The Language of Souls (2 page)

“Solena?” He rested his gnarled hand on her shoulder and touched the tip of his blade to his chest. “Have you known this old prophet to proclaim falsely?”

She shook her head.

“To choose a course lightly?”

She shook her head again.

“To make a mistake?”

She looked into his twinkling eyes and her lips twitched in the smallest of smiles.

“No, I don’t take myself so seriously.” He smiled, his eyes lit with humor. “What is your answer?”

Above them on the hillsides, the sandstone houses of Torrani huddled together overlooking the sea. Solena fixed her eyes on her beloved city and said clearly, “Yes, I’ll accept this calling—and gladly.”

“And will you accept the mark?”

Solena hesitated one moment, unable to believe this was happening to her today of all days, then she dropped to one knee in the sand. “Do it quickly,” she said and pushed the sodden sleeve of her robe. She pressed her chin into her shoulder so she’d be able to watch as he made the mark on her upper arm.

Grandpeer was old and weak, but he wielded the blade with an expert hand, just barely skimming the sharpened tip over her skin. Though he was gentle and swift, the cut stung fiercely. Solena smothered a cry. She stared at the mark and grunted in surprise. An outstretched wing? Why had he given her the symbol of faith? Grandpeer was also frowning at the mark with a similar expression of surprise, as if someone else had made the mark and not he. She dug her chin more fiercely into her shoulder, watching as he quickly added a graceful open cup, the symbol for healing, the only symbol he should have made. He seemed strangely flustered when he finished, as if he too were disturbed by the strange mark he’d made.

Bending a little unsteadily, he snatched up a handful of sand and covered her cut. After removing the sand, he dropped to his knees facing the sea and lifted the bloodstained sand to the sky. “Guide your daughter in her task....” His voice wavered. “Grant her compassion and endless wisdom.”

He cast the sand into the sea.

“It is done,” he whispered. Sweat trickled down his face.

Solena rose to face him, her eyes burning. She clenched her jaw. Though the mark hurt, she refused to shed any tears.

Her grandfather began to cough. He coughed for so long she thought he’d never stop.

Solena watched him with growing concern. “You know Theta?” she blurted, needing to say what she had to say quickly, before she lost her courage. “Her sister, Athenea, is expecting soon and Leopold is leaving tomorrow to select the child’s votif. And...and I’m going with him.”

“
What?
You’re not going to climb the cliffs.” He’d stopped coughing, but was still rubbing anxiously at his chest as if it hurt to breathe. “It’s too dangerous. It’s a difficult journey even for the most robust of our men.”

What he said was true; she couldn’t argue. Leopold was a strong young man, which was clearly in his favor. Not only that, but he worked as a shipbuilder, toiling for long hours in the sun, so he had great stamina. Though Solena swam and fished long hours every day, being able to wield a fishing spear would hardly help her climb the steepest, most dangerous cliffs in the region.

“I’m going because I seek time in prayer, Grandpeer,” she said instead, knowing he couldn’t deny a religious calling.

“But surely you can pray here in Torrani,” he protested.

“I would pray upon the heights.”

“But
why?
”

“It’s a calling. Surely you understand?”

“Of course I understand a calling,” he said, frowning at her with a trace of consternation. “But it’s too dangerous. I forbid—”

“Don’t,” she interrupted quickly. “Please.” If he forbade her, she wouldn’t go against his wishes, and she needed rather desperately to leave before her courage failed.

“But, Solena....” He started in the reasonable, old-prophet tone he’d used on her so many times when she was a child. Just when she thought he was preparing to lecture her for the next hour, he stopped and rubbed again at his chest. He looked into her face as if looking for something, maybe to determine if she was old enough or brave enough, which she feared she probably wasn’t. She gazed back steadily, lifting her chin.

He finally sighed, clearly resigned, but not happy. “If you must go, then you must. How can I, of all people, argue with a calling?” A wry smile curved his lips.

“I will return, Grandpeer. I promise.”

Solena dipped her paddle in the river again and again. Before her, Leopold was paddling as well, steering his own small boat upriver. Her back ached and the blisters on her hands tore open a little wider each time she drew her paddle through the water. She was already tired. How was she ever going to make the climb once they got there? She shivered as a rush of cold air rolled down from the mountains and numbed her cheeks. By the time she and Leopold reached the cliffs, she was thoroughly chilled. Little uncontrollable shivers swept over her as she helped him hide the boats beneath the splashing waterfall.

Torrani lay far behind her now. Though she wanted to look back again, she didn’t. She’d looked back so many times already. The image of her city’s distant shores was burned into her mind. Somewhere above its white beaches, Grandpeer was likely standing on the rocks and squinting into the distance, trying to make out the colors of their boats. He was probably coughing too. Without a fresh supply of tymia, how long did he have left—a few weeks?

She sucked in a deep, chilling breath, unable to imagine life without him. Sharing a simple meal. Hearing his low, sonorous tones filling the temple as he practiced the ancient chants. Seeing his eyes light up as he placed a gentle hand of blessing on a child’s head. Benito de Scipio had no limit to what he would give his people. Hadn’t he given her everything when she had nothing?

Solena had yearned to express her gratitude before she left, but the words had stuck in her throat. It was as if saying the words aloud would give strength to her greatest fear: that she’d never see him again, never have another chance to tell him. So she hadn’t said anything.

“The climb will take one night and a day,” Leopold predicted, his words tumbling over her thoughts. He was standing on the shore, like an over-muscled tree, and staring up at the cliffs.

Solena looked up too. The fading sun worried her, but she hadn’t donned the deerskins of a boy and paddled miles upriver only to turn back now. With a quick nod to Leopold, she strapped her fishing stick and sack across her back and began to climb. By the time darkness fell, she was dragging herself over the rocks by feel alone. Every one of her muscles burned and she was glad when Leopold finally stopped on a narrow ledge and said, “We’ll sleep here.”

Hoping their ledge wouldn’t crumble in the night, Solena curled up like a tired mountain cat and slept.

The next morning, they climbed cliffs as sheer as a wall, with only the tiniest of nooks to slip their fingers and the toes of their boots into. The rocks in one passage were so brittle, Solena was sure they’d fall if even one gave way. Finally, she pulled herself up one last outcropping and stood on the plateau. Her hands throbbed with prickly heat from hours spent gripping the rough rock face. She blew on them as she looked around, exhausted but curious. The ledge they stood on was long and flat and pockmarked where lightning had struck it many times. Curled bits of molten ore lay scattered around at her feet. From these, Leopold would choose a votif for his new babe, selecting one large enough to hold the embers of life, but small enough to carry for a lifetime.

Solena walked beside him, clasping her sore hands behind her back.

Leopold picked up one of the jar-shaped bulbs, considered it, and cast it aside, declaring it too big. By the time the sun had peaked and slowly began to make its descent, he’d gone through twenty or thirty bulbs of hardened ore, pronouncing them too small, too thin, too ugly....

Solena followed along, watching and waiting. She found Leopold’s devotion to his task fascinating, but, as she walked along, she was also searching, trying to find a molten circlet for Theta. So far, like Leopold, she hadn’t found anything good enough.

At last, her companion held a votif up for her inspection.

She smiled, surprised at the relief and joy she saw in her companion’s face.

“It’s perfect,” she told him quietly.

Leopold cradled the votif in his palm. It was as small as an infant’s fist, as the best votifs were. The opening spread out like the ruffled petals of an iris. During the day, a cork would stop the opening and keep it safe from the elements. By night, it would sit open in a stand by the child’s bedside. His parents would breathe many prayers over it and, when the child was old enough, he’d begin to offer his own prayers.

Solena’s votif dangled from her belt, where its comforting warmth bobbed against her hipbone. Thinking of Athenea waiting at home, ready to give birth at any moment, Solena wondered about her own mother. Her only memory was her mother’s frightened face looking down at her and then an aching sensation of loss. She felt that same sense of loss now, as cold and empty as the mountain wind. They’d been ripped apart for some reason...for some terrible circumstance that lay just outside her grasp. And she’d likely never know what had happened. Or why a mother would leave her own child with a stranger, even someone as good as Benito. It hurt to think about, so Solena stuffed the feelings down deep and turned her attention back to Leopold.

“It is perfect, isn’t it?” he said, smiling through his tears and showing no trace of shame at this rather unmanly display. She’d always thought him a coarse sort of young man, caring more about feats of strength than books. How different he seemed to her now. Maybe she’d never really known him.

Solena tried to smile back, but failed. She found she genuinely
liked
Leopold. It occurred to her then, in that awkward way of realizing too late that you’ve asked for something you don’t deserve, that this was a sacred moment. Leopold might have wanted to bring someone else along on his journey. It was certainly one of Torrani’s oldest traditions for young fathers to bring a brother or a close friend with them, but she’d never heard of anyone bringing a girl, let alone a girl who wasn’t even family.

“Who would you have brought if I hadn’t come?” she asked. “Your father?”

“My father? He’s too old to make the journey, and I don’t have any brothers, so there was no one fighting over who’d be able to join me.” He grinned.

Solena hadn’t considered that. Leopold’s father was Korvanus, or “Old Korvanus,” as his students liked to call him, although not to his face, of course. She’d studied with the teacher for many years and had watched as he paced ever so slowly before the class, expounding on the mysteries of the ancient texts. He certainly didn’t seem the sort of man who’d enjoy climbing impossibly steep cliffs. The thought prompted a brief inward smile.

“But what of your friends?” she asked.

Leopold brushed aside her question with an expressive shrug and a wave of his hand. “Don’t worry, my friend. You’re good company.”

Solena bowed her head, inexpressibly pleased to hear him call her friend. As she stared down at the ground between her feet, attempting to smother the urge to hug him, she saw a perfect molten circlet, softly glowing in the light of the setting sun. It had an almost unearthly kind of beauty, as if lit from within. She picked it up and held it in her palm. She’d found it: a circlet for Theta. Something for her friend to remember her by if she never returned.

“If we leave now....” Leopold was saying. He’d crouched down and was carefully wrapping the votif he’d found in some soft, fibrous padding he’d brought. When he was done, he tucked the bundle into his sack. “We’ll make it home by nightfall tomorrow.”

“I’m not returning with you, Leopold.” Solena closed her fingers around the circlet as she delivered her news.

“Of course you are.” He look
ed up at her with raised brows.

“Benito is growing weaker every day. He’ll die if he doesn’t get more tymia soon, so”—she took a breath—“I’m going into Oden for more.
”

“
Oden?
” Leopold straightened abruptly and gaped at her. “You can’t be serious.” He glanced uneasily at the mountains that loomed over their heads. “It’s too dangerous. Surely someone else could go.”

“How can I ask someone else to go? He’s my grandfather. No. I’m going. I have to. For Benito.” For the dear old man who’d given her a home when she had nothing. He’d loved her and treated her like a granddaughter when he could have simply provided for her needs.

Leopold’s eyes flickered with understanding. “Then I’ll go with you. He’s your grandfather, of course, I can understand that, but he’s also my prophet, the prophet of us all.”

Solena’s heart lightened at the thought of having Leopold’s company. She’d been planning her journey for weeks. She couldn’t count how many nights she’d woken in her darkened room with her heart pounding wildly, aware of some disturbing dream hovering outside the edges of her mind. On those nights, she’d lain awake for hours, staring up at the stars through her window, too afraid to sleep. To have Leopold along to share the journey, to have
anyone
with her.... It was so tempting, but she couldn’t ask it of him. She forced herself to shake her head.