Azhure had to steady herself before she looked down into the second crib. It was the boy who had generated much of the hostility, who had forced the birth, who had begun the horror and then encouraged his sister in it. She did not know if she could even regard him with equanimity. Even now she could feel resentment rising like a thick cloud from the crib.
Caelum pressed closer into her body, and Azhure smiled briefly at him, loving him for the comfort he gave her.
Then she looked down.
Her second son had WolfStar’s colouring. A profusion of dark copper curls covered his head, and his eyes, wide and hostile, were the deepest violet Azhure had yet seen in an Icarii.
DragonStar. Azhure had been rocked by the name StarDrifter had chosen, although, gazing at the boy she knew why. He was powerful, very powerful, and would come into more power. Yet DragonStar was a name that boded only ill.
Caelum trembled, and Azhure hugged him closer. Slowly she lowered her hand into the crib but before she could touch the boy’s face he grabbed her forefinger with his own fingers.
Azhure took a quick breath. The boy’s fingers squeezed painfully around her own, and his eyes narrowed.
Suddenly Azhure’s temper snapped. She had fought long and hard to keep these babies, and if she chose to love Axis despite the wrong he had done her, then that was her business and no-one else’s.
“Wretch,” she muttered, and sent a wave of stinging rebuke coursing towards the baby.
He let her finger go with a squeak of surprise and, Azhure hoped, a modicum of discomfiture. She placed her fingers on his
brow. “Welcome, DragonStar SunSoar, into the House of Stars. My name is Azhure, and I am your mother…and I am far more than I think you have bargained on. I hope that we may learn to respect and live with each other.”
DragonStar stared at her unblinking, and Azhure lifted her fingers. “Caelum?”
Reluctantly Caelum let himself be lowered down to greet his brother, but Azhure could feel his relief as she lifted him back into her arms.
My poor Caelum, to have such a younger brother to torment you. But you are your father’s heir, and he will have bequeathed you the power to cope with him.
Brothers, she thought, have given Axis nothing but pain and grief, and I hope DragonStar will bring you more joy. She smiled mirthlessly. I hope.
Relieved that her maternal duty was over, Azhure stepped back from the cribs. “Tomorrow we sail for Carlon, Caelum, and from there I will rejoin your father.”
Axis. Azhure sat in an easy chair by the fire and thought about Axis as she nursed her son. The GateKeeper had said that Axis had begged and wept to be allowed through the Gate, to be allowed to die. Only his vow made at their marriage, made with the Enchantress’ ring – the Circle of Stars – had kept him from the death he craved. Stars! she thought dismally, his injuries must be horrific if they had driven him to the Gate.
And if he yet lives, then how does he manage to bear such death-dealing injuries? Such pain?
Axis! her mind called, but there was nothing.
Command Axis?” Belial bent down and touched the man’s shoulder, then leapt back as Axis started violently. “I’m sorry. I did not realise you were asleep.”
Mother, he thought, how can he sleep through such pain?
“Drifting,” Axis muttered. “I was just drifting.”
Belial sat back on his stool and glanced at Magariz. Arne stood by the closed tent flap, shifting from foot to foot.
No-one knew what to do. How to help. He should be dead, but somehow he would not die. And only in death lay relief from his agony.
Belial rubbed his eyes, still unable to believe what had happened. As the Gryphon had fallen from the sky he had managed to rally those commanders left alive to get their units back in formation and moving back to the east. Arne and Magariz between them had lifted and dragged what they believed to be Axis’ dead body over to Belaguez, hoisted it over the horse’s saddle, and joined in the retreat.
Now, some two leagues south-east of the Azle, they had made their camp, expecting attack at any moment. But somehow this had never materialised.
A movement at the tent flap caught Belial’s eye and he looked up. Ho’Demi, Sa’Kuya and SpikeFeather TrueSong pushed their way in. He nodded at them, relieved beyond measure to see Sa’Kuya, then spoke to Axis.
“Axis, our supply column has caught up with us and Sa’Kuya is here. Let her tend you.”
None had known what to do for Axis beyond bathe his injuries in ice-water, and now Belial hoped that Sa’Kuya could somehow relieve Axis of some of his distress. She slipped quietly to his side.
“StarMan,” she said. “I have salve and analgesic tea. Here, drink this first.”
Arne helped support Axis’ shoulders while Sa’Kuya raised a small cup to his lips. He grimaced, but managed to gulp down some of the tea.
“Good,” Sa’Kuya said. “Now, let me rub some of this salve into your burns.”
Axis’ body jerked as she rubbed the salve as gently as she could over his face, and he could not help but moan.
With each of his muffled cries both Magariz and Belial shuddered in sympathy, and Magariz had to wipe tears away from his eyes. Gods, he prayed, please let him die, for how can I bring home this twisted husk to either Azhure or Rivkah?
SpikeFeather, who owed Axis far more than either Belial or Magariz, kept his own dark eyes steady on the man writhing about the bed and wished he could sing Axis the Song of Recreation as Axis had once sung it for him.
Finally, gratefully, Sa’Kuya was done, and she gathered her jars and bandages and hurried out of the tent. There was no more she could do.
“Belial?” Axis groaned, and Belial reached out a hand and put it on Axis’ shoulder.
“Here, my friend.”
“Then talk to me, man! Give me something to hang on to!”
Tears slid down Belial’s cheeks, but he kept his voice steady. “I have Magariz and SpikeFeather here with me, Axis, and that is Arne’s hands you can feel on your arms.”
Axis shuddered as he took a deep breath, but it seemed to help him. “Are any of you injured?”
Belial shook his head, then remembered that Axis could not see him, “No,” he said hastily. “No. We have all survived with barely a scratch.”
“SpikeFeather,” Axis said. “Why are you here and not FarSight?”
Silence. Then . . . “FarSight is dead,” SpikeFeather said. “As are six of the other Crest-Leaders. Others are critically injured. I…I am the most senior Strike Force commander left.”
“Oh gods,” Axis cried, and turned his face away. “I should have been quicker.”
“If you had not acted when you did,” Magariz said, “then none of us would be here.”
“Tell me the casualties,” Axis said finally. “Half the Strike Force are gone,” Belial said. “The Gryphon tore them apart. Of the ground force, over three thousand were killed by the Skraelings or by falling into the Azle when it broke asunder, and some two thousand were taken by the Gryphon. Another four and a half thousand lie wounded.”
Magariz rose and carefully sat on the edge of Axis’ bed. “Axis. What happened? What can we do for you?”
For a long time Axis was silent. “I let too much of the power of the Star Dance flood through me,” he said eventually, “in my effort to destroy the Gryphon. Too much . . . I’m sure that you, at least, can see what it has done to me.” He paused, licking dry lips, and Arne gave him some more of the analgesic tea Sa’Kuya had left behind.
“I should be dead.” He paused again, remembering how the GateKeeper had refused to hear his pleas. The return journey along the River of Death had been worse than a nightmare.
Now he had to live in a body that, by rights, should not be allowed to harbour even the barest flicker of life.
“I should be dead,” Axis said, and none present begrudged him the slight touch of anger in his tone. “And I have lost all power. Lost all touch with the Star Dance.”
SpikeFeather stiffened. Of all those in the tent, he had the best understanding of what that meant to an Enchanter. “You hear nothing? Feel nothing?” he asked.
What was left of Axis’ face stiffened in a ghastly parody of a smile; Belial and Magariz both looked away hastily. “I did not know what it meant to live without it, SpikeFeather. Even as BattleAxe, trapped within the lies of the Seneschal, the Star Dance constantly wrapped my soul – although I did not recognise it as such then. Now I do not know how I will be able to live without it. There is no point, and yet cannot let go.”