Brightly Burning v(-10

by Mercedes Lackey

  A suspicion had formed in his mind, and he kept dismissing it as nonsense, but the sight of all this kept bringing it back up, for who but a King could afford gardens and buildings like this? Surely this couldn't be—Why would anyone bring him to—There was no way this could be—

  "Your first view of the Palace, Lavan?" asked someone behind him; he started, and turned around.

  A man of medium height with silver hair pulled back into a tail and wearing the uniform of a Herald waited there; with him were three Guardsmen in their distinctive silver-and-mid-night-blue uniforms, one of them with the insignia of an officer. The Herald stepped forward first, and stood with one foot up on the stone bench, admiring the view.

  He was a handsome man, perhaps forty years old by his face, though his silver hair suggested he was older than that. His firm, square chin and sober mouth suggested he was a stern man, but his kindly, dark eyes and the smile lines around his mouth suggested the opposite.

  "Behind you is Healer's Collegium; the building to the right is the dormitory where the Trainees live, the one in the middle holds the classrooms and the library, and the one to your left is the House of Healing itself," the Herald said easily, in a way that made Lan cautiously want to like him. "Out there, that tangle—" He chuckled, waving his hand at the Palace. "Well, that's the Old Palace, and New Palace, and the Herald's Collegium. Bardic is on the other side of Herald's; you can't see it from here. They keep threatening to pull it all down one day and rebuild it because it's such an illogical mess, but I can't imagine them doing so."

  "I can't either," Lan replied, dazed at the very notion. "Where would they put everyone?"

  "Well, that's the question, isn't it?" the Herald replied, with a wry smile. "One solution would be to build the new structure in a logical fashion first, move everyone in, and tear the old one down. If they ever carry out their threat, that's the only way I can see it happening." He turned to Lan and extended a hand. "I'm Herald Pol, by the way, and I imagine you're wondering why I want to talk to you."

  Lan took his hand gingerly, but Pol put no pressure on it at all, just allowed it to rest in his for a moment. His handshake was warm, dry, and neutral. "I don't know why a Herald would want to talk to me," he said doubtfully. "I'm nobody."

  "Well, you see, four of your schoolmates died in the fire that hurt you, and you are the only one we haven't asked about it yet," the Herald said, and Lan felt his heart stop.

  He felt as if the Herald was waiting for him to say something, but he couldn't think of anything. His mouth went dry, and he felt cold all over.

  "What exactly were all of you doing in that classroom?" the Herald asked into the silence.

  How can I tell him? He'll never believe me! My own parents didn't believe me!

  Lan started shaking, and gripped the bench with both hands. "I wasn't doing—anything," he said through clenched teeth.

  The Herald raised an eloquent eyebrow. "Perhaps I should rephrase that question. What were the older boys doing to you?" When Lan didn't reply, his gaze bored into Lan's eyes, prying each reluctant word out of him.

  I can't—

  "I—they—were—they were—pushing me about—" He couldn't get his breath, somehow, and he was shaking so hard... why wouldn't this man leave him alone? He didn't know anything. "I—it was a kind of game."

  To them, anyway.

  "But why did they bring you there?" the Herald persisted. "What kind of a game is it that involves large young men tossing a younger boy around? What was going on?"

  Maybe if he just told the Herald the truth, the man would go away! "They were going to flog me!" Lan blurted in desperation. "Tyron said I was—that—he said—" He couldn't finish; after all, it was just his word against that of the other boys, and who knew what they'd told the authorities? That was why the Guard Captain was there, wasn't it?

  The Herald gave a little nod to the Guard Captain, as if to say, "I told you so." He continued more gently, "We've made a point of talking to some of the other youngsters, and they've been telling us some interesting things. Would you care to talk to us about it as well?"

  He looked so trustworthy. He was a Herald! Shouldn't I be able to trust a Herald?

  But there was a barrier to that. What if they decide I'm responsible for the fire?

  And another. What if he really was?

  No, that was ridiculous. How could he have started the fire? Impossible. And this was a Herald. Surely, if anyone would know the truth when he heard it, this man would.

  "It depends on who you were talking to," Lan said, unable to keep sullenness out of his voice, but relaxing a little. His heart stopped pounding, and he stopped shivering as much, but he still held to the bench with a death grip.

  "Not the young devils in the—what-you-call—Sixth Form," the Guard Captain rumbled unexpectedly. Paper whispered as he took a list out of his pocket. "Young lad called Owyn Kittlekine in your group was the most talkative."

  Lan felt tension spool up again. "What did he tell you?" he asked.

  "Largely that the leaders of the Sixth Form were using the sloth and negligence of Master Keileth and your teachers to bully and abuse the younger students," the Guard Captain said in disgust. "We've had words with their parents, and that school isn't going to open again until matters are set right."

  "But we want to know—exactly—what happened in that room, Lan," the Herald interrupted, "I know you don't want to think about it, but when there is even one death, much less four, we have to know why. People are asking a lot of awkward questions, and we must have answers for them."

  Oh, gods. They do think I'm responsible!

  This time, Lan wasn't shivering with cold, he was trembling with fear, and something angry and ominously familiar roused deep inside him. He began to flush as he spoke, feeling anger uncoil in his belly.

  "They—Tyron—said I was eroding discipline because I wasn't letting them catch me to beat me up," he began slowly. "And because I wouldn't steal velvet from my father for him. He wanted scarlet for a Midwinter tunic, and he told me to get him some. When I told him I didn't get pocket money, he told me to get the velvet however I had to, and that he'd flog me for disobedience if I didn't." Just the memory made him angry, and he felt a headache beginning. Once again, the Herald and the Guard Captain exchanged a look. "He said he was going to punish me for that, and because some of the others were staying up in the classrooms over lunch like I was doing instead of going down to the Hall where Tyron and his bunch could get at them. And he said he was going to punish me for lying about being sick, and for lying about staying behind after classes to study and coming in early to study. He was going to flog me for all of that, and that was why they took me to the storeroom, where nobody could hear me."

  "Hmm." The Guard Captain made a note, but said nothing. Once again, it was the Herald that asked the questions.

  "And did he tell you just how severe your punishment was going to be?" he asked.

  Lan squinted through his headache. "Eighty stripes—I think—" I can't think... why won't they leave me alone? I didn't do anything!

  The Herald interrupted. "All right, you say that the older boys found you in the classroom and took you downstairs to the storage room to flog you."

  He hadn't said that, he hadn't said where they'd found him, but it was right, so he snapped his mouth shut and tried to think through a pounding headache that misted his vision with red. He just nodded, and the Herald continued.

  "Then what happened?"

  "Tyron—told me what I told you—and then he told the others to 'play with me' and they started to shove me around." He could hardly speak now, torn between anger at his tormentors, and a terror as great as they had given him, but why was he so horribly afraid? What was it that the Herald's questions were pushing him toward? Why did the questions make him want to run away, howling?

  Please! Leave me alone!

  "So they tossed you about and slammed you into the walls. Then?"

  "Then—that was w
hen Tyron said—and they took me to the chair—and they tied—" The red rage and fear rose together, and the Herald wouldn't let him alone!

  "Then what, Lan?" the Herald persisted. "Then what happened? We have to know!"

  He reached out and seized Lan's shoulder in an insistent grip, and the rage and the fear spiraled upward, out of control, and melded into a terrible whole.

  "No!" he screamed, flinging himself away, dimly understanding that the unthinking rage and the animal fear would strike at whatever was nearest, whether the target deserved it or not.

  He stumbled and fell to his hands and knees at the foot of one of the great torches as the maelstrom of emotion became the monster of flame—but this time, he did not touch anything living.

  He sprawled at the base of the ornamental torch, and as his eyes glazed over with crimson, the oil above his head erupted in flame with a sound like the dull impact of a giant fist on flesh, or of something soft and heavy falling to earth. A wave of heat washed over him, and his trailing sleeves caught fire.

  By this point, he was helpless; the fire held him in thrall. All he could do was let it rage around him, and hope nothing came within its grasp.

  Forlorn hope.

  Another torch went up, and another, and the nearest bush started to crisp and crackle with flames. The fire spread, and he could do nothing! He heard, as from a far country, the cries of alarm, and even someone calling his name, but he was no longer himself, he was the fire, and the flames were more intoxicating than wine, more implacable than a thunderstorm, all-consuming and all-enveloping, and in a moment or two he would be gone and there would be nothing left but the flames.

  The little of himself that was left was nothing more than a dry leaf in the firestorm; tempest-tossed, not yet consumed, but doomed, surely doomed—

  :Never!:

  The word, clear and bright as a trumpet call in a still night, sounded above the chaos enveloping him.

  There was a moment of total stillness. Lan, teetering just above the fiery abyss and about to fall into it forever, felt—something—reach for him, take him, and pluck him away.

  The rage and fear ran out of him like molten metal poured from a cracked crucible. The ragged lightning piercing his brain with unbearable pain vanished. The crimson haze cleared from his sight, and he looked up, saw that the fire around him had died away, all but the flames rising from the torches; saw that he was not alone.

  But it was no human that stood beside him, valiantly shielding him with her own body from the Herald and the spears of the two Guards and the Captain.

  It was a Companion.

  Oh— he thought vaguely, and looked into her eyes.

  Once again he fell, but not to his doom.

  He fell into a cool, blue world of light; he fell forever and never reached the bottom. But something reached out for him.

  Something enfolded him, wrapped and cradled him in an emotion he almost didn't recognize. And when he realized what it was, he wept, and as he wept, he returned it with all his heart, and wrapped the giver in the gift, until it was no longer possible for either of them to have told where one began and the other ended.

  They trembled together there, in an embrace so close that there was no room for thought, for a single, deliriously sweet moment. Then they parted, separating into individuals—but never again to be alone, never again without a bond beyond words, joined together by the strongest thing on earth or in the Havens.

  He fell back into himself, still gazing into the most wondrous eyes in the world, and heard her speak for the second time into his mind.

  :I love you, Lan. I Choose you. I am Kalira, and I will never leave you.:

  "Well," said the Herald, in a voice heavy with irony. "This certainly changes things."

  *

  POL had anticipated many possible outcomes from his confrontation with Lavan Chitward, but this was not one of them. Never in his wildest imaginings would he have anticipated that Lavan would be Chosen—or be a Firestarter who had nearly immolated himself along with his persecutors.

  He managed to persuade Captain Telamaine that the boy was no longer a danger to anyone; he also managed to persuade him that the boy was in no way responsible for what the fires he had called had done to his tormentors. How he had done so, he had no idea. It might have been his own feeble powers of Empathic projection, it might have been a miracle. It might even be the work of Kalira, Lavan's new Companion, for there was no doubt that she could, and would, do anything she had to in order to protect him.

  Now the four of them—himself, young Lavan, Kalira, and Satiran—were alone in the garden. There was plenty of light to see by, although it was well past midnight. They had gathered, ironically enough, beneath the huge garden torch; there seemed no reason to extinguish it. They needed to have open space for the two Companions, since the Healers wouldn't allow Lavan out of their sight, which meant Pol couldn't carry him off to the Collegium.

  Yet.

  Lavan stood no taller than Pol's shoulder; short for his reputed age of sixteen, thin, and lanky, with the loose-jointed, unfinished air of a boy who hasn't yet grown into what he will one day be. He had chestnut hair, more red than brown, with a slight wave to it, hazel eyes prone to change colors as his mood changed, and a thin, finely chiseled face, delicate, but in no way effeminate. Not a boy one would have ever suspected as the cause of so much horror.

  The Healers had reclothed him and examined every bit of him for new burns, but in the end, only needed to replace the bandages. This time his powers had done him relatively little damage, other than to ruin his clothes. Pol had sent at once for a proper Trainee's Grays; it had reinforced his arguments with Captain Telamaine when the boy reappeared in the garb of a Heraldic Trainee.

  Now the only question was—what was Herald's Collegium to do with him?

  :What do you think?: asked an unfamiliar mind-voice; female, and there was only one creature it could be. Pol stared at Kalira in astonishment; he could count on the fingers of one hand the number of times that a Companion had ever Mind-spoken to someone other than his Chosen Herald.

  :Are you—Mindspeaking me?: he asked in shock.

  :Of course I am!: she said tartly. :Don't be ridiculous, Pol. You need to talk to me directly, not through Satiran. And as for what you will do, you Heralds—you will take him, and train him, that is what you will do with him.:

  He gazed at her dubiously. Lavan was oblivious to the conversation, although Pol was certain he heard it; sitting on the bench with one hand and his forehead resting on her flank. He was exhausted, and more than a little befogged by the drugs the Healers had given him.

  :How?: Pol asked her. :How do you train something like—this?: There hadn't been a Firestarter in the Heraldic Circle in all the time he could remember, not one of any power, at least. He was the only Herald with even a trace of the Gift, and all he could manage to do was light an occasional bit of tinder. A powerful Firestarter came along once every two or three generations—someone like Lavan, never before. He was unique—and not a little frightening.

  :How can we deal with this?: he continued. :It's not a Gift, it's a curse! He's got no control over it. It damned near took him, and the gods only know what would have been unleashed if it had!:

  Kalira raised her head and stared at him defiantly. :I can control it,: she replied. :I can, and I will. He will be of no danger as long as I am with him, and I will never leave him.:

  :Kalira—: Satiran interjected haltingly. :He has murdered four already. Is this any kind of person to Choose?:

  Satiran gazed at the other Companion with eyes dark with fear and worry, and well he might. Kalira was his daughter.

  :He didn't murder anyone; it was part accident, part horrible bad luck, and part provoked. I Chose him, Satiran; it is my Choice, not yours. He needs me. Would you have another Tylendel?: she asked harshly, and Pol saw Satiran wince.

  He moved to the side of his old friend, and laid his arm along Satiran's neck, hoping to give him some c
omfort, as Satiran had so often given comfort to his Chosen. "Children grow up and make their own paths," he murmured. "It's not for us to force them out of the roads they pick, however much we might wish to. The Choice is made; now let's deal with it."

  Kalira cast him a glance that was half gratitude, half defiance, then turned her head to nuzzle her Chosen. What passed between them was not for Pol or Satiran to hear, but the boy turned his head and looked to them with a bit more life in his pallid face. And anguish, terrible anguish, more than any boy his age should have to feel.

  "Oh, sir—I didn't mean—" he began, and started to cry, the sort of helpless, hopeless weeping of one who is weary far past his strength. His face crumpled, and Pol heard his spirit crumbling in his tears.

  Pol was not proof against that agony. Gingerly, he sat down beside the boy, and when Lavan didn't resist, put an arm around his shoulders. "I know you never meant any of this to happen, Lavan," he told the youngster, and somewhat to his own bemusement, he knew at that moment that he had spoken nothing but the truth. Lavan Chitward had probably fantasized about dealing the bullies the same punishment they'd inflicted on him, but he would never have been Chosen had he been the kind of person who could actually carry out those fantasies. How could anyone blame him for what had happened? Even the mildest of creatures fights back when cornered, and it was just everyone's misfortune that Lavan had teeth and claws that were sharper than swords and more deadly—and hadn't known it.