by C. N Lesley
“Then I don’t have to meet with Dragon?”
“Not if I can avoid it, you won’t. It’s doubtful he’d recognize you from a distance now, and I want Rowan out of High with whatever information he’s managed to extract.”
Shadow thought this through. It seemed logical, if not enough to explain his unease with her. “Are we arguing over my difference again?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“Did you forget I’m fey when you started the mission I felt begin in Avalon? Did you think I wouldn’t notice if your life was in danger? We’re going to fight because I’m withdrawing you from active listing.”
“Copper, that’s unjust. It’s possible I might earn a certain degree of punishment for invading an area not open to casual visits . . . if I’m caught on record. Since this didn’t happen before we left Avalon, I assume it will wait until I try again. I won’t bother unless I find a very compelling reason to return. There is no more danger for me here than there was before.”
“Yes, there is. The sensation is even stronger on the surface. Something hunts. Are those fish-men really to be trusted?”
“Ector’s vanguard didn’t include any seers.” Shadow nestled against him, satisfied he was going to behave. “They won’t volunteer for surface assignment if they think they might be in personal danger. Maybe they’ll hold back until they get a detailed report on Harvesters in the frenzied pursuit of fey brothers? Seers are those who are going to be seriously upset with me. The others wouldn’t be affected beyond mild amusement.”
“You’re still not permitted to leave my side.”
“That’s a relief. I thought you decided I couldn’t leave Haven.”
“I have. Fey brothers will have specialized outside duties from now on. I won’t be visiting any forts either, so you’ll be sharing my banishment.”
“You’re giving up on acquisitions?” Shocked, Shadow started to sit up, but he pulled her back. She couldn’t believe he’d leave new Brethren to a sad fate.
“I’ll concentrate exclusively on them,” Copper said. “We’ll keep outside forts until we figure a new way to shield. We’ll have to, or risk looking very odd, wandering around in inseparable twosomes.”
“With one of you fey, priests are going to suspect the other. It’s going to tell them we know who they target. I take your point.”
The ghostly shape of a huge white owl flew overhead, dropping suddenly, followed by the sounds of some small animal screaming.
“We’d better hold another strategy meeting when Ector arrives at Haven. Once we learn to work together, we’ll have more idea on tactics, but giving up acquisitions isn’t an option, not when we constantly lose manpower.” He sighed into her hair. “Then there’s Rowan’s input to sift through. Let’s try for some sleep before we tackle more problems.”
Copper settled into a deep sleep, but Shadow lay fretting over restriction. Now that she’d found one way into a Harvester inner sanctum, she’d planned on searching for more. Getting a force right to the heart of their nest solved the problem of luring a ship into the open and perhaps catching one of the beasts intact. If she worked Ector round to her plan, then he could convince Copper . . . those two ganged up far too much for her liking. Alternatively, exploring the remains of ancient cities appealed, if she were banned from forts for a while. Neither of them could object, since neither knew what she’d discovered in the bowels of Avalon. With this satisfying thought, Shadow allowed sleep to come.
The next morning they breakfasted together on Brethren journey fare, after sleeping through sunrise. Copper figured they’d create less stir if they entered High Fort at a busy time. Shadow worked on an alternative plan once they started out, having it figured just as High Fort appeared in sight over the crest of a hill. She grabbed Copper’s reins, bringing him up short.
“Change of plans,” she told him. “Rowan comes to us.”
“How? The threat level remains constant—it would reduce if we stayed out of High.”
“This might not work. I’ll need your help to break through the shield of his earring, and then there’s that noise.”
“What noise?” His face revealed his total ignorance.
“Inside forts . . . the noise that makes speaking difficult, or do earrings counteract that, too? I didn’t notice last time I visited, I was rather busy trying to leave.”
“Shadow, I’ve never heard any noise, with or without an earring.”
“Ask a Shade when you get one inside. I wonder if I’m alone, or they will hear, too.”
“You’re going to call Rowan to us? Let’s see if it works.” He dismounted, hobbling his horse.
Shadow decided to go with his instinct, since they broke new ground. Once they’d removed earrings, she reached out to place her hands on either side of his head. He’d opened totally to her. She seeped into the area of his mind where precognition ruled, hoping to find the extra strength she might need. Nothing prepared her for the sudden blending of their separate talents; no amount of fighting prevented a terrifying union forming. For one instant they shared a single soul, a barrier withered before combined force. Contact established. It took every ounce of will either of them possessed to separate. Both of them trembled with the effort as they came apart.
“Are you all right?” she asked, feeling she needed a week of sleep.
“No. Linking with you is too intense.” He looked away from her. “I think I’m going to have problems with this joining.”
“Copper . . . I didn’t mean to snoop. For what it’s worth, I’m truly sorry.” Somehow she found the courage to face him. “Whether it was using your new implant or maybe the linkage became . . . involved because your fey quality joined with my psi power for whatever reason . . .”
“Now you know I love you.” He smiled that slow, sad smile peculiar to Brethren.
Shadow answered with one of her own. Harvesters took everything from them except pain, thinking to destroy them, not knowing they smiled because they could still feel enough to laugh at fate. Just as uncomfortable as Copper, she accepted he’d had access to her deepest thoughts, knew emotional contact with others terrified her. Somehow they had to work through this intimate knowledge to be comfortable with each other again.
“Pax, Copper?” she offered.
“Aye, pax. It’s a start.” He seemed about to say more, but his eyes became fixed with a look Shadow recognized. It lasted many heartbeats, and then he shook himself. “The sense of threat to us lessens. Time flows in a different path.”
“Rowan comes?”
“I think so. The suggestion you sent of needing clear spring water was overpowering. I confess I feel thirsty. Why didn’t you send him an image of us at this location?”
“Suppose Harvesters heard our thoughts? I’m not that lonesome for company.”
Copper replied with a wicked grin. He took her reins to bring them both to a small stream among trees where they tied their mounts. Both returned to the tree line to watch one lone horseman leaving High Fort, his dark skin identifying him at a distance.
“He’s going to be very disappointed when he finds our stream doesn’t have a wild mint flavor,” Copper said.
“I had to have some way of making this place special, and our stream has mint growing close. He can always crush some leaves in his hands before he cups them to drink.”
“I’m sure he’ll appreciate the thought, just as soon as he gives you a piece of his mind you don’t want.”
Shadow shrugged. They both watched High Fort to see if he’d acquired followers. Rowan appeared to be free from pursuit. Copper signed to pull them back to the stream.
“Why?” Shadow asked sitting down on a fallen tree trunk.
“He’d react to people lurking in bushes. In plain view, there won’t be a problem.”
Copper was right. Rowan entered the glade, reining in when he spotted the two grotesquely altered people. He drew his weapon, advancing with extreme caution. Copper moved to sit b
y Shadow, wrapping his sword arm around her waist.
“By the Seven Hells! Copper . . . is that you?” Rowan looked at them through narrowed eyes. His shoulders relaxed.
“How did you guess?”
“Shadow’s blonde hair. No one else would dare to touch her with any hope of living. Will that muck wash off?”
“It’s permanent, until we grow new skin,” Copper said.
“There’s a good reason?”
“It works on Shades as well. Given no one really looks at us in Forts, they’ll pass.”
Rowan dismounted, almost running to the water. He spat out the first mouthful to glare at Shadow. “Take whatever you did away right now.”
“I can’t. You’ll have to make do.”
Looking furious, Rowan snatched up a handful of mint to cram into his mouth, chewing, spitting out before he tried to drink again. His face registered immediate relief.
“Don’t you ever, ever do such a thing to me again. If I find I can’t drink beer without chewing weeds, we’re going to fight.” He glared at Copper. “You’re King. You keep her in line.”
Copper shrugged. “It was necessary. We wanted you, not any hangers on.”
Still glaring, Rowan fished in his clothing to toss a small pouch. Copper caught it midair, opening it to tip tokens into his hand. These discs weren’t the usual blank variety Alsar used as barter in his fairs. One side bore a good resemblance to his head in profile, and the other held the likeness of a crown.
“Alsar’s gotten creative. Priests allow it? Rather close to being proscribed as a living image,” Copper said.
“He has permission. The idea may even have come from them, but I haven’t found out for certain. These pretties are aimed at us. This is how we’re paid now, but when we try to barter them . . . surprise, surprise, ten from us is worth one from a fort dweller.”
“This is serious,” Copper said. “Any reason why?”
“As near as I’ve pieced together, it was Shadow’s apparent drowning last year. Priests became upset that one of us got close to their inner sanctum.”
“My doing, I’m afraid,” a deep voice said, from a nearby thicket.
Chapter 27
Earth Date 3892
Cloying dampness and the scent of wet dirt curled around Arthur in the mist-shrouded night. Warriors with naked swords joined in a circle with him. Mist wove around them and through them while they posed, frozen in time during a lull in battle. When he looked down, he had an unsubstantial body like the others, and he carried a sword.
Wolves howled, and a horn call signaled for the Wild Hunt to start.
I shouldn’t be here. This is wrong.
A star fell, growing in brilliance as it came to earth, filling his eyes with light, to draw him into another place. His body dissolved as it had countless times over, and then he fell for many heartbeats until he landed in flesh.
*
Earth Date 3875
Dragon stepped from behind a tree with his sword held point lowered. He strode around to the water, fronting the Brethren all the while. Rowan edged to the others while Copper and Shadow rose in a relaxed manner. Within seconds, they had assumed a Brethren fighting-crescent.
Shadow bit her lip to stop a cry of shock when Dragon tried to drink and repeated Rowan’s gesture of disgust. Her mind spun in sickening circles. He’s not fey, and he isn’t a Submariner. Reality began to slip away from her. Each passing second in this man’s presence increased her pain of loss until she entered the place of Brethren retreat, only aware of the need to survive.
*
“That weed near your left foot . . . you chew some of it to get the right flavor,” Rowan advised. “Next time we get drunk together, and I ramble on about flavor, make sure you get the full recipe before you start snoring.”
Standing behind Rowan, Copper glanced sideways at Shadow wondering if she guessed the problem, despite her blank expression under the dye. Rowan spun a very plausible, impossible lie for any Brethren, a brave attempt, riding on how much Dragon overheard before he made his presence known. They might have to kill him, or at least attempt it if he was not alone and had men in calling.
Also partly shielded by Rowan’s bulk, Shadow signed that Dragon might feel intrusion if she raided his mind.
Dragon snatched a clump of mint followed by a hand cup of water, combining both. Some tension eased out of his face the moment he swallowed. “Not drunk now, are you, or dumb? Good trick to gain sympathy,” he sneered, alluding to alcohol indulgence loosening Brethren tongues.
“No trick of ours, just a part of our punishment.” Copper kicked a dead branch out of his fighting perimeter. He didn’t want to fight Dragon, but he was going to win if he did. “When we’re cast out we lose the ability to talk straight in forts so that we don’t contaminate righteous worshipers. Outside contains too many other defects and mutations for such a curse to hold. Priests would be obliged to silence saurians if they wanted us dumb here.”
“Now that you know, what are you planning to do?” Rowan asked, quiet-voiced.
All hung on Dragon’s answer. A breeze sighed through leaves, rustling the trees and bringing a faint coolness to the humid air.
“Report you to the priests, unless I get a straight answer.” He looked at Rowan. “One of your people drowned at High Fort last year. What did you do with the body?”
Rowan shrugged. “Why the interest in a corpse?”
“I heard talk of an ‘apparent drowning’. I need to be sure of the death. My single thrust through the heart would’ve been quicker and more certain.”
Shadow’s sudden gasp turned Dragon’s hard eyes on her for the first time. “So she lives. Now I see a reason for hiding your faces under dye. Priests want her alive. Give her to me for a swift ending and they’ll ease off the rest of you.”
“Even if we agreed, you couldn’t take this one in a fight.” Rowan shifted into a battle-ready stance, a minute adjustment that no-one but Brethren might notice. “You’ve fought with me . . . I can’t take her.”
“Lies. She wasn’t that good.” Dragon’s sword point raised a few finger spans.
“She’s trained with our best. You’d last about six heartbeats, if that. Your death is going to stir more grief for us. We can’t permit it.” Rowan gripped the hilt of his sword, easing it out of the sheath a hair’s breadth.
“So you’re telling me to swallow my honor? Including her in the mantle of Brethren protection isn’t going to help you when Alsar’s scheme spreads to other forts. Is she worth slow starvation?”
Copper moved forward a pace to clear ground. “None of us will sacrifice another. We’ve all suffered too much at fort hands to give over one of our kind to torment. Remember, we’re used to living off the land. You people aren’t used to the filthy tasks you have assigned to us.”
A pheasant broke cover, startling them all with its noisy flapping. The lazy drone of insects filled a charged silence.
“Your choice.” Dragon’s faced paled. He took a deep breath, as if getting his temper under control. “We’ll manage without your services. Be sure I’ll have her cut down if I catch her alone.”
Rowan’s fingers flickered behind his back in sign language: ‘Alone is the key, he hasn’t got any backup. Do we take him?’
“We’re agreed then.” Copper gave Rowan the signal to stand down by that phrase. “She stays out of your range.”
“I know you. I’ve fought with you.” Dragon looked past Rowan at Copper.
“Aye, and I’ve always won. For your sake I’ll add my warning to my brother’s.” Copper gestured to Shadow. “I can best her, just. Don’t think your luck is going to hold because of gender. Our sisters are just as lethal . . . more so in her case.”
“I’m terrified.” Dragon’s face twisted into a sneer.
“Be so.” Another gust of wind ruffled Copper’s hair. “We always know when we’re about to gain a new brother. Be good, Dragon, very good. Your band status is uncertain, right now. Oh,
and don’t blab to priests about any threats—this isn’t one . . . or they may decide to act on the spot. You would be a valuable acquisition for us, but it is up to you.”
“Keep her then. I’ll be waiting for my chance.” Dragon began a careful retreat, his sword raised to chest height. He edged through the trees, watching them until he slipped behind a bush.
Copper placed one hand on Rowan’s shoulder, warning him to let Dragon go. Rowan’s fingers flickered urgently behind his back. ‘We should take him while we can.’
“Not worth the trouble,” Copper said. “Let it ride.”
They heard the sound of Dragon’s horse pounding toward High Fort. Shadow wandered over to the water, staring at the glinting surface.
“Why?” Rowan demanded. “He was alone.”
“He has a personal score to settle too pressing for any to take his ravings seriously. We have enough problems without adding the execution of a fort leader to our score. Besides, lying low while forts cut off their own feet will give us the time we need to establish bases away from Haven.”
“Alliance is made?”
“Yes, and Helga approaches normal womanhood. I thought you’d appreciate knowing this.”
“Completely normal?” Rowan looked as if he feared to believe it could be possible.
“Our new friends think she won’t need her veils anymore, unless she’s overcome by shyness.” He noticed Shadow’s stiff movements as she knelt down by the stream. She cupped water and rinsed her face.
“And us?”
“They started with me. I’m told I’m viable, but I’m not sure how grateful I am.” Copper met Rowan’s gaze. “I freeze constantly.”
“Maybe I’ll wait until I see positive results before I lose advantage.” Rowan smirked and wandered over to the log to sit in the shade.
“I don’t suppose I can ask you to keep this to yourself?” Copper decided he felt hurt at the humor. He wondered at Shadow’s silence, dreading her reaction to Dragon.
“Not a chance . . . we’ll all be watching to see if you’re productive.”