Riders of the Storm

Interlude

ENRIS MENDOLAR STEPPED OVER A tiny stream ribboned in ice and asked himself, again, what he was doing here.

He gauged the dark, roiling clouds with a wary eye. The snow might be done; the storm wasn’t. He refused to look up the horrible cliff. The Yena were beyond comprehension. There was nothing wrong with flat, normal ground. A few more steps, that’s all.

More than a few, he admitted to himself. Keeping to the boundary between ridge and valley floor meant interminable detours around barriers Enris glumly realized wouldn’t bother the Yena at all, from young Ziba to elderly Husni.

Fine for them. He took his extra steps, glad to confine his climbing to walking over screes of shattered rock, his leaps to long strides over the odd stream. When he had to wade, he did, his good solid boots—the one item from home he’d managed to keep intact—providing ample protection.

Home. Enris sighed, reaching involuntarily to find Tuana’s place in the world and his own. Against his will, he was farther from home than ever in his life. Now he was moving away from the one goal he’d set himself.

What was he doing here?

It wasn’t the Yena Chooser. He felt nothing for Seru Parth, beyond sympathy for her situation. When she released it, her Call was faint, like the smell of yesterday’s sweetpies. He barely heard it in his mind; he doubted it could summon any unChosen across this waste.

He stopped, his head turned toward Vyna. That’s where he belonged. That’s where he’d start finding answers. His fingers curled around the memory of a cylinder. An Oud had brought the strange device to his father’s shop, demanded their help to discover its secrets. Enris was convinced the device was neither Oud nor Tikitik. It fit his Om’ray hand perfectly; it responded to his mental touch, revealing a store of voices and images.

He’d understood none of them. He had no idea how the device worked. All he knew? It was Om’ray, despite being a technology as far beyond those he knew as the workings of the strangers’ flying machine.

The device was still in the shop, unless Jorg, his father, had returned it to the Oud. At the thought, Enris felt himself break into a sweat despite the coolness of the wind. The unrestrained power of the Oud was evident here as nowhere else he’d seen. They’d reshaped the road, or rather the tunnels beneath the road, as well as the lower half of this valley. If it hadn’t been deliberate, then it was without heed to anything above. The result was the same. What had set them off, he didn’t know or care.

He wanted Tuana safe. He had to believe it was. He couldn’t breathe if he thought the device, what he’d done, might have aroused the Oud against his Clan.

What was he doing here?

Aryl Sarc.

Enris crouched to bring a palmful of icy mountain water to his lips, then another, savoring the taste. He shook the last drops from his hand as he straightened. Surrounded by rock, soil, and stray clumps of withered grass, where the only sound was the wind and his steps, he wasn’t alone, not if he reached for her thoughts. He didn’t have her Talent to identify an Om’ray at a distance, but he did have the strength to contact a known mind, especially a welcoming one.

Did she appreciate her own Power?

Did she think he was here because of it?

Was he?

“What I need,” he said aloud, “is someone to talk to who isn’t scampering over the mountainside like a—”

Crack!

Enris accepted Haxel’s teasing about his feet—hadn’t he teased his Yena friend Yuhas? But, though big, he wasn’t clumsy by Tuana standards. He’d stepped on something that didn’t belong.

A piece of broken wood protruded from the pebbles, worth more than the handfuls of grass he’d been dutifully collecting for tonight’s camp. He bent to retrieve it, delighted when it took all his strength to wiggle it free. “Good size…” the words turned into a whistle of surprise.

Not a stick.

His hand fit perfectly around what had been a carved and finished staff, almost half his height. The wood was dark red and unfamiliar, its polish scratched and dulled by exposure and the rocks of its bed. Enris put it aside and dug for the rest of it.

Not a staff.

The remaining piece was a blade, long as his forearm and fitted to its bit of shaft so securely the wood had snapped under his foot, not that junction to metal. Enris grinned with triumph as he examined his treasure. “Aren’t you the beauty?” The Oud’s metal, right enough, but reworked by someone with skill and patience into a most unusual shape. The wide, thin blade, once razor sharp along both outer edges, ended in a forked tip. One portion of the tip was longer than its mate; not a break but made that way. Impractical for harvesting any crop he knew. Dangerous, that was certain.

Under the dirt, he discerned a line of ornamentation along the flat of the blade. A spit and hard rub revealed nothing so simple. A series of small, intricate symbols marched in a tidy row, some close together, some apart. Unique in design; not beautiful. He knew to a twinge in his shoulders the time and meticulous effort it took to inscribe metal. Why bother, if the result didn’t enhance the finished work?

Pride, perhaps. Hadn’t his father taught him to identify what he’d done? Not the everyday work, but those special pieces made after the routine blades and tools were finished, the adornments and art meant for Om’ray pleasure, not Oud—their creator should be known. Enris had chosen his favorite stars, hammering that tiny pattern discreetly into whatever was, to him, his best.

Nothing discreet about these symbols. He ran his thumb over them, achingly curious. Were they a metalworker’s personal mark? He’d show Aryl. She’d seen the symbols the Tikitik used to represent words and those of the strangers. If they weren’t the same…he felt a rush of hope. Could these represent words?

There were Om’ray who drew lists of names, crop yields, and such: Adepts, responsible for maintaining the Cloisters’ records. The skill to write and read was provided only to those who accepted that role for life, to be used exclusively within the Cloisters, for the concerns of the Clan as a whole.

Ordinary Om’ray had no need. Surely a metalworker, even if an Adept, wouldn’t abuse the knowledge simply to name his or her work.

More than pride. A message?

Enris shrugged off his pack and swung it to the ground. He went to one knee and untied his coat from the top. With a struggle—the pack already bulged in all directions—he managed to store the blade and its end of broken wood safely inside. The longer piece? He hefted it and grinned. No more wet boots.

As he reached for his coat, he spotted a pale speck among the disturbed pebbles by his foot. He brushed at it, hoping for more metal or wood, but it was only bone.

The bone itself didn’t trouble him. Tuana carried their dead to the end of the world—namely as far from their village, and any other Clan, as was comfortable to go—across the wide nost fields to where the flat land of the Oud gave way to low, rolling hills. Though he’d heard some Clans practiced burial, Tuana’s empty remains were sensibly left accessible to scavengers, present in abundance when the noisy clouds of delits returned to nest in their hillside burrows. Scattered Om’ray bones often greeted those bringing the latest to join them.

But no Om’ray would discard objects, or even wearable clothing, with their dead. This Om’ray must have died away from his Clan. There was only one kind who could. An unChosen on Passage.

A fellow fool.

A little digging unearthed more bones, most shattered or split. Enris was about to stop when he touched a softness among the fragments. It was a bag, its brittle material crumbling as he pulled it free.

Most of the contents fell apart as well, becoming flakes and fine powder, easily taken by the wind. He was left with two items. The first was a metal box the size of his smallest finger. He pressed its two longer sides together and a tiny, hot flame obediently bloomed from one end.

An ordinary firebox.

Enris pulled out his. The two were identical, save for the discoloration of age and dirt. Oud, as if he needed more proof the land between Grona and Rayna was theirs. He tucked both away.

The second item was as strange as the ’box was familiar: a featureless wafer that fit within the palm of his hand. It was thin but solid, with five unequal sides. Unlike metal, it didn’t warm as he held it, instead stealing heat from his skin. The material was clear; it might have been cut from the window of a Cloisters, if that were possible. Unlike his other finds, the wafer glittered as if new. Baffled, he put it in the pouch with the fireboxes. It would be pretty, made into an ornament. When he had time to make things for their beauty again.

The grayed bones weren’t fresh leavings. Enris frowned. The wood was still strong and whole. Despite its finish, it would have rotted quickly in hot, humid Yena; perhaps the coolness of the mountainside preserved it, the way it had the reshaped road and landscape. Though even in Tuana, such bared soil would be carpeted by tall, waving nost or other hardy plants within a harvest. Despite the little mountain streams and dusting of snow, he guessed this was a dry place. No wonder it was barren.

Bones that weren’t fresh. Intact wood. What else did he have? The Oud metal. Something he’d believed impervious; the darkened blade in his pack was proof it wasn’t, though he’d never tried leaving the precious stuff outside on the ground.

Old. But how old?

Enris grinned. Other Om’ray wouldn’t care. What was now, had always been. After all, the Agreement among Cersi’s three races was built on things staying as they were. He wouldn’t have cared before he met the strangers, with their preoccupation with the long-buried and longer past. But he’d seen with his own eyes the incredible structures from another time that they’d freed from a cliff face.

Things had been different once.

Faced now with his own puzzle, he began to see the fascination. Maybe he should keep digging. If this had been an Om’ray on Passage, there would be a metal token with the bones, twin to one Enris kept in a pocket. The tokens granted the bearer the freedom to trespass anywhere on Cersi.

He grimaced. Maybe not anywhere, after his experience with that crazed Oud in its tunnels. Instead of leaving him be, the creature had taken his original token from him. He owed the one he carried now to Yena’s paranoid Council.

A token with the bones would make this a normal, if lonely, death—an expected hazard facing those who left their own Clan to seek a Chooser in another. If there was no token…

Enris gave himself a shake, then retied his coat to his pack with unnecessary force, almost snapping the tie. His imagination wasn’t usually out of control. It was this place. What was he doing here? Of course there was a token. No need to waste precious time digging for what had to be there. He stood, settling the pack over his shoulders. A Clan couldn’t abandon one of its own, any more than a member could stray too far. There would be family, a Chosen, who would feel and react to distress. Only those on Passage lost that protection.

“Bitter, are we?” He snorted and started walking.

It was the way things had always been. His family grieved him as dead, as was natural and proper. His friends might talk of him, tell stories. Hopefully, those fit to be heard. Naryn S’udlaat…

A mistake, to think of her when he was alone. Enris gritted his teeth and walked faster, driving the shaft of wood deep into the pebbles, his feet slipping with each careless stride.

Naryn…

She thought herself powerful. She’d make Adept; of that he had no doubt, if only so others could keep her in the Cloisters and under watch. She thought herself entitled to whatever and whomever she wanted; as a result, her failed attempt to force him into Choice had left him…damaged. Whatever she’d done, the Adepts warned he might never be able to Join.

He certainly didn’t feel inclined to try.

No?

Enris blew out a harsh breath, unable to lie to himself. He was unChosen and eligible for Choice. Seru Parth might not interest him, but the mere thought of Naryn brought the heady remembered lure of her Call to speed his pulse, make his hands clammy despite the cool air. No matter how thoroughly she disgusted him, there was a part of him desperate to go back, to let her do whatever she wanted, turn him into whatever she wanted, if only he could touch her hand….

The length of wood snapped, stinging his knee. One way to get his sanity back, he thought ruefully.

Enris picked up the broken pieces and put them in his pack. He walked at a more rational pace, finally paying attention to his surroundings. The freshening wind couldn’t decide between a pleasant mildness—doubtless chill to the Yena—and a truly bitter cold.

He feared the storm played with them. Fine for those under a roof, with a warm fire, or for those used to such weather. On that thought, he reached to find the Yena. The glow of Haxel and her companions was still too far, farther up the valley. How long did it take to find some kind of shelter? The rest of the exiles were closer than he’d expected, and lower. Coming toward him. Maybe they’d finally grown sensible.

He lowered his shields and reached for one mind in particular. Aryl.

Here.

Strain. Worry. He could sense them despite her control, and couldn’t help looking up the slope beside him. The mountain ridge was every bit as awful as he feared, an impassable conflict of vertical shapes and loose, snow-streaked rock, soaring into ugly cloud.

Distinct amusement. That was the easy part.

How had she seen what he saw? An image could be drawn from memory and sent mind-to-mind—this was something new. Enris surreptitiously checked his shields, though he should be used to surprises from Aryl Sarc by now. Be careful, he sent. I don’t trust this storm.

Good advice. Here’s mine. Walk faster, or we’ll eat supper without you.

He laughed. You forget who’s carrying the pots.

A whisper of contrition, quickly silenced. It left a warmth, like a smile. We’re coming down. Truenight’s too close.

Afraid of the dark? Enris shared his instant regret. The Yena had excellent reason to be. Sorry.

With the honesty he’d come to expect, I’m afraid of everything until my people are safe. Move those big feet of yours, Tuana.

His awareness of her faded and he didn’t try to regain it. If this part of the ridge was “easy,” he couldn’t imagine what Yena might consider difficult.

Enris found himself walking faster, and smiling.

It wasn’t only the reminder of supper, scant as that would be.