Survivors: Book 4 Circles of Light series (7 page)

‘I give you greeting,’
she said now, her voice surprisingly deep but pleasantly
toned.

Two small white bowls
stood in front of her and she held a short transparent pipe with a
finger held over one end. The pipe was half full of a thick red
fluid. She bent her head as she sealed the top of the pipe with
something and stood it in a rack of similar pipes. She turned back
to the visitors.

‘This is where I spend
most of my time,’ she told them. ‘One of my interests is
xenobiology – understanding the life forms of different worlds than
my own. Despite being here on Kel-Harat so long, there seems an
infinity to discover.’

At the back of the
group, Tika had only half listened to Orla: her attention had been
caught by a small bird. It looked very like the larger night loving
great-eyes she knew in Sapphrea, and she sent a guarded thought
towards it. Now, as Orla continued speaking about something she
called blood groups, Tika stumbled back against Sket, her face
white and beaded with sweat. Sket’s arm went round her even as Farn
began to fuss in the passage outside.

‘Captain, my lady is
ill!’

Gan spun to look at
Tika and lifted her into his arms without a question.

‘Forgive us Kertiss,
Orla, but we must get Lady Tika to our rooms at once.’

Orla and Kertiss looked
discomposed but then Kertiss stepped forward.

‘Very well. We would
have liked you to stay longer but you will return tomorrow evening.
Evening is our preferred time,’ he said, leading them back along
the passages.

Tika’s face was pressed
into Gan’s shoulder and Farn’s head banged against Gan’s, so close
did he keep to his soul bond. They reached the doorway through
which they’d first entered and Kertiss paused. He studied the small
panel set into the door, Gan seeing a red light flashing before
Kertiss’s body blocked his view. Kertiss looked over his shoulder,
as if checking the group of companions and the two Dragons. He
placed his hand on the panel and the door swung open. Gan strode
straight through.

Olam sprang to his
feet, closely followed by Pallin and Riff. Brin rumbled and surged
up from his reclining position.

‘Oh dear friends! Why
is the small one ill?’ Singer cried.

Without knowing why he
did so, Gan halted his rapid march towards the ramp and swerved
towards the Ship. Shielding Tika with his own body from Kertiss’s
sight, he pressed the back of her hand briefly against the Ship’s
side. There was the faintest gasp then Singer’s voice poured music
into the chamber. Gan turned at once and made for the
ramp.

‘We will not see you
tomorrow Kertiss if Lady Tika is not fully recovered,’ he called
over his shoulder. ‘Unless of course you care to visit us in our
rooms.’

The party crossed the
floor of the Dome which was still lit with the strange amber glow
and took the waiting Keeper by surprise, so quickly did they emerge
from the archway. He scrambled to his feet and hurried after them
across the starlit space towards the Ring Complex. He skidded to a
halt when Storm whirled with amazing speed, barring his way. The
Keeper stared at the young Dragon’s glittering eyes and snarling
mouth and chose to stop following the group.

Gan laid Tika gently on
cushions Maressa spread on the floor and Farn pushed ungently
through to crouch at her side. A gijan silently appeared, a bowl in
his hands. He knelt right under Farn’s nose and lifted Tika’s head
to tip some liquid against her mouth. Her eyelids fluttered and she
swallowed a little more of the drink.

‘My Tika, please, are
you feeling better?’ Farn’s distress was all too plain.

Tika struggled against
the gijan’s arm and he simply slid closer, pushing her into a more
upright position. She blinked, looking at the worried faces
surrounding her. She reached for Farn and he ducked his long face
against her shoulder.

‘I feel very odd,’ she
said.

Gan reached for the
bowl in the gijan’s hand and sniffed its contents. He took a
cautious sip and rolled his eyes. He gave Tika a wry
smile.

‘It would seem that
Lorak is not the only one to concoct lethal
“restoratives”.’

‘What happened in there
Tika?’ Ren asked.

She shook her head. ‘I
just felt faint I think.’ Green silvered eyes stared at him
guilelessly. ‘I’m rather hungry now though.’

Her friends regarded
her, not one of them believing her first statement. Tika twisted
round to the gijan against whom she leaned. ‘Thank you.’

Farn’s head lowered so
that his cheek rested briefly on the gijan’s head. The gijan didn’t
cower as everyone half expected him to. Instead, he gazed into
Farn’s prismed eye steadily before easing away from Tika and
disappearing to the kitchen.

Maressa sat back on her
heels. ‘Khosa’s not here,’ she said, watching Tika’s
face.

‘Is she not? I can’t
imagine her finding many squeakers around here. Perhaps she’s just
gone for a stroll – you know how nosy she is.’

Farn’s laugh held a
great deal of relief as well as amusement. ‘Khosa would not like to
hear you call her nosy my Tika!’

‘No,’ Tika conceded.
‘Perhaps we should say she is inquisitive.’

Pallin picked up the
drink the gijan had brought Tika and now took a sip. His eyes
widened and he passed the bowl to Riff. Riff tasted the contents
and got to his feet.

‘I’ll see if they’ve
got any more – this is really very good.’

Gan groaned. He glared
at Pallin. ‘For stars’ sake, don’t drink too much of that stuff. We
must keep our wits about us – all of us.’

Seela announced that
she and Storm were going to fly in the starlight. She gave no
reason for this decision and no one asked. Brin merely settled in
the colonnade while Farn still occupied a large amount of the
sitting room as Tika ate in the kitchen with her companions. It was
nearing dawn when Seela and Storm returned and as they reclined
outside, Khosa slid between the heap of Dragons, marched across
Gan’s chest and perched on a table.

Only Sket, Tika and Gan
remained downstairs, the others having decided that proper beds
were to be preferred whenever the opportunity arose.

‘Well?’ Tika’s thought
was but a whisper in their minds.

Gan saw Seela’s head
swing towards Khosa and he also noted a gijan slip into the room
from the kitchen. He couldn’t tell if it was the same gijan who’d
provided the restorative earlier or another.

Khosa bristled:
whiskers and fur were in spikes and her tail twitched
constantly.

‘Grek is with Singer,’
she told them.

Seela’s eyes flashed in
alarm.

‘He is trustworthy
Seela,’ Khosa said firmly. ‘If you trust me, so you can trust him
now. We were both afraid that Kertiss’s alarms would be triggered
even by an entity such as Grek. I waited, but no alarms sounded as
far as I could tell at least. But then, I couldn’t reach Singer’s
mind through that floor. Kertiss has the whole Dome sealed somehow,
even against a mind contact.’

Ren came down the
stairs and sat on the last one listening to Khosa. The Kephi
glanced at him. ‘You knew that didn’t you?’

Ren nodded. ‘When I
asked him if he felt pain.’ The Offering’s eyes filled with tears
which he made no attempt to hide. ‘He cannot even send his mind
beyond the Dome to see any of the life around him. And he once flew
between the stars and saw wonders upon wonders. He fears for his
sanity. It is the cruellest imprisonment I can imagine for such as
him. He said other Ships very occasionally make direct contact with
him, but the last time was half a year ago.’

Khosa slitted her eyes
at him. ‘And?’

‘And he wants to see
Namolos. Or if that is as impossible as Singer seems to think, he
begs us to reach Namolos and ask him to release Singer from
Kertiss’s grip.’

‘Hmm.’ Khosa’s fur
became smoother and her tail slowed its thrashing. ‘We will wait
for Grek but you must not go into those rooms beneath the Dome
again – any of you. You will be safe enough in the Dome itself but
not below its floor.’

Sket fidgeted. ‘Khosa,
what are those statues in the Dome?’

Khosa turned her
turquoise gaze onto Tika’s self appointed personal Guard. ‘I don’t
know. Namolos might. But they reek of grief.’

They looked in some
surprise as the gijan dropped to his knees, his hands clasped
against the veil half hiding his face, eyes fixed on
Khosa.

‘Namolos,’ he
said.

The day passed quietly,
the companions grateful for a restful break in their travelling but
also somewhat on edge. They all wondered if they would be able to
leave as easily as they’d arrived.

When they sat in the
kitchen towards the end of the afternoon, Olam told them that Khosa
was still curled in a tight ball, sound asleep, inside a shirt
upstairs. Even as he spoke, Khosa jumped onto Navan’s lap, her
orange face poking over the table’s edge.

‘Grek is
here.’

Grek’s mind voice,
coming from nowhere, unsettled them all as usual, but they quickly
forgot their discomfiture listening to his report. There was no
mistaking the pain and sorrow underlying his words.

‘Singer was desperate
to talk,’ Grek began. ‘Kertiss should not have been Singer’s
captain. The one who should have been was killed in some fighting.
Kertiss and Orla climbed inside Singer and ordered him to fly.
Singer obeyed: he was nearly mindless with grief.’ Grek fell
silent.

‘I think a Ship bonds
with a captain, as you are bonded to Farn Lady Tika. That is the
impression I had at least: Singer became distraught trying to tell
me of those times.’

Tika’s eyes were
enormous in her white face. She could guess all too vividly how
Singer might have felt if he had truly been one half of a soul
bonding and lost his bonded one.

‘There was a great deal
that Singer tried to tell me,’ Grek continued. ‘It was jumbled and
although no doubt of great interest later perhaps, it was
irrelevant to us now. There was fighting in the star fields,
battles, which was all very confused in his mind but then he, with
other Ships like himself, reached this world. He thinks that six or
maybe even ten, landed on the ground. All were damaged. He doesn’t
know if any of them can ever fly to the stars again, but he says he
needs Namolos.’ Grek paused once more.

‘He called Namolos the
Father of the Ships and he also said that he has heard most often
from Namolos’s own Ship. That Ship is called Star Dancer, a female,
and she was the last to speak to him.’

‘Did Singer know
anything of those winged people in the Dome?’ Ren asked.

‘He said he likes to
sing to them. He said they appreciate it and that they were
trapped, perhaps even worse than he is.’ Grek sounded puzzled. ‘He
also said that you must take a gijan with you to Namolos and you
must go by tomorrow at the latest, or Kertiss will hold
you.’

Sket growled, his hand
reaching for his never absent sword.

‘What about the map
thing Kertiss had in that room? He could use that to see where we
go if we have to make a dash for it. And we don’t even know where
they put our koninas.’

‘We’ll see about that
now.’ Pallin got to his feet. ‘Come on Riff, let’s take a walk
around this dratted Ring Complex and wander through the arch where
we came in. We’ll find our mounts all right.’

Riff grinned but looked
to Gan for his agreement. Gan nodded.

‘A good idea. See if
you can learn anything about a road out of this Valley too. We need
to go south.’

‘I think I’ll go too,’
Olam decided. ‘I am an Arms Chief after all – I’m entitled to make
a fuss if necessary!’

He winked and followed
Pallin and Riff from the kitchen. The others wandered out into the
colonnade to watch the three men march off, somewhat surprised to
see Storm pacing close behind them. Brin’s eyes
sparkled.

‘Did you see young
Storm turn on that Keeper last night?’ he asked generally. ‘Most
effective.’

Seela huffed and
ignored the crimson Dragon. ‘I heard Grek’s words,’ she said. ‘We
have been flying high when we go for our “exercise”.’ She sounded
pleased with herself. ‘The Valley stretches on towards the rising
sun as far as we could see, but there is a trail leading in the
direction we need not too far away.’

Maressa smiled, moving
to lean against a massive purple shoulder.

‘ “Not too far” for a
Dragon is “quite a long way” for humans. We’ve learnt that already.
Let me look.’

The air mage closed her
eyes, sending her mind high and fast to the east. ‘Three or four
leagues,’ she said, opening her eyes again. ‘That’s far enough, if
Olam can’t get the koninas.’

‘If he can’t, we can
carry all of you to that place,’ Brin told them.

Ren nodded. ‘I’m sure
you could, but then what? You cannot carry all of us for long and
we have no idea how much desert land we have to travel – in any
direction. Without a guide, I can’t see how we’ll make
it.’