Restoration (41 page)

“Taíne Horet is the less hospitable of the two valleys,” Blaise told us as we rode the steep narrow trail. “But also the more remote and difficult to find. I explored the region for three days before I flew high enough to discover it. They call this ridge ‘the shield wall' and for good reason. You can stand anywhere in Taíne Keddar and swear that there could be nothing behind the cliffs.” A slow grin bathed his tired face. “It would have taken you considerably longer to get here if you weren't with me, even if you could have found the path yourselves.”

“How long have you had people here?” I said, amazed to see the numbers that made their homes in such a place.

“Well, you see, they are not ‘my' people. They settled here long before I came ... very long indeed. That's why I ask permission before I enter or bring guests. And that's why we must dismount and approach respectfully”—Blaise swung his leg over his gray's back and dropped to the path—“except for you, Lord Aleksander. They will expect to see a Derzhi riding. Their customs are as long held as your own.”

Mystified, I dismounted and followed him down the steep trail. As we descended through a jumble of massive red boulders and stunted pines, Blaise and I in the lead, Aleksander behind, we were confronted by three sentries: a brown-bearded Manganar bearing a spear, a Suzaini who carried a curved sword and wore a yellow haffai, and a gangling Thrid youth, who had his bow drawn, an arrow nocked and aimed at my heart.

“Greetings Therio, Vunaz, and ... is this you, L‘Avan? I've not seen you in half a year, lad. I hope you've had good hunting.” The sight of Blaise softened the fierce expressions on the three, but their weapons stayed ready as they peered around the outlaw, trying to get a glimpse of who was behind him. “You must have just come on watch. I was here earlier and told M'Assala I'd be back with two others.” Blaise gestured at me. “This is my good friend and teacher, an Ezzarian who holds his name private as is their custom. We've brought one for whom you have been waiting a very long time. This, my friends, is Lord Aleksander Jenyazar Ivaneschi zha Denischkar, Firstborn of Azhakstan.” Blaise stepped aside and held his hand out toward Aleksander. At their first glimpse of Aleksander, the three wary sentries squared their shoulders, fixed their eyes straight ahead, and raised their weapons, not in threat, but in salute. Aleksander and I exchanged a quick glance of confusion.

“Aveddi
,
”
said the Suzaini, bowing his head as he spoke. “We are honored beyond telling that this day has come as we stand watch. The old ones will rejoice at your coming.”

“Old ones?
Aveddi?”
I whispered to Blaise, watching Aleksander acknowledge the honor done him with a gracious nod and a gesture that clearly invited the sentries to resume their watch.

“You'll see,” said Blaise, satisfaction at the exchange of courtesies illuminating his face. I saw then that part of his tiredness had been apprehension at this encounter ... whatever it was. He started down the path as before, leading his horse ahead of Aleksander. From behind us a powerful voice intoned a chant that pierced the evening air, triumphant, rebounding from the shield wall and the surrounding cliffs,
“Pas maru se fell marischat, Aveddi di Azhakstan.”
I didn't know the language of the Suzaini singer. His echoes still rang across the valley when the Thrid joined in with the same melody, but in his own language ... and then the Manganar, also in a dialect unknown to me. Their song might have been drawn from the very bones of the earth.

“What do they sing?” I whispered to Blaise.

“They say, ‘Comes our defender from out of the desert, the
Aveddi
of Azhakstan.' The Firstborn. It's a chant older than the Empire.” Blaise pointed down into the valley. “Those who live here have no use for the Derzhi Empire, but they've been waiting a very long time for one particular Derzhi. I think their wait is over.”

Old ones ... older than the Empire ... the defender from the desert. Gaspar's stories ... A glimmer of understanding flared, like the first spark struck in the depths of a cave. “You've taken a great risk, I think.”

Blaise wrinkled his long face in wry humor. “Don't say that! I don't know that I would ever have brought him here solely on my own judgment. Your faith is what's persuaded me.”

I slowed my steps to let Aleksander catch up with us, thinking to tell him what the singers had said. “My lord, the words—”

“I know.” He did not look down at me. Rather his gaze roamed the valley as if he might see the future written in the fire and shadow. “Can you find me some salt? In a hurry? If you would ... as in Drafa, but three portions.” He glanced at Blaise. “Three?” Blaise nodded.

I remembered Aleksander's gift to the old women as we left Drafa, following the ancient Derzhi custom for a noble to give salt to those who sustain him. Even with so little understanding of the night's unexpected ceremony, I suspected that his instinct was correct. So I withdrew into the shadows, wrestled myself into the form of a falcon, and flew off in search of salt. By the time I returned, transformed, and found Aleksander again, he was sitting on the grass with a circle of Thrid, deep in a torchlit grove of cedars.

As I slipped from the shadows to sit behind him, the Prince drained a wooden cup and passed it back to an old Thrid. Blaise was sitting between and slightly behind Aleksander and the old man, translating for them. The talk was of little substance ... ceremonial greetings and tracings of lineage ... but as I listened and observed the old man, I realized that he was someone of great importance. I had never seen anyone with so many tattoos. Every mezzit of his dark skin was marked with lines and sworls of ink, even his shaven head. The narrow strip of white cloth wrapped about his loins, his several bracelets and a wide necklace of ivory beads ... hundreds of beads ... covered more of the marks. Thrid fathers wore a tattoo for each of their children, and they hoarded their wealth—their legacy for their children—in ornaments of prized ivory. This man clearly had many children ... or perhaps he was a father to many not born of his body. More than two hundred years had passed since the people of Thrid had fallen under the yoke of the Empire. Was it possible that a Thrid chieftain still lived in exile, here in the heart of the desert?

Wondering, astonished, I almost forgot my errand. But when the old man and Aleksander stood up, I quickly retrieved three small bundles from my pocket—salt cadged from Blaise's quartermaster and tied into small squares of linen torn from his kerchief—and pressed them into the Prince's hand. He snapped his head around and nodded at me. In his bleak face was the first inkling of hope I had seen in half a year.

“Na salé vinkaye viterre,”
he said, opening his hand to the old man. The Thrid took the tiny bundle, smiled, and bowed deeply to Aleksander.
Salt gives life its flavor.

Aleksander mounted his horse and in the company of Blaise and the old man and at least twenty Thrid, he proceeded slowly across the valley toward the sea of tents. I followed, staying out of the way, watching as the Thrid bade him farewell and a group of young Suzaini came to greet him. The three sturdy warriors, wearing striped haffai, long curling mustaches, and beards woven with red, white, and orange beads, escorted the Prince to the large tent with the unfamiliar banner where waited a powerfully built man of middle age. The man himself was unadorned, save for the beads in his elaborately curled beard, but three white-robed women stood beside him, each of them wearing such a weight of silver that I wondered they could stand. His wives. The three impressive young men who had greeted the Prince were most likely this man's sons. From the deference of the rest of the crowd—those who brought us silk cushions, platters of dates and sweet cakes, and steaming pots of fragrant tea prostrated themselves before our host—the implications began to sink in. This, too, was a man of considerable rank. Was it possible? The Suzaini had been one of the earliest conquests of the Empire, more than four hundred years in the past. After a century of rebellion and resistance, the warlike Suzaini nobility—the palatines—had been exterminated ... so everyone thought.

Again Blaise served as translator. Aleksander was welcomed to the man's tent, offered refreshment and smoking pipes filled with aromatic herbs. Two hours and thousands of words later, the Suzaini kissed Aleksander on each cheek, bowed, and presented him with his own knife. Aleksander offered him the bundle of salt and the blessing that completed the gift.

After all this, it was no surprise when the Suzaini dignitaries escorted Aleksander to the village tucked into the western wall of the valley. And I could have conjured the image of the white-haired Manganar who stood with a hooded falcon perched on his gloved wrist, waiting to greet the Aveddi. The old man was straight and broad-shouldered, and his long trousers, full sleeved, knee-length white tunic, and colorful woven belt were exactly those that you could see on old tapestries depicting the Manganar tribesmen who had surrendered to the imperial conquerors. All of the Manganar men and women who stood in the circle of firelight wore this most traditional of garb, and with it the gualar, the woven, many-pocketed wool garment that dropped over their heads, family identification woven into its colors and patterns. But the broad-shouldered man with the white hair, introduced as Yulai, wore a gualar of pure white, the color that was the combination of all colors, telling us that Yulai's family was the combination of all families. The white gualar was the symbol of the kings of Manganar.

I sat on the rocky ground behind Aleksander as he accepted the hospitality of nazrheel and spiced apples and listened solemnly as Yulai recounted the story of his ancestors' flight from the conquering Empire. Yulai's son, a middle-aged man introduced as Terlach, sat on the old man's right, quietly observing, while a weathered, sweet-faced old woman called Magda sat on his left, pouring the tea and freely interjecting her additions and corrections into the history. A crowd of Manganar men and women sat and stood in a circle around the Prince and old Yulai, listening and laughing and making comments of their own. The hour grew late. The heat of the fire left me drowsy, and as I examined Yulai's falcon, now settled on a wooden perch beside the old man's place, I wondered what it would be like to transform into my falcon's shape and try to speak to the bird. Perhaps it could tell me what all this meant.

Just then, a slight disturbance broke out in the ring of listeners to one side of the old man. A small child ran into the firelight and threw himself first into Magda's arms and then onto Yulai. Yulai rubbed his head affectionately and asked who let him stay up so late. “Mam said,” chirped the little boy. “Say ‘good dreams,' Goda.”
Goda ...
grandfather.

“Good dreams, little one,” said Yulai smiling. “Now off with you.”

Yulai set him on his feet and gave him a little shove, but the child was suddenly struck shy by all the people and turned slowly, staring at the ring of smiling folk. Evan. My tongue was poised to beckon him, but in the same moment, he streaked across the grass toward someone across the ring from me. As Elinor gathered him up in her arms, our eyes met, her dark gaze throwing down a challenge I could not interpret. Was Evan's presence an accident, a taunt, a gift? She disappeared into the gathered Manganar, and her posture demanded that I follow her and find out. But I didn't trust myself.

From the moment Catrin had told me about the terrible events in Ezzaria, the sounds and sensations of ordinary life had begun to dull and fade. Ysanne was dead, and to accept that truth would take me no little time. Yet grief had not created this distancing; I had grieved for Ysanne years ago, while we lived together and grew apart. But all through the day just past, my mind had been besieged by visions: of prisons and demons, of the frozen winds of Kir‘Vagonoth, of Gaspar and Fessa bound to the tree, of Sovari hanging on the walls of Tanzire, vultures gnawing his entrails ... and of the Madonai sitting at his game board. The images consumed me, more vivid than the world I walked. And so throughout this magical evening, though immersed in events of historic dimension, I felt no more a part of them than if I were watching Avrel's bees buzzing purposefully about their hive. I didn't belong here anymore. My duty was elsewhere. The only thing that might soften my resolve was my son. I could not allow it. Three young Wardens lay in torment, waiting for me o save them.

I wrenched my eyes back to the fire, and my mind back to the conversation. “... received a guest into our house this day, Aveddi,” said the old man, beaming. “As is our custom, our guests are treated as our own family, honored and protected as our own sons and daughters, fully sharing in our prosperity or our lacks. I understand that this visitor is of special concern to you, so I wish to reassure you as to my goodwill. You need not fret as you embark upon the course you've chosen.”

A puzzled Aleksander nodded politely. “I thank you, Lord Yulai, but—” Whatever the Prince was going to say was lost in that moment, for Lydia appeared just beyond the ring of firelight, leaning on Blaise's arm. She stood behind Magda, among the women and children of Yulai's family. A dark, flowing cloak masked her condition, half hidden as she was in the shifting shadows. Her red curls were piled atop her head, and her pride adorned her as no ornament of gold or silver could have done. But the only color in her face was the rosy reflection of the firelight.

Aleksander stood up slowly. His remarks were addressed to the Manganar, but his words and his eyes were only for Lydia. “Again and beyond all courtesy, I thank you, Lord Yulai. I could ask nothing more ... nothing more ... than your shelter and protection for my wife. My only wish has ever been to see her safe, for I love her as holy Athos loves the earth and honor her as the stars give deference to the moon.” He did not go to the Princess, constrained, perhaps, by lingering pride or perhaps only by the delicate ceremony of the night, the cascading levels of deference and position and honor, but he held out his hand to her. She tipped her head in cool acknowledgment and stayed where she was. Aleksander flushed and withdrew his hand, bowing stiffly before fumbling at his pocket to pull out the last bundle of salt.