“I suppose you don’t remember me, do you?” he said. “We used to play together.”
“Really?” Balsa stared intently at his small face.
He laughed and shook his head. “Well, I’m not surprised. You were only five at the time. But I remember you very well. You were quite a handful! When I showed you a goat, you insisted on riding it and wouldn’t take no for an answer. I let you try, just as a joke, but you actually rode it surprisingly well.”
Balsa, embarrassed, rubbed the back of her neck. “Really? Did I do that?”
“You sure did. I was very sad when I heard that you’d died, and very surprised when I got Toto the Elder’s message. They had to repeat it for me twice! When I knew you really were alive, well, I just had to meet you again, so I volunteered for this job.”
Kassa was grinning, and Balsa laughed and shrugged.
As they rode Sootee Lan smoothly through the dark caves, the Herder, whose name was Nono, continued to regale Balsa with detailed stories of things she barely remembered. It was odd to think that someone still recalled the time when she had been Karuna’s daughter. To relieve the monotony and fatigue of the journey, she responded to his questions about her life after she fled with Jiguro. The memories came flooding back with remarkable clarity: the hard days of hiding; the pleasures of her friendships with Tanda and Torogai; her work as an itinerant bodyguard. She told them about her adventures with Chagum, the Guardian of the Spirit, and Nono and Kassa listened as if it were some ancient and fascinating legend. But at one point, Nono interrupted her.
“Nayugu?” he murmured. “You said it’s another world, usually invisible to us, but laid over and linked with this one? That sounds like Noyook.”
“Noyook?”
“Yes. We too know of this other world. And we call it Noyook.” He twisted his head to look back at Balsa. “If you see the door open in the Mountain Deep, you’ll get a glimpse of it. The palace of the Mountain King is usually invisible, because it’s in Noyook.”
Balsa smiled wryly. Nono looked puzzled. “What?” he asked.
“Nothing. It’s just that up until now, in my work as a bodyguard, I’ve mostly dealt with problems like fighting between rich merchants. But lately, I keep running into this mysterious world! It’s strange stuff for someone who knows nothing about magic weaving.”
The familiar, carefree face of her friend Tanda came to her mind. He would love to take a trip like this, as he always longed to learn more about the strange and extraordinary. Balsa was not really interested in an invisible world regardless of what it was called, but Tanda would be thrilled if she told him that in Kanbal it was called Noyook.
To Balsa, deep under the rock of the mother range, Tanda’s hut in the forested mountains of New Yogo seemed very far away. Since the day she and Jiguro had first found their way there when she was ten, they had always returned to that house, no matter where they traveled. It was the closest thing to home that she knew. She pictured the slanting rays of the sun falling across the hearth. Will I ever sit by that fire again and share some stew with Tanda? When she thought about what lay ahead of her, this did not seem possible.
If I die at the ceremony … He would probably still wait for her by that same hearth, without ever knowing what had happened to her.
She took a deep breath and shook her head. It can’t be helped. Magic weavers can see spirits, right, Tanda? If I die, I’ll come back to you as a spirit.
Soon, four days had passed since their departure from Musa territory. The Herder People had been careful to stop when it was night in the outside world so Balsa and Kassa could keep to their sleeping patterns. Their guides from each clan were very kind, but still Kassa and Balsa talked less and less as they drew closer to the ceremony chamber.
On the night of the fourth day, two Herders from the king’s territory met them when they stopped. One was quite old and the other young. “From here, we’ll walk,” they said. Balsa and Kassa thanked Sootee Lan and bid him farewell.
Before they had gone far, they came to a cave shaped like a small plaza. Unlike the other caves they had been through, there was no sign of life, and the space was filled with silence. While she sensed no living creatures, Balsa was overcome by a strange sensation. It seemed as if the very air was watching them.
The Herders stopped, and the older one pointed to a window-sized hole on the far side of the cave. “That hole leads to the ceremony chamber. Go and take a look.”
They did as they were told, placing both hands on the edge to peer inside. Just a few steps lower down, they saw a bright space enveloped in a hazy, pearly light.
“Tomorrow at dawn, the king, his Spears, and their attendants will descend into the ceremony chamber.”
“What’s that light?” Kassa asked.
“The walls of the chamber are alive,” the old man said in a hushed voice. “When the day of the ceremony draws near, it begins to glow like this. By that light, the King’s Spears compete with each other. When the chosen one summons the hyohlu, the light will vanish and complete Darkness will fall.”
He looked at Balsa. “You’re Jiguro’s foster child, I hear.”
“Yes.”
“Thirty-five years ago, I watched from this hole as Jiguro fought. He was unparalleled.”
Balsa nodded. He shifted his eyes to Kassa. “Do you have the letter from Laloog Yonsa?”
Kassa pulled a goatskin scroll from inside his shirt. The string tying it was sealed with wax that bore Laloog’s seal.
“Good. Listen then. You’ll have only one chance to show that scroll. If you reveal yourself before the spear fight begins, the king will think you’re interfering, his men will attack you, and you’ll have no chance to escape. But if you wait until after the chosen one summons the hyohlu, you’ll be in pitch darkness and unable to read the letter.
“The only chance you have to address the warriors and the king is after the chosen one announces himself, but before he summons the hyohlu — a very brief moment in time. Once the Dancer is chosen, all the other warriors must place their spears on the ground. If you speak at that moment, you’ll still have a chance to escape, no matter what happens afterward. Even if the men plan to storm the Mountain King’s palace, they must obey the rules of the ceremony until the hyohlu opens the Last Door. Do you understand what you must do?”
Trembling, Kassa clutched the scroll and nodded. The old man smiled for the first time. “Good. You will sleep here tonight. Even if you can’t sleep, it will help just to close your eyes and rest. We’ll make sure to wake you up before the king and his men arrive.”
Setting down a bag of dried grasses and goatskins that he had been carrying, the young Herder quickly made up their beds. Kassa crawled inside but could not sleep. The words he must call out to the warriors kept spinning through his mind, keeping him awake. There seemed to be a cold board in his stomach, and light flashed behind his eyelids at every little sound.
He tossed and turned until Balsa laid her warm hand gently on his shoulder. Slowly and quietly she rubbed his back, and he felt himself relax a little.
The silence underground seeped inside him, and before he knew it, he was asleep.