Kushiel's Avatar by Jacqueline Carey Read Free Book Online

Serenissima. Lilit, the first wife of Edom, had fled his dominion; the One God sent his servants to bring her back. She had laughed and spoken His name, sending them back.
    Well and so; I had not lied, I have spoken with many Yeshuite scholars since first I heard that tale. There are branches of mysticism within the Yeshuite religion, and those that hold the five books of the Tanakh itself is but the Name of God written in code. To each letter of each word a value is ascribed, and the resonance of every word to words of like value studied endlessly. Yet I never met a one who claimed the Name of God was known.
    Now, there are fewer Yeshuites in the City of Elua and elsewhere across the realm, and their thoughts turn ever northward. The exodus that began ten years ago has continued, and rumor comes from the far northeast that they are forging a nation in the cold wastes. Not all agree that it is this which the prophecies of Yeshua ben Yosef intended-my old master the Rebbe did not-but the dissenters grow fewer every year. What he feared has come to pass: The Children of Yisra-el are divided. Of those who remain, their eyes turn increasingly toward the future, and less and less to the past. And I ... I am D’Angeline. When the One God sought to bid Elua to his heaven, Blessed Elua and his Companions refused. I am a child of Elua, Kushiel’s Chosen and Naamah’s Servant, and I have no place in such matters.
    But for Hyacinthe.
    There is a Hellene myth, which tells of a man who had leave to ask a boon of the gods. He asked for immortality, and failed to ask for eternal youth in the bargain. The mocking gods granted his wish to the letter. Never dying, ever aging. At the end, when he had shriveled to naught but a dry, creaking thing of sinew and bone, they took pity on him and turned him into a grasshopper. How long? The myth does not say. To this day, I cannot hear the grasshopper’s song without a shudder.
    We passed a quiet night at Pointe des Soeurs, and in the morning, took our leave of the place. Evrilac Duré offered to send an escort with us, which I declined, though I thanked him graciously for the aid he had already provided. We broke our fast at dawn, and were on the road a scant hour later.
    Joscelin, having already ascertained my mood, kept wisely silent on our journey, and Ti-Philippe knew well enough to follow his lead. It was young Hugues, prattling endlessly about the encounter, who would not let matters be. “They say his mother was the Queen of the Tsingani, with gold on every finger and gold scarves for every day of the week, and if she cursed a man, he would fall down dead. Is it true, my lady?” he asked eagerly. “They say he told fortunes in the marketplace when he was but a boy, and Palace nobles would line up to wait their turn!”
    “He stole sweets,” I said shortly, “in the marketplace. And his mother took in washing.”
    “But they say -”
    “Hugues.” I rounded on him, drawing my mount up short. “Yes. Hyacinthe had the dromonde , and his mother before him. She told fortunes, and sometimes people gave her coin; mostly, they were poor. She ran a lodging house for such Tsingani as did not disdain a woman who had lost her laxta , her virtue, and she took in laundry and changed her profit for gold coin, such as you have seen around the necks of half the Tsingani women on the road. Do you think her son was marked for this destiny?”
    Blood rose to his fresh cheeks. “I did not mean ...”
    I sighed. “I know. It is a splendid, terrible tale, and you have been privileged to see a glimpse of it. Outside Azzalle, I do not think they even tell it. But Hugues, never forget it is real people who live out such tales and bear the price of the telling, in grief and guilt and sorrow.”
    He fell silent, then, and lowered his handsome head, and I felt remorse for having shamed him. We stayed at an inn in the town of Seinagan that night, and Hugues excused himself from the common room to retire