Whisper of Leaves

by Unknown

  ‘Not necessarily. Arkendrin might kill her after she leaves the forest.’ Tarkenda shrugged. ‘Assuming the Healer of the Last Telling is the Healer of the forest, and the gold is the gold of her eyes. The Sky Chiefs are not renowned for the clarity of their sendings. It might mean that Arkendrin takes us north, beyond the Braghan Mountains, as he’s long wanted to do. Then there’d certainly be fighting. The Northerners aren’t going to tolerate us on the plains.’

  ‘There would be much blood spilled,’ said Palansa grimly, ‘and the Telling says it will be ours.’

  ‘Fire will be the flatsword’s bane and bring the dead to life again,’ said Tarkenda.

  ‘How can fire destroy flatswords other than by melting them?’ demanded Palansa. ‘Was there fire in your visions?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Tarkenda, her brows knitting in a heavy frown. ‘But what the Sky Chiefs send is not like the view over the Grounds, but fragments of this and that, flowing together like weed under water.’

  ‘It’s strange the Sky Chiefs speak to you in this way,’ said Palansa. ‘Perhaps they aid us, intending my son to be Chief.’

  ‘I’m not sure it’s aid they send.’ Tarkenda was old enough to know that the Sky Chiefs favoured no one, but she didn’t want to crush Palansa’s hope, remembering all too well how important hope had been in the long nights after Ergardrin’s death. ‘Did Ormadon tell you that Arkendrin has taken Irason south-west?’ she asked. ‘No doubt he intends to use him to speak to one of the treemen.’

  ‘The treemen will be on their guard now and unlikely to be wandering about alone in the trees,’ pointed out Palansa, rising and rubbing her back. ‘Arkendrin will have trouble finding the Healer, which bodes well for us.’

  Tarkenda’s fingers drummed the table. ‘I don’t think any of it bodes well,’ she said. ‘Spilt blood has a habit of drawing more.’ Her shrewd gaze fixed on Palansa. ‘Have you heard tell of how Erboran died?’

  ‘No. Only Arkendrin’s braggings about his own valiant efforts.’

  ‘You’d think it would be simple to kill a single, unarmed girl, wouldn’t you? Yet Erboran’s dead and she lives,’ said Tarkenda. As if the Sky Chiefs favoured her, Tarkenda thought.

  ‘What are you saying?’ asked Palansa.

  ‘That the Last Telling might be a warning.’

  ‘But of course it’s a warning. The Healer mustn’t be allowed to see a setting sun, or else the rest of the Telling will follow.’

  ‘Or we will cause it to follow.’

  ‘You speak in riddles,’ said Palansa irritably. She’d settled on the seat again.

  ‘Arkendrin boasts that the loss of Erboran’s life was avenged by the deaths of many in the forest; that he slew those who had stood with the Healer at their wooden sorcha,’ said Tarkenda. ‘The Healer might flee the forest to escape us.’

  ‘You think the Sky Chiefs have tricked us?’ said Palansa.

  ‘It’s not for us to judge the Sky Chiefs,’ said Tarkenda with sudden solemnity, ‘nor to question the moons of honouring owed to those who have now passed into their realm.’

  ‘You’ll seed the sorchas with the idea that the Telling can be read two ways?’ asked Palansa, not put off by Tarkenda’s sudden change of tack.

  Tarkenda eyed her approvingly. Erboran had chosen his join-wife well. ‘I think it’s time you called a Speak. Such an important possibility needs to be debated.’

  ‘And the warriors need to be reminded of the importance of honouring the dead,’ said Palansa. ‘We can hardly expect the Sky Chiefs to lend us the wisdom to fathom their Tellings, if we withhold the respect owed to them.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Tarkenda. ‘It would be good to remind the likes of Irdodun and Urpalin of the cost of licking at Arkendrin’s heels.’

  Palansa’s face hardened and she cradled her belly in her hands. ‘Two moons of mourning, little one; two more moons for you to grow strong.’

  30

  Kest had stopped again and was holding the map up to the lamp. ‘We should have been out by now,’ he said, chewing on his lip thoughtfully. ‘Of course, this might be totally inaccurate.’

  Kira resisted the temptation to sit down, fearing she’d never get up again. ‘It shows the training rooms and the Water Cavern in the right places, and the Sarnia Room.’ Even speaking had become an effort.

  ‘Then it can’t be to scale. We should’ve come to the opening by now.’ Kest stared back the way they’d come. ‘Unless we’ve missed it.’

  ‘We haven’t missed it, Kest.’

  ‘How can you be certain?’

  ‘We’ve got a lamp and two sets of eyes.’

  Kest grimaced, refolding the map.

  ‘It can’t be much further,’ said Kira, starting off again. ‘I hope,’ she added under her breath.

  She trudged on and after a while the tunnel began to climb, imperceptibly at first, then more steeply. ‘It must be ending,’ called Kira over her shoulder.

  ‘Keep your voice down,’ warned Kest, hurrying after her, ‘and don’t get too far ahead.’

  Kira nodded and slowed her pace. Once she had the fireweed, they’d need to get back to the training rooms as swiftly as possible. It would probably be best administered by a paste directly on the wound. The sheaf had described the fireweed as highly potent, so she wouldn’t need much . . . Then her eyes widened and she came to a stop, Kest all but cannoning into her.

  ‘What –’ Then he saw what she’d seen. ‘Stinking heart-rot!’

  The tunnel had broken, one branch going left, the other turning sharply right.

  ‘Look at the map,’ said Kira.

  ‘I don’t need to. It doesn’t show any stinking junction.’

  Kira stared at the walls but there was no soot, or brackets for lamps, or markings of any kind to show which way to go.

  ‘We could toss a stone for it,’ suggested Kest sourly.

  ‘We’ll try the tunnel on the right,’ said Kira.

  ‘Why the right?’

  Kira sighed. ‘The first entrance was easterly, remember?’

  ‘It might loop back west, or south or north for all we know.’

  ‘Well, let’s find out.’

  Kira strode forward with more confidence than she felt, but the tunnel twisted back on itself and her heart sank. She kept going, for want of a better alternative, and after a little it swung east again and started to climb.

  ‘It looks like –’ she began, then froze.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Did you hear that?’ It sounded like the clash of metal against metal.

  Kest shook his head and his sword whispered free. They stood straining into the darkness, their hearts thudding. Nothing. Kira wondered if she’d imagined the noise and was about to suggest going on when it sounded again.

  Kest thrust Kira behind him and Kira’s heart roared, drowning all thought. Then the noise came again, sounding oddly familiar now, and she breathed again.

  ‘I think it’s birds,’ she whispered.

  ‘No bird sounds like that,’ Kest hissed back.

  ‘I think the stone’s distorting it.’

  ‘Wait here,’ said Kest, setting down the lamp and moving away, the gleam of his sword the last thing Kira saw before the darkness swallowed him.

  Silence closed in and after a while Kira started pacing up and down, feeling that doing anything was better than simply waiting, and hugging herself despite the mildness of the air. What if Kest didn’t return? What if the Shargh were lying in wait? They might already have killed Kest and be creeping back down the tunnel towards her. She felt vulnerable exposed in the pool of light. Her scalp prickled and she imagined she could hear stealthy footsteps. Then she could hear stealthy footsteps! She looked round wildly but there were no weapons! Snatching up the lamp, she drew her arm back. Hot oil in their faces should give her a few moments before their blades plunged into her back.

  She sucked in her breath, bracing herself, then Kest emerged from the murk. With a choking gasp, she collapsed int
o his arms.

  ‘Kira! What is it?’ He extricated the lamp carefully from her grip.

  ‘I thought . . .’ She was shaking, the tremors making speech difficult. She buried her face in his shirt, drawing in the scents of sweat and dust and burned espin as his arms tightened round her.

  ‘I thought you were dead,’ she mumbled, drawing away and busying herself by smoothing her crumpled shirt.

  ‘Pecked to death by a nest of tippets. You were right, the stone does do strange things to sound. The entrance can’t be very far ahead – I could see light. We need take care. Come.’ He took her hand, for which she was grateful, and they went forward, the tunnel bending twice more before the light began to grow, the stone going from black to brown to the silvery sheen of dusk. The noise they’d heard resolved itself into the chirp of tippets, then the sounds of springleslips and leaf thrushes intruded, the air losing its dankness and taking on the myriad scents of the forest. But instead of the tunnel opening up as they’d expected, it came to an end.

  Kest held the lamp aloft, illuminating the tumbled rock-wall confronting them and the pale sun-starved tendrils of sour-ripe vine falling from a small opening above.

  Kest stared up at it. ‘We’ve come all this stinking way for nothing.’

  ‘I can fit through,’ said Kira.

  ‘No!’

  ‘Kest . . .’ she protested.

  ‘Absolutely not! I forbid it.’

  ‘We agreed you wouldn’t hold me prisoner again.’

  ‘We agreed we’d stay together.’ His hands came to his hips. ‘You’re asking me to break every tenet of Protector training, to toss aside every rule I’ve obeyed for eight seasons – and that I’ve forced my trainees to obey on pain of incarceration! I can’t do it, Kira. I won’t do it.’

  Kest’s face was haggard, his eyes dark with exhaustion. We’re the same, Kira realised abruptly. Kest needs to protect in the same way that I need to heal. The revelation calmed her and she laid her hand on his arm.

  ‘Kasheron never intended protecting and healing to fight each other, but to work together to make the Tremen strong. Most of the wounded in the training rooms are Protectors, Kest. Kesilini lives because of them. I live because of them. They did what they were trained to do. Now let me do what I’m trained to do.’

  ‘Don’t ask me to do this, Kira.’

  There was a long silence.

  ‘I’ll need your help to reach the opening, Kest.’

  He shook his head. ‘How did you get to be so cursed stubborn?’

  His voice was ragged and she made a determined effort to lighten hers. ‘Perhaps it’s the company I’ve been keeping.’

  He didn’t smile. ‘Our agreement stands. You go straight there and come directly back. If there’s no fireweed, you don’t go looking for it, and you’re to wait till dark.’

  Kira nodded. ‘It’s almost dark now. Give me a leg up.’

  ‘Wait,’ said Kest, drawing his sword. ‘I’ll clear the sour-ripe.’

  ‘No. It’s better the opening stays hidden,’ she said. ‘A few scratches won’t kill me.’

  ‘But the Shargh will.’ His warm hands cupped her face, forcing her to meet his eyes. ‘You have no love for yourself, Kira, but you are loved by many. Remember that.’

  Kira nodded, her throat too tight to speak. Then Kest linked his hands and she placed her foot in them, bringing their faces close together.

  ‘Take very great care, Kira.’

  She nodded again and he hefted her skyward, so that she was able to grab the edge of the opening, and kick her way forward. The sour-ripe dragged her back, as if intent on preventing her exit, but she pushed it aside and wedged her shoulders through, finally scrabbling clear of it into the leaf litter. Her hands were horribly scratched but she’d kept the worst of it off her face, and there was a major compensation for her pain and effort: the sour-ripe was loaded with fruit.

  ‘A fair trade,’ she muttered, stuffing her mouth and filling her pockets, ‘your flesh for mine.’ She ate greedily, the sweet juices slaking her thirst and sating her empty belly, then crawling back to the opening, called softly to Kest.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Catch.’

  There was an exclamation and a muffled chuckle.

  ‘I’ll get some more when I come back.’

  ‘Be swift,’ whispered Kest, but she was already gone.

  Kest lowered himself onto the dusty floor and quenched the lamp to save the oil. It was completely dark outside now, the edges of the opening limned by star sheen and light from the waning moon. It would be a good time to get some sleep, but his mind was squalling. He shouldn’t have let her go. The totality of Kasheron’s dream was now held only by Kira, and he, Kest of Morclan and would-be Protector Commander, had sent her off alone into a forest that might well be crawling with Shargh. He rested his head against the stone and shut his eyes. Yet what was the alternative? Backtrack until they’d found the second opening? One that he could fit through too? If there was one. Force Kira back to watch the wounded die, like he’d intended? He sighed. What was the point of fretting? For good or ill, she was gone and he’d just have to wait for what was to come.

  In the trees above, Kira ran with a mixture of fear and desperation. The fear kept her scanning constantly, avoiding the crack and snap of brittle windfall and keeping to the darkest blots of shadow. She concentrated on tricking her mind into believing that the pain in her body didn’t exist. But she couldn’t dispel the doubt that threatened to overwhelm her.

  If she were right in her reckoning, and if the opening to the Warens were where she thought it was, then the lands bordering Sarnia Cave should be close by. Should be! Yet she recognised nothing. The leaf litter near Sarnia Cave had been dry and thick while here it scarcely covered the simpleweed. Maybe the opening she’d scrambled through wasn’t in Kenclan at all; maybe the map was completely wrong. Panic bubbled as she scanned frantically, seeing nothing beyond the walling trees. Perhaps higher ground would help her to orientate herself.

  She started up the slope, then stopped, suddenly remembering that there had been white stone poking from the ground near the cave, and even with only a part moon, she should be able to see it. But the ground was dark. Maybe it was the next slope, she thought quickly, stilling the surge of panic. Or maybe she was completely lost. Gritting her teeth, she turned and forced her trembling legs down into the shallow valley and up the other side. She had to stop often to catch her breath and sleeve the sweat from her eyes, and when she finally reached the next crest, she rewarded herself with the last of the sour-ripe, sucking it down between pants.

  A nearby bitterberry thrashed sideways and she stifled a scream, barely aware of the leaf thrush winging away. All around her the leaves whispered, and scuttles in the undergrowth took on the sounds of hunting footsteps, so that she had to fight the urge to continually look over her shoulder.

  She went on, straining into the gloom, and seeing a pale glimmer on the adjacent slope. Micklefungus or stone? She struggled down through the bitterberry and up the other side, the rich smell of leaf-fall quickening her heart. It was stone and the contorted sever tree to her right looked familiar too, as did the stand of shelterbushes.

  She picked her way carefully between the stones, the litter so thick it reached her ankles, then stopped, her mind suddenly as blank as the night around her. The memory she’d boasted to Kest about was gone. For a moment she simply stood, sweat oozing down her back, her legs aching as if bone rubbed on bone. Then, more by instinct than anything else, she turned back and, as the leaf litter deepened further, dropped to her knees and began raking about in it. Nothing. She trawled forward, ignoring the jab of a stick in her calf, and the possibility of turning up something unpleasant, but still there was nothing.

  Sweat stung her eyes and she blinked ferociously. It must be here! Then her fingers stabbed into slime and she recoiled in disgust. It didn’t make sense, unless . . . there were small soaks scattered among the stone. That would e
xplain the withyweed she’d seen. Wiping her face on her sleeve, she crawled onward, her left hand connecting with something spongy. Very gingerly she pushed aside the litter, exposing a row of fingers, the smaller ones pale, the larger ones dark-tipped. The fireweed darkens to a deep red at maturity when its potency is greatest.

  Kira gave a sob of relief and, with shaking hands, took out her herbal sickle and began harvesting. The larger fingers came away cleanly, as if they were ripe. Lacking her herbal sling, she laid them gently in the front of her shirt. They grew in a run, and she followed their trail, smoothing away the leaf-fall, harvesting, and reburying the immature plants, collecting more than a dozen before the run came to an end. Would it be enough? The Writings had said nothing about quantities, or about storage, and her Healer sensitivities rebelled against wasting even a sliver of it. Stowing the sickle, she got slowly to her feet and turned to go, just as a figure stepped from the shadows.

  Terror rooted her to the spot, turning her legs to water and emptying her lungs of air. It came closer but still she couldn’t speak or move.

  ‘I greet you, clansman.’

  The customary greeting of one Tremen stranger to another.

  Kira’s mouth formed a word but nothing came out. He was little more than a boy, despite his height.

  ‘I . . . I’m sorry, Healer Kiraon, I didn’t realise it was you in the dark.’

  ‘You startled me,’ she choked out at last. More like scared the life out of me. She took a ragged breath. ‘I didn’t expect to see a Kenclansman beyond the First Eight.’

  ‘I’m Sherclan. My name’s Bern.’ He straightened, clearly proud.

  ‘A Sherclansman? You’re a long way from home. I would have thought Clanleader Dakresh forbade such travelling.’

  ‘Clanleader Dakresh believes that the danger of another attack before the full moon is small, and I agree with him. He’s happy enough for us to continue to travel until the moon is bigger.’

  ‘In your octad.’