He’d expected walls, at least. But the stairs led to more doors. Beyond those had been…this. Windows. Tall arched windows just like those that graced Yena’s Council Chamber. After his first astonished stare, Enris did his best to keep his eyes on anything else. The darkness pressing inward wasn’t the sky. It had no right being populated by stars. Stars that moved with disturbing suppleness or would abruptly gather and still, as if watching.
“Anything else” was only slightly less disturbing. If he thought Vyna’s Cloisters strange, what could he call its Council? No one outside Vyna, Enris thought wryly, was going to believe this.
Instead of the eldest of each family—something he supposed was unreasonable if they all considered themselves members of one—he stood before six pregnant Chosen.
Very pregnant. When his mother had been this large with Worin, he and Kiric had teased her about moving out of the house until she gave birth.
All were dressed in the next-to-transparent fabric Fikryya had worn, as if it was important to flaunt their swollen abdomens and breasts.
He couldn’t have told them apart. This went beyond the resemblance of kin to kin. Any one of them, if not pregnant, could have been older Fikryyas.
As well as the Councillors, there were nine Adepts, attended not by Lost, but by nine unChosen males. Vyna’s Adepts were the oldest Om’ray he’d ever seen, frail and confined to chairs. Fortunately, a judgment he kept to himself, they were wrapped in layers of fine white blankets. He couldn’t have told their sex. He couldn’t tell if the two in the middle were still alive, but assumed the rest knew.
All wore brightly colored caps over their hair; all had tassels of fake hair hanging to their shoulders. The colors varied, but not the style. It was as if they wanted to look alike.
He brushed his straying black locks from his forehead self-consciously.
Enris Tuana.
Disconcerting, not being able to tell the source of the words. Though not as disconcerting, Enris thought, as the tone of boredom. He smiled politely at the Council, quite sure his smile would have no impact on the Vyna Adepts. I have come on Passage and hope for your welcome.
Strange, how that part he’d never doubted until now.
Tuana bears the stain of Ground Dwellers.
Another mindvoice. And of the Meddlers. An esan dropped him here.
Meddler—that suited the Tikitik. Ground Dwellers? Had to be Oud. He felt a fierce rush of hope. Had he been right? Was Vyna free of the Agreement, safe from the demands of other races?
Does Vyna not have such neighbors? he sent, allowing a tinge of envy.
We are not lesser Om’ray.
The emphasis stung, as the sender no doubt intended. The third Councillor, he decided. The one closest to the Adepts’ row of chairs. There was something in her posture that matched the overbearing pride of the sending, a hint of greater strength. Or ruthlessness.
Careful of that one, he told himself.
I come in search of Om’ray technology. Enris delicately offered his memory of the device the Oud had given him, just its shape, nothing more, not yet. Is this of Vyna?
One of the Adepts slumped forward. The attendant unChosen immediately placed one hand on his or her shoulder. Enris sensed a flow of Power, a giving of strength from the younger Om’ray. The ancient Adept wheezed and sat up again; the attendant, now gasping, removed his hand.
The rest ignored this lapse, their wizened faces intent on him, lipless mouths working eagerly as if he’d offered them a sweet morsel.
These would “scour” his mind? Shaken, he checked his shields.
Show us. Noncommittal, but he sensed interest.
Which was a problem. The device was still in the Mendolar shop, unless the Oud had reclaimed it. If only he’d taken it…
Wait. Enris pulled the pouch from his neck and opened it. I have this, he sent, holding the clear wafer on the palm of his hand. It was old, strange, and Om’ray. He’d meant to leave it with Aryl; a small curiosity of Sona, a bauble of no possible use to an unChosen on Passage.
Of definite use, if it bought him his life.
The wafer rose from his hand and flew to that of the third Councillor. Enris let out the breath he hadn’t realized he’d held. More than interest.
He wasn’t prepared for her to press the wafer over the swell of her unborn and exclaim—out loud—in rapture, “Take her, Glorious Dead! Take her and be born again!”
The other Councillors took up the chant, the Adepts gumming the words. “Take her! Be born again!”
The clear wafer turned milky white and began to glow, pulsing in time with the chant.
It wasn’t the only light to play over the rapt faces of the Vyna. Enris looked at the windows. The stars-that-weren’t swarmed in greater and greater numbers. They pulsed, too, but faster, as if excited.
He rubbed his hand against his tunic. What had he been carrying?
Take him. No telling who gave the order, but Enris stepped back quickly, ready to defend himself. He didn’t want to hurt anyone, but he’d be willing to throw a few.
You’ll live, Tuana. Too cold to be reassuring. Take him to those already contaminated.
Chapter 13
“THOUGHT TRAVELER SAID THE OUD would come for their machine.”
Haxel raised an eyebrow. “And they needed this?”
“This” being the surprise that greeted them at dawn. An Oud tunnel mouth had opened on the other side of the river, complete with support beams and a ramp leading into the depths. Aryl shrugged. “The machine’s gone.”
Along with the corpse. No Hard Ones in sight, but she didn’t doubt they’d been the first to arrive. As for the tunnel? “Before it died, the Oud told me something was coming here,” she reminded the First Scout. “This could be what it meant. Maybe this is how the Oud establish their presence. A—door. There’s one at Grona.”
“Theirs is tucked under a bridge. Discreet. This is in our way.”
Aryl’s lips quirked. Haxel gave her a sidelong look, then chuckled. “You’re going to tell me to be grateful they didn’t put it through one of our homes.”
“Not in so many words, but yes.”
“Glad you’re the Speaker, Aryl Sarc.”
With that less than comforting statement, the First Scout headed back to the village.
Aryl lingered, trying to see down the tunnel, but the contrast between daylight and the faint glow within was too great to reveal detail. It went down, that was all she knew for sure. She tried the geoscanner. Its red symbol told her what she could see for herself: Oud, here, and active.
A mere five days after Om’ray stumbled on its ruins—ruins they’d caused in the first place—Sona’s Oud were ready, even eager, to resume official relations. Had the creatures been waiting all this time or had they watched them leave Grona? Would any Om’ray have done, or was there something about the exiles they approved?
Disturbing thoughts.
Aryl pulled the small bag from her belt and stared at it. The dying Oud’s “gift.” Probably should open it, she told herself. They might show up at any moment, and ask for it back. Or not. Who could predict what they’d do?
The pendant. The headdress from the ridge. The blade Enris found. Sona itself. Things from the past had an unsettling way of changing the present.
The wonder, she decided, wasn’t that the strangers were interested in what happened long ago, it was that they dared look.
Were they braver than an Om’ray? Aryl pressed her lips together, then untied the bag’s fastener, shaking its contents out on her open palm.
A circle of green metal.