The Singers of Nevya (55 page)

“That proves nothing.”

“I think it does.” Sira sat straight in her chair now, sure of herself. “I think we will perish if we do not explore other ways of training the Gift. We are killing it.”

“Ridiculous,” Mkel declared. They were at an impasse.

“I hoped to persuade you to give me a
filhata
,” Sira said wearily.

“
Filhata
are for Cantors and Cantrixes. You gave up your title. You turned your back on your duty.”

“I know. I am sorry, Magister, that I have disappointed you. But I have work to do.”

“What do you want? Would you destroy Conservatory, your home, your background?”

She rose from her chair and went to the window to lean her forehead against the cool glass. She looked down into the courtyard where she had last seen her beloved Maestra Lu. The sense of loneliness, of isolation, chilled her breast and tightened her throat. She let her emotion rise unshielded, hoping Mkel was open enough to sense it. But, she reflected, before Theo had taught her to allow the feelings of others to affect her, she would not have been able to do so. It was unlikely Mkel would understand.

She straightened, and shook her head. “No, Magister Mkel, I would never wish to destroy Conservatory. For me, it was the perfect way to develop my Gift. I was happy here.” She turned to face him. “I was more than happy here—I was fully alive. But things are changing on the Continent, and I would offer an alternative for the Gifted for whom Conservatory is not the perfect path. Another way to acquire training, to learn the skills vital to Nevya’s survival. The Gift is showing us that it is necessary, that we must—diversify—if it is to stay with us.”

Mkel appeared unmoved. Sira bowed deeply to him. “I wish you well,” she said in farewell. “I have the greatest respect for you and for your work. I only wish I could believe, as you do, in the one way, the only way.”

She left the apartment, and Mkel neither rose nor spoke as he watched her go. As she made her way to the stables, Sira thought of Pol, every bit as sure of himself as Mkel. She had had the greatest difficulty in persuading Pol of anything, and she had less hope of changing Mkel’s mind. She had no idea where to turn next. How could she complete Zakri’s training without a
filhata
? Could she have come so far only to fail in the end?

Chapter Twenty-five

Zakri knelt on the floor of the tack room and Erc leaned over his shoulder to point out a burst seam in Sira’s saddle. “This’ll cause your
hruss
a nasty sore spot.”

“So it will,” Zakri agreed. “If I can borrow a needle, I will fix it now.”

Erc handed him a small coil of split
caeru
gut and a smooth bone needle. “I’d soak that gut first, though,” he advised. “Then when it dries, it’ll hold tight.”

“Thanks, Houseman. I will do that.” Zakri did not tell Erc that he knew these things quite well already. There was joy in sharing the work. He did not want to say or do anything to spoil it. He concentrated, too, so no telltale shimmer would spring up around him to alarm the stableman. I am just like a lonely
hruss
, Zakri reflected, too long shut out of the stables and let in at last to the light and the company.

When he had set a length of leather to soak in a jar, he turned to lathering the saddles with tallow. Erc helped, opening out the folds of the felt blankets they used as saddle pads, brushing them until they were smooth and almost as fresh as when they were new. “I’ll hang these to air,” he offered.

“Thanks.” Zakri wiped down the excess tallow from the saddles and wrung it out of his cloth, back into the jar Erc had given him. The
hruss
in their stalls munched noisily with their heads deep in the mangers. Zakri stood and looked about him. “Your stables are as orderly as any I have seen,” he told Erc. “Larger than most, are they not?”

“So I’ve been told,” Erc responded. “Though I’ve never seen any others. I’ve never put my foot outside Conservatory, for all I send so many travelers on their way. Would you like to see the rest?”

“So I would.” Zakri followed the stableman as he led the way up a short ladder to the loft, which was stacked with sacks of grain and dried softwood leaves for
hruss
fodder, its walls neatly lined with rolls of cured leather. This storage loft was at least half again as large as the one Zakri knew at Tarus.

They went down another ladder to a second tack room, which Tarus did not possess. It was hung with saddles, bridles, and halters, some in various stages of repair, and ironwood jars of tallow and oil stood ready on shelves. A half-finished saddle rested on a wooden brace, and Erc shrugged modestly when Zakri admired the work, although he did admit to tooling the leather himself.

“There’s one more room.” A narrow door opened onto a small room at the back that was not much more than a closet, too small for more than one person inside. Zakri stood in the doorway to look at the saddlepacks, bedfurs, and oddments of tack and supplies crowded into the space. “We’re always ready to supply any of our House members or our Singers who might need to travel,” Erc said. “And let me show you this.” He squeezed past Zakri and reached to a top shelf to bring down a neatly wrapped bundle.

“What is that?”

“Just look.” Erc brought the parcel out of the closet and laid it gently on the workbench. He drew back its leather wrappings slowly, fold by fold. “When Cantrix Sira left here a summer ago, all upset she was by the doings at Bariken, she wanted a
hruss
but she had not a bit of metal to her name. I would have given her the beast, or loaned it, but she insisted on paying for it.”

He opened the last fold of leather to reveal a gleaming, beautifully carved
filhata
, its patterns of leaves and curving branches catching the
quiru
light. It shone with oil that must have been often applied. “This was her own,” Erc said, “that she received before her first
quirunha
.”

Zakri delicately stroked the ironwood of the instrument, and touched the strings that hung slack and untuned from their pegs. “It is beautiful,” he murmured.

“Made at Soren,” Erc said, “and bought by Conservatory especially for her.” He began to rewrap the
filhata
in its nest of soft leather, smiling at his memories. “She didn’t know a thing about traveling, or about
hruss
. She just took the first one I suggested, and gave me this. She wouldn’t hear of anything else.”

“That sounds like her,” Zakri said with a laugh. “As stubborn as last winter’s icicles.”

Erc had just finished rewrapping the
filhata
when Sira came back into the stables. When she found them in the second tack room, her face revealed nothing, but Zakri felt her distress as distinctly as if she had been openly weeping. His own enjoyment of the afternoon drained away instantly, and he struggled to suppress his feelings. This was no time to see that warning finger lift, that scarred eyebrow arch.

Sira nodded to Erc. “Please excuse me. I must speak with Singer Zakri.”

“Of course, Cantrix.” Erc bowed, and said, “I’ll just tend to an errand.” He left the wrapped
filhata
on the workbench, and climbed up the ladder to the loft.

I am sorry
, Sira sent to Zakri.
There is a problem.

She avoided his eyes, and Zakri felt a surge of sympathy. He had never seen his teacher less than completely confident, sure of herself, clear in her direction. She was vulnerable at this moment, and it made her seem younger than he had thought her to be. He looked closely at her for the first time in many months.
What is it? Can I not help?

She leaned wearily against the wall of the tack room, looking every bit the worn and weathered itinerant, but Zakri remembered that she was only a summer older than himself. The lines in her face were put there by the cold, by the wind and the sun, and now by unhappiness.

Zakri, I have failed you
, she sent.

How could that be? I owe you everything!
he answered in a rush.

But I want to teach you the
filhata
, and now I cannot.

Zakri was immediately awash in guilt.
It is me, is it not? Because they know about me, and my problems.
Before he could catch himself, the air in the tack room began to darken. He took a deep breath and focused his psi, and it brightened again.

His effort was not lost on Sira. She managed a small smile.
It is not about you. It is all about me, and what I have done. And what I have not done.
She ran her fingers through her hair and rubbed her eyes.
I am so tired, I can scarcely think.

Zakri sent,
It does not matter. We will just go on as we have been. We will find a traveling party, earn some metal, and I will practice very hard on the
filla.

We need to do more than that, Zakri. Your Gift needs more than that. But I do not know what to do next.

Why is the
filhata
so important?
he asked.
I bet I can do a House
quiru
without one!
He closed his eyes and concentrated again, and the air in the tack room brightened still further, growing uncomfortably warm. The effort beaded his forehead with perspiration, but when he opened his eyes, the room was brilliant with light.

Sira was smiling, and shaking her head.
Yes, your Gift is powerful. But to maintain a House
quiru
that way, or even with only your
filla
, would exhaust you. I have seen this before.

Zakri nodded. He knew Theo’s story. He wiped the perspiration from his face, and sent,
It could be that there will never be a House for me to warm in any case. Who is going to want the two of us
—
a half-trained itinerant and a rebel Cantrix
—
in a Cantoris?

Sira sighed.
I do not know. But I feel it. There will be a need, and you must be ready. The Gift is demanding it.

Then the Gift had better show us a way! It is like a master that orders our every move!

Sira nodded acknowledgment of that truth. She straightened and looked around at the overly bright room.
You have made it as warm as Lamdon in here. Come, let us at least go to the kitchens and get something
— She broke off.
What is that?

Zakri followed the direction of her pointing finger. When he saw what she was looking at he began to laugh, and her white-scarred eyebrow arched high, making him laugh harder. The sound brought Erc hurrying back down the ladder into the tack room, to see Sira staring at the workbench where her own
filhata
lay in its wrappings.

“Why, Cantrix Sira,” the stableman said. “Don’t you remember your own
filhata
that you left with me all this time?”

Sira moved to the workbench and put her hand on the fine leather. Zakri stopped laughing, but he could not suppress a chuckle, and a grin so enormous it almost hurt his cheeks.

She unwrapped the
filhata
, slowly, and he felt the emotions pour through her as clearly as if she had sent them to him. In those moments he knew her love for her teacher, her pride in her first
quirunha
, her anticipation when she went off to Bariken. He felt the crushing disillusionment that had driven her out onto the Continent in search of meaning for her life and her Gift. While she was so open, he also knew the weight of her fears, and his own heart ached.

With the
filhata
in her hands, Sira turned to Erc, her dark eyes shining with tears. “Houseman,” she said. “I had thought this long sold to pay the cost of my
hruss
.”

“I would never sell your
filhata
, Cantrix Sira,” Erc asserted. “I knew one day you would be back for it.”

And so the Gift used him as well
, Zakri sent.

Sira nodded as her long fingers found the tuning pegs and began to twist them. Then, abruptly, she turned back to the workbench and put the
filhata
down. “It is no longer mine.”

“But it is,” Erc protested. “I’ve only waited for you to come back and claim it.”

“But I cannot pay you for it.”

“That’s no matter to me.”

“It is true, nevertheless,” Sira said firmly. “This must be done right. But we will find a way. We will earn the metal, Singer Zakri and I, and we will be back for the
filhata
.” She smiled at Erc, a full smile such as Zakri had never seen on her face. She stood very straight, her entire bearing changed, lightened, charged with energy once again. “I am more grateful to you than I can say, Erc. You do great credit to your House.”

He bowed low, and Sira bowed in return. She left the tack room with a lingering glance to the
filhata
, and strode away, weariness and fears forgotten. Zakri followed her out, glancing back from the doorway to see Erc rewrapping the instrument with care.

“We may be back sooner than you think,” Zakri said to him. “When Singer Sira sets her mind to a thing, it is as good as done.”

As he set the bundled
filhata
back on its high shelf, Erc nodded to Zakri. “She’s not the only one, I think.”

Zakri laughed, and went to catch up with Sira, leaving the stableman standing alone in his overheated, overbright tack room.

Zakri found Iban soaking in the
ubanyor
. He dropped his own clothes on the floor and splashed down into the tub. Iban protested and threw up his hands as flying drops of water covered him and everything else in the vicinity. Zakri laughed and sank deep under the surface, coming up sputtering to look about him. How plain and severe everything was here! It was as if decoration might distract the House members or the students from the serious work they all did. The tub was generous in size, but devoid of any carving or ornament. The water was gloriously warm, though. Zakri ducked his head under the water, came up for air, and submerged again.

“Singer Zakri, if you don’t take time to breathe, we’ll be planting you in the waste drop!” Iban cried.

Zakri squeezed a bar of soap in his wet hands to make it fly across the water. Iban laughed, but when he caught the soap he refused to give it back. “If you make a mess in here, the Housekeeper will be after both of us.”