ZYGRADON Read Free Page B

hiding
place.
    "Why can't they just walk to Moerta?" he asked, on the heels of Le'esha
commending the children for being so good.
    "Walk?" The Queen of Snows blinked, visibly caught off balance, and sat down
in her chair. Then she laughed. "You mean the tunnels that we use to travel between the
enclaves? Oh, my dear, do you know how far it is from the shores of Lygroes to the
shores of Moerta?"
    "Magic makes the distance shorter," Mrillis said. Now he was confused. He
knew that if he rode a horse, it would take him one whole moon to travel from
Wynystrys, on the western shore of Lygroes, to the Stronghold, on the far northeastern
tip of the continent. Walking the tunnel from the Stronghold to the island, however,
took less than a day. He had never gone into the tunnel, but he had stood at the barred
door of the entrance. He knew the tingling in his fingertips and the whispering in the
back of his mind was his imbrose , reacting to magic at work.
    "Yes, magic does make the distance shorter. And only those of Rey'kil blood,
with strong imbrose , can use the tunnels. There is no tunnel under the sea,
reaching to Moerta."
    "We could build one."
    "Hmm, yes, but how much power do you think it would take to dig a tunnel,
much less keep the weight of all that water and stone from crushing it?" Le'esha sighed
and smiled and reached out her arms to the children.
    Ceera, who was sleepy again, crept up into her lap. Mrillis leaned into the
warmth of her arm around him and rested his elbows on the arm of her chair.
    "I don't know," he admitted, after thinking a long while.
    "That is knowledge you must grow into. Just as you will grow into whatever
talent the Estall has given you." She brushed a kiss on his forehead. "Once long ago, when
all Rey'kil had magic and power flowed like water, a tunnel reached from Moerta to
Lygroes. It is long gone, vanished or destroyed, I know not. As imbrose waned
in the World, there was not enough strength to keep the tunnel intact. As the World is
now, there is not enough power to build another tunnel, nor maintain it. There is only
so much imbrose available for the use of magic."
    "But magic is everywhere. Can you run out?"
    "To my knowledge, no," she answered slowly. "It is like the water that collects
in the cisterns. Water always flows in, yes? But the level of water in the cistern changes,
depending on how much we use. If we used it all, if we wasted it in splashing games,
instead of using it for laundry and cooking, we would be thirsty until the water filled the
cistern again. Do you see?"
    Mrillis nodded. "What happens if nobody uses magic for a long, long time?
Does the imbrose overflow?"
    "We don't know. There is never so much imbrose that it becomes
dangerous. All Rey'kil have the gift of magic, but some can't do much magic because
there isn't enough imbrose ."
    "Like everybody can wash, but not everybody can take a bath, because there
isn't enough water for that?" he guessed.
    "Exactly." Le'esha hugged him. Ceera clapped and giggled, even though she
probably didn't understand what they had been talking about.
    "So that's why we don't help the Noveni like they want?"
    "We don't help the Noveni?" Le'esha's smile faded. For a moment, she looked
unutterably weary. "You overheard a great deal, didn't you?" When Mrillis nodded, she
sighed and closed her eyes. "Tell me what you heard. If the Noveni have decided to
blame the Rey'kil for their troubles again, we must be warned."

Chapter Three
    Mrillis repeated back as much of the conversation as he could recall. Then
Le'esha had him tell her what he thought of the men's words, his feelings, his fears, his
questions, the things he understood and didn't understand.
    "Are they going to try to take Lygroes away from us?" he said as he
finished.
    "The Estall gave Lygroes to the Rey'kil, just as he gave Moerta to the Noveni
and Flintan to the Encindi. We are all such different people, we cannot live
together."
    "But the Rey'kil and Noveni do live