but he hadn't found him. It's hard to track the blind from a distance; he can't see out of his prey's eyes, so he doesn't know where to look. But he hears the camel bells, and the air grows warmer."

That jibed with Shou's report. He felt a burden lift from his heart that Master Markko hadn't succeeded in capturing the blind prince. But warmer? The high plains had already passed the height of summer and now declined swiftly into winter.

"Camel bells mean a caravan," Llesho mused out loud, "but does it cross north, down off the plateau toward Shan, or into the West?"

West, he thought. Lling didn't look away from Hmishi's wounds, but she was tracking now, and he took ruthless advantage of that. "Did he know of Ghrisz?" he thought. Lling didn't look away from Hmishi's wounds, but she was tracking now, and he took ruthless advantage of that. "Did he know of Ghrisz?"

"Oh, everybody knows about Ghrisz," she said in such an offhand way he wondered how the matter had escaped him.

That was Markko's imprint, however; the magician had tapped a mind somewhere Llesho's brother was well known. "Tell me, then." "He's in Kungol."

"A prisoner?" He was plotting rescue attempts in his head when she answered with a dark smile.

"A fugitive. In hiding. It's a race now, he thinks. If the raiders find Ghrisz, they will kill him." She had gone away in her head again, and Llesho wondered who was speaking to him-Lling, out of her memories, or the magician himself, in control again and taunting him with pieces of the puzzle. She'd said he was gone, but could she have been mistaken?

"Master Markko?" he asked, softly so as not to startle her.

But when she stole a glance at him, he knew. That was Lling, the most dangerous of their cadre, but herself alone.

"He can't touch me now," she said, and he wondered if she meant more than the breaking of the spell with Tsu-tan's death. "I can't read him either, anymore. But I remember it all." And she would use even her most horrific memories in their service if it brought her closer to Master Markko's blood.

"He would have used Adar to draw Ghrisz out of hiding, but now he seeks the last brother to use as ba to draw you all to him. If you win through and fii Menar first, he loses his leverage against the raiders wl hold Kungol. And he wants something in Kungol ve; badly."

"But what?" The raiders had looted the treasuries Kungol long ago, and they had mostly been spiritu; anyway.

"I don't know. I never got deep enough to find out. Her gaze was clear when she turned it on him. "Fin him for me, and I'll make him talk. Those secrets-wha pain he feels as pleasure, and what other he fears mos in the world-I know."

Llesho shivered at her grim purpose. What did it maki him, knowing he couldn't do what Lling proposed, bu willing to let her take that burden for him? What othei tasks in front of him would prove greater than hi; strength? This one, for instance. Watching Hmishi die.

Carina joined them then, with a shallow dish of pungent purple water in which leaves and bits of bark floated. "He can't drink," she said. "Even if his throat could swallow, there is too much damage throughout his body. Any liquid would leak through the wounds and create infection where it pools. But this will help."

She took a soft white cloth and dipped it in the water, then smoothed it over Hmishi's cracked lips. "Sometimes, especially when the pull of life and love are strong, the spirit of one who has traveled so far on his journey to the underworld will turn back to bid farewell. This should free him from the pain, if he should rise out of his sleep to say good-bye."

"Thank you." Lling reached for the cloth, and Carina gave it to her, relieving her of the pillow on her lap so that she could move about his bed with ease.

"Bathe him carefully-he won't feel the pain where the elixir touches."

Llesho figured he wouldn't feel the pain anyway. He'd seen death on the battlefield, and it hovpr^H tui^v tui^v this bed like a dream. It gave Lling something to do, however, and a way to touch her lover without fear of hurting him. Knowing Carina, that was her intention. It seemed to be working. The healer passed in and out of the tent with a word, a touch, but left them to their vigil. Chen and Han, the lesser moons, crossed the sky with Great Moon Lun in pursuit, but Llesho marked their passing only by the dim red light that moved across the roof of the tent. this bed like a dream. It gave Lling something to do, however, and a way to touch her lover without fear of hurting him. Knowing Carina, that was her intention. It seemed to be working. The healer passed in and out of the tent with a word, a touch, but left them to their vigil. Chen and Han, the lesser moons, crossed the sky with Great Moon Lun in pursuit, but Llesho marked their passing only by the dim red light that moved across the roof of the tent.

Finally, as the lesser sun spread the gray light of false dawn, Lling curled up on the floor close beside the bed and closed her eyes. Llesho resisted the pull of sleep but battle and grief had exhausted him. Like Lling, he would not leave Hmishi to die alone, but found a place on the rugs to rest. Sleep, when it came, crept up on him like a gray mist.

Pig was waiting for him in the dream world, but he didn't need his spirit guide to tell him where he was. He recognized his brother, and the woman pulling him down on the rich-turned earth with an arm around his neck and a kiss on his lips while the bright heads of sunflowers above them guarded their play. With a long, silent glance at Pig, who watched the couple moving among the tall green stems, he began walking, out of his brother's dream.

He had figured out on his own that he sought out Shokar's dreams unconsciously, for the comfort they afforded. That ought to mean that he could visit his other brothers as well, though he doubted that he would find so warm and inviting a resting place in any of their dreams. Before he went on spending lives in his quest, however, there were things he had to know. Like, what did Lluka dream that filled him with despair? He would go there before he was done, but first he brought the image of Balar to mind. This brother, too, harbored secrets. He didn't think Balar would react as badly as Lluka would to finding Llesho in his dreams, so he stepped up, into a room with walls plastered in yellow mud and lit by a branch of candles on a familiar table. They were in Balar's music room in the Palace of the Sun.

"Come in if you want to, but try to keep still." Balar turned to him with a frown of concentration pulling at his brows. In his hands he held a lute which he was tuning with small turns of the keys and small shifts of the frets. It was a smaller instrument than Llesho knew him to play: four courses of strings, he saw, with two strings per course, except for the highest string. Seven strings in all, six in pairs and one alone.

"Where is Ping?" Llesho asked. He figured the strings must be the seven brothers, but where was their sister?

"Not yet born," came the answer, "Soon, though, I should think." Not long after Ping was born, Balar had gone to Ahkenbad for a diplomatic visit and training in the mystical ways of the dream readers. In his dream, Llesho's brother had returned to that more peaceful time, but still his face was tense with worry.

"What are you doing?"

To demonstrate, Balar strummed the lute. It took no expert in music to hear the sour clash of notes. "I can't seem to bring them into harmony, no matter what I do." He shifted the frets a bit more, tried again, and shook his head, dissatisfied. "This one is the key-" He plucked the highest string, the solitary note. The string Llesho thought must symbolize himself.

"I think it's this one," Llesho said, and pointed to the lowest string, so tightly drawn that it seemed on the edge of snapping. The neck of the lute seemed to strain under the pressure of that tension.

"I've lost the key," Balar pointed to the beak, where one tuning key was indeed missing. "Still, it's all in the balance. The other strings will have to compensate. Especially-" he gave Llesho a pointed look "-the highest."

"I don't think I can stretch any farther," Llesho answered in the same metaphor.

Balar gave a little shake of his head. "Then you'll have to find the key." He returned to his tuning as if he were alone.

After just a moment more to breathe in the memory of Kungol, Llesho started running in his dream. He thought about visiting Adar, but didn't want to disturb the work of Carina's healing herbs on his brother's sleeping body.

"You know what you have to do," Pig reminded him. "You might as well get it over with."

Llesho did know, and he ran with a purpose, finding his brother Lluka sleeping in his tent with a lantern glowing in the dark. He wondered if Lluka always slept with a light, if the darkness of his mind was so desperate that he daren't close his eyes on an outer darkness as well.

"What do you want?" Lluka opened his eyes, staring into the corner of the tent where Llesho stood, but his brother didn't seem to see him. "If you are a demon of my sleep, begone. I've had enough of your torments. They don't move me anymore."

"Not a demon. It's me, Llesho." He stepped into the lantern light, but Lluka didn't see or hear. With a grumble he straightened his tangled blankets and lay on his back, staring blank-eyed at the tent cloth overhead.

No dreams here, Llesho thought, before he was swallowed whole into a directionless gray twilight. Like the gardens of heaven, he remembered, where night never fell. He reached to clasp the pearl he carried at his throat. When he found them all and returned them to the Great Goddess, light and dark would return to heaven, and the stars would ascend to their proper places. He didn't know how, but it was part of his quest. This wasn't the heavenly gardens, however. In Lluka's dream, there was no earth to stand on, no heavenly paths or divine fruit trees. The gray dusk, aswirl in ash and fire, rang with the clash of swords and the cries of the dying, reeked with the sweat of battle and the fear of horses and soldiers. And their blood, a smell that choked him as Llesho struggled to find his way. Llesho thought, before he was swallowed whole into a directionless gray twilight. Like the gardens of heaven, he remembered, where night never fell. He reached to clasp the pearl he carried at his throat. When he found them all and returned them to the Great Goddess, light and dark would return to heaven, and the stars would ascend to their proper places. He didn't know how, but it was part of his quest. This wasn't the heavenly gardens, however. In Lluka's dream, there was no earth to stand on, no heavenly paths or divine fruit trees. The gray dusk, aswirl in ash and fire, rang with the clash of swords and the cries of the dying, reeked with the sweat of battle and the fear of horses and soldiers. And their blood, a smell that choked him as Llesho struggled to find his way.

"Lluka!" he called through the dream landscape. "Where are you?"

"I am in hell, brother. All the futures I have seen come to this, though you are dead in most of them." Lluka took shape, came forward out of the mist.

"What has happened here?" Llesho asked. "For that matter, your answer to my first question was dramatic but not very useful. Where are we, and how did we get here?"

"The questions are impossible to answer. 'How will will we get here?' at least gets the when of it right. This is the future of all the worlds. 'Where' doesn't exist anymore. Hell will overrun heaven and earth, killing the night and murdering the day, wiping out all that lives or grows or breathes. When they are free, the demons of hell will set fire to the air and trample the heavenly gardens under their clawed hooves. The material world will vanish, disintegrate into nothing as the forces of heaven and hell come together in the greatest conflagration the universe has ever known. All the realms of sky and earth, of the underworld and the wheel of life will fall in the fires of that battle. In all my dreams, and my waking nightmares, this is what I see." we get here?' at least gets the when of it right. This is the future of all the worlds. 'Where' doesn't exist anymore. Hell will overrun heaven and earth, killing the night and murdering the day, wiping out all that lives or grows or breathes. When they are free, the demons of hell will set fire to the air and trample the heavenly gardens under their clawed hooves. The material world will vanish, disintegrate into nothing as the forces of heaven and hell come together in the greatest conflagration the universe has ever known. All the realms of sky and earth, of the underworld and the wheel of life will fall in the fires of that battle. In all my dreams, and my waking nightmares, this is what I see."

As Lluka spoke those final words, the sounds of battle erupted in an explosion so immense that his senses couldn't grasp it. Fire swept toward him in a wall, faster than a horse could run, faster than a mind could grasp the oncoming devastation. Llesho called out in terror and threw his hands over his eyes, too late to stop the blindness as the fire swept over him. In the trembling gray of the death of the universe, he realized that he was still alive, the battle raging around him as it had before the conflagration had passed over.

"And now, we do it again," Lluka said with a grimace of a smile, mocking both of them.

"Does Master Markko do this?" Llesho asked, his voice shaky but determined. All he had to do was stop the magician, and none of it would happen.

"No," Lluka answered, "though he started it long ago. When he was young, I think, he wished to prove his power over the underworld, probably by calling the dead, though his purpose and his methods make no part of the dreams that fill my nights. What the dreams show is that he released a great demon king from hell instead. How the magician survived his own magic I do not know either, except that he must have made some bargain with the creature. Their goal is now the same-bring down the gates of heaven. When hell takes the heavenly gardens, all life will perish, all worlds will perish."

A fireball suddenly filled the sky, sucking all the sound out of the air and freezing time and motion in the moment. Llesho crouched down, cowering behind his sleeve, as the waiting havoc was released in a hurricane riding ahead of the flames. When the storm had passed over them, Lluka continued.

"Like you, I once had hope. But one by one the futures that might vie with the destruction have vanished from my dreams. Now I only see the end, and sometimes, the face of the demon raging at the gates that still stand against him. But they weaken, and there is nothing left to be done but die."

"There has to be a way," Llesho insisted, though his heart quivered in his chest. "The Great Goddess calls me to her aid. That has to mean we have a chance of winning."

"None that I can see," Lluka answered, then he squinted, as if something had obscured his vision. "Llesho? Where did you go? Llesho!"

Returning his brother's call would do no good, any more than waving his hands in his brother's face. The dream had taken Lluka past Llesho, and he wandered away, moaning as the fireball rose again, taller than any tree, tall enough to swallow Great Moon Lun in its vast maw. When Llesho brought his eyes away from the horrifying sight, he was back again in the tent city of the khan. The ger-tent of the khan lay ahead, and he felt the lingering pull of the Lady Chaiujin's potion in his blood. He entered, surprised that none of the khan's many guards stopped him as he passed down the center to the dais where the khan slept with his wife. Except that when he reached the mound of rugs and furs, an emerald- green bamboo snake raised its head and looked at him out of lidless black eyes.

"Go back," she hissed at him. "You do not belong here." And she laid her head down on the khan's breast.

Pig rejoined him then, a troubled frown curling around his tusks. He put a forehoof on Llesho's shoulder, drawing him away. "She's right. You don't belong here."

"I want-" he began, and woke up with the words still on his lips.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE.

LLESHO woke in the red tent where he had started his dream travels. Dawn had brightened the sky to the color of Lluka's dreams, confusing him for a moment. Had he really returned, or was he still dream traveling? But Lling still slept at the side of the cot where Hmishi's labored breath stuttered and fell, stuttered and fell. Back, Back, he thought; it hadn't happened yet. There was still time to stop it. He gave a shaky sigh of relief and threw off his blankets. he thought; it hadn't happened yet. There was still time to stop it. He gave a shaky sigh of relief and threw off his blankets.

On the cot in the corner, the breath rattled in Hmishi's throat, and died.

No! Leaping to his feet, Llesho pressed his lips tightly together to keep from raging out loud. He thought he ought to wake Lling but refused to give her up to grief; he needed her sane to keep from flying to pieces himself. But he couldn't stay here, with the rage beating at his ribs.

Low branches hit him, and vines grabbed at his legs, but he ignored them and the small injuries he collected. Llesho was running before he realized what he was doing. No, no, no! No, no, no! He needed to get away, escape to the river where he could rail at the gods for laying waste to his life again and yet again. When he was far enough from the encampment that he thought no one would hear, he gave himself up to the anger and pain clawing its way out of his throat. He needed to get away, escape to the river where he could rail at the gods for laying waste to his life again and yet again. When he was far enough from the encampment that he thought no one would hear, he gave himself up to the anger and pain clawing its way out of his throat.

"I can't do this!" he screamed at the gray mist clinging to the river. "I needed him! I needed Harlol, and you took them both! How am I supposed to save Thebin?" The fireball of Lluka's dream rolled through his waking mind. "How do I stop the end of the world if I can't even keep my own cadre alive! You may as well ask me to empty the Onga River with a drinking cup-it's impossible!"

He didn't know who he was shouting at, but it wasn't the woman who stepped from between the trees. Lady Chaiujin, dressed in green like bamboo in the spring, answered him anyway.

"I know, child." She stretched her arms wide to him, and smiled sadly as she said, "They ask too much and never give you the rest you crave. But I will give you rest. Come."

He should have wondered how she happened to appear in the woods outside his own camp when he had just visited in dreams the tent city of her husband a hundred li away. The dream he had visited, in which she lay as an emerald-green bamboo snake on the breast of her husband, should have warned him of the danger she represented. But her voice crooned low, hypnotically calling to him with promises of rest and more in the comfort of her soft arms. She didn't inflame him as she had before but offered the cool water of peace between her breasts. Part of him remembered Carina's warning, that a potion had stirred the longing she raised in him.

It should have troubled him, but his losses lay so heavily on his heart that he was beyond caring anymore. He went to her with his own arms wide, and let her wrap him in her green peace.

Heavy footsteps rattled in the undergrowth behind him. Llesho sprang back, shocked to be caught with his arms around the wife of the khan. Before he could begin to formulate his excuses, however, Master Den broke into the clearing by the riverbank.

"I thought I might find you here."

The lady had disappeared. Den's brow furrowed when he caught sight of Llesho standing alone by the river. Coming closer, he hissed a "tsk" and from the place where the lady's arms had wrapped him, Master Den plucked a snake as green as new bamboo. "We'll have none of that, Lady Chaiujin."

With Master Den's presence, the dream state seemed to fall away from him, and Llesho recognized the snake as poisonous, with a sting as deadly as anything Markko had ever poured into him. She went for the trickster's hand with bared fangs, but Master Den caught her behind her jaws and raised her so that they were eye-to-beady-eye. "He belongs to the goddess," he said. "Your master cannot have him."

She hissed at him and lashed her tail while he held her gently, so that she hurt neither herself nor him. When she had calmed a little, he set her into the crook of a tree.

"Is that really Lady Chaiujin?" Llesho asked as she slithered away in the branches.

"As real as she was when she greeted you in the tent of her husband," the trickster god asserted. Llesho wondered, though, which visit he meant-the formal one, when she had poisoned his tea with a love potion, or the dream travel where she had greeted him as a serpent in the bed of her husband. He didn't have a chance to pursue his question, however.

"You've been busy," Master Den noted wryly, brushing at his shoulders with the discerning eye of a body servant.

Llesho waved him off, heading back toward the camp with an angry jerk of the head. He was sick of riddles, sick of help showing up just when it would do Hmishi no good at all.

"How did you get here, and why do you always arrive just moments too late to be of any earthly use to anyone?" Llesho snapped the questions like arrows as he headed back for the camp.

"The khan traveled through the night with his army and raised his city on the plains above us." With his great long strides, Master Den quickly caught up to Llesho, who didn't indicate by any gesture that he noticed while Master Den gave the mundane explanation for his appearance. "We fetched up here shortly after false dawn, but no one could find you in the camp. Prince Tayyichiut seemed to think you might have sought the comfort of the river. And so I have come, just in the nick of time, to save you from a greater rest than you bargained for."

There were layers to that statement that Master Den's presence forced him to consider. No, he hadn't come to the river to find the comfort of death. But, yes, he had welcomed the touch of the Lady Chaiujin even knowing what she offered. And as for the nick of time- "Maybe not." Let his teacher chew on that and see if he liked it. When a beautiful woman offered him rest in her arms, he'd be a fool not to take it, even if she meant it to be permanent.

More likely, he was a fool to think that was a good idea. It gave him pause. Maybe Lling wasn't the only one who had crossed the line of sanity. He'd seen it in her-how had he not seen it in himself?

"Carina said to tell you that Adar is resting comfortably, but will have to travel under sedation and with the baggage until he heals. Lling would not be moved, but has taken a little tea. She will sleep at least until Great Sun rises. Bright Morning attends Hmishi's body, and wanted me to fetch you."

"The mortal gods make uncommon messengers," Llesho remarked pointedly.

Master Den raised an eyebrow and sniffed his displeasure with his student. "That's what we do-deliver messages. The question, when confronting the gods, should always follow thusly: 'Who sent the message?' and, 'What was its purpose?'"

"Do I get any clues?" Llesho kicked through fallen leaves, expecting no answer. The trickster god surprised him.

"You can be sure that the gods who attend you fit the purpose."

"Then I suppose I am lucky that I've got you and not the Lady SienMa."

Den slanted him an ironic side glance. "Oh, she's on her way."

That didn't surprise Llesho at all. But Emperor Shou had her special favor. "What does Dognut want?"

"You'll have to ask him yourself."

They had come to the tent where Hmishi lay. Carina was nowhere in sight, but Bixei and Stipes waited for him in front of the tent, and Tayy stood with them, cradling Little Brother in his arms.

Bixei stirred and gave a bow of salute. "Your brother Shokar was here, and paid his respects. He has gone off to keep an eye on Lluka, who has begun muttering under his breath in a way that worries Balar and sets Shokar's teeth on edge, he says. Balar himself is inside, with Bright Morning."