Keepers of the Flame

by Robin D. Owens

  Elizabeth winced.

  All the Exotiques were there, sitting together. Their auras held a blue-green tinge of Earth under their personal colorful layers. Elizabeth shared this with Bri as they linked hands. Bri sent back the intricacy of Song between them, the notes of folk tunes that they all shared. Songs they recognized from each other but didn’t personally have. All knit them close. They had more in common with each other than any Lladranan, except for the men, who were learning to understand them.

  Luthan’s face was stern, but his expression naturally fell into those lines and from the general joshing and loud talk going on among the company, no one felt this was a serious meeting. But Bastien’s muscles were rigid as he watched his brother, a smile on his animated face that hadn’t moved since he’d walked into the room.

  Luthan clapped once and the room fell silent. Elizabeth had seen Command Presence before—the stance, the manner, the one sound that ordered a room. He paced from one side of the room to the other, then back to the middle, garnering everyone’s attention, but Elizabeth met Bri’s eyes, the man was nervous, and not about addressing this company.

  “Amee is in danger of dying,” Luthan said.

  The silence deepened with utter shock, with terror.

  “As everyone knows, the rains and cold lasted far into summer instead of ending with spring. Amee has expended some of the heat of her core, some of her great Power, to warm the land and our country and keep our seasons more natural.” A mass shudder went through the crowd.

  Sevair stood. “We would rather not—”

  “Please sit, Citymaster. It is done, and Amee is stubborn about this. Those of Lladrana need her support and she is giving it. Because…” He stopped. Elizabeth thought she’d never heard such an absence of sound. Seen such a flaring of aura, bright enough to light the hall. Bri rubbed her ears. When she focused, Elizabeth heard the screeching of fearful souls.

  “Quiet,” Luthan said, and the mental tunes stopped, though the personal Songs were charged with seething energy.

  “The Singer and I believe Amee used her Power so our country would be strong and ready to free her from the Dark. That the battle in the fall will be decisive. That if we fail, if our Exotiques fail, Amee will die.”

  Bri’s hands flew to her throat. Oh, man, she whispered in Elizabeth’s mind, in the minds of all the girls. Nothing like a little pressure.

  “So be aware that we fight not only for Lladrana, but for Amee herself.” The skin over Luthan’s face tightened to show good bones and steel determination. “Make every blow against the Dark count. An expedition to the Dark’s island nest will take place and must not fail, even if we all must give our lives. Those of you who wish to go, test your skills. When we win, we will free Amee from a leech which has fastened upon her for eons, and she will survive and prosper. It is for that result that Amee spent her Power to make our summer less cold.”

  He swept the room with a probing glance and Elizabeth knew he saw her, measured her, as he saw and weighed each person. Definitely a natural leader.

  “One last word. Cherish our Exotiques, because they will lead the way. They have sacrificed their old lives on their strong Exotique Terre to fight for Lladrana. Protect them, for they are our hope and our symbols.”

  Everyone turned to look at the group of alien women.

  Bastien had pulled Alexa into his lap, shielding her with his body.

  A blank check, Bri said mentally to Elizabeth. Why do I wish I didn’t get it? But if she could have cashed it in for the knowledge of how to cure her sickness she would have. Negativity again. She tried for a joke. Why do I have the feeling that I will never be able to go to the bathroom alone again? Not that Elizabeth or Sevair left her alone much.

  “Later this month we’ll choose the invasion force,” Luthan said.

  Faucon shifted and murmured so only their group could hear. “What of a ship?”

  Then Luthan continued, “One last matter. The Singer believes there was a great magical ritual during the shortest day, but has seen no results.” From his ironic tone, Elizabeth was sure that the Singer wasn’t sharing any more information than what Luthan had pried out of her.

  “I have consulted—”

  “A ritual by the Dark!” someone cried hysterically.

  “No, this was a Lladranan ritual.” He raised a hand. “Not of an evil bent. Had that been so, the Singer would certainly have notified the Marshalls to handle the problem. As I was saying, I believe this was a Summoning ritual by the Seamasters that failed. Be aware that in the future, great rituals may very well sap the Power of us all and refrain. The Seamasters have been so notified. You are dismissed.”

  The alarm claxon screamed.

  “The Dark sensing our great emotions, sending horrors,” Luthan shouted over the siren and the noise of bodies rushing from the room to fight. “Let it sense our unity, too.”

  The incursion was small and easily handled with no casualties. No Chevalier returned with the sickness.

  As soon as that glad news was verified, Bri collapsed.

  When Bri woke in the keep’s healing room, terror inundated her. So many Chevaliers she’d tried to heal here, so many had died. She realized immediately that Elizabeth had told the others what was happening. She heard the pair-songs of the Exotiques and their men. Her twin. Faucon. Sevair.

  She was dying. Elizabeth was with her and would be doing just as she had done, trying to take the sickness into herself to heal it.

  Her body hurt so that she let herself fall into the healingstream and allowed it to carry her away. She floated in space, the source of the healingstream, her Power, feeling like a mote of the universe, captured in a bubble perhaps. Being distant from pain and emotion, she realized that she was a fraud.

  She’d always cherished her gift, always linked to it, directed it, controlled it. She was more of a control freak than her sister. When Brigid Elizabeth Drystan didn’t like something, she ran away. She took life on her own terms. All this time when she’d been telling others to let go, to surrender to the healingstream, she hadn’t surrendered. She’d linked to that flood of Power between stars and manipulated it, but had not let it manipulate her.

  She had to really change if she was going to save her own life and Elizabeth’s. She recalled Zeres’s thoughts, his wonder, his epiphany. If I’d only known to tune my own chimes to the real Song. Tune herself to the Song. Understand her own Song and what notes of the Universe she echoed.

  So she listened, root chakra C, but other more subtle notes that held other senses, Bri’s C also had the cadence of the patter of rain…so it went, analyzing her own Song, that which made her unique, hearing it in the Universe around her…that small pulse from that galaxy there, that wisp of solar flare from that particular star. How odd.

  How wondrous.

  When she knew herself, and her Song, she opened herself to the Universe and let it take her. She floated in serenity. She coalesced. The sprout inside her withered and died.

  She opened her eyes and saw vivid and rich colors around her, lovely textures: the deep red of Elizabeth’s damask medica robe, the creamy tunic underneath, the polished satin wood of the walls. The brilliant sunlight shining through pointed windows.

  Someone was sobbing. Since the sound was in her mind and blood as well as outside her ears, she knew it was Elizabeth. Bri moved her head slightly to see her twin held in Luthan’s steely grasp. On each of Elizabeth’s shoulders was a feycoocu, also restraining her. Luthan was repeating something over and over as if trying to impress it upon Elizabeth. Good luck.

  “Losing one is terrible enough. We cannot let you try to save her. She would take you, and perhaps the other Exotiques and their mates and children, others we cannot spare.”

  Bri blinked as, during the third go-round, the words made sense. She couldn’t see the men and women ranged beyond Elizabeth, but could hear their lovely Songs, singly and in pairs. A great spring of delight filled her. The other Earth women had always sai
d they’d stand by each other, and they’d been ready and willing to link with Elizabeth and pour Power and energy into her to heal Bri.

  Her mouth was dry. She swallowed and swallowed again to wet her tongue enough for words. She thought of the last bit of chocolate she had in her pack and saliva pooled. She tried to speak. A tiny cough emerged.

  Everyone froze, all their Songs pitched higher.

  Elizabeth put a fist to her mouth, met Bri’s eyes.

  Bri must not have floated around in the healing stream for eternity after all, perhaps only the eternity that comprised each moment of living.

  “I,” she whispered.

  Everyone came closer to hear, so she decided to shout it with her mind as well as propelling words with breath.

  I healed my own self! She smiled and her lips cracked and the pain was almost sweet. She lived, which was good, because she still had many, many things she wanted to do, to learn, to love.

  “I healed my own self,” she said, louder. “And I can teach other people to do the same.”

  “How? How!” sobbed Elizabeth.

  Bri thought a minute, ideas swam. “Um, adjust my vibrations to the space-time-dimensional continuum?”

  “Tune yourself to the music of the spheres,” Elizabeth said softly.

  “Ayes.”

  The big red bird feycoocus hopped on Bri. One walked down her body—Tuckerinal. Sinafinal stared her in the eyes.

  She speaks truly! A long, melodious warble rose from Sinafinal. She has learned how to stop the frinkweed sickness and the Chevalier seed sickness!

  A great shout tore from many throats. Luthan released Elizabeth and the feycoocus circled around the ceiling of the room, Singing joyfully and with tones outside the range of human hearing.

  All the Exotiques surged forward, formed a healing circle and sent her energy and Power—and love. She hadn’t realized until that moment how much all these people actually cared for her. As soon as she struggled to sit, Sevair’s arm was behind her. The flow of love from him added to the rest, simply overwhelmed her. Perhaps it was also the aftermath of tuning her Song to the spacestream or letting the Universe’s Song permeate her body, whatever, but she burst into tears.

  Sevair slid to sit on the table, lifted and placed her across his lap. Elizabeth gave her a handkerchief.

  “It’s gone.” Bri stretched the arm not clutching Sevair wide. “It’s gone and I’m healed and it was beautiful and I love you all.” She’d gained strength and energy from them all.

  A couple of men shuffled their feet.

  The chief Castle medica took her wrist and sent a probe through her that she felt in every nerve. “The sickness has been vanquished.” Jolie’s eyes were dark and steady. “You will have to teach us how to do that.”

  Bri nodded. “Yes, I can.” She smiled at Elizabeth who was letting big tears roll silently down her cheeks. “If I can’t find the words, Elizabeth will help me, but I know how to find the feeling and I’m sure I can show others how to do so, too, even the most average Lladranan.”

  Alexa let out a big sigh. “That’s good, excellent.”

  The medica said steadily, “You will teach us so we can also spread this technique.”

  “The Circlets, too,” Marian said. Her brow creased. “A few young people with healing gifts have approached us for training.”

  “When the need is so great the Song provides,” Jaquar said.

  Her burst of energy drained, now Bri felt as if a bulldozer had flattened her, and sleepy. “I’ll start tomorrow.”

  Sevair lifted her with that ease that always sent a thrill through her. “I’ll take her to our tower.”

  And when he let her sink into the soft feather bed and he joined her, uncaring of the jubilant rumors already spreading through Castleton and people milling in the cul de sac, she turned in bliss to sleep in his arms.

  Her deep and heavy slumber was roused by desperate wailing. How had Elizabeth made it through her internship? Bri couldn’t imagine doing the same.

  Sevair was up and moving and soothing by the time Bri cracked her eyelids to see streams of sunlight painting bright transient squares throughout the room. Before she could do more than stretch, Sevair was back at the door, wearing his carved-in-stone expression of utter seriousness.

  “What is it?” Bri asked.

  “A stricken Chevalier flew in from patrolling the northern boundary.”

  As she dressed, Bri muttered, “The Dark is learning what works just as we are; it made another soul-sucker, mutated the disease.”

  “Yes.” Sevair crossed the room, took her hand and kissed it. “But you know how to vanquish this plague once and for all. Destruction can never triumph over survival. Good always has an edge over Dark just because it is good.”

  She was glad that he believed that simplistic philosophy. Finding herself smiling, she chuckled. She was glad she believed it herself. Sevair dropped her hand to hold her tight. Though outwardly as solid as ever, she felt his inner quivering.

  “Too close.” His murmur was rough. “Your death was too close. Let me hold you, know you are healthy again.”

  She hugged him, rested against him until he reluctantly dropped his arms.

  Downstairs she found a young man wearing ragged leathers pale and hunched on the settle. He rose and stood stiffly when he realized she was there, as if he was even more distressed that she discovered him in a private moment of despair. “My pairling is dying,” he said starkly. “Up at the Castle. They are doing the best they can, but he—” His hands flexed uselessly. “Lady, they say you battled the illness in your own body and won, that you can teach others to do the same.”

  Bri nodded. Mud’s whinny came from the cul de sac. “Let’s go.”

  The man’s smile was wan. “I walked down.”

  “Then we’ll meet you there,” Bri said.

  “I’ll run back,” he said.

  A few minutes later Bri strode into the lush main healing room of the Castle. She didn’t like it anymore. She hoped this would be the last time she used it.

  A team of medicas were keeping another young man alive, and from their Songs, Bri knew they were professionally compassionate but detached. He was more an experiment for them, to see how Bri could cure him, than a person. They barely knew his name.

  She stepped up to the dais holding the ornate healing table with Elizabeth.

  “Let me help, listen, watch,” Elizabeth demanded.

  “Sure,” Bri said, “but let me teach. Take his feet.”

  Elizabeth did as she asked and curved warm-aured hands around the man’s feet.

  Bri reached. It wasn’t the healingstream as she knew it, but an outside force that she hooked up to, opened a portal, determined the flow she needed.

  Now it felt as though the innate creative force of the Universe permeated her body. She wasn’t a conduit, a manipulator, she was one with the source.

  Link with me, she told the young man. Listen, feel! She showed him space.

  Elizabeth said, You’ve done it. You’ve taken a Lladranan out to the Universe.

  This is what surrounds Amee. She altered the point of view and showed him his green-blue world floating in space, circling a bright sun, with a large moon in turn revolving around it.

  So vast, he said weakly, and Bri knew she was losing him.

  No! Look at the light.

  Too much dark.

  No! There are motes of light even in the darkness between suns and stars and galaxies. Find them, LISTEN.

  More light than dark. I…I hear my Song! He sounded exalted. There are notes of it in the wind of the true Song of All!

  The music of the spheres, Elizabeth murmured.

  Yes! Bri shouted,

  Ayes! agreed the young man.

  Find your Song in the Song of All, the music of the spheres, Bri said. Tune yourself to it. Shifting slightly, a little embarrassed, she advised, Surrender yourself to it—the light and music of the Universe as reflected in you.

&n
bsp; To her utter amazement, he went limp, and she saw! A sphere of—music incarnate? light and music? sound?—something coalesce and penetrate his chest. Without any Power from her it burst inside him and filled him, and vanquished all touch of the Dark.

  Bri and Elizabeth folded onto the ground from sheer awe.

  Maybe it’s better not to be linked with the patient when that happens, Elizabeth said drily, turning her head to stare at Bri. When the bubble bursts.

  Probably true, Bri said, still too limp to stand. But I’m glad I saw it once.

  39

  Bri ate first, stuffing her face with an order of the Marshalls’ Dining Room’s premier delicacy, Mickey Potatoes. Life was good. She was surrounded by babbling people and that was good too.

  Sevair and Faucon had mysteriously disappeared. Bri figured it was because all the Exotiques were moving as a group.

  Alexa had offered the seclusion of the Marshalls’ Baths to relax in, the Exotiques and Bri and Elizabeth had taken her up on it. After a fun and wild time, they’d retired to Elizabeth’s suite for a nap.

  Hours later, Bri woke, checked herself out mentally and danced with joy to find herself clean and healthy and feeling fine. Elizabeth shook her shoulder and smiled.

  “What?”

  “We’ve been invited to a picnic in the Brithenwood Garden.”

  Bri stretched. “More food. Excellent.”

  “I think so. Faucon has the best food.”

  “Good man.”

  “Ayes.”

  Bri dressed in cream-colored gown and red damask over-gowns Elizabeth looked the same.

  The doorharp sounded. Sevair and Faucon led them through the maze to the Brithenwood Garden and Bri’s nerves started twinging. I’m getting a weird feeling about this, she sent to Elizabeth.

  Elizabeth didn’t reply. Her face had frozen into a mask Bri had seen on rare occasions when she was thinking too hard, all her cylinders revving. The men didn’t seem to notice.

  Sevair did reply. “Calm, Bri.”

  She snuck a glance at him from the corner of her eyes. Had he heard her? On her personal telepathic line to her twin! Was he that sensitive to her?