“Your horses will be with you shortly,” the Maesteri said to Vendanj without turning away from Wendra, who still held Penit’s hand.
She smiled appreciatively at the old man, but in her heart she held reservations. It had been a long time since she’d felt anything she could use that word to describe—endowment. The Maesteri might not use the word if a child had been ripped from his womb, or another sold on the blocks, or had himself been the wager in a game of chance.
The Maesteri left her and walked around the black oval to the lectern. He climbed a stair behind it, and soon stood overlooking the room from several strides above them. Carefully, he untied the scroll and unrolled it on the lectern. His eyes read the words. He looked up. “This is A’Garlen, I can tell.” He smiled. “Please be seated,” he said.
Vendanj pointed to the seats. Each of them took a chair, Wendra yet keeping her hold of Penit’s hand.
Sitting last, the Sheason spoke to the Maesteri. “Belamae, speak strongly for Helaina when you are given the opportunity to do so. With laggard seat holders, pretenders, the League, and the Quiet … Help her where you can with this convocation. We go to attempt an important task, but our success may mean nothing if the convocation fails.”
The old man smiled devilishly, as if he relished the debates in store for him with the likes of Roth Staned. He laid a finger aside his nose in what looked like a salute. The Sheason gave a grateful nod.
When they settled, the Maesteri began to hum in a rich, deep voice, the sound of it resonating in the chamber until the entire space seemed filled with it. The sound came at Wendra from every direction, washing over her like her most vivid dream. The music thrummed with life of its own, so that she could not be sure the Maesteri sang it at all.
Then the man began to sing the words on Garlen’s vellum. The telling unfolded in glorious detail, the words fitting together as naturally and rhythmically as any lyric Wendra had ever heard. The dance and play of each phrase gave life to the words and what they described, and from the lips of the Maesteri, the music soared as though it might stretch outward and upward without end.
In moments, the words ran together with the song and became something more. It touched Wendra deeply, striking a chord at once in flesh and spirit. Wendra felt the chamber about her begin to recede, becoming insubstantial, visible more as elements of something much more vast.
Above the brilliant oval, the air began to draw itself into threads like the weave of a loom. Tendrils of space with the color of what lay beyond it reflected in thin, wavy lines. Hundreds, then thousands of these strands shimmered together and grew until they filled the space between the chairs.
Through it, Tahn saw the faces of Grant and Mira undulating as though through rippling water, but in slow vertical lines, and thin, like strands of hair.
As the song unwound itself, Wendra glimpsed the gift that lived inside her. She thought she might have been afraid, but in the embrace of Belamae’s song, she felt safe.
The Maesteri sang a crescendo that wove itself in a shifting, scintillating pattern above them. Garlen’s words given voice began to create a picture. The threads moved, changing color, weaving in new patterns. Wendra felt a pull as though the world, the physical space of the chamber, was realigning itself. The strands danced to the song, the words gave direction, and thousands of hairline rents in the air obeyed, moving and reshaping what she saw.
The weave coalesced, pulling tight and firming. The strands began to disappear from view, creating a new order in place of the old. On the Maesteri sang, until the breeze became a wind, and Wendra smelled the plains she looked upon, and heard the sound of thunder in a dark sky.
“Step through,” Vendanj said, his voice low so that he would not disturb the song.
Though she could not see past this new curtain draped in the air before her, Wendra saw Mira and Grant suddenly appear on the soil of the scene rising up from the black oval mirror. Then Vendanj, and Braethen. To her left stood Sutter, who gave an enthusiastic salute to Tahn, and stepped through himself. Then Tahn. And Penit.
Wendra looked back at the Maesteri, who continued to sing, but gave her a reassuring nod. With a rush of sound entreating her mind and poetic language quelling all disbelief, Wendra stepped into the tapestry. With a sudden sadness and doubt, she left the Descant behind.
CHAPTER SEVENTY
Children of Soliel
Tahn crunched fine shale underfoot as he emerged into the vast dark plain. A damp wind gently lifted his hair as he quickly took visual count of his friends. All had arrived safely. He looked back at the fabric and saw a scene torn from open space showing the chamber and its chairs, where the Maesteri was bringing his song to a close in softer tones. The woven strands began to unravel, pulling back to a previous form and distorting the picture behind it. In moments, the lighted chamber was gone, replaced by unbroken terrain that met dark clouds at the horizon.
Vendanj went to Braethen and laid the sodalist on the ground, rolling his cloak for a pillow to cushion his head.
“Breathe easy,” the Sheason said mildly.
Then Vendanj put one hand over the wound in Braethen’s leg, holding his other palm over his navel. He said something that Tahn lost in the wind’s flapping of his cloak. Moments later, Braethen’s face relaxed. Vendanj applied an ointment and carefully wrapped the wound.
A shearing sound drew Tahn’s attention. Looking up, he witnessed a display of ever-changing, dazzling light mere paces away. Mira approached the coruscating brilliance, and shortly their mounts walked through another window of shimmering strands. The Far gathered the horses and left the breach before it could close, soon handing reins to the appropriate owners.
A distant flash of light blazed near a range of jagged mountains, followed by a muted roll of thunder. The charcoal darkness of the shale blended gradually with the darkness of the mountains and storm clouds that closed them in.
“The Soliel Stretches,” Mira said evenly. “Garlen is full of surprises.” She jumped astride Solus, and looked around in a full circle. “Naltus is close. We should take shelter from the storm.”
Another flash lit the night. Soon the grumble of thunder cracked and boomed around them; faraway coyotes or wolves raised howls of protest to the sound.
As they traveled, Tahn now and again caught glimpses of the silhouette of the man with tan skin looking at him. Perhaps Grant only appeared to be watching him, but in a dim streak of lightning, his eyes rested solely on Tahn, menacing with hidden purpose.
They passed tangles of bleached bone in the shale; small prongs of calcified skeletons jutted up from the earth, the size of the creatures’ bones confounding any guess Tahn had about what they’d been in life. More than once, Tahn thought he saw rows of shale piled in mounds like graves, where the hardness of the earth permitted only a covering and no final rest in the bowels of the land.
Then in front of them, as if appearing from no where, rose a city.
Massive walls had been mortared together from the same shale around them, making the city hard to discern, especially in the shadows of twilight. Watching close, Tahn realized something more. He could see no watch or movement; could, in fact, see no gate in the seamless outer wall, no congregants or merchants without the walls to harangue them on their way into the city.
What traveler would come here? Everything here feels isolated … abandoned …
As they approached, Mira spoke to them. “Strangers are seldom admitted past the gate.” She sounded unapologetic. “Be respectful.”
Sutter whispered, “I guess if you’re not a Far, you’re an outsider.” He smiled.
“We haven’t even seen anyone, let alone been stopped. How safe will we be?” Wendra asked.
“There are no secrets on the Soliel,” Vendanj explained, having heard their whispering. “Not to the Far. They have known of us since we came through the telling. News of our presence has surely been announced. A decision to admit us likely awaits our arrival at the city wall.”
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“And what if they will not let us in?”
“The errand we bear will prevail over any protest, I’m sure. But you are more than guests here.” The Sheason looked over them intently. “Every man and woman who comes into the Soliel is an unwitting model of life as it persists in the lands south and west: sometimes merchants, sometimes vagabonds, sometimes vain men given to adventure. The intentions of such men cast our kind in an unfavorable light. Beyond here is the Bourne to the north and the Saeculorum to the northeast. And beyond the Saeculorum the land comes to an end.
“But you pass this way with a different purpose than these others I name.” Vendanj leveled a threatening gaze over them all. “Do not sully that purpose with tricks or your own private contentions.”
The walls of Naltus Far were much taller and broader than they had appeared from farther away. Tracking the parapets proved difficult in the dark, but their tops were clearly visible each time the sky erupted in flashes of lightning.
Drawing closer, Tahn saw that the walls rose in smooth, sheer planes. No joints or extruded rock offered a foothold, and there was no gate. Mira led them to the base of the great wall. With sure movements, she traced a design on the smooth surface with her fingertips. Then she again made the pattern. And a third time.
When she’d completed her last pass, a whisper of escaping air came from the wall and a large door began to swing inward. Tahn strained to see what the Far had done, but saw no marking on the door, nor a traditional latch. The entry moved in a slow, deliberate arc but made no sound, no grinding of rock or squeak of hinges. Shortly, an entry large enough to admit a horse had opened in the wall. Mira rode through.
When they had all passed, Tahn found Mira standing silently before a male Far. Mira lifted her right hand and placed her middle three fingers on the other’s lips with a tenderness Tahn envied. While her hand still rested there, the male Far returned the gesture. Neither spoke a word. Mira withdrew her hand and motioned them to follow.
The city rose in sleek lines of shale. In places a dark wood augmented the architecture in the way of support posts or window dressing. But the impenetrable dimness of black slate prevailed in almost every structure.
“It’s not very attractive,” Tahn muttered.
“I don’t know,” Braethen said from behind him. “There’s a stark beauty in it, I think, a kind of simplicity, if nothing else. Besides, I don’t believe the slate is used because it is all they had.”
“What do you mean?” Nails turned in his saddle to look at the sodalist, who was avidly taking in their surroundings.
“I mean that I think the Far chose the Soliel Stretches because they are dominated by shale.” Braethen looked back at Tahn. “Or that the Noble Ones sent them here because of the shale.”
“Why? Has it got something to do with their personalities?” Sutter asked, quickly checking to be sure he hadn’t been overheard.
Braethen smiled as he explained. “Shale is noted in the histories as an element without Forda. Or at least, so little that it possesses no value to—”
“Quietgiven.” Grant silenced them with his intrusion. He looked straight ahead, but seemed to be seeing neither the stone nor Tahn and his companions. Tahn had a feeling that what the man saw was still in the Scar, that the man himself might forever inwardly tarry there. “The land may, with time, replenish itself. If left alone … if it is Will that it be so.
“This place, though. It is already at final rest.” Grant focused on Mira at the lead. “How they thrive here as they have done since the first turn … it is a wonder. There must be a reason to exile an entire people.”
The Far who had greeted them led on through only a few turns. Hooves beat at cobbled shale bordered by countless homes and shops and storehouses, but Tahn saw not one Far step into the street to watch them pass. Nor were any casually sauntering by, and he saw no faces peering from windows. He did not hear the usual strains of music from a tavern or the raucous laughter and shouts of men and women drinking toward inebriation. Everything was still as though slumbering, though many windows burned with light, even at this late hour.
An entire city like Mira. Are they all as beautiful?
They stopped before a large rectangular building with round, fluted pillars supporting a roof that covered an outer walk. Well within the pillars stood a hall three stories high. Long terraced steps rose in groups of two from the street to the first story. Mira dismounted and handed her reins to the man who had conveyed them there.
“Thank you, Secretary Bridgoe,” Mira said softly, her words barely carrying to Tahn’s ears.
“They convened when we learned of your return to Soliel. You are expected,” the secretary replied.
Tahn and the others stepped down from their mounts, and the male Far took their reins as well, escorting the horses away while Mira led Vendanj and the rest toward the large building, her gait slow but certain. Near the stone wall she went to one knee, bowing her head in the direction of the inner hall and holding her unguarded pose for what seemed a long time.
The sound of their passage came like the rustling of cloaks, and Tahn thought that they all walked on the balls of their feet to diminish the click of boot heels. The small hours of the night held sway in the quiet and depthless shadows.
Several paces on, they mounted a stair that led to a mezzanine. The light of large lamps gave Tahn a view of bookcases set in long rows. The tall shelves cast large, square shadows upon the vaulted ceilings above. Ahead of them were several closed doors. Upon each portal hung a different weapon as if an indication of what one might find within.
Immediately to Tahn’s right, a large wall was covered by an enormous map that stretched from floor to ceiling. Across it, names had been written in a tight, fine hand. Upon it he saw notation for cities he’d never heard of, and cities nearer to the Hollows than Myrr, and beside them all he found dates. Mostly, though, Tahn saw the names of battles, wars, and leaders, some of whose legacies lived in the stories they told at Northsun and late at night when mortal thoughts crept in upon even young boys.
Calem Heelstone at the Rise of Shalin during the War of the First Promise; Vancet Jonasilith I’Nesbitt, Lord of Nallan, who held Sever Ens while his people fled south to safety; Olan Forant’s name written beneath the Stand at Mal Point South. And more, so many that the map was crowded with its ink. Names Tahn had not heard, and handfuls of them in the northeast near Naltus, the writing smaller to keep each name discrete. One among them was penned in red: Kieronit Dalo, whose name dominated the rim of the mountains that lay beyond Naltus and the Soliel. The surname showed a tailing serif on the last stroke denoting gender—female, which Tahn surmised by finding Helaina’s name near Recityv. This Kieronit had earned a place of prominence for whatever she had done, and her name was nearly the last to be seen before the markings of the Saeculorum Mountains.
There was one last name: Elan. This one looked recent, and ran into the markings of the Saeculorum to the far north. It seemed clear some battle had taken place, and that this Far, Elan, had led his people to victory—his name was actually written in several places near the top of the map.
Tahn scanned past the sharp scores and jagged scrawls to a final legible writing, expecting to find the Heights of Restoration. But the word written there was not one Tahn knew. He peered through the dim light, straining to see. There, scrawled at the farthest corner of the map were the words Rudierd Tillinghast.
Simply reading the words filled Tahn with hot chills. At times, musicians traveling into the Hollows had played their songs, calling upon the noblest qualities Tahn could imagine to describe the value of surrendering life for liberty. More than once, A’Posian had sat for them at Festival and read aloud the fruits of his pen, his words carrying over the fire and evoking images in Tahn’s head that raised the hair on the nape of his neck. And when first Tahn had seen the Bar’dyn, rough hands cradling what fruit it could wrest from his sister’s womb, this, too, had caused severe feelings in his bosom.
The internal feeling wrought by these words at the edge of the Far map exceeded the sum of all these, was somehow both a threat and promise, condemnation and freedom, in the same breath. He shaped the words with his mouth, unwilling to give them voice. The act of merely reading them had stolen his ability to speak.
What might saying them aloud actually do?
Before he continued, Tahn knew in his heart that this notation on the map was the place they sought, the place Vendanj had set course for from the hearth at Hambley’s inn. With every step between, the Sheason had surely known more of what awaited Tahn than he ever shared. That corner of the map remained a mystery to him, a distant place more myth than reality. But those words, Rudierd Tillinghast, etched themselves on his mind and heart as though they had always been there. And of a sudden he believed he had likewise always feared them.
Would I have come if I’d known? Perhaps Vendanj had been right to be secretive.
The Far had gone to the left. They followed her down another stair that descended in long steps to the level below. Coming to the edge of the mezzanine, Tahn looked down on a small assembly of Far sitting in rows divided by a center aisle. Before them stood a young man who held a short crook in his hands, which he stroked thoughtfully.
Light-bearers stood stoically around the group, lanterns hanging from poles only slightly taller than their owners. The lamps glowed small in the vastness of the hall. Their presence felt merely symbolic to Tahn, rather than to actually provide light. He recalled Mira keeping vigil in the night with her bright grey eyes, taking in all that the darkness deigned to hide, not seeming to need light to peer into the night. If it were so, then he imagined the Far here possessed the same ability. Perhaps, then, the lanterns were for Mira’s friends—a welcome.
None of the Far looked up at them as they descended the stairs. Flat footsteps echoed in the hall, announcing their arrival. Still not a single head turned to greet them. At the base of the stairs, Mira held up her hand to stop them before she crossed to the man heading the congregants.
The Unremembered: Book One of The Vault of Heaven Page 81