The Children of the White Lions: Volume 02 - Prophecy (41 page)

Sabine nodded silently. Both orbs hung low in the sky, shining through the mist, lustrous halos of faint rainbows surrounding them.

He continued, “When I was little, Mother used to sit with us outside at night. We’d all stare at the sky and she’d point out the constellations, tell us their names.”

A wistful smile graced Sabine’s lips.

“My mother did the same with me.”

The quiet returned.

After a few moments, Nikalys said softly, “I never said anything to Mother, but staring up there, at the moons and stars…I always felt a little uneasy.”

“Why?”

“I could not tell you,” whispered Nikalys. “Then or now.” He paused a moment. When he resumed speaking, his voice had changed. A note of caution had slipped into his tone. “I will never deny the beauty of the night sky, but something about it scares me. I want to turn away as much as I want to stare.”

Sabine’s eyes narrowed.

“You aren’t talking about the sky, are you?”

There was a long pause before he muttered, “No.”

Sabine pressed her lips together and, before she lost her nerve, spoke in a firm and quiet tone.

“I have feelings for you.”

She continued to stare out the window, mildly upset with herself. She could face a horde of oligurts rushing up a hill, yet a conversation with a man rattled her.

She heard—and felt on the nape of her neck—a heavy sigh.

“Sabine, I—”

“I am going to say what I must, Nikalys. Do not try to shush me.”

He drew a breath to respond, paused a moment, and then exhaled.

“Go on, then.”

Nodding firmly, Sabine said, “To be clear, Nikalys Isaac, you do not get to tell me how to feel or what I want. Jak is a good man. A very good man.”

“Yes, he is, which is why it would be best—”

“Stop right there. If you say ‘he can have me’ again, you will be sporting a black eye on your voyage.”

“I wasn’t going—”

“Let me finish!”

A quick, exasperated sigh slipped from Nikalys, yet he remained quiet.

“Now,” began Sabine. “For all the wondrous qualities your brother possesses, he lacks one very important one: he is not you.” Her voice dropped to whisper. “The day my father died, you were the one who rushed to my rescue, without any thought of your own safety. I will
never
forget what you did for me and Helene that day, Nikalys.
Never
.”

“Jak helped, too.”

“But you were the first one down that hill.”

“Jak was right behind me.”

“Blast it, Nik! Stop it! Stop trying to sell me your brother like he’s a charm at a market!” She gave a short shake of her head, took a steadying breath, and continued. “You have feelings for me, do you not?”

She paused for a breath, giving him the chance to deny. He did not.

“And something more than duty—or your concern for Jak’s feelings—is holding you back. Am I right?”

She hesitated again, hoping that, this time, he might say something. Yet only silence greeted her plea.

Pressing her lips together, she nodded, and said, “Fine. Hold your tongue.” She tried not to be angry, knowing she would regret it, but some heat slipped into her tone. “But think about what I’ve said while you’re gone. I expect you’ll have plenty of time to do so starting tomorrow.”

She was not expecting Nikalys’ response: a soft, bemused chuckle. The quiet laugh washed away her anger and broke her resolve. She could hear his smile and had to see it. Whirling around, she stared up into his eyes, glinting in the moonlight. The slight, lopsided smile she had imagined rested on his lips, kind and gentle. A half-dozen other emotions muddied his amusement, however. Sadness. Guilt. Hope. Happiness. Affection. Worry.

On pure, sudden impulse, Sabine took a step forward, stood on her tiptoes, and kissed him lightly on the cheek. It felt natural to do, up until the moment her lips brushed his skin. Nikalys froze at her touch, flinching ever so slightly. Panic rushed though Sabine and she immediately withdrew.

“I’m sorry. I…I shouldn’t have done that.”

He stared at her with an honest, stunned expression, seemingly at a loss for words.

Pushing her embarrassment deep inside, she summoned forth a bit of cool calmness and looked him steadily in the eyes. Pretending the past few moments had not occurred, she said in an almost-formal tone, “Please do not forget to say goodbye to Helene in the morning.”

After a moment, Nikalys mumbled, “Of…of course.”

With a prim, curt nod, Sabine said, “Good.” She needed to get out of here. Sweeping past him, she hurried to the door.

“Sabine?”

A flicker of hope dashing through her, she turned around and stared, a tiny smile gracing her lips.

“Yes?”

Nikalys pointed at her.

“You still have my blanket.”

Sabine gaped at him for a moment before her eyes narrowed to a pair of thin slits. A single, whispered word slipped from her lips.

“Unbelievable.”

With a short huff, she released the blanket and let it drop to the floor. Spinning around, she grabbed the door’s rope handle and pulled. She hurried down the hallway and never looked back. As she reached the top of the stairs, she heard a soft rattle as his door closed. She rushed down the stairs quickly, a scowl on her face. She should have stayed in her room.

17
^th
of the Turn of Luraana, 4999

The cart hit a hole, jostling Nimar sideways, into the side panel. His temple struck the wood with a dull thud, prompting a low, painful moan from his throat. He started to crack his eyelids open, but shut them tight almost immediately. The sky above was ablaze with the light of a thousand bonfires.

He reached out with his left hand, hoping the sudden jolt had not displaced the white crane that had been sitting with him. As he felt about blindly, a tiny shred of sanity fought through the sludge of his mind, reminding him that there was no bird. He was hallucinating again. The wounds he had received from the Dust Man had festered, bringing the expected fever along with it. Lucidity and delusion had been battling for control of his mind and sanity was losing.

A harsh, rough voice, full of reprimand, called out, “Blast it, Golt! Be careful! You’re going to break an axle!”

A bad-tempered, scratchy voice replied, “Make up your mind! You want to go fast or slow?”

Nimar recognized that voice as belonging to Golt, which meant the first had been their father.

“Keep that tone with me and I’ll cut out your tongue and feed it to you!”

Without doubt, that was their father.

“Why don’t we leave the cart here?” asked Golt. “We can take two horses and ride hard after them.”

“What about Nimar?” growled his father.

Golt hesitated before saying, “We can come back for him later.”

Not trusting his brother and father to come back for him, Nimar tried to protest against his brother’s plan, but all that came out was a mumbled moan. His tongue did not want to work.

A distinct creak of wood from the front of the cart resonated over the rhythmic squeaks of the bed. A moment later, Golt announced, “He’s awake.”

“Of course he is, you muck-feeder. A corpse would awake with the way you’re driving.”

“We might get to find out if that’s so,” said Golt. “He don’t look too good.”

Nimar might have been upset with Golt had he not already come to the same conclusion himself. His death was inevitable. When wound-rot set in, without medicine from a healer, one was dead within days.

He drifted in and out of lucidity for an unknown amount of time, bouncing about the back of the cart, when a sudden, strange howl cut through the air. The cry reminded him of the gray-nosed wolves that roamed the edges of the swamps of his youth, only it was deeper. Much deeper. The wolf’s call hung in the air for another heartbeat before cutting off abruptly.

Nimar was about to mark the cry as hallucination when Golt asked, “What in the Nine Hells was that?”

A second howl ripped through the air, deeper than the first and from a different direction. A third howl joined in, quickly followed by a fourth. Then a fifth.

A tiny, wild smile crept over his lips as his fever surged ahead, pushing aside rational thought. Wolves were hunting them, and for some mad reason, that was humorous to him.

“What do we do?!” called Golt. “Hold! Where are you going?!”

In a sharp, frantic panic, his father shouted, “Save yourself!”

Nimar heard the sound of horse’s hooves galloping away. Golt cursed and began screaming at the cart horses to run, repeatedly snapping the reins. Nimar began to bounce about the back of the cart as it rattled and creaked with each dip and hole it struck. He started to giggle.

The wolves’ cries changed, shifting form long, drawn-out howls to short, quick barks. Golt began blubbering like a scared child.

“Blast the Gods! What are those?!”

His brother sounded terrified. Nimar’s wild giggling grew into outright laughing.

A horse’s terror-filled whinny cut through the air, followed shortly by a man screaming. The cries belonged to his father and stopped as quickly as they started.

A sharp crack exploded under Nimar. The cart bed smacked into the ground and Nimar slid out the back along with most of the sacks. As he rolled through mud and grass, Nimar heard Golt cursing loudly.

As he came to a rest, Nimar opened his eyes and stared about him. The day was still painfully bright, but he blinked through the glare to spot the wagon bouncing away, its rear axle snapped and wheels dragging. Golt was—somehow—still seated in the driver’s bench, screaming as he and the cart rattled over the prairie. Nimar stared at the beasts running alongside the wagon, snapping at the horses’ legs and began to laugh hysterically. Wolves were not hunting them. Mongrels were.

One of the horses pulling the cart went down, tripped up by the jaws of an all gray beast. The second horse fell an instant later. The poles attached to the horses’ harness jammed into the ground, sending the cart tumbling. Golt went with it, his legs splayed apart as he flew into the air. It was the last time Nimar saw his brother.

Golt’s screams filled the barren countryside, turning to cries of pain, before cutting off altogether with a sickening, soft gurgle.

Nimar lay on his side, chortling while waiting to be eaten, and happened to look upon his festering wrist wound. It was a mottled mixture of unhealthy yellows and browns. Some of his flesh even looked black. The stink of the wound-rot filled his nose and he began to retch through his laughter. The sane sliver of his mind was repulsed by his condition. After a tortuous period of uncontrollable heaving, Nimar eventually lay still with his eyes closed again, breathing hard.

A soft, wet puff of air nearby prompted him to crack open his eyelids. Five mongrels stood in a line between him and the ruined cart, their mouths wet and red with blood. The perfect blending of man and wolf was unsettling. One of them—all brown with patches of white on its muzzle and arms—stood upright on two pawed-feet, its yellow-eyed gaze locked on Nimar. The mongrel’s nose twitched.

In wet, heavily accented Argot, the beast growled, “Where is the leather pouch that this was attached to?” It took a few steps closer to him and crouched down.

Nimar’s gaze shifted to a rich-looking piece of leather the mongrel held in a calloused hand. He was as surprised that mongrels had hands as he was by the question and the presence of the strap.

Lucidity reigned for a moment, allowing Nimar to mumble in honest confusion, “Where did you get that?” He swore it belonged to the pouch they had stolen from the nobleman.

The mongrel leaned forward and huffed.

“The pouch! Where is it?”

Nimar choked out, “It’s gone. A Dust Man took it.”

The beast growled, “You are sure?”

With great effort, Nimar nodded.

“He stole it from us.”

A few puffs of wet air escaped from the mongrel’s jaws. Spittle dripped to the ground.

“The thief complains of a thief?”

Nimar glared at the monster, irritated that the beast was apparently laughing at him. He tried to reach down to his boot to retrieve his bone-handle dagger, but he was slow and weak. The mongrel’s eyes shifted to where Nimar stretched and, reaching down, the monster grabbed the knife first. Nimar dropped his head to the ground in defeat.

“Do what you will, mongrel. End me. Rip my throat out.”

The animal’s black lips drew back to reveal yellowed teeth as it sneered, “You reek of death, man. I would taste your rot for a season.”

It moved suddenly, driving Nimar’s dagger into his chest. Oddly, there was no pain, only a strange warming sensation. The beast pulled the dagger free, stood, and walked away with the blade still clasped in its hand, blood dripping to the ground.

Nimar’s eyes fluttered shut for the last time.

18
^th
of the Turn of Luraana, 4999

With each breath that Kenders took of the cold, wet air, the spicy char of oak smoke tickled the back of her throat. If she inhaled too deeply, she might cough. She tilted her head back and stared at the cloud-choked sky, the chilly breeze whipping through the streets of Claw leeching the heat from her body. Tiny droplets of a cold, heavy mist pelted her exposed skin. Kenders silently cursed the weather. Again.

From beside her, Khin’s wispy voice interrupted her misery.

“What are your thoughts?”

An exasperated huff escaped her lips. Her thoughts were many.

That she hated this lesson more than all the other ones put together. That Miriel Syncent must have been mad to choose one of the least hospitable places in the duchies for the enclave. That Khin was perhaps the worst teacher anyone could have. That this was—beyond any doubt—the worst yearday of her life.

She did not voice any of that, however, as she turned to stare at the aicenai. With forced calm, she said, “That I should seek out the fibríaal by searching for the imprint his Weave has left.”

Khin stood motionless, his eyes closed. After an interminably long pause, his eyelids opened, he turned his head to face her, and he studied her in silence. She gnawed on the inside of her cheek, waiting for some response. She wanted Khin to say something. Anything.