After all, Mirabar's child would need a father, and Tansen had already started practicing on that sea-born boy.
If Elelar felt any regret, she nonetheless knew that, she and Tansen being the people they were, things probably couldn't ever have been any different between them.
Mirabar untangled herself from Tansen's embrace and led him over to Elelar. He stared for a moment, looking exhausted and surprised, then—all shallah now—crossed his fists and lowered his head. "Torena, I am pleased to find you safe, and I congratulate you on the birth of..." He raised his head and suddenly grinned. "The new Yahrdan."
She smiled back. "Mirabar says... I am to take my place as the Yahrdan's mother."
Tansen nodded, his gaze flickering between them with evident curiosity. "And Cheylan will disappear from his official bloodline."
She frowned. "It's not that I object to forgetting Cheylan, but won't I need to name a fath—"
"Ronall."
"Ronall?"
"He's waiting in the bay due east of Gamalan, with my son." Tansen looked troubled. "At least... If they're safe. But... I think they must be safe, because Zarien—"
"Ronall?" she repeated.
"He is your husband," Tansen pointed out.
"He's also a Valdan," Elelar said.
"Half-Valdan," he reminded her. "Which will be politically advantageous in dealing with—"
"And he's a drunkard and a fool," Elelar added, feeling renewed loathing flood her. "No! I absolutely refuse—"
"Elelar—"
"Don't even try to convince me to put up with that—"
"I told you to kill her," Mirabar said to Tansen. "I want you always to remember that I was the one who told you to kill her when you had the chance."
"Oh, you were also the one who trusted Cheylan!" Elelar snapped, thoroughly annoyed with Mirabar now. "Just how naive could you—"
"Don't you dare—"
"Enough!" Tansen shouted at them both, provoked into a rare display of temper.
They both fell silent and glared at him.
"We're going to focus on the task at hand," he informed them both, "and quarrel some other time."
"What is the task at hand?" Elelar asked with chilly dignity, comforting Gaborian as he fussed.
"Getting you safely back to Shaljir where your son can be acknowledged. Normally, the best way would be to go overland, but it's a hard journey for a woman who's just given birth. Besides, it's not a journey you should make without me, under the circumstances, and I'm going back to sea to find my son before I do anything else. Now, since your husband is also waiting there—"
"If he's still alive," Elelar grumbled.
"Don't talk like that," Mirabar snapped at her. "Zarien is with him. So is Najdan."
"I'm sorry." She took a calming breath. "I shouldn't... I'm sorry."
"We'll go down to the bay," Tansen said. "I know an easy path. I used to smuggle along that coast."
"Of course," Elelar said dryly.
"We'll find my son, your husband, and Mirabar's... assassin. If the sea seems safe, you and Ronall will take a boat to Shaljir. If, that is, we can find someone willing to leave the bay. The sea-born are all gathered..." He looked around and frowned. "Like these pilgrims. I wonder..."
"You think they were waiting for the birth, too? These people didn't know what they were awaiting until it happened," Mirabar said.
"All right, the sea," Elelar agreed. "I will..." Her temples started throbbing at the very thought. "I will acknowledge Ronall as the father and... return to Shaljir with him." If he's still alive. Which wasn't a prospect she could pray for with genuine sincerity.
"Can you walk?" Tansen asked.
She was about to reply when a sudden crash, like mountains colliding, made her flinch. She looked up towards Darshon's summit, as did everyone else, tense with fear. Another eruption? Another earthquake?
No, please...
Something hit her upturned face. She flinched and brushed it away. Dust? Ash? A falling pebble? More of it hit her face, little drops in quick succession.
Tansen inhaled sharply. "Is that..."
"Oh, please, Dar," Mirabar said, "let it be..."
Elelar realized what it was. "Rain?"
"Rain!"
"It's RAIN!"
There was another deafening crash of thunder, and then the skies opened up, pouring down life-giving rain upon them.
Jalan screamed in ecstasy, "Rain!"
"The rains!" Tansen shouted, impulsively embracing Mirabar again. "The rains have come!"
The skies had been so thick with smoke and ash in recent days, they'd never even seen the rain clouds gathering.
Elelar laughed and hugged Gaborian, who wailed as water drenched them all.
The long rains had finally begun. The dry season was over.
"Is that really rain?" Baran asked Velikar. "Or am I hallucinating again?"
She squealed and embraced him. "The rains! The rains have come!"
"Please, I'm a married man," he reminded her.
He heard a woman's delighted shriek from somewhere else in the household. A moment later, Haydar ran into his study, still shrieking. "Siran! Do you hear it? Rain! Look out the window!"
"I've already looked, thank you, Haydar. If you hug me, too, I'm going to throw up. I really cannot tolerate all this happiness."
Velikar snorted and stuck her head out the window, laughing maniacally. Haydar pouted and left the room. A moment later, he again heard her shrieking, "Rain!"
Predictably, Vinn appeared a few moments later. "It's raining, siran!"
"I'm starting to miss the good old days," Baran said crankily, "when we used to mourn the arrival of the rains."
"Those were different days for us, siran." Vinn went to another window and gazed out at the ensorcelled moat. "But I'm sure Kiloran is mourning right now, if that comforts you."
"You always know the right thing to say to me," Baran assured him.
"He's mourning more than the rain, siran."
Baran eyed him. "Let me guess. We've had news from Cavasar?"
"He hasn't precisely lost the city yet," Vinn said, "but Cavasar is consumed in all-out battle between the Society and the loyalists at last report, which arrived while you were resting."
"He's still got the mines of Alizar and the Idalar River, though," Baran muttered. "The Olvara and I tried to surprise him last night—which is why I was then obliged to spend most of the day resting."
Velikar snorted. "You're lucky you didn't spend most of the day dead. You can no longer afford to expend that kind of—"
"Velikar, look!" Baran cried. "Rain!"
She scowled at him and turned back to the window.
Vinn asked Baran, "And did your surprise produce results?"
Baran shook his head. "I think he was expecting it. Or at least shrewd enough to be prepared for such an attempt."
"Now what?"
Baran sighed. "In all honesty, I'm running out of ideas, Vinn."
"But now that the rains are here..."
"It's heartening, I'll go that far. But it's not an answer to the consuming problem of our happy days together: How do we destroy Kiloran?"
"He is losing too much influence and terri—"
"That's how it looks," Baran agreed.
"You still think he has another plan, a new surprise for us?"
"I know that old man too well to think otherwise."
"But given his situation, siran, wouldn't he have employed it by now?"
"Maybe he has," Baran said gloomily. "And we just don't know it yet."
Najdan relieved Linyan at dawn and continued the search. The renewed downpour obscured visibility, yet it had also washed so much smoke and ash out of the air that there actually was a dawn today, which was a blessing.
Another sea-born family had found Najdan unconscious in the water, mostly dead, while searching for one of their own. They'd hauled him aboard and forced the water out of his lungs. By the time he regained conscious
ness, even he had to acknowledge that it was too late to dive in after Zarien again. Then the rain had started, making the search even harder.
The family who had rescued him had helped him search for Zarien until they'd encountered Linyan's boat, to which they returned him. Although not a laborer, let alone a sailor, he had done all he could to help repair the damaged boat, and then they'd gone in search of Zarien again.
Now, more than three full days after the boy had gone overboard, he knew he would have to face Tansen and tell him he had let Zarien die.
They were only searching for a body at this point.
As for Ronall... Najdan was sorry about the toren. Ronall was not his responsibility, as Zarien was, but he recalled how much the toren had wanted to go ashore, and he regretted that his own decisions had cost the man his life. They looked for Ronall, too, but they had lost hope sooner. Zarien was sea-born and would survive as long as possible in the water. Ronall... no, they had lost hope well before now.
The toren was certainly dead.
The arms which held him were cool and soft, pulling him ever deeper into the dark water.
His thoughts returned slowly, coming to him one by one, like lazy waves lapping at the side of a boat. He was underwater. He felt peaceful and serene. He wasn't holding his breath, nor was he drowning. Someone soft, voluptuous, and cool-skinned embraced him. He felt no pain. No more pain...
Three have mercy on me, what happened?
A feminine voice, rich and unfamiliar, filled his head. It seemed to come from within him as much as from all around him.
Don't call on them anymore. I will give you mercy. All the mercy you will ever need.
Ronall went still, startled and confused. He tried to speak, but water filled his mouth. So he asked the obvious question in silence: Am I dreaming?
No, you are finally awake. For the first time.
He didn't understand. He'd been in the water, and something had hit him...
A boat, she said, silent and yet echoing all through him. The boy didn't understand. He would have taken you from the water. From me. So I swept the water to bring you into my arms.
Ronall felt a dark suspicion. Are you Death?
The gentle laughter which greeted this question seemed so incongruous that his eyes snapped open—which was when he finally realized they'd been closed.
For you, I am a new life.
She was as beautiful as she was strange, with veil-like fins flaring around her translucent body, alternately revealing and concealing her voluptuous form as they flowed back and forth. Her diaphanous skin glowed silvery-pale, like the moons on a misty night. Her full hips flowed down to a sleek tail whose undulations kept propelling both of them away from all that Ronall had ever known. Heat crept through him as he became aware of the soft globes of her breasts pressed against him. Instead of hair, something like spun pearls grew from her scalp, flowing around her in pellucid strands. Her incandescent glow illuminated the darkness all around them.
I'm not... dying?
She assured him, You are safe. I will always keep you safe when you come to me.
Always... He still didn't understand. Why...
Dar has chosen you for me, as She has chosen me for you.
He flinched with shock, and her body undulated in response to his impulsive movement.
This can't... I can't...
The world is changing, she told him, and you have changed with it.
He felt the cold and the texture of the water, and he concentrated on it, trying to understand if it was real. If he was still real. Her strong strokes propelled them ever deeper, and the currents that touched him were as real as anything he'd ever felt. The arms which embraced him, protected him, and kept him safe felt even more real.
You're the sea goddess Zarien told me about, he realized.
I am Sharifar.
Looking for your consort.
Zarien has brought you to me, as was his duty.
No, he protested, Zarien thinks it's Tansen.
What he thinks doesn't matter. He has done what he had to do.
And what do I have to do? he asked, aware of her translucent flesh, her glowing beauty, the rich feel of her body against his.
Belong to me, she coaxed. Make me belong to you.
He was quivering with longing, yet bewilderingly close to shedding tears in mourning.
You lose only the pain, she promised. Only the loneliness, the sorrow, the shame.
It's... He felt her encompassing him, healing him, engulfing him in an embrace that sank through his own flesh and into his soul. I didn't think it would be hard to give up those things, but it is.
You gave up your life to save Zarien. Clear-headed when you did it, cleansed of all your poisons...
He felt as if he were inside of her now, and she inside of him. He felt half water god, and now she felt half human to him.
Cleansed of my poisons... He learned from her, letting her teach him how sea spirits made love, how he could share himself with a creature whose miraculous and exquisite body was so different from anything that walked the dryland.
Poisons of the soul, she said, poisons of the body...
All that seasickness, he realized. It had emptied his stomach every time he drank. Sharifar had inflicted it, not wanting him to come to her so numbed by liquor that he felt only half-alive.
That was no dragonfish I kept seeing in the water, he realized, it was you. Not a monster stalking its next meal, but a lover preparing to welcome him into her watery domain.
I waited until you were ready.
The first time Zarien went in the water... he realized.
Yes.
You did that to him?
And fear still poisoned you.
I didn't go in after him. I failed.
You weren't ready, she said. So I waited...
Until I was ready to die to save him?
Until your fear was gone, and only your hunger remained, she told him.
That consuming hunger for something he could never name, that endless craving which had ruled his life... She was feeding it now, satisfying it at last, nourishing that long-starved void within him.
Sharifar...
Contentment flowed through him in soft waves, filling that ravenous ache inside of him.
Why? he wondered, truly coming to life for the first time in his whole miserable existence. Why me?
Because you need what I can give, she said inside his heart, and I need what you can give.
And what was she describing if not...
Love?
Chapter Twenty-Six
Secrets are like children. No one can
guard them night and day forever, and no
one can predict what they will become.
—Kiloran
Despite Tansen's eagerness to get to sea, he nonetheless took time to meet with Jagodan's son-in-law, the new leader of the Lironi, to plan a complex counterattack on their enemies.
"Then, while you've all got Verlon's remaining allies fully engaged in half a dozen skirmishes," Tansen explained, going over the plan he had formulated on the way here, "I'll lead the assault on his stronghold." He paused, allowing himself to hope. "If our timing is good, I think we can finally break the Society in the east. Forever."
"Surely the torena is traveling slowly. Does your plan allow enough time for you to accomplish what you must when you reach the coast, then rally with the Moynari to attack Verlon in his lair while we're conducting our battles elsewhere?"
"It does. Don't worry. I'll be there," he promised.
"You'd better be. We're all likely to die if you fail to engage Verlon when you're supposed to."
It was a bold plan—even risky. Tansen suspected it would also seem restful after so much time spent with both of the women who had obsessed him during his life. Mirabar and Elelar incited such regular and uncontrollable bad temper in each other that he couldn't imagine how they expected to cooperate in the education of Elelar's remarkable chil
d. In a moment of exasperation with them both, he had foolishly said so—and then they had united in turning on him.
Women.
He loved Mirabar and cared about Elelar, but he didn't really regret that his duties here would prevent him from going all the way to Shaljir with the two of them. Even Faradar's sturdy temperament was starting to show signs of the strain.
Nor was Jalan, also traveling in their entourage, the most enjoyable companion. If Tansen had to hear one more long-winded, convoluted, effusive recounting of Gaborian's birth, no matter how extraordinary...
Then there were the praise-singers who made up the greater part of their entourage. Tansen permitted them to come along because he knew they'd die to protect Gaborian if anyone tried to attack. Moreover, now that the child had been born, Dar seemed willing to let most of the pilgrims return to their own lives. Many of them were already drifting back to their native villages and cities, spreading the news of Gaborian's arrival across Sileria as they abandoned the tormented slopes of Darshon. Witnesses to the baby's Dar-blessed birth, they would convince the rest of Sileria that he was indeed the prophesied ruler.
Tansen only wondered if those pilgrims were all as noisy as the ones now traveling with him. The constant chanting and singing, the praises and prayers, the elaborate vocal celebrations of Gaborian's birth and Dar's merciful favor were... getting on his nerves. He'd always been the quiet type.
He sighed, cleared his thoughts, and returned to discussing with the Lironi leader what he hoped would be the decisive battle in eastern Sileria.
Najdan felt the boat shudder violently, yet when he looked around, they were a safe distance from other vessels and the water was calm. The rain had ceased for the time being, and there had been no eruptions or earthquakes for several days. Even the smoke-filled sky was clearing rapidly, though the summit of Darshon itself still looked ominous.
"What was that?" he asked Linyan. "Did we hit something under the surface?"
The old man shook his head, his tattooed face frowning in perplexity. "The water is very deep here. And it's not coral or—"
"Dragonfish?"
"It would have to be an unusually big one to hit us that hard."
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