Voran unsheathed his sword and saluted, as he would at the training field in the warrior seminary.
“I look forward to that day, Zmei.” He bowed low, to his waist. When he looked up, Buyan snored, and Zmei was nowhere to be seen.
There is one thing you must never forget. No matter how evil the times, no matter how dire the calamity, if there is but one person on earth who makes Covenant with Adonais, then the world will not fall. The dawn will come after the dark night, though it lasts for centuries.
-From “The Testament of Cassían, Dar of Vasyllia” (The Sayings: Book II, 21:30)
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Covenant
Lebía stood, as she did every morning, on the banks of the sea, waiting for Mirnían to return. For more than a year, she had seen nothing. After the baby had been born, she came with the little bundle in her arms, that simultaneous source of pain and joy, terror and courage that taught her, for the first time in her life, that she had no idea what it meant to love.
The baby gurgled something profoundly wise, and she found herself enthralled by him. Already he smiled when she looked at him, opening a toothless mouth wide and cackling in joy. If only he would sleep a little more at night.
When he had finished his oration, she looked up again and saw something. It was probably nothing; probably yet another trick of the light, another game of the early spring sun. Already all around her Nature was just waking to life; only she remained cold with the winter of her heart.
Then she recognized them—longboat sails. She watched in mute astonishment as two, then five, then ten, then twenty boats came into view, all of them bearing the standard of old Vasyllia—a Sirin in flight enclosed within a fiery sun.
“I will not expect it,” she said aloud. “It is not my husband. He is gone from me.”
Still, her heart pined and agonized and shuddered in fear. Soon the first boat came close enough for her to see the passengers at the helm. Mirnían and an older woman, hooded, stood together. She looked directly at Lebía. The wind caught and threw back the hood, revealing a face Lebía never expected to see again in her life. The face of her mother. Lebía burst into tears and lifted little Antomír above her head.
The moments of waiting were each an exuberant eternity. Lebía imagined asking them every question hoarded over months and years, felt every prick of pain and swell of joy she could have ever conceived, all in a few moments. And yet, the boats seemed to do no more than stand on the water.
Now, she was in Mirnían’s arms, limp from tears of joy. Aglaia held little Antomír. She seemed a favorite of his already, and he babbled to her with all the seriousness of his three months. Mirnían could not contain himself at the sight; he tried to enclose all of them in his arms at once. Behind Mirnían, the twenty boats were filled with Vasylli.
“Who are they?” Lebía asked in wonder at their tear-streaked faces.
“They are all that remain of the true Vasylli,” said Aglaia, “rescued by the Sirin from the Raven.”
“We have little room on Ghavan,” said Otar Svetlomír behind them, approaching Aglaia with open arms. “But we will make more.”
Aglaia embraced him as an old friend, then seemed to recollect herself and fell on her knees, begging for his blessing. He put his hand on her head and pulled her close, and they sobbed together.
All of Ghavan met the refugees with cheering and wonder. Some found brothers, children, friends among them, and the dead eyes of those who had seen the Raven began to flutter with new life. Immediately, Mirnían took control of the situation and ordered that trestles be set in the center of the village, and that a great feast be prepared for the faithful Vasylli. But no sooner did he command than Lebía heard a surge of the song of the Sirin in her heart. Aína whispered to her, and only she could hear.
“Vasyllia!” exclaimed Lebía more loudly than she ever had in her life, feeling foolish and elated all at once. Everyone hushed and looked at her in surprise. “This is not the only joy for Ghavan. Come, my dear family, I must show you Vasyllia’s hope.”
She rushed out of the square into the woods, pulling Mirnían’s hand to follow. Aglaia came, still discussing great things with little Antomír. The villagers, somewhat confused, followed a little hesitantly. They walked for what seemed like hours, but the early spring cold dissipated with their brisk pace. Finally, they reached a spruce grove, stately in silence. Hidden within the trees was a tiny white aspen, gently pulsating with light.
“Is that what I think it is?” Mirnían’s eyes wide with wonder. He turned to see Lebía smiling at him proudly. “How did you know?”
“The hope of Vasyllia,” whispered Otar Svetlomír. He fell on his knees before the sapling.
“We must replant it in the center of the village,” said Mirnían.
“I do not know, my love,” said Lebía. “It seems somehow disrespectful, no?”
“I mean to honor it, swanling. Were we not punished enough for hoarding our treasures in Vasyllia? Let us bring the tree to a place where all can see it and be filled with hope.”
Filled with sudden inspiration, Mirnían walked up to the sapling and reached for the roots.
“Be gentle with it,” whispered Lebía.
“I will be gentle with both of my new treasures, always.”
Lebía blushed a little, like a white rose tipped with red.
Mirnían gently took the trunk near the base, and to his amazement the roots disentangled themselves from the ground and wrapped themselves around his hand.
“The blessing of the Heights is on you, Dar Mirnían,” said Otar Svetlomír, his eyes brilliant in the white light.
They planted the tree in the center of the village. The roots took the earth by themselves, just as they had taken Mirnían’s hand.
Lebía hesitantly touched the quivering branches of the white sapling. They thrummed with life, and she gasped in pleasure, like a child might when touching something unexpectedly cold. Suddenly, the tree grew before their eyes. Within seconds, it was a full tree, adorned with golden leaves still half-folded. The white light rose until it was hard to look at the tree directly.
“Look!” said a girl in the crowd, pointing upward.
The sky above them shimmered with red gold. Hundreds of firebirds circled the tree. A single pin-prick opened in the sky above the firebirds, and a light descended on the tree, until it seemed to burn with fire. Then Lebía realized it was no illusion. The white aspen was on fire.
Mirnían embraced Lebía. She nestled under his chin, that most comfortable of places, where she fit perfectly.
“I have so many questions, my love,” she said. “But one will suffice for now. How is Voran?”
Mirnían pulled away from her and put his hands on her shoulders to look intently into her eyes.
“How did you know?” he asked.
She smiled. “We have always been bound unlike other people. I feel him like he is part of me.”
Mirnían nodded, understanding. “He is well, as well as can be expected.” He huffed, at a loss for words. “I do not even know where to begin.”
“Where is he now?”
“He is going to Vasyllia. Sabíana waits for him, you know.”
Lebía smiled. “Did he find what he sought?”
“No. He seeks still. I think he will seek always. If things were dangerous before, now they are far worse. Thank the Heights, this place is safe. No other place in the world is safe anymore.”
On the next morning, before the sun rose, Lebía came one last time to the shores of the Great Sea, to take leave of that part of her life—the long wait for Mirnían—forever. She was surprised to see Aglaia standing there as well, looking out over the water.
“Mother? You are up early.”
“Wolves don’t sleep as humans do. They need much less.” She grinned. Lebía gasped.
“You were the wolf that brought Mirnían? You brought me my happiness. That was you!”
“Yes, my swanling. And now, I must
leave you again.”
Lebía started to protest, but Aglaia silenced her with a glance, as though no time had passed at all since Lebía was a five-year-old girl. Lebía even giggled nervously.
“My poor boy needs someone,” said Aglaia. “Voran has taken the healing of many on himself. But he is still so young, so inexperienced.”
“Dear mother,” Lebía smiled wryly. “What can an old woman do to help the greatest warrior of our age?”
“Ha!” The grin on Aglaia’s face was uncomfortably wolfish. “He is nothing without me.” She winked, and suddenly a wolf the size of a bear stood next to Lebía. Lebía laughed in her shock and clapped her hands like a little girl.
“Voran thinks I am a helpless old woman. He will learn to value his mother more in the future.”
She leapt into the water without a backward glance. Lebía stood there, watching her turn into a black dot. In an instant that seemed to stop time itself, the rays of the sun streamed out between two distant peaks. Everything the sun touched danced with life. Lebía realized with a start that Antomír would be awake already, and poor Mirnían would have no idea what to do with a screaming baby. She turned around, hiked her skirts up, and ran back to Ghavan.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Nicholas Kotar is a writer of epic fantasy inspired by Russian fairy tales, a freelance translator from Russian to English, the resident conductor of the men's choir at a Russian monastery in the middle of nowhere, and a semi-professional vocalist. His one great regret in life is that he was not born in the nineteenth century in St. Petersburg, but he is doing everything he can to remedy that error.
Table of Contents
CHAPTER ONE - The Song
CHAPTER TWO - The Pilgrim
CHAPTER THREE - The Market
CHAPTER FOUR - At the Potter’s
CHAPTER FIVE - The Story
CHAPTER SIX - The Dar's Daughter
CHAPTER SEVEN - Sister of the Pariah
CHAPTER EIGHT - The Sirin
CHAPTER NINE - The Fall
CHAPTER TEN - The Dumar
CHAPTER ELEVEN - The Changer
CHAPTER TWELVE - The Waystone
CHAPTER THIRTEEN - The Island
CHAPTER FOURTEEN - Healing
CHAPTER FIFTEEN - The Conspiracy
CHAPTER SIXTEEN - The Gumiren
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN - An Ordeal of Stories
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN - The Sore
CHAPTER NINETEEN - Sabíana's Test
CHAPTER TWENTY - A Narrow Escape
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE - Complications
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO - The Wedding
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE - Training
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR - The Raven
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE - The Warrior of the Word
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX - Contagion
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN - Black Turnips
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT - The Funeral
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE - The River of Fire
CHAPTER THIRTY - Bayan's Last Song
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE - The Last Battle
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO - The Staff in Bloom
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE - The Raven's Choice
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR - Healer
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE - Covenant
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The Song of the Sirin (Raven Son Book 1) Page 34