No Quarter

by Tanya Huff

  “How can a kigh be lost?” Celestin wondered when he told her.

  “They can’t. At least, I never knew they could.” Brow furrowed, he Sang a different question. He changed the phrasing. He changed the pitch of the Song. Finally he gave up. “I don’t know what they’re talking about,” he admitted, pulling at his beard in bewildered frustration. “They just keep repeating the same thing, over and over.” It almost tore him in two, but he couldn’t take the time to learn what they wanted—not when past experience said it could take days.

  They made him Sing his feet free every step across the graveyard. When he had to Sing the kigh away from his pack, Celestin lightly touched his shoulder.

  “Perhaps you should stay.”

  “I can’t.” The words ripped great holes in his heart.

  “Have you told them why?” She gestured at the ground.

  “They don’t understand.” The final word became a plea for understanding from the priest. When she nodded, he swung the pack up onto his shoulders. “Look, Brencis is still out there trying to contact a bard. Sooner or later, he’ll come home with one. If they can Sing air, have them send your recall to the Bardic Hall—everyone should know about this. If they can Sing earth …” For a moment he was unable to go on. “If they can Sing earth, ask them to help the kigh.”

  The earth tugged at his shoes as Jazep hurried away from the village. Voice tight in his throat, he sang to the breezes as he walked, hoping one of them would carry the news to a bard who could hear it.

  * * * *

  Head cocked, one hand lifted to stroke the air, Annice frowned. “Something’s wrong.”

  “At the keep?”

  “No.” The bard squinted up the length of the valley to bring the distant stone bulk of the keep into better focus. “It’s definitely not Stasya. In fact …” Her frown deepened as she slowly pivoted, trying to pinpoint the source. “… it’s not really a Song, it’s more a … feeling.”

  Pjerin, Duc of Ohrid, stepped back from the stooked corn, swept an approving gaze over the work continuing in the rest of the field, and finally turned to face Annice. While he’d come to appreciate bardic abilities over the last seventeen years, he’d spent a lifetime learning that good weather seldom lasted so close to Third Quarter Festival. He wanted the field stacked by dark, and that wasn’t going to happen if something was wrong.

  “A feeling?” he repeated irritably. “Annice …” An imperious wave of her hand cut him off and he folded his arms across his chest with a scowl. The scowl lightened as he realized the extent of her concern and, watching the play of emotions across her face while she called the kigh, he began, himself, to feel a faint sense of unease.

  Although the kigh seemed skittish, they couldn’t answer Annice’s questions. “Too far,” she muttered at last, having Sung an unhappy gratitude.

  Ohrid stood on the border between Shkoder and Cemandia, the farthest of the five mountain principalities from Elbasan. The farthest from the Healers’ Hall. Pjerin stepped forward, as though to close the distance. “Is it about Magda?”

  “No, I don’t think so.”

  He turned on her, violet eyes narrowed. “You don’t think so? If you’re not certain, check.”

  His tone left no room for disagreement. Under other circumstances, Annice would have disagreed anyway, on principle—growing older had only intensified Pjerin’s fondness for having his own way—but not this time. Hearing the fear behind the arrogance, she called the kigh back and Sang the four notes of their daughter’s name. She didn’t believe the wrongness had anything to do with Magda but, now that the possibility had occurred to Pjerin, she knew he’d not let it rest until he was convinced their child was safe.

  “Shall I have them check up on Gerek as well?” she wondered. Although Gerek was not her son by birth, she had long since come to consider him hers, much the same way she’d come to consider all of Ohrid hers.

  “Gerek,” Pjerin growled, “is a grown man and does not need you peering over his shoulder!”

  “Magda is …”

  “A child,” her father declared.

  And that was that.

  Over half the crop had been stacked by the time the kigh returned with the unmistakable message that all was well at the Healers’ Hall. Magda was in no danger the kigh could discover.

  The wrongness remained, a shadow over the Circle; faint and undefined, impossible to ignore.

  “If not Magda,” Annice asked herself, growing increasingly concerned, “then who?”

  * * * *

  “Tadeus!” Magda flung herself past Vree, across the courtyard, and into the arms of a slight man standing just at the edge of the cloister. He laughed as the force of her greeting rocked him back on his heels and Vree, who’d spun around into a defensive position at the sound of footsteps behind her, relaxed slightly.

  *I think she knows him,* Gyhard observed dryly as Magda dragged him forward.

  When Tadeus stepped out into the late afternoon sun, Vree realized that the shadow covering his eyes was a narrow black leather band cut to perch on his nose and loop back over his ears. *He’s blind.*

  *So it seems.*

  *He’s also not alone.* Tadeus’ companion moved hesitantly out of the cloisters and Vree was astounded to see he was Southern. In fact, if she had to place him more precisely, she’d say Sixth or Seventh Province based on the cinnamon-brown of his skin.

  “Vree, Gyhard, this is Tadeus.” Tucked in the semicircle of his right arm, Magda smiled proudly at the bard as though he were something she’d thought up on her own. “He’s one of my name-fathers. Tadeus, this is …”

  “The young Imperial citizen who carries the two kigh.” His smile held a warmth Vree felt herself responding to. “It’s actually you I’ve come to see.”

  “Tadeus!”

  Ignoring Magda’s exaggerated protest, he half-turned toward the Southerner and beckoned him forward. “Ullious here is one of the four remaining Imperial fledglings, and when he heard you were in the country, he expressed a very natural desire to meet you.” A breeze ruffled silver-shot curls as he reached out an unerring hand and pulled the fledgling to his side. “Ullious, this is Vree and Gyhard who are sharing a body. Vree, Gyhard, this is Ullious who has an astonishing command of air and a truly amazing tenor.”

  “Better than yours?” Magda dug an elbow into his ribs.

  “Don’t be impudent, brat, or I’ll tell your mother you’ve quit your studies, taken up hayla dancing, and are living with a drunk who beats you.”

  “She’d never believe that.”

  “You’re right.” Garnets glittered in his ears as he cocked his head to grin down at her. “But I could always tell her you were looking pale and I didn’t think you were eating properly.”

  Magda winced. “She’d be here the next day.”

  “Or sooner,” Tadeus agreed. He pinched her chin. “So why don’t you tell me what you have been doing, I’ll pass on what I think Annice should know, and the rest can be a secret between us.”

  “But Vree …”

  “Can spend a few moments with Ullious who I’m sure would love to speak his own language with someone who doesn’t confuse verb tenses.” Tadeus turned and Vree had the strangest feeling he was smiling directly at her although he couldn’t possibly see anything through the leather band. “You don’t mind me stolen my name-daughter away for a little while, do you?” he asked in Imperial.

  “Stealing,” Ullious murmured. “Not stolen; stealing.”

  Tadeus winced. “Verb tenses,” he muttered. “Hate ’em. Come along, Maggi, we’ll sit over here and you can tell me all about the hearts you’ve broken while I was gone.”

  “I’d rather hear about the hearts you’ve broken,” Magda declared as they walked toward a bench set into the far wall of the courtyard.

  Vree thought she’d never heard anything quite so engaging as Tadeus’ laugh. “When you’re older, child,” she heard him say. “When you’re older.”

  “He
’s still friends with every lover he ever had,” Ullious observed quietly. “And he has a lot of friends.”

  *I’ll bet.* Gyhard sounded so appreciative, Vree couldn’t help but smile. The expression seemed to reassure Ullious.

  “You’re not what I expected,” he said, nervously brushing at his narrow mustache.

  The smile faded. “Because I’m an assassin?”

  “No, I’ve met assassins. I spent four years in the Seventh Army—Third Division, Second Company, Second Unit, First Squad.” He looked a little startled at the involuntary completion of the list, then he went on. “It’s just that you’re you, and Gyhard’s himself, and there’s so obviously two of you in one body. When the kigh brought us the news about you, I guess I expected things would be mixed up a little more.”

  “Does everyone know about us?” Vree growled.

  Ullious shook his head. “Oh, no. Only the bards who Sing air.”

  “And there’re how many of those?”

  “Actually,” he shrugged a bit sheepishly, “most of the bards Sing air.”

  Vree couldn’t keep from glancing up into the square of sky framed by the courtyard. A shadow flickered on the west roof of the Healers’ Hall as an archer moved back out of sight. *I wonder how many of them are watching us now.*

  *You could ask.*

  *Think he’d tell me?*

  “You were talking to him, weren’t you?” Ullious leaned a little forward, eyes shining.

  “Yes.”

  The blunt monosyllable stopped conversation cold. In the distance, Vree could hear Magda filling the older bard in on the details of her life. As usual, she didn’t appear to be bothering to breathe.

  “You’re not what I expected either,” Vree admitted at last. “I thought fledglings were supposed to be young.”

  *Oh, that’s tactful.*

  “Younger,” she corrected hurriedly.

  Ullious ran a self-conscious hand over his thinning hair. “The Emperor has only allowed citizens to be tested over the last four years,” he explained. “When I heard, two years ago—news travels slowly to the South …”

  *Unless it comes with a tax collector,* Gyhard added and Vree remembered he’d been, as Aralt, governor of a Southern region.

  “I sold my carting business and went to the Capital. The bard Karlene met me at the South Gate saying the kigh told her I was coming.” He flushed with pleasure at the memory. “She didn’t have to test me. She spoke of you.”

  Vree blinked. “Two years ago?”

  “No. Twelve days ago. Tadeus had me practice Singing the kigh over long distances and from up the coast to Karlene was the longest distance we had. She said I was to see that you weren’t lonely.” He spread his hands. “Can you be lonely? I mean under the circumstances?”

  She could feel Gyhard waiting for her answer. “Homesick,” she said at last, “but not lonely.” All at once, as though they’d been waiting for her to admit it, the pale gray stone of the buildings, the scent of the surrounding herbs, even the clothes Ullious wore seemed strange and unsettling. Hurriedly, she focused on his face, which could have been any of a hundred faces from home. “And you?”

  “I am learning to be a bard, with bards. Lines drawn on a map mean nothing to that. But still …” He reached out and, fleetingly, touched the back of her hand. “It’s good to see someone from home.” Then he grinned, lightening the moment. “If only because everyone in Shkoder is so slaughtering tall.”

  Vree laughed, as much at the army curse coming from the fledgling bard as at the observation. “I’m small even for a Southerner. Magda is the first person I’ve met since I arrived that I can look in the eye.”

  As though she’d heard her name, Magda’s voice rose momentarily over the background drone of the bees. “… realized when I touched her kigh that she still blamed herself for the death of her baby. Once we knew that …”

  “She’s very special,” Ullious murmured as they both turned to look. “She’ll be able to heal a lot of people who would otherwise have no hope at all.”

  *Like us.*

  *Like us,* Vree agreed. Then she thought of Gyhard in a body of his own, and heard Ullious ask again, “Can you be lonely?” She’d already lost Bannon.

  * * * *

  By nightfall it was obvious that the thing disturbing the kigh was moving east along the mountains. It crossed from Somes to Bicaz at a ford in the Spotted Fish River and Jazep would’ve given his left leg to have been able to Sing to the water kigh at the crossing. He still had no way of knowing if more than the earth was upset.

  As he drew closer, the kigh became more and more agitated and harder to reach. If he hadn’t known better, he’d have sworn they were afraid. Certain he was only a short distance behind, he walked until he nearly put out an eye on an overhanging branch, then reluctantly made a quick, cold supper and rolled up in his blanket for what remained of the night. Although cloud cover made the dark impenetrable, he didn’t think it would rain.

  He was wrong.

  By dawn, he was wet and miserable and hoping he’d run into his quarry soon so he could make the most use of his mood. Grinding up a mouthful of dried fruit, he swung his pack up onto his back and turned toward the rising sun.

  “With any luck,” he muttered, “this thing’ll keep going all the way to Ohrid and Annice can help deal with it.”

  Then he frowned and put down his pack.

  There was something he was forgetting.

  Something important.

  Something to do with Annice.

  No, Annice’s daughter.

  Magda. A year ago, Maggi had gone to the Healers’ Hall in Elbasan for training. She not only had an incredible talent for healing, but she also Sang—or did something as near to Singing as made no difference—what they were calling a fifth kigh.

  His legs folded under him, and he found himself suddenly on the ground, mud soaking through his trousers. It took him three tries to find the pitch, but when he finally regained control of his voice, the kigh appeared as a seemingly solid barrier between him and the way he’d been traveling. This time, he knew what questions to ask.

  Dymek said he could feel Filip’s presence.

  The lost kigh was not an earth kigh.

  You have to Sing it home.

  Jazep felt physically sick. He knew why it had looked as though Filip’s body had climbed out of the grave. It had.

  But if he went back, he risked losing his chance to catch the thing he followed.

  But if he didn’t go back …

  His hands were shaking so badly he could barely trace the sign of the Circle on his chest. If he didn’t go back, Filip’s kigh would remain lost between life and death, lost outside the Circle.

  Brencis might have already returned with another bard.

  But no, he couldn’t have, for the kigh were still desperate that he return.

  He had to choose. Had to weigh what could happen against what already had. He hoped he’d never have to make another choice like that again because he doubted that the scars from this choice would ever heal.

  Sunset turned the lower margin of the clouds a sullen orange when Jazep reached Bartek Springs. He wasted no time entering the village but went directly to the graveyard. A trio of curious dogs followed him for a while but would not approach Filip’s grave.

  His heart lurched when he saw a body sprawled at the edge of the loose earth—he’d half-expected to see that the dead man had dug himself free once again—and began beating normally when he realized it was Dymek.

  The young man lifted his head and peered at Jazep through a tangled curtain of dripping hair. “He’s here,” he said, his voice hoarse from crying. “I can feel him. He’s here.”

  “Yes.” Jazep slid out of his pack and untied the padded oilskin bag that held his drum. “He is.”

  Dymek pushed himself up onto muddy knees and stared at the bard. “You mean that.”

  It wasn’t a question, but Jazep answered it anyway. “Yes,” he said ag
ain. “Filip is the lost kigh they want me to Sing home.”

  “How?”

  “I don’t know.” He only knew that it had to be done. “Will you help?”

  Turning to look at the dirt piled over his lover’s body, Dymek whispered, “I’d die for him if it would help.”

  Jazep took hold of his shoulder and shook him gently but said nothing because there was nothing to say that wouldn’t sound like a meaningless platitude. He sank cross-legged to the ground and settled his drum on his lap. If a fifth kigh existed, which it did, then it could be Sung. The earth kigh believed he could Sing it, so he had to believe them. “Tell me about Filip.”

  “He had hazel eyes,” Dymek told him, his own eyes locked on the past. “But he always said they were green. I used to tease him about it sometimes. He was a little shorter than me and . .”

  As Dymek spoke, his voice growing stronger with every memory, Jazep stroked a heartbeat out of the drum and listened past the words. Gradually, he became aware of a presence matching the undertones of Dymek’s detailing of Filip and he opened himself to contact.

  Terror so intense it bordered on insanity slammed into him. His spine bowed backward, muscles spasmed, and he screamed.

  “Filip, stop it! He’s trying to help!”

  Jazep felt the terror turn. Tried to warn Dymek. Couldn’t find his voice. Found himself lying on his back, staring at a darkening sky, blinking rain out of his eyes.

  “Bard?”

  Either Filip could touch only those with bardic talents or love had kept him from hurting Dymek. Which, at this moment, Jazep neither knew nor cared. Shaking, as much with rage that someone would dare to so abuse a kigh as in reaction, he forced himself into a sitting position and picked up his drum.

  “Bard? He didn’t mean it.”

  Startled, Jazep peered at Dymek through the dusk. The younger man’s face was a pale blur against the approaching night but his expression clearly matched the worry in his voice. The sudden realization he was grinding his teeth gave Jazep the clue he needed. “I’m not angry at Filip,” he explained. “I’m angry that such a thing was done to him.” Drawing in a deep breath, he forced himself to find a measure of calm before he continued, “But I know how to help him now.”