Skolian Empire - Skyfall Part 5

She s.h.i.+vered. "Is cold up here."

"Usually not this much." He sighed. "I should apologize for our weather's poor showing to my guest."

"Is not so ****" She had meant to say "terrible," but it came out wrong. Her node supplied the p.r.o.nunciation.

"I don't know that word." He rubbed his cheek against her hair. "But I love how you say it."

Roca reminded herself to pull away. He had been persistent in his attentions during the trip. She told herself she didn't want his lips against hers, his breath warm on her skin, his hands on her body...

"No more," Roca muttered, to herself rather than him. At least he helped distract her from the danger of their route. The pounding of her heart came as much from the drop-off at their side as from his sensual voice.

"Why are you so cool?" He spoke near her ear. "You look like the suns but you act like ice."

"Do not do that." The way his breath tickled her ear was driving her crazy.

"I know a sun burns inside you," Eldri murmured. "Let me be your second sun. We can orbit each other for a while."

She couldn't help but smile. "Who is larger sun?"

"Neither." He nuzzled her hair. "We can be the same."

Roca sighed. "Is only dream." She didn't have the luxury of such dreams. She had too many duties.

A shout came up ahead, followed by an exchange of calls in Eldri's tongue. He lifted his head, his arms loosening around her.

"What is it?" Roca asked.

"A part of our path has collapsed."

Her shoulders hunched. "We stop?"

"I am not sure." He fell silent while they rode, listening as people called back to him. After a moment, he said, "I am sorry, Roca. Nothing like this has happened before."

"We go back to plains?"

"I think not. It will be dark soon. Navigating this path then would be deadly."

She felt the blood drain from her face. "Then what we do?"

"We cannot stay here. The lyrine must sleep, and if they do, they might step off the path. Also, the cold is more than usual. We haven't protection enough for the coming night."

"Good G.o.ds," Roca said. "Is terrible way to travel."

Eldri spoke patiently. "Perhaps your people can do it better. But this is the best we can do now."

Roca closed her mouth. He was right, it didn't help for her to criticize their lack of technology.

More shouts came back. The riders halted, their lyrine stamping on the path, breath curling up from their nostrils in the freezing air, making blue condensation. Roca had dealt with many cultures, but never anything like this. The situation was always controlled, with her staff setting up the meetings ahead of time.

Eldri called forward, and the riders relayed his words to the front of the line. They soon began moving again.

"They find new route?" Roca asked.

"There isn't any." He cleared his throat. "We have decided to cross the break."

"You make bridge?"

"No. We jump."

"Jump?"

"It is our best chance of survival."

Roca closed her eyes. "G.o.ds help us."

Eldri answered in a low voice. "Yes."

The climb seemed to take forever. The animals would walk a short distance, then stop. Apparently they had to wait as each rider executed the jump. Every time the line moved again, Eldri exhaled behind her.

Then came the long stop.

Roca knew tragedy had hit before the call came back. Shock reverberated from the riders. Then the word reached them: someone hadn't made it. He and his lyrine had plunged down the side of the mountain.

Eldri leaned his forehead against the back of her head. His pain fell over her like a great weight.

"I am much sorry," she said softly. "Know you him?"

"Yes." His voice caught. "We grew up together."

"I am so very much sorry."

He said nothing, but she realized he was crying silently, his shoulders shaking.

After a while they moved again. Eldri lifted his head, but he spoke no more.

When they finally reached the break, Roca stared in disbelief. Their path here was more a ledge than a road, and it ended in a jagged breach. It didn't resume until several meters beyond, leaving a broken stretch longer than a lyrine. Garlin was standing on the other side, bundled in furs, coiling a rope that had one end tied to several ringbolts in the cliff. Dark blue clouds covered the sky and cast a pall over the waning day.

Garlin threw the free end of the rope across the gap. Eldri caught it, then tied a length around Roca's waist and his own. She doubted it was strong enough to hold them if they didn't make the jump, given what had happened to the rider they lost, but it was better than nothing.

"Ready?" Eldri asked.

She took an uneven breath. "Yes."

He backed his mount down the trail. Then he leaned forward and kicked with his heels. The lyrine surged up the path, its muscles bunching under them. With a great leap, it sailed into the air. Before Roca had a chance to breathe, its feet hit the other side and rocks went flying. As the animal stumbled, one hoof going over the edge, Garlin reeled in the rope, trying to pull them toward him.

Then the lyrine caught its balance and stepped unevenly down the trail. Eldri whispered in his own language.

"What say you?" Roca's voice trembled.

He too spoke shakily. "By Rillia's Arrow."

"I know not Rillia, but if his arrow bring us here safely, I thank him."

"I also."

"Eldri?"

"Yes?"

She breathed in, trying to settle her pulse. "How go we back tomorrow?"

"I will send people to bridge the break."

"You can do this? You say it never happened before."

"My rock-builders have made many bridges. They can fix worse than this."

She touched his arm. "My sorrow for your friend."

"Thank you." His answer was so quiet she barely heard. She felt the tears he kept inside, unable to shed them in front of his men.

They continued on, so other riders would have room to jump. The line of lyrine hugged the precarious path in the last light of the fading day.

4.

Windward.

The castle rose out of the dusk. Roca had sagged over the neck of the lyrine, but now she sat upright, gaping. Windward was literally sculpted from the mountain, with ethereal stone spires, flying b.u.t.tresses, and soaring towers. Her breath caught. No primitive culture had created this keep. It stood on an island encircled by a canyon so deep, she couldn't see the bottom. They were crossing an arched, b.u.t.tressed span of rock that provided the only access to the fortress.

"G.o.ds above," Roca murmured. Wide enough for four lyrine to ride abreast, the bridge led to a portcullis in the ma.s.sive wall of the fortress. "This is incredible."

"You like my house?" Eldri asked.

"House?" She laughed shakily as they rode under the portcullis. "It is a monument."

"It is as old as all time."

Roca smiled. "All time?"

"Since before history." He waved at the sky. "Legend says the wind G.o.d came down before time began and exhaled his great breath on the mountain to make Windward."

"A good legend." Roca could almost feel the weight of the millennia in the magnificent walls. She didn't doubt the castle had endured for thousands of years. From what she had seen, these people had nothing close to the technology needed to carve a structure like this out of a mountain, isolate it on an island of stone, and have it survive for ages. The ancient Ruby colonists must have built Windward.

Light glowed within its windows, a welcome sight as night fell, its arrival hastened by the heavy overcast.

When Roca turned her face up to admire the castle towers, snow fell on her cheek.

"Ah, no." She brushed the flakes off her face. In accepting Eldri's invitation, she had underestimated the problems of traveling in a primitive culture without the safeguards she took for granted. "Tell me this not snow season."

"Season?" Eldri asked.

"Winter."

"What is winter?"

"Cold time of year."

"Year?" He sounded bewildered.

Roca pulled back the hair blowing across her face. "Does snow come more at some time than other time?"

"It comes when it comes." He slowed his lyrine as a boy crossed the courtyard to them. "We never know what the weather will be. Snow, ice, rain, sun." After handing the reins to the boy, he slid off the lyrine.

Roca jumped down beside him, then staggered as pain shot through her already sore legs. Her landing also jarred because she felt too heavy; although her node was a.n.a.lyzing the gravity and helping her adapt, it could only do so much.

The "boy" who had come for the lyrine turned out to be a girl. She smiled shyly and led the animal away, toward a structure Roca guessed was a stable, mainly because other people were taking animals there.

All the riders were accounted for-except one. Eldri stood watching the stablehands, his face shadowed as if he were searching for the animal-and rider-that were missing.

Roca laid her hand on his arm. "Are you all right?"

"Yes." He obviously wasn't, but he tried to smile.

Garlin came toward them, his long-legged stride eating up distance. He was about six feet tall, two inches taller than Roca, and he towered over the other men in the courtyard. Roca was the same height as Eldri, but she too stood taller than most of the men. The Lyshrioli people seemed shorter than Skolians, perhaps due to their diet or the heavy gravity.

Garlin spoke in their language, ignoring Roca. Eldri gave him a look that reminded Roca of how she felt when her bodyguards hovered about. It didn't surprise her that Garlin bothered him. The older man's tension snapped against her mental s.h.i.+elds; Garlin regretted that Eldri chaffed under his watchful eye, but he disliked Roca too much to back off. Perhaps he feared she would replace him in influence with the Bard. She had seen that dance of intrigue played out again and again among the n.o.ble Houses, as the aristocracy jockeyed for power. She didn't trust Garlin. She wished it weren't so important she return to the port in two days; she felt drawn to Eldri's life and wanted to learn more.

Turning to Roca, Eldri held out his hand, palm up, hinging it as if to cup the air for her. "I am sorry your introduction to my home comes with such grief." Sadness had replaced his earlier cheer. "But I welcome you."

Roca took his hand. "Thank you." It felt odd to hold such thick fingers and only four of them.

Garlin spoke in their language, his voice low and taut, and Eldri shook his head. When Garlin persisted, Eldri scowled. Tightening his hold on Roca's hand, he took his leave of Garlin and led Roca away. As they walked to the great double doors of the castle, she felt Garlin's gaze like a laser burning into her back.

Many people joined them inside the castle. Their faces lit up when they saw Eldri. An older woman in a homespun tunic and leggings fussed about, taking his coat, drying him off, chattering in their musical language, making his face gentle with fondness. A white-haired man addressed Eldri with obvious respect. Others spoke as well. She needed no translation to see they were offering welcome and informing Eldri about the castle. Their affection and high opinion of him came through in their every gesture. She didn't yet know the social hierarchies here, but she sensed none of the distance between Eldri and his people that in her universe set royalty apart from commoners. These people dressed in simple clothes and had work-roughened hands, but they treated Eldri as one of them.

Torches and antiqued oil lamps lit the hall. Actually, the lamps probably weren't antique; they just looked that way to her. Although she doubted the plan of this building matched castles on other worlds, certain traits tended to repeat in human architecture, including windows and also artistry in great houses.

Windward was no exception. Its arched windows were gorgeous, their borders engraved with intertwining lines and spheres, probably a stylized version of the bubble reeds in the plains. The openings were narrow, perhaps to make defending them easier. All had shutters in red, blue, green, or purple gla.s.swood, which young people were closing throughout the hall. Roca could see why; the windows had no gla.s.s. Shutters provided the only protection against the storm.

People bustled around her and Eldri, drying the melted snow on their clothes. A huge fire blazed in a hearth at one end of the hall, defying the chill that seeped through the walls. Blue snow had scattered across the stone floor beneath the windows, as if the sky had fallen to the ground and collected in a pile.

Two thoughts came to Roca, first that she understood the name of the world-Skyfall-and then that she didn't understand at all. The sky of this planet was lavender. Snow here matched the color of the sky as seen from Earth, not from "Skyfall."