Shed never understood why the Barrani had chosen to take the Imperial Oath to the Halls of Law; shed never understood why they served. Theyd said they were bored. But...they were good at what they did. Shed learned a lot from Teela, and most of it was within regulations.
When she reached the far wall, her hands were vibrating because the runes themselves were shaking. It was as if the component parts wanted to fly free of each other, and that was so not happening right now. Not yet.
The small dragon dug claws into collarbone again. She bit back the urge to tell him to shut up or be helpful, because it was his wings that were moving them both. She forgot frustration as they at last approached surface.
It wasnt a wall. Or rather, it wasnt the side of a pit. It looked likelike a carved likeness of the flattened streets of a very, very bizarre city. Parts of that city were laid open, as if theyd been sheared; rooms were exposedor what she assumed were rooms.
And what had she expected? The Consort had fallen unconscious because of the nightmares of Alsanisand Alsanis was a building. A sentient building. She looked right, left, up, downthe vista, the flattened, exposed likeness of something that shed be afraid to policestretched out for as far as the eye could see. Everything was cast in shadow; it was not, as shed thought at first glimpse, of black stone or rock.
Nor was it completely without light. Here and there, she caught flickers of something that might have been candle or lamp; she caught movement, but only out of the corner of her eye. It reminded her of cockroaches. She hated cockroaches.
The buildings themselves were not uniform. And, as she drew closer still, she realized they werent squashed and flattened. But they had been. They seemed to gain dimension, stories unfolding where her flight brought her close. She could see what might have been streets, but they were dark hatches that grew even less distinct as the buildings themselves emerged following the trail of her flight path.
The runes in her hands, had they been alive, would be agitated and panicked; theyd probably be screaming. She wondered if those screams would be laden with fear or joy, which was an odd thought.
She nudged the small dragon, and he banked to the right; buildings rose out of their flatness, the flickering lights becoming the heart of windows and arches. Stone, she thought, and then reconsidered. This was some part of the Hallionne, if nightmare was a word that could be literally applied. The rules of normal architecture didnt mean anything here.
She had no idea what she was doing, but seeing a city unfold as she passed above it made her feel almost at home. It wasnt Elantrabut it wasnt an endless forest full of insects and talking Ferals, either.
On the other hand, it didnt seem populated. Small twitches at the corner of her eyes didnt become people of any stripe when she looked. It was a ghost city, a deserted town, absent the usual decay and dilapidation. She nudged the dragon, and he banked to the right, slowing as he straightened out their gliding path.
She saw why: the building that began its ascent as she approached did not stop unfolding; to avoid running smack into its side, the small dragon would have had to ascend just as quickly. She shouted because he didnt even try.
Up! Up!
He flew straight, the little winged rat. She had the horrible certainty she was about to discover just what these buildings were made ofby splatting against the wall. But beneath a roof with a spire that could impale Dragons in flight form, a balcony opened up. It was longer and wider than Kaylins entire apartment. Former apartment. The wall it jutted from was rounded, and it had no doors; instead, it had an arch that was open to air, as if it were a cloister. The dragon flew straight above balcony rails and beneath that arch, tucking his wings so theyd fit. He also wrapped his tail around her neck.
When theyd cleared the arch, he folded his wings entirely, and she fell a good six feet to the ground. Six feet wasnt usually a problem. Six feet when both hands were occupied wasnt the usual.
She sprained her ankle. At least, it felt like a sprain because it hurt like blazing fire, but she could stand and it more or less supported her weight. This is stupid, she said in Leontine. Im not even physically here and I have to hobble through this maze with a bum ankle? She did not, by dint of full hands, punch the wall. Or kick it.
It wasnt a maze, though. It was a cloister. Arches cascaded beyond the arch shed entered; to her right was wall, to her left a shadowed courtyard. The air was still and dry; there was no sound but her breathing. Even the dragon was silent, although he batted her face with one wing. It wasnt an improvement over ear-biting.
As she walked, simple stone walls gave way to small fountains, small statues; the open courtyard continued. Shed never been in a courtyard this large; she was certain it was at least four city blocks in length, and it showed no signs of ending. What she wanted from a city, she decided, was stable architecture and buildings that made sense. Who made a courtyard this bloody high off the ground?
She stopped, turned, and walked toward the open space to her left to look down. She couldnt see bottom. The small dragon whiffled, but he didnt bat the side of her face. Im not jumping unless we run into Ferals or a really, really ugly dead end. Got it?
He exhaledair, not cloudand flopped across her shoulders, rolling an eye in her direction before he closed it.
Now youre clocking out? Are you kidding?
He failed to answer.
She started in on a very Leontine reply, but something caught her eye; it was bright, gleaming. She turned to her right; there was a statue against the wall, between the right-hand pillars of two arches. It didnt vanish when she looked at it. She realized that the gleam she saw was the reflection of the two words she was dragging along at her sides as if they were recalcitrant foundlings on an outing.
The statue was made, not of stone or marble, but...glass. It was glass. It stood on a pedestal of white marble. If it had been standing on the floor, it would still have been taller than Kaylin; Barrani were. It looked like a blown-glass representation of a ghost. A male ghost. Its features were delicate, the glass taking the form of ears, chin, perfect cheekbones. Probably perfect skin. Kaylin didnt really believe in ghosts, but none of the stories shed heard indicated bad complexions, and anyway, he was Barrani.
She stood, bracketed by the two words, watching the light play off transparent surface as if it were a window. A very beautiful window in a nonexistent frame. She peered through his chest, which was at eye level, given the pedestal. She did not see stone; she sawthought she sawnight.
She wasnt surprised when the window moved his arms. She should have been, but the minute shed hit balcony, shed given up on anything making sense. The statue reached out to touch the rune that meant grief and loss. His hand passed through what was, to Kaylin, appreciably solid.
She began to walk again, the statue, the ghost, trailing behind her, his open, empty eyes upon the words she carried. And why wouldnt they be? They were the only obvious source of light.
He was not the only statue. Immediately ahead, between the pillars of two arches, stood another, also male. His face was broader, the cheeks wider, the chin more chiseled; he was otherwise tall and slender, although she thought him taller than the first. He wore a thin tiara across his brow, although it, too, was made of glass.
She stopped in front of him, watching the first ghostshe couldnt quite think of them as Barrani, although it was clear thats what they were meant to be. He, too, reached for the rune that spoke of grief and loss, stepping off his pedestal to do so. He didnt seem to see the first ghost; nor did the first ghost see him. But his hand passed through the rune, as well, and a ripple of expression moved across his face like a liquid wave.
She would have let them take the runes, because there was something about them that was not Barrani. They seemed younger to her, and drawn only to grief. The second rune might not have existed at all. But she knew the words werent meant for them, because as she passed beneath the second such arch, she came to stand in front of a third glass statue.
Unlike the first two, this one was female; the slight swell of breasts and the delicate curve of hips would have given it away, but she also wore a Court dressa Barrani Court dressthat hung in folds. She wore two rings, two glass rings, and a bracelet that looked almost martial; her hair fell from forehead to knees, unbraided. She was slightly shorter than the second ghost, and of a height with the first; she looked far haughtier than either of the first two. She didnt attempt to touch the rune, but her chin dropped as she looked at it.
She wouldnt reach for it, either, Kaylin thought, because she knew she could never touch it. But she, too, stepped from her pedestal, and she followed as Kaylin continued to walk.
She wasnt surprised to see that there were eleven such statues by the time she reached the T junction at the end of the murderously long, open gallery. The rune had become heavier as she walked; she was practically dragging it, by the end. Two of the glass Barrani were women, nine were men.
Kaylin was annoyed. Not at the rune. Not at the ghosts. Not even at Alsanis.
No, she was annoyed at the High Court. Because they spoke of twelve lost children. Twelve. There were eleven. She had no doubt, in this amalgam of dream, nightmare, and Hallionne, that these ghosts were the ghosts of the eleven who had been so badly damaged by the ceremony in the green. They had been taken to Alsanis after the end of the recitation, when forbidden blood had been spilled during the telling, as if Alsanis was a jail. They had been sent to the West March by ambitious parentsand they had been sacrificed to that ambition.
But they numbered eleven, damn it. Teela wasnt here. Teela wasnt lost. Teela had come to the green wearing the dress that Kaylin now wore, and Teela had served as harmoniste. She had come of age. She was a Lord of the High Court.