Kindred and Wings

by Philippa Ballantine

  In those dark eyes, Byre fell once more to darkness, suddenly sorry to be leaving the head of his enemy.

  When he woke, he was on the reassuringly painful ground, his own knees cracked and bleeding. It was Pelanor who was touching him, her hand on his back.

  He shrugged her off and rose. Once more he was back under the earth in the rocky cavern that they had first entered, and he could feel the Kindred not far off. Now he was angry; he had felt the kind of man this Vitus was. A good one, until the Kindred had placed too much faith in him.

  “Why did you choose him?” Byre raged, pacing up and down their tiny prison. He was screaming at the walls, but he knew that they had ears to hear him.

  “Who?” Pelanor asked softly. “Who did they choose? What do you mean?”

  Byre could feel that he was ready to snap. He wanted to break something, to see something crack open, like he felt he might. “The Caisah! They needed someone to bring the Vaerli back into line, so they picked him as their messenger . . . but he couldn’t hold that much power. He broke. He was not Vaerli, but they used him anyway!”

  What would you have had us do? The Kindred with its flaming eyes pulled itself free of the stone wall, stepping toward them. The Vaerli had stopped listening to us. They had begun to bolster their own power with other races from the Void. We needed one to speak for us. Someone who was outside the Pact.

  Byre stared at the creature of chaos and tried to imagine how mortal creatures looked to them. They could not understand fear and loss the way that even the Vaerli did. To them, their allies of the Pact had been weak and foolish. Neither had they been able to understand the limits of one man’s strength.

  Everything was rock and chaos. Yet something drove them, and he had to know what.

  “What was so urgent about the Vaerli going into the White Void anyway?” Byre walked over and stood only a foot from the Kindred. He raked his eyes over the creature, and examined it as probably no other living being had in a long time. He took in the flaming eyes, the formless gray and brown shape that looked as if it came from the earth itself. It could be anything, but it was nothing. The Kindred were part of Conhaero and they were obsessed with the White Void.

  This world is special. The Kindred spoke finally, while its eyes blazed brighter. A center of chaos and change across all the worlds. Beyond time, it is the font of forces that fight entropy. It burns. See it as we see it.

  The prison walls changed from simply earth to something else entirely: a shifting wall of flame and beauty with infinite patterns. It swirled and pulsed with a rhythm that seemed to penetrate his bones and he suddenly comprehended truly the beauty of change. Without change, all was stagnation and arrogance. Change made mortals rise to challenges and feel the true depth and joy of being alive. Even in adversity they found themselves. The patterns that Conhaero wove could bring down Empires of tyrants and benevolent kings, but all needed to be shaken to the foundation.

  Pelanor, who had been standing at Byre’s shoulder, fell to her knees, a beatific smile on her face. “It is what I saw on the edge of death. The twelfth maw of the goddess, the beginning and end of all things.” Red tears escaped the corners of her eyes and poured down over her cheeks.

  She was obviously seeing something different than Byre was—but it was just as affecting.

  We may be outside time, but time still changes what we do. The White Void has grown more vast and dangerous over time, stretching wider than we can travel from Conhaero. Yet, change and chaos must reach all worlds or everything would be as it is forever.

  “The Vaerli were meant to be those heralds,” Byre croaked out as the words of the Pact came back to him. “We were made to ride the White Void for you.”

  We must always remain with Conhaero. The Pact was indeed made so that you could take change and chaos into all the worlds connected by the Void.

  “You didn’t see it as we did.” He looked up into the flaming implacable eyes. “You are not creatures of flesh and bone. What you thought of as a simple thing terrified the Vaerli—even with all the gifts you gave them.”

  He quickly recalled the complete lack of understanding the Kindred had displayed when he was being tortured. They looked on the Vaerli as they were, themselves, and could have little comprehension of what their allies in the Pact felt.

  They had threatened the Vaerli, and the Vaerli had acted in fear.

  Byre took a long breath. “The past is gone, and even the Kindred cannot bring it back. What about the Gifts—will you return them to us?”

  The Kindred leaned in closer, so that Byre could feel the uncomfortable heat of the creature’s body and smell the sulphur coming from him. “If the Pact is restored and the seers stand before us, then the Gifts will be needed by our warriors. You must be there, at the end. A chance remains to answer that call.”

  He was going to have to take that as a yes.

  The seers. His mind raced. He knew of Nyree, the seer that was Putorae’s acolyte, but the born seer had not revealed herself. So, one seer who might or might not be dead, and another that he didn’t even know the name of.

  “The White Void is coming,” he muttered to Pelanor. “How am I supposed to find these seers in time to stop it?”

  She was a Phaerkorn, she could have no answers, but she tried her best. “Maybe there is something in Perilous. Some hint to the born seer and her whereabouts . . . some . . .”

  The Kindred moved so fast that even in the before-time Byre was not certain he could have tracked it. It was suddenly on Pelanor, leaning over her. The Blood Witch froze, her eyes raised to the force of chaos. If menace could have been conveyed in a better way, Byre could not think of it.

  The flaming eyes raked over the Phaerkorn, measuring her and weighing her worth in ways that not even the Vaerli could tell.

  When the Kindred’s voice finally issued from the impassive stone, the tone was hungry. “You have her stain on you, the hint of a seer awakened.”

  Pelanor and Byre stared at each other, but it was the Vaerli that spoke. “She has my blood . . . are you saying I am the seer?”

  “No.” It was bluntly put, and Byre had never more thoroughly put in his place. Considering his history, that was quite impressive.

  “But the only other blood I have had is . . .” The Phaerkorn gasped, choking under sudden understanding, and then looked up at Byre, her eyes wide. “Is . . . is that possible?”

  “My sister . . . the born seer?” When Byre thought of her, the only image he had was her face set in pain. She had found him the best home she could at short notice. The curse, even then, had been eating its way into them. Soon they would burn, but her dark eyes had filled with tears, even as she began to walk away. He had heard many stories of his sister since then, some from his father—and they had not been good. His sister had become a Hunter for the Caisah, and though he knew the tyrant was not all that his people had thought, in his madness he had made his sister do terrible things.

  She is revealed, the Kindred spoke softly. The end game is upon us, and the arrival of the White Void has bought her power to the surface, like magma will rise.

  “And the Gifts?” Byre asked. “I have walked the ways to the past, seen more than I ever wanted about my own people, and I understand now. Will you return the Gifts to my people?”

  One last walk for you, one last test to prove that you are the Vaerli to lead your people. The seers see the path, but you as Chief must hold your people to it. Show them the way, and finally share a road for a time with your sister.

  The Kindred was now at his side, breathing flame and promises onto his skin. He could see that this was where his father had hoped the journey would end. He would take up the mantle of leadership that his mother had carried. The trail would lead to reforming the council, showing it bravery and steadfastness.

  First, though, he would have to master the White Void, and learn to travel it as his ancestors had always been meant to do.

  “Take me with you,” Pelanor said simpl
y, putting her hand in his. “I have seen the twelfth mouth of the goddess. I am not afraid of anything. The White Void or your relatives.” Her smile was brief and bright. “Besides, I have seen your sister much more recently than you have. I might have to make introductions.”

  Part of Byre wanted to deny her place, but she had walked the path with him, and her strength and company had saved him.

  He cleared his throat, feeling his body tense like he was about to dive into deep and unknown water. “How do I use it, then?”

  The Void is so close now. The Kindred stepped back into the darkness and embrace of the earth. It is within you. Find it.

  Byre thought of his mother dying alone on the Salt, her bones washed clean by the wind. He thought of his father, dying in his arms, cut off from the Vaerli. Then he thought of Ellyria Dragonsoul, her strength and kindness shining through her eyes. She was how a Vaerli ought to be, brave and compassionate.

  He wanted to be that person. He wanted to be the things his parents had always striven to help him be.

  Byreniko wrapped the fingers of his right hand around Pelanor’s, and then reached out with his left. The White Void was close. He could feel it tingling on the tips of his extended hand, chill and terrifying.

  Like his ancestors, he felt the terror of it. So many things could happen in the White Void. He accepted that terror, let it in to become part of him.

  Then he moved his fingers; the faintest flutter divided reality, and the glare of the between worlds was there. Somehow, he knew the way.

  “It’s not far.” He turned back and whispered to Pelanor. “Don’t let go.”

  “I won’t,” she returned, with the faintest of smiles.

  Byre led the way into the White Void.

  Kelanim looked around her, feeling the chill of the evening cut right down to her bones. She was not dressed for this sudden foray into the wilds; her thin silk dress and beaded wrap were no match for this cold night. “Why are we here?” she stammered out through lips that were already turning blue.

  “Because she is here.” It was impossible to read the Caisah’s eyes in the shadows of all these trees.

  The way he spoke those words filled her with a kind of dread that only ghost stories she had shared with other harem women could. She licked her lips before daring to ask, “She who?”

  He held out his hand to her. “Come, I will introduce you . . .”

  She had nowhere to run at this point, but the mistress was trembling as she put her hand in his. He led her closer to the Steps, which gleamed like cut ice in the moonlight. Like the walls of Perilous and Fair, this edifice was covered in the word magic that the Vaerli favored. She wanted to know what it said, but was also glad to be ignorant. The sinuous lines of the writing made her uneasy.

  “What happened here?” she whispered, more to herself, but the Caisah answered.

  “This was the place where it all began.” He pointed to the top of the steps, a circular space that Kelanim would not have stepped within even if her life depended on it. “That is where the Vaerli slit the throats of their first born children, so that the White Void would open its center and the other peoples that journeyed in it could come through. If you listen, you can hear the screams of the little ones.” He brought them to a stop within only a few feet of the first step, and cocked his head.

  Kelanim forgot to breathe, her ears straining to make out what he was hearing. In this dark and mysterious place it was easy for her racing brain to imagine the howls and sobs of children being dragged to the top of those three steps. She shuddered at the terror they must have felt. Even if they had known why their parents were doing these things, they must have been out of their minds with horror.

  The mistress had always wanted the Caisah’s children so badly that her whole body ached at the thought of it.

  He shook his head, as if trying to clear it of what he had heard. “But she is waiting to meet you.” He took her trembling hand in his, and she followed. What other choice did she have?

  Not too far from the Steps, he knelt down and pulled her with him. It just looked like another piece of ground to the mistress, but the Caisah had a soft smile on his face. “The Steps travel, you see, moving with the Chaos, but they always take her with them. She’s very special, you see.”

  Kelanim looked around, but they were totally alone. No sound even emanated from the forest that surrounded them. She shivered, and chose her words as carefully as she could. “There’s no one here, my lord. Let’s go back.”

  His head flicked around. “We can’t go back. Perilous and Fair is no longer ours, and we are far from alone.”

  He started scrabbling at the ground, and Kelanim felt the edge of panic creep closer. The dirt was flying, and inside her head she could hear a voice telling her to get up and run as far and fast as she could. She did not want to see what he was doing.

  This was the Caisah who could move mountains at his command, who was a force of nature, and yet here he was, digging like some madman. That voice in the back of her mind told her to get up and walk away now. It didn’t matter that they were alone and the forest was dark and frightening—it couldn’t be any more frightening than this man at her side.

  He was also the man she loved, whom she had sacrificed much for, and whom she had condemned to weakness because of her own desires. Kelanim knew that she had to stay. She leaned back on her heels and watched with dull eyes as the Caisah dug up what she knew it had to be.

  Bones. They gleamed as white as the Steps they were tethered to. Vague remnants of clothing still clung to them, what might once have been a beautiful dress. Vaerli bones, by their size, small and delicate.

  They must have been there a long time, because there was no stench of death about them.

  “This is Putorae,” the Caisah said, and sighed as if he were finally content. “Putorae, this is Kelanim.” He glanced back at the mistress, and the gleam of madness in his eye pinned her to the spot.

  She did not know what to say but, “Hello, Putorae.” Apparently she was as deep in this madness as he was.

  “Putorae is the mother of my children,” the Caisah went on, his fingertips brushing the clean, white bone as if he were stroking beloved flesh.

  That jolted Kelanim from her stunned reverie. “M . . . Mother?”

  “Yes, mother,” he said, his eyes never leaving the patch of dirt. “My only children; twin boys. She was bad, though; she hid them from me. Gone, I do not know where . . .”

  Of all the things that her love could have said to her, this was the worst. Kelanim’s eyes filled with tears, and she sank back onto the moist earth as sobs clogged her throat. He could have children? All of her effort and time had been spent to the thought that it was the Caisah who could not have children. Everyone thought so, and yet here he was so blindly revealing this fact to her. It would have been better, she thought, if he had simply punched her to a pulp.

  Breathing was hard since her raw sobs were choking her. She retched and gagged, but nothing came out; she simply hadn’t eaten enough recently to be able to be sick.

  When Kelanim finally regained herself, she sat up. The Caisah was watching her with all the interest of a person watching a bug die.

  “You . . .” she paused, marshaled her thoughts as best she could, and went on. “You can have children. All those mistresses, all those lovers and never one child, except for her?” She threw an ugly look at the stark white bones.

  “Yes.” The Caisah said his head tilting at an odd angle. Suddenly he looked nothing like a human at all. “She was special. The Last Seer of the Vaerli. She helped me.”

  And there it was. He had loved her. Kelanim’s hands clenched into tight fists as it dawned on her. He had loved her. Some long dead woman, someone he had killed and buried, he still loved. Not her. Not Kelanim the needy. Not Kelanim the clingy.

  She found herself on her feet, backing away from him, even as he continued to lovingly clear the dirt from her bones, all the while muttering soft, swee
t things to someone who had been dead for centuries.

  “Do not judge him,” a voice whispered in her ear, and it was not inside her head this time.

  When Kelanim spun around, a woman, gleaming in the moonlight, stood in front of the Steps. Her eyes were dark but full of stars, and every inch of her naked body was covered in the same writing that decorated the edifice.

  Kelanim realized that she could see right through her. She darted a glance back at the Caisah, but he had not moved from his ministrations. Her eyes shot back to the woman, who was still there, and she understood. “That . . . that’s you in there?”

  The dead Vaerli’s expression softened. “Yes. He killed me when I wouldn’t tell him where I had hidden our sons. He is so broken that it happened quickly. All I remember is earth all around me, and then . . . nothing . . .”

  “Are you a . . . ghost?” Kelanim managed to choke out. She had always had her eyes so firmly set on her goal, she had never considered that such things could exist.

  “No,” the seer said, her long dark hair slowly waving in unfelt breezes. “I am a sliver of memory, a portion of myself that I put away. I saw so many dangers ahead that I placed little pieces across Conhaero. Some for my sons, some for others. Like you.”

  Her eyes were now locked on Kelanim. “I saw one who would love him as I did. One who would weaken him at the behest of the Phage.”

  “The who?”

  “You know who I speak of.” Darkness seemed to gather around the Vaerli’s form. “They come in many shapes, some beautiful and enticing.”

  Kelanim thought of the centaur, and the alluring smell of him that had perhaps driven her to recklessness. Blood rushed to her cheeks. “I . . . I thought it would . . .”

  An icy thrill ran through her when the apparition reached down and touched her cheek. “Don’t fear, child. They thought to use you to break him, because they must. He, despite all his flaws, is a gift of the Kindred. By reminding him of his past you have opened his eyes. Look!”