Exile's Return

by Gayle Greeno

  But another part of his mind screamed for self-preservation, to run away as fast and as far as he could, away from the carnage, away from the boy’s malign influence. Tadj scrambled away on hands and knees, not feeling the blows, the pain as he was kicked and shoved by passing feet.

  The cellar floor seemed to swim before her eyes, swarming figures, screams of rage and lamentations, exhortations. And in the mist of it all, Doyce Marbon collapsed to her knees, rolled onto her side, breath coming in harsh, short pants, her whole focus centered on the explosive pain of a baby demanding to be born. Now. “I can’t hold back anymore,” she groaned to Khar, “it’s coming too fast.” Second pregnancies rarely followed the long, tortuous process of a first delivery, and she’d felt her water break longer ago than she wanted to remember.

  A foot bruised her shoulder, but the pain was a mere distraction, a minor insect bite against the waves of pain that swept through her, but it made her shout aloud, “Jenret!” “Jenret, dammit,” she screamed in her mind, “this is all your fault!”

  Miraculously, Bard was at her side, a serious-looking little girl in tow. “She’s bad, far along,” the child said, placing her hands on Doyce’s stomach. “Coming faster than Mama ever came.”

  Bard tried to scoop her up, arm beneath her shoulders, the other beneath her knees. “We’ve got to get her out of here before we’re all killed! Darl and Faertom and Garvey are already dead.” The urgency of the unborn twins’ tiny mindvoices was shaking him to the core, tearing at his heart and mind, making him sick with worry.

  “Don’t think you can move her now, no matter what.” Lindy stripped off her coat, stuffed it under her head as Doyce arched back, teeth sunk into her lip.

  Khar was stretched beside her, her own flanks heaving. “Leave her be, there’s something even greater being born.” Her head tilted in a silent cry that unnerved M‘wa. “Just find Jenret.” And M’wa nodded, sent out his mindcry and stood guard.

  Standing behind Eadwin, sword drawn, Jenret heard Doyce’s mindcry, knew Muscadeine, Eadwin, and Dwyna had faintly heard it as well. The cellar pit was being rapidly surrounded now; more Guardians and Marchmontian soldiers streaming in, much to Muscadeine’s relief. He’d mindcalled for reinforcements as soon as they’d left the mayor’s house, regardless of Eadwin’s wishes. He gestured for them to let the people fleeting the pit through, drain some of the mayhem clear, like lancing a boil, but still a red-hot throb of activity surged at the center. Whether the crowd would dissipate quickly enough to ensure Eadwin’s safety and help Doyce and the others, he wasn’t sure.

  “Dear Lady, she’ll be trampled, the crowd’s going wild, some fleeing, some fighting. Go to her, Jenret,” ” Muscadeine urged, roughly shaking his shoulder. ”She’s called for you, though I’ve heard sweeter love calls. Eadwin and I’ll have the Guardian squad down there cordon her off from the fighting—there’s enough of them for that but not for much else. Best they get used to taking orders mind-to-mind. ”

  Jenret plunged down the slope, Dwyna behind him, her eumedico satchel in hand. No way for him to see Muscadeine’s wistful look, though Eadwin did. Yes, Doyce wanted Jenret, and rightly so, face the facts, man! She was never yours.

  “Beloved,” Khar implored. “Soar with me, take the pain and soar with me through the Spirals.” It was the best she could offer as Doyce’s pain became her own, as her own pain invaded Doyce. “Concentrate, beloved!”

  And Doyce bore down, felt the pain tear through her, ripping and shredding her flesh and soul, tried to fly, not to flee it, but to ride on it. Soar? How could one soar on mangled, torn wings, but she pumped higher and higher, Khar cajoling, urging her on. Other voices encouraging her now, other ghatti, some she knew, some she didn’t, and a dimly familiar voice feathering her brain, laughter chiming, bracelets chinking. Dwyna? Dwyna Bannerjee?

  But she didn’t have time for that, she labored upward, bouyed by Khar’s encouragement, mingled with Khar’s pain. Yes, she would soar. “Bear down now, that’s right,” Dwyna’s voice encouraged, “The next one will come easier.” Next one? Next pain? No—why could she hear the thin squall of a baby?

  She seized control of her mind—after all, wasn’t pain something the mind could control, override if it had to?—and with each downward thrust she let herself spiral higher, mind reaching eagerly out to survey everything it could see. Pain and exultation, touching on every mind around her, rippling out from that like waves, touching and touching and touching....

  So many minds, some known, some strangers to her. Past Jenret’s with a whispered endearment, all she had time for, because he was beside her now, but only her body was there. Mahafny, near but not near enough, looking up from Harrap’s bedside, her face touched with wonder, and Parse’s with surprise. For a moment Harrap sensed her presence, felt the craving fade. Swan, in the distance, sinking closer to death, but still not giving up, smiling as she felt Doyce’s mindtouch like a benediction. Her mother and sister, clinging to each other, the livid burn mark on Inez’s hand turning pale, healing.

  And with pain as her vehicle she drove it forward, intent on reaching her goal. “A boy this time,” a child’s voice cried out, but another voice interjected, “She’s started to hemorrhage, an artery’s torn.”

  The pains had eased but she was weakening, starting to drift off of course as Khar encouraged her, lofting her higher. Well, if her body couldn’t keep up, her mind could, and she reveled in the joy of following after Khar, surging past and beyond her. “Ah, beloved, not too high or you’ll crash.”

  And all around Doyce, around the laboring figure, people stopped short, Resonant and Normal alike, Reapers and Guardians and average citizens, all felt a touch of the mighty battle being waged in one woman’s mind and body. The will to live and love as her body pumped its lifeblood on the already crimsoned ground. Some quaked in fear, praying a brave soul would live. Others stood cheering, urging her on, all of them caught in the same web of passion and pain, and it spread slowly all across Canderis as people stopped in their tracks, looked upward at the night sky as if they could see her soaring there.

  “Hurry, Khar, she begged, gasping. ”Don’t leave me now.”

  “I’m coming,” she heard faintly from behind.

  “Welcome,” the voice said, others echoing it, “Wel ... wel ... come ... come ... come ... come.”

  She smiled to herself. “So, Kharm, beloved of Matty, we meet at last. ”Hands closed gently on hers, “And Matty as well. Did you return to Coventry? I never read that far, I’m sorry. Strange for us both to be from the same little town, yet so many years apart.”

  “Yes, I did, but we can save that for later.” She strained to see him, see him in reality as she had seen him in her mind, the straight, serious brows, the dark blue eyes, the boyish face firming into a hard-won adulthood. “You came seeking answers to questions, though I’m not sure you found any answers to help. I’m sorry. ”

  He was translucent, she was looking right through him, but then, her hands seemed equally clear. “No, the journey itself holds half the answer, at least. Your journey wasn’t easy, but you did it. ”

  “Then you think you can help people come to terms with each other, Normal and Resonant?”

  “You managed to make them come to terms with the ghatti and their powers, ”she persisted. “All I can do is try as hard as you did.”

  “Time to return now,” Kharm purred in her ear. “Poor Khar’pern couldn’t spiral all the way, but she does have two of the loveliest little ghatten you’ve ever seen.”

  “Ah,” a relief, that, to know that Khar was fine, “is it easier going down?” Soar on broken wings, land on mangled feet. Falling faster now, faster and faster, no control, no control at all! But she didn’t care. Speed was needed.

  Jenret pressed his fingers against Doyce’s carotid artery, caressed her clammy brow with the other hand. “I’m losing it, Dwyna,” he warned. “It’s weaker and weaker. Hurry, for the Lady’s sake!”

  Arms blood-s
oaked to the elbows, Dwyna Bannerjee worked between Doyce’s thighs, probing inward and upward. “I’m trying! I can see where it’s bleeding, it’s clear in my mind, but I can’t get in to clamp it. Can’t reach!”

  “Try harder!” He would not lose Doyce, he would not—not after all this, not after he’d barely found her. She towered above him, beyond him in goodness and strength, and he needed her for his soul’s completion.

  Dwyna caught Eadwin’s and Muscadeine’s gazes from where they’d been shunted to the periphery with Bard, safe inside the Guardians’ ring. Wincing, Muscadeine tucked his bloody sword behind him, silently cursed Eadwin again for abandoning the relative safety their forces offered at the top of the pit, insistent on dashing below to see if they could help. The young Seeker woman they’d nearly crashed into on the floor of the pit had been unarmed, but she’d been brilliant at hand-to-hand combat, had managed to snag the bridle of a braying, kicking white mule ridden by Doyce’s sister, so he’d gathered. The mule hadn’t been half-bad support either. It had a natural talent for letting its heels fly at an enemy, and Doyce’s sister had sent two potential threats reeling with blows from her cane. Her handicap hadn’t crippled her feisty spirit.

  “Can you reach her mind-to-mind?” Dwyna begged Jenret.

  He shook his head, “She’s involved in a conversation beyond this life. I can’t break through to her.”

  Arras whispered, “I think she’s the strongest Resonant ever born.”

  Dwyna let out a groan. “It’s no use! I can’t put any pressure on it! I can’t reach!”

  “Mayhap I can. I’ve got smaller hands,” Lindy crouched at Dwyna’s elbow. She shook her long, blonde hair back, pushed up her sleeves.

  “Absolutely not! Your hands are filthy. I can’t risk infection on top of everything else.” The girl rubbed her hands on her dress, looked imploringly at Bard. Stripping off his coat and wrapping it around his hands, Bard went to the brazier, removed the copper basin, its water still steaming. He knelt before Lindy and she winced, began methodically washing her hands, making little sounds of dismay at the water’s penetrating heat.

  “But you can’t ’see’ where to reach, only I can,” Dwyna despaired. “She can’t take much more fumbling around inside, I’ve done more than enough.”

  Davvy held Lindy’s shoulders. “I can tell where it is, guide Lindy’s hands through my mind.”

  Swiping her brow with a bloody forearm, uncaring, Dwyna wondered wearily when children had become eumedicos. She didn’t care, anything was worth a try. “What you do when you reach it is—” she started to explain.

  How the Erakwan woman had broached the defensive circle, Dwyna didn’t know. She only saw Addawanna staring compellingly at Jenret, as if willing him to do something. Mouth agape in amazement, Jenret freed one hand and pulled a knife from his boot top; Dwyna stifled a scream of surprise. “I believe this belongs to you, your people. Forgive me, I forgot I had it.”

  Addawanna accepted the knife with a grateful smile, touched it reverently against a small birch bark packet. Suddenly the scent of growth, of the earth, filled the air. “Whad you do is press dis gainst it, hold it dere hard til Addawanna say ’nough.”

  Now Dwyna had had enough—ghatti ’speaking her, transmitting Mahafny’s chivying advice, desperate suggestions, children interloping on her domain, and now this, this Erakwan woman with a smelly, disgusting handful of pulverized ... something, she didn’t even want to think what. Totally unsterile, unidentifiable, twigs and leaves to carry and hold infection. “Absolutely not!”

  The black ghatt, Rawn, stared her down. “Do it. Mahafny says trust Addawanna.”

  And damn Mahafny for ordering her around like this from a distance—she wasn’t on the scene, couldn’t judge the gravity of the situation! She was a Resonant eumedico, surely knew better than a Canderisian eumedico dependent on physical, not mental talent. “I don’t care what Mahafny wants!” With shock Dwyna realized that both Rawn and Hru’rul had bared their teeth, hissing a clear warning. Before she could muster further protest, Eadwin and Arras had dragged her clear. Chastened but still determined to exert at least a modicum of control, Dwyna nodded unwilling permission, and the girl seized the contents of the packet, plunged her hand inside Doyce. “Do I want to know what that is, Addawanna?”

  “Neh. Mebbe someday Addawanna get round ‘splaining to you. Eumedicos don’ know ebry-t’ing.”

  The crimson tide pumping from between Doyce’s thighs slowed, ebbed to a trickle, finally stopped.

  “Dat be ‘nough, Addawanna t’inking,” and Lindy obediently pulled out her small hand. “No movin her fer while.”

  EPILOGUE

  Doyce snugged the plaid lap robe closer and swung slippered feet onto the chair across from hers, looking guiltily to see if anyone would scold her. So many people had surrounded her, fussing and bustling for the past two octs, that she couldn’t do a thing she wanted to do. But tonight she was almost blessedly alone—if you didn’t count two infants content in their cradles and a ten-year-old nursemaid sound asleep on a couch. She might, just might, have time enough to finish the last chapter of the Bicentennial History of the Seekers Veritas. A wave of laughter came from downstairs, Jenret holding court with the last of the guests from the naming day celebration.

  The babies roused and stirred, made eager little grunting sounds. “Davvy, stop that this instant! The babies are settled and Lindy’s exhausted.” Blast the boy! The infants recognized his mindvoice, reacted when they heard him “tweaking” them. It had taken her time to realize that that was why they’d often been so unsettled during her pregnancy when Davvy was anywhere near.

  An unrepentant, “Sorry!” floated up to her.

  “You’re hardly alone when I’m here,” came a muffled voice from the closet. “These ghatten are insatiable, they never stop nursing.”

  “When they fall asleep, come out and keep me company.”

  But the last few lines of the history eluded her, so she doodled instead. So wonderful to be back in their stone house on Headquarters grounds, she and Jenret and the babies.

  “And your mother and Francie and Jenret’s mother Damaris and Jacobia and Syndar Saffron and ... need I go on?” Khar sounded equally weary of visitors.

  “Well, we had to invite everyone for the wedding and the naming day. ”She’d been moved back to Gaernett by slow, easy stages an oct after the babies’ births when Mahafny and Dwyna were confident she wouldn’t bleed again. At first she’d feared Khar wouldn’t return with her, the ghatten, eyes still closed, too young to travel, but Sarrett and Per’la had helped, taking zealous charge of a large wooden packing crate stuffed with straw for Khar and the ghatten to nest in, safe from prying eyes. The crate had been transferred to the closet here, and it wasn’t until earlier today that she’d been privileged to see the ghatten.

  She grinned. What a day, and what a night from the sounds below. Parse’s voice rose high and indignant, “I did not lose the plans, Mahafny! I left them there on the table for you while you and Jenret were outside hammering away, pulverizing that device.” “Well, they weren’t there when I came back.” “I think I can remember how to redraw it, though the ratios may be slightly off.”

  An insidious device that revealed Resonant powers whether the person wished it revealed or not. A chill crept up her spine—would she have wanted to know in advance of her bursting forth, her powers surging high in the midst of the contorting pain—hemorrhaging after labor, drained almost bloodless—and then sweeping through to fill the emptiness within her. No, and pray the Lady that the plans were well and truly lost, hadn’t fallen into the wrong hands. Not while at least a tenuous reservoir of goodwill existed between Normals and Resonants, the deaths of Darl and Faertom, Garvey, Hylan, and Bazelon Foy amongst others serving as an all too grim reminder of what could happen, had almost happened. Too bad the one that Lindy and Davvy referred to as Tadj had escaped, but surely he was long gone by now.

  Goodwill had deepened as well
between Marchmont and Canderis, Eadwin and Muscadeine hastily canceling the royal progress after Ruysdael and returning to Gaernett as part of Doyce’s anxious escort, surrounded by his soldiers and Guardians. Eadwin and his people had been spending long days with the recuperating Monitor and the High Conciliators, and she suspected the talks ranged from trade and tariffs to the utilization of Resonant abilities. Certainly Mahafny had looked abstracted of late, muttering to herself about aptitudes, training periods, and testing.

  As to her own skills, she wasn’t sure where they would lead her, content to take it “with all due, deliberate speed,” as Arras had advised. Comfortable, safe, right to touch the infants’ minds, explore a whole new universe of closeness with Jenret, or chastise Davvy, but there must be a happy medium between those “simple” pleasures and touching every mind on Methuen! Well, it could be put off a bit longer.

  Think of pleasanter things, she sternly ordered herself, because for once she was surrounded by happiness. The wedding this morning, Harrap unaccustomedly brief and totally solemn. It hadn’t seemed terribly necessary somehow, but Harrap refused to name-bless the twins unless Doyce and Jenret were joined in matrimony. “The Lady will bless them whether I do or not,” he’d said, “but no blessing from me unless you commit yourselves.” So they had, and Inez had cried, and Francie had cried, and everyone else, herself included. Yet even that had been marred, some of her tears a secret mourning for the burly, bouncy Harrap who once was, replaced by a gaunt, gray soul still conquering the craving for Hylan’s special drug and the transcendent communion with the Lady it had offered.

  The only one missing today had been Swan, and for that Doyce grieved. The Seeker General hovered at the twilight borders now, no matter what Mahafny and the other eumedicos did for her. Jenret and Bard had carried Doyce in to see her, but Swan barely recognized her. Without Swan’s presence, something essential was lacking.