Talyn the Dark did not pause or glance behind to see if he was actually following. Finn could hear her breathing, fast and low as if she had run a great distance—which was perhaps in a sense true. She was not the only one.
If the vision of the woman claiming to be his mother was correct, then the Bastion was his heritage as well. What of his father—was he Vaerli too? He had to be—but then shouldn't he look like one of them? He didn't have the dark hair and skin…
Finn couldn't think straight with his head full of so many questions. Nothing in his form or thought proclaimed him Vaerli, and he was not sure if he wanted anything to do with their perilous Gifts either.
So he said nothing to Talyn of what might be; he would not try to claim something he was not yet sure of. That could wait until the moment she dragged him before the Caisah to get her bounty, because if there was one thing Finn was sure of now, it was that she would complete her mission, dragon or no dragon.
Ahead the walls of salt curved away into unfathomable distance, but Talyn had stopped and put out her hand to steady herself against one. Concerned, Finn broke into a jog just as she began to scream. Before he could catch up, her whole body jerked and then she toppled over.
Finn yelled her true name, the one she wouldn't recall he knew. No reaction. Dropping to his knees, he gathered her up. Talyn was twitching so much he feared for her.
“Byreniko!” Her brother's name was torn from her throat.
Finn whispered her own into her hair as dread cramped his gut. For a long terrible time there was no answer, then Talyn's body twitched and her eyes flew open.
“He's gone.” She licked her dry lips before speaking again, “I heard a shout. A cry of victory or pain, I couldn't tell…and then all was emptiness.”
Finn didn't let go, wondering if she had heard her true name from his mouth. When Talyn didn't pull away, he thought of leaning in and kissing her, but her fingertips were on his lips. He had no idea how they got there. The Vaerli before-time was a cruel Gift indeed.
Talyn smiled and got out of his embrace with spare elegance. She walked away before reminding him, “I don't remember how it was to love you, Finn.”
Talyn was striding ahead of him, which was impressive considering her legs were much shorter than his. Then she was gone, not waiting to see if he followed.
Perhaps she was right. It was memory of love that had got him into this dangerous situation, and could still end with torture and death at the hands of the Caisah.
Finn paused for a moment to examine one of the beautiful murals that decorated the walls. This first panel, painted the most intense shade of malachite, was marred by a series of shadows. It didn't take his talespinner's mind to work out they were the terrifying outlines of people contorted in agony. The Harrowing had happened here, he reminded himself. This place was soaked in blood and ash even after all this time.
He trailed his hand along the panel, feeling the indentations that had once been living beings. The next frieze caught him enthralled. It was a beautiful dark-haired woman standing poised, looking out into the world as if behind a thin sheet of glass. The trail of pae atuae on her skin pointed her out as the Made Seer.
Curious at how such a lifelike image had been created, Finn touched her outline. A snap of electricity leapt from the wall to his fingertips, and the world contracted.
The woman who had saved him shook her head and looked out at him with star-filled eyes, not quite real but not quite dead either.
He heard his name called and looked over his shoulder to catch the strangest sight: Talyn with her mouth open on his name. Her eyes were wide with shock, but frozen in place like an insect in amber.
In the chilly corridor, the only things that seemed capable of movement were himself and the apparition from the wall.
“Mother?” Finn realized he had not called anyone that for many years. “What have you done?”
She sighed. Whatever portion of herself she'd left here was very slight—mostly gray—illusion. The talespinner part of him understood she had placed a tiny slice of herself aside in time. He'd learnt plenty of stories about such things: lovers who got to leave a last message, angry villains who wanted to spit out one final angry curse, or long-lost parents saying good-bye.
They all made good stories, but this was his mother—and she was smiling at him. Unfortunately, there was nothing to hug; his outstretched hand didn't even feel a chill when it passed through her.
“I wish that too, my son. I have put us between-time,” she said softly, “a place that even the Caisah's Hunter cannot reach.”
“You are Vaerli…that means I am Vaerli?”
“Part of you is…” She made a gesture that might have touched his face if she was corporeal.
“And your name?”
“Putorae.”
Finn's stomach lurched. That could not be true. Putorae had been the last Seer of the Vaerli, and had died just before the Harrowing. Yet she had the markings of the Seer and her powers were rumored to be greater than even a normal Vaerli. A thousand questions burned in Finn.
Her beautiful face creased with sorrow. “I know there is more than I can possibly tell you. This form only has so much power in it, not enough to tell the whole tale. It has been waiting a long time for you.”
It was grossly unfair. He above all people should have a proper story, and there was obviously a complicated one to be revealed.
“I have other slivers of my former self seeded along the way. You and your brother will have to find them.”
He had a brother! Shock chased all other thoughts from his head.
Unseen winds began to tug at her form, pulling her apart like tenuous mist. “Go back to your dragon, the one you have Named. He will take you to your brother and there will be more answers there, I promise.”
“But Talyn, she is…” Finn stopped, unsure what he was actually going to say.
His mother, his real long-lost mother, gave him a deep hard look.
She didn't need to say anything. He had a chance to make it right, a chance to understand his own past. He looked back to where Talyn the Dark was standing, hand opened toward him.
It was not concern that marked her face, but rather the vision of her prey slipping away. It said it all. She'd chosen to forget him and all they'd shared. Only an idiot would keep chasing a phantom, and he might be many things, but an idiot was not one of them.
He would take the advice of another phantom; this one at least loved him.
“Poor Talyn is lost to us,” the shade of Putorae, last Seer of the Vaerli reminded him. “Go quickly and find your brother, my beautiful son.”
So Finn had to make a choice. It had all seemed a simple plan to foment rebellion, so he'd never imagined he would be in this position. He had to abandon his dreams of Talyn the Dark throwing her arms around him and remembering their love. He just had to accept she'd chosen to forget.
“You're right,” he whispered. “Sometimes when you fight for someone you don't always win. In stories maybe that happens—but not in the real world.”
Finn would keep his memory of Talyn but release the dreams he'd nurtured. He needed answers—and she had none for him. While the ghost of his mother held the Hunter locked between-time, Finnbarr the Fox turned on his heel, back the way he had come to find his own destiny. Behind he left the hopes of his past.
Talyn pressed her hand against the now-vacant mural. She'd never had Vaerli powers used against her, least of all by one long dead. Finn had been there, hand touching to the frieze, and the Hunter had only enough time to recognize the face materializing in the wall before the trap closed on her.
Putorae had played the Hunter for the fool, using her own vain loyalties to the Vaerli against her. When the bubble in outside-time faded, only Finn's tracks remained, back the way they'd come. Dimly she'd caught the noise of the great Kindred dragon's wings leaving her to ruin.
It was worse than merely having lost her prey. Somehow Putorae had severed the bon
d between them; it was as dead as the Bastion itself. Talyn the Hunter now had no way of tracking Finn. Nothing to offer the Caisah. Alone, the Hunter sank to her knees with a sob.
Over the sound of her own tears she heard the whispers of fabric dragging in the sand. The woman's head and all those extra ones were hidden under a large hood. Leaning against the curve of the tunnel, Talyn wondered if she was imagining compassion in that gaze. Wordlessly, she beckoned Talyn toward her, before turning and walking away.
The Hunter had no other purpose, and it mattered little if she was killed at this point. If she fled there were only two fates possible: death by her people's hand, or death by the Caisah's will. Rather than make that decision, Talyn climbed to her feet and followed.
They came down into the gathering place. This was the great white and empty cavern where the Council had met to discuss business. It was also where the Harrowing had begun. The woman with her hood up seemed almost normal. “This is the last road for you, Talyn the Dark.”
She was right. All paths from the Bastion would end in the same place. Talyn should have saved the briefest recollection of being loved for a moment of desperation like this. Empty of fear or rage, she walked over to the other woman. She knew those eyes of bright stars; they could only be Vaerli.
“Why did you call me a fool?” she asked, sounding petulant even to her own ears. Funny how here at the end, pride was the emotion that remained intact.
“Not a fool, a child of fools.” The woman grinned. Talyn didn't flinch when the woman touched her; let flames take them both.
Nothing.
Looking up at the normal Vaerli face underneath the dusty hood, Talyn felt herself break. “It's impossible,” she gasped.
The other smiled tenderly. “We have no fear of the Harrowing. It cannot touch the Last Believers. We could teach it to you as well…if you choose.”
Tears were now running down Talyn's face. Words she'd never shared with another came bubbling out. “I've journeyed all this time with only my destination in mind, and I've never noticed where I stepped or whom I trampled on to get there. Looking back now, I wonder if there is a way back for me. Is it possible, do you think?”
The Vaerli smiled. “I have walked that path, and I know for such as we there is no going back. For Talyn the Dark, there is only going forward, because now you too are a Breaker of Oaths.”
“I know. I have failed the Caisah and my own people.”
The abomination's face softened into kindness as she held out a hand to Talyn. “To go forward you need to understand the now. Let me show you.”
What other alternative did she have? The other's hand was hot like that of a Kindred, but it felt to incredibly good to feel Vaerli skin on hers. It was a thrill she'd never expected to have again.
The woman led her silently deep into the cavern, through another dark passageway. They emerged, and there they were standing in the Golden Puzzle Room at V'nae Rae. Talyn looked about, sure her mouth was agape. They must have passed along one of the Threads of the Void, yet there had been no sensation at all. Every story she'd ever heard told of the horrors of using such a thing. Whoever the woman was, it was obvious she was a mistress of the Void to have passed through so simply.
It seemed like an age to Talyn since she had stood in this very spot, fitting the latest piece into place. She looked down at the puzzle spread out and gleaming in the sun. Bending, she caressed the leading edge, trying to recall every dark moment that had led to each piece.
“A valiant effort,” her new friend said—her constant companions whispered in her wake, “but don't you see how you have been fooled all this time?”
She cast her hand out in a sweeping gesture while the Kindred halo howled in accompaniment. The puzzle twisted; its pieces shuddering to reveal what the Caisah had always promised but dangled out of her reach.
It was a picture, a huge sprawling image, and Talyn recognized it at once; the last Seer of the Vaerli, dark, beautiful, and smiling softly. Putorae.
So it had been a cruel joke all along. The Caisah had broken their Pact and played with her all this time. This was not the answer to the Harrowing! It was all a sham.
Talyn had placed her trust in oaths and pacts and magic; standing right in front of her was the proof that such things could be cruelly false. With a howl of primal despair she lashed out at the Golden Puzzle. Kicking and screaming, she broke it apart in a whirlwind of frustration that washed over her and consumed all thought.
The feeling eventually drained away, leaving a panting Talyn looking down at the shattered and scattered pieces—bits of her past she could never put back together.
So engrossed was she in what she'd done that she didn't notice the doors swing open. For an instant the Caisah and his Hunter stared at each other in mutual shock. Out of the corner of her eye Talyn realized that her new friend had faded back into nothingness.
The tyrant was the first to recover. She saw the flicker of his expression change, as if he'd been about to say something and then changed his mind. As always, his thoughts flew faster than hers.
Smoothly shutting the door behind him, he took in the shattered remains of the puzzle. Then stepping over them, he spoke softly, “So, where is your prey, my Hunter?”
It was ridiculous. He could see what she'd done, so he must have known she'd discovered his trick, yet here he was calmly asking for her side of the bargain.
Ignoring his question, she glared at him. “You are a liar and an oath breaker of the highest order!”
He raised his eyebrows as if it was trifling matter. “On the contrary, I fully intended to give you the answer you wanted. It seems it is you who is the oath breaker.”
Talyn was lost to all reason. Dipping into the before-time, she drew her pistol and shot at her tyrant's forehead. If only it could have been that easy.
The Caisah flinched out of the way, though how he could have seen it coming was incomprehensible. Throwing aside the weapon he'd given her with a scream of frustration, Talyn drew her mother's sword and dashed across the room. Three hundred years of desperate hatred and loss had built up and now spilled over the edge of her control.
The tyrant, seeing all this, withdrew his own sword. He blocked her first wild swings easily. Talyn managed to rein in her anger, instead slipping into the before-time. He was there, as impossible as that was, parrying her blows, riposting so swiftly that she found herself forced back; at least he was having to defend himself.
Now as coolness stole over her rage, she wondered how this was going to end. In all the time the Caisah had been in power there had been many attempts on his life; some covert, some as blatant as this.
Knowing all this, Talyn understood she had only one chance. Throwing caution to the wind, she abandoned all conventions of swordplay and stopped thinking about what she was going to do. Instead she just let her body do it. It was a desperate measure to fool the before-time.
Instead of parrying his downward strike, Talyn stepped into the stroke. The blade smashed into her collarbone with all the power of his arm behind it. The pain was blinding as muscle and bone were sliced and pierced by the sword.
She had a momentary impression of his eyebrows shooting up in shock. His blade was caught in her flesh, which was struggling to manage the sudden flow of blood and repair what she'd allowed to be injured. Ignoring the agony by blind determination, she used her undamaged shoulder and her forward momentum to thrust him back on the wall.
Talyn had managed to surprise the Caisah—an unusual experience for him. Hearing the air get knocked out of his lungs, she didn't take the time to revel in it. Arching back against him like a lover in the throes of passion, she thrust forward with her mother's curved blade as hard as she could. The sword carved through the Caisah's shoulder and was buried in the wall behind him. The vibration of it piercing stone went through Talyn's injured collarbone so that she cried out with him.
It must have been a while since the Caisah had experienced real pain. She was mo
re used to it than he was. So that made two surprises for him in a very short space of time. She'd have to take satisfaction from that, at least.
While he was coming to terms with this new reality, she yanked her narrow knife free and nailed him through the other shoulder in a similar fashion. She could have tried to slit his throat, or sever his head, but she knew the stories, knew it wouldn't work.
He screamed again, but it was a sound he was having fun with. When he looked up, Talyn saw that he was actually laughing.
Shaking and realizing with horror that she was crying, she asked him the one question that had consumed her. “Who are you?”
They were closer than they ever had been—even while dancing at the masque.
“You want an answer, my hawk? You spend so much time looking for answers. I am afraid it is almost pathetic.”
She didn't care about her pride now. “I need to know,” Talyn pleaded, as if he could be reached with desperation.
He looked down at her hands clenched on his jacket, and sighed. “I am the leader that never should have been—the broken bird.”
She followed his gaze over her shoulder to where the large golden eagle statue spread its wings over the window. Strange how she'd never noticed before that under the eagle's claws was a rough edge, as though something had been broken off. More riddles and lies.
Turning back to him, she howled in frustration once again. It didn't matter; she was going to rip his head off just to see if the stories were true.
That was when the Caisah flexed his power. The air gathered around her and the Hunter was flung backwards against the wall. Trailing blood from her collarbone, she heard her ribs snap when she smashed into the unforgiving stone.
So they were both pinned on opposite walls: one by steel, one by magic. However, she was sobbing in anger. He was laughing.
Finally the Caisah's true face was revealed. It wasn't the calm one she'd always seen; instead it was one of complete madness.
The Hunter could feel the Caisah's Pact dissolving around her. It was as though her skin was being stripped from her and she howled at the unfairness of it.
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