As he looked at it, Eanrin knew that what he had seen on the edge of the Dark Water was no dream.
Guilt weighed upon him. How, in his arrogance, could he have been so foolish? How could he have believed that the work of the Dragon only affected other people? Wicked people who deserved their fate if they were willing to listen to those lies. He breathed a long sigh, remembering the scales he had seen at his feet, where they had fallen from his own face. How close had he been to becoming one of the Dragon’s brood?
Gazing at the light, Eanrin felt his heart settling into a steady beat. “My life will never be the same,” he whispered. “I have forsaken the Dragon. So I must be devoured—”
“Hallo in the dark! Be you living or dead?”
In that moment, Eanrin realized what miracles might occur in these deep places of the world. For, when he heard Glomar’s voice ringing in the darkness, he felt a surge of good feeling, of camaraderie, of brotherly affection and even . . . yes, even love. It was a dizzying sensation! He hollered back:
“Lumé’s crown and scepter! I never thought I’d see the day when your voice would give me joy!”
There was a long pause. Then, “Dragon-eaten vapors. For a moment, I thought that was real. Ah well . . .”
“No! Glomar!” Eanrin shouted. “Glomar, you blundering oaf of a badger-man, stay where you are!”
“That was more like. Is that you there, cat?”
Eanrin sprang forward, little caring in that moment if he followed the Path of the lantern or not. His longing for a familiar face, a good old Rudioban face, beat all other concerns into nothing. Asha shone upon the startled features of the guard, who had just time to open his eyes wide and exclaim, “What by all the Dragon’s brood is—” before Eanrin clasped him in glad embrace.
“You dirt-nosing lug!” he exclaimed, slapping the guard repeatedly upon the shoulders. “Fancy meeting you in these foul parts! To what depths have the mighty plummeted, eh?”
Glomar growled and pushed the poet away. “The darkness has made you mad. Or madder than you were.”
“Perhaps,” said the poet, stepping back and smiling. Asha swung gently in his hand, spreading its glow up and down the long tunnel. “Or perhaps it is here that I have finally seen the light.”
“Little enough light, if any,” said the badger. His eyes squinted as though he were peering through heavy murk. “I can hardly see my hand before my face in this tomb. It’s a good thing I depend on my nose rather than my eyes, or I’d be lost indeed.”
Eanrin blinked, and his smile drooped into a frown. “Are you daft, Glomar?”
Glomar snorted. “I’ve no time for this. Follow me if you’d like; I’m not opposed to your company in this place, but I am opposed to your wicked tongue. Keep it behind your teeth, and perhaps we’ll find our way out of here.” He moved heavily past Eanrin, stumping several steps down the long incline.
“Lumé’s crown!” Eanrin darted out a hand to catch the captain by his shoulder. “Have you gone blind?”
“Blind? I’m a badger! Blindness makes no difference to me.”
Eanrin began to tremble. Asha’s light shivered in his grasp. “Can you not see the lantern, then?” he asked.
“What lantern?”
So perhaps Eanrin had gone mad. Visions of dragons and black lakes and hounds! He gazed from Glomar’s stern face to the silver light and back again and saw that Glomar, indeed, had no perception of what Eanrin held.
“No,” he whispered. “I know what I saw. I know what I see, even if he does not! And it’s more real than real.”
“What are you babbling about, cat?”
Eanrin licked his lips. “I’ve been down that way,” he said. “It’s . . . it’s a dead end.”
Glomar grunted. “I trust my nose.”
“In that case, tell it to sniff this.” Eanrin lifted the lantern right up to Glomar’s face.
“What are you doing, cat?”
“Please, stand a moment and smell!”
Glomar had never heard Eanrin’s voice so urgent. It was enough to shock him into momentary obedience. He stood where he was, inhaling deeply, though he did not know what he was supposed to smell. The light of Asha fell upon his rough features, washing away the golden man of Rudiobus into the truth of the badger underneath. Eanrin, however, saw no understanding in his face. No sudden revelation of the wonder that gleamed so brightly just before his eyes.
Suddenly the guard snorted. “What is that?” he said.
“What is what?”
“I do smell some . . .” Here he gave a glad, wordless cry. “Come on, cat!” he said, turning, taking Eanrin’s arm, and running up the inclined path. “I smell it now! Fresh air, this way!”