Whispers on the Wind (33 page)

But, he couldn’t help wondering, was it already too late for his sister...and for his love?

In stealth, shielded by the protection of Fricka’s
willayin
, the cover of Zareth’s illusion, and the power of all their combined minds, five Aazoni slipped across the desert. Behind, they left Wend still working on the unconscious child, carefully, skillfully peeling back the layers of her protection, freeing her from the protective chrysalis her mother had created for her, and in which she had safely remained when Lenore had flung her.

In the crystalline desert air, the encampment appeared closer than it was. Making their way toward it on foot was slow, tedious for those accustomed to instant movement from one spot to another. But, with what they now knew of Rankin’s enhanced abilities, his power to kill with a mere single thought, they could not risk letting him know of their approach. To translate would surely alert him that the group he “sensed” as still being huddled under the trees was nothing more than one of Zareth’s illusions.

Still within the surround, they safely reached the first of the adobe huts. All was quiet. Jon slipped apart from the others, a shadow masked by the other shadows Zareth created, and peeked inside the building.

B’tar!
He lay in a heap on the floor, as if he had been flung by a powerful force against a wall, only to slide down and stay put. Jon spared him only a glance. He was of no account, and clearly out of commission, but there, on a bunk at the side of the room, deep in real shadows, he saw Lenore.

Deeply unconscious, she lay as in death. Only the faint rise and fall of her chest told him she still lived. He dared not reach out to her physically, lest her unconscious mind respond to that touch and signal Rankin of a change in her neural patterns. He dared not reach out to her mentally. To do so, he would have to break out of Fricka’s surround.

There was no physical sign of Rankin in that hut, nor in the next. Jon was forced to clamp down on Minton’s inadvertent howl as he spotted Zenna lying in the dusty soil, bruises covering her face and body, blood running from wounds, a limpness about her that spoke of more than mere unconsciousness.

Carefully, Minton lifted her, cradled her close, rocking her to and fro, telling her Glesta was safe, healthy, healing, that they were together, they were going to go home. Jon felt her fogged brain begin to respond, and bade Ree to cast a hood over her and Minton, to contain their uncontrollable gladness.

Yes, they were together. Yes, they were going to go home.
He closed his eyes, visualizing Lenore lying alone and unconscious in that hovel not ten meters away. How could he leave her like that? How could he leave her at all?

But he must. Time was running out. The window was about to close and he had yet to find Rankin, yet to dispatch him. It was his duty to his people that he fulfill the task he had come for. Rankin had to be stopped.

But...in stopping him, Jon would be forced to leave his bond-mate to die.

Grief overwhelmed him, spilled forth, and in that moment, Rankin pounced from out of the sky.

The criminal’s amplified mind struck out at Jon, flinging him across the open space between the two adobe shacks and Rankin materialized right in the middle of Fricka’s surround, sweeping it aside as if it were of no more substance than a
welligan
’s nest.

Jon recovered quickly.
To me!
his mind roared.
With me! Together!

Zareth sent a bellowing herd of
grumpion
stampeding down on Rankin, who dodged instinctively, leaving an opening for Jon, with Ree’s help, to send him rocking back onto his haunches. Before he could recover, Fricka had him, wrapped him in a surround, against which he fought, pummeling her, trying to keep his mind attuned to the amplifier.

Zareth created a clap-banger right over Rankin’s head. He dropped the amplifier, cupping his hands over his bleeding ears, and Jon, this time joined by Minton, smote him again, forcing his mind into instant retreat.

The battle raged on as Rankin recovered the amplifier, melded with it, aimed its might at the opposing forces, but they were too many, coming at him from such different angles, and he couldn’t hold his focus long enough to vanquish any one of them. One moment he thought he had Jon, but realized he held only the illusion of his primary enemy’s mind. The next, he felt Vanter slip from his grasp, only to blind-side him with a painful mental jab.

Then it would be the turn of Ree, or Minton, or Jon again, or any of the six in concert. As the
grumpion
herd bore down on him again, he struggled to hold his position, to convince himself they were not real, but somehow, they were, and they were upon him, their sharp hooves trampling the ground all around him, kicking up choking dust, obscuring his physical vision, the thunder of their passage, the stench of their bodies, the heat of their breath all over him.

He curled into a ball to protect himself, and unexpectedly, B’tar seized the moment—and the amplifier—by dashing into the herd only Rankin could see and feel and smell.

With it in his hand, he forced his inadequate mind into its inner workings, trying to meld with it as he had learned from watching Zenna and Rankin, but he was inept.

Rankin knew at once what his partner was trying to do.

With a shriek, he dove for the other man, his hand connecting with B’tar’s ankle just as the other man managed to operate the device, setting it into translation mode. It stuttered, hesitated, and Rankin forced B’tar’s mind out of the way, struggling with him for control, but it was not B’tar whom he had to fight.

Zenna, coming out of her drug-induced stupor, linked with Minton, linked with the amplifier, and the two of them, knowing it so well, misaligned it completely, destroying it, and with it, both B’tar and Rankin.

Their singed, corporeal forms dropped at Zenna’s feet.

Carelessly, she stepped over them, still clinging to Minton’s arm. “Brother,” she said to Jon, bowing low before him. “I thank you for coming to my rescue.”

Jon embraced his birth-mate, holding her close, lending her some of his poor, remaining strength. They both did better when Wend and Glesta, the latter now fully restored, materialized beside them. Zenna scooped up her daughter, pressing her tightly to her breast.

With one hand on Minton’s
Kahinya
and the other on Glesta’s, she gave her child back the memories of her father that she had taken to protect Glesta and herself. She repeated the same with Jon’s
Kahinya
, and then her own.

Smiling, she looked at Glesta, who stared curiously at her male relatives, trying to put together all the information she had just been handed.

“It will come,
letise
,” Zenna said. “Soon, it will all make sense.”

“It makes sense now,” Glesta informed her, then met her uncle’s gaze with a wide blue-eyed blaze of complete trust.

“Jonallo, can we go home now?”

“We can go home,” he said, though his heart was breaking. “And we will. But first, I need your help.” He looked around his Octad. “Everyone’s help. Lenore lies in there, near death. I cannot leave Earth until she is whole again. She has gone into hiding. It may take all of us to find her and bring her back.”

“I know where she is, Jonallo,” Glesta said, sliding down from her mother’s arms. She led the way into the adobe hut where Lenore lay. Standing close beside her, she touched the central bead on Lenore’s
Kahinya
. “Come,” she said. “Follow me, Jonallo. I will lead the way.”

Lenore stood facing the eight adults and one child, formed in a semi-circle before her. All were naked, as was she. This time, it didn’t bother her. Why worry about her body being exposed to them, when her mind was even more so? Oddly, that didn’t bother her, either.

Zenna was the first to bow deeply, formally. “Lenore of Earth and Aazonia, I thank you for the care you gave my child.” She stood erect and pressed an
Aleea
to Lenore’s
Kahinya
. “To remember us by.”

Lenore returned the bow then briefly stroked the new light bead, feeling the tingle of it extend into her heart. “I will never forget.”

One by one, the others thanked her, gave her a memory of themselves, beads she could dip into whenever she chose, to know them better, to visit their pasts—since she could never visit them in the present, nor in the future. Even within an Octad as powerful as Jon’s, Lenore could never translate that far through time and space. This, they all knew, was a final goodbye.

Then, Jon was before her. He did not bow. He did not thank her. He merely put his hands on her shoulders and held her as he gazed into her eyes, into her mind, one last time.

I would like to go first
, she told him.
I cannot bear to stay and watch you leave.

And do you think I can bear to leave you?
he asked. She shook her head, but both knew he had no choice.
I will return. In ten of your years, I will come to you.

Lenore nodded.
I will wait.

Ten years might seem like a lifetime, but it was not. A lifetime without Jon would be an unendurable eternity. Ten years she could manage because she must.

She smiled at Jon, then at the others. “I’m not very good at this yet. I hope you’ll offer me a boost.”

In the next instant, she found herself, not at home in her Port Orchard condo as she had expected, but in the mountain cabin.

The smile, she noticed as she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror, was still on her face. Had they sent her here, or had they merely given her, as she’d asked, a boost to get her started? Had she, of her own volition, come here to her safe-place? She liked to think she had.

Carefully, though her
Kahinya
was getting more proficient at seeing to her needs for warmth, safety and direction, she laid a fire on the grate in the pot-bellied stove. As she crouched to light it, she saw her crochet hook just under the front of it. After retrieving that, she sparked the striker, igniting the kindling, and watched the happy flames dance upwards, filling the cavern of the stove with a golden glow.

It reminded her so strongly of another cavern, filled with firelight and a golden glow that she sank back onto the floor, lost in memories that had no need of
Aleeas
to bring them forth.

Still, she touched the one given her by her mother, no longer afraid of what it contained, let herself slip into its comfort for a few precious moments, gathering strength from the affirmation of self she found there.

She visited the
mazayin,
laughed and sang with them and with Jon. She nibbled at the sweet fruits that grew on the tips of the branches in the fern-forest. She smelled nut-bread baking in an oven, and sipped the sweet of the waters of the Sea of Lancor.

No, she would not be lonely. She had all those memories, but she also had a life of her own, a life she would fill with things that would please her.

She picked up her unfinished afghan, set the hook into the yarn, wrapped the first loops around it and pulled them through. As she continued, she watched the pattern emerge, bright, straight edges, zigzagging from one color to another. There was satisfaction in creating beauty.

Soon, she would paint the scenes she had seen on her journeys, paint them that others might know them, too. To those completely of Earth, they would appear as surrealistic, as fantasies, but she would know the truth. She alone.

Not alone
. She started, and scrambled to her feet, dropping her crocheting, glancing around the familiar room.

Had it been a thought or had it been actual words? She frowned and closed the door of the stove.

No. It had been nothing but a stray thought—her own, she decided. For once, following translation, she was neither hungry nor thirsty, merely bone-achingly weary.

She showered, brushed her teeth, and gave her long hair one hundred strokes that way Grandma had insisted the girls do. It shone in the glow cast by her
Kahinya
, looking, she thought happily, like the inside of a
florentia
shell, all filled with moving shades of brown and gold and amber and red.

Then, mounting the stairs, she took herself off to bed. Alone.

As she slipped under the covers, this time not having bothered with the long flannel gown she normally wore here, she heard again the words
not alone
. Or...had she heard them? Had she merely sensed them? But if so, from where? Was it her
Kahinya
? Did they talk to their wearers? No one had suggested such a thing.

And then...
Mama. Sing
.

She sat up, waved her wrist at the light despite the glow from her necklace, wanting more, wanting to see, wanting...what?

Mama, sing
...

And then she knew. With a choked cry, she cupped her hands over her lower belly, closed her eyes and tried. It was hard. The words came thready from her throat, weak and unsteady.

“Toor-a-loor-a-loor-a...” and were joined by, filled in by, strengthened by, Jon’s tenor, “Toor-a-loor-a-lie...”

Her voice faltered, trailed off as he materialized in the bed at her side, gathering her close. “Hush, now don’t you cry...”

But cry she did, clinging to him.

“Jon, you mustn’t do this. It’s too cruel. We’ve already said our good-byes. I can’t bear to have to do it again. Just go, please, go. I told you I’d wait, and I will. But your Octad needs you. You must take them home.”

“They are home,” he said. “As am I.”

She gazed at him, uncomprehending. “But...”

“Glesta is a very powerful little girl,” he said. “With her, the others had a full Octad. I was not needed.”

He smiled ruefully. “It is a strange sensation, that of not being needed.”

Lenore sat up and slid her hands into his hair. “Well, don’t get used to it, Alien,” she said fiercely. “Because you are needed. You are more needed than you can possibly know.” She smiled. “Do you think I really want to raise our child alone for his first ten years?”

He stared at her, reached into her mind and saw the truth. She laughed at his expression. “Who did you think I was singing to?”