storm (91 page)

            “I can smell the future,” Caeru said.

            Velaxis stood behind the Tigrina and put his arms around him, pressing his hands against Caeru's stomach.  “You've lost less than you know,” he said.

Epilogue

Galhea looked as if it had been abandoned years before. 
Forever
had been ransacked, presumably by Teraghasts who'd returned to finish off any hara remaining in the area, but at least it was still standing.

            Cobweb walked with Snake through the house, and in every room a hundred memories assailed him.

            “It will be different,” Snake said.  “But that will not make it less than it was before.”

            Cobweb stood in the centre of the main living room, where all the long windows were shattered, and took Snake in his arms.  “Cobweb is dead,” he said sorrowfully.

            Snake kissed the top of his head: he was so much taller than Cobweb now.  “No, he isn't.  Far from it.”  He began to undo the braid of Cobweb's hair, pulling it out of confinement so it fell around them in a cloudy mass.  They shared breath in the dying light, leaves blowing in from the terrace around their feet.

            Swift and Seel came in from the garden; they'd wanted to spend some moments at Ithiel's grave, beneath the cedars by the lake.  Swift looked sombre, his eyes were wet.

            “So,” Cobweb said, pulling away from Snake.  “Dinner.  I'll go and see if Yarrow and Bryony have got the kitchen in any kind of order yet.  Swift, scour this house and the town beyond if necessary for alcohol, preferably sheh.  Tonight, we celebrate in the ruins.  We shout at the future.  You'd better be ready for it.”

            Swift smiled a little.  “I think I need to be drunk to see beyond the mess and imagine this as a home again.”

            “It will be,” Cobweb said.  “Knock down some walls.  Build others.  Let's change things we'd never have changed before.”

            “I like the idea of a converted attic,” Snake said.  “With roof lights to look at the stars.  We can sleep there.”

            “Good idea,” Cobweb said.  “We've never made use of the attics and they're huge.  We'll make new rooms.”

            Cobweb went to the kitchens, wishing he was as optimistic as he'd sounded.  In fact, the state of the house depressed him utterly.  When he looked at the stairs, in the main hallway, where shards of the fallen chandelier lurked dangerously amid the rubble, he saw Swift coming down to his Feybraiha celebration, so many years ago, a beautiful young har trembling at the brink of maturity.  In the kitchen, he saw Ithiel, leaning against the frame of the open back door, and the summer stableyard beyond.  When he laid eyes on Yarrow, helping his staff clean up, Cobweb saw a ghost of past festival preparations, pots bubbling on the range, the table piled high with food.  Bryony was a human girl again and somewhere upstairs, an interloping har named Cal took aruna with Terzian, who was hopelessly besotted.  Some things in the past it was better to forget.

            “Tonight, we all eat together,” Cobweb said to Bryony.  “All the staff, everyhar.  Do we have enough?”

            “Just about,” Bryony said.  “Yarrow had somehar go out to the fields and fetch a lamb.  It's quite big.”

            “Good.”

            Families were returning to the town, coming down from the cloud forests, and along the old roads that led to the sea.  When he went out into the garden, Cobweb saw the light of fires below the hill.  He heard voices singing.  And there were Moon and Tyson riding back from town up the long driveway; magnificent hara, the flowers of Galhea.  Ferany would not visit
Forever
for some time, Cobweb thought.  But what must be must be.  Not everyhar could have a happy ending.  This moved his thoughts to Azriel and Aleeme, who were still under Gelaming care, too sick to be moved via the otherlanes or overland.  For now, Cobweb had sent Aleeme's harling to Lisia, for if anyhar could help the wretched child, Lisia was the one.  They would have to wait and find out what Aleeme felt about the whole experience, but Cobweb himself was uncomfortable with the idea of a child of pelki being reared in his home.

            Cobweb waved to Moon and Tyson and went back into the house.  Snake was waiting for him.  “I watched you there outside,” he said.  “You needed time alone.”

            “We are never alone,” Cobweb said.  “This is something I've learned, and there are no benevolent angels or kindly gods to watch over us.  There is something else, and it's watching us through the tall grasses.”

            “We have dehara,” Snake said.  “We are not defenceless...”

            “That's true.  And we have Lileem.  One day...”

            “A parage I hope very much to meet in person,” Snake said.  “Tonight, I must dance.  I haven't danced in many years.”

            “We'll dance,” Cobweb said.  “We'll dance with dehara.”

            Arm in arm, they rejoined their family.  Outside, the fields spread out beneath the moon and the sky went on for ever.  The world looked just the same.

~ end ~