Once called Sorhkafâré, he had taken a cutting from Chârmun before leading others all the way to the eastern continent to found the territories of the an’Cróan. While reading the memories of the paranoid madman, Chap had seen an image of First Glade as it had looked a thousand years ago—and Chârmun within that place.
For some time now Chap had contemplated confronting his kin, the Fay, one more time. He had broken with them when they had once attempted to kill Wynn. Due to an error of the same thaumaturgical ritual that allowed Wynn to hear him, she had unwittingly overheard him speaking to his kin. Their outrage and reaction had been swift upon realizing that an outsider was aware of them. He had been forced to defend her in an ugly battle and, in the end, had broken with them.
He needed answers, and his kin before his birth into this world might be the only ones to supply them.
“Do we have enough coin to lodge all of us?” Wayfarer asked quietly. She had not spoken much since leaving the forest.
“We may not need to pay,” Osha answered. “The innkeeper knows I train with the Shé’ith.”
Hoisting one chest from the wagon, he ushered Wayfarer and Shade toward the stable’s open bay doors. Chane and Ore-Locks carried the other two chests as Chap contemplated Osha’s claim.
It seemed the Lhoin’na and the an’Cróan had some customs in common. Though anmaglâhk did not earn wages for service, they were given food and shelter. Perhaps Shé’ith were viewed here in the same way. After all, they did function as their people’s protectors.
Osha led the way, and after a short walk down immaculately manicured paths off the street, he approached a one-story building constructed of light gray stone, and he set down his chest.
“Please wait here,” he said in Numanese before entering alone. Only moments later, he returned to direct everyone around the inn’s rear.
“We have three rooms,” he said, indicating the closest oak doors in the inn’s rear wall.
Chap looked up at Wayfarer.—I ... will stay ... with you—
Wayfarer might have hesitated and glanced toward Shade, who had already sauntered off to the nearest door. Then she nodded.
The distribution of rooms took no discussion. Chane and Ore-Locks took the third. Osha said he would take the second to himself, but he opened the first door for Wayfarer. Without waiting to see her in, he hauled off his one chest toward his own room.
Wayfarer quickly stepped inside, and Chap followed, as did Shade. This still took him aback, though it should not have, considering how close Shade and Wayfarer appeared to have become. His daughter did not display anything more than acceptance toward him, and he was still afraid of losing even that much of a change.
Something was different. She was different. Still, he had—would—never blame her for any coldness toward him. And it was not the first or thousandth time that he had thought of Lily.
Several years ago, during his time in the an’Cróan lands, he had been accepted as mate by the white majay-hì whom Wynn named Lily. He knew even then that he could not remain with her and would soon leave with Magiere and Leesil and Wynn. But he had also known that at some point, Wynn would be forced to part from them as well.
Chap spent his last night in the an’Cróan forest with Lily, trying to express to her all that must be done. Someone had to be sent to watch over Wynn, for the Fay still feared any mortal knowing of them and perhaps whatever part they had played in all that had happened before or after Magiere’s birth. Chap knew they might eventually make another attempt on Wynn’s life.
He gave Lily every memory he held.
In faltering with memory-speak, he begged her for something terrible.
One of their children would be condemned to banishment, or at least that was how a child would see it. Only someone akin to himself might stand between Wynn and the Fay. Even just any majay-hì was not enough. And once Chap finished his request, his begging, he lay there with Lily the rest of that night in close silence.
He left her before dawn, her eyes still closed, though she could not have been asleep. Moons later, his children had been born without him, including the one chosen—the one Wynn had later named Shade.
Shade had come to love Wynn, the two now as close as sisters. Something like this appeared to have started between Wayfarer and Shade, though the complications among the three concerning Osha could not be easy on any of them. Regardless, Shade still blamed Chap for forcing her away from home, siblings, and a mother in the absence of a father.
Among other sins, this was another for which Chap could never ask forgiveness.
“Only one bed,” Wayfarer said, looking around the tiny room. “Shade, perhaps you could keep Osha company for tonight, so he is not all alone?”
Before Shade could answer, Chap stepped in and spoke to Wayfarer.
—I must ... go out—
She turned to him with wide green eyes. “At night? Why?”
Shade turned and fixed upon him.
Chap wasn’t certain what to think of this and remained focused on Wayfarer. And his answer could not be a lie, not to her.
—It is time ... I speak ... with ... my kin ... at ... Chârmun—
“The Fay?” Wayfarer whispered. Her breaths quickened. “You will talk with them? Why?”
Before he could answer, two clear words rose in his own thoughts.
—Not ... Chârmun—
Chap’s hackles stiffened in a back step at those sudden words in his mind. This had never happened before. No one other than his kin had ever spoken to him this way, and not in ... using ...
Memory-words?
Shade huffed once.
—Chârmun ... is not ... true ... First Glade—
Chap could only stare at his daughter as she stood watching him. How had she done that?
Those six broken-up words had come in Wynn’s voice out of his memories. No creature but another Fay-born with memory-speak—like the majay-hì—could have found such memories, and they would have had to touch him to do so. Most did not understand language—and a specific one—to use memory-words instead of memory-speak.
Shade understood both, like himself, though she was far better with memory-speak.
Chap had always thought memory-words would work only with those who actually used spoken language. Obviously Shade had. And he had never considered anyone with such ability to be able to use it with him.
“Chap, what is wrong?”
Wayfarer’s question startled him as much as Shade’s first two words. For a moment, he did not know how to answer. Did Wayfarer know Shade could do this?
—No ... first try ... with our kind—
Was this as unsettling for others he spoke to this way as it was for him now? And all the more so with his own daughter. He reached out hesitantly to search for words in Shade’s surface thoughts, and there they were, out of her memories.
“Chap, answer me ... please!”
Startled again, he looked up into Wayfarer’s panicked eyes.
—It is ... nothing— ... —but ... where is ... the true ... First Glade?—
Almost instantly, he saw a ring of aspens in Wayfarer’s mind. The girl glanced at Shade and then back to Chap. He answered Wayfarer’s unspoken question about Shade.
—Yes ... she told ... me—
Wayfarer appeared troubled now. Perhaps this was something not meant for outsiders. Then he saw more thoughts surfacing in the girl’s mind.
Vreuvillä passed from the dense forest into a clearing that held that ring of aspens. She headed straight for it, entered, and in standing at its center, she spread her arms.
More memory-words rose in Chap’s mind.