“Ah…” Lily glanced from Cullen to their hostess. “Obviously you and Cullen know each other. He hasn’t bothered to introduce us, so I will. The woman with me is Cynna Weaver, and I’m Lily Yu.”
“I know that, child.” She turned her head to smile at them. The smile fell away, wiped out by pure startlement.
Then she laughed. “Oh. Oh, my. I’m not half as clever as I’d like to think. Well, this will be interesting. You’re Cynna?” She spoke to Cynna as directly as if she could see her.
Cynna agreed to that.
“You’ll stay. Cullen, go run. It’s been too long since you’ve Changed. Go enjoy your four feet instead of your brain for a while.”
Cullen didn’t look happy, but to Lily’s surprise, he obeyed, giving the Rhej a single, stiff nod and leaving.
Nodding at someone who couldn’t see? But then, Lily didn’t understand how anyone could garden without sight. Unless… “Do you see the way Cullen does?” she blurted. “Second sight, or whatever it’s called?”
She snorted. “I’m no sorcerer, and that is not what ‘second sight’ means. Sit down, sit down.” She nodded at the table, already set with cups and saucers and dainty china plates. A larger plate held a dozen or more chocolate chip cookies.
Slowly Lily complied. Cynna sat, too, looking as clueless as Lily felt. The three cups had dried herbs in their bottoms. Cynna picked hers up and sniffed at it. “Are you a precog? You seem to have been expecting us.”
“I wasn’t expecting your She shook her head. ”Lady help me, I sure wasn’t expecting you. I’ve spoken to Isen, of course, about last night, and the Lady said Lily would come. I figured Cullen would be bringing her.“
“You talk to your goddess?” Cynna asked.
“Talk, argue… now and then I even listen. But the Lady is just the Lady. She’s not into the god business anymore.” She turned, teapot in hand, and waddled over to the table.
Lily didn’t want to talk about goddesses, even if they weren’t in the god business anymore. “You’ve created a beautiful garden.” Though she couldn’t see how. How did the woman know what seedlings to yank, which plant was which? How could she enjoy her garden when she couldn’t see it?
The white eyebrows lifted. “Realized it wasn’t wild growth, did you? Not many would.”
“I like gardening, and I’m interested in native plants.”
“Rule mentioned that you enjoy grubbing in the dirt.” She found one cup with her fingers and then poured steaming water over the herbs in it, releasing their pungent scents. Rosemary, Lily thought, among others.
“The cookies are just those refrigerator things, but they’re pretty good. Help yourselves. You probably won’t like the tea, but drink it anyway. It’s good for you.” She located another cup and poured.
She found things by touch, Lily realized. She found people by… “You’re an empath. A physical empath, I’d guess, because you aren’t tuning into the plants’ emotions. It’s their physical state you sense.” The Gift itself wasn’t rare, but was usually considered one of the weak Gifts. The old woman obviously had a triple dose of it— which was probably why she lived apart. “You don’t see me, but you feel me so clearly it’s almost the same.”
“Not the same,” she said. “Better in some ways, not as good in others.” She filled the last cup with water. “That’ll need to steep a few minutes.” She turned and padded back to the stove to deposit the teapot. “You going to tell me what you want?”
“You asked me to come.”
“I know that. I may be eighty, but my memory’s good.” She chuckled as she came back to the table and pulled out a chair. “Damned good.”
Lily looked at her dubiously. “Eighty?”
“Clan females don’t age as slow as the males, but we do weather well.”
“Ah…” Lily darted a glance at Cynna. “Are we going to talk about big, hairy secrets now?”
“That’s why you’re here. I’ll tell you some of my big, hairy secrets, and you’ll tell me yours. You’re wondering why I’m letting Cynna listen in. I’ll explain later.” She bent over the steaming cup, sniffed, and nodded. “Good batch. It’ll taste nasty, but it’ll work. Drink up.”
Cynna looked dubious. “What’s in it?”
“Rosemary, rue, chamomile, a few others. All properly harvested.” She “looked” at Lily. “It’ll be good for Cynna and me, too, but it’s mostly for you. Opens you up to the spell I’ll add to help your body mend. Not that I’m a healer, but I’ve picked up a thing or two over the years. You’ll need to sleep after.”
Spells would work on her now. Lily’s hands fisted in her lap.
The old woman leaned over and patted her arm. “I won’t tell you it’ll get better. It won’t stop being a loss and a grief just because times passes. I went blind more than thirty years ago, and I still miss the sight of dew on the grass. Or a smile.” She formed one of her own. “Lord, but I’d love to see a smile again. But the hurt changes over time, if you let it.”
Lily started to nod and caught herself. “Okay.” She took a breath and let it out. “I’m not here to talk about the loss of my Gift, though.”
“You want to go after Rule.”
She jerked slightly. “You are a precog. Or else Isen—”
“Isen’s trying to keep you from doing that, yes. While hoping to do it himself or send some of his people, if he can come up with a way. He’s a man and a father, not just the Rho. But you’re Rule’s Chosen. Of course you want to go after him.” She picked up her teacup. “Drink your tea, child. I’ve a good deal to tell you, and I won’t start until you’ve emptied the cup.”
Was there something in the tea other than healing herbs? Lily picked it up, sniffed dubiously, and glanced at Cynna… who was holding her hand over her own cup, her face wearing that focused look.
After a second she shrugged, picked up her cup, and took a sip. “Oh, ugh. You weren’t kidding about the taste. Rat turds.”
“Not in this batch.” The old woman downed her own tea in three big swallows, grimaced and then belched gently. “Before you tell me what you want from me, you need to know what a Rhej is. I’m the memory.” She reached for a cookie. “You haven’t drunk your tea.”
If that’s what it took to get her to talk… Lily tried to emulate the old woman. It took her five swallows, and she wasn’t sure she’d keep the last one down. “The clan historian, you mean.”
“I mean what I said. Eat.” She pushed the cookies toward Lily, who took one and bit. “They get rid of the aftertaste.” She finished her own cookie and dusted her hands. “You’re thinking I memorize a bunch of songs and stories so I can pass on our oral history as it was passed on to me. You’re half right. I do pass on what was passed to me, and I know and teach a lot of songs and stories. But I check their accuracy against the original sources.”
“Ah… dead sources?”
She chuckled. “I’m no medium. The Etorri Rhej, now—but that’s another story. A Rhej is always Gifted, though. There has to be a channel, but it doesn’t seem to matter much what the Gift is. Speaking of Gifts… you guessed mine. I know yours was taken from you. What about you?” she said to Cynna abruptly. “You’re Gifted, but I don’t know what it is.”
Cynna blinked. “I’m a Finder.”
The white eyebrows lifted. “Interesting. As I was saying, a Rhej has to be Gifted so there’ll be a channel, a way to receive what’s been passed down. I hold memories going back more than five thousand years. Mostly Nokolai,” she added casually, reaching for another cookie. “But some of the older memories are too important to trust to a single Rhej, so we all hold ‘em.”
“Five thousand years,” Lily said blankly. “Five thousand years?”