CHAPTER 19

23rd Day of Kheraya’s Waking, Year 634

After Maeli commanded her to leave Hayncalde, Droë considered calling for Tresz. He would bear her again; he had told her as much. She had no idea where to go, and no means of reaching another isle. Under the circumstances, the Shonla would gladly help her.

She spotted the Shonla’s mist on the bay, drifting toward a ship. She needed only to sing. Lyrics danced on her tongue; a melody repeated itself in her mind. She kept it locked there.

Pride.

He would want to know what had happened, and she wouldn’t be able to tell the story without weeping. The cruelty of the other Tirribin, the condescension of the Arrokad – she didn’t wish to think about either. She wouldn’t speak of them.

For centuries, she had lived alone, hunted alone, provided for herself in every way. She could do so again. Yes, she was hundreds of leagues from the isle she knew best. What did that matter? She was Tirribin, an Ancient. She needed no one.

She crept back to the Daerjen wharves and stole onto a ship, hiding herself in the hold among sleeping men and women, the foul smells of humans surrounding her. None saw her or heard her. Her own smell was masked by those of the sailors. Humans were so often oblivious of the world around them, foolishly secure.

She didn’t know where the ship would sail, and she didn’t care. Away from Hayncalde. Nothing else mattered to her. As long as they departed come the morning. She didn’t wish to be on these waters at night, in case the captain wasn’t wise enough to light torches on his deck. It would have been humiliating had Treszlish attacked the vessel with her aboard.

The crew stirred at dawn and soon bustled above, readying the ship for the sea. She remained below, hidden, hungry. She didn’t like the slip and roll of voyaging. She would have traded the warmth of the hold for the cold of Tresz’s mists if it meant she could end this disorienting up and down and experience again the joy of flying with the Shonla.

For all that day and two more, they sailed. Droë’s need for years consumed her. Time and again, she started to crawl from her hiding place, intending to feed on the nearest of the crew. On each occasion, fear of discovery stopped her. She could fight off the strongest humans. She might best three or five in a fight to the death. Against all of them, though, many armed with pistols and blades, she couldn’t hope to survive.

But neither could she live long without feeding. Her gut ached. She struggled to keep her thoughts clear, to maintain her restraint. It was worst at night, her natural hunting time. She slept poorly when she slept at all. The aroma of so many years insinuated itself into every thought, every dream, every breath. She feared she might go mad with desire.

Ironically, her one consolation also came at night, when couples retreated into the hold to take pleasure in one another. Love, the act and the emotion. Her fascination. Her obsession. It was here in abundance. Men and women, men and men, women and women. She had never seen or heard so much. It surrounded her, permeating the air much as the years did. Her kind saw well in the dark, and here, with humans writhing and panting all around her, every one of her senses was heightened. So, too, was her determination. For arousal did not follow fascination. It seemed it couldn’t, wasn’t part of her. She resolved anew to change that, and so was doubly eager to leave this vessel.

Late on the third day, with daylight waning, the ship’s motion changed. Shouts from above. Sounds she didn’t understand. When she realized that the crew had furled their sails and taken up oars, she nearly cried out.

Her relief didn’t last long. She listened, and even left her nook to determine where they were.

Still not at a wharf. They had anchored the ship near a port, but, she gathered, would not approach the dock until the next morning.

Men and women neared the hatch. She scrambled back to her hiding spot. Waited, watched, listened, dreamed, her desire for desire as keen as her hunger.

Later, when all the humans in the hold had fallen asleep, Droë left her hiding place again and climbed onto the deck, making not a sound. Above, a few humans still prowled the ship. She kept out of sight, peered over the rail at the torches burning on the nearby wharves. The distance wasn’t great. Her kind didn’t like water, but she could swim if she had to. After she fed.

A young woman stood near the ship’s prow, gazing toward the city. Easy prey, even for one as famished as Droë.

She stalked, rushed the woman when she was near enough, clambered onto her back, clamped a hand over her mouth to muffle her screams. She rode the woman down to the deck, mouth at the sailor’s throat, sweet years on her tongue. She fed until the woman had nothing left to give. A man approached, wary, a blade in his hand.

“Winn? That you?”

Hungry still, Droë waited until he was close and then took his years as well. His struggles alerted others. She was sated now, and eager to get away. She climbed over the rail and down the side of the ship, and slipped into the water without a splash. Sailors on the deck of the vessel lit torches, cried out at the sight of their dead shipmates. Droë glided away in the inky waters, her strength restored. More torches burned. They would scour the hold and then the deck and then the hold again. No one on the ship would sleep this night.

She swam silently, chilled by the brine, but pleased to be away. Her one fear was that she would find Tirribin in this city as well, wherever she was.

She reached a stone-strewn strand some time later and dragged herself out of the cold surf, weary from swimming so far. As she scanned the shoreline and the city beyond, she saw much that struck her as familiar. The arc of the rocky coast, the soaring spire of the city’s sanctuary. She had been here, recently.

“Rooktown,” she whispered. She was back on the isle of Rencyr, in the royal city, where she had been with Tresz not so long ago. She didn’t know whether to be frustrated or amused. In the end, she decided she was neither. It was a place, like any other, filled with prey and largely unknown to her.

She made her way to the city gate, passed through at Tirribin speed, unnoticed by the guards, and set out through the lanes, searching for others of her kind. Since she had fed on the ship, she didn’t have to risk hunting in another’s territory. It took her a bell or two to pass at speed through most of the city’s streets. By the time she finished, she was hungry again, but also convinced that no Tirribin dwelt here. She could prey at will.

She fed, found a lair in which to pass the day, hunted that next night and during the ones that followed. No other Tirribin appeared to disrupt the rhythm of her new life. For the first time since beginning her wanderings with Tresz, she had found contentment. She had abundant prey, a city to call her own. What more could one of her kind want?

A great deal, she learned. For while she had found the ingredients necessary for contentment, true peace eluded her.

She wanted to find Ujie again, to convince the Arrokad that she had been wrong about Droë’s desire to change. Or perhaps to be convinced that she was the one who was wrong. She tried not to think of Tobias, or of her nights in the hold of that ship. Love was for humans. Companionship was something she had eschewed for much of her existence. The purpose that had driven her from Trevynisle – the transformation of her very being – terrified her. But it tantalized as well. Ujie’s words and admonitions implied that she could change, if she chose to do so.

Arrokad were wise and knowledgeable, the acknowledged leaders of all the Ancients. Droë would have been foolish to dismiss Ujie’s cautions. And she hadn’t. Rather, the warnings had come too late and from too great a distance to stop her. Fearful though she was, she was also set on her course. This, she came to understand, was the source of her restlessness. She had made her choice, but apprehension stayed her.

Diagnosis did not bring a cure. Not at first. Her fear proved stubborn, and she resented her own weakness. She was a predator, a Tirribin. She should have been immune to fear.

An oversimplification, she knew, but true enough to make her ashamed.

She continued to exist – to prowl and hunt and sleep and want. Until finally want overcame all.

On the night she made up her mind to act, a hot wind blew out of the west, carrying the whisper of distant thunder and the smell of rain. She had hunted and fed. Now she wandered the lanes near the waterfront, restive as always. After a time, she realized that she wasn’t wandering so much as searching. She sought that young woman, the one she had seen give away love for a bit of coin, the one who had warned her off the streets.

Have you ever loved any of them?

Nah. If I had, I woulda held on with both hands.

She thought of Tresz, of Ujie, even of Maeli and Teelo. She thought of the other woman, the Walker, who had spoken to her of Tobias and awakened within her this yearning. Though she preferred always to be alone, on this night she would have welcomed a conversation with any of them.

“Enough.” She said it aloud, startling a stray cat at the mouth of an alley.

You have been Tirribin for your entire existence, Ujie told her.

Perhaps that had been true, but Droë wasn’t certain she was Tirribin anymore. She wasn’t even the “girl-thing.” She had become something she didn’t recognize: part-Tirribin, part-human, part-child, part-coward, part-exile, alone, confused, sad. Whatever she was, she hated it. Change carried with it uncertainty, perhaps peril. But at least she wouldn’t be this anymore.

Droë angled toward the waterfront, followed a narrow strip of pebbly shore to a broader strand. This she traversed, her feet cushioned in cool sand, starlight and the gibbous moon lighting her way. Her heart beat very fast, like the wings of a hovering falcon. Her hands shook.

Apprehension had given way to anticipation, even excitement. She had started down this path some time ago, and after delays of her own making, she was glad to tread it again.

At the far end of the strand, she scrambled over a jumble of huge rocks to yet another sandy beach. Here, alone, she halted to stare out over the Inward Sea toward distant Ensydar. Lightning flickered across a bank of clouds. Thunder mumbled a response. The rain would reach Rencyr before long. For now, the world seemed balanced: storm and clarity, lightning and starglow. She stood on a knife’s edge.

She took a step toward the water.

“I would speak with one of the Most Ancient,” she cried, her voice swallowed by the pounding surf.

Droë wondered if any would answer. Her resolve to act meant little if no Arrokad swam in these waters.

She shouted her summons a second time, and after waiting, once more. She would not call again. Thrice made it a true supplication. More would be rude.

Wind whipped her hair. Lightning brightened the foamy swells and the boulders around her. Thunder rumbled in the sand beneath her feet.

Something broke the water’s surface, tiny and distant.

Droë fought the impulse to flee.

Whatever it was vanished, only to rise again, closer now and recognizable. A face, framed by dark hair.

It dove, surfaced nearer still, swam in her direction. As it neared the shore, it stopped swimming and advanced on foot.

It – he – emerged from the sea like an animate statue. His skin was alabaster, his shoulders wide, his body tapered to a narrow waist. His legs were darker, and Droë realized that he had covered himself with scales, rather than appearing naked. A kindness and a relief, unexpected.

His face was as sculpted and perfect as that of a Tirribin. His eyes were pale and serpentine, much like Ujie’s. Indeed, he could have been her brother.

Water ran down his body as he stepped from the surf and halted in front of her.

“There is a price to be paid for summoning my kind, even for one such as you, cousin.”

“I know. What price?”

“We shall decide, you and I. Why have you summoned me?”

She opened her mouth to answer, but no words came. Instead, to her shame, she burst into tears. For some time, too long, she could not speak for her sobbing. The Arrokad regarded her, unmoving and apparently unmoved.

When at last she found her voice, she apologized.

“What is your name, cousin?”

“I am Droënalka. Most call me Droë.” She would have expected a human or another Tirribin to reciprocate, but such conventions did not apply to the Most Ancient Ones. Either he would tell her his name or he wouldn’t. His to choose.

“Do you seek a boon, Droë of the Tirribin? Is this why you summoned me?”

She hesitated before nodding.

“I see. That, too, carries a cost.”

“I know that,” she said, wearying of being spoken to as if she knew nothing. “I’m Tirribin. I understand the commerce of summons and boon.”

A canny smile revealed gleaming sharp teeth. “Better. That is the spirit I expect when treating with Tirribin. I had begun to think you simple.”

“That’s rude.” But his teasing made her feel better, more like herself.

“Yes, I suppose it is. I am Qiyed. You showed great restraint in not asking. I know how much your kind care about etiquette.”

Her cheeks warmed.

“Tell me more of this boon you seek.”

“I- I don’t know how.”

“That is intriguing, but I do not wish to remain on this strand for long.” Lightning flashed, and thunder followed, sooner than she had expected. “A storm comes, and I long to swim with it.” Another sly grin. “Have you ever done this?”

“No.”

“Would you care to?”

She reflected with distaste on her swim from the ship. “I don’t think so, no.”

“Very well. Quickly then.”

Where to begin?

“There is a Walker. I’m told I knew him when he trained in the palace at Trevynisle.”

“You have come from the northern isles?” he asked, surprise in the question.

“Yes.”

“And what does that mean: ‘I’m told I knew him’?”

“He traveled back in time, and created this misfuture we’re in now. The humans have fought over Hayncalde in Daerjen. One supremacy has given way to another.”

“I knew nothing of this.”

She canted her head. “Payment for my summons?”

He bared his teeth again. “Clever, cousin.” He considered this. “Done. That part of your debt to me is paid in full. Go on.”

“This boy – a man now, no doubt – I’m told we were friends, and I’ve come to suspect that… that perhaps I cared for him even more than that.”

His eyebrows rose. “This is unusual for Tirribin, is it not?”

“More than you could know,” she said, the words tumbling out of her. “I am… I have always been fascinated by love, by passion. The act, the emotion. Everything about it.”

His brow creased, but his grin remained. “You would have me teach you of such things?”

“No. I would have you…” She broke off, swallowing. Her gaze slid to the clouds behind him, to the flicker of light in their depths. “I tire of being Tirribin, of being a child, of being denied the… the fruits enjoyed by other sorts of creatures. I wonder if you might change me.”

He gaped. Cunning as he might have been, as all his kind were, he clearly hadn’t expected this.

“I don’t know if your power runs that deep,” she said, filling a yawning silence. “I have spoken of this with another Arrokad, and…” Her words came haltingly; Ujie might not wish for others to know of their conversation. “And this Most Ancient One suggested it might be possible, though inadvisable.”

“Allow me to understand,” Qiyed said. “You wish to be brought to mature form.”

“That’s right.”

“I assume you also wish to remain Tirribin, to retain your time sense, your abilities.”

She hadn’t given this much thought, but didn’t wish to admit as much. “I do,” she said, hoping she sounded certain.

“Well, cousin, I will confess to being astonished, almost beyond words.” His forehead furrowed again. “You are set on this course? You have considered it from all perspectives?”

“I… I have thought about it a great deal.”

“You could never go back to being Tirribin in the way you are now. You would be unique, but also alone. You would be a creature unto yourself. That strikes me as a lonely existence.”

“I’m lonely already.” She regretted the words as soon as they passed her lips.

Qiyed studied her, not with sympathy as she imagined Ujie might, but with cool appraisal. The wind rose and a bolt of lightning stabbed the sea. For the moment at least, the Arrokad had forgotten the storm and his desire to swim in it.

“I might be able to do this thing. It has never crossed my mind to try and so I do not know. It could be a risk allowing me to try. Do you understand?”

His response frightened and thrilled her.

“I do. What price such a boon?”

“No price. Not for now. In time, if we do this, and if you are pleased with the result, perhaps we can revisit the matter. In the interim, we would… become friends. And perhaps you would tell me more about this misfuture. Access to your time sense would be payment enough. Is this agreeable to you?”

“Would I have to come into the sea with you?”

He laughed at that. “You might enjoy it, Droë of the Tirribin.” He shook his head. “You would not have to do anything you are not prepared to do. In time, you may wish to experience the surf as I do. Until then, you can live on land as you have, and I will swim the sea as I have. You may summon me at will, without cost.”

For the first time since reaching the shoreline, Droë allowed herself a smile. “Thank you. That would be… Those terms are acceptable.”

“An arrangement then, freely entered and fairly sworn.”

“An arrangement, freely entered and fairly sworn.”

He nodded. “Good then.” Lightning illuminated the strand and sky. Thunder boomed. “I take my leave, cousin. Until next we speak.”

“When?” she asked before he could turn from her. She sounded too eager. Fortunately they had completed their negotiation.

His grin, fleeting though it was, raised bumps on her skin.

“Tomorrow night would be fine. Or the next. I will leave it to you to decide.” He pivoted and waded back into the surf. When the water reached his chest, he dove, the scales on his legs catching the gleam of lightning like a fish tail. Droë watched him swim away, envious of his comfort in the swells, the memory of his beauty, of his powerful chest and narrow hips, like the aftertaste of the sweetest years.

A few raindrops pelted down on the sand and on her. In mere moments, the skies had opened, soaking her hair and her shift. Droë didn’t mind. She remained by the shore. The storm roiled the water and she lost track of the Arrokad. After a time, she started back to the city. She was hungry again. Few humans would be abroad in such weather, but those who were would be careless, in a hurry. Easy prey.

Droë didn’t return to the shore the following night. She didn’t wish Qiyed to think her too eager. She couldn’t say why. She had revealed much in their encounter, and she would have to share far more in days to come. Before long, the Arrokad would know her better than any creature ever had. This made her uneasy, which might have been why she kept away. She didn’t go the next night, either.

By the third night, she could wait no longer. They had an arrangement. Reneging on a bargain struck with one of the Most Ancient would be as perilous as any change in her form.

Besides, she had made her decision.

The night was warm and still. A thin haze obscured most stars and smeared the moonlight. The surf at the strand was much calmer than it had been several nights before. Droë walked to the water’s edge, allowing low waves to lap at her toes.

“Qiyed! I would speak with you!”

She called only one time, assuming she wouldn’t have to repeat her summons.

Within a spirecount or two, he broke the surface of the water far out to sea, and swam toward shore, his body undulating like that of a porpoise. She marked his approach, noting as he drew near that he had changed somehow. She wasn’t certain what was different until he reached the shallows, stood, and walked in her direction.

Her face heated. No scales this time. He was naked, unashamed, glorious.

“I sense your discomfort, cousin,” he said, halting several paces short of where she stood, seawater eddying around his knees.

She had seen naked humans many times, male and female. She had thought nothing of speaking with Ujie. Why should this bother her so? Was it because he was so beautiful? Was it because of what they intended to do?

“Shall I change my form? Cover myself as I did when last we spoke?”

Droë stared at the seafoam gathering around her ankles. “Yes, please.”

From the corner of her eye, she saw him making a sweeping motion with his pale hand. Magick whispered against her skin.

“Better?”

She looked up. He was scaled again from his waist down.

“Thank you.”

“I have spent little time with Tirribin in all my centuries. Your kind are most peculiar.”

She scowled. “That’s rude.”

“I merely meant that you are children in more than just appearance.”

He stepped closer to her. He smelled of brine and seaweed and rain. She breathed him in and looked off to the side.

“I am told that your kind do not breed as we do,” he said. “Is this true?”

“Yes. We simply are. We spend our years, but then we replenish them. We don’t age, we don’t die unless we kill each other, and we don’t reproduce as humans and other Ancients do.”

“Is this why you wish to change? Do you wish to have a child?”

She shook her head, still avoiding his gaze.

“So it truly is love that you crave.”

Droë made herself face him. “Do Arrokad love?” Before he could answer, she added, “I mean, do you experience the emotion? I know that the act itself is integral to what you are.”

“Is that a judgment, cousin?” Amusement shaded his tone.

“It’s an observation.”

“A valid one, I suppose.” A drop of water wound a crooked course over the muscles of his arm. “Yes, we love. And anticipating your next question, I have loved and been loved.”

“Who?” she asked. She was being rude, but she couldn’t help herself. And wasn’t this part of what they had agreed to begin together?

“Many. I have lived a long time. I have loved many of my own kind, male as well as female.”

“You don’t love them anymore?”

His slitted eyes surveyed the shoreline. “I remain fond of many, but love is impermanent.”

“Not for humans. Not always.”

“True. Humans live for a breath and are gone. We – your kind and mine – we live long lives. Too long, I believe, to confine ourselves to a single love. It is something you should consider. This human you love will be here for but an instant. Your change will last forever.”

“Do you have offspring?”

“I do,” he said. “That is different as well. My sons and daughters have lived for centuries, as I have. They have not been my children in any meaningful way in a very long time.”

“Do you love them?”

“As a human parent loves his offspring, you mean?” He shook his head. “I do not believe so. It is pleasant when I see them. Most of them. I have a son who I do not like at all. The rest…” Another shrug. “The rest are no more or less to me than other Arrokad I have known.”

Droë pondered this, frowned again.

“My responses have troubled you. Are you reconsidering our arrangement?”

“No,” she said, thinking her voice sounded odd.

“It is all right if you are. To be honest, I am still uncertain as to whether I can do what you have asked of me. The power required might well prove beyond my capabilities. I would not consider it a breach of our arrangement if you were to withdraw from it now.”

She faltered, unsure of herself. Again. She had thought she might become something akin to an Arrokad, but with time sense. Now she wasn’t so sure. In preying on humans, she had come to know them: their habits, their customs, the many flavors of their love. She wanted to love one being for a long time. If she were to have offspring, she would want to love them as a human mother did. But an immortal human? With time sense? Frozen in time once more, but at a more advanced stage? As Qiyed had told her when last they spoke, she would be alone and unique.

“You have doubts,” he said.

“Yes, but I don’t want to end our arrangement. Not yet.”

“At some point it may be too late to do so. Thus far, I have done nothing for you. That will not always be the case.”

“I understand.”

“Very well. You summoned me again. Why? What did you think would happen tonight?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “If you were to try right now to begin to change me, what would you do?”

Qiyed stared at her, eyes narrowed. “I would begin slowly. An undertaking such as this should be approached with care.” He took another step, closing the distance between them. He started to reach a hand to her brow, but stopped, a question in the quirk of an eyebrow. “May I?”

She nodded, not trusting herself to speak.

His touch was as cool as a forest rill, light and gentle, yet insistent. Awareness of his presence flooded her. His scent, the chill and damp radiating from his body. He held three fingers to her forehead for a tencount, and more. The cold spread through her, calming, pleasant. It eased her mind.

When he pulled his hand away, she sighed and opened her eyes.

“To answer your question, I would begin with a soft push. It would barely be noticeable. You appear now as a child of perhaps eight or nine, as do all Tirribin. With this push, you might seem more like nine or ten. Few would notice. You might not notice either. One of your kind could read in your years more than are really there. You are young for your kind, yes?”

“I suppose.”

“This might be less apparent to other Tirribin after I attempt this. In most respects, though, it would not change you in any significant way. That said, in another two or three days, when next I touch you as I just did, I might sense the change. And having done so, I might then have a better sense of what to try next.”

“Could we stop after you do this? If I don’t like it?”

He didn’t answer right away. “Yes. This time. And perhaps two or three times more. But after that, we will reach a point beyond which asking me to stop would be a violation of our arrangement. And beyond which halting the process may become impossible.”

She shuddered and folded her arms over her chest. She raised her chin, though, and said, “Then do it.”