The first leap took her high over the shore, and she watched with amazement and delight as she gained altitude. Boulders dwindled to pebbles and the huge crash of the breakers shrank to a soft-spoken crawl. (Inland, perhaps?) said the mdaha who had spoken, her song calm with her own joy.
(Oh please!)
She wheeled, catching currents of air and fields of force with her wings and her mind, gaining more altitude and speed as she soared south and west over northern Darthen. Below them the sunlit headlands of Síonan and Rûl Tyn lay patched and quilted with small field-squares. There were threads of brown road, and toy houses like a child’s carved playthings. Southward stretched wilder, emptier lands, tree-stippled hills, forests like green shadows on the fields.
She leaned up toward the sky and gained more height, watching the sunlight flash on a river-strung series of little lakes. Upward still she dove, through a furry fog of cloud-cover, and saw the Darst below go pewter-shadowed. More distant lakes and rivers seem to hover unsupported in the haze below. She dipped one wing, stretched the other up and out in a bank. Over her the patterned sky turned as if on a pivot, wheeled like a starry night about her center…
The higher and farther she went, the lovelier it all became. Thick clouds as white as drifting snow rose up before her, blazing in the sunlight. Bounded by these mountains of the sky, drowned far down in the depths of air, the land lay dim and still. Pacing her above the silence, the white Sun rode, swimming soundlessly in an unfathomable eternity of blue.
Still higher she climbed. Above her the sky went royal blue, then violet. Her wings lost the wind entirely and began to stiffen in the great cold above the air. She stopped beating them and fixed them at full soaring extension. Her mind was doing all the work now, manipulating fields and flows, triggering the shutdown of some body functions, the initiation of others which would protect her in the utter cold of the Emptiness.
The sky went black, and the stars came out, the winter stars that summer daylight hid, burning steady as beacons. In the same sky with them hung the ravening Sun, unshielded now by the thick cloak of the world’s air. It was a searing agony on her membranes, but an ecstatic heat within. Quite suddenly the mdaha whose memory this was flipped forward, tumbling end for end—
Had she been breathing, breath would have gone out of her. Below her, she saw an impossibility. The flat world was curved. The black depths of the Mother’s night rested against that curvature, holding it as if in a careful hand. The whole great expanse of the Middle Kingdoms, from Arlen in the west to the Waste in the east, could be seen in a single glance. Beyond them were unknown lands, unsailed seas—the whole of human experience and possibility, held under a fragile crystal skin of air.
Awed, she spread wings and bowed her head to the wonder. Surely this was the way the Dragons had seen the world on the day they came falling out of the airless depths: a jewel, a treasure, life—
(Perhaps you understand now,) Hasai said, his voice hushed with old love, old pain, (why we decided to stand and fight for a home.)
She hung there, unmoving in the silence beyond all silences, and understood.
(Not that we’ve forgotten what we left,) said the other mdaha. (Turn and see—)
Something happened to the Sun hanging behind her back. It felt suddenly strange, but welcome, like the touch of a friend coming up from behind. She turned and found that it had changed, was bigger, hotter, pinker. Close beneath her hung the memory of the ancient Homeworld, red-brown and dry; a harsh place, a birthplace, dear and dead.
A great mournful love for the lost lands where her kind was born rose up in Segnbora at the sight. But the mournfulness turned to something deeper and more piercing as she looked off to one side. Suspended there, seeming to cover half the endless night, was a great swirled pattern of stars. They seemed frozen in midturn—a whirlpool spraying drops and gemlets of rainbow fire, its arcs sinuous and splendid as the curve of a tail, its heart ablaze like the memory of the Day of Dawning, when the World’s Heart beat its first.
Oh, My Maiden, my Queen, they know You too—
She could find no other thought. Thinking was driven out of her by the immensities. After a while she realized she was leaning against Hasai’s face, her cheek resting on the great sapphired one, her left arm holding the Dragon close and her right in his mouth up to the shoulder. And her face was wet. She straightened up, abashed.
Hasai let her arm loose, and Segnbora spent a few moments brushing herself off and trying to find some composure. Hasai watched her gravely, waiting.
“It felt real!”
“And so it was.”
“But that happened a long time ago!”
“Certainly. And it happened again, right then.”
“But it was a memory,” Segnbora said, confused. “If I’d tried to change what was happening, I couldn’t have.”
“Of course you could have changed it,” Hasai said, courteous but confused. “We wondered that you didn’t try.”
Segnbora shook her head again. I’m missing something here:just not thinking well in this language yet. “That was very beautiful…” she said.
“We’re glad you find it so, sdaha. It’s well that you find value in who we were and are, for there’s nowhere else for us to be. Henceforward you will have to deal with us as we are—as we shall with you.”
Segnbora looked up in sudden anger at the immense face above her. “Who are you to dictate terms to me in my own mind?”
“You say ‘your own mind’,” Hasai said, impassive. “You imply ownership, or at least control. Prove your claim. Leave this ‘mind’ and then come back. Or better still, remove us.”
There was a long silence, during which Hasai watched her, and neither of them moved.
“So the realities assert themselves,” said Hasai, “for you, as for us.”
After a few moments Segnbora let out a long breath of resignation. “I supposed they do. Now what?”
“Now,” Hasai said, “we ask pardon for wrongs done in haste.”
He bowed to her, his wings going up again, and his great head sinking low; lower than ever, this time, till it almost touched the floor. Those eyes half as high as her body were now below her own.
“I am—sorry—about the mdeihei.” The words came out of him oddly; it occurred to Segnbora that to a Dragon this was probably like apologizing for breathing. “They were trying to find out what kind of place they were in. That is very important to us. We are large as your kind reckons size, true enough; and well armed, and long-lived. But we have our fears too.” As Hasai spoke, Segnbora became conscious that the rustling in the shadows had stopped, and that many eyes were gazing out of it at her with an alien directness that was as much frightened as frightening.
Hasai caught the sense of her realization, and bent his head toward her, seemingly relieved. “I feel your dislike of others delving in your memories. I will keep the mdeihei out of your past—though you are of course welcome to ours. But I don’t know what can be done about your future—”
“Neither do I!” Segnbora said, with a rueful laugh. “The present is giving me enough problems already.” Suddenly she thought of Lorn, and Lang, and all the others. Had they left her in Chavi as planned? She had to get out and see where she was…
“Since you are us now,” Hasai said, sensing both the joy and danger her liege represented, “you must be more conscientious in safeguarding your body. There is more than just one of you to go rdahaih if you’re careless.”
“And you of course will take care of me for the same reason—”
“We would take care of you anyway, shared mindspace or no,” Hasai said. “Life is the Immanence’s gift, not to be thoughtlessly cast away even when it is alien—or angry.”
Segnbora nodded, feeling ashamed of her initial reaction. I did ask for a change at the Fane, she thought. The request’s certainly been granted! But it’s just like the old stories: if you don’t specify what you want when you wish for something, you may get a surpri
se…
“I have to go,” Segnbora said. “The others will be worrying. ” She turned and headed for the little low door of the cavern.
“Sehe’rae, sdaha,” said the huge viol-voice from behind her: Go well, outdweller.
Segnbora paused. “Sehe’rae—” she said, and tasted the next word. “—mdaha.” Mindmate.
The mdeihei, pacified at last, settled back into the song of the ages, the litany of all their memories, all their lives. Segnbora threw a last glance at Hasai, burning in iron and diamond in the light from the shaft. Then she turned and ducked through the door—
***
—to stare at the dawn from her blanket-roll. The Sun hadn’t yet climbed over the edge of the world, and gray mist lay low over the grassy lea in which the camp was set. Off to one side the horses stood together, stamping and quietly snorting their way toward wakefulness; three or four feet in front of her, the campfire was down to ashes and embers.
“Oh, thank You, Goddess,” she tried to say; but her throat, after some days of disuse, refused to do anything but squawk like the rooks trying their voices all around. She was about to try clearing her throat a bit when the fire before her flared up wildly.
(Took you long enough!) it shouted, annoyed and delighted. (Herewiss!)
From behind her came hurried rustling: blankets being thrown aside, wet grass whispering as someone came quickly through it. Then Herewiss was down on his knees in front of her, staring at her. “Are you sure? The last time it was just a coughing spell—”
Segnbora looked up at Herewiss and very distinctly croaked a rude word in the oldest of the dead Darthene dialects, a word having to do with one of the less sanitary habits of sheep. “Now I’ll cough,” she said, and she did.
During the coughing spell, Freelorn thumped down beside Herewiss. He grabbed Segnbora by the shoulders and shook her. “You had us worried sick! Are you all right? ”
“I will be—when you stop that—!” she gasped. As Lorn helped her sit up, she looked around at the blessedly mundane morning with tremendous appreciation. “Can I have a drink?”
Herewiss got water for her, then sat down with Freelorn, staring at Segnbora while she drank as if at someone returned from the dead. “How long was I out?” she said between sips.
“Six days,” Herewiss said. “We thought we’d have to leave you in—”
“I know. I heard you. I would have done the same thing.” Freelorn and Herewiss glanced at one another in relief.
To the sound of more rustling, Lang dropped to the grass beside them. He stared at Segnbora and said nothing; but her under-hearing woke up as if it had been kicked, bringing her a flood of worry, not nearly as relieved as that of the others.
She took another drink to gather her composure, and then looked at Lang and said quietly, “You told me so….”
He shrugged and looked away.
“Here,” Freelorn said, “you ought to see—” He got up, went off and rummaged around in his bags for a moment, then came back with a small square of polished steel, a mirror.
Segnbora looked at herself. The same old face—prominent nose, pointed chin, deep-set eyes with circles smudged a bit darker than usual. But her hair wasn’t the same. It was coming in shockingly silver-white at the roots. “Oh dear,” she said, and couldn’t find anything else to say.
Lang got up abruptly and went away.
Segnbora handed Freelorn back his mirror and looked at Herewiss. “I had quite a night. Can I sleep a little more? Then I’ll be able to ride.”
Herewiss nodded. “Rest,” he said. “Chavi is still a day away, and we’re not in such a hurry that you can’t recuperate a bit.”
She nodded back, suddenly very weary, and lay down, gratefully wrapping her blankets around her. Some time after she closed her eyes, she realized that neither her liege-lord nor his loved had moved, but were still watching her, wondering.
“‘Berend,” Freelorn said very quietly, “the thing that happened to you at the Fane— What was it?”
“Not ‘it,’” she sighed, without opening her eyes. “‘Them. ’”
This time the darkness was only sleep, and she embraced it .
SIX
If you’ll walk with kings and queens, well; but take care. For the Shadow aims ever at them – and though it often misses, it doesn’t scorn to hit the person standing closest.
Askrythen, 14, xi
It was an odd riding that someone standing on the old diked road to Chavi would have seen approaching through the evening haze. Possibly it was just as well that no one was there to witness it.
Between the tall hawthorn hedges in the fading light came first two men in country clothes, one on a sorrel, one on a bay. Their horses flinched and shied occasionally, for their riders were juggling stones, and dropping them frequently. A third man on a black palfrey was repeatedly plucking a single string on a lute, trying to elicit the same note twice in a row from his tone-deaf companion. Then came a young slim woman in a worn brown surcoat, riding a Steldene steeldust mare. She spoke occasionally to the empty air, like a madwoman, with a hoarse voice, frequently raising a hand to brush back hair going very pale at its part.
Close behind her, bringing up the rear, rode a tall dark man on a blood-bay stallion and a short dark man on a black-maned chestnut. The small man was waving his arms and complaining about something; his tall companion nodded gravely at most of what he said, glancing occasionally over to his left, where a hundredweight boulder was floating, pacing him as he rode.
“Look at them. Look at them! They’ll never manage a juggling act with people watching them! Dusty, I love them, but they can’t juggle air!”
“They’ll do all right. They’re just out of practice. After all, it’s been years since they juggled for a living.”
“Yes, but—”
“Lorn, they’ll do all right! So will you, and so will Moris and Dritt and the rest. Most of the entertainers on the road are only mediocre anyway. And it’s not as if gleemen’s immunity depended on whether we’re good or not. No one’s going to suspect anything. This is the middle of nowhere.”
“I don’t know…”
(Hah!) Sunspark said suddenly from beneath Herewiss. (For one lousy penny I’m supposed to cut off my legs?)
The remark was directed at Segnbora, She tried to put her head under her wing in token of mild exasperation, and was nearly as exasperated to find she couldn’t. “The punch line usually comes at the end of the joke,” Segnbora said.
(Oh. Well, there’s this beggar—)
“That one won’t work now. We know the ending. Try another.”
(All right.) Sunspark’s expression became one of intense concentration, an interesting one for a horse.
Segnbora shook her head, bemused. While she’d been busy with Hasai, Dritt had one day made the mistake of trying to make friends with Sunspark by telling it a joke. Since then it had decided that joking was a vital part of human experience, and had been demanding everyone to teach it the art, on pain of burning them when Herewiss wasn’t looking. As soon as she was in the saddle again, Sunspark had accosted Segnbora. In no mood for joking, she had suggested that it tell her jokes, and thus learn by doing. She’d had no peace since.
(Try this. So there are these two women, they go into an inn and the innkeeper comes to their table, and one of the women says, ‘Bring us the best red wine you have, and be sure the cups are clean!’ So the innkeeper goes off, and comes back with a tray, and says, ‘Two red wines. And which one asked for the clean cup?’)
Herewiss laughed. “Not bad.”
(I made it up,) said Sunspark, all childish pride. It did a quick capriole out of sheer pleasure, and almost unseated Herewiss.
“Hey, watch that, you! Though on second thought, maybe we should increase your part in the act. We could use another jester.”
“Mnh ‘qalasihiw, HhIr—” Segnbora cleared her throat. The Dracon language was beginning to fascinate her, though she couldn’t yet sing even the
simplest of the emotion-intonations that went with the words; and her desire to master the tongue sometimes caused it to get out of her mouth before Darthene did. At least she hoped that was the reason. “I mean, Herewiss, there’s only one problem with that. What happens if an audience doesn’t laugh?”
Sunspark threw a cheerful glance at its rider. (If they don’t laugh, we get rid of them and bring in a new audience.) Theconcept “get rid of them” was attached to plans for the same sudden-death fire that had been the end of the deathjaw.
Freelorn glanced up at the sky, no doubt to invoke the Goddess’s protection on their next audience. Herewiss said nothing, just looked hard at his mount.
Sunspark laid back its ears and showed all its teeth around the bit, then subsided somewhat. (They will come back,) it said, sulkiness showing in the thought, (you told me so!)
“They will. But there’s no reason to hurry people out of this life. Let the Goddess handle the timing.”
“It does learn quickly, though,” Segnbora said. “Another few months and I dare say the audiences will be safe.”
Freelorn and Herewiss exchanged unconvinced, humorous glances, which Sunspark ignored. (She makes me understand the rules,) it said. (And a good thing, too. Otherwise—) Its thought carried an amused undertone of threat, like a bright edge of smoulder threading along the edge of one leaf on a dry tree, thin and potentially dangerous.
Segnbora said nothing. Respond to a threat, and an elemental will get the idea that you’re threatened. A bad idea to give it. But without warning the huge dark form in the cave at the bottom of her thoughts reared halfway up and breathed a withering blast of white fire at the little line of red.
Sunspark blinked and drew away, annoyed. (Not another one! It’s getting so there’s no one left around here to scare.)
Segnbora loosened her collar, feeling hot, and closed her eyes to “look” at Hasai. Through this day and the day before he had been stretched at ease in the seaside cave, looking out of her eyes, silent for the most part. He stayed out of her thoughts except to ask an occasional question. The rest of the time the rumble of his private thought blended with the bass chorus of the mdeihei, a sound Segnbora found she could now start to ignore, like the seashore when one lives nearby.