Owlknight Read online

  I don’t think we’ve asked for anything new for . . . more than a year anyway. The outfits that Loshi had designed might well have been in production, or even finished, waiting for a special occasion to finally be presented.

  Well, not the two surcoats - but the uniforms, the festival garb, and the Ghost Cat regalia could have been made. There was bound to be something of importance at Ghost Cat eventually.

  “You know - ” Darian paused to yawn, and accepted a warm mug of something from Meeren. “You look amazing in that outfit.”

  “I think I like it,” Keisha replied, turning to the right and left to look down at herself. “I didn’t think it would be comfortable, but it is.”

  Darian downed the drink, which was mouthpuckeringly tart, and handed the mug back to Meeren before he got out of bed; his mind felt very fuzzy, and he hoped whatever it was that Meeren had given him was a dose to help clear the effects of the sleeping potion. “How did the village welcome go?”

  “I think I am going to be in Shandi’s debt for at least a year,” Keisha replied, still looking as merry as she had before Darian broached the subject. “She’s gotten Mother to think of something besides me.”

  She looked so tickled that Darian could only say, “Dare I ask how?”

  “Shandi can answer that for herself, thank you,” Shandi replied, poking her head in at the bedroom door. “Mother made the mistake of asking about - no, actually making prying questions about the overnight arrangements Heralds have, meaning me and Anda of course. So I told her.”

  Shandi’s lips twitched as she tried not to laugh. “Oh, but that wasn’t the best part,” Keisha put in. “She turned bright pink, and practically shouted, ‘You mean you sleep with him?’ “

  “And I answered, quite matter-of-factly, ‘Why, no, do you think I should?’ It’s the first time I’ve ever seen her speechless.” Shandi couldn’t hold back the laughter any longer, and Keisha and Darian joined her.

  Darian wiped his eyes, which were damp with tears of laughter. “Both of you had better go get something to eat before all the good stuff is gone. I’ll catch up with you. It won’t take me long to get dressed.”

  Shandi vanished, and Keisha took the hint. Only then did Darian get out of bed. He’d gone to sleep last night not wearing much, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to get out of bed in front of Shandi. She didn’t have Tayledras sensibilities, after all.

  Meeren had his entire outfit ready and waiting, and in next to no time he was trotting up the trail toward the building where most people in the Vale ate together; food was always kept ready and waiting there, but at the usual mealtimes hot, fresh dishes were brought from the kitchen in a steady stream. He actually did catch up with Keisha and her sister just before they reached the door; they helped themselves, then took a small table near one of the open windows. Gauzy curtains and vines framed them as they began their meal.

  He ate lightly, but drank plenty of water; he hoped someone had warned Anda to do the same. “Where’s your senior?” he asked Shandi, as she did justice to a stack of flat-cakes.

  “He’s already over at Ghost Cat,” she replied. “You should have seen his face when I told him what he was going to be doing today!” She rolled her eyes and grinned. “It’s a good thing he has patience and a sense of humor. I pointed out that he wasn’t the only one making this round of ceremonies, and that it’s all in his honor anyway. He just sighed, and said, ‘I wish they were a little less glad to see me, then.’ “

  “How long have you known him?” Keisha asked, curiosity writ large all over her expression. “You mentioned him now and again, but I didn’t think he was anything more than one of your teachers.”

  “All the way from the time I arrived - what I didn’t know is that there’s a kind of fast way through the Collegium, if you arrive older than about fifteen and are already educated by Collegium standards.” She paused to take a bite or two. “I didn’t have to go through most of the academic courses, because I had the basics already - and imagine my surprise to discover that all of those useless lessons in ‘manners’ we had to go through turned out to be identical to all the courtly protocol Heralds need for dealing with the nobility!”

  It was Darian’s turn to drop his jaw. “No! Are you serious?”

  “Absolutely.” Shandi nodded and grinned. “Even the book they use is the same one old Widow Clay uses. There were three examinations, which I passed - those old lessons saved me from a year of schooling in ‘Courtly Graces.’ To cut it all short, by doubling up a fair amount and not taking as many holidays as everyone else, I finished in two intensive years instead of four. In order to do that, I had to have a mentor assigned to me to help. It was no accident that I got Anda. As soon as the Queen and her Council realized what you lot were up to, they planned to send an ambassador and picked Anda for the job, and he mentioned that I was from the region. The Queen herself gave the nod about me, can you believe it? And so then I was being tutored by Anda.

  He was learning as much from me as he could while I was stuffing my head full of Collegium classes, and he tutored me when I wasn’t quite getting things. He’s a lot like your Starfall, Darian. Very dry sense of humor, but it goes deep. He took to dragging me around with him socially, once he knew I wasn’t going to embarrass him, so I got to know the gryphons and some of the other ambassadors. We got on so well that they waited until I had my Whites and sent us both, so I could coach him on local politics and customs while I learn about how to be a diplomat.”

  “Are you going to stay after your field-year?” Keisha asked.

  I’ll bet she wants Shandi to stay, Darian thought. I think it would be a good thing if she could.

  Shandi shook her head. “I don’t know; it may depend more on what happens here than anything else. If Anda thinks I need more experience elsewhere, then I’ll be sent off. If he decides he needs me to help out here, then I’ll stay. Heralds don’t have much say in where they’re sent; we go where we’re needed.”

  “But why send a Herald-Mage and not assign another Herald-Mage as his junior?” Keisha wanted to know.

  Good question. Darian was as interested to know the answer to that as Keisha - maybe even more.

  Shandi took her time in finishing her breakfast before answering. She pushed the plate away as a sign that she was done with it, and took a long drink of juice while Keisha waited with admirable patience.

  “I can only tell you what I think is the reason,” she replied, putting down her glass. “I haven’t asked that question myself, partly because right now I’m supposed to be learning to figure out answers on my own. I think that the reason a Herald-Mage was sent in the first place is twofold. First, the Circle wants to know more about how to use that Heartstone they’ve got simmering under the Palace, and they hope Anda can pick up some answers from you lot. Second, magic comes as naturally to the Hawkbrothers as breathing, and someone who didn’t have Mage-Gift might make some wrong assumptions or give the wrong impression to them.”

  “I don’t know if you’re right, but it certainly sounds logical,” Darian agreed. “But why not pick a junior who has the Gift?”

  “Two reasons again. One, there aren’t a lot of Heralds with Mage-Gift, and there might not have been anyone to send. It’s entirely possible that I’ll be replaced by someone who has it. Second - our generation is used to magic; we’ve grown up with it. We know what we can reasonably expect a mage to do and how he’ll think. Or - maybe I should say, the Heralds of our generation will; ordinary folk might be just as perceptive or completely oblivious.” She chuckled and winked at Keisha. “The point is, for someone to assist Anda, or even take over the post when he steps down, a Herald of our generation is perceptive enough to handle the job. Plus, they told me that my particular Gifts will be very useful to a diplomat.”

  She didn’t elaborate on what her Gifts were, leaving Darian to wonder just what it was she had. He knew about the limited ForeSight - which could presumably keep a diplomat from making a disastrous dec
ision - but what else would apply?

  Keisha was staring at her sister with a mingling of surprise and chagrin. “Shandi, you have changed out of all recognition!” she managed. “When you left, you were - well, kind of dreamy and careless. Now - ”

  Shandi waved her hand at her sister. “It’s all in having a sense of purpose and a job to do. You were the one who always had that; there didn’t seem to be any place for me that made any sense. I didn’t really see myself as getting married no later than seventeen and raising ten or a dozen littles. The only thing I really liked was sewing, but you can’t make a life around fancy-work. I just drifted, right up until the moment Karles Chose me. Then, for the first time, I had a place that was my own, and an important job no one else could do.” She shrugged. “I haven’t so much changed as woken up, you could say, and as soon as I did, I started making up for lost time.”

  “With a vengeance!” Keisha looked at her sister as if seeing Shandi for the very first time. “No wonder you were able to render Mother speechless!”

  Now I’m happier than ever that Shandi’s here, Darian thought, surveying the two sisters, who were more alike than they would have guessed two years ago. She’s like fuel for Keisha’s fire.

  “Time to go, people,” Darian reminded them. They all shoved away from the table, which was promptly swarmed by hertasi, and by the time they had reached the doorway another group had taken it over.

  The sweat house was very dark inside, with only a little light leaking in around the blanket over the door. Sweat literally ran from every pore of Darian’s body as he sat knee-to-knee in the circle around the hot rocks in a pit in the center of the house. Thick with steam, redolent with the scent of cedar, the air was so hot it would have been torture to anyone who hadn’t been in the circle from the time the first rock was brought in.

  A hand touched Darian’s right elbow, and he accepted the bucket of water passed to him, taking up the dipper made of gourd floating on the top and drinking eagerly of water that tasted strongly of the bundles of herbs that had been soaking in it. Once in a very great while, and only under extreme conditions, there were herbs in there that were supposed to make “seeing the other side” easier, according to Shaman Celin Broadback Caller. That wasn’t the case today; this ceremony was meant to make Darian one of the tribe, not meant to be a vision-seeking. The herbs in the bucket were those that aided endurance and heat tolerance, nothing more esoteric.

  Still, even with that help, the heat in here had climbed considerably past the point that Darian had experienced the last time he was undergoing a ceremony. He was glad that they were on the last round, and from here on, although it wouldn’t get cooler, it wouldn’t get hotter either.

  This round was for silence; the rounds alternated, silence and speech. With each round, more hot rocks came in, fresh from the fire. They had been warming in the heart of the fire stack for half the day and hissed as they were brought in, glowing red from every pit and crevice. Poignant to Darian only perhaps was the fact that they were brought in scooped by a pitchfork. The ceremony began with a round of speech, and ended in a round of silence, or rather, listening. Outside the sweat house, the women surrounded the building, drumming. Six of the Eldest sat in a half-circle around a huge drum made from a section of tree trunk; the rest were placed around the sweat house with hand-drums. All of them beat the same, simple rhythm during the silence rounds, the rhythm of a heartbeat. Darian felt as if he were sitting in the middle of the earth’s own heart as the drumbeat throbbed around him, vibrating deep in his chest. It was a magnificent effect, felt deep in the bones and lungs.

  He passed the bucket on to Anda, who was on his left, and stared at where the rock pit was, just in front of him, no more than a hand’s length away from his feet. He couldn’t see the rocks glowing anymore, but he certainly felt the steam coming off them when the Shaman tossed another ladle of cedar water on them. The rocks hissed as the water splashed on them, and it rose in clouds of heat that felt like a blow to the skin of his face.

  And yet he had to admit that all this felt curiously comforting, if not comfortable. There was no one partaking of this ceremony who did not want Darian to be there, the Shaman and Chief Vordon had seen to that. Unlike the ceremony of knighting, literally everyone here was a friend, and fully pleased to welcome Darian and his friends into their tribal circle. Even Anda must have sensed that, for now there was no hint of the earlier tension that Darian had sensed to his left.

  Outside, had the drumbeats quickened a little? It was the women who determined the length of the rounds of silence, signaling an end by increasing the speed of their rhythm until the drum song ended in three decisive beats.

  He thought there was tension in the air that had not been there a moment before. Perhaps the drums had sped up, and the women were about to set them all free into the cool air of early evening. He knew every nuance of the symbolism here; he and Shaman Celin had discussed the ritual for many long nights once Ghost Cat had decided to bring him into the tribe. This was in every sense a birth - did Anda know or sense that? He wasn’t sure how much the Shaman had told the Herald before the ceremony began.

  Tension increased; the air throbbed around him, pressing in on him. There was the recurring sensation that his skin no longer held him, but rather that his flesh and blood extended out into the sultry air, a vapor. Celin threw another dipperful of water on the stones. A second rhythm joined the first, both sets of drums driving onward, pace increasing slowly, but steadily.

  In the general area of the stone pit, a hazy hint of a glow appeared. At first Darian thought that his eyes were playing tricks on him; then he figured that Celin had opened the blanket over the door a trifle, and there was a ray of light reflecting and diffusing into the steam. But when he glanced to the side, the blanket was still firmly down, yet the glow had strengthened.

  Is anyone else seeing this?

  To his right, there was no sign that Kala saw anything but darkness - but to his left, he felt Anda stir and lean forward, peering at the glow.

  Little whispers of sound between the drumbeats told him that there were others who were seeing something, too. The glow brightened, and began to pulse in time to the drums.

  Celin hadn’t said anything about this!

  Now even phlegmatic Kala tensed; the glow was bright enough at this point to see the faint outlines of rocks piled beneath it.

  As the drums sped up, with each beat the glow pulsed and condensed, assuming a definite shape.

  A large four-legged shape.

  Suddenly, in the rounded area that could have been a head, a pair of fiery eyes appeared, exactly as if the mist-creature had just opened them. And the eyes were fixed on Darian.

  Darian caught his breath and sat very still, although his heart outraced the drums outside.

  A moment more, and the final pulse of light brought form and detail to the shape - but Darian had known from the moment those eyes focused on him what that shape would be. It was the Ghost Cat, the totemic spirit of Ghost Cat tribe. It was the size of a pony, with blue eyes exactly the color of a blue-white flame. This wasn’t the first time he’d seen it - though there had only been one other moment he had looked into its eyes while wide awake.

  The drums outside rose to a crescendo of frenzy.

  It paced toward him, putting one enormous, snow-shoe-sized-paw in front of the other, until it literally stood nose-to-nose with him. Then it slowly bent its head - he thought he felt a puff of cold breath on his feet - he couldn’t think through the frantic drumbeats that filled his body -

  Thud! Thud! Thud!

  With the last of the three beats signaling the end of the ceremony, the Ghost Cat vanished. From outside, the Eldest of the women flung the blanket up, and light and cool air poured into the sweat house as the steam rushed out. The steam glowed, but with natural, reflected light; swirls of fresh air entered and began to dissipate it.

  Those to the left and immediately at the door began crawling out, Shaman Celin
first; although Darian was still trying to wrap his mind around what he’d just seen, he managed to respond when Kala nudged him and joined the rest to crawl in single-file out the sweat-house entrance.

  The light of the setting sun half-blinded him; as his head emerged, the women set up a mighty chorus of ululation; two of the Elder Women came forward and seized him under each elbow, pulling him to his feet. A third came forward with a bucket of cold water - which, after the heat of the lodge, felt like knives of ice! - and drenched him with it.

  He yelped, then performed as expected, gasping and sputtering; the women howled with laughter, then the two Elders wrapped him in a blanket and rubbed him down briskly, as impersonally as if he’d been a horse. They spun him three times around, then thrust him forward, staggering, to where a fourth woman waited to help him on with his clothing. Shandi and Keisha stood by on the sidelines, bent over with laughter, but he didn’t mind. He’d known exactly what was coming, and he was the one who had asked for Ghost Cat to invite both the girls to participate.

  The Shaman, clothed and dry, but with damp hair slicked back, came forward as soon as Darian was dressed; he grabbed Darian’s right hand and swiftly slashed a flint blade across his palm, in the fleshy padded part between the base of the thumb and the wrist. He did the same with his own, and before Darian’s cut had even begun to sting, Shaman Celin clasped their two bloody hands together, and raised them to the sky.