Grail of the Summer Stars (Aetherial Tales) (34 page)

Then the dark maiden was there, holding her. From a position high on the cave ceiling, she watched herself screaming in Persephone’s arms.

*   *   *

Persephone steadied her as she sobbed. Fela thrashed as her feline form changed, her limbs straightening, fur turning to smooth skin, hair flowing from her head. All her terror and confusion flowed into Persephone, who absorbed it all into the endless shadows of her being.

At last Fela lay still across her lap, exhausted. She was now a slender, pale girl, silver and pearl within a cowl of shimmering mist. An orphan soul.

Presently she said, “Someone lured me into the swamp and drowned me. I was … murdered.”

Persephone asked, “Do you remember why?”

“No. I try, but there’s nothing there.”

“Your body died on the surface world, then something blocked your soul-essence from finding its way to the Mirror Pool. Yet you forced a way into the Spiral and came to me instead. That shows great determination.”

“Or despair. Blind instinct brought me here. I wasn’t conscious.”

“Well, that’s how Aelyr find me. Fela, if you can’t recall the past, let it go. You can enter a new existence and leave the old one behind. Forgetting can be a mercy.”

Fela was quiet for a time, her thoughts burning. Then she said, “No. I need the truth.” She tensed, seeing a flash of city spires, feeling herself on all fours, her long strides eating the ground. “I was an athlete. Whom did I offend?”

“Perhaps no one,” said Persephone.

“But I need to know…” A fresh urgency seized her. “What if others are harmed, too?”

The maiden’s face was full of concern, but no pity. “Is that your responsibility?”

“Yes! I can’t turn away and pretend it doesn’t matter. It does. It’s vital.” She pulled herself from Persephone’s arms and knelt facing her. “What should I do?”

“It’s not my purpose to tell you that, but I can suggest a choice.”

“Please.”

Persephone pointed at the cave ceiling. “You may go out into Asru and haunt some tree or hill until you’re ready to begin your Spiral journey outwards towards rebirth.”

“And if I do that, I’ll forget?”

“Very likely. That would be the easiest path.” She pointed down at the lake. “However, if you want the hard path, a way to resolve the wrong done to you, you can leave through Meluis.”

Fela recoiled. “I used to love the water. Now it terrifies me. I’m afraid of drowning. Again.”

“You won’t drown. All the streams, lakes and seas of the Spiral flow into Meluis, even the Mirror Pool itself. It’s not water you need to fear, but what lies beyond. Are you ready to face whoever took your life? To relearn truths so painful your mind has wiped them away?”

Fela was quiet. Fear and doubt pinched her. “I must,” she said.

Leaning down, she made herself look into the bright water of Meluis. The turbid, cold scent of water flowed up and the sound of its lapping filled the cave. Fish slid through the shallows, their scales flashing with rainbows. Now and then a leviathan would surge up from the deeps and vanish again.

The idea of following those great fish into an unknown realm filled her with dread. She saw her own reflection swimming up to meet her: a soft pale shape, undulating and re-forming. As she reached down, her twin soul reached up towards her.

Fela rose to her feet and said, “How do you bear this? Always being here, and people endlessly spilling their misery into you?”

Persephone opened her arms. Fela saw that the lining of her sleeves had changed from blood-red to spring green. “Pain exists in time, but my sanctuary is timeless. I’m always here, always the same. If you come again, you may not remember this visit. And I…” She smiled sadly. “Much as I’d wish to do so, I may not remember you either. So, take courage now.” She indicated Fela’s ghost-self in the water. “Your
fylgia
, your shadow soul, will guide you.”

She took a last look at the guardian in all her dark splendor. Her arms were half-raised, her palms open in blessing. Then, like a swimmer poised to race, Fela focused her full concentration on the waters of Meluis.

In Persephone’s chamber all fear dissolved. Raising her arms, she took a last breath and dived—unleashed herself like an arrow into the green-glass depths.

14

Circles and Sacrilege

Stevie surged upwards, powered by the force of her companion’s fins. Entwined like a single entity, they torpedoed through fierce clouds of bubbles. She felt her head break into the air, felt the waterfall’s weight splashing over her. They kept rising, as if thrown by a wave right out of the water to land painfully on the flat stones of the bank.

There they lay, gasping.

Stevie saw the sea dragon changing. Leafy fins were reabsorbed. Its vibrant, fire-laced blue-black hues leached away to ivory as the sinuous body smoothed and flattened into human form. The seahorse head tipped back, metamorphosing until she found herself looking into Mist’s stricken face. Only his eyes stayed the same, black orbs wide with shock.

She was changing too. One outflung arm was coated in dewy fur … then it was suddenly her own pallid, human arm again.

Too weary for speech, they lay side by side, panting. Their naked bodies streamed with water, as if they were made of ice and dissolving.

Virginia had gone, but she’d made preparations for their return. Two dark blue towels, as big as cloaks, lay folded on the dry grass. Stevie sat up, racked by a violent coughing fit. She was aware of Mist wrapping one of the towels around her shoulders. The fabric was warm and delicious against her chilled skin. She huddled inside, coughing and shivering.

When she could breathe again, Stevie looked at Mistangamesh. He sat wrapped in the other towel, squeezing water from his hair. The brief sight of him naked would have been thrilling, if she hadn’t been too exhausted to appreciate it. Her experiences replayed through her mind but she felt weirdly calm now, all emotion spent. She understood … not all of what she’d seen, but most of it.

When she managed to speak, her voice was croaky. “Well, I found you.”

“You were looking for me?” He seemed disoriented. His black eyes were lightening gradually to their familiar grey-green.

“Of course, but I wasn’t expecting to be … ambushed.”

“I’m so sorry.” His head dropped. “I’ve changed into my Otherworld form so rarely, I’d almost
forgotten
. How could I forget?”

“Forgetting seems to be part of our condition.”

“Stevie, are you hurt? How are you?” He moved so their shoulders were almost touching. She wanted the physical comfort of his arms around her, but they both held back. What had happened was too raw. He’d sunk serpent fangs into her. After that, you couldn’t simply … hug someone, as if nothing had happened.

“Wet. Shaken up. I feel as if someone’s blasted my brain out with a flamethrower. But yes, I’m all right.” She touched her collarbone. The small double wound flared with pain. “You bit me!”

“I know. Unforgivable. There seemed a good reason at the time, but now—gods, this is dreadful. I don’t make a habit of it, and I’m sure I’m not venomous … If you never come near me again, Stevie, I wouldn’t blame you.” He rested his head on his knuckles. “I would never have wanted you to see me in that form. I didn’t want to frighten or hurt you … nor see that look in your eyes.”

“What look?”

“Shock, horror … however you’d describe it.”

“Well, it
was
a shock. You didn’t warn me.”

“How do you tell someone, ‘Oh, by the way, my Otherworld form is a scaly salamander thing—wouldn’t you prefer to go out with a nice predictable human?’”

Despite herself, she smiled. “You’re under no obligation to explain your secret propensities to me. And I had no idea we were ‘going out,’ as you put it.”

“No. Er … slip of the tongue.”

She let the remark pass. “I certainly wasn’t expecting to be carried off by … whatever you were.”

“It’s an altered state of consciousness,” he said softly. “I acted by Aetherial instinct. And you were in the same state.”

“Yes—I get that now. But I’m new to it. It was … a hell of an experience.”

“I wouldn’t frighten or upset you for the world, Stevie. This is horrible. This is why I wish that I could have stayed human, or dead, or both.”

“Don’t say that. Mist?” He looked up, his eyes raw. Resting her hand on his shoulder, she said gently, “You startled me, and I was shocked and not happy to be bitten—but you know what? I’ll get over it. The important thing is what we both learned. You saw what I saw, didn’t you? We were together in the visions.”

“Yes, but only fragments. You’ll have to tell me what they mean.”

She looked down at the place where the serpent’s fangs had struck. The swollen double puncture made a figure eight on her left collarbone: a small infinity sign.

“I think this is what I received instead of a branding. You were my Initiator.”

He closed his eyes in pain for a moment. “Then the Spiral itself used me to initiate you.” Pressing one palm to the rock, he added, “The ground feels solid but it’s full of capricious energy swirling around, doing what the hell it likes with us. The Spiral used me.”

“Maybe, but it couldn’t be any other way, could it? It had to be you, because we knew each other all those thousands of years ago. I was Fela.”

Mist nodded. He was troubled, and she knew why. “Do you remember…?”

“Everything,” she said softly, “except who killed me.”

*   *   *

As they walked back to Virginia’s cottage, they reconstructed events. Stevie asked him to speak first and he did, while she listened in numb silence.

One day Fela was a star among the Felynx; the next, she vanished. Afterwards, said Mistangamesh, all he knew of her death was that her body had been dredged from a swamp. Fela, a strong swimmer, had obviously not drowned by accident. There were injuries on her throat and a rock on her chest to weigh her down. Azantios went into a state of shock at the news. Murder was almost unknown among them, accidents rare, suicide alien.

Aurata was inconsolable. Why would anyone murder a being of such grace and talent as Fela—except out of jealousy?

Perhaps it was another Tashralyr, a jealous rival. Or was the murderer a Felynx patron, furious about having to watch his own champion repeatedly humiliated? A notorious malcontent … such as Rufus?

Then a witness came forward, claiming he’d seen Rufus walking back from the Tashralyr wetlands that night. The witness was a respected member of the Sovereign Elect’s staff, an assistant to no less than Veropardus himself.

No one dared accuse Rufus directly, but rumors ran wild. He reacted with outrage. Poectilictis and Theliome called their son to them and asked him, quite gently, if the rumors were true.

“I was there,” Mist told Stevie. “I can’t forget the look in his eyes. He didn’t answer, didn’t say a word. His eyes burned, as if he simply couldn’t believe his own parents would ask such a thing. He told me, much later, that it was the final insult. He turned and marched out of the hall. It was the last we saw of him, until he led the invasion.”

“I can’t say if it was Rufus or not,” said Stevie. “All I saw was a shape. But I know why…”

Tears flooded out of her. She put her hands over her face. They’d reached the edge of the cottage garden, so Mist drew her into the cover of soft foliage among fruit trees and bushes. “I’m here,” he said, letting her weep without trying to soothe her out of it.

“I’m not crying for myself,” she said. “It’s what I learned. All those Felynx souls, held prisoner.”

Briefly she told him of her time in Persephone’s chamber. “My memories were muddled, but I saw myself back in Azantios again. I was in the palace, after I’d won my last race. I had too much wine and I got lost and Rufus found me.”

Mist groaned.

She gave a shaky smile. “You were always in the background, watching. So like Poectilictis, but without his confidence—your strength was more subtle. I remember how you physically dragged Rufus away from me at times. Protecting me. I wish I’d listened. I was no one to you, yet you tried to keep me safe.”

“And failed,” said Mist.

“But you tried.” She found it impossible to admit that his kindness had made it all too easy for Fela to start falling in love with him. “You couldn’t watch me every moment, and nor could Aurata.”

He looked sad and troubled. “I wonder if he killed you in anger because you rejected him? He was increasingly wild in those days.”

“No, it was stranger than that. He took me to see the Felixatus.”

Mist stared. “He what?”

“I know,” she said. “The Felixatus was a sacred object that even he was not allowed to touch. He said that Veropardus was having an affair with Aurata and that’s why no one was guarding the chamber that night. Although I don’t know why someone else wasn’t put on guard.”

“The chamber was often left unguarded, because it was assumed no one would dare enter. We were trusted to respect the rules. And we did … except Rufus, of course.”

“That was his game,” said Stevie. “Sacrilege. He knew he had no business revealing the Felixatus to the profane eyes of a Tashralyr, so that’s just what he did.”

Mist gave a sigh, tinged with anger. “In hindsight, regarding the Tashralyr as ‘profane’ is the most disgusting idea, but that’s how the Felynx were. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize. The Felixatus was your hallowed object, not ours.”

“Well … yes, you’re right, but that was Rufus all the way through. Irreverent. A forbidden sanctum was irresistible bait to him.”

Stevie said briskly, “And he was trying to impress me, seduce me and blackmail me, all at once. Fela wasn’t stupid. She knew what he was up to.”

“Did he succeed?”

“What, in seducing Fela? Is that your business?”

The sudden tension between them startled her.

“No. Well, yes,” he said. “All I mean is that I knew he was trying to use you. I don’t want to hear that he succeeded.”

“He didn’t,” she said, nettled. “I’d never have left Aurata’s patronage. I’d grown to love her, in a way. And Karn was my friend; I wouldn’t betray him by replacing him as Rufus’s favorite. No, I wouldn’t have gone with him in a million years. Either way, Fela ended up dead.”