A Thousand Glass Flowers (The Chronicles of Eirie 3) (24 page)

‘As I said, this is
a land filled with the malign.
You a
re in Other lands now, Lalita.
It’s anybody’s g
uess who might follow and why.
But please, can you tell me why you place yourself on a precipice the
way you do?’
He spoke with an im
patience he chose not to mask.
Her sigh was not lost on him.

‘I found out two days ago that I have a niece, a bab
e called Isabella,’ she began.
‘That Kholi, my deceased brother, fell in love with a Traveller and they con
ceived a child before he died.
Fi
nnian, you have to understand. I have…
that is to say I
had
…
no one.
My parents were killed in a
n avalanche when I was a baby. Kholi was murdered.
Kurdeesh,’ she stopped and heaved a breath, but then her eyes chilled, the green becomin
g as hoary as grass in winter.
‘That jackal killed my aunt and uncle – his own brothe
r who had been so good to him. He killed him.’
The fr
ost set hard as she continued.
‘And then a jealous odalisque killed my dog who was all
the family I had left. I had no one a
nd I was
so bereft, insane with grief.
Which is why I decided to take
my own life by jumping off the s
eraglio tower.’

Dismay filled Finnian and he grabbed her but she started and pushed at his fingers.

‘D
on’t, please, don’t touch me.’
She sat and wr
apped her arms around herself.
‘
I tried but I was forestalled.
The person who saved me told me of little Isabella and my hopelessness would have been replaced by relief and
contentment but for one thing.
Prior to the news of Kholi
’s child, I had discovered… that is the paperweight…
’ she stopped and looked at him and he lea
ned forward with anticipation. ‘As I fell off the tower…
’

‘You what?’

‘Fell. That is to say, I jumped.’
Her eyes said
don’t interrupt, just let me tell
and be done.
‘As I fell down I dropped the paperweight and it smashed onto the r
ocks at the foot of the tower. I was caught…
t
hat is to say, I was saved…
’

‘Caught?
By whom?’

‘Rajeeb.
A djinn.’

‘Djinns,’
Finnian swore and jumped up
.

‘He is like no
other djinn, I’m telling you. He and the afrit…
’

‘Afrit!
Aine,
what
is the point? Two of the most dangerous…
’

‘
DO YOU WANT ME TO FINISH OR NOT?’
Lalita’s fraught emotion roared around the little glade, birds
flying up in feathered alarm.
He sat again,
no apology, as she continued. ‘They rescued me.
The afrit picked up a tiny piece of the broken paperweight as I sat trying to pull myself together and I noticed it was a hollow cane, absolutely tiny, a
nd inside was a roll of paper.
I’m sure you can guess what it was because why else would you
want the paperweights so much? So yes, I have a charm.
Rajeeb and the afrit knew what it was and you see, they d
idn’t try and take it from me.
They were hone
st.
After Rajeeb told me about my infant niece, he explained how
your
brother,
my
brother, the charms and
everything
were linked.’

Words rolled across the glade as he struggled to catch every syllable, listening closely, deciding to let her tell her fantastic story.

‘Rajeeb moved me to safe surroundings and whilst I slept and he and the afrit guarded me, I dreamed such a strange dream of paperw
eights and charms and tragedy.
Have you ever had dreams that lead you to do something?’

A brief vision of the Moonlady flashed through his mind but he drew his attention back to Lalita, watching her – her oval face, her hair, her mesmeric eyes.

‘It seemed obvious to me that a deadly charm that could kill my brother’s friend could be used to kill my baby niece, maybe
to destroy all life in Eirie.
I woke from my dream believing that the child was
owed
a long and safe life
, the one her father never had.
I owe
d my brother the care of her.’
Her eyes welled but she didn’t cry,
just scrabbled the tears away.
‘I determined to find the remaining paperweights and deliver them to a man I believe might know th
e secret to their destruction.
When I told Rajeeb about my dream and what I wanted to do, he said that Fate
had brought me to this point. See?
Another like you who be
lieves in Fate.’
She took an enormous breath
and clasped her hands tightly. ‘There. Now you know.
Like I said, it sound
s implausible, paltry and mad.
A quest based on a dream.’

His head filled with voices – the mellow tones of a lady with hair like spun sugar, of a man with gentle e
yes and a compassionate heart.
He pushed hi
mself up and brushed past her. ‘Fate. I told you, didn’t I?
And you chose to berate me about it, despite the fact that your
kind
djinn said the same.’
Irony filled him to bursting. ‘Moons and stars and fate.’ He laughed, a grim feeling settling in the pit of his stomach.

She spoke emphatically, eac
h word pressing into his soul. ‘I don’t lie, Finnian.
Everything I told you is the truth.’

Chapter Seventeen

‘Everything I said,
everything,
is the truth.’
She ran after him as he walked away, her fe
et brushing through the grass.
‘You can choose to believe it or not as you like, but I shall tell you this – I found I had family when I thought all I
loved had been taken from me.
But Aine the Mother be thanked, there is one little piece of goodness left in my life,’ Lalita’s voice began to rise, ‘a benediction and so help me, I shall protect her with every ounce of strength
that I have left in my body.’
Finni
an stood with his back to her.
‘When something matters tha
t much, that is what one does.
Because when
you have family, you do that. You must know this.’
Her voice dwindled to a halt but then a
fresh burst built inside her.
‘Aine, I have answered
you, have you nothing to say?’
She swung away from him and walked to the edge of the glade, tearing at the folds of fabric that
caught on leafy obstructions.
‘Damn
!’
She
yanked the sari and it ripped.
As a further aside she muttered, ‘Please yourself,’ and pushed past a thicket of wild lilac that se
nt grasping fingers after her.
‘It matters little to me
what
you think.’

She thought she had hooked herself into the shrubbery as something tugged her
by the arm, pulling her back.
‘You’d be wise not to wand
er on your own,’ Finnian said.
‘You have no knowledge of what’s out there.’

‘My own company is all I seek so take your hand off me.’

‘Woman, your life would be over in a day if you left this glade alone.’

‘Presumption on your part, sir, that
I am unable to handle myself. I am a murderer remember?
Murderers have ways of looking after themselves.’
Murderer, murderer.
She jerked from his grasp and as she did, she slipped on the grass of the
riverbank and began to tumble.
His hand reached out and grabbed her, holding her tight by her upper arms and she hung there, not sure if she should be grateful or terrified as he pulled her from the edge of the enchanted stream.

He loosened his hold slowly, as if time had no dimension and slid his fingers down past her elbows to her forearms, all th
e while looking into her eyes.
She wondered if she were mesmered, if she were like a deer i
n the way of a speeding arrow.
His palms barely touched and she cursed that her skin almost stretched to meet him, wondering why
she did not rebel at his touch.
Kurdeesh’s fingers pushed at her memory but the thought faded and she turned her head away to hide from such recollection and from
Finnian’s seering gaze.
But he took a step even closer.

Still, be still
and
she wondered if she meant him or her frenzied heart.

His coat rustled like a whisper and she felt his breath on her hair and then his lips grazed the well in her collarbone and she heard him suck in a breath, knowing instantly it was the silver
on the necklet that hurt him.
But he continued, his hands still light upon her, his lips grazing her skin like a moth’s wings and she closed her eyes, turning toward him just slightly.

His cheek slid over her own, still that infinitesmal touch and she didn’t
mind the rough of the stubble.
Nothing but rough and smooth, soft and hard.

She turned another degree and his lips brushed hers, only brushed, but a sensation of such intent.

‘Look at me,’ he whispered.

But then sadly it was done and she hated that it
was
so because the world had shifted on its axis and if there had been tellurions and orreries, their whole swinging r
hythm would have become wider. ‘The truth, Finnian.
Your turn,’ she said and wondered if it really mattered.

H
e ran a hand through his hair.
‘I have the means to find the other two.’

‘How?’
She moved from him to the log, suddenly tense, and sat smoothing her hair in its tight bun, a mirrored action to his very own.

‘
Curiosa.
I wanted the paperweight that you pre
sumed to acquire last evening.
I was there before you, and Curiosa told
me the woman had come for it.
She left, he said, as if she had
cursed him.
I mesmered him and secured her address.’

‘Which is?’

‘Here.
In Trevallyn.’

‘Do you know where?’
Her interest concentrated itself fully on his words.

He bent to pick up a stick and snap it into measured pieces, the crisp cracks breaking the ambience that surrounded them.

‘Not precisely
, no.’

‘But Trevallyn is the home of Færan like the Raj is home to djinns – you should know every inch.’

‘I don’t.
I have never lived in Færan, Lalita
.
Like you, I spent my life in the mortal world of the Raj, in a castello that sat on the edge of a godforsaken cliff by th
e side of a grey-as-grief sea.
I grew up with all manner of Other and mortal types, all of them malign, and with a
bitch
of a grandmother…
’

‘Finnian…’ she broke in.
Pain wracked his voice, and she wat
ched his eyes become shadowed.
Saw the man she had met outside Curiosa’s who had said,
‘Excuse me, Lady, can I help?
Are you faint?’

‘No. You shall listen.
I
do have family as it happens. Foul and malignant
family whom I w
ouldn’t lift a finger to help. Unlike you.
I am searching because if I don’t, my grandmother shall find the
charms and wreak devastation. She has an obsession.
An indecent ob
session,’ he added scathingly.
‘So it seems to me that
I
need you and your charms, and
you
need me to be able to find the charms
you
require.
Therefore it seems obvious we must search together.’

‘And then what?’
Fright tickled at the edges of her neck, fear of what might be.

‘What indeed?
I think Lalita, that you shall just have to trust me and we may yet see what Fate has in store.’

‘Fate!’
Fear a
nd distrust exploded together. ‘What is it with Others?
The djinn and the afrit, they talked of Fate as if it
were as powerful as the Lady Aine. It’s ridiculous.
Surel
y one commands one’s own life.
Do you mean to say that I would always have murdered Ku
rdeesh? That it was foreseen?
That even as a babe, I had this base streak inside me that would eventuate, no matter how loving my
upbringing or gentle my life?’
She stood, h
er hands gesticulating wildly. ‘And you, Finnian.
Is it Fate that makes yo
u search for the charms?
Do you th
ink it was always meant to be?
That no one can have an altruistic motive
that springs from the moment?
Rajeeb said it was Fate bringing me to this exact minute in Time but if I hadn’t heard about Isabella, I doubt I’d have wa
nted to search for the charms.
Did Fate intend for me to find out about h
er at just that right moment?’
She stalked around the glade, her throat hurting as she shouted.

‘I told you, Lalita,’ the tones of his voice t
ouched her in intimate places.
‘I never believed in Fate, in pr
e-destiny, but now, after… now I do.
In any event, you ha
ve to admit it matters little.
One can moan and decry one’s predicament but
our
predicaments are the same.
Better we live in the moment than dwell on what was. At
this
very moment we are in Trevallyn on the
edge of the Ymp Tree Orchard.
We must get to the other side away from here and on th
e way we shall find Killymoon.
You must persuade yourself to trust me because you are safer
with
me than not.’

She was so close to leaving, dancing o
n her toes like a nervy horse.
So close, but the name flickered before her –
Isabella.
She drew in her breath, walked up to Finnian and stared him straight in the eye, pus
hing his chest with her finger.
‘I was honest with you
. I bared my soul to you.
If I am to trust you and work with you, then tell me why I
need to leave here so quickly?
What is it that has you so nervous you
look to the river constantly?
Who are we running from?’

‘Lalita, damn you.’
He ran his fingers through his hair in that oft repeated gesture, scrab
bling at the wind tossed knots.
‘We run from the crone I call my grandmother.’

‘Your grandmother?’ She laughed.
‘An
old
woman?’

‘
YES, MY GRANDMOTHER
.’

‘Why?’

‘Aine,
woman, it doesn’t matter why.
Just know if she finds you with the charms, your
life would be over like that.’ He clicked his fingers.
‘Believe me.’

She moved away from him, shaking her head but then turned back quickly,
her finger marking time again.
Something made her believe him, some grudg
ing truth that pressed on her. ‘It is agreed then.
I’ll trust you and I say to y
ou Finnian, don’t let me down.
When shall we leave?’

‘Immediately.
Get away from the Gate, beyond the orchard.’

‘But it goes forever.’
She subsided onto the log, the humming, foaming waves of blossom stretching away into the
far hills for miles and miles.
The weight of the day settled on her, the guilt, the horror, the insanity of it all, so th
at she couldn’t shrug it away. ‘I can go nowhere immediately.
I need
time, Aine help me.
I just killed a man.’

‘We
have
no time!’

‘Please.’
She pulled again
at the sari around her ankles.
‘Besides, look at this!’

‘Can you ride?’

She nodded, surprised at his question.

‘I shall try and find horses.
I suspect there is a farmlet on the edge
of the orchard near the river.
I
saw hedging as we floated by.
I shall have to
leave you for a short while.’

She sucked in a breath
but he continued more equably. ‘No, don’t worry. See that tree?’
He pointed to a tall trunk with a crown of twiglets and leaves that spread in an elegant manner, and where creamy white
flowers hung in dense corymbs.
Bright orange berries clustered together, waxwings and thrush
fighting over the delectables.
‘It’s a rowan
, a guardian tree for mortals.
I can’t go to that side of the glade myself, but you must pick yo
urself a staff for protection.
And I know you
have silver around your neck.
With the silver and
the rowan, you should be safe.
There are clothes,’ he wafted his hand and a pile of gar
ments manifested on the ground. ‘When I leave, change.
Put them on ba
ck to front if you feel safer. It’s another guardian means.
And do
not
speak to anyone, ignore them if they appear, and hol
d your staff in front of you.’
He began to turn away, ‘Please heed me in this.’

Her last sight of him was a tall shape striding away and she wrapped her arms around herself and cursed the feeling she had, as if some indefinable bond was stretching fit to break as he left.

She pulled a dark knitted garment over her head, the close fit clutching at a body used to the flirtatiousness of floating fab
ric when the Symmer wind blew.
She had encased her legs in dark breeches and her feet were nestled in stockings and boots, her toes unaccustomed to the hardness of suc
h stiff and enclosing leather.
Sunbeams streamed into the glade, the sun moving rapidly across the sky, so she left the shadowy jacket on the log as she moved
to the rowan tree.
There were a number of broken branches and she found one that was straight and strong and she rested on it as if she were an old woman beset with the tribulations of age.