Spirit Song

by M C Dwyer

  “What are you talking about?” Nepenthe whispered, eyes wide. “You were my first friend in Alain. I didn’t abandon you. You left.”

  Aidan flinched, a tiny motion that barely showed in the shadows. “I had to. My feelings—I was so confused. But now I understand why.” He reached a hand out and brushed Nepenthe’s cheek.

  She flinched away. “That’s not true,” she said. “That can’t be true.”

  He followed her, grabbing her shoulders painfully. “It is true. I love you.” Aidan leaned forward to kiss her.

  Nepenthe panicked. Somewhere deep in her memories, something clenched her heart in half-remembered fear. She forgot her months of training, forgot everything Edmun and Ena had taught her, and simply lashed out. Flailing blindly, she screamed, and it was as much a blast of water power as it was a physical response. Nepenthe felt her mental wall tremble.

  Aidan shuddered away, shaking his head as though to dislodge something. Nepenthe seized the opportunity and turned away. Her knees were weak, but she forced them to carry her. She fled deeper into the forest, sobbing breathlessly but without tears.

  After a few minutes she stumbled to a halt, panting and crying and trying through sheer mental effort to keep the wall in her mind upright. She knelt on the ground, her fingers digging into the leaf litter, as she waited for the world to either end or recover. Morbidly, she wasn’t sure which she was hoping for at this point. She had no desire to remember whatever it was that could still seize her heart with fear, but she was also tired of waiting and watching for its return. There would be some relief in remembering, even if it destroyed her utterly.

  Eventually, Nepenthe calmed down, and the wall in her mind still held. She clenched her hands, crushing the leaf litter in her fists. It crumbled, and she smelled smoke. Looking up, she realized she was in a clearing. The moon illuminated the shapes of several huts, or what remained of them. Scattered around the clearing were other shapes that were obscured by the pale moonlight, and Nepenthe was grateful. From what little she could see, they seemed to be the charred bodies of the huts’ occupants.

  A heavy presence filled the clearing, and Nepenthe looked up, searching the shadows for two eyes that glinted like stars.

  Greetings, Cousin, a deep voice said.

  Nepenthe opened her mouth to speak but had to swallow a couple of times before anything would come out. “Hello.”

  I’m grateful you have come.

  “It was no trouble,” Nepenthe said, politely if not truthfully. “Can you tell me what happened here?”

  It was the one you call Pyrdred, the voice said. For many moons he held the Brothers here in thrall, but approximately two months ago he slew them all, absorbing their power.

  Nepenthe sucked in a breath. “Is that even possible?”

  The colossal shadow heaved a shrug. It has happened. He must be stopped.

  With a somewhat bitter sigh, Nepenthe said, “Couldn’t you stop him?”

  No, Cousin, Nox said with a heavy sigh of his own. His power and mine are of a different sort. It would be like fighting a shadow with flame. Neither would prevail. His presence loomed suddenly close, and Nepenthe felt a touch, feather-light, against her cheek. Your power, however, will suffice.

  She blanched. “You tell me he not only held the entire Brotherhood of Fire in thrall but stole their power as well—and I can stop him? How?” The final word was nearly a sob.

  The shadow that was Nox drew her to her feet. You are stronger than you know, my child, and you should know that all the spirits of water, air, and earth are at your command.

  “What good are they against fire?” And what did he mean, they were at her command? She didn’t control the storm; she couldn’t possibly be responsible for the destruction it caused.

  In sufficient amounts, any of those three are enough to quench the power of fire. You have the power. It is time to remember.

  Nepenthe shivered. “I don’t want to,” she whispered.

  You must, or others will die. While some of our brethren care little for human life, these men were my friends, and I mourn their passing. I wish to prevent any more deaths. For their sake, and the sake of others like them, Pyrdred must be stopped.

  With a sigh that seemed to come from the depths of her soul, Nepenthe said, “I know. That’s why I came. He killed someone dear to me, too, and threatened all of Lainen with sickness.”

  You are strong enough, now, to face your past. I see many good things in your memories; hold on to them when you remember. They will give you courage.

  Nepenthe thought of Edmun and decided she knew what he meant. “Thank you, Cousin.”

  You are welcome. Now go. It’s all right to be afraid; it’s what you do with it that matters.

  Somewhere behind Nepenthe a light appeared, making her shadow dance across the clearing and its grisly remains. She looked up, but Nox was gone.

  “Nepenthe? Are you well?” Jahan asked, holding aloft a burning brand.

  She sighed. “Well enough. Let’s go back. There is nothing here but death.”

  Jahan passed the torch over the nearest remains and turned away. “Was this the Brotherhood of Fire?”

  Nepenthe nodded, then followed Jahan back to camp. The others returned soon after. They’d fanned out in search of her, no doubt alerted by her scream. Her eyes sought out Aidan, but he was sitting next to the fire, his head bowed and lips moving silently.

  “He is meditating,” Taela murmured. “He told us some of what happened. Jahan suggested he spend the rest of the night in meditation to try to counter Pyrdred’s influence.”

  Turning away without interrupting him, Nepenthe sat down near Jahan and Taela—Mae and Barth had returned to watch duty—and told all that had happened since she left the fire.

  “That would explain where Pyrdred’s unprecedented power came from,” Jahan said when she finished. “But I’ve never heard of someone acquiring power like that before. It is worrying.” Nepenthe smothered a yawn, and he finished, “That’s for another time, however. You’re off watch duty—get some rest, if you can. Tomorrow we can head south and west toward Brae.”

  Nepenthe nodded, then rolled over and fell asleep with the image of Aidan’s hunched shoulders in her mind.

  Chapter 35

  After another week of uncomfortable travel—made more so by Aidan’s grappling with the fire’s influence—the weary band pulled up on a cliff overlooking the sea. At the sight of its blue-green expanse, something in Nepenthe’s chest eased, and she felt an intense longing to plunge into its depths and join her mother. She drew herself back with an effort. Running away was not the answer; she’d already decided that. With a sigh, she turned Jasper down the worn track that used to be a road.

  “Is this the right way?” Mae said, jogging her horse alongside.

  Startled, Nepenthe looked up, then back up the road the other direction. “Yes, though I’m not sure how I knew that.”

  The others had fallen in behind her, allowing her to lead. Stretching out with her senses, she tried to see if there was some hint of fire spirit power that had told her which way to go. There was nothing, and her mental wall trembled under the strain. She let go of the effort reluctantly and had the sensation of standing on a beach with waves licking the base of the wall, eating away the foundation. She shivered and quickly pushed the water away. It left grudgingly.

  “Just a few more days,” she whispered. A few more days would bring them to Brae, and then she would face the memories. But not yet.

  “Just a few more days,” Jahan echoed. “Have you given any thought to how you will confront your brother?”

  Nepenthe glanced at him. Mae had ridden ahead, and Taela had taken her place on the other side. “No,” she sighed. “I’m trying not to. When I think about it, I have an intense urge to run screaming into the ocean and not look back.”

  He smiled sympathetically. “I can understand that. Taela and I will stand with you, as no doubt will your Aileron friends, but it is likely tha
t Aidan will not be able to withstand Pyrdred’s power, especially at such close range.”

  “Then he should stay here,” Nepenthe said, standing in her stirrups and craning to see him.

  Jahan shook his head. “I doubt you will persuade him. And I don’t have the heart to deny him.”

  “But he’ll never forgive himself if he gives in,” Nepenthe protested.

  “And he’ll never forgive you if something happens to you and he was forced to remain behind.”

  Taela spoke up. “Pyrdred’s attack is not likely to be a physical one.”

  “How does that help?” Nepenthe asked impatiently.

  “If he attacks you using the power of his fire spirit,” Jahan explained, “then you may be able to counter it before anyone gets hurt.”

  “That’s a pleasant thought,” Nepenthe sighed. “I hope I can live up to your expectations.”

  “All you can do is your best,” Barth said unexpectedly, riding up from behind. “As for the rest, well, your friends are here for you.”

  Nepenthe’s cheeks warmed with gratitude. “Thank you—all of you.”

  “No thanks needed, young lady,” Barth said. “After all you’ve done for Alain and King Edmun, it is the least we can do for you.”

  Bereft of words, all Nepenthe could do was bow.

  Two days later, they reached the edges of Brae. The noonday sun shone harshly on every detail of the ruined city, and it became obvious that the horses could go no further. The streets were strewn with rubble from the collapsed buildings, making the going treacherous for two legs, let alone four. After a brief discussion, the horses were stripped of their tack and turned out to graze. They were unlikely to wander far, and, Nepenthe thought morbidly, if no one was left to return, they would not be left to starve.

  As a group, they began picking their way through the city streets. Nepenthe led, guided by either the awareness of her brother’s presence or possibly some deeply buried memory, and the others followed.

  It was difficult to gauge their progress through the ruined streets, as the collapsed buildings had a sameness that was only disturbed by the protrusion of a bit of sun-bleached bone or a piece of tattered cloth that flapped in the breeze. Nepenthe could not tell them how far they still had to go, but she suspected they were getting close. She had an oppressive sense of being watched, and there was a spark in the air that could not be completely explained by the gathering storm clouds.

  Even as the sun dipped towards the now unseen ocean, the clouds turned the sky green with a promise of hail. The first drops of rain fell as they reached a sort of clearing with the remains of a fountain in the center. It was some sort of courtyard, spared of rubble by the distance of the surrounding buildings. No water came up from the ruined bowl, but Nepenthe could sense a current of water running somewhere close by.

  “There’s water near,” she said, turning in a circle and scenting the air.

  “See if you can find it,” Mae said, pulling off her satchel and laying out food for a quick meal, “but don’t wander too far.”

  Nepenthe nodded. She turned her face into the growing wind and started walking. A minute or so later, she ducked under the ruins of an arch and stopped in sudden surprise. She knew this place. A wave of familiarity swept over her, shaking her mental wall to its very foundations. Gasping at the strength of the memory, she put a hand out for balance and found it clasped in a warm hand.

  “Hello, Little Sib,” a voice said, running down Nepenthe’s spine and causing her stomach to clench in fear.

  She looked up, knowing what she would see but unable to pull away.

  Pyrdred. His fiery hair was loose, the red curls tumbling in the growing wind of the storm. His eyes had green fires dancing in them, and a cruel smile twisted his lips.

  He put a hand to Nepenthe’s cheek and caressed it with his thumb. Nepenthe only had time for a quiet whimper before his smile twisted into a snarl, and he ripped the amber ring from her ear.

  Nepenthe gasped, clapping a hand over her bloody ear as the walls in her mind vanished like smoke and her memories poured over her. Dropping to her knees in the rainy courtyard, she watched a drop of rain fall, slow, and then hang suspended in the air as she remembered.

  Chapter 36

  In the land of Breccia in the city of Brae, a king lived alone save for his only son. He’d been married, once, to a lady of his court who had fire in her veins and very little love in her heart. The king had done everything he could for his fiery queen, but she’d died, bitter and alone, after locking herself in her chambers the night her son was born. Ignoring the rumors that said she’d tried to kill herself and her newborn babe, the king raised Pyrdred as the Crown Prince and resigned himself to living out his days alone.

  But one day he returned from his usual walk on the beach with a woman perched behind him on his horse. As they rode through the streets of Brae, the townspeople were amazed, for this was no human. Her hair clung damply to a dress that shimmered like fish scales, and her blue-green eyes were too big and just slightly too far apart to be comfortably human. The king, however, was beside himself with joy, and the undine appeared to be just as besotted as he.

  They were married, and soon after, the palace was filled with light and laughter the likes of which hadn’t been seen in years, for the undine gave birth to a little girl. Her mother called her Luce; her father called her his light and his joy.

  At least, this is the story he told her when she was old enough to understand. Looking back on these memories with the advantages of maturity and time, Luce wondered if the truth might not have been slightly different. Her past continued to unfold before her, implacable.

  Her mother loved her, she was sure, but it was a distracted love that showed in fits and starts. Luce the child was as likely to be pushed aside impatiently as she was clasped to her mother’s heart, and while childhood ailments and injuries could be healed with a mere kiss, doing so seemed to remind the undine of her daughter’s frail humanity.

  After a while, her mother began to pine for the freedom of the sea. She took Luce for long walks on the beach, staring out at the waves and wading in the surf until the tides threatened to dash both mother and child against the rocky cliffs.

  The king sensed his wife’s growing distance and did everything in his power to distract her. It worked for a time, but eventually the call of the sea overwhelmed every other call on her heart.

  She took her daughter down to the beach as the tide was beginning to turn.

  “Luce, my dearest,” she murmured, her liquid voice pouring over Luce’s ears like the water she was, “I must go. I am no mortal, and I long for the sea and the caress of my mother, the West Wind.”

  Luce looked solemnly into her mother’s eyes, her normally cheerful face pinched in the anticipation of grief. She was only ten, and not prepared to say good-bye.

  “Beware Pyrdred,” her mother continued. “He is an angry, bitter man, and I don’t know what he intends.” She pressed her lips to Luce’s brow. “The spirits of air, earth, and water are yours to command. Call them if you have need.”

  With that, she embraced her daughter once more, then stepped back into the frothy brine of the sea and was gone.

  Luce sniffed and blinked away her tears and began the long climb back to the top of the cliffs.

  Where was Pyrdred throughout all this? Luce searched her memories and found him lurking, hanging like a specter over everything she did. When Luce was a child, he was already a young man; by the time her mother returned to the sea, he was nearly twenty years old.

  He could usually be found at the fringes of any group, not a part but watching from the side. He seemed to watch everyone, but Luce in particular. After her mother left, he could usually be found wherever she was, his green eyes fixed and brooding. It didn’t bother her at first, for her father had taught her to pity Pyrdred.

  “His life has been a sad one,” Theodric had told her, pulling her onto his lap after he’d done something particula
rly upsetting. “His mother did not love him, and he finds it hard to love others.”

  Luce the adult cast back, looking for the memory of what had frightened her, and discovered a dance lesson. It had been held in a long airy hall with large arched windows. A sparrow, mistaking the glass for an opening, had crashed to the ground unconscious. Pyrdred had swept the tiny bird up, holding it aloft by a crooked wing and laughing.

  “Look—see how fragile it is!” With a quick twist, he had wrung its neck. Luce had run sobbing from the room.

  Luce shivered and let the memories play on.

  A few years passed. Theodric doted, Pyrdred brooded, and Luce learned to live without her mother—a task that was, perhaps, made easier by her mother’s distance when she’d been around.

  For Luce’s thirteenth birthday, a grand celebration was held. She was officially crowned as a princess, as the thirteenth birthday marked her passage into adulthood. She could be courted and married now, though her father assured her it wasn’t necessary for many years.

  Perfectly content to continue as merely a princess of Breccia, Luce smiled and said, “But if I get married, then I’d have to leave you, Papa.”

  Theodric laughed. “Oh, my precious child, bless you for that. But someday you will no doubt change your mind.” He smiled down at her. “Some handsome prince will sweep you off your feet and carry you away to his castle, and you’ll never think of your lonely papa again.”

  “Never,” Luce declared. The king merely laughed and shooed her away to go finish preparing for the evening’s masquerade.

  That night, dressed in a foamy concoction of lace and pearls with her curls swept back in seashell combs, Luce felt more grown-up than she ever had in her life. She fancied the courtiers looked at her differently, too, as she smiled and nodded her greetings.

  The first dance was reserved for her father, following the tradition of presenting her to the court as an adult. After that, she danced every dance, laughing and smiling at her masked partners and generally having a wonderful time.