Her knobbed cowl bobbled as she bent to put her mouth to the crack, and her sharp-edged whisper cut the peaceful night. 'Keeper!' she hissed. 'I know you must be there. Answer me!'
She waited for a reply, the night silent but for her harsh gasps of frustration. The dark breeze from the other side of the Gate was gone. Yoleth burned to know how balance had been restored. If they had forced Vandien or Ki back out of the Gate, they should have told her of it. She rocked slowly back on her heels, her joints cracking. It was a strain to crouch here and an insult to her position. She was aWindmistress and a High Council member, hissing through a crack like a lovesick peasant courting a housemaid. 'Keeper!'
'Yes?' The oddly sexless voice was calm. 'You had no need to call so often. I heard you, but I had a distance to come. My Master says that so small a crack has little need of guarding, for what could venture through? The worlds have found a new balance, and perhaps if we leave it alone it will close now, though it shows no signs of it yet. My Master says that perhaps the crack will remain open between our worlds. An interesting thought, don't you agree?'
Yoleth did not agree. She had no patience for this Keeper and his crack. 'I am come to finish our business. That the worlds balance is good, for the Gate will not draw the Gatherers now, and it is one less thing to hinder our settling.'
'There is no need of abject thanks. You may rise. My Master has completed all you asked. It is always pleasant to be of service to another sentient species, and to interact with strange cultures.'
'I did not come to thank him!' Yoleth raged.
'Indeed.' The single word was an accusation of execrable manners.
But Yoleth was not to be cowed by social protocol. 'No! I am here to demand my payment! Your master has had his new plaything long enough! Do not pretend that Ki was accepted only as a favor to me. There is the calling jewel that they promised to me. You have put me off long enough.'
'A calling gem?' The Keeper's voice wondered that she dared say such things.
'Yes, damn you! The jewel the Limbreths use to call ones of their choosing to them. I would have one of my own. They agreed to that, when first this bargain was struck, and together we opened the Gate. Ki was to be their toy, and in return I was to get a calling gem.'
'That is not how I understood it! I am the Keeper of the Gate, and know such things. You begged the Limbreth to aid you! The Limbreth opened the Gate, testing it once on a Brurjan totally unfit for any of our purposes, and then took Ki out of your way. It was a favor between peers.'
'Liar!' Yoleth was rabid. 'You spoke of it here to me. We talked of it before, and you promised that when the Limbreth had Ki and was sure of her suitability, the jewel would be delivered! How dare you claim no memory of it!'
'Yes, we spoke of such a thing. But as a possibility only. I am staggered that you dare ask for it so brazenly, as if it were a tinker's trinket. But, be still! My Master speaks to me.'
Yoleth fumed at being so addressed by such a lowly creature. She swallowed her words and peered through the crack at the Keeper. The Keeper huddled like a pile of rags on the ground, its eyeless face gazing far afield. Yoleth stifled her impatience with a growl. She couldn't tolerate, any more delay. Ki was out of the way, and the High Council was beginning to sway to her songs; but the calling gem could make her power certain. With the jewel, not even that insolent Rebeke would dare to stand before her. Once she had the knack of using it, she could call any before her and keep them there, until they knuckled to her will. The Relic would be hers, and Rebeke would learn to do as she was told.
Yoleth seethed as she measured Rebeke's ambition by her own. Rebeke wanted control of the High Council, to sway them to her ridiculous ideas. She would make them all slaves to the peasants in thefields. Ever she harped on duty and always she prattled of how generosity and gentleness would pay off in larger harvests and tribute given with a free hand. The fool. The larger the harvest, the less value each bushel had. The peasants were not the simple-hearted folks she painted but greedy sneaks, adept at hiding the true bounty of the harvests from the Windsingers who gave them the fair weather. Give them a golden summer and they gave you a bushel of wormy apples and some spotted tubers. But give them a few storms and a splatter or two of lightning to keep fear in their hearts, and they would yield up the Windsingers' proper due. No, Rebeke was a fool and a dangerous one, and Yoleth wouldn't wait until she had the Council at her feet. Yoleth would get that calling gem, if she had to sing a wind to blow through this damned crack and shred the rags off the Keeper. She would have it.
The Keeper stirred, coming out of a far meditation. Yoleth was secretly disgusted at the quivering of his body as he became aware of her again. 'Well?' she demanded harshly.
'Long has my Master kept me, to make me understand what they wish.' He bowed low to her, suddenly subservient. 'I am rebuked for my discourteous words, and must ask your pardon. I am but the Keeper of the Gate, not the Mouth of the Limbreth. I have spoken beyond my station, and said words that must be taken back. I abase myself before you and beg that you will consider those words the mouthings of an ignorant churl, not the message of my gracious Master.' The Keeper literally groveled in the dust on his side of the Gate. Yoleth regarded him with distaste as he writhed in the dirt, scooping handfuls of it to pour over his own head.
'Enough!' she cried. 'I am sure you have learned not to interfere between your betters. I dismiss your words from my mind. Rise now, and give me the gem.'
The Keeper leaped up in a flurry of dust. He curtsied low to her and crept close to the crack. 'Of course! As my Master has agreed, so it will be done. It costs me a pang to part with it, so long have I held it for them. I will be honest. Jealousy flavored my earlier words. The highest honor this one has ever known has been the holding of this for my Master. But he has revealed to me that his will may be better served by putting it into your hands. What true servant questions the wisdom of the Master? I obey.'
Yoleth knelt in the dust to receive it. The Keeper slipped his hands inside his ragged robe, groping. He seemed to struggle; Yoleth made a wry face at his dramatics. Having said he was loath to part with it should have been enough for him, but now he was miming his own reluctance. She saw the sinews of his muscles crawl as he gripped something tightly, and there was a ripping sound, then a snap as if a cord had given way. He thrust the something to her, his own eyeless mask twisted into a mockery of agony. The jewel alone seemed to pass easily through the wall; she felt as if she reached into tar to take it. As soon as she took it from the Keeper's hand, he fell limply back into the dust. Yoleth gave one more disgusted look at his abject posturing, and rose with the jewel clutched in her grip.
She wiped it clean of his sweat on the cuff of her flowing sleeve and raised it to the pale light of the stars. It began to pulse and throb, gleaming so intensely she almost believed she felt a warmth with each blossoming of light. Her heart quickened to its beating; she felt a thrill of possession such as she had almost forgotten. It was hers, Yoleth's alone, to master and use. Did the High Council think that she would do their dirty work for them and have nothing to show for it? Fools.
She began to slip it into the pocket inside her sleeve. A dark stain on her cuff caught her attention. It smeared darkly on her fingers with a coppery smell. Puzzled, she stooped to peer again through the crack in the wall. The Keeper lay as she had last seen him, his eyeless face a grim mask; no breath swelled his chest. Instead, a dampness spread in the dust beside him.
Yoleth rose, her thin lips pulled even tighter. The Jewel in her hand pulsed at her fondly. She knew thespeaking eggs of the Windsingers, living creatures so like stones, but brimming with life and thought. They might be used to communicate, if one were trained and dared risk the tremendous energies involved. But this calling gem was not like them. She gazed into its lights, wondering what dangers were in it. Would the Limbreth or Keeper have warned her? Was there any real need for it? She had thought there would be some formula given, some series of meditations to attune oneself to the gem and focus her calling. But the Keeper, who could have given such instruction, sprawled beyond the Gate, senseless or dead. Perhaps she would be wiser to put this thing from her hand, to thrust it back through the Gate and ask for some other favor, a lesser boon, a trinket. Yoleth gazed into its shimmering depths and knew the Limbreth possessed nothing that was the equal of this, and that she would take nothing less. She could learn to use it; a bold hand need never fear power. She gripped the gem tightly, feeling its surging warmth flood her. Sliding her hands up inside her long loose sleeves, she strode away into the night.
Jace stood in the shadows watching her leave. The Gate was little more than a crack now and she wasn't much more than a shadow herself. Her past few nights had brought her no food, and her constant wandering and calling for Chess had taken a toll of her energy.
She could not have explained what drew her back to the Gate, for it no longer held any promise for her. If
