“I'll just wait over on the other side…” The smell of the blood lingered in his nostrils and he tried to be casual as he pulled his scarf from around his neck to cover his face. “If you need anything…” Coll paid him no more mind than if he were a chair. Lonely, possibly. Strange, well, that was without question. Zaii seated himself as far away as possible and listened to the wind shriek in the empty courtyard and waited for the storm.
There were already buckets of sand lining the walls in many places in the main corridors, and Rhuun hoisted one of them, using his unmarked arm.
“Perhaps I may accompany you, Your Grace?” The girl had been waiting outside for him, he thought. She smiled up at him in a way he recognized but couldn't quite place.
“How are you at water?” he asked her.
“Better at translating it than carrying the pail.” She dipped the cheap silver cup she carried into the bucket, and he watched as the sand rippled. He took a sip.
“Nicely done. You're hired.” She nodded and fell in step, two or three strides matching his longer ones. He slowed down. “Have we met? I don't wish to be rude but I'm terrible at names.”
“I'm Calaa,” she said. “We did meet. I was in a play, I spoke to you and to the Queen. It was before . . .”
“You're Ash,” he smiled. “Of course.” Then he laughed. “I called you Ash in my head. Because of the play.”
She looked up at him. “I was in your head?” Then she caught herself and blushed. “That play, it was very silly.”
Rhuun laughed again. “Thank Light and Wind, it wasn't just me. Still, I thought you were quite good.” He looked down at her. “Are you still on the stage?”
“No,” she replied. “Yridaane cast too many glances in my direction, if I may be honest. It became clear to me that my work on stage depended on my work off stage.”
“Vile,” said Rhuun. “We’ll let the playhouse fill with sand.” At her shocked expression, he quickly added, “I’m sorry, that was a joke.” What do we say about jokes? He heard Lelet’s voice as clearly as if she were whispering in his ear, and his good humor, his pleasure even on such a perilous occasion to be talking to a pretty girl, deflated. He cleared his throat. “Please see to the people from the Quarter; they are mostly on the upper floors. I’ll see you later, if we all live through this.” He left her standing in the darkened hallway; knowing she didn't want him to leave, but unable to stay.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Mistra
After they’d been courting for about a month, Lelet sat Auri down in his handsome study and put a glass of whiskey in his hand.
“I have to tell you something,” she said. “About myself. About someone I met.” For a moment her throat closed up and she waited for the ache to recede. “There was a man…”
“I would be surprised if there were not, Letty,” Auri was always ready to defend her— this time against spinsterhood, it seemed.
“Not like that. This man, he was from a different place. A place we all think is mythological. He was from the other side of The Door.” She drew deep, steady breaths through her nose as the memories flooded back—the rain, the way he and the horse finally became friends, his stupid book, his beautiful eyes…he is fond of you…and that’s almost the same as nothing at all…
To her surprise, she wasn’t asked to defend herself. He didn’t look at her like she was mad or wonder aloud how some ordinary human man had duped such a supposedly clever girl.
“How remarkable!” Auri’s eyes were bright; he appeared not to notice her pain. Maybe she’d perfected the Eriisai art of showing nothing. “The Door! You see, I’ve kept a secret from you, as well. This is going to sound like an incredible coincidence, but I’m something of an expert. It seems we were both afraid of appearing mad, doesn’t it? Mythological, ha! That’s for the small-minded and the ignorant. I knew you were neither. I knew you and I were fated to be together.”
She blinked. “Really? An expert?” Some small part of her wondered whether this remarkable coincidence was a coincidence at all. Then, no. That was just borrowing trouble, imagining some sort of conspiracy. After all, it had been Rane who introduced them. She wondered if her brother knew about Auri’s area of expertise. “You’re an expert on demons?”
“Really. I know all about them. Been studying them for years. You actually met one? What happened? What was he like? Oh, and I have some people you must meet!” Then he laughed. “I’m sorry. Start at the beginning.”
“We traveled together for some time,” she began, “and he told me he was a member of the royal family. Then he went home, I don't know how. He just left.” She couldn’t bring herself to continue the story past the point at which Yuenne had tricked Moth into going back to Eriis. She’d spent enough time reliving every detail of her time there and her final humiliation. As it was, she spent the better part of the evening struggling to answer his questions—he had a lot of questions— and not cry.
“Yes, they can fly, most of them, and yes, they can make fire with their hands. No, I never saw mine make fire. No, I don’t think he could.” Not with his hands, anyway.
Finally, of course, she did break down into tears. That was what it took for Auri to understand that this man, whatever he was, had broken her heart. He had an explanation for that; he had an explanation for everything. As he held her and gently wiped away her tears, he said her mistake was thinking that they were like humans on the inside, just in a different wrapper.
“Different inside and out. How could you expect to know its mind? The creature deceived you,” he continued. “Look at what a mark it left on you, after only a week in its company. It is in their nature. You mustn’t blame yourself.” According to Auri, the demon heart was as impervious as its flesh, feeling neither pain nor pleasure. “Tell me again what it said to you, about the royal family.”
Auri wanted to know everything it said.
If he had only believed her, that would have been enough. If he merely treated her like a fragile glass figurine, that would have been a relief. But Auri turned out to be an excellent remedy for her pain. He filled her head, talking constantly about this or that invention, theory, lecture, the book he was writing, his poetry, did she like it? Was she paying attention? Was she ready to go out, and why wasn't she wearing the new shoes he'd bought for her? Fix your hair, Letty, must you swear so much? And don't walk so fast, you mustn’t think of going out alone, what will people say? So much to consider, so much to remember, so many decisions she didn’t have to make, after making so many wrong ones. So many things in her head, there wasn't any room for Moth.
The only place he could slip in was in her dreams, where they were both blameless.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Eriis
Hellne sat on the sand in the dying light of late afternoon and gazed with wonder at her brother.
It had all been worth it. The Zaal had been telling the truth. Everything she’d done, all the time she’d wanted to scream or fly away or set it all on fire—it had all been for something. The sacrifices she’d made had led her here, to her family. She had her family back.
Or at least, she hoped she did.
After pulling Araan out of the hole in the sand—The Door—whatever had held him and his lady Thaali out there in the Vastness, Hellne had quickly realized that her brother was not the same man she remembered. She blamed the slow crawl of years and her own wits—at least, at first. Then she blamed the unknowable physics of the Veil. Then, she thought about the maps the Zaal had given her and wondered.
Araan looked the same, exactly the same. Young enough to be a contemporary of Rhuun, and that in itself was jarring. Based on the vague descriptions the pair gave, she assumed they'd been caught in the Veil after the Weapon, and everyone knew time ran differently there. Slower. Some said not at all. But his memories of life and family were fractured. Thaali's were even worse, and try as she might, Hellne couldn't recall Araan having a companion by that name. The best she could remember was a
young courtier who after the Weapon had, like so many others, disappeared.
“Yes,” said Thaali. “I was that person. Am that person.”
It appeared they had somehow found each other in the Veil, and for that she was grateful. And as far as memories, it was long ago. Long for her, but if it was next to no time at all for him, why couldn't he recall how to translate water? The first time, Araan turned the handful of sand into a cup, and held it up for her. She thought he looked as if he wasn't sure what sat in his hand.
“A confusion in my wits,” he told her. “Let me try again.” That time, it was a liquid of some sort, but nothing one might consider drinking. He got it right on the third try, so that was all right.
“Things are very different,” she told them. “Do you remember the attack, the Weapon?” They did not. One moment they'd been walking in the garden (Where? Which one? A garden, just a garden.) The next, they were in that dark and formless place. “Well, you might as well hear it now. We've spent more than twenty years trying to rebuild Eriis. After the Weapon. The humans nearly destroyed us.”
Thaali cocked her head. “What are humans?”
“My love,” said Araan. “Think. You know what the humans are. Don't you?” He fixed her with an unusually steady gaze, and she nodded, looking at her hands. “Good.”
To Hellne's surprise, neither seemed concerned about the war, or anything else, really. She confessed her affair with her own human, knowing they would find out soon enough.
“Malloy was his name, you must remember him. The ambassador's assistant?” He shrugged, he wasn't sure. “Well, it was a long time ago. It'll come back.”
They hadn't been friends, as far as she could recall, but she knew for certain they had sat together at dinner more than once. She could see them, laughing together about something. In her mind, they looked very young. Araan looked exactly the same. She wondered if Malloy still lived, and what he looked like now.
Finally, she told them about Rhuun. “He looks unlike us, but he is clever.”
They nodded, agreeing he must be a fine young man. It seemed nothing she said surprised or upset them. She supposed it was a sort of malaise from being in the Veil, and when they all got home it would lift.
Hellne thought again about that hole in the sand, the Door, and how her eyes had tricked her, because while she knew she saw her brother's face, she also caught a glimpse of…something else. Teeth. No, that was foolishness. She'd been so tired, ready to give up. It was the light. But now as she looked across their simple camp at the pair, sitting with their heads together, she wondered.
She wondered, and she began to worry.
Hellne stifled a yawn. The day on the sand had been a long one, and she was looking forward to closing her eyes. Diia was already unrolling her quilted blanket. She smiled at the older woman; it was only affection that made her continue to attend Hellne. After everything they’d been through, she was certainly no longer a servant.
“What is that?” Thaali left her seat near Araan and stood staring at the sky. Hellne sighed. What now?
“Look,” she said. She pointed at the cloud-covered horizon, still light enough to make out a strange disturbance in the sky. “What is that?” A quick glance at Araan. “It's a new thing, I'm sure of it.”
She and Diia shared a glance and got to their feet. The grey-yellow light of the evening sun behind the clouds sheared sharply off. The bleary sky was light and then much darker, as if cut by a knife. And the wall of darkness was moving.
“It's the Hand of Aa.” Diia fell at once into a crouch, her hands held out before her, palms facing the sky. “Let it find a different path.”
“What is she doing?” Thaali asked. Araan shushed her.
“She's praying.” Hellne knew her assistant kept the traditions of her people, Diia knew her mistress did not, and they tacitly agreed long ago to not mention such things. But Hellne certainly knew what it looked like. Everyone did.
“She's what-ing? Who is Aa?” Thaali knelt next to Diia. “What does this mean?”
Diia sat up. “Who are you, that you don't know these things? Because you are no daughter of Eriis.”
“Diia!” Hellne helped Thaali to her feet. “Forgive her speaking to you like that. The Veil has played tricks on your minds, and these memories will come back to you. The Hand of Aa is a storm, a huge and devastating storm. It's moving towards the city, look. It's traveling the same way we are. It will arrive before we do. We must hurry, they will need us.”
She had cause to regret not supporting Diia, that evening.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Eriis
The night of the storm, the night the Hand of Aa came to wipe the landscape clean, Rhuun and Zaii had finished settling everyone in at roughly the same time the first waves of wind-driven sand began to batter the city walls. Overhead, it was still light enough to see bits and chunks of structures from outside the Arch—once shop awnings and stalls and front porches, now trash—flying past the atrium. The 'roof' built by Coll and La Naa held, so far. The howl of the wind was joined by the crying of children, and the halls began to darken as the sand piled up above their heads. A firewhirl passed directly above them, and not only the children screamed.
Rhuun met Calaa in the great hall, now lit by flickering stones. It was becoming hard to see even inside, as the air filled with the dust that crept through every crack and seam. Still, he thought, everyone was accounted for, every child and parent, no matter where they slept the previous night, was now safe. Even if they had nothing left but a blanket and a cup of water and if it was through a veil of ash, they would see the sun rise. He wondered if this was what it had been like after the Weapon. Since none of the folk from the tents had appeared, he asked Light and Wind to watch over them all, and over Ilaan, although he doubted Ilaan would welcome the intervention on his behalf.
He couldn't comfort Ilaan, but he could comfort Calaa, who was stiff with fear. They settled on the floor behind a row of ceremonial benches alongside many hundreds of others who had taken refuge in the palace. (Zaii had quietly suggested he not retreat to the privacy of his room.) In the old days, these seats were used to observe the transit of the moons as they passed above the atrium, but tonight they held sleeping children, with their families standing or crouching nearby. He pulled a blanket around both of their shoulders. She smiled up at him gratefully as she shivered and tried not to cry, and he couldn't do anything but hold her, not even whisper courage in her ear. Speech of any kind was impossible, because the wind had gotten too loud. They spent the night clinging together, and near dawn, when it seemed the roof would hold and the wail and boom of wind and storm were lessening, he awoke from a dream of searching for Lelet in the ruins of a burnt-out building to find Calaa's lips against his. He pulled her closer. As it grew lighter and quieter, they both fell asleep. When they woke a short time later, she was nestled against him and those nearby were carefully not looking their way. As families came down from the upper floors and heads were counted, it became clear that without his offer of shelter, many lives would have been lost. As it was, there were no casualties.
“Look,” Zaii loudly proclaimed as he walked the halls. “Aa has left us all that we need. Why, we could build another city! Let us thank Aa, Light and especially Wind for delivering this bounty right to—or should I say right through our door.” People laughed and clambered to their feet. The buckets that had brought sand in last evening now went to moving it out. Zaii did his best to remind everyone whom to thank for nothing more dire than property damage. “It's the project of a span of days, not a period of grief and mourning. Yes, it was the prince's idea entirely, he couldn't be talked out of it.”
Zaii was interrupted by raised voices from outside the palace, in the direction of the Arch. Rhuun followed the stream of Quarter folk who were anxious to survey the damage to their homes, and to see what the fuss was all about.
Coming up the debris strewn road leading through the Quarter to the Arch were four v
eiled figures. It appeared that one was male, and the others female. He thought he recognized the robes and gait of one of the women, and his throat tightened.
The woman, who led the others along, stopped just inside the Arch. Rhuun stood before her. Everyone else had drawn back and stood silent, waiting to see who Aa's storm had blown their way. The woman threw back her veil.
“Mother. Thank Light and Wind—”
“Light and Wind had nothing to do with it. It was the Hand of Aa who set them free.” She turned unsteadily and indicated the others to join her. They pulled their veils away and a gasp went up. Rhuun thought the man strongly resembled his mother, the woman he didn't know at all. “This is my brother, your uncle. It's Araan and his lady Thaali, come back to us. I've brought them home.” She stumbled, and the fourth member of the party, Diia, came and took her mistress by the arm. Hellne allowed Diia to lead her past Rhuun and on into the palace without another word or glance.
Araan looked around mildly. Thaali yawned behind her hand. Rhuun cleared his throat. “Welcome home, Uncle, Madam. Although this was unexpected we are overjoyed to find you returned. Please, come inside. You'll find the place a bit messier than when you left it…” The two merely stared at him. “Zaii?” The man appeared at his elbow, in some danger of his eyes falling out. “Escort my uncle to, um, give them my room until we have something cleaned and made fit.”
“Are you sure that's wise?” Zaii whispered. “Human-looking things in there.”
Rhuun tore his own eyes away from the two strangers. “It'll have to do. Please put a few people into fixing something appropriate up, quickly.” He wondered where his mother had found them, out in all that sand. He watched as they walked past him and realized neither had said a word. Shock, he told himself. It had to be shock.
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