Raven's Strike (Raven #2)(115)

"I've seen a Bard or two who could build pictures, sights, or sounds with their power," said Hennea. "But I've never seen any of them build truth from their stories."

Tier grinned. "I don't know about truth. But it's pretty disconcerting, isn't it. When I saw I'd gotten the details right on where Red Ernave died that first time I told the story this way - it fair made my heart stand still. I could have warned you, I suppose," he said. "But I haven't tried anything like that since the first time it happened. I wasn't certain it would work as well." He looked at the Memory. "What did you think?"

"Your control is better," it said. "You didn't leak power all over for anyone to feed upon."

"And I didn't get caught up and need rescuing." Tier's fingers found another song, something instrumental that was light and airy that seemed to clear the depressed atmosphere left by the death of Red Ernave. "Maybe it was adding music to the mix."

"Kissel, where are you going?" asked Toarsen.

Sure enough, Kissel was up and walking slowly toward the rows of shelving. "She needs us," he said. "Don't you hear her crying?"

Jes darted forward and stood in Kissel's way, growling at something in front of them.

Then Seraph heard it, too. A woman's brokenhearted weeping.

Seraph climbed over Tier's table since it was the shortest route, waving back the others, who all started to get up to help.

"Play, Bard," suggested Hennea. "Sing something. Something cheerful."

Tier started a common drinking song.

With Jes blocking his path, Kissel had stopped moving forward, but tears were flowing down his cheeks. "She's so sad," He told Jes. "Why can't we help her?"

The thick ruff of hair down the black wolf's back was standing straight up. Seraph moved slowly to Kissel's side, not wanting to startle him into doing something. He was fighting the enchantment, or else he wouldn't have stopped, Jes or no Jes.

With her spirit sight she could see one of the dead stood a few feet from Kissel, she thought Jes saw it, too, because his attention was focused on just the right place. Either Tier's music was keeping it back, or something about the way it fed required its victim to come to it. Either was possible from the little Seraph knew about such things.

Seraph slipped her hand into the crook of Kissel's arm. "It's like a painting," she said quietly. "It makes you sad or moves you, but you can do nothing to change it. The woman who weeps died a long time ago. There is nothing you can do for her."

"She will weep forever unless someone helps," he told Seraph, but he sounded more alert, more like his usual self.

"No one can help her, Kissel," Seraph said, tugging a little on his arm. "Come sit down."

He turned and shuffled back to his place, with Seraph guiding him and Jes guarding their backs.

"She was so beautiful," whispered Kissel as he sat down. "So sad."

"I know," said Jes.

Toarsen put an arm around Kissel and gave him a quick hug before releasing. He nodded once at Seraph - either telling her thanks, reassuring her that he would watch out for Kissel from here on out, or both, she wasn't certain.

Seraph released the sight magic with a sigh of relief; it was giving her a throbbing headache. She glanced down at Jes. "Did you see her?"

He nodded, curled up next to Hennea, and rested his snout on her knee. "She was beautiful."

Seraph bent down and rubbed him behind the ears, taking the moment to look over the others. They looked a little shaken, but Tier's drinking song - a silly, slightly risque piece - was doing its job. Lehr and Phoran were singing along, and after a few verses Toarsen joined in as well.

Seraph worked her way back through the crowd to Tier's table. She patted Ielian then Phoran on the shoulder as she passed because they looked as though they needed it. She sat down on her bench and leaned her cheek against Tier's knee and let the melody his fingers coaxed out of the battered old lute sink through her like the knowledge of everyone's safety. Tier was safe.

She had a good idea now of how the Orders caught in the Path's gems might be cleaned so she and Hennea could release them. They knew who the Shadowed was - and that he awaited them in Redern. Hinnum and Hennea, for all their arguing, were pretty sure they'd come up with a way to destroy the Shadowed, so Phoran could be free of his Memory. All they had to do was find a Lark, and Hennea knew of a young man who would be willing to come though it might take her a few months to find him.

"Seraph," Tier said, as his clever fingers finished the song he'd been playing and began his between-song chord playing. "I feel better. Tell me you managed to do something more with the Shadow's hold on me."

She smiled at him. "Ravens are arrogant," she told him. "When there is a problem, we tend to believe we are the only ones who can solve it." She opened her palm, where she still held the remnants of the garnet. "You broke the spell yourself while you told the story of the Fall of the Unnamed King."

"Huh." He raised his eyebrows in surprise. "Just the same, I think I'll stick to more mundane music for the rest of the night." His prosaic words didn't cover the relief she saw in his eyes.

He picked a sweet ballad written by a young man to his love, who was supposed to wed another. It suited his range, and the song was soothing, the perfect foil for the press of fear the dead still raised.