Rift in the Sky (12 page)

For what good it would do.

The others looked up, weary with grief, unsettled by Haxel's barely contained
fury
. No one spoke. Morla looked to Aryl.

“There's no way to know,” Aryl said gently. Beside her, on a bench covered with blankets, lay her aunt. Her hair hung limp as a child's. Her eyes were closed. She might have been alive.

She was not.

Her mind had followed Ael's. According to Oran, assigned the task of making sure, not enough had been left to keep her body breathing.

Aryl wasn't sorry to be grateful.

Three long strides brought Haxel looming over her. “There must be. Ael doesn't—didn't—he was strong. Capable. We have to know what happened!”

Such
pain
. Aryl felt it, shared it, as she did from all around. It bound them together, Sona to Sona, as nothing else could have done. She wasn't Myris, to ease another's suffering, to turn grief into acceptance. But she understood Haxel's desperation. Beyond the grief of losing her foster brother, training and instinct made the First Scout need to identify the threat, find a way to counter or avoid it.

“We can't,” Aryl said, lifting her gaze to Haxel's. “I named the Dark the M'hir because it's like that wind. It can tear the best climber from a branch, snap the strongest rastis, without warning. When we ride it, we take that risk.”

“You think Ael was careless.” Clear threat.

“How?” From Enris, leaning against the wall nearby. His arms were folded, his face in shadow. “The M'hir is new to all of us. We can only explore it by trying. We've learned a shared memory is enough for a 'port. But can I 'port to another Om'ray? Can I follow a trail through the M'hir? Someone has to try first. Some ideas will work. Some won't.”

“And some will kill.”

“And some will kill.”

“No. No more ‘firsts.' ” Haxel looked at them all in turn, her face as grim and set as Aryl had ever seen. “Do you understand me? There's only us. We were barely keeping up with watering before losing these—these two. If we lose anyone else, we could all die.”

Galen rose to his feet, equally grim. “I agree we should use caution. But make no mistake, Haxel, this ability we have will save more lives than it risks. Let the Oud reshape the ground. Sona will 'port to safety. Let our crops fail. We'll 'port to another Clan and trade for food. This is the most important Talent ever discovered by Om'ray and we must never fear to use it.”

Agreement.
Emphatic from some. Aryl hoped Haxel missed the faint
glee
coming from their unChosen. Though to be callous, those were best suited to trying “firsts.”

UnChosen died alone.

“Doubt causes falls.” Her voice sharpened. “So does carelessness. I suggest we leave the risks to our daring unChosen—” so she had sensed them. Haxel's eyes flicked to the body. “Why is this still here?”

She was right to ask. Om'ray only
felt
the presence of the living. The body on the bench was no longer Om'ray, but simply a problem.

“There's no swamp.” Husni clenched her gnarled hands in distress. “There's no proper water below.” Her Chosen, Cetto d'sud Teerac, tried to soothe her, but she'd have none of it. “We have traditions for good reason,” she snapped. “The husk must be removed from the village.”

“We could bury it in the ground,” Oswa offered carefully. “It's the Grona way.”

From too few voices to too many. “No!” “Don't disturb the Oud!” “It's dangerous!” The objections came from Tuana and Yena both.

Oswa sank back and hugged Yao. Aryl caught her eye and gestured gratitude. It wasn't the Grona's fault others had had worse experiences with the Oud.

Before anyone suggested feeding what remained of Myris to the rock hunters, which would entail carrying the sad husk a day's journey across the exposed valley, she sent a quick plea.
Enris.

And what was left of Myris di Sarc disappeared. The blanket sighed to the bench and lay empty.

It was done.

In the following hush, Juo di Vendan's ragged gasp drew everyone's attention.

“The baby!” Gijs shouted, leaping to his feet to hover anxiously over his Chosen who, for her part, looked more embarrassed by the attention than in distress.

Seru was already on the move. The room began to hum and sizzle with words spoken and not, everyone's attention shifting from death to life.

It was their way.

Aryl pressed her hand to the blanket beside her. Still warm. She and Enris had run into the nekis grove, out of sight—that much sense—before 'porting here. Her legs were coated in flecks of drying mud from the Oud. She could, if she wasn't careful,
hear
the dreadful sound it had made in the M'hir. How could the creature know of Ael's loss before they did?

Despite that warning, they hadn't been in time. The breath had fled Myris' lips with her Chosen's name; she'd fallen into Rorn's arms, already gone. It had been that quick. It often was.

What was she to do without Myris and Ael?

Comfort
waiting;
strength
if she needed it. No words.

They should never have been exiled.
Aryl felt a tear trace her cheek, curl along her jaw. Her mother had claimed Yena's Adepts dreamed who should go, choosing those who could survive together. Myris and Ael had no new Talents, no unusual strength or Power. Only compassion and courage.

“No.” The room seethed with emotion. Easier to form words aloud. “No, it's not.”

Her mother had sent them. Because of a dream.

Adepts dreamed to a purpose. A purpose set by their Cloisters' Keeper.

“I'll be back.”

ARYL . . .
his protest vanished with her surroundings.

The M'hir taunted, sang of death and insanity, tried to confuse. These were her reactions to the roiling
darkness
, not the truth. Not that the truth belonged here. Nothing
real
did. Aryl concentrated on
where
she should be . . .

... and was.

The Meeting Hall had been humid with breath, warmed with bodies and cookstoves, fragrant with the remains of the morning meal. Crowded with the living and the dead.

This was no place as peaceful or safe. Overhead, green metal had been woven into a mesh tight enough to keep out the rain. She stood on metal slats, raised the height of a grown rastis above the black water of the Lay. To either side, the mesh widened to allow the hot, heavy air of the canopy to caress her, thick with the scent of flower, fruit, and rot. There was no sky, no ground, no rock. Only that which struggled to live, and that which failed and died.

Home. This would always be home.

Driven through the M'hir, the summons couldn't be overheard or ignored. How long Taisal di Sarc would let her daughter wait on Yena's bridge—that was a question.

Biters arrived first. The mountain spring encouraged bare arms and hands during the heat of day, bare legs made it easier when filling buckets. Aryl gritted her teeth, accepting the bites as deserved. Not that Enris would let her forget it. Despite the distance between them, their link was as strong as ever. He kept his shields in place. Let her have this.

Aryl scratched the rising welts on her forearm. Maybe they wouldn't all swell.

Yena's Cloisters rose on its own massive stalk. The bridge met the paired doors to its lowermost platform, the level buried at Sona by the Oud. Aryl faced them, not seeing the lovely colors coaxed from the metal, or their size.

If she lowered her shields and
reached,
she'd know who was on the other side. The solitary presence at her back would be the scout assigned to the bridge platform. He wouldn't have
sensed
her arrival, so close to the rest of Yena. Few Om'ray had her ability to sense exact numbers within the glow of their kind.

That glow was potent, alluring. Almost two hundred, mere steps away. It made Sona's few more precious.

The doors turned open, spilling light, creating new shadows. A slender figure in a hooded brown robe stepped through. Another pulled the doors closed again.

The locks reset.

She had their secret. These would open to her knowledge, to her name in the records of this Cloisters—unless they'd stripped it.

Not that she'd be welcome.

The figure stopped and threw back her hood, revealing a netted mass of black hair and a pale face as closed as the doors. Taisal di Sarc. For the first time, Aryl could see the resemblance between sisters. The wide-set eyes, the high forehead, the graceful line of throat were the same. The differences had always mattered more. Myris would have been incapable of this intimidating glare. Her Power would never have
tested
Aryl's shields like this.

“Mother.”

“Come to explain yourself ?”

“Explain myself?” Hard to frown with dignity while biters feasted on her ears, but Aryl did her best. “It's your turn for that. I know Yena's Cloisters has a Keeper; someone who controls the dreams of your Adepts. Why dream to exile us? Don't tell me it was to protect Yena from the Tikitik. There had to be an Om'ray purpose. Why?”

The very essence of dignity, Taisal lifted an eyebrow. “While I, Daughter, want to know why Yena's Adepts now dream of Sona.”

Her heart thudded in her chest; could her mother hear it?

Oran.

It had to be. She'd succeeded after all, but told no one. Instead of controlling Sona's Cloisters to dream of what might help her own Clan, somehow she was reaching out to others. But why? Aryl swallowed bile. “What do you dream?”

Distaste.
“Walking on dirt. Cold. Darkness. Oud.” Taisal's shields tightened until she seemed to disappear. “And what you can do. All of you.”

Not the time to admit “all” was an exaggeration. Not the time to vent her fury at Oran di Caraat or try to comprehend what the Adept might have hoped to accomplish.

“It wasn't our doing. But—”

Her mother
knew
. Everything.

Relief made Aryl shake. She found words spilling out, urgent, important. “It means safety for everyone. Once every Om'ray can 'port, unChosen won't have to risk Passage. We can travel wherever we want as easily as breathing. Share with each other. Once the other races accept it—”

“They won't. They can't.”

“The Oud have—”

“Some Oud—”
disgust,
“—Sona's Oud. You're a Speaker, Aryl. You of all Sona should realize just because the not-
real
look alike doesn't make them the same. And what of the Tikitik? What of the Strangers? Will they let Om'ray become independent? Let us ascend to a power of our own? Shatter the Agreement?” Every word calm, measured. Aryl could hardly breathe. “Even if they do, for reasons of their own—” Taisal paused. Her hand grasped air and threw it aside. “Om'ray won't.”

“Sona—”

“One Clan. What of the rest? What of those Om'ray who can't do this—this 'porting? What of those who will not? Who rightly fear the Dark. Would you force them? Is that why you've made us dream?”

“I didn't—” To Aryl's dismay, her voice came out sullen, like a child's. She did her best to modify it. “It doesn't have to be that way. Those who can't—others can do it for them. Those who won't—” she didn't finish.

Taisal did it for her. “—will if they must? Do you hear yourself? You would split our kind in two. Not Yena.” The words echoed along the bridge. “We will protect ourselves. Sian spent much of his life searching for ways to protect Om'ray from the
Dark.
Now he works to help us resist the urge to step into it, awake or asleep. We will keep even those who might be tempted safe from your—” her lips twisted, “—M'hir.”

Sian d'sud Vendan. Her mother's heart-kin, before they'd Chosen otherwise. He'd come to the Sarc home regardless, stay till firstlight with Taisal debating this or that obscure detail about the Power and its use. She should have listened, Aryl thought desperately. Here was expertise, where she least expected it. Someone to guide their exploration of the M'hir. “We could use his help,” she began, unconsciously fingering her Speaker's Pendant.

“To stop this?” Taisal stepped closer, her eyes alight. “Is that what you're saying—is that the reason for the dreams? That Sona calls out for help, before it's too late? Or is it already too late?” She lifted her hand to trace the curve of Aryl's cheek in the air, then let it fall to her side. The relief in her face became something else.
Dread.
“Who?”