Even Zenith seemed to revive slightly, and Drago found he did not have to support so much of her weight.
They began to walk slowly down the forest track, Drago lost amid the beauty of the forest, Zenith lost in (losing) the battle in her mind.
This forest is so beautiful. I loved it when Azhure brought us here as a child.
No, no, no, no…
Look! There is a diamond-eyed bird! Remember how we loved to watch them flutter from branch to branch?
No, no, no, no…
You know where he is taking us, don’t you, Zenith? My grove. Poor girl, soon it will be your burial ground, not mine.
No, no, no, no…
But Zenith was now very, very tired of saying “no”. She thought it would be good to lie down. Rest a while. Perhaps just to let Niah have her way for a few days, a week at the most. Then, once she had rested…
You go to sleep now, dear. You have been good. Go to sleep…
And Zenith tottered along by Drago’s side, losing the strength to maintain her grip on life.
They walked for an hour or more, deep into the forest, Drago unaware of, and Zenith ignoring, the thousand fey eyes that watched their passing from the shadows.
It was only when they approached a large grove that Zenith’s head whipped up and she stopped, aware at last, her eyes wide. “No!”
Drago turned wearily to her. “Zenith, we need to rest, and this grove has sunlit spaces we can warm ourselves in. Come on now, we’re almost there.”
He pulled her forward.
The instant they stepped into the grove, Zenith felt Niah lunge within her. She screamed in terror – Niah was too strong here! Ah! Stars! Niah was penetrating and invading her soul, tearing it apart, a rape more painful, more humiliating than WolfStar’s invasion of her body.
And she could do nothing to stop Niah – she was so powerful, so vigorous, so certain!
“Zenith!” Drago tried to hold her, but she wrenched away from him, falling against a tree.
“Zenith!” Again Drago reached for her, but recoiled in horror as his sister convulsed.
Her hands beat frantically at her bare breasts where the cloak had fallen away, and she whimpered. “Help me! Oh, Stars, help me!” Her voice ended on a thin wail of terror.
Drago tried to grab his sister to him, but she kept rolling out of his arms. What was going on?
“Oh Gods, it hurts, it hurts!” Zenith’s hands were now patting at her head, now her abdomen, now clasped about her shoulders. “Put it out, please…put it out! It hurts!”
Drago stared wildly about, desperate for help, taking in the large grove ringed by nine trees and covered in Moonwildflowers, Azhure’s mark.
A coldness overwhelmed him as he realised where they were. What had he done? He’d led Zenith right into Niah’s Grove, the place where Azhure’s mother had burned to death – when this site had once been the village of Smyrton – and the place where her body lay buried.
“Oh Stars!” he cried. “What have I done?”
Zenith no longer spoke or cried out, but her eyes and mouth were circles of horror reflecting the agony that the Niah within was visiting upon her.
Suddenly Drago was very, very angry. Damn their parents into every eternity of unhappiness for visiting such pain on their children!
He finally managed to grab Zenith to him, trying as best he could to give her some reassurance, trying to touch her mind, to break the horror that had consumed – was consuming – her.
The sack fell to one side, but Drago ignored it. “Zenith,” he murmured. “Zenith!”
Zenith was no longer aware of him. She writhed and struggled, and was now gasping and choking so much that Drago thought she would, in truth, die.
I wish Niah’s soul would stay in its damned After Life! Drago thought, and then cursed aloud, panicked that he could do nothing to help Zenith.
“’Tis no use getting so angry, my boy,” said a voice firmly to one side. “It will not help your sister.”
Startled, Drago looked up, and Zenith almost rolled out of his grip. He managed to hold on to her, then continued to watch the other side of the grove warily. A peasant woman had stepped forth, rubbing her hands anxiously above her large belly. She was in her midthirties, with roughened skin and thick limbs. She was clean and well-kept, but she was dressed simply in a worsted dress and enveloping black apron, and her expression was that of a simpleton.
“Who are you?” he snapped. “Stay away!” His arms tightened about Zenith.
The woman ignored him and advanced a little more. Drago wondered if she was indeed dim-witted, or if she used that expression to mask more dangerous thoughts. Stars knew what mad creatures these woods contained! “Stay away! I –”
“You need help, m’lad.” And ignoring his angry expression she sank down on the other side of the still-writhing Zenith. “Tell me what’s wrong with her.”
Drago had no intention of telling her. What? This peasant woman who at best knew how to curdle milk? No! He wasn’t going to –
The woman raised her eyes from Zenith and stared at Drago.
Drago may have had no residual Icarii power himself, but he had lived his life among Enchanters and Gods, and he recognised power when he saw it.
This woman’s eyes blazed with it, although it was such power that Drago had never seen before.
“It is the power of the Mother,” the woman said, and now her voice had dropped its simple brogue and throbbed with power as well. “Come to help your sister, if it can. Now, be still.”
She dropped her eyes back to Zenith, and patted at her arm with one work-roughened hand.
Suddenly Drago knew who this woman was; not only had his mother talked of her, but she was a legend among the Icarii and Avar. She was Goodwife Renkin, the peasant woman who had helped Faraday plant Minstrelsea, and the woman who also acted as a conduit for the voice and power of the Mother, the being who personified the power of the earth and nature. When Faraday had completed her planting, the Goodwife had wandered off into the forest, never to be seen again.
Not by human eyes, anyway.
Now here she was. Sitting before him, patting Zenith’s arm and singing a trifling lullaby to her.
Much good that was doing, Drago thought. He trusted no-one, and certainly not this odd woman before him now.
“She is in great pain,” the Goodwife said, her voice still carrying its power. “Why is that, older brother?” She raised her eyes back to Drago.
He considered again if he should tell her or not, then found to his amazement that the words were flooding out of him. “She battles the reborn soul of Niah within her,” he said. “It is a trouble she should not have to bear, for she is innocent of any wrongdoing.”
“Unlike you,” the Goodwife observed.
Drago’s mouth twisted. “Have the tales of my misdeeds penetrated even this green haven?”
“All know your story, Drago. You betrayed your brother for your own gain.”
“So I have been told,” Drago said, angry beyond measure. “And to be perfectly frank with you, Goodwife, I wish I had been more successful at it! Maybe then I could have saved Zenith this pain!”
Her head jerked up. “Do you still covet your brother’s place?” she asked softly. “Would you like to sit the Throne of the Stars?”
He stared at her, frightened, because suddenly that was what he wanted – very much. What would it have been like to have been born first? To have been born heir?
“It is not good to covet your brother’s place,” the woman said, babbling again in peasantish brogue rather than the power of the Mother, and with her eyes focused on something other than Drago. “Is it, m’Lady?”
Drago looked over his shoulder where the woman was gazing and froze.
A doe stepped from the far side of the grove, her russet skin trembling with apprehension, her great, dark eyes flickering from the tableau before her to the forest. Drago was unsure whether she’d stay or flee.
“C
ome, come, m’Lady,” the woman said. “This child here needs your help. I find I can do little for her.”
Drago glanced at the woman. Not even with your power? he thought. But just then the doe took a hesitant step forward, and Drago’s eyes flew back to her.
Again he knew who this was. Faraday. Once Queen of Achar, now trapped in animal form.
All of us betrayed in one way or another, Drago thought suddenly. All of us trapped in flesh we don’t want.
“Nay,” the Goodwife said quietly before him, her brogue again gone. “This girlie before me is betrayed, surely, and Faraday has betrayal branded into her very bones, but you are a betrayer. It is what you were born to. You have sin branded into your bones.”
Appalled and hurt rather than angry, Drago stared at her. “No, no…”
There was a quiet movement at his shoulder. The doe had crept up to them, and was now standing a pace away from the sack, staring at it.
She was trembling almost uncontrollably. Slowly she raised her great eyes from the sack and stared at Drago.
And he understood with that look that she knew what it contained.
“The girlie,” the Goodwife said gently to the doe. “She needs your help.”
For a heartbeat longer the doe continued to stare at Drago, then she broke the stare and edged about him to Zenith. She lowered her head and nuzzled the woman’s face with her nose, then sank gracefully down at her head.
Drago could not take his eyes from her. He had never seen the doe – Faraday – before. The tale of this woman was so legendary, so lovely, that even Drago had found himself touched by it.
Particularly because Faraday had been so betrayed by his father, and yet still she had died for him.
Drago could not imagine loving anyone that much. Was her agony worth it? Surely she must now regret her devotion to Axis. Surely?
The doe raised her eyes from her contemplation of Zenith and stared briefly at Drago.
It was only a brief look, but in that moment Drago saw something that took his breath away.
As the doe had raised her head he had seen in the curve of the animal throat the grace of a beautiful woman’s neck, and he had seen in the rough reddish hair of the doe’s coat the gleam of tangled chestnut hair, and for an instant he had seen a tortured woman’s soul behind the creature’s dark eyes.
The doe glanced once more at the sack, trembled, then bent her attention back to Zenith.
She is losing her battle. She descends towards madness. This place is too Niah-strong for her already weakened and saddened state.
The voice, so soft and gentle, whispered through Drago’s mind, and he stifled a cry.
“M’Lady?” the Goodwife said. “Isn’t there something you can do? My herbs cannot mend this malady.”
How can I evict this presence that torments her so? The doe lowered her nose to Zenith’s forehead. She fights, and it fights within her, and I can see no help, no solution.
“WolfStar found her, and raped her,” Drago put in suddenly, wanting them to know all the horror.
“And what did you do as WolfStar raped her?” the Goodwife asked.
“I…I did not know what was happening. She’d run from camp. I did not know until it was too late.”
The Goodwife lowered her eyes contemptuously.
Was he to be blamed for all Tencendor’s woes, Drago wondered, then turned to the doe.
“Help her, please,” he said, and extended a hand towards her.
The doe flinched, and he dropped it.
I can do nothing, she said.
“I can do nothing,” the Goodwife echoed.
“But what can I do? I can’t leave her here! I –”
“Where do you go?” the Goodwife asked. “What sin do you plan next?”
“I plan to save my own life!” Drago shouted. “Is that such a sin?”
He took a huge breath, trying to bring his anger under control. “She wanted to go to the Island of Mist and Memory. To StarDrifter.”
StarDrifter?
“He said once…he said he would always be there to catch her.”
Ah. The doe tilted her head and considered Drago. Perhaps I can summon StarDrifter here. Zenith will never survive the trip to the Isle.
Drago hesitated, then leaned down and touched Zenith’s cheek a last time. He could do no more for her, and he knew that she was better left in the care of these two than struggling further south with him.
“Take care of her, please.” He let her weight fall into the arms of the Goodwife, picked up the sack, and stood up, retreating several paces.
Where are you going?
Where? Where? Drago didn’t know. He retreated another pace, the sack clutched tight to his chest.
Why that? the doe asked sadly.
“I don’t know,” Drago muttered, staring at her. “I don’t know.”
It has its own purpose.
“It has no thought of its own!”
It seeks…it seeks a home.
“No!” Now Drago had reached the far edge of the grove.
Take it back.
“No!” Drago yelled one last time, staring frantically for a moment at Zenith, and then was gone.
24
StarDrifter
After his son defeated Gorgrael, StarDrifter had made his home on the Island of Mist and Memory. There he studied and dreamed, conducted the rites of Star worship, and was generally content. He lived on Temple Mount, establishing an academy for Icarii children with Enchanter powers, and teaching what he knew and what he’d come to understand. He had mellowed in the tranquillity of the island, and became more patient and serene, although StarDrifter did not fully realise this change in himself.
He did not lack for company, either. Although the population of the Mount itself had not grown appreciably over the past years, the Icarii had built themselves a spreading town about the foot of the mountain. From there, they could rise on the jungle thermals to the peak to attend rites, or just to come and absorb the power that washed about the great Temple of the Stars.
At first StarDrifter had visited his family in Sigholt once or twice a year, but as time had passed, and Axis and Azhure’s children grew into adulthood, his visits had become more infrequent, sometimes once every two years, more often longer. Axis and Azhure came to him on Temple Mount now and then, but their visits had become rare since they had drifted more with their Star God companions; StarDrifter had not seen them in some three years.
He missed them, but he missed his grandchildren more, and every few weeks guilt made him vow to himself to go to Sigholt this Yuletide. But he somehow knew that Yuletide would come and go, and his grandchildren would remain unseen. Caelum was now too busy ruling Tencendor to leave, RiverStar too self-absorbed, Isfrael and Zenith had their own lives, and Drago…well, Drago had so little in common with the other SunSoars that he was the last person StarDrifter expected to visit the island.
All his grandchildren had spent time with StarDrifter when they were growing up. StarDrifter even missed Drago who, despite his outwardly sullen appearance, had a lively mind and had spent hours following StarDrifter about the complex, asking questions. StarDrifter missed them all…except RiverStar. He was glad she no longer came. StarDrifter had once promised himself that he would have Azhure’s eldest daughter if he could not have Azhure, but RiverStar had herself crept into his bed when she was thirteen, her hands knowing and bold, and StarDrifter had been so repelled by the experience that he had lost any desire for her.
StarDrifter was lonely, although he did not recognise it. He had let Rivkah go, and he had lost contact with his son and his grandchildren. Even FreeFall and his wife, EvenSong, StarDrifter’s daughter, were too busy to attend to him.
So this day he wandered the orchard above the Dome of the Stars, his wings fluttering out behind him, eyes half closed, his head lifted slightly to the sea breeze as it rushed over the cliffs, and he wondered why he felt so melancholy.
It was a warm day, and yet Sta
rDrifter found his flesh creeping with a strange chill. He opened his eyes fully, and stood still, looking about.
There was something wrong.
A knot of nervousness twisted about in his belly. He had not felt anything like this for years…many years. What was it?
He turned about in a slow circle, his wings now half extended, ready for flight.
StarDrifter…
That voice! He knew it, but could not place it. Who?
StarDrifter…
Calling, calling to him. Worried, but so far away. Who?
And then power hit him like a blast of turbulent wind. StarDrifter cried out, almost fell over, then managed to regain his balance. He looked about, not understanding. He was surrounded by vibrant, pulsing emerald light. So vibrant it lived, shadowing and shifting…
“Stars,” he whispered, and saw that one section of the emerald light was changing, reshaping so that it became a tunnel of swirling silver and emerald light, and at the end of this tunnel stood two women, one holding out her hand.
One was a pleasant-faced woman in late middle-age, dark brown hair greying and coiled loosely about her head. She was dressed in a soft pale blue robe, belted about with a rainbow-striped band. From her came most of this power.
The Mother. StarDrifter had never seen her personified, but he recognised her power from years of conducting joint rites with the Avar.
The other woman was Faraday. StarDrifter could not believe it. When had he last seen her? At Axis’ side in Carlon, smiling and cheerful, not yet knowing that Axis had betrayed her with Azhure.
She held out her hand, and she smiled. “StarDrifter.” Her voice came from very far away. “StarDrifter, I have need of you as you once had need of me. Will you aid me?”
“Gladly,” StarDrifter said without hesitation, and stepped into the spiralling tunnel.
He spread his wings to the power, letting it carry him towards the two women. He felt earth and stars rush by him, knowing it carried him a great distance, and when it finally let him go and he stepped into Niah’s Grove, he was not truly surprised.
There waited before him a doe and a peasant woman. Like Drago before him, StarDrifter knew instantly who these two represented. But his eyes were caught by the twisting, moaning figure between them.