I stared. He was utterly bewildering.

He said, “Let me tell you something. I intend to be a Pilgrim too.”

I laughed right in his face. “You, Traiben?”

“Me. Yes. Nothing can stop me. Why do you laugh, Poilar? You think they’ll never choose anyone as weak as I am? No. No, they will. They’ll choose you despite your crooked leg and they’ll choose me even though I’m not strong. I’ll make it happen. I swear it by He Who Climbed. And by Kreshe and all the sacred ones of Heaven!” His eyes began to blaze, bright with that hot eerie Traiben-brightness of his that made him so mystifying and even frightening to all who encountered him. There was a Power about Traiben. If he had been born a Witch instead of into the House of the Wall, he would have been a santha-nilla with great magic at his command, of that I’m sure. “There’s work for us to do up there, Poilar. There are important things that need to be learned and brought back. That’s why the Pilgrimages began—so that we could sit at the feet of the gods and learn the things they know, the way the First Climber did. But for a long time now nothing useful’s been brought down from the mountain. We make no progress. We live as we’ve always lived, and when you stay in the same place, you start to slide backward, after a time. The Pilgrimages still go forth, yes, but either the Pilgrims don’t return or they come back crazy. And they bring us nothing useful, so we stay forever in the same place. What a waste, Poilar! We have to change all that. We’ll go up there together, you and I, side by side, rising through Kingdom after Kingdom just as the First Climber did. We’ll meet the gods, just as He did. We will have their blessing. We’ll see all the wonders and learn all the mysteries. And together we will return, with new knowledge that will change the world. What kind of knowledge that is, I can’t begin to say. But I know it’s there. I know it without any question. We have to find it. And so we have to make it happen that we become Pilgrims, you and I. Are you following me? We have to make it happen.”