Seeklight

Then this is it, part of him thought, a part that had already seemed to separate from his body seconds—or years, measured in the storm’s time—ago. The part receded a few feet away and looked down at the rest, the arms and one leg tracing slow letters in the muddy space between two boulders, the face puffed and masked with fever. Seventeen years old—the thinking fragment was filled with a sad calm—and 1 didn’t even start to find out.

Another scream filtered through the storm, but this was above him on the hillside. He realized dimly, as if it were no longer of any importance, that the pursuers must have encircled him.

He was no longer listening for the sounds of their movements. The part that had floated free of his body sunk back down to his swollen face, as if for some final departing kiss. It fell back into the flesh, merging, and he opened his eyes to the full pressure of the storm. The rain no longer stung. And it had a voice. Is that a language, too? he wondered, marvelling. The idea enchanted him. Perhaps, if he listened as hard as he could, he would be able to understand, it would thin out and become pellucid as all the other tongues he had heard.

Motionless, he strained, listening to the compound, mingled voice. Finally, like glass dissolving—

“Traitor’s son,” the voice whispered in its own tongue.

He closed his eyes. The words changed, but what was said with them always remained the same.

“Blood of thanes. Traitor’s son.”

Soon enough, his pursuers would be standing around him, and then they would press the points of their weapons against his chest, lean their weight on them and leak the few remaining drops of his life into the mud. Their faces would be hard and shiny under the rain. The feeling of calm turned bitter under his forehead, a throb of hate and despair.

“Traitor’s son.”

He remembered the key. Reaching to his neck with one hand, he drew it out by its long fine chain from beneath his shirt, the fabric plastered right to his skin. His hand enfolded the flat square of white metal—a dull light seemed to seep from between his tightly clenched fingers. The throbbing in his head turned into a vast wave of regret as he realized that whatever door the key was meant to open would now stay closed forever.

“Traitor’s son.” Now that he understood its language, the storm’s voice wouldn’t go away. It seemd as if he had been hearing those words, in all the different tongues, all his life.

He twisted slowly on the ground.

Chapter I