“YOU MIGHT AS WELL eat it; you won’t get anything else.” The woman called Axia held out a chipped blue-and-white bowl of congealing meat broth in one hand, her other braced on her hip. She wore a faded, much-washed rose-colored gown and her straggling hair was pulled up into a loose knot. Her mouth was pursed, her golden eyes hard as granite. “I suppose you’re used to much better fare—at Shael’donn.”
Haemas stared down at the greasy soup, then rested her aching forehead on her drawn-up knees. Actually, the quality of the food at Shael’donn, where she had lived nine out of the last twelve years, varied widely since all students, herself included, were required to put in turns in the kitchens. Still, the rancid broth, along with the general air of moldering decay in this place, curdled her already unsteady stomach. She pressed her lips together, then shook her head. “No, thank you.”
“‘Thank you,’ is it?” The sharp-faced woman set the bowl back on the cracked lacquer tray. “That’s rich—‘Thank you!’ Wait until Diren hears that.”
“Hears what?” Diren Chee strode into the ill-lit room, his fair hair neatly combed and swept back from the harsh planes of his face.
Haemas looked up at the sound of his voice, still unable to believe he was the same man she had seen in Council year after year, never suspecting what lay behind those dark-flecked eyes. She should have paid more attention to the gossip that always seemed to be circulating about the infamous House of Chee. She straightened her shoulders.
Looping his thumbs through his wide black leather belt, Chee scrutinized her with an assured calmness that spoke of power more eloquently than words. He cocked his head to one side, reminding her of one of her silshas stalking a rock barret. “Let’s get down to business, shall we? I want the timeways.”
Without answering, she tried to probe his mental shields, but her mind still felt muffled and dull. The latteh, whatever it really was, had drained her. With a shock, she realized she could not even have read someone standing across the room at that moment.
“That’s not possible.” She looked away. “Even among the ilseri, males can’t align with the timelines. You know I can’t take you, or any other man there.”
“I only know you won’t.” Chee seized her upper arm and dug his fingers into her flesh until she met his eyes again. “And that’s not the same thing at all, is it?” A bitter smile flitted across his face. “Besides, Jarid Ketral entered the timeways.”
She jerked her arm from his grasp. “And paid for it ultimately with his life, while nearly destroying the rest of us at the same time!”
“That was his mistake.” He tapped his chin with a forefinger. “I have no intention of repeating it.”
Suddenly she threw open her mind and reached desperately for the ilsera crystals set into the Chee’ayn portal. Perhaps she could access the temporal nexus and leave this terrible place.
Try all you like, Lady. Chee slid into her weakened mind with a practiced oiliness. You don’t really think I’m fool enough to leave the crystals in place, do you? His mirth was like a drenching of ice-cold water.
With an effort, she raised her shields again and shut him out of her mind, but the back of her throat tasted of burned iron and the ache in her head strengthened.
“Of course, no one understands exactly how you do it,” Chee continued, “but I do know from the official notes of the last Conclave on Temporal Transference that you need a set of attuned crystals. I’ve separated the Chee’ayn crystals and they won’t be back in place until I’m ready.”
“It’s pointless!” Haemas stared angrily at his triumphant face. “You can’t change anything by going back. Nothing in the past can be altered.”
“Ah, Lady, you mistake me.” Chee reached out one finger and tucked a lock of pale-gold hair behind her ear. “I need to learn more about how to use the latteh crystal. Although it’s been forbidden for over twenty generations, I’ve managed to puzzle out a little of the craft. But if you give any credence to the old legends and tales, there was much, much more.” Gripping his hands behind his back, he strolled over to stand before the hearth, his eyes on the meager flames. “All the old manuscripts talk of the unparalleled power wielded by the latteh in the hands of the ‘true adept’—power to kill, power to heal, power to build.”
Slipping one hand into his pocket, he drew the oddly cut crystal out and held it up in the palm of his hand. “But that knowledge was literally thrown away by rattle-headed thinkers who thought they could decide what was best for everyone.” His fingers caressed the dull-green facets. “It would take more than a lifetime to rediscover all that by trial and error. But there is another way; you can go back and find it for me.”
Her heart settled into a steadier rhythm. Although he didn’t know it, he was giving her a way out; once she had entered the timelines, he couldn’t follow her. No male could enter the timelines without an enormous boost of outside power, and even then it endangered the fabric of reality. She would pretend to agree, then escape him in the temporal pathways, exiting somewhere else, or even some-when else, and he would be able to do nothing to prevent it.
“Where—where do you want me to go?” she asked, concentrating fiercely on her shields.
“Not where so much as when.” He gripped the latteh tightly in his fist. “You will have to go back into the time of the Ivram Despots or even earlier. I don’t care as long as I get what I need. And if it’s true I can’t go with you myself—” a grim half smile twisted his mouth, “I’ll send Axia in my place.”
Haemas leaned her head back against the wall. “But she’s not trained.”
“That’s your problem, isn’t it?” Chee looked down and smoothed the black fabric of his long loosely fitted pants.
Again Haemas tried to think, hoping her strained shields could keep him out of her mind. How Talented could Axia be, anyway? Perhaps she could just leave her behind, too, as soon as Chee gave her access to the ilsera crystals.
He crossed his arms. “I wouldn’t be so sure of that.”
A sliver of ice formed between her lungs and her heart. “I have friends who will look for me.” She closed her eyes. “You won’t get away with this.”
He laughed a brittle, hard-edged laugh. “But, Lady, I have already gotten away with it.” Placing a hand on either side of her, he leaned over the cot and stared into her eyes. “And if any of these so-called friends of yours should happen to get the least bit close to the truth, or if you refuse me the timeways, I will kill every one of them, starting with the fat old meddler, Enissa Saxbury, and that tiresome dreamer, Kevisson Monmart.”
* * *
The gathering ilseri clustered around the violated pool, their anguish so palpable it was as if another, darker sister had joined them to mourn. Starlight winked down through the leafless trees as Summerstone hovered above the grove, counting the new arrivals. She was more worried than she wanted the rest to know. So few had come back from the southern seas, and this was so very important! Did they not understand? What the ilseri decided now could alter the future in unforeseen ways. Every full-grown sister was needed to examine the nexus for possible courses of action before they decided which course to take.
Windsign drifted into the grouping, and Summerstone reached for her mindpresence with a profound sense of relief. They had known each other for so long that she trusted this sister’s judgment more than any other ilseri of similar experience.
Windsign responded with a mental caress, then increased her density and let gravity tug her down to the forest floor as she gazed into the pool. I thought they had forgotten.
Summerstone joined her. We must call Moonspeaker and learn what she knows of this matter. Perhaps she can—
No! A young, clear mind voice rang through their midst. She is one of them! The speaker coalesced into a tall, broad-shouldered sister, well grown and strong.
Seashine, we welcome your strength and vision. Summerstone regarded her gravely, remembering that this sister had not yet borne her first son. She was barely out of the trees, quite young compared to the rest of the gathering, and her judgment was still clouded occasionally with ilserin excesses.
Summerstone projected an image of the young human whom she and Windsign had once called to them, then trained in the ways of the nexus: a slender female with golden hair as pale as moonlight and eyes of the same elusive shade. She saved this world from temporal disruption when she was hardly more than a child. She textured the image with Moonspeaker’s fierce, uncomplaining strength and her former courage in the face of fear and pain. She has spoken well for the ilseri to her kind.
The short green tendrils that covered Seashine’s head writhed with indignation and distrust. She is still one of them, and if they have not forgotten after so long, they never will. In the fullness of time, they will always come back.
Let us examine the nexus for possible Whens, Windsign interrupted. Then we will consult our sister Moonspeaker and decide what must be done.
* * *
Kevisson hunched his shoulders against a biting Highlands wind as he trudged back across the grounds to Shael’donn. His wet clothes clung like a clammy second skin and his feet were blocks of ice, but much worse was the coldness he felt within. Why in the name of all that was holy had he turned on Haemas in front of the Council and half the members of the Highest Houses as well? No wonder she had left without telling anyone. Reaching Shael’donn, he jerked the huge door open and passed the startled student on duty without a single word.
It was his damned pride; he knew that. Born of only a Lowlands House and with his dark coloring, he had always been oversensitive to the slightest insinuation that he was not as good as his fellow Andiine Masters.
But Haemas had never seemed to see anything but simple Kevisson Monmart when she turned those pale-gold eyes on him. The image of her introspective face rose up in his mind, and he thought back to twelve years earlier, when Lord Senn had sent to the Lord High Master of Shael’donn for the best Searcher available. Kevisson had answered that summons. The charge had been to find the daughter of a High House who had attacked her father, then run away to the Lowlands. Haemas Sennay Tal had been that girl, not quite sixteen at the time. He’d found her using the ancient mind-disciplines taught by the Andiines, and in one way or another, it seemed the link he had established with her then had never been broken. He sighed. They had both come so far since those days. She was light to his dark side, a river of quiet strength and perseverance. He couldn’t imagine life without her.
He ran into several more students on the steps, including one from the Eighth Form whom he had been tutoring personally. Ignoring their greetings, he swept by and felt their bewildered thoughts follow him up to his small room in the West Wing.
Finally, closing the door behind him, he leaned against the varnished wood and gave into the ache; she had left without telling him, had gone away to only-the-Light-knew-where to nurse the pain he had caused. He stared around his sparely furnished room, then squared his shoulders. Myriel and Ellirt were beyond his help, but he could still do something about Haemas. Although she probably never wanted to see him again right now, it wasn’t safe for her to go off alone. She never admitted it, but the House of Moons was a sore point with the more old-fashioned Houses, especially in the Highlands where the High Lords had little interest in seeing their wives and daughters and sisters better trained and more able to decide for themselves how to live their lives. She had enemies, not the least of whom were the Killians, since she had once refused to marry a son of that House. He had to find her and make sure she was safe.
He stripped off his sodden breeches and shirt and threw them in the corner, then pulled on a loose robe. Kneeling, he started a fire in the small hearth. Once it was properly kindled, he crossed to the narrow bed that had been his ever since he had first come to Shael’donn, a frightened Lowlands boy of seven. Although he’d rated more luxurious quarters as he’d moved up through the ranks, he’d retained this room, preferring its familiarity.
He pulled a fine-linked chain over his head and fingered the gold ring threaded upon it, an ancient signet of the House of Tal: oak leaves of solid silver, chased with gold and studded with tiny green koral stones. His face warmed as he remembered the touch of her fingers as she had folded his palm around it in return for his gift—the Monmart emblem of flying caestrals, though his had not been half so fine. Try as he might to feel differently, it still rankled him that Tal’ayn was one of the Highest Houses while Monmart’ayn was little more than a Lowlands farm. Despite the fact that Haemas never seemed to care, he had always felt the distinction standing between them.
Stretching out on his back on the bed, he closed the ring into his fist for a focus and shut his eyes. Letting the sensations of his body fade from his awareness, he began to count each breath, setting his mind adrift. With each breath, he let more tension drain from his body, soaking up the faint emanations of her that still permeated the ring: her strength, her determination and stubbornness, and still, even after all this time, her sorrow. He pictured her somber expression ... the sense of duty that ruled her even when he would have had it otherwise ... the steady regard for him that he had come to count upon.
Finally he loosed his mind into the gray betweenness, seeking the bit of brightness that would signal his quarry. Time passed unnoticed as he spread himself over the Highlands like a sheet of water, growing thinner and thinner until his energy reserves began to fail and he knew he would have to either give up or face the consequences of overextending himself.
He wondered if she had gone to the Lowlands, perhaps to visit the ilseri, in which case he would have to follow her over the mountains in order to find her.
Then he caught something, the barest whisper against his mind, a faint glimmer of her familiar silvery presence, but muted or altered in some way. Something was wrong. He concentrated on following that slight contact through the grayness, holding on as if it were his own life-force.
She was there, still in the Highlands, but off in a remote corner, far away from the House of Moons and Shael’donn. Holding on to the tenuous line, he gathered the shreds of his remaining energy and emerged from the nebulousness of Search. For a split second, he had the impression of a tall house, crumbling gray stone, and fear mingled with mocking laughter, then a bolt of lightning flashed, shearing the precarious link. Suddenly adrift, he cried out, then spun off helplessly into blackness.
* * *
“I won’t go!” Axia rubbed her arms, then knelt to shove another log onto the guttering fire. “If you want this information so damn badly, go yourself!”
Diren tipped the heavy mug up and drained the last of the mead, then held the pewter up in the firelight to examine it more closely. “Such fine work,” he murmured. “What do you suppose it cost?”
“More than we’ll ever have!” Axia grimaced at her younger brother’s strange expression, remembering another golden-haired man who had sat in that same seat and stared off in much the same bewildering manner; sometimes Diren reminded her too much of their late father for comfort.
“Not after tomorrow.” Diren nodded at the flames dancing over the logs. The light played on his fair hair. “Not after you go back and learn more about the latteh.” His eyes left the fire and glanced up at her. “When I have power like that, we’ll have everything we ever wanted—gold, servants, respect. Chee’ayn will be rich again and every eligible male in the Highlands will be clamoring for your hand. You’ll have your pick of Houses.”
“Don’t be stupid!” Knotting her fingers, Axia pulled up a chair and sat down beside him, trying to make him look at her. “It didn’t work on Haemas Tal. You almost killed her with it, but you never really controlled her mind.” She put a tentative hand on his shoulder. “The first time you trot that little trinket out and try it on a Council member, you’ll get caught and that will be the end of this House.”
“Shut up!” Jerking to his feet, he dashed the pewter mug to the floor. It clattered into the wall, then spun back against her foot. “I just don’t know enough about it yet to make it work right on the Tal woman. I have to learn more, and that’s where you come in.” His eyes burned down at her. “You’ll do as you’re damn well told tomorrow, or I’ll use it on you!”
He swept up the mug, then ran his fingers over the embossed Chee crest. “Anyway, I’ve already tried it—on Himret Rald himself, practically in front of the entire Council.” Setting the mug on the mantel over the hearth, he stepped back, then centered it. “Worked far better than prayer, I must say.”
That nasty, snide edge in his voice was the same one Axia had often heard from their father, usually just before he succumbed to another violent mood swing. Although she had thought her life hardly worth living already, hearing her younger brother speak in those manic tones stole what little comfort remained.
She stared down at her folded hands, seeing how the blue veins showed through the skin. She was almost forty; no one was going to contract for her now, wealthy or not, but Diren didn’t seem to understand that.
“After you come back, we’ll make another trip down to Lenhe’ayn.” Diren settled back into the worn chair and propped his boots up on the hearth. “There should be more crystals where we found the first one.”
“What do you need more for?” She blinked in surprise. “Besides, that Lenhe woman was suspicious enough when she saw us heading for the woods last time. What if we run into her again?”
“Don’t worry about her.” Folding his arms behind his head, he leaned back and stretched until his bones popped. “Both she and that brat of hers are dead. One of those doddering Rald cousins has moved in until final disposition of the property is made, but he doesn’t worry me. Even the old Lord himself couldn’t withstand my little toy.”
The top log shifted, showering red sparks up the chimney. Axia watched them swirl into the darkness, thinking they were just like dreams she used to have. When she and Diren had been younger, it had seemed as if anything was possible. Now they were down to depending on this crystal to make their dreams come true—a thing so forbidden that death was the sole penalty for using one.
“What about the Tal woman?” she asked finally. “Since the latteh doesn’t really work on her, how long do you think you can keep this up? She’s supposed to be a Plus-Eleven.”
“You don’t believe that nonsense, do you?” A sneer twisted Diren’s lips. “And it wouldn’t make any difference if she were. You saw what happened when she fought the latteh. It turns your own strength back against you. The damn thing nearly killed her.”
Axia went cold again, remembering the paleness of the woman’s face when Diren had emerged from the Chee’ayn portal the night before. For a moment, she had thought Haemas Tal was dead. She ran her tongue over her dry lips. “What’s to keep her from leaving me in the past once we’re away from the latteh?”
“That’s the easiest part of all.” He reached into his tunic and drew out the dull-green crystal. “You just take it with you.”
* * *
With a feeling of panic, Haemas saw the seneschal, Pascar, waiting for her before the dining room. He glanced pointedly at the door, his old chierra face disapproving. Late again, she thought, and then knew with an icy certainty when and where she was.
Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew she didn’t have to do this anymore, didn’t have to repeat this endless pattern of guilt and shame. She started to turn away, but Pascar opened the doors for her, revealing the long table set only for four.
Her stepmother, Alyssa Alimn Senn, and her cousin, Jarid Tal Ketral, looked up from their plates with amused eyes.
But Jarid was dead. He had died at Haemas’s feet after trying one last time to kill her over twelve years ago.
Seeming to hear her thoughts, he ran a careless hand back over the bright-gold of his hair and laughed. “Once a skivit, always a skivit, isn’t that right, Cousin?”
She flinched at the hated nickname. She didn’t deserve that anymore; she was no longer the same timid, frightened girl. She watched as he poured dark-red tchallit wine into green crystal goblets. Her hand reached for the goblet even as she remembered how Jarid had drugged it on that long-ago night.
She looked up at the self-satisfied smirk on Jarid’s suddenly indistinct face, blinked, and then, like wind-blown sand, his features shifted. It wasn’t Jarid at all—it was Diren Chee. Her hand jerked away from the goblet as if it had burned her.
“You never learn, do you?” Chee smiled at her with predatory sharp white teeth. “I find it quite disappointing that after all this time you’re still so stupid.”
Laughter began then, manic laughter echoing off the walls until it deafened her. The woman sitting beside Diren Chee took her hand away from her mouth and revealed the thin-featured face of Axia Chee. The Chee woman threw back her head and laughed louder and louder until Haemas thought she would scream.
“Go ahead.” Diren Chee nodded at her. “No one will hear you, of course.”
Haemas bolted up, feeling as if she were drowning in the shrieking, mirthless laughter, as if she would die if she didn’t get away that very second—
“Die?” Diren Chee reached into his pocket. “I suppose we can arrange that.” He held his open hand out. “If you insist.” A glowing green crystal lay in his palm, buzzing with deadly energy.
She backed away, knocking over a chair. It clattered on the floor and blocked her way.
“If you insist.” Chee leaned across the table. “If you—”
“No!” Haemas sat bolt upright on the narrow cot in the Chee’ayn tower and threw off the worn blanket. Breath rasped in her chest as if she had run halfway across the windswept Highlands. She glanced around in a panic, but no one was there. The only door was closed and the sparse fire had burned down to sullen red-gray coals.
Jarid was dead; she knew that, yet somehow it seemed he was with her tonight in this terrible place, laughing as she tried not to lose everything she had struggled to build since his death. She had been his victim during the hard bitter years of her childhood, the object of his envy over her place as Heir to Tal’ayn, and the instrument of his revenge against her father. But no more!
She had cast all that away when she had finally broken the false memory Jarid had inflicted upon her. Then she had renounced her inheritance, seeking instead to found a Shael’donn for Kashi daughters where they could come and freely learn the mindarts and understand that they had choices in life that went beyond marriage and childbearing. She was not going to be anyone’s victim again, not now or in the future.
There had to be a way out of this. Rising from the cot, she found a chipped basin in the far corner of the room and dashed tepid water over her hot face.
Diren Chee would not get away with this. No one was ever going to use her again.