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  “That is not an option. Her presence is requested by the FirstMother of her order. The request is delivered by the FirstMother’s personal aide. You will make sure she complies and at once.”

  “But the bugs. I’m allergic to bees and wasps. Spiders too, I think. What if she turns them on me?”

  “That will not happen. She may have some small influence over insects, but she certainly cannot command them like servants.”

  “But the other women say—”

  “If you say ‘but’ one more time, I will put you to work at the front gate sifting through the latest batch of worthless girls and give your position to Anouk. She, at least, knows how to follow orders.”

  “Yes, FirstMother.” Velma lowered her head. There was some kind of discolored blotch on the top of her scalp. Nalene wondered if it had always been there, hidden by her hair, or if it was some kind of rash from the sun. Being bald wasn’t always the most pleasant thing.

  “Go now. And hurry. I have much to do.”

  Now Nalene sat waiting, hoping that Velma actually was successful in bringing Ricarn here. It would look bad if the others came to think the FirstMother had no control at all over the Insect Tenders. Already she had had to spread word—through seemingly careless references dropped in the presence of Velma and Anouk, knowing they were the biggest gossips—that the Insect Tenders had foregone the shaved heads and white robes because she had a special task for them, a task that would require them to be able to blend in with the general populace. It was a weak excuse—the idea of those women with their eerie calm being able to blend in anywhere was ludicrous; they caused a stir whenever they went out into the city—but the other Tenders seemed to have accepted it. For now. Soon enough they would begin to wonder, and shortly after that her control would slip. Nalene did not think she would long retain her position if the Protector thought she could not control her own followers. How could she lead them against Melekath if they did not obey her instantly?

  It was for this reason that she had not asked Lowellin for assistance in dealing with Ricarn, though she had seen him only last night. She’d been about to. In truth, she’d found herself spending a great deal of her waking hours thinking about the woman’s insolence and trying to figure out how to deal with it. But when she opened her mouth to ask him for his help, she suddenly realized how it would sound and she’d kept it to herself.

  Instead, she and the Protector had spoken of the Tenders’ progress with their sulbits.

  “The time draws very close,” he’d said. “Kasai’s army grows by the day. He will march on Qarath sooner rather than later. This is the only army that can seriously challenge him and it lies closer to the Gur al Krin than his own does. When he does, I want the Tenders ready to crush him. With his army out of the way, we will be free to concentrate on Melekath himself.”

  “There are perhaps a dozen women who can really control their sulbits,” Nalene said. “Women that I would trust to back me up in battle. Beyond that, maybe another dozen who can be trusted not to kill themselves in a particularly stupid fashion. The rest would do us more good if they would join Kasai and help him.” Nalene was pacing by then. It always upset her when she really thought about how small her “army” of Tenders was. “They are either weak or afraid, and the worst are both. The weak ones have to be helped every time they feed their sulbits because they can’t stop the creatures by themselves.” Controlling how much the sulbits fed wasn’t just a matter of asserting control over them. They limited how much the sulbits consumed because of the concern that if allowed to feed freely, the creatures would grow too fast and become too strong for their Tenders to control them. “And the fearful ones won’t let their guard down enough to fully meld with their sulbits.” Tenders had to be able to meld with their sulbits in order to take hold of flows and manipulate them.

  At her words Lowellin went to the edge of the balcony and stared out into the darkness. “We don’t have time to be cautious. I want you to push them even harder, take even greater risks.” He held up a hand to forestall her objections. “Soldiers are hurt and even killed while training all the time. A military commander understands that and sees it as an acceptable loss. You must learn to see it the same way.”

  Nalene bit back what she wanted to say and nodded her head.

  “It’s time for you to take the next step. I’m going to teach you how to work together, several Tenders diverting Song to another to make her attack stronger.”

  Nalene’s eyes widened as he spoke and for the next hour or so as he explained to her how it would work she forgot her concerns in her excitement at trying out this new technique.

  Nalene’s thoughts returned to Ricarn. That woman was neither fearful nor weak. If Nalene could just bring her to heel, there was no limit to how powerful she and her sulbit would be.

  The door to her chambers opened and Velma entered. Nalene sat still, listening, and was relieved to hear another set of footsteps besides Velma’s. Inwardly she relaxed just a little. The first hurdle was crossed. Ricarn had answered the summons. Maybe this would go well after all.

  The footsteps halted within the rooms. If Nalene turned she would be able to see them standing there, before her desk. But she did not turn. She was busy. They waited on her, not the other way around.

  Finally, Velma said, “FirstMother?”

  Nalene smiled inwardly. Velma had learned that she was not to disturb the FirstMother without an invitation. She waited several long seconds, then turned. “Come.”

  Velma walked onto the balcony, followed by Ricarn. For a moment Nalene thought she saw a hint of a smile on Ricarn’s porcelain face—was she laughing at her?—but it was only her imagination. It was possible that Ricarn had never smiled in her life.

  “Please, sit,” Nalene said, gesturing at the wobbly chair. “Velma, you may go. If I need you later I will ring.” Velma slept in one of the servants’ quarters, where she was easily summoned by pulling the bell cord.

  Ricarn sat down. Unfortunately, the irregular legs on the chair had no apparent effect at all. The problem was that Ricarn did not sit as a normal person would, but seemed almost to alight on the edge of the chair, where she watched Nalene with a steady intensity that was frankly unnerving. It was like having a giant praying mantis watching her.

  Nalene reached for the words she had rehearsed for this moment and realized they were gone. Her mind was a blank. She cursed herself. She had planned to match Ricarn’s calmness, flavoring it with magnanimity. She was loftily prepared to offer concessions to an unruly subordinate and be gracious in her treatment of the subordinate. Instead, she hadn’t even started talking and she was already rattled. She took a deep breath and thought furiously. Then she remembered.

  “I realize we started with the wrong hand the other day, and I wanted you to come up here so we could start over. I may have come down a bit harder than I should have. You are a leader. Surely you understand the demands of leadership. It is not an easy task and even the best of us can become cross and take it out on others.” She paused. At this point a normal person would nod or frown. Do something. Anything. But still the praying mantis watched her.

  “So I…I wanted to offer my…” She could not say ‘apologies’. That sounded weak. “…my regrets. You no doubt came far and deserved a better welcome than I gave you, a woman of your standing.” Still there was not the faintest flicker of emotion. Nalene wanted to scream.

  “I am even willing to forgo my usual requirements regarding attire and…” She gestured toward her bald pate. “Since it is entirely possible that they go contrary to your Arc’s beliefs.” She was starting to feel desperate. Why wouldn’t the woman say something? “It could even be argued that the reasons for these measures do not apply to your Arc and, as such, are unnecessary for you and your women.” She sat back. Surely now Ricarn would say something. She was the FirstMother, after all. And she had just granted her a concession that any other woman on this entire estate would climb over her sisters to recei
ve. They were not fond of being bald.

  Silence.

  “Have you nothing at all to say?” Nalene said, forcing a smile.

  “We do not need such things.”

  Nalene started to come to her feet, then caught herself. “What?”

  “We do not need your sulbits. Furthermore, we will not take them. That is what you were leading up to, isn’t it?”

  Nalene spluttered. She could feel her sulbit, fully awake. It had slid down her arm and waited in the shadows of her sleeve. She sensed its hunger. “I just offered you a serious concession!”

  “So that you could pressure me to agree to take one of those things.”

  Now Nalene did come to her feet. She loomed over Ricarn, who still did not seem to have moved, except to tilt her head to meet Nalene’s eyes. “You cannot fight Melekath with bugs!” she yelled.

  “You cannot fight him by deluding yourself.”

  “And what is that supposed to mean?”

  “Look at what you turned into. Little more than strays, begging for handouts, the smallest kindness.”

  Nalene drew herself up. She longed to set her sulbit free to feed on this insufferable woman before her. “You have no idea what we went through to survive. It was…” She struggled to find a word to express her feelings on this subject. “The humiliation was more than I could bear,” she finished. “But there was nothing we could do about it. We were outlawed, the lowest of the low.”

  “Which made you perfect when Lowellin showed up and offered you a way out. He didn’t even have to try.”

  “Now you speak ill of the one sent to us by the Mother? He is Lowellin, named Protector in the Book of Xochitl itself.”

  “The Book is very old.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “Things change over thousands of years, sister. It would be foolish to assume otherwise.”

  “The Book is the word of the Mother, absolute.”

  “Perhaps it was. Perhaps it no longer is. Perhaps Lowellin is not what he seems.”

  “You are casting doubt on him?”

  Ricarn shrugged. “Open your eyes. Look at him. I am not saying he is not the one spoken of as the Protector. Clearly he is far beyond an ordinary man. But I am saying that he uses you and our order for his own ends. He plays a game beyond the one he speaks of and I fear this game does not mean well for us.”

  Nalene’s sulbit was in her hand. “I could make you suffer for that.”

  “Could you? Are you sure?”

  Nalene drew herself up. “I am the FirstMother of the Tenders and I—” She broke off with a small cry and swatted at a bee on her arm. The insect avoided the blow and buzzed around her. “It stung me!”

  “You were saying?”

  “It is only a bee.”

  “Are you sure?” The bee landed on the table between them. There was an orange stripe around its middle and it was no kind of bee Nalene had ever seen. “Perhaps you are allergic to it?”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Nalene said, but then the pain hit. She pushed her sleeve up and examined her forearm where she had been stung. There was a large red welt there, with some clear fluid leaking from it. “I don’t…” she said, sitting back down. “I feel dizzy.” Her voice sounded curiously small to her.

  “But probably you aren’t,” Ricarn said, making a dismissive gesture with her hand. “After all, it’s only a bee.”

  At that, the pain and swelling began to visibly recede. Nalene took a deep breath. Her sulbit had disappeared back into the depths of her robes.

  “The difference between us is that we do not care if we die.”

  “What?” Nalene’s brain felt fogged. “You’re not afraid to die?”

  “No. We do not care if we die.” Ricarn pointed. The bee on the table lay dead.

  “That…doesn’t make any sense.”

  “It doesn’t matter if our deaths make sense or not. We just don’t care. It is something we learned from our friends. It helps us think more clearly.” She waited, but Nalene had nothing to say. “I have told you what I won’t do. But here is what I will do. I will use every power and trick at my disposal to help you in the war we face. I will give my life to defeat our enemies.”

  Now she moved, leaning forward across the table, and the look in her eyes was so utterly cold that Nalene shivered in spite of herself. “I will also watch Lowellin closely, and if there is a way out of his snares, I will find it. What I will not do is play your foolish power games, so leave them off and let us have no more of this.”

  She leaned back in her chair and studied Nalene the way a normal person might watch a beetle to see what it would do.

  “What are you?” Nalene asked at last.

  “A warning? An example? You choose.” Ricarn stood in one fluid movement. “We will speak later.” At the door leading back into Nalene’s chambers she paused. “The young woman, Cara of Rane Haven.” Nalene nodded. “Do not bully her. She is the only one of you who is thinking clearly at all.”

  Twelve

  Quyloc was utterly worn out by the time he headed for his quarters to sleep. Though there’d been no attempt to drag him into the Pente Akka since he killed the snakes, the strain of having to be constantly on guard was wearing him down. Added to that was the fact that he was sleeping hardly at all. He lay there for hours in the darkness, the rendspear gripped tightly in his hands, afraid that if he fell asleep he wouldn’t be able to react in time when the next attempt came. Then, when he finally fell asleep out of pure exhaustion, he only slept fitfully, over and over dreaming that he heard the crackling noise that preceded each attack.

  Or he dreamed that he was pulled through into the Pente Akka but he didn’t have the spear because he’d let go of it while asleep. His fear of this happening was so great that he’d begun lashing the spear to his hand before bed.

  He was so tired that when he got to his room that he just collapsed on the bed. Lying there, looking at the ceiling, he realized that he had forgotten to lash the spear to his hand. He was just going to lie there for a minute and rest first. It always took hours to fall asleep anyway.

  Without meaning to, Quyloc fell asleep.

  Somewhere in the depths of sleep he dreamed he was standing by a huge fire, trying futilely to warm his freezing hands. The fire crackled loudly and all of a sudden he became alarmed, certain that he was too close to the fire, that he was going to be burned. As he looked down at himself to see if any coals had landed on him, he suddenly realized what the crackling noise meant and he came instantly awake, his eyes opening.

  Overhead he saw thick trees against a sulfur-yellow sky, but at the same time he could feel the softness under him that was his mattress. He was not fully over, still between worlds.

  The spear was not in his hand.

  Blindly, he lunged for it, his hand slapping at wadded blankets. His fingers found nothing. The blankets were fast becoming grassy soil when all at once his fingers met the spear shaft and closed around it.

  Quyloc leapt to his feet. But he couldn’t get his spear free. It was stuck halfway in the ground, halfway in his own world. He yanked at it as his head spun side to side, looking for the attack that he knew was about to happen.

  There was a strange, gibbering cry and the sound of vines snapping. Panic rose in him and Quyloc jerked harder at the spear, trying desperately to free it.

  Something crashed through a thick stand of ferns and charged at him. Though shaped like a man and not much taller than Quyloc, it was much broader and bulkier. Its arms were longer too, relative to its height, so that it ran using its knuckles as much as its feet. It was covered in dense, blue-black fur and long, yellow canines curved down from its upper jaw. When it reached him, it howled and swiped at him with one clawed hand.

  Quyloc was forced to let go of the spear and duck under the swing, which whistled past his head, painfully close. At the same moment he sidestepped, just enough that the creature only clipped him in passing, instead of running full on into him. />
  The blow knocked him to the side, but he didn’t go down. As the creature struggled to break its momentum and turn, he darted to the spear and pulled on it again.

  It slid upwards a couple of inches and then the creature attacked again. At the same moment Quyloc could hear more crashing in the undergrowth and knew soon there would be at least two more of the things attacking him.

  Quyloc temporarily gave up on trying to pull the rendspear free and snatched up a limb that lay on the ground.

  As the creature ran at him, he swung the limb as hard as he could and hit it on the side of the head. It didn’t seem to really hurt it, but it was knocked aside just enough that he was able to elude its claws once again.

  Desperately, he tugged at the spear again and this time it came free. He barely had time to raise it before the furred creature was all over him in a frenzy of slashing claws. Movement in the corner of his eye warned him that another of the things was about to join the battle.

  Quyloc threw himself to the side, away from the new attacker, rolling when he hit the ground and coming back to his feet.

  But he was done fighting defensively. All that would do was delay the inevitable.

  Before the one that had just attacked him could turn, Quyloc leapt forward and stabbed it in the side.

  The blade easily pierced it flesh, sinking halfway into its chest, and it screamed, fighting to turn and shred him with its claws.

  Quyloc ripped the spear free—relieved that the blade didn’t catch on a bone—and spun to face the other attacker.

  They were clearly more than dumb beasts because this one slowed when it saw what happened to its brother and feinted to one side, then attacked from the other.

  Quyloc ignored the feint and slashed back across the creature’s body, scoring it deeply across the lower chest. It howled and pulled back.

  Two more entered the small clearing and spread out so that they had him surrounded. The one he’d stabbed first was still upright, but purplish blood poured from a wound in its chest and it was visibly slowed.