The Blue Sword CHAPTER ELEVEN

In the hollow w present they met Murfoth they set up their eldest proper camp. The hunting-beasts all went taboo that night, and all wizard, non just a some Riders, had good fresh meat for dinner. The kings zotar was put up, and it was obvious that it was the kings, for it was the biggest, yet this hotshot was plain, a dull dun color, and the door was just a tent flap, and indoors there were a few carpets, and hooks on side poles for lanterns, further that was all although the black-and-white banner still flew bravely from the peak of the roof. She and the king and Murfoth and most of the Riders Innath and Mathin among them slept within it but she lay awake a long condemnation learning to the others breathe. You didnt hear the person next to you breathing if there wasnt a roof oer you to keep the noise close in. She missed the stars.The next daybreak there was breakfast at a long table similar to the one where she had number one met the Riders they were all there a gain, with a few others of those who had joined them oer the last few days. Corlath explained what was immediately onward of them how they would climb into the mountains again the range was childlikest where the frizzle west was sharpest to meet the game plateau where the Lake of Dreams lay, and where Luthe lived. Luthe? thought chivvy. some of the army would not climb all the way to the meeting-place, but fade into the fo residuum in weensy groups and pretend to be invisible for, so far at least, Corlath and the outriders regardd they had not been sighted. ravage blinked and wondered if the morning mists that throwmed to continue all day long all day as a kind of dull haze had afterwards all been more than a curious local weather pattern. Luthe himself Mathin told her this during an interval go the household folk brought in hot malak had ways in sentence Corlath did not understand of haveing things, and Corlath wished to see and speak to him. hardly Luthe never left his lands, and so it was necessary to seek him there. Luthe claims that lowland air confuses him, Mathin express, and shrugged the un nonetheless so Hill shrug. It is not for us to k the like a shot. He picked up his cup.Yes, but who is Luthe? tell Harry.Mathin regarded her with his inscrutable expression. No one knows, he say. Luthe is someone who lives in the mountains, who sees things things something uniform what some of us see when we taste the Meeldtar. He has been there a very long time. No one butt end remember when Luthe came, or when he has not lived on his mountain.And the Lake of Dreams?Mathin stared into his cup. There is a spring that runs into the Lake of Dreams, and it is where the Water of stool is found but sometimes the water from the spring is further water, and no one knows why although it is believed that Luthe knows. Water drunk from the Lake of Dreams does not give the Sight, as the true Meeldtar does but it is not quite worry drinking wat er.Harry sighed.Corlath explained in short for the newcomers what the army was proposing to do. The Northerners must, perforce, choose the one wide pass in the mountains that led into the great central plain and whence the sodding(a) desert of Damar, for it was the however gap salient plenty to accommodate an armys numbers. The gap was a bit west of the midpoint of the length of the mountains from the curve where the north-south mountains, the Ildik range, became the east-west Horfel Mountains. When the last of Corlaths little army had collected in the hollow at the elbow of the two ranges, they would ride as quickly as one dollar billflesh would allow to the mouth of that pass, and formulate to engage the enemy among the empty villages and deserted fields of Damar.Then there was a silence, for all in the kings tent knew that Corlaths force could not win a victory from the Northerners nor were they likely able to resist them to the point that the invaders would decide Damar w asnt worth the trouble and return home. The best the defenders could hope for, and this they did hope for, was to cause enough trouble and loss that the Northern army would not gift the strength left to seize all of Damar in quite so cheeseparing and marrowive a grip as Thurra would wish and that pockets of renegade Hillfolk might hide in the Hills, or under the kelar of the urban center. If they succeeded so much, the battle would be worth what it would hail them, for they would have preserved themselves a future.Harry swallowed uncomfortably. She heard, a little dizzily, what Corlath was saying about the foothills the mountain pass gave into, and where the army would stand and she cast in her mind for her best memory of Damarian geography, for she had the un winsome sensition that something was being ignored, something that shouldnt be. Corlath was saying that they would decide more exactly once they arrived, but he seemed to know every stone and clump of grass there, the ex act location of every farmhouse, as did those who listened no one fell so low as to seek recourse to a map. She fr owned in concentration. She could almost see the Residency map of Dana it was very poor at the eastern end it barely admitted to the existence of the mountains where the kings City stood the City itself was one of Jack Dedhams native legends but about the west it was pretty accurate AhCorlath had fallen silent. Murfoth said something and there was another silence, and Harry put in, shyly but stubbornly Sola, what of the pass just northwest of the of the Outlander station? It is abbreviate, but not so narrow that the the Northerners could not send a clientele done to come up behind us.Corlath frowned. Let them take the Outlander city it will keep them amused long enough to delay them, perhaps. tear down the Outlanders will try to stop them when they are on the threshold.There was a silence so rigid that Harry felt that speaking words into it was like chopping holes in a frozen lake. They would do a better job move to stop them if they were warned, she said. Her words didnt make much of a hole the drinking glass thickened visibly. She didnt want to do everything so obvious as put her pay on her sword hilt but she did press her elbow surreptitiously against it, and stiffened her spine.They were warned, said Corlath, and Harry raised her eyes to his and maxim the golden tide rising in them and wondered what that fruitless conversation in the Residency must have cost him. Yet he hadnt burned the Residency down with that golden glare of his, as she suspected he could have and so she blinked at him now and said, Colonel Dedham would listen to you. You did not know the Northerners were on the march then you know for certain now. The pass is narrow he could hold it for you indefinitely but not if they have had time to come through and go where they will. Her voice was rising with alarm and perhaps anger was there anything but stubborn pr ide, the offended majesty of the coercive ruler of his small land, working in Corlath, that he should waste a chance to gain a little more time? How little she knew him after all, and how little she knew Damar, she who could not visualize every yellow blade of korf before the great pass in the mountains. And yet she could see did she not truly see? the threat that this second, narrow pass presented a threat that the king and the com partder of the army was choosing to everyplacelook. She did not understand she was born of a different people and she still different things.No, said Corlath the word rang like an axe blow, and his eyes were as yellow as topazes. Harry stared back at him you great bully even knowing what he could do to her, even as the sweat broke out on her skin with the effort of holding his eyes. Her elbow clamped desperately on Gonturan, and the hard edge of the blue gem dug into her ribs and encouraged her. Then he snapped his gaze from her and pointed it at the tent flap and shouted, though he rarely shouted, and fresh malak was brought in and fruit with it. The ice began, nervously, to break up, and Harry glowered at her cup and refused to be drawn into conversation, and listened to her heart beating, and wondered if she were a traitor and if so, to whom?The next morning thirty-five chosen horsemen, with Corlath at their head and Harry, still somewhat sulky, among them, started up the track to Luthes holding. The rest of the army broke camp first, and melted into the scrub of the mountains feet, winning the hunting-beasts and the pack horses with them. Corlath and the little band with him waited till last, watching them go, judging if their disappearance was effective looking to see if there were any too obvious paths humbled in the undergrowth. A few fleeks broke cover, but that was the only sign of their passage. Corlath and whoever else might have a weather talent must have been satisfied, and Harry watched, with a few shivery fingers working their way up her spine in spite of the heat for the loyal fog over them was blandly break of serve up. The sky was blue and clear. A britti burst into song, and Harry raised her eyes to watch the little brownish speck zigzagging madly overhead. Corlath sent his big bay laurel forward, and thirty-four riders, and one obstinate hunting-cat, followed.Harry hung near the back. She had not slept the night before for thinking of the northwest pass and Jack Dedham Dedhams face watching Corlath as he stormed out of the Residency and Corlaths face as he said, Let them take the Outlander city it will keep them amused.Surely there was a reason none of the Hillfolk thought that gap into Damar worth consideration? But if there was a reason, what was the reason? possibly this Luthe would show some disposition. Perhaps his crystal ball or what-have-you would say, Beware the northwest pass BewareAnd then again maybe it wouldnt. So, Harry, what do you propose to do about it th en?She didnt know. She concentrated on Sungolds ears, slender and pricked, framing the trail in nominal head of her, and the phantom grey haunches of Innaths horse going on before. The scrub gave way to trees, and the trees to greater trees, till they were walking in a forest heavy with age, where even the air tasted old. By the end of the good afternoon all the riders were on foot, walking with their sweat-dark horses up a steep uneven incline. Harry was panting, but she tried to do it quietly. Corlath probably never breathed hard. Tsornins nostrils showed red, but his ears were as alert as ever, and on occasion he would rub his nose gently against the nape of her jazz, just in case she was momentarily not thinking about him. Narknon ranged beside them like a spot shadow. The trees were so tall and grand that Harry, watching her, could believe that she was no bigger than a housecat that when she came up to be petted, she would twine virtually Harrys ankles, and Harry would pi ck her up with one hand and put her on her shoulder.The trees were so high overhead that the twilight under them might have been sunset, but might only be leaf shade and they were a silent accompany, for no one spoke and the footfalls were muted by leaves and moss. Harry allowed herself to wonder about the trail, as an alternative to her sempiternal mental circles about northwest passes that it stayed clear enough that no one had to duck under low-hanging branches, or fight a way through an advance bush, but so little used that the moss underfoot was thick and smooth. And still smooth after thirty horses and thirty human pedestrians have tramped over it, the 31st pedestrian thought, scuffing it curiously with one foot. Sturdy moss. Maybe Luthe is a botanist in his spare time.By nightfall Harry was still walking only by dint of holding a large handful of Sungolds mane in one hand. She had tried resting an arm across his back, but his back was too high for comfort and her sweaty hand kept sliding through his fine pilus. Even his head was hanging a little low, and Harry knew she was still in company only by the soft creaking of other saddles and the occasional flicker in the gloom immediately ahead that was Innaths horse flipping its quartern.As she walked her eyes closed and the colors of exhaustion twinkled across her eyelids. Then to her dismay they began to sort themselves out into patterns, but she was too tired even to open her eyes and disperse them. She saw a red-haired rider on a white horse. The horse was old, white with age, the bones of its face very clear and fine she thought it went just a bit short with its right hind foot, but its neck was arched and its tail high. The riders shoulders were set grimly, the legs against the horses sides were determined, not eager. There was a smoky redness to the view beyond them, scarlet that did not look like dawn or sunset they were going toward it, and the light flashed off a chain around the riders nec k and the helm tied to the saddle, and the riders hair, and the horses flanks. Harry wondered where they were going, where they had come from. The countryside could have been Damar. It could have been almost anywhere.She realized there was light sparkle through her eyelids it was setting the white horse on fire. The horse broke into a canter, a shining glistening wave of motion Harry dizzily opened her eyes. They were approaching a clear set with torches she could see Corlath pick uped, talking to a man as tall as he was, but narrower the mans hair was yellow. Innath broke into the lighted circle, and Harry came after, trying not to stumble, too tired even to take her hand out of Sungolds mane for prides sake. She looked around a little, and the faces she could see near her were haggard and drooping. Perversely, this gave her strength she dropped her hand and straightened her shoulders. Sungold turn his head to rest his chin on her shoulder. Whos reassuring whom here? she murmu red, and Narknon immediately sat on Harrys feet and bumped her hand with her head as if to say, I am. individual knew the way, for while Corlath finished speaking with the yellow-haired man the rest of the Riders were following someone else to someplace to lie down, Harry wished fervently. She stole a glance at Corlath as she passed him, and was comforted by the hollows under his eyes and cheekbones. It might have been only the torchlight.When Harry woke up the sun was high, and for a minute she had no idea where she was. Her first thought was that she had missed breakfast and her father would tease her about burning midnight oil. Then she remembered, with the old lurch of the heart, that she was in Daria with Richard no, Damar, with Sungold, and Narknon, who sprawled across her feet. And Corlath, and Gonturan. Her hand had rested mildly on her sword hilt again as she slept, and through the first upheaval of waking now her fingers recognized what they touched. She shivered, sighe d, sat up.She was in a long narrow hall with a dozen or so low beds in it high overhead, narrow but close-spaced windows let in a flood of sunlight. She only dimly remembered coming here, having seen Tsornin stabled and unsaddled and happy with a manger of grain and a heap of hay and falling into her bed, asleep before she touched it. Most of the other beds in the board were still occupied. The hall was built of large blocks of undressed grey-and-white stone the alike sort of stone, she thought, as much of Corlaths City. The room was cool, but it smelled clean and sharp, like young leaves.There were doors at each of the narrow ends of the room, and as she stood at the foot of the bed she could look through either of them. The flagstones were cold underfoot. She sat back down on the edge of the bed Its even a real bed, she thought and regarded her pillow a moment. Then she sighed regretfully and pulled on her boots. Narknon opened one eye and closed it again. The rooms on each si de looked much like the one she was in, and full of still-sleeping bodies rolled in dark blankets. There was another door midway in the wall opposite the windows. This she went through.Here was a vast hall, taller than the ancient trees of the forest she had just walked wearily through, with windows restrict at the very heads of the walls to open above the lower roofs of the sleeping corridors. At one end of this space was a fireplace that in any room less immense would have been itself enormous here it looked insignificant. There were several massive wooden chairs before it, and a long trestle table beyond these the rest of the chamber was empty. Opposite the fireplace wall were doors, thrown open to admit sunlight and birdsong and the rustle of leaves. She looked up at the ceiling. Curiously, there was no sense of oppression built by the stone and space rather there was peacefulness, the quiet of repose.Contented simply to be less tired than she had been the night before, she sto od a moment, drinking in the sense of relaxation. For the first time since the confrontation with Corlath, the thought of the northwest pass left her freely, without her straining to push it aside even the fellowship of the coming war, of her part in her first battle, did not trouble her at present. Of the latter she did know it would trouble her later soon but she would attend to it later. For now she smiled. Her mouth felt stiff.She brought her gaze down from the ceiling and directed it again toward the fireplace. Sleep and peace were all very well, but she smelled food, and she was hungry.The man with yellow hair who had stood talking with Corlath the night before was sitting in one of the great wooden chairs she did not notice him till she was quite near. Her footfalls dropped gently to silence no sullen echoes ran up the walls to disturb the birdcalls. She stopped. There was a tiny fire, barely two hands breadth, burning at the front of the cavern of the hearth. Over it hung a large capital pot on a chain, and on a stool nearby were a stack of deep silver bowls, and a heap of shining silver spoons.Breakfast, said the man with yellow hair. Ive had mine eat as much as you like. I flatter myself its quite good, although I admit Im not much accustomed to cooking for so many, and one begins to lose count of how many potatoes one has already put in after the first armful. She sat down with her bowl, encountering that formal introductions were not wanted and that he would be amused if she tried to be conventionally polite and she was so hungry. As she sat, he brought up a leather bag from the far side of his chair and poured into a flagon discovered at his feet. He handed it to her Goats milk, he said. There were brown flecks of spices floating in it. She smiled, not so stiffly this time.She looked at him as she ate and while she was sure he knew she watched him, he kept his eyes on the small leaps and dance steps of the flame beneath the pot, as if letting her look her fill was a courtesy he did her along with filling her belly.He was tall, she knew sitting, he looked even taller, for he was so slender. His arms were spread wide from his sides to rest on the is of the chair but his long fingers reached well over the change surface fronts of the armrests, and his knees were several inches beyond long seat of the chair. He wore a dark green tunic, and a brown shirt beneath it, with long full sleeves gather at the wrists with gold ribbons. He wore tall pale boots that reached just above his knees, where the tunic fell over them. The tunic was slit up the side to his waist, and the leggings beneath it were the gold of the ribbons. He wore no sash rather a narrow band of dark blue cloth made a cross over his breast, and wrapped once thinly about his waist. The ends of it were tassels, midnight blue shot with gold. A huge dark red stone hung on a chain around his neck.His face was thoughtful as he stared at the fire. His nose was long and straight and his lips thin his eyes were heavy-lidded and blue. His hair was curly as well as bright gold, and it grew low over his collar and ears although he was clean-shaven. He should look young, Harry thought. But he did not. Neither did he look old. He turned to her as she set down her bowl and cup, and smiled. Well? Did I know when to stop adding potatoes?Hill potatoes were golden and far more flavorful than the pale Homelander conformation that Harry had eaten obediently but without enthusiasm when she was a child, and here they blended most satisfactorily with the delicate white fish that was the basis of the I stew. It was the first time she had eaten fresh fish since she had left her Homeland, where she had often brought supper home after a few hours beside a crime syndicate or stream on her fathers acres and she was pleased, now, to notice that remembering this fact caused no nervous ripples of emotion about her past or her future. Yes, she said peacefully.Their eyes met, and he asked, as though he were an old friend or her father, Are you happy?She thought about it, her gaze drifting away from his and coming to rest on the tip of Gonturan, as she leaned against her sols chair for she had, without thinking about it one way or another, slung Gonturan around her as soon as she stood up from her bed. No, not precisely, she said. But I dont believe I wish to complain of unhappiness. She paused a minute, looking at the thoughts that had been with her constantly for the weeks since she had left her old life as a bundle across Firehearts withers. It is that I cannot see what I am doing or why, and it is unsettling always to live only in the moment as it passes. Oh, I know one never sees ahead or behind. But I see even less. It is like being blindfolded when everyone else in the room is not. No one can see outside(a) the room but everyone else can see the room. I would like to take my blindfold off.The man smiled. It is a reasonable wish. No one live s more than a few moments either way even those fortunate or unfortunate ones who can see how the future will be cast and perhaps they feel the minutes passing the most acutely. But it is comforting to have some sense of the probability of choices, perhaps?Yes, she sighed, and tapped a finger on Gonturans hilt, and thought of the red-haired rider on the white horse. He had looked as though he knew where he was going, although she had to admit that he had also looked as if the knowledge gave him no joy.Not he, said the man with yellow hair. The Lady Aerin. You should begin to recognize her, you know you have seen her often enough.She blinked at him.You carry her sword, and ride to a fate not entirely of your own choosing. It is not surprising that she in some manner chooses to ride with you. She knew much of fate. Not surprising. It continued to surprise her. She would prefer that it surprise her, in fact. She permitted herself just briefly to think about her Homeland, with the w ide grassy low hills and blue rivers, when the only sword she knew was her fathers dress sword, which was not sharp and which she was forbidden to touch and where the only smoothen was at the seaside. She rediscovered herself staring at a silver pot over a tiny fire.Im afraid I cant comfort you very much with predictions it is pleasant when I can comfort anyone with predictions, and I always enjoy it as much as possible because it doesnt happen too often. But I can tell you even less than I can usually tell anyone, and it hurts my pride. His hand closed around the dark stone at his neck it glowed through his fingers like fire.She looked at him, startled.You have already begun to see the hardness of the choices that you will soon be forced to make and the choosing will not be any easier for your not knowing why you must choose. His voice took on a singsong quality, the red light of the stone pulsed like a heart, and the heavy eyelids almost closed.Take strength from your own purpose , for you will know what you must do, if you let yourself trust your horse and the cat that follows you, for there are none better than they, and they whop you and trust your sword, for she holds the strength of centuries and she hates what you are learning to hate. And trust the Lady Aerin, who visits you for your reassurance, whether you believe it at present or not and trust your friendships. Friends you will have posit of, for in you two worlds meet. There is no one on both sides with you, so you must learn to take your own counsel and not to fear what is strange, if you know it also to be true. He opened his eyes. It is not an enviable position, being a bridge, especially a bridge with visions. I should know.Youre Luthe, of course, she said.Of course. I told Corlath in particular to bring you although he has always brought his Riders if he brings anyone. And I knew you had been made a Rider. I dont ask for anyone often you should be pleased.I can see the two worlds I am betw een, she said, unheeding, although why the second one chose to rise up and snatch me I still dont understand Ask Colonel Dedham the next time you see him, Luthe put in.The next ? But she said, be looseered, and thrown off her thought.You were about to ask me a move important to you, for you were trying to put your thoughts in order, when I interrupted you, said Luthe mildly, although I wont be able to answer it. I told you I am not often comforting.What are your two worlds? she said, almost obliterating the question as she continued But if you cant answer it, why should I ask? Can you hear everything Im thinking?No, he replied. Only those arrow-like thoughts that come flying out with particular violence. You have a better organized mind than most. Most people are distressing to talk to because they have no control over their thinking at all, and it is a constant barrage, like being attacked by a tangle of thornbushes, or having a large litter of kittens walking up your legs, ho oking in their claws at every step. Its perhaps also an effective preventative to having ones mind read, for who can identify the individual thorn?Harry laughed involuntarily. Innath said you lived where you do, high up and away from everything, because lowland air clouds your mind.True enough. It is a little embarrassing to be forced to play the enigmatic oracle in the mountain fastness, but I have found it necessary.Corlath, for example, when he has something on his mind, can knock me down with it at arms length. Hes often asked me to come stay in his prison that he calls a city, saying that I might like it as it is made of the same stone as this He gestured upward. No convey you. He smiled. He does not love the stone walls of his city, and so he does not understand why I do love my walls to him they look the same. But he knows me better than to press it, or to be offended.If it is only within arms length you find Corlath overwhelming, I have no sympathy for you, Harry said rue fully, and he laughed.We soothsayers have other means of resistance, he said, But I shall be sure to tell him you said so.She sobered. Id rather you didnt, if you dont mind. Im afraid were were not on the best of terms just now.Luthe drummed his fingers on the wooden armrest. Yes, I did rather suspect that, and Im sorry for it, for you need each other. He drummed some more. Or at any rate he needs you, and you could do a lot worse than to believe in him. Luthe rubbed his forehead. But I will grant you that he is a stubborn man at times.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 p resent.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 Luthes hall the horses grazed in a broad meadow, the only wide stretch of sunlit green within a days 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 couldnt 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 Luthes 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 H arry 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 sight 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 attendant or muttered to himself. The mutter-ings couldnt 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 en ough 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 scrap 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 t he 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 theyre 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 Dr eams 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.Harry, at that, caught a thought just as it was streaking out, and stuffed it back behind her eyes.Very good, said Luthe. I thought you might prove apt. I didnt catch a glimpse of that one.Harry smiled faintly.I suspect, however, that it might make you more comfortable to ask me it nonetheless, Luthe said, looking into her face but she turned away.Corlath, eh? Luthe said gently.Harry shake her head, not denying it, but as though she could shake herself free of her anxieties but Luthe said no more. At last she stood up, gazing across the lake she could not see its far shore. It is so large, she said.Luthe rose to stand beside her. No, not so large, he said, but it is a private sort of lake, and hard to see. Even for me. He was quiet a moment, looking across the water. I think perhaps the reason I stay in this particular uninhabited valley of all the uninhabited valleys in the Hills is that it comforts me by reminding me of things I cannot do. I cannot see the farther shore of the Lake of Dreams. He turned away. Come I will show you the path. Unless you prefer fighting your way through the poor trees, which are accustomed to being undisturbed.