[Lanen Kaelar 01] - Song in the Silence (20 page)

“You honour me,” she whispered back,
and her heart in truespeech echoed her gratitude, her wonder. I shivered with
the feel of her breath warm acrossmy eyelid. “We will meet again, at
midnight.”

When I opened my eyes she was gone.

I returned to my hiding place, watching, thinking
long on my folly and wondering where it would lead me, and was amazed to see
the light rise about me hours later. For all my doubts I had never felt more
alive.

I had never known the
ferrinshadik
to
bring joy before.

Marik

I summoned Berys’s Messenger the night we landed
on the Dragon Isle, and no sooner had it appeared than it spoke with his voice.

“So. You have survived the Storms, and since
you summon me the Dragons have not killed you. How goes the Harvest?”

“Greetings to you as well, Magister,” I
replied, speaking slowly to annoy him. “I am very well, I thank you. The
Dragons remembered some treaty we had forgot, and all is arranged. Already the
workers have made back the cost of the journey, and we have been here barely
half a day. And you might be interested to hear that the child of Maran Vena is
here as well. She knows nothing of the Farseer, but it is still possible that she
is my child.”

“Indeed?” asked Berys with a sneer.
“I am not interested in your conjectures. We cannot be certain until we
have made tests. And for that we will need blood from her.”

This was news. “Blood, say you. And how
should I go about getting blood from her?”

“You have guards, do you not, and men paid
to serve you? Take her captive and cut her. What could be simpler?”

I had been thinking the same thing, but since
Berys suggested it I thought of an objection. “And if she is my child? Do
not your Masters require her whole?”

“You need not remove an arm,” he
replied, disdain rich in his voice that came from the demon’s throat. “It
will take enough to fill a cup, no more. Doubtless one so clever, who has
arrived whole at the Dragon Isle, will be able to discover some way to acquire
that much.” I would swear then that the small, distorted demon Messenger
smiled with Berys’s smile. “May the Harvest prospect, Marik. I look
forward to my share of your profits.”

The creature disappeared in a cloud of sulphur. I
threw wide the shutters and left ward for Caderan to attend me in the morning.
There was much I needed to know if my search for dragon gold was to be rewarded
with other than death.”

IX

LESSONS

Kantri

I had gathered my thoughts and was preparing to
return to my chambers when Hadreshikrar, my dearest friend among the Kindred,
came upon me as I lay silent in the early dawn.

“Good morrow, Lord Akhor,” he said
cheerfully. “I am glad to find you here: I began to wonder if the Gedri
had put you under some spell in the night!”

“It is not impossible,” I
replied. The idea had occurred to me more than once in the long darkness.

“Akhor, I spoke in jest!”
said Shikrar.

“That is no surprise, my friend,
you jest more than any three other of our Kindred.” I did not want to tell
him of my thoughts, though, not for a few minutes yet. “Still I live in
hope that more of my people will catch this light malady of yours. Tell me,
what makes you so winghearted this morning?”

“It is no great mystery. Such a
wondrous time for my family! I bespoke my son Kédra this night past, and he
tells me Mirazhe has left for the Birthing Cove. Their youngling will be born
ere the moon is past the full! Is that not enough to lighten the darkest
heart?”

“It is indeed,” I replied,
smiling at him as I rose. “And of course, any son or daughter of Kédra
will be as great a blessing to the Kindred as his father has been.”

I teased Shikrar and he knew it, but
his pride in his son was too great to be affected by anything I might say. He
had invested in Kédra all the love he had felt for Kédra’s mother, his lost
beloved Yrais. Kédra was, to his credit, a modest soul, and though he loved his
father dearly he laughed at Shikrar’s excessive praise. They got along well,
Kédra was bright and well liked, and Shikrar never stopped talking about his
wondrous child.

“And so it will, my friend, mock
me though you might,” he replied. “My Kédra has given me joy since
his birth; I trust his youngling will do so as well. Mirazhe is a wonder, she
all but glows with the littling. Idai stands birth sister to her.” Shikrar
gazed keenly at me, which I as keenly ignored. “And when shall Mirazhe
return the favor, Akhor my friend?” he asked pointedly. “It is widely
known that Idai leans to you, she has these many years, spurning all others.
Can you not find it in you to return her regard?”

I sighed wearily: “Hadreshikrar,
must we go through this again? As Eldest you should know better. Should I take
Idai as mate out of pit y? She would no more stand for it than I. I cannot
count the numbers of those who have urged this joining upon me, nor the number
of times you yourself have done so. Of your kindness, my friend, do not speak
more of it. Idai is wise and worthy of all praise, but I do not love her.”

“Ah, well, I shall keep my
peace. But with our numbers so few, it pains me to see you still without a mate
and Idai yet yet barren.”

“That is her choice and
mine!” I replied, stung by his bluntness. “You know I never said
word, never asked any such devotion from her. If she chooses not to mate with
another what word then should I give her to sway her? I will not bring a
youngling forth where there is no love to sustain it, even if Idai were
willing. And she would not be. Why should she settle for such a half-life when
there are many who hold her in high regard and would take her as mate with honour?
And it is no shame to choose a life of solitude.”

“Forgive me, my friend,” he
said, as we walked a little away from the watch post. “I did not mean the
words to gall. But the tire rises in me with the coming of a youngling, with my
pride in my dear son—surely it is no wonder that I wish the same joy for
you.”

“Ah, Shikrar, you old
meddler,” I said. “You would have all of us mated before ever we left
our mothers.” Truth to tell, his words disturbed me more than I could
allow him to know. So few younglings, so few of the Kantri even taking mates. I
feared for my people, but I did not know what I could do. It was not a new
problem, there have never been many of us; but our numbers were halved by the
Demonlord, and despite the long years between we had not even begun to recover.
Still, no need to speak of that with Shikrar while his heart was so light.
“Not content with instructing the young ones, you would teach us all what
we must do to keep old Hadreshikrar happy.”

He laughed, as I knew he would.
“That’s better. You have been overgrim this morning, Akhor.” He
grinned at me. “Is it that old disease of yours, eh? It does come round
this time of year, especially when the Gedri are so close. Still, no one has
ever died of the
ferrinshadik
. “When I did not respond, he stopped
and peered at me. “Do you know, I begin to wonder in truth if someone or
something has not put a spell on you.”

“As for the
ferrinshadik
,
Shikrar, you are not immune yourself. Tell me if you can in the Language of
Truth that you have no longing in your soul to speak with them, that deep in
your heart of hearts there is no burning desire to learn of them, to have
converse with another Kindred and see the world through new eyes.”

He said nothing: I sensed no more
from him than the amused tolerance of friendship, touched lightly by concern
and by a grudging admission of guilt. I went on, “But I do not recall the
casting of a spell. Surely I would remember such a thing.”

Instantly Shikrar’s voice sang in my
mind, worried, caring as only a soul’s friend cares.
“Khordeshkhistriakhor,
I ask as your namefast friend, what has happened to you? I spoke in jest, but
truly you are not yourself this morning. Your thoughts are guarded against mine
as they have not been in my memory. Does the Weh sleep come upon you again so
soon? Or have the Gedri indeed cast binding spells upon you?”

“Hadreshikrar, I warn you, much
has happened this night,” I replied cautiously, aloud. Then in the
truespeech I added,
“I will gladly open my thoughts to you, but for
friendship’s sake do nothing, do not even move, unless you find the true touch
of the Rakshasa.”

“I swear it, old friend.”

I let down the barriers of conscious
thought and let Shikrar see the events of the night before. In a moment he knew
most of what had passed, and in that moment I threw my wings and my forearms
about him and held him fast. I had not known him all these years without
knowing what his first reaction would be.

“You swore to me!” I cried
aloud as he struggled to throw me off, to take to the sky, to seek out this
Gedri and destroy her. “Hold to your word!”

In his fury he struck at me as best
he could while I held him, raking his claws across my chest plates. If he had
had any leverage my blood would have drenched the grass. My wings had hampered
him, but now they were vulnerable and I withdrew them; they were far too
delicate to risk in a struggle. “You fool!” he cried, thrashing.
“Would you damn us all? Shall we be cattle in the Trollingwood, shall we
be
dragons
because you trusted some pawn of the Gedrishakrim?”

“Enough!” I cried. I felt
my grip weakening. Shikrar was older and larger than I. I focussed instead on
using all the power of truespeech to cry out to him mind to mind, where I could
not be ignored.
“Hadreshikrar, listen to me! Did you find
Raksha-trace?”
I shook him even as he battled to escape me, even as I
felt my hold slipping.
“Tell me, your soul to the Four Winds, did you
find any trace of the Rakshasa in me? Any trace at all?”

He stopped struggling then, suddenly,
bowing his head in defeat.
“No, Akhor. Your soul is as clean as the day
you were birthed, you great fool,”
he replied. Then he spoke aloud, as
if truespeech were too painful. “What madness possessed you? For since it
is not the Rakshasa, it must be that you have in truth lost your mind.”

I released my hold and stepped back,
praying to the Winds that my tongue might be touched with the power of persuasion.
If I could not explain this to Hadreshikrar, I could not explain it to any of
the Kindred.

“Shikrar, do you remember my
waking from my last three Weh sleeps?”

He stared at me, waiting.

“Hold your silence now if you
will, but then it was you who spoke to me of my dreams. You reminded me then
that it was the third time I had spoken of them, and how Weh dreams should be
honoured as they are so rare. Do you remember my reply?”

“Is that it, then? Is that the
basis for this madness, that you have dreamt a child of the Gedri calling to
you? I tell you, Akhor, we have all had that fantasy—though the
ferrinshadik
has ever been a shadow over your shoulder.” He stared straight into my
eyes and said, “Do you tell me, Akhor, that she called you by your
name?”

“No,” I replied quietly.
That had been a powerful element in the second Weh dream, that the Gedri had
known my true, full name without being told. “She did not call me by name,
my friend. But Shikrar, neither did she call me ‘dragon.’ ”

“What did she say? ‘Hello you
great idiot’?”

“She called me brother, Shikrar.
Brother, as in the first dream. And she told me she had longed to know us for
all of her short life.”

“Did she also tell you that she
had heard tales of dragon gold and might she please have some?”

I felt the tire grow in me, rising
with my anger, but I fought it down. My own vehemence surprised me. “Have
you so little respect for our fellow creatures that you will allow none of them
to be greater than the worst?”

“Have you so far lost your
reason that you forget what happened to the Lesser Kindred?” he growled.
His anger was echoing mine and growing on it, flame fed by accusation.
“Will you have us all live as soulless beasts? Shall we haunt the deep
glades of the Trollingwood like the Lesser Kindred, slaughtered like cattle,
with no soul and no reason? I am the Keeper of Souls, I have tried my life long
to speak with the Lost, with the Lesser Kindred, to no avail. They were in the
heart of their flower, Akhor!” he cried, as though the Demonlord’s
destruction were a blow struck moments before. The youngest and best of us,
struck down by this twisted child of the Gedri with no more thought than we
give cattle.” He could barely contain himself. He had begun to crouch, and
I could see small tongues of flame in his speech even in the bright light of
early morning. With his next breath he would challenge me, and I was in no mood
for a fight.

“Shikrar, I charge you by our
friendship, restrain your anger. Let us guide one another in the Discipline of
Calm, but I charge you to follow that Discipline now as my namefast
friend.” I spoke quietly, with all the calm power I could muster. It did
not move him at all that I could see.