The Singers of Nevya (13 page)

When she was ready, Sira took one deep breath, tested the noose once again, then, pushing off with all her strength, sprang away from the tree.

The arrow jerked out of her body and hung by the thong, grisly and broken. Sira fell face first into the snow, sobbing with pain and the disgusting feeling of the wood yanking through her flesh. Fresh blood soaked her back, but she was too glad to be free of the arrow to care.

She rested for some time, until she noticed the air growing colder around her. Raising herself on her arms, she saw the last fragments of the
quiru
scattering before the wind and snow. She had to do something soon, or her efforts thus far would be wasted.

She was stranded halfway through Ogre Pass, without
hruss
, or food, or guide. The swirling snowstorm obscured the landmarks. A trickle of blood burned against her back.

For today, what she needed was a
quiru
and a chance to stanch her wound and rest. She recovered her saddlepack from beneath the snow, mentally bade farewell to Rollie and even to Shen, and began her difficult trudge through the deepening snow to find a spot where she could rest away from the fatal campsite. She did not trust this place.

The wind intensified, making it difficult to listen for
hruss
and riders. Her pack was not heavy, but as she slung it over her shoulder, she winced with the pain of her wound. She would walk, she decided, for one hour, then call up a
quiru
. When she was rested, she would think what to do, and how to get somewhere safe.

Maestra Lu was haggard from a night spent first in grief and anxiety, then a terrible confusion. When Sira had drawn the veil over her mind, her teacher had felt the loss of her thoughts as surely as if she had died. Then, when Sira began once again to think and feel, Lu’s heart fluttered with hope.

She leaned now on the doorjamb of Magister Mkel’s apartment and knocked weakly. Cathrin opened the door, and drew a sharp breath when she saw Lu. “Maestra! Why, whatever are you . . . you should have sent your Housewoman to us!”

“I am fine, Cathrin. And there was no time. Please get Mkel for me, will you?”

“Of course, of course I will.” Cathrin led Lu to a soft chair near a window. She did not touch her, but her warmth was tangible as she hovered over her. “Let me get you some tea.”

“After,” Lu said tiredly. “I must see Mkel immediately.”

Cathrin disappeared into another room. In a moment she came back with Mkel, still arranging his dark tunic, at her side. He carried his boots in his hand, and sat to pull them on.

“Something has happened to Sira,” Lu said, without preamble.

“Maestra?” He waited, one boot still in his hand.

“Last night, something happened . . . I felt it. I thought she was dead.”

Cathrin gasped, but Mkel held up his hand. “Where was she?”

“I cannot tell. Far away.”

“There was a congress at Lamdon,” Mkel said. “Possibly she was there. But that is too far for you to hear her, surely.”

Lu shrugged that off. “Something happened to her, and through the night I could not feel her at all. Then, at first light this morning, I heard her clearly for just a moment. There has been a disaster of some kind. We must send riders to Bariken.”

“But how could you hear anything so far away, Maestra?” whispered Cathrin.

Lu shook her head. “I do not question my Gift.”

“Nor do we,” Mkel said. He thrust his foot into his boot and stood. “I will dispatch riders to Bariken right away.”

“They will need a Singer, someone strong,” Lu said urgently. “And they must hurry.”

Mkel nodded, and Cathrin wrung her hands. “Now will you drink some tea, Maestra? And you must rest. You look exhausted.”

Lu leaned back in her chair, her strength ebbing suddenly. “Tea, yes. Thank you, Cathrin. I will rest when the party is on its way.”

A Housewoman brought Lu some tea and
keftet
while she waited for news. Mkel went straight to the great room, where the House was assembling for its morning meal. He came back soon after with two riders and a blonde itinerant.

“Maestra, of course you know Jane and Gram,” Mkel said. The two riders bowed to her. “And this—” Mkel indicated the itinerant. “This is the Singer Theo.”

Theo bowed also, and Lu inclined her head to him.

“Something is wrong at Bariken,” Mkel told the three. “The Maestra has heard something, and feels Cantrix Sira is in great danger.”

Jane and Gram nodded. The Singer Theo frowned, but was silent, waiting.

“There is no time to lose,” Maestra Lu said. Her voice scratched in her throat. “Jane, Gram, please do all you can to find her.”

“We will ride immediately,” Jane said. “To Bariken, then?”

“I do not know where she is. You will need to begin there.” She turned to the itinerant. “Singer Theo, this is of the greatest importance. Will you help us?”

His bow was as elegant as that of any Cantor. “Of course I will help, Maestra,” he replied. She found his voice resonant and reassuring. He turned to Mkel. “Magister?”

“Yes,” Mkel said. He turned to lead the riders out of the apartment. “We’ll make arrangements for provisions and mounts. And your pay, Singer.”

Lu just heard the Singer’s answer before they closed the door. “My pay can wait.”

A moment later the room was empty except for Cathrin and Lu. Lu let her head drop back and her eyes close. She felt the softness of a
caeru
rug fall around her. She took a deep, sighing breath, and fell asleep where she was.

Chapter Eleven

Snow and wind harassed Sira as she struggled to put some distance between herself and the campsite. Her muscles strained, and blood trickled steadily down her back. Her skin was cold and clammy, and her head felt as it were floating free of her body. As if from another lifetime she recalled Maestro Nikei talking about the effects of bleeding. The remedies circled vaguely through her mind as she pressed on. None of them were available to her now.

When she judged she had waded through the powder for an hour, working her way off the road into the forest, she allowed herself to collapse against an ironwood tree. She reached into her tunic for her
filla
. She could go no farther until she was warm all the way through.

Sira’s Gift almost failed her at that moment. When she took a breath to play, pain from her injury stunned her. Her lips were icy, and her mind fluttered with fatigue and weakness. Her psi felt as distant as the safety of Conservatory. For one terrifying moment she could not think of the mode she needed.

She stiffened her spine. “I have not come this far,” she said aloud, to convince herself, “to let my body get the better of me.” The iron will that had seen her through the hours beneath the snow cleared her thoughts. She bit at her lips to increase the circulation, and began to play. No emotion, no physical sensation, did she allow her mind to register until a slender, intense
quiru
was born about her, as warm as she could make it under the circumstances.

Then, while her body warmed in the safety of its warmth and light, she gave in. She crumpled to the ground, pulled her furs around her, and sobbed against her knees for her pain and fear and betrayal. The softness of the
caeru
fur soaked up her tears and muffled her weeping.

Several hours passed while she rested. When she felt a little stronger, she remembered that she should drink. She used her
filla
again, the briefest
Doryu
melody, to melt snow in a hardwood cup from her pack. The icy water tasted of wood and rock. She had to do it again and again to get enough water, but she kept at it until her thirst was quenched. She had a little food, a gift package of dried fruit and nuts. Cantrix Sharn had given it to her only two days before. It seemed a time past remembering.

She chewed a piece of dried fruit and a few of the nuts, and began to feel stronger. She could think of no way to bandage her wound, but the bleeding seemed to have ceased for the moment. She took some of her extra linen from her pack, and pressed it between her back and the tree, thrusting it down the back of her tunic as best she could. The entrypoint of the wound, below her collarbone, was already closed and scabbing.

She decided to rest the night through before setting out again. Lamdon was the only safe place for her to go, and it was also the closest House, as far as she knew. If she worked her way back to the road, she should be able to find the way.

Now, as she settled in for the night, she tried to take in what had happened. Mike and Alks had evidently been part of an assassination plan. Magister Shen had been their target, of course, but it was shocking to think that neither of them, nor Wil or Trude, had cared who died with him. Sharn, and even Magret, had tried to warn her, but she had been too blind to see how bad the situation was in Shen’s House. What had she missed? What evidence had she, in her eagerness to go to Lamdon, ignored?

A picture rose in her mind of Rhia, now a beautiful, pale widow, Magistrix at last. She would be flanked, Sira supposed, by Wil and Trude. Perhaps Wil had conceived the intrigue. Trude was surely not so clever. And Alks and Mike? They would straggle in to Bariken with a dramatic story of storm and separation, a not-unheard-of tragedy in the Mariks. So sad, everyone would say, the loss of the brilliant young Cantrix.

Sira huddled lower inside her furs. There was no way for her to know what was happening now at Bariken. She didn’t know whom she had to fear most. But she was certain she must hide the fact of her survival until she reached safety. Cantrix Sharn would know what to do. Until she could reach her protection, she would have to protect herself.

Shen’s party had come one long day’s ride by
hruss
from Lamdon. Sira estimated it would take her three days to cover the same distance on foot. It was a daunting prospect, but there was nothing she could do but accept it. She lay down, hoping for a healing sleep. Outside her slender
quiru
, snowflakes danced a menacing pattern in the cold and wind.

I can do it, she thought. One step at a time, I can do it.

It would be a hard and lonely three days, but at the end of it would be the safety and warmth of Lamdon, the comfort of Cantrix Sharn to confide in. The important thing—the saving thing—was that no one knew she was alive. Mike and Alks would not be coming back for her.

Maestra Lu and Isbel sat close together in a window seat at Conservatory. Lu sent,
I have heard Sira’s thoughts. I know only that she lives. For a time I thought we had lost her.

But what has happened?
Isbel begged.
What did you hear?

It is hard to explain. Something frightened me in the night, and when I sought Sira’s mind, it seemed it was gone. I could hear nothing, as if she had gone with the Spirit beyond the Stars. Then, hours later, I heard her again.

Your reach is so long, Maestra
, Isbel sent sadly.
I wish I could doubt you, but I do not.

Lu put out her fragile white hand, and Isbel took it in both of hers. They clung together that way, the old Singer and the young one, sharing their fear for one of their own.

I think someone died,
Lu sent a few moments later.
Not a Gifted one, but someone with Sira. There was grief in her thoughts, and shock.

But she lives,
Isbel sent.

Lu squeezed Isbel’s fingers.
She lives. We have sent Gram and Jane to Bariken to discover what is wrong. She is their Cantrix, and they will surely help us to find her.

We must save her,
Isbel sent, tears springing to her eyes.

We must. Nevya needs her. And I need her.

Soft-hearted Isbel, in an unusual display of emotion, put her arms around her teacher. Lu accepted her embrace, and they wept together.

Sira managed a few hours of sleep despite her circumstances. She woke once to replenish her faltering
quiru
, the wind having torn at it through the night, then slept again. A bright day woke her, fading the light of her
quiru
to a dim glow. Her wound was stiff, and she moved carefully, hoping not to start the bleeding again.

She made a brief meal of fruit and nuts again, carefully wrapping what little was left and stowing it in her pack. She hoisted the pack gingerly to her shoulders, trying to avoid chafing her injury, and set out to retrace her steps of the day before. Her only real danger, she thought, was getting lost. She could manage without food for a little while.

The road they had followed to Lamdon and partway back again was one established by tradition and landmarks rather than improvements. Occasionally blocking trees were cut down, or boulders rolled aside. But snowfall shrouded Ogre Pass most of the year. Footprints rarely lasted more than a few hours.

But Sira knew Lamdon lay northeast of Bariken. Holding that in her mind, she could find the way. She would allow herself no doubts, but envision her welcome by Cantrix Sharn, a beacon to guide her to safety.

She intended to start by returning to the campsite where Magister Shen and Rollie lay entombed by snow. She would take her bearings there, where she would recognize the landmarks. Though it meant retracing an hour’s worth of steps, it seemed a prudent beginning.

The wind died down with the coming of day, and it gave her the added protection of her acute hearing. She could detect the approach of any riders. By this time, Wil and Trude and the others would already be at Bariken, and were perhaps even now sending messages about the accident that had taken the lives of Bariken’s Magister, its junior Cantrix, and one faithful rider. She shrank from thinking how grieved Maestra Lu would be.

She did not make good time. She was hungry, and weak from bleeding. The powdery snow had grown even deeper, and she had to wade through thigh-high drifts at times. Her trail had vanished, but she trusted her instinct to keep her moving in the right direction. When the moment came, however, she almost went right past the campsite.

She was plodding past a snowfilled clearing, which looked as if a clutter of boulders had been covered by the snow, when a crooked irontree caught her attention. It looked familiar. She stopped, and turned to look back the way she had come. The configuration of irontrees and their great twisting suckers jolted her memory. She went to one of the snowy boulders to clear it with her hand, and she found, as she swept away the powdery layers, that it was Rollie’s frozen body, freshly buried by the steady snowfall.