Sara Douglass – The Axis Trilogy 3 – StarMan

“Shra…it is good to see you again.”

Shra understood what he wanted to say. “It is good to see you again, Axis, for I have not yet thanked you for either my or Raum’s life.”

She took his hand in hers and kissed it softly.

Axis smiled, remembering how good it had felt to hold her tiny body in his arms and suffuse it with life. “You were my first enchantment, Shra. Your suffering was the key that unlocked the gate.”

She laughed. “You are as much a courtier as an enchanter,

Axis, for you misrepresent the truth so charmingly that it is hard to be cross with you for it.”

“And you speak far too well for a child who should still be clinging to her mother’s skirts.”

Shra’s smile faded. “My mother is dead.”

“Forgive me, Shra. Azhure told me of your mother’s fate.”

She parted his hand and motioned him to stand up. “If my tongue is smoother than that of most five year olds, Axis StarMan, then perhaps it is because of the mystical filaments you wove into my recreation.”

He stood reluctantly, wishing he had hours to speak with the girl, but already she was turning to her people. He thought she would speak, and it did not seem strange to him that she stood at the head of the Avar. She was Raum’s natural successor, and somewhere in a dark corner of his mind Axis wondered what had become of Barsarbe.

But Shra did not speak. Instead she stood, waiting, eyes fixed into the darkness that had gathered beyond the Avar, and Axis lifted his eyes as well.

A woman walked out of the tree line, and every muscle in Axis’ body froze.

Faraday.

Oh Stars, he thought bleakly, how could I have betrayed her as I did? How could I have treated her so badly?

His nervousness returned.

Faraday stepped gracefully through the ranks of the Avar, her eyes fixed on the gold and crimson figure before her. She thought she had resigned herself to her fate, but the instant she had seen him step into the grove every doubt and fear she’d ever entertained returned to plague her. But none could have guessed Faraday’s inner turmoil as she walked past them. Her face remained serene, her eyes still and calm, her gait smooth.

As she approached Axis and Shra she dropped her eyes to the girl.

“Shra,” she smiled, and rested a hand on her shoulder. Then, very slowly, she raised her eyes to Axis’ face.

“Axis.”

“Faraday.” He wondered if every time they met after long absences it would be before large crowds of potentially hostile people. This scene reminded him uncomfortably of the afternoon he had seen her enter the hall in Gorkenfort to stand by Borneheld’s side as his wife. Now he did not lust after her as he had then, but he would still have liked to hold her, to embrace her, and to whisper that he loved her.

For he did love her. He could admit that to himself now. It was not what he felt for Azhure – he could never love another woman the way he loved Azhure – but his love for Faraday was like a still, cool lake in the hot, tangled jungle of his existence. He would never remain true to it because he could never be sated by it, but now and again he would like to touch it, to rest by her side, to draw strength from her stillness.

But he could not touch her now, not in front of the assembled Avar, so he merely inclined his head, and hoped that somehow she understood.

She lifted her hand from Shra’s shoulder and reached out for his. Her skin was cool, and he was afraid to press her fingers too firmly. She was far more fragile than he had ever seen her before – what had so drained her that it left hollows under her cheeks and her skin so translucent? But her fragility only added to her beauty.

Her fingers trembled in his, and he wondered if she were as calm as she appeared.

“My friends,” Faraday addressed the Avar, but she did not turn her eyes from Axis’. “I present to you Axis Rivkahson SunSoar, StarMan of Prophecy. He is the one for whom Plough, Wing and Horn have waited for so long, and he is the one who will heal the hurts that have torn our peoples apart for so long.”

Now she did wrench her gaze away from Axis and look at the Avar. “Will you give him the aid he needs to defeat Gorgrael?”

A man stood from the front ranks. He was muscular and swarthy, with greying brown hair, and he wore a tunic with branches embroidered about its hem.

Faraday took one of his hands in hers and nodded at him. The man reached out and took Axis’ hand with his, so that the three stood in a triangle; Shra stood slightly to one side of Axis and Faraday.

The man met Axis’ eyes without hesitation. “Yes, the Avar will give the StarMan the aid he requires.”

Some of the tension left Axis’ shoulders.

“Will the Avar give blood to aid the StarMan?” Faraday asked. Startled, Axis’ eyes flew to her face.

“Yes,” the man said. “The Avar will give blood to aid the StarMan.”

No! Axis wanted to cry out, but he said nothing, and Faraday carried on, her voice resolute.

“Will the Avar seek out that which they have created for the StarMan?”

“Yes.”

Faraday paused, and now the corners of her mouth lifted in a slight smile. “Will the Avar give that which is needed to form the Rainbow Sceptre?”

“Yes, the Avar will give freely to the StarMan.”

Faraday leaned over and brushed the man’s cheek with her lips. “Grindle, Leader of the GhostTree Clan, I would present you to Axis, StarMan.”

Then she repeated the words to Axis, presenting Grindle. “Grindle is Shra’s father,” she added, and Axis smiled at him.

“Now,” Faraday said, “I would present you to the other Clan-Leaders.”

As they slowly moved along the front ranks of the Avar, Faraday introduced each Clan-Leader by his name and the name of his Clan, and with each, hand that gripped his Axis understood that each man made the same pledges that Grindle had mouthed aloud. It was so different to his last meeting with

the elders, Banes and Clan-Leaders of the Avar that Axis felt as if he were in a dream. Any moment now this veil of civility would drop and their hostility would shine forth.

But it didn’t. It was then Axis realised that something fundamental had changed among the Avar. Something had been accepted, and it wasn’t only himself.

When the introductions were done Faraday and Shra each took him by a hand and drew him back towards the circle of stone, halting some fifteen paces away.

Axis glanced at them both, puzzled, but they motioned him to silence, and then looked at the stone circle.

He followed their eyes. As it had been on Beltide night, torches flickered about the upright stones; beyond he could just see the shape of the Earth Tree looming. Everything else within the stone circle was shadowed. What was going to happen now?

Something moved beyond the stone archways.

Faraday tensed at his side, but Axis did not look at her. Figures were moving slowly about the trunk of the Earth Tree, but even Axis, even with his Enchanter-enhanced vision, could not make them out. He felt Faraday tremble, and this time he did look at her.

Tears were rolling slowly and silently down her cheeks, but she shook her head slightly when she saw him looking at her.

He turned back to the stone circle, feeling the silence of the Avar behind him almost as a weight.

A figure shuffled into view and Faraday, as Axis, gave a low cry of horror. It was Ogden, but an Ogden so warped and contorted by sickness that Axis took an involuntary step forward.

“No!” Ogden cried hoarsely, holding up an unsteady hand. “No, Axis! Stay back. You must not touch us!”

“Oh, Stars!” Axis mumbled, stricken by the sight of the Sentinel. His hair had all but fallen out, only a few wisps clung above his ears. His skin was reddened, covered in running sores, his face so bloated that his eyes were almost swollen shut, and

his mouth hung open as he fought to breathe. Even from his distance Axis could hear the breath bubble in his lungs.

Veremund and Yr struggled out behind him, and their condition was, if anything, even worse.

Faraday took a harsh breath and looked away momentarily. Yr was almost unrecognisable – where were the sharp blue eyes, the irrepressible humour, the knowing smile now?

Gone, gone into the same well of pestilence that consumed Ogden and Veremund.

Now Zeherah – and even the stoic Avar silence crumbled when she appeared, and a low moan rippled about the grove. Zeherah could no longer walk, and she had to drag herself from the circle, her fingers clawing into the dirt, her legs dragging uselessly behind her.