Those who have not returned

The council had not met when Zaelyra returned to Les Salines. Sarn made them wait in the outer courtyard, near the salt baskets. The inhabitants passed in front of them without stopping. No one chased them; no one welcomed them anymore.

Kethra asked to speak to Nara. The dean accepted, but demanded that Zaelyra and Ilda be present. The conversation would take place in the room where the maps were kept. Sarn kept the copy of the notes, face down on the table.

"You have information about my son," says Nara.

Kethra didn't look away. "We found a sheet whose name is incomplete. It could contain the beginning of mine. The brand near the niche looks like a brand used by Saira. I don't know if she left her."

"Do you think she knew Ulven?"

"I don't know."

"Do you think she left with him?"

"I have no proof."

Nara put her hands on the table. "You say that as if you wanted me to believe you."

"I don't ask to be believed. I want to know if the name I saw can help you recognize its route."

Ilda intervened. "The salt path leads to several shelters. The watch station is not the only way out. If they crossed the door before it was sealed, they were able to reach the western galleries."

"When was the door sealed? Zaelyra asked.

Nara hesitated. "After Ulven's departure."

"Why?"

"Because the travelers who accompanied him had taken water and forced a room. We didn't know if they would come back. The council closed the road to prevent others from entering."

"You also closed the passage through which your son could have returned."

Nara's face hardens. "Yes."

"And did you know?" asked Kethra.

"I understood it later."

Neither of them added any consolation. Silence did not require the response to be softened.

Nara looked at Sarn. "When did you find the sheet?"

"She was already in the niche during the last inspection. I hadn't opened it."

"Why?"

"The red thread warned not to touch the cache."

"You respected the brand," says Nara.

"Yes."

"And then you let Zaelyra discover it."

"She didn't cross the thread."

Nara closed her eyes. When she reopened them, her look was more tired than suspicious. "We still don't know if this sheet comes from Ulven or Saira."

"No," says Kethra.

"But you want to continue to the west."

Kethra thinks. "I want to know if Saira has been here. I also want to follow the road. I don't know yet which of these two desires would make me change direction."

Zaelyra would have preferred her to choose now. That would have made the rest easier, and a clear answer would not have been more honest.

Nara took out an old map from a drawer, folded around a piece of leather. She didn't open it right away.

"Ulven didn't go alone. According to the last register, two other people accompanied him: a drow woman who said her name was Saira, and a merchant from the surface. The merchant's name has been scratched."

Kethra stopped breathing for a moment.

"Did you see him? Zaelyra asked.

"I saw him go to the salt pan years earlier."

"Why didn't you tell the council?"

"Because at the time I had no reason to believe that it was the same person."

"And now?"

"Now I still don't know."

Nara put the map on the table. It showed the way of the salt beyond the watch post, then three branches. Two were crossed with a black line. The third stopped in front of the drawing of a bell.

"This road led to the Refuge des Cloches," she says. "The community that had settled there moved after tremors. We don't know where she went."

"Did you send someone to pick her up? Zaelyra asked.

"Yes."

"And?"

"The team found the shelter empty. The bells had been carried away."

"When?"

"The year Ulven disappeared."

Kethra put her hand flat on the table. "Then he could have gone there."

"He could have."

"What if the community moved?"

"We don't know where she is."

The old map did not promise to find the missing. It offered only a series of places, some of which had ceased to exist as refuges.

Nara refused to let them take the original. She authorized Ithryl to copy the western part, without the name of the merchant or the details of the houses. Ilda added the conditions of passage. Sarn noted what was uncertain.

Zaelyra observed the barred branches. "Why did you close them?"

"The one leads to an unstable gallery. The other has an abandoned guard post. We haven't sent a team there since Ulven left."

"They should be checked."

"Maybe. Not with families, not without a guide, not before knowing if they are still open."

They were limits, not prohibitions made to humiliate them. Zaelyra enrolled them in this way.

At the end of the meeting, Nara authorized the group to stay one more day. She would then give them the name of a guide who could lead them to the first inhabited shelter, if that shelter agreed to receive them.

"You won't go through the sealed door," she said.

"Understood," says Zaelyra.

Kethra did not protest. She kept her eyes on the branch that led to the Refuge des Cloches.

"You want to go get it," said Zaelyra, once they were out.

"I want to know where the road leads."

"It's not the same thing."

"Not yet."

"If you leave alone, you risk compromising the passage of the whole group."

"I won't go alone."

"If the road opens, you could decide to follow this track rather than us."

Kethra didn't answer right away. "Yes."

"Then we'll have to say it before we leave."

"I'll say it."

She didn't promise to stay. Zaelyra had no right to ask him more.