“Why now?” Zaidra bristled. She was not in control. It was not her decision to make!
“There are changes that will impact us all soon.”
“What? Those globes in the far south? That abomination ruining our trade with the Dragonlands? Do you think me ignorant?”
“Not at all, sister,” Gishna said softly. “I know the power of your network.”
Her words rattled Zaidra. This was a first. Had Vakayne depended on the southern empress and her ancient tombs, as Hosmyr did?
“I meant simply that another significant shift is coming,” Gishna said. “Foreigners, heathens swamp the Southern, I hear.”
“They’d not dare enter Vaidolin.”
How easily Zaidra forgot the turmoil of the past.
“Of course not,” Gishna acknowledged. She shifted in her seat. How could she introduce the return of the valmasin? She leaned forward and wafted the blue flames stronger, increasing the power of the silence. Zaidra’s brow arched.
“I have something unique to offer,” Gishna said.
Zaidra recoiled from her. Was she so powerless? Gishna wondered then if she should share the truth of her seer, of her records, and all the rest. Zaidra covered her hair with a veil and shawl, but at least one strand should fall. She’d have her people scour Zaidra’s seat and surroundings. Gishna had focused on the daughters; did the answer lay with Zaidra herself?
“I will make amends for my house’s great crime,” Gishna wheezed.
“Which crime, Gishna? There are so many. What will you do about this acolyte’s murder? There is no greater offense against the goddess… against all Mornae. The flesh of the acolyte is sacred. Without that, we crumble! Don’t you see that? What’s keeping savages from striking us? Or our own savages?”
Gishna stared ahead, resisting the urge to snap. Did this woman think to teach her the base lessons of their society?
“I would think the fire summoning priestesses of your house could manage savages easily. Anyway, Hosmyr has only one great crime,” Gishna said.
Zaidra’s eyes widened. “Surely you are mistaken. You cannot atone for that offense. Not now, anyway. Even if you could, what use is that power when all have fallen so far?”
Even Vakayne? Gishna wondered. This meeting had proven to be invaluable for all Zaidra revealed. Goddess above, what was to become of them all?
Gishna’s face turned to stone. She would fight on until her last breath. “Now is precisely when we need it,” she said hoarsely. “Don’t you think? It would bring your blood houses to heel, would it not?”
“What makes you think they disobey?” Zaidra asked. She could no longer restrain her annoyance, which Gishna now understood was a mask for her impotence. “They, above all, know their duty.”
Gishna hoped they were talking about the same thing. She’d never seen Zaidra so defensive.
Zaidra’s eyes narrowed to slits. What was going on in Velkamas? They’d broken off all communication with Hosmyr for six centuries because of that ancient crime against the valmasin and traded with them only out of dire necessity. Their pride and honor could only suffer so much austerity, but now its matron was reluctant to have it redressed.
“Are you worried what it may reveal about your daughters?” Gishna asked. It was a risk to press, but she must settle it soon. She must understand that convoluted bloodline.
Zaidra twisted in her seat and then stood. She looked like a deer about to bolt. Gishna acted like she’d not noticed, hacking loudly and wheezing. Between two bouts, Zaidra sat again, taken aback by her own reaction.
I see, Gishna thought. It’s not your daughters you’re worried about… perhaps you’re concerned what they’d see in you?
“It doesn’t matter,” Zaidra said confidently. “The valmasin are destroyed at last. My spies in the south confirm it.”
So Vakayne had deals with the southerners as well. What knowledge had they looked for in those tombs, or perhaps from the gigantic, sky-grazing gates she’d heard of?
“You must be right,” Gishna said, wiping her lips and tucking the pink-stained linen in her sleeve. There could be no bargaining with Zaidra on this matter. “I had hoped to recover their power for our benefit. As it once was.”
Zaidra huffed, trying to regain the advantage her superior position as a Vakayne granted her. “We can’t turn back time, Gishna, and undo those horrors. They are gone, and we continue.”
At that moment, Gishna’s chest cramped. The seer was so precious now, and what game was he playing, saying his comrades would come to Vaidolin? He must know more than Zaidra. Of course he did. His power was outside theirs, of a different nature. They’d survived hidden and secret for thousands of years at a time… and then waking like a plague to wreak havoc on the living.
“Like a wildfire,” she said under her breath.
“What’s that?” Zaidra demanded.
Her voice shook. Gishna suppressed a laugh. Goddess above, it felt so good to rattle her for once, to pick at mighty Ilor’Vakayne wounds—and she must find out the nature of it. Perhaps Matrons Kiseyl or Zashtrin, even Lauxyn, would be interested in what she had to say?
“Nothing,” Gishna said. “It’s nothing.”
The silence grew and compressed in the bubble. Zaidra glanced at her, her face twisted angrily. She’d need to tighten security around the work, the scriptorium, even the seer. Vakayne must have spies in her citadel, as she had hers in theirs.
But what to do now? She’d placed all hope on this bond between them. If the answer wasn’t Vakayne and its bloodlines, then what or where? Every step forward produced nothing but more difficulty, like pulling back the tarp on a compost heap only to see vermin had devoured it.
“Are we done then?” Zaidra asked. “These unplanned meetings grow tiresome.”
“Forgive me, sister,” Gishna said. “I am so very old… the days and years run into each other.”
Zaidra grunted, as if age was no concern to her. She looked younger than Gishna had at that age, and goddess above, she had three daughters!
Gishna lowered her head to her chest. “Goddess, keep your house,” she said in farewell.
Zaidra rattled a response, as if compelled.
