Golden Daughter

by Anne Elisabeth Stengl

  But there was no gate of trees. Jovann, his eyes closed, his mind encompassed in the chant and the scent of the need before him, saw only swirling mist. Not the pure white emptiness; this was emptiness without purity, formlessness without clarity. It was gray, or not quite gray. For gray still requires some perception of color. This was not gray, nor white, nor even black. It was the churning of the mind on the edge of dreams, where all is lost and all is irrecoverable.

  Then suddenly he beheld his door: The tall gate of Ay-Ibunda, one post carved like a dragon, the other post jagged, uncarved, unshaped.

  Jovann felt his heart lurch in his breast, back in his mortal body. But his spirit turned toward this sight with a certain measure of relief. Dreadful though that gate was—and still more dreadful the chant of the Chhayans which slowly replaced all sound of the Kitar priests—it was still something. Anything was better than the formless mist, so Jovann moved toward the gate as swiftly as he dared, remembering to speak the chant the Besur had given him.

  The moment he stood beneath the arch of the gate, however, Jovann felt himself take on a form more solid. His feet stood upon ground which, though hidden beneath the mist, supported him nonetheless. And he saw the stones of the temple wall take shape around him, black and forbidding, one set upon the next far more firmly than he had last seen. The temple—and those who built it with their minds and the evil of their hearts—was stronger.

  He should go back. He should not enter here. He should return to his body, return to his world, and wait and beg the songbird to call him. This was not safe, and he was not strong dream-walking thus.

  But Lady Hariawan must be inside. And he had promised the cat. What else could he do?

  The next step Jovann took was both the bravest and the most foolish of his life. It carried him across the threshold, through the gate, and into the courtyard. In that single step, he felt as though he passed into a world more solid and real than his own, and he knew he need not speak the Kitar chant anymore. He was here, within the temple boundaries, and his spirit would not slip away easily. Indeed, he wondered briefly if he would be able to return at all.

  There was no time to think of that, however. All around him, standing in clustered circles, were priests, Chhayan priests adorned in crowns set with animal teeth. They paid no attention to him, fixed as they were upon sustaining their chant. Though Jovann looked carefully, he saw no sign of Chhayan warriors, no men of the Khla clan.

  He proceeded, passing silently through the courtyard and the mist. With each step he took, the Chhayan chant embedded itself deeper into his heart. He began to see images of what the chanters saw and invented with their words. He saw the whole layout of the temple, the three halls, the circular main hall, in the center of which stood a great altar. He saw the altar itself as clearly as though he stood before it. It was a dreadful thing, smeared with blood. Chhayan worship was always bloodier than Kitar.

  More images appeared in his mind, and he saw the prayer chambers beyond the altar, both elaborate and humble. And suddenly he knew exactly where Lady Hariawan waited.

  As is the way with dreams, Jovann had no need to walk the whole of that distance across the courtyard and into the hall, searching out each room as he came to it. Instead, the moment he envisioned the chamber he sought, he found himself standing before it. The chanting of the priests in the courtyard was just as loud, but he could not see those who chanted. He was alone in this passage, the bloodied altar at his back, and a low door before him. He felt his heartbeat far away in another world, but here his spirit was strangely calm.

  Kneeling and putting his mouth close to the door, he called softly, “Umeer’s daughter?”

  He saw a picture of her in his mind, again as clear or clearer than reality. He saw her kneeling in the dark, waiting. She waited with perfect calmness, perfect serenity, but with an absolute certainty of doom. She did not move at his voice, though he was quite sure she heard him. “Umeer’s daughter, can you open the door?” he asked.

  No answer, but again he felt the answer and knew it for truth. She could open the door. If she could but summon the strength and the will, she could open the door and walk out into his arms and away. But she remained where she was. And she waited.

  Jovann felt around for a latch but found none. Foolish! Why should he need a latch here? If the chanting priests could form this entire structure from their minds, what could he himself not accomplish? He braced his spirit and placed both of his imagined hands against the door. How solid it felt, how real, how mortal! And yet it was but the stuff of dreams. He pushed.

  His hands were through in an instant, and he followed swiftly after them. The darkness of the chamber closed in around. He had no sense of size, either great or small. The walls might have pressed in on all sides, mere inches from his head, from his shoulders. Or they may have been miles distant. It did not matter, not here. Not in the dark.

  “Umeer’s daughter?” he whispered, feeling her near. He dared not stand but crawled instead, placing each hand carefully before him. It wasn’t as though he found any real ground upon which to support himself. There was only darkness.

  Then suddenly, as he set his hand down, he touched her fingertips.

  The moment their fingers met, it was as though a light illuminated them both. This was not in fact the truth, for all was still dark around them. But Jovann could see her face now, and her kneeling form. He saw the mark of the hand upon her cheek, and it was vivid and ugly, marring her lovely features. He saw the shining sheet of her long, loose hair hanging down over her white shoulders.

  Her eyes upturned to him, and they contained all the darkness of that chamber in their depths.

  “You have come,” she said.

  “I have,” Jovann replied, and he took her hand firmly in his. Or rather, he tried to. With mounting horror he looked down and found that, while he could touch her, he could not grasp her. When he tried, she slipped away like a ghost. He realized suddenly that she was here in her mortal form—not dream-walking as he was, but physically trapped in this Realm of Dreams, her body, mind, soul, and spirit, all together here in this chamber.

  He knew then that he would not be able to rescue her.

  Sairu woke up trying to scream but unable to find her voice. She sat bolt upright, startling the cat so that his back arched high and he hissed despite himself. Then, trying to smooth down his on-end coat, he meowled, “Dragon’s teeth, girl! You scared the living Lights right out of me!”

  Her chest heaving as she struggled to relearn how to breathe, Sairu stared around her. She found she lay on the hard floor of the emperor’s council room and wondered briefly how she had come there. Then she winced, gasped as though in pain, and bowed her chin to her chest, her eyes squeezed tight.

  Before her vision swam the face of Idrus, the dead slaver. And his was the same face as the Chhayan she had killed the day before.

  Sensing her distress, the cat placed a paw on her knee. “There, girl, there,” he said. “You’re safe. I’ve sung over your wound again, and the pain should be eased. But there is poison in your heart, and I’m afraid I haven’t yet managed to sing it out. Not sure I have the skill.” He put his ears back. “I know I’ve said it before, but I do wish Imraldera were here. She would be able to help you in ways I cannot.”

  Not knowing who Imraldera might be, Sairu ignored this. She put up her hands, clutching her face, and tried to push memories back into place. The emperor’s council . . . the siege . . . Jovann . . .

  “My mistress,” she whispered. She opened her eyes, fixing her gaze upon the cat. “Where is Lady Hariawan?”

  “She’s gone, remember?” the cat said as gently as he could. “The Chhayans took her.”

  “Oh. Yes.”

  “Not to worry, though,” the cat continued. “Your handsome hero has gone in search of her.”

  “My what?”

  “Jovann. He has gone to the Besur to seek help, to dream-walk. He has found the Hidden Temple before, and he belie
ves he can find it again. I am certain—”

  “Alone?” Sairu pulled her hands sharply away from her face. “You sent him alone?”

  “I told you,” the cat said soothingly, “I do not know the way. In any case I could not leave you, poisoned as you are. You might have died. Or worse.”

  “You should have gone with him,” Sairu said. Her face was fierce and deathly pale as she gathered herself and stood, swaying slightly. “You should have gone with him! You should have let me die!” She closed her eyes again, bracing herself, summoning all the control she possessed over her own body and mind. Her heart raced as fast as her thoughts, and for a moment she did not think she would be able to master herself.

  Then she was running. Her robes flew out behind her as she fled the council room, through the winding corridors of Manusbau. She saw and heard signs of the preparations being made for the coming siege, but she did not stop to inspect these, only ran all the harder. The cat was at her heels, and he was calling out to her, but she was too angry, too furious to acknowledge him. So she ran harder, feeling the looseness in her shoulder and realizing, distantly, that the wound was much further along in its healing than it had been mere hours before. Whatever the cat had done had worked wonders on her.

  But he had not been able to touch her wounded heart, and this beat a steady poison through her body—a poison of fear, a poison of devotion. Fed by this poison, she ran harder, brushing past any who might try to impede her, warding off the curious with the expression on her face. She passed from Manusbau into the Crown of the Moon, bursting through the gate without a word for the gatekeeper who demanded that she declare herself. No one could stop her as she crossed the temple grounds, and she did not slacken her pace save once. For as she drew near the plot of wild land filled with broken stones, she felt her heart give a painful jolt inside her. She longed suddenly to hide herself among those stones, her ears straining for some sound, some song for which she had always sought without knowing she sought it.

  Her spirit, so highly tuned and trained throughout the years, urged her on relentlessly. She could not tarry, she could not wait. She could seek no balm or blessing. She must find Jovann before he stepped into the Dream, and she must tell him the plan that had formed in her brain while she slept.

  Priests stood guard at the doors of Hulan’s Throne, and they were fierce, tall men un-softened by years of temple service. “Declare yourself!” they cried as Sairu drew near. When she did not answer they stepped forward, weapons raised, and would have cut her down. But she avoided their plunging blades without a thought. She grabbed the belt of one tall priest and, pivoting so that she used his own weight against him, swung him around so that his body connected hard with his brother, and they both fell. She did not wait to hear their curses but darted through the doors of Hulan’s Throne, following the sound of chanting heard deep within.

  The light of the braziers cast a red glow on the figure standing in the center of the circle. Sairu instantly recognized Jovann. Somehow the way his face was lit sent a stab of horror through her heart. She nearly stumbled as she drew to a halt just outside the circle of priests and braziers, staring into that center where Jovann stood with his arms outstretched.

  “No,” she gasped.

  “Golden Daughter,” said a voice she knew and loathed. She turned to the Besur with such ferociousness in her eyes that he took a step back. “Golden Daughter, why are you here? Are you not meant to be guarding the emperor’s children on this evil night?”

  Sairu ignored this, demanding instead, “What have you done, Besur? What have you done to Jovann?”

  “Nothing he did not ask for himself,” the Besur replied, putting up his hands in protest of her vicious tone. “He came to me for help, claiming he could find Lady Hariawan. Did you not declare him trustworthy before the Anuk’s own throne? Do you go back on your word now?”

  Sairu’s mouth twisted into an ugly snarl, and her hands moved into her sleeves, feeling for the daggers attached to her arms. The cat arrived at her feet just then, however, and growled. Sairu turned away from the Besur, staring into the circle again, staring at Jovann.

  “Come back,” she whispered. “Please, come back!”

  The chant rose up into the night, mingling with the harimau spice.

  The young dragon stood in the courtyard of Ay-Ibunda and felt the glory of mastery in his veins. For the moment his fire was low. He wore the shape of a man, his own former shape though it was no longer true. He forgot what he had become, though he could not quite remember what he had been. He knew only what he was in that moment: chief of the Khla clan. His father’s heir. Master of the Tiger men.

  It was a power he had never hoped would be his, not from that time so long ago when his mother held him close and told him that he had a half-brother now and must try not to hate him. He could not remember his mother. She was gone along with his heart, lost in the furnace blaze.

  But he remembered his brother. And he remembered his hatred.

  The young dragon, a light in his eyes, stared at the door of the temple, waiting. His brother was inside, and soon he would emerge. Soon Jovann would see how drastically the game had changed, how far he had fallen beneath the rising shadow of the elder brother’s might.

  For hours the young dragon stood thus, or perhaps for mere moments. Mortal men surrounded him, and they dragged Time in their wake, but here it did not move and flow as it did in the mortal world. This did not matter. The trap was sprung, the quarry caught. Time could neither save nor hurt Jovann now. His fate was sealed.

  The door of the temple opened. The young dragon’s lips drew back, and fire licked about his teeth and gums. He prepared to laugh, to roar, to shout out his victory in the face of that one he hated so much.

  But instead of Jovann, a girl stepped through the door and into the gray half-light of the Dream. And the young dragon recognized her at once. In a voice suddenly chilled he breathed, “Angel!”

  He felt the ring on his finger as though it were made of red-hot iron. He had almost forgotten it. He had forgotten it. But he recalled it now with startling pain. In that moment he realized that his heart was not entirely lost after all.

  Lady Hariawan stood above the courtyard. She wore the leper’s rags in which she had been captured. These could not mar the perfection of her slender form, nor could her long black hair veil the beauty of her face, her neck. But the courtyard, full to brimming with ranks of Chhayan warriors standing in formation, shuddered with horror rather than longing. For all eyes except those of the young dragon fixed upon the mark on her cheek. The mark of the Dragon’s hand.

  She looked out upon them, her eyes empty save for a faint trace of mockery. She was unafraid, though she knew—or at least suspected—what they would do to her.

  Jovann stepped out behind her, and he stood numb upon that step. He too showed no trace of fear, for his surprise far outmatched his fear and masked his face. He recognized all of those before him, men of the Khla clan with whom he had lived and survived all his life. But though their faces were familiar, they were strangely unfamiliar as well. For the first time, Jovann gazed upon men of the Tiger and saw his enemies.

  He spied his brother standing before the others on the first step below. He saw the helmet of Juong-Khla upon his head, and he felt a sob well in his throat. “Sunan!” he said, and though he did not speak loudly his voice filled the air, rising even above the pulsing chant of the priests. “Where is our father?”

  Dragging his gaze from Lady Hariawan only with an unwilling effort, the young dragon turned to his brother. In a flash the memory of the ring on his hand vanished and all his hatred returned. “Our father is dead, Jovann,” he said. “I am Sunan-Khla, the Tiger Master.”

  “You were not our father’s heir,” Jovann said. “Stand down. Call off these men and let this lady go. Then you and I will settle the inheritance by right of combat as befits men of the Tiger.”

  It was a vain command, and well Jovann knew it. The faces of
the Khla men were as stone before him. They would never accept him. Not now.

  The young dragon took another step up, and Jovann saw the flames in his eyes. He did not yet know what it meant, but his heart—far away in another world—quailed in his breast. “I am Khla,” said his brother. “You are nothing. Nothing but the dreamer. The slave. You have lost your inheritance, and soon you will lose your life. But not before you lose your soul.”

  No eye could have spotted which of the brothers moved first, for the next instant both were flying at each other—Jovann leaping down the stairs with the speed of lightning, the young dragon rising up to meet him with fire spilling from his mouth. The fire overwhelmed Jovann, but he walked in spirit, not in body, and it could not hurt him. He threw himself through it and into his brother, and both of them, grappling together, fell back down the temple stairs. Jovann struck at the dragon’s face, and the dragon clawed at his eyes.

  Never before had Jovann felt such power here in the Dream. He realized now, as he never had before, that he was not limited to physical strength. Here he could be what he imagined, and so his fists became rocks of granite with which he pounded the face of his brother. But the young dragon transformed beneath him, scales plating his skin, teeth jutting up from his jaw. Soon he no longer wore the form of a man but was a dragon indeed, his wings beating the air around them. Still Jovann did not let up his assault, but struck at his brother with all the force of his pent-up frustration, all the fury at his enslavement, all the vengeance of a son whose father has been slain.

  The battle might have waged for generations of mortal men. But instead, a voice that filled the whole of the sky above, the whole of the ground beneath the mist, shaking the walls of Ay-Ibunda down to their foundations, said: “Cease this childish brawling, you dog’s sons!”

  Jovann and his brother raised their furious eyes up to the temple door where Lady Hariawan waited. Behind her stood the Dragon, his hands upon her shoulders, his long talons sinking into her skin so that blood ran in thin, scarlet rivulets down her breast and arms.