And Azhure was glad of that, for the Aldeni that now groaned under the weight of GorgraePs fury would have distressed him and made his dying harder. Roland was a gentle man, despite his warrior upbringing and occupation, and deserved the sweet fading of the light he now experienced in Sigholt. There would be no rage in his passing.
Did Axis fade sweetly? Or did he spend his nights raging into the darkness?
Azhure shuddered and only barely restrained her tears. Tomorrow she would leave, just herself, her hounds, her horse, and the Wolven, as Belial had requested, and race westwards. She did not doubt that she would find him, for the moon now fattened towards her full girth, and she would light the way.
Far beneath her she could feel the tug and pull of the waves at the base of Sigholt.
Azhure.
She turned, not surprised or frightened.
Adamon stepped to her side and put his arm about her shoulders, stroking her face and hair with his other hand. His
dark hair, so like Caelum’s she now realised, curled about his shoulders, and the faint light of both stars and moon picked out the fine lines of each of the muscles of his body.
Do not cry for him.
She shuddered again, and his arm tightened about her shoulders.
He waits for you, and yet is afraid to see you. He sits his horse, a corpse ten-days dead, and wonders if you could find anything left to love in it. He fears.
As would I.
Yes. As would we all. None of us have gone through what he has.
Azhure leaned against the comfort of his body. What must I do?
He fears~the power of the Star Dance, Azhure.
It has burned him fearfully.
He misused it. With reason, surely, but he misused it nevertheless. No wonder it bit him.
She wrapped her arms about his body. He was warm, and she could feel his skin quiver against hers. Help me to help him.
That is what I am here for. Azhure, can you hear the Star Dance?
Assuredly.
Then let me tell you a secret, a holy secret, about Axis and the Star Dance. And he took her face in his hands and whispered into her ear.
Azhure leaned back, her face shocked.
Imagine, Azhure, what you have held in your arms at night. He felt her shiver. You have shared much the same relationship, Azhure, as exists between the Moon and the Star Dance. Do you understand?
She smiled tremulously. / think so.
It will become plainer, Azhure. And it is this relationship which will enable you to help him.
I don’t understand.
Later, my lovely, later. You have a long way to go, and a long way to grow, before you reach Axis. Many nights in which will come back to you, and in which the other Six will come to you. But me, mostly.
He let her face go and held her close. Azhure, has anyone ever told you that your eyes are the same colour as the grey blue sea as it crashes against the cliffs of the Island of Mist and Memory? And has anyone ever told you that your hair is the same inky blackness that embraces the stars? And has anyone ever told you that your skin is . . .
She stood back, smiling. “And has anyone ever told you, Adamon, that your tongue is far too sweet and your hands sometimes far too silky?”
He laughed and kissed her, and then he was gone.
When Azhure returned to her chamber she found a set of clothes she had never seen before laid out across her bed. She fingered the material, awed by its beauty.
When she lifted it to her face, she thought she could catch Xanon’s lingering scent.
For a long moment she drank in the scent, then abruptly lifted her head and stared about the room, remembering.
A year ago tonight she had been deep in her labour with Caelum in this room. It seemed so long ago – ten years, not one. Then she had only been Azhure. Then MorningStar had still been alive, and Axis still refused to admit his love for her. Then Faraday had been her nemesis, not her friend.
A year ago tonight. Yuletide Eve.
Yuletide Faraday had planted Minstrelsea from Arcen to the Bracken Ranges, then through the ranges towards Fernbrake Lake. Now even Pig Gully, where Jack and Yr had once left Timozel wrapped in enchantment, lay deep in shade arid soft song.
For the past three days, Faraday and the Goodwife had been exploring the lost Icarii cities of the Bracken Ranges, with the Icarii as their guides.
Over the past thousand years the Acharites had known the Bracken Ranges as a range of mid-height mountains, mostly so barren the only life they contained was the brown bracken that covered the slopes. But in the days of old Tencendor, and again now, the Icarii had known the ranges as the Minaret Peaks, and even though the recovery of the cities was barely under way, Faraday could well understand why. Every day another of the minarets was disencumbered of the enchantments that had concealed it, and every day another of the spires leaped towards the firmament.
As in Talon Spike, most of the Icarii construction in the Minaret Peaks had been within the mountains themselves; Faraday was astounded to learn that the entire mountain range was riddled with airy corridors and chambers. But the ancient Icarii had built on the outside as well: cloisters leagues long that wound through the passes and arced about the slopes; gentle terraces that provided views of both Skarabost and Arcness;
platforms and balconies from where the Icarii could lift into the thermals and descend from the stars; and the minarets themselves, great domes and spires of pale pink, gold and blue luminous stone that reached hundreds of paces into the sky.
And about all of these soon-to-be-recovered terraces, balconies and domes would sway the Minstrelsea. The Icarii showed Faraday where she should plant.
“Once,” they explained to her, “the Minaret Peaks stood in the heart of the great forests that covered Tencendor, their spires reaching through the canopy to greet the sun. Now they will again. This is the place where the Avar and the Icarii lived side by side, where both the Mother and the Star Gods walked and sang. Now they will again.”
On the day she and the Goodwife crested the mountain-top that cradled Fernbrake Lake, she turned and looked behind her.
“Mother, but I wish I would see this in its full beauty one day,” she said quietly, and the Goodwife looked at her in alarm.
“But you will, my Lady,” she said. “Of course you will!”
Faraday smiled at her sadly, then took her arm and turned her to face Fernbrake Lake.
“Behold,” she said softly, “the Mother.”
Below them the Lake glowed gently in the afternoon light, not as beautiful as when it was lit with power, but lovely nevertheless. Faraday had planted up the slopes to the crest, and now she would plant down the trails to the water’s edge, linking the ancient stand of trees at the far curve of the Lake to Minstrelsea.
The Goodwife felt her stiffen at her side, and she looked at Faraday in concern. “M’Lady, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing!” Faraday laughed. “Look!”
The Goodwife squinted. Several dark shapes were emerging from the trees and pointing to where she and Faraday stood.
“The Avar!” Faraday cried, her hand tightening about the Goodwife’s arm in excitement.
Faraday had wondered if any of the Avar had ventured south now that the power of the Seneschal had been broken, or whether they would prefer to wait in the Avarinheim for her to plant Minstrelsea to their home. But here they were, at least five or six of them waving at her, and Faraday was thrilled. She would not have minded spending Yuletide at Fernbrake Lake with only the Goodwife for company, but the Avar’s presence made it special.
Of the Avar people, Faraday had only ever met Raum and Shra before, and then only briefly. Now Tree Friend would meet some more people of the trees.
But Faraday did not rush. An afternoon’s planting still lay before her, and she did not let her own excitement spoil that of the seedlings who would be lifted from their cribs and planted out this day. Their joy was the more palpable because of where they would finally find their rest; along the shores of the Mother, the seeding ground for the original great forests of Tencendor.
So Tree Friend sang and spoke gently to them as she lifted them from their pots, and the Goodwife clumped behind, humming her cradle song. And behind both of them, careful to keep both hooves and the wheels of the cart well away from the seedlings, trod the white donkeys.
It was late afternoon when Faraday completed her planting and stepped onto the grassy space before the trees. The Avar, six women and a child, had waited patiently as she worked her way down into the crater, and now they stood, some smoothing their long robes or tunics nervously.