The Land's Whisper (33 page)

“Do you regret coming?” Brenol half feared
Darse’s answer, but he could not help himself.

The question was one Darse had been mulling
over himself. He answered thoughtfully, “No. No, I don’t… I do wish
the whole thing back there hadn’t happened. I can’t deny that.” He
moved his hands up to caress his closed, yellow eyes. “But life
isn’t about escaping pain.”

Brenol puzzled silently before responding.
“What’s it about then?”

“Love.” Darse smiled as he spoke, realizing
he again felt the freedom of believing it.

The boy did not ask anything else, so Darse
rolled over and left Brenol to his ruminations.

~

Brenol squared the remaining costs with the
taciturn inn-keeper, who solemnly nodded his farewell. The boy
cringed as he watched the coins and papers disappear into the dark
hands, for they had very little remaining to get them through their
journey. He swallowed his thoughts and collected his belongings to
meet Darse outside.

The two pushed forward with renewed vigor,
marching east toward the Songra, and Brenol again perceived the
jeering smirk of the land. The hills pushed up with a vicious jut,
the avenues were rockier, and vines and underbrush crowded upon
them. Still, the two managed to eke their way.

Brenol remained wrapped in his thoughts
throughout. He brooded, burrowing his feet into the damp earth and
flinging it forward. Darse raised an eyebrow on several occasions
but let the matter rest.

By late afternoon of the second day, they
happened upon the water. The Songra was as Gartoung promised:
lovely, absolutely lovely. About twenty strides across, she flowed
with the softness of a swishing gown and shone with the clarity of
glass. Flowering lily pads, like pink-white jewels, grew along her
banks, for the hems of the Songra were still and calm. The
exquisite serenity hushed the travelers. The only sound to be heard
was the opus of her gentle garments brushing gracefully past.

Brenol could not pry his eyes away from her.
He finally spoke, “It’s like the water’s being pushed by a breath.
A breath alone.”

Darse inhaled the fresh scents. “Clouds move
faster,” he agreed.

“There aren’t even any bugs.”

“Hmmmm,” Darse sighed in enjoyment.

“How deep?”

Darse smiled playfully. “Only one way to
see.” He set down their pack, stripped, and with the agility of a
youth, dove into the crystal aqua depths. As his head popped up, he
grinned widely and shot a thin stream from between his teeth to hit
Brenol in the face.

“What are you, ten orbits?” Brenol crowed,
diving in with a laugh.

The Songra was invigorating. She may not
have moved much, but her waters were live. She was clean and mild
and deliciously cool. The two swam, dipping down into her
depths—the length of two men—and played at catching fish with only
palms and fingers. They laughed, and their mirth was genuine. It
was as though the nightmares of Massada had never been.

Amidst the play, Brenol glanced back to the
bank where he had left his things, where he had left the weight. A
sudden longing to shed his anger and hate welled alive within
him.

I want to be free again. I want to forget
Fingers. Forget the horrible desire in me. Forget it all.
His
longings swished down the lane with the Songra’s skirts, down into
the heart of Selet.

Could I? Could I really just speak that to
the waters? That easily?

He treaded the water somberly, with a heart
full of anticipation.

But his lips never moved, and the moment
ended.

“I’ll grab our things,” Darse said,
startling Brenol from his introspection. The youth nodded, and
Darse misread the flicker of disappointment he spied within the
jade eyes.

“Maybe we can come through here on our way
back, Bren.”

Brenol issued another inattentive bob of the
head.

Darse dipped into the clear one last time,
finally surfacing when his lungs stung with need. He scrambled up
to the western bank, collected their belongings, and precariously
balanced them on his head before returning to cross the river. The
pile promptly tipped as soon as his legs began their tread, and he
smiled guiltily at Brenol. The two corralled the sodden items into
their arms and worked their way across, eventually clambering up
onto the perfumed pink banks.

On the shore, dripping, they donned again
their clothing, drenched pack, and burdens of Colette and Massada.
Brenol gave a wistful glance back to the Songra’s smooth, clean
body.

Thank you
, he thought, grateful for
the lush oasis and what it had been, although his heart still
yearned for more.

He sighed and turned, leaving her innocent
allurements to the next forlorn traveler.

~

The following day marked another trying day
of travel. The land was ever hostile and rough, opposed to their
intrusion. It fought them every step between incline and valley,
but the two progressed with a new dignity; the Songra had
galvanized them. Brenol felt less strained. He laughed more and
brooded less. His silent prayer for freedom had at least begun to
soften the stone that was wedged so sturdily in his chest.

“Hey, Bren?” Darse asked, after a
particularly arduous section.

“Yeah?”

“Have you had any more luck talking to
Selet?”

Brenol’s face elongated in surprise; of all
the things Darse could ask, he had not anticipated that one. He
peered sideways at the man grimly battling the greenery. Darse
lifted a bough to allow the youth to slide under unscathed.

“I haven’t really been trying. But no.”
I
didn’t have to try with the others.

“Why do you think that is?” Darse asked.

“Don’t know,” Brenol replied, yet he tapped
Darse with a double brush of his index finger. It was nothing that
anyone else would have noticed or understood, but it was enough for
them. He hoped Darse would understand his meaning:
Wait for the
lugazzi.

Darse pulled on his ear, expressionless:
I hear.

They mopped the sweat from their brows and
pressed on, with Selet’s eye upon them.

~

They camped that night, and by midday of the
following day, trod into the dusty village of Graft. It was a juile
town, but it lacked the vivacity of Trilau. Graft was smaller,
likely no more than a hundred residents, and had a quiet, quaint
feel. The townspeople watched them indifferently, like scientists
observing and noting, awaiting an outcome.

It did not require extensive questioning to
discover that Arman was indeed in Graft. Brenol could have wept in
relief but instead held the thread of gratitude like a lifeline,
hoping it would sustain.

Eventually, they were granted further
fortune: a child willing to help. She was a dark-plaited and
wide-eyed girl in white, no older than six orbits, and she ushered
the two through the sooty paths and lanes. She flitted quickly in
and around with the nimble quickness of a cat, and their breath
grew short as they labored to keep up. She had that capability all
juile seemed to share of somehow sweeping over the ground in a
manner so as not to upset the dirt. Her clothes, skin, and feet all
remained immaculate.

Darse and Brenol did not share her
grace.

The creature in white paused after several
minutes, and the two slid to a halt behind her. She pointed a tiny
finger in the direction of an oddity: a single-story house—one of
the few the two had spied in juile country. But it was still
bedecked in the same gray pebble-dash with colorful drapes sweeping
back and forth within the door frame. The house was simple and
solid, and evidenced a sure hand guarding its upkeep. The girl
muttered something unintelligible and bowed. She was gone like a
flame before a breath.

The world writhes; an unseen evil sinks its teeth
still deeper.

-Genesifin

Darse and Brenol stepped forward to approach
the house, and, like a magician’s trick, a man appeared standing in
the frame, with portiere flapping against his body. He resembled
juile on the whole, yet a taste of something foreign clung from top
to toe. He was a towering creature, easily a hand’s span higher
than the average juile, and his erect posture gave the impression
of even greater height.

Darse and Brenol approached slowly, both
eying the figure with concern. As they drew nearer, he stepped
fully from the doorway and loomed over them—and what felt to be
Massada entire. Now within two strides, they saw the man more
clearly. His body was fit but not muscular; his skin, olive;
complexion, baby-smooth. He had dark, tolerably greasy hair that
curled up in a wave of unruliness, although its length was no more
than five digits long. His eyes were sunken in and
characteristically juile: so dark that the pupil and iris were
almost impossible to distinguish from the other. His nose was long
and pointed and slightly too large for his face, while his lips
were thin and pursed. His austere face was not handsome, but also
not unpleasant.

“I am Arman,” he said plainly and without
nuance.

“Uh, Bren…and this is Darse,” Brenol said,
pointing in turn.

Arman bowed his head to them politely. “I
pray it will be bountiful.”

Darse returned the bow and Brenol hastened
in awkward mimicry. The juile did not react; it would seem he did
not expect anything less.

Arman surveyed the two, awaiting their
story. He was apparently not prone to wasting words.

It was Darse who finally spoke. “We were
told you might be willing to help us. We have a task that Queen
Isvelle and Ordah have sent us on.”

Arman’s thick, dark eyebrows rose at the
mention of the latter’s name. “What is this task?”

“We are looking for Isvelle’s daughter. Her
name is Colette.”

The dark eyes bore into Darse. Their
penetrating perception was unsettling. “So Colette is still alive?”
His lips pursed in thought. “That is unexpected… What does he
suggest?”

“He didn’t say. He just said to come to you
for help.” Darse wanted to squirm under the odd gaze.
I feel
like a fool,
he thought. Arman seemed about as hospitable as a
wet cat.

“Am I to follow orders from a
prophet
?” the juile muttered, the final word spraying from
his tongue as if he were spitting out a bug. His left hand moved
into his robe, where he absentmindedly toyed with a clicking
device. For several intense minutes, the short snaps patterned off
in a foreign cadence. Brenol pictured the dark fingers tinkering
with a pocketed abacus like he used at school, yet the rhythm
seemed to indicate more than mere fiddling.

“Ordah, Ordah. He forgets others do not have
his foresight,” Arman finally said. He inhaled deeply and exhaled
with a slow hiss. “Or maybe it is just easier for him to pretend as
such.”

At this, Arman flashed a stunning smile. It
evened out his face, making his large nose fit perfectly among his
other features. His eyes softened, suddenly aglow with diversion.
One could even argue that the smile made him handsome, at least for
that brief and beautiful moment.

“All right, Bren and Darse. I will help
you.” He dipped his chin as if in acknowledgement to himself. “I am
surprised at the timing, but Ordah has his reasons…or he imagines
he does.” The arresting smile again transformed his features.
Brenol gaped; it was fascinating that a mere grin could alter a
person so markedly.

Darse would have been charmed had he not
been numbed to everything but a blossoming ire. “A reason for his
timing?” he mumbled. He grappled with his thoughts, but the words
spilled out before he could even make sense of them. “Are you
saying he knew all along—these last
eight
orbits that she
was missing—that she really was alive?” His voice warbled with
emotion. He thought of Isvelle back in Veronia; she was half insane
because of all these games.

Arman’s smile vanished like a meerkat into a
hole, and his nose again protruded grossly from his face. His
searching eyes probed with a keen intensity. At last the juile
released a sigh that told of a puzzle being completed. Darse
squirmed, feeling that Arman now perceived more than he would have
liked.

The juile spoke gently, “No, no. That is not
my meaning. I do not think Ordah would ever behave as such. I mean
only that it is odd to face this in light of the coming
lunavidola.
He knows I would not leave unless it were dire…
But again, he has his reasons.” The meerkat smile popped out anew,
handsome and playful.

“The plan, then?” asked Brenol. Somehow he
knew it was not going to be sleep. He sighed before he even heard
the answer.

The meerkat disappeared. “We travel.”

~

Arman pointed their party east, with the aim
of gaining assistance from an old friend in Granoile, and they
began their trek.

Walking out of Selet was unexpectedly
astounding. The land thinned of its vegetation and settled into
barrenness. The sun beat down and beaded their skin in
perspiration, yet the late afternoon skies lit up with the colors
and radiance of the lunavidola, or at least the preludes of it.
According to Arman, this was the first glimpse of the panorama of
colors that would paint the heavens for ten days, becoming even
starker and more vibrant in a stunning and rhythmic dance. For now,
they surveyed a pale pastel wash behind dancing lights—more
reminiscent of rainbow fireflies flitting about than an ordered
symphony of beams and movement. But Arman promised that within the
next day, zenith and horizon alike would morph into astounding
beauty. It was extraordinary for any juile not to be present during
this event.

“Why is that?” Brenol asked.

Arman strode forcefully, eyes stretched
forward toward their destination. His garments flapped gently. “It
is the time for those without soummen to find one.”