Tarashana by Rachel Neumeier (little red riding hood ebook TXT) 📕

Hokino from Lorellan; that was why he had a deep tie to the inKera warleader. No such need had driven him to take a deep tie to Garoyo. He had barely come near my younger brother; of course he had no tie there. I asked nothing more. At least he had brought Lalani to us. This was very good. I was very, very pleased to see her. Extraordinarily pleased and glad ... I realized suddenly that these were not my feelings. I felt that way, certainly, but not this much, or not in exactly this way. There was a sense of something else, of satisfaction to that feeling. It was much like the satisfaction a warrior feels as he sees a stratagem he has designed begin to fall into place.

I looked at Inhejeriel. She was gripping her hands together, shivering a little, her eyes fixed on Lalani. But she saw me look at her, or felt my attention. Her gaze came to me, and she said, her tone apologetic, I do not mean to. I am very glad to recover her. I am more likely to succeed now that we have recovered her. She is not as I am, not as one of my people would be, her memory is not right for the full task, but she can help me.

I could hardly protest. Any warleader might have said much the same. Inhejeriel was more like that, like a warleader, than I had realized. I had not understood that until this moment. She was so small, but our strategy in this place, such as it might be, was entirely hers. No one else truly understood what she meant to do, except perhaps Aras.

He was looking at me over Lalani’s bowed head. When I met his eyes, he nodded. He said nothing, but I took this as sufficient assurance that he understood enough.

Lalani was recovering. Unlike Suyet, she did not recoil from Aras when she realized she was embracing him. Her hold loosened, and she stepped back, her hands sliding down his arms until she gripped his hands, but though she still shivered, she did not retreat or apologize or even seem embarrassed. She said, “Aras.” Then she blinked and said, “Lord Gaur.” Then, fervently, “Thank you. Thank you ... I thank the gods!” She let him go at last, but did not back away.

“Very good,” he murmured. “Yes, I thank the gods I’ve recovered you both. You’ve been feeling the pull for some time.”

Lalani touched her lips, then her forehead. “I don’t know ...”

“A long time,” Suyet interrupted her. “Yes. Hours and hours. Days. It seems like days ... weeks. Years.” His voice was hoarse. He looked away and down, shuddering, and swallowed some of the tisane. His hands were shaking, but Etta caught the bowl and prevented the rest of the tisane from spilling.

“What was it like, in that place?” my sister asked, uncharacteristically tentative. “If you are able to say.” She sat back on her heels, looking at him anxiously.

“Did you meet enemies there?” Iro asked, much more curt. “Do enemies pursue you?”

“No?” Suyet said, not sounding at all certain. “I don’t ... it was ... it was nothing. There was nothing there. For a long time ... it seemed like a long time.”

Iro gave the nearest smear of emptiness a grim look, disregarding Suyet’s tentative denial.

Aras said quietly, “Nothing at all. Nothing to see or hear, nothing to touch. No sense of your own body.” Lalani was nodding, and Aras shuddered suddenly. “No wonder your return struck you both hard.”

“I heard you, my lord.” Suyet’s voice shook. “Or, not really heard. I knew where you were, but I—”

Tano burst into view around the curve of the mountain, running hard, his head down, looking much as he had when he first ran out of the forest and encountered us. I was very glad to see him, and began to step forward, but checked as he shied hard to the side, nearly fell from the ledge, barely caught himself, and came to a quivering halt. Then he stood braced, his eyes fixed on us, untrusting; his knife in his hand. Certainly his behavior was nothing like that of the Lau. Perhaps I should not have expected an Ugaro to respond to a sorcerous pull in the same way as a Lau.

“Tano!” I called to him.

When he heard my voice, he staggered, caught himself, lowered the knife, and stared at me as though he had no idea who I was. Or as though he did not trust that I was who I seemed.

Aras lifted empty hands palm-out. He said, his voice level but tense, speaking loudly enough for us all to hear him, “He does not clearly remember anything other than the nothingness Suyet described, but he feels ... he believes ... he feels strongly that something else was in that nothingness. Someone else. Danger. Enemies. Something coming, always coming closer.”

“Oh,” said Suyet, and shuddered.

“Ah. Suyet actually felt that too.” Aras glanced at Lalani. “They all felt that, but my people not nearly as strongly as Tano. Speak to him again, Ryo. That may help.”

“Tano,” I called, making my tone firm and unworried. “It does not befit an inGara warrior to threaten friends. Look at me. Understand that what you see is real and true, and recover good sense.”

His expression did not ease, but he heard me. I knew this because he looked around at the mountains and the sky. The Moon, so close to the world here, drew a second look, and the brilliance of the stars. But his breathing became smoother. Looking at me, he said, his voice almost steady, “It is you. I—we—”

“Yes,” I said. “Are you steady enough to walk?”

“Yes,” he said, stung. He sheathed his knife at last. His hand was shaking, so it took him two tries, but he sheathed it