The wail came again, so full of heartbreak and pain that Karal had to respond to it; he walked in the general direction of the sound, Florian following behind. A few moments later, he knew what it was—not a baby, but a cat.
"Is that Altra?" he asked, incredulously.
:Yes,: Florian replied. :He hasn't told you the whole truth, Karal. The Firecats are almost exactly like us—like Companions, except that they have magic to protect themselves, and they can move themselves the way someone who has the Fetching Gift can move an object. They are mortal, they eat—he's been stealing food from the kitchen—and they have no more idea about what is going to happen in the future than you or I do.:
"That was why he didn't know that the disruption-waves were coming, he only knew something was going to happen." Karal replied absently, distracted for the moment from his grief by this revelation.
:Yes. And that was why he didn't know you were going to be attacked until it happened. Nor does he know who your attacker was. He blames himself.: Florian's mental voice was saddened and subdued :I can understand that only too well. I had thought about urging you to take a break this morning and come out here for a ride on Trenor, you haven't seen him for days. I keep wondering what would have happened if I had done that instead of just thinking about it.:
"What's the point in rasping away at yourself with might-have-beens?" Karal retorted. "All you do is make yourself hurt more—"
:I know that. You know that. It is Altra who needs to hear that.: They were practically on top of the wailing now, and Karal made out a white form curled into a ball of misery, wailing disconsolately into the night. Karal's heart and his resolve to stay controlled broke at the same time.
"Altra—" he cried, flinging himself down in the grass beside the Firecat. He took the Cat into his arms exactly as Talia had taken him into her comforting embrace, and his tears started again. "Altra, Altra, it wasn't your fault."
:I had to choose,: the Cat cried in his mind. I had to choose, and I was sent for you, so I had to choose you.:
"And you almost saved both of us anyway," Karal told him, holding his furred body tightly, as the Firecat shivered with more than physical cold. "You aren't the Sunlord, Altra, you can't know everything or be everywhere at once. You did your best. I know that."
:But I couldn't—save—him!: The heartbreaking wail began again. Altra had no way to shed tears, so Karal did the crying for them both.
Florian stood vigil over them, a solid, comforting presence in the dark, until they were finally too tired to weep anymore.
In the end, Karal picked up the exhausted Firecat—who must have weighed nearly half what he himself did—and carried him to the ekele, with Florian walking beside them. Firesong was still awake, but he said nothing when he met them all at the entrance to his home, neither about the lateness of the hour nor Karal's odd burden. He only gestured for Karal to follow and led the way to that peculiar room draped to resemble the interior of a tent.
And this was where Karal talked to Altra until the sun rose, telling him all the things he had tried to tell himself, and in so doing, seeing the truth in those things. That was where they finally slept, spent and exhausted—but neither one alone.
When Karal awoke, he knew by the sun that it was well into the afternoon. He'd slept far later than he had thought he would, and Altra was still curled against him. The Firecat woke as soon as he moved, though, and raised his head to look at him with shadowed blue eyes.
"Altra?" he said, quietly.
:I will be all right,: the Firecat replied. :The pain—it is bearable, now. We have things we must do; you especially, and he would not thank us for neglecting them.:
Karal rubbed at his eyes; they were sore and gummy, the lashes all stuck together. His nose and cheeks were tender from scrubbing at them. Odd how such little discomforts distracted a person from grief, but not enough to be more than one more burden.
He had awakened with a heaviness of soul that cast a gray shadow over everything. He knew that he ought to be hungry, but he had no appetite whatsoever.
He scratched Altra's ears—the Firecat didn't seem to mind being caressed like an ordinary cat. All of his things were here, piled into baskets at the sides of the fabric-draped room. Was this supposed to look like the inside of a Shin'a'in tent? Probably. So this would be An'desha's room, though he doubted An'desha used it much.
Now he wondered what it was about An'desha that Talia had wanted to talk about. If she hadn't come to their suite, would things have fallen out any differently?
No matter. He should follow his own advice, and not torture himself with might-have-beens. The danger from the disruption-waves hadn't gone, just because Ulrich was—
His eyes stung.
There was still work to do. He should get changed and do it.
"Altra, you ought to stay here and rest." The fur under his hand felt harsh and brittle, and Altra looked in poor shape, as if the events of yesterday had completely depleted him. "I'll be back after I find out what everyone else is doing."
"Everyone else—the mages and the Prince, that is—is—are?—coming here," Firesong said from the doorway. Karal's head snapped up and he started; he hadn't heard anything at all to indicate that Firesong was in the hallway. "With an unknown agent somewhere in the Palace, the others are reluctant to trust that he or she might not be somehow listening. The ekele is safe enough; I supervised every bit of the building myself, and before you arrived I checked for more such little gifts as were distributed yesterday."
The Hawkbrother entered the room and sank down on his haunches beside the pallet that Karal and Altra shared. He studied Karal for a very long time without saying a word; Karal didn't say anything either. He was too tired, and too grief-laden to play at verbal fencing with the Healing Adept. If Firesong wanted to know something, then he could damned well ask it.
"I think I understand, now," Firesong said, out of the blue.
"What?" Still less was Karal ready to trade non sequiturs.
"What An'desha sees in you." Firesong continued to sit on his heels, watching Karal measuringly.
Karal traded him back look for look. Firesong was baiting him, and he was not going to rise to it. Maybe the Hawkbrother meant well, trying to distract him from his sorrow, but he'd chosen a bad tactic to use.
"Talia wanted to talk with you and—" Firesong hesitated, then went gamely on. "She had already spoken with me. An'desha is in the midst of a crisis, she thinks; he is afraid of setting his feelings free, and he is afraid of losing control of himself if he keeps examining those 'Ma'ar' memories. Evidently they are the most powerful and the most seductive of all. Falconsbane was mad, purely and simply, but Ma'ar was as close to sane as anyone of his ilk is ever likely to be. He had reasons and rationalizations for everything he did, and I suppose that is what makes his memories so seductive." Firesong shrugged. "An'desha is afraid of much, and I have lost patience with his timidity. Frankly, I do not think he is going to be of much use to us unless he can face what he has inside him without being afraid of it, and I know he will not be of much use—ah—to us, if he keeps shutting off how he feels."