Light in the Darkness

by CJ Brightley

  I walked up to the edge and stared down into the water, which rilled to the edge of the tiles. One end was very deep, and the other shallow; at the shallow end a low fountain sent a steady stream of gently steaming water pouring into the pool. How did it not overflow? Pacing to the other end again, I saw a hole at the bottom of the pool. The water must run continually in and out again.

  Suddenly my entire body was one giant itch, and I flung off my clothes, only taking care that my tools and take did not get jumbled with the food I’d stashed, then I dove in.

  My hair and tail stretched in the swirling warm water, and I gloried in having them free for the first time in close to a year. I swam down to the bottom and stretched out, letting my tail and spine hair wave in the current. It was exquisite.

  When I came up for air I saw two mounds of soft soap lying on shells on a tile tray. One was yellow and gritty and smelled of streams and sun-washed herbs. The other soap was soft, gray, and smelled of some kind of perfume. I scooped up a handful of the yellow one and used it to scrub myself all over.

  When I was done I swam about happily for a time. At length I climbed out, and shook myself. Water flew off in all directions, sparkling in the afternoon light streaming in the window. My hair lifted and settled several times, until it was a damp silver-blue cloud around my head and body, barely damp.

  Going back into the other room, I found a big towel laid on the bench, next to some folded clothing. I used it to mop up the worst of the puddle I’d made in fluffing myself, then I turned my attention to the clothes.

  They were made of heavy watered silk, a pale spring green embroidered with almond and cherry blossoms. The trousers had wide legs. I pulled them on backwards, so my tail could poke through the hole where the tie-string tied. Then I yanked on the tunic, which settled like a silken weight against me, reaching down below my knees. I wore this backward as well, so as much of my spine hair as possible came free of the open neckline. After the confining heaviness of my Thesrevan clothes, this was like wearing air. Last I tied loosely about my waist the wide, silky sash I’d been given, and I surveyed myself with satisfaction.

  The only problem, I realized very quickly, was the lack of pockets in which to put my stash. So I rolled it all into my old clothes and tucked them under my arm.

  I turned toward the door, but when I reached it I stopped, my nerves chilling. When was the last time anyone had seen my hair and tail free? The last time came very clearly—which made my stomach curdle with fear.

  You can always run, I told myself. Look at this as a dare.

  I slipped out into the hallway, and retraced my steps, back to that big room where Mardi had first brought me.

  I heard them before I saw them, and I paused in the doorway, looking in. The three of them were there, sitting at a low table covered with fine porcelain dishes. Hlanan had changed and bathed, tying his wet hair back neatly off his high brow. He looked like a scribe again, his slim form mostly obscured by an open gray robe. It was the scribe’s summer garb, the robe sleeveless, worn over a loose-sleeved shirt of undyed cotton-silk, and gray loose trousers of the same fabric as the scribe robe.

  Rajanas no longer glittered with gems. He’d dressed to fit his status, but his burgundy-colored tunic was only tied with a gold sash, without embellishment. Beneath it, he wore a silk shirt of black, and dark riding trousers stuffed into his boots.

  Thianra had gotten rid of her toff clothes and had donned her bright minstrel-blue robe, worn over floating trousers not unlike what I wore. She had braided her hair and bound it around her head. When I saw her, my scalp lifted in memory-protest, and my hair swirled around me.

  It was then that Hlanan looked up, and his jaw dropped.

  Thianra turned, her eyes startled. Rajanas lifted his brows and said wryly, “If you are indeed Lhind, that was a very effective disguise.” He turned to Thianra. “I congratulate you on your powers of observation.”

  I felt strange under their triple gaze, so I held up my roll and said, “I’ve got nowhere to put my stash.”

  “That’s your Lhind, all right.” Rajanas’s voice was ironic, but his gaze was not unfriendly. He saluted me with his goblet, and added, “Come join us, Young Mistress. I never thought I’d entertain someone quite so . . . ornamental.”

  “I only guessed a part of your secrets, Lhind,” Thianra said apologetically. “Well, two parts. But that, I had no idea,” watching as my hair lifted, clouding around my head and shoulders.

  I flexed inside and forced it to settle, but my spine twitched and up it all went again, as if my hair, so long confined, gloried in freedom as much as I did.

  “Hrethan,” Hlanan murmured.

  The word seemed to take shape in the air, making them all fall silent.

  Rajanas was the first to speak. He rubbed his jaw, frowning, then said, “Correct me if I’m wrong, but I understood their . . . their fur and hair to be blue. And blue eyes.”

  Thianra nodded slowly, her gaze steady. “That’s true. But Lhind’s hair is the silvery blue of the Snow Folk. They are nearly invisible against the blue-white snows of the heights. Just as the darker gray-blue of the island Hrethan make them difficult to see against the water if they don’t want to be seen.” She looked puzzled. “Though I’ve never seen one with eyes the color of honey.”

  “My fuzz’s the same color as my hair,” I said, yanking up my sleeve, and showing them the fine short silver-blue hair that covered me from my neck down to my wrists and ankles.

  They stared at my arm, so different from the browns and pinks and bronzes of humankind.

  Hlanan still gazed intently at me.

  “Stash?” Rajanas repeated belatedly.

  “Yeah. Knife, burglar’s tools, herbs, food. And, uh, money and jewels.”

  Rajanas slid a hand over his eyes, his shoulders shaking with silent laughter.

  Thianra’s eyes quirked, shining with a liquid gleam—tears had gathered along her lower eyelids. “You’re still our Lhind,” she said with a breathless chuckle. “I think Ilyan will give you a room, and you can leave your things there. No one here will touch them, I think I can safely promise.”

  Rajanas turned to Hlanan. “Well? Is this what you expected in addition to the—entirely understandable, considering Thesreve—swap of female mage for male thief?”

  Hlanan just shook his head, then he frowned and tossed off a glass of the cider in his golden goblet. “All right,” he said, taking a deep breath. “The first thing, I think, is to contact the Council. They can send a message to the Hrethan. Yes, I really think that’s what we should do. If you’re willing, that is, Lhind.”

  “But what about—” I snuck a look at the others. “The job?”

  Hlanan shook his head. “I think that’s impossible now.”

  To my surprise, Rajanas said, “Why? Shut your eyes to the vision before you, and think back to the fight in the inn. We’ve merely exchanged a dirty thief for a clean one. If Lhind still wants the job, she can disguise herself again. In fact I think that might be advisable.”

  Hlanan was rubbing his thumb over the bumps on his ring, a restless gesture. “Impossible because now that I have had a little time to consider, I believe that Geric Lendan got to that book first. The more I think about his insisting on joining us on the yacht, the more suspicious I am. I do know that someone used magic to summon those pirates, but I cannot prove who or how, merely that it was a fairly powerful spell to break my wards.” He turned my way. “But that is a matter for another time. Lhind, you say you don’t know wherefrom you came. What do you remember of your origins?”

  I shrugged, and this time they all watched my hair cloud, then settle down my back. “Not much.” The desire to have my questions answered was nearly as compelling as the wish to be free of the confining cowl.

  And yet, I was still afraid. Secrets had been as much a part of my armor as the cowl. Perhaps even deeper was my reluctance to mention the Blue Lady. Maybe she wasn’t a real memory. She might have been no mo
re than a dream I’d made up to be comforting when times were bad.

  So I began with the memories that I was certain of.

  “I was with some people. Traveling ones. Cotton harvesters. They first dressed me as a boy, and I got used to it, I guess. They got angry when I tried to take the clothes off or stretch my hair, or my tail. And the first shimmer I made, the man—I don’t remember his name beyond that he wanted me to call him Papa—beat me so bad I was in my bunk for four days. Later I wondered if in off-season they were slavers, or sold slaves once in a while.

  “Anyway, I felt danger whenever any of them talked about me. After the shimmer he started tying my hands at night. So one night during a very bad storm I ran away. That part was easy. Figuring out how to live wasn’t, and I ran into a lot of trouble along the way. But I learned.” I shrugged. “I found I had only to hear other tongues and I could speak them, and I could call animals to my aid. One winter I spent with a den of wolves. They didn’t eat me because I could make fire-shimmers, and I didn’t want their food. I guarded the cubs. They let me be part of the pack, but it was very hard to get enough for me to eat, because I couldn’t abide their food. So I left in spring, and went south.”

  “What brought you to Thesreve, of all places?” Thianra asked.

  “Running. After I left Piwum, I got chased by some poke-nose who saw my shimmers and wanted my magic. Decided I was best off in a place where magic wasn’t—well, looked for. Liked being a thief. Was good at it, I’m fast, I can jump, and I didn’t have to talk to anybody.”

  “But you can’t be a thief for the rest of your life,” Hlanan protested earnestly.

  I grinned at him. “Well, I was about to tell you my idea when you stuck me in that nasty magic-trap. I think I’d like to be a messenger. I like horses, and new places, and I can speak any tongue I want to. And it’s honest.” I finished triumphantly.

  Rajanas laughed, and Thianra smiled, but Hlanan looked serious.

  “Maybe,” he said. “But first you must go to the Hrethan.”

  “So tell me,” I responded. “Who are they?”

  10

  Hlanan seemed nonplussed. Rajanas merely raised his goblet again, and studied the fine etching along its edge. It was Thianra who answered me.

  “They are people, kin to the humankind we see in greater numbers.” She pressed her fist to her chest, and opened her hand toward the two fellows. “It is said that they came from another world centuries ago. They live in the mountains beyond Liacz, and on Starborn Island, far north in the Sea of Storms where snow falls most of the year. Other people of great magic live there as well, according to report. I know no one who has actually been to the heights, we only know the ones at the Summer Islands, as they are called, for Hlanan studied magic there. They are known by several names. Hrethan is just one. Snow Folk is another common one. They are supposed to have first settled Charas al Kherval, according to legend.”

  Hlanan rubbed his eyes again. “How long have you been on your own?”

  “Not certain,” I said. “I’ve tried to figure it out, but you know, everyone counts the years differently in every country.”

  “Do you remember what happened to you?”

  I shook my head. Impossible to tell what was really memory, and what was just vivid dream. I felt it safest to say little. “I remember snow,” I said. “Music. Deep blue sky . . . wind.”

  “Any people?” Hlanan asked.

  “Don’t know,” I mumbled, thinking of the Blue Lady, and of the single image I had of a tall, smiling man with long yellow hair. Those images always came with a stir of intense emotion, too strong to talk about. I was unsettled enough by all this . . . truth. As their eyes took in who I really was.

  “Do you remember any major events from Charas al Kherval or any of the other kingdoms on this end of the continent?” Thianra asked.

  This was much easier. “I remember the year Aulin Crown died,” I said, thinking back. I was careful to use the proper name: on the streets of Piwum on Dunleth’s side of the border, the old emperor had been known as Aulin the Ugly. And worse. “That was the spring after I stayed with the wolves. Everyone wore mourning white in the capital. Crushed flowers on the streets.”

  Rajanas whistled softly. “Eleven years ago. You were right again, Thianra. Lhind is older than he—she—looks.”

  Thianra said, “At least twenty, probably a couple years older. I knew she was no child. The Hrethan are reputed to be very long-lived—”

  At that moment Rajanas looked up at the doorway. “Kenned?”

  The tall steward who’d met us in the courtyard had quietly appeared. His long face lengthened into incredulity at the sight of me, sparking my instinct to hide. I longed for the safety of my cowl, and the huge knickers that disguised my tail.

  At the sound of his name the steward started, then bowed swiftly. “Kuraf is here, your highness,” he said.

  His second glance at me was quick—and covert.

  “Tell Kuraf I am on my way.”

  The servant bowed again and left.

  Rajanas got to his feet. He frowned slightly, then gave his head a quick, sharp shake.

  “Must you leave this moment?” Thianra protested. “I think we need to decide right away what should be done about Lhind.”

  “One of the promises he made when he signed the treaty with Kuraf was that she has immediate access to him whenever he is in residence,” Hlanan said. “And you may be sure she knows exactly when he appears.”

  Rajanas smiled. “Besides, she never comes into town but for a reason. Usually something I’d better hear right away.”

  As he walked out of the room, I turned to Thianra, who was pouring cider into the third goblet. “Who’s Kuraf?”

  She looked in question at Hlanan, who said, “Leads a band in the northern forests. Started as a thief under Ilyan’s grandfather, who was not a good ruler. Later Ilyan and I joined her band . . .” Hlanan smiled, then he gave a tremendous yawn. “It was great fun, but a long story that can wait. They became allies, and she protects the northern marches, specifically the Idaron Pass that leads down into Alezand. Her daughter’s in the Guard. In fact, you were riding with her.”

  “Kuraf sounds like somebody I’d like to meet!” I chortled.

  A bright spot flickered, and Tir swooped into the room through one of the open windows, flew around Hlanan’s head. “You found us,” Hlanan exclaimed, and yawned again. Even with his watering eyes, he and the bird made an appealing picture, creature and human, each so intent on the other. “Welcome back, Tir,” Hlanan said. “Do you see Lhind here, do you recognize her?”

  I could have told him that Tir paid almost no attention to things like outer appearance, but I still wasn’t ready to talk about mind-speech. I had revealed enough secrets, and I was still braced for a nasty result.

  “Lhind! Lhind!” Tir shrilled, and lighted on the back of one of the empty chairs. Then the bird flew out again.

  Hlanan touched his forehead gingerly. “Somehow I suspect Kuraf would either recruit you or challenge you to a duel.” He laughed, then gave another jaw-cracking yawn. “Maybe Rajanas will invite her to stay. For now, I think we had better get you situated, and I need desperately to get some rest. The events of the last day, including that cursed transportation spell, have given me a headache the size of a moon, and I can scarcely keep my eyes open.”

  “Perhaps you’d better arrange a room for Lhind first,” Thianra murmured. She also yawned. “The one adjoining mine?”

  Hlanan looked from her to me, blinked, then nodded. “I think that would be best. I’ll see to it now. I need to move. That cider must be harder than it tastes.” He rose, blinked rapidly, passed his fingers over his eyes, then walked out.

  Thianra set down her empty goblet, then leaned forward. “I understand it’s probably offensive, and so I apologize, but I so badly wish to examine your hair. It looks so much like . . .”

  She reddened. I shrugged. My scalp twitched in response and my hair dr
ifted away, then returned and a few strands settled across her wrist.

  She turned her hand over, letting the strands draw across her palm. “It is! It really is feathered!” she exclaimed in delight. “That’s why it looks so cloudy.”

  “So’s my fuzz.”

  I stuck out my arm, and she bent close to my wrist, saying slowly, “It’s like down.”

  “Thick up here,” I pointed to my scalp. “So it can lift. Helps me balance when it’s free.”

  Because we were alone, I gathered myself—for a little strength had returned—and sprang to the back of the chair opposite the one on which Tir perched. I balanced on my toes, my tail and hair moving to keep me upright. Thianra’s eyes rounded. I couldn’t help showing off, and did a flip right there, landing on my hands, my toes pointed upward. Then I pushed and somersaulted in the air before landing.

  Thianra clapped lightly. “No wonder you were so nimble during that fight at the inn. How could you bear to have your hair bound under that cap?” she asked sympathetically, as she poured herself more cider.

  I shrugged. “Just remembered what happens to magic-makers in Thesreve. Magic-makers and anyone who’s different.”

  Her eyes narrowed. She knew what I was talking about. She said, “Please pardon if the question is impertinent, but why the disguise? No, I understand the swap between male and female, for convenience, but why a child?”

  “I don’t disguise myself as a child,” I said. “I just let people think whatever they want to. Less trouble for me, that way.”

  “Trouble?” she repeated. “I should think there would be more. Unscrupulous persons always taking advantage of the young, the ignorant, the weak, for preference.”

  “And those I know how to avoid. Trouble with . . . other kinds of things,” I said evasively.

  She was giving me that steady gaze again, the minstrel searching for the exact line to sum up a character in a song. Only I didn’t want to be summed up.