The Secret Texts

by Holly Lisle

  He stared into her eyes, and took her hand in his own. “I’ll do that if that’s all you’ll let me do,” he said. “But if you find that I can do more . . . please . . . let me.”

  She turned and looked at him. The love in his eyes was too clear and too painful. She hurt for him. She wished she could be the woman he wanted her to be. She nodded and felt a lump forming in her throat and tears beginning to burn in her eyes. Unable to find words, she gave him a quick hug, then turned to face the Mirror again.

  Chapter 8

  Crispin woke to blackness and ringing in his ears. For a long, painful moment he thought that he was still in the Veil, and that his memories of reprieve had been nothing but a dream. But the scent of his body was musky in his nostrils, and the sweetness of night-blooming jasmine reached him from somewhere in the distance, and from nearer he caught the stink of drying blood and piss. Then the ringing ceased, and he realized that in each of the city’s hundreds of temples and parnisseries, the bellringers had been clanging out the Invocation to Paldin to mark the end of day. Twilight had come.

  He sat and ran his fingers over his face. His face. He touched his hair, his neck, his chest, pressed his palms hard against each other and felt the blood pulse in his fingertips. He sucked in air until his lungs began to ache from holding so much, then let it out with a joyful whoosh.

  He wiggled his feet and felt them move, stretched his arms high over his head, flexed his spine and felt the satisfying crack as joints popped all along it.

  “Back,” he whispered, and grinned. “Damn the Dragons to darkness, I’m back.”

  His eyes adjusted to the nearly lightless room, and he realized that he was in the torture chamber in the Citadel of the Gods, the Dragons’ city-within-a-city in Calimekka. A body lay on the table, still strapped down; it was from that body that the various stinks emanated.

  That body. . . .

  Memories deluged him—not just his own memories, but those that had belonged to the corpse on the table, and those of the Dragon who had stolen his body and ridden him like a cheap nag, and those of a terrifying wizard hiding in the distant hills—a wizard, he realized, who could still see everything he did and who could, without warning, invade his body and listen to his most secret thoughts.

  He snarled. Because of those memories, he knew much of what the old wizard knew—he saw how he could travel in trance to the place where the Falcon Dùghall hid with his followers, simply by following the energy strand from the talisman that the dead man had embedded in his skin. He could watch them; perhaps he could find a way to destroy them.

  But even as he entertained that pleasant thought, he knew that he didn’t have the time to persecute his persecutors. They’d found out about Ulwe. And they intended to kidnap her and use her against him.

  He snarled again. The cold white fury that he felt toward the spying Falcons and the manipulative Dragons metamorphosed into something else—something hotter and redder and more primitive. His blood began to simmer and his muscles burned and grew liquid beneath his skin. He had spent his life mastering the beast that dwelt inside of him, but now he wanted no such mastery. He embraced the animal that bayed for blood inside his Shifting skull; he offered himself up to its hungry, wordless passions.

  Quickly he stripped off his clothes. He bundled them neatly, took a bit of cord, and slung the bundle around his neck. His clothes were light silk—they made an unobtrusive burden.

  He lusted for the taste of blood in his mouth, for the feel of bones crunching between his jaws. He yearned to maim, to rend, to destroy whoever sought to kidnap his daughter. He slipped into four-legged Karnee form, and the world became hard-edged and clear, scents sharper and suddenly full of meaning, sounds broader and richer and louder. He panted, tasting the air, and turned his muzzle to the door.

  He had to hurry. The kidnapper would certainly already be on his way to get Ulwe, and she would not know her danger. She was only a child, ignorant of the dangers of the city and those who dwelt in it. She would go trustingly with the first man who uttered the right phrase—and Hasmal had learned the phrase from Crispin’s own mind. He had no hope that Hasmal’s agent would get it wrong. His only hope was to be fast enough to get to Ulwe first.

  Or that the scent trail remain unsullied long enough that he could track the kidnapper back to his lair.

  Crispin loped through the long white corridors of the Citadel of the Gods, avoiding the hurrying Dragons, ignoring their obvious agitation and dismay. He would deal with them later.

  First, he had a kidnapper to kill and a child to save.

  Chapter 9

  Silk Street after twilight seethed with life.

  The silk shops for which the street had been named were closed, and om-bindili bands were set up in front of them on the high sidewalks above the cobbled road. The inhabitants of the apartments above the shops moved out to their balconies to enjoy the cool evening air. They drank and danced to the music or sang with the bands’ singers, or made their way down to the street itself, where they bet on rolls of the dice or strolled hand in hand in the nightly promenade, wearing their finest to see and be seen.

  The songs of Wilhene and Glaswherry Hala and distant Varhees, sung in the original tongues of those places and those people, blended into a rich and oddly comforting stew. The outlanders’ ghetto would make a surprisingly good place to hide a little girl, Ry realized. These people accepted each other and looked out for each other because they knew that they were all they had. Not citizens of Calimekka, they wouldn’t have access to the many protections such citizenship offered. They had become neighbors and friends out of self-defense.

  The promenaders were watching him. He was a stranger to Silk Street’s nightlife; they were remembering his face, his clothing, the way he walked. He couldn’t help being memorable. He couldn’t make himself someone they knew. Inwardly he cringed, but outwardly he nodded politely, and made his way as quickly as he could through the gamblers and the chatters and the strollers.

  His main landmark, the Black Well, sat in the midst of a square of greenery. Carefully shaped shrubs and sweet-scented flowers grew in boxes at the four corners of the square; the boxes themselves bore mosaics reminiscent of the bold, stylized street paintings that decorated the thoroughfares of the city-state of Wilhene. Benches surrounded the well itself, and on those benches old women sat talking to each other and watching the spectacle of the promenade, and old men told their old jokes and slapped their knees with laughter at tall tales they’d heard a hundred times already. As he walked past the square, their voices dropped to whispers, though, and he felt their eyes, too, fixed on his back.

  When Crispin came looking for his daughter, a thousand people would be able to give a clear description of Ry.

  He would have to find a way to render that description worthless.

  Beyond the well and on the other side of the road, Ry saw the sign for the dyer’s shop, and read the name Nathis Farhills scrawled out in Iberish and half a dozen other common scripts. On the balcony above the shop, a pretty girl stood, staring down at him. Small-boned, slender, and with hair that looked white in the twilight but that was likely pale gold, she leaned forward with her hands resting on the rail. Her eyes, light as his own, didn’t seem to blink when he looked into them. He had intended only to glance in her direction, but her steady stare didn’t waver, and he found that he couldn’t look away. He would have thought her too old to be Crispin’s daughter, but she had her father’s features. She had to be Ulwe.

  He came to a stop and stared up at her, feeling like a fool. He couldn’t hope that she would believe he was her father. In his early twenties, he was too young to have a daughter already approaching womanhood, and he knew nothing of the past that she shared with her true father. What could he hope to say to her that would not betray him as the imposter he was?

  He almost turned away. But Crispin was . . . Crispin. And the Falcons would have to deal with him. And this girl, this watchful, still creature, was
the key to controlling Crispin.

  Ry’s heart raced. He looked away from that steady gaze, hurried across the street, and climbed the steps at the side of the building. The girl was waiting for him with the door already open when he reached the top.

  Her father should have warned her about the danger of this place, Ry thought. Surely he must have let her know that she should never open the door for strangers.

  “I felt you would come tonight,” she said before he could say anything to her. “All day the air has whispered trouble. The ground trembles with changes brewing.” Her voice was high and sweet. A very young voice. Up close she was younger than she’d looked standing on the balcony. Her actions, her movements, her startling grace and amazing beauty, all gave her a maturity that belied her true age. He guessed she was no more than twelve, and perhaps as young as ten. She had an odd accent. After a moment he placed it—she had the drawling speech of the settlers of the Sabirene Isthmus. She’d spent the better part of her life in Stosta, he guessed, being raised by her mother, or strangers hired by Crispin. Things he didn’t know and dared not ask.

  “I’m . . .” He wanted to say, I’m not who you think I am, but he stopped himself. He said, “A daughter is her father’s greatest blessing, his greatest weakness, and his greatest fear.”

  She looked at him, and one eyebrow slowly rose, and the tiniest of smiles twitched at the corner of her mouth.

  “So the birds told me,” she said.

  “We can’t stay here.”

  She nodded. “I know that. I feel danger following in your footsteps. Even now we have little time.” Abruptly she threw her arms around him and hugged him. “Thank you for coming for me. I’ve been . . . afraid.”

  He nodded, not daring to speak. She was a sweet child, and trusting. Damn the fact that she was so trusting. He would rather she had snarled at him and been hateful—he wouldn’t have felt so horrible about snatching her away from her father and taking her off to serve as hostage in the trouble that was to come. She had every right to be met by her father; she had every right to have the world meet a few of her expectations. The world wouldn’t, and in many ways it wouldn’t because of him, and he felt guilty just standing next to her.

  She smiled up at him, then turned away and stepped into the room and spoke to someone—he hadn’t realized until that instant that she wasn’t alone. He should have heard the other person breathing, should have noted her scent in the air, but he had been too distracted by Ulwe and his own doubts. He needed to regain his focus, and quickly.

  He heard the clink of gold and Ulwe’s soft voice saying, “You’ve been very good to me, Parata Tershe. I hope we’ll meet again someday,” and an old woman answering, “I hope you’re happy, child. You deserve happiness.”

  Then she was back, a bag in each hand. “Would you carry one of these for me?” she asked. “They aren’t heavy; my nante told me be certain not to pack too much before I left Stosta. She said I’d have plenty of new dresses and toys when I got here and I needn’t bring any but my dearest things.”

  “That’s fine,” Ry said. “I’ll carry both of them.”

  “Then you won’t be able to hold my hand.”

  He looked down at her. The solemn face looked up at him. “You want to hold my hand?”

  “Yes. Please.”

  “I’ll carry one if you wish.”

  “We should go now,” she said.

  He nodded. “You’re right.” He took the bag she offered him. It was light. He wondered what she’d brought across half a world with her—what “dearest things” might have comforted her during a sea passage alone, on her way to meet a man whom she had never seen before who had claimed her and pulled her away from the only people she had ever known.

  They hurried down the steps, and he was surprised that she set the pace, and set it so fast. She was walking so briskly that he had to lengthen his stride to keep up; he could as easily have jogged beside her. She waved to some of the promenaders, and they called to her, “Is that him?”

  “It is,” she shouted gaily. “Isn’t he as lovely as I said?”

  Now the faces that looked at him wore smiles. A few of the people waved. An older woman said, as the two of them hurried past, “You have a lovely daughter. I’m glad you returned safely from your voyage at last.”

  “So am I,” he said. He was no longer a stranger in their midst—by virtue of her presence and her words, he was Ulwe’s father, and they knew Ulwe, liked Ulwe, accepted Ulwe. He could understand why. She squeezed the hand he held and looked up at him, and her smile was radiant. He wished at that instant that she was his daughter.

  Then they were outside the outlander’s ghetto, and the character of Silk Street changed. The people who hurried through the gathering darkness avoided each other’s eyes, and stared straight ahead. The om-bindili bands were gone, the merry promenaders replaced by hollow-eyed women and gaunt-faced men who offered their bodies for pleasure, or who shilled for custom for the caberra-houses, or who waited for some unwary target to pass by. Ulwe moved closer to him. She didn’t complain when he walked faster. He thought perhaps he should swing her onto his back and let her hook her knees over his elbows. He could carry both her bags that way and still run. He turned to her, ready to suggest it.

  But she said, “We’re going to have to get a carriage.”

  He said, “Are you getting tired?”

  She shook her head. “Not me. I could run for days. But we’re leaving a trail, and he’s coming right now. And he’s really angry.”

  Ry frowned. “Who is?”

  “My father,” she said simply.

  Chapter 10

  Grief cannot touch us here.

  Alarista spread out her arms and spun in weightless circles, feeling warmth that surrounded her and penetrated her, feeling light that flowed around her and through her. She danced, lost in beauty and happiness, and Hasmal danced with her. This was life beyond death, joy beyond pain; she and Hasmal were united in a place where Dragons could not touch them and where evil could not come.

  She could not name the forms that moved around her and shone in the shadowless brilliance, but the forms needed no names. They were a part of this eternal world, the keepers of this place, guardians against those beings that moved in coldness and darkness and hunted through the Veil beyond. They were part of the light, welcome and welcoming.

  Grief cannot touch us here.

  She knew that Hasmal’s body had died—knew that hers was dying. She recalled her sacrifice with crystal clarity; she could still feel the weight of unaccustomed age her dying flesh bore, the harsh pains and labored breathing. A thin strand still connected her to that constrictive, sense-dulled form, passing to her whispers of movement, hints of frantic activity aimed at saving her life. She knew only relief—her flesh-pains would soon end, her dance with Hasmal would continue through eternity, and she and he, soulmates reunited, would move beyond this greeting place to the infinite mysteries beyond.

  This was her destiny.

  They rejoiced and embraced.

  One of the nameless guardians of the realm of light brushed against Alarista. Through her. She felt calm pressure building around her, an air of certainty, a sense of foreboding.

  The guardian said, Wait.

  She moved closer to Hasmal, blending with him along her edges, flowing into him. She tried to silence the guardian, tried to push it back to the gate through which she had been admitted.

  She said, We are together at last. We are meant to be together. Grief cannot touch us here.

  Grief cannot touch you here, the guardian agreed, but the world behind you awaits completion of the task you chose. You have not yet finished.

  Hasmal pulled away from her, and their dancing ceased.

  The time in which you can return grows short. Will you return, or will you move forward?

  She felt within that question the weight of knowledge she had hidden from herself in life. She had chosen her life, had given herself a path, a
nd had planned her path to intersect with that of her soul-twin, her beloved Hasmal. But other intersections that she had also chosen had not yet taken place. She had slipped away too soon, and if she left, her work left undone would remain undone. No one else had chosen her path. No one else would complete the task she had chosen.

  The pull of the fragile strand that connected her to her body lessened.

  She looked behind her, back into the slow, heavy world of flesh, and saw the healer crouched over her, spinning a final desperate spell. Her body breathed in ragged, irregular gasps, its mouth hanging open, its eyes open, too, and dully staring up at nothing. How could she don that weight again? How could she return to slow thoughts, to ignorance, to pain and weariness?

  How could she leave Hasmal?

  But her task remained undone, and none but she would complete it.

  She reached out to Hasmal, palm upward and forward. He pressed his hand to hers, and she felt his yearning for her, his need that the two of them be together and complete. His hunger for her was as great as hers for him. After lifetimes of separation, they were finally together again. If she returned to her flesh-self, she knew she might face yet more lifetimes before the two of them could find each other again. They might never find each other again if he lost his way or she lost hers. Souls could fall into the maws of the dark hunters of the Veil; souls could die. This wondrous moment, which should have been hers for eternity, might instead end, never to be repeated.

  No one else could do what she had gone into her life as Alarista to do.

  The task she had chosen for herself mattered.

  Is there any way that Hasmal can come back with me? she asked the guardian.

  You know there is.

  She did. But she considered the ways that he might, and shivered. He could be lost so easily.

  She said, Dear one, I cannot stay here.

  I know. He caressed her with a thought, and she discovered that grief, indeed, could touch her even in that place of joy and light.