Crystal Gorge

“It is the temple that must be defended, holy Aracia. The empty ground outside the temple is not significant.”

Andar was startled by Bersla’s lack of understanding, but he approached the fat man rather carefully. “I’m just guessing here,” he said, “but I gather that your family has served holy Aracia for many generations.”

“We have served in her temple for centuries,” Bersla declared with some pride.

“Ah,” Andar said. “That might explain why you’ve overlooked something rather important.”

“I overlook very little, outlander.”

“Good. Now tell me which part of the temple you’ll eat when the supply of food runs out.”

“There’s always food here. It’s the primary obligation of the commoners to provide food for the priesthood.”

“But if they don’t have any food to give you, there won’t be anything here for you to eat, will there? If you think about that just a bit, I’m sure you’ll realize that the farmland out there is much more important than this temple.”

“How dare you?” Bersla flared.

“Truth sometimes has a very bad taste,” Andar said. “How many times a day do you eat?”

“Thrice, of course. All people eat three times a day.”

“And where does the food you eat come from?”

“Well, the farms, I suppose, but there are many farms in holy Aracia’s Domain. We’ll always have food.”

“Not if we don’t stop the invasion of the bug-people, you won’t. The bug-people eat everything—vegetables, fruit, meat-animals, trees, and the farmers themselves. Once the bug-people start eating, it won’t be long before everything out there will be gone. That’s when you and the other priests here in this holy temple will begin to starve to death. I’ve been told by people who know about such things as the process of starvation that it would probably take a man of your girth about three months to die, and it’s likely to be the worst three months of your entire life. You’ll have to be very watchful after the supply of food runs out, because your fellow priests are very likely to decide that a plump fellow like you might taste very good after they’ve gone without food for a few weeks.”

“That’s monstrous!” Bersla exclaimed.

“I know, but it does happen in these situations. Now, then, if your fellow priests don’t kill you and eat you, your body will begin to absorb your flesh. In a certain sense, you’ll be eating yourself, and your skin will start to sag like a wet blanket. I wouldn’t worry too much, though, because after the bug-people have eaten everything out in the farmland, they’ll come here, and then they’ll eat you. You should probably keep a nice sharp knife handy so that you can kill yourself before the bugs arrive. Bugs don’t seem to think it’s necessary to kill something before they eat it, and being eaten alive would probably be even worse than dying of starvation. If you’d like, I’ll show you exactly where to drive in your knife to kill yourself quickly with the least amount of pain. Or maybe you could hide yourself long enough to finish starving to death before the bugs find you. But make no mistake, great priest, when the food runs out, you will die—one way or another.”

Bersla was staring at Andar with a look of sheer horror, and Aracia’s expression was much the same. “He’s just making this up, isn’t he, Narasan?” she demanded.

“Actually, I think he put it rather mildly, Lady Aracia,” Narasan replied. “When famine strikes, horrors beyond imagination begin to crop up. Starvation is even worse than a war, and when a really severe famine breaks out, everybody dies—eventually—and the longer people live, the more they suffer. Now that you understand what’s likely to happen here, maybe we should talk about how we’re going to prevent it. I’d say that we should concentrate on keeping the bug-people out of your Domain. Once they come down out of the mountains and spread out, we’ll have lost this war, and all of your people will become nothing more than something the bugs will have for lunch.”

THE NORTH COUNTRY

1

At first light Captain Hook-Beak rowed a skiff across the harbor near Veltan’s house to speak with Narasan. Rabbit was standing near the bow of the Seagull when his young Trogite friend Keselo came out on deck. “Where’s your captain going?” he asked.

“He wants to get a few things straightened out with your commander before we split up and sail off in different directions,” Rabbit replied. “We’re likely to be separated for a month or two, so the cap’n wants to be sure that we’ll all be ready if trouble breaks out, I guess.” He looked at Keselo. “Do you know very much about these horse-soldiers that everybody seems to be so excited about?” he asked.

“I’ve never been in that part of the world,” Keselo replied, “but I’ve heard a few stories, and if those stories come anywhere close to being accurate, I definitely wouldn’t want to face them in a war.”

“Just exactly what is a horse?” Rabbit asked curiously.

“It’s one of the animals that eats grass,” Keselo replied. “It’s not very much like a sheep or a cow or a deer, though. It’s quite a bit larger, and it can run faster. The Malavi have somehow managed to tame them, and they sit on the backs of horses when they’re moving their cattle-herds from one place to another. Horses can run faster than cows—even when they’ve got a Malavi sitting on them. Over the years, the horses have turned out to be very useful, and the Malavi cow-herds have proved to be extremely valuable.”

“Do the horse people have any unusual weapons?” Rabbit asked.

“Their swords and spears are a bit different from ours. They call their swords ‘sabres,’ and they slash with them rather than stab. Their spears are called ‘lances,’ and they’re quite a bit longer than ours. I think they might have some problems if they encounter the bug-people, though. Venom would kill a horse just as fast as it kills people, I think, and a Malavi without his horse wouldn’t be very effective.”

“Do they wear armor of any kind?”

Keselo shook his head. “It would probably just get in their way, and the extra weight would slow their horses down. Speed is very important in Malavi war tactics. In many ways they’re very much like your people, Rabbit. They rely on speed.” Keselo smiled briefly. “Now that I think about it, the Malavi are almost a land version of the Maags, and the horse is very much like the Seagull here.”