The Lesser Kindred (ttolk-2)

To reach All Corners, you had to pass through the main doors.

  What could let in could let out.

  Marik

  Berys left me to my thoughts for only a few moments before he was back, carrying two mugs of hot chelan. "So. The voices are real," I said, surprised at the smell of what he had brought. "Some sleeping draught."

  "Ah, but I want you awake," said Berys, smiling. "Did you recognise the voices you heard?"

  "Hells' sake, Berys," I snarled, "it's not like overhearing a conversation in the next room. These were voices in my head."

  "The phenomenon is called Farspeech. I thought it was mere legend, but here you are just recovered from madness with it in full bloom. I want to know how you have managed it."

  I shuddered. "Tonight before you came, it was—I felt as though I had gone mad again. I heard voices all the time then. Talking, talking, they wouldn't leave me alone no matter how I screamed. You can't know how it was, Berys. I had no peace, they were always there—but it was worse when they left me alone. Then there was only—no, I can't."

  "What precisely happened to you, Marik?" he asked, staring intently at me. "You have not been strong enough to tell me before, but somehow I think it will not be beyond your powers now." When I shook my head and gulped the chelan, he said "Come, Marik. All is past, the damage done is healed now. The best thing you can do to reestablish your strength is to tell someone all about it, with all the details. Leave nothing out. Come, my friend, speak to me."

  I had indeed recovered enough now to be wary of his concern. Berys had never been concerned for another except as that other affected him and his plans, and he was no one's friend and never had been. Still, his offer was tempting. I could feel my mind returning, both it and I were stronger every day, and it would be a relief to speak of it once and have done. Besides, I had been out of my mind for a long time, and Berys has ways of learning things. For all I knew he was testing my trust.

  "Caderan and I fought them, two of the dragons, a silver one and one of dark bronze. The silver one was Akor, the Guardian, the one that had brought Lanen for healing and had stolen her away when I tried to give her to one of the Lords of Hell." I shivered at the memory. "It came through the wall, Berys. The damn things are tremendously strong.

  I'd wager its head was as long as I am tall, and the rest of it in proportion. It wouldn't fit in a house."

  "That was some time before the final battle, Marik. Come, man, face it. Leave nothing out of your account. You and Caderan were fighting the two dragons."

  "Yes. They spat fire at us but Caderan's spells kept us safe, and the beasts could not reach within the cast circle to touch us. I used the Ring of Seven Circles to fight them—the first five had nearly done for the silver one—when another one we never noticed roared down at us from the sky. Caderan killed it, but its body fell full on him and crushed him. I flung the sixth circle at the bronze one and wounded him, but before I could get the last one off Lanen knocked me down. She bore no weapon, so Caderan's spells of protection could not stop her. In my fury I tried to kill her with the last of the Seven Circles, but I had forgot it was proof only against the dragons. I then tried to send forth the last circle to kill the silver one when I heard—they—oh Hells, Berys." I was breathing as though I had run a race, the terror of that moment alive in my mind. "They—I heard screaming, as from a distance, and suddenly it was in my head. I can't recall if I sent off the last circle in the end or not. I think so, but I'm not sure. I couldn't get them out of my head, they cut me off from my body and cast me loose in the darkness. I wandered lost, dismal, only coming back every now and then to a voice or a time."

  A few scattered images returned to me. "I—all I remember after is something about a charm Caderan had cast. He had warned me about it, said over and over how deadly it was, so I'd make sure he survived. I've no idea why we didn't all die—either Caderan was lying or they found the charm and destroyed it somehow."

  I turned away from Berys's face. "I seemed to remember Lanen's voice speaking to me in that darkness, but that's not possible." I shivered. "I imagined all kinds of things in my dreams."

  "After that I knew only Maikel, now and then, speaking words I did not understand, feeding me something that tasted like nothing I'd had ever known, the ripest pear, the sweetest apricot—oh Hells' teeth!" I swore then, for I had only that moment realised. "Damn it! He gave me Ian fruit, didn't he?"

  "If he hadn't you'd have died, you wouldn't eat anything else. Be at peace, Marik, there were still plenty for each of us, and your Steward has sold yours for an obscene amount of silver. I have eaten some and sold some of mine."

  I stared at him. I had never dreamed he would be so wasteful: but then, he never did know the value of things. "If I didn't know better—I swear, Berys, you look younger." I peered at him in the dim light.

  "That does not matter now." He frowned, rubbed his chin, and began to pace the room. "I believe your story, Marik, but on the face of it, it is impossible. What they did to you would only work if you had the gift of Farspeech in the first place"—he frowned at me—"which apparently you do, but how did they know that? Unless..." He started muttering. I heard only phrases—"but why should they—only if..." Suddenly he looked up and stared at me across the room, and his face blossomed into a smile that would terrify strong men.

  "Lords of all the Hells," he said in an awed, delighted voice. "They have sown the seeds of their own destruction. The balance will call for it." He stared at me, his eyes boring into mine from ten feet away. "Marik, had you ever had any idea that you might have Farspeech?"

  "Of course not. I have only ever heard of it in children's tales," I replied. "Would that it had stayed there."

  "Oh, no, Marik my friend, no, no, we have been given a great gift. The power of Farspeech has never been truly understood." His face changed, slowly, and he came to look remarkably like one of the demons I had seen him conjure. "You were forced into this power, but at some level they must have known you possessed it. That means that at least one of them has it, and if you are hearing more than one voice—"

  "It seems like hundreds of whispers, sometimes," I said.

  "Then it is likely they all have it." He laughed suddenly, a plain laugh, full of delight. "Ah, Marik, we have them now!" He grinned and walked slowly towards me. "For if you can hear, if they have forced you to hear, even one of them, then we have them." He leaned over me, his too-brilliant eyes not a handspan from mine, his breathing short and quick. "Can you speak as well?"

  "Back off, Berys," I snarled. "Why in all the Hells do you care?"

  "Do this for me, Marik. For us. Try to speak to them."

  "And how should I do that?"

  "Can you hear any voices now?"

  "Berys, I don't want to—"

  "I don't care what you want! Listen! Can you hear any voices?"

  His voice demanded obedience, though I swore I'd get him back for this. "There is one soft one, a long way away. I can't tell what it's saying at all."

  "Listen closer. Can you make out the words?"

  I closed my eyes. "No, nothing. I can tell someone is speaking, that's all."

  "Try to say something."

  "How?" I demanded.

  "I have no idea. Just try it."

  I tried thinking at the voice, but I felt and heard nothing. "It's useless, Berys. Nothing. Nothing at all."

  "Perhaps you can only hear, then." He moved back with a sigh. "Still, it is a great deal better than nothing."

  "Whatever you say. My head hurts like fury, you bastard. Fix it."

  He laughed, loud and long, as the pain went away and I grew sleepy once again. "Are you content now?" I asked.

  "Content, Marik? Yes, I am content. You are saner than you have been since you left Kolmar, and this gift mat has been forced upon you will be the undoing of every dragon ever spawned. Think of it, Marik, dream of it. The hurt they have done you will prove their death. Sleep with that in mind, and dream of power untold." I was too weary to care.
I lay down and slept like the dead.

  Lanen

  We woke to a sunny morning. The rain had moved off at last, thank the Lady, and it was a little warmer than it had been. If I used my imagination I could almost smell a hint of spring in the air, but that didn't make me feel any better.

  In truth I was really beginning to worry. There were far too many things happening to me that I could not explain. It was not simply the voices, though they were bad enough. For the last week I had had a constant headache, and for the last few days my lower back had been aching as well. I was just over my blood time for this moon, and that had been so light and short as almost not to have happened at all, but all the symptoms had stayed with me, the aches and the bloating. I rose that morning sick to my stomach and sore all over, with a burning desire to find a healer as quickly as possible.

  However dreadful I was feeling, though, Rella was as bad. When we woke mat morning in the cramped way station, she cried out and cursed when she tried to stand. I knew better by then than to offer to help, but I did it anyway and was snarled at for my pains. She hobbled out the door and we all sat talking quietly, pretending that we couldn't hear her gasp of pain as she pulled herself upright. When we heard her stomp off towards the horses we all went out to help, carrying the saddles and tack. We managed to give the poor creatures a bit of a brush before we saddled them, though they were all in a shocking state. Looking around, I realised that the four of us weren't a lot better.

  Rella was first packed and mounted, despite her pain, and we all hurried to join her. To break our fast we ate as we rode, cheese with hard edges and a few last crumbs of travellers cakes—made with oats and wouldn't go stale, but sweet Lady they were dry—and followed Rella's promise of Kaibar. I often had to ride with my eyes closed to keep out the light, for it made my head hurt worse.

  We smelled sweet water long before we saw anything, and heard the rush and tumble of the river through the bare branches as we rounded a last stand of trees. The Kai was before us, and there to the west still some miles away across the plain we saw the tall white buildings and the red rooftops of Kaibar. We were at the gates just after noon. Jamie, Varien and I were all for stopping at the first inn we saw, but Rella dragged us deeper into the city and nearer the river, to an inn called the Three Kings.

  Kaibar is a large city that sits on the banks of the great River Kai, just where the smaller River Arlen joins it from the north. The Arlen is the boundary between Ilsa, where I was born, and the North Kingdom that we had been travelling through for two moons. If you stand on the pier at Kaibar facing west, your feet are in the North Kingdom, before you across the Arlen lies the southern border of Ilsa and across the Kai to your left is the northern boundary of the South Kingdom—hence the three kingdoms and the name of the tavern. I didn't think of the kings very often, for though I knew old King Tershet of Ilsa sent his tax men to the farm and the village once a year, they never demanded anything that couldn't be paid easily by all, and we never heard tidings of the other three. There had been peace between the four Kingdoms for many years, and even though the barons, the great landholders, were always squabbling amongst themselves it didn't make much difference to the rest of us.

  When we finally stopped at the inn, Rella went in and was out again in a very few minutes, looking happier than I had seen her in weeks. "We're to take our horses to the stables while he makes up the beds in our rooms, I've got us the use of the scullery all morning to wash our garb, and I've claimed the first bath, so there!"

  The horses were drooping even as they stood—I knew how they felt—but we all four managed to brush them down decently for a change, feed them a good mash of oats and corn with plenty of warmed water to drink, put their blankets over them and let them lie on clean straw. I managed to hide the fact that I was feeling terrible, and in fact the stretching helped a bit. Jamie's Blaze let out a huge sigh of relief when he finally lay down, and we all laughed for we felt exactly the same way.

  Despite being grubby we ate first, for the afternoon was passing and we'd had nothing since breakfast to sustain us. And such a feast! Or so it seemed to us—imagine the change, from what felt like weeks of little but tough strips of dried salt beef, oat-cakes, hard cheese, and salted porridge for breakfast every day of the world, to fresh brown bread and soft white cheese, hot soup with carrots and barley and a venison pie cooked with strong red wine. There were even spiced roast apples afterwards. We all fell on it like starveling souls, the innkeeper must have thought we hadn't eaten in weeks. It felt that way to me, too, and for once I was hungry enough to do the meal justice. I only hoped that enough of it would stay down to do me some good. The headache had eased a little as well.

  While Rella had her bath I chose out my least filthy tunic to wear as I washed everything else I owned and paid one of the kitchen girls to put my clothes to dry before the kitchen fire and keep an eye on them.

  The inn, miraculously, boasted a little room on the ground floor with a little fireplace, a high window to let in the light, and a real bath. When Rella finally came out and the maidservant brought in clean water I leaned over and scrubbed my hair first, then knotted it on my head and lowered myself into the water. I nearly wept when the heat started soaking through and warming my cold bones. Never mind that I was far too long for the bath itself, that my head was pounding, that I was still swollen—warmth and the prospect of being clean did wonders for my spirits and I lay back as far as I could, revelling in the luxury. I had not realised how stiff my shoulders had been until I felt them relax. I was almost falling asleep when the first pains hit me.

  It felt like little more than a muscle cramp, at first. A twinge below my waist, no more. I ignored it. Then as I sat back in the water and started to relax it cramped again, a little harder and a little longer this time; but it gradually went away and I gently began scrubbing off the grime. I made fairly quick work of it and was leaning over in front of the little fireplace drying myself off, but when I stood up straight from having dried my foot I felt pain like a knife blade in my gut. I cried out, as much in surprise as anything. Then, I felt a strange dampness between my legs that was not water and realised that I was bleeding. Not much, but my blood time was past. It frightened me well and truly, and fear I had to rush out of the bathing room to be sick in the garden. So much for that lovely meal. I managed to get back to my room and get a blood cloth in place before I called for Rella.

  Rella

  I'm glad Lanen called me to help her. Varien was bathing, for which I was grateful. This was not something that either ex-dragons or husbands would be much good at.

  I took one look at her and called to the landlord, who immediately sent one of his lads for the local Healer.

  "Thanks," she said, when I came back in. "I thought I'd need one soon. I don't know what's wrong with me, Rella, but it's getting worse." She told me then, finally, all that had been affecting her. I began counting the moments until the Healer would arrive.

  "You idiot child, why in the name of all that's sensible didn't you say something before?" I asked her, keeping my voice as calm and reasonable as I could. "How long has it been since you kept down a proper meal?"

  She couldn't answer me right away. I think that's when I began to realise that she was very unwell indeed.

  The Healer finally arrived in the late afternoon. It was a woman, middle-aged and sharp-looking, very brisk and blunt in her manner. I was not impressed, and that was before she set to work.

  She called her power to her with the ease of long practice as she took a deep look at Lanen. "Sweet Shia's tears, girl, how long have you been like this?" she asked, as she reached out to send her power into Lanen.

  We should have known, I suppose.

  "Like what?" asked Lanen. "The bleeding only just started, not the half of an hour gone."

  "No, I mean how long have you been so ill with this pregnancy?"

  "What!"

  "My dear, I must warn you now that it is not going to last, but you are
most certainly with child."

  Lanen was pale before, but now she went white. "Shia— what do you mean, it won't last?"

  "I'm sorry. This is your first, isn't it?"

  "My first what?" demanded Lanen, her voice a little blurred. She was so terribly pale.

  "The girl's in shock, woman. Help her," I snarled. The Healer nodded and sent a brighter blue pulse towards Lanen, who relaxed a little. "Your first pregnancy, my dear. I'm sorry, I'm not often called in as a midwife, but I have done enough work in the field to know when the body is intent on rejecting that which it carries. Believe me, it is for the best. If the unborn is too weak or too ill-formed to live, your body is the first to know. It is always best to simply assist the body to cleanse itself. Rest assured, I will make you comfortable while it happens."

  She covered Lanen with a bright blue haze and started moving her hands.

  "What are you doing?" I demanded. Lanen's eyes were watching but unfocussed. The woman was a horror.

  "The body has rejected the unborn, but at this stage it is not difficult to remedy," she said, her voice calm and steady. "I have only to encourage the natural—oh."

  She stared at her hands for a moment, then closed her eyes and began to glow much brighter. She opened her eyes again and sent a thin blue river of power through Lanen, who instantly started screaming.

  I had the Healer flat against the wall and my hand about her throat almost without thinking. It worked, for the flow of her power stopped. "What in the Hells .are you doing!?" I cried.

  "It should have worked," the woman said, removing my hand but otherwise bizarrely unperturbed by my actions. "And it most certainly should not have hurt her. I don't understand."

  "You'd damn well better try. What were you trying to do?" I demanded.

  "What I said, attempting to assist the girl's body to rid itself of the pregnancy, which is obviously causing her great harm," she said. "It would cure the girl and ensure that the next pregnancy would be more likely to be successful." She frowned at Lanen, who was now holding her belly in pain. "Her body doesn't seem to know what it is doing, which is very odd indeed," she said. "It seems to be at war with itself, at the same time trying to protect and trying to be rid of the unborn." She held her hands out towards Lanen again and sent a far softer blue glow her way. The pain faded from La-nen's face but the anger did not.