Quest for Lost Heroes Read Free Page B

nothing there. Nothing. Just clouds. And I found that you can't live on that mountain. But when it throws you off - oh, how you long for it! I would kill to climb it again. I would sell my soul. It is so stupid. With fame I thought I would be someone. But I wasn't. Oh yes, the nobles invited me to their castles for a while, but I couldn't talk to them in their own language, of poetry and politics. I was a farmer. I can't read or write. I stood with them and sat with them and I felt like the fool I am. There is only one skill I know - I can swing an axe. I killed a few Nadir. I took the standard. And now I can't even become a farmer again. The mountain won't let me.'
    'Why don't you visit Maggrig and Finn? They still have that house in High Valley. They'd be glad to see you and you could talk of old times.'
    'They were always loners and we were never close. No, I should have died at Bel-azar. Nothing has gone right since then.'
    'Death comes soon enough to all men,' said Naza. 'Don't wish for it. Come inside and have a drink.'
    'No, tonight I will sit out here and think. No drinking. No fighting. I will sit here.'
    'I'll send a jug out to you - and a hot meal. I'll have some blankets brought out too.'
    'You needn't do this for me, Naza.'
    'I owe you, my friend.'
    'No,' said Beltzer sadly, 'you owe me nothing. And from now on I work for my food.'
     
    *
     
    Forty wooden pegs two inches in diameter had been driven into the lawn; each was set some three feet apart in rows of eight. The eight young students stood before the pegs awaiting instructions from Chareos. The morning sun was bright and a light breeze caressed the elm trees which bordered the lawn.
    'Now, gentlemen,' said Chareos, 'I want you to walk along the pegs, turn and come back as swiftly as you can.'
    'Might I ask why?' enquired Patris, the Earl's eldest son. 'Are we not supposed to learn the use of the sword?'
    'Indeed you are, my lord. But you hold a sword in the hand, and that is only one aspect of the bladesman's skill. Balance is everything. Now kindly take your positions.'
    The youngsters stepped on to the pegs and made a wary start. Patris moved smoothly out, turned and ran back to where Chareos waited. The other youths followed more carefully. Three slipped and had to make the attempt a second time; these three Chareos took aside.
    'You will continue on the pegs until I return,' he told them. One was the fat child, Akarin, son of the city's Elder Magistrate. He would never be a swordsman, but he was a game boy and Chareos liked him.
    He took the other five youths to the Run. It had been finished the day before and Chareos was well pleased with it. A long plank was angled up to join a platform of logs some six feet above the ground. The logs were balanced on greased spheres of wood, allowing them to roll gently. At the end of the log run was tied a knotted rope. With this it was possible to swing the twenty feet to the second set of logs and down a greased plank to the ground. The youths looked at the structure, then gazed one to the other.
    'Who wishes to be first?' asked Chareos. No one spoke. 'Then it will be you, young Lorin,' said the monk, pointing to the red-headed son of Salida, the Earl's Captain of Lance.
    Gamely the boy ran up the plank and on to the logs. They rolled and twisted under his feet and he half fell, but righted himself and slowly made it to the rope. With a leap he sailed over to the second run, released the rope and missed his footing, tumbling to the soft earth. The other youths did not laugh; they knew their turn would come. One by one each of them failed the Run until, at last, only Patris was left. He nimbly ran up the plank and on to the logs. Moving carefully, he reached the rope and then swung. Just before landing he angled his body sideways and, bending his knees, dropped into a crouch. Although the log rolled, his balance was perfect. But the greased plank at the end of the Run foxed him, and he slipped and fell sideways to