Black Spice (Book 3) (18 page)

Kyric
couldn’t believe he had come straight to the right place.  It couldn’t have
been luck.  That cavern must have been like the one inside the Ilven dream
tree.  He still wasn’t sure about the dreamlands.  Rolirra had made it clear
that first you had to know your way to these places, then you could find what
you needed.  He found a flat boulder and sat down.  There was nothing to do now
but wait.

Time
became indistinct, like the features of the frozen coast.  The fog held
steady.  At length, the dragon exhaled once again and this time the fog swirled
away directly in front of it, revealing a dark silhouette, a human figure. 
Kyric jumped to his feet and stumbled backward, afraid but unable to look away.

It
couldn’t be
him
. 
It couldn’t.  I drank from the fountain.

Moonlight
glanced sharply off the figure’s obsidian eyes as it turned.  No, it wasn’t
Cauldin’s dream self.  The figure glided across the fog-shrouded ice, heading
towards the open sea.  Kyric ran to the edge of the shore.  He felt a weird
impulse to follow it.  Something about it seemed familiar.  He had to know who
or what it was.

He
leapt onto the frozen sea, dashing after the figure as it merged with the fog. 
He couldn’t see where his feet landed, but he could feel the ice cracking and
booming underneath him.  He caught sight of the dream-being once again as he
closed the distance, the ice underfoot growing wetter and more slick.  He ran
up to it, reaching out, grasping it by the shoulder and spinning it around.

It
was a face he had seen many times.  It was Mother Nistra, the high priestess,
her eyes replaced with the cold orbs of a dragon.  The same eyes he had seen in
his dream with Master Zahaias.

“Why
do you always come to me with
her
face?”

“We
are her and she is us,” the dream-being answered.  “We are of the Power
feminine.  We are the light in the darkness, the awakened within the dream.”

“You
don’t represent all of the Powers?”

“We
are not all one.”

Kyric
threw out his hands.  “So what do you want of me?”

He
suddenly realized how different it was this time.  He could speak.  Before, he
could only watch and listen.  And now the Unknowable Forces answered him directly.

“It
is you who has always come to us.  You sought us in the beginning, and so it is
now.”

“In
the beginning?  You mean when I held the dreamstone?  I was a kid.”

“A
child’s spirit may be capricious and ephemeral, but there is a place in every
spirit which is the source of all its essences.  This elemental instinct
remains unchanged throughout his life.  Yours is to seek the Unknowable, and we
have accepted you.  Only now have you come to see this.”

Kyric
didn’t know what to say.  He had a hundred questions that needed answers and he
couldn’t remember any of them.

“Then
what purpose is there in accepting me, as you put it?  Do you have any purpose
at all?”

The
dream-being stood motionless.  “We would have you be a thread, woven into a
greater design.”

“And
Mother Nistra was your agent in this?  Is that why you appear to me in her
form?  Because it was she who made me into what I am, not my real mother.  I’ve
always felt that my life was my own, but now I wonder.”

“It was you who came to us.”

He
blinked.  He lay on his hammock, Lerica standing over him.  She stared at him
strangely.

“What?”
he said.

“Is
it that easy for you?  You just laid down and dreamed up a fog so we could slip
past them?”

He
sat up.  He still felt those inhuman eyes upon him.  And he felt cold.

“No. 
It isn’t easy.”

It
was midnight before they sighted the fires at the mouth of Ularra harbor.  The
wind dropped, coming around behind them, and
Calico
eased into port, her
square sail only half full.

“I
hate to tell you this,” Lerica said to her uncle.  “But this ship smells like .
. . oh, I don’t know . . . a ship full of spice?”

Ellec
frowned.  “I didn’t think of that.  I guess I’ve gotten used to it.  Mister
Pallan,” he called.  “I need you to raise a great stink.”

Pallan
blinked for a moment.  “Aye, Captain.  I’ll have the tar pot on the fire at
once.  Yes sir, the ratlines are in dire need of tarring.  In dire need, they
are.  A few other places too.”

Once
they had docked, Ellec broke out the muskets and armed the watch.  “Keep them
under covers,” he told them, “but no one comes aboard without a fight.”

Ellec
went to arrange for supplies as soon as the sun was up.  Lerica begged to go
with him.

“We
could have breakfast at the Sevdin Arms,” she pleaded.  “Eggs.  Fresh milk. 
And those briny little kippers they serve.”

In
the end he took her with him just so he could keep an eye on her.  They soon
returned, Lerica frowning, having been to the chandlers and nowhere else.  But
later that day a fresh side of beef was delivered to the ship and they had huge
steaks for supper.

A
storm kept them in Ularra an extra day, but the rain held down the scent of
spice.  It turned deliciously cool.  After nearly a year of warm climates,
Kyric drank it in.  He and Lerica still dined together, and they talked
comfortably on deck as they always had.

“I’m
dying to jump ship and go have some fun,” she told him.  “It’s making me
crazy.  My home port is there in front of me and all I can do is look at it.”

They
departed Ularra in a stiff breeze, tacking through the Straits of Terrula as
the weather slowly moderated.  They sailed almost due west out of the straits,
with Ellec pacing the deck when they passed between the former pirate colony of
Toscarbi, and the tip of Jakavia, where the ships of the costal guard were
little more than privateers.  The days turned at first grey and blustery, then
clear and mild as they approached the shores of Aessia.  They came to the
harbor roads of Aeva early one morning in the third week of spring, the crimson
sky mirrored on the quiet waters of the bay.  Kyric stood at the rail as the
sun rose and they entered the harbor.

“How
does it feel to be home?” Lerica asked him.

It
was something he’d never considered.  He shrugged.  “I wouldn’t know.”

Seldorven
held the lantern high for the grandmaster as they followed the winding steps
down, deeper into the mountain.  He had no doubt that his master could see well
enough in the dark, even when he wore the eye patch.  Seldorven simply carried
the lantern for the same reason he accompanied him.  It was out of respect.

Seldorven
personally looked in on the linguist every day.  Often there would be no change
for days on end, then overnight more than a dozen of the fragments would change
position.  Grandmaster Cauldin visited once a year.

A
light flickered below, at the bottom of the staircase.  One of Seldorven’s men
sat outside the door to the chamber at all times.  Not a guard, an attendant
ready to fetch food or drink, or anything Galettan required at any hour.  There
was no lock upon the door.  This was not a dungeon.  It was simply the most
insulated chamber in the citadel.  A winter gale could be blowing outside and
you would never hear it in there.  Nor would you ever see the sun.

Seldorven
opened the door for his master, and Cauldin stepped into a flood of
candlelight.  A gigantic chandelier hung from the ceiling, with smaller ones
sitting on stands in the corners.  This was Galettan’s only demand, that the
chamber be brightly lit at all times, even when he slept.  He might wake with a
flash of insight, and it could fade should he not go to work at once.

The
old man sat at his desk, cutting a nib into a quill, his hands in wool gloves
that left the fingertips exposed.  He insisted on cutting his own pens.  But something
was different today.  His papers had been arranged into neat stacks, and all
the usual clutter stowed away beneath his cot.  He stood at once when he saw
the grandmaster.

Cauldin
held up one hand.  He was in his monk’s robes, as he often was when he stayed
in the citadel.

“Sit,
Galettan, sit.  You sent word that you must speak to me.”

“I’m
sorry, my lord,” Galettan said, sitting.  “This is the only chair I have.”

Cauldin
went to the huge table that dominated the room.  He strolled its length idly, running
one finger along its edge.  A thousand pieces of shattered tile ran from one
end of the table to the other, scrawled with bits of a lost language.  Some of
them could cover a large man’s hand, others were small as a fingernail.

“This
arrangement has changed greatly since the last time,” Cauldin said.  “The gaps
are wider.  The fragments are more spread out.”

“That’s
what I wanted to tell you, my lord.  There are more missing pieces than we had
first suspected.  I realized that last year.  Strange, but knowing it made the
work go faster.”

“You
determined yourself that the weight and surface area was sufficient.  That is
what you told me.”

“Yes,
my lord.  The problem was that when they smashed the lowest row of tiles, they
also broke the bottom edge of the row of tiles above.  Those got mixed in by
whoever recovered the fragments from the ruins.  I sifted them out and this is
what remained.”

Cauldin
stopped and turned his human eye on the old man.  “What does this mean?”

Galettan
smiled uneasily.  “Good news, my lord.  I have completed my task.  It is
finished.”

Seldorven
stood stunned for a moment.  Twelve years.  The man hasn’t left this room for
twelve years, trying to decipher this puzzle inscribed in an ancient tongue. 
And he doesn’t have all the pieces to solve it.

“I
have the translation for each grouping here,” Galettan continued, indicating a
stack of pages in front of him, “with likely candidates for some of the missing
words.”

The
grandmaster stood very still.  Seldorven knew that he always stood with one
foot in the realm of power, and now it bristled around him.  Seldorven could
feel a storm gathering there.  Whatever happened in the next moment, it would
be a nexus for lines of power that went back hundreds of years.

“Tell
me what you have learned,” Cauldin said.  “Is it a song?  Is it an instrument?”

“It
is both, my lord.  It is a horn, and a song — ”  He shuffled his pages.  “Here
it is.  ‘A song played on the horn of Elitass, known only by the essence of the
wind.’”

“Have
you any knowledge of its whereabouts?”

“No,
my lord.  There is a great gap in the text concerning its location.  I only
know that it was in Keltassia.  Ancient Keltassia, before the continent was
drowned in the flood.  It is most likely underwater.”

Slowly,
the grandmaster walked a full circle around the enormous table.  He removed his
eye patch and let the light of the Pyxidium fall on the broken tiles.  He
stared with the full power of his gaze, then turned to Seldorven.

“Send
for Andemin at once.”

Galettan
struggled to his feet, bowing low and averting his eyes.  “My lord.  If it
please you, may I go home now?  There is nothing left for me to do here, and I
have never seen my granddaughter.”

Cauldin
turned the light of the Pyxidium on him.  He didn’t look up, but Galettan still
cringed when it struck him.

“Not
yet, Galettan.  It may come to pass that we will find more fragments.  For now I
want you to go over the rubbings again.”

“I
have examined them many times, my lord.”

“Once
more will do no harm.  You must understand the importance of this work.  Know
that you are indispensable, and that you do the highest service to the order,
and to me.”

“Thank you, my lord.”

When
Dragoneye
arrived a fortnight later, the only snow remaining in the
courtyard lay in the corners that never saw sunlight.  Seldorven could taste a
hint of springtime in the air.  The grandmaster had spent the entire winter in
the citadel, which was strange.  It was well known within the order that he
never stayed anywhere more than a month or two.

He
wanted to see
Dragoneye
immediately, and Seldorven led him up the
winding stairs to the grandmaster’s study.  Once the iron-strapped door swung
shut, Seldorven could only hear the low, muffled echo of their voices.  But he
had not been named
Silenthand
for nothing.  He was commandant of the
citadel, and he would know everything that passed here. 
Dragoneye
was
the grandmaster’s razor — any task assigned to him would require the most
delicate violence.

In
some ways, this was difficult for him, for he knew that it would displease his
master to know that he spied upon him.  It wasn’t that his love was weak.  It
was strong.  But it was the protective sort, and he couldn’t protect the
grandmaster if he didn’t know all that he could.  He slipped into the adjacent chamber,
a little-used day room, and turned the third wall sconce counterclockwise. 
Long ago he had a funnel-shaped hole carved through the stonework to open
behind a particularly porous section of wood paneling in the study.  With his
ear to the hole, it was like he was in the room with them.

“One
of them was a Keltassian,” Cauldin was saying.  “He could have been the one who
revealed my presence in the ruins.  He may serve as one of their resident
watchmen.  And if not him, there will be another, for they now have something
to watch.

“Go
to Albatas and find him, Andemin.  Take him alive and bring him to the castle
in Zelfinor.  Have Wirren accompany you, so he can dreamspeak to me when you
have the Keltassian.”

“I’ll
need two more brothers of my choosing if you want him without serious injury,”
Andemin said, “and even then it will be difficult.  They have a way of making
you kill them.  But if he is one of their watchmen, the hardest part will be
finding him.  He will look like any common man.  He will not go about with
visible weapons, nor will he even carry his locket.  Of course, if you wish him
found quickly, I could hunt him on the plane of power, cast nets upon the
weird, but he might sense it.  And one of the masters of Esaiya might sense the
danger.”

“You
mean Zahaias.  Yes, that is possible.”  The grandmaster fell silent for a
moment.  “There is no great urgency, yet do not tarry.  Find him with more
passive means, get close to people and see them.  But do find this man.”

“Yes,
Grandmaster.  How much time do I have?”

“If
you do not locate the Keltassian, return in two years.  I will need you then for
the Baskillian invasion.”

“I
mean no impertinence, sir,” Andemin said hesitantly, “but isn’t the conquest of
the Avic lands dependent on the
Shi’Zalin
gaining the governorship of
the Spice Islands?”

The
grandmaster answered evenly.  “No.  It is not.”