"You won't get any argument from me," said Rella. "My back is killing me. I've been ignoring it something shocking ever since we started out."
I tended to forget about Rella's crooked back. She had exaggerated it when I first met her, to appear helpless and crippled in the presence of my father Marik, but it was not a disguise she could do off. I hadn't known how it bothered her until we started travelling together. She was made of stern stuff, but the cold and the wet got into her bones and every now and then she'd swear at the ache. Varien had taken to sitting back-to-back with her when we had our meagre meals, for she said the heat was a great relief. Still, that very morning she had not been able to contain the groan when she mounted her horse.
She wasn't the only one. My long back was starting to bother me too, and to add insult to injury I had a growing sense of discomfort below the waist. I had taken to running alongside the horses as often as I could stand it. It wasn't that I was getting fat, really, but I felt the way I did each moon just before my blood time. I was concerned, because I was a week past that time, and still my fingers were swollen, and my belly, and I had to wear a breast band to keep the soreness at bay. My bloods had been much lighter and shorter of late as well. I felt decidedly peculiar below the waist, and I could seldom eat much. Half of what went down came back up again later, but I tried to keep that as secret as I could. I put all down to short rations, too much cold and too much riding. The idea of a night in an inn—or two if I could convince the others—sounded like heaven. A chance to clean my clothing, my hair, my grubby self—blessed Lady, what a delight! And perhaps, I said in my inner thoughts, a good long visit with a Healer.
As we began to relax and to warm ourselves, I asked sleepily, "So, we are near to the South Kingdom at last. I have never been there. What is it like, Jamie?"
"Much like anywhere else," he grumped, but his heart wasn't in it, for he let out a muffled laugh. "Now, mere's a thing. I never thought."
"What?"
"That's where the little dragons live."
"What!" I asked again, more sharply now, and I could feel Varien beside me sit straight up.
"You're right, Jamie. I'd forgotten. Well, you almost never see them, do you?" said Rella. "Shy creatures they are. I have only seen a few in my travels, though that's not so surprising, they don't go where they know there are men." Her voice softened in the darkness. "They are quite beautiful, really."
"The Lesser Kindred, kadreshi," said Varien in true-speech, as excited as exhaustion would allow. "It is well. Perhaps we shall find them a little more easily, you and I."
We slept sitting up in that tiny way station, drier than we had been but still damp around the edges and not really warm enough, and dreamed of the simplest of pleasures. Being warm and dry may not sound like much, but it is the very stuff of heaven if you can't get it. As I drifted off to sleep, trying to ignore the voices that were now muttering constantly just below hearing, I almost smiled. For years I had wanted to see the wide world and move out of the four confining walls that I felt were drawing in around me. I had heard that all things come full circle at the last, Lanen, but surely this is a bit quick even for you, I thought sleepily to myself.
It was only just over the half of a year since I had first set out from my home.
That thought was nearly enough to keep me awake. Nearly.
Varien
I waited until they were all asleep. It did not take long. Indeed, the most difficult part was to remain wakeful myself, for I was weary and the dry blanket was a blessing. Still, it had been far too long. I missed my people.
I drew my soulgem in its circlet from my pack and put it on.
The moment my soulgem touched my skin I felt Shikrar's presence. I knew that feeling: it was as if he called me without words. We did so often, he and I, when troubled or lonely.
"Hadreshikrar, my brother, I hear you. What weighs so weary on your heart? "
"Akhor!" he cried, and I found myself in the centre of a wild storm of emotion that overpowered words. I feared at first that something had happened to Kedra, but I swiftly bespoke him and was answered.
"Lord Akhor! Blessed be the Winds! My father is in need ofyou."
"Kedra, what is it? You sound almost as bad! Shikrar, soulfriend, I beseech you tell me what wrings your heart so. I hear your pain, my heart aches with it, yet Kedra is well. This is—" I stopped, stunned. "Shikrar, how—what hath befallen thee? I know this sadness of thine from of old, from my youth, yet it bleedeth like a new wound. It cannot be—"
To my intense relief, I began to hear at least the slightest hint of recovery in his reply. "Akhor, soulfriend, thy voice is balm to my shattered soul. Alas, Akhorishaan! It was the Kin-Summoning—it has only just come to an end. Akhor—/ could not stop her. Yrais—Yrais—she spoke through me, she spoke to Kedra with her blessings for young Sherok. I heard her voice, her words, felt the touch of her soul—ah, my heart. Akhor, Akhor, it was Yrais."
I bowed, so far away as I was and despite the pain in my head that was growing steadily worse. Shikrar had been mated for so short a time before Yrais was taken from us. Their love had been remarkable among a passionate people, and Shikrar's grief had been deep as the sea and nearly as boundless. "/ have no words, heart's friend, soulfriend. Is there aught to be done?"
"No, Akhor, do not fear for me. I begin to recover. But oh, alas for that wound that will never heal!"
I would have been shocked at his anguish had I not known how deep was Shikrar's love and how long grief had claimed him after her death. I could only call his name, sending my friendship without words to comfort him. It was a blessing that he had the ordeal of the Kin-Summoning behind him, for as soon as the worst of his grieving was past, as soon as he felt my mind-touch and that of his son and felt our love and friendship surround him, he was taken gently and irresistibly by sleep.
"May sleep bring healing," I said softly to Kedra. "Did you learn much from the Kin-Summoning before—"
I could hear the sad smile in Kedra's voice. "Fear it not, Lord Akhor—forgive me! I should say Lord Varien."
I smiled myself. "I answer to both Kedra. Lanen frequently calls me Akhor and does not even realise she is doing it. It was my name for a very long time, after all."
"And my mother, may her soul rest on the Winds, has been dead for a very long time. Do not fear to speak to me of it. I was astounded to hear her voice—she called me by name. Akhor, she remembers!—and pleased beyond measure that she somehow knows delight in Sherok, but I am not devastated like my father. The Kin-Summoning was extraordinary, in fact. Keakhor himself wakened to speak with us. Alas, his words shed no light. This island has never been so violently disturbed, and for all his travelling he never found another place that we might live. He even suggested that Kolmar was our rightful home and we were being called to return!"
"In the midst of all that has happened of late, Kedra, it would not astound me. The Kantri on Kolmar again! It would be a wonder."
"It might also be a disaster, Akhor. Not all of our Kindred are pleased at the thought.' "
"I never thought for a moment they would be." I replied. "Yet remind them for me, Kedra, this is a vast land. We forget, on our little island, how broad the back of Kolmar is. Few as we are, those who do not seek out the company of the Gedri need never endure it."
"Ah, my Lord King, your wisdom is sorely missed, and not only by my father! I will tell them, my Lord Varien. And a thought to pass along to your lady Lanen Maransdatter— did you know that Keakhor took the name Far-Traveller for his own? In the old speech, he was Keakhor Kaelar!"
"I will tell Lanen when she wakes," I said, smiling. "She will be pleased. Forgive me, Kedra, my head aches terribly, it saddens me but I must go. Give my regards to your father when he wakes."
"I will, Akhor. And do not be too sad. You may be seeing us all far sooner than any of us expected!"
I removed the circlet and held my cool hands against my aching head. It helped a little, and the ache passed
swiftly enough, but exhausted as I was I remained wakeful long enough to send a prayer winging to the Winds, that Shikrar might wake and find the armour of time and distance that had been stripped from him intact once more.
Will
Just before it all came to a head I found myself outside Vil's chamber of a winter's day. I heard voices through the door as I approached.
"Vilkas ta-Geryn, put me down!"
"Be quiet, woman. You're in no danger." A pause. "There, back in one piece."
"Not if I get hold of you," came the sharp reply, then the voice softened a little. "You're getting better at that."
I decided that at the very least someone had to tell them they could be heard. I knocked twice, loudly.
The swearing was reasonably muffled and the delay before the door opened not too long.
Vilkas flung open the door. His face was a picture, though he tried hard to keep his thought from showing. If he were a normal lad, he'd have been scowling at the interruption and been halfway through telling whoever had disturbed him just what they could do to themselves before he recognised me. Thankfully his face changed when he saw me. He drew me into the room and shut the door quickly behind me.
"Keep it down, you two. I could hear you in the corridor," I said as I sauntered to the chair before the tiny fireplace.
"I thank you for the warning, Will," said the girl. "Was anyone else out there?"
"No. Everyone else is at their classes, Mistress Aral, as you well know. What excuse have you today?"
"No excuse and none needed. Did we not tell you? Vil asked Magistra Erthik if we could work together, try combining our powers as a special project. She seemed happy enough to let us."
"And yet you are here, and not a patient in sight," I said. "Not lying now, are we?"
"Not in the least and you know it," replied Aral stoutly. "I'm a servant of the Lady, you know, and She doesn't take well to liars. We've already been down to All Comers—you know, where anyone can come who needs healing and isn't afraid of students—and we worked together on two people."
"Any luck?"
"Yes, if I take your meaning aright," replied Vilkas with a brief smile. "One badly crushed leg, caught under a cart wheel, and one with a chest you could hear rattle from the next room. Not often we get such acute cases, but they served our purpose well."
"It was wonderful, Will," added Aral, her dark eyes shining. "Once we got them asleep, we combined our coronas and—it was—oh, sweet Shia, Will, it was amazing." Her voice grew thick with emotion. "That leg especially. I could—we could see the whole structure, and while Vil drew out all the bone fragments and put them back in place I knitted the muscles and the blood vessels back together. Together we cleansed the wound of dirt and infection, and I smoothed the skin. It was as if it had never happened." She laughed, delighted, and the joy in her smote me like a blow. My heart started pounding as she gazed up at me. "When we woke him he couldn't even speak at first. He just kept looking at his leg, and then he stood on it." She laughed. "I think if his clothes hadn't been bloodstained he would have thought it was a dream."
"I was prouder of the chest case," said Vilkas, his voice deep and slow and lazy. It pleased me to see him so relaxed. It didn't happen often. "We do work well together. Aral has a way of calming folk down and getting them to accept the healing that she ought to teach. The woman was nearly blue at the lips with it, and you know how those breathing cases panic."
"So would you if you were fighting for every breath," said Aral indignantly. "I had a bad chest infection once and it was terrifying. Don't dismiss people like that. As if you wouldn't panic if you couldn't breathe."
Vil bowed to her. "Quite right. Your pardon."
"Oh, get on with it," she said, flapping a hand at him.
"There's not much to tell, but it was harder work. The purely physical, the gross injuries are just a question of structure," said Vilkas, sounding briefly like Magister Rikard on a dull day. "It's the cause behind the infection that was such a challenge. She's one of those who gets a rattling chest every time she gets a cold. We didn't just clear up her lungs, we managed—"
"You managed," corrected Aral.
"We managed to find the underlying weakness in her lungs and repair it, though she's still got her cold." He grinned briefly. "She didn't seem to mind. And don't underestimate yourself, Aral. You were already there intuitively by the time I found it."
"So Magistra Erthik was pleased?"
"She will be when we tell her," said Aral, mischievously. "We finished ages ago and came up here to practice—other things."
"Magistra Erthik is always pleased when we find a reason to be elsewhere," said Vilkas. "She is a kind woman but mere is nothing more she can teach us."
"That's enough, Vilkas. There is no need to speak so of Magistra Erthik," I said sternly.
It was hard to object, though. He was right. Magistra Erthik was wise in her way and had a deep understanding of human nature, but she had never had much to teach Vilkas that he could understand. Still, Vilkas was too inclined to judge everyone and everything by his own impossible standards.
It was part of his great gift and part of his difficulty with life. He was the strongest Healer to appear before the Mag-istri in many a long year. Some said he would one day be as strong as Magister Berys himself, but that was because Vilkas had held back when he was tested. There was untapped power the limits of which no one knew inside that long, lanky frame. Aral and I were the only ones who had any idea of it and Vilkas had sworn us to silence. He'd had no need to do so, really, for we knew little beyond the fact of its existence.
"Quite right. My apologies, Will. Can I offer you a cup of chelan? It's bloody cold out there."
I grinned. "Then close the window, idiot. And yes, please, chelan would be a pure gift, I'm frozen."
Because I was the only outsider there, Vilkas sat back in his chair and closed his eyes, frowning with concentration.
The window creaked in on its hinges. Despite myself, I let out a low whistle. "By the Lady, Vil! You're getting good at that."
Aral let out a sharp laugh. "Ha! Good? He's getting insufferable. Just before you came in he lifted me off the ground and held me there for a quarter of an hour." She glowered at him.
"It was nowhere near that long, and you came to no harm. I don't see why you're upset," said Vilkas calmly as he made a pot of chelan for us all in the conventional manner.
"I don't appreciate feeling helpless, idiot," she replied. "Just let me catch you off guard and I'll keep you still as a stone for an hour, then you might get the idea."
"You might be able to, at that. Interesting thought. We should try it."
"Oh be quiet and make the chelan, thou great and powerful wizard."
"Honey for you, Will?" he asked. Their sniping was a good sign, it meant that all was well with them.
Vilkas and Aral—how to begin their story, they who have shaped so many stories since? At that time I had known them both for a little less than two years, ever since they first arrived at the College of Mages in Verfaren, young and fiery and green as grass in spring.
For a start, to look at, they were wildly mismatched. They could not have been more opposite in their appearance or in their approaches to life. Where he was quiet, solitary and withdrawn, she was all light and laughter, sound and movement. She spoke and acted according to her heart, he according to his head.
It was rather the friendship between them that was astonishing.
Aral was an attractive lass. She was on the short side of medium build, with long brown hair that curled and flowed like water when she let it escape from the braids wrapped around her head. Her deep brown eyes sparkled with the life in her, but she kept her generous curves hidden beneath what she called "work clothes" and what the rest of us called men's clothes—trews and a tunic that came below her knees and was belted loosely around her waist. I could understand her reasons, though. On those rare occasions when she wore a fitted dress and let her hair
loose, she drew every man in the place—including me—to her like moths round a candle. Every man except Vilkas.
He was on the tall side but young enough yet that he might stretch even more, and so thin that he always looked even taller than he was. His skin was very pale and his hair black like a raven's wing, with the same blue depths, and his eyes when he unveiled them were a shocking brilliant blue. He wasn't handsome, or that's what the girls tell me, but he was certainly striking enough to look at. Soon after he had arrived he grew a neat beard and the picture was complete. A great Mage in the making. Several of the lasses tried for him, as they were honour-bound to do, but he showed no interest beyond friendship. Most of them found him too uncomfortable for that. Certainly it was the sense of mystery about him that drew Aral.
Not many knew it, but I had heard that of all the students she was nearest to Vilkas in strength and intellect. The Mag-istri had admitted her into the college only months after Vilkas had arrived. She worried them. Magistra Erthik told me once that the Magistri thought the arrival of two such powers would mean either internal strife or some dire threat to the world, and were relieved after two years to see that neither seemed to be the case. Shows how much they knew.
It might be that that was what started their friendship. She never expected any more of him than friendship—well, not at first—and he found in her kindness and a mind equal to his. After a little time, though, they could not be separated. It was never love in the usual sense—not on his part, anyway—though they had a partnership that most would envy. I think it was simply that they found in each other the presence of something they lacked. For her, a sharp mind equal to her own that would challenge her, power even greater than hers that was willing to work with her, a friend to rely on who, despite all the boundaries he put up to keep the world out, was always willing to help, and even let her come close on occasion. For him, it was the contact with a loving heart, one that listened and gave a damn about what he thought and felt and did with his life, a friendly hearth-fire at which to warm himself when the roiling power within threatened to overcome him.