The Lord of the Plains

by Sarah Chapman

Chapter 31

  Even Mr Briggs stopped in awe.

  The song wound down through the tunnels. Vearla’s song.

  Suddenly it cut off.

  She knew they were there.

  Disappointment rose in Messenger, then he saw the same look on Mr Briggs face, just for a second before it vanished. Maybe, just maybe, that would be enough for Mr Briggs to see… see that beauty was not a waste. That it added something indefinable and indescribable. Something Astar would be better with.

  They resumed walking up the steep tunnel. The rock here was raw and the tunnel was narrow enough that it scraped. It was not so much a tunnel carved by the Vachi but an opening formed naturally by some prodigious movement in the rock.

  Here, natural light washed down through the tunnel. They were very close to the surface.

  Finally the tunnel opened into a small cave formed by an overhang in the rock above. It was wide, open and shallow and looked out onto the towers below.

  Vearla was watching them, her back to the towers, to the sunlight.

  This was a place an Astarian might feel at home. Any beauty here was not formed by human or valkar hands. It just was. There was no furniture or decoration. Just Vearla, sitting on a rock.

  Her skin was even darker than that of the Vachi. It was as black as a starless night. Her hands were sitting limply in her lap. Her dress was simple and magnificent at the same time. She did not wear the robes of the Vachi.

  Her eyes, dark as her skin, travelled slowly over the party arrayed before her. It was cramped, for they would not approach her. Messenger knew from experience Vearla was oddly skittish. Suddenly a thought occurred to him as he looked at those dark eyes. Perhaps it was the darkness of the deepest cave that coloured her, not the darkness of a moonless night.

  ‘Recha, Skachi,’ the Speaker stiffened at having her call his name, an injured look on his face, but she travelled on as if she hadn’t noticed. That was another reason Messenger liked Vearla’s place. She seemed oblivious to the Vachi’s rules sometimes. Other times she seemed to know them better than they did. But when she didn’t, it was easy for him to behave as an Astarian.

  She stopped at Mr Briggs.

  ‘Neiteis Briggs.’ Mr Briggs offered.

  ‘Neiteis, Saris.’

  She stopped, having named everyone. Her eyes drifted back to Skachi, the Speaker.

  He spoke in Ravki to her. He said, ‘Please, honoured one, you know our customs, please do not use my given name. You dishonour myself and my House by doing so.’

  Vearla didn’t seem to hear. Her eyes drifted back to Mr Briggs. Her voice was soft and lovely. Somehow, everyone could understand her when she spoke. ‘I am not a Judgement Master, or even a judge, nor can I call any of my people. Yet the dark ones of the mountain have asked me too, so I suppose I should…’ she trailed off.

  ‘Perhaps you could make this decision by yourselves.’ she said. Her voice drifted like a cloud on a sleepy summer’s day.

  At the same time Recha and Skachi began begging her to take part in the decision.

  Messenger was surprised. He had thought she insisted on taking part in decisions. It looked as if he had misunderstood her relationship with the Vachi completely.

  ‘Mistress,’ Recha translated, even though he didn’t have to, that was how upset he was, ‘we do not wish to make any alliance that might harm your people. These pale ones have harmed your kind in the past, we would never wish for that to happen again.’

  Messenger’s heart felt like it stopped. Then it began again, slowly. ‘Are you a valkar?’ he asked in awe. He’d thought they were gone but surely, what else could she be?’

  Recha and Skachi looked at him in horror, they both began speaking at once. ‘Your people mustn’t harm her.’ Skachi said while Recha, translating for him at the same time said, ‘please, Saris, you mustn’t tell your people.’

  Vearla gazed at them, her eyes trailing over them. ‘We all speak the same language here.’ she said, her voice a leaf drifting on the wind. ‘How can we be friends if we do not understand each other? There is no need to translate.’

  ‘Are you a representative of the valkar?’ Mr Briggs asked firmly, resting his oddly soft eyes on Vearla.

  ‘No… I’m not a representative of anything. Yes, Saris, I am of the valkar.’

  Messenger felt curiously lightheaded, as if he was floating, as he tried to figure out what this meant. While he was doing that Mr Briggs was going on, undaunted, like a good Astarian.

  ‘My people have never harmed the valkar. The gemengs are our enemies.’ Mr Briggs said firmly, fixing a steely grimace on Skachi. ‘You have no need to fear for the valkar on our account.’

  Skachi looked shocked to find he could understand him. ‘No, eminent one, are you completely unaware of your past? Your people violently attacked and enslaved our allies, the valkar. Only with our help did they find freedom and peace. We-’

  He was about to launch into a long description of that time when Vearla interrupted him.

  ‘Where are you from?’ she asked Mr Briggs. ‘I have tried to talk to Saris, but he is more interested in getting answers, than giving.’

  Messenger blushed fiercely as Mr Briggs tried to describe the location of Astar.

  ‘So you are descended from the Seiaans.’ Vearla said and fell silent for a moment.

  The name meant nothing to Messenger. He was mystified and intrigued and dying to ask more but after what Vearla had said about him he dared not.

  ‘The Seiaans did not fight against us. But they did not help.’ she said after a while. ‘But what has that to do with the Raka?’

  Messenger quietly told Mr Briggs that she always insisted on referring to the Vachi as the Raka. She didn’t even notice their pleas to call them the Vachi.

  ‘It is not the valkar you want an alliance with, and I am in no position to make that decision for my people.’ she did not appear to be talking to them. Again, Messenger was used to this behaviour from her.

  ‘Are there any valkar in Seisaa?’ she asked suddenly, brightly, and Messenger was surprised and rattled to see hope in her eyes.

  Mr Briggs looked at her in confusion. Messenger had an idea she was doing to them what she did to the Vachi and so could answer, ‘no, lady, there are none.’

  Her gaze fell to her lap. Her face was hidden by her hair, as dark as the rest of her, so dark the hair of the Vachi looked pale next to it. It was hard to pinpoint what it was exactly, but sometimes it was hard to tell what the difference could be between valkar and human, other times she amazed him. Yet he couldn’t say why. The Vachi were different enough for him as it was.

  ‘Are you sure?’ she asked.

  ‘I think we would notice someone who looked like you in Astar.’ Messenger said.

  ‘Why would the others look like me?’

  Messenger didn’t know what to say to that.

  ‘Vearla stays with us because she looks like us.’ Skachi said. ‘Your people held great anger towards those who looked differently, so the valkar often visited only the lands with humans who shared their colouring.’

  ‘Your people were the same.’ Vearla added. For once, Messenger thought he heard a note of annoyance in her voice. ‘Most left the land… I was one of the few who stayed.’ Her head drooped again. ‘I knew a valkar who travelled many places. Perhaps he came through your land?’ she did not look up when she asked, perhaps to spare them her disappointment.

  ‘Gemengs live in our city with us.’ Mr Briggs said. ‘Perhaps a valkar came in too.’ he looked uneasy at the idea.

  ‘He was a Moonsinger… I did not know him well, we had little in common. They always gaze at the sky…’

  ‘What does he look like?’ Mr Briggs asked.

  ‘A Moonsinger.’

  Mr Briggs looked over at Messenger, who shook his head.

  ‘Lady, we do not know what a Moonsinger is.’ Messenger said.

  ‘One who sings to the Moon. I had heard he often travels with a young girl. Oh but the
y must be different, girls from the other people always change so fast.’

  ‘What does a Moonsinger look like?’ Messenger asked again.

  ‘Oh, they look like the moon.’

  ‘Well, we’ll see if we have any… we’ll look into it for you, Miss Vearla.’ Mr Briggs said.

  ‘About the alliance, Vearla,’ Recha said delicately.

  ‘Oh… the alliance… I have no objection to a friendship between the Seiaans and the Raka. The valkar have never wanted war. So please, if you would form an alliance, please let it be a force for peace in the world. Do not use it to make war.’

  As they were leaving Messenger arranged to be the last one through the narrow tunnel.

  ‘Vearla.’ he said.

  She contemplated him in a distant sort of way.

  ‘Did the valkar really help the humans survive when the gemengs came?’

  She nodded. ‘Yes. We tried to give shields to all we could find. Even though we hated you….’

  ‘So there was a time before the gemengs?’

  She nodded and smiled. ‘And a time before humans too. I never knew that time though.’

  ‘Just one more thing,’ he said hurriedly, glancing down the tunnel and seeing Recha looking back.

  ‘Did you give more to the Vachi?’

  ‘The Vachi were our friends. We did not mind helping them, though we couldn’t trust them any longer. We hated helping the others.’

  ‘Why couldn’t you trust them?’ Messenger asked.

  Vearla smiled a smile that wasn’t really a smile. ‘Because the others used to be our friends too.’