Reality, Aryl realized, had changed. The Sarc home no longer existed. Myris was the only Sarc Chosen among the exiles. The title was hers by every right, even if it had no real meaning.
The duty to her younger kin was hers as well. Aryl gestured a gracious apology. I’m sorry to have upset you, she sent. I couldn’t let Enris leave without wishing him joy. He is…he was my friend.
Her aunt’s eyes glistened. I wish he’d come back with you, Aryl. I wish he could have waited.
If wishes were dresel…even now, she knew where Enris was. The how he was remained locked behind his shields. She doubted he’d ever reach for her mind again—certainly not through the M’hir. She would not reach for him. Those on Passage had to focus on their own future, not those left behind.
Left behind, in a world gone quiet and cold.
Annoying Tuana.
Aryl felt her pain fade and resisted, clutching her grief. “Please don’t,” she asked gently. “Let’s get you back to bed before Ael scolds me.”
As always, the mention of her Chosen brightened her aunt’s face. Aryl buried the twinge of envy she couldn’t help.
She had work to do.
Dry leaves muttered to themselves. Dead stems clattered against one another, frozen and hollow. The plants offered more questions than answers, Aryl decided, squatting on her heels to drop below the wind. She’d hoped the small field would give her another vision of the past, something to tell her where Sona’s Om’ray had found water, something to prove this place could become green again. She trailed her fingertips along fresh scars in the dirt. Enris didn’t believe in Sona’s future. Here, then, alone, he’d made his decision to seek another path. Not one they could follow, even if they would. Myris was unfit to travel; Chaun…wasted away. Weth didn’t leave him.
“There you are!” Seru wriggled through the gap the Tuana had forced between the thorns, an effort hindered by her too-long Sona coat. “Myris said you were upset.” Tugging her bright scarf free of an avaricious twig, she plopped herself on the ground beside Aryl. “Are you?”
“I haven’t found water, if that’s what you mean.”
Her cousin’s eyes sparkled within their nest of scarf, hood, and hairnet. “Of course not.” She pushed her right sleeve up to expose her hand, wiggling her fingers suggestively. “Tell me you at least tried.”
“Seru, you know I’m no—” Aryl caught despair and stopped. In another life, they’d tuck themselves into bed and talk until firstlight. Brainless flitters, Costa had called them, not appreciating the importance of such conversations. How to glance just so at handsome unChosen. How to tip a wrist in a manner subtle yet alluring. How not to be caught doing either.
She made herself comfortable on the dirt, cross-legged, hands flat on her knees. “I would have tried, if I could,” Aryl admitted. Her own hood was down. She was, she realized with a vague surprise, no longer as troubled by the cold. “But Enris isn’t ready for Choice.” True, in a sense.
“He’s on Passage.” As if Aryl had missed some vital lesson. “How could he not be ready? That’s why unChosen go.”
Easy to sigh. “He told me about his family. How Mendolars can seem eligible to others before they really are.” Glib and almost true. Aryl tucked away her guilt. There was no harm in shaping words to undo pain.
“I’ve never heard anything like that.”
“His brother?” She waited. Seru had loved every version of his story.
“Kiric?” Her cousin sighed, too. “I’ll never forget him. Such a waste. He arrived too late, you know.” As if Aryl, equally fascinated by the sad-eyed stranger and far more willingly inventive, hadn’t been the source of most rumors. “There were no Yena Choosers left for him. He died of loneliness. I can understand that…”
“What if that wasn’t true?” Though they were alone in the field between buildings, she leaned closer. Seru did the same until their noses almost touched, her green eyes wide. “What if Kiric was like Enris,” Aryl whispered, “and couldn’t.”
Her cousin drew back with a gasp. “Aryl! What a dreadful—” another, calmer breath “You mean…But if that’s true…? Oh.” She sniffled. “Poor Enris. He must have been so unhappy to be near me, to want me yet be unable…” Another, wetter sniff. “No wonder he had to leave. I mustn’t Call again, not until he’s very far away.”
Seru Parth might not have the Power of others, but she had kindness enough for a Clan. Aryl managed not to smile. “I didn’t let him go without saying good-bye.” She let a tiny portion of loss leak through her shields. “Enris was a good friend to all of us. I told him so. I think he feels better about himself now.” She hoped. The biting anger she felt at his Clan’s betrayal was something she kept very much to herself.
“May he find joy.” Seru laid her hand over Aryl’s. “And may we find it, too, Cousin.” A breathless laugh. “Though it might have trouble finding us here.”
Aryl turned her hand and gripped Seru’s, hard. “I promise, Cousin. You’ll have Choice.” Even if she had to travel to another Clan and drag an unChosen back through the M’hir by his hair. “I promise.”
“No.” Seru drew herself up straight. “You can’t. You’ll be a Chooser soon and then you’ll understand. It’s up to me to Call. It’s up to him to hear me and come. However long it takes.” She pulled something from under her coat and smiled shyly. “I’m going to show him. How long I waited. See?”
It was a loop of braided yellow thread, hung around her neck. The braid was dotted with fine black knots. Seru’s hair. Between the knots were tufts of frayed red thread. “It’s pretty,” Aryl ventured. The frayed thread—likely from an undershirt—looked like small bursts of flame.
“It’s more than that.” Her cousin touched a knot. “I tie one each truenight, before I sleep. With a wish.” Her cheeks went pink. “I’d like someone…you know what I mean.”
Aryl fervently hoped not to, for some time yet. Bemused, she touched one of the tufts. “What are these, then?”
“A fist.” Seru ran her fingers along the loop, her lips moving soundlessly. “Eight fists and a day since I became a Chooser.” Her smile faded. “A fist and two days since we left Yena.”
Seven days. Was that all? It might have been another life, lived by another Aryl, another Seru. Three days at Grona. Three on the road. Their first day at Sona.
Yena had no need to mark days. The only change in their lives came with the annual M’hir, which the Watchers announced. The steady growth of rastis and vine mattered more, the constant decay of bridge or roof, the cycle of biters. But now—in this exposed place, where storms swept away the sun at whim, where nothing grew in winter? They had to hold every day, Aryl realized, or lose track. They had to learn to remember, to warn themselves of the season’s change, to prepare. Her mind felt swollen by the possibilities. “Clever, Seru,” she praised, adding warmth.
“I didn’t think of it,” the other admitted. “Mother…she taught me. It makes it easier to wait. Parth Choosers must be patient, especially if there’s—you and I—we were always together, Aryl. Mother knew I couldn’t avoid you.” Grief beneath the confusing rush of words.
Ferna Parth lived—her body lived. That was all. The rest of what she’d been had been Lost with her Chosen, Till sud Parth, killed by the swarm during the Tikitik assault on Yena. Aryl shielded her own emotion and tried to understand. She’d never doubted her welcome at the Parth home. Ferna and Till treated her like a second daughter. Had. She and Seru weren’t heart-kin; they were dear friends nonetheless. “Why would she want you to do that?”