"Do you feel it? The desire to join the dead?"

Riane started at the sound of a voice, a beautifully modulated voice, at that. She turned and saw a female. She was tall and slender, with a high-domed forehead. Her skin was white as snow, her hair the same hue, long and flowing, almost prismatic as ice will be when struck by sunlight. Long face, sad eyes.

Bloodless lips.

"I feel nothing," Riane said. Was this the white-bone daemon Kalla had warned her of? "It is as if there is a pane of crystal between me and them."

The ice-colored female nodded. "That is good. You will not die soon."

"You know I am alive?"

The ice-colored female laughed. "Your stench will fool the others, but then they are dead. What do they know? The idea of life is beyond them now." She nodded toward the battlefield. "Here are the warriors, fallen all, continuing their battle unto eternity."

"Is this N'Luuura, then?"

"Call it what you will," the ice-colored female said. "The song remains the same."

"Are you a daemon?"

"My name is Sepseriis. I am an archdaemon."

"Then I am somehow in the Abyss."

Sepseriis shook her head. "Not at all."

"But I thought Miina consigned all daemons to the Abyss."

"I am the only one She spared. I am therefore despised by my kind, even by my father and stepbrothers."

"But why did the Great G.o.ddess spare you?"

Sepseriis smiled. "Someone must shepherd the dead, care for the flock." She gestured. "Now come.

We must hurry. If you are to retrieve the soul of your Dragon, you must do so quickly, for after a certain time it will no longer be possible."

They crossed the blood-spattered battlefield, crunching silently through gore and bones that seemed meters deep one moment, then to have vanished the next. But then again, Riane thought, wasn't that the nature of things here? How could you kill something that was already dead?They walked for a long time. Now they were in rolling pastureland, filled with flowers of every color and description. Trees dotted the landscape, though the sky was dark, low, and ominous as a cavern ceiling.

They came at last to a wall. It was very high and thick and seemed to stretch to the horizon in either direction.

Sepseriis said, "That which you seek is on the other side of this wall."

Riane saw no gate. Nor were there any seams on the stonework, not hand- or toe-holds that would allow her to scale it.

"How do I get past it?" she asked.

"You must hurry," Sepseriis said as if she had not heard Riane. "Seelin is running out of time. In moments, it will be too late. Her soul will remain here. You will not be able to bring her back to life."

Riane inspected the wall most closely. Even with her skills, she could see no way to scale it. "But how am I to-?"

Sepseriis had made a gesture, and Riane looked down at her feet at a box that had not been there a moment before. She bent down and picked it up. It was made of wood, olive-colored, highly grained.

She turned the box in her hand. The workmanship was exquisite.

She could see that the box opened from the top, and she slid the cover off. Inside was what appeared to be a child's toy, carved out of the same olive-colored wood. She took it out, saw that it was a cthauros-but a most curious one, for its color was that of the first tender shoots of spring. *

"Qelar will take you to the other side," Sepseriis said.

"This toy?"

"Qelar is no toy."

Riane remembered Kalla's warning about making a pact with the white-bone daemon.

"Only I know Qelar's secret," Sepseriis said. "If you try yourself, you will fail."

Riane saw a Venca rune incised into the side of the tiny saddle. It was the rune for "Larger." Did that mean all she had to do was intone the rune and Qelar would become real size? A glance at Sepseriis told her that was too easy an answer. She turned Qelar around and around, thinking.

"The Dragon's time is almost spent," Sepseriis said. "I will tell you how this works, and in return one day I will come to you and ask a favor. You must grant it, whatever it might be."

That did not seem like a favorable bargain. Riane did not want to take it. But what other choice did she have? Unless . . .

She stared at the rune and realized that if you reversed it you would get the rune for "smaller." Holding the toy tight in her fist, she spoke the Venca word for smaller.

An instant later, she found herself on the ground beside the eight-hoofed steed. She was very small indeed. Sepseriis towered over her as if she were Kunlung Mountain itself. Beside her, Qelar snorted and ducked his head. He was no longer made of wood-or had Riane been mistaken in the first place?

Whatever the truth, it no longer mattered.

Putting her hand on the steed's gently curving neck, she mounted him. He snorted again and reared up; she held on by gripping his mane. Then the steed leapt over the wall. On the other side she found herself on the edge of an ocean-grey, pacific, endless. A shale beach was strewn with sh.e.l.ls. The tide was coming in, for with each wave-impossibly huge in her diminutive state-a few more sh.e.l.ls got drawn back into the water.

Desperately, she roamed the strand, peering at each sh.e.l.l in turn. But all of them were grey, brown or black-spotted, striped, smooth, pebbled-inside their whorls pale and empty, devoid of life. All at once, she saw a sh.e.l.l rolling into the surf. It was blue-green, iridescent, sparkling. She lunged for it, grabbed it just as it was about to be sucked out to sea. It was tear-shaped with a spiked tail that rippled like the ocean's tide. It tingled in her hand just like Seelin's coral talon. She drew a deep, awestruck breath, for she knew that she was holding the Dragon's soul, her essence, her spirit.

Though Seelin's body was huge, her essence was tiny. Now Riane understood the secret Sepseriis believed only she knew. Had Riane been her normal size, she surely would have overlooked this minuscule thing.Reaching up, she grabbed Qelar's mane, hoisting herself onto his back. Digging her knees into his flanks, she turned him loose to leap back over the wall.

Sepseriis was gone. So was the battlefield, the black river over which the bridge of bones had arced.

All that remained was the winding road, down which Qelar began to pound.

From the trees that flew past on either side, she heard the voice of the white-bone daemon. "I provided you with Qelar. Without him you never would have crossed the barrier, you never would have found that which is so precious to you. Remember this in the time to come. Remember what I have done for you."

Riane gave the steed his head and he began to enlarge and she with him until both were their normal size. He pounded along at such breakneck speed that quite soon he had reached the limits of his domain.

The stone Kalla had given her had begun to glow. She held it up as a guide. Ahead lay the ascent back to the cavern and the Cage of Nine Banestones.

Riane dismounted, thanked the steed, and, with a slap to his flank, sent him back to the mysterious place from which he had come. Then, with the iridescent Dragon's tail curled around her neck, she began her ascent out of the Underworld.

36

Resurrection

The Cage was waiting for Riane when she returned. Her first instinct was to resurrect Seelin, but she knew that should the Dragon awake still within the Cage of Nine Banestones, the shock might be enough to destroy her utterly. Inside the Cage, she could feel the banestones' insidious power, like insects crawling beneath her skin.

As Amitra had described, she found the west-facing banestone and turned it forty-five degrees to the south. As she did so she heard an eerie keening, as if someone were dying. Moving always to her left, she turned each of the banestones in the same manner. At last, she came to the ninth banestone. This, she turned forty-five degrees to the east. The banestones ceased their emanations, the Cage disappeared.

Hurrying to Seelin, she crouched over the gigantic curled body. The giant orbs were closed, and when she ran her hand over the scales from rib to rib she could discern no trace of either heartbeat or respiration. Seelin was, indeed, dead.

For the first time, she noticed that the Dragon was so pale its blue-green color was almost blanched out, and she began to tremble. What if Seelin was beyond resurrection? Would she, as Dar Sala-at, be able to go on without the aid of the Dragon?

Putting those black thoughts aside, she bent to her task, kneeling to feel along Seelin's left front foot.

Her hand moved along the thick pads, to the long wickedly curved talons. There were seven of them, a deadly forest within which she desperately searched. Amitra had told her there would be an opening somewhere there, and she found it at the base of the seventh talon, an opening that seemed too small to accommodate the Dragon's spirit.

Nevertheless, she pushed the spirit globe into the cavity, and as she did so, she felt it widen. All at once, the spirit was sucked inside the Dragon. At first nothing happened, and she worried that she had found the wrong opening. Then, as she continued to watch, she observed a small bulge as it made its way through Seelin's foot, her leg. It its wake Riane was thrilled to see the color returning to those parts of the Dragon's body through which it had pa.s.sed. Now Riane could see that it was growing, as if it was getting from the body as much as it gave off. By the time it reached Seelin's abdomen it was as large as a bane-stone. Through its proximity the lungs began again to work and Seelin took her first shuddering breath. Then it entered the Dragon's heart and Seelin's golden orbs opened and she smiled at Riane.

"I have been waiting an eternity, Dar Sala-at." Her voice, though still diminished, caused the cavern to reverberate.

"Rest easy." Riane put her hand on the Dragon's flank. "You have returned from the land of the dead."

Seelin's long, spiked tail moved, curling slowly, gently around Riane, drawing her against the Dragon's heart, which beat like an enormous ba.s.s drum. Seelin sighed, her eyes closed. In her fathomless sleep her tail uncoiled enough for Riane, after one long caress, to step away.

It was just as well the Dragon slept, for Riane and Giyan needed their time alone together. Giyan had arrived from the Abbey of Five Pivots just after Riane had begun her eerie journey into the land of the dead. She had made the journey south to Suspended Skull on the back of the fulkaan, the fabulous creature psychically tied to Riane. The fulkaan had been searching for Riane when Giyan, seeing it through the Skreeling Engine, had summoned it.

Riane and Giyan sat upon Seelin's scaly back. Her wings were folded high like the walls of a cathedral, enfolding them on either side, protecting them, giving them the privacy they required. Her long, spiked tail curled around her flank, swishing slowly back and forth with each breath she took.

Riane told Giyan what the spirit of dead Kalla had revealed about her origins."Why did you not tell me you were Annon's mother?"

"Do you hear what you said, Teyjattt? You did not say, 'Why did you not tell me you were my mother?' You said, 'Why didn't you tell me you were Annon's mother?' " Giyan ducked her head, whispered, "You are no longer Annon. Annon is dead."

"Then why do you call me Teyjattt?"

"My mistake."

They sat watching each other with a wariness that made Giyan want to weep. What terrible fate had contrived to take her only child away from her? She had saved Annon from death, that much was true.

But where was he? What had become of him? Looking at Riane now, having heard the news of the existence of her parents, of who they were, but not yet having absorbed its implications, its ramifications, still she knew enough. Annon was gone. Only her extreme love for him had kept him alive in her mind.

"I have to let you go, Teyjattt," she said, rising. "That will be the last time I call you by Annon's nickname."

Riane reached up, took her wrist, held her. Giyan looked back over her shoulder.

"Dar Sala-at."

"Do not call me that. Please." Riane tugged a little, and Giyan sat back down opposite her.

"I know you must be angry with me," Giyan whispered. "Do not deny it; it is only natural. But if you can, temper your anger with this thought: How difficult would it have been for Annon to grow up knowing the truth? How easy would it have been for him to have made a slip to someone close-can you imagine if it had been Kurgan? I made the only choice I could make, but never think it was an easy one. Never think there was a single day afterward that part of me did not regret what I had done, that longed to tell you, that ached every time I looked at you."

Everything Giyan said was true, and hearing it did mitigate her initial anger. But there was something else Giyan had not mentioned, possibly because it was too painful. Riane could not imagine the tempest of emotions that must be roiling Giyan now that she knew about Amitra. She had not had her child for so long, and now that he did know she was his mother, he had found another one.

What an impossible situation this was! And yet, perhaps because they were both in it together, there was a chance it would bind them to one another.

Riane leaned in, took Giyan's hands in her own. "Now," she said, "I want you to tell me everything.

Everything I suspected, everything a child of yours should know."

"Really?"

"Annon is not dead. He exists as part of Riane, as part of this fused ident.i.ty. He is no longer what he once was, but then neither is Riane, neither are you." There were tears in her eyes. "I just found you, Mother. I will do anything not to lose you again."

Giyan, weeping, gathered her child into her arms.

Riane asked Eleana to help her pack up the nine banestones. Asir had told her that immersing them in seawater would dampen their radiation for a period of ten to twelve hours. They had built a container, which Krystren had designed along the lines of a Sarakkon ship, to be watertight. In truth, Riane did not need help, and everyone knew that, especially Eleana.

"Giyan has agreed that it will be best for me to take the banestones to the Abbey of Summit Window for study and safekeeping," Riane said. "Seelin will take us there. I cannot wait for you to meet Asir and Amitra. I know you will love them as I do." She paused at the somber expression on Eleana's face.

"Love, there is something I have to tell you."

Riane felt a small clutch in her stomach. "What is it?"

"Let's sit down." Eleana took her hand. "Please." She led her to a rock ledge in the crypt, where they sat side by side. "This is so very difficult to say."

"Why?"

Eleana looked at her. "Because I am afraid?""Afraid?" Riane laughed. "Of what?"

"I am afraid of you, love. Of disappointing you, of not doing what you expect me to do."

"I don't expect-"

"Oh, yes, you do." Eleana pressed Riane's hand between hers. "Just think about it for a moment."

After a moment, Riane nodded. "What do you want to tell me?"

"Oh, love, do you see how it is? That coldness creeping into your voice. Like Giyan, you can be cruel at times, though I know neither of you means to be. But you are so driven, you have a vision of the future, and you mean to take everyone in your orbit with you."

Riane swallowed. "What are you saying? That you no longer believe in the fight for the freedom of Kundala?"

"Of course I believe in it, fervently, completely, absolutely. Never, ever doubt that, love. I would willingly give my life for the cause. But it is because my belief is so strong that I must disappoint you." She took Riane's hand, brought it to her lips, kissed it. "I want to return to the Resistance. I realize how much I miss it, how I long to be a vital part of the struggle."

"You already are a vital part of the struggle. Right here at my side."

"At your side, yes." Eleana stroked Riane's cheek. "Oh, love, don't you see that I will never be who I was meant to be if I remain always at your side. I love you most desperately, but I have to have my old life back-at least for the time being."

"But I need you here." Riane's heart was beating so fast she could hardly think straight.