“You shouldn’t even be out of bed.” Halla hovered behind him, holding her hands out as if she would catch Liseli if he dropped her. She still did not make any real move to stop him. Liseli was limp, and her head lolled back as he lifted her with one arm against her back and the other under her knees. She wasn’t very heavy, but he realized that she was still going to be harder to carry than he’d thought. He shifted her, trying to support her neck, leaning back a little so all her weight wasn’t solely on his arms.
Halla kept shaking her head, saying, “You shouldn’t be doing this.” She sighed in resignation. “Well . . . if anyone else were here I would have them stop you. As a healer who knows a thing or two about recovery I protest this . . . this . . . where are you taking her?”
“My room. I’ll know when she wakes up, then.” Russ staggered toward the door. His left shoulder screamed in pain, but if he let his left arm go Liseli’s head would be the first to hit the floor.
Halla followed him out into the hall. “I’m not sure I can allow that,” she said, crossing her arms as she rounded him and stood in the way. “It is not proper, especially with her asleep and unable to voice her wishes. She is not your wife.”
Russ coughed uncomfortably. What to say to that? He almost replied, “I’ve slept with her before, anyway,” but bit his tongue. That wouldn’t go over well. Halla was eyeing him as if she actually suspected he might try something on Liseli while she slept. Oh, that was nice. You don’t need to be the one on the defensive, y’know. “Look.” He shifted Liseli, pulling her up closer to him. He tried to ignore the pain the shot through him and told him to drop her. “It’s just that I don’t trust you. I want Liseli with me.”
Halla blinked. “You don’t trust me? Oh. Well. I . . . have . . . just . . . spent . . . the entire afternoon . . . nursing you back to life. ” She spoke evenly, but she couldn’t hide a momentary glimpse of hurt in her eyes.
Oh. Right. Wrong answer, then. “N-no. Not you personally. Sorry. Thank you. I mean . . . ” he stopped and lowered his face, hiding it in Liseli’s hair against the side of her neck. He inhaled; she smelled like the river, fresh and still somehow slightly damp after all those hours. That wasn’t helping. “I would never do anything to her.”
“I was not saying that I think you would . . . you would . . . while she slept,” Halla reddened and looked away. So maybe that’s not what she’d been thinking. “It’s simply not prop—”
“I’m sorry. But I’m gonna drop her in a moment and then I’ll fall down and we’re both gonna be lying in the hall,” Russ cut her off. “Please.”
Halla fell silent and stepped to the side, nodding slightly. Russ walked by and she followed again. Her mouth was set in a line of displeasure, but she opened the door for him and watched as he lowered Liseli onto his bed and then sat next to her.
Russ was exhausted. His arms burned and felt like shredded noodles. “Uhhh.” He rolled to the side and lay down.
“That was very foolish. You have used up precious energy. You forget that you are not well.”
Oh, I remember. Trust me. “Hmmm.”
She sighed. “Legs, in bed.” She assumed a brusque manner. “You’re not going to sleep hanging off halfway.”
He sat up again with a grimace. It was aggravating. What if it was always like this? What if this was as healed as he would ever be? He had no scars that could be seen, maybe that was as good as it was gonna get. He pulled himself all the way into bed, and lay next to Liseli with his arm across her torso. He didn’t much care what Halla thought of that, at the moment.
She shook her head, but lifted the blankets over both of them. “Sleep, then. You can eat later. There is always the water nearby. I will check in on you.” She straightened and surveyed them. Russ felt weird being tucked into bed with Liseli beside him, as if they were two babies in a crib. But Halla’s expression as she stepped back made it even stranger. They were children, to her.
“Thanks.” He didn’t know what else to say.
Halla turned and left the room, shutting the door gently. Russ tightened his arm around Liseli and said her name. But she didn’t wake up. That was okay. He was going to sleep. She’d be awake later. She would.
Chapter 18 ~ Alone With The Sleeping, part 2
Death was not always bad.
It began as a nightmare. She wandered alone over the gray road for what seemed like forever; lost, not knowing what she was searching for. Voices called out to her from nowhere, sometimes they sang and sometimes they cried and wailed, cursing her. Sometimes she slipped off of the road into the endless mire, and drowned all over again. Then she lay alone on a bier with her hands folded over her chest, staring at the stars and thinking, So this is death. She watched maggots crawl over her body and devour her down to the bones, thinking, So this is life. She floated down rivers of gray silted mud, past ruined cities full of sleeping bodies, but she was nothing but bones, bobbing in the stream.
Then she was whole again and she sat at a feast in the ruined cities, but the food was all rotted and she was alone. Her hosts were bones covered in webs in their chairs, and they smiled at her. Then she was their dinner, they awoke and they feasted and she lay on the table. So this is life.
She wandered through darkness, with no body. She could not feel herself and she could not touch herself, but she knew that she was in a giant maze inside of a spider’s belly, and she was bacteria floating through the murk, and that was all. That was all she was. She feasted on the maze that was the spider, and then she was the spider, and she was washed down a drain, never, never, never to be seen from again.
She was released from her prison and the sun came up. She was Liseli again, or a shadow of Liseli, looking at the sky. So death was not always bad. She wandered through a field of grass and flowers. She picked the flowers and sprinkled them over her head as she walked, and she came to a pond. She looked in and saw herself sitting on a blanket in the field with a small child at her side. The child was a girl, and they sat on a checkered cloth with her great-grandmother’s china tea set at their feet.
“This used to be displayed in the china cabinet at my family’s old hotel,” she was telling the girl. “Before they tore it down.” She held out a cup. “Here.” The girl didn’t move, simply smiled. She had long auburn hair that was wavy and curled at the temples, and her grin was lopsided and shy as she looked at the china. She was afraid she would break it. Liseli thought she was the most beautiful being in all the worlds, and she wanted to reach out and touch the mane of silky hair or hug the girl to her bosom. But she didn’t.
“Would you like me to tell you a story?” she asked, folding her hands in her lap, keeping them to herself.
The girl shook her head. “No, thank you.”
“What is your name?”
“I don’t have a name.”
“Why not?”
“I am only a vision. You are really alone.” And then she was not a girl, but a rock, and Liseli was kneeling by that rock in the midst of a field of boulders in the gray night. There were no stars. Liseli draped herself over the rock, but she did not cry. In time she became the rock.
But death did not let her rest. She was running through a swamp, ankle deep in sucking mud, and there were dogs barking her name in the distance. They were coming for her. The faster she ran the deeper she sank, and there was nowhere to hide. She let the dogs tear her apart, and soon she was rent limb from limb and scattered to the four corners of the world. But she became one again and walked across a narrow bridge over an endless gorge, until she slipped from the bridge and fell forever. When she landed she was an insect caught in a pitcher plant, beating her wings in sickly sweet liquid, and then she was the plant, feasting on the creatures inside of her until she was cut down with the smooth chop of a blade. But then she was the blade.
Death was not always bad. She only wondered why she never saw him. He was dead as she was. Why did they never meet wandering in the endless gray dreams? She wondered if she had eaten
him or he had eaten her somewhere along the way. But then she remembered that she was always alone.
Sometimes death was very bad.
* * *
Liseli was not awake in the morning. Russ tried to wake her up, but it was an impossible task. He was starving. He’d slept straight through the whole night, missing dinner. He’d missed lunch too, for that matter. And breakfast had ended up on the pavilion steps. He touched his side, down by the stomach, and realized that it didn’t hurt terribly anymore. Just a dull ache. Maybe that was only because he was hungry. He could move his arms again without feeling searing pain. Just a twinge.
He helped himself to a cup of Chaiorra water, noting how cold and crisp it was even after sitting out at room temperature all night. The twinges eased up, little kinks of pain and dull throbs disappearing, and he sighed. He needed to use the bathroom. He eased out of bed, though he knew it wouldn’t disturb Liseli if he did jumping jacks on the pillows. Anyone could do anything to her and she would not wake up. Something told him not to leave her. But he had to . . . he had to use the toilet. They were alone anyway.
He shut the door habitually. When he opened it again and came back out he jumped. “What the hell . . . !” He smacked the doorframe involuntarily as he fell back. “Who the—”
“My name is Alisiya,” said the small figure sitting next to Liseli on the bed. It wore a docile smile. “You recognize me as the Child.”
Russ paused, then took a step forward warily. He’d planned, vaguely, to defend Liseli against anything. But he hadn’t expected a little child to appear, and place itself between the two of them with the most innocent of expressions. “I do. Yeah. You wouldn’t give us the time of day before.”
“I led you to the river when you were sick, didn’t I?” the Child shook its head. “But let’s be brief and forget about things that don’t matter. We need to talk. I need you to do something. And Liseli needs you to do something. It’s very important.”
Chapter 19 ~ Assignment
“How did you get in here?” Russ glanced toward the balcony windows.
The Child shook its head. “No, not that way.” It watched him in silence.
“Well, then how?”
It looked him in the eye, which he found unsettling, but he didn’t turn away. It began to smile. “I did not ‘get in.’ I’m not really here.”
“What?”
“See;” the Child lifted a hand from its lap and slowly turned toward Liseli, still eyeing Russ. It reached out as if to touch Liseli’s face.
“Hey—” Russ lurched forward and put his hand out between them. “Don’t tou . . . .” His voice faded away as he looked down to see the Child’s hand pass through his arm. He pulled back quickly, as if he’d been burned, even though he felt nothing. It rested its palm on Liseli’s forehead, but it wasn’t touching her. Now that Russ was closer to it, the Child looked different to him. There was something faintly transparent about the pale brown skin. If he looked closely he could Liseli’s face beneath the hand.
“What are you?”
The Child was looking at Liseli, and did not reply at first. Russ wanted to take the hand away from Liseli’s face, but he couldn’t touch it. “You may call me Alisiya,” the Child said, looking up at him again. “Will you listen to what I have to say?”
Russ hesitated, then sat down next to Liseli and pulled her toward him, away from Alisiya.
She drew back her hand. “Well?”
He held Liseli with one arm around her shoulders. Her head rested against his chest. “Do you know what’s the matter with her?”
Alisiya nodded. She looked at Liseli with a small worried frown. “She’s under a spell. The River’s spell.”
“How do you know?” Russ didn’t like the sound of that.
Alisiya slid off the bed without disturbing the blankets. “I see many things. And I know about the River. I am connected to it.”
“Yeah? Then you can break the spell.”
She smiled, looking down. “I could . . . but not now. Not like this.” She spread out her arms. “That is where you come in.”
“How?”
“Well, if I am not here I must somewhere else.”
“Wait a minute, back up.” Russ lifted his hand, and Liseli listed to the side. “How are you here if you’re not . . . here?”
“This is only a vision of me,” she said patiently. “Not my body, but my consciousness. My being. When I am here, my body is sleeping. My consciousness can only be in one place at a time, and without my body I can do very little. But I can appear and speak to whom I will — to speak to your mind, not your ears. And you see me not with your eyes. Understand?”
Russ blinked and opened his mouth to ask all the tangled questions that came to his mind. But he stopped, and instead came out with; “I’ll say yes. So . . . where is your body?”
“Varaneshe. It is the city to the south, along the sea. That is where King Leeton lives, and where he keeps me imprisoned. You must go there and free me, so that I can be here in body and mind. Only then can I help Liseli.”
Russ tried to focus on what he knew already. This was making very little sense, but he tried to grasp it. He remembered one thing; it suddenly seemed very important. “Currun told me about Eliasha’s parents. You . . . you told her mother they wouldn’t die, but they did.”
Alisiya bit her lip and looked away for a moment, then nodded slowly. “Leeton killed them, just as he almost killed you and Liseli . . . . But Liseli is not even out of the woods — if she stays like this for much longer she will die. She cannot eat; she cannot drink. She will wither away.”
“No,” Russ said. He shook his head, looking down at Liseli. Withering away. No . . . I’m not letting that happen. He turned and picked up the jug by its handle with his right hand, still supporting Liseli with his left. He poured water into the cup and tried to get Liseli to drink from it. He could get her mouth open and pour the water in, but she would not swallow, and it dribbled out the corner of her mouth. Alisiya watched.
“This is my father’s doing,” she said, eyeing Russ. He looked up.
“Who?”
“My father. Leeton. King Leeton.”
“Oh.” Russ shook his head, feeling distracted, not knowing whether to give Alisiya all his attention or keep trying to make Liseli drink.
“The River is poisoned by him,” Alisiya continued, demanding his attention. “It’s his spell she is under. I am the only one who can counter his spell, because I was born a part of it. Do you understand?”
Russ shook his head.
“Have they told you how Aysha died?”
“No. Your mother?”
“Yes. She drowned. In the Chaiorra.” Alisiya turned around and hovered a hand on the bedpost with her back to him. “I was born after that. I was . . . I had to be cut from her after they pulled her from the water. I almost died. It was my father who caused her to drown.”
“Why?” Russ was taken aback.
“Because he is selfish, and blind. Nothing ever mattered to him more than his spells and potions and the power he holds over this land.” Alisiya turned back around, touching the post with her other hand and lifting her head stiffly. Her voice was bitter. “Even his wife and unborn child were nothing more to him than experiments. He wanted to create a super human. He fed my mother poisons and lies, and in the end she went mad. She was . . . .” She stopped and looked down. “She was afraid of me. I was the monster of my father’s creation, and she feared . . . she killed herself because my birth was coming and she didn’t want it to happen. She threw herself from the North Bridge and drown in the River, because she would not bring a monster into the world.”
“I’m sorry,” Russ said, thinking it sounded inane but not knowing how else to react. Her shoulders were stiff, and the hand over the bedpost tightened into a fist, before relaxing to tap each finger against the wood. Or was he just imagining that? Was she really touching the wood? If she wasn’t there and he wasn’t really seeing her with h
is eyes . . . . He stopped thinking about it.
“I was an unnatural child,” she said, “thanks to my father. I knew things before I was born, I understood things and I remember it. I became aware of the world while still in my mother’s womb. And I grew with abnormal speed.” Alisiya seemed to calm, and shrugged. “But I am not a monster. My mother was delusional, driven mad by my father. That is why he is to blame.”
“I . . . see . . . .” He nodded slowly. What kind of a man could do such things to his family? As if they were guinea pigs or lab rats instead of people? Russ shook his head, finding his way back to the burning question: “What about the River? I mean . . . why is it poison? How?”
“You have been wondering that since they said so, haven’t you?”
“Well, yeah.”
“Why didn’t you ask them?”
“I . . . what?” Russ started to grow impatient. “I’m asking you.”
She smiled briefly, then her expression turned grim again. “My father’s potions and spells. They went wrong. Simply wrong.” She folded her hands and looked him in the eye. He believed her.
“So why hasn’t it poisoned us?” He looked down into Liseli’s sleeping face. He wasn’t sure that it hadn’t.
The smile returned, and stayed. “You’re otherworlders. You’re special. You’re . . . different.”
Russ looked up. He found that a smile was on his face despite his worry. “Really? That’s all? What about . . . .”
“Byzauki and Ilia? They were special in their own time. Being special is not being one of a kind,” Alisiya admonished. “They were not invincible, and neither are you. That’s why you must be careful.”
He nodded. “Of course. But . . . what do I have to do? For Liseli I mean . . . .”
“For Liseli,” her smile widened, and he thought it bright and sympathetic. “I told you. You have to free me. After my birth my father decided that I was a monster, as well. The monster . . . called me . . . a monster. He has kept me locked away in his palace ever since. You must go there, and release me.”
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