“And does it?”
“Not often. He doesn’t like to disturb the natural balance of things. He’s a real stickler for the rules.”
“He seemed to know you pretty well.”
“We’ve had dealings in the past,” Brak said abruptly. She could tell he didn’t want to elaborate.
“What did he mean about—”
“Here comes our new queen,” Brak cut in, before R’shiel could frame the question she was certain he didn’t wish to answer. There was an inexplicable edge in his voice. “We’d best say goodbye.”
Shananara approached them, dressed in dragon-rider’s leathers, her long-legged stride and easy grace marking her as Harshini, even more than her totally black eyes. She smiled as she neared them, then glanced over her shoulder to check on Dranymire and the demon-meld before turning to R’shiel.
“As soon as we have reached the Citadel, I will send Dranymire and Elanymire back for you both. Do you know what to do?”
R’shiel nodded. Although the Harshini were abandoning Sanctuary, they had no intention of leaving it empty to be pawed over by the Kariens and defiled in the same way the Citadel had been defiled by its new tenants. Shananara had shown R’shiel how to remove it from time, but on this occasion there would be nobody inside to suffer from it. The fortress would be completely empty of life. Every animal had fled. Every Harshini was preparing to leave. Even the insects had been advised to move out. Once the Harshini were gone, she would send Sanctuary so far out of time that only she or Shananara would have any hope of retrieving it.
“Then let the Kariens come. There will be nothing here for them to find.”
“I hope I do it right,” R’shiel said, suffering a momentary pang of uncertainty.
“You will,” Shananara assured her. “Korandellan was right about you, you know. You are not nearly as unreliable as I first thought.”
“Thank you…I think.”
“Things are as they should be, R’shiel.”
“Even though Korandellan is dead?”
“My brother was honoured by Death. There is no greater reward for a lifetime of service. Now, I must bid you farewell. I will try to ensure that our return does not wreak too much havoc on the residents of the Citadel.”
Shananara and Brak exchanged a look that was full of amusement.
“You both keep saying that! What are you talking about?”
“You’ll see,” Shananara replied with a cryptic smile. “Will I see you again, Brak?”
“Yes. It’s not over yet.”
“Then there is no need for goodbyes. I will see you both at the Citadel. Hopefully, Tarja will be a little more reasonable than the last time we met.”
“He wasn’t unreasonable, Shanan. He was under a geas.”
Suddenly serious, Shananara nodded. “I know. And now the geas is gone. It’s strange, but when we sat around that fire beside the Glass River trying to coax the demon child home, I never imagined that a couple of years later I would be returning to the Citadel as the Harshini queen and Tarja would be the Lord Defender. Even destiny can play tricks on us at times.”
“Go easy on him, Shanan,” Brak advised. “He’s had a rough time lately.”
“Never fear, Brak. I know how to handle humans, even testy ones.” She turned to R’shiel and hugged her briefly. “As for you, little cousin. Do this thing for us then return to the Citadel to fulfil your destiny. I will help you locate the Seeing Stone.”
“Why not use the Stone here?” Brak asked. “Now that Sanctuary is back in real time, does it matter?”
“Korandellan told me that only the Seeing Stone of the Citadel is capable of what I need. I must find that or find another way, I’m afraid.”
“We’ll find it, R’shiel. The High Arrion was right. No human could have destroyed it. If it’s still in the Citadel, we’ll locate it eventually.”
Shananara then turned on her heel and walked back towards her dragon. She leapt aboard with practised ease and the dragon lifted into the sky with a powerful beat of his massive wings. Her departure was the signal for the other Harshini to take off, and within minutes the sky was dotted with dragons climbing towards the red-tinted clouds. There were too many for R’shiel to count. She watched them dwindle into the distance until they were little more than specks in the sky. The sight both cheered and saddened her. The Harshini were abroad once more, but they were facing a world they had been removed from for centuries and it was radically different from the one they had left behind.
“Will they be all right, Brak?”
“Yes. Shananara is right, you know. Things are as they should be.”
She turned to look at him, puzzled by the sadness in his voice.
“Korandellan was a good king, but he never stepped foot outside Sanctuary. Shanan has been walking among humans since she was a child. She’ll rule the Harshini much more effectively now that they have gone back among humans than Koran ever could.”
“But you still grieve for Korandellan, don’t you?”
He nodded. “He was a good friend.”
“How many good friends have you lost for me, Brak?”
“More than you will ever know.”
She had no answer for that and darkness was falling rapidly over the deserted fortress.
Brak jumped down from the balustrade and held out his hand to her. “We’d better make sure this place is empty before you send it away.”
She took his hand and jumped down beside him and together they walked back into the silent, empty halls.
CHAPTER 51
The last room they checked was Brak’s. R’shiel looked about in fascination, seeing a side of him she never suspected. There was an easel by the window with a half-completed landscape resting on it. Leaning against the wall near the bed was a beautifully crafted lyre, and beside it a thick pile of music. She picked the lyre up and strummed the strings thoughtfully. Brak looked up from papers he was sorting through on the table on the other side of the room and frowned.
“Please don’t touch anything, R’shiel.”
“I didn’t know you played.”
“I used to.”
“I didn’t know you painted, either.”
“There’s a lot you don’t know about me.”
She replaced the lyre carefully and sat on the bed. “Why did Death say he would meet you again soon?”
Brak shrugged. “He’s a sociable sort of fellow.”
“I noticed,” she said with a smile, hoping to lighten his mood. He had grown ever more morose the longer they spent in Sanctuary’s echoing, silent rooms. “Korandellan told you to face Death secure in that knowledge that your sacrifice is not in vain. Shananara asked if she would see you again, too. Why would she say that?”
“Ask her.”
Brak was shifting papers across the table without purpose. She had angered him and couldn’t understand why.
“Did I say something wrong?”
“No…look, why don’t you go and see if there’s any other rooms on this level we haven’t checked? I’ll meet you on the terrace when I’m finished here.”
She rose to her feet, a little hurt that he was dismissing her so coldly. “Can’t I help?”
“No.”
“Brak…”
“Out!”
R’shiel jumped at the anger in his voice. “What did I do to deserve that?”
“Right now, you’re breathing!” he retorted. “That’s enough.”
“What’s gotten into you, Brak? This isn’t my fault, you know.”
“Actually, R’shiel, it is your fault. Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to be alone while I sort out my things. I’m not likely to get another chance.”
“Fine!” she declared. “Take all the time you want. I’m not going anywhere!”
R’shiel stormed from the room and ran down the long hall, her footsteps loud and discordant in the dark, silent halls. She stopped when she reached the balcony overlooking the valley, angry and hurt by Brak’s s
udden rejection. The waterfall tinkled musically down the rock face on the other side of the valley, although the perpetual rainbow had been swallowed by the half-light that passed for night here. The sound soothed her. She had done nothing to deserve Brak’s anger that she could recall. No more than usual, at any rate.
His sudden intolerance mystified her. She tried to recall everything that had happened since they arrived at Sanctuary. Nothing sprang to mind that would make him turn on her like that. Except when she questioned him about Death. He’d been rather touchy about that up on the terrace, too. And why, in the name of the Founders, did he suddenly decide to sort his papers out? Anyone would think…
With the thought only half completed, R’shiel ran back to Brak’s room and threw open the door. She glared at him accusingly, tears blurring her vision, anger and grief battling each other for dominance.
“It’s you!”
“What?”
“It’s you, isn’t it? The life you traded for mine? ‘A life of equal value,’ that’s what you said. You told me you traded someone’s life for mine when Joyhinia almost killed me. You bargained with Death and offered your life to save mine, didn’t you? That’s why Death said your deal was almost done. It’s why Shananara asked if she would ever see you again. You damned, sentimental, self-sacrificing, half-breed, bastard idiot!”
Brak stared at her for a moment and then looked away. His anger had faded. He looked simply resigned. “It doesn’t matter.”
She crossed the room and grabbed his shoulder, forcing him to look at her. “How could you?”
“How could I not?” he asked her softly.
She wiped away her tears angrily and punched his arm. “You can’t do this to me! You can’t do it to yourself. I don’t deserve it. Founders, Brak, what am I supposed to do? Spend the rest of my life—all ten thousand years of it—knowing I’m alive because you squandered your life on me?”
She tried to hit him again but Brak pulled her close and held her while she sobbed. She could not believe what he had done, or the guilt such knowledge had burdened her with.
“There, there,” he said, as if he was comforting a small child. “It’s too late to do anything about it now.”
“Why did you do it?” she cried, her face buried in his chest.
“I only had one life to bargain with, R’shiel. To offer another life would have been murder.”
“You could have let him take me.”
Brak kissed the top of her head and lifted her chin with the tip of his finger. With his thumb he gently wiped away a tear. “No. That I couldn’t do.”
For a timeless moment he looked at her. Then he kissed her, lightly, his lips just brushing hers, as if he expected her to pull away from him. It sent an unexpected shiver down her spine. There was a world of promise behind his kiss, so different from Tarja’s artificially imposed desire that it left her unable to breathe. R’shiel stared at him in wonder, suddenly understanding the source of her anger, the reason for her grief. This moment had been long in the making, she realised, simmering at the back of their often-volatile, strangely dependent relationship, waiting for an opportunity to catch them unawares.
R’shiel reached up, running her fingers through his dark hair and pulled his head down towards hers, with the certain knowledge that no god had interfered in his desire, no geas had imposed feelings for her that he didn’t want to own. He pulled her even closer, the slow burning heat of his desire searing away her doubts. He kissed her neck, her ear and then her mouth again, then broke away from her embrace suddenly and took her face in his hands.
“Look at me.”
She met his gaze evenly, unafraid, wishing he would stop talking.
“You know this changes nothing, don’t you?”
She shook her head wordlessly, wanting to deny him, not trusting herself to speak.
“Nothing can be altered, R’shiel. Whatever happens, if you succeed or fail, I cannot alter the bargain I made.”
“But—”
“There are no buts. No loopholes. No way out. Do you understand that?”
R’shiel felt fresh tears prick her eyes as she nodded her reluctant agreement.
“Then understand this, too. You are part-human, R’shiel, but you are also part-Harshini. There is so much you don’t understand. So much you have yet to learn. You can’t send Sanctuary out of time until sunrise. We have one night. I can show you a part of being Harshini that you cannot possibly imagine. But I’m not doing this for payment and I don’t want you doing it out of guilt, or to get even with Tarja. Tomorrow, you will still be the demon child, he will still be the Lord Defender, and I will still be the half-breed who will die as soon as you succeed. There is no future. There is only now. The choice is yours.” His eyes bored into her, demanding an answer. Then he added huskily, “Stay, or stay out of my way until morning.”
The decision was harder than she imagined. But tomorrow was a lifetime away, and deep down, despite everything she had seen, everything she had done, R’shiel was still not convinced that she was ruled by her destiny.
“I want to stay.”
He searched her face, looking for some sign that she was uncertain. When he found none, he smiled briefly and his eyes began to darken as he kissed her again, harder, and more hungrily. R’shiel followed his lead and kissed him back, opening her mouth to his and her mind to the power. Her eyes blackened until they were orbs of glittering ebony as the intoxicating sweetness filled her. Brak reached for her, not with his hands but with his mind. The space between them blurred as he wove an enchantment around them that left no room for anything but a sweet, seductive desire that had no parallel in the human world.
This was what the legends spoke of. This was the gift of the Harshini that ruined humans for any other lover. She’d heard stories about it. The Novices had whispered about it in the dormitories late at night, fascinated and repelled by it. The Sisterhood had tried to destroy the Harshini for fear of it. All the violence they could not contemplate, all the conflict they could not confront was transformed into this offering, this all-consuming, passionate inferno that consumed every thought, every fibre of one’s being in the pursuit of mutual pleasure. It was the ultimate expression of the Harshini quest for happiness.
R’shiel lost all sense of time; could not separate reality from fantasy. She didn’t know how they got to the bed or how long the night lasted. She could not distinguish touch from desire, or pleasure from pain. Nothing she had experienced in the past had prepared her for this and nothing would ever come close to it in the future.
It was the first time she truly understood the meaning of magic.
Brak shook her awake at sunrise. She turned in his arms, a little surprised that she was still holding onto the power. It filled her with a heavy, languid weariness.
“Time to get up and do your good deed for the day, demon child,” he reminded her with a smile.
“Brak, I…”
“No,” he said, placing a finger on her lips to silence her. “Don’t say it.”
She smiled and nodded. “I was going to ask if there’s anything to eat. I’m starving.”
“I’ll find something while you’re getting dressed.”
By the time Brak returned with a platter of impossibly perfect fruit, grown here in Sanctuary where even the grubs were considerate of others, R’shiel was dressed and ready to leave. They ate as they walked through the silent halls. Brak made no attempt at conversation and R’shiel didn’t try to engage him. There was nothing to be said. He had laid down the conditions of their one night together and they bound her, despite what it would cost her in the future. There was nothing to be gained by talking about it.
The sun was almost over the peaks as they stepped through the Gateway and out into the chill, snow-covered mountains. They walked some distance from the fortress before R’shiel stopped and turned to look back at Sanctuary.
“I wonder how long it will have to remain hidden?”
“Not as long as
the last time, I hope.”
She frowned. “If I get this wrong, we may never be able to find it again.”
“Then don’t get it wrong,” he suggested dryly.
She hesitated a moment, framing her next question carefully. “Can I ask you something, Brak, about last night?” When he did not answer, she chose to take his silence as permission. “When we…well, could the other Harshini feel it?”
“Yes.”
She felt her face redden with embarrassment, but that wasn’t what she wanted to know. “What about the demons?”
“If they were paying attention.”
“And the gods?”
“Certainly.”
“So Kalianah would know?”
“Oh, yes, Kalianah would know.”
“Would Xaphista have felt it?”
“Undoubtedly.”
She tossed her apple core to a curious squirrel come to investigate them. “Good.”
He stared at her curiously.
“I want that bastard to know I was having a good time.”
“If it’s any consolation, he was probably squirming the whole night. When he rose to power the first thing he did was forbid his people to indulge in anything so wantonly pleasurable. They call all sex a sin now in Karien, but his original intention was to stop his people consorting with the Harshini. He had that in common with the Sisterhood. They too were afraid of the effect it had on humans. It’s like a drug, in some ways. As the only way to get more of it is to have a relationship with a Harshini who can’t abide violence, the end result was a fairly peaceful and very happy community—back in the days before Xaphista and the Sisters of the Blade.”
“And a lot of half-breeds,” she added with a grin.
“That too.”
“So Xaphista despises pleasure.”
“He’s afraid that it will distract his people from him.”
R’shiel nodded, filing the information away for future reference. Then, unable to delay what she was planning any longer, she drew even more of the power she was still channelling and turned her attention to Sanctuary. The fortress glittered in the sunrise, as if it had put on its best face to bid them farewell.
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