Of Truth and Beasts

EPILOGUE

Wynn sat in an intersection alcove, deep in the guild’s catacombs, while Shade lay on the floor, watching her. Upon the night of her return, she’d sought out Domin High-Tower to give proper notice that she was back. She preferred to deal with him rather than Premin Sykion, but her effort hadn’t mattered.

The impassive way that High-Tower looked at her suggested he already knew. Some word must have reached him, and he’d merely dismissed her to her quarters. He hadn’t even told her to remain on grounds; he didn’t have to.

So much had happened over the course of a single winter.

Wynn had watched helplessly as her guild began to curl up on itself, one faction or branch turning against the others in distrust, suspicion, and secrecy. The Fay had come for her again, manifested in anguish and anger like some avatar of a divine force called by a wild priestess. In dead Bäalâle Seatt, the forgotten gí’uyllæ—the all-eaters, the dragons—whose generations went back to the first animate life that had walked in Existence, were found guarding a weapon and waiting for the blood of Deep-Root to come.

And in one desperate moment, Wynn had bent Chane to her will by his love for her.

In that, she’d revealed that she knew how he felt, though she couldn’t even consider how she felt about him. That was too much, yet too little a thing, in the face of everything else.

The light of a cold lamp exposed one open book upon the table before Wynn, and the sun crystal staff leaned beside her. Chane’s scroll lay nearby, as did her new journal of short, cryptic entries in convoluted Begaine symbols. This single, brief journal was all that she needed now that she had Shade.

The old journals that she’d burned weren’t truly gone. What they’d contained was now even farther beyond anyone’s reach than ashes. On the nights she’d sat alone with only Shade, preparing scant, cryptic notes in the new journal, she’d silently read every line in the old journals, over and over, until ...

Shade had echoed back every word.

Shade might never speak with Wynn as Chap had done, but Shade could do one thing perhaps even better than her father. Along with any memory Wynn recalled, once Shade understood something, she remembered it—perfectly.

What better place to hide secrets than with the one who would never forget the smallest detail? Who better to secure knowledge than such a companion, a majay-hì from whom no one could forcefully take it?

Shade understood why this was necessary. Perhaps she would finally come to understand the risks Wynn had taken—would continue to take.

A whining rumble made Wynn stiffen on her stool, and she looked up.

Shade stood before the alcove opening leading back toward the stairs up to the guild. She’d been fidgeting more and more as the night grew later.

“Stop!” Wynn said. “There’s no one else down here ... and I already took you outside after dinner.”

Just like with Shade’s father, Wynn sometimes slipped up when frustrated or exhausted. She forgot the powerful spirit and unique intelligence hidden in the guise of a young animal.

Others saw them as majay-hì, mere mythical beasts of awe. Even most Lhoin’na, who regarded them as sentient and free-willed, treasured them with too much reverence to understand them as individuals.

Wynn knew better, which added a spike of guilt to her burdens.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, expecting a petulant retort in broken memory-words.

But Shade merely returned to Wynn, not even grumbling. With a sigh, Wynn propped her elbows on the table and dropped her forehead into her palms.

Three of the five orbs were still missing, and what had finding the second one truly accomplished? Chane had kept it from Sau’ilahk, but still, Wynn knew next to nothing of the orbs’ creation or purpose other than that the one now with Ore-Locks had been used somehow in an attempt to breach Bäalâle Seatt. But how else were they used?

Wynn had little to go on except for Magiere’s mistake with the first one, the orb of Water, when she’d blindly opened it in the cavern below the ice-bound castle. Did Magiere have the only way to open an orb, with that tool she’d been given?

The tool might look something like a dwarven thôrkh, but it wasn’t one. So what good was it, if all it did was unleash an orb’s effect without control? What purpose, if any, might there be in finding all of the orbs, beyond keeping them from falling into the hands of the Ancient Enemy?

More lies and deceits weighed Wynn down, more suffering for others because of it, and one more secret.

That last one, which held no discernable bearing upon any greater questions, was something she dared not tell to anyone, most especially Ore-Locks. It made her sick inside after what she’d already done to him—forbidding him from clearing Deep-Root’s name. Only Shade knew this additional secret by now, but Wynn couldn’t stop thinking about it.

One phrase she’d seen clawed into that cave wall had made her falter twice.

May only my brother ...

She looked down at the open book: an original lexicon of dwarven root words, compiled over centuries from archaeological recoveries. An abridged copy was available in the upper library. But what she sought here in the original wasn’t a confirmation of what she knew. Rather, she’d hoped it would prove her wrong and free her from another burden. Even when she’d asked Master Tärpodious where to find it, she had known it wouldn’t let her escape the truth or her deceit.

Beneath Bäalâle, she’d heard an ancient name. It had come as the dragon recited Deep-Root’s last words, damning himself to eternal death. That name had filled her head in every language she knew, by whatever translation she would’ve given it at first. She hadn’t grasped the ancient Dwarvish until she’d focused on the Numanese that came with it. It had choked off her voice.

May only my brother, Softly-Spoken, remember me....

Why the orb’s guardians hadn’t forced her to repeat it only confirmed why she hadn’t. Perhaps they’d known what she feared, should Ore-Locks hear it.

Wynn glanced at the last set of cryptic Begaine symbols in her new journal. The strokes were so tangled, so truncated that only she would be reminded of what they meant.

Bhedhägkangâva ... Softly-Spoken.

If Ore-Locks had heard it in the Numanese she’d spoken, perhaps he wouldn’t have caught the hidden connection. As a cathologer steeped in language, Wynn had missed it only for an instant. Pronunciation changes in the Dwarvish root words hadn’t hidden it from her. And suffixes, prefixes, and alterations for creating verbs, nouns, adjectives, and adverbs had remained mostly stable over a thousand years.

Bhethäg was an adverb in the vocative for a proper name. Its root had to be something like vetheg. It was listed so in the lexicon.

Vetheg, vedhegh; see vedzagh in contemporary usage.

Its most accurate translation in Numanese was “softly,” but the more literal, if less meaningful, might’ve been “featherly.” Vedzagh—vetheg—was the root for “feather.”

Kangâva had been less clear, but she’d worked it out. The vocative of a past-tense verb, its root was something like changa or changasa.

Changasa, changaksa, chenghak; see chenghaksé in contemporary usage.

“Spoken” was the precise meaning in Numanese, but the more literal would be “tongued.” The root chenghaksé—changasa—meant “tongue.”

The name of Bhedhägkangâva—Softly-Spoken—would need to change only so slightly over so many centuries to ...

Bedzâ’kenge.

Feather-Tongue had been Deep-Root’s twin brother. The repercussions Wynn now hid with that name were overwhelming.

Ore-Locks had barely succumbed to her reasoning as to why he couldn’t speak of Deep-Root to anyone except Master Cinder-Shard. From the beginning, he’d been silently obsessed with one thing: to clear his ancestor’s forgotten name and restore his family’s heritage.

Wynn had denied him that right, to do what was right.

If he’d heard that brother’s name, desperation and a great heritage would’ve made him unstoppable. She’d seen fear, hatred, and revulsion evoked from Shirvêsh Mallet at her naive mention of Thallûhearag. Sliver and High-Tower were vehemently sickened by their elder brother’s passion for a long-dead ancestor that had called him into service among the Stonewalkers.

If Ore-Locks had proclaimed who Deep-Root was, what his ancestor had done and why, he would’ve been denounced by any who still remembered Thallûhearag. Without verifiable proof, at even a testament from Wynn, a mere “scribbler of words,” Ore-Locks would’ve turned to the name of Deep-Root’s brother as his last salvation.

What would happen if Ore-Locks publicly claimed that the forgotten worst of the Lhärgnæ, the Fallen Ones, was blood kin to a Bäynæ, an Eternal?

Feather-Tongue was revered as a paragon of knowledge and wisdom, but also for a cherished heritage. That meant everything to any dwarf with faith, as it did to Ore-Locks. Wynn had seen her own people let belief override reason to the point of denouncing fact ... or worse.

Ore-Locks would’ve been branded a heretic, at best. His family would’ve suffered more than they already had. And at the worst ...

Any head shirvêsh, even Mallet himself, could’ve incited righteous outrage. Neither Ore-Locks nor his family would’ve been safe—not even High-Tower. Any dwarven family, clan, or tribe coming after the domin would rouse the guild to his defense. And the royals would have used any means to defend the guild. They already had against Wynn’s efforts.

The people of Malourné and the dwarves of Dhredze Seatt had been neighbors, allies, even comrades for over four centuries. Those connections could not be destroyed simply because one stonewalker yearned to clear his family’s heritage by any means.

Wynn couldn’t face the chance that any of this might happen. She’d stolen Ore-Locks’s final hope of absolution and locked it away. She’d sacrificed his chance to be free of a hidden heritage to the Lord of the Slaughter.

Wynn had been raised, nurtured, trained to seek the truth for all to hear. Another choice like this crushed her down even more. Every muscle in her small body ached as if that growing weight were real. If anything more dropped upon her, she felt she might break. And there was more to come; she knew this.

Except for Shade, Wynn felt alone in this moment. There was no one far enough outside the guild for her to trust. There was no one here who knew enough and believed in what would come ... not even Chane.

Shade’s low rumble cut through Wynn’s growing anguish.

“All right, we’ll go,” she whispered.

Shade’s rumble grew to a snarl.

Wynn almost sighed. Was Chane coming? Maybe he hadn’t received her message—or he’d ignored it.

—not ... Chane—

Shade’s hackles stood on end. Her ears flattened as she bared her teeth and glared through the opening at the alcove’s rear.

Wynn snatched up the staff as she dug into her robe’s pocket for her glasses. Did she sense some other undead?

Shade suddenly twisted her head, looking to the opposite opening among the four ways into the alcove. Her head whipped twice both ways before she turned again toward the front opening.

—behind—

Wynn shoved on the glasses and ripped the sheath off the staff’s crystal. Shade’s snarl sharpened again as Wynn barely turned toward the rear arch, and she almost glanced back.

A dark form crept around the rear entrance’s left side.

Wynn thrust the staff out as shapes and phrases for its ignition raced through her mind.

The sun crystal ignited.

“My eyes!”

That strange cry came the instant that Wynn’s glasses blackened. She couldn’t see anything except the sun crystal’s dimmed point of light.

“Put that thing out!”

Wynn spun at the snarling command behind her, but still held the sun crystal toward the first intruder. The glasses began to adjust.

Beyond Shade’s tense form, Wynn barely made out a tall figure outside the other alcove arch. It was dressed in a heavy cloak, with one gloved hand held up to shield its face within the cloak’s hood. Beside it stood the shape of a huge canine.

Shade wasn’t snarling anymore.

That is enough, little one. It is all right now.

Those strange multilingual words barely filled Wynn’s head when a cry rose behind her.

“My eyes! Ah, seven hells, Wynn, you’ve blinded me!”

She spun back, staring at the first intruder, now standing in the alcove’s corner between two of its openings. This one had both gloved hands clamped over its face. Only then did it dawn on Wynn ...

Both intruders were speaking Belaskian.

Wynn instantly snuffed the sun crystal’s light, and only the cold lamp’s softer glow lit the dark alcove.

The figure before her was slight, tightly built, and obviously male. Beneath the cloak and the wool pullover, the collar of a leather hauberk protruded. There were unusual weapons lashed to his thighs. Around the gloved hands clamped over his eyes she thought she saw tendrils of white-blond hair.

Fright and guilt flooded Wynn at what she might’ve done. She dropped the staff across the table and rushed at him.

“Leesil?” she whispered, and grabbed at his hands, pulling them down.

There was his caramel-tinted face. Faint scars showed on his jawline, and those feathery eyebrows weren’t quite as slanted as a full-blooded elf. He opened his eyes, blinking several times.

Wynn was still panting in fright, and then ...

He winked at her with a sly grin. “You’re just too easy to play. You know that, don’t you?”

He was still blinking through a squint when Wynn sucked in a shocked breath. All the joy and relief at seeing him once more faded under fury at another of his stupid tricks.

“You ... you ...” she stuttered. “You ... bastard!”

She punched him straight in the chest.

Steel rings lashed on his armor beneath the pullover bit into Wynn’s knuckles. She snatched her hand back in a cringe of pain.

“Hey, what was that for?” he asked.

Looking into Leesil’s frowning face, Wynn lost any irritation he always sparked with a jest. She threw herself at him, knocking him into the alcove’s corner.

“Take it easy,” he warned. “You going to crack my head open on the wall now?”

She just held on to him.

“Wynn?” Leesil asked, but she couldn’t answer.

His hand slid across her back as he wrapped his arms around her in return. She was shaking when he clamped his hold tighter. She lifted her head and saw the concern in his slightly large amber eyes.

Wynn barely regained composure as she rose on her toes to kiss his cheek.

“What do you think you’re doing with my husband?”

That caustic jibe came from behind, and Wynn quickly turned her head.

There she was, nearly as pale as a corpse.

Magiere pushed back her hood, letting loose her black hair. The cold lamp’s dim light barely raised a shimmer of bloodred in those locks. Magiere closed on Wynn with a typical scowl, though she smiled, as well.

Wynn twisted away from Leesil and quickly reached out, grabbing the edge of Magiere’s cloak. With a sigh of burdens dropped for the moment, Wynn buried her face against her tall friend.

“What magic are you toying with this time?” Magiere asked, and the rumble in her chest hummed against Wynn’s cheek. “I’d have thought you’d have learned your lesson by now.”

With her friends’ arms around her, Wynn looked up to find Magiere glaring toward the staff lying across the table. Wynn wasn’t certain, but she thought she saw Magiere’s irises go pitch-black. Now they faded quickly to their normal rich brown.

“Where’s Chap?” Wynn asked as she peeked around Magiere.

Here.

She saw him as his answer filled her head. His silvery blue-gray fur shimmered in the low light. He stood outside the alcove archway, but he was looking down the outer passage. Why didn’t he come to her?

Wynn rushed over, dropping to her knees, and slipped her arms around Chap’s neck. Just before she buried her face in his fur, he whipped his whole tongue across her face.

“I missed you so much,” she whispered, and then suddenly remembered Shade.

Is that her ... my daughter? Is that what you call her?

Wynn lifted her head. Of course he hadn’t known. He’d been long gone from the Elven Territories before Lily had given birth to their children.

“Yes!” she answered, looking about and finally following Chap’s sightline. “I named her ... or she named herself ... after ...”

Wynn looked down the passage.

So little light leaked from the alcove that she barely made out Shade’s form, but that light sparkled in Shade’s eyes. Wynn heard Shade begin to growl.

Why would she do that? It was obvious these were friends, and especially with her father finally here.

“What ... who is that?”

Magiere stood behind Wynn in the alcove’s archway and was looking down the passage.

“One of Chap’s children—his daughter,” Wynn answered.

“What?” Leesil tucked into the archway next to Magiere.

Wynn looked at Chap. “You didn’t tell them? Why?”

In their separate ways, they are both fixed on those they consider family. It would have been another contention, another distraction from what had to be put before ourselves.

“How?” Leesil interrupted, unaware of anything passing between Chap and Wynn. “Who’s the mother?”

“The white majay-hì, I’d guess,” Magiere barely whispered.

It sounded almost sad to Wynn.

Leesil huffed, perhaps a half laugh. “Why, Chap, you ol’ dog, you.”

Instead of chiding him for crudeness, Magiere looked away.

“Shade?” Wynn called out.

Shade was barely more than a black shadow hunkering and growling in the dark. Those pinpricks of eyes vanished, and Wynn heard the click of claws on stone recede in the distance. She was about to call out when Chap interrupted.

Let her go. There is nothing here for her ... except you.

“Yes, there is,” Wynn returned. “You’re her father.”

No ... only the one who forced a purpose on her through her mother. That is all I am to her.

Wynn was confounded, much as she partly understood the problem. She didn’t ask him why he had done that, didn’t tell him he shouldn’t have. She couldn’t imagine being without Shade. But there was so much in her head that she had to let some of it out.

“What of the first orb?” she asked Chap, but it was Magiere who answered.

“First? How do you know of the other one?”

Wynn looked up into Magiere’s eyes. “There are five, but how would you know—”

“Five?” Leesil asked sharply.

Magiere stared down at Wynn and then turned away into the alcove.

Leesil ripped off his cloak and tossed it too hard toward the table. It slid off to the floor, but he left it there. He pushed his hands through his hair, almost covering his ears for an instant.

One sleeve of his wool pullover was raggedly torn off. Long, parallel scars ran along his forearm, like the marks of claws. Leesil had a tendency to gather scars, but Wynn had never seen these before. He shut his eyes hard.

Magiere glanced at him as she dropped onto the one stool at the table.

The orbs are safe. I have seen to that.

“Orbs?” Wynn echoed back at Chap. “You had one ... I found another.”

Chap turned his head to look at her, his ears falling for an instant.

“That leaves three,” she added.

No, if your count is correct, there are two left.

Chap gazed down the passage, though no one remained there to see.

Wynn was lost, uncertain what it all meant, but for one thing. Wherever her friends had gone to hide the first orb, they had uncovered another one.

Suddenly, she wanted to go over what little she had copied from Chane’s scroll and try to see which one they had found. And that thought made her turn.

Magiere glanced sidelong toward Leesil, as if she wouldn’t look directly at him. He had his back to her and remained so. Neither said a word, not even to each other. And there was something more.

Wynn began to panic as she watched Magiere sitting in cold silence.

Chane would soon return, and Magiere was here.

Wynn looked to Chap, wishing she could just be with him, be with all of them, and try to bring Shade back. But an awful question lingered around her, as if it hung out there in dark of the catacombs beyond the reach of the cold lamp’s light.

“What happened to you,” Wynn asked, “all of you ... in the Wastes?”

Though she waited, Chap didn’t answer—not yet.