Prophecy, Child of Earth (71 page)

She called Ashe's name at each rise, the wind swallowing her voice and hurling it back into her face, blended with a wail of its own. His mist cloak would keep him from her sight, she knew, and unless he heard her she had no chance of finding him. Her heart grew tighter with each step; she was unable to shake the clutching fear that had clawed at her soul since she had seen the look in Jo's eyes earlier that night.
Soon he will have reached the steppes, and then I'll never be able to find
him
, she thought, shielding her eyes from the dust and tiny shards of rock blasting against her face as she rounded the cliff face that led to the windward side of the mountain.

The wind was so fierce here that Rhapsody's cloak ripped loudly, tearing loose the stays that kept the flaps together, and nearly pulling it from her body.

She cried out in pain, then made for the shelter of the pass in front of her, the last outcropping of rocks before the sheer drop to the steppes four thousand feet below. The wind had hollowed out an arch over the centuries, leaving a thin rocky refuge, open on both sides but solid in front, jutting into the middle of the pass. It seemed stable, and would afford her a few moments' rest before turning back.

There was no way she could go forward and live.

Rhapsody's fingers stung where the skin had been scraped away from clinging to the rock, and when the archway was within reach she took hold, only to find her grip give way. She was vaguely aware that her hands were bleeding, and struggled to hold on, pulling herself inside the shelter. The front face of the wall seemed solid and she rested her head against it, trying to regain her breath. When she could speak she called Ashe's name one last time into the wind, hoping it would carry down the crag. Then she leaned against the wall in exhaustion, watching the wind shriek by on either side of her through the doorways of the arch. A shadow partially blocked the view on the southern side of the rock refuge.

'What's the matter? Gods, what are you doing out here? The Rakshas could be anywhere, haunting these passes, waiting for—waiting for one of us."

Rhapsody looked up, still panting, and saw that the darkness which obscured the doorway of the arch was man-shaped. His voice had a note of panic in it. With great effort she answered him.

'I—forgot to—get—something."

He hurried into the sheltered arch and dropped his pack, then came and took her by the shoulders. "What?"

Rhapsody could barely see him in the inky darkness, even though he was immediately in front of her. She looked up into his hood, attempting to make eye contact. She swallowed, trying to find her voice.

'Your promise."

She felt the muscles in his arms tighten through the grip of his hands, and he shook her slightly; she could tell he was struggling from letting the intensity of his feelings cause her harm. "Are you insane?" he asked incredulously. "They would never find your body if you misstepped even once. Gods, Rhapsody, what promise could have been so important?"

She coughed as he took her bare hands in his gloved ones, turning the bleeding fingers to his lips, caressing them in a rough gesture of comfort. "I need you to swear you will not hunt it," she answered, her throat tightening as the wind howled through the arched shelter, snapping his hood stiffly.

The dark figure remained silent, brushing her fingers with kisses that became slightly more gentle. Rhapsody's hands began to tremble, and she knew she had been right; he had set off in search of the twisted vessel that housed his soul. She thought about how desperate he must be if he would risk something so eternally awful, and realized that he was probably confronting the one prospect that was worth gambling his own damnation: the possibility of hers.

'You must stay away," she said, her words coming out as frightened gasps. "I told you, I will be able to kill it, and I will not be alone. Promise me, Ashe. Swear to me you will not hunt it. Let me do this. Trust me, please."

The hood lowered, and she knew his head was bent low with the weight of her demand. "I can't let you do this," he said at last, his voice full of pain. "I couldn't bear it if—"

Violently she slapped both palms on his shoulders, shoving him against the side of the mountain cliff. His head snapped back up, and she glared up into the hood again, this time catching a glimpse of blue eyes opened in shock by her blow. She took the collar of his cloak at the throat into her clenched fist.

'Listen to me," she snarled, her voice low and deadly, but clearly audible above the howling wind. "You will
not
do this to me! You will afford me the belief that I know what I am capable of, and you will believe in it unwaveringly. And if you can't do that, you will still yield to my request and^t
out of sight
. I have already let this abomination harm the only sister I have ever had. It has ravaged her, and it's my fault. I will not lose you to it also, Ashe." She began to shake uncontrollably, and he pulled her into a tight embrace as she succumbed to hiccoughing sobs.

His lips touched her frozen ear. "What happened to Jo was not your fault," he said, raw pain in his voice. "If anyone is to blame, it's me. I could have looked harder—I didn't even check the heath."

'Because I told you not to," Rhapsody choked. "I told you not to pursue her too much because I thought she was back in her room crying. I had no idea how much we had hurt her; I never thought she would go outside alone. Gods, what have I done?" The sobbing dissolved into gasps of agony, and her tears soaked his cheek.

He leaned against the mountain, slipping a hand behind her neck and another behind her back, holding her with all his strength as she cried tears of deeper grief than she had ever been allowed.

The wind whined in discordant accompaniment to her weeping, and when she paused to draw breath he pulled her face up and kissed her roughly. Her own response was ungentle as well, her hands reaching under his cloak to clutch his back as her mouth sought the harsh comfort of his. He ran his hands over her flying hair, stopping long enough to pull off his gloves and throw them on the ground near his pack. Then he reached beneath her cloak, grasping her waist, pulling her closer, his mouth breaking from hers.

'You came out into the Teeth in a nightgown and a cloak? Where's your armor?

Gods, what's the matter with you?"

'Promise me you won't hunt it," she whispered, fear filling her voice. "Please.

Please, I love you. I love you. Do this for me. Please."

She could feel him begin to tremble, his tremors matching her own. Then he nodded.

'All right," he said, his voice cracking. "All right, Rhapsody, I agree. I will not hunt it. But if it takes you, so help me, I'll—

She kissed him again, her mouth seeking to silence him. "It won't," she said, her hands releasing his back from their grip and moving to his chest. "Have a little faith in me."

His hands grasped her waist more tightly. "There is no end to the faith I have in you, Rhapsody, but you forget, I've fought this demon myself. It reached into my chest like it was an open sack of grain and dragged out a piece of my soul without breathing hard. That was the sealing of
our
blood contract. If I hadn't been able to break free then, it would have owned me, too.

'It was like a vine growing up my spine, wrapping itself around my essence, becoming part of me as gently as a breeze, spreading without hesitation until it reached through my entire chest cavity. What do you think damaged me so much?

I injured myself as much as it did, ripping it out with all my strength before it consumed all of me. The piece of me that it took I had to sacrifice, like an animal in a trap chewing off its foot to escape. It only took an instant, Rhapsody; I don't know if I could get away a second time. I don't know if you can, either."

'Stop it," she said fiercely. "I'm not going against the F'dor yet; I'm only killing his toy. And I have far better reason to. Besides what it has done to you, it has hurt and degraded Jo. She has suffered enough in her life, she didn't need this. I have never felt this much hate before—if I don't give vent to it I will burn alive." Her voice broke. "Do you hear me, Ashe? I will
burn alive.''
She buried her face in his chest, her fingers drawing into claws once more.

He pulled her away and kissed her repeatedly, his mouth hard and insistent.

"Now you listen," he said between touches of his lips, "you sound like me. That's criminal, Rhapsody. You are the one who made me believe that love was not just a false concept in this sour world. Don't you dare turn away from it now. Don't become like the rest of us. You'll be abandoning us to our hatred forever." His last kiss lingered; she felt all the intensity of his pain in it, and the feeling was alien to her, so unlike the gentleness she had always found in him. "I love you. I believe in you. And I'll stay away, may the gods forgive me." He almost spat the last words.

A crosswind blasted through the arch, pushing both of them off the mountain wall and chilling her through her flimsy clothing. He grabbed her as she fell out of the rock shelter and swung her around, pulling her back inside the arch and pushing her up against the face of the mountain.

'Are you all right?" he gasped, panic in his voice. His hands clutched her and found her skin to be cold; he began to run them over her in the attempt to warm her, and found himself lost in the throes of desperation, of fear, and he wanted her, wanted to hide her away from the danger, wanted to shelter her in his soul, to protect her with his body, with his life.

She felt the same longings; she clung to him and pulled him back into the kiss of lovers who didn't know if it was their last. Her hands ran over his upper body, dien set about freeing him from the laces of the trousers that kept them apart. She trembled violently as his hands moved up under her nightgown, and she gave herself over to the darkness of fear.

There on the mountain pass, leaning against the cliff face, sheltered only by the open rock arch, they made love in panic, in desperation, cloaked in the night wind, covered only with the blanket of the misty darkness, thick as pitch, that hid the peaks of the Teeth. They found little comfort, and no joy, just the frenzy of the need for contact, perhaps for the last time. No clothes were shed, no words spoken, just the fierce need met in a way that left neither of them reassured.

When the tumult had passed they held each other, still braced against the mountain, and whispered words of promise, his oath to not pursue the Rakshas, hers to be careful. Then he kissed her, fastened her cloak for her, and ran his hand over her hair tenderly before guiding her back to the path that led to the Cauldron.

She watched until the darkness swallowed him up, then made her way carefully back toward the lights in the Firbolg seat of power, buffeted by the screaming wind.

LrYvorning came early. Long before the guard changed, or even had made their scheduled rounds, Rhapsody had met her Bolg partners on the heath, provisioned for a month's journey, dressed in traveling clothes and a grim expression.

The spicy scent of autumn was in the air and begged a moment's appreciation.

While the men checked the gear one final time, Rhapsody closed her eyes and reflected on the last time she had experienced the odor of burning leaves in a wind that kept growing colder.

She thought back to the Island for the first time in a long while, her memories no longer as painful as the reality of the Present. Harvest had been a season of great excitement, the air alive with promise and threat; it was a heady, romantic time, far more than summer, a time when every small thing had seemed of vast importance and the blood ran close to the surface all the time.
Whatever your hopes
are, catch them now
, the Earth seemed to say as it dressed in its glorious funereal finery;
time grows short. Winter is coming
.

'Ready, darlin'?" Grunthor's booming voice broke the stillness and her reverie.

Rhapsody glanced around at the fields, coming to light in the gray foredawn.

Frost had come in the night, and the ground glittered in the light of Daystar Clarion. She sheathed the sword and patted her dragonscale armor.

'Yes," she said. "Let's go."

°

C,'he sun was just cresting the top of the tallest crag when the Three reached the summit. They had scaled the Teeth with ease and in silence, their shadows blending in with the ones cast by the peaks themselves, long and fanglike, in the growing light of the valley below.

From high above, the mighty canyon looked like a thin curved rope lying along the base of the mountains. Achmed stood among the racing clouds and cast his gaze over the range, staring out across the steppes and to the fields of Bethe Corbair beyond, unshaken in the howling wind. He turned in a slow circle, the world at his feet, as his eyes scanned the horizon. Then he sat at the highest point possible and cleared his mind.

Rhapsody had been instructed to remain silent and as still as possible. Except for Grunthor, she was the only person ever allowed to observe Achmed obtain a trail, and the significance of the trust implicit in this was not lost on her. She held her breath, watching him close his eyes and open his mouth slightly, breathing in the thin air and the moisture of the clouds. In one hand he held her shirt, encrusted with the blood of the Rakshas. The other he held open and aloft, as if testing the direction of the wind.

Achmed's breathing became measured and deep, each intake of breath becoming slower and more expansive. When he had attained the right pattern, his attention shifted to his heart. He concentrated on its rhythm, on the pressure it exerted on the vessels and pathways through which his blood flowed, and willed it to slow, lowering his pulse to a level barely able to sustain his life. He drove all stray thoughts from his mind, leaving it blank except for the color red. Everything else faded, leaving nothing but the vision of blood before his mind's eye.

There had been a time when he would have been all but deafened by the sound and feel of millions of hearts beating. Now there were but a few thousand in the world he could still hear. Those of Rhapsody and Grunthor he knew at once, but the others were far away, flickering in the distance of his bloodsense.