The Deepcombers

Chapter Twenty Two

Mel thought about it for a moment, "all my tricks will work on him."

Valari snorted a laugh from behind her hair. Saeya frowned at him. Zed shook his head no. That wasn't the answer he sought.

"Valari," the medico turned to the brunette, "what does it mean to you?"

"He'll be useless in a fight." Val said as she came out from behind the curtain. "Except as bait." She mimicked Lon kissing the mutant hag in the swamp. Melcart laughed heartily. Saeya was furious. She put down an uncorked bottle and moved her hands to her hips in protest. Nobody spoke for a moment as the blond stared hot daggers at Valari, who merely shrugged an apology.

Zed shook his head no. He still hadn't heard the answer he sought but probably knew he could extract it from Saeya. He turned to his best student, "what does it mean?'

The freckle-faced girl knew what he wanted to hear, and she recited it like memory work. "A clean path is a straight path as steep as the pilgrim sets; its the hardest course but the most rewarding and it's also the most dangerous. There can be no imprints." She bit her bottom lip, "which means we cannot help you Lon. I'm sorry."

"That's right," Zed summarized. "No help." He repeated and looked at Melcart and Valari, "or you'll die."

Lon gulped. Why would they die? This news crushed him. Moments ago, he'd been so excited about the prospect of learning to shoot blue light from his hands and how to make wind. He had so many questions. Now, he was just supposed to accept that nobody here could help him? That didn't seem fair.

"What I saw last night?" Lon asked Saeya directly, "will you teach me that?"

Zed shook his head no and frowned. "The Secondsun shall never rise..." He began and the three other young masters joined to help recite a well-known mantra, "...but you can touch the sky if you follow your own path." Zed, Melcart, Valari and Saeya all spoke in unison, "...and the lessons are all around you." And with that said, the three young Varget speakers smiled and chuckled at their own sub-cultural bond. Saeya explained it to the outsider, "that's what Hamlin will say if you ask him to show you glyphs."

"Glyphs..?" Lon mulled it over. This was the first time he considered just how the Varget symbols could be used to manipulate the groundsmilk; he knew just what they were talking about but had no idea how it worked. The ancient language had appeared to him when he was strapped to the Altar of the Aquatic. He'd seen dozens of different runes when they ran through his mind as messages; those symbols must be the glyphs of which they spoke. He had seen fifty of them, more, but alas too many to recall even one for certain.

Melcart handed his charged purcloine to Zed and then smelled his armpits. "Uggh. I'm sweating," the uncouth lad looked up at the sky. "Why does it get so hot up here in the mountains?"

"I'm reminded of complaints I heard some months ago about the cold weather." Zed nodded toward the pool. "Go cool off."

Lon heard and saw movement in the brush beyond the giant tree trunk.

Zed saw it too, and he turned and welcomed two reptilians in brown robes who carried wooden saw benches into the area.

"What's this now?" Lon asked the others, a little nervous.

"It's Temple Day." Saeya announced.

"A lunch and lecture," Melcart said dismissively.

"Welcome, welcome," Zed hastily moved crates to clear a path for the incoming parade.

The young lad studied the people who lined up to enter through the leafy shrubs.  He saw that only a few of these temple-kin were red reptilians. Instead, the cosmopolitan congregation was composed of a wide variety of mutants; black, brown, yellow and green skinned picnickers awaited entry. Some had fur and one looked like a fox. Another long-legged lady had feathers and a beak. He wondered if those two could ever be friends.