ONE HUNDRED FORTY-FOUR: Dawn I

 

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It was so bright.

The first breath was lightning in Alden’s chest, and his eyes were blinded by a burning white star the size of a house that hung in the air far above him.

Before the second breath, before he even knew the nature of his salvation, there was something crucial. That gravity.

“Zeridee,” he said.

His rescuer dropped him onto his back on top of a hard surface, and instantly, Alden tried to reach for her, to protect her. He rolled, arms stretched out, striving—

A hand on his chest forced him down again.

“Were you enjoying the swim so much that you want me to put you back?” a voice asked in Artonan. “Stay.”

Alden couldn’t quite register the instruction or the one who’d spoken it.

She’s there. Right there. I’m so close.

“I’ll <<collect>> her. As soon as I’ve <<tended>> the ryeh-b’t I’ve already caught.”

An unfamiliar face leaned over him. Dark brown eyes, uncommonly close-set for the species, stared down. “Hello, Alden. I did hope to take a look at you, but I imagined a more social first meeting.”

“Zeri—”

“I’m Esh-erdi. Don’t worry about the daughter of the und’h family. For now, she’s safe. You are hurt and probably very confused. Contract, provide an injury assessment for this Avowed.”

After a brief pause, the Artonan patted Alden on the chest and smiled. “You’re not dying. And you’re obviously not in <<intolerable>> pain. The only thing left to worry our minds with is your emotional management…do you feel so overwhelmed that you might lose control of your behavior or pass from consciousness?”

Alden felt a surge of fear, as much as his exhausted body could give him. But not at the suggestion that he might pass out. This person wasn’t understanding.

“No,” he tried to explain. “My arms. Zeridee.” He didn’t have enough air yet to fully say the very important things that needed saying.

Save her. Help her. She’s with me. I thought she was with me. But she’s not in my arms.

“I lost—”

“You haven’t.” The Artonan leaned even closer to him. Dark hair held together in three long braids slid over his shoulder as he studied Alden. “She’s right beneath us. You were only <<an archaic measurement based on the distance of a small mountain-dwelling creature’s leap>> apart when I pulled you from the water, and you’re not much farther now. She’s still held by your authority.”

Alden shook his head frantically. “My skill doesn’t work like that. I can’t. When I’m not—”

“Ahhh. So that’s why you’re arguing.” The man’s smile turned strange. “If it’s like that, all right. I’ll get her for you now. If you stay here.”

His face, looming over Alden’s, had been blocking out most of the sky. When it disappeared, the blazing star overhead stung his eyes again.

Wait, thought Alden, squinting. What is this? What’s actually going on around me right now?

That was when he finally dropped his burden.

And when he finally realized he’d been holding her all along.

The change was drastic, and it was unlike anything he’d ever experienced before upon letting go of something he was carrying with his skill. He felt like he’d lost himself in one way and come back to himself in another.

In that moment, with a soul-deep focus on Zeridee suddenly reduced to intellectual and emotional worry, he didn’t understand much about what had just happened to him…what was still happening. His body was a storm of sensations—most of them bad. And the world was full of such astounding, impossible sights that his brain was doing unhelpful interpretive things as he tried to comprehend it.

Like alternating between telling him that nothing was moving at all and telling him the water covering the world was moving pretty fast. Because there were visual indications of speed—the way the surface rippled around obstacles, froth forming at the edges of a few still-visible rooftops.

But it was like a video of fast-moving water that had been paused. Everything was strangely quiet.

Not paused. Slowed. He remembered thinking that was how it was working when he’d first been caught in the effect.

And, on top of that, there were so many other confusing things trying to make themselves known to him all at once. He couldn’t even understand what it was he was lying on. Just inches above the water, the firm translucent green surface had enough texture to it for him to use a wet hand to push himself upright into a sitting position without slipping. It was a nonagon shape, big enough for four or five people to comfortably lie on. It seemed completely solid.

Beyond that, though, Alden wasn’t even sure if the platform was a magical device or a spell effect. His rescuer—a knight, Esh-erdi—had placed him near the edge of it.

Below him, the ripples the Artonan had created when he jumped overboard were the only things in the world, other than Alden himself, that moved with a normal-looking speed. And that was only at first. As he watched, within a second or two, they slowed down just like everything else.

He was baffled. He was shivering from cold again. His head hurt. His ankle and one shoulder were throbbing enough through the pain killer he’d taken earlier that the injuries were probably more serious than bruises.

And as he tried to collect all of these facts into a coherent picture of what was going on, his eyes were turning to the most astounding sight of all. The blot to the east, that mountain of water, had been subjected to the same magic as everything else. Its collapse was halted and illuminated by more spotlight-bright spells hovering in the air above and around it.

Alden swallowed.

Who could do something like this?

Alis-art’h’s display of power on Thegund had been larger in scale, true. But Alden had been nearly out of his mind and observing it from a distance as he ran. He’d never actually been in the middle of it while it was ongoing. Here and now, he was profoundly conscious of his own smallness.

Then Esh-erdi was back, breaching the surface of the water with a splash that sounded unexpectedly flat. He launched himself up to land gracefully on his feet on the nonagon, just on the other side of Alden.

He’d only been gone a moment.

And was holding Zeridee like she weighed nothing at all.

“—to carry me,” she was saying in a faint voice. “It would be best for you to leave me here. You must think of the peace your life gives to Hn’tyon Alis-art’h. And Hn’tyon Evul-art’h. Of Stu-ar—”

“Are you going to <<bully>> a human child with the names of every living art’h, Zeridee-und’h? At a time like this while you lie bleeding in my arms? Don’t you think that’s too much?”

For a second, there was a pause as Zeridee tried to fix her good eye on the knight who held her, and as Alden stared at the ambassadorial assistant in turn.

She’s just now finishing the sentence she started before I pulled the enchantment from the puzzle door, he thought. That means…I really did keep her preserved. Without touching her. Somehow.

And now I’m not preserving her anymore.

No!

He threw his arms out and opened his mouth to demand that the knight give him his dying Artonan back, but Esh-erdi was already bending down to pass him Zeridee.

Alden tried to activate his skill the moment she was in his arms, but he couldn’t.

I let her go. I’ve lost entrustment.

“Zeridee, say I can carry you,” he said urgently.

Her braid fell across the arm of the bathrobe he was wearing. The pale brown fabric was being stained with blood.

As soon as her good eye met his, her pained expression gentled. “Don’t worry about those men,” she said softly.

“I’m really not worried about them. At all. Let me—”

“Hn’tyon Esh-erdi, this is Alden Ryeh-b’t,” Zeridee murmured. “His flyer was stolen. Please take him to safety.”

“I’ll take care of him,” said the knight, keeping one eye on them and pointing the other toward the mountain of water. “If you let him carry you.”

“There is also the matter of the greenhouse,” she said.

“Zeridee-und’h, I will be inconvenienced if you don’t let the Avowed use his skill on you.” Esh-erdi’s words had a tone of rebuke in them that wasn’t present on his face.

She frowned.

“Say I can carry you,” Alden repeated. “We’re almost out of here.”

“Yes?” Zeridee said hesitantly.

Alden activated his skill. It wrapped around Zeridee, and he sagged with relief. Holding her, even while sitting down with the bulk of her weight in his lap, was hurting his injured right shoulder. He gripped her with both arms anyway.

You’re all right. I’m all right. I didn’t lose you for long. We’re not dead yet.

“Can you hold her like that for a while?” Esh-erdi asked. “I’ll be sending you both to a medical facility, but since she’s injured so badly, I have a specific healer in mind.”

“I can hold her,” Alden said. His skill lacked that extra something he’d felt earlier—the sense of stability he’d barely given any attention in the midst of everything else that was going on. But he wasn’t in immediate danger of losing her. “I’m not sure I could walk with her, though. I could try if I had to.”

“I rarely ask the Avowed I’m responsible for to walk on broken bones.” Esh-erdi was rearranging a stack of rings on one of his middle fingers. “Unless they’re members of a species that enjoys that kind of thing.”

He extended an arm and the ringed finger. In response, the green platform glided forward smoothly and silently.

“I’m sorry I can’t give you as much of my time as I would like. Later, I’m sure I’ll have a moment. For now, I’ll be carrying you to the edge of the <<pacification,>> and one of your own people will take you both to safety from there.”

Pacification, thought Alden, staring around them. Is that what this is?

He was still breathing hard. He was cold again. And he was just becoming aware that the stretchy pants he had on beneath the robe were way too interested in stretching now that they were saturated, and they were not nearly interested enough in doing their job as a pair of pants. It was a wonder he’d kept them at all.

At least his messenger bag had stayed with him.

I almost drowned. Just now. I was drowning.

He’d asked to use his privilege. He’d been rejected. And now a Knight of the Mother Planet was ferrying him to safety through this flooded nightmare, like his own personal gondolier.

The light spell didn’t follow them, but it was illuminating such a large area that everything was still strikingly clear in its harsh blue-white glow. They traveled along what had been the middle of a street, away from the epicenter of the flood. More and more rooftops gradually appeared as the water became shallower.

“Are you doing this?” Alden asked, his voice quiet. He looked back toward the slow-motion cascade, set against the backdrop of a sky that was still growing paler.

“No. This is Lind-otta. Do you like it?”

It was crystal clear that he expected Alden to like it.

“I do. She saved me. And you did. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. The timing was fortunate. There were a few different places that would have benefited from our help. We actually chose this one because we were looking for that one.” He nodded down at Zeridee. “Several hours ago, she called out. And sent a <<cryptic>> message out along with it. What happened to her?”

They felt her? Does he mean that same authority cry I felt? …all the way at Matadero?

His arms locked a little tighter around Zeridee, and it sent a lance of pain through his shoulder that made him grimace.

“I’m sorry I can’t cast a pain relief spell for you,” said Esh-erdi. “Lind is good at that kind of magic, but I have <<been at odds>> with most healing spells for years.”

“I’m fine,” Alden said.

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Esh gave him an amused look. “You have an interesting <<phraseology.>>”

“Did I say ‘I’m fine’ wrong?”

“No. You said it well! Here. I can cast a spell that will warm and dry your clothes. A moment…” He briefly turned what looked like his full attention to Alden and chanted a series of long lines. Alden felt his robe and his pants heating up.

When he’d finished the spell, Esh-erdi continued speaking without waiting for Alden’s thanks. “Zeridee-und’h’s injuries—?”

“She was protecting me,” Alden said firmly. “And herself. Three men attacked her. They were trying to steal the flyer. They tried to kill her and me. She…stopped them.”

“Stopped them?”

“One of them could be alive. Maybe.” Probably not. “I left him in the ambassador’s greenhouse. I didn’t make sure he was really dead. He might have been pretending?”

“The ambassador’s house isn’t there anymore,” Esh-erdi told him. “The men were Avowed?”

“Yes. Will she be in trouble? She shouldn’t be. They—”

“Did she use magic to stop them?” Esh-erdi asked.

Alden frowned down at her. “Is she a wizard?”