In retrospect, Rhuun thought, he should have known something was wrong when Ilaan wasn't there to greet them. Despite what he knew lay ahead, he could think of little but seeing the face of his friend. It had only been a matter of a few days, but in his mind there had been no pause to the life-long conversation between them. In his mind, they'd talk through it, and then Ilaan would come up with a plan—just like always.
Instead, Aelle was there, along with Jaa, and they both looked pale and stiff-faced. “You came back,” said Aelle. “We thank you. I know the decision wasn't an easy one, given your…condition.”
“He's fine,” said Maaya. She smiled up at him. He wasn't sure if it was true, but she would have said the same if he was on fire or carrying his own head. “And we'll get Thay back.” She turned to Aelle and continued. “And we'll find out what your father thinks he's doing.”
The two women visibly flinched at that. “What is going on?” Rhuun asked. “Where's Ilaan?”
Jaa turned her blind face to Aelle. “Tell them the rest, sister.”
Rhuun took a step forward. “Has something happened to him?”
“Yes,” Aelle replied. A shadow passed over her face and she squared her shoulders. Her features were utterly blank. “My father and the Zaal have conspired to send Niico to the Crosswinds. They mutilated Rhoosa while they were at it, and she's more than likely been murdered as well. Hollen is their pet, now. Niico is dead and, well. Ilaan is as you might expect.”
Maaya's face hid nothing. “How can you just stand there and say that?”
Aelle's lip may have curled. “Would you prefer I weep, like my brother? Would that make this news sweeter? Would it bring anyone back?” She smoothed her coiled hair. “I struggled with what to say, to spare your sister's arm.”
“I, uh, thank you,” Maaya replied. “We . . .” she shook her head. “I'm sorry.”
“Are you sure of all this?” Rhuun couldn't imagine an Ilaan without a Niico, any more than he could picture himself without Ilaan. “This is madness. Why would your father—”
“Would you like to argue with the stones?” Aelle asked. “Because they do not lie or twist a story for their own amusement. We saw it. He's dead.”
Rhuun raked a hand through his hair. “Well, I have to see Ilaan. Can you take me to him, now?”
Aelle shrugged. “Come on, then.” She glanced at Maaya, who moved forward when Rhuun did. “Perhaps just you.”
Rhuun followed Aelle down a corridor, trying to make sense of it himself. What had led Yuenne to move against Niico? He must have discovered that Niico was ferrying information back and forth to Ilaan. Even so, Yuenne must have known this was a breach with his son—and his daughter—he'd never be able to mend. And the Crosswinds - that was a fate reserved for the most egregious of criminals and hadn't been used since his grandfather's day. If then. Most people agreed it was like the daeeva that haunted the hills; a story to scare children.
“I'm sorry about Niico,” he said to Aelle. “I know you two were close.”
“Yes,” she said, without looking at him. “When we were abandoned by those we loved, we naturally turned to each other. It didn't work out so well for him.” She gave a little laugh. “The funny thing is, he never really was abandoned by Ilaan. He was lying to me, even as we were as close as two mice in a hole. He was good at lying. Of course, I can't say that to Ilaan, he'd set me on fire.”
“Is this funny to you? What is wrong with you?” he asked.
“Is my grieving not appropriate?” She stopped and he saw white rage behind her blank expression. “Perhaps you'd like to instruct me on how to behave.”
He shook his head. “I can't say the right thing. Or there is no right thing. I'm just . . . sorry.”
She sighed. He thought she looked terribly tired. “I know. Just be easy on Ilaan.”
They had reached one of the many curtained doorways at the perimeter of the tents. This one led, like all the others, to a sandy pathway and then on to the broken hillside.
“Follow the path to where it leads up and around. You'll see him. He likes it out there,” she said. She seemed to want to say more, but then turned and vanished back into the dim corridor.
He did as Aelle instructed and made his way around several rocks the size of the houses in the Quarter, and found Ilaan sitting cross-legged on a lip of stone. He was holding out his hand and shooting narrow jets of flame at the rocks below. Based on the pile of shattered rubble, he seemed to have been at it for quite a while.
“I've been looking for you,” Rhuun said. Ilaan turned with his hand still out, almost searing Rhuun's feet in half. He jumped back, nearly losing his footing on the uneven rocky ground.
“Oh,” said Ilaan, turning away. “I didn't see you there.”
Rhuun sat next to his friend, trying not to look at the streaks of grey ash on his face, dirty smears running from brow to chin. They were the marks of mourning, a conduit between the one who grieves and the rock and bone of Eriis, connecting the mourner to their beloved for a little while longer. The marks would remain until the wind blew the ash away. Rhuun hated to look at them; they distorted Ilaan’s features. But he supposed that was the point. From now on, Ilaan would present a different face to the world.
For a while they just sat, Ilaan burning the rocks and Rhuun wondering how to begin.
“I'm sorry,” he finally said. “I can't imagine what you're feeling.”
“Well, that's true enough,” Ilaan replied. “It feels just like you'd think. Like you're falling backwards. Forever.” He left off setting the rocks ablaze and turned his stony gaze towards Rhuun. “Maybe one day you'll find out.”
“It sounds…I'm sorry.” Rhuun ignored the implied threat. Ilaan and Aelle, both of them, they seemed displeased to see him. But then why would they have called him back? “The thing now is what to do next. We won't let this go unanswered. What I'd—”
“Have you ever watched firewhirls?” asked Ilaan. “I mean, really watched them?”
He had not. Rhuun found that trying to keep his eye trained on the unpredictable, chaotic path of firewhirls made him feel ill. “I know Mother likes to watch them. She says they relax her. Why?”
“I've been watching them. Out on the plains, just there. What usually happens is, a large one springs up. Look—there's one now. Watch it.”
He did as Ilaan requested. The plume of ash and flame was on the large side, far higher even than the highest point in the city, the open atrium atop the palace. It jerked and stuttered its way across the landscape, sometimes vanishing into the smoke and reappearing near where it started. It was impossible to track.
“This one,” said Ilaan, “it's going to have some followers. Look, in its path. A couple of smaller ones are swept along.” He was correct. The swirling action of the fire seemed to generate others. “They'll tramp along behind the big one, and then probably merge together with it.” As he spoke, they did just that. “Are you watching?”
“I said I would.” It made him queasy, but he watched as the main firewhirl swept up its smaller brothers. “I was saying, what I'd like us to do is—”
“And now? They'll tear each other apart. See? Nothing left.” They watched as the sullenly glowing gout of smoke exploded soundlessly into the clouds overhead. It was gone.
“I understand. Things happen, and people are swept up in it. But Ilaan, you mustn’t blame yourself for all this.”
“Blame myself?” Ilaan looked at Rhuun blankly. “I don't. I blame you.” He went back to incinerating the rocks strewn below their feet.
“I . . . me? I wasn't even here when your father—”
“You weren't here, and so I wasn't here. You knew I would follow you, you counted on it. To the Edge, through The Door—wherever you went, I trailed along behind. Not here, home, where I might have had a chance to save him. When it might have mattered. I was off making sure your little adventures didn't end in blood. You only cared about yourself, oh, and your human girl. You barely noticed m
e. You certainly didn't care for him.”
Rhuun took a breath. “I know it is grief that makes you say these things.”
“You just told me you didn't know anything about grief. How it feels. Now you suddenly understand everything. How clever of you.”
He knew Ilaan was in pain and trying to provoke him. It didn't make it any easier. “You came with me because you wanted to.” He tried to make his voice sound reasonable. “I believe you actually insisted. I never asked you. I didn't need your help.”
“Good.” Ilaan rose and dusted his hands. “From now on you won't have it.”
“Ilaan, I am not your enemy. I'm not.”
“You're not my anything.” Ilaan shimmered, and was gone.
Rhuun watched the bright spot in the air for the moment it took to dissipate. He was right, he thought. It does feel like falling backwards.
Chapter Ten
Eriis
“Like fruitcake, if all the fruit was picked out, and it was left in the sun for a month.” Maaya gnawed on a corner of the square of 'bread'. “No, maybe more like toast? Burned toast?”
Rhuun leaned back on his mat and watched her eat and talk. “You've made your point.”
“One thing I'll say about your food, it's easy to pack.” Mother Jaa had equipped them with a bag of enough of the neat squares to keep them alive for a month or more. “Flatbread, maybe? Mixed with mortar.”
“Pass me some of that, it sounds fantastic.” He handed her their cup. “If you wouldn't mind? It helps the mortar go down.”
She lifted the corner of her own mat, tucked next to his under a huge flat sheared-off slab of stone, and scooped some sand into it. He watched her contort her face with concentration as she transformed it into water. She sipped. “Gritty. Sorry.” He was unlikely to complain about that, or anything else, since he was not only dependent on her transformational skills but her stamina and strength. After another long night on the sand, he barely had the energy to strip his dirty clothes off, while she continued to work. She passed him the cup and rummaged in their pack. “I'll put the screens up. The gawds? Gowdz?”
He nodded. “More like the second.”
Along with the food, Mother Jaa had given them tightly rolled sheer screens, called gaudzh, or eyelids. The idea was to attach the edges to the rocks and make a sort of tent, to keep off the sand and dust while you slept. Since they slept during the day, it also shaded them from the heat of the sun, and any eyes that might be looking their way. So far, there hadn't been any.
They'd been walking and flying for over a week and had left the Edge behind two days ago. It was tempting to stop there and take advantage of any offered hospitality—the Edge folk were proud of having helped their prince—but they ultimately decided to avoid the clusters of buildings in case Yuenne's men or any stray Mages might be lurking.
When Maaya mentioned Mages, Rhuun had to grip one hand with the other so she wouldn't see them shake. She distracted herself by complaining about a lack of beds on this trip, and didn't notice, and the moment passed.
Right now it was fine, though. He figured they wouldn't pass the ring of dead farmland and scattered houses just outside the city walls for another two days, and if he could forget why they traveled it was pleasant even without soft beds and Mistran food. Even without sarave, which Jaa had quietly offered. He'd refused. It was hard to sleep, as he expected, and his nightmares of the Zaal, the knife, his helplessness followed him across the sand. He found, though, if he tired himself out by flying all night and joining when they stopped, sleep was possible. He had that in mind once she was done critiquing the meal and hanging the screens. As she moved from rock to rock, fusing the silk to the broken stone with her fingertip's fire, he struggled again to find something in her new, perfect demon body that moved him. Her appearance was so far beside the point he felt worse than foolish for thinking about it, but he couldn't help but wish she could be Lelet again for just an hour. He wondered about the morality of fantasizing about what your lover really looked like when they looked another way, because when he was with Maaya, his soft and tender-skinned human girl was all he could think about. He'd die before he told her.
“How did you do it?” he asked, looking from Maaya to the water cup and back.
“Hmm?” She had finished setting up the screens and sat beside him. “Do what?”
“You made this trip. After you and Aelle rescued me, when Ilaan brought me to the tents, you were still in the city. You came this way by yourself. Did you bring things with you? How did you know what to do?”
She frowned. “I must have had food and drink, and I know I slept during the day.” She shook her head. “I don't really remember. It's all blurred together. I think I must have figured out how to do that shimmering thing, Mother Jaa said I made it there in only a few days. She seemed surprised.”
He smiled. “Surprising that old lady is no mean feat.” He reached out and pulled at her hip tie.
“What's on your mind?” she asked.
“That I don't deserve you.” He knew she thought he was making a joke.
She lifted a hand and it filled with fire. “Eriis disagrees.” She shook it out, and shrugged out of her tunic, then folded it and put it aside where his clothing already sat. “What's really on your mind?”
“Only you. Ever and always. Want proof?”
He did his best to guide her towards her pleasure, but she'd mastered the calm and placid face of an Eriisai so well, he couldn't really tell. As the sky brightened and she slept, he held up his hand and looked at the ring of slowly fading bruises and burns on his wrist. One more thing to keep to himself.
“No,” he said, “I don't think it's a good idea. I'm going to keep it quiet, and you must do the same.”
They'd been walking since the rise of the first moon, and as they got closer to the city wall he grew more and more reluctant to fly.
“But no humans have wings at all, and you didn't hide them on Mistra.” She held onto his arm with one hand while dumping sand out of her boot with the other, and he was reminded of a green hillside and an abandoned farmhouse. Had she been trying to run away from the worst-conceived kidnapping in history? Or just brushing pebbles from between her toes? He mainly recalled the warmth of her hand.
“In case you hadn't noticed, my people don't much care for new things.”
“Really? And is the sky blue?”
He frowned, puzzled. “No, of course not. It's—”
She rolled her eyes. “It was a joke. Go on.”
“If the people inside the Arch see my wings on the first day I return, they will have cause to remember what else I brought home with me.” He paused, watching the understanding move across her face. “Lelet, even if they are inclined to trust me, which is far from certain, they will know what you are. You heard what Mother Jaa said; after the Raasth, there was talk. About you. It’s not a secret any more. I need any advantage I can take, and wings which look like something from the human world will only remind them. This won't be easy, even if we are successful against Yuenne.”
“I'm the one who loves you, and the one who saved you from the Mages. Won't that count?”
He sighed. “I'm sure it will.”
She nodded, satisfied that her point—the one in which things made sense to her—was taken, and they started walking again. When the ragged low clouds tore apart, he thought he could see the outline of the War Tower and a sliver of the atrium above the palace. They'd be home soon. He wondered what he'd find there, and what would become of those left behind—his mother gone, Ilaan lost to grief and rage, an uncertain ally in Aelle. And so many of his old friends, scattered as if by a firewhirl.
The girl who burnt down the Raasth, by the side of the crippled prince. It will count, he told himself, but not necessarily in our favor.
Chapter Eleven
Eriis
“So, I'll let you know when I get back to the city. I'm sure Mother will want to know how you are faring. Jaa says there's a way for
us to talk, something to do with Mother’s stones. Isn't that funny, after all the time we spent teasing her about them, they're actually good for something?” Aelle paused, then set down the stacks of food she'd be taking with her and sighed. “Ilaan, would you like me to tell Mother anything from you?”
Her brother stared at the rippling silk tent wall. It was a different wall than the one he'd been staring at yesterday, and from the day before that, but whether he heard her and chose not to reply or was lost on his own dark path she didn't know. Because he neither answered nor reacted to anything she said, she found herself lately thinking aloud.
“It's unusual to be able to place all the blame at the feet of one person, I know,” she said. “But Maaya . . . if it wasn't for her, well.” For it was all Maaya's fault, wasn't it? If she hadn’t come into their lives, none of this would have happened. While Ilaan turned his grief and anger towards Rhuun, she thought it far more realistic to blame the one who truly didn’t belong. The one who ruined everything. Good work, Maaya. Aelle looked forward to little outside of making the ugly human woman pay, and pay, and pay.
But, but, but… New Self was quick to jump in. …you helped her. She borrowed your own face, don’t you remember? Shouldn’t you really be blaming your fa--
“Shhhh,” she hissed.
Maaya played a part, but don't forget to give yourself some credit, New Self gleefully reminded her. She pushed the intrusive thoughts aside. New Self had been a comfort at first, something to lean on when she felt like falling down, but now New Self had a lot to say, and most of it stung. Point at Maaya if you like, but you know it was all your fault, you stupid sdhaach. Off you went to Father when you were . . . what was the reason? Upset with Rhuun? Jealous of Rhoosa? Well, I'm certain it was very important. Worth giving up the Night Cafe. Worth Rhoosa's life. And Niico's.
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