Chapter Nine

“Caelan,” Elandra said. Her fingers reached for his and clamped hard. Her eyes were wide with fear, and now and then her lips trembled. She was breathing hard, trying not to panic. “You must tell me what is wrong. Am I going to die?”

With an effort he forced himself to conceal his own fears. He gave her a little smile. “No, of course you are not going to die. It is only a little bite. I am sure it hurts, but you—”

She raised her hand to silence him. “No lies. I need the truth. Do you understand?”

Worry lay on him like a thin sweat. Still, he knew he must keep the truth from her for as long as possible. He could not afford to let her panic. He reached for severance, but she grabbed his wrist and pulled herself to him.

“Tell me!” she cried, her eyes flashing with fear. “Don’t turn to stone. Don’t shut me out. I deserve better than that!”

It was like being plunged into the past, hearing her voice echo his own pleas to Beva. Appalled, Caelan wondered, Am I like my father?

He stroked her cheek. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t want to be like him.”

“Who? You’re not making any sense.” Her eyes clawed at his, holding his gaze when he tried to look away. “It’s bad, isn’t it?”

The lies and assurances died on his lips. “Yes,” he answered in a hollow voice. “It is bad.”

Fear leached the remaining color from her face, making her eyes huge and vulnerable. She started trembling, but she didn’t falter. “What will happen to me?”

“I—”

“The worst, Caelan!” she commanded. “Tell me the worst.”

“The venom is in you. In time, if its work is not checked, you will become like General Paz.”

Her mouth opened, but nothing came out. Her hand dropped from his arm, and despair filled her face.

“But there is time yet,” he said hurriedly. He pulled her to her feet and put his arm around her to steady her. “While there is time, there is a chance. We must hurry.”

“Where?”

“We’ll go to the hold. It isn’t far. We need shelter, and I may be able to find something in Father’s writings.”

He led her forward, holding to her unsteady pace when he really wanted to scoop her into his arms and run. He had to keep her walking and thinking. If she kept talking to him, then he would know she was still with him.

“Walk, Elandra,” he commanded. “Walk faster. Keep your blood strong.”

Her feet moved slowly. After a moment, she glanced up at him. “Is there a healer nearby? A neighbor? Anyone who can be sent for?”

He frowned. It was as though she couldn’t comprehend that his home had been destroyed and all who lived there had died or been sold into slavery. The same had happened to neighboring holds. Whether anyone had returned or rebuilt, he did not know. But he would not deny her this small hope.

“Perhaps,” he said. “We will get shelter, and then we will see what can be done.”

His dagger lay on the ground at the edge of the clearing, its blade blackened. He hesitated over it, hating to be weaponless yet not certain whether it was tainted.

“Take it,” Elandra said faintly.

He bent and scooped it up, opening himself to sevaisin. There was death in the metal, nothing more. Relieved, he wiped it and put it back in his belt, then led Elandra on with a quick glance at the sky.

Beyond the clearing, the trees grew thick and tangled. Their boughs were turning white with snow, and the mist seemed to hang more thickly here, obscuring the way. Shouldering a path through,

Caelan pushed on at a steady pace, his face grim and set against the lash of snow.

When she stumbled, his arm tightened around her. “I am with you,” he said in reassurance. “I love you with all my heart and soul. I will find a way to save you.”

“Can you?” she asked, her voice dragging with weariness and pain. “I do not doubt your strength or your courage. I know you can do things most men cannot. But can you save me from this?”

He wanted to shout aloud in fear and frustration. He wanted to run with her for help, only there was no help to be found. For the first time in his life he regretted his expulsion from Rieschelhold. If he had stayed and become a healer, perhaps he would know what to do.

But if he had become a healer, he would never have met this woman who now meant everything to him.

I cannot lose her, he prayed. Please don’t take her from me.

“You are all I have,” she whispered. “I trust you, my love.”

A few minutes earlier, her admission of love would have filled him with joy. Now he could only grieve for her. But he had to stay in control of himself; he couldn’t bear for her to see the inadequacy and hopelessness he felt.

She had insisted he tell her only the truth, but he loved her enough to lie. “I will get it out,” he promised. “As soon as we have shelter from the wind spirits, I will find a way to save you.”

She gave him a tremulous smile. “Forgive me?”

Her plea nearly unmanned him. Raggedly, he said, “Why? What is there to forgive, my love?”

“I should have obeyed you—”

Without warning, she sagged against him.

Desperate not to let her fall, he tightened his hold. “Elandra? Elandra!”

He tipped back her lolling head, but her eyes were shut. Her face was as gray as death.

Frantic, he lowered her to the ground and knelt over her. For a moment time froze around him, and he could only stare. She looked so small, so still in her golden cloak and hood. He thought she was dead.

Pain lanced his heart, and he wanted to scream his denial to the heavens.

Then he pulled back her hood, releasing her hair, which tumbled out in a glorious mass. He touched her face. How cold it was, as cold as the snow falling on it, yet her flesh still had the resilience of life. He could feel the light, moist puff of her breath against his palm.

Air flowed suddenly back into his lungs. He sent up a quick prayer of relief and gathered her awkwardly into his arms.

Gloom was thickening beneath the trees. He hadn’t realized how fast night was coming. In Imperia, there were hours of twilight and long, splendid sunsets across the bay. He had forgotten how short were the days in Trau, how quick and final the night came.

As though in warning, the wind picked up and set the trees swaying. Their boughs whispered a sound that set the hairs on the back of his neck prickling. He stumbled forward, trying to hold onto the fading light by sheer willpower. There had to be time to reach shelter. There had to be.

It was snowing harder now, becoming a driving, stinging force at his back that whipped his cloak. The temperature was falling. Caelan’s breath streamed about his face, and he felt frozen to the bone. His cloak might be wool, but it was lightweight cloth, inadequate here. His years in warmer climates must have thinned his blood, for his hands and feet felt numb already despite the exercise. His face hurt from the cold. The air he breathed felt knife-sharp.

Do something, he told himself angrily. You fool, think of something to save her.

But fear made his wits fade. He could not think, could not find the answer. This was not something he could fight with strength and sword. All he had were his gifts of sevaisin and severance.

The venom must be spreading faster through her body than he expected. If she regained consciousness, she might not know him. Soon she would not remember she loved him. The darkness in her would spread until it consumed her.

Then she would be what Sien, Agel, Paz, and Kostimon had become, a servant of Beloth, turned into corruption, unable to find her way back to light.

If he severed her, it would kill her. What else could be done?

She lay heavy in his arms as he carried her, stumbling through the undergrowth, now and then breaking into a run only to slow down to a saner pace.

Time was against him now. If darkness fell before he found shelter, the wind spirits would kill them. For Elandra, that might be a mercy.

“No,” he said aloud, tipping back his head to gulp in more air. Then he began to trot, his panting hoarse in his ears.

“Hurry. Hurry.”

He found himself mumbling the word aloud, driving himself on the way Orlo used to drive him through his drills in the arena. He was strong and fast, former champion of the games. Now he was a soldier, the elite of Kostimon’s hand-picked Guard. He could save Elandra. He must save her.

It was nearly dark. The moaning shriek of the wind warned him that danger could strike at any moment, provided he didn’t freeze first.

He forced himself to keep going, to not surrender. Not yet, not until every drop of strength drained from his body, not until the wind spirits found them and shredded them to bits.

He had promised Elandra, promised her. He would not give up.

The ground dropped abruptly before him, and he went stumbling down an embankment before he could catch himself. He lost his footing and fell, dropping Elandra in the process, and skidded into a stream with a splash.

The water was so cold it burned. He floundered upright, cursing himself, and dragged himself from the water. Staggering like a drunken man, he found Elandra lying in the snow like a rag doll. It took him three tries before he managed to pick her up again.

When he straightened, he was hit by a gust of wind so strong it nearly knocked him over. For a wild second he thought he’d been attacked by a wind spirit, but it was only the storm, rising in force now as the blizzard came in. It hurled snow and stinging sleet into his face, pelting him without mercy. His wet clothing froze to his skin. He knew they were in grave danger. If he didn’t find shelter in the next few minutes, they would both die.

The emerald in his pocket grew suddenly warm. He reached into his pocket, thinking he could thaw his hand around the stone, and heard the rip of splitting cloth.

The stone fell to the ground with a thud, landing next to his foot. It had grown larger in that instant, and was glowing a bright green that cast an eerie lambent light over the snowy embankment and the dark ribbon of stream at its base.

Caelan stared at it, and some of his panic cleared momentarily. The stream ... the gully ... he must be near the ice cave where he and Lea had found the emeralds. While he would rather go to a different one, he had no time to be choosy. Also, it seemed his own stone was trying to help him.

He glanced around and turned north, hurrying along the bottom of the gully, splashing in and out of the shallow stream as he searched.

Minutes later, he found the mouth of the cave, halfway up the side of the slope. He paused there, his hand gripping the edge of the opening, and wondered if he had the courage to enter what must be Lea’s grave.

“Please,” he whispered aloud. “Ice spirits... earth spirits... take pity on me. Let me enter in peace.”

He sniffed for evidence of a lurker that might be using the cave as a den, but smelled nothing. Shouting, he picked up a chunk of ice and hurled it inside.

Nothing came leaping out.

It was safe, except for memories.

Right now, he couldn’t afford those.

He hurried back to where Elandra lay. Half-covered in snow, she hadn’t stirred at all. The emerald, so large now it would have to be carried with two hands, still cast its light over her like a protective shield.

He picked her up and lurched back to the cave, boosting her inside, then climbing in and pulling her deeper into its shelter. Lastly, he went scrambling back for the emerald.

It was too hot to hold. He jerked his fingers away, shaking them, and used the hem of his cloak to gather up the magical stone and carry it to the cave.

The light it cast turned the ice cave into an eerie place of strange angles and shadows. Caelan crawled down the long tunnel leading into the small cavern at the back.

Lea had once played here among the fanciful formations, imagining it to be her palace and assembling her dolls, bark cups, and playthings.

He saw one of the cups now, lying on its side on the ground. Breathlessly he picked it up, only to find it was brittle with age. It crumbled to dust in his fingers.

“Lea,” he whispered and had to choke back tears.

But it was Elandra he must care for now. He built a small fire and stripped off her wet gown to dry. Her cloak remained dry, and he wrapped her in it. A faint glow from inside her jewel pouch caught his attention. He upended it and shook out the topaz it contained. The jewel was glowing with a life of its own. It sent out golden light to mingle with the green coming from the emerald.

Not daring to touch her stone with his bare hands, Caelan used the pouch to pick it up. He placed it in her palm and folded her fingers around it, praying the magic in the topaz would work to counteract the darkness inside her.

She looked so pale, lying there. Her eyes were sunken and smudged with purple shadows. A tiny pulse at her temple told him she still lived. Now and then she frowned and jerked as though in pain. He wanted to cry out each time.

He felt so helpless, so ignorant. Again and again, he was tempted to sever her, but he dared not take the risk. No matter how much he needed to do something, his abilities were not the answer to this problem.

“Dear Gault,” he prayed, “have mercy on this woman. Give her strength to fight the darkness that assails her. Grant me the means with which to save her.”

He watched her while his wet clothes slowly dried over the tiny fire. Melting ice overhead dripped here and there, making him shift positions. Hunger he ignored. Exhaustion he ignored. He had to keep watch, as though by his will alone he could make Elandra better.

Finally he slept, only to awaken with a start deep in the night.

The fire had died out. It was bitterly cold. By the light of the glowing emerald and topaz he rekindled the fire, then crept over to Elandra. She felt very cold to his touch; only her hands were warm from the topaz she held. She still breathed, lightly but evenly.

He kissed her forehead and moved away from her. For now, he had done all he could for Elandra.

Another task lay before him. It was time to face it. Guilt, no matter how strongly deserved, was a burden that could grow too heavy for anyone to bear. It was time to hunt the ghosts and lay the memories to rest.

Turning away from Elandra, he lit a stick from the fire. Holding it aloft as a torch, he headed deeper into the cave, in search of his sister’s bones.

At the very rear of the cave, a folded curtain of stone hung from the ceiling. Some instinct made Caelan approach it. Putting out his hand, he curled his fingers around the edge of the curtain and found empty space behind it. A narrow fissure led into another room beyond the first.

This cave was sheathed in ice, as cold as the outdoors, and utterly silent as though no living thing had ever entered it. The moment he set foot in it, something began to glitter around him, like stars cast down from the night sky. They winked and twinkled from the ceiling overhead, from the ground before him, from the walls.

Raising his small torch higher in an effort to see, he realized that these were emeralds embedded in the ice. Polished and cut like fine jewels, they were reflecting back his torch.

They were too many to count. Dazzled by their beauty as well as by the wealth they represented, he stared at the sight for a moment. With these, he could buy an army of his own. He could buy the empire itself, if he chose.

When he realized what he was thinking, Caelan was flooded with shame. He bowed his head and cursed himself. How could he think of his own ambitions at a time like this? He might as well be a boy again, full of his own plans and tempted to steal his little sister’s emeralds to buy a commission in the army.

“No, Caelan.”

Startled, he glanced up and around but saw no one. He listened a moment. “Elandra?”

She did not respond.

He stepped back to the fissure and listened again, feeling he should return to her. She needed him by her side. He must not linger here.

Anxious now to finish his search, he crossed the icy cavern, trying to ignore the beauty of the emeralds as he sought evidence of his sister. Then the feeble torchlight fell upon a tiny mound of fabric.

Hurrying over to it, he crouched and picked up the red cloak that Lea had been wearing the last time he saw her.

Summer moths had eaten holes in it. A rodent had gnawed away one corner. It was covered with dust that floated in the air as he shook the cloth.

He half feared he would find her remains beneath the garment, but there was only the ice-encrusted floor.

Dropping the torch, he clutched the cloak in both hands, seeking answers to the questions that haunted him.

Had she stayed here in the cave as he had told her? Had she waited until she starved? Or had she ventured out, trying to follow the stream to E’raumhold? If so, why had she left her cloak behind? Where had she gone? What had become of her? Had her end been swift and merciful, or slow torture? At the end, had she still hoped he would return as promised? Or had she died knowing he betrayed her?

“Oh, Lea,” he whispered aloud, bending over the cloak. “I came back. I did keep my promise.”

Too late, said the guilt in his mind. Too late.

The scent of flowers filled the air, and suddenly the cave felt warm and almost pleasant.

“It is never too late, Caelan,” said a feminine voice. “Love is always in time.”

Startled, he looked up to find the cave filled with a clear, pale light. A slender maiden stood before him, gowned in pine green with a wreath of flowers entwined in her golden hair. A thick braid reached down over her left shoulder, the way his mother used to wear hers. Blue eyes, both merry and wise, twinkled at him.

“Welcome, dearest brother,” she said.

Still kneeling, he stared up at her, unable to speak, unable to think. Surely his hunger was making him see things.

“I am fourteen now,” she said and smiled so that her dimples appeared. “Am I not well grown? Do you think I am pretty?”

Then she came running to him and flung her arms around his neck. “Oh, Caelan, Caelan!” she cried, laughing and kissing his cheek over and over. “How glad I am that you have come home. I have missed you so much. I wanted you back here with me. I made you come.”

He could not understand it. He dared not believe it. And yet... “Lea,” he said, his voice choking as he hugged her back. She was real flesh and blood in his arms. He found himself in tears. “Dear gods, is it you?”

“Of course, silly.”

Pushing away from him, she threw back her head and laughed, then caught his hand and drew him to his feet. Now it was her turn to stare up at him. She did so, studying him hard from every angle.

“How big you are now. How broad your shoulders are. And you’re taller. But so am I!”

Laughing, she skipped away and twirled about the room until her gown belled around her ankles. Then she raced back up to him and gave him another hug around the waist.

“I am so happy now. Did I say how much I have missed you?”

He grabbed her by the arms to keep her from skipping away again. “Slow down, you minx,” he said, half laughing at her antics. It was as though the years had fallen away, and they were playing and tussling the way they used to. He had the urge to toss her high in the air and tickle her until she begged him to stop.

But she was too old for that. Why, she was grown, practically a woman now. He kept starting to say something to her, only to stop and stare, his breath forgotten in his throat, his words lost.

“Look at you,” he said at last. “How, Lea? How did you survive?”

“You told me to wait,” she said. “After a while, I couldn’t do that, but I came back every day to see if you’d kept your promise. And here you are! I knew you wouldn’t fail me. I wanted you to come back, and you have.”

Questions crowded his mind, too many to ask all at once. This was so hard to comprehend. He wanted to dance in joy, and yet he could not believe she was here or that she was really alive.

He pulled her near again, touching her face, tugging at her hair, entwining her fingers in his. They were long and tapered now instead of chubby and small.

“How?” he whispered, his amazement continuing to grow. “You must tell me how.”

“How I made you come back?”

He squeezed her hands in an effort to make her be serious. “No, how you lived after I abandoned you. Where did you go? Who looked after you?”

Her gaze swung away from his. “So many questions—”

“I must know!” he insisted. “I thought you were dead. All these years, I have blamed myself for abandoning you.”

“But you didn’t,” she said earnestly. “You had to help Father. I understand that now.”

“I couldn’t do anything to help him,” Caelan said bitterly, seeing the raid all over again. “I was a boy, without weapons, unable to fight properly. I should have stayed with you. Instead, I ran away and left you crying here in the cave.”

“I don’t cry now,” she said. “I’m too grown up.”

He choked and dropped to his knees before her. “Forgive me, Lea.”

“Hush, Caelan. Hush.” She touched his face with her hands, soothing away his distress. “Don’t be sad. I don’t blame you for anything.”

He kissed her hands, thankful for her mercy. “You were always of a good and generous heart, little one. I blamed myself.”

“I know,” she said, suddenly serious. “You have suffered dreadfully. If only I could have made you come back sooner, you wouldn’t have hurt so much. But I had to grow first. I had so much to learn.”

She sat down in front of him, tucking her gown around her feet as though she were impervious to the ice-cold floor. He noticed then that she wore the nine thumb-sized emeralds in a necklace around her slim throat. Many girls of marriageable age wore their dowries as necklaces. But who had made such a necklace for her? Who had taken her in and given her such fine clothing to wear? Who had cared for her?

“No questions,” she said, holding his large, callused hand in her slim one. “Not now. I promise we’ll talk of those things, Caelan, but later in a less important time.”

“But—”

“Hush,” she said, her blue eyes very serious now. “I must study you. There are things I must know, and I will learn them quicker this way than if we talk. Don’t close yourself to me. Please.”

Before he could speak, he felt her brush against his mind and riffle his thoughts. He felt her soul slip through his, leaving a refreshing sense of having dived into cool water on a hot summer’s day. He felt her sift through his past before he could stop her, then she was gone from him, separate, blinking in front of him, and looking a little pale.

“Oh, my,” she said breathlessly. “Oh, my.”

She knew it all, knew his failures, his moments of shame, his secrets. Just as she had always known them. It had never been easy to keep anything concealed from her. Now he suspected it might be impossible.

She turned his hand over in hers and stroked his palm with her fingertips. “So much blood,” she murmured. “So much killing. I can hear the death screams of countless men. Do they trouble your dreams?”

There was no point in lying. “Yes.”

“Have you taken enough lives to pay back the Fates for Father’s death?”

He squirmed uncomfortably. Lea went, as always, straight to the heart of the matter. “No,” he said after a moment. “That will never be erased.”

“Why do you blame yourself for Father’s death?” she asked.

He looked into her eyes for grief and found only clear-eyed concern for him in their depths. Sighing, Caelan said, “I don’t know. It’s been so long. It’s all confusion now.”

“Yes, you are confused. I thought you would have finished your lessons by now, but you haven’t. You are always so slow, Caelan.”

“What—”

She jumped to her feet. “Do you still have your emeralds? The ones we found here together? They were to be your talismans. Did you keep them or sell them for a sword?”

“Come and see.”

He took her back to the other cave, where the formations of stone hung twisted and folded as they had for all time, where his huge emerald still glowed beside the little fire, where Elandra lay caught in the dark spell that had captured her.

Lea gasped and shrank against him in unexpected shyness. “Who is she?”

“Her name is Elandra. She is our sovereign empress and the wife of Emperor Kostimon.”

“She is beautiful,” Lea whispered.

Joy swelled his heart. Lea’s approval meant everything. He hugged her and kissed the top of her head.

Lea pulled away from him. “Is she sleeping?”

“No,” Caelan said, his joy fading. “She is dying.”

“How?”

“A shyriea—a demon that flies and attacks like—”

“I know what it is,” Lea said.

He glanced at her in wonder, but asked no questions. “It bit her. The venom is poisoning her blood, turning her into the darkness. I fear—I fear she will change into—”

Lea turned and gripped his hand a moment. Her blue eyes met his, and they were direct, reassuring, and oddly mature. “Do not fear, Caelan. You have brought her into a place of protection, just as you brought me. No harm can befall her here.”

“But—”

She lifted a finger to her lips to silence him, then turned and knelt beside Elandra. With gentle hands she touched Elandra’s brow. Closing her eyes, Lea began to sing a low, wordless melody in a voice like gold.

It was like hearing his mother sing to him again at bedtime. Caelan turned away for a moment, overtaken by memories of gentle hands smoothing the bedclothes, of soft lips kissing his cheek, of the song lulling him into the warm caress of sleep.

Overcome, he found his throat choking up. In silence he fled, stooping through the tunnel to the mouth of the cave. Rushing outside, he stood in the gully, shielded a bit from the wind-whipped snow, and drew in rapid lungfuls of the frosty air.

Lea’s song made him think of purity, of kindness and peace, all the virtues, innocence and goodness. The notes of her music were being woven around Elandra, protecting and preserving her. But the song had driven him out, for he was tainted. Blood would forever stain his hands. Even if he lived as a hermit on a lonely rock for the rest of his days, he would never be able to purify himself.

Wrapping up in his cloak against the terrible cold, he stood shivering against the embankment, risking attack from the wind spirits, letting the harsh sleet rasp his face. Now and then when the wind lulled momentarily, he could hear a note or two of Lea’s singing. He wished she could sing such a song over him and wipe away his past, but he knew that was not possible. For Caelan could feel his future all the way to his bones. He thought of that moment when he had been linked together with Kostimon in Choven fire against the shyrieas; he thought of the various swords he had held and how some of them sang to him of battle and how others whispered combat secrets that no man knew to teach him. He had been made for war. Every muscle and sinew in his strong body had been forged for combat. He would fight again, and he would kill again. That he knew.

And therefore, Lea’s song of healing was not for him.

“Caelan?”

Her voice reached out softly to him from the cave.

Turning his head, he listened a moment, then climbed back inside. When he reached the women, he saw that the fire had gone out, yet light still glowed around Lea and Elandra. The little cavern was warm and comfortable. The scent of flowers seemed very strong. He could feel a presence with them that made his skin prickle uneasily, then it was gone.

Lea was smiling with her eyes closed. She still knelt there beside Elandra, and for an instant she seemed to fade and grow transparent. It was like looking at a ghost or a spirit.

Caelan’s heart fell within him. In an instant he understood that Lea was not real, was not alive as he had thought. The miracle of her survival had been only a dream. Yes, she was here, but as part of the spirit world, and that meant she was indeed dead and lost to him.