The Singers of Nevya (71 page)

He waited to call to Sook until Mura had turned away to one of the grain barrels in a corner, and even then he kept his voice low.

“Sook! Good morning to you. What’s the chance of some tea?”

She looked up and smiled, then put her finger to her lips. “Sshh! Mura will scold you!” She glanced at Mura’s back, and then sidelong back at Zakri, her dark eyes gleaming in the firelight. “Wait there,” she murmured.

Zakri hastily withdrew, and lounged against the wall by the kitchen door. Only a few moments passed before Sook slipped out with one of the beautifully carved teacups in her hand, and a little slice of fragrant nutbread on a scrap of cloth.

“You’re an early riser, Zakri,” she said. She held out her offering. Tendrils of black hair clung to her damp cheeks, and she brushed them back after he took the teacup from her hand.

“So I am,” he agreed. “I thank you for the tea, Sook. It is—it’s always good to have a friend among the cooks!”

She laughed, and opened her mouth to speak, but a cry from the kitchen forestalled her. Quickly, she pulled the door open and looked back inside. “Oh, no—Eun has burned herself!”

Zakri followed her back into the kitchen. Eun, a woman of perhaps eight or nine summers, stood over the sink, closing her eyes tightly, grimacing with pain. The burn had left a broad stripe against her palm, already blistering, and Zakri knew it must be viciously painful.

Mura poured cool water over the burn, her hands gentle and careful, all the while cursing steadily under her breath. Zakri forgot everything but the injury, stepping up beside the burned woman and leaning over her to see clearly.

“This cannot wait until Cantoris hours,” he said with authority. Mura and Sook both looked at him strangely. Suddenly remembering, he shook his head. “What I mean is, she won’t be able to stand the pain,” he amended. “Someone should call your Cantor or Cantrix now.”

The women glanced at each other, then back at him without responding. He knew without their saying it there would be no Cantor to treat this burn. Eun sobbed, “It’s not fair.”

There was risk in this, but the healer in Zakri could not turn away. He handed his teacup and nutbread back to Sook, and reached into his tunic for his
filla
.

“Well, now, Housewoman,” he said lightly. “Just between us, don’t you think itinerants are the best healers anyway?”

Mura snapped, “So Cho would say! In any case, it’s all we have, and in abundance.”

“Oh, do be cautious, Mura!” cried Eun, fearful even in her distress.

Sook cast Zakri a grateful glance, and led Eun to a chair. The woman leaned back against it, holding out her burned palm as if it might hurt less if it were further away. Zakri knelt beside her, and played a quick fragment of melody in
Doryu
, soothing the heat of the burn, easing the pressure beneath it that made the skin blister. The palm was a sensitive place, he well knew. It was the seat of feeling and the root of touch. Iban had taught him that.

He modulated to
Iridu
to help Eun relax, something else Iban had taught him. He did not hurry, but played for several minutes while the other Housewomen stood by, listening. Sook kept a sympathetic hand on Eun’s shoulder, but her eyes never left Zakri’s face. Mura leaned against the ironwood table, creasing her apron with her fingers. She, too, watched Zakri closely, her wrinkles deepening and her eyes bright and quick as a
ferrel’s
.

When Zakri stopped playing and laid his
filla
down, Mura handed him a clean strip of felted cloth for a bandage. He wrapped it around the burned hand, securing it with a bit of quill Mura fetched from a drawer. Eun opened her eyes then, but their lids drooped, and she yawned. “She should rest now,” Zakri said. “She will sleep for a little. That would be good.”

“I’ll take her to her apartment,” Sook offered. Zakri nodded agreement. Mura still observed him with fierce attention.

Another of the Housewomen came to help. “Take her arm, Nori,” Sook said. Together, careful of the bandaged hand, they lifted Eun to her feet, and supported her between them. Slowly, they made their way out of the kitchen.

Mura eyed Zakri in speculative silence. He could only give her his best grin and a helpless gesture with his two hands. “Better put me to work, Housewoman!” he said. “I am—I’m more used to the stables, but I’m willing.”

“I wonder about that, Singer,” she said.

“About what?” he asked. He got to his feet, picking up his
filla
to tuck it away in his tunic, and sipped at the tea that had grown cold as he worked.

“I wonder about you and the stables,” Mura said flatly.

He looked up and met her eyes, and his smile faded. Mura’s was an intelligent face, a face made hard by experience, and by suffering. He had no wish to lie to her. “It is true about the stables,” he said, “I assure you of that. I have worked many hours with
hruss
.”

“Not many itinerants play the way you do, though I grant you they’re sometimes fine healers. Who taught you?”

“The Singer Iban taught me, for one,” Zakri ventured.

Mura caught her breath and bit her lip. She looked about to speak, but then turned quickly away as if to stop herself. She hesitated, her back to Zakri. Then abruptly she pointed at the loaves of nutbread on the table. “If you want to help, you can get started on those,” she muttered. She did not turn back again.

It felt strange to Zakri to be loitering about with nothing to do at mid-day. He helped Sook and Mura in the kitchen, and then he bathed, but still he felt restless and idle as the traditional hour for the
quirunha
approached. Curious, he wandered toward the Cantoris.

The doors to the Cantoris stood open, but the room was empty. One or two people in bright tunics passed Zakri as they came to and from the great room. They looked at him without curiosity. Only the Housemen and women seemed to have much to do. He peeked in past the double doors of the great room, and saw that the tables were being laid for the mid-day meal, just as in any other House on the Continent.

An itinerant Singer wandered down the corridor and went into the Cantoris alone, his
filla
in his hand. Another Singer, a stocky woman in leather trousers, took up a position just outside the great room. A third, a man not much older than himself, went to stand in the great room among the tables. A Houseman working there quickly disappeared, glancing at Zakri as he hurried away toward the kitchens.

Each of the Singers began to play his own
filla
in the mode and the melody of his choice, as if to call up the small
quiru
of traveling parties. They made no effort to coordinate the music. They played at will, each in his own fashion. Zakri watched and listened in amazement.

From the corridors, from the
ubanyor
and
ubanyix
, from the staircase, from the upper levels, he heard the jangling discord of a dozen
filla
. Circles of light and warmth grew, touched, and blended together where they overlapped. The colors were oddly disparate, and the shapes of the
quiru
were strange, some circular and wide, others tall and slender. Some were ragged, like those made by apprentices still learning the craft. The result of these efforts was a patchwork of varied light throughout the House. It reminded Zakri of a snowfield dappled with shadow.

He had never seen a more infuriating and wasteful exercise. Berk came out of the
ubanyor
, and they stood together in the corridor watching the bits of
quiru
bloom. Berk was openmouthed with surprise. Zakri was fuming.

He thought his anger would burst from his chest in a scalding fountain. The Gift was poured out in this place as if it were no more than the contents of a chamber pot dumped into the waste drop! Where were Soren’s Cantor and Cantrix? Who would accept this excuse for a
quirunha
if it was not necessary?

A thought came to him suddenly, and he tried to check his anger. This was the moment to listen, surely. Every Singer in the House was occupied, trying to cobble together a House
quiru
. Could Cho detect one mind open and vulnerable among so many? Zakri hoped not.

He signaled to Berk, a lift of his hand and quirk of his eyebrow, then moved to a chair in the hallway. He sat in it, vaguely aware of the intricacy of its carved arms and back, no doubt the life’s work of some long-gone carver. He leaned back against it, and closed his eyes while Berk stood nearby, keeping watch.

The mental noise was almost unbearable as Zakri opened his mind. He relaxed his shields gradually, bit by bit. With each barrier that he lowered, more of the clamor poured in. Not since his early days, before Sira had taught him the skill of effective shielding, had he allowed such invasion. He was no longer accustomed to it. He gripped the arms of the chair as he opened himself further. His stomach turned as he reeled under a flood tide of thoughts and feelings and fears.

For several moments he simply let it all wash over him. It did not get easier to bear, but he began to be able to distinguish some of what he heard. The Gifted minds of the Singers, although unfocused, were like eddies in the torrent, set apart from the unGifted minds. There were others, which Zakri guessed must be the carvers, whose Gifts were different, yet clearly delineated from the unGifted. There was one dark, strong force, some distance away. It had a shape, looming, fearsome. There was a space of silence around it, a chasm of fear between it and all the others. Zakri knew it to be Cho. He skirted it carefully as he searched through the flood.

Then, at last, he found what he was seeking. He heard her through the noise, through the distraction. She was far from him, he guessed at the very top of the House, and her mind was dim with fatigue and despair, but she was alive.

Cantrix Elnor?
Zakri sent very carefully.
Can you hear me?

He sensed her sudden attention, and the intensity of her fear.

She answered after a cautious interval.
I can hear you. Who are you?

It is safer for both of us if I do not tell you that,
Zakri answered, trying to send clearly without being detected.

Where are you?

I am here
, he responded simply.
In the House.

Can you help me? Can you get help?

I am going to try. I wanted to know if you were here, if you were safe.

Cantrix Elnor’s thoughts came again, very clearly.
I am here, but not safe. My senior is dead. Killed
.

The horror of her flat statement made Zakri’s throat close, but there was no time for sympathy.
Do you know where your Magister is? And his family?

They went to Lamdon, but never returned. I can only hope that they reached it.

Zakri felt Berk move closer, warning him. He sent hastily,
I will send to you again soon. Be patient. Be careful.

And you. Be watchful at every moment. They hate all who come from Conservatory.

Zakri had not come from Conservatory, of course, but it was far too complicated to explain to her now. He doubted Cho and the itinerants would appreciate the difference in any case. He broke the contact with Cantrix Elnor, and threw up his shields with immense relief.

When he opened his eyes, Berk was standing as close to him as he could without actually touching him. The Singers had ceased playing, and the odd, fragmented
quiru
, warm and bright in spots, shady and cold in others, was as complete as it was going to get. Zakri rose, shaky with nerves and still feeling a faint nausea. He watched the Singers put away their instruments and amble by twos and threes into the great room for the mid-day meal. He was too tired at the moment to be angry, but Berk was not.

“Preposterous,” he growled. “Cho has filled the House with fools!”

“Better keep that thought to yourself,” Zakri whispered. “Come on, let us go to the stables, and I will tell you what I heard.”

Before they got far, however, Sook came running after them. “Zakri,” she said, almost but not quite bowing. “Mura asks if you would come to the carvery for a moment.”

Zakri met Berk’s eyes, and hesitated. Sook said softly, “It’s all right. It’s safe there.” Her dark eyes flashed about her, from one side to the other, making certain no one else had heard.

The two men turned to follow her. House members and Singers streamed past them into the great room. Sook fell in behind the crowd. When no one was watching, she turned right, down the corridor beneath the staircase, instead of left to the great room.

It was pleasant to walk into the even brightness and warmth of the carvery. The fragrance of newly cut ironwood wafted from the open door, a clean, pungent odor. Zakri sniffed appreciatively at this new scent. Only a psi-Gifted
obis
carver, equipped with an
obis
knife, could actually cut into and through the rock-hard wood of the ancient trees. Even the suckers by which the great trees propagated, and which stretched in tangled patterns all over the Continent, were as hard as the knives themselves.

The
obis
knives were what Zakri saw first when he entered the carvery. They hung in gleaming rows within easy reach of the carvers, meticulously clean, shining with rendered and purified
caeru
oil. They were dark and mysterious, sharp, flexible, virtually unbreakable. Their ironwood handles were almost as black as the precious metal of the knives.

Eight carvers sat idle at their workbenches as Sook led Zakri and Berk into the carvery. Half-finished pieces rested before each, but no one was working now. Mura stood with her hand on the shoulder of a young man who looked very like her. He was strongly built, with long black hair bound neatly behind his head. One of the other carvers got up to close the door.

“Zakri,” Mura said. “This is my son, Yul. The carvers have something to say to you.”

Zakri bowed slightly. He felt Berk’s wary presence behind him. It was like having a big boulder at his back, solid and immovable. Zakri was glad he was there.

Yul bowed to them, and gestured to the group around him. “We want to know if my mother is right. She has guessed you’re not interested in joining Cho, and we’ve been hoping, expecting someone, from somewhere, to come. We’re taking a terrible risk in asking, but Sook thinks you can be trusted. Is that true?”