The Soul Weaver (64 page)

We were one—my father, the Lords, and I—a single vessel passing through this midnight realm toward a horizon alive with streams and veils of colored light. Strange that I could see, though I had no eyes, and I could walk . . . or fly or move somehow . . . though I had no limbs, no physical substance at all. My senses were all blurred together, so that I tasted the rich darkness and heard the song of the light.

“I will not bargain,” I said. Not if this strange venture would destroy the Lords. Soon, surely, my father would tell me where we were and what we were doing.

“Crush this mortal being who dares contain you,” growled Parven. “No more should a cavern contain the sky, than this pitiful D'Natheil imprison the Destroyer. There is still time to cast him off. Let him pursue dissolution if such is his wish, but the Four of Zhev'Na are at the brink of triumph. We made you what you are—strong and powerful and ruthless—now we call in our debt. You swore an oath never to oppose us. Cast him off! Travel the winds of the world with us.”

“I have no wish for your companionship,” I said. “And I've not taken up arms against you. You chose to come at my call. But I am a Soul Weaver, and I control this place where you reside. I yield my father the choice of destination, not you.”

“But you don't even know where that is, do you, boy?” snarled Ziddari. “Tell him, D'Natheil. Tell your son where he and his futile hopes are bound.”

My father took a long time to answer. He seemed very distant, though I had given him control of our shared mind. “I take him to the only place he can be free of you. I take you where you can no longer destroy what is beautiful.”

His thoughts trailed away. The geysers of colored fire—closer now—shattered at their peak into cascades of music and color that aroused such deep and fundamental longing that every past desire, even my craving for power, paled in comparison. What was this place?

“He's killed you, young Lord,” said Ziddari, his voice as cool and mocking as it had ever been. “When we pass that barrier, there is no going back. Never again. No wind on your face, no solid horseflesh powering you across the earth, no exploring the wonders of the world at your will. No chance to do those things you've never done. You've never sailed on the ocean, never scaled a mountain peak. You've never even had a woman. Shall I tell you of these things, quickly, before they're lost forever? Quickly, before your body rots, forfeit to D'Arnath's revenge? Shall I show you what you've chosen to leave behind?”

Into our mind came one vision after another: women, riches, sailing and adventure, wine, food, and every pleasure, commonplace or exotic, that a physical being could enjoy. Each one was replete with sounds and smells, and tastes, and sensations, and it was true, I'd never experienced even a tenth of it. I was only sixteen, and I was dead.

“Now tell me why your father has murdered you. He should have made this journey before you were born. This yearning you feel is his, for he is tired of existing where he doesn't belong. But you, young Lord, have not even begun to know what is to be found in the world . . .”

And then he bombarded me with another round of visions, this time of his own pleasures, corrupt, brilliant, loathsome, depraved, exciting, a world of power and enchantment where I could do anything I wanted—and never to end, for I would be immune from ordinary death.

“Now tell him, D'Natheil. Tell him why he has to die. Tell him why he cannot live forever.”

“Tell me,” I whispered, suddenly confused. My progress toward the barrier of light slowed, and the fading visions of warmth and pleasure left me cold and empty. Alone. Dead. A shudder of terror swept through me. “Father . . .”

It took even longer for the answer to come back this time, as if my father had to gather himself up from the shimmering fragments of light that showered down on us.

“Because Gerick is not one of you. He is loved and cherished by uncounted souls, who even now bear him in their hearts with reverence. He does not live for the pain of others, but for their benefit. Despite all you've done to him . . . all I've done to him . . . Gerick owns his soul and has used it to choose his Way. His long journey has led him here . . . to his freedom.” We moved forward again. Faster now. Upward.

“Words. Lies.” Ziddari's voice rose. Louder. Tighter. Tinged with fear. “You murder him at the very threshold of manhood, just as you abandoned him to murder on the day of his birth.
I
am the one who saved him on that day, and I am the one who will save him on this day. The only freedom you offer is oblivion.”

“Ah, but you see, Ziddari, unlike myself, and unlike the Lords of Zhev'Na, my son will not die on this day. For all your wisdom, all your years, all your magics, you have no true power. True power lies in the hands of those like my wife, who has no talent for sorcery yet changes the course of the world with her passionate heart, and Ven'Dar, who witnesses to the glory of history and fate, and my friend Paulo, who cannot even read yet hears the quiet pulse of life and sustains it with his faithfulness. You've never understood. While Gerick lives out his future free of you, you will have ample time to consider your lacks.”

Light and shadow traveled on the warm wind that swirled around me. Through me. As we climbed the ridge of light, music took shape around us. Haunting blues and greens, frothing like ocean waves. A swelling wall of purple-and-violet melody, a mountaintop of singing rose and white . . .

“Betrayer!” bellowed Ziddari. “Weakling!”

The taunts did not touch me. I thought of my mother and Paulo and knew that what my father said about them was true. My whole being smiled as I remembered them.

The Three went wild, then, and I thought my mind would distingrate. Red-hot claws of fury, frustration, and terror rent my mind and soul into shreds of words and images. They lashed me with the fullness of their power, blinding me with pain and hatred, slashing, ripping, tearing at my reason.

“Heed my last word, Destroyer.” The venomous voice penetrated the hurricane of madness, as if the ruby-eyed Ziddari had bent down to whisper in my ear alone. “You will never be free of us. No matter in what realm we exist at the end of this day, you will not escape the destiny we designed for you. You are our instrument. Our Fourth. Every human soul—mundane or Dar'Nethi—will curse the day you first drew breath.”

The storm closed in again. I held against them, trying to stanch the spreading poison of despair, trying to shield my father's fragile spirit, until I could no longer think of my own name, could not fit two thoughts together, could not exist . . . I needed breath. I needed life. Screaming, I fell back. . . .

“Gerick, hold on . . . just a little farther. I know it is so hard . . . but you are stronger than all of us. . . . My father's voice was distant, but filled with everything he believed about life, and the reasons he had been willing to take this path to preserve the worlds. His will—not at all fragile—held me together, pulled me forward. “Stay with me . . . ah, gods, it comes. Quickly, my son . . . trust me. . . .”

On the brink of madness, I took one more step. Then, with a long sigh, we began to separate, my father and I and the Lords. The Lords' curses disintegrated rapidly into unintelligible ravings, cries that existed apart from and not inside me, and then, after a final, horrifying crescendo of terror, the Three fell silent . . . and I was free.

All that was left was the music, haunted, wandering music, just on the edge of beauty, yet just on the edge of dissonance. Streams of light and music bathed us like sparkling wine. The doors of my mind were flung open, and the melodies drifted through them, sweeping away the lingering shadows and cobwebs, and I felt my father's joy untouched by any trace of anger. We had crossed the Verges, and he, too, was free.

Vague forms began to take shape in the distance, and I strained to see what they were, but my father took hold of me again, closing off my vision as if he had brushed my eyelids shut to make me sleep.
Submerge now . . . go deep. You must not see. I believe your gift can take you back into your body, but only if you don't see. To know L'Tiere would be . . . unbearable . . . for a living man, I think. Go deep and wait for your mother's call to lead you. She'll find a way. I know it. She has always been able to learn what she needs.

Ah, I wish so very much—But my span of years was done long ago. Dassine gave me the chance to know you, to know of my people and our world that no Exile could remember, and to embrace my Seri once again. How could I ask for more?
An eternity of sadness tinged his words.

Another burst of color and the music splashed about us. My father's presence was a lacework of frost, thinning in the blaze of winter sunlight.

And as if he were pushing me under the water to teach me to swim, he forced me deep into his mind, leaving me only enough awareness that I might hear the call that would draw me back to life.

But I was a Soul Weaver, and I reached for my father as he had reached for me, and I drew him in beside me to wait. . . .

 

If it had been daytime, or I'd been more awake, or the room had been filled with light and activity, I would never have sensed it. It was no more than the glimmer of a forgotten inspiration, or a feather out of place in your pillow, or the earliest stirring of a child in the womb, but it jolted me awake and I listened until I thought my inner ears might bleed. There. Again . . .

Gerick, child, is it you? Is it true what Ven'Dar said, that you can find your way back? Follow my voice, dear one.
I shaped each word carefully.

At the end of half an hour the touch was stronger, still faint, still very far away, but I refused to believe it was some midnight fantasy of a tired and grieving widow. A lamp flared from the doorway, searing my eyes and rousing Ven'Dar, who also had dozed off.

“I was just—” said Paulo, but I held up my hand for quiet.

Mother.
The call, the touch, had come again.

“Vasrin's hand,” whispered Ven'Dar, watching as I focused my attention inward. The sorcerer slipped off the edge of the table, and hurried around to where he could touch Gerick's body.

Words poured from me into the night, like a river gathering its power and leaping from a cliff into a bottomless gorge below. Some of the words made sense, some didn't. Anyone would have called me a fool, but I'd come so far from logic and rational expectations in the years of my life that nothing was beyond the realm of possibility. My husband had once come back from the dead. Why not again? Why not my son?

I heard a harsh intake of breath from across the stone table where Ven'Dar hovered over Gerick. Then the sorcerer, in muted excitement, said, “Continue, my lady. Don't let go.”

I couldn't even move to look. I couldn't do anything lest the fragile connection be lost.

The black stone pyramid was still clutched in Karon's cold hand. Dared I move it?

With a glance at Ven'Dar, I pulled the smooth stone from the linked hands and set it aside.

“By the holy Way, you've done it!” said Ven'Dar.

I scrambled across the platform until I was kneeling at Gerick's side with my hands on his face. A tinge of color graced his pale cheeks, and a faint breath passed his pale lips. I rubbed his hands, speaking aloud now, talking, weeping, laughing, babbling, coaxing him back to the world.

Ven'Dar put his arm around my shoulders and laughed until tears came. “You can rest now, my lady. He's here. You don't want to drive him away. Give him a little time.”

So I sat back, and instead of Gerick's warm hand, I held Karon's cold one, and watched my son wake up. It was gradual at first. His color improved; his breathing deepened; his hands and eyelids began to twitch. Then somewhere in his journey, he crossed a dramatic threshold that caused him to sit bolt upright, gasping for breath, his eyes wide, seeing things that were not in the room with us.

“. . . got to come . . . not finished . . .” He swallowed and breathed. “. . . oh, yes, you can. You must . . .”

It may have been the sound of his own voice that brought him to awareness, or perhaps the shattering of glass when Paulo dropped his lamp. But, whatever the reason, Gerick squeezed his eyes tightly shut and then opened them to look straight at me.

“Welcome back,” I said, throwing my arms around him, trying to warm him, to quiet his shivering. He held me tight, but clearly his mind was on something else. When I drew back a bit to look at his face, his eyes were on Karon's body.

“I tried to bring him back with me.” He touched Karon's lifeless hand. “I thought . . .”

“It's all right,” I said, laughing and weeping all at once. “I'm sure it's all right.”

“Tell us, young Gerick . . . Please. About the Lords,” said Ven'Dar, anxiously. “We've seen signs . . . I'm sorry. I can't wait for the proper time to ask. I must know.”

“They didn't come back with me,” said Gerick. “I don't know if that means they're dead, but we separated from them beyond the Verges, and they're not in me any longer.” And he told us all that had happened when he touched Karon's outstretched hand.