Edge of Worlds (The Books of the Raksura) (13 page)

For an instant no one breathed. Moon felt a cold trickle down his spine, the sensation of having to suppress his fight reflex. The sole comfort of the shared dream was that it hadn’t been a vision, not a true augury, just a joint fear. Somebody made a faint noise of protest. Moon thought it was Floret. He thought it was a kneejerk “it can’t happen here” reaction, or maybe an “it can’t happen again” reaction. And Merit and Heart had been two of the Arbora carried away from the old colony by the retreating Fell. Maybe that explained Merit’s reluctance to believe in the vision.

Pearl’s spines snapped into a neutral position. Belatedly, Jade did the same. Her voice expressionless, Pearl said, “Explain exactly what you saw.”

Heart kept her voice calm and even too, despite the tension in her body. “We saw major kethel flying in the suspended forest. We couldn’t tell where they were. They carried sacs, and we knew they were full of dakti. We didn’t see any rulers.”

Sacs were tumor-like growths that the kethel secreted to carry the dakti swarms over long distances. They could also make giant ones, carried by multiple kethel, that the whole Fell flight could travel in.

Thistle looked away, her throat moving as she swallowed. “I don’t think it was an intrusion. I think it was part of the vision. It doesn’t mean it’s true, or that it’s going to happen, but it was part of the vision.”

Moon realized Chime was pressing against his shoulder; his breathing was shaky, as if he was trying not to tremble. Moon leaned into him. Chime took a deep breath and said, “Well, I’m glad I didn’t see that after all. The nightmare was bad enough.”

Pearl’s eyes were hooded. “And Heart, what do you think?”

Heart lifted her chin. “I agree with Thistle.”

Merit twitched in discomfort, but didn’t object.

Jade’s brow was furrowed. “The last part is a warning, obviously. If we do the wrong thing, the Fell will raise the strength to attack the Reaches.”

Balm lifted her shoulders, uncertain. “But does it mean that this happens if we go to the city or if we don’t go?”

Moon wanted to hiss in frustration. That was the key point. Both the nightmare and the vision were obviously warnings. The hard part was figuring out what they were warning them about.

Jade rubbed her brow, trying to conceal either fear or exasperation, and added, “Or does it happen if we don’t stop the groundlings from getting inside?”

Stone said, “They can’t get into the city without us. That means we have a chance to get in first, and see what’s there.”

“I did realize that,” Pearl said, her voice a half-growl.

“I’m just making sure we’re clear on what we’re talking about here.” Stone asked Heart, “The vision didn’t say we shouldn’t go?”

Heart touched her forehead, frowning in concentration, and Moon thought again what a lot of responsibility the mentors had. But their visions had kept the court alive, turned uncertain plans into triumphs, recovered the colony tree’s stolen seed, and had once saved Jade and her warriors against impossible odds. That sometimes the visions were too obscure to understand until closer to the event, or didn’t come to the mentors until it was too late, was frustrating, but you couldn’t argue with the successes.

Heart said finally, “I felt that we should send someone with the groundlings. The source of the trouble, the power, is where the groundlings are going.” She looked up, her expression more certain. “I think we should be there when they find it.”

Pearl looked at Thistle. “And you?”

Thistle nodded. “There are things about the vision that are confusing, but I didn’t feel any benefit to staying here. I felt we had to take action.”

Pearl flicked a spine. “Merit?”

Merit grimaced and rubbed his face. “I . . . agree. I just . . .”

Jade finished softly, “Don’t want it to be true?”

Merit nodded grudgingly. “Yes.” He added, “I’m sorry, Thistle.”

Thistle’s stony expression softened, and she nudged Merit’s shoulder in forgiveness.

Pearl sat back, her spines still held rigidly neutral. Jade watched her, keeping her own face blank. Stone was wearing his opaque expression and Moon stopped breathing. Pearl looked around at them all as if this was their fault, and said, “Apparently there is no decision to make after all.” She uncoiled her tail and stood, and told Jade, “Choose who you want to take with you.”

As they left the chamber, Moon told Jade, “I’m going.”

She glanced at him, her expression grim. “I thought you might.”

The argument over who else was going raged for most of the night. Moon gave up after realizing it had been a few hours and went up to his bower to sort out what he needed to take.

Besides the usual supplies for traveling like flints, a blanket, a waterskin, and a knife, he was debating whether to bring extra clothes. For trips with other Raksura, when they weren’t going to another court, he usually didn’t bother. But they were going to be traveling with the groundlings much of the time, and nudity taboos could make washing the ones he was wearing difficult.

He opened a wicker chest and paused as he saw what lay on top, wrapped in a fragment of dark silky cloth. It was the jewelry piece Malachite had given him that had belonged to his father. It was a small disk made of ivory, carved into waved lines, the pointed ends flowing to the left, in a way that symbolized the west wind. The dark rim of jade that had once framed it had snapped off halfway around and the yellow-white ivory was marred by a faint bloodstain.

His father Dusk had been captured and eventually killed by the Fell, as part of an attempt to breed Fell and Raksura together to produce a being able to open the hidden forerunner city. It was proof that being a good consort and sitting at home in your court was no guarantee of safety. Moon had always known it was better to die fighting.

Ember came in and sat by the bowl hearth to watch Moon sort through his belongings. He didn’t say he didn’t want Moon to go, but his dispirited body language suggested it. Ember and Moon got along well but they weren’t good friends, the way Moon was with Chime, and Balm, and Blossom and some of the others. They didn’t have much experience in common, and didn’t understand each other particularly well. But Ember had been raised with lots of other consorts and he supported Moon whenever he could in the court, and obviously found Moon’s presence comforting. Ember finally said, “I hope nothing happens.”

He meant
I hope you don’t all get killed
.

“It’ll be all right,” Moon told him.

As a good consort, Ember pretended to be reassured by that.

After Ember left, Frost came in and plopped down on the fur beside the hearth. She was in her Arbora form, and poked a claw at the cold warming stones. Moon wasn’t up here often enough to worry about getting a mentor to renew them. She announced, “Merit and Thistle are fighting.”

Moon rolled up a shirt and tucked it into the bag. “Still or again.”

“Again,” Frost reported.

“Really fighting or just arguing?”

“Thistle shoved him. But then she said she was sorry. She wants to go instead of him.”

“Pearl is going to decide who goes.”

“Yes, but Merit’s been out of the court more often, so everyone thinks he should go. Thistle says that means it’s her turn.”

Moon considered going to Merit’s rescue, then decided to just let the Arbora sort it out. Moon disliked the idea of taking a mentor at all, but every past experience said it was too dangerous to go without one. All their other abilities aside, a mentor could scry for them and help guide their way.

Then Frost said, “I think I should go.”

Moon had been waiting for that. “I don’t think so.”

Frost showed just how far she had come in the past couple of turns. Instead of throwing a screaming tantrum, she lifted her spines and said, “I’m big enough to help. It’s my duty as a queen.”

Moon dropped the bag and sat down at the hearth. “If you’re big enough to go, you’re big enough to stay here and do your duty to help take care of the court.” He tried not to let her comment sting. He should be doing his duty, except he had two duties, one with the court and one with Jade and the others outside it, and choosing between them hadn’t been easy.

Frost countered, “The Arbora say I have to stay in the nurseries. They won’t let me help take care of anything.”

“That’s your duty as a queen right now, to learn to listen to the Arbora.”

Frost unconsciously bared her fangs. Her rationale for going along on the trip depended on doing her queenly duty, and this effectively stymied her. Mostly because she was old enough to know it was true. Her spines slumped. “I don’t want you to go,” she muttered. “Or Jade. Or Balm. Or Chime. Or Stone. Or—”

That sounded more like the old Frost. “Unless you go with us?”

She twitched unhappily, her tail flipping anxiously. “Well, yes.”

“I know, it’s hard,” he told her. “But being a queen is hard.”

Frost met his gaze, and she seemed to realize he did know exactly how hard it was. She slumped further.

Jade walked into the bower. Frost glared up at her and said, “If I was a warrior, I could do whatever I want.”

Jade lifted her brows. “Besides going on patrols and guarding Arbora, and doing what you’re told?”

Frost seemed to grudgingly give in on that point, but added, “That’s not a hard job most of the time.”

“That’s why no warriors with any sense want to be queens.” Jade ruffled the frills on Frost’s head. “I need to talk to Moon alone.”

Frost sighed and grumbled at this outrageous request, but got up and left the bower with some semblance of good manners. She had been better with Jade, too, which Moon found a huge relief. He could only do so much; Jade was the one who would have to teach Frost how to be a queen.

Jade took a seat beside the hearth. “I’ve spoken to Song and Root and Balm. They’ve all agreed to go. I wanted Floret too, since she was there on the island even if she didn’t go down into the city with us, but Pearl wants her and Vine here.”

Moon had thought that would happen. With Balm going with Jade, he could see why Pearl would want to keep Floret. “Chime says he’ll go too.”

Jade tapped her claws on the fur, considering that. “Are you sure Chime wants to go? I know we need him, but I’ve never had the impression he likes travel the way Balm and Root and Song do.”

“He says he wants to go.” Moon had been thinking uneasily about Chime’s reaction to hearing the vision of the Fell. “I told him, after what happened the last time, if he didn’t want to risk that again, I’d understand. But he knows we need him.”

Jade said, “What about you?”

Moon stared at her, not understanding. “What about me?”

“What happened last time happened to you, too. And the time before that, and the time before that.” She pretended to count on her fingers. “I think that’s it. Unless there are some times you haven’t told me about, which I sometimes suspect there are.”

Moon considered a few different responses, and then said, “I’m fine. If I wasn’t, I’d say so.”

Claws carefully sheathed, Jade touched his cheek. “That would be a first.”

Moon didn’t pull back, but decided on a different defensive maneuver. “You don’t want me with you?”

“I didn’t say that.” Jade sighed a little. “Before the augury, the dream was bad enough. If Fell are coming to the Reaches . . .”

Moon thought of the nurseries, an involuntary image he couldn’t push away. “I’d rather stop them before they get here.”

They sat there in silence for a moment, then Moon picked up his pack to look through it again, trying to distract himself. “Who’s the fifth warrior?”

Jade settled her spines and smiled. “River volunteered.”

It was Moon’s turn to sigh. His relationship with River had been long and fraught, starting almost the instant he had first entered the Indigo Cloud court. River had been sleeping with Pearl, and the long absence of any young consort in the court had almost let him take that place with the warriors, causing a lot of conflict between Pearl’s and Jade’s factions. Moon’s appearance had disrupted that, and later when Pearl had taken Ember, River had lost his status in the court completely. It had taken him some time to get the respect or at least tolerance of the other warriors back since then. “I thought he got over having something to prove.”

“He pointed out that he has almost as much experience outside the court as Root and Song, which is true.” Jade eyed Moon, obviously trying to tell if he had any real objection. “I’m inclined to agree.”

It was true, and Moon couldn’t argue with it. He said, “But no Drift.” Drift was River’s more obnoxious companion. He had experience outside the court too, but Moon had to draw the line somewhere, even though the two were sincerely attached to each other.

“No Drift,” Jade agreed. She moved closer and tugged on his wrist. “Since we have time—”

“Is Jade in here?” someone called out.

“I’m here.” Jade let go of Moon, annoyed. Moon had the bad feeling they had just lost their last chance for private sex for quite a while.

Sage ducked into the doorway. “The Arbora are up here to talk to Pearl. They wanted you to come hear them too.”

The four leaders of the Arbora castes, Bone for the hunters, Heart for the mentors, Knell for the soldiers, and Bell for the teachers, were in the queens’ hall, sitting near the hearth. Pearl was already there, waiting impatiently. When Jade and Moon had taken seats, Bone said, “We’ve been speaking among ourselves—”

Pearl, without twitching a spine, said dryly, “You know I hate that.”

Moon couldn’t do anything but stare. Pearl had just made a joke. Bone, the only one who wasn’t fazed, said, wryly, “Yes, I know. But we think at least one other Arbora should go in the group, along with the mentor.”

Jade didn’t react, but Pearl lifted a brow and said, “This is what comes of thinking.”

Bell pointed out, “Arbora were helpful when Jade and the others went missing on the way to Ocean Winter. Moon knows that.”

Pearl turned her ironic gaze on Moon. He said, “They were.” She tilted her head, and Moon shrugged. This one was not his fault.

Bone said, “Bramble is the best tracker we have, and good at figuring things out.”