* * *
Windsign watched the small one curled up on the ground. She was lovely, after the fashion of her kind, smooth of skin, long-limbed, so solid and helpless, so young. Increasing her mass, she descended to the slender branch arching over the sleeping girl. Perhaps we should wait for another.
And how long will it be before one comes? Summerstone’s impatient mind imaged the grove empty and silent as time wove its relentless way onward. The mountain males never allow small ones of power to come alone down here in the living land.
Windsign could not argue with that. Although the dark, quiet-minded ones sometimes ventured into the forest, she had never even seen a sister of this golden-hued breed before, and her memory went back a good three Interims before Summerstone’s. She listened to the small one’s dreams for a moment, troubled by repeated images of fire and death, fear and guilt. This one has borne much in her short time.
The girl tossed restlessly in her bed of soft grasses, throwing first one arm over her eyes, then the other. Her face contorted as she cried out, then bolted up, staring wildly about the moon-shadowed glade. Windsign heard the roar of flames in her mind, saw the blackness of grief and pain.
Fear is natural. Summerstone sent soothing images of sun and shade and the sweet voice of the morning breeze into the small one’s mind. Fear is but a sister whispering in your ear to keep you from danger.
Confusion and loneliness filled the small one’s mind. She put her hands to her head, fighting the suggestion.
Small sister, you must rest. Dream of . . . Summerstone hesitated, rifling through the girl’s mind for a comforting memory, then settled on a narrow black muzzle and tufted ears. . . . yes . . . dream of our brave, clever shadowfoot. She sent the feel of its smooth, thick coat and the rumbling warmth of its company into her thoughts.
The mountain child’s eyes fluttered. Gradually, she relaxed back into the nest of soft grasses that Summerstone had woven for her.
Windsign waited until the young mind was drawn back down into dream images again, more peaceful this time. You see? This one is flawed. She will never survive what we ask of her.
It is for her kind’s survival, as well as ours. Summerstone called to a passing lightwing and held out her finger for it to perch.
You see how her people have failed her. Even by their simple standards, she has not been properly trained.
Summerstone abandoned the treetop, increasing her body’s mass until gravity bore her down to the grass-carpeted forest floor. She knelt by the mountain child’s head and smoothed back the fine moon-gold hair from the still face. The skin was warm beneath her touch, and soft as a sunbeam, but as her fingers trailed down the delicate neck to the girl’s shoulder, she felt the wrongness . . . torn muscles . . . inflamed nerves. She sent a pulse of healing energy through her fingertips into the painful area and probed the fragile body further. There was damage in the brain tissue too, neural pathways seared, nerves overloaded and unable to function properly. This child had fought beyond her strength, and yet Summerstone sensed her potential was great. She concentrated, pouring as much healing energy through the damaged area as the small one’s cells could take.
That is not enough. Windsign watched from above. There is still some dysfunction.
That is all she can stand for now. Their bodies are very fragile.
Yes. Windsign paused. Perhaps too fragile. You saw how she lost her way in the nexus.
That does not matter. I will teach her. Summerstone’s voice rang with the stubbornness of living gray stone. Then she will return to her kind in mountains and end the danger.
She is too afraid. Windsign decreased her body’s mass and drifted on the night breeze, losing sight of her sister and the small one beneath the trees below. It might be kinder to let this one fade away, before her own fear kills her.
* * *
Jarid squinted up at the twin towers of Tal’ayn spanning the split crags of gray rock ahead. Blast that simpering she-bavval, Alyssa! He watched the gold and green banner flap in the morning breeze with a white-hot anger burning behind his pale eyes. Obviously his uncle still lived.
Shouldering his saddlebags, he took a deep breath of the crisp late spring air and followed the familiar path that wound around the Old apple orchard onto the grounds of the ancient House. So far, he’d passed no workers which meant Alyssa had at least managed that much.
Reaching the tiny side entrance in the north wing, he tried the door and was relieved when it swung smoothly inwards without a creak. Just on the other side of the threshold, Alyssa waited, her green-gold eyes wide.
“Oh, it is you!” She flung herself onto his surprised neck.
He stared down at the bright-gold plait that circled her small head like a crown. “We do not have time for this, Aunt.”
She released his neck, sliding down his chest. “You’re not still angry with me about Dervlin.” Shiny tears welled up in her eyes. “I really did try to—to do it.”
Turning away from her silently, he closed the heavy door and threw the latch. “It doesn’t matter now.”
She glanced down the darkened hallway. “What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to see my uncle, of course, like a dutiful nephew.”
“Oh.” A knuckle strayed to her mouth. “You’ll find him very—restless.”
“Hide these.” Jarid handed her the saddlebags. “And stay away from Uncle’s chambers for the time being. I’ll have enough trouble covering for myself without worrying about you.” He brushed past her in the narrow passageway. “And have some roast savok with berrysauce sent to my room. I haven’t had a decent meal since I left.”
Although he didn’t look back, he felt her bewilderment follow him down the passage. She might as well get used to it, he thought, her usefulness had just about come to an end.
He encountered few servants on his way to the family wing, and those he did meet simply bowed and backed out of his path. Their minds revealed no real awareness of his absence these past days.
Good. That meant less work for him to do. Relaxing his shields slightly, he paused outside the double doors, trying to overhear his uncle’s thoughts inside.
Damnation, boy! If you want to come in, just say so! Quit sniffing around.
A wave of nausea rolled through his stomach and cold sweat broke out on his upper lip. He blotted it with his sleeve. Blast that spineless Alyssa for not finishing the job when she had the chance! Locking his shields as tightly as he dared, he pushed the door open.
“I wouldn’t be too quick to come in here either, if I were you.” Tal was wrestling with the arm of his overtunic. “Not after the way you and that sneaking wench have been wasting my gold!”
Jarid crossed the outer chamber and lounged in the inner doorway. “And what has Aunt been doing this time?” He let just the slightest hint of boredom seep through his shields.
“Don’t try to make out that you weren’t involved in this too, right up to your washed-out eyes.” His uncle’s florid face disappeared as he forced the black garment over his head. “You’ve been after me to put in an Old apple orchard for too long for me not to recognize your thieving hand in this.”
A knowing smile drifted across Jarid’s lips. “Rest assured, Uncle, if I ever should be tempted to get in your way, it will be over something more important than a few worm-eaten fruits.”
His uncle paused, staring at him with powerful golden eyes. He felt the sudden weight of the old man’s probe against his shields. He glanced down at his hand, examining the nails with as much nonchalance as he could summon.
“Damnation and everlasting bloody Darkness!” The pressure eased off as abruptly as it had begun. The old man sagged gray-faced against the four-poster bed. “Thought I’d never see the day . . . when I couldn’t crack open a young whelp . . . like an overripe melon.”
Jarid sighed. “Nor I, Un
cle.” He walked across to the bed, supporting the old man by the arm. “But if you overdo, your recovery will of course take much longer.”
Tal resisted him for a moment, then fell backwards, wheezing. “Where . . . have you been . . . anyway?”
He pulled up a chair. “Been, Uncle?”
Tal opened his eyes. “The last few . . . days. Blast it, boy, I’ve . . . been sick, not . . . dead.”
He scratched his chin, then shook his head. “I’ve been right here, looking out for Tal’ayn until you’re recovered.” He brushed at an invisible speck on his sleeve. “I couldn’t leave you unprotected.”
His uncle’s eyelids closed for a second. “You’re in on it with . . . her, aren’t you?” He swallowed hard and took a deep, gasping breath. “She knew the Council would never approve her for my . . . heir on her Naming Day so—” He broke off as a spasm of coughing racked him.
Jarid poured a glass of water from the carafe by the bedside and handed it to him.
No, Uncle, he thought, I knew the old fools would be ecstatic once they measured her Talent and found the skivit measuring Plus-six or better, much too ecstatic to think of accepting me in her place.
“We’ve been through this a hundred times.” He schooled his tone to patience. “When I realized what the little wretch was up to, I stepped in and saved your life. Surely you must remember some of that, now that you’re better?”
“Nothing.” His uncle’s voice was faint. “I . . . remember nothing of that . . . night.”
Standing beside the old man’s bed, Jarid watched until his uncle’s chest rose and fell in the evenness of sleep. As long as the old nit remembered nothing, he thought, it wouldn’t hurt to keep him around for a few more days . . . just for appearance’s sake.
He fingered the well-tempered steel sheathed at his waist and smiled.
* * *
The song rang with the chattering of water running over rocks, backed with the sweet edge of a crystal wind chime. Haemas lay aware of the music long before she woke enough to wonder where she was.
You have been sleeping in the Great Forest, small sister.
Opening her eyes, she gazed up into the deep green of winterberry leaves. She lay in a snug nest of soft spring grasses under the arching boughs of the grove of huge trees. “Kevisson?” she asked, although the voice in her head hadn’t sounded like the Searcher. Only the breeze shuffling the leaves answered her. Then she stopped in wonder. Whoever it was, she had heard their mindvoice without any physical contact. She was better somehow, and her shields were back in place. She felt rested and strangely invigorated, almost whole again.
She sat up and picked the bits of grass out of her hair; some of the pieces were charred and black. The flames; so she hadn’t dreamed that.
No, small sister, that was of this spacetime.
Her heart thumping, she backed against a tree, glancing warily around the grove.
Think not of fearing. Think of living.
“Who are you?” Haemas demanded. “Jarid?”
No males are permitted in this songful sacred place, the voice insisted primly, and although there was no sound about that voice in her head, there was something of the strange music she’d heard earlier.
Not Jarid, she told herself, and not Kevisson, but then—who?
Summerstone, the voice said, and Haemas’s mind filled with the image of gray stone cliffs washed by a river at its bending.
Windsign, another voice said, sending her the caress of the wind against her face on a balmy summer day.
“Where are you?”
Later,small sister. There is much that you must learn.
Rise, Summerstone said. Eat of the Mother’s fruits. Your struggle last night was long and difficult.
Haemas slowly rose to her feet and saw a pool in the center of the grove. Ringed with carefully worked white stone inset at intervals with large ilsera crystals, steps descended into the clear water on one side, and next to the steps she found a pile of sweet yellow callyts and succulent purple nasai, as well as several fruits she did not recognize.
Tasting an unfamiliar green fruit, she wiped at the dribble of juice down her chin. “Was it you, then, in the sanctuary?”
That was an otherwhen, Summerstone’s voice replied, a dangerous place in which to be lost.
The memory of her own waxen dead face made Haemas stop with the fruit halfway to her mouth. “How can I be dead there and yet alive here?” She swallowed hard.
That was a when that either might have been or might yet become.
“And my father?”
Nothing answered, save the murmuring of small living things and the whisper of the leaves.
“DARKNESS and damnation, Kniel!” Birtal Senn choked on a mouthful of tea that tasted like dishwater. He regarded the mug with disgust. “Why don’t you get some decent help around this mausoleum?”
Master Ellirt sipped cautiously at his own mug, then wrinkled his nose. “I suppose they’re training a new shift down in the kitchens.” A low chuckle rumbled up from his chest. “They’ll get the hang of it—after being forced to eat their own cooking for a few days.
Senn set the mug aside. “I fail to see anything so bloody funny about that.”
“You wouldn’t . . .” Ellirt turned his sightless face away from the fire and smiled. “. . . unless you’d spent a few absolutely terrifying boyhood days having to eat your own abysmal cooking as well as put up with the complaints of everyone else in Shael’donn.”
“Eat my own cooking?” Senn drummed his fingers on the arm of the high-backed chair. “Don’t be ridiculous!”
Ellirt sighed, then bowed his white-haired head and rested his chin on his folded hands.
“Let’s get back to the subject.” Senn leaned forward. “I want you to attend the next Council conclave on temporal transfer.”
The cheerfulness fled Ellirt’s round face. “We’ve already discussed that.”
“We haven’t had enough full Talents for a quorum since Tal was injured.” Senn took the poker and prodded the burning logs into a new configuration. “We’ve felt for some time now that we’re close to a breakthrough. I want you to assist in the power relay.”
Ellirt rose stiffly and edged around his chair, one hand resting on the back to guide him. “I’m not up to that anymore.”
“Don’t tell me you’re afraid!” Senn watched impatiently as the Shael’donn master crossed to his cluttered desk in the corner and fumbled through a drawer.
Ellirt turned back to him, his cheeks flushed, his jaw set. “You’re bloody right I’m afraid! How many more men do you have to lose in this insanity before the Council gives it up?”
“We haven’t lost a man in—” Senn stiffened as an unbidden memory flashed through his mind—an agonized face being drawn inch by inch into throbbing blueness. “—in over two years.”
Holding picked up a long, slender object, Ellirt angled back to his seat. “You forget I trained Yjan Tal Alimn myself.” He held out the flute in his hand. “He made this for me several months before he died.”
Senn wove his shields tighter as he stared at the rich warm brown of the polished wood. “Looks like Old oak.”
“It is.” Ellirt ran his fingers over the glossy finish. “Grown in unmixed Old soil at Alimn’ayn.” His sightless eyes roved the room as though he were staring at something Senn couldn’t see. “He was only sixteen and it was a brutal death. I heard every one of his last cries, even here at Shael’donn. We all did, down to the youngest student. I have nightmares about it still.”
“If we give up now,” Senn said tightly, “then Yjan’s death will have been in vain.”
Ellirt’s gnarled hands gripped the back of the chair. “It was in vain!”
Even through his rigid shields, Senn felt the blast-furnace heat of his old friend’s anger.
“It’s all stupid and pointless! What will the Council do with this new toy of temporal travel if they do make it work—use it to subjugate the rest of the Lowlands all the way to the Cholee Sea?” He rubbed a hand across his forehead, seeming to sink in upon himself, suddenly old and tired.
Senn closed his eyes, holding a tight rein on the part of him that wanted to seize the sightless man by the shirt and shake some sense into him. Closeted here with nothing but boys and landless teaching masters for company, Ellirt could afford to be impractical and unworldly. Those who had the responsibility of a House couldn’t. “We’ll use it for research.”
“Research!” Ellirt snorted. “Research into the tactics and disposition of outlying chierra holdings, no doubt!”
“I have no doubt that we might find some—military applications.”
“The Council has already cut off a bigger piece of this world than it can hold.” Ellirt thrust the wooden flute unerringly at Senn’s chest. “Here, take it. Let it remind you of Yjan Tal Alimn.”
Senn took the flute between two fingers as though it were made of fire.
“Yjan was a fine boy . . .” Ellirt turned away. “. . . and I’ve always felt he would have been a great man. Now, please leave while I can still remember why we are friends.”
Thrusting the flute deep into his pocket, Senn snatched up his cloak and stalked out the door.
* * *
Fear is a natural part of continuing for your kind, Summerstone’s soothing mindvoice continued, just as much as joy and suffering, disease and health.
Haemas trailed a hand in the crisply cool water of the pool, catching an occasional winking glimpse of orange sun overhead through the shifting leaves. “But the flames—”
You punish yourself.
A breeze whispered through the interlocking tree branches, bringing the scent of moist earth and growing things. She leaned forward and rested her head against her bent knees. The memory of what she had done burned like a red-hot coal, and yet, try as she might, she could recall nothing of what had been in her mind that night. . . no reason . . . no motive. “You told me he might not be dead.”
HM01 Moonspeaker Page 19