2.

 

Ayae could not sleep. She tried, pushing herself down on the hard mattress, willing herself to let go, to just drift … but each time she opened her eyes there was no light, and she opened her eyes so often that she lost count well before the morning sun’s dawn soaked through the tiny windows of the hospital. By then she’d had enough. She had stayed too long, wanted no more and, running a hand through her hair, she rose and pulled on her smoke-stained clothing.

At the door, the two guards created a human wall of worn chain mail and professionalism. She met the gaze of both. “I just want to sleep in my own bed.”

The left part of the wall shrugged. “We have orders.”

“I’m not going to be kept here.”

“I—”

“Gentlemen, let her pass.” A small hand parted the chain mail and revealed Reila, who took Ayae’s arm and drew her past the two-man blockage. “Have we lost so much kindness already, just because of a Keeper?”

“Our orders—” the right part of the wall began.

She raised a hand. “Think before you speak, Voren.”

The soldier’s lips pursed, but he nodded, once, and retreated as Ayae was led down the pale, morning lit corridor. As she stepped into the morning light, Reila told Ayae that she should rest for a few days, drink plenty of water and find her immediately if she began to feel hot. “We will take care of you, child,” the healer said, the wet cobbles beneath their feet like drying tears. “All is not lost.”

By the time Ayae had returned to her home, she felt that all was indeed lost. Her hope that no one would have heard what happened in Orlan’s shop was gone and she felt a hollow pit form in her stomach. She saw the damage from afar, as if whoever had damaged the building had damaged her. As if the broken and trampled garden was her, beaten, as if the scrawled obscenities on the door were dug into her skin, as if the broken windows were wounds upon her and not her house.

Her house.

She had paid for the house entirely a year ago, after she had been awarded an apprenticeship with Samuel Orlan.

The day had been one that she could still remember with shock. Samuel Orlan took on one apprentice every five years, and men and women came from around the world to apply for it, with the competition becoming more and more fierce the older the cartographer became. To be the last apprentice of Samuel Orlan was to be the inheritor of not just wealth, but a fame that took you to any court in any part of the world. On the day that the apprenticeship had been announced, Ayae had not even gone to the ceremony to hear, believing that a choice had already been made, that the event of the day was, like many of its kind, a planned spontaneity. But at the time of the announcement she had heard a knock on the apartment door that she and Faise had shared, and her friend had gotten up to answer it, only to return in silence, the small old man following her, looking entirely too pleased to be missing his own ceremony.

After a month, the old man had advanced her the money for the house, telling her that neither she nor Faise could remain in that awful apartment they shared. The act had lodged such affection and loyalty within her that the sight of her house reminded her what would happen when Samuel heard about her. The thought was a cold one, dousing the anger that nestled in her stomach.

At the door, a hand fell once, twice, and finally, a third time.

If it was Illaan, he had a key and could let himself in; but even as the thought occurred to her, she knew it was not him. His betrayal, his rejection of her in the hospital, struck deeply and she would not forgive him for it. He would know that, as well. When the knocking sounded again, she swallowed a sudden lump of tears and opened the door.

Backlit against the morning’s sunlight, the small, portly figure of Samuel Orlan stood, waiting for her. Dressed in fine but simple clothes of blue and gray, the elderly man’s white beard and hair looked as if they were touched by fire. If his blue eyes had not been filled with obvious concern and had he not immediately embraced her, Ayae would have thought that such lighting was a sign of anger.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered into his shoulder.

“Don’t you say another word,” he replied. “That shop was old. Outdated. I was going to burn it down for insurance money next week, anyway.”

A short laugh escaped the mouth she pressed against him.

“Besides, I need a new project. I keep dating older women who want me for my money,” the small man continued. “Do you know the look on their faces when I tell them that I have no personal wealth? That the money is part of the Orlan Estate, and not mine? Oh, but it reminds me of when I was a teenager and my first love rejected me. But you are Samuel Orlan, they say. I am forced to admit that, while that is true, I am also a fat old man born to equally fat parents who had no money. I find myself saying the exact words that dear old love said to me when I presented her with a flower. No, it has to stop. I need a new hobby. Also, I fear that word will soon be out on the street, and these women will no longer make me home-cooked meals and take—well, let us be delicate about that, yes?”

“Of course. They have reputations.”

“Awful ones, awful.” Slipping his arm around her waist, he stepped through the door and closed it gently behind him. “Now, let’s get you something cold to drink, and you can tell me who has ruined your garden and I can tell you about our new shop.”

Wiping wet eyes, Ayae said, “You still want me to come back?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

Struggling—his flippant tone suggested that he didn’t know about Fo’s visit, though she did not believe such knowledge would remain secret for long—Ayae told him about the fire, her own reaction and the Keeper’s visit. It was when she brought up the latter that, with the blind half opened to let in the morning’s light, the old cartographer paused and said, “And where was Illaan through all this?”

“Gone.”

He grunted. “Useless man.”

“What the Keeper said doesn’t bother you?”

“No.” He made a dismissive wave. “In this part of the world the Enclave offers a rare moment of sanity in the debate about cursed men and women.”

A frown creased Ayae’s lips.

Open now, the blind revealed motes of dust in the light. “The Enclave is, relatively speaking, a new organization,” Orlan explained. “A thousand years ago, the maps say that Yeflam was nothing more than a small crop of islands on the edge of Kuinia, the first of the Five Kingdoms. The area was mostly known for the cult that lived in the Spine of Ger, who built their cities in the mountains to be closer to the remains of the god himself. The gold rushes that brought men and women of a less virtuous mind to their peaks after the fall of the Five Kingdoms eventually saw the cult—which had become inbred and largely isolated—killed, and left the area open for anyone with a strong sword. In that vacuum, six men and women took control of the islands and began to build the Floating Cities of Yeflam, that huge artificial stone empire that covers the black ocean like a tomb. The people responsible for it are all long lived—immortal, if you take their word for it—but only Aelyn Meah, their leader, has any real power. You’ll find it rarely spoken of in Yeflam, but she was one of the five who ruled before. Her kingdom was Maewe, the third kingdom, after Asila, but before Mahga and Salar. She is one of the oldest beings on the planet. Those with her in the Enclave are much, much younger than her and could not compete with her in terms of power or violence, not in the way one such as the Innocent, Aela Ren, does, but they do attempt to stop the needless fear of the cursed.”

“You talk about the years as if they mean nothing,” she said. “The Five Kingdoms fell apart a thousand years ago and the Innocent began killing nearly seven hundred years ago.”

“I am the eighty-second Samuel Orlan.” The short man grinned. “My perspective may be slightly askew.”

Shaking her head, Ayae lowered herself onto a chair. “The Keeper said I was to go to him tomorrow.”

Dawn lit the edges of the cartographer again. “Demanding sort, but perhaps for the best. The Keepers do understand their curses well. And—”

“And?”

“I am afraid,” he said, the light enveloping him, “the only way to understand something is to ask the people who have experienced it.”