He shoved away from the bar. “Whatcha lookin’ at, little girl?”
“Call me Bri.” She opened the door and went out into the last, lingering light of the day before the sun disappeared below the town walls. “Do you know that liquor affects your brain, killing cells?” The word “cell” came out as “note.”
Zeres grunted. Bri danced ahead of him, wrinkling her nose. “You smell again.”
He shrugged a shoulder.
“I could probably cure you of this sickness.”
“It ain’t a sickness, it’s a choice,” he said roughly.
“My world doesn’t entirely believe that. It’s a sickness and a choice. But I can’t help if you don’t want to change.”
His eyes were stark and burning. “There is an underlying cause. If you can’t help with that engulfing night and flashing death I feel every time I heal—” He opened his bota and swigged. She continued to stare at him as he stoppered the bota.
“Yes, I can and will. You were dramatic this morning for the medicas, but Elizabeth and I heal those with this frink sickness as well. Work with us, you won’t be alone.”
Grunting, he followed her down a narrower, older, more charming side street. “Untrue.”
“What?”
Another hunch of the shoulder. “Castleton ain’t the only city to have the sickness. All the other towns do too, prob’ly more of the outlying countryside, and the noble estates.” He pointed at her. “Mark my words, you and your sister will be out making the rounds. Until we figure out why you can heal and no one else can.”
“Except you. Well, I’ll help you discover what that darkness and flashes are—that which let you heal, too. When you know what it is, it will be easier to accept.” She turned another corner where the street became more cobblestone and less large paved stones, and she heard him drink again. He didn’t answer so she pressed on, “I connect with what I call a healingstream. It can be wonderful and is very strong here, much stronger than on…Exotique Terre, but it, in itself, doesn’t frighten me. I can help you with that.” She glanced back over her shoulder and saw his scowl as he returned the bota to his hip. “And the drink.”
He opened his mouth, shut it, his face hardened. “I want my old life back, when I was a respected medica.”
Bri smiled. “Then we’ll get it back for you. You’ll be the hero of this age.”
“You and your twin will be the heroes.”
Her smile disappeared.
“You truly aren’t going to stay are you?” Zeres said.
She shook her head. “No. Neither of us will.”
He gestured as they turned once more. “Even though we are going to a place that calls to you.”
Her turn to shrug. “Places have called to me before. They aren’t home.”
The Castle claxon rang and everyone on the street stopped and looked up to the hill—volarans were already rising into the sky with armed riders. Bri shuddered. “No, this is not home.”
Elizabeth returned to the Marshalls’ Dining Room to pick up a plate of bread and some cheeses to assuage her hunger while she waited. The keep seemed empty and echoing. A third of the Marshall pairs had left the day before for northern frinkweed duty, now a third had gone fighting. Though the floors and walls of her tower were solid, she’d gotten used to sensing the faint Songs—life forces—of Alexa and Bastien and missed them. They, too, were off to battle.
So she read Alexa’s adventures, and had to put the last of her food aside when she reached three-dimensional images of the horrors. Elizabeth had heard of the trophies in the Nom de Nom, and of the Assayer’s Office here in the keep where independent Chevaliers were paid for their kills. But she hadn’t actually seen them, and she was a visual person.
Alexa’s book detailed them in all their dangerous hideousness. For a few minutes Elizabeth thought of going to the Assayer’s Office. It would be open since a battle was being fought. Or head down to the Nom de Nom tavern in town to examine the real things. Instead she found herself drifting across the courtyard to the Map Room that would show the progress of the battle. Alexa’s book had several pictures of the Map Room, too, as well as a map of the Castle and Lladrana.
She joined others, most of the older, original Marshalls, and saw the blue fire marking the border and gaping holes.
“The incursion isn’t bad,” said the rich voice of a man, Lady Knight Swordmarshall Thealia’s husband.
She frowned. She knew that voice. “You were the primary voice in the chants Bri and I heard on Exotique Terre.”
His round face lightened, he bowed. “Guilty.”
There was an exclamation and they turned back to the huge map. “Three Chevaliers dead.”
She gasped, but forced words out. “Faucon Cruess?”
“No nobles, no pairs, three independents, poor souls,” Thealia’s husband said.
Elizabeth glanced around. “Calli?” Her voice rose. She strode to the top of the map, saw little shield icons. The largest red-orange one was Faucon, the two blue-green ones Alexa and Bastien. Elizabeth didn’t know Calli’s colors.
The Marshall’s hand came onto her shoulder, squeezed, massaged. “Calli and Marrec have a family. They won’t be fighting until the last battle. She isn’t here because their children get restless when an alarm sounds.”
Anyone would get restless.
There was a slight cheer. “Four more fenceposts!”
Someone said, “More horrors to the east, we’re moving.”
“It’s going to be a long night,” said the Marshall.
Night fell and Bri and Zeres were still walking. Now and then Bri’s feet would tingle, but it wasn’t the place. She was distracted by all the Songs: Zeres’s, families’ in the well-lit houses, people in taverns, even the river running through the town, the trees and the parks. Maybe even the stone city walls that they drew closer to.
They weren’t exactly walking, more like staggering. Zeres had continued to guzzle liquor, and Bri refused to leave him. She didn’t think being on her own again at night was wise. Even drunk, Zeres was formidable.
Nor did she think the Citymasters would be pleased if she was alone. They’d met up with Sevair Masif and other guild people soon after the alarm rang. Checking up on her. One of the men had bowed and bowed and offered a dagger, a beautiful leather sheath and belt. Bri hadn’t felt comfortable refusing though she’d never used a knife as a weapon in her life. Both the head of the smith guild and the leather workers had beamed at her acceptance of the gift, so someone had been pleased.
She and Sevair had conducted a short, polite conversation, and he’d taken her hand in a formal kiss-the-fingers-goodbye. She’d gotten the idea that he was committing her Song or scent or something to memory so he could track her.
So now she was weaving from Zeres’s weight through a mist that had floated in, making the city eerie, coating the streets and buildings with moisture. She shouldn’t have been able to support him more than a step or two. She was awed that she was using magic in such a concrete way, to hold someone up and walk.
She’d taken care to keep a telepathic line open to Elizabeth, had felt brushes of her twin’s mind. Elizabeth was concentrating, nervy, as she awaited battle results. Bri was glad she was in the city; she’d go up when the wounded came in, hoped she’d have enough energy to heal the sick later. She had a deep conviction Alexa would be all right, whatever happened to her, something in Alexa’s Song, a determination to triumph.
Elizabeth had also been a bit surprised to feel secondhand Bri’s itchy feet.
She’d once sought to understand why places called to her. Reincarnation? Sacred spots? Some hadn’t been so very sacred…the hill in Prague, the clearing in Arkansas, that ancient caravansary in Turkey….
As always, she went with instinct. Elizabeth may have been learning a new vocabulary to explain their healing hands logically, but Bri sensed the best way to function here was on instinct. Her gut wouldn’t steer her wrong.
The street
s had quieted as the mist sent people to home or inns. Zeres hiccupped and snored in her ear. She wondered that he could walk, looked down to see that his feet weren’t touching the ground.
She lost it. Whatever belief that had kept him upright and moving with her. He slipped into a loose, untidy heap at her feet, and the snoring rose.
But she was here, in a small cul de sac, facing north, in the oldest part of the town. Blinking, she understood that the wall to her left wasn’t brick, but huge stones set together, the west city wall. Not crumbling, of course, but certainly aged.
In front of her was the projection of a tower built into the wall. The building had an additional small octagonal tower to the right that she recognized housed a staircase. She could barely see the crenellated top rising one more story above the rest of the building. The left side of the place was part of the city wall.
She liked the idea of living in a tower abutting the city wall. How cool was that? Able to look out on…well, whatever the view was. Green fields.
There was also some symmetry. She wriggled her shoulders to ease them from the weight of carrying Zeres. Elizabeth and Alexa lived in a tower that was part of the Castle keep, the western wall of the Castle. Not due north, more east. Bri checked her twin and found Elizabeth’s mind slow, still anxious. Squinting, Bri saw the twin bond that linked them, unrolling at a good steep angle upward and to the east.
The mist coalesced into the patter of rain. Zeres’s snores cut off. He gobbled, blinked bleary eyes. “Gonna just let me lie here in the rain? Merde, students these days….” He hefted himself and stumbled toward the tower’s door. He set his shoulder against it. It gave in and went down.
Zeres yelled. Darkness billowed from the tower. “Wha’s this?” Another grunt, this one of surprise or pain. Bri ran, saw him slide down the angled wall of the staircase tower that he’d staggered against. She jumped toward him, fumbled under his cloak to feel his heart. Strong and steady.
She didn’t think she’d be moving him anytime soon. When she stood, her hand went to her new dagger. She pulled it from the sheath. No light gleamed on its blade. The dim light of the street globe half a block down wasn’t enough to show the dimensions of the room. Rain splatted hard behind her.
There was…an odor. She sniffed. A powdery dryness coating her nostrils, an underlying hint of…damp feathers? Volaran, or volaran kin? She strained all her senses. No evil like the small motes that still surrounded the trophies hanging on the wall of the Nom de Nom.
Slowly she sheathed the knife. Rolled her shoulders again. Stepped farther into the room, blinked and blinked once more, moved step by step until she thought she was in the center. The feeling of rightness was here. She closed her eyes. The atmosphere flowed in some way. She’d read of seething and roiling atmosphere, but that wasn’t it. Richer? Contained more oxygen? She’d grown up in the Mile High City, but had lived at various altitudes since. More magic? Yes!
Like the great round temple in the Castle, there was more magic here. The rafters might be studded with storage crystals. The home surgery at the house they’d given her and Elizabeth had crystals but they weren’t as old and saturated as here.
She glanced at Zeres. No wonder he passed out. Whatever sensitized him to the Song might have short-circuited him.
Curiosity nibbled at her. She couldn’t tell where the Power source was. She stamped her feet, listening for hollowness, couldn’t hear any, but thought there was a basement. If she really believed in the Song she could raise her voice and send it echoing, testing the interior space. She wasn’t much of a singer. A feeler. Once again she closed her eyes, extended every other sense.
She had to go up.
She tried to recall how many floors. Didn’t remember anything except the crenelations at the top. She still couldn’t see much, but the stair tower was on her left, angling into the room, with a deep black slab of a door or opening. “Light,” she said, and flicked a bit of Power out with the word as she’d been taught. Nothing happened. No prepared torches or crystals or whatever was in here.
Something rustled. She froze.
Zeres snuffled, shifted, groaned. His boots scraped against the grit of the floor as he curled up.
Bri let out a held breath. She peered through the door into the night. Forked lightning silvered sheets of rain, then left the city darker. She couldn’t see to the other side of the cul de sac. She shivered. No summer warmth.
She thought of Sevair’s grumpiness, the ache she’d sensed in his joints. A low-pressure system had been affecting him. She hoped he was warm and dry.
The outside door lay black-hole-like on the floor. Zeres grumbled in his sleep. The rain hissed. She wouldn’t be leaving soon. Another shiver. Surely upstairs would be warmer, or would there be windows open to the rain?
Rubbing her arms, she sidled toward the stair tower until her toe thunked against wood, like the sound of rich paneling. She slid her foot around and found dips and protrusions. A door of embellished wood. Since nothing crumbled or splintered, the tower hadn’t been deserted too long. She opened the door and the dark wasn’t so oppressive. Air and dim light came from above.
With careful steps she wound upwards on the solid stone stairs. Then she reached the tiny threshold-landing of the next floor, this one a pointed arch, half open and not quite as dark.
The scent was stronger here, but so was warmth. Bri pushed the door open with a horror-movie creaaakk and entered the main chamber. Large windows on three walls showed light from opaque glass, a bare room. Thunder rumbled, and Bri was spurred upward. The next level should open onto the walk atop the city wall. It wouldn’t be much sheltered, she wouldn’t go out. So she passed that door and went up to the topmost floor. That rectangular door was also half open and beyond was more light, more windows. She shoved it open. Stepped through.
Hot wind whipped it from her hand and slammed it behind her.
What iss thiss? A little human. Female. Tassty?
21
Elizabeth had fallen into the dazed alertness so familiar from her internship, awaiting an emergency to shock adrenaline through her body. Absently she split her attention. She watched her bond with Bri flare and subside with different colors. Noted the coming and goings of Marshalls and Chevaliers in the Map Room. Lady Knight Swordmarshall Thealia Germain had come to study the map, nodded in satisfaction and dragged her shorter, plumper husband away to bed.
When the door opened Elizabeth scented damp air, not Colorado high and dry air, and wispy mist floated in. It smelled damp. Weather wasn’t indicated on the map, and she was most accustomed to animated weather maps. Not in Colorado anymore.
She observed the skirmishes from fence gap to gap ever eastward, raising new golden fenceposts and snapping the electric blue magical barrier into place. The fence itself was powered by the deaths of horrors and people fighting along the border.
Calli and Marrec, wearing black and silver, had left their children sleeping and guarded by the fey-coo-cus to drop by. Calli stared at Elizabeth, murmured. “I dreamt of a woman—but not you. Don’t know who.” She frowned and shook her head. “We all dream of this woman.” Calli sniffed. “Rain’s on the way.” Studying Elizabeth, Calli said slowly, “In the dreams, the smell is of the sea, the Songs are sea chanties.” She shook her head again. “Not you or Bri.”
Elizabeth was tired enough to ask, “What is my Song?”
Calli chuckled. “Like I said, I see auras mostly. You and your Song are like sunrise over the Rocky Mountains.”
“Thank you,” Elizabeth said.
“Koz is fighting,” Marrec said.
Elizabeth tensed, someone else to worry about. “Where?”
He pointed to a tiny white shield with a red trident bobbing in the thick of the action, fighting with Alexa’s force.
Elizabeth continued to pay close attention to the orangered shields. Faucon and his people. He was an equal opportunity employer. When she stifled a giggle, she recognized her exhaustion. But she was reluct
ant to leave, as if she saw history in the making. Surely when the Lladranans destroyed this Dark, Songs would be Sung, stories would be told forever. Lorebooks would be written.
Both Calli and Marrec kissed her cheek before they left.
No one told Elizabeth to leave. All behaved as if she had every right to be there, witnessing the need of the Lladranans, learning the perils of their land.
“Ah!” The small exclamation huffed from a huge Swordmarshall beside her. He strode to the top of the map, stretched out a long arm and said, “We have leagues more of border fence, have connected fenceposts. Too bad we can only build the fence when horrors invade. Only two large stretches to go and our country will be safe from the greater horrors for a piece.” His leathery face creased into a ferocious smile. “Then we will hunt.” He rubbed his hands. “Take the war to the Dark’s nest. Destroy it!”
Jerking his head at Elizabeth and toward the door where people filed into a steady rain, he moderated his tone, which had rung with glee and seemed to resound through the very Castle. “Tonight’s invasions are ended. Go to bed now, Exotique Medica. The warriors will straggle in depending upon their energy and Power and their volarans’ Distance Magic. You’ll be needed tomorrow.” He was sheparding her out and she glanced back to see the largest bit of red-orange shoot southward, Faucon come to claim dinner in the middle of the night. Her stomach was accustomed to strange meals at strange hours.
“Needed tomorrow,” she repeated.
The Swordmarshall took her elbow, hurried with her from the Map Room into the rain and across Temple Ward to the cloisters. “We only lost four, and no more are seriously wounded, or we would have seen healing circles, but there will be minor wounds. There’s continuing sickness in the city.”
Keepers of the Flame Page 18