"It would take money to appease Wikuni," Tarrin said.

"That's no stretch of the truth, my brother. I've never seen such a greedy group. They're running this ship and escorting us, so I've had a great deal of contact with them."

"Kerri said she sent her forces to protect you."

"Seven clipper water-carriages," she reported. There was no Selani word for ship or boat, so she improvised a bit to convey her meaning . There also was no Selani word for clipper, but there was no way for her to make up a meaning for that, so she simply reverted to Sulasian. "Renoit said we couldn't be safer if were we being carried on the back of Saltemis."

Saltemis was the Elder god of water and the oceans, one of the ten Elder Gods that represented the world's natural forces. "I think you'd be a bit safer if you really were, but few ships on the seas are crazy enough to attack seven Wikuni clippers. You should have no trouble getting to Suld."

"Well?" Sarraya demanded. "I'm getting tired of waiting!"

"Sarraya is getting impatient, and we've already talked too long, my sister. I should go. I'll do what Dolanna wants. I won't like it, but I'll do it."

"I'll let her know. Be well, my brother. I'll contact you again if something important comes up. May the winds ever be at your back."

"May all the water you taste be sweet," he reciprocated in the ritual Selani farewell.

And the connection dissolved.

For such a short conversation, its effect on him was dramatic. He suddenly felt much, much better, not even a bit frustrated or annoyed. Allia's voice had always had that kind of effect on him, and hearing her after their long separation made him feel, if only for a moment, that she was still with him. That took a great weight off his heart. It reminded him of what waited for him in Suld, at the end of his journey, and it made everything he endured more than worth it. He would crawl the entire way if it meant seeing Allia again.

At least the change in the amulet didn't disrupt its abilities. He hadn't really thought of that as a possibility, and in hindsight, that was probably a good thing he didn't. The Book of Ages was kept locked within the magic of the amulet, and that was something he couldn't afford to lose. The very thought of it would have made him retrieve it, and that may have alerted unfriendly people to exactly where he was in the desert, how far along he had travelled since escaping them. They could possibly use that information as a guage, to tell them when and maybe where to station their forces to intercept him as he came out. He wasn't about to give his adversaries any help if he could avoid it.

"Well? Spill! Spill spill spill spill spill!!" Sarraya said in aniticipation, jumping up and down near the melon in time with her shouting.

"In a nutshell, they're doing alright," he told her. "Dolanna ordered me to teach you Sha'Kar, that's why we were talking about you."

"It's about time!" she said with an explosive release of breath. "I figured you forgot that we were supposed to be taught. I was going to ask you to do it, at least when you weren't in such a cranky mood."

"I thought Dolanna taught you."

"She taught me a little," Sarraya told him. "I still have a great deal to learn."

"Alright. I'll teach you as we travel. That way I have the time after we stop to work on Sorcery."

"That's fine with me. It'll fill up all those dusty, boring hours we have while we're moving. You sure you can run and talk at the same time?"

"You sure you can fly and learn at the same time?" he shot back.

"I've done it before," she said in a teasing voice. "At least out here, there are no trees to crash into."

"Sounds like you speak from experience."

"When I was learning to fly," she grinned. "No Faerie can say he or she has never crashed into a tree. Or the ground."

"Sounds like a dangerous business."

"Flying isn't easy," Sarraya told him. "It's as much an art as a skill. It took me nearly thirty years of constant practice to master it. Wow, you're suddenly in a good mood. I think you should talk to Allia every night."

"I wish I could, but Dolanna said that people may be able to listen in on us when we talk that way, so I can't do it in good conscious. She was supposed to speak Sha'Kar, but I think she was up on deck. Dolanna won't let us speak it unless nobody else can hear it."

"Seems like a silly rule."

"It's only thought of as a dead language if people believe that it's dead, Sarraya," Tarrin told her. "I understand completely why Dolanna wants us not to use it in public. It's something we need to keep back. A trump card."

"I can understand it like that, but it seems silly not to use it," she said.

"If I went around speaking in a language nobody knows, someone may get curious as to which it was. Then you have to deal with a bunch of questions, or someone that's really smart and can piece it together without asking a single question."

"I know, I know. I'm saying it seems silly because that's how I feel."

"I do alot of things I think are silly," he grunted. "I gave up on trying to understand them a long time ago."

Sarraya laughed. "That's true," she agreed with a smirk. "Now then, I have this melon here waiting for me, and if I don't eat it soon, it's going to dry out."

That began a pattern of activity over the next five days, as they moved more and more out of the rocky terrain and more and more into the verdant belt of the desert, the land in the desert that was surprisingly vegetated. Tarrin found himself picking his way through strange prickly shrubs quite often, and in one shallow valley they found the entire desert floor covered in small bushy plants that had wide, thick blades for leaves, and were lined and tipped with very sharp thorns and ridges almost like the blade of a knife. As they moved during the day, Tarrin taught Sarraya Sha'Kar, and the little Faerie proved to be quite adept at learning. At night, Tarrin continued to try to find his magical power again, but as it had been the first night, every attempt ended in failure after failure. That, paired to the return of the nightmare that had haunted him, did very little to improve his mood. He became short-tempered and downright nasty to Sarraya during the day, almost to the point where he didn't want to teach her anymore.

The return of the nightmare was expected, but its effect had changed. It still made him very afraid, but it also made him very angry now, nearly as mad as he was frightened. He was pretty sure that anger was because he feared something that couldn't hurt him, and that defied the logic of his instincts. Now that they had had time to work through his reaction to the dream, they were more outraged than they had been before.

That was only one thing weighing on his mind. It had been five days since talking to Allia, and that meant that they were now in Suld. There was no doubt of that. They were back in the Tower, most likely, and that meant that they were now in danger. The mysterious spy for whom Jula had worked in the Tower, an agent of the ki'zadun, was still there. Or at least he was pretty sure that she was still there. He had little doubt that Jula's presence was going to incite her to strike out against his friends, to eliminate them before they became a threat to her.

He thought of that as he moved along a butte of sorts, a long shelf of rock overlooking an irregular valley of sorts filled with rocky outcrops, spires, and some loose stones that were interspersed with a goodly amount of vegatation, both little shrubs, grass-like growth along the north side of the valley, and several strange trees that looked like almost all their branches pulled off. They were gnarled and stunted, with only a few branches, and those branches held tufts of large needles. The top of the butte was much easier travelling than down on the valley floor, and from there he could see a flock of sukk, the large, flightless birds the Selani herded for their livelihood. They were quite distant from him, and he couldn't see an Selani around them. It was a very small flock, which meant that it could possibly be wild. He was worrying already about Allia, and the strange feeling he had about Dar. Four days there, four days to get into trouble. That worried him, worried him a great deal. But Dolanna was there, and Triana was also there. Triana would see to the heart of things, and her presence alone was enough to make himself feel foolish for worrying so much.