I hear its beauty in your thoughts.
She went quiet then, but it was a companionable silence, both of them close despite their terrible separation.
My love? he asked sometime later. Qinnitan, my heart, are you still awake?
She stirred. I drifted.
I drifted with you.
I miss the House of the People, she said, though I have never seen it with my own eyes. Is it as beautiful as my memories?
It’s a very old place. It has every kind of beauty. But there is more to it than that.
Of course, she said, then a moment later: Barrick, I can feel the moon. Is it bright?
It is.
It makes me stronger just feeling it. By the Hive, I think I can hear it, too… I feel as if I can hear everything!
He took a deep breath, in part to ease the rush of feeling. Even his thoughts were muddled, stumbling. You do too… ? I thought I would be… I thought I would never…
I know, she told him, and for just a moment he could feel her as if she were beside him, as if they again held each other in the dark dreamland. Talk to me, Barrick. It was close, as intimate as a whisper. Tell me everything. I know everything the Fireflower knows, but the Fireflower knows scarcely anything about you. At least scarcely anything of the sort of things a lover wants to know.
I will, he said. And the first thing you must know about me is that I am not an ordinary person…
He could feel her amusement. Of course you aren’t! As you told that foul bird, you are a mortal who became monarch of the fairies… !
No, that isn’t it. I was about to say that I am a twin.…
Epilude
The morning sun had pulled itself up above the eastern horizon, and the sky was brightening. Despite the paucity of clouds, a low rumble filled the air, beginning so low that it disturbed only a few slumbering creatures deep in the earth, but then rising until it made the slender branches of the birch trees quiver. Birds burst squawking from their upper reaches and a deer sprinted across the Coast Road.
The rumble grew until it sounded much like thunder, then the air seized, roiled, and cracked like a drover’s whip. Something fell out of the nothingness onto brown Southmarch earth still wet with dew.
For long moments Raemon Beck, merchant’s son, husband, and father, only lay facedown in the middle of the road, frightened by yet another forced, lightning-flash journey from one nowhere to another. At last, when the rumble of his arrival had subsided, he worked up the courage to lift his head. A moment later, he clambered up onto his feet, staring in astonishment to the southeast. There, across a short distance of green bay, stood the familiar towers of Southmarch Castle—some a little the worse for wear, scarred by fire and cannonballs, but unquestionably and recognizably the four cardinal towers and the even taller black-and-white prominence of Wolfstooth Spire.
Beck stared. He touched his own face as if unable to believe both he and Southmarch could exist at the same moment in the same place, then let out a whoop of delight and began a clumsy dance in the middle of the Coast Road. Two more deer, a doe and a fawn, sprang from the underbrush and bounded away into the depths of the woods, terrified by the disheveled man’s capering.
“Praise the gods!” Beck shouted, tears streaming down his cheeks. “Praise all the gods! I’m back! I’m home!”
And then he dropped down to his hands and knees and kissed the ground over and over before he rose, still loudly thanking Heaven, and trotted off in the direction that would at last lead him again to Helmingsea and his family.
Appendix 1
Adis—true name of Merolanna’s son
Aesi‘uah—chief eremite to Lady Yasammez
A‘lat—a priest, servant of the Autarch
Akutrir—a Qar warror of the Unforgiven tribe
Androphagas—legendary monster, half-bull, half-serpent
Aristas—mentor of Adis, the Orphan
Avros—aka Little Avros, a Temple Dog
Aylan—Sulepis’ great-grandfather
Beetlewing—a Rooftopper, Beetledown’s father
Benaridas—a mercenary killed at Kleaswell market
Benediktos—Anissa’s father, monarch of Devonis
Black Noszh-lah—Funderling version of Immon
Blackspine—Trickster
Bluedeeps—in the icy northern part of Qar lands
Buckle—a Summerfield guard
Calomel—Cinnabar and Vermilion Quicksilver’s son
Chaffy—one of Brone’s hired men
Cheshret and Tusiya—Qinnitan’s parents
Chrysolite—a Funderling warder
Corundrum—a Funderling engineer
Dard, aka Dard the Jar—Hierosoline merchant
Dawet dan-Faar—envoy from Hierosol, late of Tuan
Dawn Flower—a Qar name for Zoria, mother of Kupilas
Dolomite—a Funderling, Jasper’s lieutenant
Dordom—Parnad’s oldest son
Duke Kaske of the Unforgiven—a Qar war leader
Duke of Veryon—a Syannese historical figure
Ekkadar—leader of the Qar at Kleaswell Market
Flightless—a Trickster Qar, son of Greenjay
Flowstone—a Metamorphic Brother
Gerasimos—Trigonarch who rejected Hypnologues
Gennadas—a Syannese knight
Gorhan—Tulim’s uncle
Gunis—a Nushash priest with the Autarch’s army
Hereddin—Xixian tactician, writer
Hypnologues—AKA “Hypnologoi”, a heretic sect
Ice Ettins—one of the types of Ettins
Idite dan-Mozan—widow of Effir dan-Mozan
Jackdaw—a Qar, a Trickster
Karisnovois—Rooftopper name for Kernios
Kayne, Prince—Queen Lily’s son who died young
Kelonesos—famous sea monster
Kernios Olognothas—the Earth Lord as All-Seeing
Kersus—Xixian tactician, writer
Khau-Yisti—Yisti (Funderling-type Qar) bred by Autarchs
Khobana the Wolf—a murderess and prisoner
Kioy-a-pous—Skimmer name for Crooked
Kirgaz—one of young Tulim’s royal brothers
Kymon—a viscount of a county on the Syannese border
Leekstone—Opal’s maiden name
Longscratch—Trickster
Mackel—Skimmer, Rafe’s father
Mawra the Breathless—a Qar
Mehnad—a prince of Xis
Mihannid Blue Kings—ancient Xandian dynasty
Miron—Lord Helkis’ given name
Morna—goddess of winter, victim of Zosim
Moros—treacherous servant of Adis
Moseffir—a Dan-Mozan grandchild
Mountain Korbols—a tribe of Qar
Okhuz—Xixian name for Volios the god of war
Okros Dioketian—a physician,
Osias—Tyrant of Hierosol during the Orphan’s time
Oyler—one of Brone’s pages
Paka—a Xixian soldier
Parak—former autarch of Xis, Sulepis’ grandfather, Parnad’s father
Pardstone Jasper, the last Funderling who had regularly contributed to the wide conversation of scholars