Riders of the Storm (15 page)

A
RYL YAWNED. CATCHING HER aunt's frown, she said as contritely as possible, given she hadn't been paying the slightest attention, “I'm listening.”

“Then what did I say?” Before Aryl could reply to that, Myris went on,
exasperation
beneath every word. “I said Enris shouldn't have left us. I don't care whose Call he heard. And you shouldn't have followed him, Aryl. Outside in truenight?” A shudder. “You could have been eaten!”

“By what?” Aryl asked innocently.

Myris hesitated. She remained pale, the gash above her eye angry and swollen, and her hands trembled. That hadn't stopped her from intercepting Aryl on the road to Sona and escorting her back—as she put it—to safety. She drew a quick breath before resuming her argument. “The point is that you used poor judgment. As First Chosen, I'm responsible—”

“‘First Chosen?'” Aryl stopped in her tracks. Those exiles near enough to overhear made a show of being very busy at their tasks. Her mother, Taisal, was the First Chosen of the House of Sarc. Myris had left the Sarc home to seek her own place, as was proper.

Reality, Aryl realized, had changed. The Sarc home no longer existed. Myris was the only Sarc Chosen among the exiles. The title was hers by every right, even if it had no real meaning.

The duty to her younger kin was hers as well. Aryl gestured a gracious apology.
I'm sorry to have upset you,
she sent.
I couldn't let Enris leave without wishing him joy. He is…he was my friend.

Her aunt's eyes glistened.
I wish he'd come back with you, Aryl. I wish he could have waited.

If wishes were dresel…even now, she knew
where
Enris was. The
how
he was remained locked behind his shields. She doubted he'd ever
reach
for her mind again—certainly not through the M'hir. She would not
reach
for him. Those on Passage had to focus on their own future, not those left behind.

Left behind, in a world gone quiet and cold.

Annoying Tuana.

Aryl felt her pain fade and resisted, clutching her grief. “Please don't,” she asked gently. “Let's get you back to bed before Ael scolds me.”

As always, the mention of her Chosen brightened her aunt's face. Aryl buried the twinge of envy she couldn't help.

She had work to do.

 

Dry leaves muttered to themselves. Dead stems clattered against one another, frozen and hollow. The plants offered more questions than answers, Aryl decided, squatting on her heels to drop below the wind. She'd hoped the small field would give her another vision of the past, something to tell her where Sona's Om'ray had found water, something to prove this place could become green again. She trailed her fingertips along fresh scars in the dirt. Enris didn't believe in Sona's future. Here, then, alone, he'd made his decision to seek another path. Not one they could follow, even if they would. Myris was unfit to travel; Chaun…wasted away. Weth didn't leave him.

“There you are!” Seru wriggled through the gap the Tuana had forced between the thorns, an effort hindered by her too-long Sona coat. “Myris said you were upset.” Tugging her bright scarf free of an avaricious twig, she plopped herself on the ground beside Aryl. “Are you?”

“I haven't found water, if that's what you mean.”

Her cousin's eyes sparkled within their nest of scarf, hood, and hairnet. “Of course not.” She pushed her right sleeve up to expose her hand, wiggling her fingers suggestively. “Tell me you at least tried.”

“Seru, you know I'm no—” Aryl caught
despair
and stopped. In another life, they'd tuck themselves into bed and talk until firstlight. Brainless flitters, Costa had called them, not appreciating the importance of such conversations. How to glance just so at handsome unChosen. How to tip a wrist in a manner subtle yet alluring. How not to be caught doing either.

She made herself comfortable on the dirt, cross-legged, hands flat on her knees. “I would have tried, if I could,” Aryl admitted. Her own hood was down. She was, she realized with a vague surprise, no longer as troubled by the cold. “But Enris isn't ready for Choice.” True, in a sense.

“He's on Passage.” As if Aryl had missed some vital lesson. “How could he not be ready? That's why unChosen go.”

Easy to sigh. “He told me about his family. How Mendolars can seem eligible to others before they really are.” Glib and almost true. Aryl tucked away her guilt. There was no harm in shaping words to undo pain.

“I've never heard anything like that.”

“His brother?” She waited. Seru had loved every version of his story.

“Kiric?” Her cousin sighed, too. “I'll never forget him. Such a waste. He arrived too late, you know.” As if Aryl, equally fascinated by the sad-eyed stranger and far more willingly inventive, hadn't been the source of most rumors. “There were no Yena Choosers left for him. He died of loneliness. I can understand that…”

“What if that wasn't true?” Though they were alone in the field between buildings, she leaned closer. Seru did the same until their noses almost touched, her green eyes wide. “What if Kiric was like Enris,” Aryl whispered, “and couldn't.”

Her cousin drew back with a gasp. “Aryl! What a dreadful—” another, calmer breath “You mean…But if that's true…? Oh.” She sniffled. “Poor Enris. He must have been so unhappy to be near me, to want me yet be unable…” Another, wetter sniff. “No wonder he had to leave. I mustn't Call again, not until he's very far away.”

Seru Parth might not have the Power of others, but she had kindness enough for a Clan. Aryl managed not to smile. “I didn't let him go without saying good-bye.” She let a tiny portion of
loss
leak through her shields. “Enris was a good friend to all of us. I told him so. I think he feels better about himself now.” She hoped. The biting anger she felt at his Clan's betrayal was something she kept very much to herself.

“May he find joy.” Seru laid her hand over Aryl's. “And may we find it, too, Cousin.” A breathless laugh. “Though it might have trouble finding us here.”

Aryl turned her hand and gripped Seru's, hard. “I promise, Cousin. You'll have Choice.” Even if she had to travel to another Clan and drag an unChosen back through the M'hir by his hair. “I promise.”

“No.” Seru drew herself up straight. “You can't. You'll be a Chooser soon and then you'll understand. It's up to me to Call. It's up to him to hear me and come. However long it takes.” She pulled something from under her coat and smiled shyly. “I'm going to show him. How long I waited. See?”

It was a loop of braided yellow thread, hung around her neck. The braid was dotted with fine black knots. Seru's hair. Between the knots were tufts of frayed red thread. “It's pretty,” Aryl ventured. The frayed thread—likely from an undershirt—looked like small bursts of flame.

“It's more than that.” Her cousin touched a knot. “I tie one each truenight, before I sleep. With a wish.” Her cheeks went pink. “I'd like someone…you know what I mean.”

Aryl fervently hoped not to, for some time yet. Bemused, she touched one of the tufts. “What are these, then?”

“A fist.” Seru ran her fingers along the loop, her lips moving soundlessly. “Eight fists and a day since I became a Chooser.” Her smile faded. “A fist and two days since we left Yena.”

Seven days. Was that all? It might have been another life, lived by another Aryl, another Seru. Three days at Grona. Three on the road. Their first day at Sona.

Yena had no need to mark days. The only change in their lives came with the annual M'hir, which the Watchers announced. The steady growth of rastis and vine mattered more, the constant decay of bridge or roof, the cycle of biters. But now—in this exposed place, where storms swept away the sun at whim, where nothing grew in winter? They had to hold every day, Aryl realized, or lose track. They had to learn to remember, to warn themselves of the season's change, to prepare. Her mind felt swollen by the possibilities. “Clever, Seru,” she praised, adding
warmth
.

“I didn't think of it,” the other admitted. “Mother…she taught me. It makes it easier to wait. Parth Choosers must be patient, especially if there's—you and I—we were always together, Aryl. Mother knew I couldn't avoid you.”
Grief
beneath the confusing rush of words.

Ferna Parth lived—her body lived. That was all. The rest of what she'd been had been Lost with her Chosen, Till sud Parth, killed by the swarm during the Tikitik assault on Yena. Aryl shielded her own emotion and tried to understand. She'd never doubted her welcome at the Parth home. Ferna and Till treated her like a second daughter. Had. She and Seru weren't heart-kin; they were dear friends nonetheless. “Why would she want you to do that?”

“You're Sarc.” As if that made everything clear. Something in Aryl's expression must have told Seru it didn't. “I'm not saying you ever push yourself up the ladder, Aryl.” Another rush of words. “You aren't like that. But everyone knows. It's about Power. Always is. To be a Parth, near a Sarc Chooser?” Seru tucked away her loop of hair knots and thread. “UnChosen have to answer your Call first. They can't help it.”

Fighting back a strange, fierce
joy
—where had
that
come from?—Aryl placed her fingers on Seru's.
Not a Chooser yet.
With careful
reassurance
. “Now let's go find Haxel. I've a feeling she'll be interested in this clever idea of the Parths.”

The First Scout? Interested?
Seru pretended to shiver.
Oh, no. You show her.

Coward.

Smart. And fast.
With that pronouncement, Seru leaped to her feet, scattering dead leaves. “Race you!” A jump, grab, and twist put her on top of the nearest beam.

Aryl laughed and gave chase. The beam, used to vines, not playful Om'ray, creaked and cracked in protest underfoot. A hop took them both to the shelter's makeshift roof. Which shook and shuddered.

Someone inside shouted a protest.

Seru glanced back, hood down and black hair flying wild, balanced on one foot. Her teeth gleamed in a wicked grin, then she dropped lightly to the porch. Aryl tried to hurry. Too late. Looking oh-so-innocent, her cousin helpfully pointed up as the blanket door opened and a dust-covered head peered out.

Not dignified to leap on her so-helpful-cousin and roll her in the dirt.

But, Aryl decided, hands full of squirming Seru, it was worth it.

 

“Water's the problem.”

Aryl nodded. Freed from the threat of starvation for the first time since last Harvest, sheltered and safe, they had yet to find that final necessity. “We could move down the valley,” she suggested with reluctance. The nearest of the mountain streams was a half day away. The three unChosen—Fon, Kayd, and Cader—were there now, refilling every portable container they could carry. The next group—Rorn, Syb, and Veca—would leave soon, to return by firstnight. If the clouds building over the mountains meant another storm, best only their toughest, most experienced Chosen were out in it.

Haxel's scar whitened with her grimace. By tradition and inclination, she'd be with those after water, but they needed her here. “If we did, we'd have to come back here for supplies and oil. Let's hope for better. Are you ready to go?”

“Yes.” Aryl hadn't slept, but otherwise judged herself well rested. She checked the ties on her small pack. There'd been no need to discuss who should explore the head of the valley. No one else with any scouting skill could be spared from carrying water or improving their shelter. Also unsaid…no one else had her range to
send
for help if need be. Haxel held out a pair of ropes and she slipped one coil over her shoulder, securing it with her belt. She declined the second, wishing she could leave the pack, too, but she wasn't a fool. If necessary, she'd spend her second truenight away from the rest. And there was that brooding sky.

“It may end in a cliff around the corner,” the First Scout warned. “Nothing more.”

Aryl shrugged. “I'll be back for supper, then. If they've finished complaining about Enris.” She'd thought Grona's infatuated Choosers a nuisance, the way they'd cornered her for any detail about him, but the exiles were worse. Or made her feel worse. Even Husni wasn't beyond a sly comment on how in her day a sensible Chooser-to-Be would have found a way to keep such a fine catch happily waiting. Had anyone but Seru and Gijs missed telling her, at length, the wonderful qualities of the Tuana and how tragic it was he'd had to leave them to seek Choice?

As if she didn't know.

“You'd think they'd wish him joy and be done with it.”

A grunt. “They wished he'd found it here. Do you blame them?”

Aryl looked back at Sona. Ax strokes and cheerful shouts gave new life to the ruin; a line of billowing blankets, new movement. The same wind—always a wind here—blew an errant strand of hair into her eyes. She tucked it away, wishing the Sona supplies had included a decent net. “I suppose not. But Enris believes the future—our future—is elsewhere. What he seeks may help all Om'ray.”

“A Clan with its own technology.” She'd told the First Scout that much. Whatever her opinion of his feet, Haxel had been pleased Enris hadn't abandoned them for, as she'd put it, some useless Chooser on the wind. “He has courage,” the older Om'ray conceded. “Myself, I'd test that limb before I put weight on it.”

“Vyna exists. He'll find out the rest for himself.” Aryl stirred. “I'd better go, too.” She hefted the thin strand of rope she'd attached to her belt. Seven knots at the top; room for more below. Haxel, who'd instantly grasped the value of such counting, wore its twin. “Two days, then I'll turn around.”