by Sharon Hinck
I reached my arms around Caralad and positioned his fingers to bring a new chord from the instrument. Then I sank back, enjoying his discovery of the sounds while taking in the familiar songkeeper lodge. The large common room held a long wooden table down the center, clusters of comfortable chairs, and extra pallets rolled and stacked along the walls for the times when all the clans arrived in Lyric for feast day gatherings. Today only a handful of people were here . . . all familiar faces.
I asked Lukyan to keep Caralad entertained, and walked toward a woman I’d trained with years ago. She’d have answers to my questions. Now that I was away from the strictures of the healers in Braide Wood, I planned to learn about the last few years. Before I reached her, though, a timid knock drew my attention to the lodge doorway.
Nolan stood against one side of the open entry, as if clinging to the edge for support. His eyes took in the space nervously. His grip on the doorjamb relaxed when he spotted me. “Linette.”
I changed course and headed toward the doorway. “Well met, Nolan! Come in.”
He shook his head and backed away a step. “We heard you’d arrived in Lyric. Kieran would like to talk with you. Can you come?”
Kieran wanted to see me. My stomach gave a flutter. Silly of me. He probably wanted to meet with each of the songkeepers who had served in Hazor. Not that I’d have anything helpful to add, since my memories of Hazor began with entering the shrine. Reassured that Lukyan would take good care of Caralad, I grabbed a light cloak. The rains had ended, but I felt shivery and welcomed the added warmth.
I started to ask Nolan how he’d been, but he darted ahead, allowing no conversation. I followed him across the wide plaza in front of the worship tower. Beautiful white stone reached upward. Vaulted openings invited people into the huge space. Seeing the place where music had stirred my heart, and where mist had lowered and touched me with the tangible presence of the One, I drew a deep breath of remembered joy and peace.
“This way.” Nolan headed toward a small alley between nearby buildings. I’d been foolish to hope that Kieran wanted to meet in the tower. Back when I’d known him, he’d always been blatant with his scorn for the Verses and the work of the songkeepers. Another reason I needed to calm the strange flutter behind my ribs. Kieran and I had no common ground. But I still welcomed an opportunity to see him, if only to fill in a few more gaps about Hazor.
Nolan and I emerged into one of the many small parks near the central plaza. Set a few steps down, twisting honeywood trees created walls of brown and green while clusters of blue ferns absorbed gentle splashing from the fountain in the center. No one else lingered in the small garden today, though Lyric should be crowded this close to the feast day. The strange emptiness weighed on me.
Kieran sat on a bench and stared at the water, but he turned sharply at the sound of our approach. Strips of fabric crisscrossed the arms of his tunic and the legs of his trousers, and he wore his sword and his bootknife, not typical garb for the city. As I searched my memories of years past, most of the images I had of him were similar. Usually alone, always ready to pack up and move at a moment’s notice, eyes alert and piercing.
“Thank you,” he said in clipped tones.
I inclined my head in response, but then realized Kieran was looking past me at Nolan. Heat bloomed up my neck. I already felt off-balance, and I hadn’t even asked him any of my difficult questions.
Nolan shrugged. “She was easy to find.” Then he shot me a warm grin before jogging out of the secluded park.
“He has so much energy,” I said fondly.
Kieran snorted. “If we set him loose on Hazor, our problems would be over.” His sharp eyes scanned my face. “You look well. No return of the fever?”
I smoothed a fold on my robe and sat beside him. “I’m fine. Thank you for getting me safely to Braide Wood. I’m sure I made the journey more difficult for you and Nolan.”
He frowned. “And your memory? It’s returned?”
I brightened. “Not at first. But I found a child in the woods . . . I know this will sound odd . . . but he . . . I . . . I began to remember.”
Something like sympathy flickered in his dark eyes. “Everything?”
A subtle ache throbbed, and I rubbed my forehead. “No. And I hate this. I remember my childhood, the people I’d forgotten—but not the past few years. The healers told everyone not to tell me things, to let me remember on my own.” An edge of frustration crept into my voice.
Kieran smiled. “And you’re ready to rebel?”
I felt a sudden kinship with Kieran, the Braide Wood outsider. I raised my chin. “They’re wrong. I need to know. You don’t care about healers’ orders. Will you tell me everything that’s happened these last years?”
“I could.” He crossed his arms, watching me closely. “I could tell you that Jake’s still missing. Does that mean anything to you?”
I searched my memories and shrugged. “Wade told me he was a Restorer and disappeared, but I don’t remember him.”
The furrows on his brow deepened. “I could tell you all the political danger we’re in, all the news, everything that’s occurred, but would it make a difference?”
My shoulders sagged. “You’re right. Even if you tell me everything, it won’t be the same. It would just be words—someone else’s story. I’ll still have lost those parts of me. Never mind. It was a silly plan.”
He shook his head. “It’s not that I won’t tell you. I just think you should be asking for more.”
“More?”
“Linette . . .” He scanned the quiet garden, the windows of nearby buildings that looked down on us. “Do you remember the things I told you on the trail?”
I tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. “Not much. The fever made everything confusing.”
“We were in Hazor because the One called me to be a Restorer.”
I tried to keep the doubt from my face. “I wasn’t sure I’d heard you right.” I’d studied the Verses all my life. I knew the One used unlikely vessels. Yet it was still hard to imagine.
The side of his mouth quirked, then he sobered. “While I was the Restorer—and even since—the One has sometimes brought healing through me.” He braced an ankle over his knee and adjusted the strap of his bootknife. All the reckless confidence I remembered of him seemed to have fled. “So,” he said, “could I . . . Would you allow me to talk to the One on your behalf?”
The notion was as foreign as the idea of Wade teaching Tara how to spice her stew, or Tristan doing a three-peg weaving. I tried to nod, but a strange reluctance gripped me. Listening to him speak to the One would feel so . . . intimate. My pulse rushed inside my ears.
He shifted as if about to stand. “Of course if you don’t actually want to remember . . .”
He was baiting me, and I knew it. But I couldn’t stop a flare of temper. “Don’t be ridiculous. I need to know. But you? You . . .”
The lines of his face tightened. “But me.”
I hadn’t meant to make him angry. “It’s not just you. I’m uncomfortable around everyone. I remember bits and pieces but don’t really know you . . .”
“And you can’t imagine that the One would want to hear any request from me.”
Behind the bitter edge of his words, I heard a current of sadness that confused me.
“The One invites everyone to speak to Him.”
He turned away. “Break out the songkeeper proverbs. You are getting back to normal.”
I’d disappointed him somehow. Why couldn’t I seem to take a right step these days? I crossed my arms. “It sounds like you’re the one looking for an excuse to walk away. Why did you even offer if you just want to argue?”
His eyes widened, then he laughed. “Fair enough.” He held out a hand, callused and strong. I rested mine in his, my fingers looking fragile by comparison. His touch caused another stran
ge twist in my stomach, but thankfully he lowered his head.
“Holy One, You made Linette. You know her heart and mind. I don’t need to convince You she’s worthy of Your touch. You give gifts simply because You love us.”
His words surprised and humbled me. And he didn’t speak with the formality I’d learned in my training.
“I also don’t need to remind You how unworthy I am to ask You for this. I don’t trust in my worth. I trust in You.”
His hand squeezed mine. If faith could flow through skin, my courage would grow from the trust he imparted.
“Restore the rest of her memories.”
Something rippled in my mind. What had been a wall became a gauzy curtain, the fabric of such a light weave that I could see through it. Slowly, even that thin barrier began to part.
Scattered images flew around me, and one by one as I focused on them, I reclaimed them. Strangely, the first that I captured centered on Kieran.
The clans had been threatened. I knew that now. I remembered how it felt: the rising terror at the sight of Hazor’s cavalry stretched across the fields outside Lyric, the pang of watching from the wall as a lonely figure walked out to face them, the awe as mist gathered around the tower and the One protected us.
Memories from the seasons in Hazor also swept into sight: the thrill of being called to assist the Restorer, the efforts to share hope and light, struggling to support Kieran, battered by inadequacies.
From this distance of forgetting and reclaiming, I had more mercy on myself. I had poured my heart into serving. I could see now what I had been blind to then, that the One treasured my service, regardless of human measures of success.
I drew a deep breath, the peace of forgiveness opening my lungs. Would it be like this at the end of life one day? This view of my life through the One’s tender eyes?
“Are you all right?” Kieran’s gruff voice tugged me briefly into the present.
“Yes. It’s returning.” Tears choked me. “I’m seeing—no, I’m reliving it all.” I couldn’t spare more words. There was more to discover. Secure that I once again had access to all the memories of the work in Hazor, I cast further back. I remembered meeting Susan, sitting on the transport and explaining the clans to a woman who had come from some far-off place. Other new memories tumbled me forward. Being caught outside at night. The bear. Wade’s injury. The weeks of helping Susan . . . introducing her to Lukyan, finding ways to support her in her difficult calling.
The song I’d been writing during those weeks. I remembered blushing as I talked to her about . . .
Dylan.
I gasped and my hands flinched.
Kieran held on. “What’s wrong?”
“Dylan!” I gasped. How could I have forgotten all that love? All that longing? “But where has he been? Why did I go to Hazor without him?” I saw his wind-tossed hair, heard his easy laughter, tasted the giddy joy as we made plans. I’d been pledged and forgotten it? Forgotten him?
“Where is he?” I pulled away from Kieran and stood, glaring down at him. “Why hasn’t anyone told me?”
Compassion muted the burning intensity of his eyes. There it was, that same expression I’d caught at odd moments from others. That strange, uneasy withdrawal.
“What? Tell me.”
He stood and held my shoulders. “What do you remember?”
“He’s a guardian.” Even in my desperate scrambling for knowledge, I spared a smile. Tearing across the prairie on his lehkan, Dylan embodied confident courage. Stacking logs for the home he built for us, he exuded playful energy. Striding toward the transport stop for one of his guardian assignments, he radiated noble sacrifice. “I love him.”
A muscle flinched on Kieran’s face, but he continued to meet my eyes. “Keep following the memories. What else?”
Love swelled in my heart, filling me, strengthening me. The idea that I could have forgotten this was inexplicable. No wonder I’d felt so incomplete. Half of my heart had been missing. I beamed. “We’re pledged. He went on patrol . . . just before Susan came to Braide Wood.”
The curtain was completely pulled aside now. Almost all my memories had returned. All that remained was one corner where the fabric hid the last piece of knowledge, draped like a shroud. I closed my eyes and in my mind stepped closer toward that last corner. A chill brushed over my skin.
“No,” I whispered. After all these weeks of struggling to remember any wisp of my past, I suddenly wanted to cover this cubby and leave it undisturbed.
“You don’t want to remember.” Kieran’s quiet voice sounded resigned, weary.
How did he know?
“Even when you knew, you didn’t want to face it. Maybe forgetting is a gift.” This time he wasn’t taunting or challenging me. Even so, his words made me want to prove him wrong.
“I will remember.” Eyes still closed, I looked around at the swirl of happy memories, the beautiful parts of my life I thought had been lost to me. They stirred hope and strength. I was ready to be whole, to move forward. Holy One, reveal the rest to me.
The shroud melted away. I was in Markkel and Susan’s lodging in Lyric, racing across the common room to meet Tristan. He was bringing news from Cauldron Falls. His haggard expression told me the truth—the truth that every cell in my body resisted hearing. Like a blow to my stomach, I heard his words again, as if for the first time. “I’m sorry. He gave his life defending all of us.” I had crumbled then, Susan’s arms supporting me.
My knees gave way now, too, as a sob tore from the deepest place in my soul. Once again there were arms to hold me, and some distant part of me was grateful. But there wasn’t room for much awareness beyond the searing pain. Tears poured from me, and my shoulders shook as I cried so hard I came close to choking.
Sweet Dylan. Precious Dylan. I knew it all now. Our hopes, our plans. After he died, I’d often dreamt—beautiful, vivid dreams where we were together. When I’d wake up, the shock of realizing he was gone would hurt me all over again. This was similar, but so much worse. How could I have forgotten? And how could his loss hurt this badly when I’d only just remembered our love? But it did. And why would the One make me live through this horrific news more than once?
“I’m sorry.” Kieran’s simple words broke through the torrent of grief. I realized I was kneeling on rough cobblestone, clinging to his coarse-woven shirt that was wet with tears. He’d sunk to the ground with me, supporting me. Part of me wanted to draw comfort from his arms, but part of me resented him for causing this horrible pain.
“You knew.” I pushed away. “Everyone knew. How dare the healers tell people to keep this from me? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“When?” His eyes glinted. “When you didn’t even know me? Or later when I was doing everything in my power to get you to Braide Wood, but it looked like the fever would kill you?”
His blunt assessment only made me more furious. I shoved away from him. “Then why did you ask the One to show me now?”
His shoulders sank for a moment, but then he raised his chin and the lines of his face hardened. “There are serious problems facing the clans. Bigger than any one person’s grief. We need you.” He rubbed his forehead. “I need you.”
His quiet admission sparked a strange, twisting tingle in my chest.
Now that I was fully myself again, I remembered working with Kieran in Hazor. Assisting him had been a welcome distraction from grief . . . but also confusing . . . a bewildering blend of conflicting feelings.
How could I be so disloyal to the memory of Dylan? I scrambled to my feet. “I’m sure you’ll figure out how to save the clans again.” I welcomed the bitter taste of my words. It made it easier to pull away.
He launched to his feet, but I held up my hands, warning him off. “Leave me alone. I need . . .” What did I need? I couldn’t untangle the pain. I couldn’t find words for what I needed.
I only knew I had to get away from Kieran. So I turned and ran from the courtyard. I half expected to hear a string of curses following me, but other than the soft splashing of the fountain, there was only silence.
Chapter
27
Linette
I dashed tears from my eyes as I hurried across the central plaza of Lyric, trying to outrun the renewal of grief. The large buildings all seemed duller than usual, and even the soaring walls of the worship tower looked more grey than white. The dimming sky announced the approach of the evening meal, but I wasn’t ready to face a lodge full of Lyric songkeepers.
As I passed an arched entry of the worship tower, my feet slowed. I slipped inside the empty building and walked the familiar floor toward the center. Even this late in the day, the soft glow through crystal windows reflected off the shimmering white walls. Many times, that trick of light had reminded me of the One’s holiness and stirred my eagerness and joy. Today, that reminder almost made me withdraw.
How could I face Him? My muscles trembled with the need to shake my fist at Him. He wasn’t protecting the clans. Enemies surrounded us. Our work in Hazor had failed. And He had stood by while Dylan died a senseless death.
Dissonant, jarring, my songkeeper training filled my head: the One was perfect. He loved me. I couldn’t blame Him for all this pain and confusion.
I did.
Sinking to my knees by the round podium in the middle of the tower, I rested my elbows on the railing and buried my face in my arms.
“I should thank You,” I said quietly, struggling to hide my anger. “You gave me what I longed for. My memories. But . . .” Forcing a tone of respect only closed off my throat. Restrained Linette, the faithful songkeeper. I knew all the right words, but my spirit was a clashing chord, all mangled sounds and broken strings.