Heirs of Prophecy - Lisa Smedman [49]
Uncertain why she had been singled out, Larajin obeyed and found she was unsteady on her feet. With an effort, she regained her equilibrium. She didn't want to embarrass herself by falling over, not with the elves all around her looking up at her with expectant faces. Rylith stepped closer, and Larajin could hear the whirring of the magical energy the druid cupped in her hand. It was a high-pitched, fluttering noise, hke the sound of a hummingbird's wings.
Rylith was speaking, addressing the crowd. The language of the forest elves flowed swiftly from her lips, as clear and high as a mountain stream or the ripple of a wind through the wood. Larajin caught only a word or two-her own name, and Leifander's, and the Elvish word for twins-then Rylith opened her hand. In one swift motion, before Larajin could jerk away, the druid threw the ball of magical energy. It shot forward with the speed of an arrow. In the instant that it entered her, Larajin saw a tiny white feather strike her chest, then flutter to the ground.
She gasped as sunlight flared in her eyes, washing her vision white. Waves of heat and cold gripped her body,
which felt as though it was expanding, growing as large as the world itself. Thoughts whirled through her mind- a multitude of voices in three choruses: those who had died, those who yet lived, and those who had yet to be born. They had a message to impart, a message of hope and despair, joy and grief, urgings and warnings. A message she struggled to understand but could not, since it was being shouted in the Elvish and common tongues at once, each drowning the other out. The emotions behind the message, however, came through like breaking waves. The voices expected her to say something, do something, to be something.
Bobbing on the sea of human and elf faces was one she recognized. Tal. He stood amidst the throng, visible from the shoulders up, wearing chain mail over his shirt and an embroidered surcoat bearing the crest of House Uskevren. There was something wrong about his face. His deep green eyes were staring, unfocused, and his dark hair was matted and wet on one side. Something seemed to be sticking out of it, just behind the right ear, as if a twig had been caught in his hair.
With a shudder of horror, Larajin realized that an arrow was sticking out of Tal's head, buried nearly to the fletching in a mat of blood-crusted hair.
He was dead.
The view shifted, drew back. Larajin saw hands bursting out of the earth like grasping vines, twining themselves around the ankles and calves of Tal and all those around him. The hands were dark, the color of earth, and had fingernails that flashed silver, like steel. They clawed at the flesh of those above, tearing deep gashes that wept a rain of blood onto the disturbed, heaving ground.
The elves and humans were still shouting at Larajin, calling to her, demanding she listen, imploring her to act. Unable to withstand the discordant chorus of voices that broke over her, one wave crashing in after the next, Larajin grabbed her ears with both hands and broke into a stumbling run. Somehow, despite her eyes
being squeezed shut, she found her way through the elves in the clearing, running faster and faster through what must have been patches of sunlight and shadow. Blazing heat alternated with winter chill as darkness, light, darkness, then light flashed before her eyes. Something grabbed her from behind, and something else knocked against her legs, tripping her and toppling her to the ground.
She wept with relief as darkness finally claimed her.
S ** *
Larajin woke to the patter of rain and the smell of wet leaves and soil. She lay on a bed of soft moss, covered by a light sheet, one hand outstretched. Cool, wet leather pressed against the back of her hand-the side of a tent.
It was too dark to see anything clearly.