The Unfinished Song - Book 6: Blood (4 page)

“I’m…I’m Aelfae,” Dindi gasped. She could still taste Kia’s visceral hate for humans, stewed in the need to prove she was better than mere mortals. This didn’t seem the ideal time for Dindi to try to explain her mixed heritage. It wasn’t easy for her to speak with Kia’s fingers closed around her throat, so her words came out like a croak.

“I’m…Mayara’s daughter…from Swan Lake in the Corn Hills.”

“A colony of Aelfae
did
once dwell there,” Mrigana said mildly.

Kia dropped the girl to the ground. “If you’re Aelfae, prove it. Show me your wings.”

“I’m not…very good at it.”

“Show me your wings or I’ll kill you.”

Dindi shut her eyes. After a moment, two small, pathetically tiny butterfly wings popped out of her back. She could never have flown on them, but wings they were.

“Very well,” Kia said grudgingly. “You’re Aelfae, I suppose. But those are the most pathetic excuse for wings I’ve ever seen. Why haven’t your parents taught you to fly?”

Umbral stepped out of the shadow of a stalagmite. Dindi had been so overpowered by the Aelfae she had almost forgotten him. She wondered if he had also been flooded by visions of the Aelfae. If so, he showed no sign of discomfort. Despite the fact that the Aelfae had no more bitter enemies than the Deathsworn, he exuded confidence.

“The few Aelfae who remain in Faearth live in hiding,” Umbral said. “She is our kin and ally. Treat her as such.”

Umbral had not spoken until now. The effect of his words on the Aelfae was startling. They all nodded as if his word were final. No one questioned his command.

Dindi was astounded until one of the Aelfae males
,the man called Hest, asked respectfully, “Xerpen, where is Vessia?”

“And why are you dressed like a human?” asked Lothlo.

“I like the white-on-white,” said Gwidan. “Very chic.”

Once again, the powerful minds of the Aelfae bled into Dindi’s own aura. Though it wasn’t as overpowering as before, for a moment,
her own view of Umbral shifted to what
they
saw:

A handsome platinum blond man with ice blue eyes and pale skin, dressed all in white—white leather legwals, white vest, white fur cape—whose masculinity was painfully, almost cruelly, perfect
. She blinked and once again saw Umbral as she had before, with Kavio’s features (which compared to the other, she now saw were rough, imperfect), dressed in Deathsworn black.

The Obsidian Mask deceived even the Rainbow Fae. When the Aelfae looked at Umbral, they saw black as white. They saw Umbral as Xerpen.

Finnadro would never get used to riding a giant bird through the sky. It wasn’t all that useful either, as far as he was concerned. All he could see from this height were evergreens scattered over the mountain, like stubble on a pale chin. Where the trees were close together, he could see nothing of the ground beneath them, even if his eyesight had been keen enough to spot tracks in the snow from so high.
I would rather run under the tree cover than fly over it
.

Amdra sat in front of him. She wanted to return to her tribehold at once, to report on their fight with the Deathsworn to her War Chief. Finnadro wanted to look for survivors. Many of his people—wildlings, but still his people—had died trying to take down the Deathsworn, including, possibly, his childhood friend Fox. How much did Amdra care if the Deathsworn had swatted
Fox aside like a rock rat, casually bashing her skull against the canyon wall? Not at all. But Finnadro needed to look for Fox, in case she was injured; or honor her remains, in case of the worst.

So what would sway Amdra?

“We must have proof that the Deathsworn is dead,” he said.

“He drowned in the ice river.”

“I’m not sure that would kill him.”

She did not answer, but the giant hawk circled around and swept through the canyon one more time.

Finnadro scanned the landscape. Everything looked so strange from above. Orange striped humps of rock, crisped with snow, rippled out in either direction from the gash in the land cut by the river. The river too was edged in ice. Ice trolls had broken it up, releasing the torrent that had submerged both the Deathsworn and his victim, the girl he’d taken captive. There was no sign of either of them.

Finnadro saw a smear of blood against the canyon wall.

“Land there!” he shouted.

Again, Amdra said nothing but must have given a silent command to her winged slave, for the hawk alighted in the canyon on the frozen riverbank.

Finnadro jumped down, secretly relieved to be on solid ground. Amdra stayed on her mount while he examined the tracks and blood. The snow and mud had been turned to slush by the battle here. Finnadro touched the dark smear on the rock.

“Is that
his
blood?” Amdra called from the bird.

No. It was Fox’s blood. Her body, however, had been removed. From the traces in the snow, he surmised she’d first been dragged away, then lifted, carried. He could not tell if she’d survived, or if one of the other wildlings had simply wanted to honor her in death—the same instinct he’d had.

He looked up at Amdra. “Give me tonight. I will scour both sides of the river and make sure that he did not survive.”

“You’ve been going since dawn. Don’t you need sleep?”

“No.”

Fox would have chided him; Finnadro had already driven himself to collapse once by going too long without food and sleep. But Fox was not here, and deeds needed doing. He added dryly, “There will be time to sleep when I’m dead.”

“Be careful,” Amdra said. “Or that could be sooner than we’d all want. Hawk and I will return for you before moonset. Don’t think you get out of meeting the Great One. He’s requested your presence at the Paxota, and it begins at dawn tomorrow.”

That would not give Finnadro as long as he would have liked, only a sliver of the night, but he shrugged, accepting it. He had never wanted this alliance with Orange Canyon, his enemy, in the first place. But the Green Lady had requested it, and he was hers, song and soul.

However, the moon crossed the sky more quickly than seemed possible, and his search turned up no tracks, no signs along the river, nothing. Perhaps the Henchman of Lady Death had indeed drowned. He cursed and bit the inside of his mouth, tasting blood and disappointment. He had been looking forward to inflicting a more personal justice, but it was not just revenge he wanted. He wanted
answers
. He wanted to look the monster in the eye and ask,
Why?

A cloud of green sparkles shimmered in the air. The Green Lady solidified in front of him.

Finnadro took her hands and kissed them. “My Lady, I am still searching for the Deathsworn…”

“The Day is almost here.” She smiled brilliantly at him. “Our brothers and sisters will return to dance with us very soon.”

“My Lady?” he asked, confused.

“You must watch my sister, the White Lady. Keep her safe over the next three days, Finnadro.”

“Of course, but the Deathsworn…”

“He doesn’t matter any more. There is nothing Lady Death can do now to stop the Day.” Wistfulness tainted her smile. “It seems my sister’s plan was best after all. And now I must play my part.”

Finnadro felt a foreboding.

“What part is that, my Lady?”

She only smiled at him, shining with a thousand shades of spring, flowers budding in her tousled hair, as exquisite and mysterious and maddening as ever.

“I will join you in Cliffedge, if I am permitted, Finnadro.”

“Who could forbid you, my Lady? Tell me who would dare, and I will slay him.”

“Ah, my sweet champion. Cliffedge is not one of the Seven Sacred Places. It is the demesne of my sister, the Orange Lady. Our war is older than your race. Yet I believe even she must put aside our feud for this greater good. I will forgive her hurts against me, and gladly, to hasten the Day. I am sure she will do likewise.”

She kept repeating the phrase ‘the Day’ with particular emphasis. At first he thought she meant the approaching dawn, but he now suspected she had in mind something more profound.

“What happens on ‘the Day,’ my Lady?”

“Finnadro, on the Day, the Wound in the World will be cured.”

Wind whistled around Vessia as she emerged from the house of the Great Loom behind Xerpen. It was night, though a smudge of light on the mountains to the east insinuated dawn. She paused to examine her surroundings. Xerpen said she had been here, physically, for some time; but as far as she could
remember
she had not been to Cliffedge since the days it had been occupied by Aelfae. After humans had taken over the spot and built a tribehold here, they had excluded all High Fae except the Orange Vyfae and their lesser avian ilk. The Vyfae were not the friendly sort. Their main interest in other fae was as prey.

The house of the Great Loom was the only building that still stood from the days long ago when Vessia had visited the Aelfae here. The humans had added many new structures, stone houses made from thin wedges of slate, topped with thatch. A few houses were on the mountaintop where she and Xerpen stood, but most of the buildings were on the other summit. The Bridge of One Thread still connected the West and East peaks, as it had for untold ages.

On the far side of the mountain, a ribbon of humans curled up a trail, single file, to the settlement. There appeared to be hundreds, even thousands of them. They were wrapped in wool, fleece, and feathery finery, as if for a festival.

“By the Lost Wheel,” she muttered, “They breed like rabbits. How many are there?”

He laughed. “That’s not even all the humans in this tribe, Vessia. As many clans of the Orange Canyon tribe as can make the pilgrimage come to the tribehold for the Paxota. Many others simply offer their sacrifices in their own places and the Raptors collect them. There will be nigh on three thousand of them gathered here over the next three days. Most of them will pitch their tents on that slope over there” – he pointed to the far western side, where the incline was gentlest, which is to say, steep but not entirely perpendicular like the rest of the sheer drop around the summit – “as only the Tavaedies are allowed to dwell inside the tribehold itself. During the dances, everyone will gather in the Plaza of the Eagle…that yard there…” —he pointed now to a rectangular space surrounded by stone walls on two sides and stone lodges on the other edges— “to watch the
tama
.”

“There are no humans allowed on this side,” added Xerpen. “Except as sacrifices.”

“Good, I’d rather not deal with humans.”

“We must, I fear.” He took her hand. “Don’t worry, Vessia. They can’t hurt you as long as you are with me.”

Vessia raised her brows. “Don’t presume I fear them. They disgust me—that’s all.”

“Of course, but we must mingle with them, for the time being.” He chuckled, that low, sexy laugh she remembered well from their centuries together. “I’m their War Chief, you see, and it comes with the role.”

“
You
, the War Chief of a human tribe? It’s insane.”

“I’ve become rather used to it.”

Still holding her hand, as if he feared she might fly away, he drew her to the edge of the cliff, to the Bridge of One Thread. He described the Paxota, a three-day human festival, which he planned to use for his own purposes; and explained the eclipse and the dance he would need her to perform while he worked his own spell through the Loom.

“Timing is everything,” he said. “It must be perfect, or things will go…badly.”

“I can’t do that dance alone,” she protested.

“Others will be here soon. You’ll have seven.”

There were other questions she would have asked, but at that moment she looked down into the arroyo between the two peaks and saw utter black.

The churning cloud of darkness filled her with a feeling she seldom experienced: terror.

“Xerpen, what
is
it?”

“The Black Well,” he said quietly.

“But what
is
it?”

“Death.”

She squeezed his hand. “Here?”

“Not all of it, but a wisp of it, yes. I’ve summoned it here, to this place, so I can banish it. But it’s
powerful, Vessia, and you can see… it’s growing. I…” He scowled. “I do not have complete control over it yet. But the Paxota will consolidate my power. As I said, timing is everything.”

They crossed the Bridge of One Thread, which she saw as a slender shimmering rainbow, though it was no larger than a single strand of a spider’s web, to the side where the growing crowd of humans awaited them.

“We are in the caverns beneath Cliffedge,” said Umbral, “which is now the Orange Canyon tribehold. The humans there are my allies. I will take you there.”

“Human allies!” Kia looked outraged; then she burst into laughter. “Very funny, Xerpen!”

Yastara shrugged. “Is it so strange? The Imorvae have Aelfae ancestors. They are not as unfriendly to us as the others.”