The Mountains Rise (28 page)

Lyralliantha did not return the next day.

Daniel was left wondering if he had offended her in such a way that she might not
forgive him. He still wasn’t entirely sure what he had done wrong. Was she disgusted
at the notion of having sex with a human? Had it been her emotional reaction to the
song?

Her anger had seemed at odds with her reaction to the song, so he guessed that it
had something to do with his potentially sexual advance. He knew already that the
humans kept in Ellentrea and the other camps were the direct result of unions between
humans and the She’Har children, but he didn’t know much about how it was accomplished.

Did they only mate with female humans, to avoid having to bear the children themselves?
Perhaps they didn’t even have direct physical contact—Daniel was thoroughly ignorant
of the customs in that regard. He had never thought to ask Amarah about it once they
had started talking more freely.

Then again, the Illeniel Grove had never kept humans, or produced any via such couplings.
If they had
,
Daniel would have been forced to fight some of them during his years in the arena.
They might have a philosophical objection to sex between the races, one not shared
by the other groves.

Unable to resolve his doubts, Daniel put the question aside.
Lyralliantha had told him that he was free to travel within the Illeniel Grove’s boundaries,
so he decided to test his newfound freedom. Dressing himself
in
his warden’s leathers
,
he descended the trunk until he reached the ground.

He felt strange walking without an escort or some sort of guard. He was constantly
looking over his shoulder, wondering if someone would approach and harass him for
leaving his platform without permission. Of course, he needn’t have turned his head
;
his magesight told him quite plainly that no one was near, or following him. Still,
old habits die hard.

“No, baratt!”

He heard her words again in his mind. He couldn’t recall her ever using the term
baratt when referring to him before. That
realization alone was startling
and even more painful now that she had actually used it to refer to him. Daniel
had begun to think of Lyralliantha as different, more human, than the others of her
kind. He had thought that she was more compassionate, or perhaps even considered
him to be more than just an animal, as the rest of her race did.

Daniel wandered for hours
,
and no one approached him. On the rare occasion that his magesight told him that
he was near someone, they would relocate. None of the Illeniel She’Har had any desire
to consort with a baratt.

Not finding anything to hold his interest, and also being nervous at having left without
express permission, he returned to his platform. Lyralliantha was still not there,
so he waited. She never appeared
,
but Byovar did arrive with food for him.

“Have you spoken with she?” asked Daniel, struggling to pronounce the words properly
in Erollith.

“Her,” said Byovar, correcting his choice of pronouns.
“She told me to continue your lessons.”

“But, where is she?” asked Daniel, switching back to his native language.

The She’Har ignored him.

With a sigh he carefully constructed the sentence in Erollith, “Where at she is?”

Byovar smiled and replied in the same language, “You should say, ‘where is she’.”

Fighting down his irritation
,
Daniel repeated the words, “Where is she?”

Byovar rattled off a response that was too unfamiliar for him to understand. He was
able to pick out the words for ‘lore-warden’ and ‘elders’. “One more time,” he requested,
using one of the first and most common phrases that Byovar had taught him.

The Illeniel male repeated his answer, speaking more slowly. This time Daniel was
able to piece the meaning together a bit better. “She is dressing with the elders
and the lore-wardens,” he said in Barion, to give his teacher a chance to correct
his translation.
That doesn’t make sense.

“The verb ‘ouelvar’ does mean dressing, but in this instance it has a different meaning.
In
this
sentence it means that she is meeting or discussing something with them,” lectured
the She’Har.

“Another idiom?” said Daniel
,
with
undisguised annoyance.

“Do not complain, baratt. Your language has even more of them than mine,” observed
his teacher.

He was right, of course, but Daniel hadn’t even been aware of the concept of idioms
until he tried to learn a second language. “At least our idioms make sense,” he argued.

“You know better than that,” said Byovar. “Now, speak to me in Erollith if you wish
for
me to answer you.”

Gritting his teeth
,
Daniel cleared his mind and focused his thoughts on his next question. “What subject
are they dressing around?” he asked in his broken Erollith.

Byovar began to laugh before correcting him again. “No, baratt, you use the verb
for talk when you change to the active voice.”

Groaning, Daniel tried again and this time Byovar was satisfied. “They are discussing
you, baratt.”

That revelation made him immediately nervous.
I made her angry
,
and now she’s gone to report the problem to the leaders of the grove.
Was my sexual advance really that terrible
?

Byovar saw the look on his face. “If she wished to punish you
,
she would simply do so. She has no need to consult anyone for that. You are
her
property, baratt.”

“She told me that the Illeniel Grove doesn’t believe in needless cruelty,” said Daniel
in Barion.

Byovar ignored him again, forcing Daniel to rephrase his statement in Erollith.

After several minutes of frustrating exchanges
,
his teacher finally replied, “We don’
t, but punishment is not cruelty if it is used for teaching. My comment stands, however,
if she wanted to punish you
,
she could do so without consulting anyone.”

“Am I to be killed?” asked Daniel. Those words he already knew well enough to manage
flawlessly.

Byovar laughed, “That would be even less of a concern.”

“Then what is it about?”

“Ask her yourself, when she returns,” said the She’Har in his most inscrutable fashion.

***

It was two days before she reappeared.

Naturally
,
Daniel had already been through several
stages of anxiety. He had been amazed to discover how much his life already revolved
around the She’Har woman. In her absence he had been bereft of reason or purpose.
Not because of any particular romantic interest, although he did find her incredibly
attractive, but because he had been a slave so long.

In Ellentrea his life had hinged upon Thillmarius’ decisions, Amarah’s visits, and
Garlin’s appearances to escort him to the arena. Things were similar now, except
Lyralliantha was the one
who
fed him, and aside from Byovar’s language lessons, the only one
who
visited him. Not only was his day to day existence dependent upon her, but she was
nearly the entirety of his social life.

He had no intention of showing his dependence when she returned to his platform on
the third day. Daniel was in the middle of practicing with shapes and lines, forming
fields of force both with and without guides. It was an exercise that he had
practiced
while living in Ellentrea
,
and even though he had no expectation of ever returning to the arena he still felt
it was a good idea to
continue to
keep his skills sharp.

Lyralliantha had been visible to his magesight for quite some time, but when she finally
stepped onto his platform he gave no sign that he noticed her. He continued working
;
constructing complex shapes in the air
using only his imagination. Some of them he imbued with colors and others he left
transparent, creating a complex array of abstract forms.

She said nothing for a time, possibly fearing that it might ruin his concentration.
Likewise, he ignored her. After several minutes she grew tired of waiting and spoke,
“I have some news that may interest you.”

Daniel turned to face her, keeping a portion of his mind on his magical creation.
Trying to do one thing, such as talking, while keeping them firmly in place, was another
form of practice. “I am always at your disposal, mistress,” he replied, putting a
faint emphasis on the last word.

The subtleties of sarcasm were lost on her. Barion was still new to her, and the
She’Har seldom used sarcasm in their own language. “Your music, and the vision that
accompanied it, have been on my mind.”

“It is comforting to know that you think of me, mistress,” acknowledged Daniel.

Lyralliantha frowned. She could detect something like irritation in his aura, and
she thought there was an odd quality to his phrasing, but she couldn’t quite put her
finger on what it was. “Is there something wrong?” she asked, never one to dance
around a question.

“No, mistress,” said Daniel. “The sun shines only when you are here, so there can
be nothing wrong when you are near.”
That was almost poetic,
he thought, congratulating himself for a second.

She looked at him doubtfully before continuing, “Very well, I went before the elders
to present a question.

“I’m sure that was fascinating, mistress.”

Lyralliantha realized then what seemed odd to her about his speech. “I don’t recall
you using honorifics when addressing me before.”

“My manners became lax while I lived among the baratti in Ellentrea, mistress,” Daniel
told her. “Few of us are so lucky as to be allowed frequent contact with our owners.”
To compensate for her oblivious nature Daniel coated his words liberally with sarcasm.

She wasn’t able to figure out the dual nature of his words, but his aura showed her
his mood. “You are angry with me,” she stated.

“A slave should not direct such emotions toward his owner.”

“Is your life here so terrible?” she asked. “I have tried to improve your condition
since learning of your suffering in Ellentrea.”

The obvious sincerity in her words hit him solidly, as if he had walked into a wall.
Despite the fact that I am an ‘animal’ to her, and despite shaming her grove by taking
a pet, she is
honestly
trying to make me happy.
Lyralliantha was much like the other She’Har, largely unemotional and clueless with
regard to human foibles. She firmly believed the ‘people vs. baratti’ paradigm, and
yet she also earnestly sought to avoid unnecessary cruelty.

She’s trying to be kind.

It wasn’t the kindness of equals, but the kindness a man might show his dog. Daniel
was reminded of Blue then.
I wouldn’t let him sleep in my bed, but I loved him.

A languid despair passed over him then. The despair of a man who knows he will never
be treated as a true person.
Lyralliantha seemed the best of the lot, and yet he doubted he could ever teach her
to consider humans as people.

“No,” he replied, letting go of his anger. “My life has improved dramatically here
with you.”

She watched him, studying his aura
,
and in it she saw only
honesty and resignation. “You wish you could see your family, don’t you?”

That question caught him off guard, “What?”

“I saw it in your memories, when you were playing,” she told him, speaking slowly.
“Your thoughts were filled with them, images and flickers of moments in the past.
I could feel your longing, especially when you remembered the red haired girl.”

“Catherine,” said Daniel, giving her name
. “She wasn’t family.”

“Yet, you miss her. I felt it, Tyrion. It poured out of you, a river of feeling,
so deep that I thought I might drown in it.”

“To be so new to my language, you already have a poet’s gift with words,” said Daniel.

“Do not try to redirect me,” she said mildly. “I felt it, through you. I do not
understand the reason for it, but I understand how important they are to you.”

“And for that you had to speak to the elders?”

She nodded, “I asked them for permission to allow you to leave the grove.”

Daniel’s mind snapped to full attention, “I thought that was your decision.”

“I have the power to alter the limits in your collar, but we are forbidden to allow
our baratti outside the groves without permission,” she said.

That didn’t make sense to him. Daniel had seen the warden pass through and near Colne
at least twice after his power had awakened
,
and he was fairly certain that they had probably been making yearly trips through
the area, whether they were always seen or not.
He said as much to her, “Don’t you let wardens patrol the valley regularly?”

“We don’t,” said Lyralliantha, correcting his misperception. “The Illeniel Grove
has never had a warden before. The other groves sen
d
wardens, but only on a strict schedule.”

“Does your grove have to get permission from the others before they can allow someone
like me to leave?” he asked.

“No, Tyrion, we do not, but sending you without consulting the other groves could
have consequences.”

Consequences? He gave her a puzzled look.

“In the past, the wardens went merely to eliminate any children
who
were detected with the ability to manipulate aythar. This was a precaution to keep
our special genes from escaping into the wild population. Your particular mutation
and your success in the arena
have
led some to speculate on a different strategy regarding the wild human settlements,”
she explained.

Sudden fear shot through Daniel. Could the She’Har be contemplating genocide? “I’m
the only one
with this ability,” he told her. “The people of my village aren’t a threat.”

“You are thinking along the wrong lines,” she warned. “Your service in the arena
has given the Illeniel Grove access to a large amount of shuthsi over the past several
years. The Prathion Grove has also prospered. Thillmarius arranged your matches
to benefit them by eliminating the strongest competitors from the other groves. You
are now seen by all the groves as a tremendous asset. Do you see where this line
of reasoning leads?”

They might be thinking of searching for more ‘wild’ talents and acquiring them, instead
of just culling them.
“You worry that they will think the Illeniels are trying to secure an even greater
advantage in the arena, by finding more like me? But there aren’t any others, it
wouldn’t benefit them.”

“We do not know the truth of that statement, nor do you,” she asserted, “but if we
send you
,
it could lead the other groves to begin searching. Currently they do not know for
sure which settlement you came from.”

“Thillmarius said you have genntik information from me already. Can’t you use that
to create as many slaves with my abilities as you want? Why would they need to search
the free villages?” asked Daniel.

Lyralliantha appraised him thoughtfully, “I am amazed you remember so much from Thillmarius’
ramblings. Yes, we have your ‘genetic’ information, and we could create new humans
with your genes, but we haven’t studied them long enough yet to take such risks.
Also, that information belongs to the Illeniel Grove. If the others wish to gain
access to it
,
they must seek permission from us, unless they find their own samples.”

He noted the difference in
the way she pronounced the word
to correct his own usage, but another question occurred to him, “How long
would this trip last—i
f I were allowed to go?”

“The usual time is one or two weeks,” answered Lyralliantha, “
and while the restrictions on your collar will be temporarily removed, you are not
to breed with wild humans
.”

“Breed with wild—humans…,” Daniel let the words trail slowly from his lips.
I never asked to breed with anyone!
Even as he thought that, though, he felt an odd disappointment. Perhaps the thought
had lain quietly under the surface of his mind. “Why would you think that I would
want to do that?” he asked, unable to restrain himself.

“You are a rapist, so I thought it best to be clear,” she replied with a perfectly
straight face.

If Daniel had not spen
t so much time with the She’Har,
he would never have believed her deadpan expression. She delivered the statement
as if it were a simple fact, not something worthy of being upset over. Not an insult
or an offensive label,
it was just a noun.
“You are a rapist,”
the words repeated themselves in his head.

Eventually his mouth fell open, “What?!”

“Did I use the wrong word?” she said, glancing upward as if she was searching her
mind to double check. “A rapist is one
who
forces another to have sex, correct?”

Daniel nodded dumbly.

“I thought so,” she said brightly, pleased with herself for not choosing the wrong
word. “The other groves have many rapists, to make sure the arena has plenty of competitors.”

There were so many oddities in her last sentence that Daniel’s mind almost shut down.
They have many rapists?
Was she referring to their method of producing children for camps like Ellentrea?

“I am not a rapist,” he told her frankly. He could only imagine the ways in which
they created children in Ellentrea, but he wanted to be clear on his own viewpoint.

“But you have already tried to rape me twice,” said Lyralliantha. Again, her carefree
manner of speaking was in complete opposition to the horror of her statement.

“I—what? When?”

“Immediately after accepting the collar
,
and then again a few days ago, when you were holding me.” She seemed surprised,
as if he should have remembered.

He was flabbergasted. “I will admit to being attracted to you, but I had no intention
of trying to force myself on you,” he said arguing in his defense.

“You wished to have sex with me, yes?”

Never in his life had Daniel ever expected to have such a conversation with a woman,
of any species. Reluctantly he nodded, “Well, yes, among other things…”

“And you attempted to manipulate my feelings, to force my acceptance using your aythar,”
she interrupted. “This is forcing, you take away the other person’s choice. Forcing
sex is rape.”

He was unable to believe his ears. “I was trying to be persuasive, perhaps, but that
is all.”

“You are deluded,” she told him. “Shall I teach you the difference?”

He was growing angry, so he accepted her challenge, “Go ahead.”

The stinging slap that struck his cheek was sudden and unexpected.
Even so, his reflexes gave him the opportunity to avoid it. His days in the arena
were still fresh in his memory. He let it land, thinking it better not to anger her
by dodging. The sudden pain made his eyes water, and he was even madder now. “I
guess you taught me a thing or two,” he responded.