Carol Berg - Breath and Bone

She bent her head to her knees and beat her fists on her skull. Mumbled invective flowed from her like lava from a volcano. Her inventive mixture of human anatomy and unlikely violence altogether lifted my spirits.

The chill, damp wind flapped my cloak. Driftwood lay about the shore, tempting me to direct the prickly mage’s attention to fire. But the luminous breakers, the wind-borne scent of unknown shores, and a heaven filled with brilliant stars of such profusion and arrangement as I had never witnessed reminded me that we were not in our own land, but lost in Aeginea.

I pushed up to my feet. “I must speak to him before anything. Find out where he’s brought us and what he wants of me. You’ll be all right for a bit?”

“On the day I require the protection of a lunatic, I’ll snap my own neck. Yes, please go find out where we are, so I’ll know whether I’ve a better choice to travel east to Estigure or west to Cymra to find a new employer.” Her gaze, sparked with starlight, traveled up and down my height. “You’re going to tell me we’re in the realm of angels, aren’t you? And that the naked man with the exceedingly odd skin that I’ve imagined seeing is some kin of yours?”

I grinned down at her. “My uncle. Though he’s as loath as my every other kinsman to claim me. I’ll be back as soon as I may, and I’d advise not burning anything right away.”

I tramped the short distance down the broad tidal flats, finding it easier going than slogging through the dunes. Kol took no notice of my coming. Mustering every shred of graceful manners my tutors had beaten into me, I bowed and spoke the greeting Osriel had used. The Dané might not delight my eye, but my gratitude could not be measured. “Envisia seru, Kol. How may I serve thee in recompense for sound legs?”

“Be unborn.” He continued to stare into the churning sea.

The rebellious ember that yet denied the story of my birth winked out of existence. Seeking shelter from the wind and spray, I squeezed between his waist-high perch and another slab, pressed my weary back to the damp stone, and sat.

“If wishing could accomplish such a thing, gods know it would have happened long before now,” I said, twisting my aching shoulders. “My father’s family wished it. Many’s the time I’ve wished it—but that was before I learned that I had a kinswoman who could be spoken of as ‘beloved of every Dané for her joyful spirit.’”

“Do not think to ingratiate thyself by speaking of her.”

“I’ve no wish to ingratiate myself with any of your kind,” I snapped, his arrogance a cold wash on my conciliatory sensibilities. “You have extended me favors I never asked of you and that are clearly at odds with your own inclinations. Thus I must assume it is your sister’s desires you serve and that she wished us to treat each other with honor, if naught else. I offer no less than she would ask—and no more.”

After a long moment, he jerked his head in agreement. “I retract my unworthy accusation.”

Resisting the temptation to gasp in mock astonishment, I gestured at the desolate shore. “So, why would my mother want me here?”

“She chose me as thy vayar—thy teacher. The shores of Evaldamon provide a suitable place for teaching and are little traveled. Days pass slowly here. Yet were the days each the lingering of a season, the task is already impossible. I smell the remasti close upon thee. Once a body has passed the last remasti unchanged, naught can be done to alter it.”

“The last remasti…my birthday.”

He squeezed his eyes shut and ground his jaw. “Clyste trusted the Cartamandua to bring thee to me in the proper season—long ago. Despite what human lies tell, the long-lived do not steal human children away to Aeginea. Clyste’s innocence burned as the stars; the Cartamandua’s false promises stank as human dwellings do.”

“So it was for one broken promise that you stole Janus’s mind—stole his life.” Kol’s arrogance revolted me. “You mourn for my mother who broke your laws and sent me off with him. Yet for a failed human man, you alone issue a judgment that breaks all bounds of compassion. I’ve no desire for your lessons.”

“Which is precisely why the teaching would be useless.”

The Dané unfolded his legs, pressed the bottoms of his feet together, and drew his heels close to his groin. I squirmed as I watched, imagining the uncomfortable stretch. Clasping his hands together, he straightened his arms over his head, then slowly bent his body forward until his chest came near touching the surface of the flat rock. I hugged my knees tightly, as if someone might prod me to replicate his move.

The silence lagged. Already I rued my hasty retort. My life demanded answers. I needed to understand what I was and what I would be, come the winter solstice.

“You brought me here despite your belief that I could not learn what you would teach,” I said. “She had some plan, didn’t she…my mother? She mated with Janus because she—”

“I will not speak of that joining.” He sprang to his feet, his sigils pulsing, posture and voice articulating bald humiliation. “It is enough that my sister’s blood flows in thy veins. She believed the Everlasting had accounted a place for thee in the Canon. This I cannot and will not accept. And if ever such a disordered event were possible, the season of its accomplishment has long passed. Yet even so late in this waning season I know what she would ask of me.”

“The Canon. A vayar is—” I pounced upon the absurdity, astonishment ruining my intent to curb my tongue. “You don’t think to teach me to dance?”

His face, long, narrow, and perfectly formed, might have been cold marble beneath his sigils. “No. But if I gift thee the separation gard, as if thou wert a nestling new released from thy parents’ side, the Law forbids Tuari to damage thee without informing thy argai—thy eldest kin, who is Stian, my sire. The custom provides only a delay, shouldst thou be taken captive again, for the archon’s judgment of a halfbreed will never be other than breaking. But it might give trustworthy companions a chance to protect thee.” He jumped down from the rock, landing on his bare feet with the weight of thistledown. “If I can convince Stian to agree and gift thee the walking gard as well, thou canst move through the world with certain skills of the long-lived, which will aid thee in eluding capture. Clyste would wish these protections for thee, though all other wishes fail.”

“The gards…these markings…the sigils of Danae magic…” My hands crept inside my sleeves and rubbed my arms. Denial rose like bile in my throat. But a glance at the sea, churning a few paces from my boots where it had no business being, slowed my retort. The Danae could travel impossible distances…vanish as if they had wings…hide.

Twelve years I had hidden from the detestable life my pureblood birth prescribed for me. Lacking purpose beyond staying free, lacking skills beyond health and wits, I’d survived by embracing the chances Serena Fortuna had placed in my way. I had never turned my back on the divine damsel. And now matters were far more complicated.

I might be able to find a route out of Aeginea, but I could not imagine where I might be safe from Osriel’s wrath and from these Danae who would maim me and from the Pureblood Registry, who yet believed me pureblood and would run me to ground without mercy did Osriel but hint that I had violated my contract. More important, a stolen child awaited rescue—so I prayed—and a murdered child awaited justice. I no longer had confidence that Prince Osriel would weigh their needs important beside this mysterious course he had chosen.

“So you could just…mark…me and I could travel as you do?”