01 - The Compass Rose

by Gail Dayton

  The bodyguard was laughing so hard, he’d tipped onto his backside on the floor. Even the witch was smiling. Laughing at Stone. “You look as if a kitten suddenly turned into a tiger in front of your eyes,” she said.

  “I not—I am not a kitten. I never was a kitten. Always tiger,” the woman said, then scowled down at herself. “A small tiger.”

  Torchay draped his arms over his knees and grinned up at her, his face more open than Stone had seen it. “I could teach you a few tigerish things,” he said. “If you like. Things that even small tigers would find useful, that would give you teeth.”

  The woman smiled at him, her delight transforming a pretty face into beauty. “Teach me to fight?”

  He nodded.

  “I like, yes.” She looked at the witch. “I not—I do not have to do sex?”

  The witch shook her head, her face solemn again. Stone frowned. That meant the witch would be his only chance for sex. He studied her. She was tall, only a bit shorter than he, and slender, but she possessed a woman’s curves. Her hips flared wide from a small waist, her breasts just the size to fill a man’s hand. Her near-black hair and pale skin gave her an exotic look. But those uncanny blue eyes…Still, if she was willing, Stone was sure he could get past the eyes.

  “Then I agree. I join.” The small woman sat back in her chair.

  “Your rules don’t change, Tibran.” The red-haired man loomed over Stone’s chair, scowling down at him. He must have seen Stone looking at the witch and got to his feet to appear more threatening. “You’ll do without, unless you’re asked.” He glanced at his captain. “And who knows when that will happen, if ever.”

  Stone looked at the witch again, at those pale eyes too much like his own. “Why do you want me in this ilian? I’m a prisoner. An enemy. Why not just lock me up?”

  “Because of your mark.” She touched the back of her neck where she bore a mark similar to his, or so they told him. He hadn’t seen his own. “You and I have already been bound by the One. This is only a formality.”

  Stone suppressed a shudder. He didn’t like to be reminded of the thing lurking inside him, this magic she claimed he carried for her. The mere thought of it cramped his gut. He was trapped. Changed. Ruined. He had no hope of returning home even if he thought he could regain his caste. He couldn’t even understand the language anymore. “Am I condemned to this—this chain forever?”

  “When I can trust you, the last chains come off,” Torchay said.

  “I don’t know,” the witch said. She understood what he meant. “I wish I did. I have been told that we bear these marks because we have—you and I—surrendered our wills to the One, who has a task for us. Perhaps when the task is done, we will be released from it. But I do not know.”

  “This One is your God?”

  The witch nodded. “There is only One God.”

  “I serve Khralsh, the Warrior God.”

  “Which is one of the many faces of the One God. By focusing on only one face, you miss the many gifts the One has in store for you.”

  “Gifts like this magic?” Stone sounded sour even to himself.

  The witch’s smile was crooked. “Sometimes the good is hard for our limited vision to see. It can be very hard to trust in the One’s wisdom. But what else can we do? We have it. We cannot give it back. We can only do what lies next before us.”

  “This ilian business.”

  “Yes.”

  “I still do not understand—” He did not even know what to ask. “What is ilian? What are the rules? Who is in charge?”

  The witch and the red-haired man exchanged a look Stone didn’t know how to interpret. She was the one who spoke this time. “I don’t know how to explain when we have no reference points in common. Was there never anyone you—you cared for?”

  “Warrior pairs,” Aisse said. “Did you have pair partner?”

  Stone felt his face shut down. “My partner died. I found his body in the breach.”

  “But you—he was important to you?” The witch’s words poked at him. “His death caused you pain?”

  “My pain is my own.” He ground the words out between his teeth. “It is not for your amusement.”

  “That is ilian,” she said, triumphant. “Iliasti care for each other. They watch each other’s backs. They share. Whatever they have belongs to all. When one is hurt, all feel the pain. The ilian comes first—that is the only rule.”

  Stone refused to care for anyone else the way he had for Fox. How could he? Impossible to care for a woman like that, or an enemy. “But who decides? Who is in charge?”

  “Normally, decisions are made together, and the one in charge is the one who knows most about a particular thing.” The witch slowed her speech as she thought. “Which I suppose means that as the naitan, I am in charge because I know about magic. That is, as far as our—our task is concerned. Torchay would be in charge of security and health, Aisse in charge of supplies—food and such—and you…”

  She looked at Stone and shrugged. “Well, I’m sure we could find something for you besides ‘magic-bearer.’”

  “When is the wedding?” Torchay asked.

  “The Reinine would like it within the hour, I’m sure.” The witch looked at her bodyguard and smiled, a smile that spoke of long knowledge, as if they made up a warrior pair. Not possible. The captain was a witch and a woman. “But I have certain conditions. It will probably be on Hopeday to give time for those conditions to be met.”

  “When is Hopeday?” Aisse asked.

  “Today is Sixthday, which makes tomorrow Graceday,” the bodyguard explained. “Then Hopeday and Peaceday, and after the week’s end, Firstday again.”

  The witch looked at Stone, the blue of her eyes pinning him to his chair. “You will be swearing oaths to the One who is your God and mine. You will swear to put the ilian above all others, to owe them your love and loyalty. If you can do this in truth, I will ask the Reinine’s permission to remove the guard from our quarters.”

  “Kallista—” Torchay began.

  She held up her hand, halting his protest. “If we are to be a true ilian, we do not need extras poking themselves into what should be between us. The Reinine has truthsaying magic. She will know if Stone swears in truth or if he lies in his oath. If we do not even attempt to treat him as a true ilias, why should he bother to become one?”

  The red-haired man stared at Stone as if he could read his heart. Finally he nodded. “If he swears in truth, then I’ll allow it.”

  Stone was confused again. “The witch is—”

  “Naitan,” the bodyguard interrupted. “Or Kallista. Iliasti give each other respect. ‘Witch’ is not respectful.”

  “Pardon.” His head felt stuffed full. For a thing with only one rule, ilian seemed to have a great number of them. “The—naitan is also the captain, is she not? And the bodyguard, you are a sergeant, under her command?”

  They both nodded.

  “Then how can the sergeant ‘allow’ something the captain has commanded?”

  Now they both smiled, indulgently, as if at a foolish child who could not understand. Exactly the way Stone felt.

  “A naitan and her bodyguard are similar to an ilian in one way,” the wi—Kallista said. “In matters of magic or duty, the naitan is in charge. At other times, in matters regarding the naitan’s safety, the bodyguard has final say.”

  Stone thought he saw the sense in that. Maybe.

  “Now—” the naitan clapped her hands together and rubbed them briskly “—it is time for Aisse to show her skills in securing supplies. She will accompany Erunde Undersecretary to the tailor’s street and—” She went off into the nonsense that was supposed to be Tibran.

  Stone looked at the bodyguard who looked back at him and shrugged. It was a moment of perfect male understanding. Stone jerked his gaze away. He did not need or want another partner. He’d had one, and Fox was dead. No worm-pale, blood-haired Adaran could take his place.

  “Stone. Warrior.”
The wi—naitan was calling him. “What color do you prefer?”

  “Red,” was his instant reply. Red was the Warrior’s color. He might be changing from caste to ilian, but he was still a warrior. Could he turn those skills against his people? Would he be asked to? What would he do if he was? Khralsh help him, he did not know.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Kallista stood on the edge of the red stone mosaic rose in the center of the sanctuary at the center of Arikon’s Mother Temple and looked around her in satisfaction. For all its hurry, this would be a proper wedding. Aisse had outdone herself in the matter of clothes. Kallista smoothed down the blue silk of her sleeveless dress tunic. She’d consented to the parti-colored tights in blue and green, but had refused to submit any further to the extremes of current fashion. Though her elbow-length gloves were in two colors as well.

  She looked beyond Aisse, who was wearing a vivid yellow dress tunic that enhanced her golden coloring, to the Reinine, robed today in black over pale blue tunic and tights. Serysta Reinine would be performing the ceremony herself in her role of High Prelate of Adara. An ilian could have no more auspicious beginning.

  Kallista even had family present. Karyl and Kami had been found, still in Arikon for one week more before their journey home to Turysh. They would act as witnesses and attendants for Kallista and Aisse. Their iliasti-to-be had offered to provide the same service for the men and been accepted, since it would take weeks for any of Torchay’s kinsmen to reach Arikon even with far speakers sending invitations. The Reinine refused to wait so long. His parents had sent their blessing through Karyl’s magic. And the young men would be kinsmen soon enough through ties of ilian.

  The only other witness was the lieutenant, Joh Suteny. Torchay had not wanted to do away with the entire guard escort before any oaths were sworn, and when Stone indicated that Joh had become something of a friend, Kallista acquiesced. Stone had lost everything else familiar, even his language. What harm could it do?

  The sound of the gong shivered through the high sanctuary. Kallista turned to face the eastern entrance through which she and Aisse had recently come. Torchay led the way, his hair loose glowing waves of flame brushing his shoulders. His tunic was a green so dark it was almost black and yet still green, suiting him far better than his blacks ever did. It fit him superbly, displaying his masculine perfection with mouth-drying clarity. Kallista swallowed hard.

  Then Stone appeared in the doorway and she had to swallow again. His cotton-soft yellow hair seemed to float around his shoulders. And what shoulders they were. The baggy prisoner’s clothing had not done him justice. The red of his tunic was dark, almost a brick red, and looked well with his coloring, as gold as Aisse, his hair shades brighter. These were to be her iliasti?

  How would she ever keep her vow? Kallista could not at this moment remember why she had made it. Why would any sane woman swear not to have sex with men such as these? Her contraceptive spell was in place. She quested inward to check one more time to be certain. Yes. If there were no children, they would be free to separate when they had completed this task of theirs, whatever it was. How could they do what was needed with the complication of children? She could have—

  The rattle of chains against the tile floor broke her train of thought. Stone wore chains again, part of the di pentivas ceremony. Kallista had requested that he be allowed to marry without them, but the Reinine had insisted, even though no one had married di pentivas in hundreds of years, save perhaps in the most remote prinsipalities. Stone would have no escape from this marriage.

  That was why she had made the vow. Because he had no choice. She feared that she had coerced Torchay into consenting to marry as well. She had been so hysterical that night, after the dream. How could he have done anything else, being who he was? He would not mind having sex with her. But that wasn’t the same as wanting it, was it? She would not use these men as playthings, either of them.

  The men took their places between the compass points, the four of them spaced evenly around the rose with the Reinine in the center, their witnesses a few paces back. The Reinine had Kallista remove her gloves, and began to speak.

  Kallista made her vows first as the oldest female in the ilian. She was more than ten years older than Stone, and Aisse was even younger. It made Kallista feel ancient. Protective. She took the bracelet from her blood sister and crossed the rose to Aisse, fastening it about her wrist, repeating the promises, and exchanged a brief kiss.

  She went back across the rose to Karyl and took the gold anklet. Kneeling before Torchay as she fastened the band around his right ankle, she repeated the promises to him, looking up into his eyes. She stood and kissed him, her eyes filling with unwanted tears. Why should she weep? This was what she wanted.

  Once more she made the trip across the tile rose to collect the final anklet from her attendant. This one was gold like the others, but it had a fine silver chain hanging from it in loops. A di pentivas anklet. The chain was not mere decoration. It had been spelled long ago by a North magic metalworker to be stronger—much stronger—than it looked. The anklet and its chains had last been used centuries ago, when Tamonda Reinine had married four sedili from Korbin prinsipality—Torchay’s home—and brought Korbin into the unity of Adara.

  Kallista fastened the band around Stone’s ankle, once more repeating the vows. She stood and leaned toward him for the kiss and he flinched away. Kallista cupped his head with her hand, murmuring under her breath, “It is part of the ceremony.”

  He swallowed, his nervousness screaming at her. “I know. I just—could you—would you mind closing your eyes?”

  “Why?”

  “They’re blue.”

  What did that have to do with anything? This Tibran—this man made no sense to her. “Your eyes are blue.”

  “But I don’t have to look at my own. I—brown eyes are normal. Blue—any light color is…uncanny. Disturbing. I—it would be—please?”

  Kallista sighed. She could feel the others watching, wondering what the delay was. If closing her eyes would help him get through this, she would close her eyes. Still cupping his face, she kissed him, fumbling a moment before finding his lips. They were dry, a bit chapped, and the instant she kissed him, the magic inside him stirred, responding to her touch.

  Stone gasped, his quiver matching hers. Kallista reached, soothing the magic, laying it back down, and it obeyed. She could sense its eagerness, how it strained at the leash. Quickly, she ended the kiss, her body shaking in reaction, and she strode back to her place on the rose.

  Aisse went next, moving from one to the other, repeating the vows, fastening on bracelet and anklets. Again, there was a moment of hesitation before she exchanged the kiss with Stone, on her side this time. But in the end, it was done, and it was Torchay’s turn.

  He held Kallista’s gaze as he spoke the vows that completed their joining, fastening a silver bracelet around her left wrist. Silver rather than gold was used in the mountains of his home because the strength of pure silver represented the strength and purity of their vows. He explained it to her as he bound them together. As their lips touched in this second kiss, she felt tears gather again at its pure sweetness. He was hers as she was his. But she would let him go in the end.

  Finally it was Stone’s turn to take the bands from his attendant. Rather than crossing the rose to the others, he waited in place and they came to him one by one, first Kallista, then Aisse, then Torchay. Afterward, Kallista attached the chains to his anklets, turning his ilian bands into shackles, and fastened the bracelets around his wrists. The di pentivas bracelets weren’t like hers. They could be hooked together in an instant to immobilize him. He had no choice. Neither did she.

  As soon as the last kiss between Stone and Torchay was exchanged—very quickly—Kallista relaxed. It was done. The ilian was complete.

  The Reinine looked around at them as she spoke. “Prelates are often asked by young priests why black robes are worn for weddings. Why not green for beginnings a
nd a fertile union? Or yellow for hearth and home? Why the color of the West? Of endings and death?”

  Kallista had wondered that herself. At the few weddings she’d attended, the priests had never said why.

  “And the answer is always the same. A wedding is an ending as well as a beginning, just as death is both beginning and ending. The old life has ended. You are no longer four solitary souls, but an ilian. And that is the deeper reason for the color of the West, because the bonds of ilian are a mystery. Who in this world can understand how four souls, or six or twelve, can be many, and at the same time one? Yet we know it is so. It is the mystery of the One.”

  The Reinine beckoned, calling them into the center for the final moments of the ceremony. As they joined hands, Kallista to Torchay, Torchay to Aisse, Aisse to Stone, Serysta Reinine moved out of the center of their circle, taking Kallista’s hand and Stone’s in hers.

  “As you have each vowed today in truth,” she said, “giving and receiving these bands in pledge and in symbol of the vows you have made, as the High Prelate of all Adara, I recognize this ilian. May the One bless you with love, with loyalty, with grace, hope and peace.”

  “May it be so,” everyone said in unison.

  The Reinine stepped back and placed Stone’s hand in Kallista’s. The magic didn’t wait for her call. It leaped across their clasped hands, slamming into her with as much force as the first time. She barely had time to gasp before the magic jumped again, into Torchay, beyond him into Aisse and back home again to Stone. It bound the four of them with threads of magic that felt like nothing so much as sweet hot passion.

  Kallista could feel the threads spinning out from her, sensed Torchay and Aisse beyond a veil, felt Stone swimming through her skin. The magic flowed, thrummed, crested, and she cried out as it broke over her, Stone’s cry echoing with hers.