Jo Clayton - Wild Magic

Faharmoy slapped his hands together. Tbngues of fire licked at Faan.

She snorted with disgust, brought fire leaping along her arms, blue flamelets that wriggled and chattered their hunger at her. She loosed a pair of them and they engulfed the red fire, ate it, and plunged toward Faharmoy.

Chumavayal roared his anger, REACHED down and swatted the fire elementals into another universe, then slapped out, intending to crush Faan.

Abeyhamal kicked the Brazier over, scattering the coals; as a part of the same movement she brought the point of the fimbo hard against the Old God’s chest, striking him over the heart.

The coals died.

Chumavayal shriveled until he was a tiny black baby lying on the Forge Floor.

As the tenuous black hand swept at her, Faan dropped to her stomach.

It passed over her and was gone. She leapt to her feet, ran at Faharmoy; the tip of the fimbo touched him over the heart, went driving through empty space.

She scrambled frantically to keep from stepping on the baby wailing in the rags of his brown robe; when she was steady on her feet again, she looked around. The people in the Circle were indistinct shadows fading silently away into rapidly thickening fog, moving toward the River. Juvalgrim was helping Reyna down from the pyre; they started off together.

“Mamay!” She ran after him, caught at his arm-gasped as he looked down at her from eyes empty of all mind or understanding. She dropped her hand.

He turned and walked after Juvalgrim with a grim, mechanical deliberation.

A small hand slapped her leg. “Honey, give us a lift, mmmh?”

She looked down. Riverman. “What…”

“It’s over, Fa. The Change is starting.”

She pulled her hand across her face. “He didn’t know me. He looked at me and he didn’t know me.”

“It’s the Change, honey. He’s forgetting. That’s the way it works. If you keep after him any longer, you’ll forget, too. You want that?”

“No… •

“Then you need to get to the Sibyl’s Cave.”

She bent, cupped her hand. He stepped into it and held onto her sleeve as she lifted him waist high. “Mild?”

“I don’t know, Fa.” He settled into the crook of her arm. “Quick, there isn’t much time left.”

She looked around a last time. There was no one left in the circle, even the baby Faharmoy had vanished. “This is what it’s all about, all the starving, all the fighting, all the dying? A touch on the chest?”

“Timing’s all, Faan. You and HER, touching together.”

“Waste!” She blinked, shook her head, then started trotting for the nearest kariam. She was too tired and too numb to feel anything yet, grief or triumph.

The Forge Floor melted into the air leaving a circle of crisp green grass with a conical Hive in the center. A garden filled with the sound of water and with flowers whose perfumes drifted aimlessly on wandering breezes; gossamer bees like bits of sunlight hummed from bloom to bloom and back to the Hive. A grand Sequba grew beside a stream, its moththeries flittering about, changing color in a visual song of pleasure in their new freedom. Abeyhamal laid the baby on the grass, leaving him for the sun to feed him, the rain to quench his -thirst; his excretions were perfumed and ephemeral, sublimating into the Garden air like dew evaporating in the morning.

She settled herself on a Sequba root and contemplated with intense satisfaction the realm that was now hers alone.

The Low City was silent, the wynds and ways filled with yellow-white mist. The dead lay where they fell, but the wounded rose and stood staring at nothing, their bones and muscle healing as the mist eddied about them.

Penhari sat in the Heart Garden of the Kummhouse, staring vacantly at the mist.

There was a weight in her lap. She looked down. A baby.

The baby wailed. Without thinking, she unbuttoned her blouse and put him to her breast which was suddenly heavy with milk.

At the first swallow, the baby stiffened. His body convulsed, began to change. In minutes what had been a boy child was a girl; a hungry vigorous little girl. Penhari laughed and shook her head.

And forgot.

Ailiki came lollopping from the Sibyl’s Cave, circled round Faan, reared on her hind legs, and clapped her forepaws together.

Faan smiled; the lump in her throat eased a little. She set Riverman down, straightened her shoulders and walked into the shadow.

Her gear and Faan’s were in two leather bags by her feet, Desantro was squatting beside the Sibyl’s Chair, looking angry and confused. She stood when she saw Faan. “Maybe you can tell me. What’n jann’s going on here? The beast of yours went crazy, it kept biting me like I was a sheep it was herding. The Kassian said to pack up and follow it.”

“Sibyl?”

The old woman looked tired. “It was necessary. You’ll need a Companion, Faan, someone to teach you how to survive once you leave the Land.”

“Leave.”

“You have no place here, Honeychild, not any longer. No home. No family. Nothing.”

Faan clenched her teeth; her eyes prickled with tears she was too angry and too stubborn to shed.

Desantro slapped at her thigh. “Gaangah! Don’t I get any say what I do or don’t?”

The Sibyl turned her head, looked down. “No.”

Desantro snorted, got to her feet. “One jeggin’ thing atop ‘nother. Well, least I get outta here.”

Faan swung round, walked to the front of the Cave and looked out across the Land. All she could see below the black points that were the peaks of the Jinocabur Mountains was a billowing yellow-white fog. Her breathing was ragged, she scrubbed the heel of her hand across her eyes. The rage that filled her was trapped inside her; there was no one to vent it on. And it frightened her. I can’t deal with this. I can’t…

Ailiki brushed against her legs, wove around her, warm and soft.

Faan gasped, shuddered; when Ailiki reared on her hind legs, she caught her up, held her against her face. The mahsar’s purring vibrated through her, eased the tightness a little and reminded her that there wasmaybe-something left. The thing she’d wanted to know and couldn’t find out-who she was, where she came from. Maybe now…

She turned and came slowly back to the Sibyl. “My mother. Can you tell me now? Give me a hint or something?”

The Sibyl tented her fingers, looked over them at Faan; her bright black eyes were twinkling. “More than a hint, Honeychild. Your mother is a sorceror called Kori Piyolss; you’ll find her in the Myk’tat Tukery on an island called Jal Vith.”

“I see. And how do I get there?”

“When the fog clears, you’ll find a ship tied up at the Camuctarr Gat, Vroliko Ryo’s Rostokul. The crew’s sleeping through the Change, but they’ll wake for you.” She smiled. “Don’t forget your studies, little Soreerie. “

Faan shivered, went back to the Cave mouth, and stood watching the Fog boil.

Goddance. The Beginning

Riverman on her shoulder, the Sibyl stood at the mouth of the Cave and watched Faan run down the path, Desantro close behind her. The Change was complete, the Fog had cleared away. The morning was crisp and cold, the sky gray with clouds; underfoot Fogomalin was rumbling.

Riverman tugged at her ear. “What’s bothering you, mmh?”

“Faan. What a mess these gods make. And they never clean up after themselves.”

“Abeyhamal, godlet. She set a shell over Jul Virri I doubt even a sorceror could break through. Now that the Change is done, she has no doubt forgot all that and even if she hasn’t…” The Sibyl shrugged. “By tomorrow, godlet, your River will be flashing itself clean. Stay with me a while. Then we both can rest.”