Cleress had been at pains to remind them all that, despite the ravaging mana surging barely checked through Lyanna’s head due to the Dordovans’ clumsy Awakening, she was still just a small child. And that brought its own rash of idiosyncrasies, demands and responsibilities. With Erienne gone, however temporarily, all four of them had to assume the role of understanding grandmother. And though Lyanna undoubtedly trusted them, while she didn’t trust any Guild elves now Ren’erei had gone, they had not practised that particular quality of care for decades.
So there were mistakes, the worst of which was to assume Lyanna could always amuse herself when at play. They kept a watching brief on her mind and the flow of the mana around her, yet that wasn’t really the point, and Cleress knew it. But they had to rest and the temptation to do so at any time they weren’t actively teaching or shielding was overwhelming.
Cleress took another long draw on the pipe, ensured it stayed lit and passed it to Myriell, having to place the stem between her sister’s lips before she acknowledged it was there.
‘What time is it?’ she mumbled before inhaling.
‘Too early to be relying on the Lemiir in that pipe, Myra. The sun is riding down but night-time is way away.’
‘Or maybe not so for the child.’
‘No,’ agreed Cleress.
Myriell’s brief assessment nagged at all their shattered minds. They supported each other, gave each other their strength and tended their bodies and minds as carefully as they could. But the question remained. Would Lyanna learn even a modicum of self-control before their capacity to teach, control and protect her was finally gone?
Cleress feared the worst.
Cleress, orchard, now. Ephy’s voice rang through her head, an alarm that sent her heart racing.
‘Trouble, Myra. Stay here. I’ll call you if we need you.’
‘Try not to,’ muttered Myriell.
Cleress dragged herself to her feet and hobbled towards the orchard, the effects of the Lemiir not strong enough to fully dampen the pain that shot up her leg and through her back every time she put pressure on the arthritic knee.
Out of the dining room and through the ballroom she moved, worry hurrying her step, Ephemere’s anxiety dusting across her mind.
Ephy was standing at the doors to the orchard, staring out, one hand on the frame to brace herself. When Cleress joined her, she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
In the centre of the orchard sat Lyanna in her favourite blue dress, cross-legged. Her arms were outstretched before her and her face turned up, a beatific smile across her features. And all around her, the trees moved at her bidding. Whole branches turned down towards her, their leaves rippling, flowers opening, embryonic fruits shifting in colour.
Like a dance, choreographed by Lyanna, eight or nine trees moved to her order, their boughs swaying, crowns dipping and twisting. But it was the leaves that held Cleress rapt. Their movement, like a pulsing wind over the top of a corn field, sent them shimmering in surely impossible directions. Their synchronicity was beguiling, their dark green top surfaces and silver undersides blinking like ten thousand eyes as they twisted gracefully on their slender stalks. And the noise they made was like voices, whispering and laughing, joyful and so real.
Beneath them all sat Lyanna, still but for her lips, which moved soundlessly as if . . .
‘She’s talking to them,’ breathed Cleress.
‘Yes,’ agreed Ephemere. ‘Or trying to. A child’s imagination has no boundaries and Lyanna’s has the power to animate what she dreams. The trouble is, she’s flaring. She’ll have a headache when she’s done.’
‘And Balaia will have another gale,’ said Cleress. She attuned her eyes to the mana spectrum and saw what Ephemere meant. Though the mana shape Lyanna used unconsciously to manipulate the trees was a stunning spiders’ web formation, all around it dark brown spears of mana tore away, creating eddies and vortices which gathered in size and strength as they whipped away beyond vision - beacons for those who searched for her and would do her harm.
She had no idea what she created but the after-effects were felt all over Balaia, where her birthplace was and where the core of her mana strength would always reside. Cleress could only imagine the problems her flares were causing, but knew the dissipation of focused yet unfettered mana energy of this magnitude typically manifested itself as terrifying elemental forces.
Tinjata, for all his senile meanderings those thousands of years ago, had been right about one thing. An awakened Child of the One could lay waste to Balaia in less than half a year. It was up to the surviving Al-Drechar to stop that by keeping her from the worst excesses of herself until she was old enough to understand the control she had to master. If she couldn’t, the Al-Drechar would be left with one alternative and its mere contemplation was hideous.
Not for the first time, Cleress cursed the Dordovans for disturbing something in which they should never have meddled.
‘What do you want me to do, Ephy?’
‘Go in and speak to her. Hear how she describes it. I’ll cap the flaring and monitor the mana shape.’
Cleress nodded and entered the orchard. It had an eerie quality to it, though the late afternoon sun cast a warm yellow light. The birds weren’t singing and the creak of boughs and branches under Lyanna’s control was alien in the windless air.
Close to, Cleress could see Lyanna’s eyes darting from leaf to leaf, her mouth moving, her smile alternately thinning and broadening as if the answers she thought she received to her questions pleased her. Her outstretched arms trembled with the effort of maintaining the mana shape and a frown creased her brow. She was tiring.
Cleress knelt by her and smoothed a loose hair from her forehead.
‘Lyanna, can you hear me?’ she asked, her voice soft despite the effects of the Lemiir.
‘I’ve got my friends here, look, Clerry,’ replied Lyanna, not turning from her work, her voice distant with effort.
Cleress looked and had to smile at what kept Lyanna spellbound. From an arc in front of her, branches flowed in, almost touching her face, caressing the arm in front of her and moving over and floating across each other, like the tentacles of a benign sea creature, the stiffness of the bark and grain gone, replaced by a flesh-like suppleness.
And in the branches, the leaves danced and rustled, twisting and bending along their lengths, their gentle susurrations almost musical. It was a beautiful sight and Cleress gazed back at Lyanna, wondering what it was the little girl imagined she saw and heard.
‘Are they good friends?’ asked Cleress. ‘They look pretty.’
‘Yes they are, but they can’t talk to you because you wouldn’t understand.’
‘Oh, I see. And what are they saying to you?’
‘There are bad people coming here but good people too, to help us. And you’re very tired and it’s because of me but it’s all right really.’
Cleress was speechless. She glanced over to Ephemere but her sister was deep in concentration, eyes closed, hands held at her midriff.
‘How do they know that? They must be very clever.’
Lyanna nodded, the leaves rustled as if in applause.
‘They know because that’s how it feels, silly.’
The elderly Al-Drechar stifled a gasp. Lyanna was feeling communication through the nuances of the mana flow. Some of it she probably picked up from conversations with Erienne but the rest was somehow being filtered from the random force roaring through her head. Had to be. But it also had to be terribly draining and dangerous. She only hoped Ephemere was in control of the flaring.