The Blue Sword (Damar #2)(62)

He was silent a moment. "Aerin was a little like that; but she was also a little like you ... Aerin was very dear to me." He smiled faintly. "Teachers are always vain of the students who go on to do great things."

"Aerin?" said Harry. "Aerin? Lady Aerin of this sword?" - and she banged the hilt of Gonturan.

"Yes," said Luthe gently. "The same red-haired Aerin who troubles you with visions. You asked me about my two worlds: you could say that they are the past and the present."

After a long cold moment Harry said, "Why did you ask Corlath to bring me here?"

"I told you that, surely. Because I knew he needed you; and I wanted to find out if you were the sort of vessel that cracks easily."

Harry took a deep breath. "And am I?"

"I think you will do very well." He smiled. "And that is a much more straightforward answer than anyone consulting an oracle has a right to expect. I shall stop feeling guilty about you."

Corlath and his Riders spent two days in Luthe's hall; the horses grazed in a broad meadow, the only wide stretch of sunlit green within a day's journey of the tree-filled valley where Luthe made his home. Harry found Sungold tearing across the field, head up and tail a banner, on the first morning, the toilsome way up the mountain apparently forgotten. He galloped over to where Harry leaned on the frame of the open stable, where a few of the horses still lingered inside, musing over their hay. "You make me tired," said Harry absently, thinking of her conversation with Luthe. "You should be recuperating, not bounding around like a wild foal." Tsornin thrust his nose under her chin, unrepentant. "You realize we will have to do the whole thing again shortly? And then go on - and on and on? You should be harboring your strength." Sungold nibbled her hair.

The other Riders and the fifteen other horsemen slowly seeped out of the tall stone house. Harry tried to decide, watching them, if any had had bewildering conversations with their host; but she couldn't guess, and it did not seem the sort of thing one might ask. They all looked only semi-awake, as if the journey so far - this was the first real halt since they left the City - combined with the sweet peacefulness of Luthe's domain prevented the lot of saddle-hardened warriors from feeling anything but pleasantly drowsy. They smiled at one another and leaned on their swords, and even tended their precious horses nonchalantly, as though they knew that the horses did not need them here. Narknon, so far as Harry could tell, never moved from her bed; she merely stretched out when Harry left it, and reluctantly permitted herself to be shoved to one side when Harry re-entered. Harry, although she felt the same gentle air around her, was surprised; whatever it was, it had less effect on her.

Corlath himself strode around in his usual high-energy fashion; if any sense of ease was trying to settle on him, it was having a hard time of it, for he was no different than he ever was, although he did not seem surprised at the condition of his followers. Harry stayed out of his way, and if he noticed this, he gave no sign. Mostly he spoke to Luthe - Harry saw with interest, on the occasions she saw them together, that Corlath seemed to do far more talking than his companion - or muttered to himself. The mutter-ings couldn't have been pleasant, for he was often scowling.

The two days were fine and clear; warm enough during the day to make bathing in the pool at the edge of the horses' meadow pleasant, cool enough at night to make the blankets on the beds in the sleeping-chambers of comfort. The torches that formed a ring outside the front gates of the hall were not lit again; Luthe was willing to welcome his guests, but did not deem further illumination necessary.

On the second afternoon Harry followed the stream that spilled out of the bathing-pool, and after a certain amount of fighting with curling branches and tripping over hidden hummocks she burst out of the undergrowth to a still silver beach bordering a wide lake. The Lake of Dreams. The stream stopped its chattering as it left the edge of the woods, and slid silently over the silver sand and slipped into the waters of the lake. Harry went to the edge of it and sat down, looking at the water. There was a step at her side; she looked up and it was Luthe. "There is a path," he said. "You should have asked." He bent down and detached a twig from her hair, and another from the back of her tunic. Then he sat down beside her. "I will show you the way to return."

"Do you live here alone?" Harry said, extracting a leaf from the neck of her undershift.

"No," he replied, "but my housemates are even shyer than I am, and have a tendency to retreat into the undergrowth when visitors are anticipated. There are quite a number of visitors, now and again."

"The oracle is a popular one," said Harry, smiling.

Luthe smiled back, but sidelong. "Yes; I think it may be private dismay that sends my companions away at such times; they have something of kelar and the Sight themselves."

He did not seem disposed to go on, so Harry said: "Does everyone who comes here behave as though they're half asleep?"

"No again; I and my friends are generally quite sharp. But yes, most visitors find it a sleepy sort of place - a reputation I, um, encourage, as it makes their thoughts sleepy too, and thus easier to dodge."

Harry said, "Encourage?"

Luthe said, "You are not a sleepy one, are you? The source of the Meeldtar taints all the water here; and the air that passes over the Lake of Dreams carries something of sleepiness with it. Only those bearing much kelar of their own do not find that faintest touch of the Water of Sight a little drowsy. Like you. And Corlath."