I find my way to the gardens by luck alone.
Every now and then I stop, hold my pendant, and seek inside for the pulse, the pull which I’ve felt before. There’s nothing. My perceptions are blocked. And my heart aches with each feeble attempt to beat against the encasing stone.
Cursing bitterly, I drop my pendant, let it bounce against my breastbone as I hurry on through the twisting passages. There doesn’t seem to be another living soul anywhere near. The denizens of the palace must have retired at dimness. That, or I’ve somehow been plucked from my former existence and dropped into an empty world, abandoned to my solitude. Either way, I wander lonely as a ghost through these cavernous halls.
I take turns at random. Perhaps some inner instinct guides me for after nearly an hour I descend a short stair, step under a tall stone arch and, to my surprise, find myself gazing out upon the palace gardens. Even in dimness, it’s a startling sight. The gemstones are alive with their own, inner glow, not as bright as lorst, but enough to offer a gentle aura. Blues and violets, a few patches of gold and scarlet. Strange lichens climb the larger boulders, creating luminous abstract patterns that dazzle the eye. Mushrooms nearly half my height bob gently, though there is no breeze. Their gills ripple, and their speckled caps reflect the low light around them. Here and there, tiny flying creatures—olk, Vor called them—flit across my vision, trailing glittering dust in their wake. The air hums with their soft music of their wings.
It’s wondrous. More beautiful than I remembered. For a moment, I can only stand there, awestruck. Then my heart gives another painful throb. The pressure in my chest is mounting. If I cannot find relief soon, it will burst, shatter my heart, and leave me an empty husk on the ground.
I lift my gaze to the higher regions of the garden, to that outcropping I spied the last time I was here. There stand the tall blue crystals, big as trees, pale and lustrous. My breath quickens with sudden hope. Setting my teeth, I plunge into the garden, take the first path I come to, and stagger on as fast as I can. The ground is rough. Tiny gravel stones tear into my bare feet. I hardly notice. It’s like it’s happening to someone else, someone wholly disconnected from me. I have my goal in sight and can think of nothing else but to reach it as swiftly as possible.
The path branches. I growl in frustration but choose the way that seems most likely to lead up to the outcropping. It winds off into a grotto, however, and I’m obliged to retrace my steps. I search out another path, slowly making my way deeper and deeper, higher and higher.
The creatures of the garden are alert to my presence. The little olk flutter closer, tiny beaks snapping, six feathery wings fluttering. One flies past my face, trailing dust that makes me sneeze. The little catlike beasts appear as well, eyeless faces lining the openings of their cave dens, ears pricked, noses snuffling.
I come to another split in the path. Both branches seem to lead back toward the palace. I curse softly. My goal lies beyond, up a steep incline, with no visible trail leading up to it. There’s nothing but rough stone and sharp gems between that tall circle of crystals and me. I drag a long breath into my lungs.
Then I leap forward, clamber up and over an onyx boulder. My foot slips as I’m descending the other side. I fall hard to the uneven ground below, and pain shoots through my wrists and one knee. Hissing, I pick myself up. My knee is a mess of lacerations, and my palms have faired little better.
Prrrrlt?
I start, turn my head sharply. One of the little cat-creatures is perched on the stone behind me. Its eyeless face is level with mine, tilting first this way then that. It burbles softly. By the glow of the nearest crystals, the orange streaks in its colorful coat gleam like ribbons of fire.
I blink. The creature twitches its ears. For a moment, all my urgency filters away. There’s just me and this animal. Studying one another. Slowly, I stretch out a hand. The creature responds, elongating its neck so that its dainty nose can just sniff my fingertips. As though deciding it approves, it rubs its cheek against my finger and allows me to stroke the top of its head. Its fur is almost shockingly soft and silky. Amazed, I tickle under its chin. A loud thrum of a purr erupts from its throat. The vibration ripples up my arm, strikes my chest, bouncing off the stone around my heart. It’s unexpectedly soothing. For one lovely moment, I can breathe.
Then, for no discernable reason, the creature chitters abruptly and scampers away into the rocks. I watch its long, bushy tail flick out of sight. The stone in my chest feels heavier than ever, so heavy, I wonder if I’ll even be able to get to my feet.
Somehow, I manage to gather my limbs beneath me, push upright, and continue my climb. I’m close now. So close. Close enough that I can start to feel the hum of the tall stones even without the aid of my gods-gift. Soon I’ll be among them. Soon I’ll be able to take that hum into my body, into my soul. My pace quickens as I climb. I stumble often and am obliged to use my hands to pull myself up the steeper portions of the rise. Dirty, exhausted, I stagger on. My feet leave drops of blood behind me with each step, but I don’t stop, can’t stop. Not until I pull myself to the top of the outcropping and stand at the base of the stones.
They are . . . enormous. Much bigger than I’d realized when looking at them from afar, at least four times a trolde man’s height. It would take three of me standing in a circle, fingertip-to-fingertip, to span the girth of the smallest of them. Seven main stones stand in a near-perfect ring, with other, smaller, but still impressively sized crystals in between. They’re uncut, unpolished, and perfect. Their blue is as clear as a summer sky with hearts of dusky purple and deep indigo. But more impressive than the look of the stones is their voices. Their low pulsing tones, so profound they pierce through the stone in my chest to stir my heart. My own little crystal vibrates in response, buzzing like an insect.
They can help me. I know they can.
I step in among the stones. In the very center, there’s a smooth place, obviously polished by hand, approximately six feet in diameter and flat as a table. After traversing that rough terrain, the relief of stepping on such a smooth surface is tremendous. I stand in that center, close my eyes, extend my arms. The vibrations around me intensify, fill my senses, work down into my bones. It hurts. Like plunging burning hands into ice cold water. A blissful pain.
It’s not enough, though. The stone in my chest vibrates, but it does not crack, does not break. My heart remains trapped.
I fall to my knees. Right there, in the center, with the great crystals towering above me. I press my palms into the flat surface. The vibrations flow through me. A song, an anthem. A hymn of life and death and all the complexities in between, dancing through my veins, through my soul. I close my eyes, feel how it ripples out from me, out across the garden, across the city, across the whole of this vast cavern. The resonance connects each and every living creature, every stone, every gem. On and on, the heartbeat of song, reverberating from one being to the next, forever.
“Please.” My lips form the soundless plea. “Please, help me.”
I bow, press my forehead to the stone. The pulse increases, quaking my skull. Still, it’s not enough. The stone around my heart is too hard, too strong. I’ve got to get closer, I’ve got to . . .
Not stopping to question what I do, I strip off my linen shift, toss it carelessly to one side. Naked, I press my body flat into the ground and let the resonance enter me. Overcome me. It pounds against my imprisoned heart. The stone cracks. I gasp, shudder, but only press myself harder, harder. Now I feel it, the hard outer crust chipping away, one flake after another. Inside, my trapped heart roils, churns.
Then suddenly—it erupts.
All that feeling. All that pain. And not just my own. Everything that had been contained. This is the pain of those trolde men and women in the chapel: their fear, their terror, their desperation. Their despair. I understand now what I saw in that dark chapel. How the blood-fed crystals drew the worshippers’ emotions from their bodies. Trapped them, held them. Left them cold and hard. But that feeling must go somewhere, and those crystals were not strong enough to contain it all. So it had sought a new place of shelter and found it . . . in me.
Now it rolls out of me. Pulse after pulse, as the stone around my heart disintegrates. I’d not realized how that stone protected me, shielded me from these emotions that don’t belong to me. If I’d known, perhaps I wouldn’t have been so desperate to free myself. Perhaps I would have embraced the stone, given thanks for its weight.
Too late now. I can do nothing but lie here. Exposed. Shuddering. As the music of the crystals flows through me. It will kill me. I’m sure of it. My physical form is simply not strong enough for this.
Faraine!
Some part of my consciousness, deep down under the pain, pricks with awareness. I know that voice. I know it but cannot place it. Is it . . .?
Faraine! Faraine!
Echoing. Faraway.
Across the worlds.
And then . . .
Right here, close to my ear: “Faraine!”
Vor! He’s here, beside me. I would recognize the shape of his soul anywhere, in any plain of existence. His hands are on me. That touch is enough to jar my awareness back to my body, and I’m relieved to find that, though every bone in my skeleton aches, the pain is not what it was. It has moved out from me, poured into the tall crystals, and my heart beats freely in my breast once more.
“Faraine, can you hear me? Speak to me!”
I pinch my brows tight. I want to open my eyes but can’t seem to remember how. Neither can I utter a word. When I try, nothing but a pathetic moan emerges from my lips.
“You’re alive!” Vor’s voice breathes against my ear, his lips pressed close to my temple. He’s caught me up in his arms, holds me tight against him, rocking me slowly back and forth. “Praise be to all the gods, above and below!” he rasps.
He keeps talking, murmuring in troldish. Prayers, I think, by the rhythmic cadence. I don’t try to decipher the words, for suddenly I realize that I’m leaning against his naked torso. My right hand is pressed flush against a hard, muscular chest. Frowning, I manage to pull my head back, pry my eyes open, and take a look. First at him. Shirtless. Magnificent. Then down at my own body. Loosely wrapped in a trolde man’s shirt.
Oh, gods.
“Vor,” I gasp. My whole body flushes with embarrassment. “Vor, I—”
A bolt of lightning seems to shoot through him. He pulls back, stares down at me, his pale eyes shining in the light of the crystals. “Faraine? Yes, what is it? I’m here. Tell me what you need.”
“I . . . I . . .” I swallow. My throat is dry, and my voice seems very loud, ringing inside my skull. “Where is my gown?”
His eyes flash. I get the distinct impression he’s refusing to let his gaze drop. “I’m not sure,” he admits. “I found you here. Like this.” His arms shake, but he tightens his grip on me. “Who did this to you, Faraine? Who brought you here? Was it Targ?”
“What? No.” I shake my head then look blearily around. Ah! There it is. My shift, tossed aside and caught in some of the lower crystals. I work one arm free of Vor’s grasp and point. “There. Please, may I have it?”
Vor turns where I indicate. Then he looks down at me, brow puckered with concern. “Can you sit on your own?”
“I think so.” I’m still quivering, but the pain is manageable.
Vor sets me down reluctantly, his arms disinclined to let go. I’m painfully aware of my own naked flesh pressed against the smooth stone. His shirt is large at least and covers most of me. Vor hastily fetches my shift and hands it over, keeping his eyes averted. When I have the garment in hand, he turns his back to give me privacy while I dress myself.
I hesitate. I shouldn’t of course. Not when he’s being so gentlemanly. But I cannot help letting my gaze linger on his muscular shoulders, his tapered waist. My stomach fills with heat which spreads to other parts of my body, warming my cheeks last of all.
I tear my gaze away, slip Vor’s shirt off, and pull my shift over my head. My fingers tremble as I do up the front ties. It’s not a lot of covering—my arms are bare, as are my legs below the knee. But it’s better than nothing. Better than how he found me.
“I . . . um. Here.” When Vor turns, I awkwardly hold out his shirt.
He takes it but doesn’t put it on right away. Instead, he stares at it, as though I’ve just handed him something strange and he cannot puzzle it out. Finally, he lifts his gaze to mine. “There was blood,” he says. “All the way up here. I thought . . .”
Fear radiates from his words. It’s so sharp, I nearly take a step back. “Oh, that!” I say hastily. “I did not stop to put on appropriate shoes. The ground, you know. It’s very rough.” I point to my bare, bloody feet and grimace ruefully.
Vor shakes his head. A muscle in his jaw ticks. “What are you doing out here, Faraine?” he says at last. “I thought you’d been taken. Another assassin maybe. Then Yok . . . he said you wanted to go to the gardens. I raced here as fast as I could, and when I saw the trail of blood . . .”
There’s something dark in his eye. Something he dares not articulate. “It’s hard to explain,” I say lamely.
“Hard to explain why you would incapacitate your bodyguard to go for a stroll? Barefoot? Naked? In my gardens?”
A flush roars up my neck. I bite my lip, uncertain where to begin. Finally, I say the only thing I can think of in that moment: “My feet hurt.”
He is silent. A long, terrible count of ten breaths.
Then suddenly, he steps forward. Before I have a chance to comprehend what is happening, he scoops me off my feet. A cry bubbles in my throat as I wrap my arms around his neck. “What are you doing?”
“I know a place where you can bathe your feet. It’s not far from here.” With those words, he steps out from among the tall crystals and begins to pick his way down the rise. I feel a momentary dart of pain, reluctant to leave the crystals behind, but that feeling is quickly subsumed in the undeniable pleasure of being cradled against Vor’s chest. He’s so strong, moves with such easy, effortless grace. The sheer power of him is enough to make my head spin and my newly-released heart pound in my throat.
I should resist. I should fight this, demand he put me down. I shouldn’t let myself feel what I’m feeling. If I were wise, I would plant my hands against his chest, push as hard as I can, force him to release me.
But I am not wise. Besides, do I really want to crawl back through this stone garden on my bloodied hands and knees?
With a sigh, I give in and rest my head against his shoulder. I don’t ask where we are going or how long it will take to get there. All I want is to live in this moment. To listen to the pulse of his heart, to feel the rhythm of his breath, and let it sink into my soul like the living song of the crystals.
