Bracing against the sudden gust of Wind, he glanced around.
Crouched there, transfixed.
The tipo had vanished, leaving them both surrounded by nothingness…
N’da, not nothingness. He heard water. He felt Earth beneath him. But he gazed into forever. Into darkness, heavy and immense, into which, slowly, spackles of light began to appear: first one, then several, then more, and more. So many, like Sky’s night basket. Uncountable, slicking faint lights upon the waters and silhouetting the mound rising beneath them. Ai’o, rising, as if he and his daughter had come from Beneath Worlds and arrived home, whilst above them hung the lost Spirits in the wide weave of Sky’s basket, shining down upon Grandmother to light the waters.
Suddenly the basket shook, upended itself. And Stars began to fall.
Palatan tried to tear himself from the contact, squinching his eyes shut and gritting his teeth, hunching like hareKin beneath a predator’s drift of shadow. For long breaths the Vision refused to loose him: he saw tailed Stars falling all around them, heard them hissing as they struck the waves, flinched from the burn of sparks…
Finally, the Vision released him. Palatan twisted sideways, thudded onto his back beside Anahli and lay there, panting, for what seemed like forever.
Only when Arrow started licking his face did Palatan dare open his eyes. A familiar, homely sight met his gaze: the seasoned hides and poles of his family’s tipo. No Stars. No basket upending them to fall upon thisLand.
No Chepiś sorcery slithering through his daughter’s heart.
“Yeka?” Anahli’s brow was furrowed; she’d risen to her elbows, curious. Her eyes were sleepy-dark, normal. Lit with concern but nothing more.
She had seen nothing. Fire curled in the hearth, dozy embers, and when Palatan sought silent reassurance, his co-tenant oozed complacency.
“Yeka? What’s wrong?”
“All is well, my heart.” His movements cautious—muscles quivering, waiting for the next blow—Palatan scooted back over beside Anahli. “I merely slipped on the furs and knocked my head.”
“You must be careful,” she fussed, burrowing back into the furs. “Sometimes, Yeka, you’re a bit clumsy.”
With a chuckle, he cupped her cheek. “I am indeed.” But his thoughts whirled, still in thrall to the Vision.
Of all the Elementals, Stars were no longer of firstPeople. Not even when People walked on. They had once gone to Stars, but that way had been blocked. Few Spirits could make the journey, opting instead to sink into Grandmother’s embrace.
Stars belonged to Chepiś, now. Chepiś had stolen the Kinship for their own twisted uses. Even as they longed to steal Grandmother Herself.
Arrow crept back into bed, this time folding into a furry, fawn pillow. Anahli sighed, curling one arm over the dog and ducking her face into Palatan’s palm.
The pang of it was sweet and rue. “Better then, Nani?” With light purpose he used the pet name—gleaned from her own first attempts to speak it.
Another drowsy smile. “You never call me that anymore.”
“I do. Just not often enough.”
“Why does she hate you so?”
Palatan blinked, startled. “Who?”
“Chogah.”
Palatan leaned on Arrow—who huffed content—and stroked Anahli’s hair. So many answers, none of them simple… save one. “She wants what is mine. She always has.”
“What is yours.”
“A’io, eldest daughter of my chieftain. I have a few irreplaceable treasures. You, for one.”
A frown; with firm fingertips Palatan rubbed it back into complacency. “Enough for now. Sleep. Sleep long and well, with pleasant dreamings.” A tiny push, a hint of Smoked somnolence should any hiveKin linger.
Arrow grunted, shifted, and burrowed in. Anahli’s fingers twitched in his fur—once, thrice—then stilled.
Palatan stayed there for some time, watching her sleep.
Found himself remembering a long, hard wintering seven years before Anahli’s birth. Another defiant oških, crying for his Vision within the vast deeps beneath the cavern mound a’Šaákfo. Fire had woken, sprung from Palatan’s singular torch to catch others, lighting the cavern walls. Beneath his feet the caldera had stirred, rumbling and smouldering, flowing beneath him…
Had greeted him.
Palatan would never forget the smell… the taste. Nor could he deny what he had become in the consequence of that Vision.
Chogah had tried to deny it. Ai, had she tried.
And now, this. Palatan hadn’t experienced a Vision this strong in many summerings. And to have one here?
Here, where remained an outLand presence he’d Sensed but once before, in any children of the Alekšu’ín.
15 – Accords
Galenu a’Hassun took his time returning to his guesting-den. Old eyes didn’t pierce the dark like they once had, and admittedly, his walk came a bit unsteady. But surely it could be considered disrespectful, to refuse or waste prime Smoke. Naišwyrh’uq had enviable trading connexions; there were places downriver that produced the best leaf thisLand had ever seen.
And this First Running had produced the most entertainment Galenu had seen in some time. New information, stories and gossip to catch up on, a bit of scandal to liven the Dance circuit—who could ask for more? He and Nechtoun would have plenty to talk about over nextSun’s first meal…
Nechtoun. The reminder sobered. Reaching out, Galenu touched the curved stone walls and paused to gain his bearings. While the youthful elements of Council diverted, not all of them were nonsense.
Change isn’t coming. Change is here.
Sarinak always claimed the wyrhling hadn’t the sense Grandmother gave a wabadeh in rut; yet the wyrhling’s speech had proven exactly who knew what and how. Wayward, a’io, but Našobok was no great fool.
Galenu resumed his progress through the tunnel. A fair courtesy, to be quartered with Mound-chieftain’s immediate family during the height of First Running. More from Nechtoun’s influence, certainly, than any change of heart in Inhya. She’d never liked him.
A smirk touched Galenu’s lip as he circumnavigated a pair of coupling oških fems, a heaving elder who’d imbibed too much, a pack of noisy ahlóssa who nigh trampled him on their way to who-knew-what, then finally found the set of switchbacked passages he sought. A small climb, with openings that allowed a view of River. The moored craft lay quiet beneath the Moons, rocking.
Ai, another reminder—he had to find Našobok come Sun’s rising, make arrangements for the
