“And that is your only goal?” I shook my head. “You know who she is?” When I still said nothing, Della smiled. “So you know. And help anyway. Interesting.” Della turned to the fire and heated a long ladle. She tipped hot liquid into a cup and handed it to me. “I had not expected to see you again, Galen. Certainly not traveling with one of the Elvraeth. There is a story there?”
I nodded once. The story was simple. Either Cael Compelled me or I loved her. Already I decided that it didn’t matter. I would help just the same.
“Hmm. You think to return?” Della asked.
I shook my head. No matter what happened, returning to Elaeavn for good was not an option. “I am Forgotten, Della,” I said. My voice was little more than a whisper.
Della fixed me with a hard stare. “Not by all,” she said. Even with the hardness to her expression, I did not miss the warmth she once felt for me that bubbled to the surface.
Forgotten. A title given to those banished by the council of the Elvraeth from the city, never to return. Yet Cael thought to bring me with her, as if she could reverse my banishment.
“No?” I asked. “By enough, then.” Even after all this time, there was a little anger that slipped into my voice.
“And Isander?” she asked. “I have heard nothing of him for some time.”
“Dead.” I would not tell her how. Not yet.
She watched me for a moment, looking at me with the same expression Cael had on her face as she tried to Read me. I did not think Della was a Reader, but slammed my barriers into place to be certain. Caution cost nothing.
“From what I hear, you have learned much from him.” The words were not an accusation, but nearly so.
“I do what must be done, Della. If not me, then some other.”
“Did Isander know how you used what he taught you?” she asked.
I took a sip of the liquid she poured into the cup. It was hot, but not unpleasantly so, and burned the back of my throat. Warmth spread through my body and I wondered what Della laced the drink with. Something to soothe me, likely. Perhaps loosen my tongue.
“He knew.” Isander was not as innocent as Della thought him to be. A skilled healer once, Isander took to the darker trades in his later years. It was because of him that I became what I am.
“Then I will say no more,” Della said.
I took another slow drink, feeling the warmth steal through me. “And Del?” I asked.
She chuckled softly. “He will live.”
“Was it erasn?”
“It was. Small amounts, given over years. Erasn does not wash out quickly, so even such a small amount can eventually become fatal. Clever, really.”
“Clever” certainly described Orly. I worried what it meant that he was gaining so much skill with herbs. First the tchinth powder and now erasn. Had I underestimated him? A dangerous thing, if so.
“And you managed to wash out the erasn?”
“I did.”
I waited for her to tell me what she used. Once, she would have shared such knowledge quickly, but that was when I had been nearly her apprentice, before I had made my first mistake.
“I have access to narcass leaves,” Della finally said.
I was relieved that she shared with me. At least we had not gotten so far apart that she refused that. “Narcass does not grow anywhere near here,” I said. I should have thought of narcass, but of course I had not. It was found in the mountains to the north, a special plant with many healing properties but, as Isander taught me, it had to be harvested fresh to be useful.
Della only nodded.
“Was it fresh?” I asked.
Della nodded again but didn’t say anything more. It seemed there were things she would not be sharing with me, just as there were things that I had not shared with her.
“What of him now?” I asked.
“That is up to Del. He is more useful than he knows. Perhaps he might find his way back to Eban, continue his work for Orly under a different pretext.”
I blinked. “You wanted him to find you.” How had I not realized that before?
“You think some healer in Eban would know how to find me if I did not choose for them to know?”
“But…why?”
Della snorted and turned back to the fire. She held a long ladle in one hand, different than the last, and stirred slowly through the fire. “Did Isander teach you nothing? You have lived in Eban so long that you have forgotten that there is more to this world than Eban?”
“I remembered,” I said. “I just wish that the rest of the world would stop trying to pull me into its games.”
“Then stop playing them,” Della said.
I frowned.
“I know more of you than you realize, Galen. I know how you choose your jobs. You may call yourself an assassin, but you are not the killer you think yourself to be. The girl recognizes that as well. Why else do you think she is with you?”
I shook my head. “She is with me for safety.”
At that, Della laughed. I had not heard her laugh in years, but the sound brought back memories of my youth, a time before I had been forgotten, a time when I had still been happy, when Elaeavn was still home.
Della craned her neck to turn and look at me, her hand still swirling in the fire. “If that girl is what I think she is, then she might be safer without you.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Don’t pretend you have not seen it. There is a reason Orly is after her. A reason you chose not to kill her in spite of the price he put on her head. That reason is more than the attraction you feel for her.”
I sat up. My left arm quivered but moved when I propped myself up on it. At least I had some function there, though I still did not know whether I would regain full use. “What do you know?” I asked.
Della met me with hardened eyes. “There are other uses for that which she carries,” she said.
Without thinking, I reached for my pouch, finding that it was missing. Della would likely have removed it to do whatever healing I needed. I wondered if she would simply keep it. For her healing, the price would be worth the expense. I could always find more supplies, but few healers could match Della’s skill.
“Careful now, Galen,” Della said. Her voice changed, becoming soft and angry.
“I would see Cael,” I said.
Della poured another cup of liquid before setting the ladle down, resting it outside the fire. “I will not keep her from you, Galen, and I will not hamper your journey. But consider that you are helping the same ones who banished you, exiling you to your fate.”
“Not the same,” I said, shaking my head. “Only Cael.”
The difference was important, at least to me. And my fate might have been different than what it would have been had I remained in Elaeavn, but I would not deny the fact that it had been any less meaningful. Had I not helped some? Had I not killed others that needed to die? Whatever Della said, I knew who I was. That I was a killer was not something I shied away from.
Della watched me for a moment and then nodded, leaving the small room. Down to the fire and the shape of the hearth, it looked so similar to her warm home in Elaeavn, almost as if she had tried to recreate what she had there.
I managed to stand after a moment and rested against the cot. I was weakened, my legs barely managing to hold me upright, but even as I stood, I felt strength returning. When Cael entered the small room, I had finally managed to hold myself up without support.
“Galen?” she asked.
I nodded. “We should go,” I told her.
“What is it?” Cael asked. She looked around, as if someone would jump out at her.
Not within Della’s place. Anything that came for us would be subtler. I wondered if we hadn’t already been attacked, but decided that unlikely. Della hadn’t known what I would say when I awoke. She would have waited, given me a chance.
Cael held the cup that Della had last poured. As she placed it to her lips, I grabbed it away f
rom her.
Cael looked at me with a worried expression.
Ignoring it, I inhaled the steam coming from the cup. I smelled a mixture of scents, bitter and sweet, those of honey and lamins. Neither dangerous, only invigorating. I took a sip, letting the heat dissipate as the flavors lingered on my tongue. The same.
As I handed the cup back to Cael, she frowned. “You think she would poison me after she has helped you?”
“That she helped me is reason enough to poison you,” I said. “Della knows who you are. What you are.”
Cael smiled. “And you think that places me in danger.”
“I know that it does,” I said. I took a hesitant step forward and found that I moved well enough. I scanned the room, looking for something—anything—to take with me. I would not leave unarmed, not after learning that there was more afoot than I realized.
“Had you not considered that I too have learned something here?” Cael asked.
My breath caught as I looked at her.
“Della does not guard her thoughts nearly as closely as you,” Cael went on. “Perhaps that is arrogance. I have known many Elvraeth that feel the same, thinking a Reader cannot get past the defenses they construct within their minds.”
I swallowed. And there it was. The secret I had kept for Della all these years. All it had taken was Cael coming into contact with Della to learn of that secret.
I began to wonder how dangerous being around Cael would become. There was only so much that I could do to guard my own thoughts. After a time, I would be at her mercy. Already I felt as if I was.
Regardless, I could not abandon her. I might tell myself that it was because she needed my protection, but that was not completely true. Especially injured. When I was well I might prove useful to her for a little while longer, but I didn’t know what would happen when we reached Elaeavn. As one of the Forgotten I was not allowed back into the city, though many ignored such decrees. Della was one.
“You knew,” Cael said to me. It seemed that she had not been certain about that. Something she had been unable to Read.
I nodded. “When you are around someone long enough, even the deepest secrets have a way of slipping out.”
Cael smiled. “Have you ever wondered if it wasn’t simply that she wanted you to know?”
I had considered that but had never come up with a reason why. A secret like that should be closely held, guarded carefully. Even when I was in Elaeavn I was not trustworthy enough for such a secret.
“I have,” I said.
“What of us now?” Cael asked.
The question seemed loaded and I knew to be careful with my answer. Sometimes I wondered why Cael bothered asking me questions anyway.
“Because it is more fun to see you consider your answer,” she said.
“Stop it,” I told her. I knew that she would not.
“I cannot Read everything about you, Galen. I find that intriguing.”
She had told me that enough times that I knew I should believe it, but even with my barriers in place, she managed to crawl past much of the time. Too often she knew exactly what I was thinking.
“Then I will tell you what I think we must do next,” I said. “You must return to Elaeavn with the crystal. Return it to its rightful place in the palace.” And nothing would change with how the Elvraeth ruled. My first instinct had been to return the crystal to Elaeavn. Even after what had happened to me, even after my banishment, being made one of the Forgotten, I still felt that the crystal needed to be returned.
But what if Della was right?
From what she had said and from the fact that she had been moving around as often as she had been over the years, I knew that she was involved in some deeper plot. If she acted against the Elvraeth, it made it all the more surprising that she had helped me knowing that I was helping Cael.
I took the last drink from my cup, tasting the soothing aromas Della had mixed in. There was an art to mixing the right drink, and as long as I had worked with her I had never begun to approach the level that she managed so easily.
I looked again at her small house. Books lined shelves on the walls. A small kettle sat next to the fire. Small stoppered bottles stacked atop one of the shelves. For the first time, I considered taking a few of her bottles, knowing that Della would have quality supplies, but just as I had not been willing to be the one to violate her secret, I knew that I could not steal from her. Some things just were not done.
Cael gripped my hand as we walked to the door. Just as we were about to leave, something that caught my eye and I turned.
In the corner, set on a small table hidden by a stack of parchment, was a dark-bladed knife. There was nothing ornate about it that should attract my attention. Only the shape and the fact that it was lorcith made.
Lorst.
Did Della help Lorst as well?
I suddenly felt very weary as my mind began to work through the possibilities. I knew how I had failed to consider alternatives when I first encountered Lorst; I had been too busy trying to keep us alive. But had I only thought about it, I should have realized that there might be other reasons for his interest. Was that why Thom had come after me so quickly?
Had that been how Della had narcass leaves?
I closed my eyes, trying to think quickly, to connect the pieces, but failed. There were just too many. Everything that I considered put Cael in danger, and I knew that I could not allow that.
Of course, Della was right. There was a much larger world than Eban, but maybe I did not care. Maybe, as much as I tried to protect my little part of the world, doing what I thought needed to be done, it did not really matter. Now that I had left Eban—likely for good—there was just nothing really for me to do other than to protect Cael.
I turned and saw her staring at me. I did not know how much of my thoughts were close to the surface where she could Read them and how many were deeper where it was more difficult for her to reach. I decided that it didn’t matter. If I was going to stay with her, she needed to know everything.
“Lorst has been here,” I said.
Cael nodded. “I Read that from Della. I think she wanted me to know. And part of the reason she did not take the crystal from me, though I think she knew that I would not allow it.”
“Were you going to share that with me?”
“Eventually,” Cael said. “There are some things that are easier to learn naturally.”
“You don’t consider the way you learned of it natural?”
Cael shrugged. “I believe that my abilities are a gift from the Great Watcher. I believe that my family has been especially gifted. I do not know how much of that is because we have access to the crystals and how much is born within us.”
I nearly missed a step as we reached the door to the room. On the other side of the door was the small town, the road leading us to Elaeavn where Cael would be home. And I would still be banished.
“Why do you say that?”
She looked up at me. Her deep green eyes blazed softly. “I was always a strong Reader, Galen. I have always been able to pass through the barriers our people think to construct in their minds, thinking it keeps their innermost thoughts private. But I have gained new abilities since my Saenr when I first held the crystal.” She shook her head. “I do not know how many of these abilities would have developed naturally had I not accessed the crystals, only that I continue to find new uses, new skills, that I had not had before.”
“Della knows of this,” I said.
Cael shrugged. “She is Elvraeth, regardless of her punishment. She would have experienced a Saenr.”
“Is it possible that the crystals can open new abilities to others?” I asked. If so, that explained Della’s interest. That would explain so much about why Orly had pursued the crystals so aggressively, why Lorst nearly killed us both to acquire it. And I had thought the crystal simply a marker, a gift from the Great Watcher to the earliest founders of our people.
“I don’t know, Galen.
Only that I could not Compel anyone before my Saenr. I had no ability to create a glamour before holding the crystal.”
“What else have you noticed?” I asked.
Cael smiled and reached past me to open the door. Outside the light was bright and blinding, the sun high overhead. Unlike in Eban, the sky was clear and the warm air greeted us, almost inviting us outside. “Galen, there must be some secrets.”
She stepped outside, not seeing the look on my face. If she had, I suspected that she wouldn’t have cared.
For a moment, I considered staying behind. I knew Della would have me, especially if she thought me useful to whatever plan she had in place. But then I looked out on Cael as she turned to face me, sun shining on her face, her dark hair trailing behind her head, and I knew that I could not.
For the first time since I had met her, I knew that she did not Compel me. I would see Cael to safety. Beyond that, I did not know what would happen, only that I made the choice. I took her hand and followed her into the sunlight.
A Forgotten Return
I stood staring across the bluff overlooking Elaeavn, salt wind gusting around me. The city at night danced with hundreds of flickering lights, candles and lanterns that made the city a terrace of stars. If not for my Sight, I could almost imagine the beauty of the city. Instead, everything I saw reminded me of my exile.
For so long, I had never imagined returning. As one of the Forgotten, I was banished from the city, forever outcast from my people. And now I returned. Changed and different than when I had been banished, but no less deserving. If anything, I was more deserving now.
Had I more choice in the matter, I might never have come. A mixture of emotions washed over me. At least they were mine. As far as I could tell, in this Cael did not Compel me.
“No one will recognize you,” she said.
I turned. An ache in my back where I had been hit by the crossbow bolt stretched and tore; I tried not to grimace as I looked at her.
Cael stood with one hand in her pocket protecting the crystal she had worked so hard to reclaim. She studied me with bemusement and the moonlight reflecting off her dark hair made her face nearly glow.
The Forgotten: A story in the world of The Dark Ability Page 11