Horses were magnificent creatures from a distance. But clinging to the back of one as it canters roughly through badly lit trails in an alien forest made a car sound like a much better option. Or a four-wheeler. Or, even better, staying home and reading about it in a book.
Jim swallowed a cry of alarm as the old mare Bhuna shied sideways around a thick root stretched across the trail in front of them.
At least the mare was moving forward. When he’d first climbed into the saddle, the old mare seemed to think stepping backward was the best way to get where they needed to go. It took ten minutes for him to learn how to hold the reins so that she knew forward momentum was the rule of the day.
Ridiculous really. Who trained horses to walk backwards?
A high-pitched whine in his ear warned him of a dive-bombing mosquito before it landed. He smushed the bug against the side of his neck.
Anyone who said Rainbow Valley was heaven on earth never did battle with its mosquito population. Josharons had enough fur to protect them from the offending bugs, and Celtican blood must have tasted terrible, because the bugs didn’t bother Velanna either.
The humans, however, made a lovely meal. Yasira had sprayed them down with some kind of plant oil as they were leaving the castle, but Jim had long since sweated it away, much to the joy of the mosquitoes of the Great Forest.
Ahead, Mickey and Danny rode side by side, speaking to each other in low tones every few moments. Danny’s ball cap only barely contained his carrot-colored curls.
Both of them rode easily, as though they’d grown up riding horses through dark woodland trails. Danny probably had. And, obviously, Mickey was a fast learner.
Even farther ahead of them, Meg rode alone astride Zafidi. The giant horse seemed even larger with her on his back, yet the wild-eyed stallion didn’t once fight her lead.
Tzaitel was somewhere far at the back, unsociable and taciturn and just generally unpleasant. After Velanna’s wild story the previous night, though, part of him didn’t blame her. That was a heck of a bombshell to drop this late in the game.
Velanna rode Saathi, her gelding just to the side and behind him, hands folded on the pommel of her saddle. Her dark robes only made her look even paler than she had in the bright morning light at Prism Castle.
Jim frowned at her slow movements and the drawn expression on her face. He didn’t know Velanna well, but he recognized the signs of exhaustion.
Carefully, he pulled back on Bhuna’s reins, and the horse understood what he wanted, slowing her pace until Velanna caught up with him.
“So.” He forced a smile at her. “What are we riding into?”
Velanna didn’t look at him. “I could not tell you, James. I have never been inside the Centaur’s mountain.”
Jim frowned. “But you’ve fought Centaurs before.”
“Many times.” Finally Velanna turned to meet his eyes. “But this will be unlike other instances. They have the advantage. We are invading their home.” Velanna’s expression tightened. “Your hair is showing.”
Jim reached up to adjust the scarf Meg had wrapped around his bright blond hair. “Thanks. Probably stands out a little, huh?”
“If a Centaur scout were to see us, they would immediately know our purpose.” Velanna nodded toward Mickey and her frizzy brown hair at the front. “Of the humans, only Michelle can pass truly unnoticed in the forest.”
Jim felt around his ears and neck just to make sure none of his hair escaped the dark fabric. “Well, good for her.”
Bhuna stepped around another thick root, and Jim clung to the saddle until his knees ached. The poor old horse would probably buck him off at her first opportunity. Once he was sure of his seat, he righted himself in the saddle and patted the old mare’s neck.
“You are unaccustomed to horses.” Velanna stared straight ahead.
“No, I’m a jockey in my spare time.”
Velanna arched an eyebrow at him. “Sarcasm?”
“Yeah, Velanna.” Jim chuckled. “Do you seriously think I belong on a horse?”
Bhuna shook her head and nickered.
“See, even the horse thinks it’s laughable.”
Finally, a small smile shone in Velanna’s too-green eyes.
Jim bit his bottom lip. “Can I ask you something?”
Immediately, the light in her eyes faded. “You may ask anything, James, but whether I am able to answer is less certain.”
“What happened to your people? Really?”
Velanna looked away and gathered Saathi’s reins in her hands. “They died.”
“Yeah, but how?” Jim leaned on the pommel of Bhuna’s saddle. “From what I’ve read, your people were the most advanced culture in Andaria for a thousand years. No other people group in Andaria could match your technology or knowledge or accomplishments, not to mention that your race numbered into the hundreds of thousands. How could a people that powerful and numerous just die out?”
Velanna swallowed, refusing to look at him. “The Great War raged for more than fifty years, James. Even a mighty people can be brought low by a conflict that lasts so long.”
Jim closed his jaw with a snap. That wasn’t an answer. Wars in Terran had lasted as long and not resulted in the near-extinction of a race.
“It wasn’t a war, was it?” He sighed. “It was genocide.”
Velanna’s shoulders stiffened, but she didn’t speak.
“The Great War wasn’t a world war. It was a war against your people, to exterminate you.”
Velanna shut her eyes and folded her hands on the pommel again. “In some ways it was a war to exterminate life altogether, James, but Celtica was the focal point, yes.”
“Why? And who even had the power to do something like that?”
“It is irrelevant.” Velanna finally looked at him, her eyes deep and sad. “The aggressors are gone, and speaking of them again serves only to resurrect memories better left buried.” She shifted in the saddle. “Regardless, the Great War broke this world. It drove cultures to the point of extinction. It eradicated nations. It left this world in tattered pieces, and I can only guess at its long-term effects in the north since I did not witness them for myself.”
“Because you and Tolan left.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell Tzaitel?” Jim asked. “It seems like it would be important for her to know what happened to her people.”
Velanna pressed her lips together. “Celtica was a bastion of light and knowledge in the old world. My people were wise and strong and great, and our culture helmed the continent as leaders in science, philosophy, and art.”
“It sounds wonderful. Why wouldn’t you tell her about it then?”
“All our great accomplishments came to naught, James.” Velanna sagged in the saddle. “Almost overnight, with one proud choice by one misguided man, all of it came crashing down around us. None of our greatness mattered at all.” Her voice shook. “What good is a history of great accomplishments when none of them remain? When none of them could save a single life in the midst of a war of extermination?”
Jim swallowed, his mouth dry.
“Celtica was a great nation. My people were a great people. But all any of us can learn from them is that pride will lead to destruction. That is all my children need to know.”
Jim gathered Bhuna’s reins. “I hope you’re right.”
Velanna glanced at him and scowled.
“You’re not telling us everything, Velanna,” Jim said in response to her expression. “And maybe it doesn’t matter. But we’re walking into unknown territory here, and I’m just worried that some of what you’re not telling us might save our lives.”
“Unlikely, James. But I am grateful for your honesty.”
A shaft of morning sunlight broke through the forest canopy. Velanna’s skin looked like chalk, and her hands shook while they held Saathi’s reins.
“Speaking of honesty,” Jim mumbled, “are you—okay?”
Velanna arched both eyebrows at him, and he rolled his eyes.
“I’m not trying to be rude, Velanna, but you don’t look so well,” he said. “Should you even be here? You look like you could pass out at any moment.”
“An astute observation, James.” Her half smile seemed almost amused.
“You should be back in the infirmary, shouldn’t you?”
“Yes. That would have been the wiser choice.”
Jim heaved a huge sigh and swatted a mosquito from his neck. “Why are you here, Velanna? Why did you even come?”
“Without the Kirana, the Andhera will destroy you all.” Velanna stated it as though no other fact mattered.
The Kirana. Velanna’s magic band of light. The one that had chased the living shadow away from Prism Castle. The weapon Velanna claimed destroyed her entire people.
“You’re really going to try to use it again?”
Velanna shook her head. “Present me with another option.”
Jim frowned. “Can’t someone else use it?”
Velanna focused on her hands. “Tzaitel has refused it.”
“Yeah, we all heard that last night.” Jim rolled his eyes.
He didn’t know Tzaitel well, but personally he didn’t see what Meg saw in the younger Celtican woman. Meg almost revered her, as though Tzaitel were some great figure in Meg’s life. Maybe she had been when Meg was growing up, but the Tzaitel Ittai Jim had met seemed disinterested and harsh. Sure, losing her father had to have damaged her, but it had damaged Meg too. Yet Meg valued Tzaitel’s feelings above her own, and Tzaitel had done nothing in Jim’s opinion to deserve it.
“Does it have to be a Celtican?” he asked.
Velanna went rigid in the saddle, long fingers curling around Saathi’s reins until her knuckles turned white.
“Margaret cannot wield the Kirana,” Velanna said.
Jim smirked. So, Velanna had been thinking the same thing as him. He hadn’t even needed to suggest Meg as an alternative.
“Are you sure it can’t be her?”
Velanna scoffed. “James, if you understood what is at stake, you would not suggest Margaret.”
Irritation instantly flared in his chest. This wasn’t the first time Velanna had expressed doubt in Meg’s abilities. Velanna seemed to have a notion that Meg wasn’t capable. Meg Mitchell was the most capable person Jim had ever met, aside from his sister. There wasn’t anything that Meg couldn’t do.
But a shouting match never solved anything.
He didn’t know Velanna well either, but he understood her type. He’d met too many professors and academics during his stint as a doctoral student who were certain they were right, and he’d proved most of them wrong. But he didn’t do it by shouting at them.
“Can you beat him?”
Velanna looked at him sharply.
“Tiron. The mad horse-guy with a chip on his shoulder. And the evil shadow thing. Can you beat him?”
Velanna chewed on the inside of her mouth, something he’d never seen her do before.
“No,” she said finally.
“You can’t beat him? Not even with your magic rainbow?”
She looked away. “No, I cannot defeat him. And attempting to do so will most certainly end my life.”
Yeah. She’d said that last night too, but it didn’t make it easier to hear when she repeated it.
He ran a hand through his hair, dislodging the head scarf. “You know it’s going to kill you, and you’re still going to use it?”
“There is no other option, James.”
Jim readjusted his head scarf, muttering. “No, you just won’t consider another option.” Blond strands still kept poking out from under the scarf. Why had he touched it?
Velanna sighed and nudged Saathi closer to him so she could tuck the strands under the scarf for him. She mumbled in Celtican under her breath. Someday he’d know Celtican well enough to tell her that whatever she was saying was unnecessary but probably totally true.
The lines on her face were deep. The sorrow in her eyes made his stomach tighten.
“Do you think you deserve to die?” he asked quietly.
Velanna froze and blinked at him in surprise.
“Tzaitel said that last night,” Jim said. “That if you use the Kirana and it kills you, you will have deserved it. Do you believe that?”
Velanna scoffed and looked away. She urged Saathi forward again, and Jim gathered Bhuna’s reins so that he could keep up. There had been no quip, no retort, no answer of any kind, and Velanna always had an answer. He knew her well enough by now to understand that.
“Velanna?”
“What I want or believe is not the issue, James.” She didn’t look at him. “My daughter will not wield the Kirana, thus I must.”
Jim rolled his eyes. “Well, what does your other daughter say?”
Velanna fell silent as she guided Saathi around a large boulder on the trail, the horse flicking her tail and tossing her head in the dim light.
That was the cue to stop talking. Velanna wanted him to stop asking questions, stop making her think, but he hadn’t survived six Ivy League colleges and eight doctoral studies by running away from a professor who wouldn’t engage.
“Meg.” Jim guided Bhuna closer to Saathi. “Your other daughter.”
Velanna grunted.
“What did your other daughter have to say about your magic rainbow?”
“It is neither a rainbow nor magic, James.”
“What did Meg have to say?” he insisted.
Velanna set her jaw. “I did not ask her.”
“Maybe you should.”
Velanna settled herself in the saddle so she could turn to face him. “James, you do not understand. I value your opinions, but this is not something you can grasp.”
“It’s not?” He turned in his saddle too, and Bhuna nickered unhappily. “We’re marching into battle against an enemy we don’t really know on a battleground we’ve never fought on, and you’ve got a weapon that will kill you when you use it. And you won’t even win. What am I missing?”
Velanna huffed and turned away.
Good. He didn’t want to make her angry, but she had to see that the choice she was making wasn’t based on logic. Not even close to it.
“The Kirana is a weapon.” Velanna ducked beneath a low-hanging branch. “Using it will most certainly kill me. Even if Margaret could wield it, it would cause her immense pain. I would not wish it upon her.”
“But you’d wish it on Tzaitel?”
Velanna grimaced. “Tzaitel is my blood. It is her birthright and her burden as a descendant of my grandfather.”
“Or is that just how you see it?”
Velanna jerked back on Saathi’s reins, and the horse stopped in the middle of the trail. Her eyes burned into him.
“The Kirana causes pain, James.” Her voice was raspy. “It is live, raw electricity, and its wielder becomes its conduit. You would wish this pain upon Margaret? Do you not care for her?”
Heat rose in his face, and he swallowed the first words on his tongue.
“I do care about her, Velanna,” he said slowly, reining Bhuna to a stop. “I don’t wish it on her. I don’t wish it on you either. But wishes are just daydreams, Velanna. They don’t hold up well when real life kicks in. You’re not being rational about this.”
“How so?”
“Before it was just fighting the Centaurs.” He pointed ahead of them to the still-hidden glow of Centaur Mount. “The Josharon army could do that. Meg could lead a team to rescue Barb and Jenny, no problem. But we’re not just fighting Centaurs now. We’re fighting the Andhera. And the only thing that can fight the Andhera is the Kirana, and you’ve just told me that you can’t defeat it. But you won’t consider another option.”
“There is no other option, James.” Velanna snarled through clenched teeth, clutching the pommel. “Even if Tzaitel would have taken it, even if I gave it to Margaret, they might still lose. Would you rather I sacrifice her and save my own life? No, better to die myself with the disgraceful mantle of shame that destroyed my people. Perhaps I can take the Andhera with me.”
“But you don’t know for sure.” Jim reached across the distance between them and set his hand on her elbow. “You might die before you do any good. And then we’ll be left with no one to fight for us.”
Velanna didn’t budge at his touch, but she didn’t shake him off either. Her arm trembled.
“Velanna, what are you afraid of?”
The old Celtican closed her eyes. “The Kirana is my family’s burden.”
Jim tightened his hand on her elbow. “Velanna, your people are dead. Don’t you think it’s time you stopped blaming yourself for it?”
Velanna turned sad eyes on him.
“It’s not a burden you have to carry alone.”
Velanna scoffed quietly. “Tolan used to say that.”
“Well, he was right.”
“Tzaitel will not carry this burden. She has turned away from our family’s shame, and I do not blame her. But I cannot give the Kirana to Margaret.”
“Because she’s human?”
Velanna pulled away. “Margaret has sought to be Andai for nearly ten years, James. She has sought to still her mind and control her emotions, and in many instances she has failed.”
Jim tightened his hand on his knee.
“She is not Andai, and she likely never will be. I agreed to train her for Tolan’s sake, and while she has progressed further than I expected, she will not succeed. I cannot entrust the heritage of my people to her. It is too much for her.”
Jim clenched his teeth together until they squeaked. Anger roiled in his chest. Is this really what Meg had grown up with? Is this really all Velanna expected of Meg? Couldn’t Velanna see what Meg was capable of?
Apparently not. Velanna was blinded by genetics and used her corrupted logic to point out Meg’s flaws and failures. She couldn’t see beyond her prejudices.
Jim relaxed his fist against his leg. “You know, Velanna, I flunked kindergarten.”
Velanna drew back with a surprised frown. “I hardly see how that is relevant.”
“I was three or so,” he said. “Mom realized I needed to be in a harder class, so she put me in kindergarten a few years ahead of schedule. And I failed.”
“It was too advanced for you.”
“No. It was too easy.”
Velanna’s expression hardened.
“My classmates were learning the alphabet, and I needed trigonometry and advanced statistics.” Jim kept his tone even. “Mom had known I needed more of a challenge, but she didn’t challenge me enough.”
Still scowling, Velanna turned Saathi back onto the trail. Jim nudged Bhuna after her.
They rode in silence for a few hundred feet.
“Your mother made the best choice she knew how,” Velanna said quietly. “I am certain she wanted to protect you from disappointment.”
Jim shook her head. “I know. But disappointment wouldn’t have killed me. It just would have made me try harder. She was protecting me from something that would have helped me.”
Velanna reined Saathi to a stop again. “Disappointment would not have killed you, but the Kirana could kill Margaret.”
Jim stopped next to her again.
“I have lost my husband, James.” Velanna’s voice broke. “I may have already lost Jennifer. I cannot lose Margaret as well.”
Jim held her eyes. “If you can’t defeat Tiron and the Andhera, you will.”
Velanna’s shoulders sloped, her brow furrowing in defeat.
“I don’t want her to have it,” Jim said. “I don’t want her to have to carry it. But if anyone can, it’s Meg.”
Jim glanced toward the front of the trail where Meg had come to a stop, still astride Zafidi. Her own headscarf covered the golden coils of hair wrapped around her head, and the dark robes on her shoulders covered most of her body. But he could trace the angle of her shoulders, the graceful slope of her back, the strength in her arms.
Velanna traced his gaze. “I cannot ask it of her, James.”
He forced a smile. “You won’t have to.”
They sat in silence for a few long seconds before Velanna set her hand on his shoulder and squeezed.
“I did not tell you the entire truth,” she mumbled.
“About what?”
“I do not believe Margaret will fail.”
He glanced at her. Velanna’s gaze hadn’t moved from Meg. Her eyes burned with some emotion between dread and pride.
“You’re afraid she’ll succeed?”
Velanna clutched the medallion hanging at her neck. “Margaret may succeed where I failed.”
“That’s good though. Isn’t it?”
“I failed, James.” Velanna offered a tight smile that didn’t erase the dread in her eyes. “I cannot tell you.”
Velanna nudged Saathi forward, still holding the Kirana medallion. Jim swallowed as he watched her ride away, his stomach in knots. Giving the Kirana to Meg was really the only choice, but asking her to wield that kind of responsibility alone didn’t feel right. Maybe somehow he could find a way to help her. The difficulty would be getting her to let him help.
He patted Bhuna on the side of her neck. “Come on, girl. Let’s catch up.”
Bhuna started forward after Velanna and Saathi.
Meg could do anything. He firmly believed that. But could she wield a power that drove Velanna to her knees? And if she could, what did that mean? If Meg could do something a Celtican couldn’t do, what did that make Meg?