The Echolone Mine (15 page)

Elianas asked,
“And you have never seen Torrullin before today?”

“No.” Petin
rose and looked down. “There is no likeness of you anywhere in the
universe, they say. Not a painting, not a sketch, a photo, a
computer image -
nothing
. Folk say you cannot be captured,
because one knows you in the soul. My Lord, I think that is quite
remarkable.”

“Who are these
‘they’ folk keep referring to?” Torrullin laughed, although
unsteadily.

Petin was
amused. “And who are the ‘folk’ others speak of?”

Elianas
chuckled. “And who are the ‘others’?”

Everyone
laughed.

Allith rose.
“I think we need dessert now. I know my mouth craves something
tastier at present.”

More general
laughter.

“Come, up, up,
stretch your legs, make space in your stomachs. We’ll talk further
in a while.” Allith bent to help her father to stand, a sign
nothing would be discussed until he returned.

“A bright
lady,” Elianas murmured.

In the
interlude Carlin commandeered the deck of a cottage, the space
large enough to lay out the various tracings.

He and Muller
worked together to overlap and synchronise until a replica of the
door lay represented blue on white, flat on the deck. Both men did
not bother with dessert, so involved did they become.

By the time
the rest were finished, Carlin stood hand over mouth, staring at
the glyphs.

Muller looked
down also, but with less understanding than the Cèlaver.

Soon most of
the crowd were in the vicinity. Cassy, Lowen and Caballa leaned
elbows on the deck from their lower level, glancing over the
tracings with curiosity.

Torrullin and
Elianas, with Anethor and Allith, stood behind Carlin and
Muller.

Carlin turned
to the archaeologist. “Can you read it?”

“I wish I
could,” Muller said, with regret in his tone.

“But do you
know who could have recorded this?”

Muller shook
his head and joined Petin on a lower step.

“Carlin?”
Torrullin prompted.

“I can read
it, yes,” the Cèlaver murmured, bending over. “Need more
light.”

Allith
gestured and more light came.

“Looks like
Avior,” Caballa said.

Carlin was
surprised. “It is. Can you read it?”

“No, but that
stylised arrow always set Avior apart from Aldari.”

Torrullin
lifted a brow at her.

“Twenty-five
years, Torrullin. Read a bit.”

“My Lord, did
you recognise it?” Carlin asked.

Torrullin
leaned closer. “Old Avior, before the numeric system. Those
straight symbols are their tally markings. Can I read it? No.”

Carlin glanced
at Elianas, who said, “Not me.”

“What is this
Avior?” Anethor demanded. “A world?”

“A race and a
world,” Torrullin said. “Both are now gone.”

“The world,
too?” Allith frowned.

Elianas
murmured, “A Siric mistake, a long time ago when Siric fought
Siric.”

“Hell,” Allith
muttered.

“How long
ago?” the young shaman asked from ground level.

“Ages, friend,
literally,” Elianas replied. “A number would not be relevant.”

“How is such
an old thing on Echolone?” Allith frowned.

“Echolone, as
world, is old enough,” Caballa said. “As to how and, more
pertinently, why, I don’t know.”

Torrullin,
meanwhile, watched Carlin. “Well?”

“Old Avior,
not easy,” Carlin muttered. “I need more time.”

“Gods, give us
one line. In the curve.”

The tracings
showed a decided curve at the top of the door and a broad solid
outline surrounded a line of glyphs before the body of the text
adorned the greater part of the door. It was a single leaf, and a
solid rectangle to the left gave evidence to a depression, such as
a hand would employ to push a door wide or pull it shut.

Carlin looked
over his shoulder. “Have you paper and ink?”

Muller man
delved into his jacket and brought forth a pen and notebook. Carlin
accepted them and stood with pen poised over book, mouth moving in
silent mutters. He scribbled, looked up, scribbled, scratched out
…

Anethor found
a chair and sat, his daughter standing with him. Everyone else was
patient, although Cassy noted Elianas moved to stand shoulder to
shoulder with Torrullin, not quite touching.

Both men were
tense.

Carlin’s robe
swirled with movement. “It is a warning. It says,
He who enters
cannot leave by the same token
.” He shrugged, pen poised.

Torrullin
closed his eyes briefly and then, “We need more.”

“I require a
few days, my Lord, and some definitive texts.”

“Titania has
texts,” Caballa murmured.

Everyone
looked to Torrullin, who stared thoughtfully at the tracings

“Lowen, will
you go to Titania?”

She inclined
her head.

“Allith,
Anethor, might I ask for space to be made in the gloom for Carlin
to work during sunlight hours?” Torrullin asked next.

Anethor said,
“My home is his.”

“Thank you.
Carlin, get some sleep …”

“Sleep? I can
sleep later,” the Cèlaver muttered. He bent to gather the tracings,
and Torrullin stopped him with a hand on his arm.

He pointed at
a tiny symbol of a dragon. “What does that mean?”

“That one is
new to me. The texts should have it.”

“I think I
know, but prove it to me first,” Torrullin murmured.

Carlin stared
at him and nodded, and started collecting paper. Muller came to
help him.

Nothing more
would happen that night and thus the crowd dispersed. Lowen, with a
word to Caballa, vanished for Titania. Allith helped her father to
his home set back from the main part of the village, and Carlin and
Muller followed, arms filled. Caballa and Cassy went to help the
village women with clean up, while Petin pondered on a log near the
embers of the big fire.

Elianas
inclined his head significantly, and he and Torrullin wandered off,
until darkness swallowed them.

“A one-way
only,” Elianas murmured.

“A dragon and
beside it a sword with an eye. You and me.”

“I saw.”

In the dark
Torrullin stopped and Elianas faced him. Torrullin’s hand settled
on his cheek. “Elianas, you have four days to settle your dilemma
with your wife. I do not think anyone but you and I may pass beyond
that door.”

Elianas’
fingers brushed over the hand on his cheek and then he moved away.
“What of you and Lowen?”

A wry laugh.
“The same, my brother. I must make choices also.”

In silence
they headed back to Allith’s house.

Choice.
Really?

Unknown

Echolone

C
arlin, Muller and Petin virtually disappeared.

The three men
with tomes on reluctant loan from Titania bent over the tracings
and the world in its universe held no meaning for them.

Elianas, never
one to back from a challenge, commenced his assault on Cassy over
breakfast.

“Cassy,” he
began and his tone caused her to look up from her plate. “We have
scores to settle.”

She chewed and
then, “Here?”

“Here.”

She swallowed
and pushed her plate aside. “This is Allith’s home. Do you really
want to bring confrontation into another’s retreat?”

“She is away
to orchestrate the meeting, and confrontation already exists.”
Elianas buttered a piece of toast and took a bite.

“You really
want to do this so soon? Why?”

“Because this
may be the only time we have.”

She paled.
“What do you mean?”

“The future is
unclear; we dare not wait for a better time or place.”

“Gods, you
sound like the old Elianas.”

He shrugged.
“He exists.”

“I am not
doing this with you before these people.”

Lowen made to
rise … “Sit!” Elianas snapped. She sat.

Cassy leaned
forward. “You need witnesses?”

“No, my wife.
You need them.”

Torrullin
studiously poured coffee, not looking at anyone.

“You put him
up to this!” Cassy hissed in his direction.

“I do not need
him to point the way for me!” Elianas shouted.

“But you need
him!”

Elianas stared
at her. “Yes, I need him.”

Caballa sighed
inaudibly.

“More than you
needed me,” Cassy accused. “It was always him!”

Elianas
smiled. “We get to it, at last. Time for honesty, finally.”

“Answer
me!”

“I never
needed you, Cassy, surely you know that? We were betrothed as kids,
a political union …”

“We were
friends as kids, Elianas. Was it so unbelievable to expect love
could grow from it?”

“I did not say
I didn’t love you. I loved the ruffian you were when we were kids,
the girl who would listen to my woes and the friend you became as
we grew older. In truth, I thought real adult feelings would
develop also.”

“For pity’s
sake, do
not
patronise me. We were both virgins when we got
married and you had to find that bloody man …”

“You have
misread everything,” Elianas interrupted.

Cassy
whispered, “Did I misread you were physically attracted to the Lord
Sorcerer? Did I misread, when you made love to me, it was him you
imagined?”

Lowen glanced
at Torrullin and found he stared at the table. She doubted he saw
anything.

“He does not
need to be here!” Cassy shouted.

“If you are
going to fucking accuse him, then he has to be here!” Elianas
shouted back.

Torrullin’s
hand smacked down on the table. “Talk like sane people.”

Caballa stood.
“I am leaving.”

Cassy blinked.
“Please stay. Elianas is right. I need witnesses.”

“Why?” Caballa
frowned.

Cassy sighed.
“Because I could not talk to him in private, and that may yet be
so.”

“Would he hurt
you?” Lowen demanded.

Torrullin
snarled, “Give him some credit, for fuck’s sake!”

Cassy stared
at him and then answered Lowen. “No, he would be silent as
graves.”

Elianas raised
his brows.

“Fine, I would
stop talking,” Cassy muttered, “and he would answer only questions
I asked, and I never asked the important ones.”

“Sit,
Caballa,” Lowen murmured. Caballa sat reluctantly.

Cassy drew
breath. “I do not want to make the same mistakes.”

“Neither do
I,” Elianas said.

“Yet, if I am
to move forward, I need to hear the truth from you. It remains a
festering thorn and I want rid of it.”

“Whatever the
truth is?”

“Jeez,” Lowen
muttered.

Caballa looked
at her, and sighed.

Elianas pushed
his chair back and stood behind it, staring at his wife.

“Whatever it
is,” Cassy whispered. Her fingers were white and tense on the
table, unmoving.

Elianas leaned
on the back of the chair. “We were wed because it was deemed a
political union, and yet we knew each other, were friends and
always knew the day would come when we would be man and wife. It
was not so bad, for we expected to reach that point and then move
forward together. We could have learned to love each other and had
all things been equal, we probably would have. A happy, settled
life.

“However,
things were not normal, were they? Nemisin learned I had a talent
for magic, over and above the Valleur inherence, and sent me to
study with the Lord Sorcerer; upon my instigation, true, but I
sought to learn while Nemisin sought something else. What was
political suddenly became a way for Nemisin to tie a potential
future sorcerer to him. He made it clear, Cassy,
very
clear.
That came later, of course, once I had proven my talent was still
growing, and he also made it clear I was to watch Torrullin and
report on him.”

Cassy
gaped.

“Only Nemisin
and I knew that, and Lord Sorcerer himself.” Elianas straightened
and paced away. “I told him, because I loved him.”

Cassy closed
her eyes.

“Yes, my wife.
I loved him more than duty to my Vallorin, loyalty to my
father-in-law or friendship with you, a friendship that could have
blossomed into more. I did not tell Nemisin about Torrullin;
instead I told Torrullin about Nemisin. It is akin to treason.
There, that is the truth.”

“Not all of
it,” Cassy whispered.

Elianas
scrubbed at his face and swung back into his chair. He leaned
forward to engage with her.

“Was I
physically attracted to him? Yes. Did I imagine you were him? No,
you were a woman and there is no mistaking the difference. Have I
slept with Torrullin? No, not then, not now, not ever. Do I prefer
men to women? No, I find a woman’s body more alluring. Did I hate
sleeping with you? No, I enjoyed it, but I felt guilty, because I
knew I deceived you.” He paused. “Is there anything else you want
to know?”

“Do you still
love him?”

“Yes.”

“Are you
physically attracted to him?”

“Yes.”

“Why, damn it?
You say you never … will never - WHY?”

Elianas
shrugged. “There is no answer.”

“You won’t
answer!”

“I would tell
you if I knew how.”

She stared at
him. “Does he feel the same?”

“He is right
there. Ask him.”

Cassy glanced
at Torrullin and then looked away. “I cannot.”

“I would not
answer,” Torrullin murmured.

She glared at
him. “Did you know how he felt about you?”

“Yes, but
whether you choose to believe it or not, I never reacted to
it.”

Cassy glanced
back at her husband. “It must have driven you insane.”