Cast in Sorrow (Luna Books)(30)

Kaylin nodded.

"You live in the city. But you are not the city."

Kaylin nodded again.

"The Emperor also lives in the city; he claims it, rules it, and hands down its laws. But if he perished, the city would not perish with him."

Given what it would take to actually kill the Emperor, Kaylin wasn't as sure this was true. "The green is-is like a city?"

"Like a sentient city," Teela replied. "It is a place. It has geography. It has laws and rules and customs. We," she added, refilling her glass, "are merely the least of its citizens. We do not make the laws; we merely live-as most of the people in Elantra do-by them. If there is an Emperor, or his equivalent, we-again, like most of Elantra's citizens-will never meet him.

"But cross him, break his laws, and his anger is felt. The green is like the Hallionne, and unlike. I don't believe it hears our thoughts when we are in its domain; nor does it interfere in our lives in immediate, visceral ways. But it can. On that day, it did. Not all of the men who died intended to strip the chosen harmoniste of his role; the anger of the green is not so directed. No one will try to kill you while you wear that dress.

"But, kitling, do not bleed on it."

"I didn't exactly stab myself," Kaylin replied.

Teela fell silent, and not in a good way. She rose, and began to pace. The Barrani Hawk could pace for hours. She could wear ruts in stone. She had, when she chose, a light, graceful step that belied her size. Clearly that wasn't her choice today. "I swear, I will strangle Nightshade myself."

"After he's finished the telling."

Teela laughed. "Of course. I know the anger of the green quite well."

"What aren't you telling me?"

"Nothing. Nothing you need to know, kitling."

Kaylin looked down at her hands. "Tell me about the others."

"The others?"

"You're stalling."

Teela chuckled. "You are not my keeper. I am not stalling; I am considering what you usually do with information you shouldn't have."

"Meaning?"

"You run full tilt into the heart of things. You let your fears propel you. You have the caution of a mortal child-what is the word again?"

"Toddler," Kaylin answered reflexively, and found annoyance after the two syllables had left her mouth.

"Toddler. Why do you think I hear Alsanis? Don't frown like that-your face will get stuck that way. Immortal faces don't."

"I saw them, there."

Teela didn't ask who. "Where?"

"I think I was walking through either the dreams or the nightmares of Alsanis. I was trying to find the Consort at the time."

"With full hands."

Kaylin grimaced. "Yes. The full hands aren't important here." She fell silent. "Maybe they are. I was carrying words. I mean-runes. Like the marks on my skin."

"Like?"

"Two of the marks on my skin. I needed to take them with me. I needed to take them to the Consort-don't ask me why. I just did. But-I didn't find the Consort immediately; I had to fly through-"

"Fly?"

"Well, the small dragon had to fly, but in the dreaming, his wings were larger. Anyway, there was a city there, eventually. On the walls of a gigantic pit. We landed in a tall building-that's when I twisted my ankle. The Consort was there, but to get to her we had to walk down the side of a ridiculously long courtyard. I was still carrying the words.

"And I found statues along that wall. They were-they looked like they were-made of glass. They were Barrani, Teela. There were eleven in all: two women, nine men. It's funny," she added. "I had the hardest time telling Barrani apart when I first joined the Hawks. They all looked the same to me. I mean, women looked different from men, but-you were almost the same height, with the same eyes, the same hair, the same general facial characteristics.

"But...the statues, absent of color, didn't. If I saw them again, I would know them."

"You're thinking again. I can hear it."

"Very funny. I saw one of the lost children in the forest on the way to Bertolle."

"And you recognized him, cast in glass."

"No. That's the strange thing. I didn't recognize him."

Teela shrugged. "It was dark."

"In both places. The only light in the courtyard was the one I brought with me. The words," she added, "they glowed."

"Very well. Statues." The Barrani Hawk's eyes had lost their green.

"Technically, no."

"If you take much longer to tell me the rest, I'll strangle you myself."

"Didn't you just say-"

"I told you not to bleed on the dress. I don't recall that strangulation causes bleeding."

"The statues moved. They followed me. They tried-they tried to touch one of the words. I thought of them as ghosts," she added. "They always reacted to the same word."

"I am not going to ask you what the word was, because I really will strangle you when you can't answer." Teela folded her arms across her chest as if to stop her hands from acting of their own accord.

"They couldn't touch it; their hands passed through it."

"Yours clearly didn't."

"No. But-every time one of them tried, the word grew heavier. By the end, even you would have found it a strain."

"And that end?"

"I walked into a room. It was behind a warded door. My hands were full; I had to hit it with my head."

A grin tugged the corners of Teela's lips up as she considered this. "It opened?"

"With a lot of noise, and if by ‘opened' you mean turned to burning ash."

"Alsanis was never rumored to be this dramatic. Continue."

"The Consort was there. In the center of the room. Which wasn't a room at all-it had no ceiling. The sky on the inside was daylight; the sun was high."

"Did she cast a shadow?"

Had she? Kaylin frowned.

"Did you?"

"I was kind of busy, Teela. Is it important?"

"It's a dream. Or a nightmare. Everything-and nothing-is important."

"The Consort had been singing. She was almost at the end of her song when I arrived; I panicked."

Teela shot Kaylin her best "water is wet" look.

"The weird thing is, she was standing in front of a fountain. The fountain was at the heart of the room. The room was like an eleven-pointed star, in shape; the floors were stone. The ghosts-they all followed me in a line-walked to the eleven corners, and climbed invisible pedestals; they were all facing inward. They were looking at the Consort or the fountain."

"Or you."

That hadn't occurred to Kaylin. "Or me. I had to let go of the words to catch her before she fell. But the words waited."

Teela didn't even tell her that the words weren't sentient. "And then?"

"The Consort touched the words; they were solid, for her. We kind of-kind of pushed them into the fountain."

Teela stared at her.

"There was nowhere else for them to go, Teela, and they had to go somewhere. I'd've given them to the ghosts, but there were eleven ghosts and two words."

"I cannot believe Lord Sanabalis considers it wise to teach you magic."

"Whisper that in his ear if it'll get me out of his lessons." She hesitated. She had come to the end of safe story-if mentioning the eleven was safe at all.

Teela, of course, noticed.

"One of the words sank into the water. The weightless one. The other hit water-and rose." She sucked in air, and rose herself. Standing was in all ways less impressive. "The water froze as the rune changed shape, Teela. In the center of the fountain, made of ice, I saw you."

"You have not spoken of this to anyone else?"

"No."

"You're lying."

"It wasn't technically speaking." Kaylin didn't like the color of Teela's eyes; she didn't like the Hawk's sudden stiffness, either. "The eleven came off their pedestals then. They walked to the center of the room, to the lip of the fountain. They lifted their arms-to your image-and, Teela, they screamed."

* * *

She wasn't certain what Teela would do. She ate, in silence, although she'd lost all appetite. She was a betting person, but this could go either way; there was a good chance Teela would pivot on heel and leave the room. She had that tight-lipped "keep away" look that would have sent most of the office on whatever errands they could find that took them farther away from her desk.

Kaylin, with eight years of experience in the same office and no reasonable-or farfetched-errands to run, should have said nothing. It was safest. "Teela, what happened to the children? What happened to you?"

"Nothing happened to me," was her bitter, bitter reply. Kaylin almost didn't recognize her voice.

"What happened when you served as harmoniste?"

"Nothing." Teela looked over her shoulder to the closed door. "If I had known that you would be involved like this, I would never have allowed you to-"

"We needed that information."

"No, kitling, we didn't."

"People were dying-"

"Yes. But we didn't know that at the time, and the truth of the matter is, I don't care about those people." Her eyes narrowed as Kaylin's jaw dropped in outrage that was entirely genuine. "I don't care about them as much as I care about you. Is that better? You don't value yourself. Fine; not all of us labor under your evaluation of yourself."