Whisper of Leaves Read online

  Snapping the shutters closed, he stomped back to the table, a single lamp burning on it. Maxen was his clan-kin but he had to admit that he’d never had much liking for him, nor respect for his skills. Fasarini had been the better Healer of the two, despite being a Sarclanswoman, but she’d died young and no one had challenged Maxen for the leadership. In retrospect, that had been a mistake.

  Menedrin of Sarclan could have challenged, for his healing skills were equal or superior to Maxen’s, but Menedrin had been a shy man and unwilling to put himself forward, and so Maxen had continued in the Bough. His healing skills hadn’t grown over the seasons, but his arrogance certainly had.

  Miken snuffed out the lamp and made his way out of the hall into the passage. Whichever way you looked at it, the morrow’s Clancouncil could bring only ill news.

  15

  Kira jerked awake as a hand gripped her shoulder. A dark shape loomed over her and she felt a moment of confused terror until she realised it was Tresen, his eyes hollow pools, the cavern beyond him bathed in yellowy light. It was almost dusk.

  ‘The fever’s eased but his breathing’s changed,’ he whispered urgently.

  She focused on the sounds around her and a memory of pretty stones came back to her. She’d spent the day at the Drinkwater collecting stones, carrying them home in a wooden bucket, swinging it as she went. They’d rolled together and rattled, and that’s what she could hear now: rattling.

  She struggled out of her sleeping-sheet and hurried to Feseren, laying her hand on his forehead. He was definitely cooler, but his chest rasped and heaved as if he were drowning.

  ‘He’s got worse and worse,’ said Tresen, crouching by her side. ‘Brem and I think we should raise him to help his breathing.’

  Kira glanced to the Kashclansman, grim and silent on the other side of the fire. None of it made sense. ‘The fever’s less. He shouldn’t be struggling to breathe. Maybe –’ she started.

  ‘We have to raise him!’ interrupted Tresen. He heaved the unconscious man half upright, and thrust his pack under his shoulders, but Feseren continued to gasp. Brem rose and left the cave.

  ‘He can’t bear to witness my failure,’ said Kira.

  ‘Why do you always think it’s about you?’ snapped Tresen. ‘Brem’s been stuck here all day. He’s gone to stretch his muscles, that’s all.’ Tresen envied Brem’s escape from the death-filled cave.

  ‘You should go too,’ said Kira.

  Tresen coloured. ‘I’ll fetch you food. It’s too long since you’ve eaten.’

  Kira stared down at Feseren, barely aware of Tresen going. Feseren shouldn’t be struggling to breathe. The thought congealed in her head and she couldn’t move past it. Footsteps approached and she glanced up, surprised that Tresen had returned so soon, but it was Kest.

  ‘Tresen’s got food for you,’ he said. ‘Come and eat outside.’

  She shook her head.

  He squatted beside her. ‘There’s nothing more to be done here.’

  His gentleness was harder to bear than his anger. ‘I thought we agreed you weren’t a Healer, Protector Leader.’

  ‘Have you seen death before Kira?’

  ‘I . . .’ her eyes burned and she dropped her head.

  Kest took her arm, guiding her across the cavern until the pale stone beneath her feet was replaced with earth and simpleweed. He lowered her onto a broad stone a little apart from the Protectors and settled by her side.

  ‘Here,’ he said, giving her a double handful of sour-ripe and rednuts.

  For a long while Kira sat looking down at them, as if from far away.

  ‘Eat, Kira.’

  She put a sour-ripe in her mouth and tart juice squirted down her throat, waking her appetite. She ate another and another, finally raising her head and looking around. The Protectors were eating too, Kandor sitting next to Penedrin, his face alight as he listened to the men around him. Beyond him she could see the tops of castellas, severs and fallowoods bending in a soft breeze. Everything was the same as she remembered, yet unutterably altered.

  ‘There were two deaths in my longhouse last season,’ said Kest quietly. ‘One was my father.’ Kira looked at him startled.

  ‘I wasn’t called.’

  ‘No Healers were.’

  Kira nodded. The death of the aged was a matter for each clan. Kashclan used healing to prolong the lives of their old, but not all the clans did. Kira remembered that when Menini’s mother had died, the helper had refused Maxen’s offer to accompany her to her longhouse. ‘In the end, even the alwaysgreen must fall,’ she’d said.

  Kest sat watching her. At least she was eating now, and a little colour was coming back to her face, though she still looked ill: the cut on her brow dark against her skin, her eyes more green than gold. And what he must say now wasn’t going to help.

  ‘I know the pattern of death,’ he said, as matter-of-factly as if he were discussing the weather. ‘The way Feseren’s breathing . . . it’s the way my father breathed at the end.’

  Her eyes flashed to his. ‘Feseren’s young.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘You’re wrong. His fever’s eased, he can’t be dying,’ insisted Kira, every fibre of her being screaming denial.

  Kest had heard many tales of Kira’s healing skill: of how she’d saved Narini and her babe when both seemed lost, how she’d cured old Barenen’s cough when even Maxen had despaired of it, how she’d set Dernash’s smashed hand so that it was as whole and fair as the other. She hadn’t failed, ever. Healing meant life, not death. He sighed. Dusk was invading the trees again, and soon darkness would hold the forest. Had the Shargh been alone, or were there others who waited now, as he did, for the ending of the day?

  ‘Keep Kandor with your men this night,’ she muttered.

  He felt a stab of surprise. Had she accepted the inevitable after all?

  ‘I’ll share the watching with you.’

  ‘I’ll do it alone.’

  ‘Feseren’s my clanmate.’

  Her head jerked up, a mix of emotions flicking across her face: shock, fear, shame. ‘I didn’t know . . .’

  ‘I’d watch in any case. The men are under my care, regardless of clan,’ he said, looking towards the Protectors clustered round the fire. He’d be the first Protector Leader in the history of Allogrenia to lose a man; men, he amended grimly.

  The birdcall faded and the Protectors settled down in their sleeping-sheets, their mood sombre. Deeper in the cavern, the fire turned from bright flames to glowing coals, Penedrin coming to replenish the wood and exchange quiet words with Kest. Kira sat motionless, her attention fixed on Feseren. A long wrenching inward breath, an agonising hiatus, then a hoarse exhalation. His eyes were shut and his head had ceased its rolling. Kira took his hand in hers, feeling as if she’d stopped too, as if everything had stopped. She had no sense of a time before the cavern, and no hope of anything after. Feseren was dying; all her Healer senses told her, yet her heart refused to accept it.

  She’d cleansed the wound, stitched the wound, bound the wound. The sorren had been pure, the falzon bandages the same as those she’d bound Sherendrin with, Mihrin, Jerid . . . They’d healed, they’d lived . . .

  Feseren exhaled and there was absolute silence: no murmur of voices, no crackle of fire, nothing. Kira had stopped breathing too, all her strength focused on him, willing his chest to move, his heart to beat again. Firelight moved, but not flesh. Suddenly the pain in his body surged into her fingers and palm, burning her like flame. Gasping, she dropped his hand and sprang back, gaping at her hand and expecting it to be as charred as firestick, but it was unmarked.

  ‘It’s done, Kira, it’s over. He’s at peace,’ said Kest softly.

  She was overcome with nauseating weakness. The world she’d known had been torn apart and rebuilt in an alien mix – the air was too thin, the stone closing in and crushing her. With the last of her strength, she scrambled to her feet and fled.

  ‘Kira!’

  Ke
st’s feet pounded behind her and his hand skimmed her shoulder as he lunged, but she was already plunging down the slope, her legs having collapsed beneath her, the world turning over and over, scraping and gouging her. Finally there was an immense wrench as Kest halted her descent.

  ‘Are you hurt?’ He was panting almost as harshly as Feseren, his hands moving over her, testing for injury. ‘Are you hurt?’

  She couldn’t answer him. The fall had smashed the air from her lungs and she was dying too, going with Feseren into the dark cold places under the earth. Kest’s arms jerked her upright, pressing her against his heart, and her senses were flooded with the scent and sense of him, dragging her back to life.

  Kest felt her convulse against him, felt the wetness soak through his shirt as she sobbed. It was a long time before her shudders eased and she drew away from him, standing with bowed head. Kest didn’t speak. What was there to say? That this nightmare was over? That he could undo death? Brem had told him that Sanaken’s wounds were now as rotten as Feseren’s.

  ‘We need to go back,’ he said, staring into the darkness, acutely aware that his sword was still in the cave.

  ‘No.’

  A figure appeared on the cave ledge above, dark against the wash of wood smoke, then disappeared as it made its way down. Thank the ’green for a clanmate, thought Kest, as Tresen approached.

  ‘Stay with your clanmate for a little then bring her back to the cavern,’ said Kest. ‘Don’t delay too long, Protector,’ he cautioned.

  Tresen bowed and watched his Leader make his way back up the slope. Kira’s face was tear-stained but calm, and for the first time in all their seasons together he didn’t know what to say. The silence stretched between them, and still he was held mute. And then, off in the west, a bird gave voice.

  ‘The mira kiraon,’ he said. ‘Your namesake.’

  ‘The first Kiraon’s.’

  ‘It’s said she was a great Healer, yet even she couldn’t save everyone,’ said Tresen.

  Kira said nothing.

  ‘We need to go back to the cave. It’s not safe here,’ said Tresen.

  ‘I’m not going back.’

  ‘Kandor’s there.’

  ‘How can I go back when I’ve killed their friend?’

  ‘It’s not about you, Kira. The Shargh killed him.’

  Kira turned on him furiously. ‘I’m a Healer! Yet I couldn’t heal him!’

  Tresen sighed. ‘No one could.’

  ‘My father could have.’

  ‘You know that’s not true. You know you’re a better Healer than him.’

  ‘No!’ Her hands had balled into fists and she was glaring at him.

  ‘Maybe there’s some things that can’t be healed,’ he said, glancing nervously into the dark.

  ‘All things can be healed!’

  ‘There are stories told by the Protectors that aren’t to be spoken of outside the Warens.’ He shivered slightly. ‘The Shargh blades . . . there’s something about them.’

  Kira froze. Kest had said the same thing, two days and a lifetime ago. Fire with flatswords brings the bane . . .

  Understanding hit her like a falling tree and she faltered. Feseren had burned with fever. The world swayed and Tresen caught her arm.

  ‘Back to the cave,’ he said firmly.

  16

  Miken scowled down at the table, his thoughts boiling. No sign of Tresen, or Kira, or Kandor, and yet Maxen seemed to have nothing better to do than engage in politicking. Everyone was seated and ready to start except Maxen, who stood apart, deep in conversation with his eldest son. What was so important that Maxen must tell Merek now? Nothing! Maxen was simply taking the opportunity to underline his authority by keeping everyone waiting. And to push Merek forward by keeping him in the hall for the Clancouncil, where he had no right to be. It might even suit Maxen if Kira didn’t return, thought Miken bitterly.

  Sendra appeared at his elbow, pale-faced and shadow-eyed, bearing a pot of steaming thornyflower tea, and Miken sobered.

  ‘Tenerini sends greetings,’ he said, touching her hand. ‘She’s not sleeping much either.’

  ‘We must hope that the alwaysgreen Shelters them all.’

  Miken nodded, watching the elderly helper moving down the row of councillors, but his hopes lay more in Kest and his men. No sign of them and no word. Kest had taken only half a patrol, just eleven men including himself. If Kest had struck trouble he’d have no men spare to send messengers back. Miken sighed and directed his gaze to the carvings above. Castella leaves, lissium blossom, tippets and springleslips, but no mira kiraon. Perhaps Kasheron hadn’t wanted to be reminded of the mother he’d lost.

  Who’d succeed Maxen if their own Kiraon were lost too? Not Merek – Miken would see to that. The Bough wouldn’t have another Leader whose passion lay in control rather than cure.

  ‘Maxen should make a beginning,’ grumbled Dakresh beside him.

  Miken eyed the disgruntled Sherclan leader sourly; it was rare that the council wasn’t waiting for him to appear.

  ‘I’m sorry there’s no word of your son,’ added Dakresh.

  ‘There’s time yet.’ Miken paused. ‘I don’t know why we’re meeting today. It’s hard to see what we can do until Kest’s patrol returns.’

  ‘His return will make no difference,’ replied Dakresh, his grizzled brows settling lower. ‘Strangers have found their way in. The only question is, what’s to be done about it.’

  ‘Or who’s to do it.’

  Dakresh’s rheumy eyes came to his. ‘It’s the Protectors’ task to keep us safe.’

  ‘Under whose orders?’

  ‘I . . .’ began Dakresh, but was interrupted by Maxen calling the council to order.

  Miken’s gaze moved over his fellow councillors as Maxen started the opening courtesies. Dakresh usually agreed to anything to get his aching bones home, and the rest were just as bad. Even Farish, who was half the age of some of those present, merely mimicked his neighbour Berendash’s views. Only Marren of Morclan would occasionally back him up.

  ‘I won’t waste time going over what’s already known,’ Maxen was saying, ‘our task is to determine what’s to be done. I’ve given the matter considerable thought and there’s no evidence to suggest the intruders are hostile. There have been no attacks on the longhouses or reports of Tremen being approached. Therefore I see no reason to continue the prohibition on gathering beyond the First Eight. Such a prohibition is unsustainable in any case.’

  Miken felt his mouth gape open and shut it.

  ‘I’m glad to hear it,’ said Berendash, rising. ‘The blacknuts are ripening ungathered.’

  Farish was the next on his feet. ‘The feathergrass tubers are also wasting,’ he added.

  ‘We’ve all found the curtailing of gathering difficult,’ said Miken tersely, as he rose. ‘But as Clanleaders we’re obliged to put the safety of our longhouses before convenience. Nor are we at liberty to disregard the instructions of those trained to protect us.’

  ‘I think, Clanleader Miken, that we’re all aware of the purpose of the Protectors,’ said Maxen. ‘But it’s the council’s role to decide the future of the Tremen.’

  ‘In matters concerning the daily doings of the longhouses and the octads, perhaps. But I can’t agree with you in the matter of our people’s safety. Kasheron established the Protectors for that purpose.’

  Maxen glanced around. ‘It’s hardly surprising to anyone here, Clanleader, that you can’t agree with me.’

  There were several guffaws and Miken’s guts tightened. ‘Are you suggesting the council ignores Commander Sarkash’s advice?’

  ‘Sarkash’s advice is precisely that,’ said Maxen. ‘It’s given to us to consider, as we consider other factors in discharging our duty.’

  ‘In that case, let us be absolutely clear what these other factors are,’ countered Miken. ‘We don’t know how many intruders are in Allogrenia, we don’t know where they are, we don’t know what their intentions are. Just
because the intruders have so far not attacked individual Tremen or the longhouses – as far as we know – doesn’t mean they don’t intend to. What we do know is that trees have been slashed, leaving a path for others to follow. What we do know is that Commander Sarkash, whose duty it is to protect us, has asked us to temporarily limit our gathering to the areas where he can safeguard us.’

  ‘Thank you, Clanleader,’ responded Maxen smoothly. ‘Has anyone else anything to contribute?’

  Dakresh wedged himself upright, his knobbly hands gripping the table. ‘Have you read in your Writings, Leader, who these intruders might be?’

  ‘The Writings speak only of healing,’ said Maxen, ‘but everyone here is familiar with Protector-knowing. The Terak Kutan hold the north and the Illian and Terkirs traverse the plains south of them. The Shargh were scattered countless seasons past, but one branch, the Ashmiri, have long reaped the rewards of being peaceable, free to go where they will. As the Ashmiri are a restless people, given to wandering, it’s most likely they.’

  ‘That knowing is old,’ broke in Miken, springing to his feet. ‘It’s the way things were when Kasheron entered the forest. Who knows what’s happened since?’

  ‘Who they are is of less consequence than why they have come,’ said Maxen.

  ‘Perhaps they’re merely curious,’ suggested Farish, half rising and glancing at Berendash.

  Maxen steepled his fingers thoughtfully. ‘That’s my belief. After all, we keep no grazing animals and we meld nothing precious from metal. There’s nothing of value here for them.’

  Marren’s chair squeaked as he rose and said, ‘I find it strange that they haven’t been curious in the past. As you’ve said, the Ashmiri roam both north and south. They must’ve come to our borders often. Why haven’t they come in before?’

  ‘They may have, but left no sign,’ said Maxen.

  ‘If the intruders are Ashmiri, they’ll have no love for us,’ said Miken.

  ‘How know you this?’ asked Maxen.

  ‘The Ashmiri share blood with the Shargh, and they have a long hatred for the northern seed.’