Authors: Deborah Chester
Puzzled
and astonished, Caelan turned around in a small circle, unable to believe it.
No wonder Old Farns hadn’t wanted to give him the key.
A
host of questions filled Caelan’s mind, but he didn’t have to speculate long to
guess that the room had been emptied by his father’s order. Beva disapproved of
weapons. He believed utterly in pacificism, as though by keeping oneself
calm and detached all the
world’s problems would go away. Caelan snorted to himself. Did that make his
father shortsighted or simply naive?
Scorn
swept through Caelan. Angrily he blew out the lantern and hung it back on its
peg. He pushed his way outside into the raging elements, gasping from the cold
that took his very breath, and replaced the hinge pins. For the first time in his
life he considered his father a fool. Beva’s beliefs were placing everyone in
the hold in jeopardy. Even if the threat of Thyzarene raiders seemed to be
over, other hazards would come along in the future. To render the hold
indefensible was so unwise Caelan could not believe it. Surely his father had
only had the weapons moved to some other location. Surely he hadn’t thrown them
out like rubbish.
Caelan’s
anger grew with every step as he struggled against the wind. He floundered,
found himself blown back, then bent low and forced his way forward again.
Barely
able to see, he blundered straight into a bundled figure swathed in a hood and
cloak. The figure gripped him by the arms, even as he flinched back.
“Boy!”
shouted the figure. “Are you mad?”
Caelan
squinted at the man’s face. “Farns?”
The
grip on his arms tightened. “Aye, and who’s the bigger fool to be out here, me
or you? Come on back, you crazy boy!”
It
was impossible to ask his questions out here in this raging blizzard. Caelan
jammed his shoulder against Farns’s, and together they struggled back toward
the house.
The
wind was brutal, shrieking and raging around them. Within its roar, Caelan
thought he heard a moaning cry. Instinctive fear crawled up his arms, but he
shook it off, concentrating instead on getting to shelter before he froze.
Another
shriek came, and this time he could not call it his imagination. Farns stumbled
to a halt, calling out some
thing, and Caelan looked up to see a white shape
taking form in the air before them.
Swirling
and reforming, it became an elongated body that ended in tatters of mist and
nothing. Farns held up his hands, shouting, and Caelan stood rooted, unable to
move or even think.
The
wind spirit formed a face, one as white as a skull, a face that would haunt
Caelan’s nightmares for the rest of his life, a face fanged and narrow like a
viper’s. Eyes like red coals suddenly glowed at him. It shrieked again, and his
name was somehow entangled in that hideous sound.
Reaching
out with long white talons, it rushed at him and engulfed him before he could
run.
It
was all around him, swirling and intangible. It billowed through his clothes,
slid across his skin, burning him with cold. Caelan beat at himself, wild with
fear, trying to drive it away.
But
how could he fight the wind? The demon had him. He felt its talons rake his
shoulder, and he screamed again.
“Caelan!”
Old Farns shouted and clutched his arm.
The
wind raged around them. Caelan toppled over and felt himself being dragged
across the ground. Then he was lifted bodily on the current of wind despite
Farns’s desperate attempt to hang onto him.
Fear
congealed within Caelan. He realized it was taking him, carrying him off like
prey.
Its
screams drowned out his own.
He
fought and struggled, his flailing arms hitting Farns instead of the wind
spirit.
“Help
me!” Caelan cried. “Farns, get help—”
At
that moment a second wind spirit came boiling into the struggle, whirling like
a miniature cyclone. It caught Farns and ripped him away from Caelan. The old
man’s screams rose into the night, and Caelan could not see him at all within
the white, twisting column.
“No!”
he cried. “No! Farns!”
He
struggled with all his might, yet the spirit that had him could not be touched.
One of Caelan’s flailing hands struck something hard ... a post. Realizing he
was near the stables and had rolled into the railing where horses were tied for
grooming, Caelan gripped the post with all his might, while the spirit buffeted
and clawed him.
“Caaaaeeelaaaannnnn!”
the spirit screamed.
It
shrieked his name at him again and again, filling his mind, driving his
consciousness down, hammering at him.
Sobbing
with fear, Caelan hung onto the post, but his strength was failing fast. The
wind yanked at him hard enough to break his grip. Dragged bodily, he went bouncing
across the cobblestones, and heard something clang beneath him.
It
was the warding key, still in his pocket.
Twisting
around despite the wind that clawed him, he dug into his pocket and pulled out
the key.
It
was still cold and lifeless. Dismay rose in him. Why didn’t it activate! Why
didn’t its spell work like it was supposed to?
“Caaaaeelaaannnn!”
The
wind spirit lifted him off the ground. He found himself flying, his cloak
sailing away, his clothes shredding and whipping in the wind, his hair blowing
back and forth as though it would be yanked out by the roots. The demon’s face
reformed right in front of his, just inches away, close enough for him to
inhale the frosty, lethal vapors it breathed out.
He
choked, gagging on his own fear. His heart was hammering so fast he thought it
would burst in his chest.
The
spirit shrieked in triumph. Its eyes glowed red, and it opened its mouth wider
and wider, until all Caelan could see was a whirling maelstrom. And he was
being sucked straight into it.
Panic
filled him. He held up the key with shaking hands and remembered that he’d
severed
it. Crying out to the gods
for mercy, Caelan instinctively used
sevaisin,
the joining. He poured back all its fire and heat,
all its fearsome power.
The
key ignited with heat and light, an immediate response that shone across the
wind spirit.
The
spirit squalled and dropped Caelan.
He
hit the ground with a jolting thud and dropped the key. The sound of metal
hitting stone cobbles rang out loud and clear, cutting off the wind spirit’s
shrieks. It drew back, shredding into mist, then vanishing in a swirl of snow.
The
key was shining now, bright enough to illuminate the courtyard. It drew on
Caelan, fed on him.
He
could feel the tremendous charge of its power. It was like inhaling fire. He
was burning up with it, dying from it as though exploding from the inside out.
No mortal was meant to feel such things.
Even
as he arched his back, screaming, he heard Farns’s feeble cry for help.
Consumed
with heat, Caelan twisted about on the ground and saw the second wind spirit
still raging several yards away. Dimly he remembered Farns, who had been
captured by it.
Caelan
knew he must somehow save the old man. It was his fault Farns was out here. His
fault...
his fault.
Groaning,
Caelan reached out and picked up the key. The pain seared his hand and up his
arm, shooting into his heart with a jolt that seemed to break him apart.
Barely
conscious, he somehow hung onto the key and scrambled to his feet. Staggering
forward, he drove himself into a weaving, unsteady run, holding the key ahead
of him, and thrust it straight into the midst of the white cyclone.
The
second wind spirit shrieked in an agony unbearable to hear. It vanished as
though it had never been, and suddenly the courtyard was absolutely still and
calm. Only a few snowflakes drifted down, sparkling in the radiant golden light
of the warding key that Caelan still held aloft.
He
could not drop it, could not separate himself.
Sevaisin
was complete. He was
melting, becoming heat, radiating ...
With
one last desperate try, he reached for
severance.
Cold met heat in a collision that burst and flowed
over him. He felt himself flung aside, falling, falling; then he heard the key
hit the ground with a clatter. It broke into pieces. Caelan landed in a heap of
snow, the blessedly cool snow, too weak to even lift his head or care.
People
surrounded him, their voices a babble.
Then
strong hands gripped him by the shoulders and lifted him. “My son,” a voice
said clearly.
Caelan
could not see him. The world remained a swirl of color, light, and shadow. Pain
was everywhere, seeping into his awareness at first, then rushing over him.
“Farns,”
he whispered, his voice a broken, feeble sound. Guilt filled him, riding the
pain. “Old Farns—”
“Caelan,”
his father said urgently. “My son, answer me. Caelan!”
But
the darkness came, extinguishing even the light from the torches and lanterns.
Caelan faded into it without a struggle.
For
three days
Caelan did not speak.
Revived
by his father, whose healing gifts soothed the fever from his veins, took away
the cuts and bruises from the wind spirit, and cooled the burn in his hand,
Caelan lay in a strange lethargy, aware of his surroundings but apart from
them.
The
infirmary was quiet and plain. Kept very warm, it consisted of his father’s
study, the examination room, and the tiny ward with its shuttered windows and
row of cots.
Caelan
lay with Farns on one side and the injured Neika tribesman on the other. Farns
was alive, but unconscious. The Neika man and his brother—barbaric in long
blond braids and fur—spoke to each other in hushed, fearful voices. Caelan
ignored them, ignored everything. He was aware of the activity around him, but
without interest or response.
Lea,
her little face tight with worry, came to see him frequently. She would chatter
and stroke his forehead. She would smooth his blankets and tuck the fur robe
more closely around him. She would show him her dolls and bring him something
to drink, which he did not take.
He
saw her, but as though she stood far away. Her voice was very soft, almost too
faint to hear. When she stroked his face with her gentle fingers, he felt
nothing.
After
a short time, the adults would gently shoo her away.
Beva
came every hour, peering into Caelan’s eyes, changing the bandage and salve on
his hand, pouring a measure of dark liquid down his throat.
Huddled
in her shawl, Anya stood at Farns’s side, holding the old man’s hand. Her eyes,
however, were for Caelan. “Master,” she said softly, “is there any hope for
him?”
“Of
course there is hope,” Beva said briskly. He pulled up Caelan’s sleeve and
counted his pulse.
“But
it’s said that when the wind spirits catch a person, if he’s not killed
outright he goes mad. Is our sweet boy driven mad, good master?”
Weakness
suddenly shook through Caelan’s legs and traveled upward through his whole
body. He closed his eyes in wretchedness, then felt his father’s warm, dry palm
upon his brow. The trembling fit was driven back, and Caelan sighed in relief.
“He
is not mad,” Beva said.
“The
gods be praised,” Anya said, dabbing at her eyes with her shawl. “Why, then,
won’t he speak to us? Why does he look so far away?”
Beva
replaced the blankets around Caelan. “He is deeply
severed,
Anya. It is a way to heal
his mind and soul after what happened. When he is ready, he will rejoin us.”
She
tried to smile, without much success. “And Farns?” she whispered, stroking the
old man’s gray hair.
Beva
paused, and for a moment his gaze did not look so sure. “Old Farns will rejoin
us when he can.”