The Singers of Nevya (52 page)

Gram frowned as he held out his brown fingers to add up the new class. “One is coming from Manrus, and one from Perl; two from Isenhope–twins.”

A murmur of delight came from the little group at this good news, but it faded as Gram continued his count. “None from Lamdon, none from Bariken or Tarus. One from Filus, one from Trevi, none from either Arren or Soren. Your own little one, and three from Conservatory.”

“Ten only,” Isbel said. Trisa’s would be one of the smallest classes in many summers.

Cantor Ovan grumbled, “The Committee must do something! How many Gifted children are being withheld, I wonder?”

Gram knew nothing of that. Magister Edrus put in mildly, “We need itinerant Singers, too, Cantor Ovan,” but Ovan’s mouth turned down even further. His dark features looked to Isbel as if they might fold in upon themselves. She thought it remarkable that a mouth so pinched could ever open enough to sing. She carefully pressed her thought low, and twisted her hands in her lap.

At the edges of her mind she felt Kai’s absence from the House, an emptiness which only he could fill. The Cantoris was the greatest part of that emptiness, a void pulling her farther and farther away. It felt like a chasm yawning before her, which she would topple into if he did not hold her back. She would disappear forever into that gaping void, be consumed by it, her last choice gone from her for always.

She startled from her black reverie when Gram asked, “Who will be bringing the child—Trisa, is it?—to Conservatory? Her parents?”

“Yes,” said the Magister. “We’ll arrange for an itinerant to accompany them.” Isbel’s heart contracted at the pain coming to Brnwen, and to herself.

“Is it not interesting,” Ovan said grimly, “that there are always plenty of itinerants, but never enough Cantors?”

All eyes turned to his black ones, but no one had a response. Isbel remembered Sira saying, “If the Gift is punished, it will not appear.” She wondered about that. Three from Conservatory, none from Bariken or Tarus or Lamdon. Poor little Trisa! And poor, sad Brnwen. There was no surcease for the suffering that was coming to them.

It was a hard farewell. Trisa cried, and Isbel could hardly bear her sadness. She wept, too, as Ovan stood frowning, his mouth pressed tight. The parting ceremony was brief, a swift intense pain like the cut of a sharp knife. Isbel thought she would sob aloud from the ache in her throat as the
hruss
carried Trisa away, and she had to retreat inside the doors of Amric.

Ovan turned on her the moment the doors closed.
Discipline yourself! This is something to celebrate, and you have spoiled it with your foolishness!

Isbel turned her brimming eyes to her senior. She sensed the Magister and Cael watching, and she bit her lip hard. The pain at least helped her to control her tears.

We will begin Cantoris hours now,
Ovan sent, stepping past her toward the Cantoris.

Cantor Ovan, it is so early. Could I not have just a moment to–

Ovan swung around, narrowly missing stepping on Cael’s foot.
Now!
His thought was a slash, a whip of psi that made Isbel stumble back and close her eyes.

She put a shaking hand to her forehead. Cael frowned. “Are you all right, Cantrix?”

“She is perfectly well,” Ovan snapped. “Please do not interfere, Housekeeper. It is a senior’s duty to discipline a junior.”

Cael set his jaw, but he backed away from Isbel. One did not argue with a senior Cantor.

Isbel drew a ragged breath. She felt her tears drying on her cheeks as she went across the hall and into the Cantoris. As she passed Ovan, she caught a strange, sweet odor about him—as Trisa had said, “bad sweet”. She wiped her cheeks as she stepped up on the dais, and looked down at the wetness on her fingers. What was the use of it all? There seemed to be nothing in the world but pain and bereavement, loneliness and suffering. No matter how hard she worked, how she strove to please, she found nothing to look forward to.

When she reached inside her tunic for her
filla
, it felt as heavy as stone in her fingers.

*

The season of heavy snow closed over Nevya. During Kai’s hunting trip it seemed the sky was forever white. When he turned his face upward, fat soft flakes or tiny icy ones coated his eyebrows and eyelashes.

Kai and his brothers had been hard put to locate the
caeru
in the deepening drifts. They finally uncovered a den by digging through a fresh snowbank. They found a pack of four, a male and three females. One of the females was heavy with pups, and the hunters let her go scrabbling away over the snow. The others they killed cleanly, their arrows as swift and accurate as they could make them. They cut the throats to protect the meat. The livers and hearts of freshly-killed
caeru
were special treats reserved for hunters. Their Singer cooked them on the spot, and Kai and Rho and Tam ate them seared brown on the outside and red and rich on the inside. They remembered to thank the spirits of the
caeru
for giving them strength. Rho held out a bit to the Singer, grinning, with fresh meat juice dripping down his chin. The Singer laughingly refused.

By the time the kill was gutted and skinned, and the hunters turned for home, they had been away from the House five days. They rode into the courtyard at Amric just as the evening meal was being served, but it was long over by the time the
caeru
carcasses had been hung in the abattoir and the tired
hruss
stabled and fed. When one of the cooks offered them a hot bowl of
keftet
and a platter of nutbread, the men gratefully accepted. They sat at the long table in the kitchens, bragging and laughing. Tam was planning to mate soon with one of the kitchen Housewomen, and he teased her out of one small cup of wine for each of them, while the cook pretended not to notice.

They all went to the
ubanyix
and bathed, growing quieter, feeling their fatigue. When at last they were toweled dry and dressed, even Kai longed for his bed.

She was waiting in the corridor, in the shadows behind the door that stood open to the empty
ubanyix
. Kai was walking with Rho, too tired now even to talk. She whispered his name as they passed. Rho heard, and winked at Kai. “Someone wants you, little brother,” he said with a chuckle. “Didn’t know you’d found a girl!”

Kai could find no words to answer, and his brother laughed as he hurried on after Tam. If he knew who it was waiting behind that door, Kai reflected, he wouldn’t think it funny. He would be shocked as perhaps nothing else on the Continent could shock him.

Awkwardly, Kai waited until the men turned a corner, then stepped into the shadows where she waited. His exhaustion evaporated in a heartbeat as he felt her breath against his neck. Her hair was still damp from the
ubanyix
. He couldn’t resist bending to taste its fragrance, and the smooth skin of her forehead was just beneath his lips.

He couldn’t have stopped himself then if the senior Cantor of Lamdon had been standing at his shoulder. She was so small and soft, so delectably close, there in the rectangle of darkness cast by the open door of the
ubanyix
. He couldn’t bear it.

“Isbel,” he murmured, his voice little more than a groan. “Oh, Isbel, please!” and she was in his arms, her lips pressed to his and the swell of her breasts maddeningly warm and pliant against his chest. He lifted her right off her feet and into his hard embrace.

Not until they reached her room did he see that her eyes were swollen, their green gone dark with weeping. She tried to explain, to tell him that Trisa had been taken away sobbing just that afternoon; that there had been no one to talk to to confide in, to cry with; that she had had to go on with Cantoris hours as if nothing had happened. Kai hardly heard her words over the loud demands of his body. They were too insistent to deny, and soon her own need rose to meet his.

Kai was not Gifted, but he felt nevertheless as if he and Isbel melded into one person, body and mind. She knew his every thought and desire without his speaking, and he knew there would never be a more intense experience than this night. She was the Continent for him, the whole world, every mountain pass and peak. All the stars and both suns she offered to him as if he were the master of the universe.

Not until much, much later did he understand the events that had precipitated her crisis. By then it was too late for reason to save them. They had chosen.

Chapter Twenty-two

Why do I have to play scales?
Zakri demanded of Sira.
Teach me a tune, a real one!

No. To be able to work in the modes, to understand their structure, you must practice them just like this.

It is boring.

That may be. Now do it again. Listen for the intonation so that the lowered thirds in
Iridu
and
Lidya
are clear.

No Conservatory student could pass into the second level before mastering this exercise. When Sira had given it to Theo, he had perfected it by himself before his next lesson. Now, sitting in the tack room of Tarus’s stables, she had to guide Zakri as if he were a stubborn
hruss
.
Iridu
, modulate to
Doryu,
to
Aiodu
, to
Lidya
, and finally to
Mu-Lidya
. Correct the intonation, the lowered second and fifth degrees of
Mu-Lidya
. Release the center to sustain the breath, even out the tempo. Again. And again.

At last she allowed Zakri to put down his
filla
. The
hruss
in the loose box had crowded forward, hanging their broad heads over the half-wall to watch the humans.

Zakri pointed the
filla
at them. “Silly beasts. You’d rather hear a song, wouldn’t you?”

Sira almost chided him for speaking aloud, but decided to let it go this time. He was making progress, despite his complaints. His sending and listening were strong and clear. On the
filla
, the same that had been his mother’s, his tone was true, if not as full as Sira might like. His mother, before her death, must have made a start on his training.

The next step was to acquire a
filhata
. Zakri had quickly learned the C, though unlike Theo, he lacked perfect pitch. They began and ended every lesson, just as at Conservatory, by singing the C to which the middle string of the
filhata
must be tuned. Sira was a little concerned about her own skill with that instrument. She had not touched one since leaving Observatory.

Working through the night and sleeping in the daytime made her feel sluggish and irritable, but there was no choice in the matter. She often lay awake and exhausted on her cot, and when she did sleep, she dreamed of Theo in the Cantoris at Observatory, and of the days she had spent teaching him. He seemed so real in her dreams, so close, she could almost put out her hand to touch his hair or his strong fingers on the strings. At other times, she dreamed of Isbel, and those dreams troubled her, jarring her awake with a jolt of anxiety.

I will teach you a tune now
, she sent to Zakri, as much to banish her worries as to please her student.

But I remember one
, he sent back, grinning at her. He put the
filla
to his lips and launched into a jaunty melody Sira had never heard before.

You must have practiced that! Is it your own?

My mother taught it to me.
Zakri’s brown eyes clouded, and Sira braced herself, but he kept his control.

It is a charming melody
, she told him.
You must teach it to me.

He smiled again, his slender cheeks curving in a way that reminded her of Isbel’s dimples. Sira looked at him with fondness. He had grown taller, and he stood straighter now. Nothing had broken or fallen around him in weeks, nor had he shed the helpless tears that had so plagued him. In truth, he was better in every way.
Perhaps it is time to cut your hair
, she sent.

He laughed aloud and put a hand to the silky tail of hair that hung down his back.
Are we leaving, then?

Possibly.
Sira smiled at his enthusiasm.
First Iban must approve.

But he is away from the House.
Zakri’s disappointment clouded the air in the tack room. Sira lifted one long, admonishing forefinger, and he quickly brightened it again, without ever touching his
filla
. For the thousandth time, the strength of his Gift astonished her.

Yes
, she answered.
A traveling party was headed to Trevi, and he took it for the chance to see his parents and his sisters. But I expect him back soon.

Let us go to meet him!
Zakri jumped up to do a dancing turn in the cramped tack room, his ebullience returning with this new idea.

We can wait
, Sira sent mildly, though she liked his flashes of gaiety. He seemed young again at such times. She could almost have danced with him, but she must beware of relaxing her guard. His Gift could still startle, even injure.
Let us cut your hair, though, and perhaps you should speak to the stableman.

Zakri swept her a bow.
So I will, Maestra!

Do not call me that!
Zakri’s dance ended abruptly.
Where did you learn it?

I have heard you use it, I think. It is a teacher, is it not? Have I made a mistake?
His eyes began to darken once more, and Sira shook her head and held up her hand.

It is not important. It means master teacher, and I am not that.

To me you are.
He stood before her, slim and soft-faced in his youth, but no less stubborn than she herself.

She stood and faced him, her hands on her hips, a wry smile on her lips.
I thank you for the honor, but I have not earned that title. Nor will I ever earn it now, I suppose. Please do not use it again.
She reached to a shelf for a sharp knife used for splitting leather, and for a stone to hone it on.
Now sit here. I will cut your hair for you.

Zakri sat down on the bench. As she untied the string that held his fine long hair, and lifted the strands in her fingers, he sent,
Please do not make me look like Iban. His hair looks like an
urbear
chewed it off!