Part 24 (1/2)
After a time, however, she realized that this was not the moonlight which glowed in the depths, but rather something else. It rose slowly, slowly to the surface of the water, wavered there, then broke through and lifted into the air. Water and vapor seemed to blend together. The air grew suddenly cold, as though she'd been plunged into winter. She saw an apparition form and take shape, still glowing from within. It was the figure of a man. Her breath caught, then fled her lungs. This was not her father. Disappointment seeped through her. She saw instead a youth, dark-haired and lanky, his full growth not yet achieved. He stood there, his feet in the mist, his legs straight and coltish, his chest strong, his arms longer than his sleeves.
His head was bowed, but then he lifted it and looked right at her. She sat there openmouthed, unable to look away. How pale his eyes were, glowing with the unearthly light that formed him. His cheeks were lean, his nose straight and aristocratic. His brows were thick dark slashes above his eyes. He spoke not, and she could not tell if he saw her. Then he lifted his right arm. A sword formed in his hand, both mist and light, a sword whose blade flashed with carved runes. When he swung it aloft, the runes flowed from the blade and sparkled off the tip like shooting stars.
They rained down on her, winking into the water and glowing there like tiny lights.
Tipping back her head, she laughed silently, marveling at the beauty of light and mist and water.
”I am Faldain,” her vision said, his voice sounding only in her head. It was a voice young but deepening, with a resonance that echoed long inside her. ”Summon me not again. It is not my time to be found.”
”We need you,” she dared whisper. ”Come and save your people.” He swung of mist and light again, this time right at her. The tip pierced her breastbone, and icy fire plunged through her heart. She arched her back with a choked cry.
Then he was gone, the vision fading in a last shower of sparks and starlight. When she recovered her senses, Alexeika found herself huddled on her knees in the bottom of the skiff, doubled over and crying.
She hurt, yet her fingers found no wound where the vision had stabbed her. The mist was gone, and the water lay calm and dark. A cloud had crossed the moon overhead, muting the starlight as well.
With shaking hands, she rubbed the tears from her face. Her teeth were chattering, and she felt so very cold. Whatever she had wanted, it had not been this.
”Alexeika,” called a voice softly. It reached across the fjord and brought her from her thoughts. ”Child, come back to sh.o.r.e. It is over now.” Startled, she looked at the bank. Uzfan, his long robe perilously close to the water, stood right at the edge, beckoning to her. Behind him cl.u.s.tered what looked like half the camp. The people were silent in the moonlight, which came and went fitfully behind its thin veil of cloud. They stared at her with their mouths open.
Fear touched her, along with embarra.s.sment. What had they seen? She gripped the paddle, her fingers tight on the polished wood, and felt a strong temptation to go far away into the darkness, never to return.
”Alexeika,” Uzfan called again. His voice was gentle, full of understanding.
”Come to sh.o.r.e, child. You must be cold.”
Yes, she felt as chilled as if it were a winter evening. Overhead, a falling star plummeted through the sky, falling out of sight among the treetops of the distant sh.o.r.e. She s.h.i.+vered and began to paddle slowly to Uzfan. Her arms felt leaden and stiff. It seemed to take her forever to return, but finally the skiff b.u.mped into the rocks and eager hands reached down to grip it and tie it fast. Someone took her hands and pulled her to her feet. She stumbled out, feeling as though her mind was not quite connected to her body, and Uzfan gripped her arm firmly.
”Come, child,” he said. ”Time to rest. Make way for her. Shelena, step aside.” The women and old men parted way before her reluctantly. As she walked between them, they reached out and touched her hair and her clothing, murmuring words she did not quite understand.
Up the hill, as she and Uzfan left the others behind and approached her tent, she faltered and stopped.
”What happened?” she asked, still feeling dazed.
”Come. I will build a fire,” the old man said kindly.
Beneath his rea.s.suring tone, however, she heard disapproval.
She frowned. ”I don't understand. I wanted to see my father.” Uzfan shook his head and pushed her toward her tent. She stood next to it, watching while he a.s.sembled twigs and kindling in a circle of stones and struck sparks into the fluff of shredded bark. A small blaze caught, flaring orange in the darkness.
”Child, child,” he said in mild rebuke. ”Do you remember none of the lessons I taught you? A soul newly departed cannot be seen. Would you call your father forth from the safety he so barely reached?”
”I miss him,” she said, her voice small like a child's.
Uzfan climbed to his feet with a grunt and turned to grip her arms. ”Come and sit by the fire. It will warm you.”
She sank to the ground, rubbing her chest where she still ached. Uzfan tended the fire, feeding sticks to it as the flames grew hungry and stronger. He kept staring at her with a frown, his eyes s.h.i.+fting away each time she glanced up. His disapproval seemed stronger than ever.
She frowned. ”I did something wrong?”
”Do you think so?” he asked too quickly.
She sighed. She didn't want a lesson. ”I don't know. It seemed-I don't know. I've never cast a real vision before. Not like that.” She rubbed her chest again. ”I didn't know it would hurt.”
”Who did you conjure forth?” he asked sternly.
She did not answer. She was suddenly afraid to.
”Child, what you did was very wrong. Think of the danger you have placed yourself in. The camp now knows what you can do.”
She shook her head. ”I can't. I don't know how it happened. I've tried before, and it never worked.
You remember.”
”I remember an impatient girl refusing to follow instructions. Did I not warn you never to part the veils of seeing on your own?” ”No.”
He snorted. ”Then remember it now. Dangerous, child! Dangerous. You must never invoke forces you do not understand or cannot control.” He shuddered. ”We are too close to the battlefield. Nonkind roam our land, and the darkness is always close. You must never again take such a risk.”
”It wasn't malevolent,” she said, trying to defend herself now. She felt ashamed, and therefore defiant. ”I found no evil-” ”Ah, but evil may find you,” he retorted, glaring at her. She glared back and wanted suddenly to shock him. ”It was Faldain,” she said.
”He told me so.”
Uzfan's mouth fell open. He stared at her, his expression altering into one of shock. The stick he held halfway in the fire burst into flames, and still he sat there motionless.
At last, however, he was forced to throw the stick into the fire. Shaking his scorched fingers, he blew on them and stared at her again. ”Faldain?” he whispered. ”Are you certain?”
”He said that was his name.”
”Impossible.”
”Why?”
”Because it is. No one knows if the boy even lives, or where he might be.”
”He lives,” she said with a.s.surance.
Uzfan clasped his hands together. ”Great mercy of Thod,” he muttered. ”How could you find him, an untrained natural-I-I am amazed.” ”He said for me not to summon him again. He said it was not yet time for him to be found.” Frustration filled her, and she pounded her fist on her knee. ”When will he come? If I am to keep people in support of him, he must come soon.” Uzfan reached out and closed his hand over her fist. ”Stop this at once. You are not in command of these events.”
”Don't you think I can lead-”
”That is not what I'm talking about. Listen to me, child.” Uzfan's old eyes, very grave and serious, held hers. ”When you want a thing to happen, when you have devoted your life to making it happen, it can be very hard to let events take their course. But you do not control what is to be. You must never again try to force destiny.”
”I only wanted to see him,” she began, but Uzfan scowled. ”No,” he said sternly. ”You asked me to give the people a vision of Faldain, and when I refused you set out to defy my wisdom. Is this not the way of it?” She could not meet his gaze now. Squirming a little, she glared at the fire.
”Alexeika?”
”Yes! I suppose so. I wanted hope for myself. Is that wrong?”
He stared at her. ”It is wrong.” Angry, she flashed her eyes at him, then looked away again. ”If he comes one day or if he never comes, it is not for you to decide. You cannot set his path. It is forbidden for you to try. Is that clear?”
”I don't have those kinds of powers-”