Rythe Falls by Craig R. Saunders Page B

lied.
                  The suns had barely moved since Reih and Perr and their new companion had set out across the swamplands for the temple Sybremreyen. Their horses seemed tireless, the Rahken loping easily alongside, behind, ahead. The Rahken were almost as many as the sly, sharp grasses of the swamps, or the heavy fronds that grew, it seemed, on the murky water itself.
                  The two shining paladins who accompanied the seer rode beautiful horses that seemed bred for war, rather than speed, but they kept pace just as easily as the Rahken. The girl-child, Sia, rode with the paladin named Yuthran, side-saddle across the man's lap. The other warrior, face hidden deep in the shadow of his helm, rode alone. That one never spoke, but Yuthran was nearly garrulous...though compared to Perr a dead man would have seemed talkative.
                  Through the swamp for what seemed like hours they rode hard and fast, did not tire or hunger.
                  'How long have we been riding?' she asked of the Rahken beside her mount at one point.
                  'Minutes, only,' said the beast. But it seemed like hours to her.
                  Magic pathways, strange creatures, plants and trees and beast-song that was all alien to her, knowing only the north. No sense of great speed, but a hint of something otherworldly. Almost as though there was a constant buzz in her ear, like an insect spoke to her in a tiny voice she could not understand.
                  It could be that they had only been riding minutes, as the Rahken told her, though her mind was convinced it should now be late in the day, near the first sun's setting. She looked for the suns, but both were still high and seemed not to move. Time, outside this path, standing still?
                  She didn't know. Nor could she gain any sense of their direction. If the fabled Sybremreyen was hidden, as it was rumoured, in the deepest part of the southern lands, then it was deep in the swamp indeed. Far as the southern-most coast, maybe.
                  The maps would have Reih believe that the swamps of the south bled their rot into the sea where it reached the end of Lianthran lands. But Reih was learning that you could not trust maps. Maps lied. Cartographers made mistakes - deliberate or accidental, it didn't matter. The fact was, should they be abandoned on this odd path that took them unhindered through the murk of the swamp, she and Perr would most likely breathe their last here. No one would ever find them.
                  The thought gave Reih a moment's pause, but as she glanced around at the swamp, her companions (hardly needing to steer her horse at all - she let the mare have her head and the mare was happy enough to run), then, up to the sky, she realised that the suns were...dim.
                  Not because of foliage - trees here tended to be short things, it seemed - but because they were...setting?
                  A younger Rahken noted her skyward glance, and nodded to her. Seemed the creature grinned, though it was so full of teeth and fur, you couldn't really call it a grin or a smile, even.
                  'Yes,' said the Rahken, in answer to her unspoken question, 'the suns are setting. A day passed. Close your eyes if you wish - your mount will not tire, nor can she stray. The pathways hold us, still and true.'
                  'A day?'
                  The Rahken nodded.
                  Reih shook her head. How could anyone be expected to fall asleep on a galloping horse?
                  She should be hungry, or tired, or even perhaps a little scared...but she was not.
                  So thinking, she rode on as the skies darkened and somehow, she knew not how, opened her eyes but a moment later to see bright light yet again, to find her