The Ghosts of Blood and Innocence (40 page)

‘No,’ Slinque replied, ‘your brothers.’

Darq put his hands against his face. His skin felt hot. ‘When?’ His voice felt small in his throat.

‘Soon,’ Slinque said. ‘I’m sorry. We’ll help you as much as we can. As you rightly said, all hell might break loose.’

Darq took a shuddering breath. ‘I have three brothers, right?’

Slinque appeared puzzled by the question. ‘No. To my knowledge, only two. Why?’

‘A prophecy I once heard. There are four of you. That’s what I heard.’

Slinque shrugged. ‘Then perhaps there are things that even we know nothing of. But one thing is certain: your brothers have been, and are being, influenced by somehar or something. We haven’t picked up much information on this subject, but can feel the potential for trouble is there. If you agree to help Tava, then we agree to help you.’

Darq shook his head. It was all too much to think about. He remembered something Zu had said, something about hara messing with his development. ‘What of my voice?’ Darq asked.

‘Your voice?’ Slinque frowned.

‘The one who visits me and speaks in my head. He says he is of neither faction. I’m not sure who or what he is, even whether he’s har or not.’

‘I know nothing of that,’ Slinque said, and there was a tone to his words indicating that if he didn’t know about it, it could only be meaningless and unimportant.

At that moment, the door to the house opened and two other hara came into the room, bringing with them the cold. They shook out their hair and stamped the snow from their boots. In appearance, they were almost identical to Slinque.

‘You are here!’ one of them said to Darq.

‘Early!’ said the other.

‘This is Shayd and Stelph,’ Slinque said. ‘My brothers.’ He smiled at his kin. ‘I’ve been giving Darquiel a history lesson.’

‘Have you told him yet?’ Shayd asked.

‘No,’ Slinque replied. ‘Not yet. It isn’t the time.’

Darq stood up. He felt nauseous. He had to get away. ‘I must go,’ he said. ‘I’ll be missed.’ The room appeared to be swaying slightly. He hoped he could cling to his stomach and his consciousness until he got outside. The power of the Weavers seemed to swirl around him, like a century’s worth of spider webs in an old house, caught in a hurricane. Slinque must have put some kind of potion in the tea, but why?

Slinque took hold of one of Darq’s arms. ‘Yes. Go. And think. You’ll return to us when you’re ready.’

Darq tried to stagger towards the door, but his limbs felt restricted.

‘One thing,’ Slinque said. ‘Before you go.’ He pulled Darq to face him, holding onto his shoulders. Darq could feel how powerful the har’s fingers were. They might gouge though flesh if they had a mind to try. ‘You mustn’t confide in your mentor, the Ikutama, about our meeting.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because although he’s loyal to you, and would no doubt die to defend you, he’s still employed by Thiede har Gelaming. If you tell him what you’ve learned, he’ll feel obliged to report it, and it’s not in Tava’s interests for Almagabra to know he’s alive and where he is. Not yet.’

‘I won’t say anything,’ Darq mumbled. He really wanted to get outside, breathe cold air.

‘No, you won’t,’ Slinque agreed. ‘I’ve put a binding on your tongue. Apologies. It was necessary. There’s only one you may speak to, and that is Tava. You’ll do this when the time is right.’

Darq swallowed with difficulty. His mouth was full of the bitter taste of pine. ‘I have to go now.’ He pulled away from Slinque and somehow managed to grope his way outside.

Below the steps, Follet raised his head, ears forward. Darq stumbled to the pony’s side and leaned against him. Follet sighed. Darq looked up at the round house. It was impossible to see what was going on inside. It was very quiet. No har might live there after all.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Darq could not remember how he got through the rest of that day. All he could recall was feeling feverish and the phrase repeating in his head:
I have brothers.
He wished now he had not been so squeamish about asking who his family was. It was odd, most unlike him. He thought perhaps that when he knew, he would be disappointed, even disgusted. At least he could spend the day savagely chopping up meat, which provided some small comfort and outlet for his feelings. Everyhar left him alone. It was as if they knew where he’d been, and now he was off limits. The Weavers had touched him. It could be visible on his face.

When he finished work for the day he returned to Tava-edzen’s house and made his way to the small bedroom he shared with Ookami on the top floor. Ookami, who had been engaged in other tasks in the town, was already there. He roused himself from meditation when Darq entered the room. ‘You look ill,’ Ookami said. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘Something’s going to happen,’ Darq said. He threw himself face down on his bed.

Ookami came to stand over him. ‘What makes you think this?’

‘I just know. I feel it. I need to sleep.’

‘Is it the voice again?’

‘No. The voice has gone. Please, Ookami. We’ll talk tomorrow.’

‘You must eat.’

‘No. Tomorrow.’

Ookami remained where he was for some seconds, then withdrew. He would perhaps communicate with Thiede now.

There were no significant dreams for Darq that night, nor for the nights that followed. Several times, during the next few days, he considered returning to the round house, but then changed his mind. He felt contaminated somehow. He didn’t think the Weavers had his interests at heart. They were concerned only about Tava-edzen. He also considered talking to Ookami, but as Slinque had warned him, the words stuck in his throat. The Weavers had bound his tongue. As for Tava-edzen, the har was nowhere to be found. Also, Darq wasn’t sure what he could say to the phylarch. He felt that Tava-edzen would think that Darq’s fate was none of his business. In the end, cut off from any other recourse, there was only one thing Darq could do.

A week after his visit to the cliff top, he waited one night for Ookami to fall asleep. Moving himself into a quiet space, he slipped from his bed and dressed. He slid through the silent Drudehall like a ghost and went outside. He went to a high place, but not the one where the round house stood.

It was very cold, and the snow was frozen hard beneath his boots. When he took off his gloves to swing the weighted cord, his fingers pained him with cold. He realised there were tears on his face. He had lost himself entirely. He was alone in a place he barely knew, calling upon the one entity who should not be trusted. The cord sang in the cruel air; an ancient, shamanic sound.
Come to me,
Darq thought, as loudly as he could.

The movement of his arm became hypnotic. He could not stop. It felt as if his whole essence was being tugged into the whirlpool of air, and he would disappear from this world. Where would he go then?

A hand folded over his own. Warm fingers clasped his frozen ones. ‘Be still, Darq.’

Now Darq could barely move; he was frozen into place. ‘Zu,’ he said. ‘Is that you?’

A tall figure glided in front of him. It looked har, very beautiful, clad in close-fitting yet draped clothes of pale fabric, long white hair hanging over the chest. His face was quite long and the eyes slightly slanted, though not as much as Ookami’s were. Darq knew those eyes were blue, but in the dark they looked black. ‘Is that what you call me?’ Zu said. ‘Why have you brought me to this place? Your need is very strong.’

‘Tell me who I am,’ Darq said.

‘You are Darquiel har Aralis,’ Zu told him.

It meant nothing. ‘Is that all?’

‘That’s all. To others, it would have great meaning. You’re the second son of a celebrated family. Most hara believe you’re dead. Your pearl was excised from your hostling’s body before term. You were taken into the otherlanes, and from there eventually to Samway.’

Darq choked on a sob. ‘Why?’

Zu moved closer, but did not touch Darq. ‘Because you’re like no other har. Your fathers are Tigrons of Wraeththu. Do you know what that means?’

Darq hugged himself, wishing that Zu would do it. ‘No.’

‘They rule the Gelaming, along with your hostling, who is the Tigrina.’

Darq swallowed painfully. ‘Who cut me from him?’

‘An enemy of your family. The plan was for you to be devoured before you came forth from the pearl. Devoured alive.’

Darq dropped to his knees, hugging himself tighter. ‘Who?’

‘Ponclast har Varr. You have heard of him?’

‘Yes.’ Darq put both hands flat against the snow. It made his skin look very dark. ‘His star will rise again.’

‘You were rescued, fortunately,’ Zu said. ‘Thiede has kept you safe ever since.’

Darq uttered a sobbing laugh.

Zu hunkered down beside Darq and at last put an arm around his shoulders. Zu was warm, even though the clothing he wore appeared flimsy, designed for a hot climate. ‘You asked, and it was time to tell you.’

Darq leaned against him. ‘Thank you. I knew I was Gelaming. Do my parents know I’m alive?’

Zu stroked Darq’s hair. ‘Pellaz and Calanthe do. Your fathers. You know you have two fathers?’

Darq wiped his nose. ‘Thiede told me I was created by three hara. I don’t really know what that means, or how it was done. When Thiede told me, I didn’t care about it. How did they do it?’

‘I wasn’t there,’ Zu said. ‘Some things aren’t meant to be observed, but it’s obvious that the aren of two hara mingled with the yaloe of the third. It summoned you into being.’

Darq shivered. He saw in his mind’s eye an image of shadowy hara taking aruna together. ‘These names,’ he said, ‘Pellaz… Calanthe… they are strangers. I can’t think of them as family. What is my hostling’s name?’

‘Caeru.’

‘And my brothers?’

‘Loki and Abrimel.’

Darq uttered a short laugh. ‘Instant family. How will they feel about me? Perhaps my brothers might resent me.’ He remembered what the Weavers had told him.

‘That’s possible,’ Zu said. ‘When you finally return to your family, you might well encounter jealousy.’

‘Just that?’ Darq pulled away from Zu. ‘Who are
you
? Will you tell me now?’

Zu got to his feet. ‘My true name would mean nothing to you, Darq. All you need to know is that I’m not your enemy.’

Darq looked up at him. ‘Will they come for me now, enemies and factions?’

‘Here? No. The hara here are very strong, but then they have had help.’

Darq too stood up again. ‘Who helped them?’

‘Those who were once my people.’

‘
Your
people?’

Zu nodded. ‘Yes. Darq, there’s something you must understand. When the plagues came, the madness, the zealotry, and the aggression that destroyed the human race, it was sent deliberately, but not aimed at them. They were merely a casualty. The human world was destroyed to kill my kind.’

‘Who
are
your kind? Are you human? I don’t understand.’

‘You will,’ Zu said. ‘You’ve had enough revelations to deal with for one evening.’

‘I feel like I know less than before,’ Darq said. ‘What am I supposed to do, now that I know who I am? I’m confused. I think I should be doing something, formulating a plan, but what? My head’s spinning.’

Zu smiled. ‘You’re strong. What you feel now is a growing pain, that’s all. It’s the moment of awakening, like feybraiha, when nothing can be the same again.’

‘Can I trust the hara here? There are some, called the Weavers…’ Darq was surprised he could even speak their name. ‘I’m not supposed to be able to talk about them. They have bound my tongue.’

‘Not against me, they haven’t!’ Zu said. ‘I know of these hara. Tell me what they’ve said to you.’

Darq told Zu what had occurred. ‘It was why I had to call to you. I felt bewildered. I couldn’t think of anyone else to turn to.’ He laughed bleakly. ‘Even to me, that seems insane.’

‘I’m glad you feel you can trust me a little.’

‘I’m not sure it’s that, Zu! It seems to me more like desperation than trust.’

Zu did not appear offended. ‘Well, whatever the case, I’m glad you called to me.  I’m confident the Weavers will try to protect you, because they see you as useful. Tava-edzen was wronged, but then many hara were wronged. His part is up to him, not you. But if you want him, Darq, then take him. You could do worse.’

Darq sat back in the snow. He laughed. He felt drunk. ‘I can’t believe I’m doing this, talking to you here.’ He paused, and Zu let the silence stretch. Darq stared at him. Zu couldn’t be a human. He was har, and a supremely attractive specimen, even if he was full of mysteries and deceits. Darq wondered if the information he’d received would somehow feel more real if he lived it again through Zu’s breath and inner vision. He made a decision. ‘Zu, I feel disorientated, almost out of my body. Can we take aruna together?’

Zu raised his eyebrows, then grinned. ‘No, much as I’d like to. It would not be… appropriate. Not at this time.’

Darq gestured wildly. ‘Then possess Tava-edzen. We could do it that way.’

Zu shook his head. ‘Darq, that is
not
what you want.’

Darq scowled. ‘Darzu wasn’t what I wanted either, nor what you did to Ookami. You needn’t start acting all moral on me. You don’t care.’

‘They didn’t matter.’

Darq rubbed his face with both hands. ‘I don’t know what to do next. I don’t want to be waiting like this, unarmed and ignorant. If you know what’s going to happen, you must tell me.’

‘Part of it is beyond your control, and mine. We have to wait for events to synchronise. The Weavers think they have you, but let them wait too. Show them your mettle, and when you do face them again, tell them who you are. Command them to take you to those who were my people.’

Darq considered this for a moment. ‘Will the Weavers obey what I say? They are powerful.’

Zu nodded. ‘Yes they are, but not as powerful as you will be. They’re simply older and more experienced. They are also Sulh, who often think highly of themselves.’

Darq sighed. ‘Well… I can only try.’ He paused. ‘Zu…’

‘Yes.’

‘This is completely unrelated, and I don’t know why I thought of it, but do you know I tried to incept a human female?’