The Chronicles of Elantra 6 - Cast in Chaos (25 page)

“Not from here.”

Of course not. No mirrors. “Can you access them from somewhere else? I don’t want to leave. I know you don’t want to leave, either—but the Halls’ mirrors must be keyed. They won’t respond to
me.
”

Sigrenne nodded, taking the same deep breaths that Kaylin had just struggled to master. They met each other’s eyes, and were it not for the difference in their ages, height, and coloring, they might have been looking in a mirror. Sigrenne’s lips quirked up in a grim, small smile. “You’ll watch them both?”

“I’ll watch them,” Kaylin promised.

Ybelline didn’t respond to speech. She didn’t respond to shouting. Neither did Everly. Their eyes were wide, and they stared straight ahead, like startled, terrified creatures. Ybelline had seen some of the worst that humanity had to offer; she’d faced it willingly. She’d seen her people’s torture, and she’d seen their deaths when they attempted to avoid the darkness and the insanity of the normal, human mind by
disobeying
the Emperor’s direct command. And she accepted it. Each time she was asked to read a mind, each time she was asked to
go into
a mind and ferret out information at the behest of the Imperial Service, she faced it again.

But she had never been immobile with terror before.

It had to be Everly, Kaylin thought grimly. It
had
to be. The alternative—that something Ybelline had seen had caused this—didn’t bear thought.

Sigrenne came back obscenely quickly; Kaylin could hear her heavy, fast strides before the door opened again. She’d clearly run from Everly’s room to the nearest mirror—and back. But as she approached, she shook her head. “The only person who has ever—ever—managed to get Everly’s attention when he’s delivering an Oracle, Private Neya, is you.”

Kaylin grimaced. “I think I promised Master Sabrai that I wouldn’t—”

“Master Sabrai,” was the grim reply, “can get stuffed.” Sigrenne came to stand beside Ybelline. “Let me hold her arms. You try to reach Everly.”

“If it upsets him—”

“I’ll deal with upset,” Sigrenne said. “But he’s not painting, right now—and he’s still stuck in Oracular trance. I can feed him, but he won’t eat
enough
to survive. He won’t sleep. He won’t collapse until—” She shook her head. “Everly isn’t the only painter-Oracle the Halls have had. We have some idea of what will happen to him.”

Kaylin transferred Ybelline’s arms—and the bulk of her weight—to the much larger Sigrenne.

“She doesn’t weigh much, does she?”

“Not much, no.” She walked over to Everly’s palette, and picked up the brush he’d been using. It was one of the wider brushes. “This was a lot less intimidating when he was working in charcoals,” she muttered.

“What you did last time—”

“It was a mostly blank canvas. He’d done some blocking sketches, but very little actual work. I was messing with the blocked sketches.”

“How?”

“Um.”

Sigrenne, who was accustomed to dealing with the very strange commentary of the Oracles, didn’t even bat an eye; she waited.

“I added a figure. Well, a blob. I’m
not
an artist, Sigrenne. This—it’s finished.”

“It’s not.”

“It’s pretty damn close, then.”

“If it
were
finished, he’d respond. He wouldn’t talk, no, but he doesn’t. He would interact. He’s
not
done. Whatever you did before—try it now.”

“But in an entirely different way?”

Sigrenne managed a chuckle. “That, too.”

Kaylin looked almost helplessly at the colors of splotches on the palette. It was a wonder to her that anyone could turn these muddy mixes into something beautiful—or at least realistic, because to her, they looked like small accidents. What
had
she done? Not this, not stall for time.

“I’m going to wreck the painting,” she muttered. “And Sanabalis is going to have my head.”

“Sanabalis,” Sigrenne replied, in the same tone of voice she’d used to utter Master Sabrai’s name, “can—”

“Don’t. He’ll probably hear you from wherever he’s standing. They can hear fleas stretching their wings. Usually when it’s most inconvenient for the fleas.”

“We don’t privilege the art,” Sigrenne said, more quietly. “To the Oracular Halls, the paintings, like verbal Oracles, are given the weight of possible future occurrences, not more and not less. Whatever Lord Sanabalis needed to see, I’d say he saw it. The painting has
already
served its purpose, Kaylin.” What she didn’t say was also significant.

Kaylin took a good, long look at the painting, and then she began. She examined what Everly had done with these new colors, saw the ways in which the choice of color and brushstroke had implied transparency or fading, and chose colors as close to the originals as she could. She wanted to make those buildings solid.

At least, that’s what she thought she was doing. But she hadn’t lied. She
wasn’t
an artist. She began to paint, yes. She began to choose colors appropriate for the buildings she knew—and hated, and loved—to eradicate the fading. If anyone had asked her what she was doing, she would have told them exactly that. And would have added that she was doing it
badly.

She heard Sigrenne’s sudden intake of breath just before the brush was yanked out of her hand, leaving a trail of blue oil across the inside of her palm. Turning, she stepped out of the way before Everly could push her. She saw Ybelline’s eyelids flickering, and shouted a warning to Sigrenne which was, in any case, unnecessary. Sigrenne, supporting most of her weight, had no trouble catching the
rest
of it when her stalks slid from the back of Everly’s neck, and she collapsed.

She ran to Sigrenne as Sigrenne lifted Ybelline off her feet and carried her to the narrow bed wedged into one corner of the otherwise huge gallery. “Good work,” the matron said quietly.

“Was it?”

“He’s painting again. Go back to him. I’ll sit with your castelord until she wakes.”

Kaylin nodded, although she would have preferred that their caretaking positions were reversed. She made her way back to where Everly was now once again painting like a maniac, as if there had been no interruption. She expected to see him fixing the mess she’d made.

He wasn’t. He was adding to it.

Kaylin had not actually solidified buildings, although that had been her intent. She’d written
words.
Runes, like horrible, defacing graffiti—at least at first sight.

But he took this rough, flat act of unintentional vandalism, and he worked with it, adding the visual alchemy of color to give the streaks shape, form, and the illusion of dimension. Glowing in golds and blues, faint and muddy, the runes now floated in the air at the height of the portal—and it was, must be, a portal; she understood that now. They seemed to ring the entry, just above the heads of the gathered crowd.

Kaylin took a step back, and Everly suddenly wheeled, aware of her movement as he was never aware of anything external that didn’t directly affect his brushes, his paints, or his canvas. She was caught by his gaze. He didn’t speak. The babbling, the repetition of foreign words, was over.

But he was tired, exhausted, and frantic.

Kaylin wasn’t even surprised when he dug out a brush from his collection and shoved it, firmly, into her hand, folding her fingers around it just in case she didn’t understand what he meant. He pointed her at his palette, waited until she nodded, and then pointed her at his painting. This done, he turned back to his work.

Kaylin took up the brush, took a breath, and joined him.

CHAPTER 14

Kaylin wasn’t Everly. She didn’t have the benefit of the Oracular Trance to protect her from the gasps and the whispers of the people behind her. The first of those was, of course, Sigrenne. Kaylin turned to the older woman, started to explain herself, and felt Everly grab her
chin
and turn her face back toward the canvas.

“I’m sorry,” Kaylin told the orderly. “I—he—”

“He wants your help.”

“Yes. It’s not like the other time—he was aware that I was here, but I don’t think he cared if I left. He definitely doesn’t want me leaving now.”

“No, he doesn’t.”

“So…you won’t break my arms and you won’t let Master Sabrai throw me out for breaking the rules?”

Sigrenne’s laugh was low, tired, and a little bit on edge, but it was on the right side of the edge. “First, Master Sabrai would order someone
else
to throw you out, and second, it would probably be me. I think, at this point, it would upset Everly as much to remove you as it would to remove his brushes. This does mean, if Lord Sanabalis wasn’t joking, that you’ll be walking home, on the other hand.”

“I don’t think so. They’re not back yet, and I think he’s almost done.” Kaylin then took the full brunt of Everly’s reproachful stare, and she gave herself over to his work and his vision. She had tried sketching and drawing before; hers were always stiff and flat, and she certainly couldn’t do them with her eyes closed.

But here, it was almost better when she did, because what she did when she tried to deliberately add things felt just as stiff and wrong as those early, embarrassing attempts at sketching. And sketches were useful in her line of work. No, she thought, kicking herself. Look
at
the runes.

Try to see them as Tiamaris would have seen them. Try to look for the shape of the whole, the sense of pattern, of completeness. She began to work. To nudge, with brushes. To see the gaping spot that demanded another rune, like the completion of a sentence upon which the whole of a trial hung.

She wasn’t sure how long she worked, but she was sure when Sanabalis entered the room, because he roared. She jerked, spun around, and met his eyes; they were still orange, but he looked exhausted. The slow simmer of anger was completely absent. So, it had to be admitted, was Kaylin’s hearing, but that would come back.

“
If
you are finished?” he asked curtly. Master Sabrai was practically weaving on his feet.

“I—” She turned to Everly. Everly didn’t even look at her. He was still painting, but the movements were less frenetic, less desperate. “I guess I’m done.” She set the brush aside, and walked over to Sanabalis.

“Sigrenne mentioned what occurred with Ybelline and Everly,” he said. “Master Sabrai thoughtfully decided not to invoke the
very strictly enforced rules
yet again. We are in his debt.” Which Dragons, of course, loved. Fingers trailing the length of his beard, he added, “I do not understand why Everly allows you to add to his works in progress. I am not, on the other hand, certain that anyone else has ever
tried
. Master Sabrai?”

“To my knowledge, Lord Sanabalis, Private Neya would be the only individual who has tried. All other recorded attempts to interfere with Everly involved interference with the boy himself—usually in an attempt to keep him from dying of dehydration or lack of sleep.”

“It would be an interesting experiment.”

“Indeed,” Master Sabrai replied. In a tone of voice that was usually reserved for the word
never.
“Sigrenne says Ybelline Rabon’alani is now conscious.”

The Tha’alani castelord was both conscious and standing by the time Kaylin and Sanabalis reached the narrow bed. “My apologies, Lord Sanabalis,” she said, tendering the Dragon Lord an Imperial half bow.

“Master Sabrai feels that Everly will stop painting within the hour. Sigrenne concurs. Do you wish to remain, or can we offer you a ride to the Tha’alani Quarter?”

“The ride would be appreciated.”

The carriage pulled into the street. Kaylin glanced at the bright moon’s height and cringed. But the thought of sleeping in the carriage, at least until Sanabalis kicked her out at whatever he decided was her destination, vanished the minute Ybelline spoke.

“You were correct, Lord Sanabalis,” she said softly. “Everly was speaking a language. It is a specific language, of course—and it is not a language that is spoken, to my knowledge, anywhere within the Empire of Ala’an.”

“Your knowledge?” Kaylin said sharply.

Ybelline nodded, understanding what Kaylin meant. “It is not found within the Tha’alaan. No member of my race since the awakening has heard it spoken.”

Sanabalis nodded so inscrutably Kaylin couldn’t tell whether or not this was a surprise to him. “More germane, at the moment, is how much of it you absorbed. Would you recognize it, if you heard it again?”

Ybelline nodded.

“Could you speak it, if required?”

There was a minute of hesitation before Ybelline nodded again. She glanced at Kaylin, as if she could tell that Kaylin was only barely stopping a question from leaving her mouth. Reaching out, she placed one gentle hand on Kaylin’s arm—which, oddly enough, loosened her tongue.

“What happened, with Everly? Why did he freeze like that? Why did you almost collapse?”

The Tha’alani castelord shuddered. “I…cannot describe it easily,” she finally said. “Everly…was speaking…for the people he was painting. It was as if…they were part of the future. Not
a
future, and not a
possible
future, but
the
future. It was that solid.”

Sanabalis cleared his throat; it was meant as either correction or warning. He had enough respect for the Tha’alani castelord, however, that he didn’t commence with pointless lectures. Kaylin, who had often thought titles and positions were useless, briefly wondered if she’d been wrong.

“We will require your presence at the Palace on the morrow.”

“In the morning?” Ybelline asked quietly.

“Yes. By that time, I will have conveyed my findings and my concern to the Court. I apologize for the lack of warning,” he added, “but it is essential that you convey as much of your understanding of this language as it is possible to convey to the…deaf. They will be our first line of communication should they be required, until we know more about the people who speak the language itself.

“They will not be our most
efficient
means of communication, but…”