The Silent Tempest (Book 2)

by Michael G. Manning

  “Why?” asked the She’Har with a serious countenance.

  “She wants to look good, to make a good impression.”

  Lyralliantha’s face shifted to a look of disappointment, “I thought learning love would make your kind easier to understand.”

  “We’re somewhat more complicated than just that one emotion,” he told her before adding, “She’s nervous, she wants you to like her.”

  “Why?”

  Tyrion took a deep breath, “Because she’s in love with me.”

  Lyralliantha’s face became pensive. Eventually she responded, “Does she fear me?”

  “Not exactly,” he replied, “but for a human it’s a normal worry. She’s afraid you might be jealous.”

  “Jealousy is not common among my people,” said Lyralliantha.

  “You are the first to be in love in a long time,” he noted.

  “Should jealousy be part of love?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Humans feel it when we think something we care about is being threatened.”

  “I would not threaten you,” she declared. “Unless you were acting in a foolish way,” she corrected herself a moment later.

  He led her to the log benches that were arrayed around their evening bonfire spot. Offering a seat, he tried to explain, “Not a threat to me, a threat to take away what she loves.”

  “She is jealous of me then?” pondered Lyralliantha. “She fears I will take you away.” Then she smiled, “How silly. You are my kianthi. I cannot control you.” She rose and began walking toward the house. “I will explain this to her.”

  He started to follow, but she held up her hand, “You are not required. Let us talk alone.”

  Kate was surprised when she saw the silver haired woman enter the bedroom. “Oh,” she exclaimed.

  “Tyrion has explained your fear to me,” said Lyralliantha without preamble.

  “Fear?” said Kate, her eyes narrowing slightly. “I think perhaps he may not have used the best words.”

  “Fear might be wise,” remarked Lyralliantha. “My people have not been kind to him, or to you.”

  “I know better than that,” answered Kate, “at least where you’re concerned. I need to thank you for fixing my leg.”

  “You are welcome,” said Lyralliantha, “but I did not come to speak on trivial matters. I wish to explain my intentions, to allay your concerns.”

  Kate was growing steadily more uncomfortable. She barely knew the strange woman, and Lyralliantha’s directness was disconcerting. There was no help for it, though. Steeling herself, she gestured toward the bed, “Would you like to sit?”

  The She’Har woman nodded and took a spot near the foot of the bed, while Kate followed suit and sat as well, closer to the head. After a brief pause the She’Har began, “Tyrion is my kianthi. That will not change. Among the She’Har, this means his interests and mine are considered one and the same.”

  Kate flinched at the formal declaration. She might as well have said, ‘he’s mine, not yours’. She struggled with her feelings, but she had prepared for this moment. Looking at the floor she replied, “I will not interfere. I would like to stay, to help with his children, but I understand if you wish me to leave.”

  Lyralliantha’s countenance was one of puzzlement, “That would not please my kianthi.”

  Now it was Kate’s turn to be confused. She’s his She’Har wife, does she want me to stay as some sort of servant, or concubine? Unsure how to proceed, Kate answered slowly, “I think, that I worry more for what would please you.”

  “Has he explained the meaning of ‘kianthi’ to you?” asked Lyralliantha.

  “It’s something like our marriage customs, isn’t it?”

  Lyralliantha laughed lightly.

  It was a delicate sound that immediately annoyed Kate. No one should have such a beautiful laugh. How can I compare to a woman like this?

  Seeing the change in Kate’s aura, the She’Har stopped, “I did not mean to offend. It might be easier if I could show you, mind to mind. Will you permit me?” Lyralliantha lifted one hand, palm outward, indicating she wanted to place it on Kate’s head.

  Kate scooted away slightly, “Wait. Will you read my mind?”

  Lyralliantha nodded, “Yes, but I will also share mine.”

  “There are things…,” began Kate, but she didn’t know how to finish. “Whatever you see, please understand I want only the best for him.”

  “Our words are only furthering the misunderstanding, let me show you what the elders taught me,” said the blue-eyed woman.

  Kate took a deep breath, “Alright.”

  “Lie down. This may take some time. Your body will grow tired of sitting,” said Lyralliantha.

  She did as she was told, and the She’Har woman lay down next to her. The two of them were on their sides face to face, and then Lyralliantha reached across, resting her hand gently on the side of Kate’s head, fingers on her temple.

  The room vanished, replaced by a new place. A vast world surrounded them, and a red sun filled the sky. A forest stretched across the land, but it was different than the one Kate was familiar with, this forest was less uniform, more varied. Many of the trees were huge, like the god-trees she had become familiar with, but others were different, more slender, taller, shorter, and their leaves took a multitude of shapes. Somehow she knew that most of them were not She’Har. She could hear their voices through her—roots? As her awareness grew Kate realized she no longer had her old body, she was one of the trees, one of the She’Har.

  The world moved around her, and the sun passed overhead with surprising speed. She was unable to move herself, but she was not lonely, for the forest was filled with voices, and she spoke with the other trees through her roots which stretched for miles in every direction. Their minds were simple, less complex than hers, but she felt a close bond with them, and through them she received messages from other She’Har, whose roots were too far away for her to reach directly. The entire forest was alive, and their roots formed a vast network that connected trees across the world.

  It was a paradise of sorts. She knew when the rain was coming, for the trees shared the knowledge with one another. But it was not a perfect world. There were problems. The worst was an arthropod, a multi-legged creature with a hard carapace. It crawled through the canopy and ate the leaves of some of the trees, but it had a special liking for the She’Har. When it found one of them it would burrow deep into the bark, wounding her people. If left unchecked, it would multiply, and soon the She’Har would die.

  Most pests were easy for the She’Har to deal with, but this one camouflaged itself, hiding from their magesight. When they burrowed into the She’Har, they worked quickly, and their bodies secreted a substance that numbed the host, making it difficult to sense their presence until it was too late.

  Left unchecked, the She’Har would have soon died out, and their arthropod killers with them, for the parasitic creatures could not reproduce without the She’Har to feast upon. Fortunately, there were other hunters beneath the canopy of the endless forest—large, graceful, furry beasts with long limbs and sharp claws. They had a special taste for the arthropods that plagued the She’Har, as well as for ‘calmuth’, the fruit produced by the sentient trees.

  In the beginning, their partnership was accidental, but fortunate, and over time the She’Har grew fond of the arboreal creatures that lived with them. In their own slow way, they named the creatures that protected them, the “kianthi”, but they could not speak with them as they could with the other trees.

  The She’Har were different than the other trees and even the animals of that world, for they could change things. The kianthi ate their seeds and spread the She’Har, but the process was random, for the intelligence of the kianthi was limited, so the She’Har changed their seeds to benefit both themselves and the kianthi. Now, once the kianthi ate the seed of the She’Har the seed remained with them, and it worked many changes upon their minds. The kianthi became inte
lligent, and the seed of the She’Har gave it the power to change the world, to manipulate aythar, as the She’Har did.

  When the kianthi eventually died, the seed would germinate, and a new She’Har would emerge, growing from the earth fertilized by its host’s body, but it would remember the life of the kianthi it was born from. In time, the She’Har and the kianthi became so close that they could almost be considered one race. Each tree gave its special gift to only one kianthi at a time, but the She’Har lived much longer than the kianthi. Over the course of its life, a She’Har might give rise to several offspring, while the children of its kianthi were far more numerous.

  In the world beneath her branches, Kate had many kianthi, but only one was special to her, only one bore her seed within it, only one could talk to her, and she loved it. It was her kianthi. When it eventually passed on, she was not sad, for from it was born a new tree, and it remembered her. The She’Har knew love.

  Kate opened her eyes, feeling the bed shake beside her. Lyralliantha was curled into a ball, crying. At first she was confused, both from the change in her body, as well as from seeing the She’Har woman cry, but then she understood. She was exploring my memories at the same time.

  What Lyralliantha had experienced had been far more traumatic than what she had shared with Kate. Acting on instinct alone, Kate moved closer, putting her arms around the other woman. She made shushing sounds and stroked Lyralliantha’s hair, trying to soothe her.

  Eventually they both became quiet and still, and neither moved for some time.

  “You deserve better, Kate,” said the She’Har woman. “He is not a punishment for you.”

  “I know,” agreed the green eyed woman, “but it is harder to convince my heart of that.”

  “You have done nothing wrong. Hating yourself is not the real reason you followed him.”

  “My head knows that, but my heart is a mess,” admitted Kate.

  “We will heal it,” said Lyralliantha.

  Kate almost laughed, “How?”

  “With love,” said the She’Har woman, and then she kissed her gently.

  Her eyes widened with surprise for a moment. It was a soft kiss, lips against lips, but there was nothing demanding or sexual about it. It lasted a brief moment, and then Lyralliantha hugged her tightly. Even so, Kate felt her heart speed up a bit.

  An insistent knocking came from the door. Rising, Kate went to answer it. Daniel stood on the other side, looking at her with open concern written on his face.

  “What?” she asked brusquely.

  “I got worried,” he said. “You two have been in here for over an hour.”

  She smoothed her hair self-consciously, realizing it must be unkempt from lying on the bed. “We’re still talking. Go away.”

  “Why are your cheeks red?” he asked.

  Embarrassed, she began closing the door, “I’ll explain later.”

  When she turned back, she found Lyralliantha sitting up, her hair smooth and her demeanor calm and unflustered. How does she manage that? wondered Kate. “I still don’t understand some things.”

  “Ask and I will explain what I can,” said the Illeniel She’Har.

  “Everything was different, even the sun was red,” said Kate.

  “That was the first world,” said Lyralliantha, as if that explained anything.

  “The way Daniel explained it to me, your people are grown from the trees, with the seed inside, but in the world you showed me, the kianthi ate the seed, and only a few of them got it at all. Aren’t you the kianthi, at least the way it works now?”

  “I am a child of the She’Har,” said Lyralliantha. “There were no children in the first world. The kianthi were lost to us when we left, and we were forced to adapt. The elders fashioned children in the form that best suited whatever world we came to after that, and the seeds were placed within them. We no longer have predators, or kianthi. We forgot how to love, and we no longer speak to any trees other than our own. We have become cold and isolated.”

  “I’m so confused,” said Kate despairingly. “To me it seems that you fill the same role the kianthi did.”

  “The kianthi loved us, they protected us, and certain of them ate the seed and eventually became part of us. I serve a similar purpose, but I was born with the seed. All children of the She’Har carry it, but we have forgotten love, and we are not special. As we have changed our life cycle, so we have changed our hearts. The seeds that were given to the kianthi then, were similar to the loshti today, they gave knowledge as well as providing for a new generation.”

  “What is a ‘loshti’?” asked Kate.

  Lyralliantha smiled, “A fruit that gives the knowledge of the ancestors to the child who eats it. It is not a seed anymore, like it was when the kianthi ate it. The seeds are produced separately, within the children, like myself.”

  “So what are you planning to put into Daniel?” said Kate, asking her most dreaded question.

  “Nothing,” said Lyralliantha.

  “Your…,” she struggled to find a good word to describe what the She’Har had shown her, “…story, implied that if he’s your kianthi, he would have to become a tree someday. Right?”

  “Somehow,” agreed Lyralliantha, “but I do not think it will be from the doing of my people.”

  “That makes no sense at all.”

  The She’Har sighed, “I do not understand it either, but the Illeniel Grove has a different gift than the other groves. Our elders catch glimpses of the future. That is why they refused to take slaves when we first came to this world, for they saw that it would eventually lead to our destruction. They also have seen something in Tyrion.”

  “What?”

  Lyralliantha’s face became somber, “The death and rebirth of all things, for your race and mine.”

  Chapter 37

  Tyrion was waiting when they emerged from the bedroom. He did his best to keep his worries hidden, but he knew that, at the very least, Kate would be able to read him like a book. “Is everything alright?” he asked. “I didn’t expect your conversation to last so long.”

  “Your mate was full of questions,” said Lyralliantha, “but I learned more from her than she gained from me.”

  He wasn’t sure how to respond to that, but Kate hugged him suddenly, her arms squeezing tightly around his midsection. Her body shook slightly as she held him. “Hey now, what’s wrong?” he asked her.

  Green eyes met his and then looked away, “It’s just a reaction to everything that’s happened. I’m relieved.”

  Kate was lying, even Tyrion could tell that. Something had upset her, but he had no way of telling what it was. The two of them seemed to have reached an understanding of some sort, so he didn’t think it was trouble between them. Lyralliantha stepped forward as Kate released him, and he met her gaze, but he could see Kate still staring at him from beyond his peripheral vision. She had forgotten he could still see her even though his eyes weren’t on her.

  Why does she keep looking at me like someone who has just lost his dog?

  Lyralliantha’s slap caught him completely off-guard.

  “What was that for?!” he protested in shock.

  “That was for the way you left Kate at the dance,” the She’Har woman informed him, a rare expression of annoyance on her face.

  Kate began to laugh from her position behind him, but she covered her mouth quickly. Regaining her composure, she told Lyralliantha, “You didn’t have to do that.”

  “You are too kind,” said Lyralliantha, “but I will see that you get your due.”

  Tyrion looked back and forth between the two women, rubbing his sore cheek. He was starting to think it might have been a bad idea to let the two of them trade notes.

  “You must treat your kianthi better,” said Lyralliantha.

  His eyes narrowed, “I haven’t even seen you in months.”

  Lyralliantha pointed at Kate, “Not me—her. As you are my kianthi, she is yours.”

  “Huh?” He assu
med that they had discussed his marriage to Kate, but Lyralliantha had been very clear before that marriage and the She’Har concept of the kianthi were two separate things.

  “Your seed is in her.”

  “My…,” he stopped, his mind had gone blank.

  “I’m pregnant, Daniel,” Kate said, to clarify what was slowly becoming obvious to him.

  His magesight focused on her womb, exploring within her. It was something he should have thought to do sooner, considering their activities over the past month. It took only a moment to spot the new life growing there. “Oh!” he said abruptly, “There’s a—you’re…”

  “You seem surprised,” Kate noted in a neutral tone.

  “I just—you never had any after Aaron, so I thought…,” he stopped. His words weren’t coming out well, and the subject of her fertility was probably a sensitive one.

  “You thought I was barren?” she said, finishing the sentence for him.

  “Well…”

  “Things grew cold between Seth and me after Aaron was born,” she explained.

  Tyrion’s eyes wandered, traveling over the walls around them, as if he was searching for a route for escape. Kate frowned. She had been afraid of what his reaction might be.

  “If I knock that wall out, we can expand the house in the rear,” he said at last, giving voice to his thoughts. “We’ll need room for a nursery. Actually I’ve been thinking of rebuilding some of this anyway, to add another floor above. So this is pretty good timing.”

  Kate blinked, her eyes had begun to water suddenly.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked, mildly alarmed.

  Lyralliantha took the opportunity to slap him once more, choosing his other cheek this time.

  “What is wrong with you!?” he said, surprised. “Do I need to start shielding myself?”

  The She’Har’s face was serious. “That was for leaving her after you killed the warden,” she informed him. “And for making her cry just now.”

  Kate laughed.

  “Do you even know what made her cry?” he asked.