A Magic Of Nightfall Part 29

"I see you in there," she said. "Come on out."

She expected the person to run, to flee the other way toward the lane behind the house. But the form stirred, rising slowly, and she saw in the shifting, uncertain light from the brightening sky that it was a child. He shuffled out slowly, keeping his back to the wall of the structure, his wide eyes glancing at her then darting away again. His face was smeared with mud and his hair wildly tangled.

"What's the matter? Are you scared of me?"

"You're the crazy lady," the boy answered, and the voices in her head hooted with delight, Fynn's loud amongst them. You see? They already know. Soon . . .

"What were you doing in there?" she asked.

The boy shrugged. "Waiting."

"Waiting for what?"

Another shrug. "Nothing."

"Only an idiot waits for nothing, boy. Are you hiding?" She raised a finger, stopping him in mid-shrug. "Don't lie to me, boy. I'm the crazy lady, remember? I can hear what you're thinking?" She tapped her forehead with the upraised finger. The voices hooted again. Liar! Charlatan! "So you'd better tell me the truth: who are you hiding from?"

He looked at her suspiciously, c.o.c.king his head as if he'd heard the voices himself. "The soldiers," he said. "The ones in blue and gold."

"The Garde Kralji?" She spat on the ground between them. "I know them. Oh, I know them well. But why are you hiding from them? They're not looking for you, boy, not unless you're Numetodo." His face twisted strangely at that, and she looked at him sidewise, rubbing at her stomach. There were strange flutterings there, and she wondered whether she was going to be sick again, or if she was feeling the child for the first time. "Are you Numetodo?" she asked. "Is that why?"

"No," he said quickly, but she had seen too many lies and deceptions in her life already, and she knew he was saying less than he could. She looked at him more closely, at the filthy clothing and matted hair. She could see the bones of his cheeks.

"When's the last time you ate?"

Another shrug.

"Do you live near here?"

He grimaced. "I . . . I used to. Just over there." He pointed down the lane. "But . . . I don't know . . ." He stopped, and she saw his lip quivering. He sniffed and drew his sleeve quickly over his eyes, pressing his lips tightly together. The defiance, the refusal to let her see just how scared and frightened he was made her decision for her. She smiled at him, crouching down in front of him. It should have been an easy movement for her, but the thickening waist made her feel as if her own body were someone else's.

"You have a name?" she asked the boy.

"Nico," he told her. "My name is Nico."

"Then why don't you come with me, Nico? I have some croissants, and a bit of b.u.t.ter, and I can probably find a slice of meat or two. Does that sound good?" She held out her hand to him. Hesitantly, he took it, and she stood up. The voices were laughing at her, mocking her. The White Stone has gone soft as mud . . .

Ignoring them, she walked with Nico to her rooms.

CONNECTIONS.

Niente.

Karl Vliomani.

Allesandra ca'Vorl.

Niente.

Allesandra ca'Vorl

Jan ca'Vorl

Nico Morel

Audric ca'Dakwi

Varina ci'Pallo

Eneas cu'Kinnear

The White Stone.

Niente.

HE HAD NEVER BEEN AT SEA before, and he wasn't certain that he was entirely enjoying the experience.

Niente stood at the aftcastle bow of the captured Holdings galleon, once the Marguerite and now renamed Yaoyotl-which was "War" in his own language. Yaoyotl sailed in the middle of the Tehuantin fleet; from his perch, Niente could look out over long azure swells decorated with the white sails of well over a hundred ships. Behind them, lost over the horizon days ago, was the eastern coast of his land and the foul smoke of burned and razed Munereo, now the gravepit for the Holdings' Garde Civile, except for those few who had retreated to the Easterners' last small fingerhold on the continent, the city of Tobarro. The army of the Tehuantin had taken Munereo, taken back all the land south and west of its walls, and had taken the ships of the Holdings fleet in the harbor, at least those that had escaped the spell-fire from the Tehuantin fleet, or that had not been scuttled by their own crews and sent to the bottom when it was obvious the day was lost. Most of the ships accompanying the Yaoyotl were the seacraft called acalli: the two-masted, lateen-sailed ships with which the Tehuantin plied the Western Sea between the great cities the Eastern invaders had never seen. The acalli could not carry the number of crew or soldiers that the square-sailed Nessantican galleons could muster, nor were they as fast, but they were far more maneuverable, especially in shallow coastal waters or when the wind was against them.

The winds of the Strettosei however, blew steadily west to east at this lat.i.tude, and the wind of their pa.s.sage sighed past the taut lines holding the sails as the prows of the ships carved long lines of white water through the swells, dipping and rising and falling yet again, relentless and eternal.

A motion that still, after several days, made Niente's stomach lurch and burn. His limbs, twisted and ravaged by the efforts of the spell he'd placed in the Easterner Eneas, ached as he tried to remain steady against the ship's lurching. Two of the lesser nahualli stood on the aftcastle with him, watching as Niente used his bowl to perform the scrying spell; he dared not show them the weakness of his stomach or his body, or word would go to the other nahualli and eventually come to the ear of Tecuhtli Zolin, who was also on the Yaoyotl. The fate of every Nahual awaited him, the fate that may have even come to Mahri and perhaps to Talis as well: as a nahualli, every use of the X'in Ka took its toll, and the greater the spell, the larger the payment the G.o.ds demanded.

Eventually, the payment would be death.

The rolling of the ship shivered the water in his scrying bowl, rendering murky the visions of the future: that bothered Niente more than the nausea. Niente peered into the water, sloshing to the rim of the bra.s.s bowl. His eyes didn't want to focus; the left eye, clouded ever since his enchantment of Eneas, had become worse since the a.s.sault on Munereo. He blinked, but the scenes in the bowl refused to become clear. He grunted, scowling, and tossed the water in disgust over the rear rail of the ship. The other nahualli raised eyebrows but said nothing. "I need to speak with the Tecuhtli," Niente said. "Take the bowl back to my room and cleanse it."

They bent their heads obediently as Niente, shuffling, pushed past them.

Niente had argued with Tecuhtli Zolin that this strategy was foolish, though he'd not dared to use that word. He wanted desperately to go home, back beyond the Knife-Edge Mountains to the great cities by the lake. Home to Xaria, his wife; home to his children. Home to familiarity.

He hadn't been alone. The High Warrior Citlali had taken the same position, as had several of the lesser warriors. "Why should we sail to the Easterners' land? Let us take the last city they hold here and push their bodies into the great water. Then let us return to our homes and our families, and if the Easterners return to trouble our cousins again, we'll push them back once more."

But Zolin was adamant. "Sakal demands more of us," he'd declared. "It is time to show these Easterners that we can hurt them as they hurt us. If one is attacked by a wolf, driving it off leaves the wolf to attack again, perhaps when it is stronger or you are weaker. Killing the wolf is the only way to be truly safe."

"This is not a wolf," Niente had persisted. "This is a many-headed beast, only one small face of which we've seen, and we are going to its lair. It may be that it will devour us completely."

Zolin had grunted at that. "Running from the wolf because you're afraid is the worst strategy of all. It only gives the wolf your unprotected back."

In the end, Zolin had won over the High Warriors, and Niente had no choice but to tell the nahualli that their task was not yet done. He'd almost been surprised that none of the nahualli had risen up to challenge him for Nahual as a result.

The quarters of the former captain were below in the ship's aftcastle, and that was where Tecuhtli Zolin had taken up residence. The Easterner furniture had been tossed overboard, to be replaced by the more familiar geometric lines and patterns of their own styles. The room was ablaze with reds and browns, the colors of blood and earth. The smell of incense wrinkled Niente's nose as he entered, the techutli's servants prostrating themselves on the rugs tossed over the wooden planks.

Tecuhtli Zolin reclined in a chair carved from a single block of green rock, cushioned by pillows and blankets. His face and torso, like those of all soldiers, was tattooed with swirls of dashes and curling lines: a record of their prowess in battle and their rank. His head was shaved as always and now adorned with the sprawling red tattoo of the eagle. The High Warriors Citlali and Mazatl had been speaking to him in low tones, but broke off their conversation as Niente entered. Their marked, grim faces turned to him.

"Ah, Nahual Niente," Tecuhtli Zolin said, gesturing. Niente strode across the room to the throne and dropped to his knees. "Get up, get up. Tell me, what do the G.o.ds say?"

Niente shook his head as he rose to his feet. He could feel the appraising stares of the High Warriors on him. "I'm sorry, Tecuhtli, but the motion of the ship . . . it disturbs the waters. I saw a battle and a city afire at the edge of a sea, and your banner flying above it, but the rest-I saw nothing of the Easterner I sent back to this Kraljiki. I saw nothing of their great city."

"Ah, but the banner and a city afire . . . that can only speak of victory. As to your Easterner-" Zolin exhaled a scoff and then spat on the floor, "-that was old Necalli's strategy, and not even the great Mahri had been able to make it work."

Niente flushed at the mention, irritated at Zolin's dismissal of Mahri, whose gifts with the X'in Ka were legendary. Mahri had evidently failed, yes, but it must have been because some force with the Easterners had been even stronger. Niente bowed his head more to hide his face than in submission. "It must be as you say, Tecuhtli."

Zolin laughed at that. "Come now, Niente. Don't be so modest. Why, you are a far-seer and a nahualli the like of which we haven't seen since Mahri. Better, since Mahri failed to stop the Easterners from invading our lands and those of our cousins. Necalli was a fool who wasted valuable resources. He wasted you as well-all the effort you put into that Easterner. But now . . ." A broad smile spread over Zolin's face. "I have thrown the Easterners back to one unimportant town on our cousins' land-with the help of your advice and your skill-and now we go to plunder the Easterners as they once plundered our cousins of the Eastern Sea." He waved a hand. "I will chop the head from this Eastern serpent myself, and I will make certain that it never grows a new one." His hand sliced downward. Zolin grinned, but the two High Warriors' faces were stoic and unmoving.

Niente wondered which one of them might one day challenge Zolin if this expedition failed, as Niente feared it would.

Niente shared the dour att.i.tude of Citlali and Mazatl. Zolin was no different than many of those outside the nahualli. They all thought his gift was a simple thing: peer into the water and let the moon-G.o.ddess Axat send the future spinning past your eyes. They didn't understand that Axat's visions were confusing and sometimes dim, that what swam in the sacred water were only possibilities, and that those possibilities could be altered and shifted and even averted by other's abilities. Mahri-whose skills, it was said, had surpa.s.sed any nahualli's-had discovered how fickle Axat could be: Mahri's death had been one of the first visions Niente had ever seen in a scrying bowl; it had been that vision that had demonstrated to Niente's mentors how fully Axat and Sakal had blessed him. Talis, who Tecuhtli Necalli had sent to Nessantico, had since confirmed Niente's vision: Mahri had failed and been killed.

Those without the gift thought that it must be wonderful to wield the power of Axat and Sakal, of moon and sun. They didn't see how using the gift stole strength and vitality; how it disfigured and twisted those who used it. Already Niente could look into the bronze mirror in his room and see the deep lines in his face, lines that no one of his age should yet bear. He could see how his mouth sagged, how his left eye wept constantly and was now whitened with a spell-cloud, how his hair was thinning and marbled with silver strands. He could feel the constant ache in his joints that would one day turn into obsidian knives of agony. Niente had never met Mahri, but he had glimpsed the man's face in the scrying bowl, and it terrified him that one day he, too, would see people turning away rather than look on him, and he would hear the cries of frightened children as he pa.s.sed.

And he knew that Tecuhtli Zolin might be pleased now with him, but that the Tecuhtli's pleasure was fragile, and could vanish as quickly as mist in sunlight. A battle lost . . . That was all it would take, and Tecuhtli Zolin would be looking for a new Nahual to be at his side.

"I pray to Axat that you will slay the Eastern serpent," he told Zolin. "But I-"

He stopped, hearing a call from the deck. "Land . . ." someone was shouting. "The Easterner coast . . ."

Zolin's grin grew wider. "Good," he said to his High Warriors, to Niente. "It's time to see a city burn and watch our banners floating over their land." He rose to his feet, gesturing away the servants who rushed to help. "Come," the Tecuhtli said. "Let's see this land together with our own eyes, before we take it."

Karl Vliomani.

"WELL?" KARL ASKED VARINA as she returned to the room. Varina shrugged off her overcloak and sank down on a chair. "She's Nico's matarh, that's certain," Varina said. "I told her that I'd heard her son had run away, and that when we stayed in Nessantico, I saw a boy on Crescent Street. Her eyes widened at that, and she told me that was where she'd lived until last month. When I described the boy and the house, she started sobbing. It was all I could do to stop her from rushing back to Nessantico tonight."

"And Talis?"

"Talis is the boy's vatarh, and she's in love with him, Karl," Varina said. "That much was also obvious; in fact, I suspect she's with child by him again, the way she hugs her body when she talks about him. Your encounter with him scared him enough that he sent her and Nico away from the city-I think he thought you'd have the Garde Kralji after him. She's been waiting here hoping he'll come for her, hoping that Nico would return as well." Varina leaned her head back and closed her eyes, sighing. "She's not going to betray Talis to get Nico back, Karl. Honestly, I didn't even broach that possibility with her. Frankly, I'm certain she's in her room now packing, getting ready to leave tomorrow for Nessantico, hoping to find Nico there. She's been grieving and frantic ever since he left." She opened her eyes again, looking at him. "It's what I'd do, in her place. I'm sorry-I know what you wanted me to do, but . . . I couldn't go through with it. I couldn't hold her child hostage against her giving us Talis, not when we don't actually know where Nico is. I'm sorry. I know you suspect that Talis may be the one who killed Ana, and you have good reasons for those suspicions, but this . . ."

Another sigh. She spread her hands wide. "I couldn't do it."

There was no apology in her voice or in her gaze. And he found that he couldn't summon any anger toward her-he knew how it would have been with his own sons. He might have been a poor, absent vatarh for them, but had it come to that, he would have done whatever he'd needed to do for them.

At least that's what he told himself. He wondered if it were true. What if Kaitlin had sent for him while he was in Nessantico, while Ana was alive? What if she'd asked him to return, for the sake of his sons? Would he have gone? Or would he have made some excuse, found some compelling reason that he must remain here with Ana.

"Karl?" Varina asked. "Are you angry with me?"

He shook his head. "Don't worry," he told her. "I understand." His fingers prowled stubble. He felt old tonight. His bones were cold, and the fire in the hearth did nothing to warm them. "I'll go back with her," he said finally, when the silence had threatened to go on too long. "Maybe Talis will come for her. Maybe she knows where Talis is hiding."

"If you go back, the Garde Kralji will find you, and the Kraljiki will have you tortured and executed. Your corpse will be swinging in one of the cages of the Pontica Kralji, with crows picking the flesh from your bones."

He shivered, hugging himself with arms that felt tired and weak. "You may be right. But what am I running toward, Varina? Leaving Nessantico-what did I really gain by that? How will I find out who killed Ana somewhere else?" He shook his head. "No, I need to go back. Isn't that the Numetodo method?-to learn, you must examine; to understand, you must experience. You must have facts. Finding Nico's matarh . . ." He shivered again. "It's almost as if Ana's ghost had led me here."

"You don't believe in either ghosts or G.o.ds, Karl. Believe only in what you can see and touch and examine. Isn't that the Numetodo method?"

He smiled faintly at that. "No, I don't believe in ghosts," he told her. "But it's strange how comforting such a thought could be, isn't it? It almost makes you understand the hold faith has on people." He drew a long, slow breath. "Still, I'm going back."

"Then I'll go with you," Varina told him. "Just like you, there's nothing I'm running toward. And you'll need help."

"You don't need to do this. The Kraljiki would do the same to you as he would me . . . or worse. There's no reason for you to go back, after all. . . ." His voice trailed off.

She didn't answer, but he saw the set of her lips and the posture of her body, he saw the way she was nearly glaring at him, and suddenly he knew, and the revelation was painful. "Oh," he said. He wondered how he could have been so blind. He got up from his seat at the bed and went over to where she was sitting. He started to put his hand on her shoulder, but her eyes narrowed and he drew his hand back. "Varina . . ."

Her gaze held him, her brown eyes searching his. "You loved Ana, even though she never quite loved you the same way in return. She was too caught up in what she saw as her own task in life," Varina said quietly. She nodded. Her lips twitched once as if she wanted to smile, then fell back to a frown. "Well, I understand that, Karl. I understand that very well."