Tarashana Rachel Neumeier (top 10 motivational books TXT) 📖

“So,” I agreed. “Darra might marry someone else. But, so. I would prefer my children to be Ugaro. My daughters might not be singers, but they would be respected. My sons might not be warriors, but they might be poets. Or even respected craftsmen. Even herdsmen. I would not prefer that, but I would not accept it.” I was thinking of Tano, of the problems that can occur when a man does not approve of his son. I resolved that if a moment came when I realized a son of mine did not want to be a warrior or a poet, I would behave in a far better manner than Yaro inTasiyo.

Lalani was saying, “You should tell Aras he should let you go. Then you should marry your Darra before she gets tired of waiting for you. I’m going to go to sleep for a little while.” She closed her eyes. “I’m so glad I found you, Ryo. I’m so glad I’m not alone in this place.”

“Yes,” I said, and leaned my head back against the stone of the cliff, gazing up at the sky. I was very aware of Lalani curled against me, of her shape that was womanly enough in the way of the Lau. I did not mind that awareness, but it made me think of Darra. Thinking of her now was good, but difficult. At least those thoughts would keep me awake. I did not want to sleep now, in this place that was not easy to guard, when I did not know what else might happen.

 -20-

I did sleep. I only realized this when I woke. It had been inexcusable carelessness to sleep there, with no one watching for danger. I had never in my life permitted myself to sleep while taking a watch. But I woke suddenly, knowing someone, not Lalani, was very close. I came to my feet in one fast movement, drawing my sword. Lalani gasped as she woke abruptly, but I had no attention to spare for her—

It was a wolf. I relaxed, straightening. This was not the same as the wolf who had been a Lau woman. This wolf was male, larger and heavier, with a broader head. He was laughing at me, as a wolf will laugh, his mouth open a little and his ears pricked forward. Probably he had made himself visible so that he could startle me awake and laugh at me. No doubt my reaction had been amusing.

“Yes, cousin, I know, that was very careless,” I admitted, sheathing my sword. “I would be even more embarrassed if you had been a tiger.” If Garoyo had seen me sleeping when I should watch, he would do worse than beat me: he would tell me to go join the herdsmen for a season, until I had learned to take on a warrior’s responsibilities.

This wolf might be an Ugaro who had become a wolf for the joy of running. I could not tell. The way he looked at me reminded me of the way a respected warrior looks at a boy he is not certain will make a good warrior. But he did not become a man. Perhaps he was the shade of a wolf and not a man.

Setting my embarrassment aside, I said to the wolf, gesturing to the mountainside, “We need to go that way. We are not goats, to climb so sheer a cliff. Perhaps, not too far away, we might find a path easy enough for a man.”

The wolf stood up, shook himself, and trotted away, along the face of the cliff, pausing to look over his shoulder. Other wolves came to him. I could not see them, but there was a flurry of tracks where they greeted one another, and the small sounds wolves make when they meet other wolves of their family. Then all the wolves continued, trotting at an easy pace, the one wolf visible and the others invisible, but all of them laying a clear trail where they trotted across a patch of snow.

Then the visible wolf turned hard to the side and went straight up the cliff, not bounding as a goat will leap from one small foothold to another even smaller, but still trotting easily, one foot in front of the next, as though on level ground.

“That’s ... different,” Lalani said. She stared up the cliff after the wolf, her eyes wide.

No doubt I was staring too. I said nothing, only slung our pack over my shoulder, ignoring the pull of the stitches in my stomach, and followed the wolves. When we came to the cliff, Lalani took my hand and held her breath, shutting her eyes. I looked up at the wolf and set my foot there, on the face of the cliff, where he had gone up.

We were walking somewhere else, not up a cliff, but along a broad ridge, high above the earth. Stars blazed overhead, so near it seemed possible to reach up and touch them. But this was not the high peak of Talal Sabero. No one could touch the sky from this place.

The wolves had gone ... or I thought they had gone. I did not feel their presence near us.

We were not walking exactly toward Aras, but our direction was close to that. To both sides, empty air fell away; mist hid what lay below. Everywhere great mountains rose up, towering. In front of us, but not too close, the long, deadly streak of the shadow of the black tide stretched across sky and stone. Talal Sabero must lie that way. But the Saa’arii tide must have been driven in retreat by the shiral winds, because that flat smear across the sky was surely narrower now, and perhaps frayed about the edges, and certainly farther from the earth.

Lalani had opened her eyes by now. She looked around, at the ridge and the mountains;