Rhapsody, Child of Blood (27 page)

The newfound warmth made for easier traveling, but it held its share of perils as well. Occasionally clothing or other dry-goods would burst into flames unexpectedly, metal weaponry would become too hot to touch. Finding drinking water became more difficult, and more a cause for concern.

Finally Achmed stopped, and the other two followed his lead as he peered off into the distance. "Fire," he said simply. Grunthor squinted, then shook his head. Rhapsody gave it a halfhearted try, but saw nothing. She had learned ages ago that her vision was no match for Achmed's, especially in the dark.

-

They walked on, growing ever closer, until even Rhapsody could make out the flickering flames that filled the tunnel ahead of them. The Root itself, the ground below them, cracked occasionally under the pressure of their steps. The cavern ceiling above them became enormously high. As they approached, even at their seemingly snail-like pace, it became evident that the entire passageway was engulfed in flames.

The fire at the Earth's core burned in myriad colors, more darkly than fires in the open air. Flames twisted and danced within the incandescent wall, blue and purple and white in harmony with the fiery shades that Rhapsody was accustomed to. There was no space around it; the inferno reached to all edges of the passageway, forcing its light and liquid heat over and through every opening and crevice. She stood, enraptured by the sight, her eyes stinging from the intensity of the furious light. She closed her eyes.

'Bloody krekin" Grunthor swore behind her. "We're trapped. We might as well 'ave stayed in Easton." Achmed said nothing.

From behind her eyelids Rhapsody was listening, not to her dismayed companions, but to the fire's song. Unlike the low, slow tone of the Earth, the firesong roared and crackled with life, singing a melody more exquisite than any she ever remembered hearing.

The sound drew from her soul memories almost painful in their sweetness, nights before the hearth where her mother brushed her hair, harvest bonfires ripe with the sounds of dancing and celebration, her first kiss by the light of a campfire in autumn.

The brilliance illuminated her face, shining off her tangled hair, making her glow with its radiance. There was a call in the sound of the flames, an invitation to the dance, and she longed to accept. Involuntarily she took a step forward.

Strong, bony hands seized her shoulders and spun her swiftly around. She opened her eyes in astonishment to the sound of Grunthor's shocked roar.

'What do you think you're doin'?"

Achmed, who still held her by the shoulders, studied her face. "Where are you going, Rhapsody?"

The word fell out of her mouth before she had a chance to stop it.

'Forward," she said.

>_,''m going through," she said simply. Grunthor laughed aloud.

'If you wanted to commit suicide, Oi would o' been glad to 'elp you in a way that wouldn't damage the meat," he said. "Come on, miss, shake it off."

'Look," Rhapsody said, losing patience, "I'm not going back. I can't. None of us can.

Remember those cave-ins? The path is blocked. We'll never get out that way. The only way to go is forward."

'Exactly how do you propose we do that?" Achmed asked. His tone was sincere, or at least as full of sincerity as he was capable.

Rhapsody took a deep breath, knowing that what she was about to say would sound inane, at best. "Do you remember what I said about names, and how they can make us what we once were?"

'Vaguely,."

'Well, I've been thinking about it ever since this possibility arose. I think the only way to broach the fire is to wrap ourselves in the song of our names and hope that we are remade on the other side."

'You first, my dear," chuckled Grunthor.

'Of course," she said hastily. "I wouldn't have it any other way."

'You really are desperate to get out of this tunnel," said Achmed. His tone was the cross between sympathy and sarcasm that Rhapsody referred to as sympacastic.

'Have you got any better ideas?"

She sat down on the root and unslung her ragged satchel, removing her higen, a palm-sized stringed instrument resembling a tiny harp. "If I make it through, I'll come back for you if I can." She brushed the dirt from the fragments of her cloak and stood again. "If I don't come back, at least you'll know to try something else."

Grunthor shook his head, staring at the inferno before them. "Oi know that without you tossin' your life away."

'Let her go," said Achmed quietly.

-

Rhapsody smiled. "Thank you. At least if I don't make it you'll finally be rid of me."

Grunthor was growing visibly upset. "If Oi'd wanted to be rid o' ya, Oi'da done it ages ago. I could o' snapped your neck with one 'and and been done with you."

She put her arms around the trembling giant. "Well, maybe you could have back then. I've had some pretty good sword training since." She pulled him tighter, and he bent to embrace her. "Goodbye, Grunthor. Don't worry. I'll be back."

He pulled away and looked down at her, mustering a smile. "Oi thought you always had to tell the truth."

Rhapsody patted his cheek. "I am," she said softly. She turned to the robed man who had vexed her so much, had trapped her within the Earth in the first place.

'Goodbye, Achmed."

'Hurry up," he said. "We're not going to wait long for you."

Rhapsody laughed aloud. "Well, that's incentive." She shouldered her pack and walked away toward the inferno. The two Bolg watched as her tiny black shadow grew longer against the roaring flames, then disappeared in the wall of billowing heat and light.

she got as close as she could endure, Rhapsody closed her eyes, resting her higen against her chest. The tiny strings were hot to the touch; her fingers burned as she plucked them, trying to discern the right song, a song of herself.

She knew the single note that reverberated in her soul, ela, the sixth and final note of the scale. Each person is attuned to a certain musical note, her instructor had said.

Rhapsody had been highly amused upon discovering her own: She was the sixth and final child in her family. The note fit her easily; it made sense to her. She sang it now, feeling the familiar vibration. The melody that would capture her essence was more elusive. Her true name, set to music, was easy enough; she started with that.

From the simple melody line she built another refrain, a tune that resonated inside her and made her skin tingle. Note by note, measure by measure, she constructed the song, adding her voice to the composition she played on the higen. Then, gathering her courage, she walked into the fife.

As she reached the edges of the roaring inferno her eyes began to sting from the intensity of the light. Pain seared them 190—shut. She kept walking, still singing, praying that if she was wrong she would be engulfed quickly, and not suffer too long.

There was a natural wind to the fire, and it blew her blond tresses around her, illuminating her hair like a torch. It was becoming harder and harder to breathe.

Rhapsody opened her eyes to find herself within the fire's walls.

The innate song of the fire was louder now and she matched her own namesong to it, singing in harmony. Instantly her eyes ceased to sting; she found, upon opening them, a realm of glorious color, whipping around her like meadow grass in a high wind.

A sense of peace and safety washed over her. The fire knew her. It would not harm her.

The gleaming hues, sapphire blues twisting through sheets of blazing red-orange and tongues of yellow, billowed around her. Rhapsody felt the pain in her joints and bones melt away. Vaguely she wondered if she was being immolated, consumed in the fire's maw. It was a sensation akin, in a way, to joy, a feeling of being surrounded by ultimate acceptance. She sang loudly, turning the melded tunes of the fire and herself into a song of celebration.

The way before her grew clearer, patches of darkness appearing for,'7 a moment, only to vanish without a trace. She steeled her1 nerve and kept walking; it took all her strength to leave the core. If she gave in to the sweetness of the place she knew she would stay forever, happily absorbing the song of the fire until it took her as part of itself.

Suddenly the delicious heat left her face; it was like being slapped with a cold ocean wave. Rhapsody opened her eyes and saw darkness before her, though the fire walls were still flickering at the periphery of her vision. Before her stretched a tunnel similar to the one she had just left, but with slightly different features. Though she was still within the fire's embrace, she felt a shiver run through her. She had made it to the other side of the core.

She spun around quickly and hurried back through the fire, singing all the way.

L_)n the other side of the core Grunthor waited anxiously, staring into the blinding conflagration, sweating visibly through the pores of his gray-green hide. After what seemed an endless delay he squinted, then pointed into the flames.

'Oi see 'er, sir!"

-

Achmed was nodding. He had spied her shadow a moment before, tall as the cavern ceiling, flickering in between the waves of fire and disappearing again.

The woman who walked out of the blaze vaguely resembled Rhapsody, but was very different in appearance. Her hair was no longer the color of pale gold, but had been burnished in the fire to the shade of warm, clear honey. She waved to them from the fire's edge.

'Come on," she urged, her voice swallowed by the roar of the flames. "I don't know how long the pathway will stay open."

The two Firbolg ran to the edge of the core, shielding their eyes from the heat.

Rhapsody held up her hand to stop them too late. The hood of Achmed's robe ignited, ripping into flame. She watched in horror as Grunthor threw him to the ground and smothered the fire, rolling him in the white-hot ash of the floor.

Achmed's name she knew; she had given it to him. She chanted it now, over and over. Grunthor helped the stunned man rise, and assisted him to the edge of the fire wall. Rhapsody held up her palm to the Sergeant, signaling him to wait, and took the Dhracian's hands in hers. His eyes were clearing as he heard the song of his name. It must be causing the same sense of well-being in him that she had experienced.

When she was sure he could stand erect, Rhapsody transferred the tune to the higen, playing as Achmed stood at the edge of the fire. She began weaving a song for him, based around the melody that was his name.

'Can you feel the song tingling on the surface of your skin?"

'No." The tatters of his hood crumbled and fell to the ground, exposing the terrible burn that now marred his forehead and eyes; Achmed was blind. Rhapsody's own eyes stung at the sight of it. The wound looked excruciating.

She thought quickly. "Tell me something about yourself I can add to make it reflect you better," she said. She added the musical notes to the melody that spelled out Firbolg and Dhra-cian. "Shall I rename you back to your old name, the Brother?"

Achmed shook his head violently, spattering droplets of sweat into the flames that dispersed into mist on impact. His face reflected the rippling light of the fire behind her.

'What child were you in the family?"

With great effort he spoke. "Firstborn."

Rhapsody nodded and wove the word into the melody. From the look on his face she could tell that he had felt some sort of additional sensation with its inclusion.

'Just one more trait, Achmed, anything that is part of your identity. What is your profession?"

Achmed began to shake as the shock of his injury overcame him. He bent as close to her as he could, trying to allow her to hear the word.

'Assassin," he whispered.

Rhapsody blinked. Of course, she thought. She began to sing the song again, adding the new dimension.

Achmed's scarred eyes opened wider, and he nodded sightlessly as he felt the song surround him, as she had. In the next instant a memory flickered behind Rhapsody's eyes. It was the image of Achmed at the twisting nexus where thousands of differing paths along the Root met, nonchalantly choosing their course through the belly of the world. He had been unconcerned, had seemed so sure of his choices that there had never been a breath of hesitation as to whether they were heading in the correct direction.

Once Grunthor had whispered in her ear that the Dhracian was following the beating heart of the Earth, feeling its pulse, being guidfed along its veins and humming pathways the way he had one? sought his prey in the realm of the air, the world above.

Unerring tracker. The pathfinder, she sang. Achmed's body grew translucent and began, like his face a moment before, to reflect the light of the Great Fire. Rhapsody reached out and pulled him into the flames. She hurried him through to the other side, singing with all her ability as a Namer. She deposited him just outside the wall of the fire and ran back to get Grunthor.

sight of the trembling giant standing in the reflected brilliance of the billowing fire's edge squeezed Rhapsody's heart. The amber eyes, transfixed in a look she recognized as stark terror, relaxed somewhat upon seeing her, but his face was still contorted with obvious worry.

'Where is 'e, darlin'? Is 'e all right?"

'Come on!" she shouted over the pounding roar of the flames, waving him on wildly.

-

Grunthor ran to her, grabbing her by the shoulders. "Is 'e all right?"

'Don't be afraid, we're going to make it—A snarling howl issued forth. It rumbled through the massive muscles down through the clawed hands that gripped her upper arms, choking off her assurances and turning her words into a gasp of pain. "Where is

'e?!"

Rhapsody clutched his hands and pulled free of them. "He's on the other side. He's blind, but he's alive." She saw relief temper the ferocious expression on his face, noticed his mighty jaw unclench ever-so-slightly, and she felt another twist of her heart.

She knew the fear that held sway over him, and knew also that none of it had been for himself. With a hand that shook she reached up and patted his monstrous cheek.

'What is your Firbolg name?" The giant opened his mouth, and a serious of whistling snarls came out, followed by a clicking glottal stop. Rhapsody exhaled, then closed her eyes. "Tell me again," she said, righting the panic welling inside her.