Vault Of Heaven 01 - The Unremembered (112 page)

A peal of thunder reverberated around the great hall.

“Your pardon, Sheason,” Elan finally said. “I do not question your intentions. But our own history shows more than a few who have perished in the mountains that rise from the Soliel. Their beauty is savage and deceptive. What thrives there is not edible by man, and the life that feeds upon it has crept from crags and pits where the work of creation is imperfect.”

“How can that be?” Wendra cut in. Tahn started at the intrusion of a new voice, and turned to find concern in his sister’s eyes. “The cycles of life are as steady and certain as the turn of the greater light. The mountain cat is a fierce predator, but part of the balance even when it kills.”

Elan faced Wendra. “Imperfect, Anais, only because the change and growth wrought in the mountains near Tillinghast is not meet for your survival. New life there is born out of the mists and the potential they bear. It is the irony of Tillinghast that it be used to discern balance, and yet is surrounded by a terrain that threatens the harmony of man.” Elan looked again toward the wall that faced the mountains to the north. “Tillinghast,” he whispered. “Its purpose is not wholly known; its secrets are well preserved. Even authors who claim to have been there do not agree. Restoration it grants, that is sure, but—”

“Enough,” Vendanj said, softly putting an end to Elan’s words. “Fear of Restoration has crippled the efforts of otherwise good men. Generations ages past have labored to know how the Whited One could ever slip his bonds, and their search led them round to their tails while the rancor and legions beyond the Bourne grew. The Shadow of the Hand lengthens, and today’s rumors hint toward the commencement of Delighast. Enough!” Vendanj’s voice boomed in the large hall. “The blood of many stains my hands, as it does the hands of those who bear me company. Even their families were asked to follow painful paths. These sacrifices will not be mocked or go unremembered.” His voice turned cool and even. “But it is part of our weakness that most in this current age are no longer willing to sacrifice to answer the threat of the Bourne. Our great ‘civility’ breeds indignation at the thought, or worse, disbelief and complacency.” Vendanj stopped, and cast his eyes upward. Tahn heard the Sheason take a long inward breath. When Vendanj lowered his head again, an indomitable expression lit his face. “It will not be so this time.”

Goose bumps rose almost painfully across Tahn’s skin. He had the feeling that the Sheason was implying that Tahn and the others might be called upon to sacrifice something more before this was over.

Mira looked at Tahn, a kind of empathy in her eyes he had not seen before. It both comforted and frightened him.

The Sheason pulled his cloak about his shoulders and weighed the looks of those around him. Only Grant seemed to have no expression at all. The exile out of the Scar sniffed and waited. Any other time, the callousness in Grant’s eyes might have bothered Tahn. But the stillness that followed the Sheason’s words fell like a pall over everything.

“You’ll have rooms at my home,” Elan finally said, shattering the silence. “Sheason, I must insist that you take attendants into each room.”

“To sleep with us?” Sutter blurted.

The Far king smiled. “Not to sleep. It is custom that visitors to Naltus be watched over continually, even at rest. It is rare that human boots tread Far shale, but the custom has always been observed, and I’ll not diverge from it.”

“Wisely said,” Vendanj interjected. “My regret is that in harboring us you put yourselves at greater risk.”

“We accept the responsibility of our stewardship.” He looked up at Vendanj. “It would not be the first time that Quiet has come against us. And if they do, we will be ready.”

Vendanj turned to Mira. “You will sit with Tahn. The others will be attended by members of Elan’s guard.”

The Far king nodded, took up his crook, and strode away. Vendanj followed. In a dozen paces, his long, powerful strides brought him abreast with Elan. The two conferred as Mira motioned for the rest to come after her. Sutter said nothing. He just shook his head with a wry smile.

Tahn looked back over his shoulder at the great hall, seeing the light standards, the rows of chairs, and the mezzanine where he’d first seen the map showing Rudierd Tillinghast. He thought about the things Vendanj had said to Elan’s captains. Somewhere in those words, he felt there were answers for him, at last; yet at the same time, he thought maybe he no longer wanted to know.

At the door, Grant put a reassuring hand on his shoulder as he urged him through.

CHAPTER SEVENTY-ONE

One Bed, the Same Dream

Mira stepped past Tahn and surveyed the chamber: bed and chest of drawers to one side, and a table and chair set beside the window on the other. Tahn never got past the bed—there was only one. A thrill raced through him, followed quickly by anxiety. Slowly, he shut the door. When he turned, Mira had already seated herself in the chair beside the window and had taken out her oilcloth to clean her blades. As she set to wiping down one of her swords, Tahn unshouldered his bow and threw off his cloak, tossing it over the foot of the bed.

Beyond the window, lightning still flashed against the darkness to the north. Gouts of wind buffeted the eaves, whistling like thin reeds. A single lamp burned on the table, its wick so low that the oil threatened to extinguish the flame.

Tahn turned up the wick, brightening the room, and put his hands near the glass as though to warm them. He then sat beside his cloak, and shifted to look at the Far. Mira seemed to take no notice of him, running her cloth evenly over the edge of her weapon, which caught reflections of the flame.

Questions spun in his head, things he wanted to ask but did not dare:
How much of all this did she know from the beginning? Did she think it was possible that a boy from the Hollows and a Far girl …

Tahn regarded her in the lamplight. No delicate square-cut blouse overlaid her bosom as the women of the Hollows wore when spring came full. Mira’s cloak remained clasped at her neck, the grey folds cascading around the chair to the floor. No tincture colored her lips or eyes. But the glow of the flame gently touched her skin, giving it warmth even over her determined features. In contrast, white flashes burst from the sky, starkly lighting half her face for brief moments.

“Something on your mind?” she said, turning over her blade to inspect both edges.

Tahn groped for words. “I don’t know. Yes.”

“You should say it, then, so that you won’t waste sleep wondering if I might answer.”

“All right. I left the Hollows because I thought being there put the town in danger. I know now that Bar’dyn and Velle hunt me. But I don’t know why.” He leaned toward her, emboldened by his words. “And the only time I learn much about this Heights of Restoration is when I hear Vendanj telling someone else about it. He could kill me with a wave of his hand, but I’m tired of being the last to know just what, by my father’s name, this is all about.”

Mira sheathed one sword and withdrew the other. Without a look, she said, “You don’t really need me to answer that, do you?”

Tahn’s momentum ebbed. He eased back to an upright position. Thoughtfully, he touched the mark on the back of his hand. “Why me?” he finally said.

“Will that make it easier for you?” Mira said, folding over her oilcloth.

Tahn’s fist tightened into a ball. “Wouldn’t it make it easier for you?”

Mira continued to work. “No.”

“Well that’s just fine for you,” Tahn steamed. “You’re a Far. Sure! Fast!”

“Keep your voice down,” Mira said calmly. “Others are trying to sleep.”

“Is it that you don’t know?” Tahn said with some ire. “Are you a puppet, too?”

Mira went on with her careful cleaning of the weapon. “We are all puppets, Tahn,” she said. Tahn felt Mira’s words might have personal implications for herself, as well. “Yet,” she continued, “the end is not always known from the beginning. Especially for a puppet. Be glad your life will give you time to know that your road is your own.”

“That’s another thing,” Tahn retorted. “I’m tired of riddles. Tell me why you say that. Tell me why I am here. If I am going to stand at Tillinghast, I have the right to know why it is me and not someone else.” Emotion caught in his throat.

Mira stopped cleaning her blades, and showed him compassionate eyes. “I don’t have all the answers you seek, Tahn. And even if I did, I don’t believe hearing them from me would ease your heart. But what I can do is tell you about me. And maybe that will help you live with the uncertainty for now.

“You have recently had your Standing. A day to mark the putting away of childhood things, and the embracing of life that comes after it. In the light of ten thousand more skies you will toil and laugh and suffer. But what you call your day of Change is a Far’s last sky. It is a day of ceremony for man, but for the Far, it is an epitaph. It is part of our stewardship that we do not live beyond the Change. It gives us the liberty to speak and do what is necessary to guard the covenant language left behind by the Framers of the Charter, and in so doing never be accountable for those things we must to do keep it safe. Never endanger our own souls. But we do not mourn …

“My sister’s passing leaves me the sole remnant of my family line. She was Elan’s wife. And before I go he will ask me to stay. To take up her crown. And to bear an heir. It will be an honor to be asked. And our people need this very badly.” She paused and looked closely at him. “But I do not want to be the queen. And I do not wish to have a child that I will never hear use my name.”

Tahn forgot to breathe. Through her speech, Mira never showed any anguish over any of it. Tahn marveled at her strength.

“It’s strange. You don’t remember your parents because they went to their earth while you were too young to remember. While I can see my father’s face in my mind even now, still hear his voice and see his face, yet I cannot remember my childhood.”

He’d said it. He’d shared one of the great burdens he carried. And it felt good to do so with Mira.

The Far looked back thoughtfully. He could see in her face that she understood the gravity of what he’d just said. “Why does the memory of your childhood matter so much to you, Tahn? Who you are is defined by the choices you make now. And for you this is truer than most.”

Tahn considered her words. “Perhaps you’re right.” And then added, “And the same would hold true for any child of yours.”

They sat looking at one another, and he wished he could wrap his arms about her, but didn’t know how not to do it clumsily. The hiss of the lamp was suddenly very loud.

Tahn thought about how his life seemed almost a reverse of the Far’s. Tahn could not remember most of his melura years, but had the possibility before him of a long life. Mira’s life was nearly over. But in one way they were the same: Most of their childhood was fatherless, whether through death or the absence of memory. He wondered if that had shaped who both of them had become. For Mira, that question didn’t seem to matter; for Tahn, it still did. The things that most defined him stemmed from a past unknown to him.

Maybe there was a lesson for him in her commitment to this journey to Restoration, where she would give so much of her life that would end so soon.

Considering it, Tahn felt selfish.

But so many things were still unknown. The Bar’dyn had come into the Hollows, and now a Sheason and a Far led Tahn and the others to the Heights of Restoration. He harbored feelings that compelled him to make choices he didn’t understand. There was the mark on the back of his hand. What did these things mean?

And under it all was the vague memory of a man whose face he couldn’t remember, but whose advice resonated deep within in his mind.

The faceless man in his dreams, and the voice out of his nightmares.

He tried to recall Rolen and the wisdom he spoke to Tahn in the bowels of Solath Mahnus. He thought he did feel some easing in his heart when he recalled the Sheason, a reminder to look beyond himself.

Then from habit, before unstringing his bow, he pulled it deep several times, limbering the wood and stretching the string. In his mind he heard the words:
I draw with my arms, but release as the Will allows.
Their familiarity also comforted Tahn, and he repeated them twice out loud, interrupting the stillness. The words fell from his lips like a prayer.

He had forgotten Mira was there.

When he looked up, she was looking intently at him. Neither of them spoke until he asked her what had been on his mind ever since he had met her in the Hollows. “Has a Far ever married a man?”

Mira smiled her glorious lopsided grin, but did not answer. He somehow knew she meant to tease him by withholding a reply. He had one more question, but she answered it before he could ask.

“I will sit vigil. You will have the bed to yourself.”

*   *   *

Fog and mist roiled over the precipice, licking at the stone. The darkness felt like wet leaves sticking to his skin. Only the faintest trace of light illuminated the emptiness beyond the ledge, as though the shroud that separated the solid from the ethereal held its own dark energy.…

As stones grated beneath his heel, the mists absorbed the sound, leaving Tillinghast as quiet as a tomb.