For her part, she hoped for more—so long as they didn’t involve the darkness. One to tell her where to find water. One to tell her what to expect from the weather. One to explain how to avoid angering the Oud. She had a growing list.
Aryl relaxed and watched the others. She watched Enris, too, when she thought he wouldn’t notice. His pack wasn’t with the rest; it leaned casually near the door. She was the only one to know why.
While he’d been busy helping move Chaun and the others, when no one was watching her, she’d added a few things. No sense having him stint himself on food, when they suddenly had so much. No harm giving him the Grona bread, some of the dried twists of swimmer, a bag of sweet rokly.
Her longknife.
A new blanket, tightly rolled and tied. A coil of rope. He might not climb willingly, but sometimes it was necessary.
A lock of her hair, tied into a Highknot. Every Yena child made one to leave at the top of that first true climb away from their mother. It was a matter of pride to go as high as you possibly could before the longing drew you back.
It didn’t matter that Enris wouldn’t know its purpose. She did.
Enris himself was presently Haxel’s most willing taster. While he waited for his next spoonful—the Tuana had the constitution of a rock—he filled another kind of light. It had the ropelike wick of the wall lights and a reservoir for oil, but within a small, sturdy metal frame with a handle. His head lifted and she looked away, sure now.
Such a light was meant to be carried.
He wasn’t going to wait for dawn. Enris would leave when no Yena would dare, in the middle of truenight.
Aryl settled herself against the blanket-shrouded stone.
The wonder was that the big Tuana didn’t wake everyone else. Aryl listened to Enris’ attempt at stealth, grinning as he put a foot squarely on a scrap of wood, then set a row of hanging tools in motion with his shoulder. When he picked up his pack and boots, half the Om’ray in the room grunted or turned over. Passing through the doorway would have been silent, except that its blanket curtain caught on his head and he muttered something desperate under his breath as he struggled free.
That made her stifle a giggle with her hand.
She gave him time to put on his boots, coat, and pack. Another few moments for his light and orientation—and to negotiate his way past Syb, on watch outside. One more for her own courage. Then she slid from under her blanket, fully dressed and booted, and moved to the door without a whisper of sound.
Even so, a hand found her ankle. He’ll be back.
Haxel’s mindvoice. Did the First Scout ever sleep? Aryl looked down to meet the gleam of very alert eyes. There are things I need to say.
It’s truenight. Curiosity.
I’ve been out in it before.
True. Amusement. Tell the flatlander his walk’s improved. Slightly.
Before opening the curtain, Aryl reached with care. As she’d expected, Enris and Syb were standing together, away from the door. She slipped through, careful to avoid the twinned circles of light from Syb’s small fire and Enris’ device. The older Om’ray had his hand on Enris’ broad shoulder. While they conversed, she moved around the corner of the ruin, close to the wall, placing weight on each foot only when sure she was on solid stone.
It wasn’t shadow here, it was truenight. Darkness pressed against her open eyes, real and tangible. Her nerves sang desperate alarms along her skin. Despite the heavy Grona coat, she could feel the hairs rise on her arms and neck. It was bitterly cold. She’d see her breath, if there was any light. But there was no light. No Om’ray should be outside in this…
Listen, she scolded herself. No screams. No screams meant no swarm. There was nothing here that hunted in the dark. Nothing. Her worst enemy was unfamiliar ground, where a false step could land her in one of the Sona ditches, or worse, one of the deeper pits left by the Oud.
Her heart slowed its hammering. Slightly.
She reached again. Enris was on the move; Syb by his fire.
Time to go.
Om’ray defined their place and world by each other. It was simple to follow Enris—the effort came in moving away from the comforting sense of so many more of their kind behind. As for avoiding Syb’s well-intentioned interference?
Climb and seek, Aryl smiled to herself. Few could discern one Om’ray from two or three—she was the only Yena who could discern who. She ran on her toes to the second shelter, guided by a hand on the wall between them. Those asleep inside would hide her glow from Syb. Once past that?
Aryl felt the door curtain, then the rest of the wall. There should be a beam leaning here; Tilip planned to use it tomorrow. She crouched to pass underneath, growing more confident in her memory as a guide. Three more steps should…her outstretched hand found stone and she turned to face the road.
Her breaths were drowned out by solid footsteps, though to be fair to the Tuana, sound was exaggerated in the still air. The tiny light from his hand danced over the paving stones and his boots, as strong a beacon as the lives behind her.
Enris slowed and lifted the light, sending brightness skittering over the ruins. Aryl backed out of its reach, making her inner self as invisible as she could. She saw his face, how his eyes searched the shadows for a moment. He lowered his hand and continued walking, footsteps echoing.
The brief illumination had reflected from the metal disk Enris now wore on his coat. A token.
Aryl sank down and hugged her knees to her chest.
She should go back.
Tokens were for those on Passage. Those who were as dead to the ones left behind, on their way to a new Clan, a new name, a new life. It was Forbidden to say more than farewell to those departing, Forbidden to interfere in any way. She’d watched Bern leave her and obeyed.
Who did she have to obey now? Aryl rose to her feet. This was Sona.
She gazed down the road. A light bobbed in the distance, moving farther and farther away.
There was no Council here.
She started walking slowly, then broke into a run.
Nothing was Forbidden.
His long legs and light gave the Tuana the advantage. Aryl wasn’t able to catch up before the point where paving stones split around a heave of rock and dirt, forcing her to a cautious walk. She knew where she was. The heave marked where the roadway bent to follow the empty river, and where what had been homes were now piles of rubble and sticks. It made no sense for the Oud to strike harder at the edge of Sona than its core, unless their intention had been to prevent escape.
Not a happy thought.
Nor was how Enris kept on going, farther and farther. She’d been confident he’d stop for truenight once a few steps away from the exiles, take shelter in the ruins, make a bright, warm fire she could enjoy while they talked. He should be exhausted, having carried more per load than anyone else. Hadn’t he managed to slip out with—so he thought—only Syb aware so far?
The Tuana had his own ideas. Aryl was forced to follow, sure of her direction, if less so of her footing. At least it wasn’t the truenight of the canopy, with its utter dark. There were bright holes in the sky above—stars—the effect like the open weave of a black curtain. Not enough to show details on the ground, though she could see the tall, jagged silhouettes of the mountain ridges that walled the valley. She didn’t know why the Makers failed to rise—they would have bathed the land in light.
The only grace was the terrain between Sona and the first dried riverbed, with its tumbled bridge. She never thought she’d be glad of flat.
Flat…almost. Aryl’s step went deeper than she’d expected, turning her next into a lurch to recover her balance. Pebbles skittered and she froze in place.
The solid crunchcrunchcrunch of Enris’ boots stopped.
Aryl crouched and held her breath.
She really should call out. Was it fair to make him wonder who was here?
She grinned.
Then again, she always won climb and seek.
Suddenly, his footsteps came faster and faster. He’d broken into that ground-eating lope of his. Aryl hurried as much as she dared, but his light slipped away.
Did he want to leave her behind? Truenight pressed at her from all sides. Leave her in the dark?
She was about to give up the chase and shout when he halted, his light held chest-high.
At last! Aryl rushed into the welcoming glow. There was the light, on a rock. The tiny flame fluttered within its metal case so the shadows around it came alive. “Enris?” She looked around wildly—reached.
There.
The Tuana stood beyond the ring of light, impossible to see. His shields were enough to almost—not quite—make him impossible to sense as well. “Aryl?” He sounded startled.
Who else? she wondered, then pushed the thought aside. Now that she’d caught up with him, she found herself fumbling. “I—we’ve—I—Come where I can see you.”
He loomed from the shadows, gave her a cryptic look, then stalked to his light. Picking it up, he held it out. “Here.”
Aryl took it.
“Now go back.”
“Wait—”
Enris pointed up. “I’ve been out in truenight by nothing more, Aryl Sarc. Many times. You need the light—take it and go. I’ve made my decision.”
By “nothing more” she guessed he meant the stars, the little bright holes in the sky. As for his implication? She replaced the light on its rock. “I know you’re on Passage,” Aryl told him stiffly. “It’s Forbidden to interfere.”
“It’s Forbidden to follow me,” with a hint of his laugh. “So why did you?”
Why had she? Aryl watched the flame, struggling to find words for what had been clear and imperative before. “Because you were wrong about me,” she said finally. “I want more for my people. For all Om’ray. Like you, I seek a new future.”
“Here. In Sona.”
“Here,” she insisted. “Where we can be what we are without fear of harming anyone or upsetting the Agreement. Use whatever Talents we possess or learn for our own good. Think about it, Enris.”
“Put aside the fact that you’re being influenced by dreams you can’t explain,” no laughter in his voice now. “Or that you don’t know what the Oud will do. You can’t start a Clan with twenty-two Om’ray. Be reasonable.”
“We’re already a Clan,” she replied. “By the next M’hir, we’re either all that remains of Yena—or something new. The name doesn’t matter. Don’t you understand? The others didn’t leave Grona to follow me. They left because deep inside we know we belong together. Now—” she took a deep breath, “—we have a place of our own.”
“This Oud-reshaped pile of broken wood and stone? It’s not possible. You can’t stay here—”
“It’s not possible Om’ray have technology like the Oud or Tikitik,” she snapped back. “It’s not possible Vyna is the only Clan who still has it. It’s not possible, Enris Mendolar, that they’ll accept you on Passage as their own, then give their wisdom to you to share with the rest of us. Is it?”
Enris burst out laughing, deep and loud enough to echo in the distance. Despite herself, Aryl’s mouth twitched up at the corners. “We’re a great pair,” he chuckled. “Come with me, Aryl. Vyna won’t stand a chance.”
He didn’t mean it.
Knowing that, Aryl had no problem finding a smile. “Make a proper fire, Tuana,” she told him, “and I’ll do better than that.”
She had a promise to keep.
They made camp where an upthrust of paving stone reflected the warmth of their small fire and protected it from the wind. Easy to scavenge dry splinters of wood here; not so once Enris left Sona. As well, Aryl decided, he’d agreed to linger here until dawn. When the Tuana, apparently always hungry, went to dig in his pack for food, she offered the rokly she’d tucked into a pocket, along with her last chunk of Grona bread. The way he ate, he’d need all his supplies and more.
Yawning, Enris stretched his legs and arms, then shifted with a grunt to retrieve a sharp rock from where he sat. He tossed it into the darkness that walled their bit of light. “You sure you want to sleep out here?”
“We’re not going to sleep,” Aryl warned him, then temporized, “not until you’ve learned what I can teach you. If I can teach you.”
He shoved back his hood, as if too warm. Aryl sat as close as she could to the flames and left her head well wrapped. “I’ll have you know my father considers me a quick study.”
Her father had died when she was young. Her mother had somehow recovered and grown strong…Aryl pushed away thoughts of Taisal di Sarc. Her mother could touch the other. Not attention she wanted to court.
“Think about when I moved us from the strangers’ camp on the mountain to Yena. Did you sense the other?”
“‘Other?’ Someone else? No.”
“A place. A moving darkness.” That wasn’t the word she wanted. Taisal called it the Dark, but it wasn’t. Aryl raised her eyes from the fire and stared into the real thing: nothing, black, an absence of light. Even peaceful, without hunters. The other place wasn’t like that. Its darkness was ablaze with sensation, churning with powerful, chaotic movement that affected everything in its path. Like the M’hir Wind when it struck the canopy—a force to be understood and resisted, or it would destroy.
“Call it the M’hir,” she decided. The naming gave her comfort, as if it brought the inner darkness into the light of day, harnessed it for her people’s good. Her fiches were designed to ride one wind—maybe Om’ray were, too.
“The M’hir, is it?” Then he startled her by adding matter-of-factly, “Guess that’s where I pushed the roof this morning. I was afraid it would land on someone outside. Good to know it’s really gone. It is really gone, isn’t it?”
Aryl blinked. “Roof?”
“What was left of the supports. About to collapse on us.” Enris paused and his voice took on an edge. “Impressed Gijs.” He’d relaxed his shields. Now she felt anger and a curious shame. “Too much.”
That reaction, she understood. And something else. “You thought I was Gijs, didn’t you? That he’d followed you to demand you teach him.”
His lips quirked as he gestured apology. “Don’t ask me why. Gijs has young Fon now. I wonder who’ll be the next surprise? Oh, yes. You.” This with a sly glance. “Wish I could be here to see their faces. Haxel’s in particular.”
Insufferable Tuana. Aryl refused to react. She’d tell the others about the M’hir when she chose and not a moment sooner. “Are you ready to learn this or not?”
“If you won’t let me sleep—” a dramatic sigh, “—I’m ready. Do your worst, Aryl Sarc.”
If he could use the darkness—the M’hir, she reminded herself—this might be easy.
Or not.
She’d promised to try. “There’s more you should know about the M’hir before you touch it. It—it hungers. It will take you into itself, make you forget who you are. The Lost. Somehow they are part of it, or it’s part of them. I felt it.”
“Dangerous. What else?”
“This is no joke, Enris!” Aryl felt her cheeks warm. “The longer you touch it—the closer you let it come to who you are—the easier it is to let go. It came in my sleep last night, and I—” She stopped there. “It’s more than dangerous.”
Instant concern, deep and real, proved he wasn’t taking this as lightly as she’d feared. “Aryl, you don’t have to do this.”
“Yes, I do.” Aryl laid another splinter on the fire, just so. “Don’t be careless. That’s all. Don’t look at the scenery. Treat the M’hir like fire. A tool that can burn you.”
“So how does this tool work?” Enris picked up a pebble, shot through with sparkles. “How do I move this from here,” on the flat of his right hand, “to here?” a quick toss to his left.
“You need me for that?”
Enris grinned. The pebble lifted from his palm
, moved through the air between them, and landed with a quiet click among the others in front of her boot. Aryl barely sensed the Power he expended. “But that’s not what you do,” he pointed out. “Not how you brought us faster than a heartbeat to Yena.”
“No.” Nor was what he did something she could do, Aryl thought wistfully. Her mother could push with her mind, like Enris. So far, she hadn’t found that useful Talent in herself. “To move us—” or to move Bern Teerac, that fateful Harvest, “—was what I wanted most at that moment. I wanted us in my home, helping my Clan. I pictured us already there, until that image was more real to me than being on the cliff with the Humans. And there we were.”
She’d wanted Bern safe on the bridge, not falling to his death, wanted that to be real more than anything in her life. Bern, but she hadn’t thought of Costa, or the others who’d fallen…screaming…
Aryl forced the memory away. “Somehow,” she explained as best she could, “it means going into the M’hir, then out of it almost at once. It’s as if the M’hir is a place, but one where distance doesn’t matter, only will, so it lets a traveler ignore distance, too.” She threw up her hands. “Which probably makes as much sense to you as it does to me.”
Enris’ eyes almost glowed. “An image of your destination. Perhaps it’s necessary to have been there in person. To know the place well.”
“Why do you say that?”
“You said it: first, you envisioned a place you wanted to be. Then, you used your strength of will—which I’m guessing means your considerable Power—to move there through the M’hir. If you didn’t have a strong, clear location in mind, a target for your will, maybe you wouldn’t go anywhere.” He chuckled. “Or maybe you’d vanish like my roof. Go in, but not come out. Wonder what that’s like.”
She glowered at him. “Not funny, Tuana.”
No smile now. “I think it’s important to consider what could go wrong.”
Maddening unChosen. Bad as her brother for being ridiculous one moment, serious the next, without bothering to let her know which to expect. Enris returned her look with one of complete innocence.
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