Staring out into the darkness, Alec tried without success to gauge his companion's mood. The further they ventured into Aurenen, the more distant Seregil became, as if he were listening ever more closely to some inner voice only he could hear.
"How come you never told me about getting captured by the Hazadrielfaie?" he asked at last.
Seregil laughed softly. "Because it never happened, at least not to me. I heard the story from another exile. The bit about collecting the legends was true, and I was homesick enough to consider making the journey, but the man to whom the tale belongs talked me out of it, just as I did you once, if you recall."
"So you do think Nyal's a spy?"
"He's a listener. And I don't like how quickly he's cozied up to Beka. If you were a spy, what better place to be than at the side of Klia's protector?"
"So you gave him a false story?"
"And now we wait to see if it resurfaces, and where."
Alec sighed. "Will you say anything to Klia?"
Seregil shrugged. "There's nothing to report yet. I'm more worried about Beka just now. If he does turn out to be a spy, it will reflect badly on her."
"All right then, but I still think you're wrong." Hope you 're wrong, he amended silently.
They'd kept watch for perhaps half an hour when they heard the sound of returning footsteps in the darkness. Moving into the deeper shadow below the ramp, they watched as Nyal reappeared supporting Amali with one arm. Their heads were close together in conversation, and neither seemed to notice Alec and Seregil in the shadows.
"Then you'll say nothing?" Alec overheard her whisper to Nyal.
"Of course not, but I must question the wisdom of your silence," he replied, sounding worried.
"It is my wish." Releasing his arm, she walked up the ramp.
Nyal watched her go, then wandered back up the trail alone, apparently lost in thought.
Seregil's hand closed over Alec's. "Well, well," he whispered. "Secrets in the dark. How interesting."
"We still have nothing. The Akhendi support Klia."
Seregil frowned. "And the Ra'basi may not."
"I still say you're jumping at shadows."
"What? Alec, wait!" Seregil hissed.
But Alec was already gone, ambling noisily up the trail. Stones crunched and tinkled under his boots. He hummed aloud for good measure.
He found the interpreter sitting on a rock beside the trail, looking up at the stars.
"Who's that?" Alec called out, as if startled to find someone there.
"Alec?" Nyal jumped to his feet.
Guiltily? Alec wondered, unable to make out the man's expression at this distance.
"Oh, there you are!" Alec said lightly, striding up to him. "Did the Dravnians wear you out already? There are stories going untold for lack of you."
Nyal chuckled, his voice deep and rich in the darkness. "They'll go on all night whether we understand them or not. Seregil's throat must be raw by now, left alone with them so long. What are you doing out here all alone?"
"Had to tap the hogshead," Alec said, patting the lacings of his breeches.
Nyal looked blank for a moment, then broke into a broad grin. "Piss, you mean?"
"Yes." Alec turned aside to make good his claim.
Nyal chuckled behind him. "Even when you speak my own tongue, you Skalans are not always easy to understand. Especially the women." He paused. "Beka Cavish is your friend, isn't she?"
"A good friend," Alec replied.
"Has she a man of her own?"
Still facing away, Alec heard the hope in the man's voice and felt an irrational twinge of jealousy.
His own fleeting attraction to Beka in the early days of their
friendship had been no match for her determination to follow a military career. No doubt the difference in their ages had played a larger part in her mind than his, too. Nyal, on the other hand, was man-grown and handsome besides. There was no faulting Beka's choice on that account.
"No, no man of her own." Tugging his breeches closed, Alec turned to find Nyal still smiling at him. The man was either a consummate actor or more guileless than Seregil cared to believe. "Don't tell me you fancy her?"
Nyal spread his hands, and Alec suspected he was blushing. "I admire her very much."
Alec hesitated, knowing Seregil would disapprove of what he was about to do. Stepping-closer to the 'faie, he looked him in the eye and said gravely, "Beka admires you, too. You asked if I'm her friend. I am, and her almost-brother as well. You understand? Good, then as her almost-brother, I'll tell you that I like you, too, though I don't know you well. Are you a man she can trust?"
The Ra'basi squared his shoulders and made him a respectful bow. "I am a man of honor, Alec i Amasa. I would bring no harm to your almost-sister."
Alec stifled an undignified chortle and clapped Nyal on the shoulder. "Then why don't you go and keep her company?"
Grinning, Nyal strode off toward the tower. Alec hoped the man's celebrated hearing wasn't acute enough to hear his own strangled snort of laughter. Another of a more nervous variety escaped as he stopped to think what his fate would likely be if Beka ever learned that he'd appointed himself the defender of her honor. He hoped the talkative Ra'basi had enough discretion to keep his mouth shut about their little chat. He'd just started back when Seregil emerged from the shadows.
"I thought you said it was too risky to sneak up on people out here?" Alec gasped, startled by his sudden appearance.
"Not with all the noise you were making," Seregil retorted curtly.
"Then you heard?"
"Yes, and you're either brilliant or a damn fool!"
"Let's hope it's the former. I don't know what he was up to with Amali, but if he's not really love-struck for Beka, then I am a fool."
"Ah!" Seregil held up an accusing finger. "But he didn't happen to mention the good lady Amali, now did he?"
"He wouldn't, would he? We heard him promise to keep silent about something."
"Clearly a man of honor, your Ra'basi friend," Seregil observed
dryly. "To his credit, I think you're right, at least about his feelings for Beka. Let's go keep an eye on him."
It was clearly Beka who occupied the interpreter's thoughts that night and the following morning, although she continued to greet his attentions with apparent bemusement.
The second day was much the same as the first. The air grew colder, and when the breeze shifted, Alec felt the chill kiss of glacial air on the back of his neck. Just after midday, the pitch of the trail begin to drop. Riding blind, Alec found it hard not to doze off. His chin was slowly sinking on his breast when a sudden warm gust of damp, acrid mist brought him awake.
"What is that?" he asked, wrinkling his nose.
"Dragon breath!" an Aurenfaie exclaimed.
He was already grasping the edge of the blindfold when someone gripped his wrist. Laughter broke out around them.
"A joke, Alec," his escort assured him, sounding like he was sharing in it. "It's just a hot spring. There are lots of them on this side of the mountains, and some smell even worse than this."
Alec smelled the strange odor again just as the hated blindfolds finally came off later that afternoon.
A few miles ahead, an ice field hung in a valley high between two peaks. The pass was wider here, and in places along its sloping sides clouds of white steam boiled from the ground, or wafted off the faces of little pools between the rocks.
Below lay a small tarn, its brilliant blue surface shimmering like a shard of Ylani porcelain beneath a shifting pall of vapor. Deep azure at its center, the waters gradually lightened to a pale turquoise toward the shore, where the rocks were a dull yellow. Rocky ground surrounded it, devoid of vegetation. A line of darker stone ran down the slope to the water's edge and beyond, like a stain.
"One of your 'mirrors of the sky'?" asked Alec.
"Yes," said Seregil. "It's the largest hot spring along this trail, a very sacred spot."
; "Why is that?"
Seregil smiled. "That's Arnali's tale to tell. We're in Akhendi fai'thast now."
They made camp upwind of the tarn. It was warm in the little vale; the ground gave off heat they could feel through the soles of their boots. The foul odor was stronger here, too, like eggs gone bad. The yellow coloration Alec had noted earlier turned out to be a crusty rime built up just above the waterline.
"Sulfur," Thero said, taking a pinch between his fingers and igniting it in a puff of orange flame.
Despite the smell, most of the 'faie were already stripping off to bathe in it. Amali a Yassara dipped up a cupful and presented it to Klia.
"Odd sort of spot to call sacred, don't you think?" asked Alec, eyeing the gently roiling water distrustfully. "It can't be poison, though. Everyone's drinking it."
Testing the water, he found it hot as a bath. He scooped up a small amount in one cupped palm and took a sip. It was an effort to swallow; the flat, metallic flavor was not something that invited deep drinking.
"A mineral spring!" Thero noted, wiping his lips—though not discreetly enough to escape Amali's notice.
"You are perhaps wondering why we revere such a place?" she asked, laughing at the wizard's expression. "I will show you in a little while. In the meantime, you all should bathe, especially you, Alec i Amasa. The waters are healing and would do that ear of yours good."
"Is my talimenios welcome, as well?" Alec asked, keeping his tone respectful even as his gut tightened.
Amali colored, but shook her head. "That I cannot grant."
"Then I thank you for the offer." He gave her a slight bow and strolled off to the cluster of tents nearby. Seregil followed.
"You didn't have to do that!"
"Yes, I did. I can't stand them all fussing over me while they slap you down at every opportunity."
Seregil pulled him to a halt. "They aren't doing it to insult me, you damn fool!" he whispered angrily. "I brought this on myself a long time ago. You're here for Klia, not me. Any insult you offer to our hosts reflects on her."
Alec stared at him a moment, hating the resignation that underlay his friend's hard words. "I'll try to keep that in mind," he mumbled, pulling his pack down from the saddle and carrying it into the tent assigned to them. He waited, expecting Seregil to come in. When he ■ didn't, Alec looked out through the tent flaps and saw him back at the water's edge, watching the others swim.
Seregil kept up his air of cordial distance, speaking little but making no effort to retreat from the main company. When Amali invited the Skalans to walk along the shore that evening, he joined in without comment or apology.
She led them up to the outcropping of dark stone. Bulging up from the surrounding stone and skree, it spread like an ink stain to the edge of the lake.
"Look closely," she told them, running her hand over a curving slab.
Examining it, Alec saw nothing out of the ordinary except the peculiar smoothness of the weathering in places.
"It's skin!" Thero exclaimed from the other side of an upthrust slab. "Or at least, it was. And here's the ridge of a spine. By the Light, was this a dragon? It must have been over three hundred feet long, if we're seeing all that there was of it."
"Then it's true what I've read," Klia mused, climbing around to where the crumbling edge of what might have been a wing bone jutted from the ground. "Dragons do turn to stone when they die."
"This one did," Amali replied. "But it is the only one of this size ever found. How they die, just as how they are born, remains a mystery. The little ones appear; the great ones disappear. But this place, called Vhada'nakori, is sacred because of this creature, so drink deeply, sleep well, and attend carefully to your dreams. In a few days, we will be in Sarikali."
Seregil knew the Akhendi woman had not meant to include him in her invitation at the Vhada'nakori; she'd been unfailingly distant since Gedre. Perhaps her ill will accounted for his poor sleep that night.
Curled beside Alec in the tent they shared with Torsin and Thero, he tossed restlessly through a dream of uncommon vividness, even without aid of the waters.
It began like so many of his nightmares had over the past two years. He stood again in his old sitting room at the Cockerel, but this time there were no mutilated corpses, no heads gummed in their own blood on the mantelpiece chattering accusations at him.
Instead, it was as he remembered it from happier days. The cluttered tables, the piles of books, the tools laid out on the workbench beneath the window—everything was just as it should be. Turning
to the corner by the fireplace, however, he found it empty. Alec's narrow cot was gone.
Puzzled, Seregil walked to the door of his bedchamber. Opening it, he found himself instead in his childhood room at Bokthersa. The details here were equally clear and achingly familiar—the cool play of leaf shadow on the wall above his bed, the rack of practice swords near the door, the rich colors of the corner screen in the corner—painted by the mother he'd never known. Toys long since lost or packed away were there, too, as if someone had collected all of his most treasured belongings and laid them out for his return.
The only discordant element were the delicate glass orbs strewn across the bed. He hadn't noticed these when he'd first come in.
He was taken by their beauty. Some were tiny, others the size of his fist, and they gleamed like jewels, multihued and translucent. He didn't recognize them, but in the strange way of dreams, knew that these, too, were his.
As he stood there, smoke suddenly seeped up through the floorboards around him. He could feel heat through the soles of his boots and hear the angry crackle of flames from below.
His first thought was to save the orbs. Try as he might, though, a few always slipped away and he had to stop and pick them up again. Looking around frantically, he knew that he couldn't save everything; the fire was bursting up through the floor in earnest now, licking at the corners of the room.
He knew he should run and warn Adzriel. He longed to save familiar mementos but could not decide what to take, what to sacrifice. And all this time, he was still trying to gather the glistening spheres. Looking down, he saw that some had turned to iron and threatened to smash the more fragile ones. Others were filled with smoke or liquid. Confused and frightened, he stood helpless as smoke boiled up around him, blotting out the light—
Seregil woke drenched in sweat, with his heart trying to hammer its way out of his chest. It was still dark, but he had no intention of sleeping again in this place. Finding his clothes, he slipped out.
The stars were still bright enough to cast faint shadows. Dressing quickly, he climbed up to the dragon stones overlooking the water.
"Aura Lightbearer, send me insight," he whispered, stretching out on his back to wait for dawn.
"Welcome home, Korit's son," a strange little voice replied, close to his ear.
Seregil looked around in surprise. No one was there. Leaning over the edge of the rock, he peered underneath. A pair of shining yellow eyes looked back at him, then tilted as the creature moved its head.
"Are you khtir'bai?" asked Seregil.
The eyes tilted in the other direction. "Yes, child of Aura. Do you know me?"
"Should I, Honored One?" Seregil had encountered only one such being, the khtir'bai of an aunt who'd taken the form of a white bear. This creature was far too small.
"Perhaps," the voice told him. "You have much to do, son of Korit."
"Will I ever be called that again?" Seregil asked as it finally sank in that the khtir'bai had addressed him by his true name.
"We shall see." The eyes blinked and were gone.
Seregil held his breath, listening, but no sound came from under the rock. He lay back again, staring up at the stars as he pondered this new turn of events.
A few minutes later he caught the soft scuff of bare feet on stone. Sitting up, he saw Alec climbing up to join him.
"You should have come sooner. There was a khtir'bai under there, one who knew my
name."
Alec's look of disappointment was almost comical. "What did it look like?"
"It was just a voice in the dark, but it welcomed me home."
Alec sat down next to him. "At least someone has. Couldn't you sleep?"
Seregil told Alec all he could recall of his dream: the glass balls, the flames, the childhood memories. Alec listened quietly, gazing out across the mist-covered water.
"You've always claimed to have no magic, but your dreams—!" Alec said when he'd finished. "Remember those visions you had before we found Mardus?"
"Before he found us, you mean? The warnings I didn't understand until it was too late? A lot of good that did us."
"Maybe you're not supposed to do anything about them. Maybe you're just supposed to be ready."
Seregil sighed, thinking again of the khtir'bai's words. You have much to do, son of Korit. "No, this was different. Just a dream. What about you, tali? Any great revelations?"
"I wouldn't call it that. I dreamt about being aboard Mardus's ship with Thero, only when Thero turned around, he was you and you were weeping. Then the ship sailed over a waterfall and into a
tunnel and that was the end of it. I don't think I'd make much of an oracle."
Seregil chuckled softly. "Or a navigator, from the sound of it. Well, they say all answers can be found at Sarikali. Perhaps we'll turn up a few there. How's the ear?"
Alec fingered the swollen skin and winced. "My whole neck hurts. I should have brought the lissik."
"Come on, I know something even better." Rising, Seregil pulled Alec to his feet and led him down to the water's edge. "Get in and give it a good soak."
"No. I already told you—"
"Who's to know?" Seregil challenged with a wink. "Go on now, before I toss you in. The ride ahead of us will be uncomfortable enough. Take what healing you can get."
"Well, did anyone else dream last night?" Klia asked as they stood around the morning fire a few hours later. "I couldn't recall a thing when I woke up, but I never do."
"Neither did I," said Beka, clearly disappointed.
None of the Skalans had anything to report, as it turned out.
Nightrunners 03 - Traitor's Moon Page 13