Gift of Griffins Page 2

  Ker stopped, letting her shoulders sag. “I am so tired of Flashing people to find out whether some Shekayrin used a jewel on them.” All too often the answer was yes, though it might be only the mild compulsion of a mist, and not a complete change. She sighed and looked at Tel out of the corner of her eye.

  “Where’s Luca? Why isn’t he doing this?”

  “With all due respect to the High Inquisitor, when it comes to jeweling, I trust your judgment over his.”

  Svann winced. “We know, we know,” she said before he could speak. “‘Jewel isn’t a verb.’” She gestured, and they started walking again. “So, what couldn’t wait until I got back?”

  Tel shot Svann another look, as if he didn’t want to speak in front of the other man. Ker rolled her eyes.

  “Errinn was the Mind-healer with us today,” Tel said. “As she was putting them to sleep, one of them claimed to be a Talent.”

  Ker almost stopped again, but instead lengthened her stride to match Tel’s much longer one. Another Talent, even one who couldn’t see auras, would help to relieve the burden. “They had a woman with them?”

  “It’s a man—”

  Ker’s heart sank. “Oh, Tel, anyone would know that claiming to be a Talent would make us take them in.”

  “Which is why they were put to sleep before we came anywhere near a mine entrance. We know our jobs, thank you very much.”

  Svann cleared his throat. “If it is a young man, they may not have killed him immediately. Or perhaps he was able to shield himself from investigation, as Luca Pa’narion himself once did. Or . . .”

  Svann went on lecturing, but Ker stopped listening. A young enough Talent might mean someone from Questin Hall, someone who’d been a Candidate like herself. Someone she knew. She might not be the only one to escape alive. Ker hadn’t thought she could move faster, but for a step or two she outdistanced the men.

  * * *

  • • •

  They were nearing the central core of the occupied Mines and Tunnels when Tel led them aside to an isolated grouping of rooms and alcoves in the western section of the mines. They’d learned very early that outsiders— whether refugees, those captured attempting the pass, or the military recruits trickling into the Serpents Teeth guided by hope and rumors—needed to be thoroughly checked and examined by a Talent before they would be allowed to join the community. Anything less would have endangered all of them.

  Out-and-out traitors were dealt with harshly, but those who had been jeweled were a larger problem. Ker had been able to completely restore Tel because she’d been able to use Svann’s own jewel. With those jeweled by other Shekayrin, she and the Feelers helping her had had limited success. Once or twice, when the person hadn’t been jeweled very long, they’d been able to free them from the direct influence of the jewel, but they were like faded versions of themselves, tiring easily and having to be reminded of orders.

  Both the Faro of Bears and the Feelers Council were beginning to fear that they were a drain on the limited resources of the Feelers. Before today, Ker hadn’t told anyone, not even Tel, that she was hoping she could fix even these people with a jewel of her own. Maybe even people who’d been jeweled years before and turned into traitors by the Halians.

  Finally, Tel pocketed his glow stone and all three paused to allow their eyes to adjust to the much dimmer light emitted by the luminous vines they wore around their wrists and foreheads. Out of deference to the light-sensitive eyes of people who had lived for years underground, soldiers who had glow stones tended to use them only when away from the main occupied areas.

  The storage room Tel led them to had lately been transformed, with the addition of a proper wooden door and two well-armed soldiers, into a holding cell. Today’s guard was made up of a square-built young woman with a shaved head, and a slimmer, older man with a pockmarked face. Errinn, the junior Mind-healer who’d been on patrol with Tel, greeted them with a grin from where she stood to one side of the door, close at hand yet out of the soldiers’ way. Like the soldiers she now worked with, Errinn wore her black hair cut short. Of all the Feelers in the Mines and Tunnels, the Mind-healers had adjusted to the presence of outsiders most easily.

  “Have you eaten?” she asked. Not all Feelers reacted physically to using their Gifts, but Mind-healers were notorious for needing to eat when they’d been healing, and they’d extended that concern to Kerida.

  “I’m fine, thanks.” Ker rubbed her hands, her fingers suddenly cold.

  After touching her crest to Tel, the younger soldier pulled the door open to let Ker pass through. Four cots had been placed in the room, though only three were filled. Ker wondered what had happened to the rest of the Halian party attempting the pass and shook the thought away. She could always ask Tel if it became important.

  “Kerida.” Tel stood watching from the door. “Anytime today.”

  Ker waved him off with a lifted hand and approached the first sleeper. With only three men she could Flash them all from the doorway, but actually touching them was more certain. She fingered the jewel, tempted for a moment to try its magic instead of the Talent, but she wasn’t ready for that, and she knew it. She blew on her fingers, spoke her trigger word under her breath—Paraste—and touched the first sleeper on the forehead. Instantly, the man’s aura was laid out crisp and separate from the other auras in the room, and Ker was relieved to see the strong blue, green, and yellow of a healthy UnGifted person, with no overlay of red, just the dust of silver that marked the Mind-healer’s sleep magic.

  “This one’s untouched,” she said. “He’s an Eagle. A courier from Blue Company, Jade Cohort.”

  “Name?” Tel turned from the doorway where he’d been passing the information to the older guard who was taking notes on a wax tablet under the interested eye of his younger partner.

  “Ostik Seawater,” she said, as she moved to the next cot. She glanced up at Tel, her fingertips still on the second man’s forehead. “This one’s a Bear,” she said. “Penn Ferris, Second Officer, Red Company, Onyx Cohort.”

  Tel shrugged one shoulder, shaking his head. “Don’t know him.”

  “A lucky thing, maybe,” Ker said. “He’s misted.” Not fully changed by the jewel, but his spirit subdued and made obedient. Fairly easy to remove, if she only had the time. “Errinn?” She waited until the Mind-healer stood in the doorway, the strong silver stripe in her aura glowing. “Are there many waiting to have their mists removed?”

  “Well, only three just now,” Errinn said. “But we can’t do anything without either you or the griffin, and you’ve been so busy. . . .” She shrugged.

  Ker squeezed her eyes shut and tried not to sigh. “Well, I’m sorry to tell you this one’s to join those others.” More chores waited for her everywhere she looked. Honestly, sometimes she almost missed the days when all she had to do was run from the Halians. She massaged the muscles around her eyes and turned to the final prisoner, curled away from her on the bed farthest from the door. He was much browner than the first two, and thin enough that she doubted he was a soldier. She put her hand on his shoulder as she allowed the colors of his aura to spread around her.

  “Barid.” She snatched her hand back, unable to believe what her Flashing had shown her, even though the turquoise band of color in the young man’s aura was unmistakable. And, even better, clear of any red mist or web. She had last seen Senior Candidate Barid Poniara on the morning the Halians had come to Questin Hall. She’d assumed him beheaded and burned along with everyone else. To find him here, under her hand and dozing, was almost more than she could take in.

  “What is it?” Tel had taken a step toward her, his hand on the hilt of his short sword.

  “I know this man; he was at Questin, a Candidate like me. I thought he died with all the others.”

  Tel nodded, his lips in a thin line. “The question is, then, how is he here? And in this company?�
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  “There’s no red in his aura, neither web nor mist,” she said. “He hasn’t been jeweled,” she added, as Tel’s hard expression didn’t soften. “He has the same blocks I do, the same ones Luca has. In fact, Luca’s the one who taught them to Barid, and it’s Barid who taught me.”

  “Then he might have tricked them into believing he wasn’t a Talent, is what you’re saying.”

  Ker nodded. “I’d still like Luca to examine him.”

  “Your Talent is stronger than his.” Tel was nothing if not fiercely partisan.

  “It is,” she agreed. “But this isn’t about strength. Luca’s been examining people for forty years or more, longer than both of us together have been alive. He knows tricks I don’t know.”

  “Like this block thing?”

  “Like this block thing.”

  Frowning, Ker studied Barid’s face. He’d grown a beard, and there were lines and shadows she’d never seen before. On impulse, Ker used her own aura to brush the dusting of silver sleep away from him. She stood back as her friend rolled to a sitting position, rubbing his face with his hands. She would never have known him with the beard, she thought. He lowered his hands and looked up, blinking in the light of Tel’s glow stone. His lips parted, and his brow furrowed.

  “Kerida?” He rose to his feet, his arms reaching out for her, but Tel’s quick movement put a sword between them. Barid looked at Tel and back at Ker, licking his lips.

  “You’re safe,” she said. “It’s all right. This is my friend, Tel Cursar, of the Bear Wing. We’re in a safe place.”

  “Safe.” Barid sank down on the sleeping bench as though his legs wouldn’t hold him up.

  “Why weren’t you killed with the others at Questin?” Tel’s tone was too sharp for Ker’s liking, but the question had to be asked.

  Barid licked his lips, stiff defiance in his face. Ker had seen the same look on the faces of children about to cry. “I’m not proud of myself.” He focused on Kerida. “I know I should have done something to stop them, to help, but I couldn’t think . . . I was up in the north tower, checking on the stored onions, when I saw the Halians approaching from the west. I knew right away—they couldn’t be anyone else. We’d been in the gardens digging, we weren’t—I, I wasn’t in uniform like the rest of you. I snuck out the gate at the foot of the tower and ran. I thought I’d get help—” Barid looked down, licking his lips. “They found me on the road at nightfall. I played stupid. How did you. . . ?”

  “I ran, too,” Ker said. “I was in the kitchen cellars when the Halians came, and—I took a horse and ran.” She took a deep breath. “I’m not proud of myself either,” she said. “At least you were trying to get help.” Though she had no intention of saying it aloud, she still had moments when she woke shaking in the night, her dreams full of flame and the bright blade of a falling ax. “But the truth is that neither of us could have helped anyone. By doing what we did, we’re both alive now to help others.”

  Barid nodded again, lower lip in his teeth. “You’re right. I know you are. That’s what I’ve been telling myself.”

  “Never mind that.” Tel was crisp. “How did you happen to be with the Halians in the pass?”

  “There was a Shekayrin—”

  “What School?” Tel interrupted.

  “You know about the Schools? He’s a Rose. Anyway, when he examined me with his jewel, I managed to keep him from seeing I was a witch.” He looked at them, eyebrows raised, and they nodded. They knew the Halians called Talents witches. “Not that they believe men can be Talents. I told them I’d been a clerk in the Forsten’s Holding, and this Shekayrin, Hantor Kvent, thought he might use me that way.” Barid grunted. “He needed someone who could read and write Faraman.”

  “So, you’re a Shekayrin’s clerk?” Tel’s voice was hard, and who could blame him?

  “Why? What would you have done?” Barid’s voice was as hard as Tel’s or harder.

  The two men glared at each other. Then the thin line of Tel Cursar’s mouth softened. “The same as you, I hope,” he said. “Stayed alive to fight another day.” The tension left the room. “But there wasn’t a Shekayrin in the pass with you.”

  “I hope you kept a lookout, because he’s less than a day behind me. Although . . .” Barid grew thoughtful. “It might be better to let him through, if he doesn’t know we’ve been captured—”

  “We are holding the pass against the Halians,” Tel said. He turned to the door. “Anton? Let the Faro know we expect a Shekayrin coming through the pass. She should send a set of Feelers.” The younger guard saluted and took off at a run. It took a at least three Feelers to counteract a single Halian mage. Though their magic came from different sources—at least according to their auras—mages and Feelers had similar Gifts. The problem was, mages had all of them, while for Feelers it was “one Feeler, one Gift.”

  Ker pressed her lips tight. Though everything in her told her they could trust Barid, not everyone found it easy to accept that Feelers did exist, that they weren’t just bogeymen from children’s stories. As it was, not even everyone in the Bear Wing knew who their new Auxiliaries were. But that hadn’t been the part of Tel’s instructions that caught Barid’s ear.

  “I’m sorry, did you say, ‘the Faro’?”

  “Juria Sweetwater, Faro of Bears,” Tel said.

  “There’s a Faro in here?” For a moment Barid looked like he was going to giggle. “And with the Luqs dead, who gave Faro of Bears permission to enter the Serpents Teeth?”

  “Ruarel the Third is dead, but her cousin Jerek Brightwing is Luqs of Farama, Prince of Ma’lakai, and Faro of Eagles.”

  * * *

  • • •

  “But Barid’s a Talent; he’s needed. He could cut my work in half.” Leaving Tel behind to deal with the prisoners, Ker had gone directly to the small council chamber. Council members took it in turns to make themselves available to the community; today Ker found Ganni Lifter and Dersay Far-thinker sharing a quiet cup of mint tea. When they waved her to one of the empty seats, she took the stool that belonged to Hitterol Mind-healer and accepted her own cup of tea.

  “You won’t find that argument so very persuasive to many of us, my girl. It’s Talents that cast us off in the first place, made being a Feeler a death sentence.” Ganni was Ker’s oldest friend among the Feelers, oldest in both senses of the word.

  “We’ve been hearing stories of evil Talents our whole lives.” Dersay was one of those who, until very recently, had never been outside of the mines. Even now she was edging closer to Ganni, though she’d known Ker for months.

  “But I’m a Talent, Luca Pa’narion’s a Talent. And Barid’s my friend.” She hadn’t meant to say that, but if it would help . . .

  Ganni exchanged a look with Dersay that made Ker squeeze her eyes shut in exasperation.

  “You’re not just a Talent to us,” Dersay pointed out. “You’re Kerida Griffin Girl, part of the Prophecy.” She began to recite, and Ganni joined her on the last line. “‘Hear the runner in the darkness, eyes of color and light, speaks to the wings of the sky. Speaks to griffins.’”

  “You’re the runner, you know that, girl.” Ganni spread his hands.

  Ker blew out a breath. “And Luca? You can’t tell me he’s part of any Prophecy.”

  “But he’d be one of the Guardians, wouldn’t he, then?” Ganni pointed out. “One of them as stood against the laws of the Talents.”

  “Part of the old stories.” Dersay nodded. “The brave rebel Talents who rescued the Feelers of old and helped us hide away.”

  “But Barid is a Guardian.” Ker leaned forward, set down her empty cup. “At least, he would have been. Luca chose him for that while Barid was still in Questin Hall.”

  Ganni paused, frowning, as though weighing his next words before he spoke. Finally, he sighed and shook his head. “Kerry, my girl, there’s no
point in making a rule and then breaking it the first chance that comes.”

  Ker closed her mouth. Ganni was right, and she knew it. There were procedures in place to manage all those “rescued” from the pass, to introduce them gradually into the general population of the Mines and Tunnels, exposed to the presence of Feelers slowly, and watched for signs of trouble. Feelers had been persecuted for too long to be comfortable with anything less.

  Ker stopped drumming her fingers on the tabletop and stood up. “I’ll let him know.”

  Tel and Barid were waiting in the corridor just outside of the room where she’d examined him. As soon as he saw her, Tel straightened up from where he’d been leaning, his arms folded across his chest. Barid stopped paying far too much attention to what was a very common section of the rock wall of the tunnel. It was obvious they hadn’t been speaking. She looked from one to the other. They weren’t at all similar—Tel so much taller, and thinner, with his pale eyes and sun-bleached hair, Barid bearded and dark—but right now they had the identical expressions on their faces.

  “Didn’t go well,” she said. Tel rolled his eyes and Barid looked away.

  “I can’t say I blame them, but it goes hard for me.” Barid paused before continuing in another tone of voice. “What about going to the Faro of Bears?”

  Ker shook her head. “She’s more adamant about the rule than the Feelers are.” Ker looked around as if she could see a different answer on the walls. “She won’t—maybe can’t—waive the rules for me, but there might be someone who would.”

  * * *

  • • •

  “I can’t believe you’re going to ask Jerek after the Feelers have said no.” Tel sat on the edge of the table in Ker’s tiny anteroom. It always looked smaller when he was in it.

  “He’s the Luqs.” Ker pulled on her right boot and stamped it into position. “First, he’ll listen to me. Second, no one’s told a Luqs of Farama he couldn’t do something since Jurianol united the Peninsula with the Eagle Wing behind her.”