The Chaos Balance

CVI

After adjusting the floppy hat and drying his forehead, Nylan stood in the stirrups to try to stretch his legs and thighs, and to unkink his knees. When he reseated himself, he glanced out across the rolling hills of sun-browned grass, hills that seemed to extend forever southward. “Two days and the hills still seem endless.”

“Another day and they’ll get flatter, more like steppes or high grasslands,” predicted Ayrlyn. “Just think what it would be like on foot.”

Nylan winced. His lips and mouth seemed dry all the time, and the water in their bottles was nearly gone. “We don’t have that much water left.”

After the first day, they had turned off the main road and followed a trail that led more to the southeast, back toward the still-distant Westhorns. Nylan thought he recalled that the mountains extended farther westward in the southern half of Candar, but that could have been wishful thinking. Then, anymore, what wasn’t wishful thinking?

A thin stream from an underground spring that dried up as it flowed south had been the only water they had found. He licked his dry lips with a tongue almost as dry.

“If we keep on this trail, I think there’s a small lake ahead.”

“And probably a town, with a garrison of white lancers or the local equivalent.”

“I didn’t sense that. There might be some holdings.”

“How far?”

“A good half day, maybe longer.”

“We’ll need water before that.”

“We do need water,” said Sylenia. “You are mages.”

“Waada…” added Weryl from his seat behind the nursemaid’s saddle.

“I’m not a mage,” protested Nylan. Even as he spoke the words, his head throbbed. Was his internal lie detector insisting he was? “Anyway, just being a mage doesn’t mean we can find water.”

The sun continued to beat on their backs as they rode to the southeast, along the trail where the dust had gradually shifted from the yellow of Syskar to a grayed brown, mixed with sand.

Still, underneath the browned grass, Nylan could sense the boulders and stones that were too close to the surface, separated from the sun and light by that same thin line of chaotic order.

“It’s still the same,” Ayrlyn said. “They must have…I don’t know what.”

Neither did Nylan, but it felt wrong. He tried to lick his lips, but his tongue was dry, and there was no water left in the bottles on the mare. Had he drunk his too quickly?

By mid-afternoon they had crossed two or three more lines of hills and found no sign of streams, ponds, or springs-or of settlers, just more lines of hills covered with sun-browned grass.

They reined up at another hill crest, perhaps two more lines of hills later.

“There’s something down there.” Ayrlyn pointed almost due south, where a slightly higher hill cast a shadow over a flat, barely shining surface.

“I thought there weren’t any lakes this close. That’s not your lake, is it?”

“It doesn’t feel like a lake,” admitted the redhead.

“It be a lake,” said Sylenia. “It needs be a lake.”

With that Nylan could definitely agree.

As their mounts carried them downhill and closer, he could see that the flat surface was a small lake or a large pond, but it looked almost bright green, even in the late afternoon shadow. Even the shores of the lake were sere, without vegetation. There were no signs of houses.

Nylan continued to study the ground around the lake, finally noting several circular arrangements of stone in bare spots between the irregular clumps of brown grass on the higher ground to the south and east of the dried lake bed. “Someone’s had a campsite here-not recently.”

The mare’s hoofs crackled as she left the sparse grassy flat around the lake bed and carried Nylan down the gentle barren slope toward the edge of the water. There, he dismounted slowly, and swallowed.

He bent and scooped up a handful of the water, smelling it, then licking his fingers. He winced. The water was saltier than merely brackish, and the white splotches that laced the barren ground were salt crystals.

“A salt lake?” asked Ayrlyn.

He nodded. “Maybe…maybe I can order-sort enough to keep us going.”

Whuffff…The mare edged toward the water.

Nylan didn’t know if she would attempt drinking it or not; so he handed the reins to Ayrlyn before he walked to the pack mare to unstrap the small bucket.

He half-filled the bucket with the salty water, and set it on the shore, trying to summon the dark order fields. His forehead began to perspire, though he couldn’t imagine that he had enough water within for sweat, and his vision to blur.

The water in the bucket swirled, and white heaps appeared beside it. The smith took a deep breath, looked at the half bucket of water, then dipped his finger into it and licked. “It tastes all right to me.”

“Waadah?” pleaded Weryl.

Nylan carefully poured some of the water into the bottle Sylenia proffered and handed it back to her.

Weryl slurped, but didn’t seem to spill any.

In turn, the silver-haired angel refilled two more bottles, one for Ayrlyn and one for Sylenia, and drank the small amount in the bottom of the bucket.

The second bucketful was easier, and Nylan refilled the rest of the water bottles.

“What about our mounts?” asked Sylenia.

The smith turned and looked at the horses. With open mouths, all panted in the sun. Nylan wasn’t totally certain, but he had the feeling that they wouldn’t be panting unless they were in poor condition.

Nylan groaned under his breath. He hated to think about the effort involved in using order fields to get enough water for the mounts-yet if he didn’t…

In fact, even if he did…He sent his perceptions out to his mare, then shook his head.

“What be the matter?” asked Sylenia.

“We’ll be camping here tonight-one way or another.”

“The mounts?” asked Ayrlyn.

He nodded.

Sylenia slipped out of her saddle, but left Weryl in his seat as Nylan refilled the bucket with brackish water for a third time, and began to marshal the order fields once more.

They really didn’t have anything else to use but the bucket. So Nylan held it for the mare. Some water splattered over his forearms, but not too much. The smith took away the bucket after the mare had finished half a bucket and offered it to Ayrlyn’s chestnut. His eyes blurred.

“I can do the next batch,” Ayrlyn offered. “I’d better do it. You look like dead flame.”

Nylan handed her the bucket. His legs were shaking so much that he had to sit down, right on the salt-crusted lake bed.

“You must eat.” Sylenia pressed a biscuit upon Nylan, that and one of the water bottles he had filled.

He sat on the dry lake bed in the growing shadow of the hill to the northwest, and ate, slowly. On the grassy area by one of the old campfires, Ayrlyn had set up a tieline and tethered the horses.

After the shakiness passed, the smith stood and walked slowly up to join her. They both sat down, along with Sylenia, and Weryl, and ate.

Abruptly, Weryl stood and tottered toward a stone poking out of the gray-brown dirt, a stone that might have been calf-high on the boy. All three adults watched.

“I wish I had his recuperative powers,” Nylan said.

“You do. You’ve just done more.” Ayrlyn smiled and reached out and squeezed his hand.

More? Too much more? Nylan wondered, but he took another sip of water and watched his son explore the ancient rock.