Son of Avonar

by Carol Berg

  And as if I had pulled it from the weft of life’s weaving, a thread lay in my hand, drawn from the tangle of the past. The thread that connected past and present. A thread of enchantment and fate and purpose. I halted in mid-stride and stared at the Dulcé and the Prince with new eyes. “Stars of heaven . . . I know what he did!”

  D’Natheil was carving on his birchwood and glanced up curiously. He motioned Baglos to his side and never took his eyes from my face as the Dulcé translated everything I’d said. Tennice, who had been standing watch, walked into the hut just in time to hear my last outburst. “Who did what, Seri?”

  “My dream. All these years I’ve dreamed about the day Karon died. No matter what I did, no matter how much I willed the past to be gone, I couldn’t rid myself of that one horror. But I think it was because I never listened to what it told me, the comfort it offered if I but knew how to hear it.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Nor did I until now. In all that pain and torment, Karon insisted on finding order and beauty. I never believed it. Or rather, I believed in what he found, but I never thought he accomplished anything. I heard no word of magic when he died. Our child was murdered. All of you were dead. I believed he failed, and I was so angry with him—oh, gods, for all these years I’ve been so angry with him—because he let it all happen for nothing. But I didn’t know what to listen for. Today, when I dreamed it again, I heard him say the word.”

  “D’Arnath,” said Baglos, reverently.

  The memories of those last dreadful days came tumbling out of me. “He found images with the word: a great chasm and a bridge. He was almost mad with pain, and I couldn’t tell what was real and what was delirium. I put it all out of my mind, because I was convinced it had no meaning and I couldn’t bear the thought. But now I know. Baglos, Karon opened your Gates, didn’t he?”

  “It could very well be, woman. I wish I could tell you it was so.”

  “Tell me about the day the Gates were opened.” For, of course, I had to know more. What result could possibly have been worth the price?

  D’Natheil nodded to Baglos, and the Dulcé sat up straight, as he always did when telling stories of his land. “When the Gates are open, their fire burns white, and any may walk through without harm. But as they fail, the flame darkens, a fire that ravages first the spirit and then the flesh of any who attempt to pass. When the fire burns black—a fearsome sight—the Gate is impassable, and the dismal reflection of that dark fire permeates our hearts and every part of our land. And so it had been for hundreds of years.

  “On that day the Zhid were attacking in a great fury, as if they thought that victory was only the next arrow away. In the fortress kitchens we were making hot soup to send out to those on the walls, for the cold winds were blowing off the Wastes. The runners thought their legs might fail from making so many trips, but they didn’t complain. Too often they would go back for the empty pots and find the one to whom they had delivered it dead or his mind stripped away in the way of the Zhid that is worse than death.”

  The Dulcé transitioned smoothly from Leiran to his own language and back again. “But then came a peal of thunder, and we felt a surge of power, a storm of light and glory as if the Veils—the colored lights that grace the northern skies in summer—had descended on our hearts and infused us all with joy and hope. Though no one of us in Avonar had lived when last the Gates were open, we knew what the change signified, for there came a brilliance about every object from the most graceful tower of the palace to the least pebble underfoot, transforming the city with indescribable beauty. You could hear the warriors on the walls singing the Chant of Thanksgiving, so that your blood throbbed with it, and when night fell, no one could sleep for the singing and the talk of what the opening might mean. Would we wake to find the fire dark again? Would our young prince come to the Gate to walk the Bridge? With the strength and the light of the Gate infusing us, the Bridge strong, would we be able to push the Zhid back from the walls of the city? Would rain fall in the Wastes?” Baglos’s voice cracked and stumbled with emotion.

  “In his visions Karon saw brilliant light, and he thought the bridge was singing. How did you know it was the Exiles that opened the Gates?” Prove it to me, my skeptic’s heart demanded. Convince me.

  “Why, because even the Preceptors, as powerful as they are, cannot do it. Only D’Arnath’s Heirs ever had power enough to reverse the darkening of the Gate fire, and since the Battle of Ghezir, where we lost half of the Vales of Eidolon and D’Arnath’s sword, even they had not been capable. Prince D’Natheil was young and untrained and had shown no evidence of any power. We had seen no sign of the Exiles since well before the Battle of Ghezir. They had failed in their duty to walk the Bridge. But this had to be the Exiles for no one else could have accomplished it.”

  For a moment, all I could envision was Karon’s Avonar and its forest of blackened pyres. Bitterness leaked into my heart. “All those years, Baglos, why didn’t your people come here and find out what happened to the Exiles? They were being slaughtered. Perhaps everything would have been different if someone had come here to see what was happening.”

  “Because the Bridge was never meant to be crossed! It is not a roadway, but a link between our lands. It binds—Dar’Nethi power—It must remain open. To make things right. Your passions—Life flows—” All of a sudden the Dulcé was fumbling with words. A dozen false starts and disconnected phrases. Screwing his face in knots and tugging at his black hair with his short fingers. “I’m sorry I cannot explain better today. If only D’Natheil could—”

  He bit his tongue and glanced uneasily at the Prince before grasping at some thought and plunging ahead more smoothly. “King D’Arnath could not allow the Zhid free passage to your lands. He sent J’Ettanne and his followers here to maintain the far Gate—the Exiles’ Gate—and their part of the Bridge. Then he enchanted the Bridge with his strongest wards so that no one could use it to cross the Breach. J’Ettanne and his people could never return to Avonar nor any come here to succor them. It took the Dar’Nethi hundreds of years to discover D’Arnath’s secret way to make the passage. By that time, of course, the Gates were long closed. All was done for your mundane land’s safety.”

  I puzzled at these spotty explanations, but no path of reason led me anywhere that made sense. We had to unlock D’Natheil’s mind. If the Bridge was only an enchantment, then what did Baglos mean when he talked of people crossing it? What chasm was so wide that people could find no other way around it?

  “It’s near sundown, Seri.” Tennice held out my cloak. “We have an appointment. Perhaps more of this mystery will come clear with it. The thought that some higher purpose was served by all that misery . . . I’d like to think it. But your evidence wouldn’t stand in any court of law.”

  “He did it,” I said. “Karon opened their Gates.” No matter what the sense or nonsense of Baglos’s explanations, my bones resonated with the truth of my dream. I had been adrift for so long. Now, perhaps, I had found an anchor.

  The streets of Yurevan were full of people, hurrying through patterns of lamplight and shadow. I was afraid to expect too much from the meeting with Celine, but after the revelation of the dream, it was hard to keep myself in balance. What other truths might I discover, now that this one basic understanding was so changed? By the time the four of us entered the quiet, narrow street near the herb shop, my heart was racing.

  The shop was closed and dark, shutters drawn, but Celine had instructed us to enter through her rear courtyard, where Kellea would meet us. Yellow lantern light and the heavy scents of herbs and flowers guided us through a dark alleyway, and we found Kellea waiting amid the crowded boxes and planters. But her greeting was not at all what we expected. In her hand was a battered, yet quite serious, sword. “Don’t think that because I’m a woman, I’m incapable of using this. I practice, and I’m very good.”

  “Please believe me,” I said. “We wish no harm to either of you.”

&nbs
p; “My grandmother took me to a sorcerer-burning when I was a child. She said it was ‘necessary’ for me to learn of it. And so I did. Nothing is worth the risk of such a death: not sorcery, not you, not princes who’ve lost their minds. I care only for my grandmother. If you mean what you say, then go away and leave her be.”

  “You say you care for her, but it’s clear you don’t care enough,” I said. Kellea had not chosen her time well, not when the truth of the dream was so fresh in my mind. “You’ve chosen your own path. Good enough. But you deprive your grandmother of the same dignity. Is it because she’s old? Is she incapable? You’ve listened to no lesson she’s taught, if you set yourself up to make her choices for her.”

  “Ah yes, the holy ‘Way of the J’Ettanne,’ ” said the girl, sneering. “Well, I despise their Way. I will not submit to my ‘fate,’ and I will not let you endanger my grandmother. You don’t know. You didn’t see it.”

  The arguments might have come from my own mouth. And only on this day did I have any reason to refute them. “But I have seen it. The one I saw burn was my husband whom I loved beyond anything on earth, and I had to let him do it.”

  Kellea shook her head. “You’re a fool.”

  “Yes, I was a fool, but only because I didn’t trust the choices he made. I could see only the horror and grief that would result from them. He believed there was more. I’m still not sure he was right—perhaps the universe does have some larger pattern that I just can’t see—but it was not my place to judge.”

  “Kellea?” The dry voice floated from the window.

  “One moment, Grandmother.”

  At Celine’s call, Kellea’s sword point drooped only a hair’s breadth from its ready position, but it was enough for D’Natheil. In a motion as quick and fluid as a dancer’s, he snatched the weapon and laid it on the brick paving stones beside Kellea’s feet, bowing in mock courtesy. We left her fuming in the courtyard while the four of us walked into her kitchen and through a hallway to Celine’s door.

  “Come in, come in,” said the old woman. The evening breeze carried the fragrances from the courtyard planters through the sitting-room window, and a white china lamp painted with pink flowers cast rosy shadows over the walls, leaving the boundaries of her little domain indistinct. “Forgive us. My granddaughter is headstrong.”

  “She loves you very much,” I said.

  “I wish—Well, perhaps someday she will find joy in her talent and her life. So this is our mysterious pair?”

  The Dulcé and the Prince stood on either side of me, while Tennice crowded the passageway behind us. “Madame Celine, this is Baglos of the Dulcé”—Baglos bowed with great dignity, one arm behind his back, and Celine nodded graciously in return—“and this is D’Natheil, whom Baglos tells us is a prince of the royal house of Avonar.” The Prince stood stiff and expressionless. Wary, I thought. Uncertain. I hoped the season stayed calm.

  “Please excuse my lack of courtesy, Your Grace,” said Celine, beckoning D’Natheil closer, deftly ignoring his rudeness. “Once I’m installed in my chair, not even royalty can dislodge me. And I’ve a serious lack of thrones here. You’ll have to sit upon your own dignity.” She tapped one slippered foot on the floor in front of her.

  Baglos looked slightly shocked, but translated the old woman’s words for D’Natheil. The young man listened gravely, then stepped out of the shadows, sat himself on the bare wood at Celine’s feet, and bestowed upon the old Healer the gift of his smile.

  “Oh, my,” she said, raising her eyebrows and laying her dry fingers on his cheek. “What sorcery is this? I didn’t doubt your words, Seri, but this . . . this is beyond your telling. Beyond wonder. Can you not see—?” She glanced sharply at me. “No, perhaps not. Kellea!”

  The girl appeared in the doorway, her complexion an unflattering blotchy red.

  “Kellea, dear one, I want you beside me tonight.”

  While I settled myself on a footstool beside the door, and Tennice folded his long limbs onto the floor beside me, Celine rocked gently in her chair, quietly staring at the not-at-all-self-conscious D’Natheil. Kellea took up a position beside the window, standing with her back pressed against the wall and her arms folded tightly across her breast.

  “Do you know what I’m going to do?” Celine asked D’Natheil, when we were still.

  Baglos, positioned immediately behind his master, translated quietly. The Prince kept his attention on Celine and nodded in response. The Dulcé managed this so smoothly, one could almost think that D’Natheil and Celine were speaking with each other directly.

  “And you consent to it? You give me permission to enter your mind and relate to these people whatever I find there?”

  D’Natheil nodded again.

  “Seri has told you that this may help you regain your memory. That’s possible. If some physical ailment is hindering your memory or your speech, I can almost warrant success. I am very good at such things. But what I feel in you . . . There is much in you that is not of you.” She sipped from a porcelain teacup, and then returned it to the small table next her chair. “Well, we shall see. You will know whatever I find. I’ll reflect each image I discover. Just nod your head if it’s familiar, and we’ll go on. When we find something that is new to you, I’ll tell the others. If there comes a time when you wish me to stop—I understand you cannot speak, but just think your intent, form it clearly in your mind—and I’ll hear you. Do you understand?”

  Once more, the Prince agreed.

  The old woman put a wrinkled hand on either side of D’Natheil’s head. Interesting, I thought, as the familiar tension began to vibrate throughout the room, how those who feared sorcery believed it came through the eyes, while Celine, like Karon, closed hers to begin her work. After a while she blinked them open, and D’Natheil dipped his head. Another while and he nodded again. So it continued. Silently. Forever, it seemed, until Celine abruptly yanked her hands away. She shuddered, sat back in her cushioned chair, and dropped her hands into her lap, the wrinkles on her brow very deep indeed. “Powers of earth, what’s happened to you?” Only the rosy light gave color to the old woman’s soft wrinkles, and her eyes wrapped the Prince in an embrace of sympathy and concern.

  “I’ve found no memory he does not recognize,” she said. “The only images in his mind are those you’ve shared. Indeed, I can find no person here, no history, no hidden life. I sought out his earliest memory: fierce, biting cold and immense confusion, an overarching certainty of danger. The next thing he knows is your face, Seri, frightened, angry, in a forest near a stream—a stark, powerful image, as if a knife blade had pierced his head. But we know that was only a few weeks ago, and so I started again at the cold and reversed direction. But when I go backward, I find only darkness. A well of darkness. Terror, confusion, loss . . . holy goddess mother, such dreadful emptiness.”

  “But isn’t this what you’d expect from one whose memory is damaged?” said Tennice, voicing my own question.

  “Not at all. With one whose memory is damaged, I would find traces, threads from the hidden life. I could follow them into the dark part of the mind and work to heal the injury. But not with this one. It’s as if he were newborn from chaos at the time he met Seri. He is as you see him, unless”—she leaned forward again and laid two trembling fingers on D’Natheil’s cheek—“unless this enchantment I sense is responsible. If I could unravel the enchantment, heal whatever damage it has done, then perhaps we could learn more.”

  D’Natheil listened carefully while Baglos repeated all of this, then motioned to the old woman to continue.

  “This will be more difficult,” Celine said to D’Natheil. “Once we start, we must go to the end of it. No stopping, no changing course.” Her expression was drawn with worry, and, as if to soothe herself, she stroked his hair. I was surprised he allowed it, but indeed, he smiled for her again.

  Celine’s eyes widened. “Oh, my son, what miracle has brought you to us? Whatever I find in you, it will not be all of you, I th
ink.” She reached into the sewing basket that sat beside her chair and pulled out a tiny silver knife and a strip of white linen. “This is the way we’ll have to do it, the only way I know to heal this deeper hurt.”

  Celine locked gazes with D’Natheil, and he held out his arm to her. Then she opened her arms wide, and my heart swelled as she began the J’Ettanni invocation. I whispered the words along with her. “Life, hold. Stay your hand. Halt your foot ere it lays another step along the Way. Grace your daughter once more with your voice that whispers in the deeps, with your spirit that sings in the wind, with the fire that blazes in your wondrous gifts of joy and sorrow. Fill my soul with light, and let the darkness make no stand in this place.”

  D’Natheil did not even blink when the old woman scored his muscled arm with her little knife. When she had done the same to her own left arm, so scarred that no bit of flesh remained untouched, she deftly bound her paper-skinned limb to the strong young one. “J’den encour, my son.”

  Celine might have been the only person in the Prince’s universe. Curiosity and urgency defined every line of his body. Celine’s eyes were closed, her only motion the constant, gentle nodding of her white head. About the time I came to the conclusion that this attempt, too, must come to nothing, the old woman’s eyes popped open in astonishment, and in my head resonated a voice and a presence that belonged to no one in that room.

  Let your ears be opened, D’Natheil, my honored prince, my beloved son. I trust this message finds you well and among friends. Know that it was never my desire to cause you the distress and confusion that cloud your mind, though it is the inevitable result of what I have done to you. Small comfort, I know, since you cannot remember me. If we succeed in our plan, then you will know my reasons; if we do not, then you will be beyond the Verges, and such trivial questions will be moot. I do not apologize, for I had no alternatives.