'Good,' he said. 'One last thing. Hesther, I know I always turn to you but assuming word, if not detail, of this trouble leaks out through the servants, we need to have a response. You and Elsa Gueran should work together. We need the Order to stand with us, even if it is through a Reader we all know believes as we do and needs to fear the Chancellor as we do.'
'Of course, Ardol,' said Hesther.
'Only when we have the Ascendants settled will we talk to Ossacer about his learning. I have the distinct feeling it will be quite a breakthrough but we need the right atmosphere. Agreed?'
Nods all around. Kessian pushed himself painfully up on his sticks.
'Then let us all get to bed. God keep you all in bliss until he wakes you with the light of dawn.'
It was night and it was very quiet but for the breathing of Shela Hasi and Arducius. Ossacer listened to the patterns they made while the lids on his eyes blinked away the phantom shapes that swam across his blindness. Shela's breath was deep and regular, her body was still. Arducius snuffled and sighed. Ossacer smiled in the dark, his gratitude for his friend swelling again in his chest.
'You are awake, Arducius,' he said softly.
'I am,' he replied. 'I can't sleep. It hurts. How is your arm?'
'It's all right,' said Ossacer, scratching at his bandages absently, the throbbing ache not dimmed by the cooling balm Genna had spread on the wound. 'Shela is asleep, isn't she?'
'Until Genna comes in to do the ice thing again in the morning. Ugh, it's horrible.'
'Doesn't it help?' asked Ossacer, imagining Arducius's shudder.
'It just makes it numb. It still aches and everything. And my fingers tingle all the time.' 'Do you trust me?'
Arducius was silent for a while. 'I. Well, yes, of course. What sort of question is that in the middle of the night?'
'I can help you,' said Ossacer. His heart tapped quickly in his chest. 'If you'll let me.'
'Help me with what?'
'I think I can fix you.' Ossacer shifted and pushed himself up on his good elbow so he was looking in Arducius's direction. 'If you'll let me try.'
There was another silence. Ossacer could feel Arducius weighing it all up. He'd survived so many breaks from his brittle bones because Genna Kessian was so expert at locating the exact fracture point and Westfallen's doctors and surgeons could set the limb or digit under her instruction. Yet now here was an Ascendant, not two years emerged, offering him something untried and absolutely new. And they all knew the risks of trying out new abilities from embarrassing and painful experience.
'Is this what you wouldn't tell Gorian about?'
'It's the reason you're lying there,' agreed Ossacer.
'Will it hurt me? Will it hurt you?'
'I don't think so,' said Ossacer. 'Not if I get it right.'
Arducius managed a chuckle at that and the slight tension broke. 'Well, obviously.'
Ossacer smiled as well. He moved nearer his friend, shifting across his bed. They were separated by a gap of a couple of feet. Shela was by the door, sleeping in a chair with her feet up on a padded stool.
'Well?'
'Are you sure you can do this?' 'I'll let you know,' said Ossacer.
'Very funny,' said Arducius. 'Just take the pain away, that's enough. And tell me what you're doing.'
Ossacer felt a wash of pride. Trust in him. It was a wonderful feeling.
'I won't let you down.'
Ossacer closed his eyes and concentrated hard. He breathed deeply and carefully. He held his hands out from his body, his fingers spread and moving gently as if playing an invisible kithara. His ears pricked, listening for the creaking of timbers in the roof above him, in the marble supports and the beds on which they lay.
Slowly, colour and light swam into his mind, warming his whole body, reminders of a time when all he had to do to experience colour was open his eyes. But this was far more breathtaking than memories; this was his window on the world and no one would ever be able to take it from him.
Behind the curtain of his eyes, the bedroom dripped into view. He could have wished it was clear like sight but for Ossacer, it was as if God had blessed him personally with a second chance and it was up to him to make of it what he could. The others and the Echelon had thought he'd been unusually quiet and reserved throughout this dusas and he was happy to let them think that way. They left him to it when they understood he was all right, just feeling low.
But what he had discovered was in the process of changing his life from one of reliance to one of renewed independence. It had been almost by chance, even though Ossacer understood that it was because he'd been forced to develop his other senses. He'd learned to listen to the minutest of sounds to build up a mental picture of what surrounded him. He habitually held out his hands, not just to feel ahead and to the sides but to gather information on the currents of air passing his body. His fingertips had developed great sensitivity, allowing him to gauge the distance and complexity of solid shapes near him.
His nose was equally sensitive, able to sort scents in fine detail. He used it to give him direction. He could smell the villa from up on the hillside; he could navigate from the villa to the forum. And he could walk unaided to the orchard up above Genastro Falls. No one was scared he would pitch over the cliff any more. To him these were small victories in a life of struggle against his disability. However, in his few meetings with other blind people, he had become aware that his senses were far more acutely tuned than were those of others.
It led him to think. The only benefit of his blindness, and it had a bitter edge, was that it gave him time to think free of the distractions of the world of light. But this time the reward had been great. Their training had focused so much on harnessing the energies of God and the earth to achieve their goals, whether it be growing plants, bringing fruit to trees out of season or identifying the seat of infections in farm animals.
They still had so much to learn, particularly about efficiency. A single use of ability left them tired and wrinkled, sometimes for days. But what they had all worked out was that, while the particular energies most closely related to the ability they were employing aided their efficiency greatly, other energies drawn from unconnected places could be used, though they drained the Ascendant more quickly.
Father Kessian had likened it to carrying water from place to place in a sponge rather than a skin. It worked but was more tiring, because more trips would be needed for the same volume of water as so much got wasted on the way.
So Ossacer had worked on, as he liked to think of it, blocking the holes in the sponge. And he had linked the effort with the knowledge that there was something more to his acutely tuned senses than effort and fortune. It was because of who he was. There was energy all around him. It fed through his fingertips, his nostrils, his ears and his tongue direct into his mind. And there he used it.
He had always been a natural Pain Teller, able to map an infection, fever, strain or break in the body of a man and to a lesser extent, a beast. But what he hadn't been able to do, what none of them had got even close to, was healing. Gorian, the first Gorian, had written about joining energies to heal but that had proved impossible because all maladies appeared as grey shades that masked energy flows and there was no way to break through. Until now.
It had come to Ossacer quite suddenly that because there were energies everywhere that could be harnessed, if inefficiently, to heal, it wasn't necessary to go through the grey shades; you could go around them. Lacking in the confidence to test his theory on an animal, or even to talk to Father Kessian or Genna about it, he had first applied it to the energies he picked up through his remaining senses. And what he found was that he could draw an energy map in his head of the immediate area around him.
Solid objects like walls, cabinets, columns and beds appeared as deep grey shapes on the bright canvas. But people appeared as moving hues of red, green and yellow, shot with deeper blues and, when they were damaged, grey shades and black. Their outline
s were blurred but distinct enough to make out individuals. It was how he had hit Arducius with the snowball. In an open space, background was difficult to discern, particularly after snowfall, and so people stood out like fires in the night.
It was tiring though, because none of the energies were directly-applicable. So he had to work hard to keep the map in his head. He couldn't do it for long yet but hopefully long enough to help Arducius.
He stepped out of his bed, seeing his hands in front of him, his fingers deep red and bordered in pale yellow, his legs similar but less intense and the rest of his body dulled a fraction by his nightshirt. Below his feet, the rug was a pale shadow on the cool blue of the stone and ahead of him, Arducius's head and arms were visible above his covers.
He sat on the bed.
'Are you ready?' he whispered.
'How did you do that? I was watching you. You moved like you could see.'
'I can,' said Ossacer, feeling his excitement grow. 'Sort of. I'll explain it to you all. I just need to try one more thing.' 'And I am your subject, is that right?' 'Well, obviously.'
Both boys laughed quietly, energised by the thought of doing something in secret and not wishing to wake Shela.
'What do you want me to do?' asked Arducius.
'Nothing. Just lie there. It shouldn't hurt but tell me if it does and I'll stop whenever you want me to.'
'I'll be all right.'
Ossacer let the energy map fade in his mind, satisfied he was in control of his senses. He placed his hands on Arducius's left arm. 'That's cold,' hissed Arducius. 'Sorry.'
He drew back into himself, letting the energy from his own body channel through his mind, down his arms and across Arducius. Immediately, he could see the other boy's outline in his mind and he used a little energy from Arducius to bolster his own. He traced the bright pulses that were arteries and veins, following their flow through Arducius's body. The outlines of bones appeared dull green, his heart blazed red, lungs a cooler red tint and stomach a calm yellow.
Surrounding the bright strong trails of Arducius's body were the free motes of energy. They appeared as faint trails or twinkling dull lights to his mind. He was sure he could drive them to link the two areas of broken energy either side of breaks like those in Arducius's wrists. He moved his hands down towards the damaged left wrist, letting just the tips of his fingers brush his skin.
'Don't move,' he said, feeling a twitch from his friend. 'Sorry if it tickles.'
'It's warm,' said Arducius.
'Good.'
Arducius's wrist was a mess. Ossacer almost withdrew his fingers from the splinted bandage. He'd been used to sensing bruising, typified by a wash of clouded grey, damaged lines but this was something far worse. His mind displayed to him a deep, impenetrable grey shot through with a dead blackness where the fractures were complex and the energy of life absent. Splints weren't going to help.
'What's wrong?' asked Arducius.
'These are bad breaks,' he replied.
‘I hadn't realised,' said Arducius dryly.
‘I don't mean that, I mean they go so deep. Your bones are set but there is nothing running through them to heal them. No lifelines.' 'Well then . . .'
'It's all right,' said Ossacer, feeling Arducius tense. ‘I can bring them back.'
Ossacer knew he couldn't draw from Arducius to link the broken lines around his wrists. It was the same with most injured or sick people and animals. They were inherently weaker for obvious reasons. And while the trails in the air and carried through the hypocaust and on the slight breeze from under the door provided raw material, he had not plugged enough holes in the sponge and Arducius needed major help. Ossacer was going to have to use himself. This was going to be far more tiring than he first thought.
He gripped Arducius's wrist very gently, rippling his fingers across the bandage. He felt the depth and breadth of the damage, noted the dark lines indicating hairline fractures and the trapping or piercing of nerves and veins. Satisfied he understood the scale of the task, he placed his hands with his fingers splayed across the bandage with thumb touching thumb.
In Arducius's hands and fingers, the energy trails were haphazard, directionless, probably contributing to the aches and tingling sensations he was feeling. Ossacer felt joy wash over him, quite unexpectedly. It was exactly as Father Kessian and Genna said it should be. Exactly as the writings of Gorian and the scriptures of God described. The circle of life was interrupted. It was the flows of energy, the circuits great and small, that gave health and life. And it was their disruption that took them away. Now he knew with no doubt that his idea was right. And that God had placed him and his friends on this earth to heal and to cure. To be a force of wonder and to do God's work. The Order was wrong.
‘I am going to join the broken lifelines around your wrists. Try to be still.'
'Using what?'
'Anything I can get from this room. But mainly myself.' 'Ossacer, that's—'
'Don't argue. God will return my strength to me.'
He tried to bring in the slight energies from the breeze and the warmth of the stones under his feet, opening his mind as he had been urged, like he would open his mouth to accept food. But so little came in. He could just feel it helping his focus though it was nowhere near enough to help Arducius. What he had hoped, he couldn't quite do and now wasn't the time to be experimenting. He just prayed he had enough within him to do what had to be done.
Ossacer poured himself into his task. He channelled his body's energy into Arducius's arm, feeling the boy tense beneath his fingers and hearing a grunt of surprise. In his mind, he could see lifelines from his fingers intertwining with those either side of the broken wrist. Arducius gasped as the circuit was completed, feeling the life flowing around and edging into his injury.
That was the easy part. He could stay here, relieving Arducius of his pain for as long as he could stay awake and concentrated but it wouldn't heal him. Now he had to drive the lifelines back through the damaged wrist, providing the linkage that signified healing had taken place.
Ossacer could see like none of the others could, the disruption caused by the break. Where the bone was not set correctly, where fragments still sat in his flesh and where the blood flow was interrupted.
'Here we go, Arducius. Please try to be calm. The energy needs to flow into your wrist now. I hope you aren't hurt.' 'Get on with it.'
Ossacer nodded and breathed in very deeply. He began where the lifelines were strongest in Arducius, in his forearm. He could see the energy map in his head, could see the exact points where the lines turned away from Arducius's wrist to join with his own. He concentrated and pushed down, beginning to tease the lines back to where they belonged. Fraction by fraction he went, using the artificially completed circuit to force passage through the physical damage. He moved bone fragments back into place, opened up veins again, dragged nerve endings into position. It was a terribly slow and delicate process.
He had to fight every strand of energy every minute step of the way. Like steering multiple eels through a maze that shifted and changed around them; each one only too happy to fall back if his attention wavered.
He could feel the sweat form then drip from his brow. It dampened his armpits and back. His whole body heated as he used more of himself in the effort. He had abandoned all thought of channelling the room's random energies now. It was a step too far for a young mind needing purity of focus.
And at the same time, he had to fight to contain his excitement. Because underneath his fingers with their red and yellow outlines bright with the density of energy, the black and grey were lightening; fading away.
'How do you feel?' he managed to ask through his own gulping breath.
'It burns,' said Arducius, sounding calm. 'But it doesn't hurt.' 'Good,' said Ossacer. 'I think.'
The centre of the break slowed him even further. So many hairline cracks and displacements. Arducius said it ached. It must have been agonising. Ossacer quashed the guilt tha
t sprang into his conscience. He poured more of his energy into his work. He could feel himself weakening. And where the sweat ran down his cheeks, he could feel the dryness that came with age.
All this and more again, he reminded himself, if he was to fix both wrists. The elbow, not broken but swollen, would have to wait.
Shela Hasi awoke stiff and tired when the dawn, bright and white, found its way through the louvered shutters. She massaged her neck with one hand and blinked the room into focus. The yawn died in her throat.
Arducius, his wrist splints discarded, was sitting on Ossacer's bed holding the boy's hand in his. Ossacer's head was just visible. His face was cracked and lined, his head covered in grey hair. He barely moved but Arducius was smiling from ear to ear. The pained pallor in his cheeks was almost gone and his eyes shone with new health.
'Look what he's done,' he said. 'Look what he's done.'
Shela stared, confused, not knowing whether to cry with joy or scream in fear.
Chapter 16
847th cycle of God, 35th day of Dusasfall 14th year of the true Ascendancy
When Kessian pushed open Gorian's bedroom door that morning, the dazzling dusas sun was reflecting harsh white off the snow and blazing in through open shutters.
Gorian was sitting at his small desk, reading the Ascendancy text on the scope of the Land Warden discipline, its potential development and applications. Kessian had written it himself over four decades before. That Gorian should appear so engrossed in what he now considered inane meanderings, gave some small pleasure on a troubled day.
Gorian's tunic was slashed with the red of the Ascendancy, matching his own. His feet were bare, toes tapping idly on the warm stone under his feet. He didn't look round until Kessian had lowered himself slowly on to the end of the boy's bed.
'How did you know so long ago that we would ever exist?' Gorian asked, his voice clogged with emotion.
He looked terrible. His eyes were red and puffed where he had rubbed the tears away and the dark smudges beneath them told of a restless night. Kessian was comforted that in the quiet and dark, Gorian had found guilt and remorse. But he was concerned at the lack of either sentiment the boy had chosen to display to his mother the previous evening.
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