The Song of Homana (6 page)

“Your kindling is damp. What I do will take less effort.” Lachlan turned to go to his horse for the harp, but Storr was in his way. After a moment a gray-faced harper looked back at me.

I smiled. “Storr does Finn’s bidding, when he does not do his own. Look to him.”

Lachlan did not move. He waited. And finally Storr moved away.

The harper took down his case from the horse and turned, cradling it against his chest. “You fear I will use sorcery against you?”

“With reason,” I declared.

“I will not.” He shook his dull, dark head. “Not again. I will use it
for
you, do you wish it, but not against. Never against. We have too much in common.”

“What,” I asked, “does a mercenary have in common with a harper?”

Lachlan grinned. It was the warm, amused expression I had seen the evening before, as if he knew what I could not, and chose to keep it that way. “I am many things,” he said obliquely. “Some of them you know: harper, healer, priest. And one day I will share the rest with you.”

I lifted my sword. With great deliberation I set the tip against the lip of the sheath and let Lachlan see the runes, hardly visible in the dying light. Then I slid the sword home with the hiss of steel filling the shadows. “Do you admit to complicity,” I said softly, “take care.”

Lachlan’s smile was gone. Hugging his harp case, he shook his head. “Were I to desire your death, your Cheysuli would give me my own.” He cast a quick, flickering glance at Finn. “This is Ellas. We have sheltered the Cheysuli for some years, now. Do you think I discount Finn’s skill? No. You need not be wary of me, with him present. I could do nothing.”

I gestured. “There is that in your hands.”

“My Lady?” He was surprised, then smiled. “Oh, aye, there is her magic. But it is Lodhi’s, and I do not use it to kill.”

“Then show us how you
can
use it,” I bid him. “Show us what other magic you have besides the ability to give us our memories, or to lift our wills from us.”

Lachlan looked at Finn, almost invisible in the deepening shadows. “It was difficult, with you. Most men are so shallow, so transient. But you are made of layers. Complex layers, some thin and easily torn away, but in tearing they show the metal underneath. Iron,” he said thoughtfully. “I would liken you to iron. Hard and cold and strong.”

Finn abruptly gestured toward the firecairn. “Show us, harper.”

Lachlan knelt down by the firecairn. Deftly he unsealed the harp case—boiled leather hardened nearly to stone by
some agent, padded thickly within—and took from it his Lady. The strings, so fragile-seeming, gleamed in the remaining light. The wood, I saw, was ancient, perhaps from some magical tree. It was bound with spun gold. The green stone—an emerald?—glowed.

He knelt in the snow, ignoring the increasing cold, and played a simple lay. It was soft, almost unheard, but remarkable nonetheless. And when his hands grew blurred and quick I saw the spark begin, deep in the damp, charred wood, until a single flame sprouted, swallowed it all, and the fire was born again.

The song died upon the harp. Lachlan looked up at me. “Done,” he said.

“So it is, and myself unscathed.” I reached down a gloved hand, caught his bare one and pulled him to his feet. His was no soft grasp, no woman’s touch designed to keep his harper’s fingers limber.

Lachlan smiled as we broke the grip. I thought he had judged me as quickly as I had him. But he said nothing; there was nothing at all to say. We were strangers to one another, though something within me said it would not always be so.

“You ride a blooded horse,” I said, looking at the dapple-gray.

“Aye,” Lachlan agreed gravely. “The High King likes my music. It was a gift last year.”

“You have welcome in Rheghed?” I asked, thinking of the implications.

“Harpers have welcome anywhere.” He tugged on his gloves, hunching against the cold. “I doubt not Bellam would have me in Homana-Mujhar, did I go.”

He challenged me with his eyes. I smiled, but Finn did not. “Aye, I doubt not.” I turned to Finn. “Have we food?”

“Something like,” he affirmed, “but only if you are willing to eat coney-meat. Game is scarce.”

I sighed. “Coney is not my favorite, but I prefer it to none at all.”

Finn laughed. “Then at least I have taught you something in these past years. Once you might have demanded venison.”

“I knew no better, then.” I shook my head. “Even princes learn they have empty bellies like anyone else, when their titles are taken from them.”

Lachlan’s hands were on his harp as he set it within its case. “Which title?” he asked. “Prince or Mujhar?”

“Does it matter? Bellam has stolen them both.”

When the coneys were nothing but gristle and bone—and Storr demolished the remains quickly enough—Lachlan brought out a skin of harsh wine from his saddlepacks and passed it to me. I sat cross-legged on my two pelts, trying to ignore the night’s cold as it settled in my bones. The wine was somewhat bitter but warming, and after a long draw I handed it to Finn. Very solemnly he accepted it, then invoked his Cheysuli gods with elaborate distinction, and I saw Lachlan’s eyes upon him. Finn’s way of mocking another man’s beliefs won him few friends, but he wanted none. He saw no sense in it, with Storr.

Lachlan retrieved the skin at last, drank, then passed it on to me. “Will you tell me what I must know, then? A saga is built out of fact, not fancy. Tell me how it was a king could destroy the race that had served him and his House so well.”

“Finn would do better to tell it.” If he would.

Finn, sitting on his pelts with Storr against one thigh, shrugged. The earring glinted in the firelight. In the shadows he seemed more alien than ever, part of the nighttime itself. “What is there to say? Shaine declared
qu’mahlin
on us for no good reason…and we died.” He paused. “Most of us.”

“
You
live,” Lachlan commented.

Finn’s smile was not precisely a smile, more a movement of his lips, as if he would bare his teeth. “The gods saw another way for me. My
tahlmorra
was to serve the prophecy in later years, not die as a helpless child.” His hand went out to bury itself in Storr’s thick hair.

Lachlan hesitated, cradling his harp case. “May I have the beginning?” he asked at last, with careful intonation.

Finn laughed. There was no humor in it. “What is the beginning, harper? I cannot say, and yet I was a part of
it.” He looked at me a moment, fixedly, as if the memories had swallowed him.

I
swallowed, remembering too. “The fault lay in a man’s overweening pride.” I did not know how else to begin. “My uncle, Shaine the Mujhar—who wanted a son and had none—tried to wed his daughter to Ellic of Solinde, Bellam’s son, in hopes of ending the war. But that daughter sought another man: Cheysuli, Shaine’s own liege man, turning her back on the alliance and the betrothal. She fled her father, fled Homana-Mujhar, and with her went the warrior.”

“My
jehan
,” Finn said before I could continue. “Father, you would say. Hale. He took Lindir from her
tahlmorra
and fashioned another for them both. For us all; it has resulted in disaster.” He stared into the fire. “It took a king in the throat of his pride, strangling him, until he could not bear it. And when his
cheysula
died of a wasting disease, and his second bore no living children, he determined the Cheysuli had cursed his House.” His head moved slightly, as if to indicate regret. “And he declared
qu’mahlin
on us all.”

Lachlan frowned intently. “A woman, then. The catalyst of it all.”

“Lindir,” I agreed. “My cousin. Enough like Shaine, in woman’s form, to be a proper son. Except she was a daughter, and used her pride to win her escape.”

“What did she say to the result?”

I shook my head. “No one knows. She came back to her father eight years later when she was heavy with Hale’s child, because he was dead and she had no other place to go. Shaine took her back because he needed a male heir; when the child was born a girl he banished her to the woods so the beasts could have their shapechanger halfling. But Alix lived because Shaine’s arms-master—and the Queen of Homana herself—begged the Mujhar to give her to man instead of beast.” I shifted on my pelts. “Lindir died bearing Alix. What she thought of the
qu’mahlin
I could not say, but it slew her warrior and nearly destroyed his race.”

Lachlan considered it all. And then he looked at Finn.
“How is it, then, you serve Carillon? Shaine the Mujhar was his uncle.”

Finn put out his hand and made the familiar gesture. “Because of this.
Tahlmorra
. I have no choice.” He smiled a little. “You may call it fate, or destiny, or whatever Ellasian word you have for such things…we believe each child is born with a
tahlmorra
that must be heeded when the gods make it known. The prophecy of the Firstborn says one day a man of all blood shall unite, in peace, four warring realms and two magic races. Carillon is a part of that prophecy.” He shook his head, solemn in the firelight. “Had I a choice, I would put off such binding service, but I am Cheysuli, and such things are not done.”

“Enemies become friends.” Lachlan nodded slowly, staring fixedly into the fire as if he already heard the music. “It would make a fine lay. A story to break hearts and rend souls, and show others that hardships are nothing compared to what the Cheysuli have suffered. Do you give me leave, Finn, I will—”

“—do what?” Finn demanded. “Embellish the truth? Change the story in the interests of rhyme and resonance?
No
. I deny you that leave. What I have suffered—and my clan—is not for others to know.”

My hands, hooked loosely over my knees, curled into fists that dug the bluntness of my nails into the leather of my gloves. Finn rarely spoke of his past or his personal feelings, being an intensely private man, but as he spoke I heard all the pain and emotion in his voice. Raw and unfettered, in the open at last.

Lachlan met his eyes. “I would embellish nothing. With such truth,” he said quietly, “I think there would be no need.”

Finn said something in the Old Tongue, the ancient language of the Cheysuli. I had learned words and phrases in the past years, but when Finn resorted to it out of anger or frustration—or high emotions—I could understand none of it. The lyrical syllables became slurred and indistinct, yet managed to convey his feelings just the same. I winced, knowing what Lachlan must feel.

But Finn stopped short. He never yelled, having no
need, but his quietness was just as effective. Yet silence was something altogether different, and I thought perhaps something had stopped him. Then I saw the odd detached expression in his face, and the blankness of his eyes, and realized Storr conversed with him.

What the wolf said I cannot guess, but I saw Finn’s face darken in the firelight with heavy color, then go pale and grim. Finally he unlocked his jaw and spoke.

“I was a boy.” The words were so quiet I could hardly hear them over the snap and crackle of the flames. “Three years old.” His hand tightened in the silver fur of Storr’s neck. I wondered, with astonishment at the thought, if he sought support from his
lir
to speak of his childhood clearly. It was not something he had said to me before, not even when I had asked. “I had sickened with some childish fever, and kept to my
jehana’s
skirts like a fool with no wits.” His eyes hooded a little, but he smiled, as if the memory amused him. Briefly only; there was little of amusement in the tale. “Sleep brought me no peace, only bad dreams, and it was hot within the pavilion. It was dark, so dark, and I thought the demons would steal my soul. I was so hot.” A heavy swallow rippled the flesh of his throat. “Duncan threw water on the fire to douse it, thinking to help, but he only made it smoke, and it choked me. Finally he fell asleep, and my
jehana
, but I could not.”

I glanced at Lachlan. He was transfixed.

Finn paused. The firelight filled his eyes. “And then the Keep was full of the thunder of the gods, only the thunder came from men. The Mujhar’s men. They swept into our Keep like demons from the netherworld, determined to destroy us all. They set fire to the pavilion.”

Lachlan started. “With
children
inside?”

“Aye,” Finn said grimly. “Ours they knocked down with their horses, then they dropped a torch on it.” His eyes flicked to Lachlan’s astonished face. “We paint our pavilions, harper. Paint burns very quickly.”

Lachlan started to speak, as if to halt the recital. Finn went on regardless, perhaps purging his soul at last.

“Duncan pulled me from the fire before it could consume us all. My
jehana
took us both into the trees, and
there we hid until daylight. By then the men were gone, but so was most of our Keep.” He took a deep breath. “I was young, too young to fully understand, but even a child of three learns how to hate.” The eyes came around to me. “I was born two days before Hale went away with Lindir, and still he took her. Still he went from the Keep to Homana-Mujhar, and helped his
meijha
, his mistress, escape. And so Shaine, when he set his men upon us, made certain Hale’s Keep was the first.”

Lachlan, after a long moment of silence, shook his head. “I have gifts many men do not, because of Lodhi and my Lady. But even
I
cannot tell the tale as you do.” His face was very still. “I will leave it to those who can. I will leave it to the Cheysuli.”

When at last we drew near the Keep a day later, Finn grew pensive and snappish. It was unlike him. We had dealt well together, though only after I had grown used to having a Cheysuli at my side, and after
he
had grown accustomed to riding with a Homanan. Now we had come home again, at least to his mind; home again, would Finn put off his service?

It set the hairs to rising on my neck. I had no wish to lose Finn. I needed him still. I had learned much in the years of exile, but I had yet to learn what it was to lay claim to a stolen throne. Without Finn, the task would be close to impossible.