The Seedbearing Prince: Part I (11 page)

He struggled to sit up, heart thudding
against his chest as he searched his father's face. Milchamah stood
there too, leaning just inside the door frame. He halted Dayn with
a gesture before he could rise from the bed. Dayn immediately saw
why. Laman's face masked a tightly restrained fury.

“Joam may have very well saved your life.
When the shaking started, your mother and I were mad with fear over
you two until Milchamah and Joam told us about...” Something hard
crossed his face. His voice remained calm, but a vein stood out
against the muscles of his neck. “Your plans for the
Dreadfall.”

“We caught Grahm on the road, asked him for
help. Turned out he had a cinch and pulley to fish you out,”
Milchamah said, picking idly at a scabbed over cut on his forearm.
His tone grew thoughtful. “Funny thing for an offworlder to keep,
but fortunate for you. Still took us all of yesterday to find you
and drag you out.” Dayn closed his eyes, feebly grasping for
memories. Of course the rupture he witnessed would be felt in Wia
Wells. “What happened?”

“The whole of Shard shook like a dog ridding
herself of fleas.”

“This happens to other worlds, but never
Shard. I fear it was no ordinary...earthquake.” Laman grimaced over
the unfamiliar word. “She did not just shudder. Somehow the
ground...weakened. The slightest bound would take you sailing for
spans. The village has been accounting for damage, but that's not
the worst of it. There are children missing.”

“Peace,” Dayn said numbly. After his own
experience, he could easily imagine toddlers floating helplessly
through the air. His sister's absence suddenly made Dayn's heart
skip. “Tela! Is she alright?”

“Your sister is safe, and a budding hero at
that.” Laman allowed himself the briefest of smiles before the
solemn mask returned. “One of Kajalynn's triplets was nearly lost
to the sky. Tela bounded off Grahm’s roof to bring him back
down.”

“Ten spans high, and he never woke for a
second.” Milchamah shook his head in amazement. A baby that high,
in the dark, would be near impossible to see. Tela really was a
hero.

And what were you doing?
Dayn thought
to himself.
Off in the Dreadfall when your neighbors needed you.
Your family.
He slumped back into the bed. The two men allowed
the silence to linger, punctuating his shame.

Finally, Laman spoke. “She and your mother
will return soon. You need to rest now, and heal.”

“Father, we need to tell people about the
Dreadfall! I saw―”

“Tell them what? That Misthaven has been
right all along about Wia Wells stock? Or that you were off to
protect us from a deadwisp you saw in the well?” Laman shook the
family staff as though calling on the disappointment of his entire
bloodline. “An Applicant―no! A
Ro'Halan
isn’t capable of
such actions.”

“Father, I didn’t―” Dayn began to protest,
but Laman cut him off with a disgusted gesture.

“We’ll speak of this later. There’s still
need for us in the village. No,” Laman said sharply when Dayn
started to leave his bed. “You stay here. Four able-bodied men were
absent Wia Wells to save you from your foolishness. You’ve cost
everyone enough already.”

He nodded at Milchamah, who straightened with
a grunt. The two men left him without another word.

“Please tell Joam I said thank you,” Dayn
called out
. If Joam had stayed, they never would have known
where to find me.

A terse exchange flared briefly in the
hallway. Milchamah reappeared with a staff in his hand, carved from
silverpine, and completely unused.

“Don't lose this one.” He flung the staff
hard and Dayn caught it reflexively. Brand new and superbly
balanced, he could not recall holding a finer grain of wood. The
farmer likely acquired it at Evensong. “You’re the only real
competition for my boy. At least, when you choose to think. Peace
only knows you won't be headed anywhere else this season.”

Dayn winced as the truth of Milchamah's words
settled into him. Rumors spread like tripweed through Wia Wells,
same as any Mistland village. Dayn in the Dreadfall, a day after
being named Attendant? Grahm would tell his wife Kajalynn, who
would spread it to one of her gossiping sisters. Or some Elder
would corner Joam and browbeat the story from him. The how of it
did not matter, only that the secret Dayn had kept hidden for
months would be known through the village by sundown.

Only that would not be the worst of it. When
the visiting Misthaveners learned of Dayn's blunder, his time as an
Attendant would be the shortest in all the history of Shard. Elder
Buril and every hard working Mistland farmer would be hard pressed
to forgive him after that. Dayn let out a crestfallen sigh as the
old weaponmaster departed.

“Hope it was worth it, boy.”

Dayn's head throbbed with newfound intensity.
Miserable thoughts of his future as an embarrassment tumbled
through his mind. He let the silverpine clatter to the floor, and
stuffed his head beneath a pillow, squeezing his eyes shut.
Suddenly tired and weak, he sought sleep. His door stood open, and
his parents' heated voices trickled through his fading
consciousness.

“Joam said all he talks about is coursing of
all things! And the Dreadfall...”

Dayn groaned as he slept, too low to be heard
in the kitchen. He tossed aside the pillow and sheets in a fitful
bid for coolness. Sweat droplets beaded over his skin like a
rash.

“...when I return from Wia Wells.” Laman’s
calm baritone. “Imagine how the Belt will suffer if
these...quakes...continue? We'll spend more time as masons than
farmers.”

New spots of crimson bloomed on Dayn's
shoulder. He clawed savagely at the bandages covering the wound.
The brown skin nearest the dressing took on a sickly, purplish
hue.

“...peace send the monster wasn’t venomous.
Did you ask if he saw the hood, or its coloring? A snake that
large...”

Dayn twisted and turned as fever wracked his
body. On the shelf Laman built for Dayn's collecting, a new
curiosity rested, nestled between his basket of gems and a piece of
driftwood that looked like a ridgecat. Ignored since dropping from
Dayn's pocket and still caked in grime, the orb from the
wreathweaver's perch came to life.

“...Grahm is close by, I'll have him come
check on you. Don't let Tela stray far, you can imagine how that
shaking stirred up the wilds. I’ll be back well before sundown,
hopefully with good news.”

“Be careful, husband.”

The orb pulsed, mirroring Dayn's headache
perfectly. Crimson light bathed his room. Hanalene might have
noticed if she were not watching Laman bound away toward Wia Wells,
lost in her own worried thoughts.

The red glow faded. Dayn's moans stopped and
his breathing deepened.

When Hanalene came to look in on him, Dayn
did not feel her gentle touch upon his forehead. She hissed over
his soaked bandages, but clucked in surprise upon removing them.
After pulling Dayn's covers up again, she spared the strange object
on her son's shelf a mistrustful glance before closing the door
quietly behind her.

Fever dreams soon burned through Dayn's
consciousness.

He twisted through the torrent, with mist and
darkness for his only companions. Swirling rock formed an
inescapable gauntlet as Dayn’s wingline pulled him through the
void. He risked a look behind him.

Grotesque man-shapes of oily smoke coalesced
on his trail, men made of ash and fire. The very torrent bent
around their path. Dayn fluttered just beyond their clutches in the
fragile dance of prey. Their touch would change him forever,
somehow, a truth Dayn understood without knowing how or why. His
pursuers edged closer, drinking in his fear.

A sickening snap vibrated through Dayn's
being, and the wingline secured to his harness went slack. He
drifted in the torrent, the severed wingline floating uselessly
before him. Hands closed on his neck from behind, and Dayn could
not escape. He turned to face the same stare he knew from his
father's well. The gray skin split in the semblance of a smile.
Maggots poured from the mouth.

“Ro'Halan,” the gray man hissed. “I will tear
your heart from the Belt, brother.” Pale fingers squeezed around
his throat. Dayn's world splintered in pain.

“Brother?”

“No, no!” Dayn thrashed himself awake. His
blankets peeled away to reveal Tela, peering down at him with an
odd expression in her golden eyes. She yanked away his blanket with
a flourish and held it triumphantly, like some captured banner.
Dayn glowered as she beamed down at him.

“Sleep all day, time to play!”

“Get off!” Dayn flung a pillow at his
sister's head, maybe harder than she deserved. It sailed harmlessly
over her sprawling feet as she tumbled backwards off the bed, only
to alight nimbly in a back bridge. She scuttled around like a
lost-shell river crab, giggling the entire time. A cat might envy
her reflexes.

“You’d better get up, brother. You better get
up right now!”

“Can't you see I'm supposed to be still?”
Dayn growled. In truth, his shoulder felt better than before.

“You don't look hurt to me,” Tela observed.
“Did you trip while you were bounding again? Your head is much too
big to bound properly, brother!”

Dayn knew to respond would only invite more
teasing, so he pointedly ignored her goads while he inspected his
injuries. No trace of his headache remained, and the carnival of
bruises covering his ribs had faded considerably. His mother's
herbs made quick work of most cuts or scrapes, but Sister Cari the
healer must have been fetched to care for his arm, which he flexed
in amazement. Moving it barely hurt.

“Get up! Father’s gone to the village,” Tela
tugged on his good arm insistently, but Dayn slunk back beneath his
sheets. She kissed her teeth irritably and gave up, only to begin
pulling valiantly on his ankle. Her next words froze Dayn's blood.
“The strangers will be here soon!”

“Strangers? What strangers?” he demanded.
Tela jumped back, startled by his intensity. “You better not be
telling any stories!”

“I'm not! I heard Grahm whispering to father
this morning while you were asleep. He looked pale as a deadwisp,
too!”

“What did he say?”

“The part I heard? ‘It can’t be helped,
Laman. Tell Buril to let them do whatever they want. Trust me, I
know.’ Then father saw me, and told me to go outside.”

Dayn rose, his head spinning with unanswered
questions. Grahm had seen a gray man, nothing could convince Dayn
otherwise. He would never forget his ordeal in the Dreadfall, and
one memory above all.
I am not here to frighten them with
trembling ground,
the one called Raaluwos had said.
I want
this world torn from their accursed Belt.
Dayn did not know how
their neighbor was tied to the man, but it could not be good.

“You know who they are, don't you?” Tela
asked as Dayn strode by her. “Hey! Where are you going,
bighead?”

Dayn called himself nine kinds of idiot for
not telling his father about the gray men sooner, for not
forcing
them to listen about the Dreadfall―

He turned the corner so quickly he nearly
sprawled his mother back into the kitchen, a roll of fresh bandages
in her hand. Startled, Hanalene quickly regained her composure and
fixed him with expectant eyes.

“Mother. I'm sorry, I―” Dayn began, but just
then a loud knock sounded at their front door.

“Finally, Grahm comes.” Hanalene smoothed her
skirts and glided into the front room. “Maybe now we’ll have some
answers.”

Dayn sidestepped her to bar the way before
she reached the door. Hanalene's eyes widened in a blend of
indignation and surprise.

“We don't know if that’s him at all,” Dayn
said urgently. “Let me check first, to be sure.”

“Who are the strangers, brother?” Tela asked,
bouncing on her toes.

“What strangers? Dayn, you’re being
ridiculous!” Hanalene exclaimed. Her golden eyes flashed
dangerously, but he held his ground. At a look from Dayn, Tela
disappeared into his room before he even uttered the words,
returning with the new silverpine staff. A weapon ill-suited for
indoors, but better than his bare hands.

At sight of the grain, Hanalene searched his
face, suddenly hesitant. She balked at the Sweetwater tournaments,
but acknowledged the boys knew when a staff proved necessary. More
pounding at the door made them jump.

“Please,” Dayn pleaded. “I'll explain
everything, but please just go out to the garden and be ready to
run if I shout. I don't think that’s Grahm.”

Hanalene let Tela lead her away through the
kitchen. Dayn took a deep breath and turned to face the door,
wishing it were twice as thick and made of stone. Gripping his
staff, Dayn flung it open, and stopped short. An odd little man
stepped back in surprise, gawking so anxiously at sight of the
staff that Dayn expected him to turn and run.

“Oh...oh, my. I can assure you there’s no
need for that,” the man said carefully. He stood slight of build
with fair skin, a round, clean-shaven face and meticulously cut
sandy hair. His crisp manner of speaking cried offworlder to Dayn’s
ears. “I would be most unable to defend myself. I’m a Preceptor
from the Ring, and my name is Lurec. We’ve come to investigate the
trouble upon your world.”

“The Ring?” Dayn lowered his staff
hesitantly. Preceptors were men of great learning, spending their
lives in studious solitude upon the Ring, the ancient fortress that
floated between the worlds.

“Yes, we took the road from Misthaven this
morning.” The man certainly fit how Dayn imagined a Preceptor would
appear. His clothes were a simple, neatly-cut affair of the palest
gray. This Lurec looked as though he never spent a day outside. His
boots, black beneath a thick layer of red dust from the road, were
not broken in at all.