by Barb Hendee
She knew the ex-Covârleasa was already beyond the limit of her fading strength, but Fréthfâre merely nodded instead of uttering one of her typical accusatory barbs. Such words no longer stung Dänvârfij, and Rhysís took her place in aiding the cripple among them.
Dänvârfij left her companions behind and slipped up the cutway to the connecting alley behind the buildings. She gathered herself in a rare moment of solitude before stepping out of the alley’s far end to head back toward the waterfront. In a port of this size, there had to be at least some small place that served as a harbormaster’s office.
All such thoughts fled her mind as she turned onto the waterfront’s main walkway.
Two tall men walking toward her fixed their amber irises—in lightly tan triangular faces—on her.
Dänvârfij took in their strange wheat-colored hair, pulled back and up in identical fashion in high tails held by single silver rings. The narrow tips of the men’s elongated ears were plain to see. They were garbed in tawny leather vestments with swirling steel garnishes to match sparkling armor on their shoulders. Each bore a sash the color of pale gold running diagonally over his chest. Long and narrow sword hilts, slightly curved, protruded over their right shoulders.
Dänvârfij lost her composure for an instant and stared. They were an’Cróan . . . and not an’Cróan.
Her people did not carry swords, and the anmaglâhk kept their weapons hidden. Her people did not dress in accoutrements that sparkled and drew such attention. As the men, walking proudly, strode closer toward her, one slowed while staring at her with equal surprise. His skin was not as dark as hers or any of her people’s, though she was tall enough to look him in the eyes.
This continent possessed its own people, somehow akin to hers, called the Lhoin’na, but she had never encountered any of them in her travels. Perhaps this port was closer to their territory than that of other humans. And this pair’s matching garb hinted at some kind of military.
A sliver of anxiety crept in as both men closed the distance, walking right up to her . . . studying her as if they were uncertain whether she was one of them.
Dänvârfij knew that by her own people’s standards she was not a beauty. Her nose was a bit too long and her cheekbones a bit too wide, and then there were her scars. All anmaglâhk had scars. Worse, she was dressed like some vagabond human in faded breeches, a shirt and vest, and a worn cloak over the top.
It was not a wonder that these two stared at her.
The one on the left, slightly taller and more angular of face than his companion, bowed his head slightly.
“May we be of service?” he asked. “Are you searching for something?”
It took Dänvârfij a moment to understand him. His accent was thick and strange. Some of his words were disordered and incorrectly constructed, but his voice held a tone of authority. His expression was openly concerned, like some guardian meeting one of his own alone in a human settlement.
When she did not immediately answer him, his expression grew even more concerned, then uncomfortable, followed by a hint of embarrassment. He bowed his head again quickly and put his hand to his chest.
“Forgive me. I am Arálan of the a’Ghràihlôn’na Shé’ith,” he said, and then gestured to his companion. “Gän’wer.”
Dänvârfij was on uncertain ground. Did Arálan feel he had breached some code of manners by not introducing himself? She merely nodded to each of them, and the first appeared confused and more than a little curious about her. She had no intention of telling him where she was from, but one word he had said clung in her thoughts.
Shé’ith.
It was halfway familiar, for in her tongue—the true tongue of her people—the root word séthiv meant the state and nature of “tranquility” or perhaps “serenity.” If it meant the same in their dialect, then that word for these Lhoin’na might place them in their culture as a guardian caste similar to the Anmaglâhk . . . a term that meant “thief—or thieves—of lives.” The mandate of the Anmaglâhk was to take back the people’s way of life from any who would steal it from them.
She had to say something, and she glanced up and down the waterfront as if she was lost.
“Harbormaster?” she asked, hoping the one word was close enough to how they would say it and that her accent did not sound too strange to them.
Both men frowned slightly. The second lifted his head with furrowed eyebrows, but the first turned and pointed down the way to a narrow building jutting out slightly between a warehouse and what might be either a tavern or place of prepared foods.
“There,” he said, and then he took a quick breath. “Where are you from?”
Dänvârfij had to disengage immediately.
“My thanks,” she said with a nod, and moved on, walking past them. She felt their eyes on her but heard no hurried steps trying to catch her. And there were enough people crowded around the spot she sought that she quickly blocked herself from sight. Only when she neared the harbormaster’s office and stepped in beside its door did she glance back.
The two Lhoin’na—Shé’ith—were moving onward again. Stranger still, most of the little humans of the place showed them deference or even smiled and greeted them warmly. For one moment the pair paused to speak with a young woman with two children clinging to her skirt. And the first one, who had spoken to Dänvârfij, bowed his head with a hand over his heart.
These Shé’ith were respected here and even welcomed.
An idea came to Dänvârfij.
She turned back through the crowd to follow the pair. A visit to the harbormaster could wait briefly until she finished one new task.
Chapter Five
With a stab of guilt, Wynn sighed with a welcome sense of renewed freedom. Gripping the railing of The Thorn, she looked out across the waves at midmorning. She loved to journey, whether by land or sea, but, given the reason for this voyage, taking pleasure in the wind in her face still felt wrong.
“It is good to see you happy,” someone said in Elvish from behind her.
Wynn turned to find Osha, his hair loose and waving in the breeze, standing a few paces off. Dressed in breeches and a dark brown vestment, he hardly looked like the young anmaglâhk she’d once traveled beside. Unfortunately she liked the look of him better this way.
Chane was dormant below in his bunk, and Shade had stayed in the cabin as well, possibly in case Nikolas came knocking. And since Osha had come up by himself, Nikolas was probably still in their cabin.
Wynn couldn’t help feeling too alone with Osha, even though the sailors were going about their duties. Suddenly she didn’t feel so happy anymore.
“I’m sorry,” she said without thinking, “considering what we are investigating. I just felt so . . . confined at the guild.”
Osha stepped up beside her. “Do not be sorry. I felt the same. There is no shame in happiness when it becomes rare.”
At least he appeared less angry now—less intent on trying to dredge up the past. Although, at the moment, she was not so inclined to completely avoid all elements of the past. The memories Shade had shown her rose in her thoughts: of Osha’s being shown a smooth stone and forced to leave Leanâlhâm and Gleann.
Wynn was careful not to betray any of this in her expression as Osha pointed behind her. When she looked, two barrels rested against the thick center mast, but there was a space between them.
“Do you remember our voyage down the eastern coastline of my continent?” he asked, his voice even softer now. “And how we sat in little spaces on the ship of my people and played at Dreug’an . . . or talked?”
Wynn swallowed hard. She remembered all too clearly passing the time with him and listening to him tell her things he’d never told anyone. She also knew exactly what he was doing now.
He had questions of his own for her—about her—and topics that he wanted to discuss. Perhaps in his current mo
od that would not be such a bad thing. Without a word, Wynn turned toward the mast, sank down between the barrels, and only then looked up at Osha.
• • •
Osha froze as Wynn turned away, and then grew confused as she simply settled between the barrels and looked up at him.
He had been angry the previous evening when that undead thing had forced his way into sharing her cabin. Instinct screamed at him to intervene, but, as Wynn had not openly objected, there had been nothing he could do.
In the night he had realized that an open conflict with that monster would not serve him where she was concerned. Such behavior would only push her further away.
Upon waking this morning, while the young sage, Nikolas, still slept fitfully, Osha realized he had one new advantage: Wynn would no longer spend her days in study or hiding away with Premin Hawes. And Chane would lie dead for the day and unable to get in the way.
Osha might have Wynn to himself under the sun.
She’d told him that, once they landed, they would travel by night, but for now they traveled by sea. With a little time he might regain some of what they had lost when last together. No one had ever spoken—or listened—to him in the way she once had.
But now Osha looked at her almost with suspicion. He had not expected her to respond so quickly. Was she inviting him to sit with her and share as they once had?
Slowly he walked over and settled beside her.
“Not all of that journey was so pleasant,” she said, pushing a mass of her wispy light brown hair from her face. “The Pock Peaks were difficult.”
He had not even had to prod her in this, and he nodded carefully, saying nothing.
“Afterward was even worse.” She whispered this time. “The journey through the Everfen and . . . Sgäile’s death . . .”
Osha did not want to speak of Sgäilsheilleache’s death and looked away.
“But then Magiere and Leesil’s wedding . . . and that was a good day,” Wynn went on.
Osha turned his head back to find her looking up; even sitting on the deck she was still much shorter than he was. And, yes, that day—and that evening with her—was one of his best memories, no matter the sorrows he had carried then.
“. . . And then you and I said good-bye on the docks of Bela.”
There—she finally spoke of it, admitted that it had happened. But now that those words were out in the open, he grew lost for what to say.
Wynn shifted a little, turning more toward him with her eyes still on his.
“What happened then?” she asked almost fiercely. “I know you had to go home and tell Leanâlhâm and Gleann about Sgäile, as well as deliver the journal I prepared to Brot’an. Something happened after that, and you were pulled away from them. What happened to you?”
Every muscle in Osha’s body tightened as he stared at her. How did she know he had been pulled away? Had Leanâlhâm spoken of things she should not have?
“Tell me,” Wynn whispered.
Was that what it would take? He wanted to close the gap between them, one that had begun in their short time together in Miiska and had seemingly widened to a chasm now that he had found her again. Part of him longed to tell her everything, but he feared how she might react to certain things.
Some secrets should never be told to others. There were torments—falls and failures—to be borne in silence, especially with those who mattered most. Least of those secrets, but most of all to others, was her journal.
Wynn still expectantly watched him, and Osha lowered his eyes.
So little within the journal had mattered much to those who did not know her as he did. But the mentions in those pages of an “artifact”—an orb, to those who knew better—had been used by Most Aged Father and Brot’ân’duivé to start an open war among the people. If Osha had known then what he knew now, he might have burned that journal before he ever reached home.
Even so, he could not have done that. The journal—and its too-simple account of their journey together—was all that he had had of her.
Osha studied Wynn’s oval face: she was a human he had come to know as so different from all he had been taught in his youth. And she was even more than just different. She was unique to him.
“It began with another journey,” he whispered, and . . .
• • •
After Osha was forced away from the Coilehkrotall’s main enclave, he had followed Brot’ân’duivé through their people’s forests for three days. He could not stop thinking of how he had left Gleannéohkân’thva and Leanâlhâm in mourning and was not there to share their grief or to comfort them.
This was also a way to avoid thinking on the reason for this sudden, rushed journey.
The smooth stone that bore his name etched by small claws.
Three days into the forest, as the sun glimmered through the canopy overhead, Brot’ân’duivé halted suddenly and looked back along their path.
“Continue on,” he whispered. “I will catch up.”
With a puzzled glance back the way they had come, Osha obeyed and jogged onward, wondering what had given the greimasg’äh such pause. He did not have long to wait.
Soon after, Brot’ân’duivé came dashing from the forest, not bothering to be silent. Without stopping, he signaled to Osha to run.
Osha did, but Brot’ân’duivé caught up and took the lead, changing directions many times. The greimasg’äh finally stopped and crouched down beneath the bright leaves of a squat maple. Osha, utterly confused, dropped beside him.
“We are followed,” Brot’ân’duivé whispered. “I can no longer come with you, and we must act quickly now.”
Osha rocked backward on his haunches and braced against the maple to keep from toppling. Who would follow them? More important, it was impossible for him to continue alone.
“But, Greimasg’äh . . .” he whispered, “only caste elders know the exact way to the Burning Ones.”
Young initiates were blindfolded for part of their journey. Even those given assent by their jeóin did not learn those last steps until many years—if ever—into their lives of service. Osha would require a guide.
Brot’ân’duivé snatched Osha by the front of his forest gray vestment.
“Listen,” he hissed. “You will travel like the wind to the coastline where the Branch Mountains, what the humans call the Crown Range, meet the eastern coast at the far corner of our territory. . . .”
“Greimasg’äh!” Osha whispered loudly. “Do not break the covenant!”
Telling Osha these things would breach a most sacred oath between the Chein’âs and the Anmaglâhk.
“Quiet!” Brot’ân’duivé ordered.
The greimasg’äh poured out secrets into the forest air, and Osha was powerless to stop him.
Brot’ân’duivé told him how to reach the cave of the Burning Ones on his own. No one should know these things until proven fit to do so. By the time the greimasg’äh finished, Osha had gone numb in disbelief that any of this was happening.
It was not over, for there was worse to come.
Rising, Brot’ân’duivé looked all around, and then walked off toward a patch of bright light in a break among the trees.
“What are you doing?” Osha asked, barely trusting himself to speak.
“Be silent and follow. Do not speak again until instructed to do so.”
When the greimasg’äh reached the clearing’s edge, he halted and gestured for Osha to stay back. Only then did the master anmaglâhk step to the clearing’s center and close his eyes.
Cold grew in the pit of Osha’s stomach, though he was lost as to what was happening. Moments slipped by . . . until a heavy footfall made his gaze shift instantly.
Out among the trees beyond the clearing’s far side, two branches among a cluster of cedars moved. Then the limbs separated from the others
and drifted out around the tree into view. Below them came a long equine head with two crystalline blue eyes larger than those of a majay-hì.
Any deer would be small next to this great sacred being, as large as an elk or any human’s horse. Its long silver-gray coat ran shaggily over its shoulders and across its wide chest. What had at first appeared to be branches were the horns rising high over its head in two smooth curves without tines.
Osha’s voice choked in his throat until he whispered one word. “Clhuassas!”
The “listeners” were among the oldest sacred beings, like the majay-hì, who guarded the an’Cróan lands from all interlopers. He had seen one of them only three times in his life, and always from afar. That it stood so close to the greimasg’äh was somehow disturbing.
“My thanks,” Brot’ân’duivé whispered.
Osha realized what the greimasg’äh had done. Brot’ân’duivé had somehow called a clhuassas, but how . . . and why?
The sacred one stalked slowly into the clearing, and sunlight made its coat shimmer like threads made from the metal of Anmaglâhk blades. Its eyes appeared almost too bright to look upon, and Osha shied away from doing so. More shocking was when it stepped up to the aging greimasg’äh and lowered its great head.
Brot’ân’duivé put his forehead against the bridge of the sacred one’s nose.
It snorted and then stamped a forehoof once that made the ground shudder under Osha’s feet. But the sacred one did no more than that and became still.
“Osha,” the greimasg’äh said. “Come . . . now.”
Hesitantly, Osha inched into the clearing. “What are you doing?”
“Climb onto its back,” Brot’ân’duivé ordered.
Osha froze as the cold in his belly raced through his bones. “No! I will not ride one of our sacred creatures like some beast of burden!”
“It has already been too long since I received the stone!” Brot’ân’duivé answered angrily. “And this one will carry you far more swiftly than you can run. It has agreed to do this. . . . Now mount.”