Authors: Deborah Chester
“I am going to say
my prayers,” she said. “I will be alone.”
Iaris looked at her
suspiciously. “What are you up to now?”
“By tradition, a
bride has the night before her wedding to fast, meditate, and purify herself. I
have not had that privilege.”
“They are
waiting,” Iaris said. “There is no time for this.”
“I will have my
prayers,” Elandra said angrily. She glared at Iaris with all the stubbornness
she possessed.
“What are you up
to?”
“Nothing more than
I have said. I shan’t be long.”
Iaris pointed
across the room at the window, where the
jinja
sat pouting because it
was not allowed to go. “Go stand in that corner, then, and say your prayers
quickly. The gods will understand your haste. I will wait here by the door.”
Anger flashed
through Elandra. Through her teeth, she said, “You are a blasphemous woman. Get
out.”
Red surged up
Iaris’s throat into her cheeks. But she never flinched. “I do not trust you.”
“I have given my
word,” Elandra said. “Take care. You are treading close to treason.”
Alarm flickered in
Iaris’s eyes at that threat. She frowned as though she would protest further,
but instead she said, “Very well. But for a few moments only. The escort is
waiting.”
Elandra waited
until the door was closed; then she ran across the room to the window.
“Jinja,
give it to me.”
The
jinja
sprang up at her command and jumped off the window sill. It had been sitting on
her sheathed dagger, concealing it from the maids who had straightened the
room.
Elandra strapped
the thin sheath on her arm and pulled the sleeve of her dress down over it. A
more sensible, safer course of action would be to go through the ceremony today
and kill Tirhin tonight in the bridal chamber, but she had no interest in
safety. She would give Tirhin a knife in the heart instead of her vows. It
would be her vengeance for the man she had loved. She did not care what
happened after that.
The
jinja
pressed close to her skirts, making a worried, mewing sound.
“Danger,” it said.
“Danger great. Hide is better.”
She paused and
stroked its small, golden head. “I know,” she said sadly. “But I can’t.”
“I go,” the
jinja
said. “Bad magic here.”
“No.”
The
jinja
hissed, but she gave it no chance to protest.
“You will stay
here and hide yourself from what will happen. That’s an order.”
The
jinja
glared up at her, its pointed little teeth bared. “No orders give to
jinja.
Only love.”
She bent over and
kissed the top of its head. “You have served me well,” she whispered.
“Danger,” the
jinja
insisted. “Need
jinja.”
She sighed. “The
laws of Imperia forbid you to go with me.”
Growling, the
jinja
darted away and jumped back on the windowsill with its back to her.
She stared at it a
moment, but she could not relent. In silence, she fastened her veil in place,
grateful that it would conceal the defiance in her face, and went forth with
murder in her heart.
Caelan heard the
whispered argument before he heard the bells ringing over the city.
Dragging open his
eyes, he saw Orlo standing across the gloomy cellar next to a wall of wooden
kegs, gesturing and arguing in a fierce undertone with someone Caelan could not
see.
He struggled to
lift his head. “Orlo?”
The trainer broke
off and came hurrying to his side. “We woke you. I’m sorry.”
Caelan frowned up
at him in the feeble flicker of candlelight, seeing the anger still stamped on
Orlo’s features. He glanced back across the cellar, but could not see the
individual who stood motionless in the shadows.
“Who?”
“Hush,” Orlo said,
wiping his brow with a wet cloth. “Save your strength.”
Caelan could feel
a strange energy in the room, a force tightly leashed yet powerful. It emanated
from the person he could not see, and he was afraid. For a confused moment he
was a boy again, bruised and battered after his attempt to run away from school
and join the army.
“Elder Sobna?” he
said defiantly. “I won’t be punished!”
“Don’t talk,” Orlo
said gruffly. “You can’t afford to start coughing again.”
The energy rippled
around the room. It was something he had never encountered before, very
ancient, yet no menace lay in it. His initial sense of alarm faded, and he
sighed.
Orlo tried to give
him water, but Caelan turned his head fretfully from the cup. He beckoned to
the person in the shadows.
Orlo gripped his
hand and forced it down to his side. “No. You don’t know anything about it. Go
back to sleep.”
But a figure
emerged, robed and hooded in black. “His invitation allows me to enter,” a
woman’s voice said.
Orlo scowled,
putting himself protectively between Caelan and the approaching stranger. “You
aren’t wanted here.”
Ignoring him, the
woman went to the other side of Caelan’s pallet. Her face was smooth and
unlined like a girl’s, yet her dark eyes looked old and weary. When she knelt
beside him with her hands resting calmly in her lap, he saw how age-gnarled
they were.
He stared at her
in astonishment. “Penestrican,” he said, his voice a weak rasp.
She inclined her
head gravely. “I have come to offer you a lesson.”
Orlo snorted.
“What nonsense is this, woman?”
She glared at him.
“Until you learn respect, you will be silent!”
Orlo opened his
mouth, but no words came out. His eyes widened in alarm, and he raised his
hands to his throat.
Alarmed, Caelan
tried to sit up and only managed to prop himself up on one elbow. The room spun
around him, and he could not breathe. He fell back, dizzy and sweating. “Don’t
... hurt.”
“I haven’t hurt
him,” the Penestrican said grimly, still holding Orlo silent in her spell.
The trainer glared
at her and reached for his knife.
“No,” Caelan
gasped out, trying to intervene.
“Command him to be
still,” the Penestrican said sternly. “Otherwise, I shall be forced to hurt
him.”
“Orlo, stop,”
Caelan said, and broke into a painful fit of coughing.
He felt himself
bleeding, the bandage under his back sodden and warm. He seemed to be floating,
buoyed up on the pain that was like fire in his chest and back. Then the
woman’s hand pressed against his forehead, and his mind cleared anew.
Much of the pain
faded to a bearable level.
“Give him water
now,” she said.
Scowling
ferociously at her, Orlo lifted Caelan as gently as he could and held the cup
to his lips.
The water was
tepid and tasted awful, but it soothed Caelan’s throat. He swallowed more of it
thirstily and felt refreshed by the time Orlo eased him down.
“Release him,”
Caelan whispered.
She compressed her
lips tightly for a moment. “Very well. But he must learn respect.”
“I vouch for his
behavior,” Caelan said.
The woman pointed
her index finger at Orlo, who touched his throat and coughed. “What is this?”
he demanded. “Who is she?”
Caelan frowned,
tired of argument. “You waste ... our time,” he finally managed. “Respect her.”
Defiance filled
Orlo’s craggy face, but before he could protest, the Penestrican glanced at
him. “Serve Lord Caelan,” she said. “Obey him.”
“Lord Caelan?”
Orlo repeated, his brows shooting up, then he frowned and gave Caelan a long,
searching glance.
The Penestrican
took Caelan’s hand between her own. “I have come to offer you a lesson, if you
will learn.”
Her face was
growing hazy, merging with the halo of candlelight. Caelan found himself
floating again. His lids dropped half shut. “Cold,” he murmured.
“He’s losing blood
again,” Orlo said. “If you have come to cure him, then do—please do it.”
“I have come to
offer him wisdom,” she replied.
“It’s life he
needs more than wisdom,” Orlo argued.
She smiled. “Are
the two not the same thing?” she asked gently. “Will you come with me, Lord
Caelan?”
He watched her
dreamily as though from far away. “Are you the Magria?” he asked.
“No. I am only a
dream walker. Let us walk together.”
“Walk?” Orlo
interrupted with fresh alarm. “You come to a man who’s half-dead and expect him
to go for a stroll? He can’t—”
“Hush,” she said,
her gaze not shifting from Caelan. “Our walk is well within his powers.”
Caelan met her
gaze, and felt himself float farther away, sinking slowly into a mist of sleep.
Immediately he
dreamed, not the earlier feverish fragments of faces and emotions, but of
something calm and soothing.
He found himself
standing on a headland overlooking the sea. Sunlight glittered upon its endless
gray-green expanse. A strong, salty wind blew Caelan’s hair back from his face.
The waves below surged and broke upon the rocks with a restless, potent beauty.
At his back grew a
grove of trees, and a single boulder rested upon the grass. It might have been
a favorite sit-down spot for a weary traveler, but an aura of serene power lay
over the clearing. Caelan suspected the stone might be a natural altar of
sorts.
The dream walker
emerged from the trees, her stride graceful and free, her long gray hair
spilling unbound down her back in the way of a girl. She smiled as she came to
him.
“Welcome to the
place of the goddess mother,” she said.
Caelan stood
facing her, aware of the crashing sea, the swaying trees, the immovable stone.
The power centered in this spot seemed to be growing stronger, as though forces
were gathering here around him. He understood now why the power seemed so
unfamiliar to him. It was the force of the natural earth, with all her
mysteries woven through the cycles of birth, life, and death.
“What must I
learn?” he asked humbly.
The Penestrican
looked at him with open approval. “You are very respectful, for a man.”
He sighed, knowing
he must curb his inner impatience and sense of urgency. “That lesson, the
Choven taught me. It was not easily learned.”
She smiled and spread
wide her hands. Her sleeves belled in the wind, and her hair streamed out
behind her like a banner. “Look at the stone.”
He obeyed her, and
after a few moments he heard footsteps.
He glanced up and
found himself facing a slim woman with long blonde hair and intense blue eyes.
Power and wisdom shone in her face. Her features were beautiful, yet beauty was
not the word to describe her. She was as stern as his father had ever been,
perhaps more so. Her eyes were like the arch of sky over them, full of infinite
mysteries.
“I am the Magria
of the Penestrican orders,” she said. “You are Caelan, the Light Bringer.”
He bowed to her in
silence, awed by the power radiating from her. Her youth and beauty were
deceptive. This woman was both ancient and ageless. He had no words to describe
her.
“There is little
time,” she said. “Your injury makes this meeting difficult.”
He understood that
she must be expending tremendous effort to create this beautiful spot where he
might walk about in complete health. Were they really in his dreams or far
away? The answer mattered less than the situation they confronted.
He did not ask
questions.
Shrugging a
little, he said, “The dream walker offered me a lesson. What must I learn?”
“You are quick,
Lord Caelan.”
“I am not a lord,”
he said, thinking of his humiliation among the Gialtans. He had learned he
could not invent a rank for himself and expect other men to accept it.
Impatience crossed
her face. “If the gods grant you a title, will you refuse it?”
His eyes widened
in surprise. “The gods?”
She nodded.
He frowned and
dropped his gaze, not sure what to think. “I believe such a reward should wait
until it has been earned. I have not yet—”
“And Will you tell
the gods what they may or may not do?” she rebuked him with visible amusement.
His frown
deepened. Embarrassed, he said nothing.
“You need our
help,” the Magria said, switching subjects swiftly. “The Choven unleashed you
on the world, but they enjoy their secrets and mysteries. Now you are in
trouble, and where are they? Off busy with forges and chisels, more concerned
with creation itself than with what should be done afterward.”
“I don’t
understand.”
“No. Will you
accept the help of the sisterhood?”
“Gladly. What—”
“Then pay heed.
Tirhin is not the enemy you must defeat.”
Caelan looked at
her. “I know.”
“Good. Then I need
not explain.”
“Will you tell me
how to kill a god?’
Her eyes flashed.
“Where is your faith?”
“I don’t know,” he
said, refusing to be intimidated. “My faith has always been in my ability to
fight. But this is not about physical strength, is it?”
She gestured,
watching him closely. “Have you other questions?”
He sighed. “Exoner
has been taken from me. It is a sword, forged by the Choven.”
“You will need
more than a sword to face the darkness,” she said severely.
“But this is no
ordinary—”
“So your faith
lies in a metal blade and your own muscle,” she said scornfully. “Little indeed
with which to face a god.”
Caelan’s temper
began to fray. They could circle, parrying words, forever and come to nothing.
“Or perhaps the dark god hasn’t broken free. Perhaps he isn’t coming. Wouldn’t
he have come forth by now if he—”
“You have seen the
darkness,” she said sharply. “Do you doubt?”
“No,” he said,
seeing that slim hope sliced away.