and still it rained, but the wind had slackened. And after making the rounds of the first watch, and having spoken to the wounded, Aravan entered his sleeping quarters. “Is she awake yet?”
“No, my love,” said Aylis, “and I am worried.”
Aravan sighed and looked at the wee Pysk, lying as she was in a soft bed of eider that had been stripped from one of the all-weather cloaks. “What says Desault?”
“That he cannot help her. And he says that he has seen others who have suffered harm, never to waken again. He deems that their spirits fled away. Oh, Aravan, mayhap the Shade has done permanent harm. Perhaps she will never waken.” Aylis began to weep.
As if she understood Aylis’s words, Vex whined, the vixen lying on the cabin floor at the foot of the tiny bed.
Aravan lifted Aylis up from the chair where she sat and embraced her and stroked her hair. Aylis returned his embrace and laid her head against his chest. After a while he asked, “Canst thou do ought with thy magery to find her lost spirit and waken her from this sleep?”
“No, I-” Aylis gasped and turned from Aravan and peered at Lissa. “Oh, love, you might have hit upon it.”
In question, Aravan turned up a hand.
“She sleeps,” said Aylis.
“Aye,” said Aravan, not yet following her.
“And I but pray she dreams. If so, I can-”
“Dreamwalk,” said Aravan, “and-”
“Mayhap find her soul,” said Aylis.
Concern filled Aravan’s features. “Wilt thou be in danger?”
“I don’t think so,” replied Aylis.
“Thy mentor, Ontah, was slain while dreamwalking, and thou and Jinnarin didst meet that same Gargon in Farrix’s dream. What if thou dost meet the Shade in Lissa’s sleep?”
Aylis pondered a moment and finally shook her head. “ ’Tis a risk I must take, Aravan, else she might be lost forever.”
The cabin was lit by a single candle. Lissa lay in her eider bed, Vex at the foot. Aravan sat in the shadows, silent but for his soft breath. With her back to a wall, Aylis sat cross-legged with her hands resting on her knees, her mind calm, her body relaxed. And she closely watched the Pysk. The moment Lissa’s eyes began whipping back and forth beneath her closed lids, “‹ Anu ›,” said Aylis softly, using one of Ontah’s dreamwalking ‹words› of ‹suggestion›.
Aylis slipped into a state of deep meditation and used another of the ingrained ‹words› of ‹suggestion› taught to her by Ontah, and she began to dream:
She sat on a rock high in the mountains. Far below, a waterfall tumbled and became a river winding through a vale. Yet this was a dream Aylis could control, and she muttered a ‹bridge word›, one that allowed her to slip into another’s dream. And she stepped through a crevice to cross over onto a flat yellow plain, for that was the ’scape of Lissa’s dream. The sky above was aureate, as if begilded, and glittering metallic strands floated all about, as of spider silk on the wind, but spun of gold instead. A topaz sun shone brightly down on the plain, which itself was made of precious stone-yellow jade, it seemed, and it ran to the horizon and beyond.
Nikolai said he found Aylissa on a yellow jade pavestone, one shot through with metallic strands. Mayhap the Shade drove her spirit down and within. Yet, where is she?
Aylis rose up into the auric sky and slowly turned ’round, her gaze seeking-
There! Movement!
Swiftly, Aylis flew to overtake the figure.
It was Aylissa, trudging across the jade-stone land and sobbing.
Aylis landed in front of the Pysk, and she and Aylissa were of the same size.
Yet weeping, Lissa looked up through her tears. “I am lost,” she said. “Can you help me?”
“Do you know who I am?” asked Aylis.
Lissa shook her head.
“Some name me Brightwing,” said Aylis.
In spite of her tears, Lissa managed a frown and then said, “My mother told me of someone named Brightwing.”
“I know your mother,” said Aylis. “I called her Sparrow.”
“Can you help me, Brightwing? I am lost.”
“Yes, I can and will. Take my hand.”
The Pysk took Brightwing’s hand, and together they rose up into the sky.
“Oh, my,” said Lissa. “I am flying.”
“Then I will call you Wren,” said Brightwing.
“Where are we going?” asked Wren.
“To see a fox,” said Brightwing.
“Where?” asked Wren.
“Just across a bridge,” said Brightwing. “But first you must learn a special ‹word›.”
“What kind of ‹word›?”
“A ‹word› of ‹suggestion›.”
“All right.”
And Brightwing spoke to Wren the ‹word› and had her repeat it several times. When Brightwing was satisfied that Wren had the nuances well learned, she said a different ‹word›, and a hole formed in the yellow sky. In they flew-
– to emerge in a candlelit cabin.
“There is the fox,” said Brightwing. “Her name is Vex.” And she pointed at the vixen, who looked up at them both and made a yip.
“And there you are, Wren,” said Brightwing, and she pointed at the Pysk.
“Is that me? Am I found?”
“You only need to say the ‹word› I taught you.”
And so Wren spoke the ‹word› of ‹suggestion› and vanished. .
. . And Aylissa opened her eyes.
Moments later Aylis opened her own eyes, and she wept to see Lissa sitting up and Vex bounding about in joy.
“What happened?” asked Lissa, peering into the small silver mirror held by Aylis. The Pysk pulled a tress of her hair in front of her eyes. “Why is it gold?”
“I don’t know,” said Aylis, shrugging. “Mayhap it had something to do with the pavestone you were on when the Shade, bloated with the ‹fire› of those it had slain, descended upon you.”
“Pavestone?”
Aylis nodded. “Yellow jade streaked with gold.”
“What would that have to do with ought?”
Again Aylis shrugged. “They say that jade is a special gemstone, yet what its properties might be, I cannot say. Those in Jinga call it ‘yu,’ and they attribute various powers to the different colors. I believe yellow jade is aligned with joy and fortune.”
“And my hair turned golden just because I was lying on a piece of yellow jade?”
“No. If I had to guess, I would say instead it was because your spirit was driven into it by all the ‹fire› the Shade had stolen.”
In that moment, Pipper and Binkton and Nikolai came bursting into the captain’s lounge. “Liss! They said you were awake!” cried Pipper.
“I give you hug, but it crush you,” said Nikolai.
“Something to celebrate,” said Binkton, smiling, and Binkton seldom smiled.
“I’m so glad you survived,” said Pipper.
“Me, too,” said Lissa. “-I mean, I’m glad each of you survived as well. And Aylis says you two saved us all.”
