Darkness Risen (The Ava'Lonan Herstories Book 4) (31 page)

Air
...! Screamed down her throat, and she
sucked in the tiny trickle, coughing.

“D-dirty sonuva...!” she gasped; he pulled her face
right up to the bars before she could finish her curse. They pressed painfully
into her jaw and cheek.

“I could grant you a quicker death than I’ve been
granted, little spy,” he sibilated, his accent dropping away like a shed
costume, “so watch what you say to a man who holds your life-” he gave a
meaningful squeeze, “- in his hand. Now, who are you, and what do you want
here?”

“I want - to offer - you - a-an alternative freedom
- to death,” she gurgled around his fingers and their meaningful flexing. Her
nails tore ineffectually at the flesh of his wrist. Her other arm, twisted in
his grip, felt as if it were being torn out by the roots.

“De hell, you say. An’ how you manage dat?” His eyes
glinted in the gloom behind the bars.

“Let - m-me go, an’ - I’ll tell you,” she said
tightly, gritting her teeth against anger and pain and tears when he squeezed
again and gave her another shake.

“An’ let dis opportunity slip tru meh fingahs?” he
laughed. “Why I’n wan’ do dah?”

“Be - cause, you - bastard of - a cock - k-kirobird,
that’s - what I was going to - offer - you - anyway,” she spat, “and I might -
just kill - you for - s-spite should you - refuse!”

The low gravelly laugh grated against her ears and
the garroting hand released her so suddenly that she jerked back. His other
hand kept a tight hold of her, though, and held her pinioned to the bars. She
coughed spasmodically, holding her throat, as her lungs tried to get used to
processing air again after what must have been a cycle-long famine. After a
while she was able to get it under control; she could feel welts begin to rise
on her neck.

“Listen well, ignorant wretch,” she said as calmly
as she could through the pain in her throat, as if she had not been an instant
away from death a moment before, and as if she had not been about to take him
to death with her. As if he did not twist her arm till the joint popped. “I
offer this. I need - a guide to the Ritious City. You need your freedom and a
way to escape. Do you see my purpose here?” Her voice was as thick and gravelly
as his. Another coughing fit tried to take her, but she forced it back.

He squinted disdainfully at her, as if he could
puzzle out her nature by looking at her hard enough. “An’ who you is, to be
able to offer, much less execute, such deliverance?”

“Does it matter? Either you believe me, and accept
my offer, or you don’t and we both sit here and wait for the guard to change.” She
twisted suddenly, the way she had been taught, directing pressure against his
thumb to break his grip. But he was a trained warru; he felt her shift and
released her as she twisted; she spun almost completely around and fell on her
face. The laugh echoed around her - and her rage, waiting, moved eagerly
against its cage of will to get at the man who had caused its arousal. She
moved out of range of his long arms, seething inside. One turn, when all of
this was over, there would be a reckoning between them.

“So, let’s hear your plan, mamma dah,” the man in
the cell said, leaning against the bars. Silonyi let the insult pass. All would
be repaid in time.

“You tell me what we need to travel; I’ll get
everything together and have it ready. I’ll bring you better food, get you Av’light,
and get you out at the appointed time. I know a way out of here.”

“You do not bargain very subtly,” he rasped. “
We
need many things. I need sandals, and a dom’ma. We need food for five turns,
hunting knives, a desi each, money, a map, a compass, bow and arrows, two clean
de’siki and kwats each, a whet stone, a rain do’ko each, an extra pair of
traveling sandals each. Comb, brush, yajgo root. Two spear heads. An herb and
medicine kit.”

Silonyi made the list in her head. Most of those
things would not be too hard to get. Swallowing her anger, but not her hurt
pride, she pushed the basket of food she had brought closer to the cell, but
just outside his arm’s range, so he had to really reach for it. She watched him
strain to get it, malicious glee making up in some small part for the anger he
had caused. His need was gratifying to watch, and he finally hooked it with his
fingertips and pulled it in eagerly. She then expected him to gulp it down, but
he ate slowly, washing each bite down with water. Satisfied for the moment with
her slight revenge, she looked at him critically.

“You’ve been here a long time,” she said quietly,
conscious that time was passing and she needed to go soon. “Can you travel? Your
legs look weak.”

“They are,” he admitted. “But you get me out of
here, and I’ll keep up. I know some exercises that don’t look like exercise. And
you, soft, high-bred thing that you are, can
you
keep up?”

Silonyi scowled. “Better than you, old man,” she
retorted. He snorted and finished the food, started to push the basket back to
her. She shook her head, motioned for him to break it up and add it to his
bedding. “Now, I can get the things we need to travel, and hide them,” she said
coldly. “But food and Av’light are harder. To get you the light of Av, and more
than one meal each turn, I’d have to come in the morn time, and the guards are
more alert then. Do you have any ideas?”

“First, when are we leaving?”

“In five turns, on the first turn of the De’en’nu
Festival,” she replied.

“By the Goddesses’s hands,” he breathed, sitting
back. “I’ve been here that long.” It was not a question. He stared at the wall.
Silonyi waited impatiently for him to come out of  his reverie. She could hear
the guards shuffling around beyond the hall of cells.

“How did you get in just now?” he said suddenly.

“I played a little mind trick on the guard. But that
probably won’t work again, and not in morn time. The guards are so rite-bound
most tampering won’t work, and what does work leaves a trace. Do you have any
ideas?”

He looked at her with dark, speculative eyes. “Let
me think on it. Come back at mid after-zen’s turning and I will have thought of
a way by then.”

“And if you haven’t? How will you let me know?”

“If you can see and hear me from where you are
coming from, I will begin to thrash in sequences of 3-2-3-5, and I will moan
the adu’una tuku pattern as if delirious. If you see and hear that, then I have
thought of a way and you get ready to do that trick you pulled last time. If
not, return this time tomorrow’s eve, and we will come up with something.”

“Then – you agree?” Silonyi cocked an ear and tasted
the air vibrations. The guards were near completion of their rounds and her
rited dupe would soon be relieved.

“Yes,” he said, his eyes dark and bright in the
gloom.

“Then let us make it binding,” she said, moving
closer again. “I give oath to get you sustenance and Av’light and egress from
captivity and what protection I may from recapture if you will guide me to the
Ritious City; or release through death if you so desire it.” She held up her
hand.

“I give oath to guide you to the Ritious City and
give you what protection I can along the way in return for deliverance from
captivity. I will not abandon you along the way or turn you over to any who
might come after you.” He grasped her hand and the binding was complete. His
grasp, as when about her neck, was strong, firm, almost bruising. He looked
directly into her eyes and a mutual fire met with their matched gazes - this
would not be an easy partnership.

They pulled away as if burned by the other. Silonyi
turned to go - she had spent too much time here already.

CHAPTER
XVII

the darkness turned...

The
Temple of Ya’kano was large and silent. Jeliya yawned and yearned for sleep.

She
had awakened reluctantly, after being removed from the field of challenge. The
healing sleep had not been nearly long enough, and she had actually slept past
Av’set, only coming to consciousness under the proddings of an ol’bey’one. They
had stuffed her as much as they dared and bathed her in her own bath-pool. Then
the Priestesses had apologetically bundled her in the ceremonial vigil robe and
helped her to the ante-lain of the , to perform the preliminary Rites. The
Rites of Purification that were needed this eve had been long and arduous, and
unfortunately, tiring. Praying before Ya’kano, this time, required a purity not
just of body and mind, but of spirit and pay’ta, to match the purity she had to
bring within each diamond. By the end of it she was drooping again, but strong
tea and pure determination kept her awake and chanting her mantras.

“Goddesses,
Reveal unto me,

By candle-light
and Av’in tame

Through the soul’s
pane and spirit’s frame

That which would
be hallowed by thy Name

As pure as star’s
dust

As clear as
child’s trust

By av’rita, what
will be must!”

The candlelight flickered before Jeliya, mesmerizing
her as she fought sleep, picking up another diamond and reciting the mantra.

This is my last eve of vigil,
she kept
reminding herself.
But how will I make it through the last of the trials?
The thought made her want to weep. The path of a thousand paces, the final
battle at the end - she did not even want to think about them.
I am worn
down to a thread. And there will be no help, this time.

And then there was the veiled concern that everyone
around her tried so hard and did such a poor job of hiding - it made her want
to shake them all until their teeth rattled. What were they so concerned about?

Besides the obvious?
But her
weakness was not the root of it.
Why don’t they just come out and tell me?
Is it what Otaga mentioned, my fitness to rule? Is it my reticence to talk
about Gavaron? Or my behavior when they first found me? Or something else
entirely?
Did they sense that she had changed in some indefinable way, that
now made her alien to them? For she knew that she had changed, as sand changes
to glass, and she could never again go back to what she once was.

Can I even make them understand? But I will have to
deal with them later.

Her knees ached despite the thick cushion beneath
her - which was good, in a way, for the pain helped her stay awake...

...He held her, kissed her everywhere - everywhere.
He held her and he was fully wuman, his mouth hot and rapacious over her body,
questing, savoring, devouring. She arched and low moans quivered from her belly
and stuck in her throat, pouring out with each delicious sensation he wrought
from her. Then finally he lowered her and she was slowly impaled by him,
sweetly cloven, slowly tortured with pleasure. She writhed, with ecstasy rather
than pain, her cries echoing around her before they were swallowed by his
ravaging mouth...

Jeliya jerked awake and shook herself from fading
echoes of ecstasy, and - was it fading echoes of him? Had he touched her
through her subconscious?

She pushed the thoughts away, picked up a diamond
and said the mantra. She leaned forward, touched her forehead to the ground in
a request for forgiveness, then she settled back to continue her vigil, picking
up another diamond. She said her mantra again, though by now the words had lost
all meaning. The temple of Ya’kano in which she knelt seemed large and empty
and slightly chilly. The eve seemed interminable. Her fatigue tried to get the
best of her.

This was supposed to be the time of revelation, of
visions, but nothing save half-lit dreams had come to her. She suppressed a
sigh and twitched her ceremonial robe a little closer to her body, picked up
another diamond. The continuous playing of the eve tuku did not help either, even
though it played a simple rhythm of praise to Ya’kano instead of the more
lulling tribilan, the rhythm of sleep that could be heard anywhere in the Realm
in the fifth san’chron passed Av’set. The tuku was always played, continuously,
always in the background. Any time of the turn, if one turned one’s attention
to it, the tuku could be heard somewhere. Jeliya remembered how she had missed
the sound of the tuku in the wilderness. Oh, but the beat of Gavaron’s heart
made up for it. Thinking about it now made her shiver.

She shivered again, not from memory. The Temple had
grown colder, a cold that seeped into her bones and chilled her from the inside
out. It was almost like the time she had gone into lor’den...

...Cold - then a warmth enfolded her, and she
snuggled as close to it as she could get, working her way out of the
confounding desi that separated her from the warmth. The warmth sustained her
til the light and heat of morn finally broke upon the edge of the world. Then
she was lifted and carried out into the light of Av, and the warmth remained
with her as she performed the Rite of Solu. It seemed right that this should be
so, that the warm presence hold her close in this most intimate of communions,
so that as the light filled her and transformed her, the presence transformed
also and shared in her partaking of the blessing of Av. She turned and embraced
the presence,
him
,
and they mixed and mingled - which, before had seemed to be wrong, taboo, but
was right because he had enough of
lor, the glowing darkness, to keep
from being lost within her. That was the way things were supposed to be. That
was the way things were before the coming of the Tru’Av’ru, when men were as
strong in the Loro and Dio ritas as the women were in the Ava and Chia ritas.
At that time women and men had shared a communion of all ritas and knew utter
completion. That’s the way things would be again, after the Turo’dan. That’s
the way things were always meant to be...

Jeliya gasped as she came out of the revelation, and
tears filled her eyes. She remembered. She remembered now how she overcame the
lor’den, and what had followed. Gavaron had been caught in her Rite of Solu
with her, and had survived, just as he had survived with Jenikia. That was
where the second link to him had come from. But - but it was right, it was
supposed to be that way. She had not damned herself with the Solu’san as the
two fabled lovers, Jenisa and Darmad, had. She had not overpowered his
personality, nor engulfed him so that he became lost in her light. His Lora’Lona
heritage had saved him.

Jeliya shuddered with shock, now wide awake, her
eyes brimming though she could not tell exactly why. She could accept it now,
the act that, with anyone else, would have been the Solu’san, where she could
not before. But what did it really mean? Was it bound up in the completion of
unification that her mother was telling her about? And how would it affect
things to come?

The Temple was no longer so cold. Jeliya emptied her
mind and did another round of mantras on the diamonds. It was too much to try
to think about right then. The Priestesses of Ya’kano had advised her to let
the revelations come, to leave their analysis for later. The disturbing
thoughts went away obediently, which was surprising, and again the peace of eve
invaded her.

...Something stalked her, something dim and blurred
and almost undetectable, almost not there. Almost.

She
froze and listened with all that she was, listening with her feet for the
slightest vibration through the ground, listened with her skin for the tiniest movement
of air...

There. And there. There. There were too many,
certainly to fight, perhaps even to out-run. She had no more weapons save the
earth, very little strength left, and no time. She knew she would not survive.
Unless...

The
first attacked. She deflected, defended, did not trust her eyes to try and get
a hold of the thing. It reeked like something dead. She managed to get a grip
on its head and its neck snapped like a rotten branch.

Then
the next surged forward, and it was even stronger than the last - they seemed
to get stronger every time she killed one, more canny, smarter. She killed it
with a spear of stone as it scrabbled her chest and she just held it at bay.

Was
it her chest? Or someone else’s, someone...

The
third, fourth and fifth of the creatures to find her also died beneath powerful
hands, but each was harder to kill than the next. The sixth stalked her - was
it her? Either she - or he - was getting weaker, or they were getting
exponentially stronger, or both. She - or was it he? - struggled with the sixth
for a long torturous moment, before he was able to stun it with a blow to its
blurring head, then spin and kick it into the next life. The seventh, eighth
and ninth all attacked at the same time, and he went down. He reached...

Jeliya sat bolt upright with a scream, clutching her
side, in pain but not in pain, the fading echo of dream-agony lancing through
her with ghost-like fingers of blades. She moaned, knowing and not quite
knowing what had happened.

It was Gavaron. He was somewhere, hurt, and he had
reached for her.

Hands touched her and voices rang around her, but
she ignored them, closing her eyes and reaching to catch the last wisping
strands of his call; for he was far away, and weak. Desperation had given him
the strength to touch her this once. But the dispersing taste of him vanished
even as she traced it. Moaning in anguish, she poured more of her av’rita and
her strength into her questing, without the use or need of a formal Rite of
Finding. She poured it into the vinculum between them, ruthlessly spending
herself to catch hold of his receding consciousness.

Obstacles tried to hinder her. Not even wondering
where they had come from, she brushed past them without a second thought, with
a determination and a will that only a Jur’Av’chi’n could exert, striving to
follow his cooling trail along the constricting link. If she did not catch up
to him, then forcing the link open on her own would leave nothing for her to
act with - if she could follow the places where he had widened it in reaching
for her, then she would not have to completely drain herself getting to where
he was.

Then suddenly a new strength buoyed her up and sped
her along after him, on the wings of a shaped and powerful rite. She would have
wept, but her body was far behind; she could tell now that what carried her was
a rite of seeking, in which she was a conscious part, the part that would
identify the target and make the connection.

Over a vast distance it took her, farther than she
herself had ever sought before. Time meant nothing. Distance did, though, and
she absently wondered where and who was giving such strength - her mother,
perhaps...?

Contact! She clutched at him, and he answered
weakly, whispering a tiny joy to feel her with him even as blows fell upon his
body. She reached out a hand, almost physical and not purely mental, and he
took it. His ‘rita was low, but he had enough for what she was about to try, a
feat that in any other circumstances she would not try to do, even with all the
Realm backing her. She shaped the av’tun for him, using part of the rite of
seeking, part of their link and part of her love, so that only he would be
admitted, and not his attackers; and she tied her av’rita and the borrowed
strength of the others supporting her into it. She positioned it under him and
pulled, and all he had to do was fall. The end she collapsed in after him,
again pulling the dangerous trick of feeding the energy back into what
remained. But she was totally sure of what she was doing, totally sure that it
would work. Never had doubt entered her mind. Even without the support of the
others, she would have done it. Anything to save him. When the reverse was
true, he had found the strength to save her.

Back, back and back she pulled him, back to where
her body lay in wait-