As One Is and Shall Always Be, I remain,
Flandari,
Citizen of Garla
Witnessed
Nalin Corday,
Holder of Felane
It certainly sounds legal, Lisen thought as she squinted at the parchment in the spare moonlight. She stood once again alone at the parapet of the watchtower, the Milara Sea stretching out below her, and she contemplated the reaches of power. Before her, the undulating carpet of ocean loomed. Behind her, the Isle and the great land of Garla stretched out to the mountains’ Rim and beyond, to the desert of Thristas, a nation allegedly protected by the Empir of Garla. It didn’t sound like a healthy relationship to Lisen, but she couldn’t worry about that now. Too many other questions must be asked first; too many other answers must be understood first.
She turned to look upon the land across the bay. A week to reach this Halorin place? I bet it wouldn’t take much more than a few hours by car. She wondered if she could ride a horse for an entire week without paying some sort of price—blisters, unhappy muscles and who knew what else. The Holts had given her riding lessons; she figured she’d manage somehow. They gave me riding lessons, she thought, amazed.
No. She couldn’t go there. She forced herself to think of other things, of how strange it had been to listen to herself spouting all that information about necropaths and rogues and watchers and those who pushed and how it was forbidden to do so. Where had that come from? She didn’t remember learning all that while she was here before, but apparently she had picked it up somewhere.
Her musings turned to the young woman—Jozan, she reminded herself—the heir of where did they say? Minol? This heir reminded her of Betsy. Not only did she resemble Betsy physically, but Lisen sensed she was like Betsy in other ways. Certainly Betsy would have been the one to step in and explain Heir Ariel’s character to someone who didn’t know a thing about him.
She returned to the Decree, not reading, just observing the parchment, the ink, the precision of the script. This was the destiny Eloise the Elusive and Titus the healer had saved her for. Lisen marveled at how unremarkable this Empir Flandari’s choice of her daughter as her Heir rather than her son seemed to be to those who knew. Seven years ago, before her sojourn to Earth, it would have probably seemed unremarkable to her as well. Now? What was it Senator Clinton had said in her speech the day Eloise had abducted her? Something about it no longer being remarkable to think that a woman could run a viable campaign for President of the United States and how remarkable that was? What would Senator Clinton think if she knew how unremarkable that had always been here?
Earlier this night Lisen had climbed up to the haven’s highest point believing that she’d be stuck here in this stupid place forever. Now, a destiny she did not desire—a destiny for which Eloise and Titus had broken all the rules—that destiny had claimed her. Only a few moments ago, while she and Eloise had packed up her meager belongings, she had attempted to have it out with Eloise. After a quick “If not you, then who?” from the damn sooth, the arrival of the tunics from the Empir’s day pack had interrupted their discussion, allowing Eloise to escape under the guise of removing the Emperi crest from them so they could be worn in public without recognition. All of Lisen’s objections and questions had withered in her throat. Now she stood at the top of the tower, wearing the grey tunic, the Empir’s sword strapped around her waist clumsily, and she cloaked herself in the silence of the ageless Isle. The sky held the promise of dawn; little time remained of peace.
“My Liege?”
She whirled around and faced the captain stepping from the doorway into the end of night. He no longer wore his armor, having shed it in favor of lighter gear—for the long journey ahead, she presumed. This had allowed him to sneak up on her.
“Please. I’ve asked you not to call me that.”
“Then what do I call you? I’m a captain of the Emperi Guard. If you and Holder Corday are to be believed, you’re my new Empir. Tell me. What do I call you?”
She shivered at his words. She was no ruler; she was barely Garlan anymore. She turned away from him, to the expanse of sea below.
“I’m not the Empir yet. I may never be the Empir.” She shivered again. “Call me Lisen. Just Lisen.”
“All right then. Lisen it is.”
“And what should I call you?” she asked, eyes locked on the ocean.
“Captain Rosarel?” he replied too quickly.
“Oh, give me a break.”
“What?”
“Nothing.” She shook her head.
“Then, what about Korin? For now, at least.”
“Sounds good to me.” Lisen nodded, satisfied.
“Let me see if I can adjust that sword for you.”
She turned and lifted up her arms as the captain fiddled with the belt around her waist. “I did my best,” she said. “Seems a bit cumbersome.”
“Doesn’t have to be,” he commented as he worked.
She tried to watch what he was doing but found herself staring at his face instead. He looked to be in his middle twenties, and as he concentrated on the belt around her mid region, she felt a little thrill slightly lower in her belly. There was nothing particularly remarkable about his face except that history resided in the hint of sun-ripened creases across his forehead, and she wanted to know that history, all of it. Besides, she’d always preferred the inscrutable type.
“It’s not cumbersome when seated properly,” he said, interrupting her silent admiration. “It should ride down on your hip a bit.” He backed away, and she forced herself to look down at the sword and away from him, seeing what he meant. “You favor your right hand?” he asked, his voice rich, strong, caring even.
“Yes,” she answered, noting that the belt now lay higher on the right and lower on the left where the scabbard hung.
“Then that’s your first lesson in self-defense.” He smiled at her, and she wished she had the guts to kiss him. “I brought you a knife.” He produced a small sheathed weapon which he attached to the right side of her belt. “Once we’re on our way, in the next few days at least, we’ll begin your lessons.” He stood back again, arms across his chest, studying her. His dark eyes, short-cropped beard—the only thing missing was an earring. Oh well, no one’s perfect, Lisen thought.
Then she sensed it, felt it swirling around them, and it had nothing to do with attraction.
“You fear us,” she said, startled at the words and the insight which had inspired them.
“What?”
“You fear the hermits.”
“You read?” He eyed her warily.
“Read?” It took her a second to recall that one. “No, I’m no reader. Your thoughts are safe from me. But I sense something, and when I observe you, your bearing betrays you. The timbre of your voice, the way your eyes dart back and forth. Most everyone is uncomfortable around hermits, but for all your bravery, all your courage, I can feel you trembling, even here, now, alone with me.” She heard herself speak, heard the words, learned what she was saying as she said it, and wondered, yet again, how she could know all this, where it came from. It seemed that memory returned in mysterious ways.
“It won’t affect my performance in your service,” he replied formally.
“Oh, I’m sure of that.” She leaned back against the tower’s wall. “But if we’re to travel together, work together, live together, achieve this…thing…together, I need to find a way to reassure you.”
“No need. I’m a soldier, trained to do what must be done despite fear.”
“Korin,” she said, using his name for the first time and wishing she could just say it over and over, “hermits take vows, vows not to interfere, not to attempt to read another’s mind without permission, not to cast a spell without permission, save in protection or defense. Hermits are not the ones you need to fear. Fear the rogues out there amongst the unaware, acting as though they’re one of them when they’re not. Fear the rogues like the one who pushed that servant. I kn
ow I have to earn your trust, but I swear I’ll never misuse my powers the way this watcher did. Please…try to remember that.”
He nodded. “I will. And now…Lisen…it’s time to go.”
“You go. I’ll be right down.”
He left her, and she looked out on this view she’d missed even though the memory of it had been stolen from her for a time. She’d given up one life willingly, although at ten years out how much could she have understood to be willing? She remembered how she’d believed then that even with her memories stored with Hermit Titus, she’d be happy to come home again. Not. She’d said it to Eloise last night, and her feelings hadn’t changed. She’d likely never be happy being back, but she was reconciled to it. She did, however, think Eloise owed her something more than “destiny” as an explanation. “If not you, then who?” had clarified nothing, and before Lisen would allow herself to be taken anywhere, she would have her say with the damnable, slippery sooth.
Hermit Eloise sat on a bale of hay beside the barn at the far end of the receiving yard, fiddling with a sprig of straw, watching prophecy play out. Jozan paced back and forth, while the captain finished loading one of the haven’s ponies with their gear and rations. Titus stood quietly off to one side, and as Eloise watched all this unfolding, one thought troubled her. Had she misinterpreted the signs? Titus had trusted her. Lisen had trusted her, once. And yet, details mattered, and her vision had either failed to show her or she had missed one small detail entirely—the red rose in a star enclosed in a circle imprinted on Lisen’s lower back. It had not been there when she’d taken the girl to Earth. It had appeared—or been placed there—during her time away, and its unforeseen existence, noted as Eloise had prepared her for her return to Garla, had unnerved Eloise. If she had missed this, small as it was, what else might she have missed? Or misunderstood?
She shook her head. No. Other than that, her sight had proved correct. The Creators had given Lisen seventeen years to grow and learn, seven of them gaining knowledge no one else here would understand, and now Lisen’s moment had arrived. My vision has not failed.
The door to the sanctuary swung open, and out of it stepped Lisen. Eloise looked down, hid her smile of satisfaction behind the fingers she brushed over her mouth. The girl looked absolutely royal in the rich grey tunic, Flandari’s sword strapped around her waist. Lisen came down the steps, and Eloise watched as the girl focused in on her and set out in Eloise’s direction, determination clear from the firm set of her shoulders. This moment Eloise had seen; Lisen was about to make her answer for what she’d done.
Eloise could never tell the girl what she wanted to hear. She couldn’t reveal the future to her. Lisen would have to create her own future, and that could affect every vision Eloise had ever experienced. How could she explain the dream that had plagued and propelled her since her earliest memories as a holder’s child? How could she reveal her dream of a woman making the difficult decision to claim and hold the high ground when the low ground beckoned? Lisen would be angry, but Eloise’s vows would force her to stand fast, mute, forbidden to speak of anything that she’d learned from her visions. However, despite those vows, she wouldn’t leave the young woman with nothing.
Halting right in front of Eloise, Lisen stood, fists on her waist, arms akimbo. Behind her, Eloise saw Holder Corday emerge from the sanctuary, pause and then go directly to Jozan, pulling her aside for a private conversation. Flandari had done well in planning all this. Too bad she’d never see it through. Corday would make a good mentor. A bit cold for Lisen’s fire, but a good balance. And little Jozan, not so little anymore. Eloise smiled at the thought of her niece. There would be confusion and fragmentation of plans, but like the fine weapon at Lisen’s waist, her steel would require the conflagration of crisis for proper tempering.
“What have you done to me?” Lisen demanded.
Eloise rose slowly, dropped the straw, focused fully on Lisen and replied as she’d rehearsed. “I had a vision.”
“I know that, Sooth. What did you see?”
“You know I can’t tell you that.”
Lisen glared at Eloise, her rage barely controlled. “Right. ‘Never interfere.’ The first rule of a sooth. But you could tell my mother. You could interfere enough to steal me away from her, from my life with her. You could interfere enough to send me off to another world, allow me to believe I belonged there, allow me to make friends and have a life there. And then you ripped me away from that, all in the name of destiny and your freaking visions.”
“I spoke out to Empir Flandari as a friend, before I took my vows. Regarding the other, one day you’ll be grateful.’
“Grateful for what?” Lisen asked. “Oh, wait. You can’t tell me.”
“Only that it was necessary.”
“Necessary?” Lisen turned her head, breaking eye contact, then turned back. “Necessary? Screw necessary. And what’s with this necropath thing? How do I know so much about it and about vows and the abilities of hermits?”
“Necropathy is your gift.” Eloise could explain nothing more. Some things could never be spoken.
“A gift? Mind-melding like a Vulcan with dying people is a gift?”
Eloise pretended to understand the strange words Lisen used and the references from her other life. She did, however, get the gist of what the girl said, that she wasn’t happy with Eloise’s choices on her behalf. “That one wasn’t up to me,” Eloise replied calmly. “You were born with it.”
“And the things I seem to know that I don’t remember knowing before I left?”
Eloise sighed. “No doubt Titus decided you’d need more than just your childhood memories to get by on now.”
Lisen’s eyes teared up. “You’d like it to be like I never left.”
“No. It can never be like you never left. Otherwise, there would have been no point in sending you.”
“What was the point?”
“So you could see and do things no one here will ever comprehend.”
“Bull.”
Eloise held up a finger to silence the girl. “There were things you needed to learn. And your life was at risk here.”
“And the Empir’s life? My mother’s life?”
“The assassin would have struck in Avaret eventually. Having her come here may have sped it up a bit, but it was the only chance for the two of you to meet.”
Lisen’s eyes grew damp again. “She was pushed, you know. The assassin? And the consensus amongst my new ‘advisors’ is that the Heir-Empir—my brother—has a watcher.”
“You can deal with watchers.”
“I can deal with watchers? I’ve lost everything—everything—that had any meaning for me. I have to deal with people I don’t know, trust people I don’t know. I have to ride a horse for seven days and hope to God I don’t kill myself in the process. I have to pretend I’ve lived here all my life, not just part of it, and that this thing you call a body is normal to me. I have to learn to joust or fence or whatever you might call it.” Lisen’s ranting pulled to an abrupt halt, and Eloise could see she was closer than ever to crying. But, instead, she breathed in deep, drew back the tears and moved on. “And in the midst of all of that, you tell me I can deal with watchers? I’m not Superwoman for God’s sake.”
“Someday, not so long from now, you will realize how very powerful you are, and then no one will be able to harm you.”
“Tell me one thing,” Lisen asked.
“If I can,” Eloise said.
“You said there’s no way back, that you closed the portal.”
“Yes,” Eloise replied cautiously. “There was no other way.”
“So I can’t get back to Earth,” she said, but Eloise heard no acceptance in her tone. “I really can’t get back to Earth.”
“No.”
Lisen turned away.
“Lisen, wait,” Eloise said, and Lisen turned back reluctantly. “Two nights ago you asked for the truth. Here it is. I lied to Hermit Titus.” Eloise paused. Finding words
for what she’d done was difficult.
“About what?” Lisen asked.
“I lied to Titus and I lied to Empir Flandari.”
“About…?”
“About why I took you to that other world,” Eloise blurted out.
“What?”
“Your father never betrayed you, but if I’d told Titus the truth, he never would have agreed to it. And I needed him to hold your memories. I couldn’t do it.”
“Then why the hell did you put me through all that?” Lisen asked, glowering at Eloise.
“A day will come when it will all make sense.”
Lisen studied Eloise, judged her. Eloise watched the girl struggling to understand, saw her frustration when she couldn’t.
“You did it for your own selfish purposes, just to prove you could,” Lisen finally pronounced.
“No. No. I did it for Garla. And for you,” Eloise protested.
“You did it to manipulate events, to manipulate me, just as you manipulated my mother and my brother. We’re done, Sooth.”
Lisen turned and marched away. Eloise sighed and followed her. Lisen didn’t know it, but they weren’t done, not for a very long time yet. For now, though, Eloise would travel on the barge to Avaret. She would have preferred to stay with Lisen, guide her, guard her, tell her what needed doing next, but that was not Eloise’s place. Her place was in Avaret, and she must leave Lisen in the care of others, to struggle down her own path.
CHAPTER SEVEN
WAITING FOR AN EXPLANATION
What a waste of time, Lisen thought as she stomped across the yard. “A day will come when it will all make sense.” What a load of crap. And all that other bull. She did it just because she could. Mom…Daisy…would never approve. Lisen remembered her Earth mother’s admonition. “Just because you can doesn’t mean you should.” Her mother had based her medical-versus-surgical treatment decisions on that adage, and she had encouraged Lisen to consider those words whenever an opportunity to flaunt her superiority rose up to tempt her. Perhaps Lisen should call this train to a halt before it left the station. No, this is different. I can’t. “Should” doesn’t even count.
Fractured (Lisen of Solsta Book 1) Page 8