Faestivul of Coming Cold – Dee Three of Five, 768 A.E.

  It had taken nearly a full Dee for Nishan to make all the preparations and inform Bedros, by means of a pair of letters from Anthea, what would be happening and when, and they still weren’t ready yet. It had been nerve-wracking for her to wait and offer her fate into someone else’s hands for so long. Sure, the enchantment had led her to Nishan, but trusting Bedros’ fate to someone else when she could not at least oversee what was going on was asking a for a tall order of trust.

  Sagira had noticed Anthea’s confidence flagging that morning as she’d sat in a secluded corner of their safehouse, which had proved to be little more than a basement room with a secure entrance and a second escape exit. The rafters were filled with cobwebs, and soot and dirt gathered in the corners. When people walked overhead, more dirt sifted through the cracks in the floorboards. Anthea and the others kept their voices low, and no one seemed to have the slightest idea of their presence in the hidden basement below.

  When Sagira finally worked up the courage to go speak to her, Anthea was inspecting what remained of her flower blossoms and other plant pieces – occasional nuts, leaves, and twigs from plants she’d hand grown herself.

  “You’re kind of like some of those.” Sagira remarked, leaning over Anthea’s collection and momentarily blocking a good portion of her limited light.

  Anthea cleared her throat in an annoyed manner. “Move, please. I can’t see.”

  “Don’t be short with me because you feel out of control.” Sagira said curtly, though she moved as she’d been asked. She settled down beside Anthea instead of blocking her light.

  Anthea took a breath to master herself, knowing that if she didn’t pause, she’d say something she regretted. Besides, Sagira was right. It wasn’t her she was irritated at. Rather, it was the situation. “What do you mean I’m like these?” She asked, changing the topic.

  “Your patience wilts and fades like the beauty of these flowers you’ve collected.” Sagira answered.

  Anthea grunted in irritation. That was not what she had expected at all. “Did you come here to bother me, or do you have some motherly advice?”

  “I prefer to think I’m more of a sister’s age to you but have it as you will. What I want to say, and I’m sure Makan would echo my words in his own fashion, is that you can’t do things halfway.”

  “What am I doing halfway?” Anthea demanded.

  Sagira sighed. “You can’t trust one moment and not the next. You convinced us that Nishan is what we need to do what we must, and now even your confidence is waning. He is the one, isn’t he? You said yourself that you were led to him or vice versa.”

  “He is.”

  “Then what more do you want?”

  “I want to be safely off this island. I want this to all be over. I’m tired of being hunted.” Anthea answered wearily.

  Sagira chortled. “How long have you been running?”

  “Five Waykes, maybe six.”

  “I was deathly ill once, for about that long.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “No, let me finish. I was sick, yes, but compared to that, this is an extended vacation.” At Anthea’s exasperated look, Sagira held up her hand. “I see you think otherwise but let me continue.” She waited for Anthea’s nod before she went on. “I oversaw a force of men who were supposed to clean Zaraig of pirates. We’d been harrying the ships of privateers and pirates who had been preying on our commercial ships. Now Zaraig has been a haven for undesirables for many Yarres, ever since we gave up trying to hold it as an Elegian province.”

  “That’s where we’re headed?” Anthea asked, decidedly not liking what she was hearing about their next destination.

  Sagira nodded. “Likely we will, yes. It was also an Aynglican holding for a while, and even the Muerans have tried to set up shop there, as it’s situated on a nice current and there are a lot of clams in the shallows around it. But the marshes on there have been expanding for many Yarres, and many of the old buildings and small towns that were there a hundred or two hundred Yarres ago have been swallowed up.”

  Anthea had stopped sorting through her silver box and was paying complete attention now, listening with her hands folding in her lap. Sagira didn’t look at her, instead staring into the dark corner as the memories came back to her as clearly as if the events in her mind had all happened yesterdee.

  “They’re called the Gnat Marshes because the bugs are so thick in the air that they turn everything a grayish-black color. They’re ripe with diseases too. My men and I cornered a large group of pirates on the island; they abandoned their vessels, which we captured and left a token force to guard them. And as per our orders, we began to pursue them into Zaraig’s interior.”

  “I take it not all went well?”

  Sagira sighed a rueful sigh. “Not in the least. The fleet admiral, who had landed us on the island, told us to give them chase and not come back until they were all dead or captured. We had a rough map a few scouts had penciled in that showed us the most recent camp the pirates had established.”

  “We headed into the island’s interior, and as the Dees passed and we followed what tracks there were to be found in a swamp, each of us began to succumb to ague. There were mosquitoes, black flies, gnats, leeches, venomous snakes, and all manners of creatures that the Gods must have put there to keep us out. Three of my men didn’t make it four Dees. By the time we came upon the pirate’s encampment, we were all too weak to launch an offensive, and the scouts had clearly been wrong.”

  “There were more of them than there should have been, weren’t there?”

  Sagira nodded. “Many more. They had all found some sort of medicines from plant leaves that kept them safe from the fevers and the shaking fits. Then they had established an encampment on a narrow channel they’d cut in from the coast. It was a hidden route to what was really a city. There were hundreds of them living there.”

  “And you were with how many men?” Anthea asked.

  “Sixty.”

  “Bad odds.”

  “Indeed, but we were trained soldiers, and they were just brigands and the families of brigands.” Sagira chewed on her knuckle and frowned as she thought of what had happened next. “I was under orders to attack, but I knew that was suicide. We might have had a chance if we weren’t all sick from the swamps, but as weakened as we were, I knew it would be for naught. Worse than that, I thought they were preparing to launch an attack on our fleet that sat along the coast entirely unaware of them.”

  “So, what did you do?”

  “I disobeyed the orders and turned my men around… sort of. I let my subcaptain take them back the way we’d came, and I took one volunteer and stole a rowboat that night, which we took up channel to meet with the fleet and warn them.”

  “Things turned out alright?”

  “The subcaptain died in the Wayke it took my men to find their way back to the coast. She got lost, and many of the others succumbed to the illnesses that had overtaken them. Twenty-seven made it out alive. Five of those died within a Wayke of making it back to the ships.”

  “But you warned the ships at least?”

  Sagira nodded. “Yes, I did. I was told that I had abandoned my command and disobeyed orders and duty to attack, but the fleet admiral had the sense to use what I’d told her to her advantage. After all, she already had a scapegoat to blame for the men lost and the delays for success. We went up their channel under cover of fog and set upon their village with a full force of men. Seeing as how I was the only commander that had seen the village, I was made to lead the forces in the attack; the fact that I was feverish and sick was immaterial. Men, women, children, elderly or sick, it just didn’t matter. We left no one alive that we could find, though I know some must have escaped into the swamps.”

  “That’s horrible.”

  “Anthea, that’s just my point. This waiting, it’s not that bad. No one is dying. We’re all still alive, even if it’s not what we could be doing. All of this, it might not be living as many may define it, but we are alive. This Dee will pass, and with it our task is that much closer to being finish, and then we can go back to our lives.” Sagira said hopefully.

  “I see.” Anthea replied, nodding.

  “Do you?” Sagira asked, wanting to be clear on this point. “Do you know that each of us you’ve chosen would do what they must for you? I’m not sure if it’s the Gods or your enchantment, but you’ve drawn us all to your cause, whatever it might become. I’ll be beside you even if we go to Zaraig, though I had promised myself never to return there.”

  “That doesn’t mean that I won’t worry.” Anthea said quietly, fiddling with the petals of a violet.

  Sagira laughed, but it was a laugh of bitter understanding. “Anthea, if I had ever shown worry when I was on Zaraig, my men would have bolted. I was all that was holding them together. You’re our commander here. You need to be strong like iron on the outside, even if your insides quake. All of us, we don’t know what you’re doing or where you’re going. We can only follow your lead, and when you falter we all do.”

  “I’m not perfect though.” Anthea whispered, her eyes pleading for understanding.

  “I know you’re not, just like I wasn’t. Yet you must trust those who have been given to you to help you in your task. Like an army or the crew of a ship, you have to be able to trust each person in that team to do their part, because the moment you start trying to make sure you’ve got that other person covered in case they fail, that’s the moment that you forget to do your own job or mess up.”

  Anthea licked her lips nervously, not liking the severity of what she was hearing; yet at the same time it was comforting to know. “So, I lead the way, and Bedros, Makan, Rolf, Nishan, and you will all get me there? You will be my legs when I cannot walk, my eyes when I cannot see, and my arms when I cannot fight, just so long as I keep my heart and mind focused on the goal?”

  “Yes.”

  “Truly?” Anthea asked, her heart swelling at hearing such a bold promise of loyalty and dedication.

  “Yes. I have seen it in Makan’s eyes, and I know Bedros would die for you. Nishan is new to our party, but I sense a similar devotion in him already.”

  “Rolf?”

  “He’s lost right now. His heart is torn between his family and his duties to you. Despite him being pigheaded and foolish, I think he will come around.” Sagira answered.

  Anthea smiled slightly, gladdened to hear that someone else felt as she did about the wayward boy. “I feel the same way. I know I did not choose wrong.”

  “Then never let him hear doubt in your voice or see it in your eyes, because he more than any of us needs you to be what he cannot be – sure of things.”

  “You make him sound so adrift and listless.”

  “Men, especially in a culture like his, need to find themselves.” Sagira explained. “These are delicate Yarres for him. He may grow into a solid, dependable man like Makan, or he may become a faithless scoundrel. Only time will tell.”

  “Maybe this is his test in life then.” Anthea replied. “Maybe these things we do will define who he is as a person.”

  “It’s quite likely. We always have growing and changing to do. When we stop growing and learning and experiencing new things, we’re dead. I have been living in the past for too long – a fault of many Elegians – and your appearance jarred me out of that mire. I’m living a new life now. We’re going forward and even if we don’t know where the world will never be the same – for us if not as a whole.”

  “Even a landslide must start with a pebble.” Anthea commented distantly.

  “Profound. Who said it? Makan?”

  “My father.” She replied, and there was a strong touch of nostalgic pride in her voice.

  “Then he knows more of life than I, for I have never said anything so wise. Gods willing you will see him again.”

  “Gods willing.” Anthea echoed, turning back to her blossoms now, feeling that the conversation was at an end.

  Sagira rose a few moments later, giving no goodbye or parting excuse. She simply went away, leaving Anthea to what she had been doing. Anthea found as she finished packing away the last of her flowers, that Sagira’s words had lifted a weight off her heart. Her purpose was no clearer, but her heart was.

  Nishan ducked his head back in through the hatch that led into the alleyway that was their safehouse’s extra exit. With a flash of his bronzed skin, he waved them up into the alley. Anthea went first, holding her hand up so that he could pull her up past the last long step, which was nearly a Mayter tall. Sagira came next, taking his hand without reservation, as did Makan when it was his turn. He had a bit more trouble though, as his wounded leg had stiffened up after a Dee in hiding with little opportunity to stretch it.

  It was night out and that made Anthea shiver – from the lack of light, not the cold, since Cenalium was rather chilly. Her head was already aching from the dim basement and her bowels felt watery. The others either didn’t notice or didn’t pay attention to her discomfort. Likely it was the latter, since there was nothing, they could do until they were all safely out of Rummas and onto a ship anyway. The quicker they finished their task the quicker she could get back into the light.

  As they crept through the alleyways, stepping over drunks and skirting around alleyways where whores and thieves plied their trades, Anthea’s hands were in the pockets of her cloak. In her pockets she held a pair of delicate blossoms in her hands, one in each pocket. They were the ones she’d chosen to be the mostly likely to be of help if they ran into trouble. She doubted that this time she’d have a chance to paw through all her flowers for the ones she needed if they ran into Peacekeepers or bounty hunters, so she had these two at the ready.

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  They’d all donned dark clothing more suitable for alley creeping, gifts from Nishan. Part of Anthea missed her old clothing, which had become rather unsightly with its nicks, tears, and other flaws caused by overuse during the last Munth. Her clothing had been one of the few ties she had still had to her home, and now that was gone, discarded into a refuse heap somewhere. Makan had kept his Mueran seaskins, but they had been in a much better state of repair than her Aurean clothes had been. Sagira had discarded her Elegian garb and her dirty poncho rather readily in favor of the clean clothes.

  “Skulking around here makes me feel dirty.” Sagira whispered.

  “I resent that.” Nishan called back jokingly.

  “Do what you must and do it quietly.” Makan remarked in irritation, poking his head past Nishan to see around a corner to see if the way was clear. He’d insisted on being told the general path they would be taking – subject to change if the need arose – in case they were separated.

  “You’re right.” Nishan agreed, signaling with his hand that they were to go right.

  Going right surprised Anthea, since it led right into a crowd of celebrants. The smell of smoky fires of meat on spits and the cacophony of entertainers, laughter, music, and shouting drifted down to them like a veritable wall of welcoming. Already the colors of costumes were fading from the colors of harvest into the colors of winter, a process that would end in just a few more Dees. By the fifth Dee of the Faestivul, everyone would be wearing white, blue, silver, or grey.

  Anthea looked at Nishan in surprise. He smiled and nodded to her that it was going to be all right, and then he took her arm and strode forward with his hood pushed back. Makan did likewise with Sagira, as if the four of them were merely two couples, together intent on celebrating. And even if they noticed the age differences in the couples, in Rummas that was not something to bat an eye at. If you were rich enough you could have whomever you wanted as a mate.

  That was the plan. With their overly plain garb, they would seem like nothing more than rich folks trying to ‘poor’ themselves down to fit in with the masses. It was an obvious fa?ade that anyone who bothered to look would see through, but in Rummas the rich had enough power that they were not hassled. The upper class had ways to make people that bothered them disappear, even if that person were a Peacekeeper.

  Walking into a pack of people, any of who might be seeking to capture them, on Nishan’s arm was a heady experience. Her heart thrummed wildly, and her pulse vibrated excitedly in her neck. From the sideways glance Nishan cast at her, his handsome, brownish gold eyes framed by his dark brows, she could tell that he must be hearing her pulse. His jaw clenched in time with it, and his footsteps seemed to take their rhythm from her heart. Each foot was precisely placed and they walked in unison, as if they were one creature.

  At one point as they traversed the crowd, Anthea threw back her head and laughed. She’d never felt so alive and so daring. They were taunting the enemy to take notice of them, and even then, she was sure that Nishan would keep her safe. For a long moment she wondered what it would be like to live every Dee beside this man who made her feel so strongly alive, but then they were free of the crowd. They moved away from the celebrants and into a dark cul-de-sac formed by a series of apartment buildings and a broad carriage house.

  Shadows shifted in the darkness, two of which moved forward to meet them. Faces could not be seen, but low undistinguishable syllables were exchanged when Nishan went forward to meet them. The two figures melted into the night when all the necessary words had been said, and Nishan returned to the three of them.

  “What is it?” Makan asked.

  “They have readied the path to Bedros, and they are going to draw the Peacekeepers away from our route.” Nishan answered.

  “So all is going according to plan?” Sagira asked, her dark-skinned face nothing more than a silhouette in the night.

  Nishan’s lips peeled back from his straight teeth into a clever smile. “For now, lady. For now, it is, but what Gandahar has in store for us though, only he knows.”

  “Let us hope he favors us this night then.” Makan said, bowing his head for a moment of obeisance and reverence for the God of Fortune and Chance. Gandahar might not have been one of the favorite Gods of the Muerans as he was for the Rumani, but his good favor was universally sought after.

  Nishan hurried into the carriage house then and drove out a wagon with a team of four horses hitched to it, which had been readied for them. In the bed of the wagon there were barrels and what would look to anyone else like a stack of crates covered with a tarp, when it was hollowed out to hide Bedros and Anthea.

  “Makan and Sagira will be out here with me. You and Bedros will be in the back. There are peepholes for you to watch from in case something goes amiss.”

  “This is as we discussed.” Anthea said with a nod, moving around to the side of the wagon to climb in. It was not the cleverest idea ever, but simple things often worked better than complex.

  Sagira and Makan helped her in and got her situated before they took their places. Sagira sat in the rear corner of the wagon bed, her head hung low to act as if she were tired from loading and unloading all Dee. Makan sat beside Nishan on the driver’s bench, with his fish spear under their feet on the footrest, easily accessible but out of sight. Many people had to work at least one Dee of the Faestivul, and they looked no different from them.

  Then, with a quick snap of the reins in his hands, Nishan maneuvered the wagon out of the cul-de-sac and down a relatively empty road. Finding any road completely deserted during a Faestivul was all but impossible, and if one tried too hard to avoid traffic it would be clear that they were up to no good. Again, they looked for safety in numbers.

  Anthea knelt there under the canvas. She held onto the false crates framed around her to steady herself as the iron springs, that served to minimize the jarring of the iron-shod wagon wheels over the uneven cobbles, shook her until her teeth chattered. They rolled to a stop once, and even though she could see nothing from her peephole, she thought that they’d either been found out or they’d arrived to pick up Bedros. Saycunds later though, Nishan called out a greeting and another wagon rolled past them, presumably going down a street perpendicular to them from the way their noise grew from their left side and then faded to the right. Then they were rolling once more, and the next time they stopped the tarp was lifted to permit Bedros entry.

  He crawled into his hiding place and hugged her so fiercely that she thought her bones would snap. It was dark and she couldn’t see, but she felt his warm muzzle on her face as he sniffed her to make sure, she was all right. Ox-Men relied heavily on their sense of smell after all, so she bore the familiar action patiently where others unused to an Ox-Man may have been disgusted. Despite what she might sometimes classify as smothering protectiveness, Anthea found herself equally happy to be reunited with him. Her hands clutched onto handfuls of his shoulder fur as they huddled together under the tarp, albeit with him in a reclined position due to his size. She didn’t need light to sense the pain he moved with or to find the cuts and welts under his fur, some of which were still matted with dried blood.

  “You’ve gone and hurt yourself.” She whispered to him, blinking away tears that threatened.

  He grunted as if it were of no consequence now that they were back together, and that made her hug him all that much tighter.

  The next stop was supposed to be their last as far as she understood, so when they rolled to a halt one more time, she yawned and stretched her arms, ready to get out of the darkness that was making her head spin. She had dozed off beside Bedros, an old habit by now, and the cessation of the constant jarring of the wagon hitting bumps had woken her up. If she’d stopped to think about it, she’d have found it strange or even funny that such an uncomfortable thing as the rough ride could lull her to sleep.

  Bedros huffed uneasily, his large nose taking a whiff of the air. That was her first hint that something was wrong. The second hint came when she heard voices, first from the front of the wagon and then from the sides.

  “We’ve got a bill of lading. These goods are meant for the Seacrest, under Captain Keagan out of Lesser Aynglica. We’ve deadlines to meet, Faestivul or no,” Nishan called out to someone Anthea couldn’t see from the peepholes, though whether that was an actual ship name and an actual captain, Anthea didn’t know. “And if you understand my meaning, I’d like to be finished with this drollery to get back to my lady friend.”

  “I’m sure you do.” A Rumani-accented voice called back. “You have the resources to get what you want, don’t you? I don’t imagine it would be hard for a man like you to get a false bill of lading if you needed one.”

  “Sir, I assure you, all proper measures have been followed.”

  “This is Rummas, Nishan. Proper measures are never followed.”

  “Well, I’ve followed them as closely as anyone does.” Nishan said with an understanding laugh. “I’m not perfect.”

  Footsteps grew closer to the wagon’s sides, and Anthea’s hands slipped once more into her pockets, where they found the velvety petals of blossoms awaiting them even if the blossoms had been crushed a bit. Bedros’ heavy hands creaked as his knuckles tightened around his heavy mallet’s haft. Anthea closed her eyes for a moment and gritted her teeth, begging the powers that be that it would not come to bloodshed once more. Yet in the darkness, she couldn’t help but think that Kaneitha would love to see harm come to one of Maletos’ children.

  “Nishan,” The man beyond the wagon said with a sigh, “normally I wouldn’t do this, as we go a long way back, but the people telling me to search everything bound out of Rummas can’t be ignored.”

  “Must be someone important.” Nishan wondered aloud.

  “The most.” The voice said reassuringly. “You know how it is.”

  “I do.”

  “Then you’ll step down from that wagon and surrender your arms real polite like, eh? I know you’re quick with those weird Mueran knives of yours, and I wouldn’t want you slipping and putting them into one of my men on accident. There’s no telling what might happen if such a thing were to occur. I couldn’t guarantee the safety of you or your cargo.” The voice said, saying the last word with enough emphasis to let everyone hear that he didn’t believe Nishan was transporting anything but contraband.

  “I will. Just take it easy on my cargo. You know how it is. If an Aynglican finds one jar of this or that spice missing or one knick in his precious pottery, he starts acting like a shrewish wife whose just found her husband with a prettier girl.” Nishan announced, earning a few laughs from the men who surrounded the wagon, likely all Rumani or at least not Aynglican.

  Bedros’ ears flicked to and fro, and Anthea realized that the entire point of the joke had been to give Anthea and Bedros an idea of how many men there were and where they were located. Bedros’ breathing quickened as he tensed his sore muscles and readied for action.

  The wagon shook a little as the three apparent passengers stepped down from the wagon in turn, each moving slowly and deliberately, as to not give them any reason to start swinging weapons at them or open fire. The prospect of facing rifles and hand pistols made her headache even more and her legs shook anxiously. Any feeling of strength faded from her body as her mind conjured up images of Bedros being perforated by heavy lead shot as he struggled to kill those who would harm her.

  Her blood ran cold as she heard hands grabbing for the ties that held the canvas down. One of Bedros’ rough hands brushed her cheek. It felt too much like goodbye to her; her throat seized up like she was going to vomit, and tears came unchecked to her eyes.

  With a rumble in his chest that grew to a powerful noise, that seemed like it belonged more in the heart of a giant predatory cat than in an Ox-Man who gently held her while she slept, Bedros rose. The ties had been undone and so the canvas was slack around him as he rose to his full height of nearly three Mayters. The team of horses whinnied uneasily, but the brakes had been set.

  Uneasy murmurs rose from around the wagon, and with a harsh cry of anger and despair, Bedros leapt from the wagon with the canvas still about his shoulders. It slipped away from his arms like a snake shedding skin as he hurtled from the wagon. His mallet crashed down like a thunderbolt, smiting one of the Peacekeepers where he stood. His nose and ears had told him exactly where the man had been standing, even if his eyes had not seen his target because of the tarp. With a twist of his arms and torso, the mallet came up once more, swinging up and to the side to behead a man or near to it as the man’s head was crushed like a ripe melon.

  A shot rang out in the night, and a spurt of crimson arced from a hole that had just opened in Bedros’ shoulder. Anthea had seen it through the gaps in the crates, which were now uncovered. She shrieked, for this was the start of what she’d seen in her mind just moments before. Had it been a sign of the enchantment? Had it foretold the death of her first companion? Had everything she’d done just led inexorably to the deaths of her friends?

  The noise of the hand pistol spurred everyone into moving at once, as if they’d been waiting for the starting signal of a race. More shots echoed out between the buildings, some coming from alleyways, and from the noise and the clatter of weapons against each other, Anthea didn’t need to rise out of her hiding place any more than she was to know that Makan, Sagira, and Nishan had begun to fight.

  She knew firsthand how handy Nishan and Makan could be with their weapons, and she supposed that Sagira was quite able as well since she had been a soldier, but Makan was injured and they were greatly outnumbered. There was only so much they could do.

  Around her were the grunts and screams of men dying, and as she pulled the pair of blossoms from her pockets, she wondered if this had been what Sagira had felt in Zaraig. Already some of her men might have died, and she felt like she could just die on the spot. She wanted this to all be over, and she never wanted to have to put another person at risk again. Her mouth tasted like vomit and her eyes and nose wouldn’t stop running, but this was just the start of things.

  Slugs began chipping away at the crates around her, and she felt a sting in the side of her head. She toppled over onto her side from her kneeling position, a blossom in each of her hands. Warmth trickled down around her ear and forehead. Yet as she lay there oblivious to what else that was occurring around her, she saw someone shooting Kerathi long rifles from a second story window.

  “Rolf shot me? This is how it ends? With betrayal?” She whispered, wondering why dying was taking so long.

  Another shot erupted from the muzzle of the long rifle, but it did not strike her as she suspected. Instead, it struck someone near the foot of the wagon, who died with a scream escaping his mouth. With a whimper, she brushed the left side of her head above her ear with the backside of her hand, where it was damp and sticky with blood. The idea that she was merely grazed occurred to her as well as the fact that she had not been shot by whomever was using the Kerathi long rifles. After those world-shaking revelations, her eyes widened with the realization that she was still laying there fretting about a flesh wound while her friends were likely dying.

  She didn’t get up because that would just expose her to more gunfire. Instead, she held up her left hand in front of her eyes to expose the purplish group of bell-shaped heather blossoms next to the unfolded pink, white, and red petals of the lotus blossom she held in her right hand.

  Her mind blanked and she thought of what she wanted and needed now. The words came to her, and she could not be distracted, even as she saw a man climbing into the wagon and she distantly heard the distraught and pained cries of Bedros and maybe of Makan as well. No, the gunfire was a cadence that seemed to order her thoughts instead of scattering them. She smiled briefly as she saw the Rumani man regard her curiously as the sounds emptied out of her throat punctuated by a twin flashes of light that seemed to be her eyes bursting into fire, for the blossoms were so close to her face.

  Heather of mountain fields,

  We have enemies who must yield;

  Take them away and leave them no memories of us,

  Forget all they have seen that they might discuss;

  Blossom of mysteries, Lotus of colors three,

  Heal that which has been torn,

  Clear the way to the shore.

  Blossoms two, I bid these things of you.

  A roar filled her ears then, and the square began to glow with heavy strands of light as if sunshine had been spun into yarn and cast carelessly about that city block. She laughed as fluid gurgled in the back of her throat and blood seemed to flow from her eyes and ears. The man who had stood at the foot of the wagon, looming over her faded from sight.

  A crack of sound rumbled through her body like the wrinkles being shook out of a linen bed sheet. With a cry that materialized only as a croak in the back of her throat, she sagged back against the floorboards of the wagon and the light faded from the square.

  Her last lucid thought was that somehow the twinkling white and blue lights that were the only things she could see were fitting during the Faestivul. Perhaps it was even Yenis come to say hello. Wouldn’t that be nice?

  Saycunds, maybe Mynettes or Ouers later, she heard faint whispers, and while she knew her eyes were open and her ears were unplugged, she could not see and she could hardly hear. The voices seemed to be familiar, though they were hardly more than whispers.

  “What did she do?” One asked.

  “Her hands and eyelids are burnt. How?” Another asked.

  “I don’t know. I just don’t. We must move her though.”

  “Into the front cabin?”

  Cabin? Was she in a boat? She’d been in a wagon before. That much she recalled.

  “I don’t think she can see or hear us. She’s been unresponsive.”

  “I think she overdid it again. If it’s like before, she’ll recover in time. We just must keep her in the light.”

  “What if she doesn’t?” A worried voice asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “What happened to those Peacekeepers?”

  The voices continued to move around her. None of them were distinguishable, but there was certainly more than just one voice. They must have been her friends, but she couldn’t seem to draw out their names or a memory of their faces from the fog that she lived in now.

  “I don’t know. They were just gone one moment, along with our wounds.”

  “Bedros would have died.”

  Bedros! That was one of them. He was an Ox-Man.

  “As would have I.” One of the voices replied.

  “So this was the alternative that she saw?”

  “Sometimes you just aren’t given the gift of having choices. She did what she thought best. Gods willing, she will recover. I know I will be praying to all of them tonight and every night until she is better, Maletos especially.”

  Then the voices receded. She wasn’t sure if they went away or if her hearing faded more. She tried to lick her lips, but she couldn’t feel her body. Was she being punished? Was what she’d done somehow contrary to the life and purpose of a Thaumaturge? Had the mixing of the two blossoms’ powers been too much for her?

  There were so many questions that no one could answer for her, and now it seemed there was a chance she’d not need her questions answered anyway. She drifted back into the fog of her mind, and she considered all that she could remember, which was very little except where the flowers were concerned. Yes, she could remember the flowers, and that haunting face among a sea of Aurean faces she had seen when searching somewhere with the flowers, she just couldn’t remember who she’d searched for, why, or where she’d searched.