Hearts and Stones (Celta HeartMate)

by Robin D. Owens

No. If the person treated me ill, he loses what is most important to him. Loses more than if I like him.

  “I don’t understand that,” Zane replied curtly, but that sure explained finding the brooch here. “You just became aware,” he added.

  It just happens. I don’t do it on purpose. A pause. I don’t think, but if I’m upset--Maybe.

  “This always happens?” Zane’s voice cracked. He couldn’t lose the last of his sight, of his Flair, of both, and survive. Could not. Not today. Yes, the House had trapped him.

  He turned and pounded a fist on the wall, hurting his fingers. Didn’t care.

  Why did you do that? D and D asked.

  Zane refused to answer.

  I feel ... heat from you.

  “It’s the heat of anger. You know of anger, ire, fury, don’t you?” Zane snarled. “Why don’t you think on that concept.”

  But he couldn’t stay still. If the House had been aware longer, Zane would have thought it bluffed. Couldn’t count on that.

  As he shuffled to the doorway, turned at the threshold and walked down the entry hall to the main door, he strained to see. And to feel the object in his fingers as more than a brooch, a true treasure.

  Gray-shading-into-black sight. Nothing but shaped metal inset with faceted gems.

  Face it. He’d already lost his sight and Flair.

  Today. Fligger.

  The tiles under his feet squeaked, then the House said, You will lose the brooch and the reward if you leave.

  Minor compared to what he’d already lost. Almost he let his fingers release the thing. His lips curled before he replied, “It is not an honorable act, to constrain someone against his or her wishes. To imprison them.”

  It is not an honorable act to abandon someone! the House shot back.

  “I’ll come back,” Zane grated out.

  I do not believe you. This time D and D’s voice whispered so tiny Zane couldn’t catch any emotion from him.

  “Keep the brooch then.” Zane let it fall. A wind whisked the artifact away. Setting his hand on the latch, he braced and shoved the door open, and followed it into a blizzard.

  His caught breath sucked icy air into his lungs, wind whirled around him, pelting him with snow. He saw white, and thought even if he’d had his vision, it would have been the same.

  MotherDam? he called with his mind.

  Nothing.

  No sense of how to go. He’d turned right into the house, but how many blocks had he walked since the last turn? How many times had he jogged left or right? He couldn’t recall because he hadn’t paid attention. First rule of treasure hunting, know where you were and how you got there, and he’d ignored that, sunk in despair. Big mistake.

  And if he stood out here more than a few minutes, he would die.

  If he tried to find his way home, he would perish.

  Turning in place, he sensed the quietness of the open door of Debris and Detritus, and returned, shutting it behind him.

  The lock clicked shut. He didn’t care. Didn’t even care when he heard inner bars slide across the door.

  You DID come back, the House said tentatively.

  “The weather is too bad. I can’t make it home in a blizzard. I have to wait it out.” He returned to the pillar and slid down it.

  Emotion radiated from the man in wild pulses beating against Debris and Detritus’ walls, small heat from that emotion sank into the House’s floor where Zane sat.

  The man did not speak to him further.

  What could the House do to interest him again? To make him think about the non-mobile being Zane shared space with?

  He had said he was a curious man.

  Debris and Detritus stretched his mind, considered all of his contents--the things transient people had left, and those items the people who had made him had stored near his HeartStones, his brain.

  Papyrus instructions, ancient books, audios that D and D had not the skill to access. Memory spheres, but they were too odd and strange for D and D, experiencing the world as a human did. Vizes--recordings of his man and his woman.

  He could run a viz for Zane.

  Straining with the effort of a new ability, D and D projected the viz from one of the stones in his walls.

  There, there, three dimensional holographic images formed.

  “If I am Debris, you must be Detritus,” the man said.

  “What’s that?” demanded Zane.

  A viz, D and D replied.

  An ugly, spiky noise came from Zane, harder emotions flashed from him. “I’m blind, House, I can’t see a viz.”

  Oh, terrible that he’d hurt Zane. I am sorry, he whispered in his tiniest voice. I just wanted you to see my naming.

  The House sounded like a child, and its words stopped Zane’s futile and ironic laughter. He wiped his sleeve over the wetness on his face, lingering from the storm, his runny nose. Anything remotely like civilized manners were lost to him.

  The future looked--was--dim. Ha, ha.

  So may as well while away the time with the past while the blizzard raged.

  “Go ahead,” he said gruffly. “Play it, I can hear the dialog, listen.”

  Very well, Zane, came the high childish voice again. But then, in any terms, Debris and Detritus was a child, even less, a baby with only a full day’s awareness. The House’s first tones of mature and male were wrong.

  “Watch where you’re going,” boomed a woman’s voice. “You’ve broken the last vase. Left debris all over the floor. Well, I am not going to clean it up this time. It can sit until you do it!”

  “No, you’re a lump of inenergy, aren’t you? If I’m debris, you’re detritus. The detritus that life has left of a woman,” said the man whose voice D and D had copied.

  A gasp, then a sniff. “Well, Mister Papadakis, I don’t think that’s very nice of you.”

  In a lofty tone, the man replied, “We are no longer Papadakis. We are the Family Parietaria, and I missed being a GraceLord by one percent.”

  Zane snorted. That sounded like an old excuse to him. The whole scene sounded well-worn, though it kept his mind off his aches and his future.

  The woman grumbled, “But you spend your days researching and writing about that ancient heritage of yours, and too much time at night, too.”

  The man gave a sharp gasp and Zane wondered if he’d gotten an elbow in the ribs.

  He found himself smiling, more, his back had loosened up and he’d relaxed against the column. His shivering had subsided into occasional shudders, though his exhaled breath still felt warm against his face.

  “Fascinating stuff,” the man said. “I’m pretty damn sure that primal energies tagged along with us on our starships.” Followed by a hiccup that sounded drunk. Then words continued, “Small and large entities. Why not? Our main religion of the Divine Couple is not exclusive.”

  “An inclusive religion is a very good thing,” said the woman. “The easiest way for humans to pick a fight is to base it upon religious intolerance. We brought our religious fervor with us, in many forms--”

  “Our beliefs. Energies might stick to those, form into what we believed,” said the male, more ponderous.

  “Or the major energies of the Divine Couple are real,” whispered the woman.

  “Who knows?” he grumbled. “And since you complained ...” A wet smooch ... kissing?

  Zane straightened from nodding off and cleared his throat. “Very educational.” he said. “You can stop that now.” He drew in a very cold breath and warning bells alarmed in his mind.

  Then he knew. The house was too cold. He would not make it until morning.

  Despite the shelter, the cold would invade and he’d freeze to death. With eyes open to dark gray, he contemplated how long it would take for his Family to find him.

  Worse came to worse, they’d hire one of the Blackthorns to track him--the FirstFamily GrandLord with great Flair and an equally great price, or one of that man’s distant cuzes with a minor gift. In any event, it would on
ly be to find his corpse--and the Ivy artifact, of course. If D and D allowed them to leave with the brooch.

  Zane’s whole body curled as he laughed. Now that his doom had come, he realized he didn’t want to die.

  Why do you make those noises, Zane? asked the House.

  “I’m dying.”

  What!

  “My lifeforce is being extinguished by the cold. Sort of amusing. You came to life yesterday and I die today.”

  No!

  Zane leaned back, kept his eyes open to blackness. “I have no Flair,” he croaked. “Not even to call my Family. Not even to light a fire. I’m blind, I can’t teleport when blind. I can’t leave here and enter a raging blizzard. I would not find my way home.”

  No, no, NO! said the House. I will not let you die.

  The House was full of ‘noes.’

  I cannot have another death within my walls, another decaying human shell. It is terrible. Vermin come. They burrow into me and gnaw on me and bad stuff coats my walls.

  That gave Zane pause. “Huh. If you prefer me to die outside your walls, I can stagger some meters down the street.” He coughed. It racked his body, lasting longer than he’d anticipated. Well, it wouldn’t bother him tomorrow.

  No! I want YOU as my Family, the voice in his head sobbed.

  Coughing again, Zane said, “There is a fireplace in this room. If you have wood or coal and you can light the fire, I might survive the night.” And maybe he should stop talking and just think words at the House.

  This is why you mobile beings constructed me! I am failing in my duty!

  Uh-oh.

  Not your fault, Zane projected mentally to Debris and Detritus. You don’t feel the cold, didn’t know I needed more warmth than you can give me.

  The ceiling split. Zane heard plaster break, felt chunks rain just behind him. A thump hit a few centimeters near him and he coughed from the dust.

  WOOD! cried the House. A beam, use it for fire!

  Lady and Lord, Zane matched the moan of Debris and Detritus, Why did you do that! I don’t want to hurt you.

  It is done. The pain of the lost beam does not hurt me as much as my ... fear ... for you.

  “Sorry,” Zane managed aloud, through numb lips. But he scrabbled toward the beam, got slivers as he found the broken edge, ignored his back pain as he hauled the thirty-centimeter beam to the fire.

  Then he panted and rested. Even such a short exertion exhausted him. His mind fogged as he wondered how to light the beam. Too awful to make the House set fire to one of its bones for him.

  Fumbling in his pouch his nearest sister had equipped and fastened on his belt herself, he touched various objects, then found a bespelled firestarter that would work even underwater. No additional Flair needed.

  He lit the beam, feeling ghoulish, and rolled to the fire, but began to sink into a sleep he knew he wouldn’t awaken from. Sor-ry, Debris and Detritus ... just too late. I am glad of your companionship, though I am sorry I cannot spare you the distress of my corpse. He paused and listened to his slow and ragged breaths, the only sound he made. Debris and Detritus, I think if you REACH OUT mentally, you could contact other intelligent Houses and Residences. You are not alone.

  I AM! You are leaving me alone! The entire House seemed to contract in the wail that trembled through Zane.

  Not enough, the House wept in creaks around him. Not nearly enough. Please do not die, Zane. Please, fight. I do not wish to stay sentient if another one of my beings dies. I cannot bear it.

  A child, no, baby’s cry, that Zane could not ignore. He couldn’t summon his Flair, but he could gather all the strength he had. We ... will ... work ... together.

  A pause in the lament.

  How?

  Zane struggled with sluggish thoughts. Think or die.

  You have Flair. As you were constructed and as you stood, the people who lived here gave you strength and energy throughout your lifetime until you became aware.

  Yes!

  If you can share a little of that with me ...

  I can! I WILL!

  Right. I don’t know how we can share. Maybe if you run some energy down the beam in the fireplace--

  We will work together! *I* know how we can share energy. My HeartStones--

  And I WILL NOT hurt you further, by messing with your HeartStones.

  You cannot hurt me through them. I have much untapped energy that I can share!

  Maybe he shouldn’t put his trust into a newly aware House, a baby, but he had nothing left to lose. Zane found himself clearing his throat, mumbling, “All right then. Tell me what to do.”

  Stand up and face the fireplace! The order rang in his ears, reverberating oddly as if more than one being addressed him.

  Nearly beyond his strength, he forced himself up, staggered, each step jarring his back, making his lungs bellow with breath.

  Place your hands on the heads of the sculptures flanking the fireplace. Your reach is wide enough, a high snappish voice instructed, not the House’s usual tones.

  Zane blinked, saw only blackness, but now that the House mentioned it, he could feel the irregularities of sculptures. He moved forward, reached out, and found the tops of the heads of two figures, one male, one female, in the same style as those on the front of the House.

  Not just your fingers, curve your hands around the facial features of Debris and Detritus, too! A deeper voice intoned, and now the atmosphere around him seemed to seethe with energy. Heat rose from the fireplace as the beam crackled, burning.

  He palmed the faces of the figures.

  NOW!

  Lightning sizzled, arcing through him and he yelled. He’d tapped into the centuries-accrued energy of the House.

  Pain zapped down every nerve, slid over his skin, sank to his marrow, raw power.

  He screamed as the force filled him, overflowed, heard the House shriek, too. Definitely felt the whoosh of the beam as it zipped away from the fireplace, lifted to the ceiling, creaked into place.

  He connected with the House, they melded together for an instant and his own ribs shivered as the beam became whole, the burned end augmented with Flair and other ... bits of wood left in the rooms. Plaster ladened the air as the ceiling mended to better than new.

  He and the House groaned together. As the energies blew through him, he went toppling when his hands lifted from the statues of Debris and Detritus.

  He crumpled, stunned.

  I love you, said the House. I will always shelter and protect you, D and D said in the tone of a solemn oath.

  Loving Zane? That was too damn quick, but he didn’t say so. Words formed slowly as darkness tugged at the ragged edges of Zane’s mind, complete sincerity, I will always cherish and preserve you. My ... vow ... of ... honor.

  The man, Zane Aster, Debris and Detritus’ Family, lay still. D and D stayed quiet himself so he could sense all Zane’s life indicators. He breathed, evenly, steadily. His muscles lay relaxed against the House’s mainspace floor, his body warm.

  They had saved him. Zane would live.

  D and D’s inner trembling receded. He felt as if he, too, could breathe. Odd that he began to think of himself in mobile entity--human--terms, but so it was.

  Zane awoke to heat and he felt that he lay in a patch of sunlight. Even with his eyes closed he could delineate the ragged swatch of light on his body. He snorted. Eyes closed, right. From what he remembered of the evening before, he wouldn’t see anything with his eyes open ... or straining all his Flair.

  Both gone forever.

  But ... he felt that sunlight. And his normal senses fed information to him, his skin, his brain, with a nearly painful acuity. As if those senses had expanded, no, magnified. Expanded exponentially. He smiled at the alliteration and opened his eyes.

  Not darkness, but gray. A wavery gray like smoke. He didn’t know what that meant other than he remained blind.

  “I survived,” he croaked aloud. “We survived.”

  Yes. We survived, the Hous
e whispered in his mind. The sunshine on my outer walls has heated them warmer today than many days lately.

  “The storm has passed and the weather is better.”

  Yes, Zane.

  He could hear all the creaks and soughs of the House, some slight scratching of glass, like branches on windows. But not on this level. Straining his ears, he realized the sounds emanated from one of the back rooms of the third floor.

  His breath caught with a gasp that became a cough. But this cough didn’t emanate deep from his lungs, racking him.

  No, he continued to feel good--in muscle and bone, skin and tendon. His back felt Healed. No frostburn or windburn on his face.

  He simply had no sight and no Flair.

  But his senses seemed greatly augmented, a conundrum. Something that had occurred when he’d linked with the House the night before? Or the continuing strange results of the underwater accident that had almost killed him and taken his sight and Flair?

  Who knew?

  Who cared about the why? He didn’t.

  With an easy move, he rolled to his feet, stretched, popping joints. Yep, felt good.

  “The room is warmer.” He turned toward the fireplace, could sense the dimensions of the open interior, the individual pieces of charcoal in the pile, glowing red or white.

  His hands recalled the feel of the two carved statues on each side of the fireplace with enough detail that he could form the images, male and female, in his mind’s eye.

  Slowly he turned in place. His sight yet showed a dark flat gray. But the pressure on his skin, even through his clothes, told him where the columns were, the five tall rectangular windows in the back. He knew how far the ceiling loomed over his head, and the dimensions of the doorway a few strides away.

  Turning his palm upward, he commanded, “Lightspell!”

  Nothing. Not a bit of Flair for him to draw on, the psi magic he’d felt pulse through his nerves all his life.

  Blind and empty of Flair.

  Zane? the House sounded nervous.

  “I’m here,” he said absently, still taking stock. Trusting in this new awareness, he strode across the room, stopped a few centimeters before a column. Raising a hand, he brushed it over the cool stone and frowned, it seemed to him that the pillar was of a light-colored marble ... but not white. Odd.