The River Wall Read Online Free PDF Page A

Lords of Eddarta.
    Later, we had discovered a sketch of Tinis. The sketch traveled with us, riding in Tarani’s travel pack. The man who had been called Tinis as a boy was now known in Raithskar as Ferrathyn. He was the Chief Supervisor of the Council of Supervisors. He
seemed
a kindly, caring old man.
    Ferrathyn was practicing a double deception. The people of Raithskar thought the vineh had gone wild because of a new and uncontrolled illness. The Supervisors thought they were merely reacting to freedom from the Ra’ira’s control. Neither was true.
    The Ra’ira had never left Raithskar, and most of the vineh were still under its control. A red fury swept over me as I thought of it. The terror and devastation in Raithskar was being inflicted deliberately, and not by the vineh. They were merely agents. People were being hurt and killed because of the ambition of one man.
    Tinis of Rusal.
    Ferrathyn.
    Our enemy.
    *Let go
,* Keeshah told me, a note of complaint in his mindvoice.
    I was lying on the big cats back, leaning over to the left to scratch at Yoshah’s head. My other arm was laid out in front of me, the hand braced around Keeshah’s shoulder to anchor me. In physical reaction to the strong emotion, that hand had clenched, pinching fur and skin.
    *I’m sorry, Keeshah
,* I said, and relaxed my hand.
    I gave Yoshah’s head one final pat, and heaved myself upward to balance more naturally on her fathers back. The cubs displeasure at my quitting reached me through our link. Yoshah shook her head and dropped back briefly as she brought one hind foot forward to scratch her ear one more time. Then she trotted out ahead of us and began to nose along the tall growth that lined the riverbank.
    “Go. Follow your sister,” Tarani said to Koshah, and took her hand away.
    The male cub was already on his way. He caught up with Yoshah and nipped lightly at her flank, eliciting a yowl and a swat. Then both of them began to prowl the edge of the bamboolike growth, occasionally poking a head through the reeds briefly before trotting on to a new place, farther along the road.
    When the cubs left, Yayshah and Keeshah moved closer together, and for a while Tarani and I rode in a quiet, close silence. Then I said: “Thank you for coming back with me.”
    Tarani stared at me for a moment, her dark eyes lustrous against the paleness of her skin. “It was a difficult decision,” she admitted. “I truly feel as if I have abandoned my own children, at their time of greatest need.”
    “What you have started will continue while you are gone,” I assured her, with more confidence than I felt. “And your coming back to Raithskar with me is as much for Eddarta as for Raithskar.”
    “I hope so,” she said, her voice sounding odd.
    “What do you mean?”
    “I mean,” she said, smiling a little sadly, “that I hope my choice was real—the reasons logical and right—and that I did not deceive myself.”
    “Deceive yourself?” I echoed, confused. “How?”
    “By telling myself that my ‘destiny’ lies with you,” she answered quietly, “when it is only my love, and fear of being without you, that brought me out of Eddarta.”
    “Fear? Of being without me?” I stammered. “But you—didn’t you—you’re the one who suggested I go back alone.”
    “I suggested it,” she admitted. “I did not say I would enjoy it.”
    I reached across the distance between us, but Tarani was too fast for me. With a laugh, she threw herself forward into the true riding position, and Yayshah leaped ahead.
    *Catch her, Keeshah
,* I said—begging, rather than ordering. Keeshah responded with a surge of speed that nearly unseated me, and a feeling of joy that was a mixture of his own pleasure in the chase and amusement at the turmoil of emotions he must have felt from me.
    I caught a glimpse of the cubs, looking around in surprise as their parents barreled past them. The rounded points of their ears aimed backward as they quested, with