Echoes in the Dark (13 page)

I
am your companion.

“I
suppose so.”

So
I should be with you all the time.

Jikata
chose careful words. “I don’t believe that’s true.”

The
bird seemed to perk up.
No?

“No.”

The
feycoocus and volarans said so.
One yellow eye turned to consider
Jikata.

“What
are faycouscous and volarans?”

Chasonette
preened.
I am with you to help you learn our ways.

“Thank
you.”

Feycoocus
are magical beings.
A trill of Song, full of wonder.
They can shape-shift into many bird forms.
Animals, too.
Chasonette clicked her beak in disapproval.
They are about
my size, whatever shape.

“Ah.”

Volarans
are winged horses.

“Oh,
right.” The maid had used that word last night when Jikata had opened the
curtains at the foot of the bed. Jikata had been nude and that hadn’t seemed to
bother the young woman, but leaving the curtains open had. They’d had a mimed
discussion that got vigorous, particularly after Jikata had asked who’d see her
from the third-story window, with no close buildings around. The maid had
flapped her arms like a bird, then galloped like a horse. Jikata hadn’t
believed her, they’d both thrown up their hands, then the maid had made a
pleading face. Jikata had given up and gotten into bed fully intending to open
the curtains but had immediately fallen asleep.

The
afternoon before had consisted of a quick tour, then lunch, then bathing in a
wonderful spa-like pool under one of the buildings, a massage, then dinner.

Learning
to live with a soundtrack had taken a lot out of her and she’d retired early.

Now
she said, “Flying horses?”

Of
course.

They
stared at each other. Chasonette clicked her beak.
Come to the window, then.
She flew there.

Jikata
slid off the high bed, grabbed a robe hanging on a garment rack, slipped it on,
tied the belt, then sauntered over to the window.

Chasonette
gave a piercing whistle that had Jikata stumbling back, then the bird turned
her head and ruffled her comb.
Wait. They are not as fast as birds.

Jikata
shrugged, looked for her backpack. Obsessive or not, she always checked it
every morning and every evening. The bag, and smaller pouches within, were all
she had of her own…world. Everything was there, but a little jumbled, not in
the order she liked. She arranged the smaller bags.

Chasonette
whistled again, and Jikata looked up, irritated.

And
froze.

Hovering
outside her window was a gorgeous animal.

It
looked like a horse with wings.

The
song coming from it was ravishing.

It
is one of the Abbey volarans. It is glad to see you so it can gain status with
gossip. But it is not good at staying in place.
Chasonette
tapped the window glass with her beak. The horse flung up its head, then fell
away, wings beating.

“Wait!”
Jikata dropped her pack, but by the time she reached the windows it was out of
sight.

I
am your companion,
Chasonette said. She slid a glittering gaze toward Jikata.
But I don’t think
I need to be with you when you have your lessons from the Singer this morning
or visit the Caverns of Prophecy this afternoon.
She fluffed up her
feathers as if cold.

Jikata
felt a chill, too. Of change, of premonition.

9

Marshalls’
Castle

R
aine watched her
beautiful model boat cruise around the sacred pool in the Temple. She was
pretty sure this design would work to take an invasion force to the Dark’s
volcanic island. It had room enough for crew, provisions, twenty-five pairs of
Marshalls, twenty of the top Chevaliers, six Circlets of the sorcerous
persuasion, six Friends from the Singer’s Abbey, flying horses for all of them,
the four Exotiques and their mates and the remaining two Exotiques, which
included her.

She
didn’t want to go invade a hideous evil so huge and ancient it could suck the
life out of a planet.

It
was the biggest ship she’d ever designed by herself or with her family in
Connecticut. It was all wrong that she should be working on a galleon, a
battleship, instead of a yacht. It was beautiful.

She’d
gotten used to building models by magic here in Lladrana, designing them on
heavy handmade paper, cutting and folding them until they looked like the ship
she’d seen in her mind, setting them in water, then concentrating hard with her
Power, and making the pulp in the paper into wood that was a model ship. She
didn’t think the process would work for a real, full-sized ship.

Not
to mention it lacked a power source.

The
model floated and cut through the water of the pool fine, pushed around by her
Power. She couldn’t imagine even the most Powerful of the mages on Lladrana
mentally propelling the ship. Wouldn’t it drain them quickly and leave them
stranded?

Of
course it had two big masts, two small ones and sails. They could take advantage
of the wind.

Except
no one had consulted any sailors. The anger of most of Lladranan society toward
the Seamasters who had messed up Raine’s own Summoning was still in force.

Raine’s
early days on Lladrana were fading into a bad dream.

But
right now she was all too aware that she couldn’t build the ship, power it,
sail it, alone.

That
meant she had to release the last bit of grudge against the Seamasters and make
the first overture, bring them into the fold to help plan the defeat of the
Dark.

She’d
spent a month understanding the needs of the Lladranans, designing and revising
the ship. It was a fine vessel and a work of art and would carry exactly what
everyone told her it needed to carry. She had different versions for different
power systems, steam and diesel.

Here
in the Marshalls’ Castle and her tidy house in Castleton, she’d hidden and
healed. Now she was nervous about the time it would take to build the ship. All
the prophecies of this land stated that the battle would take place this year.

Since
time flowed the same here as at home, that meant they were in the beginning of
August. Casually, she’d dropped questions about shipbuilding to Marian, who
spent most of her time working on the final “City Destroyer” spell. Marian
thought it could take out the Dark’s island.

Probably
with all of them on it.

But
most were primed for the suicide mission, to sacrifice their lives to destroy
the Dark.

Raine
had never planned to “go” that way.

So
she’d concentrated on the ship instead, as all of them wished, and had asked
Marian how long it took to build a ship. Marian had gone all distant, as if
recalling something she’d read. She’d absently replied, “Three days with
Power,” turned her mind back to her studies and didn’t see Raine stagger away.

Looking
again at her model, which had floated to the center of the pool and sat in dead
calm, Raine shook her head. She could do another test of seaworthiness on
it—making the pool ripple with huge waves to batter it. Raine had lived with
tides and oceans all her life and knew to the salt of her blood how they moved.
But the ship was excellent, one of her best efforts.

It
had no Power source.

Time
to look at a real ship.

Everyone
had been very protective of her. Except for the strange flight a couple of
nights before, Raine had stayed in the Castle and the city for the past
month—she’d never lived inland and away from the sea for so long. She yearned
for the scent of the beach, the sound of the surf.

Just
as the month before that she’d yearned to be able to go inland more than a
couple of miles.

She
really wanted to come and go as she pleased.

She
left her ship in the pool and exited the Temple to a cloudy summer day, cool
for Connecticut and cool for Lladrana. The planet was dying under the onslaught
of the Dark, the weather chilling. She’d welcomed the two previous days of sun.

The
courtyard of the Castle bustled, as usual. That morning there’d been an alarm
that monsters were invading from the north. Marshalls and Chevaliers had flown
to battle. Raine had clutched her newest model in her hands and run to the Map
Room, had seen that the incursion was minor, and forced herself to finish her
last experiments in the Temple. She had really wanted to stay and watch the
animated map, particularly the orange-red shields that were Faucon and his
team. But she had her own task.

Now
she heard the clang of the siren pulse in notes that told everyone the Castle
teams had been triumphant, and waited, heart squeezing, for the pause then the
indication of casualties. The quiet went on and on and she heard a couple of
soldiers next to her sigh as she did. No deaths.

They
bowed to her, a man and a woman, and she smiled back, cleared her throat. “How
long will it take for the Marshalls and Chevaliers to return?”

The
man’s forehead wrinkled in thought. “They were north and far to the east. Quite
a distance. A few hours.”

“Thank
you.”

“You’re
welcome, Seamistress Exotique.”

She
jolted inwardly at the title but didn’t let it show. They walked away, the
woman whistling.

Seamistress
Exotique. The title was wrong. She could design pretty ships, make sure they
were seaworthy, but knew little enough about the seas and oceans of
Lladrana—the Brisay Sea dotted with islands off the western shore, the colder
waters north on the way to the Dark’s island, the narrow channel between
continents that was the only way to approach the island.

Time
to remedy that, to finish her job. When her particular task was done, the Snap
would come. The Snap was the call of Mother Earth to her wandering child to
return. Earth was a lot stronger than the planet Amee. If Raine wanted to
return, and she did, all she had to do was let herself be taken home by the
Snap.

She
only hoped that part of her job was
not
invading the island, prayed it was
only finishing and building the ship.

But
she had to take the next steps and the sooner, the better. She knew of one ship
only that she could study in complete safety, Faucon Creusse’s yacht. Surely it
would have an additional power source other than sails.

He
didn’t like her and she was wildly attracted to him. But she wasn’t going to
get involved with a Lladranan. Four out of five women from Earth had already
fallen for sexy Lladranan men and forsaken their birth homes.

Raine
was ready to return to designing fast, double-hulled vessels of cutting-edge
metal alloys. She’d been unhappy with her place in her business, but hadn’t
been willing to cut the bonds.

With
the Seamasters’ faulty Summoning, the bonds had been cut for her. She loved her
father and brothers, suffered at the thought of their grief in thinking she’d
been lost to the sea, but when she returned she wouldn’t stay with the
business. She was tired of wooden ships.

She
snorted. One last, huge, wooden ship to build, then freedom.

Now
was a good time to go to the coast and look at Faucon’s yacht while he was
flying back from battle.

Raine
called her very own winged horse mentally,
Blossom!

I
am here, Raine,
Blossom replied, sending along a wash of love that had Raine sniffing back
tears. She was so blessed now. She had a being who loved her, who would put
her
first before any other person. That was a gratitude she clutched close to her
heart, so much different than six months ago, when she’d been a despised
potgirl in a fishing village inn. Raine
sensed
Blossom at the Landing
Field. Raine had magic now, a great deal of it, called Power. And
that
was so different than a year ago when she’d been much younger and rebelling
against family tradition.

Lladrana
was so different, so scary in those first isolated winter weeks that, looking
back, she wasn’t quite sure how she survived.

But
she had, and now she was an Exotique, a person valued above all others—except
by those who had an instinctive repulsion to the alien women.

Time
to see how free she really was.
Please request one of the Castle squires
prepare you for a flight.

Blossom
squealed in joy.
We are flying? More than just exercise?

Ayes,
we go to Faucon’s castle, Creusse Crest, and back.
She should have
made up her mind earlier. Even with Distance Magic, the trip to the coast and
back would be a long haul…if she’d accepted the land the Lladranan’s had
offered her, she’d have had a seaside estate and could have stayed there
tonight. But she was minimizing strings, already had bonded with too many to be
comfortable.