Changer of Days (14 page)

Kieran blinked, sure the firelight was playing tricks on his eyes; but when he looked again it was still there. “Where did you get this?” he demanded, uncoiling his body to reach for the Royal Seal of Roisinan, which hung from a Kheldrini chain.

As he straightened, al’Tamar’s eyes were calm. “When she left for Sheriha’drin,” he said steadily, “she left me this, to work into the
say’yin
I promised to make for her. Even then, she knew. She said she would be back for it…and I have worn her
say’yin
since the day I wrought it, so it will not be seen by unfit eyes until the day she chooses to reveal it. And perhaps it was this…” The golden eyes were mirrors, reflecting the flickering of the small fire. “I knew you were coming…although not why,” and he glanced back at the tent with sorrow eloquent in every line of his body, “I did not know she would need me…and yet I have been at the cliff since dawn, waiting for the traveller I knew must come.”

T
hey spoke no more of it, al’Tamar simply tucking away the
say’yin
with the Royal Seal. Kieran didn’t press the point. If half of what the young Khelsie—damn, but he could not cure himself of thinking of them in those terms—said was true, the Seal had in itself been a talisman, a little miracle; al’Tamar had shown himself a worthy guardian.

In some ways, the Kheldrini desert itself brought about a miracle of a different kind. Anghara was still not herself, not by a long way—there were hours, once an entire day, in which she seemed to dwell on some plane far removed from that of her companions. But here, in the red sand of the Kadun Khajir’i’id, she also spent far more time lucid and self-aware. How much of a blessing that was Kieran wasn’t altogether sure, because it was here in the desert that the memories of her greatest achievements rooted in Sight were closer and more able to torment her. But the desert itself seemed to offer her healing, as though it was something in the very air she breathed. With a dose of lais tea every night, even her sleep was more restful and restoring, untroubled by disturbing dreams. But that was al’Tamar’s responsibility, and Kieran, who after bringing Anghara to this place could do little more for her, felt increasingly superfluous. To his credit, al’Tamar tried to keep him involved—but when Anghara lapsed into some distant memory and began speaking in Kheldrini, there was little al’Tamar could do except offer apologetic looks to the burnouse-swathed outlaw from Roisinan, who was beginning to feel severely out of his depth.

Other than this, their journey across the desert was uneventful. When, finally, al’Tamar pointed at the palm shapes silhouetted against the desert sky and identified the hai’r as ai’Jihaar’s home, Kieran was assailed by conflicting feelings—relief, anticipation, apprehension, anxiety, even fear. This was the reason they had come, the guiding light which had pointed the way for so long; for Anghara’s sake, Kieran prayed her faith had been justified. The alternative didn’t bear thinking about.

But even here, at the harbor where Anghara could have expected her journey to end, it was not given to her to have smooth sailing. The small caravan was greeted by an old servant, who stood fierce guard at the firmly closed entrance to ai’Jihaar’s tent and refused to let them approach. There was a guttural exchange between her and al’Tamar. Kieran understood nothing, but there was palpable frustration in al’Tamar’s voice and from the way the old woman stood with her arms crossed across her chest and her feet planted sturdily apart it was apparently a stern denial of ai’Jihaar’s presence.

“What is it?” Kieran demanded at last during a lull in the conversation, when he could stand it no longer.

Unfastening his burnouse with an agitation Kieran had never yet seen in the self-possessed young man, al’Tamar turned toward him. “She says that ai’Jihaar has been very ill, she is finally resting…and this spavined daughter of a she
afrit
will not allow her mistress to be disturbed before sunset. If at all.”

He probably hadn’t meant to be humorous, but Kieran’s mouth quirked at al’Tamar’s trenchant characterization. But when Kieran met the implacable golden gaze of the old woman his amusement melted away as he mentally seconded al’Tamar’s description. He favored the old servant with a sour stare. “So what now?”

For a moment al’Tamar hesitated. “Al’haria,” he began, “is only a day or so from here…”

Kieran glanced at Anghara, who swayed unsteadily on her camel’s back, her eyes closed. He felt a wash of bitter disappointment. “Another day?” he demanded harshly. “Look at her! And what’s in Al’haria?”

“A
sen’thar
tower,” al’Tamar said. “One of the biggest. And there is…” His head suddenly came up and his face was a picture of an almost comical distress.
“Hai!”
he muttered, “ai’Farra is in Say’ar’dun…who is there to look to Anghara?”

He must have been broadcasting his frustration on a broad mental band; two things occurred simultaneously, almost before Anghara’s name faded from his lips. One was that Anghara herself sat up, her eyes flying open, and looked around in confusion as though reacting to an urgent summons; the other, that a weak voice which still somehow managed to remain peremptory called from inside the red tent. The old servant’s arms dropped to her side and her face set into a sort of sullen mask, but at this direct command she nevertheless stepped aside. In an instant al’Tamar was off his ki’thar and halfway to the tent. Even as Kieran made as if to follow the young Kheldrini paused at the tent-flap, turning his head.

“Wait,” he said, his eyes pleading but his voice nonetheless firm. “Wait here with her.”

This was not Kieran’s territory; already he was being excluded, gently but firmly. He had brought Anghara where she had needed to be, but in order for anything to come of this journey Kieran now had to hand her over to this land and its customs. Now, at the cusp, he was finding this harder than ever to accept. His jaw set, he slipped off his camel, helped Anghara off hers, and led her into the shadow of the palms beside the small pool of brown water. She went without demur, allowing herself to be led, like a child.

Like a child…

Ambushed once again by his own conflicting emotions Kieran sat her down in the shade and stood over her, staring down at her aristocratic profile, guarding her from dangers only vaguely grasped, far from sure he would be of use if anything assailed her. That which threatened her now, here, could probably not be turned aside by a well-wielded blade.

She had thrust back the burnouse and the dappled sunlight beneath the palm trees teased out bright gleams from her red-gold hair. It was in tangled disarray, and Kieran vividly remembered a time when he’d helped her comb out her damp mane when she was a little girl back in Cascin. He would have smiled had he known the same memory had caressed her on her first night in the desert all those years ago—had been, perhaps, the trigger which allowed her to become all that she was. But at this moment, gazing down at the girl who could not have looked less like a queen if she tried, his fingers itched for a comb he had once plied upon a little girl. He dropped into a crouch beside her, and she turned questioning wide gray eyes on him.

“Anghara…”

But al’Tamar, with an impeccable sense of timing, chose this moment to thrust open the tent flap and urgently beckon them into the tent. Kieran sighed resignedly and helped Anghara to her feet.

It was cool inside, and smelled not unpleasantly of incense and herbs—Kieran’s nose twitched at the familiar aroma of lais, combined with something different, a herb he didn’t know. Probably medicinal. The woman lying propped up on her bed of cushions and woven coverlets looked as if she needed all the help she could get, every bit as ill and drawn as her servant had intimated. She was shrunken, old, her arms thin and stick-like beneath their load of silver bracelets. Her blind eyes were filmed with white, but she seemed to focus unerringly at the spot where Anghara stood and held out her arms toward her.

“Oh, child…” The old woman’s voice was rich and tender, brimming with love and compassion. “What have they done to you?”

Kieran’s hand had still been cupped lightly around Anghara’s elbow, holding her arm as he had escorted her to the tent; she had accepted this passively, going where he led her as though she had been no more than a walking doll. Now, suddenly, she seemed to come to herself and tore away to fling herself into the old woman’s arms with a glad cry.

Kieran bit back a cry of his own, which was her name, and let her go.

He was still watching this reunion, feeling oddly bereft, when he felt a gentle tug at his own sleeve. “Come, let us leave them,” al’Tamar said. “If they should need us, they will call.”

“Will she be able…”

“I do not know,” said al’Tamar softly. “But let her try.”

Outside, golden eyes hooded against the bright sunlight, al’Tamar crouched in the shade to wait with all the patience native to his race. Kieran seemed to have lost every ounce of patience he had ever possessed. He restlessly paced the edge of the pool, repeatedly ran anxious fingers across the knots on the camels’ tethers, as if they were about to fall apart at his touch; then stood staring at the image of the sun in the still waters of the pool. The sun itself hung unmoving in the sky, as though time had stopped, and yet it seemed as though it was hours later that al’Tamar’s head suddenly came up, as though he had caught a scent in the wind. He hesitated, and then rose in one fluid motion. “I think we are wanted,” he said.

Kieran glanced between al’Tamar and the red tent, a little wildly. “How do you know?”

With maddening calmness, al’Tamar shrugged and said, “ai’Jihaar can be very imperious.”

Anghara was Kieran’s first thought; as the two young men ducked into the tent it was her that Kieran’s eyes sought. He saw her lying curled up amongst the jin’aaz silk cushions at ai’Jihaar’s feet, so still that for one terrifying moment he thought she was dead. But then he saw the rise and fall of her breast, the slight smile on her face that belied what looked like tear trails on her cheeks, and realized she was sleeping. More deeply than she had been able to do since her journey began, even counting the lais-induced slumbers here in the desert. This was healing sleep; flooded with feelings of relief and gratitude Kieran’s eyes left Anghara, after a last lingering caress, and sought the healer.

The old teacher, ai’Jihaar, looked more frail and exhausted than ever—and yet, at the same time, utterly implacable. Old steel, well forged. Kieran bowed to her with respect, even though she couldn’t see him.

“There is too much broken here. I am too weak to do alone what must be done,” ai’Jihaar said, one of her hands resting lovingly on Anghara’s bright head. “There are things in the tower I do not have here. And yet…I am loath to let her go into Al’haria alone, and I cannot travel with her…” She clicked her tongue against her teeth. “Well. They will just have to come to me. But after what little I have done I am so weak I cannot even call them…You will have to go to the tower, al’Tamar. Tell them…do not tell them too much. But tell them to get together the things that would be needed for a
mar ha’dayan.
There should be a pair of silk-seekers, with matching hurts. Bring a handful of
sen’en’thari.
No whites, this is far beyond them. Grays; strong grays. And…ai’Farra.”

“She is not there,” said al’Tamar, with the careful patience of one who has already apprised a forgetful convalescent of the facts and is resigned at having to repeat everything. “She has been in Say’ar’dun for the last month.”

“So you said. Forgive me,” ai’Jihaar’s lips thinned in self-reproach. “Tell my brother to send me the one who is in charge of the tower in her absence. I need the strongest the tower has. This is an emergency. You can tell al’Jezraal I said so; tell him I will not deprive Al’haria’s tower of its
sen’en’thari
for too long.”

After casting a long glance at Anghara, al’Tamar rose to his feet. “I go at once,” he said quietly.

Then ai’Jihaar seemed to recall something else, lifting her chin, she focused on al’Tamar’s face with filmed, blind eyes with an uncanny ability that made Kieran’s hackles rise. “Should you be here at all, al’Tamar?” she inquired with deceptive mildness.

Kieran had not thought that the bronze skins of Kheldrin would show a blush, but now he saw they did; al’Tamar’s cheeks glowed as though burnished as he hung his head. “Rami understands.”

“Does she, now? I hope so; I went to a lot of trouble to arrange that match,” ai’Jihaar said, and it was immediately obvious that she and the young man she was dressing down were related, even if it was only through the dry sense of humor they shared. “Give my greetings to ai’Ramia and her family…and, if it is necessary, you have my full permission to shift any guilt concerning your sudden absence from your own betrothal celebrations onto my shoulders.”

“That has already been done,” said al’Tamar, in all seriousness, “but yours were not the shoulders. Rami knows my allegiance is to al’Jezraal, that I go where he sends me.”

“And he sent you on a wild
shevah
chase into the Kadun, did he?” said ai’Jihaar, a shade maliciously.

“Not
shevah,
” al’Tamar countered steadily, lifting his head. “A queen
haval’la,
perhaps.”

Her blind eyes still focused precisely on his face, ai’Jihaar tilted her head thoughtfully. Then she lifted her hand, in blessing as much as farewell. “So,” she said, very softly, “Go to al’Jezraal, then; tell him you caught your queen, and she is sorely wounded. And then go back to Rami, al’Tamar. Find room in your heart for a
qu’mar’a
of this world.”

After a moment’s hesitation, as al’Tamar contented himself with a final long and painful look at Anghara’s face, he turned abruptly and ducked out of the tent.

Kieran followed him. The old servant was nowhere in sight. On his way to where his ki’thar stood tethered in the shade, al’Tamar paused by the edge of ai’Jihaar’s well to draw a gourd of water, offering it first to Kieran, a wordless acknowledgment of his presence; Kieran accepted it, took a sip, and passed it back.

“Who is she?” Kieran asked, his eyes drawn back to the tent as though magnetized. “She looks impossibly old…as if she’s well past her ninetieth year…”

For a brief moment al’Tamar permitted a smile to dance in his golden eyes. “We are a long-lived race.
An’sen’thar
ai’Jihaar has seen almost two hundred summers.”

Kieran, who had received the water gourd back for another sip, choked and went into a paroxysm of coughing. Quickly rescuing the gourd from spilling its contents onto the hungry sands, al’Tamar thumped Kieran on the back.

“She was Anghara’s teacher,” al’Tamar said. “She is the oldest of the
an’sen’en’thari,
and very wise. Anghara knew well where to seek for help. Only…” al’Tamar’s own glance kept sliding back to the tent. “I mislike this illness of ai’Jihaar’s. It would have been better if this matter had been kept from the tower—especially with ai’Farra not…” He paused, and his face twisted into an eloquent grimace. “There are…always politics,” he added.