The Obsidian Mountain Trilogy

by Mercedes Lackey

  “You’ll be fine,” Kellen told Vestakia, under the cover of the preparations for the departure. “You’ll like it here. I’ll see you soon.”

  “Do you promise?” Vestakia asked, sounding a little desperate.

  “I promise,” Kellen said. “Ah, they’ll be giving you your own little house, by the way, one of the guest-houses. Just be sure to invite Jermayan to come inside when you get there. I don’t think he can come in otherwise.”

  Vestakia smiled, a fleeting nervous smile. “I’ll remember,” she said.

  And then Jermayan offered her his arm, and the two of them walked away.

  Kellen glanced back at Idalia, to see her watching the two of them go. The expression on her face caught him by surprise.

  Something’s changed here.

  When they’d left, Idalia had been holding Jermayan at arm’s length. Kellen knew that she loved Jermayan as much as he loved her, but the fact that Elves bonded once, and for life, and that Idalia was inevitably going to die centuries before Jermayan did, had made her refuse to acknowledge that love, hoping that Jermayan would find someone else.

  But now Idalia’s attitude seemed to have changed, if the expression on her face was any indication.

  It isn’t any of my business, Kellen told himself firmly. He got to his feet, glancing from Shalkan to Idalia uncertainly. He wasn’t quite certain what to do now. And then, he started to sway, just a little, as exhaustion caught him by surprise.

  “Oh, no, brother mine,” Idalia said firmly. “You’re not going anywhere until I see what’s under those bandages.”

  Kellen stared around in alarm. Here? Now?

  “I’d take you home first, but if it’s something I need to call in extra help for, I’d just have to bring you back through the city again. Might as well deal with it here,” Idalia said, leaning close and speaking softly, for Kellen’s ears alone.

  Ashaniel gathered up most of the remaining courtiers—and all of the women, including Lairamo, who was still clutching Sandalon tightly—and prepared to leave. Andoreniel and Morusil stayed, along with several others whose names Kellen didn’t know.

  “We look forward to celebrating your triumph before all Sentarshadeen once you are properly healed and rested, Kellen Tavadon,” Ashaniel said gravely.

  “Thank you,” Kellen said simply. Somehow this didn’t seem like the time to complain that he hated parties.

  Ashaniel turned and swept away, reaching out to take Sandalon’s hand in hers. The young Elven Prince was gazing back at Kellen forlornly over Lairamo’s shoulder.

  “I’ll see you again soon,” Kellen called to the child, and saw Sandalon’s face light up with pleasure. Then the Queen and her court were gone, and two attendants were closing the pavilion awning behind them.

  “Why don’t we get you out of that armor?” Idalia said pragmatically. “Better now than later.”

  As deftly as if she’d done this a hundred times—and Kellen didn’t know she hadn’t—she unbelted his surcoat and lifted it off, then pulled out the locking-pins that held the armored collar in place and slipped it free, then lifted off the armored breast-and-backplate. Next came the multijointed armored sleeves, then the boots, then the leggings, then Kellen stood wearing nothing more than the thin quilted leather undersuit that went beneath the Elven armor.

  It was damp from the rain, and had shiny worn scars on its surface where the armor had rubbed it.

  Kellen felt peculiarly light and unfinished without his armor. In the short time since he’d first donned it, it had grown to be an extension of his self, as much as his sword was.

  One of the attendants handed Idalia a thick belted robe—in the same shade of soft green as Kellen’s surcoat—and she helped him into it and tied the sash. Heavy soft over-the-knee boots of green-dyed sheepskin, woolly side in, completed the outfit. The Elves did nothing by halves.

  “Comfy now?” Idalia asked.

  “So far,” Kellen said cautiously.

  Idalia snorted eloquently, and opened a large box that someone had placed on the table while Kellen hadn’t been paying attention. The box was large but not deep—though still too big for one person to carry comfortably—and made of a satiny golden wood, so beautifully crafted that Kellen couldn’t make out where the pieces were joined. When Idalia opened it, Kellen could see that it was lined in padded leather, and filled with small glass flasks. Idalia inspected the contents critically for a moment before choosing one.

  The liquid inside was a lurid violet color. She picked up the goblet Kellen had used before and poured a generous portion of the violet liquid into it—it was thick and syrupy—before filling the cup the rest of the way with wine.

  She lifted the cup to his lips. “Drink it all, as fast as you can,” she ordered.

  “I suppose it tastes terrible,” Kellen said resignedly, having some experience with healing potions.

  “Not this one,” Idalia said, sounding amused. “But it needs to start working before I can start working.”

  Steadying the cup with his bandaged hands, Kellen complied. She’d been right; it didn’t taste that bad—particularly in comparison with other potions he’d had to drink—but the violet syrup gave the wine an odd sweetish undertaste that he didn’t actually care for, like eating candied flowers.

  Idalia took the cup back and set it carefully on the table, then reached for his hand. Reflexively, Kellen drew back.

  “I have to see what’s under there,” Idalia said gently. “It won’t hurt. Not once what I put in the wine takes effect anyway. Tell me what happened.”

  “I burned them,” Kellen said simply. He knew he ought to tell her more, but somehow he really couldn’t bring himself to talk about what had happened at the top of the cairn. Not to Jermayan. Not to Shalkan. Not to anyone. “It was the keystone,” he finally added reluctantly.

  “Do they hurt now?” Idalia asked, as impersonal as any physician.

  “No. Not much, anyway. Jermayan. had some kind of salve in his pack.”

  “Night’s Daughter,” Shalkan supplied. “Mixed with all heal.”

  “Well.” Idalia seemed surprised, and Kellen wondered what “Night’s Daughter” was. “Just as well he came prepared for every occasion.”

  “And he gave me something horrible and brown to drink every night so I could sleep,” Kellen added. “It tasted like moldy hay.”

  Idalia raised her eyebrow. Evidently she recognized what it was without Shalkan telling her. “It’s just as well you came back to us so soon, then.”

  She knelt in front of him and unwrapped his hands slowly, alternating hands so that both would be exposed at the same time. Shalkan stood close, his cheek nearly touching Kellen’s. Kellen could tell that whatever was in the wine was starting to work. He felt sleepy, and it was hard to concentrate. As the outer layers of bandage came away, he could see the inner layers, sticky and glistening with greenish ointment.

  And the more layers Idalia peeled away, the more Kellen could see that his hands looked wrong.

  They just looked wrong.

  Jermayan and Vestakia had never let him watch when they tended his dressings on the trail. He’d gone along with it then. He didn’t remember why just now, but he had. Maybe he’d been asleep when they’d done it. Maybe it was that brown stuff.

  But he wasn’t asleep now.

  “Don’t look,” Shalkan suggested, as Idalia lifted away the last layer of bandage, but Kellen couldn’t manage to take that good advice.

  He looked. And wished he hadn’t.

  His hands were warped and charred, caricatures of themselves. All the flesh was burned away from the palms, and Kellen thought he could see bone showing. Toward the edges of the burn, puffy moist colorless flesh hung in sloughing rags. His fingers were crooked into claws, the tendons pulled tight by the burns. He tried to flex his fingers and couldn’t. There was only pain—dull and distant, but there.

  He made a strangled sound, and would have risen from his seat if not for Andoreniel’s h
ands on his shoulders, pressing him firmly down. Even through the effects of the draught Idalia had given him, Kellen could feel a rising tide of panic.

  I’ll never hold a sword again!

  Idalia made a hissing sound of dismay, and somehow that turned Kellen’s panic into anger.

  “Well, what did you expect?” he said harshly, struggling with his feelings. He’d known he was burned. He’d known the burns were bad—very bad. But to see them … !

  “I expected you to die,” Idalia said, all the grief she hadn’t shown before thick in her voice. “Oh, little brother, I’m so glad you came back alive!” She put her hand over his arm—above the burns—and squeezed gently, then sat back, looking over his shoulder.

  “Kellen. Don’t look at your hands. Look at me,” Shalkan demanded. “Now.”

  With a great effort, Kellen pulled his gaze away from his hands and met Shalkan’s gaze. The unicorn had beautiful eyes—deep green, and fringed by the longest silver lashes Kellen had ever seen.

  “It will be all right,” the unicorn said softly. “You’ve seen Idalia heal worse injuries. Remember the unicorn colt? Just look at me and keep breathing. Let the potion do its work.”

  Kellen took a deep breath. Anger was a tool of the Knight-Mage, but panic was his enemy. He wasn’t going to panic. He concentrated on Shalkan.

  As if from a great distance, he heard Idalia’s voice:

  “Will anyone here share in the price of this healing?”

  “I will,” he heard Andoreniel say. “For what Kellen has done for my city, I stand in his debt forever.”

  “And I,” Morusil added. “It is a small repayment for the refreshment Kellen has brought to my garden, and the saving of the forest.”

  “And I—”

  “And I—”

  In a few moments, all the Elves who had remained behind had pledged themselves to share in the price of Kellen’s healing.

  Chapter Two

  A Healing and a Homecoming

  THAT WILL MAKE things easier, Idalia thought absently. She reached out with her small knife and cut a few strands of Kellen’s hair, then a few of her own.

  Bless the boy, he didn’t even notice. He was staring into Shalkan’s eyes as if he’d found his one true love, breathing slowly and deeply, doing all he could to aid her in her spell. For a moment there, when he’d first seen his hands, she’d thought she was going to have to waste valuable energy putting him into Sleep, but he’d pulled out of his panic admirably.

  Morusil had already gathered strands of hair from everyone else there. She added her own and Kellen’s hairs to the bundle, then pricked the ball of her thumb with her knife, and squeezed out a drop of her own blood, holding the nowbloody bundle of hairs under her hand so that the drop of blood fell on it and bound them all together.

  Power flared up in the yellow pavilion, encircling them all and settling into a dome of protection. Once it had steadied, Idalia tossed the hair and the herbs necessary to her spell into the brazier that Morusil had also prepared, and whispered her spell.

  Normally she would not need to do so much work to prepare a Healing. But Kellen, was very badly injured. And Idalia was already laboring under the shadow of an unpaid Mageprice, incurred when she had cast the spell to bring the rains safely to Sentarshadeen. Though Andoreniel, Morusil, and the others would bear much of the cost of Kellen’s healing, there was always Magedebt to be paid: this was the law of the Wild Magic.

  The weight of the Presence filled her, and she waited to hear the price. But instead, a voice seemed to speak within her: You have already paid your price in full.

  No! Her denial was automatic. There was no magic without a cost—that was the first and most basic tenet of the Wild Magic. What price she had paid was for gifts she had already received, not for this.

  But Kellen needed healing, and it would be foolishness to argue with the Presence. I accept, she said, and felt the Presence depart, just as if she had accepted a normal geas.

  Green fire filled her hands, as thick and rich as wild honey. She tilted her hands and it spilled over, splashing onto Kellen’s hands and clinging, and where it touched, ruined flesh began to heal and re-knit as if it had never been burned. Once that damage had been repaired, the green fire spread—up Kellen’s arms, across his torso, down his legs—repairing all the lesser damage he’d sustained at the Barrier.

  In moments the Healing was over. After a moment, Idalia dismissed the sphere of protection. She got stiffly to her feet.

  At least she felt just as tired as if this had been normal Healing, and judging from the faces of the Elves, they all felt the same.

  Kellen met her eyes, his expression dazed and unfocused with exhaustion. He looked down at his hands, his eyes opening wide in delight and wonder at the sight of them whole and unmarred. He opened his hands wide, and then closed them into fists.

  “They’re all right,” he said, his voice blurry with the aftereffects of the potion. “They’re all right!”

  “Of course they are,” Idalia said, with an assurance she hadn’t felt until that moment, and with affection and love flowing over into her voice. “And now we’ll go home.”

  “I’ll help,” Shalkan said. “I’m not sure Kellen remembers where it is. And even if he does, I’m not sure he could get there without deciding to lie down on the path for a nap. Which would severely inconvenience anyone else who needed to walk there.”

  Kellen grinned tiredly, but did not contradict his friend.

  Idalia brought Kellen’s cloak, then Kellen swung his leg over Shalkan’s bare back, and the three of them made their way to the small house Kellen shared with Idalia. Morusil accompanied them for part of the distance, until his path diverged from their own.

  This time, Kellen didn’t even mind the rain.

  No one seemed to take any particular notice of them. Elves were tactful in that way.

  “HERE we are.”

  Kellen was nearly asleep by the time they reached their door. He blinked at it in surprise.

  Everything looked different—familiar and strange at the same time. While he’d been gone, Sentarshadeen had taken on something of the aspect of a dreamworld in his mind; something too good to be true. But here it was again, as real as the rocks in the road. He took a deep breath and swung his leg over Shalkan’s back.

  “I’ll see you later,” Shalkan said. “Get some sleep.” When the unicorn was sure Kellen was steady on his feet, he turned neatly on the path before the door and trotted delicately away.

  Idalia opened the door, and Kellen hurried to get in out of the rain.

  dp n="47" folio="39" ?> “Rain. It’s been raining since we started back. It’s raining now. Doesn’t it ever stop?” he asked, yawning as he walked inside. Everything was just as he’d left it, with the addition of a cloak-tree and drip-pan just inside the door. Kellen hung his sodden cloak on the highest peg, stretching and yawning again.

  “Eventually,” Idalia promised. “Normally I’d suggest a hot bath before bed, but frankly, I don’t think you’ll stay awake through it—and I’d hate for you to drown after all my hard work. Why don’t you get out of those damp leathers and into your nice dry bed? You’ll need to sleep off that Healing. And then we can talk.”

  Kellen nodded, heading toward his room. Bed! His own bed! And it would be dry, and warm, and he would not have to drag himself out of it at first light for sword practice, or another long day in the saddle …

  With a mumbled thanks to Idalia, he slid back the door and walked inside.

  The bed was turned down and waiting for him. Everything had been changed to autumn colors; there was a new bed-robe laid out, and—Kellen grinned to himself—towels as well. He sat down on the bench beneath the window and pulled off his clothes, toweling himself thoroughly dry afterward.

  Even in the exhaustion that was the aftermath of the Healing spell, every time he used his hands he felt an enormous pang of relief. Just to pick something up, to close his hands, to look down and see,
not numb bandage-covered lumps, but ten healthy responsive pink fingers was almost enough to rouse him to wakefulness again—almost. He’d lived with the fear for so long, that—because of the way they’d been burned, by magic—there’d be nothing Idalia would be able to do to Heal him.

  But now that was all over. He was fine. Better than fine. Healed.

  Time to move on to the next crisis, Kellen told himself, stumbling toward the bed.

  He was asleep before he’d pulled the covers up over himself.

  A few minutes after Kellen disappeared into his room, Idalia looked in. She found Kellen’s clothing strewn all over the floor, and Kellen asleep like a hibernating bear. She smiled faintly to herself and went to brew tea.

  She was tired, but not tired enough to seek her own bed. There had been several present to share the cost of the Healing, and so the physical cost to her had been minimal. Normally, she would have also had a price to pay …

  But not this time, apparently.

  Idalia frowned. She’d never heard of such a thing before, but Wildmages didn’t run to libraries of books setting down the accumulated lore of Wildmages past. For one thing, the Wild Magic itself was fluid and ever-changing, and the way things had happened in the past wasn’t the way things would necessarily happen in the future.

  As it seems I’ve just proven. Ah, well, if there are explanations to be had, I suppose I’ll find them in the Books of the Wild Magic.

  Once the water was hot and her tea was steeping, she went to her room and got out her three Books.

  The Book of Moon, The Book of Sun, and The Book of Stars were the three Books every Wildmage possessed. The Books were magical in themselves, and once they had found their Wildmage, they could not be separated from him or her by any means save the death of the Wildmage. Nor could they be destroyed. In them was everything a Wildmage needed to know in order to set their feet on the path of the Wild Magic, and a lifetime was not enough time to master their contents.