She’s so light. It’s like carrying a dream.
The relief flooding through me is almost more than I can bear. I must summon all my strength simply to keep my knees from buckling and my body from sinking to the ground, trembling as I cradle her against me. She’s alive! Warm, alive, here in my arms. Her soft breath stirs against my skin, her graceful arms drape round my neck, and her hair, soft and sweet as spun-silk, brushes my jaw.
When I saw her lying in the center of the circle . . . naked, still, her limbs spread wide . . . Oh, gods above and below! For a terrible, endless moment, I’d thought she was dead. Sacrificed. Like that poor woman in Hoknath.
Then she’d moaned. The sound shot fire through my veins. I’d leapt forward, her name bursting from my lips. In a trice, I’d ripped the shirt from my back and wrapped her body in it even as I drew her into my arms.
Now, I pick my way carefully down the incline, away from the Urzulhar Circle, taking care not to jostle her. She feels ephemeral in my grasp. As though one wrong move on my part, and she’ll slip away, vanish from my life and existence. I long to crush her closer, to prevent her from escaping, but equally fear harming her, breaking her.
I should never have let myself come to this. I should never have allowed my heart to open itself up to this terrible vulnerability. If I’d been wise, I would have sent her home with Lady Lyria. How could I have let her remain in Mythanar? Avoiding her was no use. Avoidance only made my heart long for her more. The simple knowledge that she was here, within the walls of my home, breathing the same air I breathed was exquisite torture.
My teeth grind so hard, it sounds like a growl. I dare not speak, not even to demand what in the nine hells she was doing, lying there among the sacred stones! If I open my mouth, it won’t be any of the questions burning on my tongue that pour forth. No, it will be confessions. Declarations. Words I have no business articulating.
So I clamp my jaw tight, refuse to utter a sound. She’s peaceful at least. Still and silent as I bear her down to the lower levels of the garden. The last time I carried her like this, she was in pain, resisting me up until the moment she lost consciousness completely. Now, she tucks her head under my chin and simply holds onto me. Like she trusts me. Like I can help her, comfort her. It’s the most beautiful sensation I’ve ever experienced.
I know what I should do. I should carry her to her room, set her on her feet, back away, lock the door, and set a double watch in place. Instead, it’s as though my feet have a will of their own. They carry me and her unhesitatingly to a certain path, winding between blossoming amethyst clusters and formations of gleaming anthracite. Soon, a distant murmur of water fills the air. That murmur grows to a dull roar.
Then I emerge through the stones onto the shore of the lake facing the crystal falls.
Faraine lifts her head from my shoulder. She gasps. “What is this place?”
The delight in her voice strikes me straight to the heart. “This is Hirith Borbatha,” I answer, my mouth close to her ear. “Lake of a Thousand Lights.”
Even at dimness, the falls are spectacular. The living gemstones give off a gentle glow that shimmers through the running water. Cascades dance in many white streams, cutting through rock to fall in a joyous splash of foam. Down under the surface of the lake, small lorst crystals gleam softly, illuminating the pale, darting fish and the submerged plant life, a brilliant display of color and life and movement.
Faraine is speechless. I carry her to the edge of the lake and set her down on a moss-covered boulder. Only when she drops her wounded feet into the water does she let out a little bleat of surprise. “It’s so warm!”
“Hot spring,” I say, and step into the shallows. Before I can stop and think twice about what I’m doing, I kneel before her. Water seeps into my trousers, but I don’t care. I strip away the shirt I’ve tied around my waist then lift one of her feet in my hands. At my touch, she starts and makes as though to draw back. I flash her a swift look. “Please. Let me help you.”
She freezes. Then, slowly, she lowers her foot once more. I begin to use the sleeve of my shirt to carefully wipe away the blood and bits of dirt and gravel. Slowly, gently, methodically. Trying not to notice just how lovely her foot is. That high arch, those small toes and round, crescent-moon nails. Dainty, perfectly formed. Like the rest of her.
A little shiver runs down her spine, strong enough that I feel it. I glance up to find her gaze fixed hard upon my face. Realization strikes me like a blow: she’s beautiful. Sitting there, disheveled, hair pointing every which way, dirt smearing one cheek. I remember once wondering if I could learn to find her attractive. Now, I almost want to laugh out loud at my own foolishness. I should have known even then, looking at her for the first time, that all my definitions of beauty were suddenly changed. Since that moment no woman has compared to her in my mind. If I force myself, I can objectively see and list her flaws. Her mouth is too wide, her jaw too square, her nose too prominent. And of course, those bi-colored eyes of hers are undeniably unsettling.
Yet how can these features be anything less than perfect? Every small detail is a vital part of the whole that is her. That is Faraine.
I’ve stopped breathing. Hastily, I lower my eyes, clear my throat, force air into my lungs. Placing her foot back in the water, I take the other in hand and begin to clean that one as well. Only when my task is complete, when I’ve risen from the water, draped my soaked shirt on a nearby rock, and taken a seat on the boulder beside her, do I attempt to speak. “How do you feel now, Princess?”
Her posture is rigid, perched on the edge of the rock, her hands on either side of her. Her fingers are tense against the mossy stone, her shoulders stiff. Mist-dampened strands of hair stick to her forehead and cheeks. “A little foolish,” she admits after a moment, then sneaks a glance at me. “I . . . I don’t know how to . . .” Her words drift away, lost in the roar of the falls and churning foam.
I should press her with questions. There are so many things I need to know. Why did she come to the garden? Why did I find her naked among the crystals, shuddering, obviously in pain? Why had she knocked out her bodyguard in order to venture here? She could not know the importance of the Urzulhar Circle, for it holds no significance for her or her kind. None of this makes any sense.
But in that moment, I cannot find any words. Not with the shape of her shoulder so close to mine. The air is warm and alive in the mere inches that separate our skin. I remember too well what it was like to touch her. To hold her. To mold her to my body. Then I had not realized it was her, however. Now that I know, how much more intense would the pleasure be?
My lips part. Her name is there on my tongue: “Faraine.”
“Yes, Vor?”
“Faraine, I—”
Needle-sharp pricks pierce my skin. I let out a yelp as a mothcat springs from my shoulder into Faraine’s lap. She screams, startled. Her feet splash out of the water as she scrambles up on her stone seat. With a little screech, the mothcat leaps to the boulder nearby on which my shirt is draped, arches its back, and hisses at both of us.
Faraine poises in frozen shock. Her bare legs bend under her, her skirt slipped back to reveal rather more knee and thigh than is altogether modest. The view does something to my blood, something which the sight of her lying naked in the stone circle had not inspired. Then, all my concern had been for her wellbeing. Now . . .
I hastily avert my gaze. “Morar-juk,” I mutter, turning instead to inspect my own shoulder. “The little beast got me.” Five tiny scratches mark my skin, seeping thin lines of blue. I rub at them ruefully, but at least this wound won’t require Madame Ar’s ministrations. From the tail of my eye, I watch Faraine settle her feet back in the water and pull her skirt down over her knees again. “Are you all right?” I ask without quite looking at her.
“I’m not hurt.” She’s still a little breathless. “It surprised me, that’s all. What . . . what is it exactly?”
“They’re called varbu.” Smiling ruefully, I extend a hand to the mothcat. The fur on its spine stands upright, but it deigns to sniff my fingertip. Then, with a little trill and a hop, it springs onto my forearm. A long, sinuous tail wraps around my wrist for balance. “My mother always called them mothcats.”
“Your mother?”
“Yes. She had a special fondness for the creatures, which is why there are so many of them here. They’re considered something of a pest, but she was so delighted by them, my father had several breeding pairs brought in and turned loose in the palace gardens. Now there’s a veritable swarm about the place, all fat and spoiled and good for nothing.”
The mothcat walks up my arm to my still-smarting shoulder. There it nuzzles my jaw and begins to purr noisily. It continues sauntering behind my head, then makes its way down my other arm, drawing level with Faraine’s gaze. It sticks out its eyeless face, snuffling.
Her lips curve gently. She strokes the top of its head with one finger. Its purrs redouble as it stretches out both front feet until she extends her arm for it to climb onto. In short order, it’s settled on her shoulder, its forefeet on top of her head. Its long tail twitches under her nose.
Faraine laughs. Such a bright sound, like a crystal struck by a silver bar and made to sing. “I’d nearly forgotten,” she says. “Your mother was human, wasn’t she?”
“Yes.” I clear my thickened throat. “She liked to come here. To this very spot. It was her favorite place. She would sit here by the waters for hours, surrounded by her mothcats. She claimed their purrs were soothing to a troubled soul.”
Faraine is silent for a moment. The beast crawls down from her shoulders into her arms. She juggles its unruly limbs, trying to keep from being scratched, and only when it finally settles does she say softly, “Was your mother’s soul much troubled?”
A muscle in my jaw tightens. “Yes.” I have to force out the word. My gaze drops to my fist, knotted on my knee. “When I was young, I did not understand. Looking back, however, I think she did not thrive in the Under Realm, away from the sun and stars of her own world.”
Faraine nods even as she contemplates the brilliant falls, the myriad lights and colors. I dare to sneak another glance her way. A slight crease indents her brow, and her lips pucker slightly. After a few silent moments, she lets out a small sigh. “I did not believe a world under stone could be so beautiful. Now that I’ve seen it . . . seen this place . . . my own world seems rather colorless by comparison.”
My heart warms. The mothcat has flipped over in her arms and now lies belly-up, fat and comfortable. Its forepaws lazily knead the air. I find myself suddenly jealous of the little beast, to be held so gently in her lovely arms, pressed close to her breast.
I tear my gaze away, looking once more at the falls. “My best memories of her are here. This was where she could be happy. Father had a stone bench built for her so that she could spend more time here comfortably. I think he hoped he could find a way to draw her out, to give her a place in this world. To make her content. But most of the time . . .”
“Yes?” Faraine gently urges.
I draw a long breath and let it out slowly. “Most of the time, she kept to her rooms. The doors shut, the curtains drawn. I think . . . I think she was in pain.”
Faraine is silent. I feel her waiting for me to continue. Suddenly, it’s easier to go on than to stop. The words slip out, one after another, as though they’ve been waiting for a sympathetic ear in which to find shelter all these years.
“She disappeared. When I was still quite young. No one knows for certain what happened. My father sent many brave warriors searching, and he himself ventured to the Surface World. When he returned, however, he called off the search and never spoke of it again. Some speculated that she was kidnapped by his enemies, held hostage, murdered. Others claimed she ran away with some secret lover. Most simply believe she escaped through the Between Gate and found her way back to her own world. All I knew was that my mother had gone. And she’d not taken me with her.”
The rumble of the waterfall is not loud enough to drown out the mothcat’s snores. Both sounds fill the silence that follows as my voice fades away. I fix my gaze on the foam lapping around my bare feet. Perhaps I should have held my tongue. What good can be had from speaking of such things?
Suddenly, Faraine shifts her grip on the mothcat, freeing up one arm. She reaches out. Takes my hand. Her fingers are so small, so slender, yet there’s such unexpected strength in her grip. “You love her,” she says. “So much.”
I frown, turn away. “I gave up loving her a long time ago.”
“You needn’t pretend, Vor. I already know.”
A shiver ripples down my spine. Slowly, I let my eyes be drawn back to hers. So intense and yet so understanding. So knowing.
“What is your gods-gift, Faraine?” I ask abruptly. I wasn’t intending to speak the question out loud. But it’s been in my mind since the night I met her, out under that dreadful expanse of star-filled sky. Her sisters were both gods-gifted. Her brother too. Beauty, song, dance . . . the kinds of miraculous blessings one hears about in old tales. But Faraine’s gift is unlike those of her siblings. Yok’s unconscious body on the floor in her room is proof enough of that.
Faraine blinks. Her mouth works slightly. She’s debating how much to say, and all I can do is wait. Finally, she gives her head a determined shake and lifts her chin. “I feel the feelings of others. Deep inside me. Like a pulse. A reverberation. I feel them so strongly, it hurts sometimes.” She pauses before adding, “Most of the time.” Her eyes flit away from mine, dropping to study the mothcat in her lap. “The crystals of this world, the urzul, as you call them—they seem to channel my gift. To temper and direct it. That’s why I came out here tonight. That’s why I sought the large stones. I was in pain. Ordinarily, this is enough to moderate my symptoms.” She touches the crystal pendant on its chain around her neck. “But it didn’t help this time. Not after . . .”
“Not after what you witnessed in the chapel?”
She shoots me a startled glance. “You heard about that?”
“I did.”
“Who told you? Yok?”
“My stepmother. Roh.”
Her face seems to shutter. She turns from me again, the muscles around her eyes tightening. “I didn’t see anything. It was too dark. But the resonance of the crystals was strong, like nothing I’ve ever before experienced. It was like seeing, only without sight. Your stepmother was there,” she adds meaningfully.
“And what was she doing exactly?”
Slowly, reluctantly, Faraine tells me. Her words are heavy and low as she describes the ceremony she’d stumbled upon. The faithful, deeply sunk into stone. The knife in the hands of the gray-skinned priest. The pulse of crystals. The blood.
When she comes to the end of her tale, she shudders. “Was that an ordinary ceremony? Is this how your people worship your god?”
I shake my head. My teeth grind hard. “It is not. Blood-letting was long ago banished from the worship of Morar tor Grakanak. It is dark magic, forbidden in Mythanar.”
Faraine considers my words. At last, she asks, “What will you do?”
Ah! That is the question, isn’t it? I drag a hand through my hair, pushing it off my forehead. “There is little I can do. I cannot act on mere speculation. Without witnesses to present to my ministers, I have nothing but empty accusations to hold against either my stepmother or her damned priest.”
“But there were many in the chapel. Surely some of them could testify?”
“And risk punishment for collusion? You’ll be hard pressed to find one willing.”
Faraine nods solemnly. Then she says, “I could testify.”
“No!” The word bursts harsh from my lips. Hastily, I modulate my voice and continue, “You are human. And a guest in Mythanar. Your word would mean nothing to the council.” I bow over, sink my head into my hands. My fingers dig into my scalp. “I fear it will take greater sins committed before I can take decisive action.”
In my mind’s eye, I see that poor woman once more. Slaughtered. Her body desecrated. The whole scene is there, so vivid, so gory, so wrong. A sense of inevitability fills my gut with roiling bile. There was nothing I could do to stop that death. But now, I fear, there is no way to prevent another just like it. Or worse.
“What was that?”
I frown and lift my head enough to shoot Faraine a questioning glance. “What was what?”
“That darkness.” Her face is paler than it was a moment before. “It rippled out from you.”
“You . . . felt that?”
“It would be difficult not to.”
I sit upright, drop my hands away from my face. “This gods-gift of yours is a tricky guthakug, isn’t it?”
She tips her head to one side, another slow smile pulling her lips. “It has its uses.” Her face grows solemn once more. “Tell me.”
I want to hold back. I don’t want to burden her with any of this. But she holds my gaze so intently, so purposefully. Soon I find myself talking. The words simply pour out, a slow trickle at first. Then, as the stones of resistance fall away, a greater rush. Before I know it, the dam has burst, and I’m telling her everything. Of the dead bodies in the lake under Hoknath. Of the temple chamber. The blood-fed stones. The sacrifice. Everything. She listens, leaning toward me. Every now and then I see her wince and wonder if I’m hurting her, if her gods-gift is reacting to the sheer magnitude of horror pulsing from my soul. But every time I pause, she leans in again and urges me in that low voice of hers, “Go on.”
I do. And even as I speak, I cannot help thinking how strong she is. How determined, how brave. To take on this pain, like a series of blows, without once turning aside. The blood slowly drains from her face. Her eyes darken, set in shadowed hollows. But the mothcat nestled in her lap goes on purring, and she strokes it gently with one hand. Her other hand grips her crystal pendant so hard, her knuckles stand out like blades.
At last, I bend over, shoulders hunched, elbows resting on my knees, and stare into the water at my feet. Silence lingers, full of the dark things I’ve just spoken. “Did I hurt you?” I ask at last. “Did I say too much?”
“No,” she answers simply, though her breath is tight. “It’s not unbearable.” She’s silent again for a little while before finally asking, “What is grak-va, exactly?”
“It’s difficult to explain to someone not trolde.” I roll my lips musingly. “It is a holy state of mind in which a trolde will allow the lifeforce in his soul to sink into perfect stillness. There he may know unity with the All Dark and be at peace.”
She nods. “And va-jor? How is it different?”
“According to some theologians, va-jor is a deeper state than grak-va. It is the state in which oneness with stone is said to be made complete: body, mind, and soul.”
“And the dark magic worked in Hoknath was an attempt to spread va-jor throughout the city. To spare the people from poison.”
I nod. “But it failed. Because the sacrifice was unwilling.”
“You think Umog Targ is trying to prepare your stepmother to become the willing sacrifice for Mythanar? So that he may spread this va-jor across your people?”
At this, I shake my head. “I don’t know. The sacrificed one will not enter into va-jor. They will simply die a gruesome death. But Roh’s greatest aim is to become one with the stone. I cannot imagine her voluntarily foregoing her chance of achieving this desire.”
“But you do believe she is helping Targ prepare for the ceremony. Either on a willing or an unwilling victim.”
I don’t answer. But it doesn’t matter, because she is gods-gifted, and she reads me with ease.
“You think . . .” She hesitates before continuing. “You think they intend to use me. For this sacrifice.”
Hearing the words spoken out loud plunges icy daggers straight to my heart. My lips curling back in a snarl. “It doesn’t matter! As soon as the message arrives from your father, I’m sending you home.”
“What?”
The sharpness of the word bursting from her lips startles me. “I’ve not forgotten my promise,” I say earnestly. “I must receive your father’s official answer before I can declare the alliance over. At that point, my ministers can no longer argue against my decision to return you to your world. Which I will do. Immediately.” Unable to bear her expression, I turn away, once more staring out at the falls. “I expect the message to arrive tomorrow. The day after at the latest.”
A long silence hovers between us. But I feel her anger. My own body tenses as though for battle.
“So that’s it then,” she says at length.
“It must be so.”
“And what of your feelings, Vor?”
I frown. “My . . . my feelings?”
She whirls on me, dislodging the mothcat. It lets out an angry yip before leaping from her lap to the shore, where it begins irritably to groom its tail. Faraine ignores it. She reaches out, catches hold of my hand in both of hers. I see her wince. Does physical touch intensify the strength of her gift? I try to pull back, but she tightens her grip. “Yes,” she says, her voice almost a growl. “Your feelings. For me.”
All the breath seems to have been blasted from my lungs. “You . . . you know how I . . .?”
She lets out an exasperated huff. “It doesn’t exactly take a gods-gift, Vor.”
I stare at her. Frozen.
Then I wrench away, stand up, and splash back to the shore. There I pace, back and forth, my stride quick and agitated. “It doesn’t matter,” I say at last. “It simply doesn’t matter what I feel.”
“That’s not—”
“You’re in danger! All the time.” I clench my fists, rounding on her. She sits perched on that stone. So vulnerable. So lovely. So everything I crave. But this craving is an enemy I must face and fight and conquer. “Every moment you stay here in Mythanar is another moment of peril. If not from the cultists then from my own ministers. From the spies within my court. Why, even I have tried to kill you. Twice now!”
“I don’t care,” she whispers, her expression fierce.
“I do!” The words bark from my throat. “Which means I cannot let you stay here. I cannot let you face death again and again. I cannot risk it.”
“And what of my feelings? What of my choice?” Before I can answer, she slips from the stone, stands in the water. Slowly, she comes toward me. Spray from the waterfall has dampened the thin fabric of her shift. It clings to her body, like she’s a bride once more, climbing from the sacred waters of the marriage pool. The sight makes me feel hollow and hot inside. And she knows it. She feels it. She can sense my intense arousal.
With an effort of will, I drag my gaze up to hers. She is close now, close enough to reach out, to take my hand. Which she does. Her fingers squeeze mine, while her eyes peer right into my soul. “You once told me you considered women the equal of men,” she says. “Do you remember? Neither one superior to the other. Is this no longer what you believe? Do you intend to strip me of my rights? Of the equality of my voice? Will you deprive me of a choice that is mine to make?”
My head feels heavy as a boulder as I slowly shake it. “The choice is neither mine nor yours, Faraine. The gods themselves have united against us.” With that, I wrench my hand from her hold and back away. Firmly, I raise the walls in my mind, around my heart, stone barriers which even her gods-gift must struggle to pierce. It pains me to do so, but I must.
“I will escort you back to your chambers, Princess,” I say in a voice as cold as virmaer steel. “There I beg you to remain until the message from Beldroth arrives. It is for your own good.”
And mine.
