“You and Inhya would blame a clouded Moons’ rising upon Chepiś!”
“What blame I lay is justified!” Sarinak retorted furiously. “I remember what they did to Tokela’s dam.”
“And you know so much of what they ‘did’ to her, do you?”
“They killed her as surely as if they had put her to River themselves!” Inhya hissed. “And you know that.”
“You’re so certain,” Galenu said, very soft, “of what I know.”
“You have always claimed to ‘not know’. You, who claims to be storyKeeper; you, who claims friends in outLands! Which merely means you know just enough to slither past responsibility.”
That one clung, stung. “If I’m so irresponsible, however can you trust me with a young oških?” Galenu snorted disgust. “Ai, that’s right. It’s either me, or the gauntlet and exile, since your precious brother Alekšu has quit the field.”
“You have no—”
“But you expect me to take an oških you’ve treated as some disobedient bondling!”
“Unlike stoneClan, a’Naišwyrh do not bond or beat children!” Inhya snapped. Before her, looming altogether too close to Galenu, Sarinak’s stance promised he held few such compunctions against coldcocking an adult. Even if he was an elder.
Galenu refused to back down. There was a reason to this, one lying beneath all the ones layered atop, and he would find it, know it. “That oških is no longer a child, and I’ve eyes in my head. Fear is what he has here, nothing more.”
“Not fear but contempt is what that one holds for us—and you think we would choose that?” Sarinak snapped. “Tokela has never invited me to so much as lay a hand on his shoulder. Never. I learned long ago not to even try.”
“Preposterous!”
“Hunh. You stand in my place, an old khatak thinking to tell us how to raise a child? Pity you didn’t give as much as a thought before now!”
“Perhaps I would have, if—”
“Rot!” Sarinak spat. “You’d all but forgotten he was alive, I’ll warrant, until you saw him during First Running and decided, based on a Sun’s passage of acquaintance, you had found someone to understand your madness! Well, perhaps you’re correct there, stoneChieftain. What goes on in that one’s heart is not normal, and you’ve your own responsibility to claim there!”
The force of the outburst stilled Galenu’s tongue. Inhya also hung back; silent, almost wary.
“Don’t play innocent, Galenu, it ill suits you. You know what responsibility I speak of. You were in it up to your so-charming chin!” The low ceiling rang with the power of Sarinak’s voice. “You’re cursed lucky my sire loves you and never blamed you for any of what happened with his sister. You’re doubly lucky his sister’s spouse refused to call his mother’s brother out, make you answer for even one solitary rumour!”
“I take your meanings,” Galenu ventured, “and your warnings, insulting and oblique though they be.”
“Ai, spare me!” Sarinak snarled. “I didn’t think it was even possible to insult you! We’ve made it plain as we can. What happened to the dam is visiting the son. Alekšu hopes to help, but he is away. Tokela can’t stay here with what has been proven. This is no simple matter of purge or gauntlet. You know these… creatures. It is possible they can aid him. We cannot.” His eyes slid to Inyha, dark. “No longer.”
Galenu narrowed his eyes, watching. Had Inhya known? Her avoidance of Sarinak’s gaze seemed to further the possibility; her next words made it clearer.
“Ghost Eyes leave grieving in their wake, always, and we have all paid the price.” Inhya took several steps towards Galenu, hands balled into fists, her upper lip curling. “All of us. Save you. And it is long—ai, it is long past time you paid your due.”
Galenu peered at Inhya as if he were seeing her for the first time. Perhaps he was. If what happened to Lakisa was revisiting her son, fear had completed the cycle more than any Chepiś-invoked madness! Mismanagement, nothing but; traditional hardheadedness on every front. They’d blown circumstance out of proportion. If the oških indeed had some ancient Elemental gift, better he should be away from here, where they wouldn’t even let him sketch pictures for fear he was conjuring up ghosts—or “Ghost Eyes”! How could young Tokela turn out balanced, when he’d paid for the slightest oddity with every breath?
And ai’o, Galenu knew he owed this much to Lakisa’s son. Inhya was right about that if little else: Galenu had brought Lakisa to Chepiś, though he never would have dreamed what she would ask and what it cost her. If—if!—Tokela had some Chepiś-invoked madness, then Galenu was the best one to help. If nothing else, he could take Tokela to them. Somehow.
“He can’t stay here one Sun longer,” Sarinak rumbled. “You will take him, or I will take his name. I have nothing more to say.”
And he turned away, ambling over to the hearth, to slowly kneel beside it, Fire turning his broad profile all the more to stone.
Galenu slid a look towards Inhya. She was solely focused upon Sarinak, dark eyes glimmering. She seemed to have forgotten Galenu was there.
She hadn’t. “For once in your life, Galenu, try to heed something other than what you want. This is about Tokela, not you. You owe Lakisa ‘a’iliq that much.”
Galenu took in a breath, let it out, slow. “And what if he doesn’t want to come?”
“He will.” Inhya didn’t take her eyes from Sarinak.
“If so,” Galenu said, quiet, “then surely I’ll take him.”
Inhya rounded on him, eyes still glimmering. No darksight, no anger. Merely defeat. “Just take care of him, Galenu.”
“I—”
“There is,” she interrupted, and turned away, “nothing more to be said.”
THE SMELL is thick, sick-sweet, curling over him. Smoke, something within him recognises, and as a hand curls familiarly at his nape and raises his head to a bowl that smells dull, and dead, a tiny, gibber of panic wants to claim him. Fight, it
