“No,” Lithe replied. “Too much could hurt him. Let him rest, and we’ll see how he is.”
His head pillowed on Stone’s thigh, Moon mumbled, “Why did she do it? I was lying when I said I remembered her.”
“We don’t know,” Stone said, and ruffled his hair. “Go to sleep.”
* * *
Moon opened his eyes sometime later to a fall of dawn light from the opening to the central well. A stir of air carried the damp scent of the waterfall. He was curled in a nest of blankets near the hearth, his clothes were soaked with sweat, and he felt as if he had slept face down in cold mud all night.
Stone lay a short distance away, sprawled on his back and growling faintly in his sleep. They were alone except for an Arbora, an older male with dark copper skin and dark curly hair, who sat on the other side of the hearth. Moon recognized him as one of the mentors who had helped Lithe last night. At least he assumed it was last night. The bedding had been changed and the place cleaned; it smelled of nothing now except the waterfall and the green scents drifting in from the central well.
The Arbora said, “I’m Auburn. How are you feeling?”
Moon croaked, “Hollow.” He had a vague dream-like memory of having to get up in the middle of the night for an urgent visit to the latrine in the bathing room. It hadn’t been a pleasant experience. He still felt like he had lost some important internal organs in the process.
“Ah.” Auburn set a kettle on the heating stones. “I have a tea that should help, very mild. Will you take some?”
Moon started to say yes, then remembered that accepting food from Opal Night Arbora was what got him into this. Auburn seemed to realize that, and said, with a wry smile, “I’ll drink a cup first.”
Moon nodded. Watching Auburn sort pressed leaves into the pot, he asked, “If nobody poisons anybody here, why did you have an antidote to what Russet gave me?”
“We have an antidote to tree-asp stings,” Auburn corrected. “The hunters and soldiers get bitten occasionally. Since you actually had the venom inside you, we had to modify that simple and combine it with something that would protect your stomach and gut while the antidote was working.” He poured the warm water into the pot, and added grimly, “Fortunately, Russet is not a mentor, and didn’t know how to make a truly effective poison from the venom.”
If that wasn’t effective, Moon would have hated to see one that was.
Stone snorted and sat straight up, so suddenly that Auburn flinched. Moon was still too half-conscious to flinch. Stone rubbed his face, and squinted at Moon. “You all right?”
Moon nodded and shrugged. He felt terrible, but he was pretty certain he wasn’t dying anymore. Stone yawned.
It didn’t look like Stone had had a very good night either. Considering the condition Moon had been in, he was glad Stone was the only one to see it besides the mentors. “Where’s Jade and the others?”
Auburn said, “Malachite made everyone leave except your line-grandfather to give us room to work. Lithe and Reed are taking their turn to rest.” He poured a cup of tea, drank it, then poured a second and handed it to Moon. “I’ll go and tell them all you’re awake. I know they’ve been very worried, even after you took a turn for the better last night.”
As Auburn got to his feet and left the bower, Moon sniffed the tea cautiously, then tasted it. It was warm water barely flavored with tea, but when he drank the cup it soothed his dry throat, and his stomach decided it might live after all. “What happened to Russet?” he asked Stone.
“Nothing, yet. They had to wait to see if you recovered.” Stone scratched his head vigorously, still trying to wake himself up. “It’s a bad situation for the whole court.”
Moon refused to feel guilty, or tried to. Every Raksuran court he visited seemed to face trouble because of him, sooner or later. He just hoped nothing had happened to Viridian Sea. And while Tempest’s sister Halcyon had ended up fighting to the death, and he knew warriors were punished with exile and became solitaries, he had never seen or heard of an Arbora doing anything bad enough to warrant any punishment whatsoever. He had never even seen one get the slap to the head usually meted out to warriors for their transgressions. “So… what are they going to do to her?”
Stone gave him a look. “She tried to kill a consort. The only consort left in the reigning queen’s bloodline. What do you think they’re going to do to her?”
* * *
Moon wanted nothing more than to crawl back into the blankets and sleep, but there was too much that had to be done.
Auburn returned with Lithe and two more mentors, who came to check Moon over again and to advise that he sleep for the rest of the day. Moon sent them away to tell Malachite that whatever she planned to do with Russet, he wanted to be there, and to tell her he was going back to the groundling city to talk to them again about the Fell unless somebody came up with a better plan.
He had been thinking of Malachite as an enemy. It had finally hit home at some point last night, maybe when she had touched his face, that what Celadon and Umber and everyone else had told him was true. That she might be a powerful ally.
She already meant to stop the Fell. Getting her to stop them before they destroyed Aventera was going to be the problem. Once Moon had that figured out, getting her to let him return to Indigo Cloud with Jade shouldn’t be nearly as difficult. He hoped.
One thing he desperately needed before any of this was a bath, and he was standing under the cool water channel when Chime walked into the bathing room with a bundle under his arm. Chime said, “Good, you really are better. From the message you sent with the Arbora, we thought so, but it’s a relief to see it.”
“Where’s Jade?”
“In the queens’ hall with Malachite. She sent the rest of us back to the flying boat to rest, but she stayed.” He regarded Moon intently. “So… how are you?”
“Fine.” At Chime’s expression, Moon admitted, “Not so good. But we don’t have time.”
Chime hesitated, then clearly decided there was no point in arguing. He put the bundle down on the flat stone table used for drying clothes. “Your mother sent you some gifts. If you don’t take them, she might kill me. I mean, that was just the impression I got.”
Moon stepped out of the pool and dried off. He felt more alert, more able to at least get his eyes all the way open. He hadn’t tried to shift yet, and he still felt too weak to make the effort. He felt too weak to be standing up, actually, and sat down on the edge of the bathing pool. “What did she send?”
Chime opened the bundle and pulled out clothes, laying them out on the drying rock. They were of a very fine material but sturdy, like the cloth Indigo Cloud had made at the old colony. The shirt was black and the pants a dark gray, and there was a belt made of a very soft, dark mottled hide, set with tiny rounds of bone intricately carved into flowers. There was also a long robe, the dark fabric woven in strips of different textures, the collar trimmed with a heavy brocade. It was possibly the most expensive looking garment Moon had ever seen in his life.
Watching Moon’s lack of reaction, Chime said, “This is nice, and probably meant well, and accepting presents from your birthqueen doesn’t obligate you to anything—”
“It’s all right, Chime,” Moon said, too weary to be really exasperated. “I won’t send them back.”
“Oh, good.” Chime looked relieved. “There was this, too. I think it’s jewelry.” He held out a small packet of silky cloth.
Moon unwrapped the piece. It was a small disk made of ivory, carved into waved lines that in Raksuran art symbolized the wind. The pointed ends all went to the left, which meant it was a west wind. A darker rim of jade had once circled it, but had snapped off halfway around. From that and the rough texture of the back, Moon could tell it had once been part of a larger piece.
Chime leaned over to see, and his brow furrowed in confusion. “It’s broken.”
Moon rubbed his thumb over a reddish stain on the ivory. “That’s blood.”
They looked at each other. Chime said, “Your mother is strange. I think I owe Pearl an apology for all the things I’ve ever thought…” He drew in a sharp breath in realization. “Unless that belonged to…”
“Her consort, my father.” Moon closed his hand over the disk.
* * *
Stone and Chime walked Moon to the queens’ hall and stopped outside. Only Opal Night Raksura were to be present for this.
When Moon stepped into the queens’ hall, everyone stared at him. For once he didn’t mind. He had meant to make an entrance this time.
Malachite, with Celadon behind her, sat in the center of the chamber. Around the walls were twenty or so older Arbora, probably the leaders of the castes and all the prominent elders, plus all the mentors Moon had seen last night. Moon recognized Feather, the teacher who had taken care of him before the eastern colony was attacked. Lithe and Auburn were there too, and Moss, the young Arbora male that Russet had accused. A group of warriors sat behind Malachite and Celadon, mostly older females, including Rise. Onyx and her daughter queens and consorts and warriors were conspicuously absent. Moon took that to mean that this was only for the Arbora and the members of Malachite’s bloodline. Everyone was in groundling form, and even Celadon wore her Arbora form. Only Malachite kept her wings.
Malachite was also the only one who didn’t show any sign of surprise or agitation at Moon’s appearance. She indicated a pile of cushions a few paces from her side. It was a relief; Moon was trembling just from the walk here. He had drunk an entire pot of tea and eaten a little dry bread, but Auburn thought he should make sure that stayed down before he tried anything more substantial. Moon agreed with the advice, but lack of food made him cold and weak.
Moon went to the cushions and sat down, managing it with only a small thump when his legs gave out at the last moment. Malachite watched him, and he realized she had seen that he wore the ivory piece on a cord around his neck. She pulled her gaze away from it. “Get him another wrap.”
All the warriors twitched to obey the command but Rise was closest and got to her feet first. She brought Moon a silky blanket from the pile to one side of the room and he took it without protest.
As Rise returned to her seat, Malachite said, “You don’t have to be here.”
“I want to be here,” Moon said. His voice still came out hoarse and weak. “Did Auburn give you my message?”
“Yes.” Malachite’s tail tip flicked, the only sign of agitation or impatience that she had betrayed so far. “Why do you care so much about this groundling city?”
“Just because they’re vulnerable and too stupid to realize it doesn’t mean they should die.” He added deliberately, “And because I think you have a plan to use them as bait, so you can attack while the Fell are distracted.”
There was another stir in the room, an uneasy one this time, and Celadon’s spines trembled anxiously. That told Moon he was right. He hadn’t thought Malachite, who had rescued the remnants of her court and killed off an entire Fell flight into the bargain, would wait long before deciding what to do. Or that she would disregard an obvious advantage.
Malachite tilted her head and regarded him steadily. Moon forced himself not to drop his gaze. After a long moment, her tail tip flicked again and she said, “We’ll speak of that later.”
She looked away, and Moon tried to make his exhalation of relief silent. She said, “Bring Russet.”
Two of the younger Arbora got up and went out, to return a few moments later with Russet. She wasn’t restrained in any way, but she was surrounded by a group of young male and female Arbora, with the strong builds and rough practical clothing that usually indicated soldiers. Moon wasn’t sure what he was expecting, but after her furious reaction to being caught last night, Russet’s expression now surprised him. Her eyes were downcast, and she looked grave and sad.
The soldiers stepped away from her and went to sit down, leaving her in the center of the room, ten paces from Malachite.
One of the older Arbora said, “Three different mentors have looked into Russet’s mind, and whatever happened in the past, there is no Fell influence now.”
A sigh went through the Arbora, a shocked murmur through the warriors. Moon translated that to mean that the Arbora had been hoping against hope that Russet had been acting under Fell influence, and so was not responsible for anything she had done. The warriors had assumed that she was under Fell influence, that no Arbora would do this of her own volition. Moon thought she might have been influenced turns ago during the attack; she would have no memory of it. This might be what happened if the influence remained and the victim was never made aware of it, that it would do strange things to your thoughts, even after all trace of it finally faded. He was glad Balm wasn’t here to see this.
Russet looked up at the reaction, and her gaze fell on Moon. She went still for a moment, then looked down again.
It was Celadon who said, “This is your chance to speak for yourself, Russet. Tell us what happened.”
Russet drew a sharp breath, then said, “It started back then, at the eastern colony.” She stopped, clenching her jaw, as if speaking of it was painful. Moon felt the first creeping doubt that she was playacting, that the truth of her feelings was very different.
“Go on,” another Arbora said. They were all watching her, as still as if they were stalking prey. Some looked openly distressed, like Moss, but with the others it was hard to tell.
Russet wet her lips, and said, “I used to go out with the hunters, sometimes. One day I got separated from them. I met… a creature in the forest. I thought it was a groundling at first, then I realized it was a strange kind of shifter. It asked me questions. It… It’s easy to say I should have known. But it was hard not to answer. I don’t remember what it did, but I told it everything it wanted to know.” She swallowed. “It was a Fell ruler.”
It was all too possible. According to Feather, the court had never encountered Fell before. The first time Moon had seen Fell in the groundling city of Saraseil, he thought he might have been one of them.
“When they attacked, when they killed the soldiers and the other teachers to get to the nurseries, I knew they had been lying. Swift heard me beg them… She heard enough to know I had spoken to one before. They let me live; I don’t know why. I ran into Swift and she accused me… I lied to her, I told her I wasn’t the only one, that there were others. If she tried to tell anyone, it would be all of us against her, and no one would believe her.” She looked at Moon squarely for the first time. “She left, and I never saw her again. That must have been when she fled with you and the other children.”