"I know it. We must think of some other way to bring peace to the Lost."
This whole exchange of thoughts took mere moments, and it did not in the least make less of the wonder of that recognition. Salera understood. She was aware.
I stood and bowed to Salera, as Shikrar always bowed to a youngling when first it used truespeech. "I welcome thee, Salera, my cousin."
She bowed back, but I could see her shaking with the effort of containing herself. I scrambled to my feet, laughing, for I knew what was coming as though my own muscles were shaking so. She took the others by surprise as she leapt into the sky, sending Fire aloft to hallow the time. I would have joined her if I could.
"Why did you say Varian?" asked Lanen quietly, not even glancing at me. Her eyes never left the little one.
"Fewer sounds to learn all at once," I replied. Salera filled my vision as well. "We all learn thus when we are young."
Will stared for some moments, slack-jawed. "I'll be damned," he said, watching Salera as she danced in the air.
Aral sighed loudly and started walking. "Very likely," she said, shoving him as she passed. "And unless we get moving and get off the high road we are all going to be damned together. Berys is still around, you know."
"A point to Aral," he said, starting off after her.
We all set off towards the lowering sun, into the Sulkith Hills, following the faint path west and up.
Berys finally replied to my message by sending Durstan to bring me to him.
"It's about damned time, Berys, what in the Hells have you been doing?" I growled when I was shown into his rooms.
"A few necessary things," he said, not bothering to rise. He was stretched out on his bed in what looked like a nightshirt.
"Like neglecting me, for example," I snarled. "You were in such a tearing hurry to heal me so I could be of use to you. Do you have the slightest interest in what I have learned from the dragons? Or would you rather laze about like a bored merchant's wife?"
"If you were not so useful, Marik, I would have your throat cut for that," said Berys offhandedly. The worst of it was that, despite his tone of voice, he meant it and I knew it. He would happily kill me if it suited him and I never forgot it.
"But I am useful. I am suddenly the most useful man you know, Berys, and you will soon believe me on that score." I sat beside the table and poured myself a cup of wine. "What have you been so busy doing?"
"Ensuring my victory," he purred. "Maikel pursues Lanen even now. In three days' time—no, just over two days' time, now, when I am recovered from my labours, or as long as it takes him to find her—he will build an altar and conveniently die when the demon emerges to plant the Swiftlines."
"What in the hells are Swiftlines?" I asked. "You never told me about this. I thought you said you couldn't find Lanen!"
"Swiftlines are—well, some call them demonlines. They are instant transportation. I don't even have to know where the other ends are, for there are two, one each way. I can step through, capture her and be back before anyone notices. As for Lanen—remember the report from our healer in Kaibar?" I nodded. "It was accompanied by a sample of her blood which I have made good use of."
I snorted. "Ever find out what that dragon was that the Rikti said was protecting her?"
Berys, for all that he looked exhausted, managed to sneer. "The Rikti was mistaken. She passed through Kaibar and there was no sight nor sound or smell of a dragon. Or perhaps the Rikti was right and it has left her. In either case I do not fear the wrath of the Kantri here in Kolmar. My folk would have heard if one had been seen, and they cannot make themselves invisible!"
I laughed, low, almost to myself. "Well, Berys, I wish you good fortune. That girl finds protectors in the strangest places. Didn't our man in Kaibar say the humpbacked woman was with her again?"
"Yes, Rella seems to have joined her," said Berys casually, "along with two men he didn't have the names of and I don't recognise. It makes no difference. They will not be able to prevent me."
"They may not have to," I said grimly. "That is what I've come to tell you. The Kantri are coming, Berys. Here. Now, as we speak. We've got about—well, what a coincidence. About two days or so."
It was worth the bald statement to see Berys's face. He seldom allows anything as minor as surprise to affect him, but there, this news would change a few of his plans.
XV And the Walls of the World Came Scattering Down
It was the strangest of journeys. We set off from the inn at Wolfenden in the early afternoon, and the rest of the day was bright and warm. We walked together, the seven humans and Salera at Will's side, exchanging stories. I learned how Will and Salera had met, and Lanen and I told them a short version of our own meeting. It made the time pass easily. We camped in the shelter of a small wood that night and woke early in the morning to the most extraordinary day.
Overnight, winter seemed to have given up the battle and early spring had leapt up all around us. The small flowers, the ground roses, that were fighting to bloom in Kaibar were here full-blown. I would have expected the year to regress as we walked higher into the hills but it did not. Will assured me that as we went higher, towards the high field that was the pass through these hills, the shoulder of the sharp pinnacles of rock ahead would be cold enough for my taste. Indeed, I could see snow fingering on some of the peaks, but at least in their lower reaches it seemed that the Sulkith Hills were disposed to be kindly. Lanen showed me as we walked the brilliant red and yellow blooms on their short stalks, and in a warm and quiet dell blessed by sunlight, the fragrant queen's chamber, a many-blossomed purple spike of a flower, scented the air. Strange, is it not, that it should be the flowers that I remember? In the midst of my sorrow for my lost kindred, in the depths of my acceptance and my grief and in the joy of the new and deeper peace Lanen and I had made, it is the strong colours of spring in the mountains that most affected me.
Lanen walked beside me, unusually silent. The feelings between us were not simple nor could they ever be again, but in turning to face the darkness ,we had overcome the worst of it. She knew at last, truly knew in her soul, that she was not to blame for the change the Winds had thrown upon me— and so, at last, did I. And now she was changed as well, of her own free will, to a strange hybrid creature—nearly as strange as I—there was much to take into both of our hearts and consider, of gifts and bereavement, of death and life and the rningling of souls.
I remember the flowers.
I had my wings tucked close in, the surface as small as I could make it. The winds of the eternal Storms that blow between Kolmar and our island were ever potent and threatening. The flying was difficult to say the least.
I had left Idai only a day past. We had found that most of the Kantri were willing to rest for a little time before undertaking the second and more dangerous half of the journey, especially as the rain had stopped and the sun shone, and even that little green rock felt safer than the unknown perils of Kolmar for many of us.
I declared that I would go on ahead to learn what I could of the effects of the Storm winds and to meet with Lanen and Varien, that we might discuss how best to prepare the Gedri for the return of the Kantri. Idai frowned at me and told me that her thoughts would be open to me day and night. It was an extraordinary offer, to be open and listening for days on end. She has always had much of generosity about her, the Lady Idai.