The Seeker - Isobelle Carmody [4]
“Well, now,” Elii said sourly.
The Herder came up to stand uneasily beside him. “We will have to find another way,” he said. “Lud will lead us.”
Elii snorted rudely. “Your Lud had better help us on this path—there ain’t no other way.”
The priest’s face grew red, then white. “You go too far,” he gasped, but Elii was already preoccupied, drawing a length of rope from his pack and tying the end around a tree. Then he slung the other end down the flooded path.
The Herder watched these movements with a look of horror.
Elii pulled at the rope, testing it, before swinging agilely down to the bottom of the small waterfall. Back on dry ground, he called for us to do the same, one at a time.
“We’ll be dashed to pieces,” Rosamunde observed gloomily.
The Herder gave her a dark look as one of the boys started to climb carefully down. Several others went, then Rosamunde, then me. The rope was slippery now and hard to grip. I found it difficult to lift my own weight. Two-thirds of the way down, my fingers became too numb to cling properly, and I fell the last several handspans, crashing heavily into a rock as I landed. The water soaked into my trousers.
“Get her out. The water may be tainted,” Elii growled, then yelled up for the priest to descend.
I was completely breathless and dazed from my fall, and my head ached horribly where I had hit it on the rock.
“She’s bleeding,” Rosamunde told Elii.
“Won’t matter. Running blood cleans a wound,” he muttered absently, watching the priest descend slowly and with much crying out for Lud’s help. I felt as though I were watching through a mist.
When the Herder reached the bottom, he knelt beside me quickly and began reciting a prayer for the dead.
“She’s not dead,” Rosamunde said gently.
Seeing that I was only stunned, the priest bandaged the cut on my temple with deft efficiency, and I reminded myself again that for all his youth, the Herder was fully trained in his calling.
“Come on,” Elii said impatiently. “Though I doubt we’ll make it in time now.”
“Was the water tainted?” I asked. I ignored Rosamunde’s audible gasp. There was no point in caution if I died from not speaking out.
The Herder shook his head, and I wondered how he knew—though I did not doubt that he was right. Herder knowledge was wide-ranging and sometimes obscure, but generally reliable.
We walked quickly then, urged on by Elii. My head ached steadily, but I was relieved that it was only a bump and not a serious infection. I had a sudden vision of my mother, applying a steaming herb poultice to my head. How quickly the pain had subsided on that occasion. Herb lore was forbidden now, though it was said there were still those who secretly practiced the art.
I nearly walked into Elii, having failed to notice he had called a halt.
“Through the Weirwood lies the Silent Vale,” he said. “If we are too late today, we will have to camp here and enter the Vale tomorrow.”
“The Weirwood?” said someone nervously.
“It is dangerous to be out at night in these parts,” the Herder said, “where the spirits of the Beforetime rest uneasily.”
Elii shrugged, saying there would be no help for it if the sun had gone. He had his orders. “Perhaps your Lud will cast his mantle of protection over us,” he added with a faint glimmer of amusement.
We entered the Weirwood, and I shivered at the thought of spending a night there. It had an unnatural feel, and I saw several in our group look around nervously. We had not walked far when we came to a clearing, and in the center of this was the ravine they called the Silent Vale. It was very narrow, a mere slit in the ground, with steps hewn into one end, descending into the gap. The light reached just a handspan or so into the ravine, and the rest was in dense shadow.
I understood now Elii’s haste, for only when the sun was directly overhead would it light the Vale, and it was almost at its zenith now.
We entered the ravine and descended the slippery steps fearfully. By the time we reached the bottom, I was numb with the cold, and we huddled together at the foot of