The Redemption of Althalus

‘You can’t kill it. It’s a spirit. Is killing always your first answer to every problem?’

‘Not every problem, Em, but I can kill things – or people – when the situation calls for it, and I don’t get all weepy about it. It’s part of the business I’m in. If I do my job right, I don’t have to kill anybody, but if something goes wrong – ah, well.’

‘You’re a terrible person, Althalus.’

‘Yes, I know. Isn’t that why you hired me?’

‘Hired?’

‘You want something done, and you want me to do it for you. One of these days before long we’ll have to discuss my wages.’

‘Wages?’

‘I don’t work for nothing, Em. That’s unprofessional.’ He continued on across the bridge, his spear at the ready.

‘You want gold, I suppose?’ she asked in an accusatory tone.

‘Oh, gold’s all right, I suppose, but I’d really rather get paid in love. Love can’t be counted, so it’s probably even more valuable than gold.’

‘You’re confusing me, Althalus.’

‘I was trying hard enough.’

‘You’re teasing me, aren’t you?’

‘Would I do that? Me? Little old loveable me?’

They reached the other side of the bridge, and Althalus stopped, listening intently for the wailing sound of Ghend’s sentinel, but the forest and mountains remained silent. ‘It must have gotten bored,’ he said.

‘Maybe,’ her voice murmured dubiously.

He turned to take one last look at the House, but it wasn’t there any more. ‘Did you do that?’he demanded.

‘No, it takes care of that itself. You were able to see it when you came here because you were supposed to. Nobody else needs to see it, so they can’t. Let’s go to Arum, pet,’ she said. Then she stirred around inside the bag-like hood of his cloak until she was comfortable and went to sleep.

They covered about fifteen miles that day, traveling along the brink of the precipice Althalus still thought of as the edge of the world, despite the frozen glaciers that now loomed off to the north. As evening approached, they took shelter in a clump of stunted trees, and Althalus built a fire. Then Emmy provided him with the words that produced bread and a roasted chicken.

‘Not too bad,’ she observed, nibbling at a piece of chicken, ‘but isn’t it a little overdone?’

‘I don’t criticize your cooking, Em.’

‘Just a suggestion, pet. I wasn’t criticizing.’

He learned back against a tree, stretching his feet out to the fire. ‘I think there’s something you need to know, Em,’ he said after some reflection. ‘Before Ghend hired me to go steal the book, I was having a run of bad luck. It might have worn off by now, but nothing was working for me the way it was supposed to.’

‘Yes, I know. I thought the paper money in Druigor’s strongbox was a nice touch, didn’t you?’

He started at her. ‘It was you? You were behind all that bad luck?’

‘Of course. If luck hadn’t turned sour, you wouldn’t have even considered Ghend’s proposititon, would you?’

‘And before that, you were the one responsible for all the good luck I was so famous for?’

‘Well, of course it was me, pet. If you hadn’t had such a streak of good luck, you wouldn’t have even recognized bad luck when it came along, would you?’

‘You’re the goddess of fortune, aren’t you, Em?’

‘It’s a sideline, pet. We all play with the luck of certain people. It’s a way to get them to cooperate.’

‘I’ve been worshiping you for years, Emmy.’

‘I know, and it’s been just lovely.’

‘Wait a minute,’ he objected. ‘I thought you said that you didn’t know that it was Ghend who hired me to steal the Book. If you were perched right on my shoulder to play games with my luck, how could you have missed it?’

‘I wasn’t quite that close, Althalus. I knew that somebody was going to do it, but I didn’t know it’d be Ghend himself. I thought he’d have some underling take care of it – Argan, maybe, or Khnom. I’m sure it wouldn’t have been Pekhal.’

‘Who are they?’

‘Ghend’s underlings. I’m sure you’ll meet them before this is all over.’

‘You almost got me killed in Equero, you know. Some of those arrows came awfully close when I was running across Kweso’s garden.’

‘But they didn’t hit you, did they? I wasn’t going to let anything happen to you, pet.’

‘That notion of paper money was your idea, wasn’t it? Nobody could actually believe that paper’s worth anything.’

‘The idea’s been around for a while. People who are in the business of buying and selling things write little notes to each other. They’re a sort of promise to pay, and they’re not as cumbersome as gold is. The people of Maghu have sort of formalized the idea.’

‘Were you the one who arranged for Gosti Big Belly to lie to me about what was in his strongroom?’

‘No. That was probably Ghend. He had as much reason as I did to want you to be unlucky right then.’

‘I wondered why everything was turning so sour. I had people pouring trash on my luck from both sides of the fence.’

‘Isn’t it nice to have everybody so concerned about you?’

‘Then my luck has changed back now?’

‘Of course it has, Althalus. I’m your luck, and I’ll love you all to pieces – as long as you do just exactly as I tell you.’ She patted his cheek then with one soft paw.

A few days later they reached the place where the dead tree stood. ‘It’s still here?’ Althalus was a bit startled.

‘It’s a landmark, pet. We sort of like to keep it here as a reference point.’

They turned south there and traveled down through Kagwher for a week or so. Then late one afternoon they crested a hill and saw a rude village huddled in the next valley. ‘What do you think, Em?’ Althalus said back over his shoulder. ‘Should we go on in and talk with a few people? I’ve been out of touch for quite a while, so it might not be a bad idea to find out what’s happening in the world.’

‘Let’s not leave memories of our passing lingering behind us, pet. Ghend has eyes and ears everywhere.’

‘Good point,’ he agreed. ‘Let’s sleep here, then. We can slip past that village before daybreak tomorrow.’

‘I’m not really sleepy, Althalus.’

‘Of course not. You’ve been sleeping all day. I’m the one who had to do the walking, and I’m tired.’

‘All right, we’ll rest your poor little legs here, then.’

Althalus wasn’t really all that tired, however. There was something about the rude village below that had immediately caught his eye when he’d crested the hill. There was a corral on the southern edge of the village, and there were horses in that corral and a number of rude saddles laid over the top rail. It was still a long way to Arum, and riding would probably be faster – and easier – than walking.

He decided not to burden Emmy with his plan. He was a master thief, after all, so he was perfectly capable of stealing a horse and saddle without any help – or commentary.

He fixed supper, and after they’d eaten, they curled up under his cloak and went to sleep.

‘What are you doing?’ Emmy asked with a sleepy thought as he was preparing to leave not long after midnight.

‘I thought we should get an early start and slip past that village before the people woke up. Traveling at night’s the best way I know of to avoid being seen.’

‘You don’t mind if I sleep a bit longer, do you?’

‘Not at all, Em,’ he said. ‘Just curl up in your little pouch and go back to sleep.’

She squirmed around in the hood of his cloak as he started out. Then she got settled in and purred herself back to sleep.

She woke up rather abruptly, however, when Althalus nudged his new horse into a loping canter. ‘I suppose I should have guessed,’ she murmured.

‘We are on a sort of sacred mission, aren’t we, Em?’ he replied with a tone of high-minded justification. ‘We’re going out to save the world. It’s only right and proper that the people along the way should lend a hand, isn’t it?’

‘You’ll never change, will you, Althalus?’

‘Probably not, no. Go back to sleep, Em. I’ve got everything under control now.’

Once they were mounted, they made good time, and they crossed out of Kagwher into the vast forest of Hule a couple of days after Althalus had acquired the horse.

There were villages here and there in the deep wood of Hule now, and that offended Althalus. Hule was supposed to be wild, but now grubby little men had come here to contaminate it. The villages were squalid-looking collections of rude huts squatting on muddy ground and surrounded by garbage. They weren’t much to look at, but what really offended Althalus were the tree-stumps. These wretched intruders were cutting down trees. ‘Civilization,’ he muttered in tones of deepest contempt.

‘What?’ Emmy asked.

‘They’re cutting down trees, Em.’

‘Men do that, pet.’

‘Little men, you mean. Men who are afraid of the dark and invent ways to talk about wolves without actually saying the word “wolf”. Let’s get out of here. The sight of that trash-heap makes me sick.’

They passed a few other villages on their way south, and the opinion he’d formed about the people who lived in those villages didn’t improve very much.

His humor began to improve as they rode up into the foothills of Arum. He was fairly certain that no matter how civilized man became, it was highly unlikely that they’d come up with a way to chop down mountains.

They rode some distance up into the foothills, and on the second day as evening settled over the mountains, Althalus rode back from the narrow track a ways and set up their night’s camp in a small clearing.

‘Could we have fish tonight, pet?’ Emmy asked once he had their fire going.

‘I was sort of thinking about beef.’

‘We had beef last night.’

He was about to say something, but suddenly laughed instead.

‘What’s so funny?’

‘Haven’t we had this conversation before? It seems that I can remember long talks about having the same thing six or eight days in a row.’

‘That was different.’

‘I’m sure it was,’ he gave in. ‘All right, dear, if you want fish, we’ll have fish.’

She began to purr in happy anticipation.

Althalus slept well that night, but just before dawn he awoke quite suddenly as some almost forgotten instinct warned him of approaching danger. ‘Somebody’s coming, Em,’ he jarred her awake with an urgent thought.

Her green eyes opened immediately, and he felt her send out a searching thought. Then she hissed.

‘What’s the matter?’ he demanded.

‘Pekhal! Be careful, Althalus. He’s very dangerous.’

‘Didn’t you tell me that he’s one of Ghend’s people?’

‘Ghend’s animal would come closer. There isn’t much humanity left in Pekhal. I’m sure he’ll try to kill you.’

‘Lots of people have tried that, Em.’ He rolled out from under his cloak, reaching for his bronze-tipped spear.

‘Don’t try to fight him, Althalus. He’s a total savage and very vicious. He’ll try to talk his way in close enough to reach you with his sword. I’d imagine that he’s looking for breakfast along about now.’

‘He eats people?’ Althalus exclaimed.

‘That’s one of his nicer habits.’

‘I think I remember a way to make him keep his distance,’ Althalus said with a bleak sort of grin.

There was a crashing sound back in the undergrowth, and Althalus slipped behind a tree to watch.

The man was huge, and his face was almost subhumanly brutish. He was bulling his way through the bushes, and he was swinging a large sword that obviously wasn’t made of bronze. ‘Where are you?’ he roared in a hoarse, animal-like voice.

‘I’m more or less here,’ Althalus replied. ‘I don’t think you need to come any closer.’

‘Show yourself!’

‘Why would I want to do that?’

‘I want to see you!’

‘I’m not really all that attractive.’

‘Show yourself!’ the beast roared again.

‘If you say so, neighbor,’ Althalus replied mildly. He stepped out from behind the tree, looking intently at the heavily armed savage. Then he said, ‘Dheu.’

The brute rose up off the ground with a startled oath.

‘Just a precaution, friend,’ Althalus explained urbanely. ‘You seem a bit bad-tempered this morning – somebody you ate, no doubt.’

‘Put me down!’

‘No, I don’t think we’ll do it that way. You’re fine just where you are.’

The grotesque brute began swinging his sword at the air around him as if trying to slash at whatever was holding him suspended.

‘You don’t mind if I have a look at that, do you?’ Althalus asked. Then he held out his hand and said, ‘Gwem!’

The huge sword spun out of the giant’s hand and then drifted obediently down to Althalus. ‘Very impressive,’ Althalus said, hefting the heavy weapon.

‘You give that back!’

‘No. Sorry. You don’t really need it.’ Althalus stuck the heavy sword into the ground and then neatly filched the brute’s dagger and purse from his belt as well.

Pekhal began roaring, his face contorted with savage fury.

Althalus lifted his hand and said, ‘Dheu’ again.

Pekhal rose about another twenty feet into the air. His face blanched, his eyes went very wide, and he stopped moving entirely.

‘How’s the view from up there?’ Althalus was beginning to enjoy this. ‘Would you like to take a look at things from a few miles higher up? I can fix that, if you wish.’

Pekhal gaped at him, his eyes filled with sudden terror.

‘Do we understand each other, friend?’ Althalus asked. ‘Now, then, the next time you see Ghend, give him my regards and tell him to quit playing around like this. I don’t work for him any more, so he has no claim on me.’ Althalus picked up his new purse and dagger. He tucked the purse in his pocket, pulled his new sword out of the turf, and tapped its heavy blade with the hilt of the dagger. It made a ringing sound. Then he tested the sword-edge with his thumb. It seemed much sharper than his bronze sword. ‘Very nice,’ he murmured. Then he looked up at Pekhal. ‘I certainly want to thank you for the gifts, friend,’ he said pleasantly. ‘All I have to give you in return are my old weapons, but since you’re so much nobler than I am, I’m sure you won’t mind.’ He shed his bronze weapons. ‘We’ll have to do this again one of these days,’ he called. ‘You have yourself a very nice day now, hear?’

‘Are you going to just leave him up there?’ Emmy asked critically.

‘Oh, I imagine he’ll set along about the same time the sun does, Em. If he doesn’t come down today, he probably will tomorrow – or the next day. Why don’t we have a bite of breakfast and move on?’

She was trying to stifle her laughter without too much success. ‘You’re awful!’ she chuckled.

‘Fun, though, don’t you think? Is that half-wit the best that Ghend can come up with?’

‘Pekhal’s the one Ghend summons when brute strength and savagery seem to be called for. The others are much more dangerous.’

‘Good. This might get kind of boring otherwise.’ He looked closely at his new dagger. ‘What is this metal?’ he asked.

‘Men call it steel,’ she replied. ‘They learned how to forge it about a thousand years ago.’

‘I was a little busy just then. That’s probably why I missed it. Where does this metal come from?’

‘You’ve seen all those red rocks in Plakand, haven’t you?’

‘Oh, yes. Plakand’s red from one end to the other.’

‘There’s a metal called iron in those rocks. Men couldn’t smelt it out of the rocks until they learned how to make hotter fires. Iron is harder than bronze, but it’s brittle. It has to be mixed with other metals to make weapons or tools.’

‘It’s completely replaced bronze, then?’

‘For most things, yes.’

‘It might be better than bronze, but it’s not as pretty. This grey’s sort of depressing.’

‘What on earth has that got to do with anything?’

‘It’s a question of aesthetics, Em. We should always strive to fill our lives with beauty.’

‘I don’t see anything beautiful in something that was designed to kill people.’

‘There’s beauty in everything, Em. You just have to learn to look for it.’

‘If you’re going to preach at me, I think I’ll just curl up and go back to sleep.’

‘Whatever you wish, Em. Oh, before you doze off, though, do you happen to know which clan here in Arum has that knife we’re looking for? If I’m going to have to search every man in these mountains for it, we could be here for quite a while.’

‘I know where it is, pet, and you’ve been there before. You’re even rather famous in the clan that has the Knife.’

‘Me? I try to avoid fame whenever I can.’

‘I wonder why. You do remember the way to the hall of Gosti Big Belly, don’t you?’

‘Is that where the knife is?’

‘Yes. The current Clan-Chief has it. He doesn’t know how he came by it or how important it is, so he keeps it in the room where all his spare weapons are.’

‘Is that a coincidence of some sort? I mean, that the knife’s in Gosti’s hall?’

‘Probably not.’

‘Would you care to explain that?’

‘I don’t think so. The word “coincidence” always seems to start religious arguments for some reason.’

For the next several days, they traveled along the ridge-line Althalus had followed to make good his escape from Gosti and they finally reached the high pass that overlooked the canyon where Gosti’s hall had stood. The rough log fort had been replaced by a large stone castle. The rickety toll-bridge that had been the source of Gosti’s meager wealth was gone, and the bridge that now spanned the rushing stream was a structure of stone arches. Althalus turned his horse off the trail and rode back into the trees.

‘Aren’t we going on down?’ Emmy asked.

‘It’s almost evening, Em. Let’s wait and go down in the morning.’

‘Why?’

‘My instincts tell me to wait, all right?’

‘Oh, well,’ she replied with exaggerated sarcasm, ‘we must obey our instincts, mustn’t we?’

‘Be nice,’ he murmured. Then he dismounted and went over to the edge of the trees to look at the settlement outside the fort. Something struck him as peculiar. ‘Why are the men all wearing dresses?’ he asked.

‘They call them kilts, Althalus.’

‘A dress is a dress, Em. What’s wrong with leggings like mine?’

‘They prefer kilts. Don’t be picking any fights with them about their clothing. Keep your opinions to yourself.’

‘Yes, Ma’am,’ he replied. ‘You’ll want fish for dinner again, I suppose?’

‘If it’s not too much trouble.’

‘And if it is?’

‘That’s just too bad, isn’t it?’

CHAPTER EIGHT

Althalus and Emmy woke early the next morning, but they waited until the villagers started stirring before Althalus mounted his horse and rode through the woods to the trail that led on down to the settlement. He noticed that the houses were more substantial now than they’d been last time he’d been here.

They reached the settlement just as a husky fellow in a dirty kilt came out of one of the houses near the wall of the castle. He was stretching and yawning, but when he saw Althalus riding toward him, his eyes became suddenly alert. ‘You there – stranger,’ he called.

‘Were you talking to me?’ Althalus replied innocently.

‘You don’t live here, so you’re a stranger, aren’t you?’

Althalus made some show of looking around. ‘Why, blast my eyes, I do believe you’re right. Isn’t it strange that I hadn’t noticed that myself?’

The man’s suspicious look softened, and he started to chuckle.

‘Was it something I said?’ Althalus asked, feigning wide-eyed innocence and climbing down from his horse.

‘You’re a humorous fellow, I see.’

‘I try. I’ve found that a little humor smoothes over the awkward moments when I first meet somebody. It lets people know that I’m not really a stranger, but only a friend they haven’t met yet.’

‘I’ll have to remember that one,’ the now openly grinning man said. ‘And what might your name be, friend I haven’t met yet?’

‘I’m called Althalus.’

‘Is that supposed to be a joke?’

‘That wasn’t what I had in mind. Is there something wrong with it?’

‘There’s a very old story in our clan about a man named Althalus. Oh, my name’s Degrur, by the way.’ He held out his hand.

Althalus shook hands with him. ‘Pleased to meet you. What’s the gist of this story about that other Althalus?’

‘Well, as it turned out, he was a thief.’

‘Really? What did he steal?’

‘Money, I’m told. The Clan-Chief back in those days was named Gosti Big Belly, and he was the richest man in the world.’

‘My goodness!’

‘Oh, yes. Gosti’s strongroom was filled to the rafters with gold – until Althalus came along. Anyway, this Althalus could tell jokes so funny that they made the walls laugh. Then, late one night after everybody in the hall had drunk himself to sleep, the thief Althalus broke into Gosti’s strongroom and stole every single gold coin there. The story says that he had to steal twenty horses just to carry it all away.’

‘That’s a lot of gold.’

‘It was indeed. I’d imagine that the story’s been exaggerated a little over the years, though, so there probably wasn’t all that much gold in the strongroom.’

‘I’m sure you’re right, Degrur. I heard a story once about a man who was supposed to be as big as a mountain.’

‘I’m going on to the hall’, Degrur said. ‘Why don’t you come along, and I’ll introduce you to our chief? I think he’d really like to meet a man called Althalus.’

‘Probably so that he can keep his eye on me. My name might raise a few suspicions around here.’

‘Don’t worry, my friend. Nobody takes those old stories seriously any more.’

‘I certainly hope not.’

‘Would it alarm you if I told you that you’ve got a cat peeping out of the hood of your cloak?’

‘No, I know she’s there. I was camped up in the mountains, and she wandered in – probably to steal some food. We sort of took to each other, so we’re traveling together for a while. What’s your chief’s name?’

‘Albron. He’s young, but we think he’s going to work out fairly well. His father, Baskon, spent most of his time face down in the nearest ale barrel, and a drunken Clan-Chief tends to make mistakes.’

‘What happened to him?’

‘He got roaring drunk one night and went up to the top of the highest tower to challenge God to a fight. Some say that God took him up on it, but I think he just wobbled and fell off the tower. He splattered himself all over the courtyard.’

‘Everybody dies from something, I suppose.’

They went on into the courtyard of the stone castle. Althalus noticed that it was paved, much as the courtyard of the House at the End of the World had been. Degrur led the way up the steps to the massive door and they proceeded down a long, torchlit corridor to the dining hall.

There were bearded men sitting at a long table there, eating breakfast off of wooden plates. Althalus glanced around as he and Degrur approached the table. The bleak stone walls were decorated with battle-flags and a few antiquated weapons, and the logs burning in the fire-pit crackled cheerfully. The stone floor had obviously been swept that morning, and there weren’t any dogs gnawing bones in the corners.

‘Neatness counts,’ Emmy’s voice murmured approvingly.

‘Maybe,’ he replied, ‘but not for very much.’

‘My Chief,’ Degrur said to the kilted man with shrewd eyes and a clean-shaven face at the head of the table, ‘this traveler was passing through, and I thought you might want to meet him, since he’s very famous.’

‘Oh?’ the Clan-Chief said.

‘Everybody’s heard of him, my Chief. His name’s Althalus.’

‘You’re not serious!’

Degrur was grinning openly now. ‘That’s what he told me, Albron. Of course, if that’s really his name, he might have lied about it to put me off my guard.’