Didn't he?
StarLaughter lay on the floor of the mausoleum and hated.
More, she lusted for revenge. Qeteb could not speak such lies and blacken her son's memory —
Gods! Was her son trapped under that mountain of metal and odious flesh, screaming for herto get him out?
— and think that she would do nothing about it.
StarLaughter bared her teeth, and made a small sound deep in her throat that was half curse, half growl.
Her hands clawed on the floor, her nails scratching at its surface.
She lay there and hated, and she lay there and lusted for revenge.
StarLaughter was very, very good at nourishing both hatred and revenge. She had had many thousands of years of practice at both.
/ nurtured my son, she thought, her entire body rigid with the intensity of her animosity. I nurtured him and kept him and held and loved him through such extremes of pain and despair that you — a Demon — cannot imagine. I offered him my breast, and he took it.
I loved him, and yet you stole him from me, Qeteb, and then sullied his memory with lies.
"My son hated me?" StarLaughter whispered, her hands still clawing slowly at the floor. "He didn't hate me, he adored me ... every Icarii adored me! No-one laughed at me. No-one!"
She lifted her head slightly and stared at Qeteb, now on the far side of the mausoleum whispering with his fellow nightmares.
You are the simpleton, Qeteb, if you think you can deny both my son and myself our destinies.
At StarLaughter's thought, Qeteb turned slowly and regarded her.
StarLaughter did not move, nor drop her eyes, nor even disguise the hatred and resentment in them.
After a moment Qeteb turned his back to her again.
Now you have one more enemy, StarLaughter thought, and began to mop at the blood on her face and neck with a corner of her much-bloodied robe.
Her son hadn't hated her ... had he?
StarLaughter paused in her attempts to clean her face, and her entire face trembled as doubt overran her mind.
Had he?
Chapter 6
The Enchanted Song Book
"Tell us of Caelum," Axis said, as they sat down. "And tell us of yourself. We have heard only garbled snippets, and we would know the truth."
Where to start? DragonStar thought. "You realise," he finally said, "the depth of manipulation that has bound our family?"
Axis nodded. "I thought my task had been to defeat Gorgrael and unite Tencendor, but in reality, my task, as Azhure's, was to create the circumstances that would create the StarSon."
DragonStar's mouth quirked. "Yes. Even WolfStar had been manipulated in order that Azhure be created and Axis be trained, so that you might the better perform your task in creating ..."
"You," Azhure said very softly. She did not look at either her husband or her son.
"The manipulation," DragonStar said, "extends beyond our family. It involves this entire land and its peoples, and stretches beyond that ... back to the world of the Enemy. We are but the result of tens and tens of thousands of years of manipulation. Even longer, perhaps."
"By what?" Axis demanded. "By who?"
"By the Star Dance," DragonStar said. "Or whatever it represents."
"The Star Dance!" Axis said, and he spoke the words as a curse, as a hated thing. "The time was when I loved that beyond anything, save Azhure."
"It may be," DragonStar said, "that the Star Dance has been leading to this point, to us, for millions of years. Chasing the Demons through time and space, and being chased by them."
"We are the ultimate of millions of years of ... manipulation?" Azhure said, and then laughed merrily, shaking out her hair. "Could the Star Dance have not made us less flawed? An Axis less arrogant and cruel? A DragonStar less resentful and ambitious? And I? I less determined to know my own power, and more willing to tend to my own family."
"Who knows," DragonStar said. "Our flaws may yet save us." And he smiled, as if he had made a joke to himself. "Ah, but you asked of Caelum and of myself. We both grew up amid lies — not of your doing, or even of ours, but lies bound about us by the Star Dance, via the Maze. These lies dictated our action, driving me into such overweening ambition I could contemplate the murder of Caelum, and making Caelum ..."
"A weak ruler," Azhure finished for him, "and a murderer also, perhaps?"
Ye gods, DragonStar thought weakly, what should I say to that? Yes, mother. Caelum murdered our sister and your daughter. Do you want me to say that out loud, Azhure?
"Perhaps," he answered, and Azhure nodded and turned aside her head for a second time.
"A murderer?" Axis said. "What do you mean?"
"He means," Azhure said, "that we all have the blood of others on our hands, beloved."
