The Alwat had also erected shelters, simple lean-tos roughly covered in sheets of birch bark.

"Do they expect rain tonight?" Perkar asked Atti, gesturing at the huts.

"Not tonight," he answered.

"Not tonight? What other night? How long will this take, this negotiation?"

To his surprise, it was Ngangata who answered him. The two of them had not spoken since their fight, and Perkar did not expect to speak to him ever again.

"The Forest Lord has little sense of time," he said. "It could take a night or many nights. There is no way of knowing."

"Why did the Forest Lord send us away, then? Why can't we attend our king?"

Irritation flashed across Ngangata's broad features, as if his answer to Perkar was meant to be singular, a gift to be accepted but not a precedent to be taken for granted. Perkar felt his face burn, but not with anger. He stepped back from the fire lest it show.

"The Forest Lord doesn't really understand Human Beings or even Alwat, I think," he said. "He believes we are like the Huntress, like Karak."

"He thinks we are gods?" Perkar asked, unwilling to stop now that the half man was speaking.

"No. The Raven and the Huntress are gods in their own rights, but they are also aspects of Balati, parts of him. As leaves are parts of a tree. Better yet, they are like aspen trees. Each aspen is a tree itself, but all of the aspen in a forest are part of the same root."

"And he thinks we are like that? All aspects of the Kapaka?"

"It is his habit to think that way," Ngangata answered. "Besides," he went on, "the king is wise, and he has been schooled in this kind of negotiation. We will be allowed to fetch him water and food when need be; Balati will not notice our presence."

"You say that the king is wise," Apad said, his voice low and flat. "Do you mean to imply that we are not?"

"I mean only to imply that you are not as wise as the Kapaka," Ngangata said softly. "That is no insult, only a fact."

"Who can dispute that?" Atti added, a little too quickly.

Apad's expression said that he might, but he kept his peace. For days, Apad had been trying to goad Ngangata into a fight, following Perkar's example, but with no success. Ngangata's answers to him were always couched in words just short of insulting, and Perkar realized now that when Ngangata openly insulted someone, he meant to do so. The fight at the cave had been no accident, no slip of the tongue. The half man had invited Perkar to fight him and then let himself be beaten. Apad and Eruka would never see this—but they had not felt the strength behind Ngangata's half-hearted blows. What Perkar still didn't understand was what the little man was up to. What shamed him was the suspicion that it had been some sort of test, one he had failed.

And why did he care about that? Ngangata was not a warrior, had no Piraku. Having his respect gained one nothing.

But he did know one thing; he would rather have Ngangata with him tonight than Apad or Eruka, though he liked the two Human men better.

"I'll make my offerings now," he told them. He gave a little incense to the Fire Goddess, then moved off into the shadows crouching about the camp. There he offered to his sword, to Ko who made it. He offered to his armor, too, unfolding it as he did so. To the gods of the mountain, he made no offerings at all; he did not want to attract their attention.

His oblations were hurried, as he began to feel a nagging urgency. If he was going into the caves of the Forest Lord, he must do so now; for all he knew the Kapaka and the Balati were even now concluding an agreement. Best, in fact, not to go back to the fire at all. Ngangata and Atti might become suspicious; if he left now, they would think that he was displaying more piety than usual. It would be a good while before they actually began to look for him, and then it would be too late. Or perhaps they would go to sleep and not realize he had been gone at all. Part of him wanted Apad and Eruka along, but he was forced to conclude that he might be better off without them; after all, he had no intention of seeking battle, save with the Rivergod himself. He had no quarrel with the Forest Lord nor any god in his domain. Nor, he realized, did he really seek glory or a place in some epic. All of that was just his friends talking. It sounded good at the time, but growing fear and apprehension was stripping it away. After all, he had seen the Forest Lord, knew something of the being from whom he intended to steal; and at the moment, he felt like little Perkar, not like some Giant from one of Eruka's songs.

He donned his hauberk, and as it settled over his shoulders, a terrible cold fear settled with it. The steel felt hard and unforgiv-ing against his body, too heavy. Almost he took it back off, returned to the fire to wait for the Kapaka. He did not. This was his only chance; if he did not go tonight, he would never go, no matter how long the Forest Lord and the Kapaka negotiated. Because as his fear was stripping away his reasons—Piraku, heroics—it also gnawed at his most basic cause. How often had she told him that there was nothing he could do? How often had she begged him to forget? She was a goddess; she knew so much more of these things than he did.

A goddess, but not a warrior. She did not know what a man with the right weapon might accomplish.

And so he settled the hauberk, donned his steel cap with its plume of horsehair, strapped on his greaves. Then, with a single backward glance, he set off along the base of the valley wall, searching for the trail up, the one that went past the caves.

It soon became terribly dark, though a glimpse now and then showed the Pale Queen to be full. The forest was, fortunately, open and expansive, so that he did not become hopelessly tangled. His progress was anything but the silent stealth he had imagined, however; everywhere there were branches to step on, snags to stumble over, and his armor protested in a metallic chorus each time he tripped. Worse, it seemed impossible to keep his bearings, and he worried that he was traveling in entirely the wrong direction. He thought seriously about lighting a torch, but that would attract the attention of everyone around him—and everything—and so he decided to muddle on without one.

He did not find the trail, and the moon set. Balat became darker than the inside of a coffin, darker than any cave could be. Perkar did try to start a torch then, but could find nothing suitable from which to make one, nothing that would catch fire. Finally, blind, he sank to the cool earth, rested against an unseen tree. He thought he heard people calling his name, after a time, but could not be certain. In any event, he did not call out himself. It would be too humiliating, too stupid, and he could already imagine the condescending expression on Ngangata's face. His back to the rough trunk, Perkar cursed himself until he dozed.

He awoke with a start, but there was no clear indication of what had awakened him; the woods were still dark. Nightbirds were calling, but not close or loud. He rubbed the grit from his eyes and strained them at the darkness, realized that it was not entirely dark, after all; he could just make out the enormous bole of an ash, to his left, the suggestion of a fern frond, there. It must be, he thought, the earliest glimmerings of dawn. Soon it would be light enough to find the camp. He would tell them that he had gone off in search of solitude, he supposed, that he needed to be alone. They would think it odd—Apad and Eruka would know it to be a lie and Ngangata, at least, would suspect some more foolish motive. But it would be better than admitting the truth. Perkar realized that he felt relieved, unburdened. The knots tied in his gut were loosened and gone. The decision had been taken from him by the forest itself; he had tried to find the caves, the magical weapon—if it existed. He had failed; not because he wasn't strong or brave, but because the forest would not let him find the way. It was simple, a relief. Be a man, she had told him. Dream of the possible.

The light was a bit grayer, more details were coming clear. He studied the earth near his feet, trying to puzzle out details, occupy himself until it was really light. He made out one of his bootprints, pressed into a worn, muddy place. There, another.

He frowned. One of his prints crossed another. Not his. He found more as he searched; many men in boots, walking one behind another. And the prints of horses. Perkar drew a tight breath, and his heart pounded. It was the trail.

The songs often spoke of caves as mouths or doorways, but to Perkar they seemed like eyes, slitted and unblinking eyes of some enormous creature. He panted as he regarded them and tried to decide which to enter. The path up was harder than the one down, as his grandfather used to say. Especially in full armor, without a horse. His clothes were already soaked with sweat, though the morning was cool. The first true rays of the sun were yet to be seen.

He had no time to dither, he knew. Ngangata and Atti might not know what he was about, but they would certainly come looking for him, follow his bumbling trail through the woods. He understood that he could yet turn back, and that nagged at him. Once he entered the caves he was committed to his course of action. He was telling himself that for the fifth time when he heard muttering voices coming up the trail, the rattle of armor.

Suddenly his choices narrowed. There was only one cave close enough to reach before Ngangata and Atti came into view, and he found himself scrambling upslope toward it. It was not the largest cave, nor the smallest; but part of its floor had collapsed and the rubble formed a ramp leading up to it, like the wrinkled folds beneath the eye of an old man. He levered himself from one broken chunk of rock to the next, fingers fumbling desperately for purchase on the moss-covered stone. He was almost to the opening when he heard his name called. Reluctantly—and yet still a bit relieved—he turned toward the voice.

It was neither Ngangata nor Atti; it was a red-faced, puffing Apad, Eruka trailing not far behind him.

"Wait!" Apad called. The two of them straggled over to the talus slope and started up it—somewhat more cautiously than Perkar.

"Where are Ngangata and Atti?" Perkar called.

"They went to take food and water to the Kapaka. We said we would look for you," Apad explained, through his wheezing. He and Eruka were both clad in their armor, as well, and had probably been running or at least trotting since they left camp.

"What are you doing here, alone?" Apad demanded as he drew abreast of Perkar. "We agreed to go together."

Perkar shrugged. "I guess I thought…" He trailed off, unwilling to say what he had really thought.

"You thought you would have the glory to yourself," Apad finished for him. "But heroes come in threes, remember?" He glanced upslope, at the cave. "Is this the right one?"

Perkar raised his eyebrows. "I don't know. It was the closest."

"You don't know?"

Perkar shook his head.

"Eruka," Apad said to their companion. "Can you find out? Is there a song?"

Eruka pursed his lips, an uneasy expression on his face. "There is a song," he admitted reluctantly. "I think it would help with this."

"Well?"

"What do we want to know exactly?"

Apad looked heavenward in exasperation. "We want to know which of these caves leads to the Forest Lord's armory," Apad said.

"I know a song that might help," Eruka repeated. "But it could be dangerous."

"How so?"

"Any spirit I call here might tell the Forest Lord."

"The Forest Lord is busy," Apad said. "And heroes must take risks."

"Why don't we risk entering the wrong cave, then?" Eruka suggested.

The conversation had given Perkar time to think. He vividly remembered being lost in the forest at night. One could just as easily become lost in a dark cave.

"We need light to find our way in there," he said. "At the very least we need torches."

Apad considered that. "Do whatever it is you can do, Eruka," he said. "Perkar and I will make some torches."

Perkar hesitantly followed Apad back down. The two of them started searching for branches.

"Look for heart pine," Apad said. "That should burn brightly and long."

Perkar had his doubts about that; his father usually made torches from bundles of dried reeds—but he also usually coated them in tar or fat. Behind them, Eruka began singing, but Perkar was already far enough out of earshot that he could not make out the words.

Perkar found a long piece of heart pine in a rotting tree—but he also chanced upon some dry reeds, which he collected into a bundle, binding them together with some greener, less brittle stems. When he got back to the trail, Eruka was no longer singing. He and Apad were sitting in the nearest cave, feet dangling out. Eruka was holding something that looked suspiciously like a flask of woti.

"I thought we had no more of that," Perkar said as he climbed up to join them.

"I thought we might need it," Eruka said. "Some gods only respond to woti or wine."

"You lied to the Kapaka?" ,

Eruka shrugged. "I just didn't mention it." He took a drink of the woti and passed the flask to Apad. The air near the cave seemed drenched with the rich, sweet scent; Eruka had poured a libation into a small bowl, probably while singing.

"Did your song work?"

"I don't know," Eruka admitted.

Apad offered the flask of woti to Perkar. "Woti makes you brave," he said.

Perkar grinned crookedly. "You aren't a Wotiru, are you? You chew your shield?"

"I don't know. Perhaps I am," Apad said, taking another drink. Perkar didn't think Apad was a Wotiru; he had met them, at his father's house. They drank copious amounts of woti to fill them with battle-fever, but even when there was no battle they carried an air of recklessness—even madness—about them that Perkar had never noticed in Apad.

"We should move farther back in the cave," Perkar said. "If Ngangata and Atti come looking for us, I don't want them to see us."

"Pfah!" Apad sneered. "We can deal with them, if they oppose us. You know that."

"I know that if Ngangata chooses to use his bow against us, we are all dead men, armor or no."

"He's right," Eruka said, plucking at Apad's shoulder.

"And where is your spirit? The god you called?" Apad asked Eruka, brushing the hand away.

"I don't know," Eruka said. "Gods are capricious. Or perhaps I phrased the song all wrong."

"No," a voice said from behind them. "No, your song was sufficiently irritating that I came looking for you. Now give me that woti you promised."

The three of them whirled as one, and Perkar scrambled to his feet, as well. The speaker was an Alwa, to all appearances, though a stunted, extraordinarily thick-muscled one. And whereas the Alwat were pale, this creature was white, and devoid of all fur. His eyes were white, too, though the pupils were black.

"Well?" he demanded.

Apad carefully set the bottle of woti down near the bowl. The Alwa ambled over, picked up the bowl, and drank its contents. Then he turned his attention to the bottle.

"This is good," he said at last. "The only decent thing that ever came from Human Beings. Now. Who called me?" He turned his blind-looking eyes to them, seemed to search them out. Perkar was reminded of Ngangata.

"What god are you?" Perkar asked.

The Alwa grinned wide. "Don't know me? I guess your friend does."

Eruka cleared his throat. "He is a… ah, he is one of the Lemeyi."

Perkar gaped. "A Lemeyi," he repeated. The white creature laughed, a loud, raucous sound.

"Why…" Perkar began, but could not finish. Not with the creature standing right there. Why would Eruka call such a creature? When he was a child, his mother had frightened him with promises that the Lemeyi would come to steal him away. At least one child he knew had been devoured by the strange creatures.

"Yes, why me?" the Lemeyi said. "What do you want? Why shouldn't I eat you here and now?"

"We called you in good faith," Eruka protested.

"Answer your friend's question," the Lemeyi growled.

"I…" Eruka turned to face Perkar. He was sweating. "I couldn't call any of the normal gods," he said. "They would just tell the Forest Lord—or he would know without being told. So I…" He trailed off miserably.

"So you called a bastard," the Lemeyi finished. "A bastard, that's me! My father was an Alwa and my mother was a stone!" He laughed, so loudly that Perkar feared the Forest Lord would hear.

"And so now," the Lemeyi said, when he had done laughing, "what do you want of the bastard?"

Apad and Eruka were just staring at the creature. Perkar found his voice. "We want to see the armory of the Forest Lord."

"The armory?"

"Where he keeps his weapons."

"You want to see the Forest Lord's treasures?" the Lemeyi asked. He seemed amused by this, as he did by everything.

"If that's where the weapons are."

"And you just want to see them?"

Perkar hesitated. He answered carefully. "We want to see them. Can you take us there?"

"Well," the Lemeyi mused. "Well. I can take you anywhere in the mountain. Anywhere you want to go. But when you get there, you might not like it."

"Why?" Apad asked.

"You just might not. Humans are funny that way. Never really like what they desire."

"Well, we desire this," Perkar said. "Let us worry about whether we like it."

"Oh, I wasn't worried," the Lemeyi explained, spreading his hands generously. "No, I wasn't worried. If that's where you want to go, I've nothing better to do. Follow me."

"This is the right cave?" Perkar asked.

"Any of them is the right cave, if you know where you are going," the Lemeyi replied. He frowned, looked back over his shoulder. "You can't see in the dark, can you?"

"We have torches," Apad said.

The Lemeyi shook his head. "The Fire Goddess would arouse notice. Just follow close to me." He turned and started down into the cavern.

Perkar shrugged and followed, his friends a few paces behind. They followed the Lemeyi down the dark, constricting tunnel. Perkar prepared himself for blindness, but as they progressed farther and farther from the entrance, his eyesight did not seem to dim; indeed, it improved somewhat, though the distance he could see was limited. The Lemeyi, in front of him, was distinct, as were the floor and walls of the cave. But up ahead, beyond their guide, it was as if a fog obscured his vision. Rather than dwelling on this feat the Lemeyi was clearly performing, Perkar instead concentrated on memorizing the path through the cavern. Always they seemed to be going down, and the way was usually rough; they picked their way over jagged swords of stone that pointed always up, toward the roof—a roof that Perkar could not usually see. At other times, however, the ceiling descended to their very heads; twice they had to crawl on their bellies through narrow clefts in the rock. His armor no longer seemed hot; though he perspired freely from the exertion of wearing it, he felt cool, almost cold, and the motionless air was colder still. When anyone spoke—the Lemeyi spoke often—the voice seemed to fill the space around them like water in a jug, and it seemed to Perkar that all of the underdark must know their whereabouts. He himself kept his mouth tightly shut whenever possible.

They crossed a swiftly coursing stream, flowing roughly in their direction of travel.

"She used to flow through here," the Lemeyi said, indicating the way they were going. "But that was many years ago. She still talks about it—constantly. I think she regrets cutting her new channel."

"What?" Eruka asked.

"Well, before, she flowed down through here and finally south," the Lemeyi explained. "But she cut through to a lower fissure, worked that all up into a tunnel. Some of the little mountain gods down there were angry about that! They still resent it, even though they should pity her instead."

"Pity her?" Eruka queried.

"Oh yes, for of course she flows north now. Into the Ani Pendu, the Changeling."

Ani Pendu, Perkar thought. Changeling.

"What if we meet one of the gods?" Apad whispered.

"What if you do, mortal man?" the Lemeyi shot back.

"How are they best fought?"

The Lemeyi, of course, laughed. "From far away, by someone else."

It was too late, of course, to regret his decision, but just the right time for Perkar's apprehension to grow. By now they must be deep in the mountain, and his sense of that profundity made his magical ability to see in the dark seem a lie. In fact, he reflected, it might be a lie. The Lemeyi were said to be capable of such things. Perhaps even now they were still at the cave mouth, and this was all a dream in the white creature's head. If so, it was a lengthy dream. Perkar had not the faintest idea how long they had been traveling. Three times his throat had grown dry enough to wet with water from his skin, twice he had relieved himself while the Lemeyi waited impatiently. None of that told him much, only that time was indeed passing—something he might otherwise doubt. The dark tunnels all looked the same; they crossed a few more streams, had to wade in one for a while. The streams all seemed to flow in the direction they were going— which meant down, of course. That might be a help, should the Lemeyi choose to abandon them, something Perkar considered a distinct possibility.

Thinking along those lines, nagged by worry, Perkar at last decided to speak to the godling again.

"May I ask why you're doing this?" he asked.

"Me?" The Lemeyi sounded genuinely astonished. "Doing what?"

"Leading us. Taking us to the Forest Lord's treasure."

"Why, you called me."

"That doesn't compel you, does it? I thought Eruka's song was only to get your attention. I didn't realize it obligated you in some way."

"Why, I hadn't thought of that," the Lemeyi said, scratching his head. "I guess I'm not compelled to do this at all. Thank you for bringing that to my attention, mortal man." He smiled broadly and vanished. Or, rather, the entire tunnel vanished into darkness as if Perkar had been struck blind. Which, of course, he had been in a sense. Perkar heard a double sharp intake of breath behind him, a curse.

"Well, that was clever, Perkar," Apad drawled, behind him.

Somewhere, the Lemeyi began to laugh.