The Singers of Nevya (38 page)

There was a moment of laughter, and casual bows exchanged. Iban turned back to Kai. “We’ve been looking for something to do.” His expression changed swiftly as he spoke, his brows drawing together and his mouth turning down. “We thought we’d be on the road by now. But Cantrix Sharn is too ill to travel.”

Kai nodded. “So she is. Cantrix—that is, our Cantors are very concerned.”

Iban’s eyebrows made hopeful arches. “Can your Cantors help her? Maybe she’s better this morning.”

Kai shook his head. “I don’t know, Singer. Our Cantrix Isbel—” Kai could not help feeling a special pleasure in saying her name. He turned his eyes down to the half-soaped saddle at his feet, afraid these Gifted ones might sense his secret. “Cantrix Isbel sang for her yesterday, but only to help her sleep, I think.”

The other itinerants had found their tack and were spreading bits about on the floor, examining them for loose buckles or fraying stitches. Iban looked at them, then back at Kai. “Houseman, do you suppose . . .” He lowered his voice. “Could you speak to someone for me, someone in your House?”

Kai shrugged. “Probably no one you couldn’t speak to yourself. But I’ll do what I can.”

“Perhaps you know your Housekeeper well, or . . . one of your Cantors?” Iban looked at Kai intently, and Kai felt a moment of anxiety that the Singer had in fact read his thoughts, though no itinerants he knew did that. The ones who traveled with the hunters spoke and listened like anybody else. Only the Conservatory-trained Singers were supposed to be able to hear the thoughts of others. It would be the worst of luck if this Singer Iban proved to be the exception!

Cautiously now, he answered, “It might be possible.”

The Singer gestured toward the door, and Kai nodded. He wiped the yellow tallow from his fingers, indicating with a nod to the stableman that he would return to finish his job later. Together he and Iban walked out of the stables and down the long corridor toward the center of the House.

Beyond the glow of the
quiru
the day was bright and cold, with a fresh wind from the Glacier that carried away the stench of the waste drop. The warmth of the newly-refreshed
quiru
intensified the fragrance of the gardens. As they passed the door to thte tannery Iban sniffed. “I like the way your House smells.”

“Not everyone likes the smell of leather curing.”

Iban had to tip his head up to look at Kai. His gray eyes sparkled. “I do, though. It’s a good, practical smell. I like the abundance of meat on your tables, too.” He was smiling again, the lines of his face lifting as if he had not a care in the world. This Singer’s moods were as changeable as cloud shapes in a summer sky. Every time you looked at the man, his face told some new story. What a one he would be to travel with!

Kai acknowledged the compliment with a bow. A clever fellow, he thought, quick with his words. He wondered what he wanted.

“Houseman,” the Singer began, his smile fading once again and his brows lowering into striaght lines of worry. “The thing is—without boasting—I have had some success as a healer.”

“Yes?” Kay said, interested. “My brother Rho was healed by an itinerant once, of a nasty wound, too. We killed a
tkir
together, and the beast left Rho a great scar to remember him by.”

Iban nodded, his face smoothing until there was no expression on it. “Sometimes,” he murmured, “itinerants are better healers than Cantors.”

Kai gave him a searching look. “You think you can help the old Cantrix?”

“It’s possible. Do you know what’s wrong with her?”

“Only what everyone is saying. She has pain in her chest, she’s weak. Seems to me she’s just old. Her skin is so white and thin, it’s like looking through ice on a puddle. She must have at least twelve summers, wouldn’t you think?”

Iban was silent for a moment as they walked on. He rubbed his chin, then tousled his ragged hair. “Your young Cantrix seems fond of Cantrix Sharn. I’d like to meet with her.”

Kai was quiet in his turn. He didn’t know how it was between the Conservatory-trained and those Singers who had not made their great sacrifice. For itinerant Singers, life and work were clearly very different than for those like Isbel whose entire lives were spent serving the great Houses. Had it been he, Kai, who had given up every freedom for such service, he would have resented the itinerants who plied the Mariks. They were independent, paid in real bits of metal for their work, making their own decisions . . . taking mates, having families. But then, Cantrix Isbel seemed so gentle, so quick with her dimpled smile, so kind. Perhaps she was not capable of a feeling like resentment or envy. In any case, she probably would not be angry with him for bringing the Singer Iban to her. And, he admitted to himself, it gave him a chance to speak to her.

At last he nodded. “I will take you to Cantrix Isbel. But be very careful with her,” he warned. “She’s tired and she’s worried.”

Iban answered with gravity. “I promise I will be respectful to your Cantrix.”

Kai eyed him, wondering if he was being teased, but the Singer appeared perfectly sincere. Kai left him to wait in the great room while he went in search of Yula to carry a message to her mistress. Iban reclined in one of the window seats until Kai returned with Yula behind him, dragging her feet.

Yula bowed to the Singer, much deeper, Kai saw, than he himself had, deeper than was usual. She seemed to be nervous, picking at her tunic and twisting her hands. “Come this way, please, Singer,” she whispered.

Iban rose from the window seat to follow her. She said nothing to Kai, and he had no choice but to watch their backs as the two of them walked away. The Singer was already at the door of the great room when he turned back. “Aren’t you coming, Houseman?”

Kai jumped to his feet in joyous relief. “Oh, so I am, Singer.” He was sure this time Iban hid a smile. Ah, well, he thought, it was worth a little embarrassment to see Cantrix Isbel again!

When Yula stood nervously outside her door, muttering that the hunter Kai begged her to meet with the Singer Iban, Isbel could not stanch the little burst of happiness that warmed her breast. These last days the House had seemed as bleak and dark as if the solitary sun hardly rose at all. Isbel had not found the strength to chide herself for her moments of weakness in the hunter’s presence, although such physical contact went against all her training. In her whole life no one had ever held her in such a way, and she had been over and over the experience, wondering what it meant. To her great relief, the
quirunha
had been unaffected by the broken tabu. She kept the memory of it pressed very low so her senior could detect no trace of her offense. In truth, he seemed never to sense any of her feelings. She supposed he did not care.

Kai and the Singer were waiting in the Cantoris to meet with her, as was proper. The Singer Iban was as small and wiry as the hunter was tall and broad-chested. His gray eyes shone pleasantly from his thin brown face. “Thank you for seeing me, Cantrix Isbel,” he said with a bow. His tone lacked the resonance of a Cantor’s, but it was clear and well-focused. Isbel could imagine his voice carrying across snowbound valleys, calling up camp
quiru
for travelers.

“Is there something I can do for you, Singer?” she asked carefully. Her every nerve felt Kai’s presence. He was so near that two strides of his long legs would bring him to her side. Her eyes burned with the effort of concentration, and every private thought was as securely shielded as she could make it.

“I hope so,” the Singer said to her. “I would like to see Cantrix Sharn.”

“Oh,” Isbel said. She shook her head. “I am sorry, Singer, but she is too ill for visitors.”

Iban’s brows drew sharply together. She noticed how changeable his face was, his features moving and settling in a different expression each moment. “I know how ill she is, Cantrix,” he said slowly. “You see, I have some skill as a healer, and I have eased my own mother when she suffered a similar ailment of the chest. I thought perhaps—”

Isbel lifted her head in quick hope. “Are you a good healer? Really? I am not strong at it, myself, and my senior—” she stopped herself. It would not do to admit to this stranger her doubts about Cantor Ovan’s ability. Her cheeks flamed, and she dropped her eyes. “I am sorry. It is just that I would . . . I will do anything I can to help the Cantrix. She was so kind to Sira,” she finished, in an almost inaudible whisper.

Kai heard the whisper, and wondered who Sira was. The scene before him was a strange one, the little Singer hardly taller than Cantrix Isbel herself, and making his odd claim. Cantors and Cantrixes, after all, were the ones with the real power, power over the light and the warmth, the mind and the body, even the water of the
ubanyor
. But Cantrix Isbel appeared to take the Signer Iban’s proposal quite seriously.

“Yula!” she called.

Timid Yula put her head around the door. “Yes, Cantrix?”

“Please get Cantrix Sharn’s Housewoman for me. Quickly!”

Yula vanished in an instant, and Isbel turned back to Iban. “I will stay with you,” she said. “I must follow you, to be sure that—” She broke off, embarrassed at the implied suspicion.

The Singer forestalled her with a graceful inclination of his head. “Of course,” he said. “You must be sure that I will not worsen matters for Cantrix Sharn.” His gray eyes were clear and candid as he added, “I swear by the Six Stars I will use any skill I have only to help. If I can. And I will be glad to have you with me.”

“Thank you, Singer,” Isbel said simply.

It was not an easy thing to convince Sharn’s Housewoman to allow an itinerant into the Cantrix’s presence when she was so ill, but Isbel persisted. Once admitted, she and the Singer Iban sat close to the Cantrix’s bed, and Isbel held Sharn’s pale cold hand in her own. She was relieved to see that Iban was careful not to touch the Cantrix. Enough tabus were being broken already in these strange days.

The Singer drew out his
filla
, and Isbel looked at him in surprise. “Do you not use a
filhata
?” she whispered.

He shook his head. “Don’t have one.” His eyes remained open as he put the
filla
to his lips. The
Aiodu
melody he played was straightforward, slow and simple, without adornment.

It was strange for Isbel to follow a Singer whose training was so different from her own. This Singer who slipped so deftly into Sharn’s mind was completely unshielded, and as Isbel followed him she felt once again the persistent pain that racked the old Cantrix. Her own chest ached, and she had to press her lips together to keep from groaning.

Singer Iban’s psi went directly to the pain, quickly and fearlessly entering the very source, the center of it. Isbel had to follow quickly, or be left behind. There was no time to consider. She felt as if she were being pulled by
hruss
into an abyss, a dark chasm of suffering. It was terrifying, and she fought against the fear that she would be trapped, would never be able to climb out of that great blackness. She pressed down her doubts and gripped Sharn’s hand, determined not to disturb the Singer’s work.

It was abundantly clear form the start that Iban knew what he was doing. His psi, floating on the current of the simple second-mode melody, went to work immediately. Isbel was there with him, watching in amazement. At the very bottom of the abyss that so frightened her, in the exact center of the pain, there was a tiny passage, locked as though filled with ice, or with stone. With remarkable patience and persistence, Iban’s psi nudged and tugged at the blockage, trying to clear it. Breathing deeply, Isbel stepped through her fear and began to help, following his example with great care. As she worked, she discovered to her surprise that both her pain and her fear abated, that the activity and the sense of purpose were greater than the sense of suffering. Bit by bit, together, she and the Singer cleared the tiny channel, and when it was open, the heart’s blood flowed freely through it once again.

When it was over, Isbel looked wide-eyed at Iban, whispering in wonder, “You have healed her.”

He shook his head. “No,” he said softly. “There is too much damage, too many such constricted passages.” He looked down at Cantrix Sharn, whose ice-pale cheeks bloomed now with a faint color. “But she will be well enough to return to Lamdon, at least.”

“And she is free of pain,” Isbel said. She released Sharn’s hand at last, and flexed her fingers in her lap. “Thank you, Singer. From both of us, thank you.”

Iban smiled, and his eyebrows lifted into high straight lines. “Thank you for your help.”

“It was an honor,” Isbel replied with complete sincerity. She looked up at Kai, who was waiting protectively near the door, and she smiled brilliantly at him. “She is so much better,” she told him. “Please tell the Magister.”

Kai bowed and hurried away. Isbel turned back to Iban. “How did you learn to do this?”

“All my training came from my father, who was an itinerant all his life.”

“Why did you not go to Conservatory?”

Iban’s face seemed to close, and he looked away from her. Isbel was certain she had offended him, and was immediately sorry. One of the frustrations of speaking aloud was that her true intent was not always understood.

“My family have bred Singers for a hundred summers,” Iban said brusquely. “We have no need of Conservatory.” He bowed and took his leave. He did not look back from the door.

Isbel gazed down at Cantrix Sharn, lying now in comfortable sleep, and she wondered. Remarkable things had been happeneing, and she had no way of understanding them. She wished her training had taught her more of the ways of the world, of the surprises that lay in store after the protracted years at Conservatory. She felt utterly unprepared for the curious twists and turns of her road.

She tucked the furs more tightly around the old Cantrix, then rose and went to the window to look out on the white landscape. Two more years until the summer, and then she could step out of doors, walk freely under the ironwood trees. By then, perhaps she would be resigned to this strange life, to the loneliness, to Ovan’s moodiness. And in the summer, she promised herself, I will make them search for Sira. I will beg Cantrix Sharn, as soon as she is better. At the very least, they can do that for me.