The Shadow Isle - Katharine Kerr [34]
“I take your point.” Neb looked up, and the rebellion came back into his eyes. “You’ve lived a cursed lot longer than I have, and you know a cursed lot more, too.”
“Then why don’t you listen to what I say?” Dallandra dropped any pretense of jollying him along. “I’m your master in dweomer now. You refused to listen to the last one, too, Rhegor that was, so long ago. Do you remember what came of that?”
Neb turned white around the mouth, and his hands clenched hard into fists.
“I see you do,” Dalla went on. “Well?”
Their gazes met and locked. The drip and patter of the rain outside sounded as loud as drumbeats until at last, he looked away.
“I’ll help with the horses,” Neb whispered. “Morning and night.”
“Splendid!” Dallandra arranged a friendly smile. “That gladdens my heart to hear.”
“May I leave now?” He was staring at the floor cloth.
“You may, certainly.”
Neb got up and rushed out without looking her way. Stubborn colt! she thought. But he’ll grow into a splendid stallion one day.
In the late afternoon the rain slacked. A strong south wind sprang up, chivying the fading storm and driving it off. Dallandra and Valandario walked to the edge of the camp and stood studying the sky. The damp wind felt pleasantly cool, not biting or chilly, and it carried the scent of new grass.
“We could go out now, I suppose,” Dallandra said. “I do love the feel of a spring wind.”
“So did I,” Val said, “but the ground’s still too wet. The grass will be soaked.”
“Well, if this wind keeps up, it will dry out quickly. We should be able to do the ritual just at sunrise, once the astral tide turns toward Aethyr. We’ll probably travel all day tomorrow, and I’d like to experiment with that evocation before too long.”
“Me, too.” Val grinned at her. “Sunrise it is. I’ll memorize the words tonight.”
In the chilly dawn, Valandario left her tent and met Dallandra out by the horse herd. Both of them carried their ritual swords, wrapped in bits of cloth to keep off the damp. They were blunt blades of cheap metal to look at, but charged with a very different kind of power than that in a warrior’s muscles. For privacy’s sake they walked a good mile from the camp, then chose a spot suitable for the working. A gaggle of gnomes trailed after them, but as soon as Val unwrapped her sword, they rushed away to disappear.
Together, Val and Dallandra trod down a rough circle in the grass. After the proper invocations Val evened up its perimeter into a proper circle by marking the damp sod with the point of the sword. As the sun rose, she greeted the powers behind this visible symbol of warmth and light. To them, she consecrated the ceremony.
“Are you ready, sentinel?” Val said.
“I am.” Dallandra raised her own sword. “Let the ritual begin.” She brought the sword down sharply.
Valandario stood in the center of the circle, lifted her arms over her head, and vibrated the words from the scroll, drawing breath from deep within herself, breaking each word into syllables as Aderyn had taught her, all those years before.
"Ol-duh um-duh non-ci do a doh-oh-ah-een day Iah-ee-da, O gah day poh-ah-mal ca a no-tay-hay-oh-a ah av-ah-bay-hay. Ha-na -ma-rah ha-na-ma-rah! Ah-ca-ray, ca, od zah-meh-rah-nah, lapay ol zee-air-do noo-coh ol-pay-ee-air-tay de ol-pay-ee-air-tay.”
For a moment nothing whatever happened. Valandario took another deep breath—and flew, or so it seemed to her, darted up through the air and the brightening sunlight, up ever upward, until she stood on an island, a perfect circle in the midst of hyacinth-colored seas. All around it, purple waves rose stiffly, then subsided without a trace of foam. A greenish sunlight shimmered on the sea and glinted from the island’s glass-smooth surface. In the island’s center a circular dimple formed. Out of it rose a silver pillar, a mere stump at first, then growing higher and higher, until at last Val stood before a translucent tower.
"Ah-ca-ray,