Fen thought he would die. He knew Trueblood was right and it hurt. Breathing hurt. Living hurt. Even loving Pé hurt. But denying him anything hurt even more. “Gods fucking dammit,” he whispered.
“I can get up that tree,” Trueblood said. “But you’re the only one who can get me down. I’m going up a man and coming down a story. You have to tell the story and not let it be forgotten. Fen, please…”
“Pé,” Raj called. “It’s time.”
The two lovers pulled one another to their feet.
“Here,” Trueblood said, sliding the ringos off his finger.
“No, keep it.”
“Put it on. And don’t let anyone take it from you again. When you get back to Nyland and get your moonstone back, I want you to swallow it. Nobody is ever going to own you, in any way, shape or form. Ever again. Do you understand? Answer your commander.”
“Aye, Kep.” Fen put the ringos on and wished he were dead.
“I need you to promise me something else.”
“Héjo, you’re not in the position to be making demands right now,” Fen said, thinking maybe he could joke this whole fucking thing away.
“Shut up and listen to me. If the tree starts making spice again? I mean like it starts falling down right away from the branches? You bring some back to Belmiro. I don’t care if it’s one grain or ten, you catch it, keep it and give it to him.”
“I will.”
“You tell him more is coming and he’s free now.”
“All right.”
“Come here.”
They held each other as if trying to become the same person.
Fen whispered, “I can’t do this again.”
“Do it for me. You survive for me. I want you to live. I want you to sire an heir and show him what it means to be a good father. Whenever you think you can’t do something, you do it for me.”
“Gods, I hate your guts.” Packing sarcasm around his broken heart was the only way he could maintain any sense of dignity. If he spoke the true words, he would start screaming and not stop.
“I hate you too,” Trueblood said. “I hate you so fucking much, Fen il-Kheir.”
“Say my name. Go on, let me hear you slaughter it one more time.”
“Fuck you, Tehvani…”
The syllables rolled forward like he was born for no other purpose than to speak them. The near-perfection hurt Fen’s ears so bad, he ended it by kissing Trueblood hard. He pushed the mariner up against the tree, slid his tongue in Trueblood’s mouth, swallowed his soul name and shut the beautiful bastard up good.
“I’m going to kill you,” he whispered. “I love you so much, I’m going to kill you.”
The son of a bitch whipped around and Fen’s back slammed against Nydirsil. “Shut up and kiss me.”
Fen’s arms locked around the giantsblood’s neck, pulling him in. His mouth opened and the frantic, furious heat in his body pawed the ground like an enraged bull. The nerve of this godsdamned wharf rat, thinking he could order Fen il-Kheir around. This idiotic sailor had some set of balls, making the heir to the kheiron herd show his best side, making him actually want to survive this horseshit.
“Pé,” Raj called.
“I’m in the middle of something,” Trueblood mumbled.
Fen stepped away, digging his ringed fingers in his hair. He drew in a powerful breath and let it go, abruptly changing his attitude and deciding none of this was happening.
“All right,” he said. “It’s time. You go. And we’re going to talk about this later.”
“Be with me until the end.” Trueblood was still trying to hold him. “And I’ll be with you forever.”
Fen was having none of it. “No, don’t go being cute. We’re going to have a really long, really unpleasant conversation later. You are in a world of deep shit.”
Trueblood touched his face. “You made me a better man.”
“Yeah, we’re going to talk about that, too.”
“Fen.”
“Go on. Do your thing. It’ll be a lot more fun than the chat we’re having later.” Boldly, Fen took Trueblood’s face and kissed him with open eyes. “Go on now.”
As Trueblood turned, Fen backhanded his ass. “You’re getting more of that later, too.”
Trueblood looked around. “I’ll see you in a little while.”
“Oh believe me, you will. What you got for leaving the nyellem door open is going tickle in comparison.”
“I love you,” Trueblood said. “Don’t you fucking leave me until it’s done.”
“You wish,” Fen said. “You’re stuck with me until the end.”
Today, legantos, we call Trueblood’s sacrifice The Naŭtaggiad. The Epic of the Nine Days.
Some call it the greatest love story ever told.
Others have no name for it.
You decide.
Listen to learn, learn to tell, tell to teach.
And then call it whatever you want.
Pelippé Trueblood wasn’t afraid during the ascent of the tree, when the ground disappeared beneath him like last night’s dream. He wasn’t afraid when Raj and Lejo placed the crossbeam and tied him to it, their hands sea-strong and ship-sure as they secured him around the chest, wrists, elbows and shoulders.
He only feared for Fen.
The kheiron wound a rope of his own around the tree, flying in slow spirals. Accompanying the climb, as was his job. There in case of panic or a fall on the mast. He was excellent at it. All that long afternoon, from zenith to twilight, he glided and hovered around Nydirsil, not resting once.
His excellence made Trueblood afraid. None of this could start until Fen went to the ground.
The sun was an orange disc in a sky streaked pink and amethyst when the flight of pegasos came. The herd mentality declared it was time for Fen to come down. Darea, the beautiful copper mare, flew in closer and said, “It won’t begin until you begin. And you must begin as Khe did.”
“Go on down now,” Trueblood said to Fen. He almost said you’re tired, but he knew Fen was a proud creature. And Trueblood had promised to be careful with all the things he knew about Fen.
“I can’t do this without you,” he said. “But I need to start now. Go down with Darea and help me start.”
Fen was tired. His face pale as ash, wincing with every rise and fall of his wings. His lips trembled against Trueblood’s one more time.
“Right now,” he said. “This.”
“Right now.” Trueblood filled his lungs with Fen’s scent. “Only this.”
Pulling back, Fen’s feathers drooped and he plummeted a sharp foot before regaining himself. Darea was at his side at once.
“Tehvan, will you honor me by riding?”
“The honor is mine,” Fen whispered. His wings retracted as he mounted her back and slid his shaking hands into her dark mane.
So the kheiron went down to begin as Khe did, as a man bound to earth.
Trueblood was alone now. The twins had climbed out of sight and the ground was farther away than yesterday. The sun charged down the bowl of the sky, burning behind the lowest branch on Nydirsil’s western side. If the tree were a kheiron’s hands, the sun would set on the fourhand’s last finger. The one that bore ringosol, the ring of Solos.
His fingers were tingling. He pushed down on his feet, taking some of the tension off his shoulders.
This is going to get a whole lot harder before it gets easier.
A lick of anxiety in the back of his throat as he thought about nine long days ahead.
I want to do a good job. I may have to settle for good enough.
The sun was nearly down. The apex of the sky had darkened to indigo and the first stars were shimmering through when, in a flash of copper and gold, Darea flew toward the tree like an arrow.
Nydirsil trembled agains
t Trueblood’s back. A beat of pure silence, then the pegaso flew due west with Lejo mounted between her wings. Sparkles in their wake flooded across Trueblood’s eyes, blinding him with clarity. The last finger on Fen’s fourhand was empty now. His ringosol would be used to anchor one of the stars inside Lejo’s heart to that lowest, westernmost branch.
But why Lejo? he thought. That makes no sense. Lejo isn’t the sun.
It should be Raj in the west. Raj and his sunny handsomeness, his laugh that could light up a room. His aura that glinted at the edge of Trueblood’s vision. Bold, fearless Raj who, if he didn’t know the answer, didn’t hesitate to make something up. His solid, dependable nature that never wavered. Raj was consistent as sunrise and sunset. He was the very definition of sun.
Why was Lejo anchoring the branch of Solos?
The sun slipped out of sight and Nydirsil shuddered against his shoulders. Then the entire sky rumbled, pierced by the force of pinning the branch like a brooch to her cloak.
Once, Kepten Trueblood thought, long ago, the first time Nydirsil was anchored, Nyos accidentally made a hole in the sky, and the winged horses came through it. Their hooves tore a second hole open, and the birds came through.
Once, not quite that long ago, the minoro Trueblood sat at old Rafil’s feet, reluctant to take stories at face value. “What was on the other side of the hole?” he asked. The sitting room hissed with shushing noises but little Pelippé was unwavering in his curiosity. “Where were the winged horses and birds before?”
Far away on the western horizon, a tiny hole opened in the sky. Through it, Trueblood saw a golden temple, its central dome surrounded by minarets. Gorgeous indolent lions lazed on the wide steps, tamed by the massive field of red poppies planted around the edifice. He saw an altar of topaz and tiger’s eyes and rubies, heaped high with sunflowers, marigolds, dandelions, goldenrod and heliotrope. The potent perfume of the poppies caressed his eyelids and nose, along with the scent of burning cassia and sandalwood.
Oh, he thought. As he thought on another long-ago day when Lejo’s body slid against his and the universe whispered secrets into his ear.
Oh. I see. It kind of makes sense now.
“Good,” Solos the sun god said from everywhere. “Go to sleep. You have a lot of work ahead.”
Trueblood’s eyes closed as the new star burst into life at the tip of the lowest, most western branch.
By noon on the second day, he was certain they’d picked the wrong man for the job.
The only thing taking his mind off the growling knot of hunger in his stomach was the salty thirst swelling his tongue within his mouth. The only thing taking his mind off the thirst was the pain in his arms, which was diminished by the cramping in his legs, which was overshadowed by the war in his head.
All of which paled in comparison to the agony of loneliness.
Nothing in the history of his life, anywhere, ever, had prepared him for doing this alone. He’d been raised within a crew mentality. To work together at difficult tasks and stay together in dangerous places.
I can’t do this alone.
He knew Fen would have to kneel heartbroken at the roots, but he assumed the twins would be right next to him for the ordeal. Starsilver and giantsblood. Instead, in a cruel betrayal, the twins climbed far above him, as if they’d received outside instructions he wasn’t privy to.
“You said you’d be with me until the end.” Within their bonds, his hands went to fists, wanting to punch and throw things. An apple sailed through his starving memory, hitting a marble column with a dull thud. Followed by a sensory rush that was almost erotic and he wanted that apple.
His teeth wailed for a bite. A luxurious, crunching chomp and the skin would wrinkle under his lip while a slice of flesh would glide across his palate and drop onto his tongue. Dry then juicy. Tart then sweet. Crisp in his mouth giving way to soft in his throat. He’d eat it the way Fen ate a grasshopper once—stem, seeds, core, calyx. Not a scrap left. Then he’d spend an hour going after the bits left between his teeth.
He’d worship that fruit. He’d build a religion around it.
He swore he’d never complain about a bruised apple again.
Then he cried, because he’d never have to.
He cried a lot that first day. It was all right. Nobody could see. After weeping, he dozed off. Or maybe the cramping ache in his limbs made him pass out. He woke and was positive he was never going to do this. They had the wrong giantsblood. Surely someone in charge would be climbing up any minute, shaking their heads in regret. “Sorry, lad, afraid you’re not the one we want. Good try, though.”
It was all a mistake. Any minute they’d be here.
The walls of his mind folded down. He went away, but came back when feathers brushed his cheek.
Fen.
His eyes popped open. It was over. Thank Gods. Fen was here to take him down.
A two-tone whistle corrected him.
It was the lark.
“You came,” he said.
She swooped left and right, then settled on a small twig by his hip.
“I’m so glad to see you.”
A long trill like an explanation.
“It’s all right. I’m just glad you got here.”
She flew up and perched on his outstretched arm. Hopped shoulder to wrist, examining the ties that bound him.
“I’m really up the mast, aren’t I?” he said. “Don’t ask me how I got into this mess. Between I and you, I wish I was out of it. This ship is too big. I’m not ready. I’m not the one.”
She flew across his chest and examined his other arm.
“Did you see Fen? Is he all right?”
As if she understood, she looked down and whistled.
“I don’t think he can hear you. But maybe you can… Héjo, come here. Come close to me. Please.”
She hopped back to the cap of his shoulder and nestled by the cheek he leaned toward her.
“Tell Fen I want him so bad,” he said. “Tell him I could do this better if he were near me. Maybe Raj is the compass and Lejo is the conscience, but Fen is the courage. The valentos. He’s the bravest person I know. Tell him I’m scared out of my mind and I want him. Please. Can you do that?”
She rubbed her head against him, then canted off his outstretched arm and flew down.
Trueblood exhaled, then noticed the sun was lower in the west. Company made the time go by. Anything could be endured if you had someone to talk to.
Gods, he was so thirsty.
He dozed.
When he woke, the sky was lavender and the full moon was rising in the east. Lunos faced him dead on, peeking through the lowest branch on that side of Nydirsil. A kheiron’s fivehand pinky finger with a ringolun, the ring of the moon.
A wind blew his plaits around and a pegaso scorched the sky like a reversed lightning bolt, flashing creamy white from ground to branches, then out to the east with Raj on his back.
Through the tiny rift in the stars, Trueblood beheld the realm of the moon goddess. Her temple built of overlapping circles of light at the center of a perfectly round lake. Swans glided along its surface, barely making a ripple. The altar within the luminescent spheres was heaped high with round objects. Trueblood crammed his eyes with creamy white eggs, silver apples, globes and orbs and…
He squinted. And compasses?
“Of course,” Lunos said. “A circular journey is a noble thing. Always start as you mean to end, Pelippé Trueblood.”
She rose higher on her course and the second star dazzled to life at the tips of the easternmost branch.
The lark flew back to Trueblood and nestled in the curve of his neck and shoulder, fluffed up round and warm. As she slept, she made a funny thrum. A tiny whistle in her slumber that sounded exactly like Fen’s breathing when he slept in Trueblood’s arms.
Trueblo
od drank that little sound all night.
The third day it rained.
The ground beneath Fen’s knees turned to mud. He pinched off bits and whispered his khenom into the wet earth, then rolled it into small balls that he pressed into Nydirsil’s bark.
He remembered climbing the Kaleuche’s main mast and the kepten’s counsel to give the spine of the ship a hug. It spent so much time being hated, it liked to be appreciated every now and then.
Fen stretched his arms wide against the massive bole of the world’s mast. “You were taken away from your home and everything you loved. You did nothing wrong. Things were done to you. You had no choice and you gave no consent. All these years you’ve been lost, waiting for someone to find you. I know what that’s like. If you think no one understands, please know I do. We’re here now, valentos. You’re home.”
His fingers pressed into mud and bark. He spoke his name again and again, begging Nydirsil to draw it up like sap and deliver it to Trueblood.
I miss you so much. I love you and my heart is breaking.
The rain came down harder. Darea stepped behind him and curved her wings around, making a little shelter. All this time, she’d been by his side. She kept a respectful, emotional distance from his vigil, but she didn’t stop guarding him a minute.
The world will have to go through her before it can get to me.
She’s the witness to all of this. The rakontistos. She’ll remember everything in perfect detail and help me tell the tale.
“Thank you for staying,” he said into the circle of her damp feathers.
“It’s an honor,” she said. “The most important thing I’ll ever do.”
Fen sank his knees deeper into the earth. He spread his hands wide on the trunk of Nydirsil and let go of both the past and the future. He stayed in place and stayed in the present, knowing it was the most important thing he ever did.
Trueblood drank in the rain. Gulp after delicious gulp along his tongue and throat, the cells of his body perking up with joy before slumping back into exhausted pain. When he sensed the storm was letting up, he let the water collect in his mouth, the same way Fen had pooled up his spit while being marched across the desert.
The Voyages of Trueblood Cay Page 40
