The Singers of Nevya (64 page)

“Perhaps Trisa already knows what I am going to say,” Sira suggested. Trisa’s smile was all innocence. Sira watched them both, and a smile of her own began deep inside. “I am going to a House that is far from here, and isolated. It is a House that needs members and is not inclined to be critical in the way that Houses on the Continent might be.”

“Cantrix Sira,” Trisa lisped. “My mother and I would like very much to go with you.”

“Do you already know, then?”

“Yes!” Trisa exclaimed. “We have talked about it. Singer Zakri told me about Observatory, and about your friend who is Cantor there. Singer Zakri wants to go, and I do too.”

Brnwen said softly, “Cantrix, I’m a hard worker. I think maybe they’ll be glad to have me there. I’m good with fur and leather, because my father was a tanner.” She indicated the panels that hung on the walls of the apartment. “I did the tooling on some of these.”

“And what of your mate?”

Brnwen dropped her eyes. “He thinks we should have sent Trisa back. We’ve had terrible arguments, and now . . .” When her eyes came up, they glistened with tears. “I’m going to release him. He wants to mate with someone else.”

Sira took a long breath, and released it slowly. How hard the Gift had been on these people! Trisa patted her mother’s shoulder, and Brnwen put up her hand to touch her daughter’s.

Sira said, “I am glad to have you go with me. Observatory is not an easy House,” she warned. “But we will all be together, and Trisa’s training will go on. That is most important.”

“There is something else, Cantrix Sira,” Trisa said. Her eyes were a clear and shining blue, untroubled by the complex tangles they were all trying to work through.

“What else, Trisa?”

“It is Mreen, the baby.”

Sira drew another deliberate breath, and she wrapped her arms around herself, around the pain she still carried with her, the ache of loss. “Isbel’s Mreen,” she murmured.

“Yes. Mreen has the Gift, too. We have to take her with us.”

Shame flooded Sira. She had given no thought to the child, ever, in all this time. She had indulged her own grief, without concern for any other. She asked quietly, “Who has been caring for the babe?”

Brnwen spoke up, made bold by the subject. “Her father has. Kai. And I have, Cantrix. I couldn’t nurse her, but I could do everything else, and I think we might . . . Well, it’s possible that . . .” She looked away, not finishing her thought, but Sira could guess well enough what it was. Kai and Brnwen were close enough in age, and both would soon be free.

“So, Trisa, have you arranged all of this as well?” Sira asked.

Trisa was smiling, bubbling with enthusiasm over her plans. “Oh, yes, Cantrix. Kai will go as well. And you will teach Mreen when she is old enough, just like you teach me. And I,” she added with pride, “will teach her to listen and send. I will be her classmate!”

Sira stood and went back to the window. She felt the Gift like a hand on her shoulder. Pushing or pulling? she wondered.

“When will we leave?” Brnwen asked.

Sira looked up into the hills, where she thought she could see a faint spot of green, far up where the first melt revealed softwood shoots beginning to sprout. The sky was clear and blue and inviting. “Soon,” she said. “Very soon.”

Cantor Gavn was not a great deal younger than Zakri, but he had no experience at all of life beyond Conservatory’s walls. He would have no way to resist Ovan’s bullying. Zakri, sitting in the back of the Cantoris, observed their first
quirunha
closely, following so near it was a wonder Cantor Ovan did not detect his presence.

Zakri saw Sira sitting at the front of the Cantoris with Magister Edrus. He was sure she saw, as he did, that Gavn’s psi was clear and well-directed, if not yet powerful. There was a freshness in his voice that was lost in the grate of Ovan’s. Giving up his vice had no more improved Ovan’s music than his temper, and his psi was still shaky and unreliable. The
quirunha
took too long. Cantor Gavn’s unformed features drooped with dismay and confusion when he stood with everyone else to chant the ending prayer. Zakri heard him thinking that he had never taken part in such a weak
quirunha
, and he had no idea what might be wrong. Conservatory, despite everything, had not warned him.

S
END US THE SUMMER TO WARM THE WORLD,

U
NTIL THE SUNS WILL SHINE ALWAYS TOGETHER.

Zakri knew then what he must do. The knowledge rolled over him like a warm wind from the south, as sure as the coming summer. He did not like it, but he did not try to resist it.

Seeing that Ovan sent nothing to Cantor Gavn after the closing prayer, Zakri sent,
Nicely done, Cantor Gavn. You will be a credit to the . . . to our House.

Gavn looked out from the dais, searching for the sender. Zakri raised a hand to identify himself. When he caught the boy’s eyes, he winked at him despite the shadow of resignation that darkened his mood. Might as well have a good beginning.

Sira sent some modest compliment then, and Gavn was distracted. Ovan, however, had heard, and he sneered in Zakri’s direction.
There will be no further need for you in this Cantoris
,
Singer,
he sent.
We now have two proper Cantors, full Conservatory-trained Cantors.

Zakri looked at Sira, and saw her staring at Ovan. Her lips were pressed tightly together, and her dark eyes were narrow. Zakri sent to her,
Never mind! I know what must be done here.

She turned her gaze to him. He added,
Could we meet with the Magister, you and I?
He smiled, ruefully, and watched her scarred eyebrow arch as she waited for an explanation.
I will tell you both together
, he sent.

She nodded briefly, and bent her head to speak to Magister Edrus. She and Edrus went out together, other people stepping back to make way for them. Zakri followed, shouldering his way through the crowd. No one stepped aside for him, or even noticed him particularly. Few in the House knew the work he had been doing as he sat in the Cantoris, his eyes closed, supporting Sira in the
quirunha
while Ovan sat on the dais next to her, the full Cantor Ovan, whose Gift was all but useless.

Well, he thought, perhaps all that will change. Or perhaps not. Either way, he saw his duty now, and he was prepared to accept it.

Magister Edrus had already assessed the situation. As he and Sira sat down with Zakri at the long table, he said, “Cantor Gavn won’t be able to handle Cantor Ovan either, will he?”

Zakri laughed. “Are you sure you do not have the Gift, Magister? Seems to me you hear minds fairly well!”

Edrus smiled, but he shook his head. “I only read faces, and yours tells me everything. And now—I suppose you’re here to tell me what to do about it.”

Zakri leaned forward, his hands flat on the table. “Yes, Magister, actually I am.”

Sira regarded Zakri with wonder. He looked harder, suddenly, and older. He had taken charge of this meeting. She did not know whether to be amused or proud. She settled back in her chair and folded her arms, waiting.

“Cantor Ovan is not to be trusted,” Zakri said bluntly. “I will be fair, and admit that he may not intend it, but he is no man to have a young and inexperienced junior. There is no way you could know this, Magister, but Conservatory should have.”

“I wish I had understood it sooner,” Edrus said. “Cantrix Isbel might have had a chance.”

“I think Cantor Gavn will have a better chance,” Zakri said, “if I stay in your House to help him.”

Sira suddenly sat very straight, and looked into Zakri’s eyes. A refusal was on her lips, but he sent to her,
There is no other way. I am ready.

Edrus looked to Sira. “Do you agree? I know Singer Zakri has been studying the
filhata
, but is he ready for the Cantoris?”

Sira looked again at Zakri, measuring the change in him. He was a man, a strong Singer with a purpose of his own. She wanted to touch his hand, his fine brown hair that he kept short, like hers, ready to travel. She wished she could stop this, change this somehow, but she feared Zakri was right. She could see no other way, either. Perhaps it was time for him, his own time. He could not remain a student all his life.

“Magister,” she said slowly, “you know that it is Singer Zakri who has assisted me in your Cantoris for many months. Cantor Ovan sits on the dais, but it is Zakri who warms your House. There is no reason he cannot support Cantor Gavn in the same way.”

Edrus frowned. “How shall I manage this? The Magistral Committee is already watching my House as if we were fomenting treason here! All I want, as you both know, is to keep my House members safe.”

“Never mind,” Zakri said lightly. “I will go on doing what I have been doing. No one needs to know.”

“No,” Sira said firmly. “They should know exactly what you are and what you have done. You have earned your proper title.”

“Cantor Ovan will never stand for it,” Edrus argued.

“I will take care of Cantor Ovan,” Sira answered. She rose from the table.
Zakri. Are you quite sure?

He grinned at her. His lips trembled and his eyes glistened, but nothing lifted from the table or smashed to the floor. The
quiru
light around him was steady. He was in perfect control.

I am ready,
he answered.
It is time.

Chapter Thirty-four

Cantor Ovan faced Sira across the empty Cantoris. His eyes glittered across the room. His anger and fear had built into an emotional maelstrom that swelled and beat against her.

By what right do you threaten me?
he demanded.

Sira stood with her hands braced on her hips.
By right of necessity
, she answered him. Pol had said something similar to her, long ago. By right of need, he had told her. She had been forced to accept it then, and Ovan was going to accept it now.

What is the necessity?
Ovan began to breathe hard, as if he knew what was coming, as if he could keep it away with his fury.

Do you not know how we have sustained your
quirunha
all this time?
Sira sent.
You have been lucky, lucky in Cantrix Isbel, and in me. And now you are lucky to have Zakri.

Ovan’s face grew darker, and a pulse beat in his forehead. Sira felt a flicker of something like sympathy despite her dislike of the man. His Gift had been irretrievably flawed by years of abuse, and it was a terrible loss, the worse because he had brought it on himself.

Are you saying I am no longer capable of warming my House?

Your people might have frozen without me,
she answered bluntly.
And I could not have managed so long without Zakri’s help. Between us we have kept your
quiru
strong. But I am leaving your House now.

Ovan straightened a bit, and Sira saw a flash of hope in his face. She shook her head.
I am convinced that to leave you alone with Cantor Gavn would be a catastrophe. You must be objective in this, Cantor Ovan. The safety of your people is at stake.

That is a lie!

Again Sira shook her head.
It is not, and you know it. I had hoped your Gift would return in strength, but it has not, and I cannot help you.

Ovan’s mouth opened, but no sound emerged.
Why are you doing this to me?
His frustration and resentment were ugly, filling Sira’s mind with darkness, with immense sorrow and helplessness. She pictured Isbel in her last hours, racked with pain, and she stiffened her neck. The brief feeling of pity faded, and the air around her began to shimmer with steady light.

You have done this to yourself,
she sent.
For the good of your House, there will be no more. Singer Zakri will become Cantor Zakri this very morning, on this very dais, and you will be senior to two Cantors. If not, I will tell Magister Edrus exactly what your offense was, and you will be disgraced.

You cannot do this! I will not stand for it!
Ovan raised his fist and stepped forward, as if he would physically strike her.

The choice is no longer yours.
Sira did not move, but faced him squarely.

He took another step, leaning toward her with his body curled, his hands white-knuckled. Around him the
quiru
light was uneven, glimmering in places, shadowed in others. It shifted as he moved. He spoke aloud, a hiss that resounded in the empty room. “You take too much on yourself! You are nobody, nothing. You failed in your own Cantoris, and I will not let you put an upstart itinerant into mine! He has not earned the title of Cantor. I will never call him by it!”

Sira was enveloped now in a brilliant corona that faded the
quiru
to nothingness. She extended it, letting her temper flare, and the light widened until it reached halfway across the Cantoris. Ovan sucked in an audible breath.

Sira regarded her adversary through narrowed eyes, and her chin lifted. “You do not understand, Ovan,” she said in a low tone. “You should have faced this long ago. Now it has been decided for you. Do not test me. I will do exactly as I say.”

Ovan stumbled closer, bruising his leg on a bench, then kicking it out of his way. It banged against the one in front of it, and loud echoes bounced from the high ceiling. He loomed so close now that Sira could smell the sharp odor of his fear, and the light of her anger reflected in his eyes. It seemed he might actually strike her.

The air around her glinted like starlight, a dangerous flame that could burn or freeze. Her psi lashed out at Ovan’s, a whip of energy that snapped just short of doing real injury to his mind. She felt the softness of his Gift, the weakness, like the center of a rotten fruit. It was poorly shielded, and it lacked resilience. Her psi jolted his and withdrew, a clear and terrible warning.

He cringed and threw his hands up to cover his face. “What are you doing? Stop!”

“Consider it a demonstration,” Sira said, her tone dropping ever lower. “I have shown you your weakness. This House and these people are not safe in your care.”

“You have no respect for my title! You could have destroyed my mind, doing that!”