The Singers of Nevya (37 page)

“Housewoman, Houseman,” Sharn said, with a small formal bow to Brnwen and her mate. “Much honor is due you. Your little one is Gifted indeed, and precious to Nevya. The whole Continent offers you gratitude.”

Isbel lifted her head as Brnwen’s mate bowed and stuttered his thanks. Brnwen did not speak, and when Isbel looked at her, she turned her head away.

Sharn addressed Cantor Ovan next. “Are there no others?”

Ovan’s lips were pressed so tightly together, it hardly seemed possible he could open them to speak. “No, Cantrix Sharn.” His voice creaked with a sound like old leather cracking. “This child is the only Gifted one born to Amric for two summers.”

Sharn’s eyes were hooded and dark with worry, and Isbel sensed again the illness that weakened the old Singer. “At Bariken there were none at all,” she said. “Nor at Perl. At Lamdon we have three, but two of those are children of itinerant parents who refuse to send them to Conservatory. Unless other Houses have fared better, once again the class at Conservatory will not be a full one.”

“Can you not force the itinerants to turn over their children?” Edrus asked. Isbel saw Brnwen turn to the Magister with such an abrupt movement that her mate grasped her arm.

“The Committee wants to do just that,” Sharn said. She passed her white hand over her forehead. “Endlesly they debate. Cantor Abram favors a ruling that will require all families to send their Gifted children to Conservatory regardless of their personal inclinations.” She paused, and Isbel stepped to her side, knowing that Sharn’s weakness nearly overwhelmed her. The senior Cantrix put out her hand. Isbel took it in hers, and stood close.

Cantor Ovan grated, “Surely something has to be done.”

Cantrix Sharn agreed. “So it must. But if we force families to give up their Gifted children, they will begin to hide them, to deny the Gift.”

“But that means madness!” Ovan cried.

“Madness for some, it is true,” Sharn said softly. “But many itinerants manage to train their children rather well.”

“But this business at Soren—” Edrus began, and his voice trailed away.

Sharn nodded. “Yes. I am very worried about what is happening at Soren. But there must be a reason why our itinerant Singers are breeding more Gifted children than our House members. It is more important to discover that reason than it is to make laws to force them. Despite all our efforts, it is a rare thing for itinerants to allow their children to go to Conservatory for training.”

Isbel watched Ovan’s angry features, knowing he was about to burst out with some remark. She felt a sudden wrench in her chest and a terrible tightness in her throat. All at once it seemed as if a great hand had gripped her lungs and was squeezing the breath out of them.

But it was not her pain. It was Sharn’s she felt, and she knew it for a certainty when she knelt by the older Cantrix’s chair and saw her mouth twist in agony.

Isbel looked about for Cael. “Housekeeper! The Cantrix is very ill. She needs to be taken to her bed at once.”

Cael stepped forward, as if to assist Sharn to her feet. “No, she must be carried! A litter, please.”

She turned back to Sharn.
How can I help you?

Only . . . only to rest
. Sharn’s sending was so weak that Isbel could barely hear her.

I will stay with you
, Isbel sent firmly, with as much reassurance as she could summon. Sharn’s pain was like a fist within Isbel’s breast, clenched so tightly she thought she could not draw breath without crying out. She shielded herself as strongly as she knew how, but it took several moments for her sense of the older woman’s pain to ease. She kept Sharn’s hand in her own as two burly Housemen were ushered into the Magister’s apartments.

“Gently, please,” Isbel whispered, as they lifted the Cantrix onto the litter.

“I’ll be as careful as I can,” one of them murmured in response. Isbel saw with a rush of gratitude that it was Kai, the tall hunter who had been kind to her on her journey to Amric. As she reached to smooth Cantrix Sharn’s hair from her face, her fingers touched his briefly. His hand was warm and hard, and she found the strength of it comforting. She did not draw back as quickly as she might have.

Carefully the two Housemen bore Sharn’s litter down the corridor. Isbel walked beside it, trying to appear calm. When Sharn’s Housewoman received them, fussing and exclaiming over her mistress, Isbel went in to supervise the stricken woman’s transfer from the litter to her bed.

One of the Housemen left immediately, but Kai lingered. “Isn’t there something more I can do, Cantrix Isbel?”

She looked up at him, thinking how solid, how safe he looked, standing there in the doorway. “Yes, Houseman. Please ask one of the cooks for a very weak tea for the Cantrix.”

He bowed. “I’ll bring it myself,” he said, and was quickly gone.

Sharn’s Housewoman was offended. “I could’ve gotten the tea.”

Isben shook her head. “The Cantrix needs you here. Let us see if we can make her comfortable, you and I together.”

Somewhat mollified, the Housewoman smoothed the bedfurs beneath her mistress. She hurried to slide off her boots and cover her thin white feet with a
caeru
rug, turning it inside out so the warm fur was close against Sharn’s skin.

Isbel knelt beside the bed, her hand on Sharn’s.
Cantrix Sharn, you need to go to Conservatory, to Maestro Nikei. He is the greatest of all healers.

Sharn’s eyes did not open.
There is no time, my dear. Nevya’s need is too pressing.

Isbel sensed through her shielding how the pain in Sharn’s chest eased slightly. Kai returned with the tea, and he cast a look of alarm at the old Cantrix lying so still on her bed, her frail body lost in the thick bedfurs. “What else can I do, Cantrix?” he whispered.

“You can find Yula and ask her to give you my
filhata
from my apartment,” Isbel said. She had no real idea what she would with it when she had it, but she must do something, anything that might help. Kai bowed quickly and hurried away again.

“What are you going to do, Cantrix?” asked Sharn’s Housewoman. The hope in her eyes was fresh pain for Isbel.

“I do not know,” she answered. “Perhaps . . . just help your mistress to sleep.”

The Housewoman nodded. “The healers at Lamdon do no good, either. They only ease her pain a little. And all I can do is pray.”

“Pray, then, Housewoman,” Isbel told her. “I will, too.”

Kai was at the door again, slightly out of breath. Isbel was touched by his eagerness. She guessed he must be close to her own age, surely not more than a year or two older. “Thank you, Houseman,” she said gravely as she accepted the
filhata
, still in its leather cover, from his hands. She took it out and tuned it softly. Drawing a stool up beside Sharn’s bed, she sat with the instrument across her lap. She played the first melody she thought of, the old lullaby that little Sith and his playmates had loved at Conservatory. It was a simple thing, in
Iridu
, the first mode. She dared a mild
cantrip
for sleep as she played. It was presumption, of course, to use her psi in such a way on her senior, but there was so little she could think of to do.

A slight relaxation of Sharn’s face rewarded her, the brow smoothing and the face less pale. The pain receded farther, and Isbel chased it away as gently, as gradually as she could. The words of the old song came easily to her lips.

S
ING THE LIGHT,

S
ING THE WARMTH,

R
ECEIVE AND BECOME THE GIFT,
O
S
INGERS,

T
HE LIGHT AND THE WARMTH ARE IN YOU.

She was surprised by the thought that came from Sharn, an involuntary sending, like a sigh.
Sira
. Isbel caught a fleeting glimpse of memory, an image of a tall lean Singer with a
filhata
in her hands.
So long ago.

Kai waited outside the door of the visiting Cantrix’s apartment. The Housewoman had shooed him out as Cantrix Isbel began to sing, but he stood stubbornly in the corridor, hoping the young Cantrix might have further tasks for him. He listened to her voice through the closed door, a sound as sweet and clear as a rivulet flowing from the Glacier in summer. He thought he could stand and listen to it all the day long if they would let him.

A long time passed before Cantrix Isbel emerged from the room. Kai had been leaning against the wall, waiting with a hunter’s patience. He straightened quickly, and bowed. “Cantrix Isbel. I hope the old Cantrix is better?”

Cantrix Isbel looked worn beyond her years, and at the same time small and vulnerable. She nodded, looking up at him with those clear green eyes. “She is somewhat better,” she whispered wearily. “Thank you, Houseman. And thank you for your help. You have waited a long time.”

“Kai, Cantrix,” he said. “Please call me Kai.”

She smiled a little at that, but she stumbled with fatigue as she started down the corridor. Instinctively, he put his hand under her arm, then drew it back with alarm. “I’m . . . I’m sorry, Cantrix, I just—” His voice trailed off as he looked down at her.

She shook her head. “It is all right, Kai. I am not offended. It is only . . . I am just so tired.”

Kai thought how beautiful she was, with her red-brown hair and her curving cheeks. Her arm felt soft and fragile beneath her tunic. He wanted to hover over her, protect her. Instead, he stepped back and bowed. “Promise you’ll call me if you want anything.”

She looked up at him again. He thought he could drown in the summer green of her eyes. There were tears in them now, tears of fatigue and sadness. She pressed a shaking hand against her mouth, but it was too late to stop a sob, a childish hiccup.

“Cantrix!” Kai exclaimed. “Cantrix Isbel, don’t!” And in the space of a heartbeat he found himself, Kai v’Amric the hunter, with a weeping girl trembling against his broad chest, a Gifted girl at that.

He looked swiftly up and down the corridor to make sure they were not observed. Then he simply put his arms around her and let her cry. Gifted or not, Cantrix or no. She needed this small comfort, and he would not deny her.

It was hours later, after the Cantrix had gained control of herself and departed with a shy apology, after the news had come that Cantrix Sharn was only marginally improved, that Kai truly thought about what had happened. His breach of the respect due to the Cantoris was so serious that he dared not even confide in his brothers. Suppose he had seriously compromised the Cantrix’s Gift by touching her, holding her small body so firmly against him?

But what a delicious feeling it had been, the warmth and tenderness of her skin, the herb-scent that clung to her hair, as if she washed it every day in the
ubanyix
. He wondered if she did, and if she would taste of those herbs if he were to put his lips to her cheek . . . .

Kai fled his crowded family apartment and went to the nursery gardens. He thought if he spent some time alone, he could take himself in hand. This will never do, Houseman, he lectured himself firmly. Rho would say you had better seek a mate, and soon, and put an early end to such thoughts.

But even as he walked between the rows of plants, trailing his fingers against the tender leaves, he saw the young Cantrix’s green eyes and smooth cheeks in his mind’s eye, and he groaned aloud in an agony of doubt and confusion.

Chapter Six

The next day’s
quirunha
took place in a mood of strain and worry. Kai, watching from the back of the Cantoris, saw that both Cantrix Isbel and her senior were subdued. Still, thank the Spirit, the light and warmth flowed out from the dais as surely as always. The Magister also looked distracted, and the assembled House members were gloomy. When the
quirunha
was complete, the ritual prayer was more solemn than usual.

S
MILE ON US,

O
S
PIRIT OF
S
TARS,

S
END US THE SUMMER TO WARM THE WORLD,

U
NTIL THE SUNS WILL SHINE ALWAYS TOGETHER.

During the ceremonial bows Cantrix Isbel’s eyes met Kai’s, then quickly dropped away. Kai flushed with guilt and pleasure, and looked around to see if anyone had noticed. All eyes were on the dais, of course, and his returned there, watching Isbel tuck her
filhata
under her arm and step down neatly onto the floor. Her face was pale, her eyes shadowed. He wished he could stand closer, catch the scent of her hair once again.

It was ridiculous, of course. He set his jaw, and promised himself to banish such thoughts. I’m a hunter, he told himself, as he followed the crowd out of the Cantoris. I’m no soft Gifted boy to be mooning about in a Cantoris.

He strode through the House to the stables. There would be work he could do, active work with
hruss
, maybe mucking out stalls, something to use his muscles. He would feel more like himself if his arms and legs were tired and his mind relieved by the rolling sweat of his body.

The stableman chuckled as he assured him there was never any shortage of work. He put a wooden tub of tallow and a bit of rag into Kai’s hands, and set him to soaping the high-cantled saddles that hung on wooden pegs in a neat row against one wall. Kai began the task with a will, rubbing the fine yellow tallow into the leather with such vigor that it foamed up around his cloth.

He was on his second saddle when he heard a new voice behind him. “That’s good work, Houseman. We have some saddles that could use the same.”

Kai looked over his shoulder to see the three itinerant Singers who had traveled with the Lamdon party. It was the shortest of them, a wiry smiling man, who had spoken.

Kai stood and wiped the sweat from his forehead with his arm. He bowed, not too deeply, because they were after all only itinerants, but politely, in respect for the Gift. “I’m Kai, Singers. Hunter for Amric. I’d be happy to lend you a hand if you need it.”

“Greetings, Kai v’Amric,” the Singers said. “I’m Iban v’Trevi.” He gestured at his companions. “These two quiet ones are from Manrus. I think they were hatched on the ice cliffs. That’s why they don’t talk much.”