Echoes of the Goddess: Tales of Terror and Wonder from the End of Time (31 page)

Lady Nestra leaned low, watching intently as the mass of dust became a solid disc. Now the bright fluid swirled around it, like clouds around the eye of a storm.

She spoke words in a secret tongue, and points of light appeared in the dark circle. She spoke again, and they were stars, and she was looking through the silver bowl into the night sky.

Something was moving there, in the darkness. Wings passed before the stars, and something darker than the sky took shape, a great bird flapping slowly across the star field.

“I am here,” Lady Nestra whispered. “If you are the one I seek, come to me.”

The thing came. For an instant she shared its vision, and saw Ai Hanlo whirling, rushing up at her, and she recognized the wall of the Inner City and the great, golden dome of the Guardian’s palace. Then the view narrowed, and the bird was hovering outside a shuttered window, above a small garden.

She looked up and listened to the wings flapping and scratching against the shuttered window of her room. But she did not rise from where she sat by the table.

A voice came from without, first a confused babbling, like some animal’s attempt to imitate human speech. Then the voice softened, and said very distinctly, “Beloved.” And finally it said, “Dearest Nestra, it is I, Caradhas.”

She peered into the bowl once more. The bird was still there, but it drew nearer, and she could see that it had the face of a young man with pale skin and dark hair. It was the face of Caradhas.

Therefore she got up, taking the bowl in her hands with desperate care. Still the wings scraped and fluttered outside the window.

“Now guide me,” she said, speaking into the bowl.

Behind her, metal creaked. She turned around suddenly, the gasped with terror, afraid she had spilled the contents of the bowl. But the image merely rippled.

She looked for the source of the sound and saw a tapestry billowing in the darkness from a draft, pressing against her husband’s armor where it stood in a corner. The sword scraped against the thigh piece.

For an instant she had hoped—

But that was not the way of this magic. In the bowl, the bird was rising out of the garden outside her window, drifting on the air over the roofs and battlements and tangled lanes of the holy city.

“Rilla, come here at once.”

The maid re-entered, reverent with awe when she saw her mistress standing there with the glowing bowl.

“Lady?”

“Did you hear it? At the window?”

“No, Lady. Nothing.”

“But I heard it,” said Nestra. “We must go. I am sure this time.”

The maid reached for the black cloak Nestra always wore, but her mistress shook her head and indicated another which hung on the peg beside the black one, but was never worn. It was blue and red, embroidered in threads of many colors against the background of a gold circle, showing the double aspect of the Goddess, bright and dark, one figure astride a dolphin, with the sun in her hand, and the other holding a tree and wearing a crown of stars. It was the cloak her husband had worn to the battle of the Heshite Plain.

Rilla led her mistress out of her room, gently guiding her by the arm down a flight of stairs, across a common hall where a few late diners and their servants looked on in silence as Nestra passed with the bowl of Seeing, and out into the night. All the while the Lady never took her eyes off the image, but merely described what she saw to her maid, and allowed herself to be led. When they came to the gate leading out of the inner city, into the lower or outer city, the guards there did not question her, for they saw the bowl and recognized that this thing was of the Goddess.

Nestra followed the bird, and was led by Rilla, through many districts where few ladies would venture alone at night, but they were not molested. So, in time, she came to the wagon of the Shaper of Animals. She paused then, and the image of the bird suddenly vanished. The bowl shone with pure white light, brighter than a lantern. All around, campfires burned low and wagons and tents were dark. Loud snoring came from a window overlooking the yard. Farther away, a dog barked.

The Shaper’s wagon was dark and silent, but she approached it confidently, her footsteps scraping gently on the paving stones. It was only as she placed her foot on the first of three steps below the door that lights came on in the windows, slowly, like the opening eyes of a great beast lazily rousing itself from sleep.

Rilla gave a little cry and shrank back.

“If you wish to wait outside, you may,” Nestra said. The door of the wagon swung slowly outward of its own accord. She entered, holding the bowl gingerly. She was not aware of her maid following her.

The inside of the wagon seemed far larger than the outside, half-illuminated by the light from her bowl. Shadows flickered. She had the impression of a deep forest and of thick vines and leaves that gleamed with a touch of gold, but her eyes somehow couldn’t define anything. The whole place was like a rippling reflection by moonlight, and again, it seemed alive, as if every part were an outgrowth of every other part; and the very darkness sighed and shifted.

She turned to her left, then to her right, trying to see by the light of her bowl. Then a lamp rose in the center of the room, seeming to float in the air. It was a heavy, silver thing, like the head of a horse, open-mouthed, with fire in its teeth. By this light she saw, in the back of the wagon, shelves of bottles with things floating in them, but she had no chance to examine them closely.

The Shaper of Animals stood up in the darkness, behind the horse-head lamp. His face was long and pale, his beard silver, and he wore a silver robe; but his huge, hunched shoulders were not like those of a man, and he did not move as a man would on two legs. Beyond that, Nestra could not define his strangeness. When he shifted his great bulk, there was a sound half like leaves rustling, half like the tinkling of coins.

“You are the Lady Nestra, wife of the Lord Caradhas,” the Shaper said in a gentle voice.

“I am.”

“Give me the bowl.”

She gave it to him, then tried to snatch it back.

“Wait!”

He ignored her and calmly raised the bowl to his lips. She watched bewildered as he slowly drank the contents. After a long, silent pause, he handed the bowl back to her.

“You do not need this anymore,” he said. “It has served its purpose.”

“I saw in it—”

“You saw in it what you wished to see, what you needed with the deepest yearnings of your heart to see. Therefore you have come to me, for it is my profession to provide people with what they truly want.”

She swayed. She thought she might faint. He motioned her to a chair. She hadn’t noticed any chair before, but there was one. She sat, nervously running her hands over the armrests. They felt like mere polished wood.

“
Can it be?
Truly?” She could not find the words to say any more, for all her mind screamed her husband’s name. She sat there, trembling, drenched in cold sweat.

“Lady, by my art I shape animals, causing each one to be the perfect companion for each individual person. Each of my creations is unique, as each customer is.”

She stiffened. “A pet? You mean the perfect lapdog? I don’t need a
pet
.” She put up a brave front, but she was more frightened than angry.

He spoke to her soothingly, like a parent to a pouting child. “I assure you, Lady. It will be far more than a pet. Consider this: you peered into the night with your magic, seeking the one thing which might end your sorrow, and you found me. Has your magic, which is of the Goddess, misled you?”

“It cannot,” she said weakly.

“Then it is more than a pet I offer you.”

She took off three rings from her fingers and tossed them toward the Shaper. She didn’t hear them hit the floor.

“You require a fee. Will these do?” He did not even glance down.

“As you say, Lady.”

“Very well then. Perform your art.”

He looked at her. Their eyes met, and for an instant she felt utterly naked before him, as if he could see everything that was in her mind, and understood her innermost fears and desires more than she did. She had never felt so helpless, not even on that first day, when her husband’s horse had come back riderless. She covered her face with her hand and leaned forward, weeping, almost tumbling out of the chair.

“Perform your art!”

“Lady, I have performed it.”

Something fluttered faintly. She looked up. The Shaper was before her, holding a cage covered with black cloth.

“Take this,” he said, guiding her hand as her fingers grasped the silver handle. “In three nights, sorrow no more. But, whatever else you do, never remove the cloth before the time, nor allow anyone else to remove it, even for an instant.”

She hefted the cage. Whatever was inside weighed no more than a few ounces. Something hopped and, again, fluttered. She was sure it was a bird. But it made a sound that was not at all birdlike, more like a child humming.

“Do you understand my instructions, Lady?”

“Yes.”

“Go then, and may you find peace.”

She left, and as soon as her foot was off the bottom step outside, all the windows of the wagon faded into darkness. Rilla was waiting for her. Without a word, she handed the silver bowl to the maid and covered the cage with her husband’s cloak. She and Rilla made their way through the empty streets to the gate of the inner city, where they were once more allowed to pass without question.

It was the hour before dawn.

* * * *

When she reached her chamber, Lady Nestra carefully placed the covered cage on the table, then fell down exhausted and slept through the day. She dreamed of her husband then. She saw him as he had been on the day he rode to his death, tall in his gleaming armor, mounted on a white stallion, alternately waving to her and giving orders to the troops, while pennons flapped around him and a crowd of the common people shouted his name. She had been so proud that day as she stood on a little balcony above the crowd, in view of all, the greatest lady of the land.

Now the whole scene was repeated in her dream, so vividly that she could feel the sun through her heavy, stiff garments and smell the sweat of the horses and the dust rising in the air. But the sounds faded suddenly, as the sounds of revelry from within a tavern fade when the shutters are closed. Pennons continued to flap, but their motion was as silent as the drifting of clouds. The voices of the people were no more than a faint murmur on the wind.

It was then that Caradhas turned around in his saddle and said, “Wait for me but a little longer.”

She awoke with a cry. Rilla was standing over her. She bade the servant sit beside her on the bed, and the two women embraced. Nestra wept, and haltingly told of what she had dreamed.

“Wait for me but a little longer,”
came the voice again. Nestra screamed, broke free of Rilla’s arms, and searched about the room frantically, pulling side curtains and tapestries, opening closets and trunks. She had heard the voice clearly and distinctly, and she knew she was no longer dreaming.

Then she stared at the covered cage atop the marble table, and stood still, covering her mouth with her hand.

“Lady?” said Rilla. “What is it? Are you well?”

“Didn’t you
hear
it?”

“No, Lady. I heard nothing.”

And Lady Nestra replied, in the same tone she had used before, “This thing is not for you.”

Rilla got up and reached for the cloth covering of the cage.

“
Do not!
Upon your life, do not touch it!”

The maid drew away, as if she had been reaching for a cobra. “Shall I leave you, Lady?”

“No,” Nestra said gently. “I do not mean to be harsh. I am not angry with you. Come here and sit with me for a while. My husband is coming back. It is the excitement. It sets me on edge. He is coming soon.”

“As you say, Lady.”

* * * *

Throughout the rest of the day and into the evening, Lady Nestra directed Rilla and her other servants to make the chamber ready. What had been plain before was now gorgeously ornamented. Rare tapestries were hung. The finest carpets covered the floor. The white marble table had been replaced by one of porphyry, and on it was placed a decanter of the finest wine, and two cups. The cage remained, covered with black cloth.

And Lady Nestra still wore the black gown of mourning.

“I will change it when he comes,” she said.

Her servants answered politely when she addressed them, but otherwise retreated into their work. She could tell they all thought her mad. She laughed aloud at the thought, then sobbed as she felt a pang of doubt. Rilla turned to her, alarmed. Nestra sat down on the bed and sighed.

“I am not completely unhinged yet. Be patient with me.”

“Yes, Lady.”

The whole matter did not bear close examination. All this was because of a dream, a voice, and something in a cage, which she had not seen—

She put the thought aside, forcing herself to hope. Around her, the servants steadfastly ignored her laughter, her tears, and then her silence.