The climb was long and hard, particularly now that she was unused to her small human body. She discovered a path that progressed steeply up the otherwise sheer rock face, and she followed it, sometimes bent double to use her hands as well as her feet. The muscles in her arms shook with effort, and often she had to stop and breathe deeply, closing her eyes.
The sun set and the moon rose. Somehow, the white face of the moon was more terrible to her than the sun’s golden rays. The moonlight was icy, and she thought she would freeze on the outside even as she burned to death within. She lay down upon the trail, exhausted, her arms over her face to shield her from the moon’s eye, and slept a tormented sleep.
When Una woke she did not open her eyes but kept her arms over her face, feeling the sharp scales of the left one biting into the skin of her cheek. She did not want to face the sun nor the rest of the climb. Birds sang their morning chorus, and she cursed them bitterly between her teeth.
A jangling bell sounded in her ear, startling her from her stupor of misery. She sat up, every part of her body aching from a night spent on rocks, and looked up the path.
A goat stood not many paces above her. It flicked its ears and winked its yellow eyes at her, then voiced a disapproving, “Bah!”
“Good morning to you too!” Una snapped, drawing up her legs and scowling at the goat. She pressed her forehead into her knees, once more blocking the sunlight and wondering where she would find the strength to continue her long climb. Perhaps she would not try. Perhaps she would simply stay put until the sun and the moon burned her away to nothing and the fire inside her went out.
“Oh!” a voice said. “There is someone!”
Una startled for the second time that morning and blinked up the path once more. Beyond the goat another figure appeared. At first she could not tell if it was male or female, for the person’s face was shrouded in a linen veil and the voice that spoke was very soft and hard to discern. But on second glance, Una determined it was a girl, a small one with hunched shoulders and a hand put out to touch the rock wall on her right.
“Beana told me someone needed help down here,” the veiled girl said, moving around the goat. “Shoo, Beana.”
“Bah!” said the goat.
“Who are you?” Una asked. Her voice was harsh in her mouth, but she hardly cared.
“I am nobody,” the girl said. “Who are you?”
Una shook her head and gave no answer. She buried her face in her knees again.
“Have you come from the Wilderlands? Are you trying to climb to the Eldest’s City?” The girl drew closer until she stood over Una. Her voice was easier to understand now that she was near; she spoke with the strong accent of Southlands.
Una did not look up but shrugged her shoulders.
“You are weak and worn.” There was a long pause, then, “And I see that you suffer.”
Una felt a hand touching her scale-covered arm. She snapped upright and pulled it away from the veiled girl’s grasp. “Leave me alone!”
“Please, m’lady,” the girl said humbly. “I am not one to judge you. Will you look?”
Frowning and cringing away, Una lifted her face to see the hand the veiled girl extended to her. To Una’s surprise, she saw that the hand was gray and hard as stone, and tipped with long claws. She looked up at the veiled face and could just discern eyes through a slit in the linen. “Are you . . . are you like me?”
The veiled one shook her head. “No, m’lady. But let me help you even so.”
Hesitantly, Una reached up and placed her awful hand in the awful hand of the stranger. She was surprised at the strength in the veiled girl’s grip as she found herself pulled to her feet.
“You go to the city?” the girl asked.
Una nodded. She allowed the girl to put her arm across her shoulders and support her as they began to climb the trail. The shaggy goat turned about nimbly and led the way, sometimes pausing to bleat an irritable “Bah!” as she went.
The sun was high by the time they came to the plateau above. Una shook herself free of the veiled girl. “Which way to the city gates?”
“I can take you there myself,” the veiled one said. “I serve in the Eldest’s House. I know the way.”
“Serve in the Eldest’s House?” Una felt the fire flickering inside her.
“Have you seen . . . That is . . . have you heard tell of . . .”
“Yes, m’lady?”
Una shook her head and moved away from the girl. She couldn’t bear to know. Not yet. No, she must find him, that was all, and he himself could tell her all she needed to know. “Thank you for your assistance,” Una said, turning her back on the girl. “I will find my own way.”
“Please, m’lady – ”