The Steel of Raithskar Read Online Free PDF Page B

so Gharlas said.” His grin faded, and a look passed across his face which I couldn’t read. It might have been dislike, or wry humor. “He confided to me—not at my request, I assure you—that he intended to bypass Thagorn in order to save that portion of his freight which would go as duty to the Sharith.”
    Sharith.
Catfolk. There was something about the carefully neutral tone in which Balgokh spoke that word that worried me.
    “You said ‘so Gharlas said’?” I prompted him.
    “Yes.” He began to walk around the room. There was too much dignity in the slow movement to call it pacing. It dawned on me that he was embarrassed, and I recalled Keddan’s reluctance to ask personal questions.
    It must be a code of privacy
, I decided.
Or self-preservation. The Fa’aldu don’t get involved with their clientele. But I’m a mystery he couldn’t resist thinking about. Could he be afraid of offending me with his opinions?
    “Respected Elder,” I said, and he stopped. He turned to look at me. “Do you know my name?”
    “Your name was given to me as Lakad.”
    Nice phrasing
, I thought. The name meant nothing at all to me. “But who am I, really?”
    Balgokh sighed, and seemed to make a decision. “My first thought,” he said, “when you returned as a Rider, was to believe that you had been a Sharith agent, planted on the caravan. But after we had cared for you, and I considered carefully, I wondered why your sha’um hadn’t taken you directly to Thagorn, given the time you must have been exposed on the desert.
    “If you were not Sharith, as I had begun to suspect, your identity was obvious. I know of only one Rider in this part of Gandalara who does not reside in Thagorn. He and his sha’um live in Raithskar. When you named this one Keeshah, the proof was complete.” He paused for emphasis.
    “You are Markasset, son of Thanasset.”
    “Thank you, Respected One,” was all I said. I had to push the words through a chilling rush of associations too tangled and jumbled for me to read them yet. “My mind is still clouded, but at least I know my name. You have been a great help.”
    Markasset.
Yes, it was my name. It
felt
like my name. But it wasn’t. Not quite. Not completely. I still felt like Ricardo Carillo, too.
    Thanasset.
My father. As I thought of his name, I could see his face quite clearly. I would recognize him when I met him. But how would I feel about him? There was no emotion connected with the memory. A picture only—a face much like mine, but older and etched with lines. A good face, but only that. Like a photograph.
    But instead of solving everything, my new knowledge only led to more questions. If I had been with a caravan, how did I wind up alone in the desert with a dead man? Why was I traveling under an alias? What happened to the rest of the caravan? The old man was looking at me speculatively. I assumed he was thinking those same questions. But I was wrong.
    “I am not a Recorder, Rider Markasset,” he said gently, “but it has been said of me that the All-Mind has touched me with the power to read men. And I tell you now that you have changed greatly since you came through here four days ago. Has some Ancestor given you wisdom?”
    “Changed?” I asked, avoiding his last question because it made no sense to me at all. “How have I changed, Respected One?”
    “As I said, I did not speak to you. But I observed you, and heard what you said to others—in the caravan and here in the compound. Let me say only that now you are … less prideful. Less arrogant. And yet, you seem much more sure of yourself.”
    If I’m more sure of myself now
, I thought,
I
must have been
really
confused four days ago.
    “If I was disrespectful to the Fa’aldu, I am shamed, Respected One,” I said. And meant it. The Fa’aldu and their water meant survival in the desert, Markasset’s memory told me. Only a fool would offend these desert-dwellers.
    Balgokh came a little closer to me, and looked