The Realms of the Gods (4 page)

Daine heard something behind them and whirled. Ten feet away, crude hands erupted through dirt. “Numair!” she cried, and shot the emerging Skinner. Unmagicked, her bolt had no effect. The creature rose from the ground as if it climbed a stair.

Numair cried out in Old Thak. The creature that Daine had shot turned to water. The man whirled to do the same to another Skinner. Half out of the earth, it dissolved.

Five spots near them exploded as Skinners leaped free of the ground. Daine screamed. Numair reached to pull her closer, and discovered that someone else had the
same idea. Two pairs of hands clutched the girl by the arms, dragging her into a patch of air that burned silvery white.

“No!” shouted the mage, wrapping both arms around Daine. The phantom hands continued to pull.

Sinking into white pain, Daine heard a man shriek, “Curse you, follow them! Follow,
follow, FOLLOW!”

Unseen by her or Numair, an inky shadow leaped free of the grass to wrap itself around her feet. Girl, man, and shadow vanished into bright air.

Every inch of her throbbed. Hands gripped her; she fought. “The Skinners! They'll kill Numair, they'll kill the People, they'll kill the crops! Let me
go
!”

A female voice, one that she knew, said, “If she doesn't rest, she won't heal. He's just as bad. Both keep fretting about those monsters.”

“I'd best take care of it, then.” The second gravelly voice was even more familiar.

“Why?” The speaker was an unknown male. “Leave mortal affairs to mortals.”

“Nonsense,” barked the gravel voice. Whiskers tickled her face; a musky scent that she knew well filled her nose. “Listen, Daine. Numair is here, with you. He's safe. I'll fix those Skinners. I can handle them. Now rest, and stop fussing!”

She sneezed. “All right, Badger.” If her old friend the badger god said that things would be taken care of, she could believe him, even if all this was only a dream.

The woman's voice was fading. “I'll tell Numair.”

The next time Daine woke, the pain gnawing at her had turned to a dull, steady ache. Cloth rustled nearby; the faint odor of sweet pea and woods lily filled her nose. Like the female voice she'd heard, she knew that scent well. She opened her eyes.

A blurred face hung over her. Daine squinted, trying
to see. The face became clearer: blue eyes, a dimple at the corner of that smiling mouth, creamy skin, straight nose, high cheekbones. The whole was topped with a braided crown of heavy golden hair.

In a second the girl forgot the last four years. She was twelve again, and in her bed in Galla. “Ma?” she croaked. “I dreamed you was dead.” With a frown, she corrected herself—she knew how to speak like cultured folk nowadays! “I dreamed you
were
dead.”

Sarra Beneksri—Daine's mother—laughed. “Sweet-ling, it was no dream. I
am
dead.”

Some of Daine's confusion faded. “Well, that's all right, then.” She tried to sit up. “Where am I?”

Sarra moved pillows to help her. “You're in the realms of the gods.”

Moving dizzied the girl. “How'd I get
here
? And why do I hurt so?”

“We brought you. Sadly, passage between realms was fair hard for you. Here's something to drink against the pain.”

“Talk about familiar,” Daine grumbled, taking the offered cup. With each swallow, she felt an improvement; by the time she'd swallowed all of the liquid, her pain was nearly gone. “Your messes have gotten better,” she remarked with a grin.

“It's the herbs here.” Sarra pinched Daine's nose gently. “They're stronger. Open your eyes wide.” She used her fingers to pull back Daine's eyelids. “Where were you born?”

“Snowsdale, in Galla. Why are you asking?”

“To see if your mind's unhurt—though it being you, I wonder if I'll be able to tell.”

“Ma!” squeaked Daine with laughing outrage.

“How old are you?”

“Sixteen.” Memory returned in a rush. “Where's Numair? The Skinners—”

Her mother stopped her from getting up. “Easy. Master Numair is here, and safe. The badger took care of those skinning monsters. He turned them to ice, and they melted. They won't trouble anyone now.”

“So I didn't dream that.” Daine sank back against her pillows gratefully, fingering the heavy silver badger's claw that hung on a chain around her neck. “Where did they come from, do you suppose?”

“You know as much as me,” was the reply. “I've never seen the like of them.”

“Sarra?” The voice coming from the next room was deep, male, and unfamiliar.

The woman's face lit up. “In here, my love. She's awake.”

The door opened, and a man dressed in a loincloth entered. Although the doorway was unusually large, the crown of antlers firmly rooted in his brown, curly hair forced him to duck to pass through. He was tan and heavily muscled, with emerald eyes. Daine was unsettled to notice that there also were olive streaks in his reddish brown skin.

“So.” He touched his antlers uneasily as she stared at them. “We meet at last.”

“This is your father,” Sarra told Daine. “This is the god Weiryn.”

TWO

MEETINGS WITH GODS

He looked so—odd. No one else's father had antlers, or went half-naked. What was she supposed to say? “Hullo, Da.” She hid trembling hands under her blankets.

“Daine!” Sarra cried. “Is that the best you can do? He's your da!”

The girl couldn't begin to describe her feelings. Only months ago, she had learned that the horned man she saw in visions was her father, and that he was a god. She had tried not to think about it ever since. “It's not like you ever told me who he was, or what he was,” she reminded her mother. “Not even a
hint
.”

“I thought we'd have time later,” replied Sarra. “I never meant to be killed by bandits!”

“Daine?” Numair came to the door, looking pale and tired. “You know that the badger destroyed the Skinners, yes?”

“Ma told me. You don't look so good.”

He smiled. “I'll survive. Are
you
all right?”

“I hurt a little.” She couldn't help but note, with some amusement, that except for the tips of his horns, Weiryn was shorter than her friend.

Numair smiled twistedly. “I am informed that passage between the realms has an adverse effect on mortals.” He clung to the door frame.

Silver fire glimmered on the floor, and a large badger appeared. Daine smiled as her mentor waddled over. He looked up at her with black eyes that were bright in his vividly-marked face. “Hullo,” she told him. “So we've you to thank for handling those Skinners?”

“You wouldn't rest until you knew they were dealt with.” Balancing on his hindquarters, the god rose to plant his forepaws on her covers. Her nose filled with his musky, heavy scent.

Gently she scratched him behind the ears. Since she had left her Gallan home, the badger had visited her, teaching her the use of her wild magic, and warning of danger to come. The claw she wore around her neck was his; he could always trace it to find her.

Sarra frowned at Numair. “You are supposed to sit, and stay sat.” She made a tugging gesture at the wall beside the mage. That part of the room began to move; the floor buckled and rose. The wall stretched to meet it, then sagged to create a chair. “Down, Master Salmalín!” ordered Sarra. Meekly, he did as ordered.

Daine's jaw dropped. “But—Ma, you can't—you never—”

“Things are different here,” the badger said. “In the Divine Realms, we gods can shape our surroundings to suit ourselves.”

“Sometimes,” added Weiryn.

“Wonderful,” the girl said weakly. She was not sure that she liked to see unliving things move about under their own power. “Tell me—how did we come here? The last thing I remember is the Skinners.”

Weiryn and Sarra traded glances. “You were in danger of your life, against a foe you could not fight,” the god said. “We had meant to bring you only, but this—
man
—” he glared at the mage— “refused to let go of you. We were forced to bring him as well.”

“I just thank the Goddess that you met the Skinners on one of the great holidays, when we
could
pull you through to us,” added Daine's mother. “Otherwise you would have been killed. It fair troubles me that no one we've asked has ever heard of those creatures.”

Light bloomed through the curtains on a window that filled one of the walls, growing steadily brighter, then fading. Just as it was nearly gone, another slow flash came. “Oh, dear,” remarked Sarra as Weiryn opened the drapes. “They're still at it.”

“What's going on?” Numair asked, lurching to his feet.

“Will you
sit?”
cried Daine's mother. “Men! You're so stubborn!” Numair quickly sat, this time on the bed. Sulkily, the chair that Sarra had made for him sank into the wall.

Daine stared at the view. The ground here dropped away to meet a busy stream. There were no trees between stream and house, although the forest grew thickly on the far side of the water. In the oval of open sky overhead, waves of rippling pea green, orange, yellow, and gray fire shimmered and coursed.

“What is it?” she whispered. Numair took her hand and squeezed it gently. “I feel that it means something bad, but it's so beautiful . . .”

“It means that Uusoae, the Queen of Chaos, is fighting the Great Gods,” said the badger. That light is her magic and her soldiers, as they attack the barriers between our realm and hers.”

“She has been at it since Midwinter.” Weiryn put an arm around Sarra. “Normally the lights that burn in our sky reflect your mortal wars, but this is far more important.”

“Thanks ever so,” muttered Numair. Daine grinned at him.

Sarra looked at her daughter and said reproachfully, “Speaking of war, I never raised
you
to be always fighting and killing. That's not woman's work.”

“It's needful, Ma.
You
taught me a woman has to know how to defend herself.”

“I never!” gasped Sarra, indignant.

“You taught me when you were murdered in your own house,” Daine said quietly.

Sarra turned back into Weiryn's hold, leaning on his chest, but not before the girl saw tears in her mother's eyes. A hand patted her ankle; a broad head thrust itself under her elbow. Against her mother's hurt, she set Numair's smile and the badger's approval.

“Sarra, our war in Tortall may seem unimportant to the gods, but not to us,” Numair said. “Daine and I must return to it. They need every fighter, and every mage.”

Daine nodded, and closed her eyes. She felt dizzy. Her bones were aching again.

Sarra glanced over and saw what was wrong. “We'll talk of that later,” she said crisply. “You both need to drink a posset, then sleep again. It will be a few days before the effects of your passage are over.” She went to the hearth and ladled something from a pot into a pair of cups. One she gave to Numair, the other to Daine. “Drink.”