Cast In Secret (37 page)

And the water flared white, like incandescent flames, or like sunlight on still water from a clear, clear sky; blue everywhere implied, but white the thing that burns and blinds.

And from everywhere that water existed, be it small pond or tiny riverlet, gentle mist or raging storm, the Tha’alani people suddenly woke, and Kaylin could hear them
all.
She could hear the harvest song, and she could feel it in the thrum of a hundred throats; she could hear a child’s cries – in anger, in sadness; could hear their joy and their bewilderment, their delight and their surprise. She could hear their words, and beside them, above them, the words of their elders, the fears of their parents.

And she could hear, as well, the voice of her grandmother, long dead; the fear in that voice, the memories of a life that was somehow still being lived, somehow still vital.

Last, she could hear her own voice, her child’s voice, serious and determined, speaking not to kin but to elemental water.
You want to kill because you are not alive, but I will never allow it.

... Although I don’t understand why you want to kill, when you can help people and save lives and cause them to be happy, ‘cause when people are happy, you can
feel
it here, and even when you’re sad, it makes things better.

I will never allow it.

Oh, my people.

In water, blood could be washed away. Against this tide, there was no defense. It was as if… As if she could touch every single one of her people, stalk to stalk, and be calmed and comforted. Could see all their follies, their angers, and the strength of their joy.

But what must they see in her? What must they see?

The water began to shimmer in the air before her, dwindling – and with it, the voices that she had lost in her grief and her guilt and her anger.

She could not bear to let them go. And she had the power – she could see it, pulsing now in the runes and words upon her skin – to hold it, somehow; to keep it here. She had the power to force the water to do her bidding.

“What do you desire?” she asked the water, falling now to her knees, all thought of conquest forgotten.

And the water was silent, then, but the voices were
so
strong. The elders answering the question that they could feel her asking; they could not hear it across the distance, but she was touching the water, and they – woken by water’s desperation, were also touching it.

They answered her, their many voices becoming, at last, one voice, like the voice of a waking god.

And, awake herself, she waited while the water slowly diminished, knowing that the water had heard what she herself had heard.

“And this,” she asked softly, “can you do this, for us? Is
this
your desire?”

And the water answered,
Yes
. And in its voice, wonder, surprise, just the faintest edge of fear. And joy.

But if you use this power, if you do this thing, you will have the power
no more.
It will be gone from you – you will have no weapon –

I… am done with weapons. If you will do this, if you will it, I am done with weapons.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes
.

Cheeks wet with tears, hands trembling, Kaylin Neya felt the world slip away from her. She didn’t want it to leave. She’d been abandoned so bloody many times, she wanted to grab on and hold and
make it take her with it
wherever it went.

But…

It was a vision, wasn’t it? She smeared water across her cheeks and stared into the unnatural eyes of a twelve-yearold girl with translucent skin, long hair.

It had to be a vision because Kaylin didn’t
have
stalks.

She didn’t have the Tha’alaan.

Or she wouldn’t, when she let go – but she was selfish. For just a moment longer, she held tight.

Tha’alaan.
She whispered the word as if it were a name, and maybe it was.

Kaylin.

Kaylin Neya.

She heard the voice as clearly as if the woman speaking were standing beside her. She looked, but rock didn’t usually speak, and even if she was still shaken by what she had seen, she wasn’t so far gone that the rock had mouths. It was Ybelline’s voice. She
knew
it.

Yes,
Ybelline replied, grave and calm.
It is Ybelline. How come you to be here, Kaylin?

And Kaylin said simply,
I’m holding the Tha’alaan
.

The silence was longer, now, the hesitation marked.
Kaylin
–

But Kaylin, who had lived in terror of the Tha’alani for most of her adult life, was not afraid. Not afraid of Ybelline or what she might see; not afraid of the Tha’alaan. She had
seen
what it had given Uriel, in the dim and distant past. And she had
been
Uriel, for moments, or months, or years – she knew what Uriel was capable of. The why, slow to fade, didn’t matter in the end. If the Tha’alaan could somehow see Uriel and see a person worth saving, what had Kaylin to fear?

The Tha’alaan did not speak at all. Kaylin opened her eyes – it was easier to listen in darkness – and saw the girl’s watchful eyes. But she did not speak.

And what the water did not offer, Kaylin could not, although she was certain that Ybelline knew. Maybe they all did. It was one of the memories, wasn’t it? One of the memories that the Tha’alaan held?

They could not speak openly here, not while the Tha’alaan listened, not while it made all words and all experience part of its endless memory.
I heard the Tha’alaan,
Kaylin said, choosing the words with care.

Ybelline surprised her.
You would,
she said softly.
You, of all your kind. You bear the marks. Uriel’s marks. But you are not afraid.

How could I be? I… The Tha’alaan… Uriel.

He gave us this gift,
Ybelline said softly,
and at great cost. We would not
be
Tha’alani were it not for his sacrifice
.

I wouldn’t exactly call it a sacrifice,
Kaylin said drily.
But he used what mages use.

Yes.

And a mage could –

Yes. It is not spoken of, Kaylin. Most do not know it. To reach that far back in the Tha’alaan is the study of years, for most of my kin. Uriel is too foreign to their minds. He was the first and the last of our warrior leaders.

But not to my mind.

No. Not to yours.

Did you know this would happen? she thought.

I did not know it would happen now, but I guessed it might. And now is better. Understand, Kaylin, that the elemental forces are what they are. The Tha’alaan is
not
the whole of water, not the whole of what water is. Men still drown. Men still die of thirst. Were it not for Uriel, I do not think the water could have spoken to us at all. It does not speak to us now.

Not,
she added, and Kaylin felt both the envy and the fear, laid bare, that Ybelline herself felt,
as it first spoke to Uriel.
Not
as it can speak to you, if you know how to listen.

But Kaylin had, at last, relinquished her grasp on the water; she now fumbled with her sleeves, instead. Ybelline’s clear, soft voice was cut off the instant she had let go, and it was probably better that way. Her sleeves were a sodden mess, but that made it easier to push them up out of the way, so that she could clearly see the marks on her skin.

The Dragons think no mortals bear these marks,
she thought.

They are wrong,
the Tha’alaan replied. Speaking again, now that she could no longer be heard by the Tha’alani.
But they were few, Kaylin, and none of your kind have borne them until you.

“That you know of.”

That I know of,
the water agreed gravely.
Nor is Ybelline entirely correct – the marks you bear are
not
Uriel’s marks.

“You could read his?”

I could… sense them… in a different way. They were part of
what he was. Reading… is not for our kind, although I understand it in some fashion because of the Tha’alani.

“And these aren’t part of what I am?”

Uriel sang to me in the womb
, the water replied softly.
He cried to me before he could walk. When he called me for the first time – it was the thousandth time I had heard his voice. What he was, I knew. But you were silent, Kaylin
.

“You knew my name.”

I knew what Ybelline saw in you.

“But that was before – ”

When you rescued the child, Catti, from the undead Barrani
, she said softly,
Ybelline touched the child and she saw what the child saw. Ybelline understood you.

“She never touched me – ”

She is wise. She did not need to. What she saw, then, I saw. When I saw you again for a brief moment, I knew you. I spoke your name. I called you.

I did not know you would come bearing what you now bear. I do not welcome it,
she added, and her voice shifted, rippling on forever.
But at this time and in this place, I do not hate or dread it. I am not the whole of the water. I am the whole of the water that remembers mortality.

“Water doesn’t die.”

No. But you do. And your kind. And my people.
She lifted her translucent hands to her face, and covered the dark wells of her eyes.
There is a magic at work here,
she said, although Kaylin could no longer see her eyes.
It is not a small thing, and it will call what it calls. But I hear its voice, and it
is strong. If it wakes the water, there will be nothing I can do. I do not know if I will survive the waking.

The thought of the Tha’alaan
dying
robbed Kaylin of breath for just a moment. But only for a moment. She never accepted the loss of words gracefully. “You can’t speak to the source of this… summoning. Not like you spoke to Uriel.”

No. And I could not have spoken thus to Uriel if he had not allowed it. If you were that force, Kaylin, I
could.
I had hoped
–

“It won’t be me.”

No.

“But you can damn well bet that I’ll be there when whoever is doing this
does
call.”

The hands fell away.
What is
bet?

Kaylin cringed. On the list of things to do today, two of which should have made her question her sanity, explaining a bet to an elemental force so old you could probably call it a god and not earn demerit points was not even in the running. “It means that I’ll be there.”

You may not be able to stop the calling,
the water said quietly.
But you may have the power to stop the water from rising. You may be able to fight what he summons. You may be able to wrest control of it from the summoner.

Kaylin lifted a hand to her throat.

The water nodded.
I do not trust your kind,
she said.
Not to ignore power where power lies. But what you would do with the power, and what will be done – they are not the same, and the part of me that lives with the Tha’alani knows this, and accepts the risk
.

Kaylin nodded. She was beginning to feel the damp. “Can I get into the Castle now?”

Castle?

“The building we stand under.”

This is a Castle?

“Well, that’s what we call it.”

I have seen Castles. The Tha’alani have seen them. This is not a simple building, no matter how grand. Surely you can see –
But the water stopped.
I wished to speak with you, Kaylin Neya. I knew when you touched the ground. I felt the ripple of your presence. You are a threat to water,
she added.
And in places such as these,
all
of the elements have some awareness
.

“Places such as these?”

They are… groves. But what grows in them are not trees. There is stone here, yes, but… the shape it takes and the shape it desires are not the same. You will find stairs, here, near the darkness of this river that winds forever into the heart of the world, and they will take you to the Castle that you seek. But climb carefully, Kaylin, and try not to look down. The water will not carry you so gently a second time
.

“It doesn’t, usually.” Kaylin started to walk away. Stopped. “You drowned an old woman and an old man.”

Yes.

“Why?”

I do not know. There was hardly enough of me present
to
know
.

“Fair enough. We generally don’t arrest weapons for murder.” She hesitated and then said, “If the child who is missing is used to summon Water, what will she get? The Tha’alaan?”

But the Tha’alaan did not choose to answer the question, and maybe that was for the best. Kaylin could think of a few answers, and she hated all of them. Because she understood that the Tha’alaan – as much of it as was known, and really, that wasn’t much – was thought of as something entirely
of
the Tha’alani. She knew there were mages and Arcanists who even now played at summoning elemental water, without ever knowing there was a connection between the Water and the race of mind readers.

She doubted very much that Donalan Idis was aware of the connection; what he
was
aware of was that the Tha’alani could summon and control the elements by means of their racial abilities.

And, of course, it would
have
to be water. He couldn’t just burn down a building or two.

Comes of being a port city,
her common sense said. She told it where it could get off and began to grope her way along the cavern wall to the stairs.

The walk up the stairs was anticlimatic, and Kaylin blessed whatever deities happened to be watching over her on that particular climb. There were days when boredom – or the possibility that things
could
get boring – was as much of a gift as life was willing to give. She took it with both hands. Metaphorically speaking; she actually had both hands on the pocked rock face for most of the climb. There was no rail, and the stairs, such as they were, had been carved into stone and worn away by time.