Destiny (6 page)

But one thing the woman had said
was
the truth. It was indeed his destiny which now protected him, just as it was his destiny which had brought the woman to him in the first place.
He'd grown impatient over waiting for the
right
Spirit magic user to appear, and so had tried to use the one most easily manipulated. The man had been a total disaster and failure as a tool, but the fool
had
been the means by which the proper Spirit magic user had come within his reach.

And now that he had almost every one of the proper tools, his plans would go forward as soon as his destiny thought that the time was right. He would have his own Blending to use, and even though they were all Middle talents they would have no trouble taking over High talents one by one. And as soon as the High Spirit magic user was his, the fool of a woman who thought to steal his destiny would be put in her proper place.

And her proper place will be unlike that of the rest of the populace,
Ayl thought, his inner smile wide and wild.
For daring to presume, the Grohl woman will serve me on her knees with unquestioning love in her heart. The others will be permitted to stand and simply bow, but
she
…

Ayl felt his outward smile grow the least bit, and for that reason put all thoughts of future justice out of his mind. The time would come, and when it did his smile would be very visible indeed…

Chapter Four

Feeling uncertain wasn't a familiar state for any of us, but I definitely felt the emotion and I was convinced that my Blendingmates did as well. Borvri Tonsun, the invader of Gracely that we'd questioned, had told us things that suggested his "leaders" were a lot stronger than my Blendingmates and I. We'd already suspected that the possibility was a fact, and having the guess confirmed didn't do any of us any good. After questioning the invader from West Tallvin, the six of us moved a short distance away to talk privately.

"Okay, what do we do now?" I asked when no one else spoke up. "That man said his country had High Blendings when those 'leader' people showed up, but their Blendings didn't keep them from being taken over. If we face the rest of these invaders toe to toe we'll probably lose to them, and I don't like the idea of losing."

"None of us likes the idea of losing, Tamma," Jovvi said with a sigh that Naran joined. "Personally, I almost wish we could just turn around and go home, but I have the definite feeling that running now will mean the end of everything. After the invaders have taken Gracely, they'll come after
our
country next."

"Yes, the probability of that is very high," Naran confirmed, looking as though she wished she didn't have to agree. "From what little I can See, our turning away from this problem leads to nothing but dead ends and total defeat for everyone. The only chance our side has is if we fight those people, which may mean we'll think of something to help us win. At least I hope that that's what it means."

"Well, I can't see us runnin' anyway unless innocent lives were at stake," Vallant said after taking a deep breath. "Turnin' to run only gives your enemy a chance at your back, and we don't have to wonder if this enemy will take advantage of that kind of chance. That means we have plans to make that don't include travelin', and the first thing we have to decide is what to do with all those invaders we captured."

"We can't kill them," Lorand said at once, his tone as serious as the look in his pretty brown eyes. "Those people are slaves rather than villains, and they don't even really know what they're doing. Killing them for being victims would make us just as bad as those leaders of theirs."

"Would it be wise to free them from control, as we did with that Borvri Tonsun fellow?" Rion asked, his brow creased from a small frown. "I dislike the thought of leaving
anyone
in the complete control of those who care nothing about their true welfare."

"I don't think that turning them all loose would be a good idea right now," Jovvi said, a definite sadness in her expression. "I agree with Lorand that we can't kill them, but we really should ask ourselves whose side those men would be on - if anyone's."

"What do you mean, whose side would they be on?" Vallant asked, just about taking the words out of my mouth. "Wouldn't
you
be against anyone who had put you under their control and made you kill?"

"I think all of
us
would be frothing at the mouth to get even, yes," Jovvi agreed, the sadness still with her. "That doesn't mean these men will react in the same way, though. Borvri Tonsun was even afraid to talk to us, remember, for fear that the 'leaders' would kill him for giving away their secrets. Some people don't have the courage to stand up to their oppressors, and there are about a hundred men in this group. Even if only half of them are as afraid as Borvri Tonsun, what will we do with them? Send them away with the refugees and the people of this village? What if they're too afraid to run? What if they either go right back to be conditioned again, or try to hurt some innocents to keep their 'leaders' from hurting
them
?"

"I hadn't even thought of that," Lorand said in a mutter while the rest of us stood silent, watching him run his hands through his hair as he avoided everyone's eye. "I was all ready to ask our associate Blendings to free them the way Tonsun was freed, but we can't do that now, can we?"

"No, I fear we must think of something else to do with them," Rion agreed in a tired voice, as though he were consigning those innocents to death - or worse than death. "To allow others to come to harm because of our own needs and prejudices would be inexcusable."

"Not to mention the fact that we don't want them warnin' our enemies," Vallant pointed out with a headshake. "At the moment I'd say there's only one thing we can do with those men, and that's scatter them through the woods along the road to this village. We may end up needin' their help when those leaders of theirs get here."

"To fight fire with fire," I said, a sudden idea coming to me. "You know, this won't help against Blendings that are stronger than we are, but it's come to me that we didn't do everything we could against these invaders while they were protected from our talent. We tried to touch
them
, but we never tried to affect the world they moved through. How many people would they have been able to kill if the ground had collapsed under them, throwing them into a deep pit?"

"Not many, especially if the pit was suddenly filled with water," Vallant said, now looking a good deal happier. "I wonder how we missed thinkin' of that sooner?"

"We probably missed it because the first thing a Blending entity does is try to control individuals," Lorand said, also looking less depressed. "When we discovered we couldn't reach those invaders, all our attention went toward breaching their protection."

"Which we now know will gain us little or nothing," Rion said, clearly agreeing as much as the others. "And that may well be the answer we need for besting those leader people. If they find themselves unable to breathe, how strong will their Blending entity be?"

"That will work only if they haven't already formed their Blending," Jovvi pointed out, but she wasn't really arguing. "What we need is a closer look at our enemies, one that will give us some desperately needed answers about them. Borvri Tonsun told us that the force coming behind his is about a day and a half from reaching here. The first thing we have to do is get all these innocent people out of this village, and then we can discuss how to get our closer look at the enemy without letting them know we're there."

"And I'm afraid we'll have to put Tonsun back under control," Vallant said, speaking the words that I, personally, hadn't wanted to speak. "We can't afford to have him runnin' around loose, not when we don't know what he'll do once his owners get here. If he was the kind of man who was willin' to fight them, he wouldn't have needed our help to tell us what was goin' on."

"Vallant, you'll have to have our associate Blending put him back under control," Jovvi said, her expression more vexed than apologetic. "Just as I couldn't free him by myself, I can't now put him under strong enough control that his leaders won't be able to take him right back. For all our sakes, he needs to be held as tightly as possible."

"I'll see to it right away," Vallant said, looking just as vexed as Jovvi. "And I'll also get the rest of them hidden in the woods where they can feed themselves, with orders not to show themselves unless specifically directed to do so. We don't want them poppin' up at the wrong time."

There was nothing any of us wanted to say to that, so Vallant moved a few feet away to speak to the Blending entity that waited to give us what help we needed. The rest of us just stood there in the dark of very early morning, all but huddled around the light I'd kindled to let us see where we were going and what we were doing. The air was more cool than cold, middle-of-the-night cool that made you think about the comfortable blanket waiting for you in your bed. We hadn't had our own beds for a very long time, and now it looked like getting back to those beds would take even longer.

"I really wish this was over," Jovvi murmured, her arms wrapped about herself. "Back in Gan Garee I thought that being 'stuck' in the palace was a terrible fate, but right now even a small farmhouse would look good if we were going to be staying there for a while. I never knew I was such a … homebody."

"I'm really glad you said that," Lorand told her as he folded his own arms around hers. "I'd pretty much decided that I was the only one who was tired of being constantly on the move, so I didn't mention the feeling. Now I feel a lot less alone."

"You're even more not-alone than you know," I put in, touching his arm briefly. "I've been dreaming about being back in my house, and every time I wake up to find that I'm not really there…"

"The disappointment is almost crushing," Rion finished when I didn't, a wry smile turning his lips. "I've had my share of the same dream, and it was
your
house I dreamed about. Once Naran joined us there, it was the happiest time of my life."

"And of mine," Naran said with a better smile as she took Rion's hand. "I've spent most of my life on the move, never staying in one place too long, so it's no wonder that I consider Tamrissa's house as the haven I never had before. If we were back there now, I'd be incredibly content."

"Naran, are you saying that you've also dreamed of Tamma's house?" Jovvi asked, a small frown on her face. "And what about you, Lorand? Have you been thinking about the house you grew up in, or being back in Tamma's house?"

"Actually, it
is
Tamrissa's house that I've been missing most and dreaming about," Lorand answered, his own frown matching Jovvi's. "And now I'd like to hear Naran's answer."

"Yes, of course it was Tamrissa's house I've been dreaming about," Naran said with a small headshake. "How could it be anywhere else? And why are you all looking at me like that? I've just done the same as everyone but Jovvi and Vallant."

"You can't exclude Jovvi from the group," Jovvi said, obviously trying to lighten a situation that had grown heavy with some kind of portent. "I've also had the dream of being back in Tamma's house, and this is too much of a coincidence for it to
be
a coincidence. Would anyone like to bet gold against the possibility that Vallant has had the same dream as well?"

"That would be like betting gold against a complete certainty, so stop trying to cheat us," I said, and the words managed to bring a brief smile to everyone. "Instead, why don't you tell us what this could possibly mean?"

"Sure," Jovvi responded with a sound of ridicule that was totally unlike her. "It means we're all homesick for the safety and comfort we found in your house, even if it
was
only for a short while. What else could it possibly mean?"

We all shook our heads at her, I, at least, hating the way she'd said she had no idea of what the dreams meant. It was another really annoying mystery to add to the rest, and when Vallant suddenly rejoined us he looked at each of us with a frown.

"What's happenin' now?" he asked, and there was almost accusation in his tone. "I leave the bunch of you alone for no more than five minutes, and you find somethin' else to worry about as soon as my back is turned. So what is it now, and just how dangerous will it turn out to be?"

"Before we answer
your
question, you have to answer one of ours," I said, doing the honors this time. "Have you been dreaming of being back in my house?"

"As a matter of fact, I have," he said, and his frown had deepened. "Is that supposed to mean I'll be messin' up in some way because I don't really want to be here?"

"What it means is we now have confirmation that all of us have had the same dream about being back in Tamma's house," Jovvi said, her smile a good deal less soothing than it normally was. "We would love to know what the dream means, but so far nothing has come to us."

"And please don't say that it might not mean anything," Lorand put in when Vallant parted his lips to speak. "If all six of us are having the same dream, I'll bet everything I own that it means something very specific."

"I was
goin'
to say that just because we don't know what the dream means, that doesn't mean we won't find out at some time," Vallant told Lorand with just a trace of injured feelings. "I was also goin' to add that the invaders are bein' taken care of by our associate Blendin's, but there's somethin'
we
need to look into. One of the associates told me that there was a fairly heavy stir of activity over by the place where the Gracelian assembly members were watchin' the goin's on. No one has gone over to find out what happened, so we'd better take a look."