Dawnsinger (3 page)

Kai held his breath as he waited for whatever news would come.

Father put his hands on the wooden surface before him. A groove beside his mouth deepened. “
His ship… The wreckers...”

Kai sat forward. “What are you saying, Father?”

Father pushed off the table again and went to stand by the fire. “You have heard of
Muer Maeread?
”

Kai nodded. He knew the Coast of Bones as a place of dangerous currents and wild, subsisting Elder.

“The western shore to the north of Elderland has but poor land—sand dunes and salt marshes. The Elder there wrest a hard living from the sea, so hard it is said they rejoice when a ship breaks against the rocks offshore, for salvage rights belong to them. Some even say they
guide
ships into the shoals with false lights. If any survivors wash ashore, they do not live long…”

Kai jumped to his feet. “But Daevin’s ship should not have been anywhere near Muer Maeread!”

Father inclined his head. “The
Kestrel
journeyed west, but a storm blew it off course. Clouds obscured the stars and made it impossible to navigate. When lights appeared against the shoreline, the ship turned toward them. The captain must have thought they returned to harbor. By the time he knew his mistake, he had no time to turn back.”

Kai joined his father before the fire, although it warmed him little. “How do you know these things?”

“
The Sea Wanderer
almost succumbed to the same fate. Its captain answered my inquiries. He witnessed the shipwreck.”

“Could he not have given you falsehoods to gain a reward?”

“He asked nothing in exchange.” Father spread his hands. “He brought proof.”

“Proof?”

Father stood before the window’s velvet hangings. “When the storm relented, Captain Ivan, at his own peril, returned to the site of the wreck to search for survivors. The Kestrel’s fate would have belonged to his own ship had the other not foundered first and thus warned them of the shoals. The crew members he sent to comb the waters found none alive.” He crossed the chamber to reach above the high marble mantle. “They fished this from the sea.” Puffing a little with effort, he brought down a rough plank. “I’ve hidden it from your mother until I can bring myself to show it to her.”

Kai received the plank, the rough wood biting into his hands. Ornate letters of scarlet spelled out “
Kestrel.”
He shook his head. “This can mean nothing—or everything.”

“I have confirmed its authenticity.” In a sudden movement, Father slammed a fist into the palm of his other hand. The veins on his neck stood out. “Would that I had not allowed Daevin to go!”

“You did right, Father. Daevin longed for adventure and felt suffocated by duty. Had you not given your blessing, he might well have gone without it.” Kai looked at his empty hands in puzzlement. His father must have taken the plank away, but he had not felt its weight lift. “When will you tell Mother?”

Father returned the plank to its hiding place above the mantle. “When the time is right. She has sorrow enough with Shae leaving. I tell you, Kai, so you will know your place as Whellein’s only remaining son. I grow old and have need of an heir. Will you give your promise to attend such duties here at Whellein when the Lof Raelein’s death releases you?”

Kai gazed into the fire, thus avoiding his father’s searching gaze. A part of him wanted—
longed
—to make such a promise. He could rule and reign at Whellein rather than live the life of a second son in service. He ached to please his father, to help him shoulder his burdens. Besides, if none took up an heir’s duties, Whellein could vanish as a separate entity at his father’s death. His ancestral lands would pass to Kai’s older sister, Ilse, and her husband, Aelfred, of neighboring Merboth.

But Kai could not bring himself to speak. Loyalty to Lof Raelein
Maeven and the House of Rivenn held him fast. He had dwelt within the embrace of Torindan since his early life. As personal guard to the Lof Raelein, he was expected to swear his oath of fealty to her son at Maeven’s death. Kai could not, with ease, turn his back on such duties. Besides these things, something indefinable kept him silent—a sense of destiny— the simple understanding that a different fate awaited him.

“You will not?”

Kai shook his head and met his father’s silver gaze. “I
can
not,” he corrected, helpless in the knowledge his father would not understand, and that he could do nothing to ease his pain. He looked into the flames, watching them flicker and flare.

Footfalls sounded. The door whined and then thudded shut.

****

Shae waited in the shadow beyond the torchlight. The door to her father’s meeting room stood ajar, perhaps to release heat from the fearsome fire that blazed in the hearth. Light surged about the room in time to the leaping flames. It reached across polished floors, peeped into forgotten corners, and made ancient tapestries jump with life.

Kai was sprawled on the bench opposite the fire, and his fair head rested against embroidered cushions. Firelight played over his features, softening them. Shae itched to smooth the creases from his brow, but she curled her fingers into her palms instead. He would not welcome pity.

She knew a swift grief for the carefree youth who had taught her the ballads of her people. More than once, he had kept her at his knee long after her bedtime as he spun tales of Torindan, High Hold of Faeraven. Shae sighed. She hardly recognized her brother in the weary sojourner before her.

She stepped into the light. “You summoned me?”

He nodded but did not turn his head.

“Are you not well?”

Kai gave a weak smile. “I require extra warmth to cure me of the cold, but I do not ail.”

“You should perhaps have slept longer.” She reproved him in gentle tones. “You give yourself little time to recover before journeying again.”

“You are right, of course.” He shrugged. “I leave at first light.”

She gave him a searching look. “I don’t understand. Why did you come with such urgency only to leave so soon? Surely any messenger could have brought news to Whellein of the Lof Raelein’s illness.”

Kai made no response. His eyes shut, and he went still so long she thought he slept. She crept away but his voice halted her at the door. “Do you remember how we used to sit together before the fire and search for the blue hearts in the flames, and afterwards imagine shapes in the coals?”

“I remember.”

A smile stretched his lips. “Life seemed easy then.” He opened eyes of deep gray touched with silver. “You are right. I didn’t come to bring news of Lof Raelein Maeven. I came for you, Shae, to take you with me to Torindan.”

She stared at him. “Why should you take me with you?”

“The Lof Raelein bids it.”

“But I don’t understand. Why me? Does Mother know of this? I’ll miss Katera’s wedding! What will Father say?”

“Mother knows, and Father agrees you must go. Even now, your maid packs a few things for the journey. Torindan will provide whatever else you need. You must travel with me on my wingabeast. I would not ask such a thing of you, but time presses.” He hesitated. “You will come, won’t you?”

The thought stole her breath, and she put a hand to her stomach to comfort its churning. She wanted to say no, to withdraw into the shadows and hide from the unknown threat that seemed to reach for her.

And yet…she’d never traveled far from Whellein. What would it be like to visit Torindan? Would she find more freedom there?

“Why do you ask when the Lof Raelein bids me? What choice do I have?”

He gave her a level look. “Shae, she would have you answer her summons of your own will.”

She blinked away tears. “How can I deny her anything? I will come.” As she spoke a strange awareness twisted through her, and she saw again, in her mind’s eye, the welke drop upon the wingen.

3

Flight

The shadow of a hand suspending a comb above Shae’s head stood in relief against the whitewashed wall of her chamber. She waited, but when the tug of the comb in her hair did not come, she glanced over her shoulder at her maid.

Lyse stood motionless, her pale gray eyes unfocused. “Danger waits for you.”

Shae’s mouth went dry. “What is it?”

Lyse gave a faint shake of her fair head. “It doesn’t happen often, but sometimes I…sense things to come.”

Shae stared at her. “Yes.”

“Whispers from Lof Yuel.”

“Tell me.”

“An old evil seeks you.” With a hand at Shae’s shoulders, Lyse turned Shae to face her. “Must you go to Torindan?”

“How can I refuse my Lof Raelein’s deathbed summons? That would be worse than ill-mannered, and I’d always regret disappointing Maeven.”

“But if you go with Kai, you may not live long enough for regrets.” Lyse stroked the brush through Shae’s hair.

Shae’s laugh sounded strained within the quiet room. “These are poor bedtime stories, Lyse.” As the comb yanked at her tangles with sudden vigor, she winced. “Wake me early. I’m sorry, but I mustn’t keep Kai waiting. If it makes you feel better, I’ll tell him what you said. With a bit of caution, the journey should go well. And I’ll watch myself at Torindan.”

Lyse said nothing more but with deft fingers bound Shae’s hair in a long braid, and then lighted the way into her bedchamber.

The feather ticking gave beneath Shae, and she lay on her back, content to let Lyse shut her in with the creatures embroidered on the heavy linen bed hangings. As Lyse rustled about banging and latching shutters, Shae gazed in the wavering lanthorn light at rampant gryphons, wingabeasts in flight and unibeasts with whorled horns entwined.

A golden gryphon batted its wings and pulled free of the bed hangings.

Shae backed against the carved headboard.

The gryphon swooped to perch at the foot of her bed and, stretching its sleek head, opened its beak in a roar much greater than its tiny size.

When the gryphon dove through a gap in the bed hangings, Shae waited for Lyse’s scream, but none came. Before she could ponder what this might mean, a miniature unibeast leaped onto the counterpane and pointed its silver horn at her in challenge.

With a hammering heart, Shae held her cushions before her like a shield.

A fluttering shadow crossed over the unibeast.

Shae looked up in time to see a small white wingabeast circling at the top of the hangings before it, too, flew through the gap.

The unibeast followed in a graceful leap.

Shae strained her ears in a silence so profound it seemed to pulse, and then, with a shaking hand, pulled back the hangings.

Her bed perched at the edge of a steep cliff that fell away into darkness.

She swung her legs over the side away from the precipice, and her feet met cold stone. Steadying herself with a hand to the damp rock wall that rose from the narrow landing between flights of stairs, she edged past her bed. Her foot slid forward as she searched in dimness for the first rising stair step. An air current stirred her hair, and she swallowed against the taste of bile at its fetid breath.

Somewhere near, something shrieked.

The edge of the stair crumbled beneath her foot, and its stones clattered away. Shae pitched forward, crying out as her knees struck the edge of a tread and her palms slapped moist stone.

She scuttled backwards from the edge and up several stair treads, but as the skin on the back of her neck crawled, turned her head to look behind her.

Darksome beings crouched above her on the stairs, ready to spring

A shudder laddered up her spine, and her legs went weak even as a whisper stirred the air.

“Find the light.”

She moaned and thrashed, wrenching free of the nightmare to find herself on her bed’s soft tick with the bedding tangled about her. The shutters rattled as wind whined into the chamber and lifted the bed hangings to billow against her. Lyse must have forgotten to latch one of the shutters.

Throwing back the counterpane, she pushed the hangings aside. Wind buffeted her face. But the shutters remained secured.

Shae trembled in her thin shift, an uncanny awareness lifting the hair at her nape. A dank odor assaulted her, and she sensed, rather than saw, the fell creature that slithered into the room.

Shae’s knees went weak, and she slid to the floor as the unseen predator coiled itself around her mind—probing, squeezing, seeking entrance.

Her scream strangled in her throat.

****

Kai snapped a sprig of rosemary and inhaled its robust fragrance. Sleep eluded him, despite his weariness. He tilted his head back and breathed in the green scent of life that permeated the garden. Stars burned into his eyes, so near it seemed he could pluck one from the velvet sky. As he watched, a tiny light arced overhead and extinguished. The lonely call of a nightbird pierced the darkness. He had tiredness enough to sleep. What he lacked was peace.

He would not let himself think of Daevin gone forever, lost in the cruel sea, or worse, cut down in cold blood after reaching shore. Dark fancies crowded his mind. He pushed them away. Better to remember kinder days, when he and his brother had tangled like puppies and bandied good-natured insults.
No
. He shook his head as if that gesture could clear his pain—better not to remember at all.

Kai pulled a handful of buds from spikes of lavender that rose beside the mossy path. They filled his mouth with sweetness. Perhaps the herb would ease his rest. He could not keep Shae safe if fatigue clouded his mind. He pictured her as she had appeared earlier—garbed in a garment of mossy green, plaited hair hanging to her waist, a knotted band of doeskin circling her brow. Where had that engaging sprite gone? He glimpsed her at times in the spring of the maid’s step and in the lift of her head, but the once-bright eyes now gathered shadows. He sighed and remembered a time, not so long before, when his young arms, aching from the unaccustomed task, carried her across the Plains of Rivenn. He’d sheltered her from wind and cold and the rain that mixed with bitter tears to stream down his face.