CHILDREN OF AMARID Read online

  He readied himself for another attack, but the bird merely hovered above him, just barely out of reach, seeming to sense that Gerek was weakening and toying with him, feigning attacks and gliding from side to side. And with each passing moment, the sleeve of Gerek’s overshirt grew heavier with blood. With his injured hand, he clawed repeatedly at the perspiration that stung his eyes, but Gerek could do nothing about the fatigue and pain. He was growing light-headed; he could barely stand, much less fight.

  And then, as suddenly as it had begun, it ended. His strength failing, Gerek gathered himself for one last assault on his foe. Hoping to lure the great bird within striking distance, he lowered his good arm as if too tired to maintain his defensive posture. The hawk swooped in close to Gerek’s head and the man swung his stick with all the force he could muster. It nearly worked. Maybe, if he had been able to use both arms . . .

  Maybe. But he was hurt, and the creature was so quick, so unnaturally quick. Gerek missed. And the power of his swing threw him off balance, leaving his back exposed to the bird. He felt the creature’s talons raking his shoulders and back, and he fell to the ground. He tried to stand again, but the hawk pounced on him and tore at his neck with its beak. He tried to scream to Kori, to implore the boy to run, but he could not tell if he made himself heard.

  Kori had watched with helpless fury as his father fought the horrible bird. He began to cry when he saw the creature cut his father’s arm, and he screamed with terror when Gerek fell to the ground with the angry red gashes across his back. For the second time that day, he heard his father tell him to run, and this time he did. With all the speed he could muster, he dashed down the path toward the beach, never once looking back, and unaware that he still clutched the small sack of shan leaves in his hand. Soon he could hear the water lapping on the beach, and, through the clearing at the end of the forest, he could see the little dugout. But just as he reached the bottom of the trail, he felt something hit him heavily from behind and he pitched forward onto the hot, white sand of the beach. He looked up over his shoulder and saw a huge, black shape descending on him, blotting out the sun.

  The cloaked figure had stood on the fringes of the clearing watching the battle in detached silence. The outcome, he knew, had never been in doubt, although he would grant that the man had fought courageously. He had, however, forgotten all about the child. When the man screamed, and the boy started to run, he feared for a moment that the child might get away. But then he saw how his bird soared after the boy, and he smiled within the dark hood, chiding himself for ever doubting. He walked to the bloodied body of the man to be sure that he was dead. Again, he smiled at the efficiency of the creature, and he started down the trail toward the water.

  He found the boy lying facedown on the beach, blood from the gash on his neck darkening the white sand. The figure held out his arm and the black bird glided to it and hopped delicately to his shoulder. Then he knelt beside the body of the boy and reached into his cloak. Pulling out a single black feather, he tucked it carefully into a tear in the back of the boy’s shirt, where it was clearly visible but anchored against the wind. The figure started to rise, but then, almost as an afterthought, he reached into the sack that lay beside the boy, removed a small blue leaf, and put it in his mouth. Then he stood, and, with the black creature still on his shoulder, he walked casually back into the forest.

  2

  “Looks like spring’s going to be late this year,” Jaryd’s mother remarked, pushing a lock of her grey-streaked hair back from her face and watching the rain drip off the roof just outside the kitchen window. “I can’t remember the last time we had this much rain so late.”

  “One of the traders told me that everything’s already in bloom south of here,” her husband replied, spooning himself a second portion of hot cereal and returning to his seat. “It’s just the Upper Horn and us that’s still got winter.”

  Drina nodded and smoothed back her hair again. “Over a month since the Feast of Arick and it’s still raining. We may have rain on Jaryd’s birthday this year.”

  Jaryd smiled and shook his head. “You realize, of course, that you two have this exact same conversation every year.” His parents looked at him in feigned disbelief. “It’s true,” he insisted, “and don’t look at me like that. You’ve been saying the same thing since I was a kid; it always rains on my birthday. I’ve never seen two people learn so little over such a long period of time.”

  “Ah,” his brother broke in, “the schoolmaster has spoken.”

  His father snorted with mock disdain, and his mother turned to her elder son. “Royden, you settle this: who’s right, your brother or us?”

  Royden rose from his place at the table and put his empty plate in a bucket of soapy water. And as he did, Jaryd remarked to himself, as he often had before, how much like their father Royden looked. While Jaryd was lean and wiry like his mother, with her straight brown hair and grey-blue eyes, Royden and Bernel had the same stocky, muscular build and the same reddish-blond hair—although their father had somewhat less of it, and what was left was flecked with grey. Both had wide-set brown eyes, and a broad, open smile that Royden now flashed at their mother. “I’m not getting involved in this,” he told her.

  “Wise man,” said Bernel, grinning.

  Royden put on an overshirt and cap and moved toward the door. “I’m heading over to the smithy, Papa. I need to finish up those wagon wheels for Hadrian. What should I start on after that?”

  Bernel thought a moment. “I guess Jorrin’s tools are next. But I’ll be along soon, and I’ll let you know for sure.”

  Royden nodded and looked over at Jaryd. “You teaching today, or will I see you at the shop?”

  “I’m teaching this morning,” Jaryd replied, “but I’ll be in this afternoon to do some real work.” With this last comment he looked sidelong at his father, who snorted again.

  Royden laughed and opened the door.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” Drina growled.

  Royden closed the door, gave a sheepish look to Jaryd and his father, and leaned over to kiss his mother on the cheek. “Sorry, Momma,” he said opening the door again. “Bye, Momma.”

  The door closed and Jaryd rose from the table. “I should probably get going, too. Don’t want to keep the kids waiting.” He put his dish in the water bucket and then turned to Drina. “You know, Momma, I told Royden that I’d be at the shop, but if you need my help with the tilling, I can just as easily go to the field after school, can’t I, Papa?”

  Bernel nodded, but Drina declined the offer with a wave of her hand. “Thank you, Jaryd, but I’ll be fine on my own. Besides,” she added with a crooked grin, “there’s just so much I can do right now with this unusual weather we’re having.”

  Jaryd laughed and kissed his mother. Even with the silver in her hair, her face was still youthful, like Jaryd’s, and her hands were hard and tanned from working the fields year-round. She rarely required any help with the farming, but Jaryd always offered. He stepped into the bedroom he shared with Royden and reemerged a minute later wearing his overshirt and cap and carrying a pile of worn books. “I’ll see you both later,” he called over his shoulder as he stepped out into the cool rain.

  He walked toward the schoolhouse as quickly as he could, holding his books close to his body in a futile effort to keep them dry. And, as usual, the people he passed in the village center stopped and stared as he walked past.

  They had started staring almost a year ago, when word of Jaryd’s dreams first spread through the town. The first dream had come on a stormy night late in the previous winter. He dreamed of water—cold, turbulent water that swept over him and dragged him downward away from light and air into blackness. He had awakened gasping for breath and shivering. His brother, roused from his slumber on the other side of the dark room, asked him if he was all right, and Jaryd, thinking it only a bad dream, told Royden that he was fine, that he had just had a nightmare. The next day, however, a missin
g boy, the wood-crafter’s son, was found drowned in the river that flowed past the town.

  Jaryd tried to convince himself that this had been nothing but a disturbing coincidence, and he spoke to no one of his vision. But a month later, he had another nightmare, this one even more vivid and frightening than the first. He dreamed of a raging fire that spiraled wildly into a night sky, its searing heat scorching his hands and face and scalding his lungs when he tried to scream. This time, Jaryd awoke to find one of Royden’s shirts burning and his brother frantically trying to stamp out the flames. Jaryd was soaked with perspiration; his breath was coming in ragged gasps, and his heart was pounding.

  After extinguishing the blaze, Royden lit a candle and sat at the foot of Jaryd’s bed. He was breathing hard, his dark eyes fixed on Jaryd, and his features pale and grim. He sat staring at his brother for a long time before he spoke.

  “What in Arick’s name is going on, Jaryd?” he finally asked in an urgent whisper. “First you have that nightmare last month that had you thrashing in your bed like a wild man, and now this. What’s going on?”

  Jaryd tried to calm himself. He was far more frightened than Royden looked. “Tell me what happened tonight,” he demanded, his voice trembling.

  “What do you mean, what happened tonight! You lit my shirt on f—”

  “Tell me what happened! What did I say, what did I do?”

  Something in Jaryd’s tone stopped Royden and imposed on him the calm Jaryd had sought for himself.

  “You were tossing a lot,” Royden began slowly, “like you couldn’t get comfortable. And then you started to talk—”

  “What did I say?”

  Royden shook his head. “I couldn’t make it out. I heard the word ‘fire,’ but the rest of it was just babble. And then you cried out, just a sound, it wasn’t a word. The next thing I know, my shirt’s on fire.” He paused, staring at Jaryd. “What’s going on?” he asked again.

  Jaryd took a deep breath. “That nightmare I had last month wasn’t just a nightmare.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I dreamed that I was drowning,” Jaryd explained, his voice sounding thin and small to his own ears. “And the next day they found Arley.”

  “That’s just a coincidence,” Royden said, trying to sound convincing.

  “Well,” Jaryd continued, “I guess we’ll find out. Tonight I dreamed of fire, and this dream felt even more real than the other one.”

  Royden remained silent for a moment. “What about my shirt?”

  “I’m sorry about your shirt, Royden,” Jaryd said with regret. “Momma can make you a new one.”

  “No.” Royden shook his head and gave a small laugh. “That’s not what I was asking. I meant, how did it catch on fire? You sound like you think you lit it.”

  “I did,” Jaryd said with sudden certainty.

  “How?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Then how do you know that you did it?”

  Jaryd shook his head. “I’m not sure of that either. I just know that I did. I also know that, at least for now, I don’t want to tell anyone about this, not even Momma and Papa.”

  Royden didn’t respond, and Jaryd held his breath. He didn’t want to have to explain himself. He wasn’t even sure that he could. He knew that his visions would frighten his mother, and he didn’t want that. He wasn’t really sure how his father would react, but Bernel had always been much closer to Royden and somehow Jaryd knew that this would only serve to make things worse. But his plea for Royden’s silence was prompted by more than just these concerns. He was, at the moment, afraid of himself. He felt like a freak, a monster of some sort, and he had no explanation for what had happened. Until he did, he wanted his dreams to remain a secret. After several moments, Royden stood up. “Well, I guess if we want to avoid any questions we’ll have to hide what’s left of this shirt and air out the room.”

  Jaryd smiled with unfeigned relief. “Thanks, Royden.”

  “Don’t thank me,” Royden responded, his expression still bleak. “I’m not sure enough of why I’m going along with this to deserve your thanks.”

  His smile fading, Jaryd opened the window and then helped Royden clean up the charred remains of the shirt. They did not speak the rest of that night, nor did they mention it the next day. Royden did have to lie about the smell of smoke in their room, telling their parents over breakfast that he and Jaryd had fallen asleep with a candle burning, and that the candle had burned all the way down and singed a cloth. As their mother bustled around the kitchen and scolded the boys for their carelessness, Royden fixed Jaryd with an icy glare.

  That evening matters turned far more serious. Jaryd had been on edge all day, constantly reliving his dream and wondering if this one, like the last, would prove prophetic. The answer came just after nightfall. As the brothers and their parents sat eating dinner, they heard alarm bells start to ring in the town square.

  “Must be a fire,” their father said, jumping to his feet. “We’d better get going.”

  Neither Royden nor Jaryd moved. They sat staring across the table at each other, both of them pale.

  “Come on, boys!” their mother urged with impatience. Bernel had gathered their overshirts and now threw them to his sons as he opened the door. Royden and Jaryd followed their parents out into the night. In the distance, through the trees, they could see the flames. Above the village, the sky was heavy with a dark, billowing smoke that glowed balefully with the yellow-orange glare of the fire.

  “Looks like a big one,” Bernel observed somberly, running a hand through his thinning hair. “We’d better hurry.” He and Drina ran toward the town square, leaving Royden and Jaryd by the house.

  “You’re going to have to tell them!” Royden’s voice was tense and challenging. “We can’t keep this a secret! Not now; not after this!”

  “I’ll tell them when I’m ready,” Jaryd responded with equal intensity, “and when I know what it is I’m telling them about!”

  Royden shook his head, the fear manifest on his open face. “Jaryd, this is serious, this is—”

  “Royden!” Jaryd snarled, silencing his older brother. “I of all people know just how serious this is! You gave me your word that you’d keep quiet! I’m holding you to it!”

  Royden held Jaryd’s angry gaze a moment longer. Then he turned toward the town center and the fiery glow of the night sky. “I hope you know what you’re doing,” he said, his voice now drained of emotion, “for the sake of us all.” Without another word, Royden started toward the fire, and Jaryd followed, still trembling with emotion, and gripped by an uncertainty that terrified him.

  When Jaryd reached the center of town he found three shops engulfed in a fierce blaze, and most of the townsfolk forming a bucket brigade between the river and the fire. He joined the effort and, for much of the night, the people of Accalia fought the flames with grave determination. Several were so overcome by heat and smoke that they had to be carried back to their homes. But despite the villagers’ struggle, all three of the shops, as well as a fourth, burned to the ground. And one man, Iram, the apothecary, died when part of his shop collapsed on him as he attempted to save his most valuable oils and medicines from the blaze.

  For a while after the fire, Jaryd’s dreams stopped. And, although the visions had frightened him, waiting for the next one proved far worse. He grew to dread sleep and fear dreams, but he hungered to know whence the two visions had come. Mostly, though, he wanted to understand what had happened so that he could explain it all to Royden and to their parents. Following their angry exchange the night of the fire, the two brothers had grown distant. For the first time in Jaryd’s life he felt that he could not turn to Royden for guidance. His older brother had made his feelings all too clear; Jaryd would find no comfort there.

  So he waited. Winter relinquished its icy grip, giving way to the rains, and still no more visions came. Then, soon after the rains ended, on a clear, moonlit night, Jaryd dreamed again.
In a nightmare far more terrifying and real than either of the others, Jaryd saw the town assailed by mounted bandits with scarred, begrimed faces, wearing leather jerkins and brandishing huge, curved blades, lances, and clubs. They razed Accalia’s homes and storefronts, and then began to murder the townsmen and rape and kill the townswomen. Jaryd watched as his father was decapitated by the sweeping blade of a scimitar. He saw Royden fall with a spear in his broad chest, blood streaming from the wound. He watched his mother, with several other women, being chased by two men on horseback. And he saw himself, standing transfixed, observing it all. Then, as he watched, the dream-Jaryd, his youthful face distorted with rage, opened his mouth in a desperate scream and raised a strange staff from which leaped a killing sapphire flame that enveloped and obliterated the men chasing his mother. The dream-Jaryd then threw his fire at the other bandits, destroying them utterly, and saving what remained of the village.

  Once again, Jaryd awoke soaked in perspiration and gasping for breath. A candle cast its light across the room, and Royden sat beside him, his expression somber, his wide-set eyes betraying his concern.

  Jaryd lay still for a moment, watching the light of the candle dance along the wall beside him, and allowing his breathing to slow to normal. Then he turned his head and smiled wanly at Royden. “Woke you again, eh?” he asked with an effort. “I’m sorry,” he added when his brother nodded.

  “You have another dream?”

  This time it was Jaryd’s turn to nod. He sat up and drank some water from a cup on his nightstand. “I’m ready to tell people now,” he said, brushing a sweat-dampened lock of hair from his forehead. “I have to: there are bandits coming.”

  “Soon?” Royden asked, tension creeping into his voice.