Fires of Azeroth Read Online Free PDF Page B

or, that is power, The words are akin, and it could be either, depending on the situation . . . either or both: for when one addressed a qhal- lord in the ancient days as arrhtheis, it meant both his status as a qhal and the power he had. To Men in those days, all qhal had to be my lord, and the power in question was that of the Gates, which were always free to them, and never to Men ... it has that distressing meaning too. Elarrh something belonging to power, or to lords. A thing of reverence or hazard. A thing which ... Men do not touch."
    Qhalur thoughts disturbed him, the more he comprehended the qhalur tongue. Such arrogance was hateful. . . and other things Morgaine had told him, which be had never guessed, of qhalur maneuverings with human folk, things which hinted at the foundations of his own world, and those disturbed him utterly. There was much more, he suspected, which she dared not tell him. "What will you say to these folk," he asked, "and when-about the trouble we have brought on their land? Liyo, what do they reckon we are, and what do they think we are doing among them?"
    She frowned, leaned forward, arms on knees. "I suspect that they reckon us both qhal, you perhaps halfling, . . . but after what fashion or with what feeling I can find no delicate means to ask. Warn them? I wish to. But I would likewise know what manner of thing we shall awaken here when I do. These are gentle folk; all that I have seen and heard among them confirms that. But what defends them . . . may not be."
    It well agreed with his own opinion, that they trod a fragile place, safe in it, but perilously ignorant, and enmeshed in something that had its own ways.
    "Be careful always what you say," she advised him. "When you speak in the Kurshin tongue, beware of using names they might know, whatever the language. But henceforth you and I should speak in their language constantly. You must gather what you can of it. It is a matter of our safety, Vanye."
    "I am trying to do that," he said. She nodded approval, and they occupied themselves the rest of the day in walking about the village and the edge of the fields, talking together, impressing in his memory every word that could be forced there.
    He had expected that Morgaine would choose to leave by the next morning, and she did not; and when that night came and he asked her would they leave on the morrow, she shrugged and in talking of something else, never answered the question. By the day after that, he did not ask, but took his ease in the village and settled into its routine, as Morgaine seemed to have done.
    It was a healing quiet, as if the long nightmare that lay at their backs were illusion, and this sunny place were true and real. There was no word from Morgaine of leaving, as if by saving nothing she could wish away all hazard to them and their hosts.
    But conscience worried at him, for the days they spent grew to many more than a handful. And he dreamed once, when they slept side by side-both slept, for sitting watch seemed unnecessary in the center of so friendly a place: he came awake sweating, and slept again, and wakened a second time with an outcry that sent Morgaine reaching for her weapons.
    "Bad dreams in such a place as this?" she asked him. "There have been places with more reason for them."
    But she looked concerned that night too, and lay staring into the fire long afterward. What the dream had been he could not clearly remember, only that there seemed something as sinister in his recollection as the creeping of a serpent on a nest, and he could not prevent it.
    These folk will haunt me, he thought wretchedly. They two had no place here, and knew it; and yet selfishly lingered, out of time and place, seeking a little peace . . . taking it as a thief might take, stealing it from its possessors. He wondered whether Morgaine harbored the same guilt ... or whether she had passed beyond it, being what she was, and impelled by the need to survive.
    He was almost moved to