CHAPTER 13

“Like leaves unfurling in the spring, so didst my dream unfold before my eyes. Whether for good or ill, I could not tell. Its conclusion still lay behind the curtain of understanding.”

Mirana threw the door open to her mother’s study with a swipe of her hand and her Aspects. “Your vision of the Ford. It’s a trap.”

Her mother’s council gathered in her prime’s study—her senior seers, provincial defender commanders, Morgan Jord and Binthe Lima from her father’s il’Kin, Teague’s parents. Her father. Lord Trine Tetric Garis.

“The Ken’nar Dark Trine will split his forces.” She gulped a breath. “Five hundred will indeed attack, as we all have seen, but he will reserve the majority of his troops until we’re occupied with his vanguard. The others will then charge in and surround us. By the thousands.”

Mirana’s heart banged in her chest, striking out at her ribs. “I saw it. I didn’t understand at first. As we know, the vision was hard to understand because it mostly takes place at night. By the time I studied it again with Lord Garis, it became what we see now. I had two separate visions of the Ford attack.”

Her mother held up her hand, stopping his comment. “You saw a different version of Two Rivers Ford? A vision before this one? One you did not tell me about?”

Mirana nodded slowly. Her breath turned into soft, jagged gasps. “I thought I was wrong, and that it was just a fuzzier and earlier version of the one we’ve been seeing for sevendays. I never saw it again. So, I didn’t say anything. The one we’ve all been seeing will take place before what I saw the first time. My first vision was the conclusion of the attack, not the beginning. He will attack with five thousand, only he’s split that single force into two—a smaller one and a larger one. I saw them both.” She swallowed and tried to breathe at the same time. “I saw. Them. Both.”

“Withholding a vision is a crime. A grave one. You know this,” her mother said, her voice hushed with horror. “If you were a full Fal’kin with an amulet about her neck, I would have to consider expulsion from the province. What have you done, child?”

The minds of those gathered assaulted her. They leaped upon her like grynwen on prey. The senior seers stood around her, judgment and downright disgust emanating from their minds. Binthe, her sea-green eyes full of compassion, full of trepidation. Morgan, his handsome bearded face wearing the hard, stoic expression of a man who knew he might not be alive in a matter of days. Niah Beltran turned away from Mirana, her mind closed. Tennen Beltran’s, however, was not. His mind bored into hers with the precision of an amulet-driven scalpel. Tetric Garis, his face remained as inscrutable as his mind. Her father—

“Paithe, I thought what I saw was wrong. I swear it.” Mirana’s trembling blurred the sound of her words. Her cheeks flushed with heat. “Maybe the Ken’nar Dark Trine was going to attack with his full might, then changed his plans to what we see now. I don’t know. I saw only once the single force of thousands. It never happened again. I thought I was wrong. I’m so sorry.”

Her mother ran over and dragged her to the center of the room with an iron grip on her wrist. She slapped Mirana’s hand over her topaz amulet. “Call to us what you first saw.”

She tried to pull her hand back from her mother’s unyielding grip. “I can’t—”

“Call. Your. First vision. All of it,” her mother repeated, snapping off each word like a dry twig.

Mirana’s shoulders fell in bitter defeat. Her transgressions stood naked, her sins exposed, with nowhere to hide. Fear of her fate had driven her to turn her back on the shred of belief she had in herself. She had begged the Aspects Above for more time to find a different future for herself, one without corrupting her Aspects. Her actions to prevent her fate had only brought her closer to her downfall. Thousands would now pay for her fear, her hesitation, and her cowardice because there was no time to seek help from other provinces. Kin-Deren would be fighting on its own. Her people would pay for her sins just like they had centuries ago with her ancestor Jasal Pinal. Time had run out. For the Fal’kin. For her.

The amulet called to her, slowly drawing her Aspects from her. Her breath left her lungs in short, useless bursts. Her stomach clenched and bile seared her throat. She swallowed and closed her eyes. A brilliant yellow light burst from her mother’s topaz between their fingers as Desde projected Mirana’s memory out through her amulet. Ethereal fighters floated like specters in front of the Fal’kin.

Rain falls, a cold, liquid curtain. Lightning flares from roiling clouds, illuminating the night, only to plunge it back into darkness a heartbeat later. Cries of blood-thirsty grynwen pierce the night. A wave of black riders pounds down a rise above Two Rivers Ford. Three thousand. Lightning flickers again. Four thousand. Riders flood across the Kin-Deren landmass and charge into the Ford garrison, an endless wave of dark bodies. Five thousand. The landscape fades as night descends once more between the flashes of lightning. A smaller force of fighters fans out to meet the riders. The darkness and the storm and the uncertain skeins of the future hide the heraldics of the combatants’ uniforms. Another lightning bolt explodes across the dark sky. Grynwen howl like demon hounds unleashed from the Underworld, ripping flesh from bone. Tents erupt in flames. Screams of the dying fill the air. The battlefield fades once more under the shroud of darkness.

The crystal of her mother’s amulet began to take on a life of its own with its nearness, pulling at Mirana, drawing, bleeding the memory of the images out of her.

On and on they come, this terrifying mass of horses and grynwen and swords and amulets, visible one moment in the lightning, only to disappear in the next. Amulets burst in jets of their own colored lightning as the two forces hurl death at one another. Bodies fall and grynwen feed. The smaller force of fighters is pushed southward, toward the river chasm, unable to beat back the onslaught of the larger army. Corpses of the dead impede fighters, sending men and women from both forces off the Ford bridges to their doom into the river ravine below.

Her heart constricted within the cage of her ribs with a sharp, visceral ache. Her legs grew weak, her bones dissolving along with her resolve. Her Defending Aspect rose, searing and urgent, in response to what she witnessed again in her memory. Her Healing Aspect begged to be released upon the mortal wounds that had yet to come. The demand from her mother’s amulet was insistent, incessant, as it wrenched from her the memory of that first vision of slaughter awaiting Two Rivers Ford.

Gabrial, the Guiding Star, quivers over the backbone of the Dar-Anar Mountains in the west, a piercing silver eye in the red dawn. Bellicose chanting overtakes the refrains of fading life notes, the howls of grynwen sing a crying descant. Lightning flares again then dies.

Mirana tore her hand away from her mother and staggered back, gasping for breath. Her hair clung to her forehead with sweat.

“This is a completely different vision,” Morgan said, his voice hushed. “It is—” the defender swallowed, “deeply concerning.”

“Call it to me again,” her mother ordered, reaching for Mirana’s hand again.

She clenched Desde’s hand and forced her memory of the vision once more from her mind.

An image of the battlefield, hazy with the loosely woven skeins of time, hung frozen in front of the Fal’kin from Desde’s amulet. A massive army in black armor darkened the land, briefly illuminated by lightning. Individual fighters could not be made out clearly, but the dark armor they wore was apparent. The armor of the Ken’nar. The murmuring in the room ceased.

Binthe shook her head slowly, her gaze riveted on the image. “We have seen nothing of this.”

Desde released Mirana’s hand and the ghostly image of fighters slowly disappeared. “Tetric, you both came to me and told me we would be attacked by five hundred Ken’nar. The very same vision I had. The same one I’ve had—we’ve all had—all along.”

“Ai, I, too, saw some hazy thousands of fighters,” the tall Trine said as he stood from his chair. “She told me she had been confused by what she saw, a greater force attacking a lesser force, but both armies were indistinct. When we reached for the Seeing Aspect together to understand just who those fighters were, it was as we see it now. The Fal’kin are the thousands, not the Ken’nar. The vision has remained so ever since.”

“No, not at all. And neither should you. Nor should any of you.” His dark gaze traveled around the room. “This is a memory of a vision, Desde, not an actual one. That’s why I didn’t have her call it to me.” He gestured to the empty air in the middle of the room where the translucent images had been displayed. “As I said, by the time I called on my Seeing Aspect and we viewed the actual vision together, it appears as it does now. There is no way the girl could have possibly understood at the time what she was seeing. Without an amulet, she would have had absolutely no way of controlling the vision to examine it.”

“She understands it now,” her mother hissed, “and, it appears she may be correct.”

“If you must assign blame, my prime, put it on my shoulders,” Lord Garis said, stopping her reply. “None of us even considered looking into different skeins of time for something different. Did we not all believe we had seen enough? Only your daughter had the wisdom to think of other possibilities.”

The Trine’s mind pushed against hers, not to condemn her but something else. To comfort her? She didn’t deserve his comfort and certainly not his defense.

“How do we know this memory of hers,” her father gestured toward her, “is any more correct than the one you all have been seeing? You seers tell me visions change all the time. I agree with Tetric. Mirana doesn’t have an amulet to bring in the precision required. I’ve been around enough seers to know it wouldn’t be the first time emotions skewed an interpretation of a vision and certainly the memory of one.”

It was time to tell them before she put even more people in jeopardy. Everything. All of it. She had no choice. Maybe she never really did.

She stared into the faces around the chamber, giving in to their condemning expressions. “It is difficult to see the armies at Two Rivers Ford if one only looks at the vision with the Seeing Aspect. My awareness of the battle around me spoke to me of thousands more than you can see in the mind’s eye. I felt them, their presences, their bloodlust. My chest ached with the need to release amulet fire. I sensed their heartbeats, too. Their wounds cried out to me. Their deaths. So much death. My first vision is right because I sensed it with my Aspects. All three of them.” She took a breath, and, for a moment, it would not leave her body. “I am a Trine.”

... Hush, now ... her father called to her, his strident mind-voice resounding within her. ... All will be well ...

She tried to block out the shock of the others from her mind, but it was impossible. It engulfed her like the wave of Ken’nar that would engulf the Ford.

“This is all my fault. I am so sorry.” The words sounded so pathetically inadequate. Nothing would make up for this. Nothing. The wall of deceit behind which she had hidden for summers crashed down around her.

“I’ve hidden my Aspects from you because I was trying to stop a far more horrific nightmare than all of this. I am a Trine. I am the Dark Trine, and I will destroy Kinderra. Someday.”

Desperation, mirroring her own, escaped from her father’s mind to hers. “Mirana, quiet now. You are overwhelmed.” He turned to the others. “She’s obviously distraught. Our daughter is not a Trine. She certainly could not destroy anything. She’s a seer.”

“Tetric may be right,” Patrua Tennen said. “She has been healing, or close to it, for a while now.” His gaze, so like Teague’s yet so unfamiliar in its raw disbelief, bored into her. “And she has not said a single word of it.”

Her father gave a disgusted laugh. “How do you know it has been Mirana who has done these supposed healings?”

“We started to notice them several summers ago after Teague fractured his arm,” Matrua Niah replied. “That injury itself made no sense. The break was fresh, yet there had been some partial remodeling. Performed incorrectly. The only way this could have occurred was by a healer. At first, we thought maybe Teague had finally—But then summers went by, and, well, we knew it wasn’t Teague who had tried to heal.” The healer woman’s hands curled into fists for a moment, then relaxed. “These past few summers our use of numbweed in the hostel has dropped by magnitudes. Maybe Mirana has yet to mend flesh and definitively set bone, but she has been suppressing the pain of our patients nearly as deeply as we could.”

... Be still, girl ... her father called sharply. “Niah, we all can shunt away pain. My Light, if I couldn’t, I would have never made it past my first battle.”

“That has more to do with endurance than the actual calming of nerves,” she replied. “She’s been suppressing pain with the Healing Aspect. On others. Which is the utmost any healer can do without an amulet, and even that is difficult.”

Teague’s father nodded in agreement with his wife. “Kaarl, even we remember how quickly she progressed in training as a battle seer. She nearly bested Dav and Niall both inside of six months. No seer child of ten summers could do that. Unless she is a defender, too. This is a blessing. One we desperately need, given what’s about to take place.”

“She does not defend, Tennen,” her father snarled. “She’s a seer. She saw their moves. That’s all. Dav and Niall know her too well and didn’t press her enough. That’s why she appeared to excel so quickly with a sword. My daughter is no Trine.”

“I do not think the leaders of Kin-Deren’s provincial armies would willingly shirk their duty in training,” the healer rejoined.

Healer Niah moved to stand beside her husband. “I was there when that girl was born. Her Aspect was so incredibly powerful but had no alignment. We thought perhaps it was because she had come two months early or even her difficult breech birth. Perhaps, though, it was due to all three Aspects superimposed over each other. Ask Tetric.”

Her father flicked his eyes to Tetric Garis then back to Niah Beltran like a bullwhip. “Mirana is no Trine. Just you speaking such words could put her life in jeopardy.”

“I love her as much as you do. I would never do anything to harm that child,” Matrua Niah said, pointing to her.

“Except try to make it impossible for her to be near your son,” her father seethed.

Tennen took a step towards her father. “Are you alleging my wife would attempt to get your daughter killed to prevent her from joining in union to my son?”

Her father moved closer still. “A father will do anything to protect his child.”

“Stop it, Father!” Mirana cried. “Listen to me! All of you. I have to stop pretending to be something I’m not. I’m not a seer. Or not just a seer. I’m a defender and a healer as well. I am a Trine.”

Stark hopelessness etched itself on her father’s face. “Mirana. Please. Don’t.”

“I didn’t know at first. My Seeing and my Defending Aspects were almost always joined.” She wove her fingers together. “But healing?” She glanced at Tennen and Niah, then looked down at her boots. “I didn’t understand until Teague broke his arm. Then it was no longer just sight. It was a power. An Aspect. I had to heal him. I had to.”

Binthe Lima clutched her emerald amulet. “Why would you keep this to yourself? You know we love you. I would lay down my life for you.”

Lord Garis moved to stand close behind her as if he were guarding her against the others. “She said nothing because she is terrified. It is not easy knowing every single Ken’nar would kill you instantly if he or she could, especially when you have seen so few summers. It was the same for me when I was a child. Kaarl is not wrong. Her life will be in danger with this revelation.”

“None of you will speak of this. It means her life,” her father added, the warning unmistakable in his voice.

Mirana slipped a hand inside her belt pouch to hold Teague’s pendant for comfort. All that did was remind her that he, too, could be caught up in this nightmare. She dropped her hand to her side. “I tried for summers to hide my Defending and Healing Aspects, and look what’s happened? I can’t hide this anymore. Too much is at stake. You call the one who leads the Ken’nar the Dark Trine. Are you so certain he is, in fact, a Trine? Have you ever seen him in the flesh? Have you ever fought against him, face-to-face?”

The Trine gifts. The three Aspects. That was more power than one mortal should hold. It was an abomination. She was an abomination. She was the Dark Trine.

“What are you saying?” Her mother’s voice quaked in a way she had never heard before—a strangled, almost wheezing quality diluting her normally melodious alto.

Her parents. All of them. They didn’t understand. “The Trine Prophecy speaks of the Light Trine and the Dark Trine. There is nothing written anywhere about three Trines. I know. I’ve looked. Lord Garis is our Light Trine. What role, then, does the prophecy leave for me?”

The minds of the other Fal’kin burst through her consciousness like exploding amulets. Voices shouted, but it was all just noise in her ears. Her heartbeat pulsed in her eardrums until it, too, faded into a ringing.

“You are frightened, child,” Lord Garis said, “but you are not the Dark Trine.”

She pushed her father away and backed against the tall Trine. “Kinderra will be destroyed. Because of me. I’ve seen it.” Her voice sounded strange to her, someone else’s words echoing through her ears.

How many Ken’nar had Lord Garis put down with his amulet? If she asked him, would he do it? Was it not his destiny as the Thrice-blessed to stop the Thrice-cursed? Ice replaced the burning bile in her stomach, a smothering, chill blanket, oddly comforting. Maybe he would respect her for finding a shred of courage at the end. Maybe he would be quick.

Her mother rushed over, pulled her from the men, and held her. “You are not the Dark Trine. You cannot be.” Her voice grew shrill. “I don’t know what could have possibly made you think that. You are just frightened. Ai, it is your fear making you believe these things. Perhaps it is an actual nightmare. Ai, that is what it is. It is just a nightmare, biraena.”

Her father’s silver eyes drilled into hers. “I don’t know why you are saying all of this, but you are not the Dark Trine. You are not any Trine. You are a seer. Do you hear me? A seer. Just. A seer.”

“You should have given her to me long ago.” The tall Trine glared at her father. “Only I can protect her from those who would kill her at the Ford.”

Her father’s hands curled into fists and turned to her mother. “She’s not going to the Ford.”

“I have no choice,” her mother continued. “If there is even a chance she is correct, I will need every Fal’kin in the province I can send. We will be outnumbered.”

Morgan stepped forward. “I will leave tonight, my prime, and be in Kasan within a sevenday. We will get aid from Sün-Kasal. That province has one of the largest complements of Fal’kin in Kinderra.”

“There is not enough time.” Desde closed her eyes for a moment and swallowed audibly. “Even if you left this very moment, Sün-Kasal’s defenders will never be able to reach the Ford in time. Why do you think we leave at dawn? You’ve seen the position of Gabrial from our visions. That gives us less than two sevendays to reach the Ford ourselves. I will have to order any scholaire’e of at least sixteen summers to choose their amulets now. Those of at least fifteen summers will choose and serve in support roles. We cannot spare experienced Fal’kin to provision weapons and tend horses during the battle.”

Mirana’s heart constricted. By her mother’s pronouncement, she would have to choose an amulet.

Her father ignored her protests, and pulled her mother’s arm, forcing her to look at him. “Desde, do you understand what you are saying? You can’t take her to the Ford. You cannot.”

“I have no choice. I need every last Fal’kin in the province to turn back the Ken’nar. I cannot ask other mothers and fathers to give up their children while I hold my own back, even if it shatters my heart to do so. Our children must take up their amulets. Tonight. Including Mirana. I know what this means, Ëi ama, but I have no choice. She must choose her amulet and ride to the Ford. I need her there. Kinderra needs her there.”

Her mother’s pronouncement drove like a pike through Mirana’s mind. Turning back from an amulet had been her last refuge to prevent her destiny of destruction. Cold no longer surrounded her with an insidious comfort but became a lethal weight dragging her down.

“No. I must not choose. I told you. I will destroy Kinderra, not save her. I am the Dark Trine.”

“Miri, stop this! Now!” Kaarl shouted, swiping his hand down like a sword. “You are not the Dark Trine!”

“If you don’t believe me, I will show you.” She thrust out her hand and reached for the Trine’s amulet to release the keep vision from her mind.

He grabbed her hand before she could touch the hematite crystal. ... No, Mirana, stop ... Even if they see it, they will not understand its importance ... I can help you ...

She tried to pull her hand back from his, but it remained locked in his grip. “No, you can’t. Nobody can.”

She locked herself behind U’Nehíl, wanting not just her presence but her entire being to disappear. It would never be all right unless she made it right. One way or another.