Joraz shrugged. “He wanted a broomstick, but there wasn’t one
handy. No mops, either. Or coat-racks.”
The warrior guffawed into his
cup. “So you…what, just sawed it
off? Where’d you get a saw, eh?”
The monk made a quick hacking motion
with one hand, and winked. Valaista was
sitting nearby, listening intently. Her
eyes widened at the gesture.
“Nice,” the warrior nodded. He took a long pull at his drink. “Sharpen it first?”
“My hand, or the table leg?” Joraz
asked.
“The leg.”
“Of course.”
“With what, your teeth?”
“With Breygon’s knife, actually.”
“Your were actually carrying
weapons?” Karrick asked, feigning surprise.
“Really? And you still went with
the table leg?” He stared up at the
ceiling, shaking his head in wonder.
“You guys really need to leave the whole improvised-weapons thing to
people who’ve actually done it before.”
Joraz nodded, maintaining his
outward calm. Apparently it was going to
be a long night.
“So!” the warrior asked
brightly. “Who did the deed?”
The monk cocked a thumb at Breygon,
who was seated at the head of the table.
The half-elf looked his normal dour self, though perhaps a little more
ebullient than usual. The reason for his
good spirits sat at his side. Amorda, in
stark contrast to her fiancée, was so ethereally beautiful beneath her halo of
midnight locks that she looked like a creature from another world.
Karrick’s eyes narrowed. There was something odd about her. He leaned closer to Joraz. “Did she change her hair?” he asked.
“Hadn’t noticed,” the monk replied.
The warrior shook his head again. There was definitely something…different
about her.
Balls. “Did you
hammer it in?” he asked, returning to the matter of Joraz’s tale. “Or did you just…” He made a two-armed swinging motion, like a
miner wielding a mattock.
“No,” Joraz admitted. He had been glancing at Amorda, wondering
what Karrick had been talking about. He
turned his attention back to his table-mates.
“We borrowed Father Shields’ mace.”
Valaista got her hand over her mouth
in time. Karrick didn’t. He sprayed a mouthful of bright berry wine
across the table and its cargo of assorted dishes and plates. The dragon-girl leapt from her chair and made
as if to pound him on the back, but he waved her away.
“I suppose it was a little unorthodox,” the monk acknowledged, feeling slightly
abashed. “What about you two?” he asked
quickly. “Did you manage to do something
about the vault door?”
“Couple’o fellows from the guild’re
coming tomorrow to take measurements,” Karrick snorted. “Gnomes, likely. They’ll probably come up with some
steam-powered horror that’ll cost a mint, break down after a day, and won’t
keep out wind. Stop trying to change the subject,” he
growled. “You were saying that you
hammered a table-leg into a vampire’s rib-cage with a priest’s skull-crusher?”
“That’s what I said,” Joraz sighed.
“He kick up much of a fuss?”
“No, he didn’t seem to mind at
all. He just lent us the mace without
question.”
Karrick sighed. “Not Shields.
I meant, did the vampire kick
up –”
“Ah! No, he didn’t,” the monk
admitted. “He just sort of…lay
there, and took it.”
“He didn’t move?”
“No.”
“At all?”
Joraz took a deep breath. “Not at all.
Breygon thought he might’ve been paralyzed.”
“If he was paralyzed,” Valaista
asked, a puzzled look on her face, “then why didn’t you just hit him with the
mace?”
“That didn’t occur to us,” Joraz
replied precisely.
“Or cut his head off with the
half-elf’s knife?” she added.
“Didn’t think of that either,” the
monk grumbled.
“Yeah,” the warrior chortled,
coughing a little. He refilled his glass
from the wine-pitcher, topping up Valaista’s as well. When he waggled the beaker at Joraz, the monk
merely gave a shake of his head. Karrick
shrugged and put the pitcher back on the table.
“So,” he said, obviously enjoying himself. “You burned the body?”
“No.”
Karrick shook his head. “You guys really need to leave the whole
killin’-vampires thing to people who’ve done it before.”
“You always burn the body,” Valaista said gravely.
“I beg your pardon, missy,” Joraz
said, his carefully cultivated equanimity slipping, “but might I ask just how
many vampires you’ve seen?”
“Just the three who invaded Kalena’s
study and killed Kaltas’ priest,” she said, shrugging. “But we are hatched –”
“– with much knowledge’,” Joraz
sighed. “I know. I know.
I’ll try to remember the fire advice for next time.”
Karrick was shaking his head sadly. “So if you didn’t burn it…how’d you get rid
of it?”
“We threw it in the river,” the monk
said with some satisfaction. “According
to folklore, immersion in running water ought to destroy him completely.”
Karrick frowned. “The river? You mean, the Lymphus? That’s a half-mile from the embassy! How’d you get it there?”
The monk coloured slightly. “Through town.”
“Ah-hah, of course,” the warrior
nodded. “Bag of Holding?”
“We…ah…no,” the monk frowned. “No, we...um...we dragged the body. By the heels.”
For the first time in their
months-long association, Joraz saw Karrick lose his composure. The man’s face, deeply tanned, drained of all
colour. “You what?” he choked.
“We dragged it.”
“You dragged it,” Karrick murmured
like a man in a dream. “A vampire’s
corpse. At high noon, down main street,
in the capital of the elf-realm, with his undead noggin bouncin’ off the
cobbles.”
“Yes,” Joraz nodded.
“You didn’t consider asking Shields
to find you a wagon and a poxy blanket?” the warrior demanded.
“We didn’t think of that either.”
“So you dragged’im. With a sharpened table leg,” the warrior went
on in magnificent fascination, “sticking out of his chest!”
“Yes,” the monk grated, his cheeks
reddening.
Karrick sat back in his chair. “I take it back,” he said,
thunderstruck. “In all the history of
the universe, that is the greatest plan ever!”
The monk said nothing. He merely glowered at the grinning thug,
mentally bemoaning the fact that Tyrellus’ wisdom hadn’t included instructions
on how to set people alight simply by staring at them.
Karrick was silent for a long
moment, scratching his chin thoughtfully.
“Anybody…you know, notice?” he asked at last.
“We did get a few odd looks,” the monk confessed.
“Can’t imagine why.” Karrick thrust his chin towards the head of
the table. “And he was there? The mighty
Lewat himself?”
“Of course.”
“Masked? Disguised?
Invisible, maybe?”
“No.”
“Did he put his hood up?” the
warrior said slowly, as if speaking to an idiot child.
“Not that I recall,” the monk
snapped.
Karrick blinked at least a dozen
times before speaking again. When he
did, his voice was unnaturally even.
“You do happen to remember,” he said softly, “that he’s getting married
tomorrow, yes? At the Palace? In the Commanderie? By the chief of the realm’s biggest order of
paladins? With the Queen’s explicit
sanction, and half the nobles in the realm hanging about and gawking at the
circus?”
Joraz frowned.
The warrior held up his hands,
forming a frame with thumbs and forefingers as if grasping a broadsheet. “ ‘Half-elf who showed up at the Palace,
fought a duel in the Starhall, was acknowledged by Her Fabulous Majesty as a
long-lost descendent, and is slated to marry the Baroness of Arx Incultus, was
arrested yestereve for murder, and for performing vile indignities upon a
Corpse’,” he intoned solemnly. He cocked
an eyebrow, and added, “ ‘His henchman, a nondescript round-ear in baggy pants,
escaped into the crowd holding a bloody table-leg, and is still at large’.”
“ ‘Non-descript’?” Joraz asked, wounded. “And what d'ye mean, ‘indignities’?”
“If somebody jammed a table-leg
through my breadbasket, I’d be indignant,” Karrick
shrugged. “Wouldn’t you?”
“I suppose I would at that. But he didn’t ‘arrest’ us,” Joraz said, a
little put out.
“ ‘He’?” Karrick repeated in
disbelief. “What d’ye mean, ‘he’? Who didn’t arrest you?”
“The guard captain at the harbour
gate.”
Karrick’s eyes bugged out. “ ‘The guard captain’? You were seen by the city guard?”
“Couldn’t help that,” Joraz
shrugged. “We had to throw the body in
the river, and the Great Island
“And guarded!” the warrior
exclaimed.
“They’re all guarded,” the monk shrugged.
Karrick put his hands to his head,
and Joraz wondered if he was going to actually tear his hair. “What…about…the sewer!?” the warrior groaned, punctuating his words by banging his
forehead on the table.
Thanos, who had been deep in
conversation with princess Myaszæron, looked up at his friend’s sudden
outburst. He cocked a querying
eyebrow. Karrick shook his head,
mouthing Sorry.
Joraz looked thoughtful. “Starmeadow has sewers?”
“This city,” the warrior sighed,
“has a population of more than tenscore thousand. Nearly all of them elves. Elves pretty much eat nothing but
roughage. What do you think?”
“I didn’t know about the sewers,”
the monk said, mildly chagrined.
“Yeah, I got that. Here’s a hint.” He pointed at the floor. “They’re usually ‘down’.”
Joraz frowned.
“Look, we didn’t have a choice.
We’d staked him, but the creature still had to be permanently
destroyed.”
“Granted,” Karrick sighed. “Shields can raise the dead. D’ye think he might be able to make a little
fire?”
“We didn’t ask him,” Joraz grumbled.
“Okay. Maybe he
didn’t have the right spell prepared anyway.
Did the Embassy run out of wood?”
“What?”
“Even if the place was all out of
firewood, you still had most of that table left,” the warrior said
despairingly. “You cut off the critter’s
head, douse it in holy water, stuff the mouth full of roses and garlic…”
“It’s winter,” Joraz protested. “Where were we supposed to get roses?”
“…and burn the body in the
fireplace!” Karrick finished heatedly.
“Wouldn’t people have noticed the
smell?”
“ ‘The smell’?!” Karrick shrieked. Thanos turned to him again, looking annoyed,
and the warrior made an apologetic gesture. Turning back to Joraz, he dragged a hand across his
face. “ ‘The smell’?” he said as quietly
as his passion permitted. “You just dragged
an impaled corpse through the middle of town, at high bloody noon, and let the
militia watch while you tossed it in the river!
And you’re worried about somebody noticing funny smells? Vara’s clapped-out cunny!”
“All right!” Joraz muttered, feeling
more than sufficiently chastised for one evening. “All right!
Point taken!”
“You guys really need to leave the
whole getting’-rid-of-bodies thing to people who’ve done it before,” Karrick
groused. “Oh, well – live and learn, I
guess. At least nobody got hurt.”
Joraz reddened slightly, sucking air
through his teeth.
Karrick’s eyebrows shot up. “Who got hurt?”
“Father Shields. He…uh…got a little life-drained. And…er…blown up.”
“He all right?”
“He’ll mend. He...er...might need some new robes,” Joraz
muttered. “And books.”
The warrior glanced at the head of
the table, then back at the monk. “You
both look just fine.”
“Shields is old,” Joraz
explained. “He’s not very fast on his
feet.”
Karrick nodded. “And you burned down the library?”
“No, we saved it! Well, most of it, anyway.”
“I suppose we should be thankful for
small mercies.” The warrior leaned back
in his chair and crossed his arms.
“Well, a lamiata-mage,
eh? Probably from that Grim Duchess
lass, I suppose. Find any tattoos when
you stripped the corpse?”
“We didn’t…um…” Joraz flushed again.
Karrick pinched the bridge of his
nose between thumb and forefinger. “You
didn’t search the body.”
“He had a bunch of rings!” the monk
said defensively. “And an amulet! We got those off. And there was this stone in one of his
pockets. And these fancy bra…” His voice trailed off suddenly.
“What?”
“Ah…fancy bracers. We kind of left those on the body when…when
we…”
“…when you tossed it in the
river.” The warrior shook his head sadly. “Boy, you guys really need to leave the whole
lootin’-corpses thing to people who’ve done it before.”
“You were otherwise occupied,” the
monk said stiffly.
“It’s not hard. Just a matter of focus, really,” Karrick
explained gently. “Look, you start at
the head, and pat down both sides, doing each limb separately. Then –”
“I know how to search a body!” Joraz
barked.
“And yet here you sit,” the warrior
snorted, spreading his hands helplessly, “lamentably bracer-less!”
The monk ground his teeth. “We were distracted.”
“Were you on fire? Was somebody stabbing you?”
“No,” Joraz acknowledged. He nodded towards the head of the table. “But he’s getting married tomorrow. His mind’s been elsewhere for awhile.”
“Given what he’s marrying, I’ll
pardon him for being a little preoccupied,” Karrick nodded. “But what’s your excuse?”
“I’m his best man.”
Karrick’s expression didn’t change.
“Well, if that’s not enough of a
distraction,” Joraz shrugged, “I spent most of the morning flying between demi-worlds
floating in the sable bosom of the River
of Stars
Karrick cocked an eyebrow. “The River
of Stars
“That’s it,” Joraz nodded. “Infinite, mostly empty, and mostly
un-peopled. It was magnificent.”
“Hmm,” the warrior grunted. “Mostly empty and un-peopled, eh?” He picked up his wine glass and drained it in
a gulp. “Sounds like a good place to get
rid of a body.”
Joraz blinked. He hadn’t thought of that either.
♦
Myaszæron grinned despite
herself. His obvious enthusiasm was
infectious. “Just because it’s in a
different script? Surely there are
translations available!”
“No!
Not real ones, anyway,” he amended.
“That’s the thing! You can’t
translate it! Harkittu is…it’s…”
She waited, still smiling.
He sighed in frustration. “It’s hard to describe, that’s what it is,”
he said with a small laugh. “It’s like…”
Still listening closely, the
princess addressed herself to her dinner.
She knew she could safely eat; when the warcaster began explaining
arcane concepts, the explanation tended to take the form of an internal debate,
with listeners usually just along for the ride.
“Okay. Imagine a house,” Thanos went on
eagerly. “No. Imagine an architect, building a house.”
Mya nodded helpfully. He didn’t notice. He forged on.
“Architects work from plans. Hätäinen – that’s the dragons’ normal script – is like the
plan. Harkittu…it’s like the house.”
She
swallowed. “Is it –”
“No, that’s not
it,” he went on heatedly, correcting himself, and completely ignoring her. “That’s not it at all. Hätäinen
is like the plan for building a house with brick and mortar. Harkittu
lets you build the same house using marble and gold.”
“Sounds expensive,” the princess
muttered.
“But it’s more than a house!” Thanos
continued, oblivious to the fact that most of his neighbours at the table were
now watching him with bemused expressions.
“It looks like a house…but
when you enter it, it’s a palace! With
hundreds of rooms, gardens, balconies, kitchens and closets, statuary and
seraglios, topiaries and tapestries…”
“You’re saying,” the princess
interrupted, laying a hand on one of the mage’s waving arms, “that this…this
other dragon script…it actually transforms their language? Until it’s…what? More than meets the eye?”
“Exactly!” Thanos cried. “That’s exactly it! ‘More than meets the
eye’! You keep reading, and reading, and
it’s like wandering the halls of a wondrous palace! A work of art, that never ends! Where you keep finding more, and more, and
more again!”
Mya put her elbows on the table,
folded her hands under her chin, and regarded the warcaster with a bemused
expression. “Could you give me an
example?”
Thanos nodded excitedly. His mouth opened…and then he closed it
again. “Actually, I can’t,” he said,
sounding puzzled. “There’s no way to do
it justice.”
“Why not?”
“Well,” he said slowly, “it really
sounds no different in spoken words.
Except that it sounds horrid, because simply reading off what the
symbols mean distorts their beauty. When
you speak the words, it’s like you’re reading the plan for the house. ‘Six courses of mortared red brick, four feet
of thatch’, that sort of thing. But
reading the Harkittu symbols
themselves…it’s like looking at the finished
house, and seeing it, all at once. And
knowing that the deeper you look, the more you’ll see within it.”
“The gold-and-marble palace,” Mya
said.
“That’s it!” he exclaimed happily.
“So there’s no way to give me an
example?”
The warcaster shrugged
helplessly. “It’d be like trying to
describe a rainbow to a man blind from birth.”
The princess rolled her eyes. “I’m almost sorry I asked.”
His face reddened slightly. “I did manage this, though.” Thanos
reached into his tunic and extracted a folded piece of paper. He placed it on the table and slid it across
towards Myaszæron.
The princess picked up the page and
unfolded it. Her eyes widened in
surprise. “It’s lovely!” she
exclaimed. “I didn’t know you were familiar
with the Crypto-Impressionist movement!”
The warcaster blinked. “The what, now?”
She laid the paper back on the
table, pressing on it to flatten its seams.
Most of the surface was taken up by an incredibly complex, marvellously
beautiful drawing consisting of sweeping black arcs, lines, triangular and diamond-shaped
spots, and peculiar, hooked hatch-marks.
It was so precisely perfect that it looked as though it had been pressed
from a woodcut. Or crafted by magic.
“Crypto-Impressionism,” Mya
repeated, staring at the interwoven shapes in fascination. “It became popular shortly after the Argent
Three brought the Book of the Powers to us.
About two and a half millennia ago.
These sorts of artistic designs were all the rage.”
Thanos laughed helpless. “It’s not art, highness. It’s Harkittu.”
“I think it’s beautiful,” she
replied stubbornly, still staring at the shapes.
“Of course it’s beautiful!” the
warcaster laughed. “It’s Valaista!”
Hearing her name, the dragon-girl
turned towards her master. “I beg your
pardon?”
Wordlessly, Thanos put his fingers
on the parchment and slid it towards his apprentice.
Valaista frowned. Then, to Mya’s astonishment, the girl put her
hands to her mouth – an extraordinarily normal Kindred gesture – and burst into
tears.
“What is it?” the princess
exclaimed, glancing back at Thanos.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong,” the warcaster
grinned. “It’s her.”
My looked back at Valaista. Behind her hands, behind her tears, she was
smiling. “It’s me!” the girl confirmed.
“It’s my life!”
“Karrick told me what you clawed
into the table at the embassy,” Thanos said.
“I spoke to Ara – Ara Latentra, one of the Queen’s handmaidens?” he
added for Mya’s benefit.
“I’ve met her,” the princess nodded.
“She’s a…uh, she knows the script,”
Thanos went on, suddenly realizing that Myaszæron might not be aware of the ancillula’s true identity. He pointed at the paper. “I told her everything I knew about Val, and
she wrote that for me. Or ‘drew’ it, I
suppose.”
“It’s beautiful!” the dragon-girl
exclaimed. She dabbed at her eyes with
her napkin.
Mya leaned closer to Thanos. “Do you understand what she’s all worked up
about?”
“Something to do with the way the
individual symbols are chosen and incorporated into the overall figure,” he
replied sotto voce. “The choices are up to the writer. The same story might never be told the same
way twice. The more skilled the
symbologist, the more praiseworthy the end result.”
“Ara must be very skilled, then,”
Mya replied.
“There’s no way to know, is there?”
Thanos laughed. “Until one of us learns
to read and write the language! And to
appreciate its subtleties!”
Mya tapped a manicured fingernail on
the table. “This is all very
interesting,” she said slowly, “and far be it from me to discourage anyone
engaged in artistic pursuits. But the
world rushes forward, and things are afoot that cannot now be undone. I don’t understand how this peculiar dragon
script aids you in your goal.”
Thanos nodded soberly. “Because we’re not just pursuing our quest in
the visible world, highness,” he said.
“We’re following a trail that was blazed thousands upon thousands of
years ago. We’ve found clues hidden
among religious artefacts, in the libraries of undead horrors, and falling from
the lips of revenant masters of magic. We’ve
had to decrypt ancient texts in a dozen Kindred tongues, and words scored
magically into stone.
“The dragons recorded much of their
wisdom in the daily tongue,” he went on, looking frustrated, “but there are
pieces missing. Vital pieces. Not to oversimplify, but I’ve noticed a
pattern in my researches. Draconic
sources written in hätäinen invariably
recount the deeds of the dragons and their mortal allies. They tell the ‘what’. But they never seem to tell the ‘why’.”
The princess
frowned. “Sorry? ‘What’, but not ‘why’? Why does the ‘why’ matter?”
“Because the
great wyrms are closely woven into this story, and into our quest,” the
warcaster replied patiently. “We were
recruited to serve the silver dragons.
We aided a pair of iron dragons, and I took their daughter as my
familiar. We’ve battled and defeated
black dragons, red dragons, and even a wyrm of the shadows. We’re seeking an ancient tome of terrible
evil, buried deep in the hoard of a blue dragon. We’ve had visions of a mighty
green dragon, and of a mightier red, a servant of the Dark Queen, ancient and
terrible. And now we’ve met a gold
dragon guarding...ahh...” He cut himself
off just in time.
“Guarding what?” the princess asked.
“Not important,”
he said hastily. “What’s important is
that at every turn, the wyrms rear their heads.
They are part of the warp and woof of the world, and of our tale,
too. It is not merely their deeds that
interest us, but their desires, their demands and their destinies.” He rapped his knuckles sharply on the
table. “We know what they’ve done…but we
know next to nothing about why they
did it!”
“And that’s important?”
“It might be the most important thing
we’ve ever looked into!” Thanos exclaimed.
“The dragons are a motive force behind the great engine of the
Universe. For good or ill, they are
implicated in every event of substance that occurs. Their lore is of vital concern to us.” He clenched his fist until the tendons
cracked. “If we don’t know why they do
what they do, we won’t be able to guess what they’ll do next. I need to know more!”
Mya sat back, taken aback by his sudden
vehemence. “What more is there to know?”
With a snort, Thanos reached into his
tunic again and extracted another folded page.
This one he unfolded and pressed flat onto the table.
Mya glanced at it. It was another intricate symbol, this time in
a dark, maroon ink. It looked infinitely
finer and more complex than the page Thanos had passed to his apprentice. “What’s this?” she asked.
“A poem,” Thanos replied. “It’s called ‘Vaikerointi Olowarten ja hänen lupaus kuninkaallisen suvun tontut’.”
The
princess blinked. “And that means…”
“
‘The Lament of Olowartan and his Vow unto the Royal House of the Elves’.”
“You
can read that?” Mya exclaimed,
staring at the extraordinarily complex figure.
“Ha!
No, of course not,” Thanos laughed sadly.
“Ara read it out to me.
Basically, it’s a tribute written by Olowartan, the great silver wyrm,
to his brother Jawartan, who bore Yarchian Renovator,
the last High King of Harad, into battle at the Field of Oldarran and the
Gloaming of the Wyrms; and who, after the battle, took the king’s body to the
Vale of Skulls in ‘Fair Dracosedes’, making Yarchian the only mortal ever to be
entombed in that holy place. Jawartan,
according to legend, laid the fallen king on the earth, swore an oath that
bound all of his many descendents to serve the Elven throne, then curled up
around his friend’s body, and surrendered his life.”
“Why?”
Mya breathed.
“That’s
what makes the thing so interesting!” Thanos exclaimed. He tapped the page with a fingertip. “It’s all about
the ‘why’! According to Olowartan, his
brother gave up his sielu in victory,
because, in fighting alongside his friend Yarchian, the apotheosis of his life
had been fulfilled, and anything further would have been a diminishment.”
“I
don’t follow that argument,” the princess frowned.
“That’s
because you’re not a dragon!” Thanos laughed.
“According to Olowartan, the silver dragons set themselves apart from
their brethren because they are following a destiny that was chosen for them by
their ancestors – by the silver dragons who were present at the Raw.”
“What’s
‘the raw’?” the princess asked, boggled.
“The
Raaka. They mean it in the sense of ‘savage’. That’s what they call the moment in time, in
the depths of the ancient world,” the warcaster explained excitedly, “when the
race of dragons broke away from Bardan’s control and the overlordship of
Achamkris, and divided itself. They went
two ways – one part to follow the example of Oroprimus by serving the light;
the other to emulate his sister Nidhoggr, by serving the dark.”
“I’ve
never heard of that before!”
“Nor
had I,” Thanos chuckled. “But it’s all
in here! All the races of dragons have a destiny, one
that they selected for themselves at the moment of the division!
“The
brasses,” he explained, breathless, “seek exaltation through joy. Joy in speech, joy in song, joy in sensation,
joy in all things. The coppers, by
contrast, consider themselves as the guardians of the continuity of the natural
life of the world. The bronzes are the
vagabonds of dragonkind; they are driven always to explore. To strive, to seek, to find, and not to
yield. The golds concern themselves with
magic, and wisdom, and lore, and the order of the universe. And the silvers…” He laughed again, shaking his head.
“What
do they seek?” Mya asked, enthralled.
“They
are ours,” Thanos said. His voice was low and stark with
astonishment. “Ours! They are drawn inexorably to the Kindred –
charged at the Raw with protecting us, aiding us, safeguarding us, teaching us…
“It’s
why the silver dragons led the fight against Bardan’s hordes at the Gloaming,
and perished nearly to the last wyrm,” he said, marvelling. “It’s why the silvers served Yarchian and his
knights. It’s why most of the dragons
who act as mounts for the Knights of the Fang in Dracosedes are silvers. It’s why the dragons that brought the Book of
the Powers to your ancestors – the Argent Three, remember? – were silvers!
“It’s
why,” he went on, his voice rising with every word, “the silvers basically run
the Brotherhood! It’s why Venasta commanded his only surviving son and heir,
Svarda, to live in Anuru, among us! It’s
why Svarda’s daughters spend most of their time sharing our form and our
fate! And it’s why…er…”
He
flushed and clamped his lips shut. The
princess eyed him oddly, provoked by his sudden reticence. “Why, what?”
Thanos
cleared his throat loudly. “It’s…er…why
most Kindred half-dragons descend from silver bloodlines,” he said, his cheeks
burning. “The silvers seem to be
unusually…ah…drawn to our kind. They
spend more time in Kindred form than all of the other wyrms combined. Under such circumstances, romantic
entanglements are...er...inevitable.”
“And
that bothers you?” Mya frowned. Does it bother me? she wondered.
“Well,”
he temporized, his face flaming, “I am
more or less responsible for Valaista, you know…”
“Ah,”
the princess remarked. She kept her face
blank, but inwardly she was chuckling.
Humans – especially human males, she’d noticed – seemed ridiculously
close-mouthed about the most natural of subjects. “But dragons don’t mate unless the urge to
rise strikes, and it doesn’t usually strike until they reach maturity. Nearly a century or so. No?”
“Yes,”
Thanos agreed. “So?”
Mya
shrugged. “Well, unless you were to
develop a sudden fascination with the lore of Boorn, you’ll almost certainly be
dead long before Valaista ever rises to mate.
So it’s not really your problem, is it?”
Thanos
opened his mouth to reply, then shut it with a snap.
The
princess grinned. “Feel better?”
“Not
really, no,” the warcaster laughed.
Mya
reached across the table and slapped him on the shoulder. “Cheer up, soldier. Focus on today. You were saying that you want to know
more? About the ‘why’ of dragons?”
“I
do,” he nodded. “I do. We need
to know more.”
“By
learning this…this harkittu
script?” She tapped the figure on the
page.
“Maybe,”
Thanos mused. “Or maybe by seeking out
other sources of draconic lore. I don’t
quite know yet.”
She
smiled. “Well, if there’s anything I can
do to help, you have only to ask.”
“I
was hoping you’d offer, highness,” the warcaster replied soberly. “I’d like to go through the palace library as
well, to see if there are any harkittu
works kept there. Also, if we ever get
the chance to go south again, I’d be obliged if you asked Kaltas if he would
allow me to go through his wife’s…I mean, Alrykkian’s papers.”
He
looked so mortified at his faux-pas
that Mya winked. “Don’t worry about it,
my friend. I’ve always counted Rykki a
sister – if a moody, terrifying one! – and I would hope that, wherever she now
resides, she would think the same of me.
“So
yes,” the princess nodded. “I’d be happy
to ask my husband whether he…whether…”
Her
face went completely white.
“What
is it?” Thanos asked, alarmed.
“Kaltas! Pusfire! I forgot!”
She
pushed her chair back, stood, and strode quickly towards the head of the table,
where Breygon and Amorda were speaking quietly, their heads close together.
Thanos
watched her go. “Forgot what?” he
wondered aloud.
♦
“You’ve heard from him?” Breygon
asked, surprised.
“Kaltas?” Amorda exclaimed at the
same moment. “Really?”
As she spoke, she cocked her head
quizzically. The odd motion caught
Breygon’s attention. Unusually, she had
gathered her glimmering fall of midnight locks into a long braid that reached
down almost to the small of her back. It
was different, he decided, but not unattractive.
The princess nodded. “I’m sorry; I should’ve told you
earlier.” She grinned wryly. “I mentioned it to Grandmother, and she got
so excited that I lost track of things.
Then I got preoccupied with getting my gear sorted out for tomorrow, and
then I had to rush over here...”
The ranger cocked an eyebrow. “What’s to sort out?”
Myszæron’s face fell. “Well, for one thing,” she said glumly, “I’ve
had to replace my regalia. Obviously I’m
no longer entitled to wear Valatanna’s colours or sigil.”
Amorda frowned. “I hadn’t thought
about that,” she said, biting her
lower lip. “Oh dear. What will you wear, then?”
“Well, I am still a princess of House Æyllian, after all,” Mya
chuckled, putting on a brave face. “As well as a member of the
High Guard...at least technically. I
suppose I’ll see if I can’t wedge these hips into my old uniform.” She glanced over her shoulder at her posterior. “A century of royal living has done me no
favours.” Knocking out a couple of Eldisle heirs won’t help either, she
thought despairingly.
“Anything you need adjusted, just
have it brought here,” Amorda said soothingly.
“The staff will be up all night anyway.”
Mya burst out in a peal of happy
laughter. “Did you forget where I live,
you featherhead? Grandmother has a
regiment of seamstresses at the palace!
They work in shifts just to keep up with the demand!”
Amorda rolled her eyes. “You play the adventurer so convincingly that
sometimes I forget who you really are, highness.”
“Kak
for thy ‘highness’, sister mine!” Mya snorted humorously. “Worry about your own adornment. All eyes’ll be on you! Don’t worry, I’ll be presentable on the
morrow.”
Breygon’s eyes had narrowed
noticeably. “I didn’t know you were part
of the Guard,” he said, addressing the princess. “What rank do you hold, if you don’t mind my
asking?”
“Legate,” she replied. “That’s gradus
proprio, my permanent rank. Of the
Household Legion, of course. But I’m
also Imperator honoris causa. All members of the royal family who’ve
commanded troops in action tend to be granted an honorary generalship, assuming
we live long enough.”
For the first time that evening,
Breygon grinned happily. “A
general! That’s simply outstanding!” he
chortled.
Mya wagged a finger at him. “You
can’t tell Thanos! I’m not pulling
honorary rank on a combat veteran, much less one who’s both a nephew to my good
lord, and a cousin to the throne!”
The ranger sighed. “Well, that takes some of the savour out of
the day.” His cheek twitched. “I suppose I’ll have to settle for the look on
his face when he sees you in uniform.”
“I suppose you will,” Mya
nodded. “I look magnificent in it, by
the way,” she added with a grin.
“I don’t doubt it.” Breygon felt a tug at his elbow. He half-turned. It was the Wilder gardener and doorman, Tua
Sekop. “Yes?” he murmured.
“I apologize for the intrusion,
Lewat,” the old woodsman said with all possible deference. “But you must to bed. Recall that you have duties to Hutanibu tomorrow.”
“I’m aware, my friend,” the ranger
murmured with exaggerated politeness.
“I’m busy now. We can discuss it
later.”
The old fellow, though, was neither
as discrete as his Third House cousins, nor as willing to give ground. “Now is the opportune moment, Lewat, with all
respect,” he said firmly. “The Slaughter
begins at midnight. You must consider
carefully how to bestow the Threefold Benison.
The trees and the beasts can take care of themselves, but as I told you
this morning, for the Third Blessing, you need look no further than –”
“Stop!” the half-elf commanded. He glanced to his left, where his future
lifemate was seated, staring listlessly into the distance. “I’ll thank you, pelari,” he said intensely, keeping his voice low, “not to try to
slip the Forest Mother’s daughters into my bed while my lady is seated at my
side!”
“I am only doing my duty,” Tua
whispered fiercely.
“And I thank you for it,” Breygon
replied in the same stark tone. “My duty, however – all of it – is to my lifemate.”
The old fellow was silent for a long
moment. At last he said, “My lord
intends to wed milady on the morrow?”
“You know bloody well I do,” the
ranger snapped.
“And does milord intend,” the Wilder
elf went on nervously, “to keep to the ancient rite, and perform the coniunc –”
“Not that it’s any of your damned
business,” Breygon roared, his restraint at an end, “but yes!”
His bellow caught not only Amorda’s
attention, but also drew the eyes of the rest of his table-mates, and all of
the domestic staff. One of the younger
serving-girls dropped a salver, and burst into tears.
The Wilder elf bowed until his head
was below the table’s edge. “Most
sincere apologies, Lewat, for upsetting your equilibrium.”
The ranger sighed and rubbed his
face. “It’s I who ought to apologize,
Tua. I’m sorry. It’s been a…a busy couple of weeks.” He slapped the old fellow on the back. “You have my word; one way or another, I’ll
do my duty by the Forest Mother.”
The Wilder elf straightened up and
gave Breygon an odd look. “I believe you
will, Lewat.” He stepped back and made
himself scarce.
Breygon turned reluctantly back to
Amorda, expecting a fiery tongue-lashing.
He didn’t receive it; the elf-woman was looking away again. He didn’t know whether to be relieved or
worried.
The princess cleared her throat a
little too obviously. “Ahh, speaking of
uniforms,” she continued, turning to Amorda and babbling on as if they hadn’t
been interrupted, “what arms are you bearing tomorrow, era meum?”
“Acus,
of course,” the baroness replied distantly.
“With my little friend Novaculum
in my boot, as always.”
Mya cast a glance at Breygon. “Thinblade and stiletto,” she explained. “Traditional, for the nuptia bellum. I’ll be
similarly armed.”
“No bow?” the ranger asked, smiling. “You’ll look incomplete without it.”
“Look who’s talking,” Mya snorted. “No, no bow.
I need my hands free for the ceremony.
So do you. What arms will you
bear?”
“I hadn’t decided,” the ranger
replied, thinking hard. “Given how my
last visit to the palace went, I was considering asking our friend Ira for the
loan of a ballista.”
“I’m afraid that falls under the
prohibition against two-handed weapons,” Mya deadpanned. “You could bear the Queen’s gift; it would do
her courtly credit. You managed well
enough with Kaltas’ blade, after all.”
“ ‘Well enough’ nearly put my
lifemate in the ground,” the ranger replied stiffly. “I’m done with ‘courtly credit’, aunty
mine.”
He glanced at the woman seated to his right. Amorda was listening to their exchange in
still silence. “Thanks to my darling’s
cleverness,” he said firmly, “even a modest threat to me could mean death for
her. I’ll therefore take no more chances
and offer no more warnings. Henceforth,
the head comes off anyone who so much as looks at me sideways.”
“That seems the prudent course, I
suppose,” Mya said. She smiled. “So…greataxe, then?”
“Don’t tempt me,” Breygon
growled. “Look, I don’t mean to stifle
this line of discussion, but weren’t you telling us about a message you’d
had? From Kaltas?”
“Yes, of course,” the princess said,
rubbing her brow. “Of course. I’m sorry, I don’t know where my head is
today.
“He contacted me by
flux-speaking. It was just a brief note:
‘Novaposticum; mobilization proceeds.
Estimate Starmeadow three weeks.
Nice dragon’.”
Breygon smiled at the last two
words. Then he frowned again. “That’s it?
That’s all he said?”
Mya nodded.
The ranger glanced at his fingers for a moment. “That’s only nine words,” he said at
last. “I thought that spell allowed the
sender to speak two dozen words or more, and the receiver to reply with a like
number.”
The princess eyed him stonily. “Is there a question in there?”
“What was the rest of his mes – ”
“I haven’t seen my lifemate,” Mya interrupted, “since
our wedding night. It has been the
longest two weeks of my life. And I say
that as someone who once spent a fortnight stuck in a sealed grotto after a
cave-in, with nothing but four rotting bugbear carcasses to serve me as
company, couch and comestibles.”
Breygon sat back, stunned into silence by her sudden
vehemence.
“The rest of my love’s message,” Mya said sternly,
“was for my ears, and mine
alone.” A pretty pink flush took the
anger out of her words.
The ranger snorting, holding his hands up in mock
surrender. “I apologize most profusely,
aunty.”
She huffed a little, but smiled.
“So,” Breygon said, “what did you tell him in return?”
The princess didn’t reply. To his vast amusement, her mild flush turned
bright pink, colouring her from bodice to ear-tips.
“Furtive whispers between lifemates,
eh?” Breygon teased. “Maybe I should
take lessons.”
“Maybe you should,” Amorda murmured
softly.
Her tone caught Breygon’s attention,
but Myaszæron didn’t hear anything unusual.
She simply chuckled. “You’ll have
plenty of opportunity tonight. I had the
chamberlains take a pair of cushions over to Salus, so at least you won’t be
kneeling on bare stone. Remember, too,
that while the pervigilium coniugalis
is supposed to be a time of reflection, it is also a time for you to be
together, with no other distractions. A
good time to talk about things you’ve not spoken of before. There’ll be a dozen Guardsmen on duty to make
sure you’re not interrupted.”
“Just how private is it?” Breygon
asked with a wink. He glanced at Amorda
again; she greeted him with a wan smile.
A sudden worm of worry edged its way into his gut.
“Well, you’ll be kneeling before the
Hearthfire in the sacristy, with a half-company of swordsmen about,” Mya
shrugged. “I suppose if you were
adventuresome and quiet enough, it wouldn’t be a problem. That would defeat the purpose of the vigil,
though.”
“Oh?”
She nodded. “For prospective lifemates, it’s supposed to
be a test of their restraint. And of
their ability to focus their contemplation on larger things.”
Breygon smiled. “And you and Kaltas managed it?”
“Yes,” she chuckled. “But only barely. My heart was hammering all night for the coniunctio. Had Kaltas so much as winked at me, I’d’ve
been on him in a heart-beat, and we’d’ve failed the Forest Mother’s test on the
spot!”
The ranger laughed aloud. Turning to Amorda, he murmured, “Take that as
a lesson, my love. I’ll do my utmost to
keep my hands to myself, if you’ll do the same.”
“I promise nothing,” Amorda replied
with a feeble grin. “Sponsus, the night wears on. We need to prepare, and then make our way to
the Palace before midnight.”
He nodded worriedly. “You look a little tired. Should I call for a coach or a palanquin?”
The elf-woman smiled again. “We go a-horse, my heart, as those who wear
the clavus must. I may go bare-handed – and I will, for as you
say, I am tired, and your good right arm is armament enough for me – but I’m
afraid it’s sparum et peltam for you,
Sir Knight.”
Breygon frowned. “I have the glaive the Queen gave me, so I’m
all right there. But I’ve no
buckler. Never had much use for one.”
“Borrow a friend’s,” the elf-woman
shrugged. “I’m sure Karrick would lend
you his scutum for the night. If not, I’ve a number of presentable shields
somewhere about the house.”
She made as if to stand. The ranger shot to his feet, took her hand,
and helped her. She nodded her
thanks. “Half a stick, sponsus, and we’ll hie us up the hill
together. I’ll leave you to farewell our
guests until the morrow, if you don’t mind.
Placet, dominus?”
“Domina,
placet,” he replied with a graceful bow.
“Anon.” He remained standing,
watching after her while she made her way towards their suite.
After she had turned the corner, he
sat again. “Something’s wrong,” he
muttered.
“She’s exhausted,” the princess
said, concerned. “Yesterday came as
rather a shock, you know.”
“It shouldn’t’ve done,” the ranger
replied moodily. “These damned rings
were her idea, not mine. She’s seen us –
me – in action before. She ought to have bloody well known the risk
she was running.”
Mya grinned sourly. “You’re new at this, aren’t you?”
“At what?”
“Romance, you idiot.”
Breygon turned a jaundiced eye on
his aunt. “Excuse me?”
His discomfiture was obvious. Myaszæron laughed. “Have you ever actually been in love before?”
He took a deep breath in preparation
for an angry retort; at the last instant, though, he managed to throttle the
bitter response that built up in his breast.
He let the air whistle slowly out of his lungs.
“Well?” she prodded when he didn’t
speak.
He thought about the camp women of
his youth, and about the many quick and furtive liaisons he’d enjoyed during
his woodsman’s days. He thought about
pleasure-besotted noblewomen, delighting in a taste of forbidden fruit while
their husbands were following a false trail designed to keep them busy, and
distant, for a few hours.
He thought, too, about Ally, with
whom he’d felt some deep connection, but whose small, delicate hand he had
never so much as touched other than in the guise of a deliverer.
A muscle twitched in his cheek. “I don’t know,” he said at last. I really
don’t. It was a galling realization.
“Do you love her?” the princess insisted, nodding towards the corridor where the
elf-woman had disappeared, turning the screw a little further.
“I…I don’t…” I don’t
know. He couldn’t say it aloud. Not again.
But the truth was that he didn’t
know. He had to admit it, if only to
himself.
“That’s the problem,” Mya said
softly. “She doesn’t know either.”
His eyebrows shot up. “She doesn’t
know whether she loves me?”
“Hah! No, of course not! Are you blind?” the princess chortled. “Of course
she loves you. She’s thoroughly smitten
with you, gods alone know why. Any
imbecile can see that!”
The half-elf frowned. He wasn’t at all certain that he could see it.
“No, the problem – nephew,” she went on, grinning, “is that
she can feel your doubt, and it burns her like fire. She knows
her own heart. She is yours, warrior, wholly and
completely! But she doesn’t know whether
you are hers.”
“I’m not entirely certain how this
is my fault,” Breygon grumbled with some asperity. “She’s nigh on ten times my age. Surely she’s been through this before!” He thought of the tale Amorda had told him,
about the servant of the Protector that she had seen at the shrine to Breygon’s
grandmother, and how he had spurned her.
“I know for a fact that she’s
been in love at least twice!”
“Maybe,” Mya allowed. “Maybe.
But not like this. I know it when
I see it, Bræagond.” She smiled. “It’s pleasant to be able to speak that name
again without having to spit afterwards.
But as far as Amorda’s concerned, it’s different with you. I can tell.”
“And how, precisely, can you tell?”
“Because I’m a woman,” the princess
grinned. “One who’s in the same boat myself, incidentally, vis-à-vis your uncle
Kaltas.”
“That’s twaddle,” he snorted.
“ ‘Twaddle’?” she laughed. “Maybe, but I don’t think so. There’s more to it than mere intuition.” She put a hand to her hair, stroking the
blackening roots ruefully. “Whatever I
am now, nephew, I was once as deeply attuned to the rhythms of the green as
you. Syelission and I walked the glades
and forest-paths together in silence, feeling the world all around us, its
lifebeat warming us, like sunlight on skin.
The thunder of the owl’s wing, the fall of leaves, the slightest breath
of wind, the scents of birth and death – we tasted these as though wafted
along, within the strains of a symphony.”
Moved by the wistful longing in her tone, Breygon
forgot his morbid introspection for a moment, and simply watched her. The memory of rapture shone in her eyes, and
he swallowed heavily. She had found a
degree of exaltation in the green that he had only begun to attain, and then
she had lost it. How terrible!
No, he corrected himself almost immediately. It was
worse even than that. She hadn’t lost her link to the green; she
had given it up, willingly. And all for
love.
Could I even
imagine such a sacrifice?
She continued without noticing his frown. “There’s more to your sponsa than meets the eye.
And I don’t mean her false identities, and her penchant for
machinations. They’re not even the tenth
part of what I feel in her.”
“ ‘Machinations’?” Breygon murmured.
She shot him a withering gaze. “Don’t play the dullard with me. I know what she is. I suspected, for many months, that she was a sycophanta – a player, for lack of a
better word – but I never looked into it as deeply as I might have done,
because she never seemed to be working against our House, or against the
Throne. Petty political games never
mattered to me. Hers did furnish some
amusement, of course, especially when she was topping my idiot brother, and
wringing every possible ounce of information from his wine-sodden brain. As far as I’m concerned, she did Grandmother
a favour, keeping him preoccupied and out of trouble.
“And now that I’ve confronted her, and know for whom
she works…”
“I know, too,” Breygon interrupted. “I know she’s not what she seems, but I trust
her nonetheless. You don’t need to
convince me on that score. But I would like to know more about your
feelings, highness. About the other
‘nine parts’ of what you sense.”
“She’s different,” Mya said immediately. “I didn’t notice it before, not even when she
was flirting so outrageously with Kaltas, and I was fantasizing about knifing
her and dumping her body in the Gula at
Joyous Light.”
Breygon barked a laugh. “Why didn’t you?”
“Because she didn’t love him,” the princess
shrugged. “I could see that
immediately. Oh, the attraction was
there, of course; Kaltas is a paragon of manhood, a lord of ancient lineage,
and at the height of his powers. And as
for her, well – no male with a lifebeat could resist those charms.” She grinned self-consciously. “It was a nervous competition, let me tell
you. When it comes to aping the courtly
dilettante, I’m hardly in the same league as your beloved. It was a genuine relief when I realized that
she was only playing a game with him.”
“So why is it different now?” he asked.
“You can’t see it, because you’re in it,” the princess
replied with an amused snort.
“Otherwise, you’d be laughing at yourself. Tomorrow will be fun, certainly, but it’s
really nothing but a show. You two were
mated the moment your eyes met in Kaltas’ ballroom. Everything since that night has been child’s
games and idle formalities.”
“I thought my choices had something to do with it,”
the ranger said stiffly.
“About as much as a boulder chooses to roll downhill,”
Myaszæron laughed. “If you’d fled,
she’d’ve followed.
“Crying of banns,” she snorted derisively, “wedding
gowns, oaths and vows, roses and cups – can you imagine any other scion of the
green indulging in such foolishness? The
courtship of wolves lasts no longer than a nuzzle and a howl, and they’re mated
for life. I don’t know what attachment
you feel to Amorda, but her attachment to you is deep and unbreakable. Something in her spirit has made it so. You’re wolves, the both of you.”
“A nuzzle and a howl,” he repeated, bemused. That was as good a description of their first
night together as any, he supposed.
“With true mates, that’s all it takes.” She punctuated
her point with a dainty sip from her goblet.
“I’m sorry,” Breygon confessed helplessly. “I just don’t see it. Yes, she accepted my proposal more readily
than I’d thought she would; and certainly, she seems to be…most enthusiastic
about our becoming lifemates tomorrow.
But there’re plenty of political reasons for that. Not the least of which,” he added drily, “is
the fact that mating me makes her a princess.”
“She’s already a baroness,” the princess said,
sounding irritated. “Is that why you’re
mating her?”
“No,” Breygon snorted.
“She’s rich,” Mya said stonily. “She’s so rich, in fact, that it makes my
head spin. Is that why you’re mating
her?”
“Of course not,” he said scornfully.
“How about her fief?” she went on. “I’ve seen Arx Incultus. It’s not big, but it’s a wonder. The castle is delightful, and the gardens
exquisite. And its income is staggering. Is that
why you’re mating her?”
“No, and I’m afraid I’m not grasping your point,” the
ranger grated.
“And she’s connected, too. Well connected. An excellent reason to rose-and-cup a
woman. A very ‘third house’ reason, in
fact, to–”
“Enough,” he snapped. “Hesht! I understand.
You’re saying that if those aren’t my
reasons, then maybe they’re not hers
either.”
Mya nodded and tapped her nose with
a finger.
“So, then,” Breygon sighed, “what’s
her real reason? She’s a noble, even if an ersatz one; a
mover-and-shaker, a creature of high society, a lady of wealth and taste who’s
been around many a long year, and seen many a soul go to waste. Dragon-slayer or no, she took up my rose
before she had any idea who I really was; all she had seen, all she knew, was a
base-born, half-blooded, penniless bow-pulling sell-sword, who had somehow
managed to luck into an acquaintance with Kaltas of Eldisle. Why in the name of all the gods would that
sort of woman say ‘yes’ to me?”
“That,” the princess replied with a
wink, “is an excellent question.”
“You’re saying I should ask her?”
“I’m saying you need to think about
it,” Mya said carefully. “And if you ask
her, do so cautiously. Because if my
suspicions are correct, she might not even know herself.”
“What ‘suspicions’?” the ranger
asked, suddenly alarmed.
“About what she really is,” the
princess murmured. “Forget who you are, just for a moment, and
think about what you are,
nephew. And what you are becoming.” She leaned forward and put her palm flat on
his breast. “Close those fetching
violets, my duck, and try to see her with your inner eye. I think she’ll surprise you.”
“That’d be a first,” he muttered
sarcastically.
Myaszæron gave him a gentle
shove. “Promise me you’ll try!”
He held up his hands. “I promise, I promise!”
“Good.” She sat back and refilled her wine glass and
his.
“A question, though,” he said,
watching her. “Why do you care?”
“Because I like her,” the princess
laughed easily. “And because I like you.
You two…you’re made for each other.”
“Benigne
dicis,” Breygon snorted. “That’s
all?”
“No.” She passed him his glass. When he reached for it, she grasped his
outstretched hand, squeezing it until he winced at the pressure. “Because,” she hissed, “I feel this!
This…pulse, this lifebeat of kesatuan,
it throbs between the two of you! A deep
current, like the trembling of the earth, or like distant thunder!
“Some conduit of life has sprung up,
tying you to her, and her to you,” she went on intently, while he goggled at
her in surprise. “My connection to
eternal whisper of the Unity, to the silent splendour of the green…it is all
but gone, now. But this…” she squeezed
his fingers again. “This I can still
feel! It burns so brightly…”
She let his hand fall. “So very, very brightly!” she said. It was almost a whisper. “I suppose I’m envious.”
Still staring at her in shocked
surprise, Breygon said, “I don’t understand.
I…I think I love her. But I just don’t see what you see.”
Mya shook her head. When she raised her eyes to his again, he was
unsurprised to see tears in them. She
put her hand on his chest once more.
“Open your heart, Lewat,” she
sighed, “and look at your love’s light with the eyes of your sielu.
Maybe then you’ll see what she truly is.”
“And maybe, if you do,” she added
with a heart-felt smile, “you’ll see her looking back.”
♦♦♦
