“What do you think the crystal does?” Kadmallin slogged through another puddle, oblivious to the muck he sent flying across Sketkee’s cloak.
“The search for the answer to that question is the very reason for the existence of our journey.” Sketkee ignored the mud. Most rakthors preferred orderliness and cleanliness. She could brush away the remnants of the chaotic road once the rain had ceased.
“But you could speculate.” Kadmallin tilted his head toward her, a torrent of rain cascading from the awning provided by the rim of his hat.
“To speculate without facts is a fool’s endeavor.” Sketkee abhorred the human penchant for speculation in the absence of evidence. Tragedies rooted in baseless speculation littered their historical record.
“Hmmm.” Kadmallin walked again in silence for a time.
She watched him from the corner of her eye, seeing him tense as he mentally muddled through the situation, finally phrasing the source of his consternation.
“It definitely comes from the Forbidden Realm, though. Yes?” Kadmallin looked around as he spoke.
They traveled at the rear of the pilgrim line, but his well-honed habits took precedence, even when the possibility of being overheard seemed nonexistent. This facet of his nature proved exceedingly useful on several occasions and remained one of the primary reasons she sought his company and assistance in her quest.
“I am as certain as I can be, given the lack of any clear historical evidence.” Sketkee often wondered if she mistook the nature of the artifact and pursued an illusory goal. “Its mechanical sophistication suggests a refinement of technique far surpassing even the considerable talents of the great rakthor engineers of the Fifth Age.”
Most philosophers of rakthor history divided the procession of civilization into seven ages, a repeating cycle of advancement and collapse, some ages reaching higher than others. From the remaining historical accounts, the philosophers and engineers of the Fifth Age surpassed the accomplishments of all others. The present, Seventh Age, only a few hundred years in development, still paled in comparison to its predecessors.
“What will we do when we get there?” Kadmallin, much to Sketkee’s surprise, walked around a puddle. Apparently, his boots had reached the maximum level of saturation.
“I do not know. We will need to investigate that question as conditions for its revelation arise.” Sketkee squinted as the line of wagons and humans began to slow. It seemed the pilgrims at the head of the caravan had found a suitable site to make camp.
“Sounds as though you’ve set out to follow a hunch.” Kadmallin looked up at her, rain dripping from his smiling lips.
“I have assessed the probability of uncovering the nature and use of the artifact and pursued the rational course of action.” Sketkee ignored Kadmallin’s grunt of obvious amusement at her reply. Humans often liked to pretend their irrational and instinctual decisions coincided with sound processes of thought, especially in hindsight, when their hunch had not left them dead.
“Another one.” Kadmallin looked around the edge of the wagon stopped in the mud before them.
Sketkee followed him as he walked toward the front of the line, tromping through the slick mud as they passed pilgrims in twos and threes, in wagons and on foot. They came to the head of the caravan, stopping to take in the sight. Dead men and women, young and old, lay scattered across the road — apples fallen from the tree left to rot in the rain. The cindered remains of a wagon blocked the lane, the remnants of tents and various personal possessions littered the ground.
“Bandits,” Kadmallin said. “Again.”
Sketkee refrained from remarking on the unnecessary nature of his need to state self-evident facts. They had passed the graves and shattered campsites of three separate pilgrim bands on their journey. This made the fourth and the largest. At least thirty people lay dead. More, she noted, had been buried beside the road.
“They must have been driven off before they could finish their funeral rites.” Sketkee pointed to the rows of burial mounds aligned between two large trees.
“Our pilgrims will want to bury the dead and make camp for the night.” Kadmallin lowered his pack to the ground. “I’ll help. It might be best if you stayed shy of the place for a bit. I’m not certain how they would react to you touching their dead.”
“Based on past experience, I suspect the response would be unsettling for them.” Sketkee could not understand the human fascination with a body that ceased to function or had been forced into that state. They seemed incapable of separating the person from the body in their minds, even after the body had its head smashed in by a bandit’s ax. “I will set our tent by the tree line and await your arrival.”
Kadmallin set out to help the human pilgrims bury their dead predecessors along the road as Sketkee took his pack and walked to the edge of the woods, not too far from the road, but far enough to provide an invisible boundary for her fellow travelers. After considerable trial and error, she had established this distance to be roughly twenty-three Sun Realm ganots. Any less and they observed her constantly, clearly fearing that her movements so close might portend an unexpected but long-suspected action of a nefarious nature. Any farther and they watched even more closely, apparently concerned she might disappear for unfathomable, and potentially dangerous, purposes.
She paced out a twenty-three long steps and set down the packs. The pilgrims had already begun to remove the bodies from the road. Surprisingly, for having no clear leader, they managed to regularly accomplish communal tasks with expedient efficiency. They attacked the task of burying the dead in the water-sopped mud with the same energy and organization they applied to setting up the camp in the downpour and preparing a cold meal without benefit of flame. Sketkee assembled her tent and climbed inside, out of the continual deluge. She removed the cloak and the satchel over her shoulder as she sat under the canopy of waxed canvas and lit a small lantern. Kadmallin would join her soon and bring her a plate of food.
While she waited, she took the opportunity to follow the urge she had ignored ever since Kadmallin broached the subject — she removed the artifact and held it in her hands. Kadmallin had been correct in his assessment of her actions. While rakthors typically did not speculate, finding the act irrational and counterproductive, she had certainly done so in regards to the crystalline object in her palms. She had abandoned thousands of years of rakthor custom and numerous octuries of directed breeding to act in a manner not unlike her human traveling companions might. Why had she done such a thing? Could she be mentally unsettled, one of the rare rakthors whose brain did not behave properly? She did not sense anything about her mental state that suggested her faculties were unwinding.
She ignored the questions surrounding the actions that resulted in her presence in a band of human pilgrims marching toward the coast and eventually a realm no people had set foot upon in thousands of years, focusing instead on the puzzle resting in her eight taloned fingers. What did it do? Why had it been constructed? How might it be made to function?
She considered these speculative questions long after she put the artifact away and Kadmallin arrived with food and the two settled in for the evening, waiting until the time to take their turns watching the camp through the night. She knew those questions would be with her until she reached the Forbidden Realm, and possibly long after, but she hoped she would find the answers worth the risks she had taken, as well as the risks she suspected she would take in the future.
To continue reading the Philosopher story arena follow this link.
To continue reading Sketkee’s storyline follow this link.
THE SEER
KELLATRA
“I’LL GO with you, then.”
“I must go alone.”
“Who are you meeting?”
“It is better you do not know.”
“Some old lover, then. I promise I won’t be jealous.”
“Not an old lover.”
“An old teacher? From your days at
the Academy?”
Kellatra sighed. She had dreaded the thought of this conversation for weeks, avoiding it with a hundred subtle and not-so-subtle diversions. Now that the moment had arrived when no more prevarication could be plied against Rankarus’s questions, she felt ill, palms sweating, stomach churning, head dizzy. She rubbed her hands along the skirt of her dress and took a deep breath.
She stood beside Rankarus on the rooftop of an inn, looking out over the City of Leaves as the sun fled past the horizon and the shadows crawled into the corners of the streets below. City lantern-men walked the lanes, gradually filling high hanging lanterns with oil and lighting them to chase the darkness back into the alleys. The buildings of Kahara Nattaa, the City of Leaves, were of brick and stone, standing between two and four stories tall with flat, red clay-tiled roofs. They had settled in an inn at the eastern edge of town, its roof giving them a perfect sunset view of the straight, tree-lined avenues crisscrossing the city — the grid of a koris game board laid out upon the earth. Like the ancient game of colored wooden or stone cubes, many larger edifices dotted the cityscape, some temples to the various Juparti gods, some merchant warehouses and storefronts, some the palaces of the royal and wealthy, but the city’s largest structures held libraries. The principal of these, the Library of Mysteries, rose up from the city center, behind the gated walls of the Academy of Sight. Kellatra had thought never to see the city again, nor the library where she once spent so much of her time.
“Why did you not tell me?” Rankarus watched her as she stared at the cityscape.
Kellatra continued to say nothing. They had come to the roof for privacy, so she could speak with him. She found now that she wished for the roar of a crowd, someplace her words might be lost and forgotten. The silence of the rooftop seemed to give each utterance greater import.
“You are a seer.” Rankarus took her hand. “Now it has been said, and you need not speak the words yourself.”
“How long have you known?” Kellatra swallowed the emotion threatening to choke her. The feeling sprang from Rankarus’s kindly voicing of her secret rather than the fact of it being revealed. It also came from the knowledge that one secret exposed would inevitability lead to others being unmasked.
“Since the night of the fire.” Rankarus visibly tensed at the memory. “How else would you know so much about the book? Where to take it. Who to see. Possibly if you had been a keeper at one of the libraries. But if you were, why would you not tell me? On the other hand, if you were a seer, living in Punderra, you might hide that fact. You are not built from religious bricks and would not fare well on a Keth council. You would tell no one.”
“No. I would not.” Kellatra felt the tug of his hand holding hers, pulling her to face him. She turned her body but looked away.
“Not even your husband. Not even the father of your children.” Rankarus’s voice sounded strained.
“No. Not even him.” Kellatra finally turned to look into her husband’s eyes. They seemed sad and somewhat wounded, contrasting with the usual charming smile across his lips.
“Well, you must have a good reason. You have reasons for everything you do.” Rankarus laughed, but his laugher did not fill the air the way it usually did, fading quickly and drifting off over the neighboring rooftops.
“I do.” Kellatra found the act of forming words a physical struggle, harder it seemed than giving birth to a child.
“And you will tell me one day.” Firmness filled Rankarus’s voice.
“I will.” Kellatra squeezed his hand, a wave a relief flooding through her. She would tell him. One day. When the proper time presented itself.
“But today, you will tell me who you intend to meet about returning the book to the Academy.” Certainty and annoyance colored Rankarus’s words. “This book endangers our lives, and you brought it to us. I have not raised my voice to accuse you of foolishness or carelessness, and I have followed you to this city against all better judgment, so you will tell me who you are going to meet.”
“I…” Kellatra looked away again. How much could she tell him? “I need to see my father.”
Rankarus stepped back, still holding her hand, but staring at her with grave curiosity.
“You said your father was dead.”
Kellatra bit her lip.
“I said my father died. I didn’t say he stayed dead.”
“How…” Rankarus began to ask. He frowned. “I do not understand.”
“He wasn’t dead long.” Kellatra fidgeted, clasping and unclasping the folds of her dress in the fingers of her free hand.
“So, you are a family of seers?” Rankarus looked off toward the city streets as though considering something.
“We were. My mother is dead. I have no siblings.” Kellatra turned away from Rankarus as well, happy for a respite from his searching eyes.
“And you have not seen your father since you left?” Rankarus asked.
“No.” Kellatra ignored the thought that came with that statement.
“And he can help you get the book returned to the library?” Rankarus rubbed his chin.
“He sits on the Academy High Council. He will know what to do with it.” Kellatra hoped this proved true. Hoped that he would listen to her story before doing what he had promised to do so many years ago.
“We could still try to sell it, you know.” Rankarus squinted at the setting sun. “I might know a few people in the city who would pay handsomely for such a rare book.”
“We can’t. It must go back to the library. It is the only way to be free of those who would kill to possess it.” Kellatra did not mention the other reason she wished to replace the cryptic book on the library shelves. She could not tell him that until she had told him many other things. Her plan hinged upon her father’s actions when they met.
“And you won’t let me go with you?” Rankarus turned back, frustration clouding his face.
“It’s not safe.” Kellatra bit her lip again, wishing she had thought to phrase her refusal better.
“Not safe?” Rankarus raised a curious eyebrow. “He is your father.”
“The situation is not easily explained,” Kellatra said.
“Take your time. I will listen closely.” Rankarus’s voice deepened as he spoke.
“I cannot explain. You must trust me.” Kellatra grimaced. The entire conversation headed toward dangerous terrain.
“Trust you?” Rankarus released her hand and crossed his arms as he glared at her, his voice passionate with anger. “You brought this thing to our home and kept it even when you knew it presented danger to us all. A danger that arrived and nearly killed our children. A danger that sent us scurrying like vermin from flames. Flames that burnt our lives to the ground. Did I not trust you through all of that? Did I not trust you when you said we must return the book to the library? Did I not trust you when you insisted on bringing the book to the City of Leaves yourself? It is not I who needs to learn trust. Did you trust me to tell me that a book people died for lay in our cellar? Did you trust me all those years to tell me your true nature? Do you trust me now to tell me what new danger you prepare to walk toward alone?”
“The children.” Kellatra wiped away the tears that had welled in her eyes with her husband’s words. “One of us must remain safe for the children’s sake.”
“How can your father be so dangerous?” Rankarus placed his hands on her shoulders, his eyes probing hers.
“At our last meeting, he tried to have me arrested.” Kellatra ignored the echo of her father’s words ringing down through the years and focused on Rankarus.
“Why would he threaten to arrest you?” Rankarus stepped closer, his face twisted in sudden concern.
“Because I was banished.” Kellatra held her breath, unable to say more, but knowing she had no choice.
“Why would you be banished?” Rankarus blinked in confusion.
“Because I did something forbidden.” Kellatra took a deep breath and ground her teeth, a mule refusing t
o march the last span of the trail.
“What…”
“I will return before the moons rise full.” She pushed his hands away from her shoulders and walked back to the hatch and ladder leading down to the upper floor of the inn. “Keep the children safe.”
“Kell…”
She risked a quick look at her husband’s forlorn face before hiking up the skirt of her dress and climbing down the ladder, out of sight of the man who would think she did not trust him. She cursed at herself, biting her lip until she tasted blood. She had always trusted Rankarus. She could not trust herself.
To continue reading the Seer story arena follow this link.
To continue reading Kellatra’s storyline follow this link.
THE FUGITIVES
SHA-KUTAN
“KEEP DOWN.”
“How do you know he’s still there?”
“Quiet.”
“But how do you know?”
“Because I do.”
Sha-Kutan placed his hand on Lee-Nin’s shoulder to hold her down behind the wall of the barn they hid within, away from the open window. She glared at him.
“I will tell you when he is gone.” Sha-Kutan could sense the man clearly.
“How will you know?” Lee-Nin clutched a wide-eyed Sao-Tauna to her chest.
Sha-Kutan ignored Lee-Nin’s repeated question. If he did not answer, possibly she would cease to ask. He turned away from her and concentrated on the man in the street. The man she had recognized. The man who hunted the girl.
We should wait for him to check the barn and kill him.
We should flee through the back and leave him behind us.
To follow us again and find us again and be killed another day?
The Dragon Star (Realms of Shadow and Grace: Volume 1) Page 24