Kushiel's Avatar (Page 137)
It was enough.
I was content.
A high-pitched shout caught my ear, and I rose and glanced about, finding the source at last; Imriel, pointing landward from the impossible vantage of the crow's-nest high atop the central mast, Ti-Philippe hold ing him fast with one hand.
“He'll take years off our lives, you know.”
Joscelin's voice, low and amused, in my ear.
“I know.” I reached behind me without looking, catching his arm and drawing it about my waist. Quintilius Rousse was bellowing orders, his men leaping to obey as the shore of Terre d'Ange drew in sight. Hyacinthe gestured gracefully, his expression focused with preternatural concentration as he guided the winds, and Sibeal watched him with the calm certitude of a woman in love. The tattooed Cruithne warriors of her honor guard held his case of pages, proud and apprehensive to have been given such a charge. At the foot of the mast, an anxious Hugues pleaded for Ti-Philippe and Imriel to come down, which made me laugh. “Are you sorry for it?”
“No.” Joscelin's arm tightened around me, and I felt him smile against my hair. “Not for any of it. Not for a minute.”
Neither was I.
ONE HUNDRED
WORD TRAVELLED before us.There was celebrating all that night upon our return to Pointe des Soeurs, in the fortress and the encampment alike. By the time we mustered for the journey to the City of Elua, the countryside was alive with the news, word of mouth travelling nearly as swiftly as the royal cour iers Quintilius Rousse dispatched to alert Ysandre.
An eight-hundred-year legend had come to earth.
Hyacinthe bore it with dignity, as crowds turned out at every village and hamlet we passed, gaping and whispering to see him … a young man of Tsingano descent, quiet and collected, clad in faded velvet attire, only the aura that surrounded him and the sea-deep colors swirling in his dark eyes giving evidence to the tremendous power he wielded.
Once, he would have reveled in the attention; Hyacinthe, my Prince of Travellers, who wore gaudier clothes than half the nobles in the City, whose silver-tongued predictions coaxed coin from their purses and blushes to their cheeks. Now, he merely endured it. I remembered how it had been when we had last travelled together, Joscelin and Hyacinthe and I, and Hyacinthe had played the timbales and flirted with unwed Tsingani women along the road, spending hours teaching a reticent Cassiline Brother how to mimic a Mendacant's flair.
No longer.
Our lodgings were free at every inn, and the inn-keepers vied to serve the most extravagant meals, carrying out the last stores of winter and the first fruits of the earliest harvest. Even the Tsingani who trailed our company were made welcome on the outskirts of town, and villagers who would have hidden their valuables instead brought them gifts of food. The common-rooms were crowded with poets stretching their ears to hear the stories, and Rousse's sailors told them with relish.
From this, I was not exempt; the anguissette who banished an angel. Such a thing had never happened in the history of Terre d'Ange. People murmured among themselves and glanced sidelong at me, seeking some stamp of great magic such as Hyacinthe bore and finding none, only the scarlet prick of Kushiel's Dart, a sign grown well-known enough in my lifetime that it held no novelty. And they spoke softly in wonder and doubt.
It made me smile. There had been no magic in my deed save that which the One God had given me to hold in trust. No, Eleazar was right; it was stubbornness as much as anything else, an odd legacy of Kushiel's dubious gift, that taught me to yield without surrendering. Endurance, and love—those things were all the power I'd ever pos sessed.
Day by day, our journey grew shorter, and never have I known weather so fair, the skies blue and cloudless, the clime temperate. How not, when we travelled with the Master of the Straits? On land or sea, wind and water answered his command, further than the eye could see in any direction. A fearful power indeed, I thought as we passed fields growing ripe with the green and gold of late spring, and more dangerous at loose than it had ever been confined to the isles of the Three Sisters. He could blight the earth itself, did he so choose. It had been folly to imagine Hyacinthe could ever resume his former life.
The pages of the Book of Raziel were never far from his regard, and Sibeal's Alban honor guard was increasingly conscious of the might of what they warded, the Cruithne warriors taking turns among them selves with the case and carrying it as if it might singe their fingers.
“What would happen if someone stole it?” I asked Hyacinthe one day.
“Who would dare?” His smile was bleak, and a small breeze rifled our horses' manes as if in warning. “No, but it would do them no good, Phèdre. No one could read the script who had not been taught, and that was the longest part of my apprenticeship. I spent seven years learning it, for there are characters in it such as I have never beheld and sounds contained in no mortal tongue yet spoken.”
My pulse quickened. “So it was with the Name of God.”
“Yes.” He gazed at me with his sea-shifting eyes. “But that word, I think, was not one ever written, save once. And of a surety, it was never heard on that cursed isle until you spoke it. How you learned it, I will never fathom.”
“I was told it by a man with no tongue,” I said. Hyacinthe laughed softly, not disbelieving. “Hyacinthe, what will you do with the pages? Will you take an apprentice, or let the knowledge pass with you upon your death?”
For a long time, he did not answer. “I don't know,” he said at length. “Phèdre . . . I'm only still getting used to the notion that I am free to wander the earth, that I may live and love, beget children, grow old and die . . . die, like any mortal, and not dwindle endlessly into shriveled madness. It is too big to decide at once.” He glanced at me again. “Do you wish to learn it?”
“No!” I gave a startled laugh. “Name of Elua, no!”
A hint of his old smile lifted the corner of his mouth. “So your curiosity has a limit.”
“Yes,” I said. “I do believe it does.”
Hyacinthe reached over and touched my hand as we rode side by side. “Nor would I wish this on you,” he said soberly. “You of all people, for you're wise enough to understand that power of this nature is more burden than blessing. Know this, though. I will never forget what you've done for me, you and Joscelin . . . and the boy. As long as I live, you may count yourself under my protection. Any aid you require is yours, always.”
I squeezed his hand. “Thank you.”
No more did he say. I had not told him, yet, the whole of our story, nor of what had befallen in Nineveh, where an assassin's blade had sought Imriel's life, but Hyacinthe could guess well enough that Melisande's son would have enemies, and I was truly grateful that he had offered freely the protection I had been so quick to boast of to Ysandre de la Courcel. There would be no guarantees, for Alba's shores lay far from the City of Elua and my estate of Montrève, but of a surety, the friendship of the Master of the Straits was a powerful dissuader.
Imriel.
He rode in the thick of Rousse's sailors, Phèdre's Boys, and one of them had entrusted him with bearing the company standard, the banner that bore the image of Kushiel's Dart. Imri grinned with pride at the honor, but they'd taken to him out of genuine liking, impressed with his unwavering courage aboard the Elua's Promise. I swear, it seemed he'd grown another inch on this journey. I thought with rue of Hyacinthe's offer. In truth, it tempted me … if only the tiniest bit. Not for the power, no, but the knowledge. To master the tongue of Heaven! Ah, Elua, that would be something. Mayhap I would recognize in the strange characters those I had seen forming in the dust of the Ark of Broken Tablets, that I might record them, writing for posterity the unpronounceable Name of God.
All knowledge is worth having.
So my lord Delaunay used to say, so I have always believed. Seven years, it had taken Hyacinthe to learn it, the tongue and script alone. How long would it take me? Less, I daresay; I had the advantage of ten years of Habiru behind me. That should halve it, at least.
In three years, Imriel would be fifteen.
And not for anything, not for the knowledge of all of the One God's secrets, did I want to miss those years. The furious, terrified child I had found in Daršanga had grown into a boy on the brink of youth, proud and touchy and damaged, but with a streak of courage that awed grown men, a heart capable of love and tremendous sacrifice. While he grew to manhood, it would always be touch and go with Imri, his generosity of spirit at war with the bitter unfairness of the lot he'd drawn, of the horrors that had been visited upon him and the scars they'd left. Love alone could sway the balance.
I touched my bare throat, where once Melisande's diamond had hung.
I had a promise to keep.
Although, I thought, riding under the bright blue D'Angeline skies, it may be that Hyacinthe would be willing to share with me the alphabet alone, and mayhap a phonetic guide to the pronunciation of the unknown characters. After all, I'd done a fair job of teaching myself Jeb'ez from Audine Davul's guide. Kaneka may have laughed at me in the zenana, but she'd understood me well enough, and I'd garnered that much studying on shipboard and over campfires. A few hours here and there … I need not devote the last years of my youth to an all-consuming apprenticeship, but a good deal can be accomplished in a few stolen hours over time, if one is determined enough. Who knew what texts might be unearthed if correspondence was established between Saba and Terre d'Ange one day? Eleazar ben Enokh would be glad of the endeavor, of that I was sure. As the schism grew deeper among the Children of Yisra-el, those Yeshuites who sought peace over war were more and more likely to turn to his way of thinking; their presence among us on this journey was proof of that much.
“What on earth are you plotting now?” Joscelin's black gelding ranged alongside mine.
“Nothing.” I smiled at him. “Just thinking.”
Some five miles outside the City of Elua, the first emissaries met us; a joint party of Ysandre's and Drustan's men, the Queen's Guard resplen dent in the blue and silver of House Courcel and the Cruarch's bare- chested in woolen Alban kilts, their elaborate woad markings and copper torques signifying that each was a nobleman's son. They formed an escort around us, leading us through the first of innumerable floral arches built along the way, a court herald calling out the news in stentorian tones to any who had not yet heard it, which I daresay was no one.