Way Walkers: Tangled Paths (The Tazu Saga)

by Leigh, J.

  Jathen rose, and turning back to the mirror alcove, he made an attempt to look more presentable, smoothing his unruly hair with a little water from the sink. He already got enough grief from Petalith and his mother because of the length. Current style dictated males of high standing wear their hair long and braided. Jathen had taken a dagger to his own rope-tight braid a few months ago and hacked it off in a fit of self-hating rage. His hair had been a horrible mess, but time had allowed the thin, pale gold mane to grow in more evenly. Jathen suddenly felt oddly fond of his radical fashion statement. The slicked-back style made him appear leaner and meaner, as if he belonged to another of the races, perhaps the vampiric Clan or the bestial Ki’ra, which had more physical human traits than others but were undeniably not human.

  Petalith’s snide voice intruded upon his private fantasy. “You keep glaring like that, and I’m sure that mirror will be fixing for as much of a fight as the last one that got you.”

  Jathen jumped a little. “I didn’t hear you come in.” He turned and followed her over to the couches. The compartment across from the nursery and between the foyer and library served the dual purpose of an informal sitting and dining area, as Tazu traditionally supped while reclining.

  “Obviously.” Plopping her green bag on the low side table, Petalith paused to peer at him. “Sit.” The one word carried the implication he was a time-wasting dolt not to have done so already.

  Jathen sat, shooing Tinzy, who chattered angrily at the disturbance. The drake took refuge atop the bed’s carved canopy, snuggling up amid carvings of slumbering draconic cherubs.

  “Let’s have a look at the whole of you first, shall we?” Petalith came over and placed a hand on his chest to scan him.

  Jathen wasn’t an energy-sensitive Talent of any note, but he still felt the creeping chill of Petalith’s seeking psychic diagnosis.

  “You have a few bruised bits in addition to the cuts, and you need to eat more fish oil.”

  He groaned. “Ugh. I’m not a child.”

  “Very well, but I don’t want to hear you complaining when I have to treat you for brittle bones when you’re only forty.” She pulled his arm to her. “So did you decide how the mirror retaliated yet?”

  “I honestly did punch a mirror, Petalith.”

  “I can see that.” She squinted at the lacerations on his knuckles. “So was the fight because you punched the mirror, or did you punch the mirror because you lost a fight?” She released his hand to snag a few ointments from the table. “This will sting.”

  “Actually, one had nothing to do with the other.”

  The medicinal-smelling liquid met skin. It did sting, but he held steady. Some cream was added, stinging even more, and Jathen rolled his lips between his teeth and bit down on the cry.

  Petalith nodded in approval. She was always reminding him not to be a “soft-shell over a little pain.” “Huh, you’re just having a lucky day, then.”

  “Bree-blessed.” He let out a dramatic sigh. Bree was the Amber Dragon of the Children, who supposedly governed luck in addition to creativity.

  Without missing a beat, Petalith whacked Jathen across the side of his head. “Don’t blaspheme.”

  “Ugh, Pet,” Jathen moaned, rubbing his skull. “That’s not very Daughter of Desmoulein of you. You’re supposed to heal, not harm.” But he did notice that her whack had been strategically timed so he hadn’t felt the sting of the third ointment at all.

  “Oh, shush. I barely clipped you.” She began to wrap his hand with gauze. “And you don’t need to blaspheme, especially around a new babe.” She jerked her chin toward Dolomith, who wheezed softly as he slept. “It’s bad luck for them, not to mention they soak up everything at this age.”

  Remembering the subject he wanted to broach, Jathen swallowed hard. “About Dolomith, I thought it was strange, how he doesn’t cry loudly. Is there a reason for that?”

  Tying off his bandage with a flourish, she then started on the various other cuts and welts he’d managed to amass, dabbing his face, neck, arms, and knee with her stinging creams. “He wasn’t breathing when he came out,” Petalith explained. “His lungs were still full of fluid, and because he was early, they weren’t strong enough to exhale it out. I had to put a tube down his throat to drain it. Afterward, he was okay to breathe on his own, but his throat was scratched up a bit. He should be fully recovered in a few weeks at the most.”

  “Ah.” Jathen nodded, not really liking the sound of it but not willing to fully voice why. “But he’s well now?”

  “For the most part.” She gave a dismissive shrug. “Early ones like him are more vulnerable to all sorts of infections and whatnot because of the underdeveloped lungs, but he isn’t as bad off as some I’ve seen.”

  “You’ve taken all needed precautions?”

  “Of course I have.” Halting, she shot him a suspicious glare over her glasses. “Why are you asking me this, Jathen?”

  He hesitated a second too long.

  “Did you see something?” she demanded.

  “Yes.”

  “Damn,” Petalith murmured, gazing at little Dolomith. She turned back to Jathen. “Did you tell your mother?”

  “No. I only saw it just now. She’s not even been back yet.”

  “Good. Don’t.”

  “I hadn’t intended to. I saw—”

  “I don’t want to know,” the healer squeaked, pretending to cover her ears. “Not details, at least. Those things never have an accurate timeline to them anyway. I’ll keep a close eye on the babe. Tazu or not, these little ones are at risk for the whole first year, sometimes two. Kyanith is an idiot, prematurely pulling this succession nonsense before Dolomith is even a week old.”

  “I’d just rather not see Mother in another indigo mourning dress,” Jathen said.

  “Neither would I. Have there been things you’ve seen that haven’t happened?”

  “Well...” He toyed with a loose thread on his gauze bandage. “There’ve been things I’ve never seen happen, because I don’t know what the visions are related to.”

  An old image popped into his mind: a smoke-filled room and the acidic scent of sulfur, a voice shouting something indiscernible as he stumbled across a tile floor he’d never seen before or since. He’d had the vision when he was ten, but it was still vivid. He knew the color of those tiles as well as the inside of his eyelids: blue flowers on yellow.

  Jathen picked another to offer to Petalith. “I’ve had one where I’m flying. But of course, I can’t.”

  The older healer snorted. “Well, that’s no help. You’ve been carried by your mother and her guard in the air plenty of times.”

  “No. I’m the one flying. I could feel the pulse of the wings in my back.”

  “That’s just wishful thinking. Not a vision. Remember, you were hatched. If you were a full Tazu, you’d prefer being in your birth form.” She gathered her ointments and bandages and put them back into the bag. “But since you can’t shift, you probably dream about it a lot, I suspect.”

  Jathen drummed his fingers on the dark wood arm of the sofa. “I know the difference between a daydream and the curse of the ‘bastard Ability,’ Pet. Flying was a vision that hasn’t happened, nor will it ever. There have also been times where I saw myself attacked if I went a certain way home, so I didn’t, but will I ever really know if I managed to avoid it? No. But as to seeing babies being burned on pyres, no. So far, I’ve not been wrong, thanks to this Spirit-be-damned bastard Ability.”

  “Enough!” She swiped at him, but he ducked away. Petalith glared at him with the force of all her years as he shrank back toward the doorway. “I’m not going to tolerate that kind of impertinence and blasphemy, Jathen Cornetith Iridosmine Monortith. I don’t care if you are the heir or not, nor what ruddy part you have to play in any of this politic
al-intrigue mess Kyanith calls a court!”

  “The only thing I have ever given a damn about is the fact that you are your mother’s favorite and her firstborn. Now, since those two things will never change, I suggest you make the adjustment to your attitude before I go and give you something that will have me flung from the Way of Desmoulein for violating my Healer’s Oath!” She thrust a sharp claw in his direction. “If they can recognize you when I am done, that is. Out!”

  He yanked open the door and loped down the hallway, completely ignoring the guards. What is wrong with me today? First the mirror, then being all macho with Skaniss and Thee, and then mouthing off like that to Petalith… I’m usually so in control. Caught without answers and in no mood to hunt through the recesses of his psyche to find them, he headed to his room. The guards stationed there let him in without a single word exchanged.

  Jathen loved his room. Once belonging to his since-passed great-uncle and even Kyanith before him, it was the traditional bedroom set aside for the crown prince. Meant for a Tazu, the scaled-down version of his mother’s chamber was cavernous and terribly impractical for Jathen, but his procurement of the space had been an early battle won by his mother. So he’d always made the very most of it, commissioning oversized furniture with fold-out steps and other clever conveniences while secretly enjoying the notion that his very presence there irritated the king.

  Polished to a high sheen, the entire floor and all the arches were fashioned out of blue granite speckled with flecks of gold-hued mica. Like stars.

  A wave of his hand over the sensory panel charm mounted beside the doorframe brought forth recessed lights. With six separate bays, his room had enough space for Jathen to sprint full speed around the outer ring with minimal weaving and no bumping into furniture. Jathen was aware that the king’s chambers dwarfed his mother’s, but he couldn’t conceive of what Kyanith did with all that space, short of flying around it as a tyrn all day.

  He stepped away from the outer ring and its gold-painted walls. Above, the signature Tazu dome was a mural crafted of shaded glass and gemstones. The night sky was portrayed with a tinge of dusk, a subtle blend of lavender that bled to violet before merging with indigo. It remained Jathen’s favorite feature because he could look up from his bed and imagine he was flying amid the stars.

  He entered the dressing area, eager to change and perhaps venture to the bathing room. Taking off his tattered and blood-stained shirt, Jathen opened the mirrored door set at a protruding angle beside the main mirror. The vast walk-in closet defied corporeal physics—a product of spatial magic worked into architecture. He tossed his shirt into the depths, where it landed on a mass of clutter he referred to as his “failure pile.” In mild annoyance, Jathen watched as the addition of the shirt made the mound shiver unevenly and then fall across the whole of the closet floor, leaving him ankle deep in the refuse of his failures. The collection consisted of discarded sketchbooks, drawings, ruined clothing, and broken games. Cursing the mess, he chose to leave it for later and found a clean shirt and pants within reach of the door. Taking precautions for the many cuts and bruises new and old, Jathen changed into the clean clothes.

  When the sporadic rumbling of his stomach evolved into roaring, he decided it would be best to get some dinner. Waving his hand over the panel on the opposite side of the doorframe from the lights, he called the serving staff and asked them to bring up whatever was ready at the moment from the kitchens.

  While waiting for his food, he headed onto the balcony. The lights of Kidwellith were an artificial twinkling when compared to the true starry sky but still beautiful. The glittering, gigantic processor-charms hummed away, converting geothermic energy into electricity to provide light and life. The only hints of the magical generators’ existence were steam vents far in the distance. Jathen could pick them out along the glow of the horizon, thin threads of harmless condensation returning to the sky.

  So important, the need to protect resources, the Children thus decreed it as the final Law of Spirit. And it’s the only law I can fully agree with. After all, the world was destroyed once almost nine thousand years ago. I doubt a new one will be crafted for us a second time if we ruin the continent.

  He scanned the sky for his mother. Convinced she was not among the many dark shapes flitting along the skyline, he returned to his room, leaving the doors ajar for the crisp air. Jathen climbed onto his bed.

  Just for a moment. I’ll just relax for a moment.

  Chapter 5

  Light roused him.

  Jathen sat up slowly, uncertain how he’d become so tangled in silken sheets when he had only rested his eyes a moment. Squinting, he felt around on the nightstand for his timepiece. Damn it. He recalled the events of the previous day. Broken.

  He hastily slipped from the bed and cleaned up at the sink, too rushed for proper hygiene. Acquiring fresh clothing, he dressed. Cleanly if not neatly attired, he smoothed a few wrinkles after a quick glance in the mirror then headed for the queen’s chambers as fast as propriety allowed.

  Once admitted, he found Petalith in tyrn form, sunning on the balcony. Thee sat in the dining area with Dolomith, eating breakfast. While he couldn’t see Tinzy, the sound of the little drake’s whining snores hinted he was asleep atop one of the arches.

  “Is Mother here?” he asked his sister.

  “You just missed her,” Thee said. Balancing their brother on her shoulder, she set down a cup of tea.

  “Missed her? How could I miss her? Why didn’t someone send for me? You both knew I was waiting!”

  Petalith strolled into the room. “She checked in on you last night, but you were so deeply asleep she didn’t want to disturb you. Same with this morning.”

  “Did she leave any word as to what’s going on?”

  The great pearly-green tyrn shrugged. “Nothing she felt was worth saying.”

  “Damn it.” Jathen immediately regretted his language when Petalith swatted at him with her tail. He managed to avoid physical injury by ducking behind an arch. “My sincere apologies, Petalith,” he offered in his finest courtly manner, adding a slight bow from the waist. “I just find myself deeply inconvenienced in missing Her Highness by the inadvertent rudeness of my own lateness.”

  Pet shook her wedged head, “Oh, stop the aristocracy-stroking chatter and sit.”

  “Thank you, but I am not hungry and—”

  “Sit,” she ordered with a flutter of wings. “I promised your mother I’d see to it you ate something. And besides, I need to check your hand and rebind the gauze.”

  Jathen took a place on the couch across from Thee, who smirked at him. He was hungry, and the spread of cooked meats, roasted nuts, dried and fresh fruit as well as several kinds of cheese beckoned. He poured a mug of black coffee and downed two slices of sharp cheese. “Did Mother say when she’ll be back?”

  “No, she did not.” Petalith shifted to bipedal, donned her glasses, and came to sit beside him with her medical kit.

  “Mother said not to worry.” Thee lightly patted Dolomith’s back. “And to go about your day as usual.”

  “Unfortunately, it must have slipped Mother’s mind that my days are dependent on her allowing me to sit in on her administrative affairs, since Kyanith has always barred me from observing his.” He felt the sourness of that discrimination in his mouth. Swallowing the injustice, Jathen continued, “Since she’s not here, and as I have no position in court to glean my own responsibilities from, I am doomed to idly awaiting fate.” He placed his coffee cup back on the saucer. “I don’t suppose you are free to distract me today, Thee?”

  Face aglow, she replied, “I’d love to, Jath!” She began listing a variety of possible activities.

  “No, you don’t, Thee.” Pet yanked at Jathen’s hand as she cut away the old gauze. “You’ve a day planned with your father and grandmother. The Naming Ceremon
y, remember?”

  Thee groaned, setting Dolomith to mewing. “Can’t I cancel? I can’t stand either Genthelvith or that damn Osumilss woman my father’s seeing right now. And besides, this is a family emergency, for Jathen’s sake!”

  “Your father is your family, too, Miss. Since you have no living uncle the proper age to oversee you, Dicinith is by default the only male influence you have, and he is kind to dote on you as much as his own rightful heirs. No matter what you think of his current choice of mate or your grandmother, you owe him the debt of your life and his generous affection. Since his latest egg has hatched, you’ve the responsibility of making an appearance at your new sister’s naming. End of story.”

  “Ugh! But I already had to sit through one of those this week.” She was referring to Dolomith’s event three days ago. “And the two hours of the actual ritual are bad enough to have to repeat, but to have to mingle at the reception for Spirit-knows-how-long with the Attieth bloodline? Please, Petalith, you have to spare me, for my sanity!”

  “No.”

  Crestfallen, Thee turned to Jathen. “I don’t suppose you’d want to come as my guest?”

  “After that endorsement?” Jathen shook his head. “I love you, Thee, but I barely have it in me to put up with the Attieth bloods and their strict Angani beliefs under normal circumstances, let alone after yesterday.”

  “Yeah, I figured.”

  The doors opened, and an airy voice announced a happy greeting.

  Thee bounced out of her seat, shifted the hatchling off her shoulder, and pressed him into Jathen’s arms. “Here. Take Dolomith a second.”

  “No, Thee…” he protested but lost, taking the baby as both Thee and Petalith abandoned him for their guest. In no time the babe’s cooing had Jathen smiling.