I gulped. I didn’t have Luvo to help me with this one. “Would you ask Rosethorn something for me? Could she lay vines over the shakier parts of the stone on our left? There’s a tremor coming. I’ll hold the stone back here if she can do that. Tell everyone we’re gonna get a hard shake. It’s coming fast.”
Myrrhtide rode up along our draggledy parade, passing on the warning. I dismounted from Spark and passed her reins to somebody. Then I called up all that power I had collected the afternoon before, greeting the rock on my left as I walked over to it. This granite was lava that had cooled slowly enough for bits of quartz and feldspar to form in it. Water and plants had done some damage here. So had quarrymen, who had taken away stone for buyers around the Pebbled Sea.
Hold strong, I told the unsteady slabs. Can you feel these youngsters rushing around?
I heard the whisper of stone laughter. Then the volcano spirits rolled under us in a fiery tide. They were returning to Mount Grace far beneath the river. They bellowed for Flare and Carnelian as they traveled. They had been searching under the Pebbled Sea, with no luck. Now they plunged into the hollow chamber, discouraged.
The ground calmed. The granite boulders under my magic settled back into their beds, complaining. They had wanted to move. Another time, I promised them. Maybe even today.
That cheered them up. I knew it would.
I looked ahead. Apart from some tumbled bundles and people knocked from their feet, everything seemed to be all right. On we went. Eventually people started to fall behind, especially the older ones, and the kids.
Rosethorn rode back to me. She had a baby in a sling on her chest, and a one-legged boy riding behind her. “You look comfortable, on your nice strong horse, by yourself.”
I scowled at her. “In Gyongxe you let me ride.”
“In Gyongxe you had flayed feet. And I did make you get off the horse before you got flayed.” She raised her eyebrows. “Are you too worn-out from playing with the nice volcano?”
She knew I wasn’t. I gave Spark up to Meryem and two of Oswin’s small boys. I even carried a baby. He wet himself, and me. For good measure he burped sour milk on my shoulder. By then the road had come down close to the river. I gave the baby back to his mother to be changed. Then I happily took off my boots and walked into the icy water. Cold doesn’t bother me that much. And the smell of water and wet stone was much better than the smell of dirty baby.
I was gathering blue moonstones on the river bottom when the volcano spirits stirred in the big chamber under the mountain. It was strange. The more time I spent listening for them, the more I knew what they were doing. Now the ones who had gone out were rousing up the ones who had stayed behind. They started to whirl around, deep below the earth. The walls of the chamber began to melt, making the room bigger.
“Shake!” I yelled to the people on the road. “Shake, a big one! Shake!”
They scrambled to grab the horses and get out of the carts. I dared not move. I threw my power against the huge slope of loose, quarried rock beside the road. Even a tiny shiver would send tons of granite on top of everyone there. Next I sucked the river boulders’ weight into me. I needed to be sure I wouldn’t tumble when the earth began to kick. Once I was fixed in place, I spread my magic thin, covering as much loose rock as I could. Then I jammed it down, locking thousands of stone fragments in place. They shifted, trying to cut through my power.
Heat rose from the big chamber. The volcano spirits were hungry. They wanted Flare and Carnelian. I sent that hunger back to them as echoes. They felt battered by their own feelings. Confused, they backed deeper into the chamber. Knowing they were being monkeyed with, the earth spirits roared their fury. The ground under everything buckled and rolled.
Then, for the first time, I heard their voices. They wanted Flare and Carnelian.
They are near! one of them shouted. We need them to lead us!
We need them to lead us out! We need them to take us into glory and fire! another cried, one that sounded female.
They are the leaders, the guides! Where are they? That one seemed older.
Where are the ones who will free us of the prison and the shadows? From the sound of that voice, the spirit had been waiting to get out for a very long time.
Where are the ones who will guide us to freedom? And that one was my age, or sounded that way, at least.
Find them! Find them! They all joined in that cry, shouting it over and over.
The shake and the spirits’ screaming seemed to go on forever. I held down the rocks on the slope until I thought I would melt. I was so full of heat and power I wanted to rip the earth in two and bare its heart. I wanted to shake the world to pieces.
The earthquake eased and stopped. The volcano spirits traveled out of the chamber to the north, leaving the big chamber half full. They sensed that Carnelian and Flare were someplace close. And now I understood their need. Luvo and I would never be able to hide Carnelian and Flare from the other volcano spirits forever.
Those two volcano kids had it all wrong. They’d understood only part of the story.
I pulled myself back to my body. Once more I brought a lot of power with me. And I needed it, to keep the unstable rock from burying the refugees. For the second time my magical body was too big for my real one. I swore in my home language of Zhanzou and dragged myself in here, tucked myself in there. Finally I jammed myself back into my skin.
I came around to discover I was drenched. Myrrhtide stood beside me in the river. He’d put his arm around my chest so he could hold my head above water.