The son,’ Onrack said after a moment, ‘seems… very young.’
‘Well, so am I.’
‘Not when I look into your eyes. It is not the same with this Soletaken,’ he continued, seemingly unmindful of the wound he had just delivered. ‘No, those yellow eyes are young.’
‘Innocent?’
A nod. ‘Trusting, as a child is trusting.’
‘A gentle mother, then.’
‘She did not raise him,’ Onrack said.
Ah, the Imass, then. And now I begin to see, to understand. ‘We will be vigilant, Onrack.’
‘Yes.’
Rud Elalle led them into a split between two upthrust knobs of layered rock, a trail that then wound between huge boulders before opening out into the Imass village.
Rock shelters along a cliff. Tusk-framed huts, the spindly frames of drying racks on which were stretched hides. Children running like squat imps in the midst of a gathering of perhaps thirty Imass. Men, women, elders. One warrior stood before all the others, while off to one side stood three more Imass, their garb rotted and subtly different in cut and style from that of the Bentract-the strangers, Trull realized-guests yet remaining apart.
Upon seeing them, Onrack’s benign expression hardened. ‘Friend,’ he murmured to Trull, “ware those three.’
‘I decided the same myself,’ Trull replied under his breath.
Rud Elalle moved to stand at the Bentract leader’s side. ‘This is Ulshun Pral,’ he said, setting a hand on the man’s thick shoulder-a gesture of open affection that seemed blissfully unmindful of the growing tension at the edge of this village.
Onrack moved forward. ‘I am Onrack the Broken, once of the Logros T’lan Imass, child of the Ritual. I ask that we be made guests among your tribe, Ulshun Pral.’
The honey-skinned warrior frowned over at Rud Elalle, then said something in his own language.
Rud nodded and faced Onrack. ‘Ulshun Pral asks that you speak in the First Language.’
‘He asked,’ Onrack said, ‘why 1 chose not to.’
‘Yes.’
‘My friends do not share the knowing of that language. I cannot ask for guesting on their behalf without their understanding, for to be guest is to be bound to the rules of the tribe, and this they must know, before I would venture a promise of peace on their behalf
‘Can you not simply translate?’ Rud Elalle asked.
‘Of course, yet I choose to leave that to you, Rud Elalle, for Ulshun Pral knows and trusts you, while he does not know me.’
‘Very well, I shall do so.’
‘Enough with all this,’ Hedge called out, gingerly setting down his pack. ‘We’ll all be good boys, so long as no-one tries to kill us or worse, like making us eat some horrible vegetable rightly extinct on every other realm in the universe.’
Rud Elalle was displaying impressive skill and translating Hedge’s words almost as fast as the sapper spoke them.
Ulshun Pral’s brows lifted in seeming astonishment, then he turned and with a savage gesture yelled at a small crowd of elderly women at one side of the crowd.
Hedge scowled at Onrack, ‘Now what did I say?’ he demanded.
But Trull saw his friend smiling. Ulshun Pral has just directed the cooks to fish the baektar from the stew they have prepared for us.’
‘The baek-what?’
‘A vegetable, Hedge, that will be found nowhere but here.’
All at once the tension was gone. There were smiles, shouts of apparent welcome from other Imass, and many came forward to close, first on Onrack, and then-with expressions of delight and wonder, on Trull Sengar-no, he realized, not on him-on the emlava cubs. Who began purring deep in their throats, as thick, short-fingered hands reached out to stroke fur and scratch behind the small, tufted ears.
‘Look at that, Quick!’ Hedge was staring in disbelief. ‘Now is that fair?’
The wizard slapped the sapper on the back. ‘It’s true, Hedge, the dead stink.’
‘You’re hurting my feelings again!’
Sighing, Trull released the leather leashes and stepped back. He smiled across at Hedge. ‘I smell nothing un-toward,’ he said.
But the soldier’s scowl only deepened. ‘Maybe I like you now, Trull Sengar, but you keep being nice and that’ll change, I swear it.’
‘Have I offended you-’
‘Ignore Hedge,’ Quick Ben cut in, ‘at least when he’s talking. Trust me, it was the only way the rest of us in the squad stayed sane. Ignore him… until he reaches into that damned sack of his.’