"It is time, Lady Amira," said Lendri. "The sun sets, and the song of the people will sing their brothers home." Amira raised her staff, the gift of Hro'nyewachu that the belkagen had named Karakhnir, and she spoke the words of power. Fire roared to life beneath the belkagen's body, flames the same color as the sunset consuming the shell of her friend. She forced herself to watch. The old elf's hair, the hoary gray mixed with glistening silver, lit at once, curling and blackening in bright, tiny blue flames that produced a thick, black smoke. The skin tightened, shriveled, and blackened. Amira could hear it sizzling. Bile rose in her throat, but she would not let herself look away. The old elf had risked his life for her and died protecting her son. She would not look away from his death. The flames quickened and soon she could see no more than a dark form amid the flames. Lendri half-spoke and half-chanted a long string of words in his own tongue.
When he was finished, Gyaidun translated for Amira and Jalan.
Flames of this world, bear our brother's flame to our ancestors.
Kwarun burned bright. His exile is ended, his rest assured.
The five of them stood in silence, watching the smoke in flames, then Lendri spoke again. "Lady, someone must take fire to the omah nin, that the other pyres might be lit." "Me?" said Amira. "Gyaidun and I, we are hrayeket. We cannot." Amira tore her eyes away from the fire and looked to the omah nin, standing several dozen paces away over the body of his younger brother. Leren stood beside him. "After all you did," said Amira, "risking your lives. Still he stands behind his honor"-she made no attempt to keep the bile from the last word-"rather than beside his firstborn." "Your ways are not our ways, Lady." "Indeed," said Amira. "Let the omah nin get his own damned fire." Lendri scowled. Amira looked to Gyaidun and caught the flicker of a smile before the sternness returned to his face. "Lady," said Lendri. "That is… most discourteous." "My ways are not his ways."
"Lady-" "I will take it." Everyone turned to look at who had spoken.
Erun. He still bore the scars of his… ordeal. Amira felt stupid calling such torture an "ordeal." Monstrous, she had named it to Gyaidun. Blasphemous. Even those words seemed to fall short. Yet already the young man showed signs of recovery. Whatever being had come to him-no, Amira corrected herself-through him, much of that strength remained. Yes, his cheeks were still sunken like a corpse-far beyond the natural thinness he'd inherited from his mother's people-his bones showed under his skin, and much of his color had not yet returned, but there was a light in his eyes. Not burning, precisely. But smoldering. A glow of promise, perhaps, like the bright sky before sunrise. Looking at him now, standing next to his father, Amira thought it would be a wonder indeed to see what would happen when the sun fully rose in him. Erun stepped forward and pulled one of the larger sheaves out from the bottom of the pyre. Half of it was already well ablaze. He stood, his back straight, and looked to his father. "My grandfather will take fire from me," he said, and Amira heard a deeper meaning in his words. She watched him walk away, strength and confidence in his gait, and in that moment an image struck Amira-Arantar, wise and powerful, walking the steppes. She turned to Gyaidun and saw a dark look on his face. "What is it?" she asked. "What is what?" "You look as if you just saw your own death."
Gyaidun looked her in the eye. "No. It…" "What?" He returned his gaze to his son, walking without fear to the omah nin. "Things happen quicker than I thought they would." "Things?" It hit Amira then that in the past day-the joy at being reunited with Jalan, the grief at finding the belkagen, funeral preparations, not to mention being tired beyond all rational thought-she had forgotten to ask Gyaidun exactly how he had turned up on the shore of the Great Ice Sea knowing what had to be done. Standing over the pyre of her friend, she remembered Gyaidun's argument with the belkagen, asking why he could not seek Hro'nyewachu if she knew something about Erun. "You did it, didn't you?" she said. Even Lendri and Jalan turned to look at Gyaidun.
Durja, resting on Gyaidun's shoulder, squawked as his master looked down on all of them. His gaze raked over each of them, his jaw grinding, then he stared into the fire. "You went to Hro'nyewachu" said Amira. "Didn't you?" Still he said nothing. "Rathla?" said Lendri, awe in his voice. "Is this true?" Durja squawked again and flapped his wings but did not leave his master's shoulder. "I had no choice," said Gyaidun. "You sought the Mother's Heart and lived?" said Lendri. "How…?" "You are not Vil Adanrath," said Amira. "The belkagen said-" "I am athkaraye," said Gyaidun. "Human, yes, but the blood of the Vil Adanrath lives in me through Lendri." He raised his right hand, opened it, and the gash showed plainly across his palm.
"And through Hlessa, and through Erun." "But the belkagen said you couldn't, said you hadn't studied the arcane or the ways of the gods, said-" "The belkagen was one of the wisest I have ever known," said Gyaidun. "And I sometimes ill-treated him, to my shame. But he did not know everything." "What do you mean?" said Lendri. "Hro'nyewachu," said Gyaidun, "she… she is a being of… need." "So said the belkagen. Yes." "A mother's need," said Amira. "That's what he said.
What the belkagen told me. 'Hro'nyewachu has a mother's heart.' He said I had a mother's need, and that our hearts would beat the same song." Gyaidun looked back at his son, who had reached the omah nin and was presenting him with the fire. The Vil Adanrath chieftain stood tall and proud, almost rigid, but he took the fire. "So how did you survive?" Lendri asked Gyaidun. "I introduced her to a father's need."
"At the shore," said Amira, "after you came back, you were covered in blood. Much of it your own." Gyaidun shrugged. His wounds had been tended, but he still bore many new cuts and scrapes. "It was not an easy… conversation. I…" "What?" Gyaidun stared into the fire a long while before answering. "I was blinded by grief, despair, anger.
Kehrareth we would say. I… I think I went there hoping she would kill me. At least grant me a warrior's death. I went with no sacrifice." Lendri gasped. Amira remembered what the belkagen had told her-"Hro'nyewachu is… akai'ye. There is no good word in your tongue. Ancient. Primal. Tame blood will not sate her. She needs the blood of the wild." "The blood of the wild," said Amira. "She took your blood instead. As sacrifice." Gyaidun flinched and looked back to his son, who now stood beside the omah nin, the pyre in front of them burning. "No," said Gyaidun. "Not me." Amira followed his gaze. Erun stood beside his grandfather. The young man was considerably shorter, and emaciated as he was, still his countenance radiated power. He stood beside the omah nin an equal. What was it, Gyaidun had said, what had prompted this entire conversation? "Things happen quicker than I thought they would." "Erun," said Amira. "She wants Erun.
Doesn't she?" Gyaidun said nothing, but the look on his face was all the answer that she needed. "I wouldn't worry," said Amira. "I saw Erun on the island. I think he might give even Hro'nyewachu pause."
Lendri looked to his rathla and said, "What did she say, Brother?" " 'I will require your blood,' " said Gyaidun. "Her words. I… I thought she meant me, and I did not care. But now…" He looked back to his son. The omah nin had lit his pyre, and Erun was carrying the flame to the next one. "Rathla," said Lendri, "do not dread. I do not think Hro'nyewachu would help you find your son only to take him again. 'I will require your blood.' Erun? Perhaps. But consider this.
A belkagen-perhaps one of the greatest to have ever served our people-has left the world. His presence will be missed, and Hro'nyewachu… I do not think she will tolerate such an absence for long. Besides, look at him." They did. All of them, even Mingan and Durja. "Who does he remind you of?" said Lendri. "His gait. His confidence. 'My grandfather will take fire from me.' Such boldness."