The Soul Weaver (45 page)

Focus on the words, Ven'Dar
. I sought the truth of the words, the meanings buried beneath centuries of use. I drew them together and infused them with my gift, my knowledge, and my intent.
Patience. Let it grow. Lives could depend on how long you hold before the cast.

My hands rested on Jocelyn's flank as the enchantment swelled within me. I resisted the urge to set the spell free before it broke through the boundaries of my body, holding my focus until the main door of the stable was thrown open. One person was out of the house. The others would soon realize where we'd gone and follow him. At last, out of time, I made my cast.
Fire!

No chance of this winding going astray. Nentao was my own house, after all. As if the ground beneath had opened to the fiery heart of the earth, yellow-orange flames burst through windows and walls, engulfing my home.

I urged Jocelyn through the back door and galloped down the track in the light of the flames. I didn't look back to see Nentao burning, nor did I listen to the shouts and screams. I might have been tempted to moderate my work, and we needed every advantage we could get. Paulo had told me that most of my own servants had been dismissed; my wards would warn the rest and lead them safely away. Radele's men would be confused and desperate to find their way out, but they also would escape. I had left them a thread.

Men'Thor's bodyguard, who had opened the stable door, raced down the path after us. But, poor soul, he didn't know the track well enough and was too cautious. If he'd come at full speed he might have overtaken me before I could cast again, and taken care of me as young men can do to those more than double their age. But he hesitated and got himself tangled in what, on the next morning, he was going to swear was a massive spiderweb with a dinner-plate-sized spider lurking in it. In fact, it was a particularly thick patch of vine-draped trees and a small, very shy raccoon.

The fellow didn't know that the time for caution was past. As I galloped through the Lydian Vale, the world galloped right alongside me, history's ragged banners flying as we raced into the dark midnight.

Just before moonset I turned Jocelyn loose to refresh herself on the sweet grass of the Lydian Vale. The white stone of P'Clor's Tower gleamed like pearl in the moonlight. As I wearily climbed the wooden stair to the single plain room at the top, a lazy, humid breeze soughed through the empty window slots.

P'Clor's Tower was my refuge, my solitude, the place where I would strip down to essentials: bread, water, sun, wind, forest, and words. A Word Winder has no more fundamental necessity than such a retreat, where he can hear the truth of words unmuddled by society and business, come to understand their nuances, and prepare a place for them to dwell within himself.

The Lady Seri stood beside one of the narrow windows, as if she were watching the drift of clouds that rushed past the setting moon. She appeared to be alone in the circular chamber, but the vigilant Paulo materialized from a shadowed window ledge behind me as I topped the last stair.

“It's only Ven'Dar the Vainglorious,” I said, tossing him one of the spare cloaks and laying another about the Lady's shoulders. “I think we've a little space to breathe for now.”

“Can you do it?”

“Help the Lady Seriana? If her mind was locked with the same key as mine, and if she's not drifted too far away to hear me, I think I can.”

“You've got to hurry. I can't—” Taut, anxious, the youth remained by the top of the stair.

“Can't what?”

“I can't stay with you. Don't ask me to explain. Just hurry.”

The urgency in the youth was indisputable, even if I'd had a thought of delay. I removed my weapons and laid them on the floor beside the table where I kept my supply of candles and paper and ink.

Even if young Paulo hadn't urged me to it, I would have made the attempt. Lady Seriana's life was less substantial than the waning moonlight, and I had no faith she would survive the coming of day any more than the angled beams pouring through my tower window would.

I guided her to my chair, a straight-backed wooden thing I'd crafted on one of my sojourns in P'Clor's Tower. Then I sat myself on a flour barrel I'd pulled close, laid my hands on her temples, and intruded on her mind.

My Lady, forgive my entry unbidden. My knowledge of your character and history tells me that you would grant me this privilege were you able. I have dwelt in the place you wander, and I know how impossible is the task of mastering a coherent thought, but for your freedom and your life, I beg you try. With all you are and all you have been, grasp the words I give you and hold them close.
Then I opened myself to her.

Great Vasrin, Shaper and Creator!
I came so near drowning in a fog of incoherent images, I almost had to withdraw. She was very far away.

Well, nothing for it but to begin and to hope.
Singer, Healer, Speaker, Word Winder . . .
One after the other, I gave her the names and all I possessed of their essence, just as I had carved them from my own chaos a short few hours before. Each one I forced into the stream of her thoughts, holding it firm until I felt the flow snatch it from my grasp and whirl it away.

Never had I been involved in so intense a speaking. Twice I came near losing my place in the list. After no more than a quarter of the names, my sending faltered. My head pounded unmercifully; my arms weighed like lead; and my shoulders screamed at me to let them fall. She was so very deep, and I had been through so much myself. Unutterably foolish of me not to rest for a while before trying this. I would have to stop and try again.

Just as earlier that night, there arose in me such a strength of will, a veritable lodestone that drew together every fragment of steel I possessed, so that I could not wilt or wander or falter.

It was as if I had four hands, two of them invisible, but strong and tireless, supporting the two that trembled lest they lose contact with the sad and lovely face before me. But whose hands were they? The Lady and Paulo were mundane. The only hands they possessed were the pale, slender ones that lay passively in the Lady's lap, and the strong and capable pair belonging to the youth who sat silent and still in the shadows.

As the last words echoed from my inner voice, monumental weariness overwhelmed me as if my very bones had been drawn out of my flesh and discarded out of reach. My aching arms fell to my sides, and the moon-streaked darkness spun slowly about my head. Paulo jumped off the table and caught my shoulders from behind before I fell off my barrel, while from the distant forest, an owl's clear hoots broke the expectant silence—the silence of failure, I believed. The Lady had not moved.

But then she gasped with one great breath, and the great brown eyes that for four months had reflected only profound emptiness blinked and focused on my own. Her lips curved into a smile, and as her gaze slid over my face to the one standing behind me, her expression blossomed with deep affection.

But as I sighed and slipped into happy oblivion, the smile faded. Grief and horror claimed the territory of her eyes. “Oh, my dear one, what have you done?”

I'd thought to enjoy the sleep of satisfaction, of deeds accomplished and battles won, but the Lady's stricken countenance wrapped me in a blanket of unease, and only fearful visions were my night's companions.

 

The soft, scratching sound would stop for a moment, then take up again, somewhere close to my head, sometimes farther away. Sometimes it was interrupted by a rhythmic picking, then a flutter, and a tickle of moving air across my face. Ah, sparrows, the permanent tenants of P'Clor's Tower, so tame they'd nest in your hair if you were still long enough.

My aching bones begged me not to move. Only a blanket separated me from the floor, and someone had thrown a cloak over me in the chill predawn hours after I'd collapsed. Now the day was warm, and the angle of the sun shallow. I already felt like a piece of raw meat that had been dragged through the streets by a starving dog, and if I stayed under the warm cloak I was going to smell like it, too, worse than I did already. I threw off the cloak and creaked to my feet.

The Lady was sleeping on my thin pallet, her red-brown hair loose and scattered, her cheeks blooming with life. A cloak had been laid over her. Likewise deep in slumber, Paulo had curled on the bare floor at the head of the stair like a faithful hound guarding the entry. Somehow I had expected the boy to be gone when I awoke.

Grabbing an empty bucket from a hook on the wall, I eased around the sleeping youth and tiptoed downstairs to where a rain barrel stood in the glade, a dipper hung over the side. The water was cool and sweet. Then, ignoring all modest caution, I stripped and poured three buckets full over me. Somehow the water felt colder on my back than in my mouth, but to waste enchantment to heat it always seemed inappropriate at P'Clor's Tower. So, I smothered my yelp and snatched up my filthy shirt to rub myself dry.

Refreshed now the ordeal was over, I donned the damp shirt and breeches, vowing to burn them at the first opportunity, along with the underdrawers Vasrin herself could not have forced me to put on again. Then I refilled the pail and carried it upstairs for my companions, planning to lay out the meager bounty of my refugee's provision bag for breakfast.

Lying on the worktable next to the leather bag was a folded paper, a sheet from my own small supply, marked, FOR THE LADY. Odd. I didn't think I'd taken a yen for composition in my sleep, and I assumed the Lady wouldn't have found it profitable to write a missive to herself. And from everything I understood, Paulo was illiterate.

“What puzzles you so this morning, Master . . . Ven'Dar, I think?”

I didn't quite jump out of my skin at the quiet interruption. “Ah, my lady, what a pleasure it is—a most profound pleasure—to meet you at last.” I bowed, extending my palms. “I am indeed the one you name.”

I gave her my hand, and she rose from the pallet, returning the politeness. “My thanks are inadequate, Master.”

Her smile was genuine and kind, but her mind was not on our pleasantries, only on the youth who lay unmoving by the stair. She crouched down beside him, laying her hand on his back as if to assure herself he was breathing. Only after a long while did she rise and move to the window slot to survey our green haven. She folded her arms across her breast, one thumb pressed pensively to her lips. Her eyes flicked repeatedly to the boy.

I hated to intrude on her thoughts, but our time was not unbounded. “Please, come and share breakfast, my lady: dried fish, some old, but well preserved bread, and fruit. You need nourishment. As for my small mystery, it is yours to unravel.” I handed her the letter. “The contents are not the puzzle—I've not taken it upon myself to peruse your correspondence uninvited—but only the author. The message was written last night here in the tower, for I recognize the paper, and the ink is fresh. But we've had no visitors, and that means, eliminating you and me, the scribe must be young Paulo. I believed the boy unschooled.”

She fingered the folded paper, but made no move to read it. “Paulo cannot read or write,” she said softly. “You'll have to tell me what it means that he could do this.”

“I'm not sure . . . If I may ask, what transpired last night after I so unamiably collapsed?”

“I was tired, too; it was like a dream. He laid you on the blanket, covered you with your cloak, and then led me to the pallet. The next thing I knew I woke to the sunlight.” She threw the letter onto the writing table. “It's impossible. Impossible. I won't believe it.” Her vehemence seemed little related to the matter of Paulo being able to write.

“Perhaps reading the message will answer your questions.”

I busied myself by squandering a small enchantment to heat a cup of water and measuring out chamomile and meadowsweet from the small supply in the leather bag. I offered her the tea along with a chunk of ancient dried fruit that I hoped would not break her teeth. But she had picked up the paper again and was turning it over and over in her hands. What was she afraid of? Finally, after taking one more glance at the sleeping boy, she unfolded the letter.

Though it was only a single close-written page, she studied it for half an hour or more before silently offering it to me. I set aside my cup and took it.