Alliances

He squatted on the warm sand and watched her resume her work, wrapping the yarn slowly at first, to get back the rhythm she’d lost. The yarn was a deep, golden yellow, a shade long associated with Weya-Lu weavers. The color was derived from a combination of flowers, including the common dandelion and the rare white desert rose. Other tribes had tried to duplicate it, but no other approached the richness and colorfast durability of Weya-Lu gold.

When Wapah spoke again, he kept his voice low, so as not to throw off Adala’s concentration.

“All the families have offered sacrifices to the Desert Master.” It was considered bad luck to speak Torghan’s name, even among his children. “Will we not do likewise?”

“Not today. My maita spoke to me. It said, ‘Keep your hands clean, and victory will be yours.’ I take this to mean I am not to shed blood, even to honor the gods.”

Wapah had to agree. After many deadly, frustrating encounters with the laddad, the children of Torghan at last had them at bay. The laddad khan had taken shelter on the Lion’s Teeth. This was a grave mistake. It was easier for the laddad to defend themselves atop the Teeth, but it also was easier for the nomads to contain them. Time was the foreigners’ enemy. Their food and water would dwindle, the sun and wind would steal their strength, and in the end they would be helpless before the tribesmen.

Already the downfall of the invaders was at hand. The laddad were isolated on two crags. The peak in between had fallen to the nomads in a surprise attack led by the Mayakhur. Southernmost and smallest of the seven tribes, the Mayakhur were renowned for their tracking skills and the acuity of their night vision. In a grand display of stealth, five hundred Mayakhur warriors, wrapped in black cloaks and barefoot for silence, scaled Lesser Fang. They took the laddad completely by surprise, and those on the neighboring peaks never knew. Several thousand laddad languished in a great pen that normally contained herd animals. Bound at wrists and ankles, the captives awaited Adala’s judgment.

Wapah asked what was to be done with them.

Adala shrugged one shoulder. “I don’t know yet. I await a sign.”

None could say how Those on High would make Their will manifest. But make it known They would, Wapah knew, in Their own time.

When Adala had the spindle loaded, she called for the lap loom. It was brought out of the tent by Zayna, her twelve-year-old niece. The child had come to live with her aunt after the deaths of Adala’s two youngest daughters in the laddad massacre. The lap loom was old, made of precious wood, and lovingly cared for by generations of Weya-Lu. The frame was worn smooth, its pale hardwood darkened by the countless fingers that had gripped it. Adala began threading golden yarn across the frame.

Wind stirred through the campsite, peppering Adala with stinging sand. She told Wapah to sit on her other side, to shield her work from the wind. He did not answer, only remained squatting on his haunches, forearms resting on his knees, his head down. His wide-brimmed hat protected his face from wind and sand.

Fool, Adala thought indulgently. Too many late night rides and starlight raids. Wapah was not a young man anymore.

Streaks of white cloud rose from the mountains and stretched across the sky, shrouding the afternoon sun and causing the temperature to drop. Adala closed the black scarf around her neck. When her fingers grew cold enough to make them clumsy, she told Wapah to start a fire.

Without raising his head, Wapah replied, “My breath cannot be warded off by fire. You are cold, woman, because I will it.”

That was not Wapah’s voice. “Who are you?” she asked, setting aside her loom. “Who dares possess the Maita’s cousin?”

Wapah’s head lifted, and she flinched in surprise. His gray eyes were leaf green.

“I am the Oracle of the Tree.”

“The Oracle was a man. He died many generations past!”

“I am he. Time and place mean nothing to me. I can converse with you now even as I walk the face of Krynn five hundred years in the past.” Wapah’s slack lips barely moved, but the voice coming from his throat was strong and deep.

Understanding dawned on Adala’s face. “Are you the sign I was expecting?”

“You must release the laddad you have captured. Take your people from this place. Abandon your campaign against the foreigners.”

She recoiled in shock. “But they are murderers!”

The memory of her dead daughters was a wound that would never heal: Chisi lying with one arm thrown across Amalia, as if to shield her gentle, older sister from the death that had ripped their bodies apart. No matter what, Adala had sworn never to rest until their killers were destroyed.

A fresh gust of wind, colder than before, flooded the Weya-Lu tents. They flapped as if trying to take wing. Adala covered the lower half of her face with her scarf and squinted against the rushing air.