Auralia's Colors

by Jeffrey Overstreet

  They would come for the pearls and the gown and everything else. She was sure of it. They would give it all to Auralia.

  Dropping to her knees on the wide circle rug, she peeled back the edge to uncover the door in the floor. Her father never locked their Underkeep hatch, for no one sought to open it except the servants who sent down deliveries…and cats apparently.

  With a sound like a gasp, the hatch opened easily.

  Light from the oil lamps reached through the swirling dust, revealing the ropes, the pulley, the pallet. She stepped onto the pallet. With a hand on the rope, she released the catch, and descended into the shaft.

  In a storage room only the servants had seen, Stricia searched for signs of the treasures prepared for her. A filthy owl launched, circled twice, and disappeared down the patrol corridor, feathertufts tracing its passage and twirling slowly down. She wandered absently about, feathers settling lightly on her head and shoulders.

  There, the mask her father had stored away, the half face of Scharr ben Fray, on the shelf beside a bundle of scrolls. She picked it up, then ran her hand across the scrolls with affection. Those were the parchments on which she had learned to write out Abascar’s laws.

  She stepped into the corridor, and there, swaying slightly on a rack the same height as Stricia, was the gown.

  Stricia gathered it and pressed it to her face. She cried into the fabric, trying to breathe in the colors.

  So this is how it feels to stray beyond the law, she thought.

  “No,” she decided. She had worked too hard. The law would not disappoint her. This was not transgression. It was just a way to bring things back into alignment, to patch where the law had been torn.

  She wrapped the mage’s mask in the wedding gown. She would hide it somewhere deep within the Underkeep. Someone would find it and draw clear conclusions—the exiled advisor had been plotting all along to strip the Promised of her wedding.

  “Today,” she said, “I must be the law.”

  Just inside the heavy portcullis that barred the dungeon gateroom, four sleepy guards sat fingering their game chips, casting them clumsily into concentric circles drawn in the dust.

  “Oh, hey, I remember now,” muttered the oldest, who had done time in these prisons himself. “This is how it goes: A man of Abascar was thrown in the Hole and tortured for penning a letter of praise to the king. Why was he punished?”

  The other three looked at each other, weary with the old man’s riddles. One of them tossed in a chip. It struck the edge of another, rolled, and disappeared down the steep incline to the cells below. “Ballyworms. There goes another one.”

  “No guesses? A man of Abascar. Goes to the Hole. For penning a letter of praise to the king.”

  “We give up,” they chorused and not for the first time. “Why was he punished?”

  “Open up!” came a voice from the avenue outside.

  The four dungeon guards fumbled to tighten their buckles, stuff their feet back into boots, and hide the bottle they’d been passing around. Jostling each other at the gate, they finally determined which of them carried the portcullis key. Clack! The latch released, and one on each side of the entry turned stubborn cranks to lift the heavy barrier.

  Before the gate was fully open, King Cal-marcus ker Har-baron strode into the impenetrable darkness of the descending tunnel, a bottomless throat of dead earth. As he lifted his torch, his three personal guards did the same. They walked briskly, descending into the prisons of the Underkeep.

  Behind them the prison guards muttered to each other, amazed at this, the second royal visit of the day. The king rarely made appearances here, and never had he done so with such a small guard and no advisor at his shoulder.

  The old guard leaned forward, still preoccupied with his riddle, and grinned. “The letter…it was read.”

  Down in the corridor, at the edge of the dungeon’s dark chill, Maugam emerged, white as a maggot, slow as a snail. Cal-marcus detested that flabulous form—a pale mound of bare body that looked as though it had not grown but rather had been poured, slowly, like porridge from a bowl.

  Cal-marcus knew that Maugam considered him a disappointing remnant of a once-great royal line. The jailer preferred to wallow in memories marinated in the blood of King Gere-baron’s madness. But that sluggish survivor would never do anything less than cower before someone who could take away his power and his place.

  Still, the king was unprepared for the shaken, sniveling sight that met him there.

  “Maugam is among the greatest of fools, master,” said the jailer.

  The king laughed. “Indeed you are, Maugam. You are among the greatest of fools—and I am he. I have changed my mind. Go and find Auralia. Bring her to me. I have something to announce.”

  Aug-anstern’s voice, loud and sharp at Cal-marcus’s ear, surprised him. “I don’t have to tell you, sire, what the other prisoners will do if you…”

  “How is it you are here?” The king’s tone darkened, like blood spilling into water. “Did I request your presence?” Cal-marcus did not even turn his head. There would be the flaring judgment of reason, of law, in that old man’s hard face.

  This was not an hour for reason or law.

  After a long silence, Aug-anstern backed slowly away from the king. He said clearly, so all could hear, “Very well. Your servant, your trusted advisor, takes his leave. On this weighty matter you clearly require no counsel.”

  The implications would be clear to all present. The words seemed to shake Cal-marcus’s confidence, for he appeared to be sinking into the floor.

  And then the king unsheathed his ornamental sword.

  The guards stepped back. No advisor had ever provoked such a gesture.

  It felt strange, the weight of the weapon in his hand. He had not grasped a hilt since the days when he himself had fought the beastmen. It felt good. He wanted to smite something and defeat this encroaching sense of helplessness.

  But Aug-anstern, having struck his verbal blow, turned and ran, vanishing beyond the reach of the torchlight. When the king spoke again, it was clear the situation was slipping from his grasp. “What is wrong, Jailer? I commanded you to go and wake Auralia.”

  “Master…” The immense man fell to one knee and hung his head. “Maugam’s calls are met with silence. There is no answer from the Hole.”

  The king jabbed the tip of the sword into the ground. “What do you mean?”

  The muscles on the jailer’s neck flexed and tightened as he opened and closed his jaw with no words.

  The king tapped the sword against the stone path—tak, tak, tak. “You were too harsh on her, perhaps. She is unconscious. Or perhaps she fainted.”

  “Maugam should be dropped into the hole,” groaned the jailer. “For he was a foolish, reckless child. He was weak and could not follow orders. You told Maugam to torture the prisoner. But he could not bring himself to do so. He was not strong enough. He decided to end her suffering. He used a shovel, master, deep down in the dungeon’s Hole. And now she is gone.”

  “A shovel? You…you did what? What are you saying, Maugam? I told you to punish her, not destroy her. Pull her up out of the Hole!”

  Maugam’s hands were open and empty. “Maugam sent her on her way, master. He took a shovel into the pit, and now there is no prisoner to bring back. She’s somewhere else now. Punish the jailer, king of Abascar.”

  “There has been enough punishment in these dungeons.” Cal-marcus didn’t understand. He heard something about the Hole, something about the shovel, and something about the end of the poor girl’s suffering. He had heard enough stories about the jailer’s perverted preoccupations. Fear kept him from daring to ask for any more details.

  “Maugam must be punished,” the jailer was insisting. “The Hole is for snakes, not for little sisters. But it is too late. She is gone.”

  “You will not raise her up for us, Jailer?”

  “Master, there is nothing left to raise.” The fat man turned, still on one
knee, crawled a few steps, then heaved himself to his feet with the sob of a man walking to his execution. “Will you not punish Maugam? He has sent her on her way.”

  Tak, tak, tak.

  The darkness ahead offered no redemption, no answer.

  The king slowly turned his back on the prison.

  “Sire?” one guard said quizzically. “The jailer…”

  “Is it midnight?” The king blinked up at the pale gateway as if he was lost. “Are we finished here?” He slid the sword back into its sheath for the last time.

  25

  LAUGHTER IN CHAINS

  S oon after Maugam shackled her and dropped her down the narrow shaft of the Hole, Auralia felt the burning in her wrists and shoulders fade. Her arms became numb, bloodless. Her body, from her head to the throbbing bruises of her heels, seemed a burden, a weight, and she longed to slip free of it and fall.

  The coal in the lantern high above looked like a star dancing in a slow, circular path.

  She was not afraid.

  For as Radegan had fallen into a deep, restful sleep, and as she curled on the damp floor next to him, she had seen the Northchildren come. They sang to her in whispers, like the ripples of Deep Lake. And she had fallen asleep.

  The dream that waited there was quite different from the nightmare she had suffered in her cell.

  In this dream, the Northchildren carried her to the lakeside, coaxed her to sit by the water, brought her cloak back into her eager embrace, and then took their places around her. In their company at last, she saw they were not all as small as children, but they played and whispered together like the Gatherers’ orphans. They were fascinated by the driftwood, enthralled by the shapes of stones. They pointed out stars and sometimes whispered about Auralia herself.

  But when it happened, they went silent, unified in awe.

  Like a dark curtain flung across the moon, the creature’s wings spread above her in the sky, and something drew her to her feet. She took the cloak of colors, draped it over her shoulders.

  Like a great heron, the creature soared down to the lake. It bent its powerful legs and descended, tail touching the water first, and then crashed into the glassy surface, sending spray up on both sides and driving waves onto the beach, where they rushed up to Auralia’s knees.

  As the Keeper folded in its wings like translucent tents, gigantic shoulders eclipsed the light of a whole red moon. Its massive head was maned and muscular like that of a wild horse, and it arched a neck of glittering black scales to bring its forehead down close to Auralia. Wide nostrils flared, puffing wind against her face.

  It could have swallowed her.

  Her feet were rooted to the ground. The Keeper investigated the magical disturbance of the colors. It nudged the cape with its snout, bumping her elbow, breathing deeply the perfumes of the threads. Auralia stared into the globed, liquid eyes.

  Her mouth moved, searching to name that creature, that force of water, wind, or fire the presence so clearly resembled. But after a timeless moment, she knew—it reminded her of everything. Or maybe, as she looked at the forest and the sky, everything reminded her of the Keeper. All things in the landscape seemed to yearn, leaning toward the creature the way flowers lean toward the sun. Through the Keeper, all things seemed to draw color and vigor. And for the Keeper, waves splashed, trees swayed, stones protected knowledge, and wind waited for orders. In its scales, she saw millions of colors, and she felt deeply ashamed for how few of them she recognized.

  “You don’t come from here,” she whispered. And then, half-surprised at herself, “I don’t think I do either.”

  Like a whip lashing, its neck jerked back. The creature rose from the water to clasp the shore, sinuous legs ending not in hooves or cold shiny claws but in fingered feet that reminded Auralia of Krawg’s large, rough, and gentle hands. Feet that, while heavy, left subtle, delicate prints. Head high, the Keeper inhaled two passing clouds and puffed them forth from its lips. Lightning crackled through its mane. Auralia was sure the creature would leap skyward in a cataclysm of water, but instead, slippery as a fish, it relaxed back into the waves. That grand, strange face came in close, large eyes blinking.

  The Keeper was looking at her.

  The earth shuddered, for its voice came not from its throat but from all it touched. A deep rumbling began like a purr. Auralia sensed the creature’s pleasure as it gazed down on the soft glow of the cloak. And then she noticed something about the sunflare of the irises circling the black slits of its eyes: they were like her own, glints of emerald green radiating through rings of blood-dark red. The Keeper was as fearsome in size and strength as told in all the tales, yet it was also familiar.

  “You brought me here. We traveled down an underground river, came up into the world through a secret spring.”

  The Keeper was looking at its tail as fish leapt over it playfully, back and forth.

  “I must look like one of those dumb wrigglers,” Auralia laughed. “They see my shadow, but they’ve only ever known their world of water. They have no idea what my world is like. And they don’t know how I love to swim with them.”

  Purring still, the Keeper scratched its chin against the stones. With a trembling hand, she reached out and pulled rubble from the cords of its beard, warm and bristly spines like a thick bundle of riverside reeds. In the dark deep spaces beneath the Keeper’s thick lashes, the stars reflected in pinpoints of fire. Auralia thought she saw them move, as if constellations lived within the Keeper’s eyes.

  “Your eyes are so full. How can I know what you see?”

  Then the Keeper reared up, and a roar came from the trees above as if they had split from their trunks to their crowns. But it was not a challenge, nor was it a threat. It was a roar of affirmation, of completion. She could not comprehend it, nor could she translate it into words. But she had been given an answer, one that dissolved all her fears, leaving only laughter.

  Her name was in the music of that voice. She was part of its secretive scheme. It would not forget her, had never forgotten her.

  The Keeper stepped backward, watching her intently, sinking into the water until only the tips of its wings remained in the air, like the sails of a boat that could travel beneath the waves. The waters closed over it, whirling in thousands of sparkling circles. And after it was gone, the trees all around her hummed, struck by the hammer of the Keeper’s mighty laugh, resonating like strings.

  Even here, as she dangled, chained, that laughter rang in her ears. She laughed into the darkness of the Hole. She laughed in hopes that Radegan might hear and that the sound would ease his passing.

  In this dungeon, nothing had gone so wrong that it could evade the sound of that laughter.

  She tried to clap her shackled hands together, and the cuffs clanged like cold, dissonant bells. She began to sing the Morning Verse.

  The cuffs of these bindings had been made for men, not children. And as she rang the shackles to measure the meter of the song, she felt their grip slipping.

  She was free.

  She fell.

  She fingered the emerjade ring about her thumb. Something tangible and true.

  This was still House Abascar. Auralia had not fallen out of the world.

  Nothing was finished. Not yet.

  She sat among muck, gore, and bones. Even if she could find the strength to climb, she would never reach the dangling chains. The walls were smooth and slick, offering no hold.

  There were whispers at the top of the Hole, shadows staring down at her.

  “Come away,” they said.

  “Not yet,” she replied, for she was staring through an opening someone had dug in the wall.

  And then she remembered.

  Before Maugam had bound her hands and lifted her high by the chains, he had emerged from the Hole himself, climbing on a knotted rope. The noise he made had awakened her, and she had whispered to Radegan, “Don’t be afraid.”

  As the jailer collapsed, exhausted, beside the maw of the pit
, she saw the shovel in his hands. He was wheezing and talking to himself, mumbling something about his “biggest mistake.”

  But she had been humming a quiet song, too distracted to care. She had been holding Radegan’s large, broken hands until she felt the faint pulse vanish and the heat fade from his skin.

  Then Maugam had lifted her to her feet and walked her to the chains, whispering what must have been his best attempt at comfort. He had coaxed her to the edge of the Hole, locking the shackles about her wrists.

  And now she could see what Maugam had done.

  He had provided her with a chance. Unable to find the courage to carry her to freedom, he managed a gamble that would allow for a possibility. It was the closest thing to kindness he could muster.

  She seized the opportunity and pushed herself through the opening.

  For a while she pondered if she felt more like a rat or a worm, wriggling her way through the earth. But she soon pulled herself through into a chamber. And there she laughed again.

  Auralia stood in a pen lined with bars. It was piled high with bundles of yarn. Red. Green. Purple.

  She looked up, and she saw, far, far above her, lanternglow falling through a grate and a pallet suspended by ropes. But there was no way to climb up to it, and she felt unsure about shouting for help. Instead, she climbed out between the bars, but not without snatching some bundles of yarn.

  “Better not get lost,” she said.

  As she wandered through a maze of long and empty corridors, she unspooled the yarn behind her so she wouldn’t wander in circles and just in case she might need to find her way back.

  With the string unwinding she walked, numb with cold and nearly naked, into the Underkeep.

  It was just as the Gatherers had described it. She had often stared at the cliffs of Abascar’s stone foundation, amazed to think that people were traveling within it. She thought of the colors hidden here, the life burgeoning below ground.

  She walked past row after row of cages piled high with garments and linens and carpets and curtains. Some were labeled with names and contents. The past. Childhoods. Mountains of color. Souvenirs of lives. These were the inner linings of hearts ripped out. Her tiny arms slipped between the bars, and she felt these clothes, wrapped the colors around her, breathed in their musty patterns. These things were as lonely as their makers, dry, miserable, and yearning for light.