by Sharon Lee
He lay on the dead wooden floor, the burning in his flesh as nothing beside the burning of his desire for the rich opiate of those colors. His kest rose, beyond his will, beyond outrage or shame, blindly seeking to join, power to power, and if it were subsumed, what matter?
For a long exhalation, he hung poised between horror and need. If he were to cede control, allow his base nature rein . . . Depleted as he was, he would most certainly be overcome—subsumed, dead to agony and desire alike.
His essence joined forever to that which he hated.
"No . . ." he whispered, and exerted himself, trembling with the effort. The first lesson of childhood, and almost, it was too much for him. The colors poisoned the air, and he retched weakly—then screamed as the lash stroked his chest—screamed, and screamed—
"Wake!" The voice was loud, and something about it suggested to his disordered senses that it was not the first time that command had been uttered.
He gasped, the memory binding him, every muscle locked in horror—
"Faldana! 'ware, 'ware!"
"Meripen Vanglelauf, I command thee—wake!"
The ripple of power was nothing more than a spatter of raindrops against his face, yet it was sufficient. He snapped into wakefulness, and blinked up at Ganat, grim-faced in the starlight.
"Your—pardon," he whispered, aware then of the other's hands gripping his shoulders, holding him hard against the living land, as if the other had sought for him some aid or healing.
"Are you truly beyond the dream?" Ganat asked warily, and Meri sighed.
"You were gentle, and I am powerless. Indeed, I am awake—and I thank you for your care."
Ganat blew his breath out hard, and sat back on his heels, letting his hands fall to his knees.
"They woke you too soon," he said, then lifted a placating hand, as the night wind brought his words back to him. "Bearing in mind that I am not a chyarch."
"Though you are a healer," Meri said with a sigh. "I should have suspected that."
Ganat shook his head, leaf-brown hair brushing his shoulders. "Not so much of a healer, either. Only a Wood Wise who has been given some art and set loose to wander as I will. The chyarch would have it that the Forest Gentry are in want of ministering—or at least of sense. We crawl back to our own small-lands when we're wounded, which is all very well, but not perhaps as wise as might be. Some healing might speed the process, drain less of one's power—and so she trains any of us she can lay hand over and sets us loose again, to heal where we find harm—and perhaps to persuade those who are grievous hurt to seek the Hall." He sighed. "It's the accursed walls," he said, "and the staying in one place. None of us willingly embrace such things."
"I know," Meri said softly, and sat up, wrapping his arms around his legs and resting his chin on his knees. "I apologize for disturbing your rest, Ganat. Please, if you can, sleep."
"Well." Ganat paused, and Meri turned his head to look at the man out of his uncovered eye.
"The thing is, you're weak, and you've been wakened too soon and you need all the things that an invalid needs—and I can say that without giving offense because I am a healer and I'm here to help you." He glared, unconvincingly.
Meri snorted lightly.
"Even if I were offended—which I assure you I am not!—there's very little I could do about it in my present state."
"Exactly my point. You need sleep, for I'm thinking the Engenium Sian wants you delivered in some reasonable shape."
Meri shuddered and turned his head away, looking out into the quiet night. "Thank you," he said politely, "but I'm wakened now."
"I can give you dreamless," Ganat said quietly, and Meri raised his head, meeting the other's eyes.
"Can you," he said, inflectionless. Ganat raised his hand, fingers curled toward the palm. "I swear it on my small-land."
Meri shuddered. To slide back into the dark, where the horror awaited for him, bound to unconsciousness by whatever art lay at Ganat's hand? Did the other lack sense entirely, to think that he—
No, he told himself, recalling the other man's open, earnest face. Ganat wishes to assist you. He does not understand.
"This is not dream," he said slowly, "but memory."
For a long moment, Ganat sat utterly motionless. Then he sighed, and bowed his head.
"Memory . . . heals last," he said slowly, and for third time—"They woke you too soon."
"So it would seem," Meripen agreed, lifting his head to look at the dusty stars. "Better, perhaps, that they had not wakened me at all."
Chapter Fifteen
The scent of coffee woke her, and a gentle hand on her hair. She smiled, and stretched, her newly opened eyes falling immediately upon Altimere's face.
"Good," he murmured, smiling gravely. "Breakfast has just arrived. I've brought you coffee, here." He nodded to the cup steaming gently on the bedside table. "I will also bring you something to eat, if you will tell me what you would like."
Becca pushed herself up against the pillows, the blanket falling away from her breasts and her ruined arm. She grabbed for the covers, then let them go as contentment washed through her, and picked up the coffee cup instead.
"You are not my servant," she said, slowly. "I can rise and come to table."
"Ah, but I wish to serve you in this manner," he said gallantly, and lifted a thin brow. "Also, it is prudent, until we can find you proper lounging clothes."
Becca felt her cheeks heat, and bent her head to her coffee.
"No," he murmured, stroking her ruined arm, his fingers sowing warmth, just as they had last night. "No shame, sweet child. Never any shame, for aught that you may do."
She looked up at him quizzically, searching the cool face. "No shame? Have you no shame, Altimere?"
His expression altered; she was aware of a slight chill in the air, and then it was burned away by the pride in his amber eyes.
"I am ashamed for nothing that I have done," he said austerely. "I may be the last of my house, but none will say that I am the least. I have continued the house's work, and increased it. I reside within the seventh tier of the Constant, second only to Diathen the Queen, and my workings do not go awry."
Rebecca stared up at him, feeling the strength of his pride. "Indeed, I see that you have no shame," she stammered. "But I have shamed my house, and if I have increased my own learning, it is in small things."
Altimere placed his finger against her lips, silencing her. "You are a woman of deed and power. That your deeds were denounced by those with little understanding and your power went unnoticed by those who are blind is nothing to cause you shame. The shame is theirs, sweet child. Only and forever theirs." He took his finger away, smiling.
"Now, tell me what it is you wish to eat, and I will bring it. Then we will dress and call for our horses and ride out into this marvelous, sunny day."
"That sounds delightful," she said truthfully, and looked up at him. "Toast, please, and jam and—if there is ham . . ."
"There is all of that," he said, rising. "I will bring it while you drink your coffee."
Obediently, Becca sipped carefully, delighting in layers of flavor, the sweetness of cream complementing the acrid brown flavor. She felt it flow through her, bringing her nerves to full alert. She finished the cup with regret, and set it aside just as Altimere stepped back into the room, bearing a tray, which he placed over her lap.
"Eat," he said, gently.
Rebecca looked from the tray to his face. "This is rather a lot of food for one person—won't you share?"
He smiled and inclined his head. "You must hold me excused. There is a small matter I must pursue with the host. We will have many meals together, you and I."
He ruffled her hair as if she were a child, indeed, and left her, murmuring, "Eat," once more.
Becca looked down at the laden tray—surely enough to feed Dickon and Ferdy, too!—spooned jam onto a piece of toast, and picked it up.
"I remember when I was a sprout," Ganat's voice
came dreamily out of the darkness to Meri's left.
"I remember when I was a sprout, too," he said when the breeze had whispered long enough in the silence.
"D'you remember the tales they used to tell you?" the other murmured. "Of those who had gone before? The names you would be fortunate to be able to stand before, much less equal in deed?"
Meri sighed. "I do. Vamichere Pinlauf, Zuri Skaindire, Janoh Wavewalker . . ."
"Drakin Fairstar," Ganat took up the litany, "Kainen Denx, Meripen Longeye, Zozan Lochmeare . . ." He sighed, softly, and Meri heard him shift against the cushioning grasses.
"Names of glory," Ganat murmured. "Names on which to hang an hundred tales or more. And yet you wonder, don't you? Drakin Fairstar burned her hands terribly carrying starfire to the leviathan. Vamichere Pinlauf saw his wood vanish into the keleigh. The tales never talk of the time after—when the deed is done, the price met, and all that remains are the wounds."
"Some do," Meri said quietly. "The sea healed Drakin Fairstar's hands."
"Aye, that's so." Ganat sighed. "Is there a tale that tells us how she was healed of the death of her heartmate?"
Meri raised his head and looked at the stars shimmering against the indigo sky.
"Some wounds," he said, softly, "never heal."
The sunlight poured out of the sky like honey, coating the day with sweetness. It was as if she and Rosamunde were one creature, so well did they move together through the flavorful air, surrounded by bird song so piercingly lovely that Becca several times felt tears start to her eyes.
They rode easily, on the main road, which Altimere had pronounced perfectly safe.
"The innkeeper did allow me to know that two men had stopped by while you were still abed, asking after us. He denied us, of course, and the men went on their way, after looking in on the stables."
"So there was pursuit." Becca smiled up at him. "I wasn't foolish, then, was I?"
"Indeed you were not," he responded. "I had underestimated the value placed upon you by certain parties, and I beg your pardon."
She laughed. "Rather you should beg their pardon!"
Altimere tipped his head, apparently considering this. "I suppose that I should," he said eventually. "But I do not think that I will."
Becca laughed again, and Rosamunde flicked her ears, and very soon after that, they took the left fork in the road, following the sign for Selkethe.
"I've never been to Selkethe," Becca said. "What shall we find there?"
"Why not wait and see with your own eyes?"
"Because I would like to hear how it seems to you, and then compare my impressions." She glanced at him shyly. "An exercise, you see, to help me know you better."
"I do not see," he said after a small pause, "but I am willing to be taught. This has the promise of being as diverting as your question game."
"So," said Becca, after they had gone some little distance in companionable silence. "What do you like best of Selkethe?"
"Best?" He guided his horse over to the side of the road, and Rosamunde followed. Hoof beats sounded from ahead of them, coming rapidly closer. Becca urged Rosamunde to stand beside Altimere's horse.
"I believe that the thing I like best about Selkethe is that one can occasionally feel the winds of home against one's face there."
Becca laughed. "But you are cheating, sir!"
Altimere turned his head, and Becca felt her heart stutter at the icy look in his eyes. His voice, however, was merely curious. "Cheating? How so?"
In the few, strangled moments required for Becca to catch her breath, the sound of the racing hoof beats were loud.
"Why—why because you have not chosen something of Selkethe at all, but something of your home!" she managed, and leaned forward to put her hand against Rosamunde's neck. That lady blew lightly, in encouragement, Becca thought.
Altimere's thin brows drew together slightly.
"I . . . see," he said slowly. "It is the game that I am to choose something admirable of the place itself."
"Exactly!" Becca said, with considerable relief.
"Well, that will require some thought," Altimere mused. "If I am not allowed the winds of home, then certainly I cannot call upon proximity. I wonder . . ." He lapsed into silence just as two riders came 'round the curve in the road, riding hard.
Rosamunde stamped a foot as the pair hurtled by, but they four might have been invisible, for all the attention the riders spared them. So quickly did they ride that it wasn't until the dust of their passage hung in the air that Becca cried out—"Dickon!"
Rosamunde turned in obedience to the shift of her weight. Becca gathered the reins firmly in her hand. Dickon, she thought, and the second rider—surely that had been Ferdy? And—wait! There had been two searchers at the inn this morning, Altimere had told her so. The innkeeper had denied them, and they had gone on—to the next inn, Becca thought, and finding no sign of them there, were returning—
"Hold." Altimere's voice was soft, and he did not deign to put his hand out to take Rosamunde's bridle, but the quarter-Fey horse stopped just the same.
Becca turned to face him.
"That was Dickon!" she exclaimed. "My brother—and, and Ferdy Quince!"
"Yes," he said calmly. "I recognized them."
"But—"
"They are gone," he said, and Becca felt suddenly lightheaded; her thoughts melted, running like honey, and the day took fire around her, abruptly and painfully beautiful. She looked down, becoming instantly lost in rapt contemplation of the texture of Rosamunde's mane as it fell across her neck . . .
"Now then," Altimere said.
Becca looked up, smiling at him. "You, sir, are unhandsome! Is there no single thing in Selkethe which is admirable? Almost, I begin to believe you find all of us here on the far side of the Boundary despicable."
"No, no," said Altimere soothingly, setting his mount into motion. "You wrong me, Miss Beauvelley. I do not find all of you here on the far side of the Boundary despicable. Not at all. And as for Selkethe—there is a very pleasant little bridge over a quick-flowing stream at the edge of the village. You and I will walk there, if you like, and you will give me your opinion."
"Done!" she said happily. "Now, sir . . ."
"What, is there more?" He glanced back at her, eyebrows elevated. "How much do you wish to know of me?"
"Everything," she told him, surprised by the fierceness of her voice.
"You do me too much honor," he murmured. "But I think, instead of another game, we should let the horses run." He leaned forward slightly, and the big stallion took his leave immediately.
"Catch them, beautiful lady!" Becca cried, and gave Rosamunde her head.
Of course they did catch Altimere and his mount eventually—at Bordertown Inn. He had already dismounted by the time Rosamunde and Becca galloped into the yard. A boy ran out to grab Rosamunde's bridle, and Altimere stepped in front of the stable boy, holding his arms up with a smile. Becca slid out of the saddle, trusting him to catch her, as if they had done the same numerous times. It warmed her, this trust that had risen so quickly between them.
Altimere treasures me, she thought as they strolled arm-in-arm into the inn. Dickon would be so pleased.
And wasn't it odd, Dickon passing them on the road like that? She should have called out sooner, to let him know she was well and with someone who treasured her, just as he had wanted her to—
"A private parlor." Altimere's voice broke her thoughts into an hundred bright pieces. "A cold nuncheon, wine and tea."
Selkethe was larger than she had expected, its high street lined on both sides with shops, and thin off-shoot alleys fragrant with the aromas of baking breads and savory cooking. From the sheer number of bistros and restaurants, it would appear that none of the population of Selkethe ever cooked for themselves, or needed to.
At the end of the high street was the market square, empty this late in the day, except for a few townsfolk clustered 'round a booth beneath a flowing orang
e canopy.
"Ah," Altimere said, and patted Becca's hand where it rested on his arm. "Shall you like to meet another Fey, Miss Beauvelley? To see, perhaps, if you have made a bad bargain?"
"I'd certainly like to meet another Fey," Rebecca responded. "Is he a friend of yours?"
"A friend?" Altimere appeared to taste the word. "No, I do not think a . . . friend. Say rather, an old acquaintance."