“You couldn’t possibly understand.” The words were out before she could stop them.
“Perhaps you’re right. Full understanding comes with full knowledge, something one person cannot give to another. But you could give me enough knowledge to understand how to help and protect you.” The Paledyn leaned back again and Carcali took a deep breath for the first time in what felt like hours. “Come. I have told you what I know, what I see with my own eyes. Let me tell you also what I suspect. I believe you are a Caid, though how you find yourself here is more than I can know, I admit.”
“What could you know about the Caids?” Too late, Carcali realized she hadn’t denied the suggestion.
“I have spent more than a year in a Scholars’ Library. I know things that the common sword-wearer does not know, even across the Long Ocean, where I think such things are better understood than they are here. I know that the Caids were not gods, as some people think of them, but people like ourselves. And I know that among them were many powerful Mages, some powerful enough to manipulate even the fabric of space and time. And some who were foolish enough to do it. So if you are, as I suspect, one of these, why do you not go back?”
“I can’t.” The words were out before Carcali could stop them, pushed by the guilt that was always hovering in the back of her mind, no matter how much she tried to ignore it. She would have given anything for the words to be unsaid—even she could hear the longing and despair that informed them.
“Can’t or won’t?”
“Can’t. It’s not possible.” Carcali spoke through clenched teeth. Did the woman think she hadn’t tried? Would she have suffered all that time trapped in the weatherspheres if there had been a way home?
The Paledyn’s eyes narrowed. “What did you do there, that you can’t go back?”
Carcali’s heart stopped in her chest, her breath in her throat. She closed her mouth tight against the desire to tell her, to blurt it out. I destroyed the world. Tell her, say it. But then reason reasserted itself. The Paledyn couldn’t know. That would be impossible. This was just good intuition, nothing more. She could tell that Carcali felt guilty about something, and was using that knowledge like a sharp knife to probe deeper. Maybe there was something to this Schooling of hers after all, if it led to such perception.
“It is a reasonable question,” the woman said, when Carcali did not answer. “Considering the evil you have done here. Do you not, even now, occupy the body that belongs to another, forcing a child’s spirit to wander alone and afraid? There is cold in summer, rain in the desert. Lightning cracking the sky. Hailstorms, hurricanes, and tempests. Grain dies flooded in the field, snow and ice fall on the ocean. There will be famine and there has been—” Here the Paledyn’s voice caught. “Shipwreck.”
Carcali grasped the edge of the table to help her stay in her seat as the room around her swayed. “I didn’t do any of those things!” She looked down at her maps, at the lines she’d drawn between mountain range, shoreline, and valley. “My changes have all been local. You’re lying.”
The Paledyn seemed genuinely surprised, even to the extent of turning pale enough for her eyebrows to stand out like bloodstains. “Are you not a Storm Witch—the Storm Witch? Even I, in my Schooling aboard a fast ship, learned that where weather is involved, there is no such thing as ‘local.’ If you did not do these things, who did? If you believe I lie about the ravages of your storms, why do you not go, find out?” She lifted her arms in an unmistakable way, in the way a Weather Mage did to enter the spheres, and Carcali’s stomach dropped. How could the woman know these things?
“I can’t. I can’t.” Carcali put her face down on the backs of her clenched hands. How could this be happening? But she knew how, even if no one else did. Without leaving her body and entering completely into the weatherspheres, she had less control, and with less control, even the small changes she’d been making could cause damage elsewhere.
“You speak—and you act—like the child you are in appearance, rather than the woman I know you to be,” the Paledyn said. “You have power, but you have no discipline. Power without discipline is dangerous.”
Carcali stared at the woman on the other side of the table. How could she know these things? Those were almost the very words that the Artists had said to her.
“Help me.” Only a few minutes ago, Carcali could never have imagined asking this woman—tattooed and scarred barbarian, she’d called her—for help. But somehow the Paledyn knew and understood things no one else here seemed to know. “Please, can you help me,” she repeated. “It’s the Tarxin, he’s threatening me. If I don’t do what he says . . .” Carcali let her words die away. The Paledyn was sitting rigid in her chair, her eyes icy, her face a mask of stone.
Carcali pulled herself up straight, hardening her own face. This woman wasn’t going to help her, Carcali thought, shocked at the depth of her disappointment. “Please leave,” she said. Inside she was screaming GET OUT, but she managed to control herself. “I don’t know what you want. I can’t help you.” She heard the bitterness in her voice. Just for a moment she’d allowed herself to hope.
There was an odd look on the Paledyn’s face as she stood and looked down at Carcali. Her eyes were narrowed, a muscle bunched at the side of her jaw. She was very pale, but somehow her eyes were not so cold. As soon as the door was closed behind her, Carcali ran over and threw the latch, leaned with her hand against the door, breathing hard.
She wasn’t going to let the Paledyn Dhulyn Wolfshead make her feel guilty—at least, no more guilty than she already felt. She wrapped her arms around herself. The weather changes—they were the Tarxin’s fault. If he’d left her alone, or at least given her more time . . . She was doing the best she could, but after so long without a body—she’d been so confused at first—her Art was still just barely up to apprentice standards. And as for the child, well, Carcali couldn’t be responsible for what had happened to her. She never knew the child, never encountered her at all. As for the idea that she might be lost, trapped in the weatherspheres the same way Carcali had been—
Carcali suddenly bent over at the waist, unable to stop the spew of vomit that gushed out onto the tiled floor. No, she thought, gasping for air against the spasming of her diaphragm. She scrubbed at her mouth with a corner of her head veil before pulling the garment off and dropping it over the vomit. She forced her mind back to that immeasurable time just before she was pushed into the young Tara’s body.
Her idea had worked so beautifully at first. She’d launched herself alone—and why not, she’d thought. Everyone soloed eventually, and she was so much more powerful than any of the other Crafters and Apprentices, she’d been sure that she could do it. And she’d seen right away that her solution would work. It hadn’t been easy, but finally her patience and concentration put all the colors and temperatures right. She’d finished, or so she’d thought. It was only then that she’d realized she’d lost the connection with her body—and, with it, any chance to check and revise errors.
Then she’d panicked. And by the time her panic was over, it was too late, the thread connecting her to her body was well and truly gone.
Carcali did not know how long she’d been lost, floating in the spheres—time, space, even her own awareness of such things, became twisted and uncertain when the connection to the body was severed. When she’d felt a tugging at her formless self, she almost hadn’t responded, almost hadn’t recognized it for what it was. The feeling was so unfamiliar. Recognition had finally come, and she’d thought the Artists had found her at last, had come to save her, and she’d rushed forward, ready to admit she’d been wrong, she’d been arrogant—anything to be restored. Anything to leave behind this formless despair. A sense of great urgency had swept over her, bringing joy and relief with it.
Even when the body didn’t feel perfect, Carcali hadn’t worried. Of course it would feel strange after so long in the weatherspheres. By the time she realized what had happened, by the time she knew that
she didn’t wear her own body, that it and her friends and teachers—her whole world—were gone, mere legend to these people . . . by that time she knew she would do anything, tolerate anything, rather than to return to the nothingness of the spheres.
But there hadn’t been another soul. Carcali swore there hadn’t been. Whatever she may have done to her own people, and her own time, with her arrogance and haste, she was sure she had not condemned an innocent child to the torment she had experienced. The child was not a Mage, her soul could not have survived leaving her body.
Carcali was sure.
Dhulyn leaned against the wall next to the Storm Witch’s door and rubbed her face with her hands. Thank Sun and Moon the lady page was nowhere to be seen. Never, never since Dorian the Black had found her standing over the body of the dead slaver, had she come so close to simply killing someone out of hand.
To think it was all an accident. That selfish coward—that parasite of a stone-souled WITCH, had killed Parno, had destroyed their lives by accident. She hadn’t even known.
But that didn’t make her innocent of Parno’s death. That wouldn’t save her, the very next time the Witch—
“Did it work? Does she trust you?”
Dhulyn had Xerwin by the throat before she registered who it was and let him go. “Sorry,” she said. “You startled me.”
The Tar rubbed his throat and tried to smile. “I promise not to do it again.” Still rubbing his neck, he peered into her face. “You’re very white. What happened in there?”
“How much has the Storm Witch been told about recent events? About the Nomads and their claims?”
Xerwin shrugged, drawing her to follow him with a tilt of his head. He glanced around him, and Dhulyn realized he had somehow freed himself of his usual attendants. “Since the Tarxin replaced me as liaison to the Nomads, I’ve had no say in our contacts with them. So I certainly haven’t discussed anything with the Storm Witch. And I wouldn’t think any of her maids have much head for politics.”
Dhulyn refrained from correcting him. In her experience, the higher up the ladder of nobility, the less people understood that the people below them knew far more about what was happening in their lives than they ever let on. As they turned into a wider corridor, she stayed silent, fairly sure she knew where they were heading. Sure enough, Xerwin led her up a flight of stone steps, down a corridor whose latticed walls opened into a tiny courtyard, and finally up another staircase and out into the sunlit and walled garden that was the precinct of the Tarxin in the Upper City. Dhulyn let her lip curl up. In any other place there would have been a guard at the steps, but here in Ketxan City, things were done differently.
“We can talk here,” Xerwin said, indicating a stone bench covered in densely woven cloths in the royal colors of gold and green. The bench sat in the shade of a trimmed willow, next to a pool where water tinkled over rocks. “This is the Tarxin’s private precinct. No one is allowed up here without either the Tarxin or myself.”
“What about Tara Xendra?”
Xerwin looked at her sideways, as if thinking of something for the first time. “No,” he said. “Now that you mention it, even she has to come with either me or the Tarxin.” He shrugged. “Of course, women aren’t supposed to wander about without escorts anyway.”
“No, I suppose not.” If Dhulyn’s tone was a little dry, Xerwin did not notice.
Obviously, rock and earth had been moved here to create the pond, and with it a small elevation from which almost the whole garden could be seen, and the low wall which surrounded it. Beyond she could see the Upper City itself, and some of the more prominent landmarks. She drew up her feet to sit cross-legged. One of the maps she had seen on the Storm Witch’s table had been of the Upper City.
“I saw this enclosure when I entered the City,” she said. “I was surprised that the Upper City itself had no guards or gates.”
“Why would we need guards here? The Battle Wings patrol our borders, and the only trouble we’ve been having is from the south.” Xerwin paused, his face thoughtful. “I wouldn’t be surprised if trouble comes from the Nomads, with the Tarxin’s new policies, but they attack only from the water.”
“So you have no defensible walls, and keep no guards here?”
“There are Stewards at the City entrance, of course, you saw them.” He turned to lean his back against the side of the bench, placing himself farther into the shade. “And I suppose some of the Houses might keep Stewards in their pavilions. But you were telling me why it would matter if anyone had been talking to the Storm Witch about our current situation with the Nomads.”
Dhulyn studied Xerwin’s face with some care. Like anyone who had trained others, and led soldiers in battle, she’d had every trick tried on her, and seen hundreds who were trying to lie. Xerwin showed none of the signs she was familiar with. Which either meant he was very good, or he was being truthful.
“The Witch seemed to be unaware that there had been storms at sea, that the Nomads are claiming they’ve been attacked through the medium of her magic.”
Xerwin shook his head. “So far as I know, she’s only been asked to adjust the weather here in Mortaxa. Little things, rain for the fields, a warm wind when frost threatened the wine grapes. Perhaps a few things farther afield, but nothing more that I’m aware of. Do you mean the Nomads have been lying all along?”
Dhulyn drummed her fingers on her knee. “You forget, Xerwin, I was myself shipwrecked. The Nomads on that vessel were sure they were attacked specifically to prevent our—my arrival.” How much did Xerwin, or any of the Mortaxa, understand about the laws of Sun and Moon, Wind and Rain? Anyone who lived, or had been Schooled on a ship understood firsthand the connections between wind in one place and rain in another. “I mean that the Storm Witch is responsible for the weather the Nomads complain of, but she seems to be unaware of it herself. Is it possible that she was not told of the Nomads’ complaints?”
Xerwin turned up his palms. “Who would tell a young girl of such things? And if such things are possible, how could the Storm Witch not know?”
“I assure you such things are possible. Heavy snow and rain in the mountains cause flooding in the valley; hurricanes in one place can mean days of high winds and rain even a moon’s march away. As for how the Witch did not know . . .” Dhulyn shrugged. “It has always been true that a little learning is a dangerous thing.”
Xerwin closed his hand around her wrist. Dhulyn froze, looked at his hand, and looked up, meeting his eyes. He swallowed, kept his eyes on hers, but took his hand away. “What do you mean?”
“The Marked can do damage, especially Healers or Menders, if they are not well trained. Even Finders may Find every horse in a town, and not the precise animal sought. So it is possible that the Storm Witch has talent and power, but insufficient training. It is also possible that in order to perform her magic well, she needs to be given information that has been withheld from her.”
“How were we to have known?”
Dhulyn refrained from shrugging again. Two things had worked against the Storm Witch. First, she had wanted everyone to think she was the Tara Xendra, so she hadn’t asked many questions. And second, as Xerwin had said himself, who in this place would have thought to tell a young girl—Tara or not—anything of importance?
“But if she is not guilty of the acts of malice the Nomads accuse her of—” Xerwin was frowning, not, as Dhulyn could see, because he could not follow the thought through to its logical conclusion, but because he could not see use in the conclusion he found.
“Will that make a difference to your father? He already sees his dominion spreading over the Nomads and their oceans.” Dhulyn decided to keep silent, for the moment at least, about the Crayx. “You’ve said yourself the Storm Witch is a sword to his hand. Will he stop himself from using it?”
Xerwin’s face had settled into the impassive mask that in itself was a sign he was hiding his thoughts. Not for the first time Dhulyn thanked the Mercenary Brotherhood
from keeping her out of this kind of life. If she hid things from people, it was because they were strangers, not because she was afraid.
“We might reach the Storm Witch, if she is really just unpracticed and not evil,” Xerwin finally said. “But the Tarxin will never be persuaded to give up an advantage he’s long sought, that’s certain.”
“Then we must stick to our original plan,” Dhulyn agreed. Though whether she was trying to convince herself or Xerwin was something she did not want to examine too closely. “The Storm Witch is a danger to anyone who might cross her—still more so if she cannot control her magics. She is like a mad dog, or a child in a temper who sets fire to the house and kills his whole family. And if we speak of children,” she added. “There is the child your sister to consider.”
At this Xerwin looked up, and quickly looked away again, as if embarrassed. “I did not tell you. The White Twins, the Seers, told me they had had a Vision of you leading a young child by the hand. Could it be that you will restore my sister?”
“It could be.” Dhulyn nodded slowly. “It’s hard to be sure of the meanings of isolated Visions—or so I have read,” she added. “It certainly appears the possibility exists.” If nothing else, she thought, her own Vision showed her that the child Xendra was still alive, that her soul still existed, somehow, somewhere, in hiding. “And your sister deserves what chance she can have to be restored. That the Storm Witch refuses to consider the harm she does to your sister tells us much of her natural temperament—to say nothing of her honor. But it also points us to the way to overcome her.”
“How is that?”
“She is in a terror of leaving your sister’s body,” Dhulyn said, remembering the adult horror and desperation in the childish face. “Such terror leads me to think that she will be destroyed if we expel her from the body.”
The Storm Witch Page 24