Chapter Twenty-Four Lettle #2
She felt the same thrill she always did when she saw those little pearls of silver swirling through the talismans. But this time she was struck by a thought: the little balls of light looked just like the souls.
‘The Fates are souls…’ she whispered.
The realisation left her trembling. Afa had not known what happened to the souls that were no longer tethered to the earth.
Are the Fates my ancestors?
She longed to ask Afa, but then she’d have to face him again, and lose Alder once more. And she wasn’t sure she ever wanted to speak to Afa again.
‘What are you?’ she asked the silver threads. They pulsated but of course didn’t answer–they had answered her enough with a prophecy.
She quickly wrote it down:
Bosome’s children, power reclaimed, will aid you in your plight. The half-moon seeks to own the night.
‘What does the prophecy say?’ Lettle jumped at the voice behind her.
Mortah came and sat down next to her.
‘My heart is in my throat! You walk so lightly across the silkvine.’
‘Years of practice. I woke up and saw you reading the Fates. What do they say?’
Lettle recounted the prophecy.
‘What does it mean?’ Mortah asked.
‘No idea.’
The Nomad laughed. ‘The Fates, helpful as always.’
‘You said you knew a diviner in Waning–who was it?’
Mortah tensed, hesitating. Then she said quietly, ‘My father.’
‘What was his name?’
Mortah crossed her ankles ahead of her before answering. ‘Imna.’
‘Shaman Imna?’
‘You knew him?’
‘Of course I knew him. He was the diviner who found me after my father died, who trained me, taught me everything I knew.’
‘You mean to say he’s still alive?’ Mortah’s eyes shimmered in the moonlight.
Lettle’s smile faltered. ‘He is…well, he was when I left Mosima last year…but an illness of the mind overcame him a decade ago.’
Mortah clenched her eyes tight and nodded. ‘He would be old now, a hundred and forty-six. I have counted every one of his birthdays, mourning him as though he were gone.’
Lettle hugged her knees into her chest. She understood the grief Mortah was feeling as if it were her own. There was not a day that went past that she did not think of her own father.
‘Would you ever go back and visit him?’ she asked.
Mortah shook her head sharply. ‘No. We didn’t part happily.’
‘I know something of that. Was he angry you were dismissed from the army?’
‘I wasn’t dismissed,’ Mortah said. She tucked her greying locks behind her ears, reminding Lettle her ears weren’t cut through. ‘I left, though I didn’t want to. I loved the army, and I loved my country even more.’
‘Why?’
‘You will build a life in a mountain far from home. One day, when your muscles ache and your hair is grey, No One will appear. You must first see them. Then guide them. Then bleed for them. Without you, humanity will be lost.’
Lettle’s eyes widened as Mortah spoke. She had rarely heard of a prophecy so long.
‘Bleed for them?’ Lettle repeated. ‘That’s why you came with us, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, I think protecting Alder will be my final task,’ Mortah said. Then she lifted her chin as if daring Lettle to pity her.
‘There is some comfort in knowing your life will have purpose,’ Lettle said softly.
‘Yes, though I was resistant to it for a long time. My father foretold those words the day I was made captain of my regiment. For years we fought about it. I had just been granted the biggest promotion of my life. Why would I throw it all away for a prophecy I didn’t understand?’
‘That’s why you fought for Alder to be recognised in the council, that’s why you helped him.’
‘Yes.’
Lettle picked up her talismans and cradled them. Sometimes it was hard not to feel like a token herself, her body carved by hands she didn’t see, its movements controlled by something other than herself.
Were the Fates as dangerous as human magic?
But without them Mortah wouldn’t have left Waning and helped Alder.
‘It is good that you listened to your father, in the end,’ Lettle said.
‘It became all he could talk about, all he could think about. It ruined our relationship. So I’m not sure “good” is the word.’
‘I’m not sure it is either,’ Lettle admitted. ‘But at least you were here when it mattered.’
‘What are you both doing?’ Alder said, yawning, from his bedroll.
‘Sorry, did we wake you?’ Lettle said.
‘It’s fine. I feel like I’ve slept half a year. Did I sleepwalk?’
Lettle shook her head. ‘No, I don’t think you’ll sleepwalk again. Afa has told me all he needed to. He’s no longer warring for your consciousness.’
Alder shivered and drew his blankets around his shoulders. Then he walked over and joined the two of them at the edge of the sky camp.
‘I had a dream,’ he said wistfully into the cool air. ‘I dreamed the spell was done, and humans lived in Caperly once more. Golan and I were staying one winter, and the children, Mia’s and Dart’s children, refused to fall asleep until we read them a story.’
He was crying, but the tears were happy.
‘And you know what story we told them? The tale of the wandering human. ‘He chuckled. ‘Golan was reading it and laughing at all the inaccuracies. When he got to the end, the children asked us what happened to Afa.’
‘What did you say?’
Alder turned to Lettle with a sad smile. ‘I told them Afa became changed, and continued life in Caperly as a happy man, fulfilled by all the people around him. Then I kissed them both on the head and told them I loved them.’
‘Oh, Alder.’ The dream was a wonderful premonition of the future.
‘In the dream I was just me. Not a vessel, not Afa. Just Uncle Alder.’
‘That’s good,’ Mortah said, her voice thick with emotion.
Alder wiped at his eyes, which seemed brighter than they had in weeks.
‘Now all we have to do is get into Mosima, so I can make that dream an actuality,’ he said with a smile.
Lettle told him of her prophecy.
‘At least we know help is coming, even if we don’t know how or when.’
Even now, he still managed to be positive when everything around them was dire.
The three of them watched the sun rise over the elven camp. Together they hatched a plan to infiltrate the army.