Hatam-Ile, 9th of Ninthmoon 3045
The weather made mockery of him, for the day dawned withour rain for the first time in ages. A watery sun crawled into the horizon behind thin, wispy clouds, reflecting from the glistening drops in the wet grass. Ren’i was certain the captain and his Guards saw his blood-shot eyes and the mouth pressed into a thin line, but no one dared to say anything even if they did. He stood at the edge of the field, eyes watering in the morning sun and hand convulsively grasping the hilt of his sword. His expression was that of a man being taken to his own execution.
He had nothing but faint recollections of the night before, and he wasn’t sure how he’d made it back to the camp. He’d likely keeled straight into his bunk, for he’d been roused from his stupour (it couldn’t be called ’sleep’ no matter how you spun it) still fully clothed in the cold hours between morning and night. The lack of rest had left a throbbing ache at his temples, but he hardly felt it. He felt nothing. He supposed he should have been hungry, thirsty, tired. In their place was only numbness.
How was it possible to yearn so badly for something that had never existed in the first place, Ren’i thought quietly.
Ared had said that it was possible to decline the confession. Ren’i hadn’t even realised how much he’d started to rely within such a short span of time on the tiniest chance that Hawk would choose otherwise. That he’d choose the confession, choose him. Them.
Ren’i had spent the night wishing that Hawk’s words would have simultaneously severed all ties between them and taken the pain of rejection with them. He wished and he wished, though he knew what all descendants of Quan’s bloodline had known for hundreds of thousands of years.
There was no one left on Melkem’s soil to hear the prayers of their children. The gods had died and left them to their own devices so long ago that entire ages had begun, ended and passed out of living memory already.
The gods did not remember them and they did not remember the gods.
Sun shone straight at Hawk’s face and turned the cot and its pelts into a boiling inferno. It wasn’t the heat, however, that dragged him out of sleep’s comforting embrace. The door shook in its hinges when someone knocked on it loudly.
”Hawk!” Another knock. ”Open or I’m breaking the window!”
He could tell from Nightsong’s voice that she’d already been standing at the door for some time, or at least way past the due date of her patience, which did not always require much.
”Wait a second,” Hawk replied, voice rough with sleep. ”I’m not dressed yet.”
”Fine, fine, so long as it won’t take all day.”
He crawled up and pulled on the first trousers he could find on the floor. He hurried to the door, tying the laces as he went. Nightsong was infamous for her impatience, and Hawk did not doubt for a moment that she wouldn’t entertain alternate points of entrance once she got bored enough.
Hawk had to squint when he opened the door. The rain had ceased and the sudden appearance of the sun had turned the air sticky and humid, and he could only make out Nightsong’s outlines for a moment.
”Good morning to you too, sleepyhead,” Nightsong said briskly. She was carrying a large willow basket covered with cloth in her arms. ”Make way. I want out of the sun.”
She sailed in without waiting for Hawk’s response. Hawk shut the door after her.
”Thank the rains it’s pleasantly cool in here,” Nightsong sighed. She set the basket by the dining table.
”I couldn’t be bothered to light a fire for the night.”
”Better that you didn’t. We’re boiling alive in our house. I hate it whenever there’s heat during the rains.” Without skipping a beat she dried her face on the cloth wrapped over the basket. ”Sit down. I’m hungry.”
Hawk couldn’t help chuckling at her tone. He didn’t bother pointing out that the cottage was his, at least formally, and that there was no need to tell him to sit in his own home. He filled a water pitcher from the barrel standing in the kitchen corner and carried it to the table with two cups. Nightsong had already dug out fresh bread and golden butter from the basket in the meantime.
”What’s this now?” Hawk asked when Nightsong took out an apple and started slicing it with ease.
”What does it look like? We’re having breakfast together.”
”I knew it. You’ve only just gotten up yourself.” He poked her cheek, on which there were still wrinkles left by the pillow cover. ”Who’s the sleepyhead now?”
Nightsong slapped his hand away, though she was smiling. ”Eat and quit yapping.”
Hawk took a careful bite of the bread. He didn’t feel one bit hungry and wasn’t sure he’d manage to get a single crumb down. After the previous night’s fight his insides had tangled themselves up on such a knot that his appetite had been gone all evening and night. Oddly enough, though, after downing the first bite he realised just how hungry he was. He ate the first slice on its own without any toppings, then buttered another and slapped on generous amounts of the koori milk cheese Nightsong had brought.
For a long time they just sat in silence and ate, and Hawk wondered when he’d last simply sat in her company for no particular reason.
”Myee,” Hawk said, which made Nightsong look up from her mug. It was extremely rare for them to address each other by spirit names after they had grown up, but the name sat just as familiar and soft on his tongue as it always had. ”Is everything all right at home?”
”Yes, yes. You might even see it with your eyes if you ever came for a visit.”
”Is Silverbrook managing?”
Nightsong shrugged and stuffed a piece of fruit in her mouth. ”Some days are easier than others. She’s blue from time to time. You know what she’s like. She’s not used to asking for help with anything, not even from me.”
”She’s just as hard-headed as you are.”
”You’re one to talk.” Nightsong grinned. She reached out a hand and brushed an unruly strand of hair behind Hawk’s ear, expression sobering. ”Ared came home late last night. He told us.”
Hawk stared down at his water, silent as stone.
Nightsong asked, ”I knew when I saw you together back then, at the summer festival. Were you ever going to tell him?”
Hawk knew without asking whom she meant. He searched for his words for a while, but Nightsong didn’t rush him. ”No. Yes. I don’t know. I feel like I changed my mind everytime I thought about it.”
”I felt the same when I realised Silverbrook and I were confessed,” Nightsong said quietly. She rotated the empty cup between her hands as she thought. ”I panicked. I suppose I thought it would somehow change everything.”
”Did it?”
Nightsong laughed. ”I wouldn’t have married her if it had, goodness gracious. I’d fallen in love long ago before I even knew it. All that I loved about her is still there. I would have chosen her, even if we’d never confessed.” Hawk looked her in the eyes, as though seeking comfort in her words, and Nightsong laid both of her hands on top of his. ”Imagine for a moment that you know nothing about confession. Think about all the things you like about him. Would you still want him?”
A deep silence followed her words, undisturbed by either of them. Hawk thought, though he already knew the answer. He’d turned it around in his head so many times that he could have answered even in his sleep. Ren’i’s smile, Ren’i’s laughter. His hands, his face, all at once all that exhausting joy of life and the melancholy looming behind it, a seriousness that never quite left him. He was nameless, yet his name burned in Hawk’s mouth like a spirit name. He was taivashi, but much more than his bloodline, taivashi yet just a man, himself despite the duties and the titles.
Hawk knew the answer, and knew that so did Nightsong. Even so he felt his face burning when he replied, ”I would.”
Nightsong held his hand tight. ”Are you afraid that he only likes you because of the confession? Or are you hesitating because he’s a demon? Because he’s a prince?” Her smile was warm as she went on, ”he’s not perfect, no, but I still think he’s a good man despite it all, Kishan or not.” She huffed a laugh upon seeing the look on his face. ”Silverbrook said the same. None of us get to choose the family we’re born into.”
”The heir of the high house can only marry another full-blood. Everyone knows that.”
”Oh, cousin dearest. Is that what you’re afraid of? That you’ll be torn apart?”
Hawk managed to stammer, ”it’s not about fear. I mean, there are other reasons, too.”
”Such as?”
He opened his mouth, then closed it. All of his excuses sounded exactly like that even to his own ears: excuses. ”What if it’s not real? If the confession has just driven us mad?”
Nightsong stood up so suddenly that the feet of the stool skidded against the floorboards. She padded towards Hawk and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. She hugged him tightly, and all of a sudden Hawk felt like a child again.
”Myee, he protested.
Nightsong just held him tighter, then let go. She stepped back.
”You can never know what you might’ve had if you never even dare to try.” She caressed his cheek gently. ”You’re not getting any further than this with just ifs and buts.”
”I guess not.” Hawk let out a heavy sigh. ”I don’t know what to do.”
”The decision is yours, no matter what you choose.” Nightsong looked unusually serious, her brown eyes hard as agates. ”If I were you, I’d consider whether I could live with myself if I let him go now. I asked myself the same thing back in the day.”
Hawk sat still and stared at his bare feet as Nightsong emptied the contents of the basket in the kitchen cupboards. Things banged against one another as she moved the dishes about, humming to herself. There was something strangely cozy about it, and for the first time since moving in the cottage Hawk admitted to missing the old house and its familiar noises sometimes.
”I remember that morning when you disappeared from the house,” Nightsong said, back turned towards Hawk. The long black ponytail swung to and fro while she rearranged things in the cupboards. ”We thought you’d gone out for a walk. Ared got worried by the time it got dark and we realised your rucksack and knife were gone.”
Hawk remembered it too, though faintly. He’d left in the twilit hours of the morning like some common thief. There were no clear recollections in his mind of leaving the house, crossing the river, or reaching the opposite bank. He must have swum across, for the draw-bridge was up until first light to keep out the predators. He didn’t remember it at all, not where he’d crossed nor if the current had been strong after the rains. His first clear memories started with a fire and a camp in the shelter of great boulders when evening dusk had started to settle once more. By then his clothes had already been completely dry.
”We looked for you all week. Onniar sent Silverbrook and Willow all the way to Om-Var when you didn’t come back the next night, either. I suppose we thought you might have gone to the mines.” Nightsong was quiet for a moment. None of them had visited Om-Var since the accident, despite their relatives trying to invite them over many times over the years. ”Ared was so mad with worry when they sent out a search party to scout the woods that he hadn’t slept for three days straight. We couldn’t take him with us. We feared he’d walk off a cliff somewhere and break his neck in his haste.”
When they had finally found Hawk several hours away from Hatam-Ile after being missing for over a week, he’d been so weak with hunger and exhaustion that he hadn’t even had the energy to feel ashamed of his escape. Some piece of him had hoped they’d never find him. It solved nothing, he’d known it back then just as well as he knew it now. There was no running away from pain and loss.
Ared had yelled at him for at least fifteen minutes straight when they’d carried him home, supported by Onniar and Blueleaf. It was the only time any of them had ever seen Ared lose his patience like that.
”I’m not vanishing anywhere,” Hawk said, his tone serious. ”I promise.”
”I know.” Nightsong touched his shoulder in passing.
Thin gray clouds swarmed across the skies during the afternoon, turning the air even more muggy. A distant rumbling whispered its promises of another thunderstorm before nightfall. When it started drizzling Hawk pulled on a hooded cloak and locked the cabin door, following Nightsong to the woods. Raindrops hung from her dark hair like diamonds.
The dry, cracked earth was gone; there was lush, verdant life everywhere. Small streams flowed underneath the bridges that were fallen treetrunks, bubbling out of cracks in the cliffs and stones. The cobwebs hanging from the branches were gleaming with dew. During the rains Hawk could almost imagine the ancient Akherilands as they had been during a time when the people of the desert had still been the people of the woods.
Nightsong brushed a low-hanging bough aside, making it shed a raincloud’s worth of drops on her.
”Over here,” she called over her shoulder. She set the basket she’d been carrying on the ground and crouched down.
In the shelter of the trees there grew white lilies-of-the valley, forming such a dense jungle that the forest soil seemed carpeted with them. The sweetness of their scent was intoxicating. Hawk kneeled next to Nightsong and started picking. It had been more than ten years since they’d last been out in the woods together, but the silence between them felt just as natural as before, as if the years had never existed. The rain filled the woodlands with its quiet tinkling, making the leaves shudder. Once the basket was full there were raindrops falling from the rim of Hawk’s hood constantly.
”Thanks for your help. This ought to do,” Nightsong said.
Hawk lifted the basket in his arms. He didn’t even realised he’d walked on Nightsong’s side all the way back towards the city until the bridge emerged behind the treeline. Nightsong glanced at him, a question in her eyes.
”I can manage the rest of the way by myself, you know,” she said, but Hawk just tightened his grip on the basket.
”No need.”
The narrow alleyway between the houses was at once alien and familiar. He’d walked the same path, treaded on the same cobblestones a hundred times before. Nightsong hesitated in front of the door, her hand on the handle.
”Will you come and help with the decorations?”
Hawk thought for a moment and nodded. He crossed the familiar threshold for the first time in years and felt that he was home at last.
Hatam-Ile, 10th of Ninthmoon 3045
Ninthmoon passed in a flurry of repetetive thunderstorms. However colourful Hatam-Ile had been around the summer festival, it was nothing to what the city looked like in the week preluding the festivities that opened the harvest season. Everything was lush, the streets and squares filled with flowers. There was once more water splashing in the fountain on the other edge of the Square of the Nine Moons for the first time in a whole year, which attracted children to play around it despite the weather. Doorframes everywhere downtown and even on the tiny farms surrouding the city were decorated with fresh leaf-tree branches, leaves facing upwards for luck and prosperity in the coming year. Vases filled with enormous bouquets of lilies-of-the-valley and arctic starflowers stood on windowsills, spreading their scent on the rain-wet streets.
Hawk spent an entire day helping Nightsong and Silverbrook clean and decorate the doors and window frames, and once they were done the house resembled a forest meadow, wild flowers and all. He’d not seen Ren’i nor any of the other demons since the argument, nor Ared for that matter. Only a vague, oppressive feeling in his chest, the plume of smoke rising from the chimney of the elder’s house and its closed doors told him that the council was assembled.
They set a plate for Hawk on the dinner table automatically, just like in the good old times, though no one so much as mentioned it. He ate while listening to Nightsong and Silverbrook’s banter, washed his dishes with them, and helped with the dessert to his best ability. The downpour that struck every evening turned the world outside into a blur and made the windowpanes chime.
Hawk had a strange feeling, as though he’d stepped back in time. The house was startlingly familiar, the same air still lingering in its rooms, yet something had changed. Its current inhabitants had added their own touch to it, which, oddly enough, eased the ache of his memories.
Once nightfall came and Hawk had started yawning he noticed that his old room was still as he remembered it. The walls were adorned by Silverbrook’s paintings, but the old sleeping alcove was the same, and all the books and other belongings that Hawk hadn’t taken with him stood on the shelves exactly as he’d left them.
A green double-breasted shirt with elbow-length sleeves had been laid out on the bed. The stripes in various shades of green went from hem to collar in perfect vertical rows. It still looked brand new. Hawk felt heat rising to his face as soon as he spotted it.
”Oh, come on,” he complained when Nightsong conjured a matching pair of moss-green trousers and a handful of ribbons from the wardrobe.
”Quit your whining. You haven’t dressed up since Silverbrook and I got married,” Nightsong said firmly. ”You ought to look presentable for once.”
”Myee. Green is for weddings.”
”And?”
Hawk stammered and felt his face burning even worse than before. ”I don’t want anyone to get the wrong idea.”
Nightsong stared at him with her eyes wide, feigning utmost innocence. ”Oh, but you do want to make a good impression on your intended, don’t you? You’ll have to employ all of your questionable charms if you want him to forgive you, you know.” She smiled sweetly. ”Blue or green for your ribbon, dear?”
Silverbrook appeared in the doorway, gnawing on a piece of flatbread. ”You might as well give up already, Hawk.”
”You’ve both lost it,” Hawk grunted. ”I haven’t decided anything yet.”
Silverbrook rolled her eyes. ”Sure, and I’m monkey’s uncle. So you’re just constantly looking around for fun everytime you’re out, then sulking when a certain ginger’s nowhere to be seen?”
”I just want to talk to him, that’s all.”
Hawk didn’t need to look at either of them to know they didn’t believe him. Nightsong folded the trousers next to the shirt and grinned even wider.
”Well, you decide what you decide,” she said and wiped her palms on her trousers. ”Well then. Now that you’re staying the night, you get to help me bring the bedclothes from the attic.”