Elyana moved forward, cutting the distance between her and Beryl in a few quick steps. She reached out. Beryl almost flinched away, but Elyana caught his hand before he could get away.
“There is a reason I chose you as my Bondsman when Serrenial passed,” Elyana said. “There was something in your eyes when you realized your past Iteration was as one of the Rahuli slaves. You are wrong though, not all of us start out as one of them, though many do. Some of us begin as simple, ungifted Orinai. But this place, this Arena, it is not a place of Honor. It is a place of death and misery. I would help them if I could.”
Beryl’s eyes widened and he looked confused for a long moment before his expression shifted to one of disbelief. “This is some sort of a trick,” he said, though he did not let go of Elyana’s hand. “A test of some sort. I had thought the ministrations of your Sisters were the final torment through which I needed to pass, but then this?”
“It is not a test, Beryl. I know you provide them with weapons in the night when you think us all sleeping. I know you dwell on your time among them in the few hours you do sleep. Dreams have always been something we all dwell within, though I would not put much stock in them. The past is a place for learning, not action, and further dwelling in your past lives will only hamper the present Iteration.” She hesitated and then continued, “We will speak more of this later. For now, come with me.”
She tugged on his hand and Beryl followed.
Lhaurel woke up.
* * *
Lhaurel’s eyes snapped open and she sucked in a deep, powerful breath. The outcast woman, Shallee, stood over her, face twisted in concern.
“Are you alright?” Shallee asked. “You were thrashing and muttering in your sleep.”
Lhaurel shook her head numbly. How could she explain what she’d just dreamed? Was it just a dream? It felt like something more—something much more tangible. Something real. Her heart pounded against her chest and her lungs heaved as if she’d just run a great distance.
“We all have nightmares after the Oasis,” Shallee said, patting Lhaurel on the shoulder. “My little man’s father died there. I dream about him too. I’m here if you ever need to talk.”
Lhaurel nodded, though she had no intention of discussing her dreams with anyone, not yet anyway. Not until she was sure she wasn’t going mad. She didn’t think she was, but after the Oasis, after everything, she wasn’t sure. She didn’t know if she would ever be sure.
“The clans all left while you were asleep,” Shallee said.
Her baby cried softly from the other bed and Shallee scurried over there to comfort him.
“Well, most of them did, at least,” she continued. “Some of us decided to stay. I don’t see why more didn’t; this is a great place to live, even with some of the rationing. I guess I did hear that was one of the reasons the clans all left, a lack of supplies . . .” Shallee continued talking, but Lhaurel stopped paying attention.
The clans had left, but some had stayed. Curiosity urged her to get up. Besides, having something to do would let her mind ignore the nagging whispers that lingered from the dream and the questions Beryl’s scrolls had giving her. Maybe she would try and find the man and figure out what he’d meant by his comment about Kaiden’s motivations.
Her knees threatened to buckle almost before she’d managed to straighten all the way. She growled, put one hand on the wall, and forced herself up.
“Why am I so weak?” she muttered aloud. There wasn’t much pain anymore, but a latent exhaustion consumed her.
“Well, dear,” Shallee said. “You did go through quite an ordeal in the Oasis. You can’t expect your body to be back to where it was in just a couple of weeks, now can you?”
Lhaurel ignored her and reached within herself, pulling on her own blood, the fuel for her magic, to have the strength to draw on the spring bubbling in the corner and the blood in the sands around her. The water did give her strength, but it was less effective, like a candle’s light was inferior to a lantern’s. Using her powers gave her an immediate surge of strength, but with it came an overwhelming awareness and pain.
Lhaurel gasped as her powers swelled within her. Such pain—it was intense, immediate, close. Lhaurel felt it, experienced it, but also realized it was not her own. She forced the magic away, pushing it out in a shower of red mist only she could see. It left her weaker than she’d begun. Her knees gave out and she slumped back onto the bed.
“How?” Lhaurel gasped. Her hands trembled and shook.
“How what, my dear?” Shallee asked. She had the baby in her arms now, rocking him back and forth as she hummed a soft little tune.
“The pain,” Lhaurel said. “How can you stand so much pain?”
Shallee looked at her with confusion plain on her features.
“I felt it, just now,” Lhaurel gasped. “I can feel the pain, feel what the baby did to your body when you gave birth. How can you stand the pain?”
Shallee frowned, but didn’t ask any questions, though Lhaurel knew she wanted to. Instead, Shallee looked down at the baby in her arms.
“He is worth it,” Shallee said simply. “He gives me the strength to keep going even with the pain. Love does that to you. It gives you the strength to do what you didn’t think you could.”
“But that pain,” Lhaurel said. “I felt the people die in the Oasis, I experienced their deaths with them. That pain, it is almost as intense as death.”
Shallee frowned again, but gave a soft little shrug. “That is what mothers endure for their children, Lhaurel. All of us do. The men think they’re tough, that they’re the strong ones. I’d like to see one of them bear a child as well as half the women I know.”
Lhaurel hugged her legs to her chest, remembering the thoughts she’d had at the day of her wedding, at the fear of becoming something less than the warrior she wanted to be. She’d been wrong. The women in her clan, she owed them all an apology, though she knew she would never be able to offer it. If they went through that pain with every child, they were as strong as the stones.
Lhaurel had never experienced that level of love, at least not that she could remember. Love that would allow someone to endure that kind of torture was a strength that could weather any storm and outlast the stones themselves.
Then again, maybe she had. Khari and Makin Qays had talked about how the Roterralar watched over the Rahuli people as parents would their children. Makin Qays and a large number of the Roterralar had died upholding that sense of duty. Maybe it had been more than just duty which had driven them. Perhaps it had been something deeper. Not the level of love Shallee was going through, but some form of it at least.
Lhaurel’s head hurt. She needed to get up, be moving, be doing something. She let her legs slide across the blanket and reached for her cane. Though she hated the thing, it was part of her now, as much as Cobb’s was to him. She’d seen the old man and his wife when she’d ventured out earlier, but had had no desire to stop and talk. Now she wouldn’t have to worry about that.
“Now where do you think you’re off to?” Shallee asked, glancing over at her.
“Out,” Lhaurel said simply. She hobbled over to the bubbling spring and took a drink using the ladle that hung next to it. The water helped a little, not as much as drawing on her powers would have, but she didn’t want to risk that. Not again.
Shallee continued to protest, but Lhaurel didn’t pay it any heed. Shallee had her baby to look after. Lhaurel needed to get out, clear her head, stop thinking so much, and get the images of her dream and the memories from her mind.
A normal person may have thought the passages within the Roterralar Warren were empty and silent now that the clans had left. For Lhaurel, they were back to normal and welcomed her as she limped through them. Her cane made a soft sound as it struck the ground with each step, a steady accompaniment to the muted thumps of her booted feet. She listened to those sounds, ignoring the exhaustion and latent pain running through her body. Focusing on the steps, on th
e sounds of metal and leather against rock, kept her mind from the dream and from the jumbled mix of emotions and thoughts bouncing around in the back of her mind.
Lhaurel didn’t really know where she was going. She had a vague idea about trying to find Khari, but she had no idea where the woman was nor where to start looking for her without using her powers. The rooms Khari had shared with Makin Qays were in the greatroom, though Shallee had mentioned that part of the greatroom had collapsed in the tremors which had led to her having her baby early. Lhaurel had thought about returning to her own rooms there a few times, but then again, she’d never really used them much. She’d spent time above the plateau with Kaiden and . . . her thoughts trailed off, a mental block cutting off thoughts of Kaiden and those who had supported him.
No, she wasn’t going to the greatroom. Lhaurel looked up and glanced around, looking for something in the passage that was familiar enough to let her know where she was. Ah yes, there, the strange striations of rock were only found near the eyrie. She stopped and leaned against her cane. Did she really want to go there?
Fahkiri.
No, she didn’t want to face those memories either. Lhaurel turned, and almost bowled over someone she instantly recognized, someone who also used a cane.
“What are you doing here?” Lhaurel asked, taking a quick step back and almost—almost—reaching out for her powers.
Cobb regarded her from beneath his bushy eyebrows, face set into its customary scowl. “I live here now, girl, same as you.”
“Why didn’t you leave with the others?” She knew she was being a little rude, but she didn’t care. The man had saved her and Gavin, sure, but that didn’t mean she trusted him. He’d also done nothing when she’d taken up the sword to defend Saralhn, nothing to defend the woman and nothing to stop the clan from leaving Lhaurel chained to the rocks and left to be eaten by the genesauri.
“That’s my affair, mine and Maryn’s. Now, move over so I can get by.”
Lhaurel didn’t move. “Why are you going to the eyrie?” Emotions surged through her, anger the most predominant among them, though she suppressed them with effort. Old Cobb had saved her after all, eventually.
Cobb regarded her coolly, appearing not even the least bit perturbed by her attitude. He leaned against his cane with one hand and gestured vaguely with the other. “Again, what makes you think it’s any of your concern, girl?”
“Because I’m making it my concern. Sure, you’re not as bad as some who might have stayed, but you were well-liked and well-respected in the Sidena. You could have become Warlord. Why would you stay here?” The questions weren’t what she wanted to ask, but they were what she allowed herself to say.
Cobb narrowed his eyes. “There is no Sidena clan anymore, not really. There are only three clans, now. When there were so few of us left, the clans banded together with their allies. There’s no place for me there.”
“And what makes you think there’s a place for you here?” Lhaurel asked.
The fact that the clans had dissolved into only three groups was disturbing. She’d heard mention of it a time or two, but she hadn’t really understood the full implications, hadn’t processed the information in the face of everything else.
Cobb snorted and ran a hand over his balding pate. For a moment, Lhaurel noted a marked resemblance between the man and Beryl, then the moment faded.
“Why don’t you come along with me and see, girl,” he said.
Curious, Lhaurel followed him through the Warren without any further words between them. Lhaurel recognized the route to the greatroom. The greatroom looked different than what Lhaurel remembered. It wasn’t just the fact that part of the landings that surrounded each tier of the greatroom had fallen in and been replaced by a simple system of rope bridges. No, it was more than that. Part of it was that the greatroom was filled. Men, women, and children scurried in and out of the room, dozens of them. The Roterralar had been a small, hidden clan when Lhaurel had become a part of it. Now it appeared that there were almost over a hundred of them living here.
“I thought you said the clans had left,” Lhaurel said.
“They did, but some of us decided to stay,” Cobb said. “Some of us on our own conscience, others were persuaded by that little demon of a woman, Khari.”
Lhaurel couldn’t help by smile slightly at the description. She’d once thought that about Khari as well.
“Any Sidena beside you?”
Cobb’s expression darkened and he muttered a soft curse. “Only a few. Even my wife, Maryn, went with them.”
“What?”
“It’s none of your business, really. I’m here, let’s leave it at that.” His tone made it clear he would not answer any more questions along that line of thought.
A small child who was walking by noticed them and stopped. The boy’s eyes darted to Lhaurel and then up to her hair. “What’s wrong with your hair?” he asked.
Lhaurel felt a flush of embarrassment and started stammering an answer, a flush blooming on her cheeks. The child’s mother, a rather portly woman who had a fresh scar on one cheek, rushed over to scold the boy.
“Hellion, you don’t ask questions like that.” She chided and then turned to Lhaurel and Cobb. “Please forgive the boy. He’s not got a grain of sense in that head of his, he don’t.”
Lhaurel turned away and Cobb muttered something placating to the woman. Lhaurel leaned against the wall, her grip on the cane tightening into a white-knuckled grip. She’d been afraid of this. She was a monster, they could see it in her, just as she could. The red hair and nails were her outward badge of shame. The words from Beryl’s scrolls wafted through her thoughts, words describing the horrible power she possessed.
She felt a hand on her shoulder and she turned her head over her left shoulder to see who it was. Cobb stood there, a grim expression on his face. Actually, it may have just been his usual expression. Lhaurel couldn’t really remember a time when the man hadn’t looked grim.
“Come on, girl. Khari will want to see you.”
Chapter 14: Feelings
“The second Iteration of energy . . . is the Storm Ward, a tier higher than their lesser counterparts, the relampago. These Storm Wards are the power behind the Orinai Navy and the means whereby the plantations are able to provide the food necessary to supply such a vast geographic empire.”
—From Commentary on the Schema, Volume I
Gavin awoke with a stiff neck and aching muscles, though there was a lingering smile on his lips. He blinked a few times to clear away the last few vestiges of sleep and looked down toward Farah.
She wasn’t there.
For a moment, Gavin panicked, then an overwhelming sadness drifted over him like a storm burgeoning on the horizon. Had he somehow upset her? Women were as foreign to him as whatever lay beyond the Forbiddence. Maybe he should ask Shallee for advice when they got back to the Roterralar Warren.
“Are you ever going to get up so we can go?”
Gavin’s eyes darted to the other end of the small cave. Farah, fully clothed again, sat on a long stone bench there, a grin playing about the edges of her lips. Her long, blonde hair was pulled back into a tight braid, which she’d wrapped up and pinned back with several long pins, probably clay. The style highlighted the two earrings perched on her right ear.
With a slow shrug, Gavin hopped down, trying desperately to hide the small smile of relief which threatened to overcome his face. Farah smiled and tossed him a small sack in which he found some dried meat, a little cheese, and some bread. Thankfully, it was a mild cheese. Some of the stronger ones left his breath smelling like a goat for half a day afterward.
Farah must have already eaten, for she busied herself with saddling the two aevians which had moved toward the cave’s opening to bask in the sunlight. As she worked, she hummed softly to herself. Gavin recognized the tune and, when he’d finished his last bite, began humming a deep, low counter melody. He’d never had the best voice, but humming didn’t use
much of that and the counter melody was a simple one. Farah glanced over at him once and smiled, before finishing up with the saddles.
“You ready then?” she asked when she was done.
Gavin nodded and stowed the now-empty sack in a pocket. He buckled his greatsword on his waist, then grabbed his harness and tried not to embarrass himself as he did up the straps and fastened buckles. His fingers slipped on the last one, but he corrected quickly. He looked up, hoping Farah hadn’t noticed, but found Farah only a foot or two away from him, her eyes locked on his. He was startled at how much taller she seemed that close, though she was still a hand shorter than he. Farah stepped forward until she was only a few inches away and reached out a long, slender hand to cup his chin and cheek.
“You don’t need to try and impress me,” she said, softly. Gavin felt her breath on his face. “You already did that in the Oasis and every day since.”
Gavin hesitated, unsure what to say. Farah’s expression fell slightly and she stepped back, hand falling to her side.
“I’m sorry,” she said, rubbing one arm with the other. “That was improper of me, I think.”
On impulse, Gavin stepped forward and pulled her into an embrace. Before he could change his mind, he bent down and kissed her. It was a quick, unpracticed kiss and Gavin was sure he was doing something wrong, but Farah didn’t pull away. It was over too soon and some of the awkwardness returned, but the smile on Farah’s face seemed genuine and her eyes glistened.
“Your breath tastes like cheese,” Farah said.
Gavin laughed, and it felt good. “Well, let’s go then.”
Farah laughed and gestured for him to take the lead.
* * *
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