“Snow,” the doorman said. “Spéir’s Rain. A sign that Bais has come upon us.”
v
Óraithe
It had been hours in the bed to no avail and Óraithe was starting to become restless. Her habit of refusing sleep was one that it seemed could not be shaken by a near brush with death and so she was cursed to turn and roll and stare and begin again without meaning. Scaa had left her there to sleep, begging her to at least spend one more night resting, but the feel of the roughspun beneath her was grating ceaselessly on her mind. She stood up.
There was the faintest sound of lapping water from through the window. Óraithe understood where she was— she had seen it on maps a dozen times— but she did not imagine they would be so close to water. She had never seen the sight of any bigger pool of water than the puddles after a Bais rain. Part of her wanted to run to it, but she settled for pacing about the room a bit. The occasional shuffling of papers from the other room told her Scaa was nearby. It calmed her. Her mind still played fits when she let it drift, telling her she would wake amid the sands of the White Wastes or that she was alone in this place. She waited, still, for the shuffling of paper and when it finally came the fear in her died back down.
Curiosity finally overcame her and she opened the shuttered window over the end of the bed. The house she was in was up much higher than she had expected, the ground must have been fifteen feet below, perhaps more. It was hard to say in the dim light of near midnight. She could just make out a shimmer in the distance.
“The sea…”
She whispered the words near reverently. A word she barely even remembered. She had never understood Cosain’s attempts to describe it. A body of water whose edge could not be seen. It sounded like the ravings of a madman, something she often thought when Cosain would tell her of the world beyond the Bastion City. She wondered now about the other things he’d mentioned. White rain that piled on the ground and water made so hard it turned to glassy stone and green plains that stretched on and on. The Drow came to her mind. Another children’s story come to life. And she’d learned Fásach’s Gift from a satyr of all things. Her world had become something strange and unimaginable but it was only the sight of the sea that pushed the point home into her mind.
“I thought I would never stop staring at it…”
Óraithe whipped around instinctively feeling for earth beneath her in her mind but finding none. It registered that the voice had been Scaa’s and she exhaled abruptly. Scaa took a step forward, worry in her voice.
“I did not mean…”
Óraithe held up a hand. “No… you cannot apologize for my undue fears.” She walked to Scaa and hugged her as best she could with her body still as it was. She looked back to the window. “I wish to see it.”
Scaa smiled and took her by the hand. The next room was lit well enough to see the papers on her desk. Scaa had been at them near as long as Óraithe could account for.
“These…”
“My work.” Scaa sounded exhausted to mention it. “Dull, but necessary.”
Scaa escorted her outside. A street wound away from them and there were houses on stilts along the length of it, with fires not so far down. Only a few. The sand against her feet was a curious feeling. It riled her, brought fear to her mind, but the feel of Scaa’s skin against her own calmed her. She watched the street and the far fires until they had passed. The sound of tiny waves slapping the beach turned her head at last. Scaa took her arm and they stared out over the dull black expanse. It was different from the mirror that formed in the White Wastes. There was movement to it, life. A cool, wet wind blew across her bringing along with it smells like she had never known. Strange and wet but not fresh. She looked down to see where the water met the sand. The rhythm of it was hypnotic and the sound calmed her.
“I must have spent weeks here, as we are now.” Scaa looked at her but she could not drag her eyes from the gentle motion of the water before her. She sat and Óraithe did the same. “I haven’t the words for how you could have come to be here. I barely understand how it is that I am here. When… when you were taken, I fled the city. I could think of nothing else to do. Nothing beyond violence. I kept near the wall at first, stealing from carts that were held for morning inspection and the like. I noticed a man came by day and did much the same as I had, only to steal away off into the flats somewhere east of the city. I followed him one night and found myself among a camp of outcasts with a knife to my throat. I offered what I had and they welcomed me.” She laughed. “I never slept so poorly in my life. I thought sure they’d have a knife in me the second both eyes closed, but no. They were simple about things, straightforward. In truth, we’d likely have stayed there if it weren’t for the disappearances.”
Óraithe looked from the water to Scaa.
“Horsefolk?”
Scaa nodded. “Most like. I had told them of you from the moment I arrived, hoping that when… if you were hanged, I could at least know. That some person fleeing the Bastion City would have seen the act. None ever came, but they asked me time and again to tell the stories of what we’d done. Of Teas’s rescue and… and how she
