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LATER THAT NIGHT IT was Padg, with disturbed dreams, who woke Dun. Dun wished for once it was the other way around. He had experienced no visions for days and was beginning to wonder whether that was a good sign or a bad one.
“You all right, Padg?”
“Fine,” his friend said in a clipped fashion.
“We’ll get out of this.”
“I know.” Padg didn’t sound so sure.
He felt terrible; he was meant to be leading this party and he had dragged them into this. It was only his blind trust of Myrch that had got them here, and that hadn’t turned out well. But was it blind trust? Or was he just doing a good job of following his instincts and what foretellings he had? He was becoming too confused in his head to tell. He felt terrible too about the fact that Tali was sitting on her own in a cold cell and not with them. He knew she could take care of herself, but still... Or was he wanting that because he missed her himself? For all her occasional accidents, she had an air of confidence; confidence that he needed right now.
“Dun?”
“Yes?”
“Do they really... kill folk like that? Crushing them... it just seems so...”
“Messy?”
“I was thinking more, barbaric, but yeah.”
“It’s just another set of traditions, ways of life.”
“I know that in my head, knew it before we left, got ourselves into... this, but now I’m here it all seems so... other. I can’t understand it, and it scares me.”
“I know, Padg.”
Dun didn’t know why the “otherness” that Padg spoke of bothered him so much less. It wasn’t just all the time spent studying the cultures of other folk when they were pups. Padg had had that too, if he’d been listening to any of it. It was as if Dun knew, understood, straight away, that even the oddest cultures had a reason for what they did. Knowing that was enough, for him, not to be bothered; and it gave him time to adjust. Then it came to him; a way, at least, to increase their chances—pool their resources...
“We should ask for a last request,” he said.
“Very cheering,” Padg said. “I feel so much better now.”
Dun chuckled, the first real lifting of mood he’d felt for spans.
“No, you daft pup. I’ve had an idea. If we can’t think of anything ourselves, at least we can get our heads together.”
“But they won’t let us get to Tali. She’s being kept somewhere else,” Padg said.
“That’s where our last request comes in.”
“We don’t even know if they allow such things.”
“I suspect they will. They might seem barbaric, but they are great observers of form, and every culture believes itself to be capable of merciful acts.”
It didn’t take long for Dun to establish from Tuf that last requests were indeed granted to the condemned. It took a little extra time to persuade the gruff guard that, although they weren’t actually condemned yet, a last request should be granted now. It seemed that since the process was taking so long, if they were indeed condemned they’d get little enough chance for last requests when the time came. When the door to their cell was opened and the warm scent of Tali drifted in, Dun caught himself feeling slightly smug. His guess had paid off.
“Good work,” Padg said.
“Greetings men-folk,” Tali said as the door closed. Then they fell upon each other hugging until Tali broke it up. “Hold on, lads, I’ve had an idea.”
She spent some time explaining her plan in detail: how her relationship with Amber had developed, and how it appeared Tali’s newfound friend might become a co-conspirator. She filled them in on all the little nuances and political relationships that Amber had shared. The allegiances and rivalries, vendettas and pacts that seemingly made the Stone-folk who they were. A strange people of many rules, but seemingly there was always a way around if the reward was high enough. A people of hard work and long memories.
“What about Amber?” Dun asked, in concerned tones.
“Yeah, can we trust her?” Padg said.
“No, that’s not what I meant,” Dun shot back. “I was more thinking what happens to her if she does help us? We’re not exactly popular folks here, are we?”
“I... I had thought about that, have been thinking about that. I... don’t know, I...”
“I’m sorry, Tali, I didn’t mean to imply...”
“Yeah, I know,” she said in almost a whisper. “I like her...”
“But she’s the best chance we’ve got?” Padg always had a way of cutting to the point.
“Listen, we don’t have to ask her,” Dun said. He felt torn both ways. Did he have the right to be noble about Amber on behalf of the three of them?
“I think she’s going to decide that for herself. She may seem quiet, but that’s just the way they made her here,” Tali said.
When he heard the sound of Tuf shuffling and coughing outside their cell two thoughts struck Dun. How quickly the time had flown, and how long had Tuf been there? Their plan, such as it was, was a fragile raft and any one of its reeds could snap with the slightest nudge in the wrong place, leaving them floundering. And this particular river, Dun suspected, was heading nowhere good. They were still missing one vital straw to weave in too. How to stall a decision from the council long enough to even get their raft in the water. And aside from that, as if there wasn’t enough for Dun to worry about, the conversation with Tali had brought up something new. The attitude of some of the Stone-folk factions, to them, bothered him; more than just fear of spying and intrusion, more than fear of someone unknown and new. Something else was fueling this, Dun was sure, but he couldn’t pin down what it was. And why did it seem to be the two farthest upstream Dukedoms? He could feel all the pieces but couldn’t grasp the whole. It reminded him of a game the pups played—each with the pieces of a reed doll, sticks, and strands. The first to assemble the toy won. A simple game, stupid-seeming now and so far away. But as simple as it was, Dun felt the pieces mocking him; challenging him to make them into something. As they drifted off to sleep again, Dun arranged and rearranged the sticks and straws obsessively in his head. Padg twitched next to Dun, his voice just too faint to be a whimper.
Tali, though, dreamed of something else. She dreamed of the Stone-carvers, slowly chipping their names into a massive monolith.
