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‘I’ve heard that dreams are like that, Ashad I don’t need to sleep, so I don’t really knohat dreams are all about’ I hesitated ‘Where did you find that shiny black rock?’ I asked, e the subject than out of any real curiosity
‘It was in the back of the cave where Mama Broken-Tooth sleeps in the winter,’ Ashad replied ‘She had three cubs while she was sleeping this past winter, and while you were busy helping your sister Zelana, I went to her cave to see the-Claw, aren’t they? I -Clae were just cubs, and now she’s nursing the three new ones That sort of makes us relatives of some kind, doesn’t it?’
‘I suppose so, yes’
‘Anyway, the three new cubs werethose funny little sounds bear-cubs alwaysthe-Claw and me ere just cubs’ He picked up the shiny stone ‘This is an agate, isn’t it?’ he asked, holding it out to me
I took the stone, but al froates are very rare, though’
‘It’s pretty, and I really liked it when I first saw it I asked Mao ahead and take it I used to carry it with uess, but when I woke up this ht in hed ‘I think this ht just be the year of "odd", Ashad,’ I said ‘It seems like every ti h this past winter?’
‘Just fine, uncle,’ Ashad replied ‘There are lots and lots of new cubs’ He suddenly grinned broadly, shaking off his gloomy expression ‘Baby bears are so s that rouchy Just last week Ma fish out of a strea them up on the riverbank the way bears always do - but her three cubs thought she was playing, so they were swatting the fish back into the strea out of the water, gave them a feats, and then chased them up a tree and hed, but she growled at me She didn’t seem to think it was funny at all’
‘Will you be all right here by yourself for a few days, Ashad? I need to go talk with s they need to know about’
‘I’ll be fine, uncle I was over in the village of Asar pro, lis around here use to whip their spears out there a long, long way Tlingar’s just about the best there is with the spear-thrower, isn’t he?’
‘He keeps the people of Asreed ‘I shouldn’t be too long, Ashad If you get tired of throwing spears, you o play with Maested, poor Mama Broken-Tooth’s probably exhausted by now Give her a little tihbors, and they’ll be nice to you" I’d better get started I’d like to talk with Aracia before her priests get her involved in all those silly ceremonies’
‘Say hello to Enalla for ain Ashad had just used Aracia’s Dreamer Lillabeth’s real name Despite allbits and pieces of reality up through the barriers I’d put between theht happen if the Dreanificant than just their na sun to stay behind, and then I went to the long, twisting passageway that led out to the open air
The olden as I came up out of my cave under Mount Shrak I summoned my thunderbolt and rode on doard the south-east to the Domain of my elder sister Aracia
Aracia’s Domain is much like the Domain of our baby brother Veltan, with vast wheat fields stretching froreen carpet in the early summer sun I hate to ad and bread has brought much more stability to the Domains of Aracia and Veltan than the sometimes catch-as-catch-can quality of life in my Domain and Zelana’s, where the land is pri There has to beon a piece of half-h I’m fairly sure that Aracia and Veltan view me as some sort of primitive antique, but I know better The people of their Domains are little more than cattle They move around in herds, and I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised to discover that ‘moo’ crops up in their dialect quite frequently
The people of my Domain - and of Zelana’s - are fiercely independent Nobody - not even me or Zelana - tells thes, those farh than they do real people
You don’t necessarily need to tell Aracia or Veltan that I just said that
Where was I? Oh, yes, now I re that ulti planting is finished, a far in the autuives hi as people concentrate on such things as what they are going to eat to to death inter rolls around again, there’s a certain practicality in their lives It’s when the people have enough free ti such questions as ‘Who a wored out beyond the Land of Dhrall to observe the progress of the outlanders, and I’ve noticed that theabout ods That isn’t necessary here in the Land of Dhrall, of course, since it’s very likely that the god of any particular region lives just over the hill or down the street
Solorious opportunity there Aracia could tamper with the weather, if she chose to, and that produced abundant crops, and the displays of gratitude of her subject people were usually grossly overdone Had one of hed in the fool’s face