Welgray’s mouth dropped open. “She didn’t try to delve me,” he said.
“She was on the run. Probably too afraid,” Llory suggested.
Merikal. Truly a miracle, indeed. “Did you tell the Chamber this? No, you didn’t,” he said quickly, responding to his own question. If she had, they would have ordered the child taken immediately. The implications of this dawned on him gradually. “You hid her presence from the Chamber for ten years,” he stated finally, neither accusingly nor conspiratorially.
Llory smiled at him. “Well said,” she noted approvingly. “You are correct. I knew they’d have her brought in, and ultimately, destroyed. If she wouldn’t bend to my will at six, she would only become more and more resistant, as well as powerful enough to become a real threat. The girl had no chance.”
Welgray noticed a lack of sadness in Llory’s eyes as she said the last; was she hiding it? Or something else he wasn’t catching? “Then what?” he asked. “You must have guessed she would be found eventually. Another Collector would visit the Lower Valley one day,” he pointed out.
“Of course,” Llory said. “That’s why I intended to return when she was old enough to be taken on as an apprentice.”
“An apprentice!” Welgray said, startled. “Personal students have not been adopted in centuries. It is forbidden in the Spire.”
Llory didn’t answer, but simply gazed at him, waiting.
“You intended to take her as a personal student, secretly,” he speculated after a moment.
“Yes,” Llory confirmed.
“But surely you realized the danger to the Spire! With the powers of a Collector, and no loyalty to us, she could bring down our entire order!” Welgray was horrified that she would consider such a thing. He was already questioning the wisdom of his decision to join her.
Llory, however, waved off his concerns. “Any student can be a danger, without proper guidance. And it is for the Chamber Seats to choose the form that such guidance should take. In any case,” she went on, sighing in feigned sadness, “now that the girl’s true power has come to light, it is all the more important that I follow through with my plan.”
Welgray blinked in astonishment. “She . . . can already manifest,” he stated methodically. “Teaching her our secrets would be a greater danger to the Spire now than ever.”
“Not if a Chamber Seat learned her skills of manifesting,” Llory said calmly, her words striking home like the blow of a hammer.
“You—” Welgray started, then his words caught in his mouth, prevented from escaping by his own astonishment.
“I intend to learn from her as well as teach her,” Llory said. “My plans were somewhat disrupted when the Chamber learned of the girl, but there is no reason not to proceed on my own.” She held her flagon up in a mock salute, and downed the last of whatever was in it. Welgray suspected wine; he thought he had smelled it on her breath, though the place was full of such odours.
“With that sort of power, you would rule the Chamber,” he conjectured.
“We would rule the Chamber, Collector,” Llory amended. “The girl is difficult to delve, and impossible to control, as you well know. But she already trusts you, to some extent. Together,” she said, her eyes seizing his and refusing to release them, “we can twist her to our service, and uncover her secrets.”
・
Welgray spent the night pondering Llory’s words, hardly able to sleep. He agreed with her approach, feeling that the Chamber was foolishly conservative in their decision to destroy the girl; there was just too much potential to leave untapped. But the fact that Llory had known about Sayri for over a decade—he found that difficult to accept. It suggested that she had intended to keep her a secret from everyone, and benefit from the girl’s gifts personally. It suggested ambition in the extreme; a desire to rule over the Spire alone.
So why include him?
Surely she could have sent him on his way with minimal deception. He had followed her because he thought she shared his wish to spare the girl from the Chamber’s wrath; it would be easy to dissuade him of that belief. But she hadn’t; she had offered to include him. Why?
Could it truly be that she believed herself unable to handle the girl? That she needed Welgray’s help?
It seemed unlikely. A woman of such power and ambition was not the type to admit her own limitations so easily; not without at least trying on her own. For that matter, if she did need help, why not approach another of the Chamber? There were certainly others who were ambitious enough to accept her plan, and they could probably be of greater assistance than he.
Why?
A rap sounded on his door; too firm to be Llory’s hand. It was very early morning yet, and few would deign to disturb a Collector if they could avoid it.
Welgray was up and properly dressed, so he bid whoever it was to enter.
The door opened, and the bullish proprietor poked her head around the half open door, bowing as she did. “Many thousand pardons I beg for disturbing the Master Collector, many thousands—”
“Accepted,” Welgray cut in. He despised such overly self-disparaging behaviour. “What is it, fair mistress?”
“Oh, your lordship is too kind,” the old woman sputtered, her cheeks reddening. “Oh, too kind,” she repeated.
“To what do I owe the pleasure, mistress?” he asked, standing from his seat at the only chair in the room, a small wooden one matched to the table with which it sat, near the window.
“Master Collector, I found this one fiddling with your fine beast, and she insists she belongs to you. A thief, I thought, to be certain, and was ready to call on warders, but I thought better to check with you first . . .”
Welgray strode briskly to the door, and pulled it all the way open. Wissa crouched sheepishly behind the burly woman, held by her wrist. When she saw Welgray looking upon her, she wailed and dropped to her knees.
“Master, Wissa was only carin’ f’ y’ Cardinal, truly, she swear it,” the girl cried, tears on her cheeks. “Please na callin’ the warders!”
The proprietor shushed her, but Welgray waved her off. “That will be all, mistress. I’ll handle this one,” he added, scowling at Wissa, who wailed further at his harsh expression.
“Master, I swear y’—” she began, stopping instantly as Welgray held up his hand.
“Wissa, I know you were not stealing my horse. You have certainly cared for him enough to recognize him, regardless of your expertise with horses, or lack thereof,” he observed placidly.
The girl stopped crying then, looking up him gratefully, but knew better to interrupt him. She was still kneeling in the doorway, so Welgray took her by the arm and led her into the room. He checked the hallway before closing the door; it was empty.
Assured of their privacy, he frowned at the Wissa. “You’d best tell me how you came to be here, when I ordered you to meet me in Sun Field?”
“Wissa knew Master needed her, so when he didna show in Sun Field, she come to him,” the girl said proudly, wiping her tears with the backs of her sleeves.
“And how did you know to come here, Wissa?” he asked.
She paused, blinking at him. “Master look very tired. Would y’ like Wissa t’ prepare nice bath?”
He narrowed his eyes at her. “Answer the question, Wissa.” She blinked at him several times, then opened her mouth; he interrupted her. “You are about to lie to me. Have you forgotten that I know your thoughts?”
She clamped her mouth shut, as if to stop the words from escaping. Then she opened it again to say something, thought better of it, and clamped it shut again, this time covering it with her hand. She stood like that, one hand covering her mouth, her eyes wide and staring at him.
Welgray sighed.
“You didn’t go to Sun Field. You knew I would not meet you, so you followed me here. Against my orders,” he added accusingly.
Wissa’s eyes welled with tears again, then, and she collapsed to her knees, wrapping her arms around his legs.
She was sufficiently larger than he that she probably could have picked him up; as it was, he nearly collapsed under the pressure of her grip.
“Release me,” he commanded, and though she continued to fuss, she let go and collapsed before him.
He knelt down to her, one hand stroking her hair. “Now that’s enough, Wissa. There’s no sense carrying on. I’m displeased, but I forgive you your disobedience. After all, I did intend to free you, didn’t I? I suppose I can hardly blame you for taking your own initiative, even knowingly against my wishes.”
She rose to her hands and knees, sniffling half-sobs at him, wiping her face. “Master f’give Wissa?”
“Yes, I forgive you, Wissa. But you will obey me from now on,” he said pointedly.
“Oh, yes, Master!” Wissa cried, leaping to her feet. “Wissa is ready t’ serve y’, whatever y’ need!”
Welgray blinked. How quickly the girl leapt from one emotion to another. And how devoted she was—she didn’t want her freedom, but simply to serve him! It made him uncomfortable to think about, but he did feel happy to see her.
“Wissa . . .” he said, reaching up and cradling her smiling face in his hands. “Don’t you want to go home?”
Tears still glistened on her cheeks, but her response was so soft and certain, it shocked him. “No, Master,” she said, her eyes focused. “Never.”
He pulled her head down and placed it on his shoulder, wrapping his arms with some difficulty around the girl’s back, and held her.
He couldn’t help but think of what had astounded him the most—what had shocked him to the core.
She had lied to him, back in the stables at the Spire. She had lied to a Collector, right to his face, all while he was twisting her.
Wissa was undeniably stronger than she was letting on.
・ ・
Cadinal had been brushed and looked well rested; Wissa knew how to care for him. She was loading Welgray’s gear into the saddlebags when he arrived.
Llory had acquired a horse, a lean, black gelding, on which she was already impatiently mounted when he emerged from the public house. “You’re late,” she accused, frowning.
“You said morning; you didn’t specific when,” he fended.
“Apparently you needed some extra . . . sleep,” she parried back, pointedly not looking at the girl.
Welgray sighed and mounted his horse, then reached down to pull Wissa up behind him.
The girl stared at him for a moment, horrified.
“You’d slow us,” he explained, his hand still outstretched. “Besides, you are no longer my servant, Wissa.”
She looked thoughtful at that, then took his hand and swung up behind him. Her arms came tight around him from behind and gripped his chest, and her breasts pressed against his back.
Perhaps this journey won’t be so rough after all, he thought somewhat cheerfully. Then, more seriously; I’ll have to protect this girl. This quest isn’t hers; she’s just here for me.
Llory was smirking at him making no attempt to disguise her humour. “I guess you’ll have to come up with a different label for her,” she prodded.
Extraordinarily, it wasn’t Welgray who answered, but Wissa.
“Yes,” she agreed.
24 JODHRIK
The idea had started out as a sailboat. Jodhrik was not a carpenter, and certainly knew nothing about shipbuilding, but he had seen plenty of small, light sailing craft plying the waters off the shore near Benn’s Harbour, and had a basic idea of what he needed to build.
Start with a hull; for that he’d need to make planks, or at least come up with some way to seal the spaces between boards or logs. Then fashion some sort of tiller, so it would sail relatively straight, and a method of steering; probably a makeshift oar would do for that.
The hardest part, he had expected, would be the sail. He’d need some sort of mast, or, failing that (and he imagined he would fail at that, with no ideas at all on how to secure it), a makeshift kite that he could use to capture the wind.
It was all good on paper—or on sand, as the circumstances required—but putting the plan into practice was another matter entirely.
The first stumbling block, and one that he had not taken into account at first, was the simple process of cutting down trees. The only implement he had was the stone axe that Bauma had produced; it was sadly inadequate for the task, and resulted in an afternoon spent pulping the trunks of trees and fighting to remove the stone axe from the resulting sticky mess. The trees were not at all like those in the Lords’ Lands, with stringy, hard outer bark and a mushy, soft interior. After a great deal of frustration, he gave up on the tall trees and examined the smaller, bush-like growths instead.
Those had more promise, with firm, flexible bark that floated high on the water, and were fairly easy to cut, but none had a diameter more than half a handswidth, making his initial ambitious plan of constructing a hull impossible. Instead, he began to focus on the idea of some sort of small, narrow, skiff made of sticks woven together with twine. When it was completed, he imagined it would be sealed with animal skins, if he could explain to Bauma what he intended (since he had no skills in hunting, and the beast-man seemed able to catch the meaty pigs that lived on the island at will).
The latter became quickly the more concerning of the challenges he faced. Once Bauma saw that Jodhrik was well enough to forage and begin work on his project, he began acting strangely. First, he stopped handing food to Jodhrik, and hissed at him when he helped himself to meat. Then Bauma started kicking Jodhrik in the middle of the night, barking at him; when Jodhrik got up to see what the commotion was about, Bauma started off into the forest. After a few days of this, one night the beast-man looked back at him as he walked away, barking and whistling; clearly he wanted to show Jodhrik something.
Jodhrik followed him into the forest, taking the stone axe, but Bauma came back and slapped at the axe, hooting. When Jodhrik failed to understand, the beast-man walked back to the camp, took a second spear and handed it to him.
“I don’t know how to hunt,” Jodhrik protested, but Bauma headed off into the bush again with his own spear, looking back at Jodhrik and barking.
Jodhrik stood there for a moment helplessly, then turned and went back to the camp. The beast-man didn’t return this time, and eventually he fell asleep.
He awoke to a high-pitched screaming; leaping to his feet, he witnessed something crashing out of the bush and tumbling through the still-glowing embers of the fire pit. In the partial starlight, he was only able to make out a hulking, four-legged form in a cloud of powdered ashes as a beast rolled and tried to stand back up.
Jodhrik stumbled backward, his back slamming against the trunk of one of the tall, hard trees. He heard a clatter over the squealing of the creature, and saw two spears fall beside him; they had been resting against the tree.
Jodhrik now saw that the creature was one of the wild pigs Bauma was so adept at hunting, and a large one at that; its head came up to his waist, and it had curved tusks longer than a dagger protruding above its snout. It rolled over again and attempted to stand in deep sand of the beach, the water only a few paces behind it. It stumbled and fell, then again tried to rise. Jodhrik saw something was wrong with one of its legs; it didn’t seem able to put full weight on it without collapsing.
He looked around desperately; for what, he didn’t know, but he saw a shadowy form standing at the edge of the trees; Bauma.
“Kill it!” Jodhrik yelled, running for the trees. He tripped over the gnarled roots that divided the beach from the waterfront. Behind him he heard the pig bellowing; he looked back and saw it had managed to get upright, and was facing him, its eyes wide and shiny.
Bauma was there, pulling Jodhrik to his feet. Relieved, Jodhrik pointed at the pig and bellowed again, “Kill it, Bauma!”
Bauma hooted and thrust a spear into Jodhrik’s hand, then shoved him toward the frothing boar, not hard enough to knock him down, but enough to make a point.
&
nbsp; He wants me to kill it, Jodhrik realized in horror as he found his footing in the deep sand.
He dropped the spear. He turned and tried to run into the trees, away from the desperate creature, but Bauma was in front of him instantly, seizing him by the shoulders and hurling him back to the beach. He fell to the sand with the spear in front of him. The boar snorted and charged, then collapsed after two steps, ploughing nose-first into the sand, sending a spray of grains over Jodhrik, who lay only a couple of paces away. It twisted violently to its left, trying to stand again.
Ignoring the spear, Jodhrik took advantage of the wild pig’s struggle by sprinting along the edge of the beach. If Bauma wouldn’t kill it, he would put as much distance as he could between himself and the injured creature; let the beast-man decide what to do with it.
He had covered about five paces then he was hit from behind, and overborne into the beach, face first. He came up sputtering and spitting sand, and pulling it from his eyes, desperately trying to locate the boar before it could trample and impale him.
Bauma was crouched over him. He seized Jodhrik by the lapel of his shirt and roared at him, tearing at his shirt; it ripped away, leaving the Proselyte bare from the waist up. The beast-man leapt up and threw a spear down on Jodhrik; it fell across his back as he lay on his belly in the sand. He rolled over and looked up at Bauma plaintively, but the beast-man was snarling at him, jumping up and down, and waving his arms in the air. The boar was bellowing now, and Jodhrik saw it had regained its footing, and was kicking its heels in the sand and snorting aggressively.
Either the boar or the beast-man was going to kill him. Jodhrik covered his ears, put his head down on the sand, and curled into a ball.
He heard Bauma grunt, the wild pig roar. There was a scuffle, then the animal screamed. A moment of desperate, gasping gurgles; a final impact. Then silence.
After that, Bauma didn’t let Jodhrik eat any meat; the first time Jodhrik reached for it on the cook-fire, the beast-man snarled and leapt up, striking him on the side of the head. He nearly knocked the Proselyte out, and a bump grew there, aching for days; Jodhrik didn’t try to take any meat again.
Sayri's Whisper: The Great Link Book 1 Page 27