Farree shrugged. "I cannot tell you why," he repeated, "but that much I know."

Vorlund sealed the lock with a word code they all repeated after him and then they moved off, Zoror heading straight for the nearest one of those hillocks. Vorlund stood eyeing the nearest wall, now hidden under that thick coating of vegetation and Maelen held her head up, staring straight northward, as if from a breeze now rising she had gathered a message.

Farree's gaze followed hers. He actually staggered as the strongest hurt from that hiding place of his memory struck home.

"Caer Vul-li-Wan—"

Not part of the barriers which closed them in now, no—rather a peak upstanding like a narrow tower surmounting a keep. White against the sky which was a rich green-blue– Down its sides he thought he could see flickers of glitter even as far away as it must be—perhaps the same gem light as on the upper reaches of the cliffs about.

Almost as if his small flash of recognition had sent out some unknown message to alert sentries, there was a gathering of haze about that spire, a cover which might have been drawn from clouds too high to be seen, and it was gone from view.

Zoror's thought struck with almost the same force as the memory touch had given Farree. "Caer of the Seven Lords? So—it would appear that we have indeed been caught up by legend, younger brother. But whose legend? Have you come in summons by the 'Little People?'"

Farree paid him no attention; he thought only of the sight of that slim uprise against the sky. No, he had never seen that before– Then where had he gotten that name, and known that it was truly the right one? The haze which hid it now—the Breath of Merl-Math wafted in, to confuse any not of the true blood. But not raised to confuse him.

No, there was other cause to wear the wind veil! Other causes—!

He was airborne once more, hardly aware that he had beat upwards with what was near a leap. It did not matter that the Caer—that which called him—lay elsewhere. Farree wheeled in the air, looking not to the north where the peak was now hidden but to the west. At that moment the ship, those from it, everything which made up the mystery of this new world was wiped away. In him was a compelling call which only he might answer.

Already he had passed above the lip of the cliff which walled in the cup. There was no stretch of green beneath him as he dropped a little lower, skimming across a space filled with many pillars and wedges of rock, where there blazed forth with force enough to make him squint and strive to see only through a narrow slit, flames of light, red, green, blue, yellow, and also rainbows of many colors.

"Farree!"

He blocked that call out of his mind. Beside the compulsion which sent him on it was but a fading whisper. He was needed—he, alone—not those of other blood—those who plundered and took, killed and enslaved—

"I come!" He thought that with all his might, all the power he had learned from Maelen and Zoror. It was as if his own thoughts broke and tore as had that rough skin which had covered his wings, freeing him in another way.

Even as that tatter of some other's wing skin had led him through the crooked lanes of the portside town, so did that appeal, growing ever louder, draw his mind. The stretch of country where the jewel fires blazed fell away. He saw before him now a sloping into another valley but one much wider and more uneven of shapes. There was the glint of water there, and clumps of what might be trees. No bare soil showed the crisscross of hagger ways. Yet there was life here. Across the valley a number of dark animals were apparently grazing the short turf. One flung up its head and pointed that in Farree's direction. On so low a thought band that he almost missed it, he sensed part of what might be a question. He had no desire to linger and answer. The creature reared, flashing forelegs in the air, perhaps in challenge, while those others about it bunched swiftly, before taking off first in a trot and then at a rocking gallop.

Up from the copse of trees not too far from the river whirled a flock of birds taking to wing with the speed of warriors summoned by a chief's horn. They drew near to Farree and he saw that, though they appeared at a distance to resemble birds, this close he could see no feathers. Their brilliantly hued wings were more like his own and their bodies were covered with scales which were as jeweled in this light as the cliff rock he had crossed moments earlier. Their heads were long and narrow, split near the beginning of their sinuous necks with gaping jaws which showed teeth.

He eyed them warily and soared higher. There was a wind now which was chill and had what could be a snow bite to it. Perhaps it had come from the taller mountains to the north. For some reason the bird things did not try to join him. Instead they wheeled as if on some shouted order and headed north, leaving the sky clear.

The sight of this alien life had, in a strange way, dimmed the message which drew him on. Now that was strong again. Suddenly he was looking down at a disturbance of the turf and soil below. There was broken earth, gouges and ruts. Surely those were of such a size as to make certain they were no beast spoor left to be tracked by a hunter. Oddly enough they had sprung from a point in the middle of a bare space of ground as if whatever had left those marks had issued from beneath the surface itself.

Farree flew on. Now he discovered that the call which drew him lay in the same direction as that trail. He winged ahead to where a fringe of small hills were a screen between any ground traveler and the land beyond. But the ruts found a way among these barriers, weaving in and out. Here the valley, which had appeared narrow in the beginning, widened out, though even from the air he could not see what lay far beyond. The same haze which had veiled Caer-Vul-li-Wan cloaked it as fully as if a curtain, hung high in the heavens, lowered folds to hide the earth.

For the first time Farree faltered. That plea which had brought him so far had been cut off—as suddenly as if death itself had been the portion of the one who uttered it. Also there was something about that haze curtain which struck him with a greater chill than even the snow breeze had raised.

He turned track and flew south—only to find there again the curtain in place, while the call was not even a whisper of a whisper. The haze did not hang to the north or across the eastern sky through which he had flown. As he coasted along still a good way from its edge he tried to search with mind call for the cry he must answer, only to shrink backward—for it was as if his own thought, badly distorted, had been thrown back at him. Nor was there anything in his treacherous memory to match this.

To fly above was no answer for, as if it were indeed some weapon aimed at him, the haze spiraled upward also, matching him. From it that deadness reached outward. He was sickened, drained, having all he could do to keep a-wing. The ebbing of energy brought him at last to ground level where, once he felt the firmness of the sod under his feet, he struggled to keep on those feet, unable to do more at first than to gasp for breath.

The haze might have defeated him at this first encounter but that certain stubbornness of spirit which had kept him going as a homeless misshaped creature of the Limits held him now. His wings folded down about his shoulders like a cloak as he crossed to a big rock which showed a deep scoring, as if that thing which had made the road had grated along it. There he sat on the stone, his hands on either side of him, bracing his body as he strove to master the weakness assaulting him in deep waves. His move raised the scent of salenge. There must have been some of the seed globes still clinging to his clothing. He inclined his head to draw that reviving odor into his lungs. A flicker of more recent memory came uneasily– He raised one juice-stained hand to the front of his jerkin. There was no familiar bulge there.