“Sometimes loving people is hard,” she told him. “It makes us vulnerable in new ways, and this love is very new for you. This situation is extreme and the strain is hard on all of us. Take a moment to breathe.”
“You never show the strain.” He sounded both admiring and accusing.
She nearly told him that was because she always felt the strain of her surroundings, that she hadn’t lived a day of her life without the pummeling stress of others’ emotions. In many ways, more or less strain didn’t make that much of an impact.
And, for the first time, she wondered what she’d be like without it. It seemed odd to contemplate, a perspective of herself that had never once occurred to her as possible. Until Jak suggested the possibility.
Her senses tied to the gateway twinged. “Something’s coming through,” she called in relief. Hopefully not premature relief. Moranu, please let it be Jak and the other people.
A big woman carrying an iron skillet stumbled through, blinking in surprise at the gathering and the inn. “We’re home,” she declared, as if someone might argue with her. One of the kids ran to hug her, and Gen eased them both out of the way.
More adults emerged, all exclaiming, all looking worn to the bone. Stella watched each one, waiting for Jak’s familiar swagger, expecting his cocky grin and some teasing remark about her wound. She would take him scolding her about her lousy defensive skills, even put up with him upbraiding her and bullying her into practicing if he’d just come through.
Come on, Jak. You promised to come back.
The people from the inn were all gathered around, talking with loud excitement. Half of them seemed to have decided they’d only dreamed that Zeph had been a gríobhth—and possibly that the whole improbable experience had been a result of food poisoning. Astar waded in, bringing them to order with diplomatic reassurances. He didn’t introduce himself, which Stella counted as wise, since that would only lead to more excitement.
“Is this everyone?” Astar asked.
“Except for young Ilano,” a big man said, shaking his head sadly. “Wasn’t watching his step and pitched right off the edge. That thing had no bottom we could see.”
Astar nodded sympathetically, offering his sincere sympathies, evincing so much patience that Stella wanted to scream at him.
“Nilly,” Lena called softly. She looked drawn, shadows under her eyes. “I’m running low,” she said, and Stella nodded, understanding perfectly well.
“We’ll have to let it close,” Stella acknowledged. “Go ahead and let go of your end, I’ve got it.”
“But what about Jak?” Lena protested.
Astar came back to her side. “They say that’s everyone,” he told her somberly.
“Everyone but Jak,” she replied, having to say it out loud. Playing rear guard against a giant snake. She unknitted her magic from Lena’s, pulling the gate to be anchored on herself—and on the Star. Rhy still wouldn’t meet her eye, and she ached for that.
Astar nodded, clenching his jaw, then shook his head. “Every time I send someone through after another of us, I risk losing you both.” He switched to subvocal. “I want to do the right thing, and I… don’t know what that is,” Astar confessed, searching her face for answers.
“Oh, Willy. I know you believe there is always a right way, the noble path, but sometimes there isn’t. Most of the time there isn’t. It’s a balance. We weigh the risk against the result and decide what we’re willing to gamble.”
“Now you sound like Jak.” Astar’s expression didn’t lighten, but a smile touched his voice.
“And, like Jak, I’m going to tell you that sometimes what we choose to risk isn’t up to anyone but ourselves.”
He frowned at her, suspicion growing. “Stella, what are you—”
Before he could finish, before anyone could stop her, she stepped through the gate that was herself, and closed it behind her.
The first thing she noticed was the utter lack of emotional noise. It came as a crashing relief, as if loud music that had been playing in both ears had suddenly stopped. Like the sudden cessation of chronic pain you’d endured for so long that you’d forgotten what it was like to live without it until it disappeared. Stella almost staggered with lightheadedness, giddy with the effervescent silence.
Was this how everyone else felt all the time? No wonder she seemed so dour to them.
Turning in a slow circle, she took in the featureless black plane that seemed to stretch in all directions, though she reminded herself of the defiles that tricked the eye and the unwary. No Jak, but at least she’d landed in the same alter-realm. He had to be here somewhere.
An alien violet sky arced above. Not even wind moved here. No signs of life, not even the dragon or monkey-lizards. No sense of the intelligence watching her either, though she didn’t want to scan to intensively for it, leery of attracting its attention here, in this place, where it held all the power. For that much was unmistakable. The others had called this alter-realm unnatural, and it was. It had been deliberately created for some arcane purpose, and the intelligence was no doubt its architect.
Her empathic senses still worked—she’d wondered if that magic had been lost to her like the others had lost shapeshifting ability or as Lena had lost some of her weather magic—so she gradually expanded her awareness, seeking Jak.
Despite the tense circumstances, extending that mental sense felt amazingly good, too. As if some part of herself had been starved of blood, so tightly clenched, and unfurling it at last filled her with tingling warmth and excitement.
With heady relief, she sensed Jak. He was some distance off, so she began jogging in that direction—more of an uneven stagger than a run, as her wounded thigh throbbed—scanning the path ahead for sudden bottomless pits. As it was, she saw him, lying in a crumpled heap, heartstoppingly close to the edge of one of the infamous defiles. In fact, one hand dangled limply over the edge.
She crouched beside him, getting a grip on his jacket to drag him away from the edge. He sported a few new injuries—probably him choosing to fall in love with a healer was simple self-preservation, what with the scrapes the man managed to get into—but none were enough to have weakened him so. A few hand-sized iridescent copper discs were scattered about, and it took her a moment to identify them as scales, no doubt from the giant snake. If it had been venomous…
Turning him over, she sat cross-legged and pillowed Jak’s head in her lap—and sent a prayer to Moranu that her healing skills would work here. Otherwise she’d have to drag Jak back through the portal somehow and heal him back in their own world. Hopefully Moranu could hear her in this place seemingly ruled by one being.
For whatever reason, her healing magic flowed normally. Even better, the snake venom paralyzing him was familiar to her, as if from a snake of their own realm. It hadn’t stopped his heart or lungs yet, though it would have, given much more time to work. The slowing of his system had worked in his favor, reducing the spread of the venom. Flushing him clean of the venom first, she made sure none remained in his body before she coaxed his heart into a faster rhythm, setting it to match her own, then bringing his breathing into harmony with hers. Once his body had the new tempo, she gradually withdrew, keeping light tendrils of attention to make sure he wouldn’t falter.