—From the Discourses on Knowledge, Volume 17, Year 1171
The darkness rocked and Lhaurel started awake. She opened her eyes, feeling gritty and slow. Light filtered in from the small porthole behind her, refracting off the glass and sending tiny shards of sunlight darting into the darkness. Talha must have slipped out some time during the night, but . . .
Porthole?
Where had that word come from? Lhaurel didn’t recognize it, but she knew with utter surety that the small, round window in the side of a ship was called exactly that. Licking her lips, she looked down at the meditation candle. All that remained was a small nub set in a shapeless mass of re-hardened wax flecked with lavender puddled on the wooden floor.
Meditation candle?
Lhaurel sifted through her memories of the previous night. Though they were particularly hazy, she couldn’t recall any part of Talha’s instructions hinting at the candle’s name.
Lhaurel rocked back on her heels, stiff muscles protesting. One hand clutched at her skirt, tugging on the cloth. A bead of sweat formed and slipped down into the creases of her wrinkled brow. What is going on?
Lhaurel rushed to the door and wrenched it open. One of Lhaurel’s priestesses waited just outside. The young woman started at Lhaurel’s sudden appearance.
“Fetch Talha at once,” Lhaurel ordered.
The priestess gave a hasty bow and scampered a few feet further down the dimly lit hall where another priestess—one of Talha’s—waited in front of Talha’s rooms. Lhaurel spun back into her room, striding over to her bed, making a point to avoid the candle mess on the floor.
“Lhaurel,” Talha said, striding into the room with a smile on her lips. She had a book in one hand and jar of ink in the other, a feather quill clutched between a few of the fingers. Despite the hour, Talha had managed to do her hair up into a tight bun, though it was tied with a strip of brown cloth rather than pinned in place with wooden rods.
“What have you done to me?” Lhaurel asked, flopping down onto the bed and dropping her head into her hands. She could feel a headache building. It buzzed at the base of her skull, like the sound of a voice muffled by a great distance, yet far more penetrating and annoying. Would those ever go away?
“Whatever do you mean?”
“With the candle, the dream. There are things in my head I shouldn’t know, but I know them all the same,” Lhaurel said. “For example, I know that the window over there is called a porthole, though just yesterday I simply called it a window. I know that,” Lhaurel said, looking up and pointing at the lump of wax on the ground, “is a meditation candle made from beeswax and lavender petals and used in any number of religious ceremonies, all of which I know by name and can tell you what happens in them though I’ve never performed any of them. What did you do to me while I dreamt?” She bit her bottom lip to keep it from trembling.
“That was not a dream,” Talha said, closing the door. “And don’t bite your lip. You really must let go of that habit.” Talha put the book down on the desk and gestured in Lhaurel’s direction with the hand that held the ink and quill. Luckily, the ink bottle was closed. “You experienced a communion of lives. You’ll have no memory of the actual event itself, but it happened nonetheless. Some things are simply too pure even for memory. They must remain a part of the Path alone, remembered only in passing as fragments of knowledge gleaned, but not recalled affirmatively. Like your mastery of the Orinai tongue.”
“What?” Lhaurel shot to her feet, realizing for the first time that she was speaking Talha’s language. She hesitated, her mouth working, and tried to focus on what she was saying. “How can I be speaking the Orinai language without even knowing it? Wait, I still am. Why isn’t it like before? I’m still speaking it, aren’t I?”
Talha smiled and took a seat at the desk, flipped open her book, and took a few notes.
“I told you your prior Incarnations could assist you, Lhaurel,” Talha said. “Did you not believe me?”
Lhaurel’s mouth worked, but no sound came out. Of course she hadn’t believed her, not really. True, the evidence had suggested that something was happening, something unnatural. Lhaurel had been dreaming of Elyana since right after the Oasis and the records they’d found in the grottoes—Elyana’s grottoes—validated those dreams. And Beryl . . .
Lhaurel sank down onto her bed, all strength draining out of her. “No. I didn’t.”
Talha turned and regarded Lhaurel with cool, appraising eyes, eyes that held Lhaurel’s and seemed to look deep into her soul.
“And now?” Talha asked.
Lhaurel shuddered. “Now I believe.”
What choice did she have, faced with what had just happened to her? If she believed that, though, what did it mean for everything else she’d been told? Did that make it all true? Fear gnawed at the inside of her throat and she felt weak. Insignificant, actually. Without her powers, without claim to the one thing she could actually feel and fully explore, she was nothing. She needed her powers back. Needed them desperately.
Lhaurel swallowed hard.
“Come over here and sit with me,” Talha said, looking up from a note she was penning in her book. “Have one of your priestesses fetch you a chair. There is still much studying to be done before we reach land this evening.”
“Are we nearly there, then?” Lhaurel latched onto the thought like a breath of clean air in a sandstorm. It calmed her, even if the lingering terror and despair danced around the edges of mind, courting and nursing her headache to a dull ache.
“Estrelar? No, child, we have several more weeks of travel ahead of us before we reach the city. We will reach shore tonight, though, and that means entering the Northern Dominion. Politics enters the equation at that juncture.” Talha said the word “politics” as if it were the vilest of expletives.
Northern Dominion, the part of the Empire that was furthest north, the land of plantations and farms that supplied the rest of the nation with much needed food and staple supplies. Lhaurel tried to push down the repulsion she felt at knowing that. She felt simultaneously violated and oddly blessed to have been granted such knowledge, but the depravity of it was what stuck. She swallowed and walked over to Talha, steeling herself for a long day of study and mental exhaustion. At least it would give her something on which to focus.
A priestess opened the door bearing a chair, one of Lhaurel’s. This one was older, with grey beginning to adorn her temples and streak through her once brown hair. As the woman set the chair down near the desk, Lhaurel idly wondered what her name was. She’d never bothered to learn them. Lhaurel pursed her lips as she sat, turning her mind away from the haunting new knowledge she’d gained and onto that question.
Why hadn’t she learned their names? The priestesses had fought for her back when their caravan was attacked. They’d come to her defense, even if she’d had to goad them into it. The least kindness would have been to learn more about them, learn their names and who they were. Why hadn’t she?
The answer, Lhaurel realized, was simple. She hadn’t cared. She’d never thought of herself as one of the Sisters, or even as one of the Orinai. She wasn’t—not really, at least. Lhaurel was a member of the Rahuli people, though she was beginning to realize that perhaps a part of her, at least, was something more. She was—though it terrified her to admit it even to herself—one of the Seven Sisters. She had access to the Progressions in a way that bordered on absolute. She really was a guardian of the Path, one who led others to their ultimate destination. The least she could do to honor the ones who followed her was to learn their names.
“Priestess, hold a moment,” Lhaurel said, looking up. The older priestess stopped at the door, one hand outstretched toward the handle. She let her hand fall to her side as she turned and bowed low, eyes downcast.
“Yes, Honored Sister?”
“What is your name?”
The priestess clasped her hands together in front of her, one wrinkled finger making a pattern on the back of her other ha
nd.
“My name?”
“Yes,” Lhaurel prompted.
She ignored the pointed sound Talha made by clearing her throat.
“What is your name? I’d like something to call you other than ‘priestess.’”
“Priestess will do fine, Honored Sister.”
Lhaurel felt something foreign well up in her: annoyance. Not the ordinary annoyance of being pestered by someone tedious or frustrating, but the annoyance of being disobeyed. Lhaurel pushed it down before answering, struggling not to let the emotion show in her expression.
“Your name, if you will.”
“Meibas.”
“Thank you,” Lhaurel said with a small nod and a smile, though Meibas’s eyes were still fixed on the wooden floor. “You are dismissed, Meibas. Thank you for the chair.”
“As you will, Honored Sister,” Meibas said and scurried out the door. It may have been Lhaurel’s imagination, but it appeared as if the priestess almost broke into a run at the end.
“Well,” Talha said as soon as the door was shut. “That was interesting. The other priestesses will hear about that before the outside of a minute has passed.” She frowned, then shrugged and turned back to her notes. “I guess it’s of little import now. You are a strange one, Lhaurel, I will grant you that, but it may simply be a part of your Path. The Progression of Honor has always been something I have not quite understood. Perhaps that’s why I’m so fascinated with it.”
“Honor?” Lhaurel’s lips formed the word, tasting a familiarity with it that was not her own.
“Indeed, child. As I have explained before, you are the Sister who guards and leads others down Honor’s Progression. We will discuss this today as we study. Are you ready then?”
Lhaurel nodded, though she felt as if she were anything but prepared. Still, deciding to do something of her own accord, learning Meibas’s name, had lightened her mood and driven away some of the vestigial terror. It gave her a direction and an anchor on which to hold. It didn’t even bother her that she knew what an anchor was.
* * *
Several hours later, Talha snapped her book closed and tossed her quill onto the tabletop in obvious frustration. The pen struck and bounced, splattering small drops of ink onto some scattered papers and books there. Talha cursed and—for perhaps the hundredth time since she’d awoke that morning—Lhaurel felt surprised that she both recognized and understood it. That surprise was starting to fade though, giving way to acceptance born on the back of resignation.
“I don’t know why I bother trying to teach you when you already know it all,” Talha said, picking up her pen and looking around, presumably for something to blot up the spilled ink.
“I—you—I don’t know what I’ve learned. I can’t remember anything until it just comes up in conversation. It’s like living inside a dream while I’m awake,” Lhaurel protested. “I’m as clueless about what I know as you are.”
“An adequate description, actually,” Talha said, tapping one finger against her lips with one hand, her irritation giving way to curiosity in the space of a single breath. “But the timing is off. When I finally came into my powers, it took several long weeks of meditation before I was as immersed in my prior Incarnations as you have reached in a single night. That shouldn’t be possible.”
Lhaurel waited for the odd recognition to hit her, a memory or knowledge that wasn’t really her own, but nothing came.
She shrugged. “I don’t understand it either.”
Talha frowned and, as she seemed to be perpetually doing, opened her book, inked a new quill, and started jotting down notes.
“Clearly. I, on the other hand, have studied this at length over the years. I am one of the older Sisters, well into my third century, and have seen four of our Sisters come into their powers and memories of their former lives. It always takes more time than this . . . hmmm.”
Lhaurel could tell Talha wasn’t going to let this go any time soon. Though she hadn’t known the woman long, her personality—at least in regard to the pursuit of answers when questions were at hand—was pretty easy to follow. Then something Talha had said registered in Lhaurel’s mind.
“Third century?” Lhaurel asked. Her mind had skipped over the information at first, a part of her simply accepting the fact and moving on. It had taken a moment for Lhaurel to realize it should have bothered her, just as learning Beryl’s age had.
“Hmmm? What was that?” Talha looked up. “Oh yes. That’s right.”
“You’re three hundred years old?”
“Three hundred and forty-six, to be precise,” Talha said, turning back to her notes.
Lhaurel struggled to wrap her mind around that number. In the Sharani Desert, forty was considered old. Fifty was ancient. Older than that was either a cruel twist of fate or a miracle. Three hundred forty-six. The number was staggering. Beryl had, supposedly, been older, but he’d actually looked old. Talha barely looked middle aged. Her skin was still smooth and without wrinkle or blemish, despite its paleness. With her blood red hair and nails and painted teeth, she was—in a word—exotic, but also stunningly beautiful.
“Is it normal for Orinai to live that long?” Lhaurel asked. She thought she knew the answer already, but wanted to make sure.
“Just Sisters. Well, some of the second Iteration also live longer lives, but not nearly the span that we Sisters do.”
“What about vulcanists?”
Talha’s head snapped up and she almost spun about in the chair, eyes locking onto Lhaurel’s.
“Vulcanists are killed as soon as they are discovered,” Talha said in as intent and serious a voice as Lhaurel had ever heard before. “As are all of the Third Iteration.”
Something about that tugged at Lhaurel’s memory, something she’d read in the Schema. The Third Iterations were the most powerful, and the most unstable, if she remembered correctly. There was another Iteration up from her current power, an ability dealing with souls instead of blood?
“Why?”
“That is a discussion for another time. One which our other Sisters shall be present for. It seems your new knowledge and memories don’t recall everything after all. For now, I think I have a theory as to why your memories and learning are so advanced.”
“Why do the other Sisters need to be present? Why not just tell me yourself?” Lhaurel asked. Memories that wouldn’t quite coalesce tugged at her mind like the wind pulling at loose clothing. “I’m just curious.”
Talha frowned and her eyes flashed. “Because I won’t. Third tier Iterations are dangerous and deadly. That is all you need know for now.” Her tone was final and brooked no further argument. “Now, how long have you been having dreams of Elyana, child?”
Lhaurel wanted to protest, but Talha gave her such a hard look that she decided to let the matter drop. For now. The memories tugging at her mind faded, but didn’t fully disappear.
“Long enough,” she said, then paused to think about it. Her own memories were clearer and easy to access. “Since right after the events in the Oasis. Perhaps a few months? Maybe longer?”
Talha pursed her lips, but started writing again. Her quill scratched against the paper.
“And was that the first time you’d accessed your powers?”
“No. Khari, the mystic who found me, broke me well before that, though I had trouble with the wetta abilities. I didn’t realize that my powers were linked to blood until later, a few days before the Oasis, perhaps.”
“So half a year, then?”
Lhaurel shrugged. She really didn’t know an exact time, but that seemed as accurate a guess as anything.
Talha nodded and snorted at the same time, then shook her head. “It astounds me that a mystic helped you come into your powers. How backwards and barbaric of them to think you’d have access to the wetta’s abilities.”
“They didn’t know any better,” Lhaurel said. “They didn’t start reading the scrolls until after then and we didn’t understand even then.”
“Scrolls?” Talha arched an eyebrow, an eager gleam glinting in her eyes. “What scrolls? You mentioned them before. Do you know who would have written them or how long they were there in the Arena? I—” Talha cut off sharply as the ship rocked. Lhaurel had to reach out and put one hand against the wall to keep from falling.
Talha looked up at the ceiling with a furrowed brow and a frown, then sighed and snapped her book shut as muffled shouting drifted down to them. She stood and gathered up the books and other papers, getting ink on her hands and robes.
“What’s going on?” Lhaurel asked, as Talha made her way toward the door.
“Something unexpected, I expect,” Talha said with a sigh of resignation. “You may as well come with me. The captain will have sent a runner, I’m sure.”
Lhaurel followed, both intrigued and glad of the excuse to leave her room. Light still streamed through the porthole and Lhaurel had hope for an opportunity to go out on deck while the sun was still in the sky.
Several priestesses, both Lhaurel’s and Talha’s, stood in the dimly lit corridor outside Lhaurel’s door. Talha handed her pile of books to one of hers and kept walking, reaching the wooden steps that led up onto the deck of the ship at the same time that the doors above were flung open and light streamed down into the hall. Lhaurel blinked against the blinding light for half a moment, then a silhouette blocked out the greater part of the light.
“Honored Sisters,” a male voice said. Lhaurel couldn’t pick out any of the man’s features, backlit as he was in the doorway. “The captain wishes me ter beg your ladyships to meet him up here on the deck ifn’s it ain’t much trouble for you.”
Talha turned and looked beyond Lhaurel toward some of the priestesses who were following along behind them.
“Go fetch our staffs,” she ordered, then turned back to the man in the doorway.
From the way the shadow shifted, Lhaurel guessed he was fidgeting nervously.
“Tell your captain we will be with him shortly.”
Sharani series Box Set Page 77
