A low growl spilled from Guin’s mouth. “White rocks…”
“Where the white stones dance upon the black mountain…”
In a flash, the words of Rinda’s prediction filled his mind. “The white rocks, the black mountain. She spoke of this place!”
Here beneath the towering night-shadow of the Dog’s Head, the fall of salty boulders was spread along the narrow valley, each white mass gleaming in stark contrast with the ash-dark ground on which it rested.
The Wolf King seemed to have completely forgotten about his leopard-headed companion. He darted around, snorting like an excited wolf cub, licking eagerly at the rocks. With his white fur he looked like a large slab of rock salt himself, come to life in the shape of a wolf.
Guin took a chunk of the white rock in his hand and thrust it into his pocket. Then he picked up another, slightly smaller piece and allowed himself to indulge in the salt. Rock salt was a rare prize in the Nospherus desert. The Sem went to great lengths to obtain the large quantities of salt that they needed to survive in the exhausting climate, getting what they could from what meat they could find and culling the rest from their own fur when their sweat evaporated. He imagined how they would rejoice if they could see the natural wealth that now lay before him, but the thought distracted him for no more than an instant. He was not here to find salt; he was here for the Lagon.
“There you will find the soul of the Lagon,” she said. Where are they?
Guin looked around. The night was already deep, and Aeris cast her pale light down from the star-spattered vault of the sky. The valley of rock salt glowed softly in the moonlight, like a northern vale dusted with a layer of fine snow.
With this amount of salt on the ground, and so little rain, this valley must be particularly unsuited for vegetation, Guin thought. His eyes searched for and did not find a single blade of grass or patch of moss. Nor could the leopard-man see any desert lizards flitting fleetly from rock to rock, nor any stone-mimics on their rocky perches. It seemed that no life of any kind inhabited the valley—certainly not the legendary giants whom he sought.
Yet Rinda prophesied that I would find the Lagon “over the Dog’s Head, where the white stones dance upon the black mountain.” This must be the place! But what did she mean by “soul of the Lagon”? And the death-wind?
Guin believed the truth of Rinda Farseer’s prediction. Here were the white stones over the Dog’s Head to prove it. Yet, even the best visions had a way of misleading even the best seers.
Wait. She said, “Beyond the white rock.” I must have to pass through this valley first to find this Lagon-soul.
His path was clear, then. He must walk straight through the rock salt valley. Thankfully, it did not seem to go on for too great a distance.
Guin bit once more at the chunk of salt in his hand, but restrained himself from eating all of it. If he gave in to his desire for salt now, he would earn himself painful thirst later. He threw the chunk down upon the ground. It struck another of the salt rock boulders and split in two with a crack.
Hmm? Guin’s sharp eyes fell upon something shiny. The chunk he threw had knocked a corner off one of the bigger rocks, and where it was broken he could see something buried in the stone. It glinted in the moonlight more brightly than the salt.
Swiftly he crouched and rubbed at the crumbling boulder until more of the surface fell away beneath his hand. His fingers found something hard there, something cold and metallic to the touch. It was buried deeper than he had thought, and no matter how hard he tugged at it he couldn’t get it to budge.
Driven by an impulse he did not fully understand, Guin began scraping furiously at the boulder that held the object.
Whatever he had found, it was certainly peculiar. The portion protruding from the rock was silver-colored and smooth, with an unfamiliar shape. Again he tugged at it firmly but it still held fast. Scrabbling furiously at the boulder, he dug away enough of the salt until he could grab onto the object with both hands; then he pulled with all his strength, and finally it lifted out of the white rock and into his hand.
The thing was much smaller than he had imagined. He brushed the dust from it, and tilted his head as he held it up to the moonlight. He had seen nothing like it, and had no idea what it might be used for. He could tell, however, that it was some sort of tool, an object made for some purpose. It looked like a long silver whistle, or a prayer stick; perhaps it was a collapsible cane. Strange small nodules like the bumps on the back of a desert lizard ran along one side of it, glinting faintly.
Guin examined the object for a while longer, but further study revealed nothing more about it than he had initially observed. The lurking knowledge that hid in his wayward memory, which so often seemed to help him out of fixes and answer obscure questions did not aid him now. Yet the impulse that had told him to dig the object from the boulder now led him to thrust it into his belt.
I’ll figure out later what this is for.
He looked around. “In any case,” he muttered, “I need to cross this valley while Aeris still shines. If I intend to make my appointment with the Sem, I need to be heading back over the Dog’s Head by noon tomorrow.”
He looked over at the Wolf King, but the great beast remained utterly unconcerned with Guin. He had finished his wild frolicking in the salt, and now sat between two of the larger white stones, his tongue lolling out and a dazed look on his face, like that of a man who had been too long in his cups. His sharp eyes were half-closed, and his mouth was twisted into a grimace that, were he human, would have made him look much like a grinning fool. Despite the impatience he had shown as he led Guin over the mountain, following some unspoken schedule that needed to be kept, he now seemed to have completely lost interest in their journey.
Or perhaps Guin had been wrong to hope that the wolf, as clever as he might be, had been sent on a mission, divinely inspired or otherwise, to lead him. It was possible that the Wolf King had just wanted to come to this rock salt valley, which to him held the same magic as catnip holds for a eat or wine for a thirsty man, and had only stayed with Guin until they reached it.
Still, the leopard-man felt that it was too early for them to part ways just yet. He felt a spiritual link with this wolf, his stalwart companion for a day and a night. Yet when he called out, the Wolf King only turned his lazy eyes toward him, shooting him an annoyed look. He clearly had no intention of going any further.
“I see,” sighed Guin after trying a few more times to rouse the wolf’s attention. “It is here that we part, then. I won’t forget your help. If I do bring back the Lagon, I will be crossing back over this mountain, and passing through your kingdom again. But I do not think we will meet if I come leading an army of giants, will we?”
He spoke as though the wolf could understand him. There was indeed a deep connection between the giant white wolf-lord of Dog’s Head Mountain and the leopard-headed warrior who bore a great burden of destiny. It was a deeper tie than that of friendship or even kinship. Guin was reluctant to leave his savior behind.
Shooting a last farewell glance at the lupine king who sat complacently on his throne of salt, the leopard-man strode out into the middle of the valley. The moonlight made the rock salt stones appear to float above the valley floor, and the reflected light from the salt crystals lit his path as though it were day.
Guin moved with long sure strides. He turned around only once to look back toward his companion, but the Wolf King, having had his fill of salt, had apparently slipped away to find some water to drink—or perhaps his ancient fur, pale as the high Ashgarn glaciers, hid him among the white of the rock salt boulders. In any case he was nowhere to be seen.
Guin was alone once more.
Even though the great wolf was far from human and had been unable to share words with the leopard-warrior, a companion was a companion, and now Guin felt his absence. Without the great wolf by his side, the road seemed mirthless to him, and longer than it really was. For a while he feared that the trek through the valley of rock salt would never end. Yet soon that thought, too, was gone.
Guin quickened his pace and marched on. The scenery around him grew increasingly bizarre. Where he first entered the valley, the black soil of the ground beneath the salt had been revealed in many places, like a dark sea between the floating white bergs of salt. Now it was concealed entirely, lost under a solid sheet of white. Here and there, the salt had crystallized into beautiful, strangely shaped spires and mounds. Guin passed through a salt formation that appeared to be formed over and around the bones of some huge animal, thrusting up from the ground into the sky. Then, he strode between strange glowing trees of salt. He did not think the salt capable of killing outright, so he surmised that whatever had owned the bones had first died, then been covered with salt crystals. The resulting sculpture was as chilling as it was beautiful. The trees were equally arresting. There was no less than a small copse of dead trees, all completely overgrown and consumed by the salt. It was a phantasmagorical sight, and unsettling when he thought on it too long.
The ground crunched softly underneath Guin’s feet. The layer of salt was growing deeper as he neared the middle of the valley. Then his boot came down upon a perfectly formed sphere; it crushed beneath his weight and he saw something shine like a ruby from the shards. For a moment, he thought the salt ball was bleeding. Curiously he picked up the bright shape that his footfall had revealed.