From alt.pub.dragons-inn Fri Dec 17 09:26:48 1993 Newsgroups: alt.pub.dragons-inn Path: netcom.com!netcomsv!decwrl!uunet!pilchuck!li From: li@Data-IO.COM (Phyllis Rostykus) Subject: [Kadrys and Kardia] Night Flights of Fancy Message-ID: <1993Dec15.222025.10580@data-io.com> Sender: news@data-io.com (The News) Organization: Data I/O Corporation References: <1993Dec15.221530.10316@data-io.com> Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1993 22:20:25 GMT Lines: 229 ADMIN: Written by Andrea Evans and I. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For the next five days, Kardia went out to the pond, early in the morning, before she started work at the Guild. She would wade out into the cold water and turn the stalks and then test them to see how they broke. The coldness of the water slowed the retting process. On the fifth day, the pith broke without breaking the strands of fiber between the wood. She left it for the rest of the day, and that evening, Kadrys accompanied her to the site. He was curious about her visits to the Walled Gardens, and had been interested in her jotted explanation. She felt better walking the dark streets at night with him by her side. His quiet presence was comforting, and as they walked, she held one hand out to him. Kadrys looked a little surprised, but took her warm hand in his cool one. The garden was in bloom, the blue Winter roses filling the area with their scent, and this time in Kardia took the time to enjoy the scent and heavy velvet touch of a newly opened bloom. As Kardia paused, Kadrys looked around at the rose bushes, his brows lifted in surprise. "I saw these roses at Luthor and Serene's housewarming. Luthor must have donated them to the Garden... A generous gift." He lowered his face into a blossom, closing his eyes and taking a slow deep breath. When he looked up, afterwards, he found Kardia smiling at him. They walked through the growing light of the third moon and the waning of the second to the small beaver pond. Kardia took off her shoes and socks, rolled up her sleeves, and yelped softly at the cold as she waded into the water. She broke one of the stalks and nodded in satisfaction. She fished a doubled handful of the wet stalks from the pond, brought them to shore and dropped them a good yard away from the pond. She was shivering slightly with just the single trip; but she went back in to get more. Kadrys, after seeing what she wanted to do, waded in as well. The shocking cold of the water tingled through his veins like a kiss of fire; but he relaxed into its cold embrace and fished out some of the softening stalks that floated on the surface. He was slightly surprised to find that she could see in the dark almost as well as he could, finding stalks even when they were fully submerged under the black mirror surface of the pond. He, however, was the one to rescue an armload from where they had ended up next to the beavers' home. Kardia was shivering when they were through; but smiled her thanks to Kadrys as she sat down, pulled two towels from her backpack and handed him one. They were from the 'kani Lighthouse, soft and thick and still warm from being shielded from the night in the sack. She dried herself off and put her shoes and socks back on. "What now?" asked Kadrys. "I'll find/wheelbarrow." she scribbled on her wax tablet; and when he nodded, she went off. While she was gone, Kadrys picked up a stalk, feeling its texture; flexible yet still crisp, reminding him of old celery or fresh hakla- grass. He copied Kardia's earlier gesture, bending it into a smooth curve until it broke to expose threads finer than a hair. They glinted as faintly as mist underneath the moonlight. Kadrys marvelled silently that strands so delicate had been strong enough to support the plant's tall stalks when it had lived. He turned the bundle of rot and fiber to the light so that the threads caught the moon's glow in streaks of soft grey. 'Not too many things can boast a skeleton so beautiful... and so useful.' he added, remembering Kardia's weavings. The distant squeak and rattle of the wheelbarrow drew nearer, and he put down the stalk. 'Here she comes now, to separate the skeletons from the decayed bodies of her plants: the spider, weaving webs out of bones, webs to kill magic. Beauty out of the death of her plants, death out of the beauty of her weavings...' His hand throbbed once with remembered agony: the mere touch of her shawl had once been enough to reduce it to bone and withered skin. As Kardia appeared through the foliage skirting the pool, he rose suddenly to his feet, dismissing the oddly morbid turn of thought. When she pulled up with the barrow, he gathered a bundle of dripping stalks and helped with the load, his manner as calm and obliging as it had always appeared. They piled the stalks into the wheelbarrow and walked their way to the barn. The small building was dark and cool; but warmer than outside as it was out of the wind. The wet and retted stalks were spread out in a drying rack to the flickering light of a lamp. The barn smelled of cut grass and straw, smooth, mellow smells. After the retted stalks were spread, they put armloads of the sweet, hay smelling, dried moonsilk stalks into the damp barrow. Kadrys made sure that the lamp was blown out before they went back out into the dark. ** --- <<<< --*-- >>> --- ** The process of spreading the new stalks out in the pond went much more quickly than the gathering had; but Kardia was shivering at a teeth rattling rate by the time it was done. Kadrys frowned. "I think it'd be a good idea to get you back in the warm as soon as possible..." he murmured. Kardia jerked out a nod in reply. He stared earnestly at her, "I can get you there faster than walking, but I need to know one thing first: how good are you with heights?" Kardia blinked and then gave a faint chuckle with a shrug. Kadrys nodded and shrugged out of his coat, holding it out to Kardia. As she slipped into it, he stripped off his shirt and held that out to her too. At her sound of surprise, he grinned impishly at her. "I can't leave it on. I get too damn many shirts ripped off my back as it is..." Kardia tilted her head inquiringly at him, then her grey eyes widened. Kadrys' eyes went distant as he concentrated and the muscles of his back writhed uneasily. The flat shoulderblades warped, spiking upward until she was sure that his skin would tear wide open. But it stretched unnaturally, covering the lengthening bony spikes even after they split into vast skeletal hands, webbing the long bones in a veil of black skin fretted with tiny veins. And then the eerie transformation was complete. Wings, like those of a bat but far larger, slowly unfolded, looming dark as stormclouds behind his pale form. Kardia froze, unable to choose a reaction. She stared at the clawed and bony wings. Then a voice broke in, his voice, quiet and full of concern. She gulped, shivered a bone rattling shiver, and then looked at him. He was frowning, his mouth tight with worry, and his eyes watching her reactions closely. "Are you all right?" he murmured again. She snorted to rid herself of the shock. She sighed and reached up. When Kadrys saw what she wanted, the wing glided under her hand with a soft rustling slide of skin on skin, and she ran a trembling hand against the bony rib of one of those great wings. Kardia smiled at him and saw him relax, before a fresh bout of shivering struck her. He took a slow step toward her, as tentative as a deer, and held out his hands to her. His touch, his tones, were gentle. "Come on then. I've got to get you home before you freeze!" She grinned at that, and took her first step toward him. He went down on one knee, put a forearm behind her knees and the other behind her shoulders then scooped her up into his arms. He supported her as she drew the coat and towels around her and wrapped herself as warmly as possible. Kadrys' wings unfolded to their fullest stretch, he tensed, and came out of the crouch in a surge, leaping into the air. His wings blurred into the downstroke, and they were thrust still higher into the air. Kardia leaned against Kadrys' smooth, white shoulder as the Gardens dropped away beneath them, the pounding wingbeats becoming gentler and more even as they gained height and speed. She could feel the muscles sliding beneath his cool skin, working with the oiled efficiency of machinery. Something felt... right... comforting in a way nothing had for the last year. She frowned a moment and then realized that Kadrys was not breathing at all. The insane surges of speed, the exertion cost him nothing. There was no heat, no sweat, no panting, even as she felt the surge and fall of his efforts and the world blurred by. Just like Alistair, after one of those blurring streaks of speed, was able to speak in a completely even, low voice. As clearly as the sound of the wind she heard that even voice saying, "At least you have no reason to complain about body odor." and then chuckling that even chuckle. In her life with Alistair she had been surprised to find herself reacting defensively to the unnaturalness of it, until she'd realized what the problem was. Now she realized this was one of the reasons why she'd been more comfortable with Kadrys than with almost anyone else in Generica. That omnipresent, almost inhumanly calm capability was exactly the same in the two men. At an inquiring look from Kadrys, Kardia smiled and saw his answering one. This time she was able to relax into the waves of shivering and just let them wash over her. When his arms tightened around her, she leaned her head against his shoulder until the wave was done. Eventually she looked down and was caught up in the beauty of the vista that spread itself below her. Their elevation didn't bother her at all: in fact this was a far more secure feeling than what she'd felt the time Chistofer had taken her up on his stripped down hovercraft. They were making good speed: the outskirts of the city were already rolling by far below, a rapidly thinning crazy-quilt of streets, a mosaic flecked with burning gold. Ahead of them was the coast, the beaten pewter sheet of the sea fringed with faint silver threads of foam, the spur of land crowned by the Lighthouse looming larger and larger as they started into a smooth, gliding descent. When the walled courtyard gaped just below them, Kadrys backwinged hard, stirring up twisting gales of fallen leaves and petals, until they alighted. He knelt and set her on her feet. Kardia hugged him and then swayed slightly before she caught her balance. She stretched, grinning, giddy with the strangeness and the cold. Kadrys chuckled, vastly relieved by Kardia's reaction. "I'm glad the transport met with your approval..." he grinned and she laughed in return, before shivering and drawing the coat back round her shoulders. His grin softened into a look of sympathy. "...You look to me as though you could use a _really_ hot bath." At Kardia's emphatic nod, Kadrys smiled and bowed her on before him into the house. Kardia hurried inside. Kadrys paused and that same moment of concentration took him as his wings dwindled away, sinking back into his flesh and disappearing. By the time Kadrys entered the main building, Kardia was nowhere in sight. But Kadrys showed no hesitation, passing down the corridor containing the guest facilities until he came to a particular door. He glanced at the 'kan shiftsymbol and it flickered maddeningly for a moment, blurring through countless different types of writing, before giving up on him and settling on two images: steam rising in a plume from hot rocks, and a matching plume above heated water. Kadrys grinned and pushed open the door, disappearing into the warm mist and the sounds of splashing that spilled from the room beyond... --------------- Copyright 1993 by Andrea Evans and Phyllis L. Rostykus. Permission granted for distribution via the usual Usenet channels and for archival. All other rights reserved. ----- Andrea Evans can be reached at Andrea.Evans@orb.nashua.nh.us for comments and fan mail. :) -- Liralen Li | "Looking down on empty streets, all she can see are li@inigo.Data-IO.com | the dreams all made solid, are the dreams made real." aka Phyllis Rostykus | - "Mercy Street" by Peter Gabriel