Apsalar finally spoke. 'I wish to know more ... of this desert. Its power...'
'You shall,' Fiddler growled. 'Wrap up your faces. We go to greet the Whirlwind.'
Like a wing sweeping them into its embrace, the storm closed around them. A savage awareness seemed to ride the spinning sand, reaching relentlessly past the folds of their telaban, a thousand abrasive fingers clawing paths across their skin. Loose cloth and rope ends spiked upward, whipping with urgent rhythm. The roar filled the air, filled their skulls.
Raraku had awakened. All that Fiddler had sensed the last time he rode these wastes, sensed as an underlying restlessness, the spectral promise of nightmares beneath the surface, was now unleashed, exultant with freedom.
Heads ducked, the horses plodded onward, buffeted by wayward gusts of sand-filled air. The ground underneath was hard-packed clay and rubble – the once deep cloak of fine white sand had been lifted from the surface, now sang in the air, and with it were stripped away the patient, all-covering centuries.
The group dismounted, hooded their mounts' heads, then led them on.
Bones appeared underfoot. Rusting lumps of armour, chariot wheels, remnants of horse and camel tack, pieces of leather, the humped foundation stones of walls – what had been a featureless desert now showed its bones, and they crowded the floor in such profusion as to leave Fiddler in awe. He could not take a step without something crunching underfoot.
A high stone-lined bank suddenly blocked their way. It was sloped, rising to well above their heads. Fiddler paused for a long moment, then he gathered his mount's reins and led the climb. Scrambling, stumbling against the steep bank, they eventually reached the top and found themselves on a road.
The paving stones were exquisitely cut, evenly set, with the thinnest of cracks visible between them. Bemused, Fiddler crouched down, trying to hold his focus as he studied the road's surface – a task made more difficult by the streams of airborne sand racing over the stones. There was no telling its age. While he imagined that, even buried beneath the sands, there would be signs of wear, he could detect none. Moreover, the engineering showed skill beyond any masonry he'd yet seen in Seven Cities.
To his right and left the road ran spearshaft-straight as far as his squinting eyes could see. It stood like a vast breakwater that even this sorcerous storm could not breach.
Crokus leaned close. 'I thought there were no roads in Raraku!' he shouted over the storm's keening wail.
The sapper shook his head, at a loss to explain.
'Do we follow it?' Crokus asked. 'The wind's not as bad up here—'
As far as Fiddler could judge, the road angled southwest-ward, deep into the heart of Raraku. To the northeast it would reach the Pan'potsun Hills within ten leagues – in that direction they would come to the hills perhaps five leagues south of where they had left them. There seemed little value in that. He stared again down the road to his right. The heart of Raraku. It is said an oasis lies there. Where Sha'ik and her renegades are encamped. How far to that oasis? Can water be found anywhere in between here and there? Surely a road crossing a desert would be constructed to intersect sources of water. It was madness to think otherwise, and clearly the builders of this road were too skilled to be fools. Tremorlor . . . If the gods will it, Ms track will lead us to that legendary gate. Raraku has a heart, Quick Ben said. Tremorlor, a House of the Azath.
Fiddler mounted the Gral gelding. 'We follow the road,' he yelled to his companions, gesturing southwestward.
They voiced no complaints, turning to their mounts. They had bowed to his command, Fiddler realized, because both were lost in this land. They relied on him completely. Hood's breath, they think I know what I'm doing. Should I now tell them that the plan to find Tremorlor rests entirely on the faith that the fabled place actually exists? And that Quick Ben's suppositions are accurate, despite his unwillingness to explain the source of his certainty? Do I tell them we're more likely to die out here than anything else – if not from wasting thirst, then at the hands of Sha'ik's fanatical followers?
'Fid!' Crokus cried, pointing up the road. He spun around to see a handful of Gral warriors ascending the bank, less than fifty paces away. Their hunters had split up into smaller parties, as dismissive of the sorcerous storm as Fiddler's group had been. A moment later they saw their quarry and voiced faint war cries as they pulled their horses onto the flat top.
'Do we run?' Apsalar asked.
The Gral had remounted and were now unslinging their lances.
'Looks like they're not interested in conversation,' the sapper muttered. In a louder voice he said, 'Leave them to me! You two ride on!'