The Elder Gods. David Eddings

keep the dreams as pure as we possibly can.’ He scratched at his chin speculatively. ‘We’ve got a problem now,’ he said. ‘This first dream is likely to bring the creatures from the Wasteland swarming across the mountains, and our people won’t be a match for them. I think we’ll have to bring in the outsiders.’

      ‘Absolutely out of the question!’ Aracia exclaimed. ‘Our people are pure and innocent. The outsiders are barbaric monsters. They’re almost as bad as the creatures of the Wasteland.’

      ‘Not quite, Aracia,’ Dahlaine disagreed. ‘We can manipulate them if we need to. The only problem I can see is linguistic. The outsiders don’t speak the same language our people speak.’

      ‘That’s not a problem, Dahlaine,’ Veltan told him. ‘I’ve looked in on several of the outsider cultures. Their babbling didn’t make any sense at first, but I found a way to get around that.’

      ‘Oh?’ Dahlaine said. ‘I’d like to hear about that.’

      ‘All you have to do is step around language and go straight to thought.’

      ‘He has a point, Dahlaine,’ Zelana said. ‘It didn’t take me much more than a week to learn the language of my dolphins. If you listen with your mind instead of your ears, it comes very fast.’

      ‘Interesting notion,’ Dahlaine mused. ‘Unfortunately, I don’t think people could do that.’

      Veltan shrugged. ‘I’ll do it for them, then.’

      ‘Would you like to clarify that, Veltan?’ Aracia asked.

      ‘It’s a little complicated, dear sister,’ he replied. ‘Are you sure you want all the details?’

      Aracia shuddered. ‘Spare me that, please. Just tell me what the results are likely to be.’

      ‘The outlanders will babble in their own language, and our people will babble in ours. Neither group will hear babbles, though. They’ll think that they’re listening to their own language, so they’ll understand each other perfectly.’

      ‘Would it work that way between different groups of outsiders as well?’ Dahlaine asked. ‘We’ll probably be bringing in several different cultures.’

      ‘No problem,’ Veltan said. ‘We’ll have to decide how far out we want to take it, is about all. We might want to limit it to the Land of Dhrall, though. The outlanders all speak different languages, and maybe we should keep it that way. If they can communicate with each other, they might start forging alliances, and that could cause trouble down the line.’

      ‘You may have a point there,’ Dahlaine conceded. ‘Let’s try it and see how it works.’

      ‘I’m against the whole silly notion!’ Aracia said adamantly. ‘We can’t bring those murdering barbarians here to the sacred land!’

      ‘How sacred do you think it’ll be after the unholy monsters of the Wasteland sweep over the mountains?’ Dahlaine asked her pointedly. ‘The outsiders are a little crude, I’ll admit that, but they are mostly warriors. Our people haven’t even discovered iron yet, so they’re still using stone tools. The people of the outside world have no idea of the significance of Dhrall, but they do know how to fight. They spend most of their time practicing on each other. I think maybe we’d all better visit those outlands and find the various warrior people. There are several tricks we can use to get them here to Dhrall, and once they’re here, we can wave gold in their faces to get their interest.’

      ‘Gold? It isn’t very useful, Dahlaine,’ Veltan objected. ‘It’s sort of pretty, but it’s too soft for any practical uses. It’s much like lead, when you get right down to it.’

      ‘The outlanders seem to like it, and if they hear about mountains of gold in the Wastelands of the interior, we won’t be able to drive them away with whips. I don’t think we’ve got much choice. Our people are too simple and gentle to face the armies of the Vlagh. We need large numbers of what Aracia calls howling barbarians, and we need them in a hurry. Let’s go to the outer world and find warriors. It’s the only way we have to save Dhrall from the forces of the Vlagh.’

       4

      Zelana rode the wind westward from the coast of Dhrall for many, many leagues across Mother Sea. She knew that there was land far to the west – at least there had been before she’d become so enamored of the pink dolphins of the Isle of Thurn. Perhaps it had wandered off again.

      Night was settling over Mother Sea when Zelana saw something rather peculiar far below. There seemed to be a small fire floating on the surface of the water. Fire and water do not usually mix well, Zelana knew. Overcome with curiosity, she descended to investigate.

      She drifted down through the twilight air, and as she came closer to the face of Mother Sea, she saw what at first she thought might be a floating house. Then she realized that it was probably a larger version of the canoes the people of her Domain used when they went out on the water to hunt fish. The fire she had seen appeared to be burning in a small glass box near the back of the oversized canoe.

      She settled quietly onto the water and tiptoed closer. The floating object was obviously more advanced than anything the people of Dhrall could build, but it had probably been constructed for the same reason that the people of Dhrall made canoes. The outlanders were most likely fishermen. The pink dolphins of the Isle of Thurn ate fish, and Eleria had said that fish tasted quite pleasant – as long as they were fresh.

      The oversized canoe Zelana had found was very large, long and narrow, and the outlanders had even built low-roofed houses on it to shelter them when the weather went bad. For some reason, they’d seen fit to put a large tree-trunk in the center. As Zelana approached, she noticed that there was a distinctly unpleasant odor hanging over the entire canoe.

      Then a couple of man-creatures with hairy faces came out of the low, flat-roofed structure near the back of the alien canoe. They were both very tall and muscular, and their clothing was an odd mix of cloth and leather. They also had what appeared to be weapons of some sort belted to their waists, and that aroused Zelana’s immediate attention. If these man-things were merely fishermen, they wouldn’t need to carry weapons all the time. That strongly suggested that these two weren’t out here on the face of Mother Sea looking for fish. Zelana stepped back out of the light and adjusted her hearing as Veltan had suggested to make the speech of the outlanders understandable.

      ‘Looks to be a fair night, Cap’n,’ one of the creatures was saying.

      ‘Aye,’ the other rumbled in a harsh voice, ‘and it’s none too soon to suit me. I’ve had me a belly-full of foul weather here lately.’

      Zelana was a bit surprised to discover that Veltan’s theory actually worked the way he’d said it would. Veltan’s experiments seldom turned out exactly the way he wanted them to. She was having no trouble understanding these two outlanders, though.

      ‘You’d better get a look-out aloft, Ox,’ the one called Cap’n suggested. ‘Now that the weather’s settled down, other ships might be underway hereabouts. We’re not sailing the Seagull out here for entertainment, you know.’

      ‘Aye, Cap’n,’ the huge one called Ox replied. ‘The Trogite vessels usually hug the coast, but the storm might have swept a few of them out here to deeper water. If our luck’s running good, we might be able to harvest a fair amount of Trogite gold while they’re still floundering around out of sight of land.’

      ‘You’re starting to think like a real Maag, Ox,’ Cap’n said with an evil grin. ‘The notion of picking Trogite vessels like apples off a tree lights a warm fire in my belly. Come morning, put the crew to work patching the sails and clearing away the wreckage that storm made out of most of the rigging. It well-nigh drove us under a few times.’

      Zelana