Hunter and Fox
Page 26
The Blood Witch fell back, as surprised as any of them. “A real Hysthshai—surely a sign to gladden the hearts of your people, Seer.”
Nyree got to her feet with a little assistance. “Not just the Vaerli. I saw many things in the darkness—including your people. We are all bound together, and it seems events are rushing toward us in ways I had not dreamed before.”
“You Saw something?” Equo asked.
“I Saw many things, dear heart, most of which I cannot understand. It has been a long time since I sat at Putorae's knee.” Nyree staggered and leaned against him. “I'm afraid, though. Afraid of what I saw in the shadows.”
“The girl needs some rest.” Varlesh poked Si into helping him get a decent campfire and breakfast. Azrul, silent since the previous night, shrieked once more from her cage.
Nyree sat down next to the Witch and asked Equo politely to help his companions. The two conversed in low tones, and being excluded definitely distressed him.
“Women's business.” Varlesh nudged him. “A Seer must chose carefully what to divulge to whom and when. They can cause untold damage otherwise, so don't take it personally.”
“I'm not.” Equo sniffed, but then squirmed underneath a disbelieving look. “Dammit, you know me too well.”
Leaving the women to it, they soon had a fire going and a reasonable breakfast cooked: wild mushrooms, slices of cured ham, and tack bread fried in the grease.
“Now that is what I call worth getting up for!” Varlesh licked his lips.
“Disgusting…” The Blood Witch was pale under her brown skin.
Nyree stood at her elbow, appearing a lot healthier and alert. “Iola will be traveling with us.”
“The more the merrier,” Equo muttered under his breath, feeling completely shut out of the decision-making process. Despite having excellent hearing, neither Vaerli nor Phaerkorn made a comment.
“Just please don't try to feed me.” Their new companion looked away. “Cooked blood smells terrible.”
Varlesh shrugged and handed Nyree a plate. “All the more for us.”
The Witch drifted off while they ate. Equo watched cautiously until she was gone. “Can we really trust the Phaerkorn?” he whispered.
“They have kept to themselves and have no dealings with the Caisah—we cannot say that about many folk.” Nyree chased a mushroom round her tin plate.
It was not an answer, and Equo was worried she had slipped into that annoying trait of seers, evasiveness. He leaned forward earnestly. “But why is she here? Do you think we cannot protect you?”
“It's not about that. I need her help to open a path. Vaerli magic is not what it once was.”
At the admission, Equo felt his stomach clench.
“We must reach Baraca today, or it will be too late.” Having finished her meal, Nyree handed Varlesh back the plate. The subject was obviously closed. The other three shared a look.
“Did it hurt?” Si leaned across and touched her face where the pae atuae had made its trails of hidden words.
She looked surprised—as if for a moment she had quite forgotten what he meant. “No, not really, but it doesn't feel quite like my own skin yet.”
Si stared hard at her for a moment before wolfing down the last of his mushrooms.
The others remained silent, but Equo caught Si's eyes across the tiny fire. In his mind was the uncomfortable thought that the last time Si had spoken such a great deal, bad things had happened after. Si was closer to the wildness that had once been the Ahouri's nature. Being Shattered had changed Equo's own perception, but there were things Si sensed that the others could not. Unfortunately, he did not have the ability to tell them directly—Varlesh was the talker.
Nyree knew little of what passed between the three of them. Having finished her food, she set about braiding back her hair in a businesslike fashion. “I will require a little time to open a path for us.”
Hearing a trace of concern in her voice, Equo was moved to ask, “Is it dangerous?”
“Anything to do with the White Void is risky. It touches Conhaero in many places, but each opening has its own particular dangers.”
They packed up and quenched the fire in silence, watched over by Azrul. The eagle no longer battered her cage; instead her attention seemed locked on Nyree. She shifted uneasily on her perch and tucked her white wings tightly about her as if sensing an oncoming storm.
Unnerved though he might be, Finn still managed to feel tired. They had spent a difficult morning watching the Salt. His eyes burned and every part of his body ached in sympathy. Talyn had used her jacket and a pile of rocks to at least make him a shelter to keep the sun off. He'd thanked her for the thoughtful gesture and asked if she would like to share the shade. The stare he got in return threatened to cool even the salt plain completely.
“There is room enough for one only,” she said, “and a Vaerli doesn't hide from the sun—or anything else.”
For a moment Finn contemplated asking her if she was afraid to be near him, but somewhere in the progress of the last few days he'd learned a little restraint. The idea of being kicked off onto the Salt had little appeal.
Instead, he dozed fitfully beneath the small shelter and watched Talyn out of the corner of one eye. She was crouched not far off, leaning back on her haunches, pistol resting on the ground close by and sword lying across her thighs. Everything about her was alert and those dark eyes never stopped scanning. It gave Finn the illusion that someone was watching out for him. He wasn't quite foolish enough to think it was any more than that.
Finn passed his time watching her. He liked doing that. Her face had stern beauty, but it was nothing like the wonder it had been when she laughed. Little chance of that now.
Finn's eyes drooped as the heat washed over him. His body felt far away, with only his mind floating in the whiteness.
“She would slit your throat in an instant if the Caisah commanded it.” The quiet voice reached him from a nearby dream—or perhaps it was his unconscious.
Talyn was beginning to like him, he was sure.
“What about that poor boy?”
Ysel. Guilt washed over him suddenly—with everything that had happened since Perilous he had almost forgotten the child. All Finn's attempts to make the pattern had failed.
“Don't you want to help him?”
He did, he needed to—but here he was stuck on the salt plain.
“All things are possible.” Suddenly the whiteness was not so calm. It was pulling at him. He felt stretched as though every inch of his skin was being flayed alive. He called out Talyn's name. This no longer felt like a dream. He caught a glimpse of her dark hair, a suggestion of hands grazing his arm, and he suddenly knew with dread certainty that it wasn't a dream.
He fell for a long time through the white with the echo of laughter around him. Fear made his heart race and his ears roar. Finn yelled against the blankness of it all until there was no other sound to the world than that.
Then he began to discern patterns in the whiteness, fluctuations that reminded him of the patterns he'd once woven with his fingers. He grasped this suggestion of sanity. Raising his hands to them, he let his mind blend into the lines as they had before. A curious calmness drifted over him, until there was nothing but the patterns and the shifting light.
They resolved themselves into a woman's face and, though the light passed through it, he could still tell it was the face of a Vaerli woman. It wasn't Talyn, though. This face had none of the warring emotions and barely-held dark passions. Instead it was a face of deep peace that made even this frightening in-between place seem safe. Finn smiled—or at least he felt as though he was smiling, even though he was no longer sure he had a face.
“We meet again!” the woman's voice rang through the light.
He was incapable of answering. Perhaps his throat was in the same place as his face.
“You don't remember anything of me, I know that. However, a child knows his mother all the same.”
“You have escaped them this once, my son, but they will come for you again. Remember when the storm is the darkest and blinds you, I will be there. You have my blood in you. Hold tight to it and do not forget your mother.”
The light was burning brighter now and whatever strange world he had slipped into was letting go of him. He had the fleeting impression of lips on his forehead and the scent of flowers, and then his body materialized around his senses.
Finn felt an iron grip on his upper arm, more real than anything else. It pulled with a persistence that could not be denied. By sheer pressure of will, Talyn the Dark pulled him back into the real world. He fell into it with a gasp, to find himself lying across her: heart pounding, face-to-face. For the briefest of moments he could have sworn he saw stars in that gaze.
He wanted to tell her how beautiful she was and how much he had missed her despite everything, but the words would not come. It was a real first for him.
“You are no feather,” Talyn finally said, rolling him off her with a huff.
“I'm sorry,” he stammered leaping to his feet. Was he imagining a blush on her cheek as well? “What just happened?”
“They tried to take you. Somehow they opened the White Void and were pulling you through.”
“To where?”
“That I cannot say—but nowhere pleasant, I would think.”
Remembering the woman with the ring of heads, Finn shivered. “In that case, thank you.”
“I would hold onto your appreciation. I don't know if I have the strength to do it again. My powers, unlike theirs, have their limits.” It was the first time Talyn had shown real concern, and the slight crack in her voice made Finn even more nervous.
A light remark, something to break the tension would have been his usual response—this time though he could find nothing. He sat back down under the makeshift shelter and waited.
It didn't take long. She came and sat down next to him, folding her arms around her legs. Finn was aware how close she was—the smell of leather mingling with the strange, spicy scent of her hair and an almost palpable heat against his arm. “What happened to the Kindred that saved you at Perilous?”
That one caught him unawares. He shifted uncomfortably. “Why do you ask that?”
Talyn whirled about and glared at him. “Because there is more to you, Finnbarr the Fox, than meets the eye! A Kindred saved you, the Caisah wants you, and I was told to bring you here by an apparition.”
The last one made him blink. “What?”
She only smiled enigmatically and wouldn't explain.
He feigned disinterest and shrugged. “I'm nothing special.” He hoped his small gift would make her drop the subject.
“I'll be the judge of that.” Her eyes narrowed dangerously. “Now tell me about the Kindred.”
“It left me or lost me…I can't tell which…back at the Caracel.”
She considered that for a while, lowering her eyes and seemingly consulting some interior knowledge. “I doubt that. Kindred can develop very fierce attachments. For one to intervene seems to say there is more to you.”
“Well,” Finn murmured, breaking her gaze with difficulty, “you must be wrong, because it isn't here now.”
“The connection remains.” She fiddled with the Caisah's pistol. “I think you should call it.”
For a moment he couldn't quite believe what Talyn had said, but despite that he could only ask, “How?”
She held out her hand, and after a hesitation he took it. Talyn shook her head. “I never would have thought…”
Daringly, Finn squeezed her fingers. “You'd be holding hands with me?”
She laughed, a short, sharp, surprising sound. “No, never would have thought I'd be showing someone not a Vaerli how to do this. Never mind. Close your eyes. Think of the Kindred.”
Doing so gave Finn an intense moment of vertigo similar to the feeling of the pattern in the cat's cradle. He could feel Talyn, not just the warmth of her hands but also her presence. She burned through his senses. Finn could smell her and feel her behind his eyes. It felt as though if he reached out, he could crawl inside her head. Her thoughts were not so very far from his…
Call for it! Her voice crawled up his spine, reminding him of the task at hand. Think of the last time you saw it. Think of it coming to you.
Finn had a hard time recalling what it looked like. It had a tail and wings, but it seemed to have been more…
The connection was suddenly broken, and Talyn was throwing his hands away from hers with a shout. “What have you done?” She looked simultaneously horrified and delighted.
Finn blinked, still stunned by the abrupt breaking of the connection. “What?”
Talyn leapt to her feet and now scanned the sky. “You Named him, you idiot—you Named a Kindred!” The delight had faded away quickly. Now she seemed just very, very angry.
“I don't understand.”
She dragged him up and pointed back in the direction they had come. Finn didn't understand until he saw the shape of dark wings flying toward them like a spear of darkness against the shocking blue of the sky.
“What…” his voice dried up on him. “What is that?”
Talyn growled, “Save me from mad fools! You have summoned something you do not even know the Name of, but it was you who gave it to him!”
Finn felt his stomach drop away. He'd studied at the Master Talespinner's knee. He knew the tales of the Named Kindred. The shape in the sky was drawing closer, and with it a power almost unrivaled in Conhaero.
“Now, foolish man, you will see the power of the Named.” Talyn, in a frightening gesture of surrender, sheathed her sword and turned toward the shadow.
The White Void. Equo looked over his shoulder at Varlesh and Si. Though their people had come through it long ago, it had not lost any of its mystery and danger. Songs of the passing had been lost, along with all their other memories when they were sundered. Still, some deep racial memory made him uneasy.
Shortly after morning, Nyree had asked them to build up the fire and take their places cross-legged around it. Then, as unashamed as only a Vaerli could be, she stripped off her tunic until all she wore was a chased-silver necklace. Equo watched her with a dry throat as she unbound her dark hair. It did nothing to hide her golden-skinned beauty or make him any more comfortable.
He tried to concentrate on the necklace. She must have worn it beneath her clothes all this time. It was an intricate creation—as all Vaerli art was. The swirling silver arms of the World Tree held a small vial of a dark substance. It was very beautiful; nestled there between her breasts, beating with her heart…
Equo looked away. Varlesh nudged him hard, so he dared to look back. Now Nyree raised the vial to her lips. A vague shimmer seemed to run down that beautiful form, then she began to dance. Circling the fire with strange shuffling steps, Nyree sang wordlessly. Her voice rose, finding impossibly beautiful notes. A powerful rhythm ran through the song described by the beat of her bare feet on the earth.
Before long, the rest of the group found themselves clapping along with it. Time seemed to flow oddly. Eventually, Equo's hands stung from the clapping and his eyes from the smoke. The whole world seemed to be encompassed by that circle. Reality blurred to nothing. Only the sound and the dance remained.
How long had Nyree been moving? That long black hair was stuck to her body with sweat, and her eyes were fixed to a point beyond any sight. The rest of them swayed to her rhythm, pounded out the circle with her in their heads.
As the pace changed, rising faster and faster, Nyree held out her hand to the Blood Witch. She joined the dance. The two women swung around each other, pounding feet and hands. Finally, as the song rose to a climax, the Witch tore her hand open with her own fangs. Nyree ab
ruptly dropped to her knees as Iola placed her bloody palm against the Vaerli's chest.
She threw up her arms so that the firelight ran down the blue tattooed lines as if they were filling up with something. She called out, the first words in what must have been hours. “I accept!”
The air bent and shifted as white light burst forth from the spot where Nyree stood.
Few things in the world surprised Equo, but he was not of the Vaerli and had no knowledge of the White Void. It spilled out into reality with the power of all nature unleashed. The roar and the fury of it ruptured the trance that Nyree had built—knocking the others to the ground. Through his fingers, Equo peered out into the pure whirlwind of the space between worlds, the agony of which his ancestors had dared to reach this place. It tore at him with its beauty and its peril.
Only Nyree had remained on her feet, staring into that rift. Her dark nakedness was a shadow against its brightness, while her hair streamed in a wild corona. Squinting against the light, Equo saw her help the Blood Witch up. She screamed something into Iola's ear, something that she had to repeat twice. The other woman nodded and then turned away from the Void, running hard to escape its pull. She disappeared into the frantically waving forest.
He had no time to question Nyree about what she had said, for she was now calling to them.
She seemed so fragile, but she was Vaerli, and so they placed themselves in her keeping. Varlesh, pulling the shocked donkey after him by sheer physical strength, went first.
The light took them up and fluttered around the space they had been. The other men followed. Silence beat on Equo's ears painfully until he gave up his own scream unto the Void. The weight was too much, and he was sure they would all be shattered into thousands of pieces.
Then they were through on the other side, blinking and dazed. Varlesh was throwing up into the scrub, while Si gazed about in a dazzled awe. A wave of nausea washed over Equo, and he had to lean against their pack animal for a moment.
“Are we there?” Varlesh asked weakly, standing up and wiping his mouth.