Second Stone (8 page)

“Well, according to Khane himself, he’s your grandson, too. He said his father was—” Torian stopped. Khane claimed his father was Kahl’s bastard. Was Alara aware?

“Go on,” Kahl urged.

“Well, he said he was his father’s bastard, just as his father was before him.”

Alara answered, “My son, Alrec—Khane’s father—was no bastard, other than that he didn’t claim us. Wild as can be, that boy was. I don’t know if Khane knew the truth and lied, or if his father lied to him. Either is possible.”

Kahl slammed his hand against the table and stood up. “No good, worthless, wild as a boar-born heathen. That boy was trouble walking.”

“Sit, Kahl.” Alara cut her eyes at her husband, not looking away until he complied. “Excuse my husband’s temper.”

With a wry smile, Torian told her, “Don’t think a thing of it.”

“Anyway,” Alara continued her story, “Khane’s father Alrec was wild from the day he was born. What’s worse, he was selfish and took great fun in being a bother. To everyone but his older sister, Valencia, that is. They were thicker than blood, and Valencia was heartbroken when her father sent him away. Still, it was for the best. We were responsible for leading Sheas at that time, you understand. Leadership had passed through the Roth line for a long time, and Alrec was just too reckless. It would have been disastrous for everyone had he ever been tasked to lead the land. He wasn’t as levelheaded and calculating as Valencia. Now that girl, my Lena, she was fearless, but more than that, she had a shrewd mind. She would have made a fantastic leader.”

Torian interrupted, “Sheas allows leadership to pass to women?”

Behind him Kahl chuckled. “Allow them or have them take it anyway, far as I reckon. Our women are known to be a bit hardheaded.”

Torian couldn’t suppress a grin as he looked at Emariya. He could believe it.

Alara continued, “Either way, we never heard anything from Alrec after he left. I had no idea he had a son.”

“The bad seed of a bad seed.” Kahl frowned. “What happened after the fire?”

“Well, as soon as we were able, we made the official proclamation of my betrothal to Emariya and set out for Sheas Harbor. Emariya’s father is being held there in the prison.”

“So you are planning to marry, then?” Kahl asked, his tone weighted.

Torian hesitated. If they were afraid of the prophecies, whatever he said next could make it all fall apart.

“We need the truth, son, if we are to be able to help.” Alara smiled encouragingly at him.

A glance at Emariya’s form on the bed gave him courage. “We hope to. We’d like to find out more about what the prophecies surrounding the binding of the lines means before we do. We used finding her father first as an excuse to give us more time. We care very deeply for each other, but we’d never want to put our people in jeopardy.”

“It sounds like my granddaughter has more of a head on her shoulders than her mother,” Alara said. “Valencia was idealistic. She thought love and marriage could solve any problem in the world. No one could convince her otherwise. Oren Warren falling so blindly for her didn’t help matters any. Her letters said they were going to change the world. Maybe they would have; all I know is she believed it.”

Kahl shook his head, “She was foolish, though well-intentioned. She didn’t want to hear a word of what the prophecies said. We tried to caution her, told her not all would be as dismissive as she was of what she called ‘fireside stories, nothing more.’”

“It’s what got her killed, and nearly her daughter with her.” Torian regretted the pain he must be bringing these people, dredging up their old memories.

Tears pooled in Alara’s eyes as she said, “We always suspected as much. Some in Sheas wanted to invade Eltar, to demand retribution. But we always sort of suspected her death was because of what she was. A Cornerstone set on binding the Stones. Valencia was well intentioned but power-blind. She thought she could command her way to the head of The Three Corners. We hoped her ambitions had died with her.”

“Not because we fear the prophecies,” Kahl added, “but because we fear those who do.”

“I’m sorry, we interrupted your story. You haven’t told us yet how she came to not wake.”

“We’d not been on the road long when a rider caught us. Reeve, Emariya’s brother, has kidnapped my sister in hopes of binding the lines.”

Kahl Roth hung his head, resting it in his cupped hands. “How did we bare such poisonous fruit? Roth blood has come to be nothing but a curse upon all the three lands.”

Alara’s shoulders trembled as she stood and crossed the little room to put her arms around her husband’s shoulders.

“This is not your fault, Kahl. And even if it were, all we can do now is try to help make it right.”

“What can we even do?” Kahl turned pained eyes to his wife.

“Contact your mother. Maybe Lady Carah will have an idea. I can’t, or you know I would. That child is a Roth, and only a Roth can save her now. If we don’t wake her and loose whatever has her in its grip, she’ll be dead before sunrise.”

Torian’s own heart nearly ceased to beat at the woman’s ominous words. “We tried to wake her. She’s got at least a bit of the gift of the Warrens. Her handmaiden hoped candles and laying her on the ground would let her tap into the strength of the earth. It seemed as if it were working, but then she slipped deeper. I don’t think this is an illness. If it were, why did the gift start to work? It’s got to be something to do with the Stones. You’re her only chance.”

“All right, all right! Of course I’ll help her. But you realize, Alara, we might not like the answers we get.”

“Ofourse it’s been so long since you’ve let your mother in, she might not answer.” Alara frowned. “And as usual, it will be my fault.” She turned to Torian. “It was always my fault. Any time he did something she didn’t like, it was because of ‘that wife of his.’” Alara mimicked a scolding tone.

“He can control when the spirits talk to him or not, and even who he talks to?” Torian asked, amazed.

“Oh yes, of course.” She gave him a hard look. “Can your father not control his visions?”

“Sadly not, My Lady.”

“I see.”

“So I assume, then, that Emariya cannot control when she hears the spirits?”

Torian shook his head. “I’m afraid not. She’s tried, but has not had much luck. Usually she can only get a word here or there at most.”

“Well, Kahl will get her straightened out, I’m sure.”

Torian and Alara fell silent as Kahl closed his eyes. He took a deep, even breath, then slowly released it. Twice more he repeated the deliberate breathing pattern before his chest settled into a normal rhythm. His lips moved ever so slightly and his eyes remained closed.

“He’s talking to someone, hopefully his mother,” Alara mouthed at Torian.

Taking his cue from Emariya’s grandmother, Torian remained silent and looked over to the bed. Emariya still hadn’t stirred.

The room was uncomfortably quiet for several minutes while Kahl silently communicated. After what felt like an eternity, he clutched at his head and his eyes popped open. His face stricken, he broke into earth-shuddering sobs.

CHAPTER TWELVE

The back of Emariya’s head throbbed relentlessly. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t lift herself up. Each breath was a hard-won reward for a struggle against the oppressive darkness. Emariya’s lungs burned for want of pure air to breathe. Her face felt as if it had been engulfed in flames.

A few times, she had managed to reopen her eyes to see her mother nearby, talking to Reeve or simply watching her. Lady Valencia no longer bothered to talk to Emariya—lines had been drawn, and mother and daughter stood on opposite sides.

Emariya wavered back and forth between wanting to beg her mother to help her and being determined not to speak another word to the mother she’d never known but always loved.

Hearing her mother’s startled gasp, Emariya looked up through heavy lids. For a moment, she wondered if the woman before her was an angel, come to deliver her from the throes of agony she’d resigned herself to. Trying to get a handle on her intangible thoughts as they drifted just out of reach through her fever-crazed mind, Emariya licked her parched lips and managed to croak out, “Who?” before her throat constricted and she could say no more.

A name floated into her thoughts, clear and undeniable.
Carah, child. Your great-grandmother.
She recognized that voice. It was the same voice that had told her to stop in the Uplands, the same voice that had been whispering to her on the leaves all her life.

Valencia stood and backed away, her hands held out protectively in front of herself. “Go away. You’re too late—go away!” she screamed at Carah.

Emariya tried not to let the fear evident on her mother’s face give her false hope.

Clenching her fists together, Valencia repeated her command. “Away!”

Carah’s angelic image flickered as the mist tried to swallow her.

Emariya closed her eyes. It was as she thought—hopeless. Her mother would keep her here forever. Not even her great-grandmother could save her now.

––––––––

Torian massaged his forehead with his fingertips as he paced behind Alara and Kahl. The woman had been trying to calm her husband down, but to no avail. With his patience dangling by a thread, Torian forced himself to go sit beside Emariya.

Her fingers were frigid in his palm. Worried, he lightly touched her forehead. “Lady Alara, she’s growing cold.” Torian stood. If he had to, he’d shake some sense into Kahl himself. He couldn’t lose her, not now. Not ever.

Apparently Lady Alara and he were of the same mind. “Kahl Roth, you snap out of it right this instant,” she demanded.

His eyes red-rimmed and puffy, Kahl finally lifted his head from the table and his sobs settled to quiet shudders. “It’s her. Valencia is holding her trapped inside her own head. How could my daughter do this to her own child?”

Alara stormed into a fury of activity, bustling around the little house. She picked up little odds and ends, a powder here, a stone there, putting each back in turn, mumbling something to the accord of ‘no, not that.’ Finally, she settled on a tiny doll she pulled out of a trunk in the corner.

“Here.” She handed the heirloom to her husband. The doll had obviously been well loved, and looked like it may have belonged to more than one child throughout the years. “You pull her back. This was hers. I don’t know if it will work, but you pull her back, hear me?”

His eyes still red, Kahl nodded. He took a deep, fortifying breath. “I think I can distract her. Mother was going to try, also. If she and I together can distract Valencia and at the same time something here in our world has a stronger pull on Emariya, it just might work.”

Alara studied Torian quietly for a moment. “If she loves him even half as much as he loves her, she’ll come back if she’s able.”

Torian’s shoulders sagged. “We had a fight… I was awful…” If they were counting on Emariya’s desire to come back to him, this might well be a lost cause. Would his one moment of careless anger cost Emariya her life?

“Oh, nonsense,” Alara said. “If there is one thing us women are used to, it’s forgiving men for not knowing how to use their tongue properly.”

He still had his doubts, but he was willing to try. “Do you have any plants or even straw? Maybe the combination of being anchored to me and the gift of the Warrens will be enough.”

Alara pulled some of the straw stuffing out from beneath the blankets Emariya lay upon. His fingers moving quickly, Torian braided the straw into a rope and wound it around first his wrist and then Emariya’s, essentially binding them together, much like they would be during a traditional wedding ceremony.

“Where’d you learn to braid like that?” Alara asked.

“I have a sister.” Torian smiled. “When we were kids, she used to make me do her doll’s hair for hours.”

“Are you ready?” Kahl asked. “We may only get one chance.”

Swallowing back his nerves, Torian nodded.

“Talk to her,” Alara encouraged as Kahl gripped the tattered doll and closed his eyes.

“Emariya, I love you. I don’t care if you never forgive me, or even if you hate me. You never have to look upon me again if you don’t want to. I’ll marry you tomorrow, or in a year, or never—whatever it is you want. Whatever you want, all you have to do is ask it of me, and I will find a way. Please, Riya, just come back to me. Live. For me. For Jessa and Garith. For Rink. We all need you. Don’t leave us… Don’t leave
me
.” Torian’s voice cracked with emotion as he pleaded with her.

And then, so weak that he might have imagined it, Torian felt her squeeze his hand.

––––––––

The awakening began in her wrist and surged lightning fast to her fingertips. There, it ricocheted up through her arm, searing her shoulder and ripping its way across her chest. Under its ignited current, her heart thudded faster. A reemergence of awareness sent a sudden sensation rolling painfully through her neck, where it finally escaped as a primal scream of desire, pain, and fury combined into one undeniable need to move.

In a moment of the sweetest possible agony, she felt Torian’s solid hand in her own. The fingers gripping hers were unmistakably his, just as they were undeniably slipping away as her mother’s iron will tried to drag her fully back into the dark oblivion. Lady Valencia grabbed Emariya’s other hand. Compared to Torian’s strong hold, her mother’s grip was clammy and frantic as it tried to pull her away from Torian’s beckoning.

“No, Emariya! You have to stay here. He’s just a trick—it’s not him. Stay!”

A soft moan slipped through her lips. She didn’t want to believe her mother, but how could she even hope that Torian was still with her?

Emariya, please come back to me.
His words slipped through her mind, promising the possibility that he hadn’t abandoned her.

“Torian,” she tried to call back to him.

Yes, that’s it. Come on, you can do it, Emariya. Come back to me.
He was really there; oh, she was almost sure of it. She clutched hard at his hand. Cooling comfort slowly started to spread, pushing the mist back as it angrily swirled, trying to reclaim her.

You don’t have to stay with me if you don’t want to, just please come back. Let me see your beautiful eyes one last time and then I’ll go. If it’s what you want, I’ll set you free, even if it kills me.

Oh, no, Torian, I’m trying to get to you,
she thought.

A sticky tendril of mist settled over her throat, and Emariya found she couldn’t take a breath. She struggled against the stranglehold, but to no avail. Pins of light danced behind her eyes. Exploding bursts of pain engulfed her.

Emariya had no doubt that she was dying. She tried to content herself with the knowledge that Torian was with her—that he hadn’t given up. When her end came, he would be with her.

She was settling under the fog, succumbing to her mother’s pull, when Lady Valencia’s grip abruptly disappeared. Great-Grandmother Carah, surrounded by an ethereal glow, hovered over her, blowing a cool, earthy scent right into Emariya’s face.
Go now, child. You must hurry. Go.

Flicking her eyes to the side, Emariya studied her mother’s panic-stricken face. As Valencia backed away from Carah’s projected image, her mother’s face stilled, becoming a picture of impassive abandon. Her gaze caught Emariya’s for the briefest moment, and sadness passed behind her eyes before they once again became unreadable.

The sensation of being half in the mental prison of her mother’s making while simultaneously feeling the physical world surging in around her made Emariya cry out in shock. She felt her chest heave as she sucked in a desperate gulp of air before slowly opening her eyes.