"Halt. Stand and identify yourself and your business."
Kallista Varyl, Captain Naitan of the Reinine's Own, just
recalled from extended leave, somehow managed to refrain
from swearing. The guard at the Mountain Gate leading into
Arikon was only doing his duty. He couldn't know the
urgency riding her.
She saluted, snapped off her name and command. "I've been
ordered to Arikon by the Reinine herself." She handed over
a copy of her orders.
The guard's eyes widened when he saw the seals and
signatures on the paper, but still he blocked her path.
Harnesses jangled as another in Kallista's party pushed
her way forward and saluted. "Courier Viyelle Torvyll,
Prinsipella of Shaluine." The courier began formally, then
switched to a familiar, friendly tone as she addressed the
guard. "You know me, Daltrey. You were standing duty here
when I rode out to fetch the naitan back. This is Captain
Varyl. These are her iliasti. I can swear to their
identity. I know them all from the last time they were in
the city, at court. The captain has urgent business. Do
you honestly want to delay them?"
Kallista remembered the prinsipella from last year as
well, and not fondly. The young woman had been a useless,
annoying, mischief-making blot on Adaran society, and that
was before the quarrelsome magic had got hold of her.
Still, she seemed to have found something better to do
with herself since then, joining the courier corps.
The prinsipella-courier had brought the Reinine's orders
to Kallista along with a warning of the rebellion stirring
down on the plains. Viyelle had traveled back to the
capital with Kallista's party, fought through rebel
ambushes with them, and at this moment, Kallista was
liking the courier more and more.
"I'm sure you can, Prinsipella." The guard, who had to be
nearing the end of his military service, which would make
him all of twenty-two, blushed under Viyelle's attention,
but he did not budge. "But rules are rules and with this
rebellion on, it's worth my head if I break them. The
captain must be identified by an officer she served under
previously." He signaled to another footguard.
"I'll go for you," Viyelle said. "It's on my way, and I'm
mounted. I'll be faster. My orders were to get the captain
here, but she's not here till she's reported in, is she?"
She turned to Kallista. "I'll leave your horse in the
palace stables so you can find it later."
"Yes, fine, go." Kallista waved a hand and the courier
clattered off at the best speed she could make. Perhaps
she did mean to make amends for last year's calamities, as
she said. Kallista decided to reserve judgment, watch and
see how things unfolded. This guard, however...
Kallista glared at him, thinking hot and angry thoughts.
He cleared his throat, stiffened to even more rigid
attention, and didn't move.
"Don't twist yourself into a knot," Torchay murmured from
beside her, trying to calm her temper when it didn't want
to be calmed.
Sergeant Torchay Omvir had been doing that sort of thing
for the past ten years, first as her assigned military
bodyguard, and for the past year as her ilias — one of her
temple-bound mates. He was an exception to the old saying
that redheads have fiery tempers. Kallista's temper was
many times hotter than his, but her hair was so dark a
brown as to be almost black, while Torchay's hair was a
deep, pure, true dark red that curled wildly when not
confined ruthlessly in a military queue as it was now.
"Look around you," he said. "Have you ever seen this many
people at the Mountain Gate? Something's happened."
She wanted to let her anger rage, but Torchay's murmur
reached her, despite all. She looked.
Here on the north side of the city, where Arikon backed up
into the sharp beginnings of the Shieldback Mountains, the
walls didn't rise so high as those facing the valley to
the east and south. The mountain itself gave protection to
Arikon. Fewer people lived in the mountain valleys than
down in the vast eastern plains, and those who lived in
the mountains beyond the Shield-backs found it easier and
quicker to come through the Heldring Gap to the plains and
thus to Arikon, though the distance might be greater. In
all the times Kallista had been in Adara's capital city,
the Mountain Gate had never seen more than a few dozen
individuals seeking admittance, even on the busiest days.
Today, merchants driving carts laden with household goods
were lined up behind farmers driving livestock before
them, and they stood behind craftsmen bearing the looms or
anvils or hammers and saws of their trade, all waiting for
access to the city. Old people rested by the side of the
road. Children chased each other, playing loud games with
best friends just met while their parents tried to keep
track of them. Kallista had been vaguely aware of the
crowds as this half of their ilian approached the gate,
but she hadn't truly seen them.
Guards searched baggage, and one by one, those wanting
into the city filed up to a table set before an army
colonel with a single row of red ribbons fluttering fore-
and-aft from her shoulders and a male naitan dressed in
North magic blue. He looked weary, as if he'd been working
magic for hours on end.
The next in line came up to the table and laid her hands
flat on the rough wooden top. The naitan covered both her
hands with his, and the colonel began asking her
questions. A few minutes later, the naitan nodded, the
woman gathered up her goods, joined the family waiting
near the gate and together, they entered the city.
"Truthsayer?" Kallista spoke her thought aloud, not
seeking an answer. No wonder the man looked tired, if he
had to verify every person wanting to enter the city. She
shivered with a sudden chill. "You're right, Torchay.
Something has happened. Something bad."
And the rest of their ilian was on the road alone,
traveling to the northern edges of Adara and Torchay's
family, away from the rebellion disturbing the eastern
plain. Her babies — twin daughters — were so small, only
ninety days old. Not even three months yet. How could she
have left them? What kind of mother was she, to be here,
instead of there, with her children?
"Obed should have gone with them." Her voice was bitter,
angry, quiet. "You should have gone with them. How can
they travel safely all the way to Korbin Prinsipality with
only one able-bodied fighter? We sent him alone to guard a
pregnant woman, a blind man, a healer and two tiny babies."
She whirled her horse to ride north and find them, keep
them safe. The two with her — the best fighters in their
ilian — would never leave her.
Torchay threw himself at her reins and missed, landing
hard in the lingering puddles on the rocky road. Kallista
called for speed and her mount did its best, but there
were too many people crowded in the road and she wasn't —
quite — willing to sacrifice someone else's child to save
her own. Obed caught up with her easily, wresting the
reins from her hands.
Kallista fought for the reins, for control of her horse.
Confused and frightened, the animal reared. Obed caught
her around her waist and pulled her onto the saddle in
front of him. Kallista's fear flashed into anger and she
turned it on Obed, her fury rising as he accepted her
blows without expression, without reaction, simply
allowing her to rain them down on him.
"Damn you," she raged. "Don't you care about anything?"
She wanted to mark him, to cut him open and see if he
would bleed. Her beautiful, exotic Southron ilias with his
black hair, brown skin and the tattoos of his devotion to
the One God written on his face and body was beyond
anything in Kallista's experience. She didn't know how to
deal with him. And just now, that infuriated her.
Like the rest of their ilian, he'd been marked by the One
and bound by that godstruck magic into a whole as unlike
other iliani as a military troop was from the rabble of a
mob. But since her daughters' birth, Obed had been pulling
back, withdrawing into himself until he seemed a stone
carving, rather than a man. And she didn't know why.
His behavior worried her, for more reasons than the
personal. It drove cracks through their ilian, because
much as she tried to hide her hurt at Obed's actions, she
couldn't quite, and that made the others angry for her
sake.
Torchay pushed his way into the space around the restive
horses, limping slightly. Kallista refused the rising
guilt, but it seeped inside her anyway. She'd caused that
limp. Obed released her into Torchay's arms and he pulled
her from the saddle, holding her tight when she would have
turned her anger on him. He wouldn't let her strike him.
"You don't want to cause any more of a scene. Not here."
He spoke into her ear, holding her head still with one
long-fingered hand planted on the back of her
skull. "Think, Kallista. If you ride out of here, you're
more likely to lead the danger to them. You're the
godstruck. You're the one the rebels will watch, if
they're watching any of us. You don't know for certain
that there is any danger at all, do you?"
Gradually, his words sank in and made sense. She did not
want to make anything worse than it already was. She
stopped struggling and Torchay loosened his hold. He
didn't let go of her entirely — he knew her too well for
that — but he would know she was listening now.
"You have to trust in the plan." He led her back toward
their place near the gate where his well-trained horse
waited, calmly cropping grass. Obed followed, leading
Kallista's mount.
"They're my daughters too, remember?" Torchay said.
"Blood or no, Lorynda and Rozite are both mine. Don't you
think I want to be there myself, watching over them, as
much as you do? But this was the plan. To draw attention
our way, make anyone interested come after us. And for
that, we need Obed here.
"If we're drawing attention to you, I want our best
fighters protecting you, and that's Obed and me. I won't
risk you, too. We fought through rebels more than once on
our way here, and more than once, it was Obed who made the
difference. Trust the plan. Trust Stone and Fox and
Merinda to keep them safe."
"Fox is blind, and Merinda's a healer, not a fighter."
"You know as well as I do that Fox's blindness doesn't
make any difference in his ability to fight. That extra
sense of knowing he has from your magic gives him eyes in
the back of his head. You've seen it. You know it. And a
healer's exactly what they need right now with Aisse so
close to her time. You brought Merinda into the ilian.
She'll watch over the girls and Aisse like they were her
own."
The durissas rites weren't used much in the cities any
more, but in the countryside, in the mountains and plains,
they were still fairly common. During a crisis a person
could be temporarily made ilias, or two iliani could bind
themselves into one, swearing to guard the others —
especially the children — as their own.
Merinda had come out from the capital, a cheerful,
comfortable tabby cat of a woman, to help with the twins'
births and wait for Aisse's baby, so she had been present
and available when Courier Torvyll had brought word of the
emergency. Merinda had accepted Kallista's offer, taken
the bracelet from Kallista's own arm bound together with
the band from Torchay's ankle, and become part of their
ilian just before they'd left on their separate journeys.
Usually a durissas bond lasted only as long as the crisis,
though sometimes it became permanent, if a child resulted
or the parties agreed. In this instance, Kallista didn't
care much which way it went, as long as Merinda took care
of those who needed her. Kallista couldn't do it, and it
was ripping her apart.
At the gate again, Torchay looped an arm around her neck
for a rough hug. "They'll be all right."
"How do you know?" Kallista couldn't stop the retort, her
fears eating holes in her. "You don't have any idea how
they're faring."
"But you do."
Did she? She should. At the least, she ought to be able to
find out. Kallista took a deep breath, fighting for calm.
Could she do it?
Turning her back on the city, she faced North and opened
herself. There, that was the sound of all the people
dammed up before the gate, talking, laughing, complaining.
She named it and set it aside, letting it fade from her
consciousness. And that was the horses, and those noises
belonged to the other animals — cows, chickens, dogs,
cats. Kallista closed them from her mind as well.
She shut out the sound of the wind whipping the flags atop
the city walls and making the trees whisper to each other.
One at a time, she identified and eliminated the sounds
falling on her physical ears. With everything that was in
her, she listened for more. And she heard nothing.
No hum from the mountains. No whisper from the sun. No
joyous song of magic.
She wanted to scream with frustration. Once, she had
destroyed a demon with the magic she wielded. Today, she
could not destroy a gnat.
Kallista pulled back inside herself and let the physical
world back in. Other female naitani gradually lost their
magic during pregnancy and gradually got it back after the
birth. Kallista's had vanished all at once, and it had yet
to reappear. At least she still had the assurance of the
magical links binding her to her iliasti that the magic
would return.
She wouldn't worry — hadn't worried about the magic's
absence until Courier Torvyll had arrived at their
mountain home, where they had retreated for the birth of
their children, with news of the rebellion spreading from
the plains westward into the mountains, toward Arikon. Now
Kallista wanted it back. The sooner her magic returned,
the sooner she could help quash the rebellion and go back
home.
Needing the reassurance, Kallista reached for the place
deep inside her where her magic slept, where the links
with her iliasti abided, and touched them with incorporeal
fingers. There was Torchay and there, Obed. And —
stormwaves of panic rolled through her.
She caught Torchay's arm to keep from falling. "They're
gone." "What?" He put an arm around her, held her
up. "Who's gone?"